One Thanksgiving and Two Christmas Markets

With five women in charge, a couple of us buying turkeys and supplies from a nearby base, and with senior sisters contributing many prepared dishes, we Senior Missionaries were able to enjoy a most typical American Thanksgiving dinner for sixty right in the heart of Germany!


A group of us ladies who walk every day through the nearby cemetery over lunch
 gathered discarded pine boughs to be used as centerpieces!


Nothing was lacking from this awesome buffet!
Appearing here are Saunders, Bakers, Mathesons, Riggs, Castletons, Hawkins, Bausmans.




President & Sister Stoddard, Newsomes, Riggs, and the young missionaries

Just a few of the many, many pies to choose from

Fifteen young missionaries from the Frankfurt area really enjoyed the meal!!!


Walkers, Riggs, Hawkins, Caracenas, Castletons...

We sat across from the Mission President and next to our BYU Intern, EA Ashby.

A number of senior missionaries shared their "Thanksgiving story," 

and two musical numbers highlighted the program.

 Elder and Sister Sharpe, Humanitarian missionaries

And the finale was the amazing acappela solo, "Bring Him Home"!!!

Then, since we were given the afternoon off, we took the trolley to downtown Frankfurt to attend what is billed as one of the ten best Christmas Markets in Europe.  It was no disappointment!

Loved the swirl of bamboo over this entrance!!!

The bulk of the market is right in the very heart of Dom Romer, the historical old town square.

We got there early enough to see everything clearly before it got dark

 and the beautiful lights were turned on.

For those of us familiar with Midway's Swiss Days, Europe's Christmas Markets are pretty much the same thing, only it's all Christmas stuff.  There are TONS of vendors, and their shops are decorated to the hilt.  Elder G thinks there were more booths devoted to food than there were to Christmas crafts (bratwurst, french fries or potato chips, pretzels, cheese and sausage, chocolate-covered fruits of all kinds, donuts, and unlimited supplies of wine, beer, and other drinks).
But whatever the booths, it was a very festive atmosphere.

Huge iced cookies!

Pretzels--cheese-covered, chocolate covered, etc.--are a favorite!

One of our favorite German crafts, the Smokers.
You put lighted incense inside, and they smoke away!

Then Saturday afternoon we headed to another Christmas Market at a small village, called Nidderau.  One building had a number of local vendors selling their homemade crafts.  

These folks were demonstrating the old art of spinning.

Although Nidderau's town square was much, much smaller,
it still had the same exciting feel of the larger European Christmas Markets.

At 5 p.m. the lights came on and the mayor gave a brief talk.

Then six alpenhorn players treated us to some great German music to set the mood.

As we drove EA home, we passed by this amazingly decorated house!  

Perfect finale to a great day!