and all through the house, not much was stirring. Thank goodness.
And we will have a couple of days more of quiet. Stores closed on Thursday, Christmas Day, in the early afternoon. Of course, they were all closed Friday on Christmas as well. Here, December 26 is "Second Christmas Day" and a federal holiday. Tomorrow is Sunday, and of course the shops are closed. Nothing to do but take walks, read, relax, listen to music and catch up.
Christmas Eve we cooked our goose and though it's a fairly big bird, they're pretty sparse on the meat side. The four of us - Mutti, Christoph, Werner and me - put away the major portion of it, along with beet/carrot soup, red cabbage, potato Knödel, and the becoming-famous ginger cake with lemon curd. After a visit and after opening our gifts to each other, Christoph took Mutti home and then went out again with friends - another tradition here.
We'd originally planned a Christmas Day alone, but that changed when we discovered that Mutti had no plans - can't sit alone on Christmas !! So Werner picked up Mutti and her friend Frau Finke, also alone, and brought them here for brunch and The Opening Of The Christmas Bounty. They were amazed at the number of gifts (we do have to talk about this, folks, and scale back a bit ...) and at the same time had lots of fun looking at everything. Frau Finke was so surprised to find that Santa had left something under the tree for her! She lifted her little 95-year-old self off the couch faster than you can imagine to give us a hug! That was sweet.
We took the little old ladies back to their homes and then took a walk in the Bürgerpark near the Park Hotel. Cold, gray, slushy, melting snow was the offer, so we made it a short one.
Though we planned a fancy dinner for ourselves, that got iced. We were still stuffed from dinner and breakfast, so Werner fixed Häpchen, little bites. What a relief! A bit of TV a bit of winding down.
Tonight we'll go to one of the local churches for a concert and enjoy the walk and the music.
Here's wishing you a quiet and refreshing after-Christmas time.
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