Germany

We got to Germany Nov 12th on a Saturday, flew into Berlin. We drove 2 hours to Andres house and just went to bed. The next morning we got up early and went to his church a few minutes away. It is a small group of people who meet every sunday and they are born again Christians. A "free" church is what they call it. Most churches here are very religious and strict and don't allow people to read the Bible on their own. It is something they think only the Pastor should do. 90% of all Germans to not belong to any church and most call themselves atheists. So we were very excited to be apart of this church in Brandis. They really love Jesus!!! Every Sunday everyone from the church brings a meal and after the service they eat together. It's like a huge family. They church service was all in German but a German guy named Peter translated the message for us. 

Once these little girls found out that I was from California they were glued to my hip. The girl on the right, Gina, lives under Andres in the Park Schloss (Park Castle). 

confusing German/English exchange

This is Andres house. The front is now lined with chopped wood, compliments of my Husband's arms.

This is the Park Castle

This was the only thing in our apartment when we first got there. We got to pick out all of our furniture from Andres and Danni's storage. This bed pulls out another twin bed but it was a foot lower than the top bed. We asked if the person who donated it knew that we were married! haha We then figured out that the lower bed lifts up to meet the higher one. Good thing! 

This is our place. We live on the top floor and the bottom floor and cellar were used for the YMCA which don't meet in this building anymore so we have the whole place to ourselves. 

Andres and Gina! 

This is the INSIDE of our wonderful apartment. Do you see any spiders on the wall? Perhaps a mouse trap? 

This is our backyard. We have one garage for the convertable VW bug we are borrowing! There is another guy who is renting the other garage for his car and we see him every so often.  

the bikes that you see at the bottom are ours to borrow and the door to our apartment is on the top floor to the right. 

we needed shelves really bad so we looked around the house and found these kids beds that stacked together perfectly! Joshua's brilliant idea! 

At night we open the windows and turn off the heaters. The air is crisp and fresh and we sleep under these separate down comforters. It is funny. All married people use separate blankets and the pillows are big huge squares! 

We are really enjoying our time here. Our way of life is simple. We buy fresh bread at a bakery a lot of mornings and we actually HAVE breakfast! :)