American Christmas

The Christmas time this year started for me like every year at the December 1st with my German "Adventskalender" my mother sent me. I was really happy about having this tradition from my German house in America. 

GERMAN CHRISTMAS

Since my English got better and my thoughts are most of the time in English, my German writing style gets worse ( I know that's embarrassing, but sometimes I can't even remember some special german words), I'm starting to write my Blog in English, at least sometimes. So then there are also some american readers who don't know how German Christmas looks like. 

So in my family on the Christmas Day (that's in Germany the 24th December) in the morning normally comes the music club from my town and they play some christmas songs with their instruments. They come to our house, because my grandfather used to be the mayor of my town Niederstotzingen. At around 3.00 pm we usually eat "Coffee and Cake" with my Grandma and my Grandpa, sometimes even my Uncle ( he lives  about 4 hours ride south of my town) comes for the Christmas Days.  At around 7.00 pm we eat dinner ( a tradition is Fondue or "Pasteten"), after the Dinner we open the presents (it's "Bescherung" called). After that we sit in a nice round and talk, drink wine and sometimes we play some board games. At the next two days ( 1st and 2nd Christmas day) we normally visit family. At the 1st Christmas Day (25th) we normally go for a really big lunch to my Grandma's house and eat goose. 

CHRISTMAS EVE

So back to my american experience. At the 24th at the time when my family has their Christmas Dinner, it was around 12.00 pm in America and I was lying in my bed watching German series and was trying not to think about my family being all together. Happily my little host sister came in my room soon and asked me if I want to make snowflakes with her. So she and my other host sister Ash showed me how to cut it.

The snowflake Saige and I made

After my Host parents came home, we went to the mall for food and started cooking Dinner. First we had Cheese Fondue, then we had Broth Fondue ( Broth=Brühe) and for Dessert we had Chocolate Fondue.

Cheese Fondue

Broth Fondue

Chocolate Fondue

After the Dinner we all played the board game "The Seattlers of Catan" together. Don't ask what color I was, because I had the last place.

This here is is the plate my little host sister Saige prepared for Santa Claus and his Rendeers.

THE CHRISTMAS DAY

My little host sister woke me up at the Christmas Day at around 8.00 am. Then we went downstairs and "Santa Clause" brought a lot of presents how you can see on the picture above.

We also had some american stockings where we found candy and little presents in it.

The Women in the house. My host mother Julie, my host sisters Saige and ashley and I

Look what I got from Santa: a case for my new laptop and accessories.

After packing out about the half of the presents we ate Breakfast together. We had home fries and casserole.

How I looked like on the Christmas Day

For dinner on the christmas Day we went to Mike's Mothers's House. 

That's the view from my "Hostgrandma"'s porch.  Her yard is huge!

That was my plate of the Christmas Dinner. It was amazing. I had Salad, Mac 'n Cheese, Croissant, mashed potatoes, deviled egg, prime rip

This was a drink at her house, and the stars and trees and the snowmen were ice cubes. That looked really funny.

After Dinner, we drunk coffee and ate apple pie and cookies.

Me and Mike's Sister's Baby

After we came home, we played the Board Game again and then my host sister Marina came home from Rhode Island. I was so happy that I saw her again. After she came home, we were opening all the other presents.

My Mom sent me from Germany a pillow with the picture of my cat on it.

The Presents I got

Ashley painted me a really cute picture for christmas.

THE DAY AFTER CHRISTMAS

At the Day after Christmas the Sun was shining in Delaware. At home in Germany it was snowing the first time this winter.

For Breakfast we had Casserole again, because Marina couldn't eat it with us at the day before, because she had to work.

I  really enjoyed my first american Christmas. Actually it didn't feel too different. It was just Christmas far away from home.

I really didn't expect that I would get so many present's from my host family. I felt like a real part of the family. The days around Christmas were really amazing. we did so many things together and I felt comfortable. 

I was actually a bit scared for Christmas, because I thought I would get homesick, but it was really okay, because I had my own family of choice.