Carnival

Oct - For Saint Crispin's day, we visited the annual river carnival in downtown Kaiserslautern. It is a typical carnival with rides, food and games. We had a good lunch of leberknodel with kraut and Jamie and Kim split a roasted chicken - very good!! we rode the giant ferris wheel and took some great photos of K'town. Jamie and James went thru the crazy house and Jamie bumped the mirrors - ALOT!

K'town

Carnival from the wheel.

Roasted Chicken

Lebenknodel mith kraut. (liver noodle and saurkraut - yum!!!)

Swim Meet

24 Oct - Home Swim meet: We had our first swimmeet at home this year at Ramstein. It was not jamie's best meet. She improved .75s in her 50m freestyle and was slower in her 200M medley and her 50m breast. We'll try again this weekend at her next meet. She finished 7th in her first two events and 5th in the 50m breast. K'town won the meet.

1FCK Football Game

First European Soccer Game: Jamie and I attended our first soccer game here in Germany!! the local team is in the 2nd league and was in 2nd place. They were undefeated going into that game. The local team is 1FCK. Their mascot is the Red Devils. The stadium is called the Betzenberg. Teams here don't necessarily have the name of the town. Most teams have a very long history and started as a business team or club team over a hundred years ago. The attendance was 41, 421. Most teams in the 2nd league have 9-12,000 seat stadiums. The fans in Kaiserslautern are RABID about their team. There is one section for the fanitical fans. Fans here are not as bad as in England or other hulligan teams. They do get really rowdy and loud. The game was really good. The weather was a little wet but no rain. 1FCK played Fortuna Dusseldorf and the final score was 0:2. They always write the home team first in the score so this means K'town lost and is still in 2nd place. jamie was upset that K'town did not score because she does not know what they do when they score - guess we have to go back sometime!! By the way, beer was $3!!!!!! They play 34 games in the season - each team twice - one at home and one on the road. Teams receive 3 points for a win and 1 for a tie. The team with the most points at the end of the season is the league winner. The top 3 teams in the league move up to the 1st league and the bottom 3 teams in the top league drop to the 2nd league. It gives the team extra meaning to play. Imagine if the last 3 teams in Major League baseball dropped to the minor leagues every year!! 1FCK (red) vs Dusseldorf (yellow) Jamie and James with our new 1FCK scarfs!!!! EVERYone has a team scarf - it is a tradition.

Picking Grapes in Leiwen

17 Oct - We travelled to Leiwen to help pick grapes. We were a little worried as it was raining on our way there but the rain passed by the time we got there. We started about 1030 picking grapes on the hills on the North side of the Mosel. Michael's family also has help from Russia and Poland join them seasonally to help work. Picking the grapes is a very unique experience. You have a pair of sheers to cut the grape bundles off the vines. They are very soft skinned and juice get's everywhere!! Once your bucket is full, you dump it in a larger bucket that Michael would put on his back and carry down the hill - slippery hill of crushed slate rock. Very dangerous. Jamie picked in the morning and did a great job. She was very good and pretty quick with clipping her grapes. About 1230, Petra and Kim arrived with lunch. We took a break and had a very heartly and traditional grape harveting meal of mashed potatos with saurkraut and bacon mixed together and wurst (sausage) and bread. We had water or juice to drink. The weather was beautiful (when sunny) and not too cold. We started picking again at 1330 and stopped at 1730. We picked in several small areas on the lower parts of the hill. Accompaning us was my operations officer, Don Sankey, who enjoyed it as well. After picking, we returned to their home with a trailer full of grapes. Michael showed us how the grapes are squeezed and then drained of juice. He estimates we picked about 1800 liters of juice which will make about 1400 bottles of wine. For dinner, Petra prepared a cheese cake, open faced sandwiches and coffee. Alfons took Don on a short tour of the wine cellar and a wine probe of the wines that are still fermenting. It was a great time and one of the wonderful unique experiences we've had while in Europe with our Favorite German Family!!! Jamie and James in the wineyard. Jamie dumping her grapes into the trailer. enjoying a wonderful Petra Prepared meal on the roadside - notice how steep the hills are that we picked.

Michael and Alfons emptying the trailer into the press - Kim and Don supervising!!

Now that is some FRESH grapejuice (traubbensaft)- unfiltered!!!

Jamie cooks dinner

15 Oct - Jamie decided to cook dinner. She cooked fresh mussels in a beurre manie sauce - basically flour and butter mixed in the wine liquid remaining after you steam the mussels. We used some Slovak wine and onions. It was very good and Jamie did a great job. Of course, the best part is eatting mussels :))

Drama Performance

15 Oct - Jamie performed in the Middle School Production adaptation of "Don Quixote and his Squire Sancho". It was in honor of Spanish American Month. Jamie played the role of Don Quixote's niece. She had 5 speaking lines and practiced alot to get the right expression and delivery. She did a great job. She was in a red dress for the play and Kim's short heel shoes. For someone who initially did not like Drama Class - Jamie has done well, adapted and likes the class now.

Hohelfels Swim Meet

11 Oct - We drove the 3 hrs to just south of Nurenberg for a swim meet. K'town took 35 swimmers and won by 400 points. It was a very nice pool and we had a good time. Jamie did VERY well. She was the #1 seed in the 50M Breast and won by 0.03 sec but was over a sec slower than her best time. She also finished #2 in the 50M Butterfly but improved her time by almost 5 secs. I thought my watch broke she was so much faster!!! Then Jamie swam the 200M Freestyle for the first time and finished 2nd!! with a time of 3:17 - only 9 seconds from qualifying for European Championships. She did a great job with her swimming and earned her team 22 points toward victory. She only swam one relay but it did not count because they did not have the right mix of kids to swim but that's OK - the 3 girls and 1 boy won over the other teams that had 2 boys and 2 girls!!! Jamie starting her 200 Freestyle race.

Jamie and her teammates before the meet.

Jamie's response when asked to smile for a good photo with her friends......we're supporting her decision.

As of this weekend, this is where Jamie stands within the European League standings and qualifying. We've had Jamie swim every event she can enter so she has a good idea of where she stands. We're going to focus on her 50M Breast, 100M and 200M Free over the next few meets then see where she stands.

Champs Times Jamie Times Standing # Swimmers 50m Fly 0:41.9 00:47.0 12 20 50m Back 0:44.9 00:49.1 18 43 50m Breast 0:48.6 00:49.1 9 39 50m Free 0:37.0 00:39.8 16 50 100m Free 01:22.3 01:29.1 12 28 200m Free 03:08.5 03:17.5 9 15 100m IM 01:34.6 01:41.0 10 22 200m IM 03:23.8 03:37.8 3 7