26Jan2014-2

We left Bremen and now we report on a very nice Christmas 

in Düsseldorf with the Hartzheim family :-)

   We spent Christmas Eve with our family ("kids") and the Elders here in WHV (Wilhelmshaven)...

                                          

    On Christmas Day, we drove to visit Sr Porter's sister, Ursula, her husband, Hellmut, and their kids with their kids:-)  There were 20 of us there that day, overnight and until we hit the road the next day.  There were also 3 missing - Sandra, her husband and their son (Jonas) who remained in Salt Lake City.

                  

Hellmut and Ursula were excellent host                               We were happy to be part of it

and hostess :-)                                                                        with them:-)

                       

The girls had a pajama party! The two                      Ragnar (Rags) and his wife (Lisa) were also

OLDEST SISTERS had the most fun!!!            happy to visit "home" from their home in Houston.

                                                       Rags' sister, Naomi is at the end of the table with her little girl:-)

The day after Christmas we went for a walk along the Rhein River. We walked about 2 Kilometers (a little over a mile) to an area where another giant ferris wheel was placed. This one was a giant compared to the other ones we saw in Dresden and Bremen.  The word in German for Giant is Riesen - this one was Riesen!!! :-)  BUT - it wasn't running until later in the afternoon, so we missed that experience as we drove back to WHV.

Sorry, but my pic of the Giant Ferris Wheel up close and personal didn't pan out. This pano includes (R-L) the bridge over the Rhein, the telephone tower, the Giant Ferris Wheel (YES - I know you will need a magnifying glass, but I don't know how to use this system very well:-( ) - The church steeple (more to follow) and some other buildings.

      The church steeple will look very familiar to our son, Matthew. He did a very nice pencil drawing of it when he was in Düsseldorf during his junior year in High School

   His art work still hangs in our home and looks very nice with its black frame on a white wall:-)

We all had a lot of fun looking at the little creek (River) called the "Düssel", which gave the city its name.

See the DUCKS - it's in the water.
See everyone else - they're NOT - and we wouldn't want it any other way:-)

The kids had a ton of fun - yes, of course they had to jump, but I didn't get a picture.  May have needed it for the police and insurance for 'child cruelty' or parental malfeasence - but we didn't.

So we took a break and all had HOT CHOCLATE with WHIPPED CREAM ON TOP!

Nope - I didn't get a picture of that either. My fingers were too cold and the hot choclate mug felt too warm for me to think of picture taking :-)

The sculpting on the left is a commemerative where the big battle occured where they won the independence to become a "city" or established location of its own.  To the center, is the Düssel, and to the right the wonderful hot chocolate place.  There were 17 of us, and it was a little more than 30 Euros - which would be about $40. I frankly don't know what the exchange rate is, but we are on the lower end of this money value thing - but the investment value for fun as a family and meeting so many young relatives we had never met (other than Rags, Lisa and their children, certainly made it worthwhile.  Watching the Munchkins downing that hot chocolate with the whipped cream reminded me a of a, "Got MILK???" commerical when they looked up.

T