The Christmas season has started in Germany! Our Swedish friend, Annele, cooked lunch for all of us on Friday at the stable. On the menu were authentic Swedish meatballs. She made 70 meatballs and suffice to say, they were awesome because there were no leftovers! In the city of Paderborn, one of the main shopping areas has been transformed into a Christmas market with every kind of food and drink available as well as some carnival rides for the children. It was packed on Saturday afternoon. Things at the barn have been a little more relaxed with Hubertus gone to Arizona to give a clinic. He asked me if they have dressage horses in AZ and I assured him they do and that they would not have horns on the saddles. He was hoping to meet an authentic American Cowboy since he was going to be in the West. I will be spending my first Christmas in Germany, since I have extended my stay until Jan. 10. The horses are making such good progress, I feel that we need to stay a little longer to solidify their training so that it becomes their normal way of going when we come home. We will be starting the Selection Trials for the Pan American Games in February on the FL circuit. The Trials will go on through May and the top 12 will go to Gladstone to compete head to head in June and the Team will be chosen at that competition. The Pan Am Games are in Brazil in July, 2007. We will be competing at Prix St. George and Intermediare 1 for the Trials and will also have to do a musical freestyle. So I guess we better get a move on! One more interesting fact about the difference between our culture and Germany's is that they value their free time so much more than we do. In fact, if you stay at work past quitting time, instead of being thought of as a "go getter", you are viewed as being inefficient because you are not able to get your work done during normal hours. They also get 6 weeks of vacation each year!