a special day

The morning of Saturday, October 23 looked like this:

 By Sunday morning, the sun was trying to come out. We went to church service in a new building I hadn't seen, the Martin Luther Haus.

My parents after the service. The pastor thanked God for their enduring marriage in a special prayer.

both of them 72 years young!

 Then we were off to a restaurant to meet with relatives and have a proper celebration. The hot meal is served at lunchtime in Germany, followed by dessert. The meal may have involved some of this:

My cousin and I got a kick out of this item on the dessert menu

which looked like this cute little thing - it's creamy sweet yogurt with lots of cream and strawberries.

The afternoon brings the coffee hour, always around 3 pm. This restaurant served all the tea and coffee and cream and sugar etc, but we brought our own cakes (my mom and I both have celiac so bringing our own cake was a good thing). This one is a carrot cake (different from the American kind - it is filled with red currant jam and topped with dark chocolate glaze) made by my mother. Decorations are in marzipan...yum.

My sister's mother-in-law made this one. Papaya cream cake as far as I recall. It went fast.

Of course there was more wine later on, too. :) It was good to see everyone in one place, celebrating. One of the gifts my parents received was a gift certificate to ride in a hot air balloon - I may just have to go back there to witness it!!