December 24th 2001 - Bensheim, Germany.

At first we just spent the morning just relaxing a bit ...

Then, as there was so much snow around, we decided that we would take some plastic bags and all go psuedo-sledding somewhere around the Odenwald forest. It was very cold and we didn't actually do much sliding, but we did have a snowball fight and it was great fun anyway.

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Of course, after this we were toast ... but we weren't done for the day yet ... not by a long way.

First of all, Gudrun (Leila and Anneli's mum) flew in from Helsinki to join us. Christoph and I went to pick her up from Frankfurt airport and bring her back to Bensheim. There a very happy family reunion took place. It was the first time in many years that she had seen both of her daughters together.

Secondly, December 24th is the day that most of Europe actually celebrates Christmas. So we all went to Christoph's parent's place, met them as well as Christoph's brother Marcus, and there we enjoyed a great feast and exchanged gifts. It was really fantastic!

Needless to say, we were really toast after all that ...

December 25th 2001 - Bensheim, Germany.

On this day, after a long and leisurely breakfast, we merely rested. No photography was attempted. We were too tired (and slightly hung-over).