SATURDAY DOINGS
We had a busy Saturday.  Steve had to do a little work WORK at least at home while I got to go to the Stoffmarkt  http://www.stoffmarktholland.de/stoffmarkt/ in the morning.  I went with two good friends and we all had a nice time together and we were successful in finding fabric we wanted.  I bought some for a quilt I am making and found a nice piece to make a dress or skirt for Christina.  After that Steve and I rode our bikes to our church to do some cleaning but it was mostly all done already so we came home and got ready to ride to Ludwigshafen for a couple of parties.  It was an adventure finding the places as it was through a lot of city and my map that has street names didn't go out far enough so I used my bike map that has the bike routes but no street names.  We didn't get home until pretty late, maybe 11:30pm.  On the way while it was still light out, we saw a baby hedgehog in the Luisen park area.  On the way back in the dark we saw a fox going after a weasel or ferret and a billion bunnies.   The fox didn't get what it was after because it stopped to look at us.  I couldn't get a picture of the fox because it was really dark.

 This little guy is about the size of a grapefruit.  I think it is a hedgehog? It didn't move very fast, I petted it and the quills are really stiff and sharp.

BIKE RIDE IN THE AREA TO THE EAST
I rode my bike east of the apartment towards Heddesheim and the hills beyond that.  I don't know how far I went but I was riding for most of the 4 hours I was out.  The weather is nice right now and it feels like spring.  The only bad thing is just right around the Vogelstang Lakes, there are swarms of gnats.  I got them in my eyes even with glasses on and swallowed a few.  I rode up into the hills just a little so I could see a view.  I couldn't ride some of it because it was too steep and rocky for me but walking up and pushing my bikes counts as good exercise too.  Here is some of what I saw on my ride.

This appears to be a fresh apple cider still.  It wasn't filled when I was there but it would be fun to try some when it is going.

I saw a few goats.  The babies are so cute.  But they didn't jump around like the ones on YouTube, they just ate the grass.

I liked this small bike/walkway going to this Catholic church in a small town called Leutershausen.

This is as high as I got up the dirt road.  Nice horse pasture with trees blooming white and towns in the distance.

Cute path I found out of the hills.

I made it back to Waid and the dairy.  This time I had some money and bought myself some fresh milk from the self serve milk dispenser that you can buy from 24 hours a day.  The cows are in the barn behind the little milk house.

You buy the empty bottles on the right for .40 cents each

You buy the milk on the left for .70 cents per liter.  Here it is filling my bottle.

I stopped at Waidsee to have some of my milk with one of my home made granola bars.

WALKING IN WALLSTADT
I took Macy and Ivy for a walk through Wallstadt.  We had a great time together going to a park, and a Kleine Garten that also has chickens.

This is front of the Wallstadt water tower.  I think a Doctor lives in it now.

I made that hat for Ivy.  It has a sun dress to go with it.

Macy is making me a home made granola bar from sand with chocolate chips (wood) and coconut (flowers)

She fell asleep on the way back.

Macy found a TV cart with castors that was in the trash and brought it home for some fun.  Her mom pulled her around the parking lot with the jump rope.

SEWING AND MENDING
Last week on Monday, our neighbor on this floor came over in a frantic and tried to tell me about a leak that we had under our apartment that has made damage to the apartment below us.  He only speaks German and I had a hard time understanding the whole issue.  So we went to a lady who I know speaks English and she translated for us.  The people below us are not living in the apartment and have been gone somewhere for awhile so I don't know how long this might have been happening with the leak.  There is someone else who occasionally comes over to check on the apartment and found the problem.  He took me to the apartment on the lower floor and there was damage clearly from our place.  Our apartment had no signs anywhere of a leak.  I contacted the landlord via email but with no response from her, our neighbor was nice enough to find some workmen who could diagnose and fix the problem on Wednesday.  It was the shower drain pipe, it had become separated from the drain and was cracked.  Now that is fixed and all is OK up here but I have no idea what will happen for the apartment below us and our landlord.  She did show up on Friday and was furious that I had allowed people into our apartment to repair the problem without her approval.  So with all that going on I only did a little sewing and mending.  I hemmed 4 pair of pants, repaired the seat of a pair of pants and just got in today a skirt to alter and two dresses to hem.  I have been learning quilting on-line and I'm planning a quilt to make now.  Tomorrow is the Stoffmarkt so I will go get some supplies.  I also made this pillow this week.

BIKE RIDE TO SCHWETZINGEN
I made it a goal the other day while the weather was nice to get as close to the Schwetzingen Castle as I could.  I tried last year but didn't make it mainly because I enjoyed the Dossenwald forest that I went through on the way so much that I got tired before I could get as far south as Schwetzingen.  According to google maps on a bike it should have taken me 1 hour but I did go against a 10mph wind and I had to stop to take pictures and look at my map a lot and then I really got lost in the city.  So it took me 2 hours to get there and a little over an hour to get back.  I made a right turn in the city when I should have turned left and went almost all the way around the city before I was helped by a nice cyclist that was riding in the opposite direction on the other side of a busy street.  He could tell I was lost by the way I was staring at my map with a puzzled look on my face.  He was very polite and is a retired military man.  He went out of his way and had me follow him to the Castle gates then went on his way.  I didn't go into the Castle grounds this time, I just wanted to get to it so when Steve and I can make it down there, I will know the way.   We plan to do this when things start growing a little more and we can make a day of seeing it.

http://www.schloss-schwetzingen.de/en/

This is what I saw on the way.
I saw one of these cows last year in this pasture.  This time I saw 3 of them.  I think they are so cute with the long shaggy coats.  I'd really like to give them a bangs trim so they could see out.

I saw these young adults a few times before the town and in town having a merry time, drinking and cheering,  I  never did figure out what the celebration was for.  This guy was offering beer to us bicyclists.  No one wanted any but one old man took a sip to make the guy happy.

This is Dossenwald.  There are miles of trails in it and I took one that was really more rugged than I should have.  I had to get off and walk through some deep sand and down some steep narrow parts or I might have ended up crashing into  tree.

PUZZLE AND SEWING
We finished another puzzle last night.  This box was a real bargain as it has 3 puzzles in it and it only cost 1 euro.  We thought for sure some pieces where missing but it did all come together.   We started with the smallest puzzle of the birds.  The other two are larger and will most likely not fit on the small hobby table and have to be done on our coffee table.   In addition to that hobby, I have been doing a lot of mending for people.  This week I've done 4 pair of pants hemming and repaired a blouse, hemmed a long dress, and now a lady just rang the doorbell and gave me a pair of pants to take in and a blouse to alter.  I make enough money to buy bread.

BIKE TO LADENBURG WITH THE MISSIONARIES
Mondays are "P" day for missionaries so they can Prepare and have some Personal time.  They invited me to be a tour guide and ride with them on bikes to Ladenburg.  We had good luck with the weather and had some sun and not too much wind.  Ladenburg is such a cute German town, I like to go there often and have several posts about going there.   There are several places in town where you can see Roman ruins.  I have included other links below from some of my others trips to Ladenburg.

We had ice cream as a treat.

There is the Museum, we didn't go to with the missionaries because it is only open a few hours of the week.
http://susanssmith2012.blogspot.com/2014/03/carl-benz-museum-saturday-feb-27th-we.html

Here is the link entry from the other trip on bikes with missionaries.
http://susanssmith2012.blogspot.com/2013/07/sister-bike-ride-to-ladenburg-for.html

BIKE RIDE IN THE LOCAL AREA AROUND HEDESHEIM
I took the afternoon to ride around the area fields again.  I love seeing the farmers, flowers, fields in the springtime.

These yellow blooming bushes are seen everywhere around here.  This one was especially beautiful because it had not been groomed and was taller than I am.

I see beauty in many things, even a freshly plowed dirt field.

Just north west of Striesenheim there is a RC airport.  I had a lot of fun watching the helicopter pilots do many tricks.

 Here is a link to a video of the same type of helicopter.
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=fe9_1358501021#GzQoHJ4e2gGgEST3.03

These are serious hobbiest, they spend a lot of hours and money to get these big ones flying.