St. Martins Day

While Doug was away in the states for the most pointless three days he has ever spent traveling and sitting in a conference, we went with a friend to their towns St. Martins Day parade. We had missed the Dudeldorf one for the third year in a row and I wanted to go to one before we left so this was our last chance. For those of you who don't know St Martin, this is what wikipedia has to say about him...

St. Martin's Day (or Martinstag or Martinmas) is November 11, the feast day of Martin of Tours, who started out as a Roman soldier. He was baptized as an adult and became a monk. It is understood that he was a kind man who led a quiet and simple life. The most famous legend of his life is that he once cut his cloak in half to share with a beggar during a snowstorm, to save the beggar from dying of the cold. That night he dreamed that Jesus was wearing the half-cloak Martin had given away. Martin heard Jesus say to the angels: "Here is Martin, the Roman soldier who is not baptised; he has clothed me."
The day is celebrated in the evening of November 11 in Belgium (mainly in the Dutch-speaking Flanders), some parts of the Netherlands and most areas of Germany and Austria. Children go to houses with paper lanterns and candles, and sing songs about St. Martin in return for treats. Often, a man dressed as St. Martin rides on a horse in front of the procession.
The around 4 on the day we were going to go to the parade I decided the kids should have lanterns to go with. So I got out the shoe boxes I have been holding on to since the beginning of school and some tissue paper and started cutting. By the time I was done the dinning room was unrecognizable, but the kids had lanterns to go with. Luckily our friend Rigg had some glow sticks and small flashlights to stick in the lanterns so they would light up. I plucked some branches from the front yard and string from the kitchen and we had a truly home-made project! The end result looked really cute though walking through town and I was proud of my accomplishment. Unfortonitaly I forgot the camera for the parade itself, but I snapped the pictures of the lanterns so I could remember. I'm glad that we did it. And the boys even each got a sugar pretzel after the parade (witch was just a walk around the town in the dark:) ) . Fun times in Germany.