Today was a bittersweet day, because we left Hamburg for a few more days with my mom in Osnabrück. We very much look forward to those days with her and know that she’ll spoil us like she always does, but it meant leaving Andrea and Peter after our lovely time with them, and that is always hard. We will come back next summer, of course, and we are also all dreaming of their next visit to the States, but the farewell is never easy.
I ran a “farewell run,” enjoying the faint yeast smell from the bread factory in the park one more time. Then we puttered around and dragged out our last breakfast (what’s better than sharing yogurt, cereal, fruit, jam, and the all-important coffee?) and Mark and I packed up our last few things very slowly. We jointly transformed the new IKEA guest bed we slept on back into a couch and admired its functionality. It is awaiting our return! But soon it was time to leave about 10:30 for our train to Bremen and then to Osnabrück, indulging in our crumb-distributing habit of eating a roll with ham and cheese we brought along and a sweet baked good from a train station bakery for lunch on the train.
After all the lovely weather we had, it was fitting that it rained for most of the way, although we caught some glimpses of sunshine once we arrived in Osnabrück to unseasonably cold weather (lower 60s / 17 degrees). By about 3 pm we arrived at my mom’s, who greeted us with hugs and bubbly water and was delighted to see us and also get a present–not from us, but from Andrea, who had found a special glass trivet that matches one of my mom’s during one of her thrift store or flea market explorations.
Then we rested a bit and wrestled with laundry (for the LAST time on this trip) and partial unpacking (getting rather tired of living out of suitcases) and then had a lovely meal that Imke made us–couscous with a sauteed cauliflower-sweet potato dish and a “Frikadelle” (a pan-fried meatball). After dinner, Mark and I took a little walk downtown just to take a walk, although we also sat down for a small dish of ice cream and agreed that Fontanella, the local gelateria we like so much, has the best ice cream anywhere. We were home by about 8 pm and called it a night pretty early, while Imke watched her nightly crime show on TV. She outlasts us most nights!