Summer signs

Hi, everyone!

For the latest post, please click HERE.

More to come.

Back Home Again

Surprise! Not only am I back here in Michelau

but I am actually posting something here after months of inactivity.


The month of August was spent visiting friends and family in Pennsylvania, Texas, and Colorado. I had a great time. Thanks to all of you who shared your time with us and made our time as memorable as possible. I do hope to write about those moments and post pictures here. In the meantime, here's a little about what we've been doing since getting over the jet-lag.

First, let me say this. If you leave home for four weeks, you are bound to return to a yard full of high grass and a garden full of weeds and rotten tomatoes. Those tomatoes could have been enjoyed by neighbors if they weren't also away on their vacations.  However, we did manage to collect almost a large bowl full of red, ripe tomatoes, several yellow squash, a red pepper, and a few zucchini which could have been used as self-defense clubs on our first day home (and lots more since).

So, one of the things we've been doing is preparing a variety of zucchini meals-- feta and tomato baked zucchini, zucchini and cheese omelets... I've got a whole book of zucchini recipes to keep us going. Next week I'll be making spicy sesame-zucchini stir fry and also a zucchini cake. So, if you've got some good zucchini recipes, please share. We love trying new things.

We also picked our first corn which we enjoyed with pork and veggies from the grill. Our basil had flowered but seems to be doing better now and the celery is growing well. One thing that didn't fair well were our grape saplings in the vineyard. They look pretty miserable. We're hoping they bounce back. On the other hand, the grapes in the garden look and taste great.

Next week we'll need to pick some apples. Our tree is full of them. Looks like we'll be making apple sauce, apple muffins, apple galette, Apfelstreudel...

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Another thing we've been doing was preparing for the beginning of school. Katarina just finished her first week which had it's surprises and disappointments. She has two teachers she is definitely not fond of, but she is more than happy with her homeroom teacher, Mr. Stammler, who is also her teacher for math, geography and biology.

Here she is on the first day of school.

The class also held elections for Klassensprecher (class president). There are always two--one boy and one girl.  Katarina enjoyed doing it last year and decided not to run (even though I know she wanted to but wanted to give someone else the chance to do it). As it turns out, the procedure was a bit different this time around. Instead of people campaigning, classmates were told to elect people. They were then give a few minutes to accept or decline and say a few words. Katarina was elected so she accepted...and WON. This year a different boy won. So there is some constant, some change.  Seventh grade is a tough year, but we are off to a good start and hope it goes well. One of her assignments was to write an essay about her favorite day of summer vacation. She wrote about her day in Austin with my cousin Bob and his family. I will DEFINITELY be blogging about that at some point in the next month.


Other than that, we've just been trying to relax and enjoy things. The other day Stefan came home and said "Wanna get some flowers?" So, we went off to our favorite field. It is a place where you can stop and pick your own flowers. I've written about it on my other blog (click here).  This time instead of daffodils and tulips there were sunflowers

and gladioles in all different colors.

Aren't these gorgeous!

And there were red ones

and a bunch of other colors to choose from. It was so hard to decide.

Katarina went along and picked a few to put in her bedroom.

 

And I was busy snapping pictures. Here is one of my favorites.

The rain spoiled our plans today, so I guess I will just sit inside, write a bit, bake a cake and look at the  bouquet of gladioles. (Thanks, Stefan.)  Eventually, I will get around to those vacations posts. So stay tuned.

Not so short "short note"

Hi, everyone! I can't believe how long it has been since I posted here--4 months. In the meantime, I have been

1) posting on my other blogs:   http://lind-guistic.blogspot.com/ where I discuss anything language/literary/writing related and  http://thegatheringofstones.blogspot.com/ which is where I post photos and little thoughts and observations called "stones".

2) spending time with family and friends. My in-laws were here for 4 weeks in May/June.

3) spending lots of time a various doctors for health issues I might discuss here at a later time

4) just basically chillin' (reading, writing, taking pictures, going for bike rides/walks, local events, doing a blog challenge, submitting material, taking part in the July River of Stones, playing with our pet, and whatever else came up along the way)


While I was busy doing all these other things, I got a nice blog award from E.J. Wesley. He posted some great material at his blog, The Open Vein, during the A to Z Blogging Challenge (which I also took part in) in April. You can visit The Open Vein here.  In any case, here it is--my no strings attached Real Trooper Award for supporting other bloggers during the challenge.

Thanks, E.J.

I also received this award for my work in the blog challenge.

 

Oops! That's not the correct one but I can't find it!!! It seems to be lost in the virtual world somewhere. In any case, thank you to Arlee Bird and the other blog challenge organizers. I'll be back in 2012.

I also received these awards.

Plus, I won a book from Nicole Ducleroir in the Sneaky Red Sock Giveaway contests on her blog One Significant Moment at a Time.  Thank you, Nicole.


Oh, I almost forgot. One of my blog posts was featured in the Language/Place Blog Carnival. You can read it here.

I received all these awards, posted once in May and then disappeared until July 1 when I posted a few stones. During that time, I received a few messages from followers (not family--people I only know in the blogging world) asking "Hey, what happened to you? I miss reading your posts." or "Where have you been? Everything okay?"  How sweet. If you were one of these people, thank you for checking in on me. I am okay and plan to get back to blogging on a more regular basis once again in September. Until then I will be taking a trip to the states to visit family and friends and to show my daughter a bit more of the land where she was born.  So, be patient. I'll be back again soon.

In the meantime, you can fill this post up with comments. If you are a blogger, tell me what keeps you from blogging, what helps you to blog regularly (LOL...sounds like a blogging laxative :-) or whatever else you want to say. Just post something in the comments section. I don't care if you tell me what you ate for breakfast. Just make me happy and post something. Just. DO. IT.

Long Time No Write

I started this blog in December with the intention of keeping friends and family updated with the goings-on in my life and to spotlight a bit of what it is like to live in Germany. I have fallen short of that. It is already March and I am just sitting down to write a post. Sometimes life just got in the way. Other times I was busy working on my other blogs. What other blogs? Well, in January author Fiona Robyn held a challenge called A River of Stones and I took part. The challenge: to notice one thing properly every day during January 2011 and write it down. These polished observations are called "stones" They can be just a sentence or a short paragraph. A haiku or poem. Whatever one wants. (A new blog was started to house my stones.) So, I know what you are thinking...why do it? As Fiona says, "Choosing something to write about every day will help you to connect to yourself, with others, and with the world. It will help you love everything you see--the light and the dark, the happy and the sad, the beautiful and the ugly." It's true. On a cold winter morning I found myself admiring the frost covered grass or the gently beauty of newborn pussy willow. Over 350 people across the world took part and a book has now been made with selected stones. One of mine is included and the book can be bought at www.lulu.com.

http://www.lulu.com/product/file-download/pay-attention-a-river-of-stones/15101076

Of course, many other things happened in January---New Year's Eve and my 18th wedding anniversary, among other things. At the moment I can't remember all the events. And February brought birthdays, Fasching parades and Weiberfasching. It also marked the start of yet another blog which is more language/literary based. On my current post you can read about another wonderful event--the Lesewettbewerb in which Katarina took part.

http://lind-guistics.blogspot.com/2011/03/books-twists-of-fate-and-sushi.html

Also, one of my pieces was featured on Writing in Wonderland. Check it out here.

http://writinginwonderland.blogspot.com/2011/03/moon-stars-and-fairy-dust.html?spref=fb


I hope to add a post about Fasching in the next few days with some photographs. We currently have a week off from school so I figured there'd be time to get caught up...but you know how that goes. One just fills the time with extra tasks. So no promises on that. In the meantime I thought it best to at least write something here to let you all know I am still alive and intend to get back to this blog soon.

Now I am off to do one of those important 6 to 8 hour tasks...sleeping. Good night, everyone!

Thanksgiving in December

Last night we had a wonderful evening with close friends. We wanted to do something big to celebrate the 10th anniversary of our living in Germany. Yep...10 years now. It's hard to believe so much time has passed. Without the support and helpfulness of new friends, we wouldn't be as settled as we are. Since we are thankful for those special people and the good times we've shared, we decided to go all out and have a feast--we had Thanksgiving in December.

We started with cocktails and a bit of chatting, progressed to the red pepper soup, and then brought out the 8 kg (almost 18-pound) turkey stuffed with chestnut and herb bread filling, Kahlua sweet potatoes, sauteed mushrooms, orange-cranberry sauce, and salad. They couldn't believe how much food we served and were suprised to learn that a warm apple-plum crisp with vanilla ice cream would follow later.

One thing that made it interesting was that our guests had never had sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce or chestnut stuffing and though they'd had turkey meat before, they'd never had a whole roasted turkey before. We weren't sure if they would like the meal or not. We told them to help themselves to seconds if they wanted. Obviously, the food was to their liking since double portions of soup, turkey and sides were gladly eaten. Several cocktails, a few bottles of wine, a bit of old Scotch, and Lemberger liquor were also consumed. 

After eating so much, I thought no one would have room for dessert but lo and behold, second portions were also partaken. Despite all this merry consumption, there are enough leftovers to save me from cooking today.

We had a great time sharing a bit of American tradition and just relaxing with friends.  Thanksgiving in December...good for the soul, bad for the hips.

Long Gone

Christmas has come and gone and I haven't written anything about it.  I intended to write about many traditions, either those of my family or generalized German Christmas traditions. I wanted to write a post about the lighting of the candles on the Advent wreath. I had hoped to share with you our adventures at the various Christkindlmaerkte (or Weihnachtsmaerkte) this year. I planned to describe the differences in Christmas trees (ours needing sturdy branches set further apart so we can attach the candles) and to highlight Katarina's performance in our church Singspiel on Christmas Eve. But a long battle with tonsillitis and preparing for the holidays, among other things, allowed the time to slip right through my fingers. So, let me begin where I am now--in this moment, on this day. December 28.

Here I sit, once again reminded how quickly time goes by. On this day at seven-something in the morning 10 years ago, my family landed at the airport in Frankfurt to start a new adventure.  Stefan already had a job lined up and we had a place to stay. Other than that, we had nothing but 3 suitcases and some hopes and dreams to get us started. We weren't sure how long we'd stay, if things would work, if life would be better, worse, or the same. There were only a few things we were certain of--that no matter what, we had each other, that it was extremely cold, and that I had to start learning German ASAP. To some people it might sound crazy. Why leave the states? Why put oneself in such a position? Why, why, why? They are fascinated by our choice and always have a million questions.

In actuality, my life hasn't changed all that much. As they say, the road hasn't changed, just the scenery. I still enjoy jamming to my music, LOUD, while Stefan is working and Katarina hopefully learning something at school. After all, who can clean without music? Not me. I still like to read and write and take walks through the woods. I love watching the clouds and sunsets. And hanging with friends. Enjoying good food and wine also tops the list (and the hips). I suppose some things in life never change.

On the plus side, unlike in America when Stefan was often away on business and working endless hours, I get to see him every day after work. Also, he gets 6 weeks vacation each year and we have more public holidays throughout the year. You can't beat that! Where people at home seem to "live to work" the philosophy here is more "work to live".

One thing that took getting used to is the store hours. When we first came, they closed at 6 on a weekday. That was tough. They have since extended their hours to 8 in the evening, some places to 10. They are still closed on Sundays. But that's okay. I just plan ahead. And that gives everyone more family time on the weekend. We can going walking in the woods, have a picnic, ride bike (bicycle paths are everyone and there is no risk of riding alongside cars). And in Germany in summer, there is always a Fest going on to keep one entertained. The downside--there are things I don't like about the school system, but hey, that's another post all together.

All that said, this venture has brought some challenges, but I've learned many things, had some great experiences. I wouldn't trade that in for anything. So...does that mean I am never moving back? Maybe, maybe not. If there is one thing I've learned most is that plans are just that. Plans. Nothing is definite. Fifteen years ago I never thought I'd live here. Ten years ago, I never thought I'd still be here in 2010. Ten years from now, who knows? I don't even think about it much. There is so much going on in the here and now. Lately, I think why not live in the present, enjoy the moment, because as we all know, this moment will soon be long gone.

A Bit of Luck

Katarina had an awesome week.  While we were shopping, she won a Christmas tree. Pure luck. All the carts have numbers at the base, and the staff called out numbers every hour. I heard them ask for cart number "blah-blah-blah" to come to the service counter but had no idea what was going on or that Katarina had that cart. When we met at the exit, she stood with the gift certificate in her hand, beaming, proud she would be providing the tree for our family this year.  Since she won it, we allowed her to choose the tree herself. It was bundled and loaded into the car without my seeing it, and now it is propped up next to the basement door waiting to be unwrapped, set up, and decorated. I can't wait to see it.

On Wednesday, she represented her class in the Lesewettbewerb (reading competition). Her doing so was also a bit of luck. The girl who was supposed to take part became ill and Katarina stepped in for her. All participants had to read a chapter book beforehand. Katarina had just finished reading The Seventeen Secrets of the Kharma Club by Karen McCombie, so all she had to do was quickly prepare a speech introducing herself and explaining what happens it the book.

After reciting their speeches, each participant had to read aloud from their book to the judges (there were 8 of them). Of course, the students had time to practice this the past week or so. There is a grading system based on the number of errors made but points are also given in terms of how clearly they read and how exciting they make the story sound. They are looking not just for someone who can read well but a storyteller who reads with feeling and makes it interesting for the listeners. Then they had to respond to many questions the judges asked regarding the book.  That was the first half.

After that portion of the competition, the hard part came. All the students were given a book they had never read before and told to read from it. Now the pressure was on. Katarina said the word Pygmaeen (pygmies) came up in the story text and some of the others didn't pronounce it correctly. She, too, stumbled over a strange word of which she cannot recall, but she said she gave it her best shot. I guess it was good enough because she won the competition by one point and will now go on to represent her school at the district competition. She received a rose, chocolate, and a 15 Euro gift certificate to the bookstore. Being an avid reader, she always has a list of books she would like, so the next day we HAD TO go redeem it. She picked out a 223 page book, the third in a series she is currently into. (The Guardians of Ga'Hoole by Kathryn Lasky)

She thinks it is luck that she won. I told her it IS luck that she had the opportunity after her classmate couldn't take part, but luck played no part in winning.  She is a good reader, and she obviously showed the judges that. I am so proud of her.  I hope she does as well in the next round, but if not, I'll still be her biggest fan. Whether German or American (etc, etc), that's just how mothers are.