Germany's Newest & Biggest Fan

Konrad in the back --- Ja Wol !

Go Deutschland!

Last week we went to Doner Bistro in Leesburg, Va to watch the Germany vs. Ghana game. It was a lot of  fun, they had a big flat screen outside in their beer garten. Konrad slept through the whole first half and by the second half he was keeping cool holding Papi's back up beers, it was 91 degrees out.

You'll have to excuse the orange light, we were all sitting under big orange umbrellas.

Here I am with some curry wurst mmmmm...

Konrad kept cool with Papi's beer. 

Tomorrow we are going back to watch the Germany vs. England game... we'll be there by 8:30 am to get a good seat! Go Deutschland ! ! !

Cutting in Style

I am convinced that every woman should have an Opinel knife. I found these knives in a cutlery store in Germany and honestly, it was the best purchase I made over there on our last trip. They're made in France, which is okay I guess~  (yeah, I'm still holding a grudge against France).

I was so excited about them that I went back and picked up a few extra to give as gifts. It's been real handy to pull this stylish knife out and cut up Konrad's avocado or apple when we're out and about. I was able to track down a site that carries them here in the states, you can find them HERE. I was pleasantly surprised to see that they are about the same price that I paid for them over in Germany.

Home Again Home Again

Ahh... I have finally found the time to write about our trip to Germany. Ha, a whopping 3 weeks later! Blame it on Motherhood :)

Konrad traveled like a pro, a little jet-setter. He didn't cry or whine until the last 20 minute leg of our drive home from the airport, we are so proud of him. I have lots to say... we did a ton of stuff over there, saw a lot of family, traveled to some beautiful places. I won't get half of it in here, but I will highlight a few things.

Our home was nestled in the small village of Schweighof, which is just a 5-minute walk from Badenweiler. Badenweiler is an old swanky spa town with Roman bath ruins. Here is a Google Map of where we were.

We had such a wonderful time with Brendan's family, especially over the Easter holiday. A truly beautiful time to be in Germany. Brendan, Konrad and I were able to surprise his Grandmother for her 90th birthday, which really surprised her, the look on her face was priceless. It was a special time and I got to meet a few more German relatives. It's great, all I do is smile and nod and nod and smile and they do the same to me. LOL

Here is Brendan and Konrad in Mullheim at the farmers market. The butcher handed Konrad his first (real) wurst, he devoured it in seconds. And we kept the fridge stocked with them for the remainder of the trip.

And here is Oma being blown away that we surprised her for her 90th birthday. Talk about a tear-jerker.

I took some photos of Brendan, Konrad and Oma. I felt like Miriam taking all these pictures! I'm really happy with some of them. 

And here is Brendan and his Mom in Schweighof, which is located in the Black Forest. SO Hansel and Gretel. And it was romantic, quaint, and beautiful.... Germans are known to vacation there for the fresh mountain air.

Brendan, Konrad and I did a few side trips here and there. The one main thing I wanted to do was see some World War I trenches (since WWI is my latest interest). So on a Sunday morning we drove to Hartzmannweilerkopf or as the French call it, Vieil Armand. It is located in the heart of the Alsace right smack-dab on top of the Vosges mountains. If you want, you can read about it here. It was a chilly-cloudy morning, the place looked desolate, no warm welcome center, the signage stunk (no big surprise there) and the building that was indeed there was shut down, it looked like it had been closed for decades, the monument (which we stumbled onto) was outright pathetic.

Then beyond the monument lay hundreds of graves of the soldiers that had fought for France.  A total of 30,000 men died here. Talk about depressing, it was as if France didn't really care about what those men did for their country. I was dumbfounded. And this place is one of the four national memorials to WWI in France. It was a big difference from what I am used to here in the states, I guess I was expecting a little more. Their 100th anniversary will be in 2015, perhaps they will give it a face lift by then.

I was determined to see a trench, so we ditched the stroller and jumped the tattered chain-linked fence. We tripped our way down the path past the graves, squeeze through another gate thing and there was a sign, a real decent sign indicating where the trenches were (finally!). It was after that that we discovered we had to hike up a mountain. Brendan put Konrad on his shoulders and up we went, huffing and puffing. The entire way I was absorbed in the huge divots, bowls of land scooped out from shells and bombs, it was as if the ground were a big sponge.

When we got to the top, there were the trenches. It was amazing. It was as if the war had ended a few months ago. These trenches are known as the best preserved ones because the soldiers lived there for so long with three years of no- real combat fighting, just hundreds of thousands of men living in the trenches. The barbed wire, live ammunition... bunkers, it's all still there. My pictures really don't do it any justice. The thing that amazed me was the big difference between the French and German trenches. The French trenches were shallow and barely waist-deep, whereas the German trenches were very tall, built of stone and had intricate secret passageways, tricky and confusing paths, deep chambers... by far better than the French trenches.

After an hour it got very cold and started to rain.
And then when we started our way back, barely seeing the monument we had to hike back to was so far away, then the rain began to pour.

And POUR...
I felt terrible for Konrad, that I had put him through this (Brendan too). They marched way ahead of me as I struggled to lug the stroller over the fence and then back to the car. When I finally got to the car, Brendan was standing in the rain with Konrad and said that our car had been broken into and everything stolen. Everything meaning, everything in my bag... which had EVERYTHING in it. I melted. I'm -still recovering.

Try to imagine the 2.5 hour drive back home. Broken glass everywhere, child in the back seat crying, pouring down cold rain and bits of glass flying into the car. Sobbing and hysterical wife in the backseat with the crying child. And stressed out Brendan who took his jacket off to keep us warm in the backseat, freezing his tail off. I swore out loud that I never liked France, never had a good memory and now this... this was it. We scoured for the police station only to discover that they were CLOSED.  Brendan later went back, when they were open for the two allotted hours of the day and got the police report.

The rental car was replaced, no charge. The remaining of the trip was spent recovering most the things that were stolen. Just hours after it happened, phone calls were made, things got fixed, our neighbor and hero Al back in Harpers Ferry helped us tremendously and ... I am really blessed with the best husband because he made immediate arrangements for us to get things fixed literally the next day.

So, back to the best parts of the trip:

Konrad had the best little garden to play in at our house. 

And here is Tante Anna in front of our place.

And Konrad getting lots of loving from his Opa Ernst.

Our favorite hang out in Badenweiler was a place called Cafe Red Coffee Box.

Here is Konrad having his first Kinder Cappuccino (frothed milk with chocolate on top) it's served free to children.

I will post more pictures soon!

Cheers! Prost! It's nice to be back home in Carrot Top, to be in our own bed and surroundings. We've been gardening like crazy since we got home, which has been so wonderful.

Christmas & Advent will be here soon!

Well it's that time of year when I need to get my usual German food supplies from German Deli.com. But luckily this year, we were able to find most of our Advent and Christmas supplies from our local Aldi.
Here are the things on our list:

• Lebkuchen (puffy gingerbread cookies)


• Spekulatius with Almonds (yummy spicy cookies that are great for milk & tea dunking)


• Christmas Stollen


• Marzipan
  
• Gummi Bears (well....really,that's an all year thing)


• Advent Calendar (with chocolate)
  

Also St. Nicholas Day is fast approaching, December 6. So I need to get supplies to fill the boy's boots, big and little!

this Schnitzel is the Shizzle

We've been on vacation in Blowing Rock, NC this past week. It's been real fun but more on that later.

Today we found a German restaurant in Hickory, about a 40 minute drive from Blowing Rock ~ oh it was awesome. Unfortunately, it took us 2 hours to get there because the signage in Hickory is seriously backwards. So this German restaurant, which we saw on TV last night was voted as the best restaurant in N.C. by the food critic who was chompin' on some pork medallions and spaetzle. We were sold when we saw the Bienen Stich for dessert. He said not to let the location fool you, the restaurant sits smack in the middle of an abandoned strip mall outside of Hickory. The place was packed, a sea of cars in the middle of nowhere... it was amazing. The schnitzel was verrry good! If you are ever around Hickory, God forbid... the Old German Schnitzel Haus is certainly your saving grace.

Easter Pretty Things

Easter is my favorite holiday and Spring is one of my favorite times of the year. Here are some beautiful Easter and Spring finds ~all the things I love.

One of the many things Easter has me thinking about is hats, this one is from the Hat Shop.

The the Atelier Lzc Matriochka tea towel ~made in France is from Rose and Radish.

This little cutie is hand made in Germany. You can find him hiding here.

I was delighted to of found one of these fellers hidden in a potted plant in our kitchen last week!

This is similar to how we decorate for Easter, though ours is a bit more whimsical.

I had never made Easter trees until Brendan showed me.

I will be sure to post my Easter tree in a later post.

And of course, my favorite flowers...tulips.

I love this idea from Martha Stewart.

This Man Learned German in a Week

This article from Der Spiegel is great. It made me think of my friend Katie who is learning German in Singapore (of all places)! As well as myself... ha I've been "taking" German for over a year now (very slooooowly).

The guy who this article is about, has learned German in one week, which is amazing. Of course, he's only able to do it because he has Asperger's Syndrome, a mild form of autism. What I find most interesting about him is his connections of shapes with the German language, which is explained in the article and it makes perfect sense (at least to me). I love how he describes the German language, "like a clean room with good sharp corners, tidy and straightforward". (Ironically, that is how Brendan and I foresee our dream home)

So, since I don't have your email address, I share this article with you Katie, as well as all the rest out there.

Fennel Tea Addiction

I have been craving fennel tea since I left Germany. The fennel I've had here isn't good and doesn't have the same taste for some reason. I'm considering ordering some from German Deli.com They also carry it for babies so Konrad can have it in a couple months. It settles the stomach and makes me feel good...Hmm, am I addicted or what? A bit on the pricey side though. sigh.

A Whole Lotta Stuff Going On

So many days have passed since my last blog entry, sorry about that, a lot has been going on.

I had a stupendous 35th birthday yesterday. I think it was probably the best birthday I can remember and it was spent at home with Brendan, Konrad, and Norman. Brendan made it truly a special day for me. Brendan made my favorite meal: Schnitzel, Spaetzle with a chanterelle cream sauce, and a deelish array of German salads. And I got to open some wonderful gifts from family!

A Mushroom Mug

I like this a whole bunch, I found it here.

Baking Brotchen Bread

 If there is one thing that I miss about Germany, it's the fresh little Brotchen breads from the bakery (no American breads even come close). We finally found a recipe that's just like the real thing. We were really impressed with the outcome and had the delicious traditional fare for dinner, complete with gouda cheese, mortadela, liverwurst, and various other meats and spreads. The trick to making this recipe more authentic is cutting a slice down the middle of the dough and then brushing the milk and egg white mixture on top. Here is the recipe we followed.

Hey Ya'll, You Gotta See These Videos

Tramps Abroad created some wonderful videos of our adventures in Germany and France. Click here to see both videos,  Adventures of Special K (Konrad gets his first taste of Europe)  and Colemar avec les cousins (A visit to the Alsation town of Colmar). 

Bad Krozingen

We spent the day at the Bad Krozingen baths~ something I have been looking forward to for two years now! Laurie so graticiously watched Konrad while Brendan and I enjoyed ourselves for the afternoon.

Konrad Goes To Germany:A Visit To Auggen

It has been a relaxing first few days here. Our appartment is darling and welcoming, complete with orange pillows, Gutedel wine , grapes, and a pretty garden view. Konrad met his great Oma and Aunt Heike the following day. The weather has been nice, I love it here as always.

Off to Deutschland

We'll be in Germany for a couple weeks, I hope to be able to update the blog from there.

I'm Eating This Up

Now this is enough to make my head spin...Letterpress chocolates!? 

I found them at Typolade and of course, only in Germany.

 

Auggenfest und Parade

This is where we will be at the end of October. Auggen has been making wine for about 2,000 years. Brendan's Mom sent us these pictures, the parade went right by their house. I've never seen such creativity and hard work put into such a small village parade...So cute!

Trip to Germany

We just recently got our tickets to Germany for late October. We are all looking forward to this trip. This will be my first time to Auggen. We plan to visit lots of family with the little Kaiser Konrad.

Movie Night

Tonight we are going to watch Sophie Scholl. It was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
Sophia Scholl was a member of the White Rose non-violent resistance movement in Nazi Germany. She was convicted of treason after having been found distributing antiwar leaflets a the University of Munich with her brother Hans. As a result, they were both executed by guillotine. Since the 1970s, Scholl has been celebrated as one of the great German heroes who actively opposed the Third Reich during the Second World War. (From Wikipedia) Sounds like a pretty amazing woman and story...I look forward to seeing it.