A very quick update

It's been a long time since I checked in and there are very many blog posts waiting to be written, photos to be posted, and books to be reviewed.

But just to dip my toes back in the water, I thought I'd post a quick update on what has happened since the end of November.

I have read some books (though not many recently), and might actually post a combined review sometime but the biggest news of course is this:

That and moving back to the US, of course. More to follow (and probably be backdated to the correct times).

Tears of Joy and Relief

Four More Years

More Ch.ch.ch.changes....

It's been a while since I wrote a real post and that's because we have been completely up in the air about life and what we are doing in it.

Short form:

We are having twins in the spring and we will be moving to upstate NY in late December (if the container actually gets scheduled in December and I am feeling nervous about it).

So if anyone in Berlin is reading this, we are looking for a nachmieter who would like an apartment full of furniture, lights, appliances, and a kitchen- feel free to contact me for more info. We love our apartment and our (Wilmersdorf) neighborhood.

We vacillated between NY and Munich for a long time– even checked out houses and neighborhoods in Munich over the fall holidays. But family and personal reasons cast the vote for NY, for at least the next three to four years.

That means I have been boxing books (up to #12) while waiting to hear from the moving firm as to when we will be containerized. Have put several boxes out to give away, but I think that I have overloaded the appetite of my neighborhood for free English-language books and the 50 books left over (and added to) will need to be dropped at a Buecherboxx this weekend.

So, I am well, but exhausted. Twins and being older make this pregnancy both harder and requiring more testing and resting than either of my earlier ones.

In addition, having our Internet go out for 11 days right after the decision was made made things even tougher: hard to list the apartment or address, hard to follow up on lost luggage of friends visiting from CA (and never found, though we called repeatedly:-( ). The constant calls to O2, met by menu-driven and incorrect responses, the dragging a heavy computer off to Starbucks, the new router that did not solve the problem, the complete disconnect while Hurricane Sandy was raging in my area and my dad was undergoing surgery... it was very stressful.

Finally, a third-line tech managed to fix the issue, although after we gushed gratitude, he said he had no idea how he had fixed it, because the type of problem that we had (internet down, phone working) was actually "not possible".

We were still very grateful and grateful that he had listened long enough to see the strangeness and think that some of the issue might actually have to do with the phone and its switch being in some way crossed with the internet.

While this was going on, we were running about, setting up Drs appts, making others, having exams, having field trips, being visited by the tooth fairy: life is chaotic.

Visiting Onkle H

The children talk constantly about visiting Onkel H when we leave them for a few days with Oma and Opa, and who can blame them? Onkel H and Tante U have a pony, with a foal. Sheep, with lots of little schäffchen. Special geese, white and mated, homing pigeons and piglets and chickens, whose eggs one can collect.

So, on our visit to Oma and Opa, we took a run over, our first. We were just amazed at how one can have a real smallholding right in the middle of a village. A charming house, that they built a few years after getting married (so some 30 years ago), with an open kitchen, high ceilings and lots and lots of glass and windows (or the exact opposite of my in-laws' house, which was built around the same time), rather on a chalet model, I guess. Very airy and comfortable. And then small outbuildings and barns and fields, all secret and hidden behind a housefront which looks like any other suburban building!

Onkel H retired (as a family doctor) over several years, and after doing some consulting to his practice (which his son and daughter-in-law have taken over as Dr and nurse), he is spending more time with his enkelkinder and animals, as well as doing some traveling and lots of biking (he is incredibly fast on his mountain bike).

Both the girls gathered eggs and petted lambs and brushed the horses and then did a bit of riding. The German thought it would be fun to put the girls on the pony together, bareback, and so they were simultaneously bucked off. (No picture- I was running toward them.) That was not fun for either of them, but especially not for T2. Above you see T2 being soothed into remounting (we didn't want her to stay afraid of riding, since she is still interested in taking lessons next year)--- afterwards, we made a daisy coronet (below)and she felt much better. T1 is actually standing on the pony after being bucked off--- I'm not certain if she just loves ponies more (it may be) or if her fall was cushioned by T2!

Walking through Soest

Soest is a charming town, not far from my in-laws'.

We took the opportunity to let the children play with Oma and Opa and just took a walk along the city wall (still extant, with a running trail) and look at the trees in bloom: enjoying the medieval remains.

We also stopped at our favorite Eisladen, the Venezia, where we had coffees. The German wondered why his cost a bit more than mine: I pointed out that his had a Schlag, or a measure of alcohol, in it. (He had thought that he was ordering a cinnamon coffee but it was actually with cinnamon Schnapps.) About 85% of the coffee and hot chocolates (and ice cream confections) had alcohol in them— the menu made me laugh,a nd think how typical of Germany that is.

Rapunzel, Thinking

T2 Rapunzel Snow White LN1 LN2

What should I do next?

Goals for 2012

I'm not much for resolutions. They sort of drive me crazy, as if I fail in even the smallest way, I can find my resolve to do anything completely dissipated.

I do, however, want to set some rolling goals. For this year and going forward. I want to have a place where I can actually keep track of what I want to do and have these thoughts not just be on scraps of paper that I lose. I want to see where I (and we) are in the ever-changing structure and goal-setting of personal life. I also enjoy reading other people's life lists and I'd like to take a stab at at thinking about where we are and how we are progressing.

Current goals, very general:

1. Get in better shape. Do that through spending at least 4 sessions a week doing a proper cardiovascular activity. Which should be attainable, rather than daunting.
2. Decide where we will be next fall. We are moving. The question right now is, exactly where. It's either Munich or not. Now that we have achieved German public health insurance, the world is our oyster, as we will always be able to return to it. A huge, huge relief.
3. Make a little more time for our friends and family here in Germany, because we may not always be here. We just had a wonderful time over the holidays. The most relaxing and pleasant time since we got here 4+ years ago. We did it by actually having enough time to spend with them and we planned that time. We fell short of our goals- I had hoped to meet up with another cousin (+family) and aunt/uncle, as well as a blogger with whom I had been chatting (and to whom I owe an apology for not meeting)- but I accept my limitations and I'll try again in the spring. We did spend two nights with a friend and her family (so the girls played merrily), met up for a long afternoon with current friend and former au-pair, had an afternoon and evening with cousin (and family- kids had a blast), a birthday party with sister-in-law (and family, more masses of kids), time just chatting over the table with the in-laws and the sister-in-law and her friend. Good times.
4. Make more time for myself (cf #1) but also, note that the time that I have been spending on German classes has left me in a place where I have had not time to enjoy myself here in Berlin. Since taking the last 10 weeks off, the apartment is in better shape, the kids are getting more attention, and I have finally had a manicure: my first in this country. I'd like to continue in the path of spending more of my time making our family life less chaotic and more time enjoying this time when I am not required (and it would actually be deleterious) to work outside the home.
5. Get back to the Museums. I made a decent start on that last year, but then class and the kids' activities impinged. Since I will only be taking a 1 day grammar course this semester, I expect to spend much more deliberate time enjoying Berlin. I hope I can find a few folks to share the touristing with, but if not I will do it anyway.
6. Try to decrease the paper and book clutter in the house! I am constantly working on this (cf other blog) and this year we added another bookcase and a DVD case, which has helped. In addition, I am working my way through reading a very great many genre books, some of which will be returned to my mom, some which she doesn't want back and others of which I won't want to re-read when they are read: they are being gathered and will be 1. shipped back to Mom, 2. given to friends, 3 offered for sale locally and on Amazon and 4. given to a local library when the former don't pertain. Last year I donated 80+ books, this year I hope to achieve and surpass that level. So far I have 54 assembled, so there's not much chance of missing this goal.
7. Make certain that we have at least 1 family vacation and at least one vacation that I enjoy. This past year we had several weekends without the kids, through the joy of hotel points. Those vacations involved culture and walking through cities in other countries. We also had several with them. Of course, their favorites involved Disney, play grounds, pools (they don't need to leave a hotel to be happy- they only need a pool), and playing with other children. We are already starting to plan more for this year.
8. Try to stop over-planning. A major source of my stress in the last few years has actually just been about over-scheduling. Since the German is gone the majority of the week, we try to schedule things so we don't just veg. The kids really don't need that- they would be happy to just hang around in their pjs with us. Both my in-laws and my friends mentioned how much more relaxed the German was this last week. I think that was because, although I had scheduled our time (because otherwise we don't do anything), I both scheduled wisely and crossed out several activities (cf. meet blogger friend, meet with cousins and uncles) that, although we would have enjoyed them, would have mean that we were go, go, go non-stop.
9. Don't take things as seriously. It's hard to believe that at my age I am still so amazed, and sometimes hurt, at the bad behavior of others. I have made strides in just 1. cutting people who behave badly out of my life and 2. setting limits on how I will allow myself to be treated when not able to cut people who behave badly. This can be as simple as not allowing racist and xenophobic and sexist remarks to pass without open remark and as complex as needing to realize how deep these beliefs and behaviors may be in others' psyches, so deep that they are incapable of recognizing how sexism, patriarchy and racism have informed their understanding of normality.
10. And to round up the list, try to be more mindful of how happy my life is right now. It really is. This time with the kids is something that I am grateful for (no matter how stressful and annoying their behavior may sometimes be). It's a gift, they are a gift, my life is a gift, and I should enjoy every minute of it.

So, on the whole, life is getting better and more organized. There have been some hardships in our time here, and some health issues. But we are all in a good place now and it looks like , wherever that place is, it will only get better.

Before we leave

Pancakes.

And I had to make this 4 times (T2 gave out on the 4th round, so I could have some).

So doubling the recipe is now a given and I'm guessing that as my 5 and 8 year olds continue to grow a quadrupling will also become standard.

Florida! part 1

Vacation! We did so much that it will be hard to put it into a few posts.

• From Berlin to Miami, then a one day car rental (through Priceline) and a few hours drive north to where my family was staying (close to my brother and where my niece would be Bat Mitzvahed).
• Then a few hours south the next morning to visit a friend who I miss a lot. He's in prison and I am deeply sad that I don't live in the US and can't be a real support to him from out of the country. It took a lot of phone calls before I left to set up seeing him and the authorities were very kind to help me out and set up permission at relatively short notice.
• Up again for the rehearsal dinner before my niece's Bat Mitzvah. Got to chat with some folks I haven't seen since my brother's wedding and was happy to have the family down time.
  
• Bat Mitzvah and then the reception and then dinner/party. My niece did a wonderful job and I was completely impressed by her ability and maturity. I was terribly sorry to have missed my older niece's bat mitzvah and it was because we regretted that so deeply that we filed (six months ago!) for permission to take T1 out of school (not a thing lightly taken or easily allowed in Germany) so that we could be there for this. Beside the great work and care and study that V showed, it was really clear how well she and S are growing up and I was greatly moved by the depth of their affection for each other and their dad and by their dignity and maturity. It was a privilege to be able to share this moment and the other times we were able to spend with them while in Florida. I really hope to be able to spend some more time with them in the next year.
• Met up with V and S the next day to hang at the beach and chat and then drove down to meet my parents in the evening.
• Monday: Went down to visit B again. This time my parents and our friend L. watched the kids, which was a great relief as the visiting area at the prison was not kid/family friendly. We were not allowed to bring any games or books or toys or crayons or paper and pencil in for them to play with. I can understand that there are rules against contraband, but I spoke to the administration about whether it would be able to donate kids' books, toys or games for the visiting center (as shipments to inmates are allowed through Amazon and other on-line retailers) and was told: no. The multiple Bibles they had available were the only material they would allow. In a world where the goal is theoretically rehabilitation and that goal has been proven to be bettered when inmates retain family ties, when it takes so long to get to a prison (built in the backwoods) and so long to get through security to both enter and leave the prison (45 minutes to enter, 20+ to leave), how can making visiting untenable for families, children, mothers with small children (this was a man's prison, minimum security- what's it like at tougher prisons?) make any sense? I told the girls: no matter what, if you should ever be in a position where you might need to be imprisoned, take that term in Europe. Where the scale might be a bit to the light side, but the goal is not punitive, but what is best for society.
• And back to dinner at an interesting buffet with parents, friend and children: a super salad bar, with soups and pasta and desserts available as well. I spent my time at the salad bar, as I miss that so much here in Germany. Great prices for seniors and children.
• Tuesday was running about and doing chores, having a ring re-sized (arthritis took my wedding and engagement rings up a size and the price to enlarge them here- as well as the necessity of sending them away- made me instead just not wear them). A local store did the smything while I waited for one ring and I left the other- price was 1/3 what it was here. We also had our nails done (the kids started while I waited). The girls had their standard sparkling nail polish on fingers and toes and I tried out the new "gel" manicure: I wanted cobalt blue but the German recommended a sparkling white (to go with T1's sparkling pink and T2's sparkling purple). I was a bit hesitant, but it looked great in the Florida sunshine and in the sparkling pool water. Now that I'm back in grey, cold, drizzly Germany it looks a bit inappropriate. However, it's been 17 days and I still have a full manicure, without a crack or a chip. Since I usually chip them within 5 minutes, this is absolutely amazing. I'm not certain how I will be able to remove the lacquer, but I will look to see if I can find a place here in Berlin that does this (and use a more Berlin style dark and non-sparkly color). Though with my procrastinating ways, that could take a few more weeks.
  
• That evening we had an amazing dinner at a restaurant called Seasons 52. Charming seasonal menu, with no entree having a calorie count above 450. I certainly tasted noshort-cuts in the delicious meals: I had seared Ahi tuna and the German filet mignon (which we split between us). The children had mini-pizzas and my parents had trout and a chicken dish, all of which were wonderful.

Wednesday we left for Disney and that will be a new post.

(11.15)

Catching Up

View from the Spree this summer

One of these days I will finish up and publish the posts about our vacation, but right now I'm just catching my breath in a lazy day at home (doing some tidying and decluttering, but not laundry).

It's been a week and the German has been working like mad with T1 helping her to catch up on the work that she has missed (I don't think that we can take time off in the school year again- it's too hard catching up). So far, I have helped her with two classes and a test, he has helped with another two and she had a test yesterday and I hope that she can be prepared for a catch-up math test this week. Whew.

Orthodontist yesterday and swimming class today. Tomorrow I hope a swimming exam that will get her the Silver medal she should have had last year. Thursday nachhilfe and Friday art and then a deep breath and perhaps some fun on the weekend, rather than studying. Last week we were all in a stupor of exhaustion and I think we have finally caught up on our sleep.

The washing machine broke on Sunday and although the German has been working on it (taking things apart and replacing them), we need professional help. So I'll be hanging about tomorrow, missing a planned holiday lunch, waiting for the repairman (and it will be a man- this is Germany) to show up. I ran two loads yesterday, with the German draining the water out through a pipe, wringing the towels (ouch- not good for arthritic hands) and using the dryer as well as hanging the more delicate items. We can't last very long without a washer: right now the pile fills a basket and I should be changing the sheets tomorrow.

Back to my coffee and Castle, while I sort through more paperwork. Next commercial break I will run the bio, glass and paper down to the cellar. The clothes for donation are in the car (there's a collection point by my girls' school) and the plastic bags for the kita are also waiting for drop off.

Seasonal Turn over

I made a start at doing the seasonal turn-over before I left, but of course I needed to leave it undone: it was still transitional weather and I needed to pack for 30c, while leaving 18C expecting to come back to 5C.

So as I was unpacking the suitcases, I was also packing away the summer clothes, the fall clothes, the rain clothes and the clothes in the closets and drawers that were Summer/Fall/Spring seasonal, as well as the new and old hand-me-downs that are for sizes the girls won't wear for at least another year (so that I can re-check the sizes at the next seasonal turn-over).

Not quite done (although these boxes are now in the cellar) and not showing the tranches of removed items. But a good start.

Happier Memories

I try hard to build better memories for this date so when we saw an opportunity to enroll in a KinderBaustelle on this Sunday, we leaped at it.
There had been a kleingartenkolonie in our neighborhood which was, after years of fighting, sold by the community to be housing. (This area could actually use some). In any case, in a neighborly gesture, the company advertised a Children's Building Activity. Free but requiring registration and we jumped on that. It was possible for either Saturday or Sunday, but as I said, we try to build better memories.

It was great fun.

As you can see, the children had appropriately sized builder's gloves and hard-hats and t-shirts and because we were a limited number, every child got to be part of every building area. No hurrying, no worrying, no stress: just calm and interest and attentive Baumeisters and Azubis, both male and female. For the grown-ups (and the kids who could be torn away), juice and sodas and milk, coffee tea and pastries, bagels and cream cheese and wurst and belegte brotchen.

I'm not certain the girls are now thinking of the possibility of becoming bauarbeiters, but they (and we) really enjoyed learning about how it all works (quite differently here in Germany than in the US) and the kids used a backhoe, a crane, a cement crane, laid ceiling tile, worked on re-bar, pounded stone and had an all-around super time.

We really enjoyed it. I wasn't feeling well but the German shadowed the kids and I managed to take a few photos while drinking some weak coffee. We left with goody bags and a filled out activity sheet (the girls love being marked off as they fulfill all the stations).

What a lovely new memory on a day which seems, achingly, to always be beautiful.

Art

I am amazed and grateful to be living in a society that believes that art and an appreciation of it are a human right and one that Society (with a capital S) should extend to children.

Thing1 had been taking quite good art classes in the Friedrichstrasse area (not too bad by S-bahn), but those classes were preceded by a ceramics class which apparently had some sort of glaze or clay ingredient to which she was allergic: although she enjoyed it, she was displaying contact dermatitis quite severely (an issue she has had all her life). In addition, T2 wasn't allowed to participate (too young) and the classes ended late, so T1 could only go when the German was in town and able to take her.

Toward the end of last school year, T1 said that she wasn't learning any more and she wanted a different class. So I did a huge amount of looking around (and a good art class for young children is actually quite difficult to find) and discovered that my kiez (neighborhood) sponsors art and culture for children through the VHS system. Of course, my neighorhood is larger than all but 19 cities in Germany (there are 19 cities in the country with more than 300,000 inhabitants) so it's not surprising that there are some amenities.

What's amazing is that as we bail the southern countries out of the hole that they spent themselves into (through graft, corruption, black market dealings at all levels of society and outright cooking of the books), Germany still finds it important that being rich or poor should not alter children's access to cultural enrichment: the latest welfare (Hartz IV) reform laws included funds to allow even the poorest access to music and art lessons and appreciation, as well as to forests and farms.

The new class teacher allowed T2 to join in, even though she is 6 months younger than the limit (as otherwise she would be sitting outside with me through the 2 hour class) and she is having a blast: the first time they went, I was in a class myself, and the German didn't bring any mahlkittles. That was swiftly corrected (through the loss of that dress) and the second class had them both wearing art smocks. They were out of the large smocks and we thought T1 could just wear an apron... wrong. Her new style is in the footsteps of Jackson Pollack and the speckles went everywhere: she will have a long-sleeved full size smock this week.

The best part is that the class is in our neighborhood, only a short U ride away, that there is a great cafe across the street (and a Thai place a few doors down) and that now the kids can attend together, giving me a 2 hour block when I can read or have a coffee rather than running around, stressing out because someone will need to miss something. The down side is that when we shuffled the swim classes to free Friday for both of them, they came up consecutive. But consecutive is still far better than on separate days, as they were last school year!

So now we are settled in to our schedule and until T1 earns her music lessons back (through doing her homework cheerfully), it means that we have two days home by 4 pm (when she has nachhilfe) and 1 by 5 pm (after tennis): a huge improvement on last year!

La la la la La la la la Elmo's World (da da da)

La la la la
La la la la
Elmo's World (da da da)
La la la la
La la la la
Elmo's World
Elmo loves his goldfish
His crayon too
That's Elmo's World!

We recently got the new Shalom Sesame and T2 put it in. First she had to get Elmo to watch it with, though. (8/29)

Mother's Day

Today was the first day the girls have ever "made" Mother's Day without my husband actually putting it together. We woke to loud clanking sounds and the girls running in to tell us not to get up.
I particularly liked how they had set the table, with Zebra having a place and and audience of kuscheltiere. Notice how they set my plate with my inhaler and a bee (to signify sweetness and because T2 had made me a bee card)? They also decorated our breakfast eggs with appropriate sentiments (and the correct egg decorating pens) and only one of those was not hard-boiled.

After breakfast, we loaded up the bikes and wended our way through the many closed streets (there was some sort of road race) to the Huttenweg, where we biked and explored the forest.

Keukenhof

After we flew back from Birmingham and Eastercon, we packed up the girls and the bikes for our annual trip to the Keukenhof.

We generally stay in Leiden, which is relatively close and at a hotel which has a great pool for the kids. This time there were horses and ponies (a dam and foal of each) and the girls really enjoyed petting them.

Once we were at the Keukenhof, we did our regular wandering about and enjoying. this time, I allowed T2 to slip in the water while we were hopping across the stones and we then needed to spend quite some time with the German in the Men's room drying her pants and shoes: we bought some Dutch shoe house shoes for the children and T2 spent the rest of the time wandering around in them. T1 chose a pair in a Tulip pattern and I stared at them for a long time, wondering whether I should get myself a pair.

I asked the German, he said" If you like" and T1 said, "Go ahead, get it".

I didn't and now I regret it. Next time! The flowers were in better form than last year: one of the interesting aspects of always going on Easter vacation is that since Pesach/Easter is a movable holiday, the blooms we see vary quite a bit. We were too early for the strawberries, though, which I was sorry for. Seems odd that even though we have had some record heat, the strawberries are a bit behind in their normal season.

Happy Birthday!

It's been a busy week and it's going into a busy week. The middle of this two week period was T2's birthday party. We had a party for her and her friends (and T1 got to bring a friend along) on the weekend.
They seemed to all enjoy themselves.
We aren't quite certain why Germans will not RSVP, no matter how one asks, but at this point we are used to calling to confirm attendance (important because we also saw a puppet show Rumpselstiltskin and therefore it was necessary to be timely and for us to have a headcount). I made my standard chocolate cake with the requisite pink frosting and purple and white sparkling sugar.

That was followed with Monday's cake for her class and the cake for the last day of my class this semester. I actually ran out of butter for my third cake this week and had to use sprinkled powdered sugar and sparkling sugar for a frosting for T2 and make a French Yogurt Cake (with rose water) for my cake (as it used olive oil rather than butter). I was very glad to reach the end of the baking until next month!

The rest of the week will be practice Seders and buttoning up next month's newsletter.

(Darn- I am wrong. T2 is Shabbat Mama on Friday, so I'll be baking again, I think. Unless I wimp out with something purchased.)

Raising "multi-cultural" children

Over at American Expat in Deutschland, Christina raised some thought provoking questions about what it means to raise one's children as an expat, or in a multi-cultural environment:

If you were raised in a multicultural environment:

1. Describe, briefly, your upbringing.-- When I grew up, there was no such thing as a "multi-cultural environment". What there was, was life. My dad was a Shoah survivor, my mom was the child of refugees from the Russian empire and its pogroms. I was raised as an American, but always knowing that America was a melting pot.
   
2. What do you think your parents did well?--- They created a life out of nothing, they showed me how it is possible to be rootless and to succeed, they gave me a solid foundation of love to use as a ground. The ensured that my siblings and I knew, to our very deepest souls, that we were American and that we were Jewish and that there were no contradictions at all between those two. My father, especially, coming from a world where there was no equity or justice, raised us to believe in a morality and equity that he was not raised with.
   
3. What do you think your parents could have done better?--- I regret every day that I grew up with parents who spoke, between them, 9 languages, yet I only learned English. I think they should have made more of an effort to ensure that I spoke at least yiddish, if not Hebrew or Russian or Czech, or any of the languages that would have allowed me to feel more deeply rooted in a past that had already been destroyed by external forces, and to connect to the still remaining far flung pieces of my family. But they lived in a time when this was not considered appropriate for Americans, especially when Eastern European languages were considered to be "lower class", and they did what they thought was best for their children.
4. What would you do differently given the same situation?--- How can I say what I would have done? Living at that time and from their backgrounds, I hope that I would have attempted to build a stronger social network, to root myself in neighborhood more. But here I am, in a foreign country where I am not a native speaker, and my roots are only in the topsoil. I am ensuring that my children are fluent in the language of both their parents, we have moved to ensure that they form a strong bond with a large part of their family, and they are solidly implanted in a school that will nurture their identity and allow them to feel more strongly their heritage.
   

If you are raising your children in a multicultural environment:

1. What parts of your culture do you most want passed on to your children, or are you happy raising them only in the dominant culture?---I think that I am not necessarily the average expat parent at whom these questions are aimed, because as a Jewish American I am an alien in every culture, including my home culture. Although we made a point of putting the children in a German school, they are in a German Jewish school, so they will never sing along with the "Drei Königen" songs, and probably not have any memories of St. Martin's Day Lanterns, Öster Häse, St. Nikolaus, or other German traditions that are Christian-based. The decision we made to not put them in the German-American school but rather in the German-Jewish was a difficult one and we will need to ensure that the kids have more exposure to America and the American way of thought as they grow older because we made that decision. We would not have raised them in "the dominant culture" in the US either, although as the American culture is not religiously based, they would have absorbed it in every interaction and experience.
   
2. What are you doing differently than parents in the dominant culture?--- I don't live within the dominant culture, so I'm not certain what those parents do. I see so many different ways to "handle" children, just by those Germans that I know. I'm comfortable saying that I seem to listen to my children more, allow them to make decisions on what I consider minor issues but which they consider important more, and am less didactic. But that could simply be a function of who my kids are and who I am. I do know that my children appear to be more open and friendly than German children in the "dominant culture", but that is also probably a function of our frequent moves and modeling: I'm pretty free and easy at chatting with strangers, compared to the general German.
   

It was interesting to think about these questions and it will be interesting to see if my thinking changes in the future. Thanks, Christina.

Halloween in January

I'm not exactly certain why T2 felt like making a Jack O'Lantern this week, but she did a very nice job of it. I think the ducky bathrobe made a real contribution to the overall theme of the holiday revisited.

And the Jack O'Lantern lasts much longer with the temperature hovering around 2C than it did in October.