Treasure from the Thriftstore or My Best Chrismas Present

I got this really cool set of books from my husband for Christmas. He had wrapped up two books from the Life Time books series titled "The Art of Sewing". He said he didn't want to wrap all of them. Too much work, you know. But he had hidden "a few more" under his desk in our basement.

All in all I found 13 from the set. It took a couple of days to pry out the information of where he found them: At the local thriftstore. Does your spouse shop for your Christmas presents at Salvation Army? If not you may want to give him a hint. LOL

I love the set! Though I did not get the complete set and at first glance the book content doesn't appear organized and thourough enough to the German reader, I found the books quite entertaining. The series was published in the early 7os. Totally retro! Even if you don't care about sewing but love James Bond movies, you would enjoy this set. Psychadelic pictures of clothing will dazzle you, and every outfit James and his mistresses ever wore in the 70s movies are pictured in the books.

I am not sure about the quality of the sewing tips. The writing appeared to be a bit on the superficial side at first glance. But who cares? Each hardcover volume is beautifully bound in a different fabric. From fine silk to chunky corduroy. My husband loved the thick bright red corduroy one. I am kind of partial towards the pink butterfly book with the title "The Personal Touch".

Unfortunately my set was not quite complete. An internet search for a complete list of titles showed that there are 17 volumes in all in this series. I found that I am missing smashing titles such as

"Exotic Style"

"Novel Materials"

"Boutique Attire"

and "The Master Index" to the series.

Luckily I was able to find and order the missing books. I can't wait to see them in person.

The Best Christmas Present / Das Beste Weihnachtsgeschenk

Reading the title of this post you may have expected to find pictures of children opening boxes and wading through piles of wrapping paper. I am afraid, Santa did not bring the best gift this year. It came from Nature!

The gift the children enjoyed most this year came from above but it was not a toy. It came a day before Christmas. It came in big fluffy white heaps. It was not set down by the warm fireplace in the house. Nope it landed in the backyard, and it was oh so ccccold. Brrr. You guessed it: We got lots of snow. A beautiful White Christmas this year.

While his sister went sledding my son decided to build a snow cave in the backyard. It provided hours and hours of fun. So much so that the children forgot all about Christmas for a while...The right size and weight of snow shovels and having right kind of tools for snow cave building became a crucial matter. Santa, do the elves make snow shovels at the Northpole?

Merry Christmas! Frohe Weihnachten!

German Dolls wishes Happy Holidays to all customers, friends, team mates from the Natural Kids team. Thanks for all the support you have given me throughout 2009!

Happy New Year!

Sincerely, Ulla

A few more Nutcracker pictures...

After 3 performances the cast was quite exhausted. I heard one little parrot say to her mother:" Mommy can we do this every night?" Something about that stage...I am glad we survived another year of late night practices and performances. We'll safe our energy and do it all over again - next year!
Our cast had 140 performers in it. Except for the sugar plum fairy and the cavalier they were all local kids. I feel so blessed that the Colorado Dance Theatre ( local non-profit organization) gives children the opportunity to do this each year. Unfortunately with the economy being so bad we had a much smaller audience this year. But as they say: "The show must go on!"

Pictures of Angels...

Each year I say it: No more Nutcracker. I will not do this again next year. The long late night practices, fighting with the costume and make-up, buns that just won't stay put...The next day the tears and the crying. Children that are too tired to go to school. But then I look at the cute pictures, the smiles and their excitement being on stage again. We'll probably do it again next year...

Here are some pictures from last night's dress rehearsal without make-up. Today we'll have the dress rehearsal with make-up. On Friday it is show time!

Winterimpressionen aus Colorado

Es schneit! Es schneit! Jetzt schon zum dritten mal. Zwischen Bestellungen bin ich nur noch am Schnee schaufeln. Hier sind ein paar Bilder vom ersten grossen Schnee hier. Die Bilder zeigen den Blick auf die Strasse vor unserem Haus.

Weisse Weihnacht - kein Problem in Colorado!

If you are wondering what I have been up to...

Happy December!

I just wanted to show some new pictures of my growing collection of Pocketdolls. I believe I have 42 different colors now. Some of them I will run out of soon. It makes me so sad to see a pretty fabric go. Do you ever get sad when you run out of a fabric and know you will never be able to find it again?.

I have this great rusty orange velour. The one after the bright orange/tangerine baby. Almost gone...And then there is the sweet moss green. I cannot find it anywhere. Please, if you know where to get it drop me a note!

I am addicted to fabric...Any others here? Feel free to 'fess up here! Is there a fabriholic anonymous group somewhere?

What a little advertising can do for you!

Oh my! My little shop was featured in a Storque article Friday a week ago.

http://www.etsy.com/storque/spotlight/etsy-finds-a-team-6075/

The article was not about my shop. It did not mention me in particular. It really was about the many different kinds of etsy teams you can join on etsy. But the mention of my very cool team, the naturalkids team, was followed 4 pictures with shop links of items from various team members. One of them was a picture of my miniature Pocketdolls - the one shown below. Wow!

At first I could not figure out why I had so many views on newly listed items. To my shame I have to admit, I still have not set up google analytics which helps one track such things...I just don't have the time and energy to figure out these little technical details. Then I saw that my hearts had gone up by over 100 in two days. I had over 40 sales in 3 days.

So I went to the forums and asked. Some nice person pointed out the fact that my little dolls where featured in that article. Now I can only imagine what an article written by me could do for my shop...I will put this idea on my list for New Year's Resolutions: Propose article to etsy...

Got to run folks and play catch-up, make sure I get everything made and mailed out in a timely fashion. Luckily I have worked out a good system. I blogged about it last year around Christmas time when things got very busy over here.

Thank you Etsy for featuring my little dollies! I am very grateful this Thanksgiving that my sales in November were up and I can afford Christmas present for my family...

My Piece of The Wall/ translation

I was too tired yesterday to translate my post about the Fall of The Wall. I had just returned from a presentation about it at the University of Northern Colorado. I thought the presenters did a wonderful job. I was glad to see that so many people (around 100) came to attend the event. It demonstrates that many people here are still fascinated by these very important event that shaped my home country in such a significant way.

It was 20 years ago from yesterday. Oh my gosh! One feels really old thinking about being there life when it all happened. Where has all that time gone?


I was 21 years old, had just moved to Berlin to be a student at the Free University of Berlin. (one of the institutions of higher education on the Western side of the city!) Berlin was a city of students back then. Only few people wanted to live there. In fact so few that the government created an employee bonus, called the Berlinzulage, to encourage people to move to Berlin and work there.
It was the island of hope in the hostile communist East.

I was a student in the North American Studies program at the John-F. Kennedy Institute. Of all things - what irony!

I clearly remember the events of that night. In the early evening hours a good friend of mine called me on the phone. She said: "We must go to the Brandenburger Tor. All hell is breaking loose there. I heard on the radio that people are climbing up on The Wall."

It was a very cold November night when I left the house. I was wearing my thick winter jacket. But the closer we came to the Brandenburg Gate the thicker the masses of people became. There was an atmosphere of partying and laughter all around us. We ran into some friends who had brought hammers and chisels, prepared to take The Wall down tonight! People were lending each other a hand to climb up. Once up there there was a strange mixed feeling of fear and enthusiasm. As one stared down into the chasm of the deathstrip one wondered... There were soldiers, Eastern security personal, with weapons. Were they going to shoot at us? But people threw down gum, candy, cans of coke. It appeared that this strategy was working. No shots were fired. The guards were actually smiling. More and more people felt encouraged to use the tools they had brought along. Out came the chisels and hammers, and we started to take down The Wall that night!



In the picture you can see my little piece of history chiseled from that wall 20 years ago. Long long ago...

Mein Stueck Mauer/ My Piece of The Wall

Heute vor 20 Jahren fiel "Die Mauer". Man fuehlt sich ganz schoen alt wenn man life dabei war...Meine Guete 20 Jahre. Wo ist die Zeit geblieben?

Ich war damals gerade mal 21 Jahre alt, war aus dem WESTEN zum Studium nach Berlin gezogen. Berlin war damals eine Stadt voll von Studenten. Nur wenige Menschen wollten dort leben und arbeiten. So wenige, dass die Regierung den dort Beschaeftigten einen Bonus zahlte, die sogenannte Berlinzulage. Berlin, eine Insel im feindlichen komunistischen Osten.

Und ich lebte dort und studierte Amerikanistik. Ironie des Schicksals...

Ich werde nie vergessen, wie mich an jenem Abend vom 9.11.1989 eine Freudin anrief. "Komm schnell, wir muessen zum Brandenburger Tor! Da ist die Hoelle los. Ich habe im Radio gehoert, dass Leute auf die Mauer klettern".



Es war eine sehr kalte Nacht als ich das Haus verliess. Ich trug meine dicke Winterjacke. Aber je naeher wir dem Brandenburger Tor kamen, desto dicker wurden die Menschenmassen. Und in der Masse vergass man die Kaelte. Es war Partystimmung , alle lachten und freuten sich beim Erklimmen "Der Mauer". Wir trafen Bekannte, die Hammer und Meissel mitgebracht hatten. Es war schon sehr komisch. Die Mischung von Angst von der Mauer herunter in den Todesstreifen zu stuerzen, und seltsamem Enthusiasmus. Unten im Todesstreifen standen eine Menge unsicherer Sicherheitspolizisten, die nicht wussten wie sie reagieren sollten. Oben wir, die Wessies, die Kaugummi, Suesskram, und Cokedosen zu ihnen herunterwarfen. Diese Ueberredungsstrategie schien zu funktionieren. Kein Schuss fiel, und in dieser Nacht begannen wir mit dem Abriss "Der Mauer".

Auf dem Bild koennt Ihr mein Stueck Mauer sehen, welches ich in der Nacht persoenlich herausmeisselte. Mein kleines Stueck Geschichte. Lang, lang ist's her.

Custom Doll Clothing

Happy November! It's been busy in my little doll studio. After an eerily quiet October and September, all of sudden the orders started pouring in... Christmas is on it's way.

I am having a hard time with some requests I am getting this time of year though. I receive many an email these days, from people who want to buy my doll clothes for dolls they ordered from another Waldorf doll maker. I find that it is just about impossible to change or adjust a pattern to make my clothing fit another doll. Let's say, even if a doll is the same height as my doll: I don't know if the limbs are skinny or chubby, shorter or longer, or whether the torso is the same length? The shoulders may be wider. The doll may be more chubby around the waistline... Handmade dolls are very much like people in that way! They are little individuals and you must try on the clothes to make sure they fit. Unfortunately I cannot invite the dolls into my home to try on the clothing. The clothes I make pretty much come in one size: The size that perfectly fits my 12" doll model. So I mostly discourage people from buying my doll clothes for other dolls since I cannot guarantee the fit even if they give me the measurements of their dolls...

I am really feeling bad for all the poor dolls who'd like to wear my rather fashionable doll clothes. But I'd rather not have the sale than an unhappy customer!

Fall Impressions / Herbstimpressionen

I cannot believe I took these pictures last weekend. It was a nice sunny day and the kids were helping with raking the leaves. They had so much fun plaing in them.

Ich kann es kaum glauben dass ich diese Fotos letztes Wochenende gemacht habe. Es war ein schoener sonniger Tag, und die Kinder halfen beim Sammeln der Blaetter. Sie hatten so viel Spass beim Spielen im Laub.

Two days later it snowed on us. A snowstorm dumped about 3 inches of snow on us...

Zwei Tage spaeter schneite es. Ein Schneesturm schuettete ca 10 centimeter Schnee auf uns herab..

I guess it is Good-Bye Fall already! Welcome winter!

Es scheint zu heissen: Auf Wiedersehen Herbst! Wilkommen Winter!

Dolls for Boys and for the Imagination

I think it is so important for boys to have dolls to play with when they are little. Unfortunately a lot of people seem to think that boys won't enjoy them or it would be an "unmanly" gift to give to a young fellow. Why so? Little boys grow up to be fathers. Hopefully when they do, they will have practiced with a soft, warm ,wool-stuffed Waldorf style doll like the one shown in the pictures.

Waldorf style dolls are usually gender neutral. The only way to tell a boy from a girl doll is by the clothes the doll is wearing. I once received an email from a customer who had bought a boy doll, asking where the doll's "you-know-what" was. Blush...What was I to say? It had never even occurred to me to make a doll that was realistic in that respect. I have never seen a pattern that included genitalia indicating the gender of the doll.

Though made of plastic, I fondly remember the Ken-Doll I received one Christmas Eve in the 1970s. My sisters and I always thought it was kind of curious how Ken did not have any genitals. But did it make us doubt his manliness? Not really. All it took was a bit of imagination.

A lot of commercial toys these days don't leave room for a child's imagination. For example, coloring books, where the child fills in the blanks, but there is no room for his or her own drawings... I'd rather buy my child an empty sketchbook! After all, that is what Waldorf dolls are all about. Waldorf dolls, in their purest form, have intentionally no features at all or very simple ones. Dots for eyes and a line for a mouth. Some artists will put a nose. I usually don't. I am always amazed at how much expression you get from this simplest of faces. I enjoy the pure an simple beauty of these doll.

I don't like clutter. It makes life so complicated. I like wide open spaces. I like an empty canvas or empty piece of ruled paper. Oh the possibilities...

What became of the heads/ Was aus den Koepfen wurde...

Last weekend I made heads. Here is one of the dolls that came to life with one of the heads I made. I named her Jenny. I think she turned out so cute! I love her coloring. The golden mohair yarn looks so nice with the lavender bow and nightgown.

Letztes Wochenende habe ich Koepfe gebastelt. Diese Woche wurde einer der Koepfe in klein Jenny eingebaut. Ist sie nicht suess? Ich find ihr goldenes Haar passt wirklich gut zur lila Schleife und dem lila Kleidchen.

Some thoughts on making doll heads...

In my opinion the most important part of a Waldorf style doll is the head. The head needs to be the perfect size for your doll. If it is too big or too small your doll will not look right. In order to achieve a successful doll you must get the proportions right! I guess being trained as a painter and taking lots of "life" drawing classes, has helped me immensely with this aspect of doll making. After all, dolls are just imitations of the human body, usually the child sized body. When you look at a painting with human figures, you'll probably find the one with the right proportions more beautiful and pleasing to the eye. I believe the same is true for dolls.

If you have ever made a Waldorf doll you probably know how much work it is to make a doll head from scratch. The ingredients and tools used are rather simple: a strong kind of thread or string, floss, cleaned carded sheep's wool, a piece of stretchy cotton tubing, scissors,doll maker's needle.

It takes me about an hour to make a good head. I admit it is not my favorite part of doll making. In fact I like to make heads only about once every couple months. I call it my head making day or fest. I will make between 8-10 heads in a session - usually spread out over two days. I find that making a number of heads at a time improves the quality. With each head I get more into the grove until they finally become effortless and perfectly even.

Here are some pictures of my latest "headfest". I had fun arranging them in different ways.

A book review of sorts/ Advice on buying a sewing machine

About a year ago my sewing machine broke. It was a cheap hand-me-down machine from a friend. I had been fighting with this cheap department store bought machine for quite a while. I was so tired of constantly running to the repair shop and paying the little bills for getting the tension adjusted and resolving other issues. You can ask my family - they still remember the days BEFORE THE BERNINA entered my life. To say the least, I was not a happy camper or seamstress...The emphasis mostly being on STRESS.

I had it with that cheap machine and was anxious to buy a new machine for my little business. So I went to library to do some research . I found this neat little book at my local library by John Giordano. I don't know too many guys who sew, but does this guy know his stuff! The book's title is:

The Sewing Machine Guide: Tips on Choosing, Buying, and Refurbishing.

I really learned so much from it. So if you are in the market for a new sewing machine you may want to read it!

After lots of research I ended up purchasing a Bernina 1008. I solemnly swear, they are not paying me to say this! This machine is just great. It is a mechanical sewing machine - not one of those fancy schmancy computerized machines. But boy, does it work well! I have worked with it for over a year now and it has NEVER let me down. It sews through all kinds of materials.

I guess the part that really killed me, was the easily accessibility of the bobbin case. The old machine was as inconvenient as it could get. Whenever the thing got jammed with lint (which happens a lot with those cheap machines) or there was a tension problem - I had to take a little screwdriver and open it up. Sooo much time wasted!



I also highly recommend Giordano's book because not only did it help me make a decision buying the right machine - it also had a great deal of information on how to care for my machine after I bought it!

One tip I found really helpful was the Giordano's recommendation to purchase a small vacuuming device! You know, like the type people use for their computer keyboards. Whenever lint collects in the bobbin case, I just take my little vacuum out and voila - all clean in seconds! It is so much better than blowing the lint into the machine - like it did before.

I hope this post of mine helps someone who needs a new sewing machine. I am also glad I listened to my husband's words. He told me to NOT buy a used machine but get a new one. I had played with the idea for buying a used model over the Internet. DH said: Why would you buy someone else's problem? When buying for your business you should buy the best NEW machine you can afford.
I am so happy I followed his advice. I am totally happy with my machine and how it has enabled to me make lots of cute doll clothes.

Happy sewing to all of you!

Ulla

I love Fall / Ich liebe den Herbst

I love fall with all it's pretty colors: the bright yellows, warm oranges and reds, shades of ocre and brown. After a long hot summer the crisp cool Octoberdays make me want to go outside and take deep breaths. Ahh! The smell of fall.

Ich liebe den Herbst mit all seinen schoenen Farben: leuchtende Gelbtoene, warme Orange und Rottoene, Ocker und Braun. Nach einem langen heissen Sommer draengen mich die frischen kalten Oktobertage nach draussen zu gehen und tief durchzuatmen. Ahh! Es riecht nacht Herbst.

The children have been asking us to make fires in the fireplace, in anticipation of cups of hot chocolate and freshly baked apples consumed in front of it. The changing season is cause for joy. Unfortunately we always end up with various sicknesses in this time of transition. It never seems to fail. Once school starts, so does a cycle of colds and illnesses. We have to remind ourselves that it is important to dress warmly and rest once in a while.

In der Vorfreude auf heisse Schokolade und Brataepfel verlangen die Kinder taeglich das wir ein Feuer im Kamin machen. Der Jahreszeitenwechsel ist Grund fuer grosse Freude. Leider fuehrt diese Uebergangszeit immer zu Krankheiten. Die Schule faengt an und gleichzeitig beginnt der Teufelskreis von Erkaeltungen und anderen Krankheiten. Wir muesse und daran erinnern uns warm anzuziehen und auch mal eine Pause einzulegen.

What can one do to boost one's immunesystem? What, besides eating lots of fruit and fresh vegetables? Do you take vitamins? Is there a tea you can recommend? Having recovered from the first "round" of sickness I would like to hear from you about natural ways to boost your immunesystem.

Was kann man tun, um das Immunsystem zu staerken? Ausserdem. dass man viel Obst und frisches Gemuese konsumiert?Nehmen Sie Vitamine? Koenne Sie einen Tee empfehlen? Nachdem wir die erste Krankheitsrunde ueberstanden haben, wuerde ich gerne ein paar Tips von Ihnen hoeren. I'll leave you with pictures of some fall treasures I made for my etsy shop celebrating the gorgeous colors of fall that I love so much. Happy Fall!

Ansonsten verbleibe ich mit Bildern von ein paar Herbstschaetzen in meinen Lieblingsfarben, die ich fuer meinen Etsyladen hergestellt habe. Froehlichen Herbst!

Bees in our Backyard: Part II / Bienen in unserem Garten: Teil 2

Thanks to Lucky Pebble, I just remembered that I never told you what became of our bee project. Remeber the bees, my husband and I received as a birthday gift in April? Well, I am proud to say that they did not abandon the hive! They decided they liked it here and worked as hard as only bees can work. Sometimes I wonder if humans could solve the global warming problem if people worked on this project as hard as bees work on their projects...

We think the bee population in our top bar hive grew from around 10,000 bees to over 50,000.

Pretty cool , eh?

Along the way we did encounter some problems. For some reason the bees did not build their combs straight down from the top bars. On some bars they built multiple "sheets" of comb at a slanted angle. You can see that in the closeup picture below. There really should just be one comb per bar. This sort of messed things up because we were not able pull the bars straight up and out. The crooked "sheets" of comb needed to be cut because they were stuck together in places. In the process we had some loss of life and honey. Very frustrating.

Why are the bees building crooked comb? Any beekeepers out there? Could it be because the hive itself is not sitting straight on the ground - but slightly angled? My husband rested the hive on a couple of benches from an old picknick table.

In the other closeup you can see some unfinished honeycomb. The cells are not closed or capped off. Apparently the bees decide when the honey is at it's best and put a lid on. We opened the hive twice over the last five months. I only have pictures from the first event.

The uncapped honey was not very sweet and as tasty as the final product. The last time we opened the hive we got a few beautiful chunks of the most delicious honey comb. We did not take a lot. We want our pets to be able to survive the winter and continue their happy life in our backyard. We got ONE precious jar we will savor down to the last drop over the next few weeks.

Plus, I got some wonderful beeswas to seal the wood buttons for my doll clothes. I love our new pets. They stung only twice. Luckily the kids and I got off scott free...

New Doll Dress Design / Neues Design fuer Puppenkleid

The childhood memories of a dear customer (remembering Holly Hobbie Dolls) inspired me to make a new dress and change up my dress design a bit. I made the sleeves and pocket of the dress of a solid matching fabric. Thanks to my secret fabric fairie -I was able to create this dress from an absolutely adorable Japanese quilt fabric. It is a cheater quilt fabric in beautiful shades of purple, pink, and green.



Die Kindheitserinnerungen (die Erinnerung an Holly Hobbie Puppen) einer lieben Kundin inspirierten mich zu kleinen Veraenderungen bei meinem Puppenkleid Design. Die Aermel und Tasche fuer das Pueppkleid sind aus einem einfarbigen Material, passend zum Stoff, genaeht. Dank meiner geheimen Stoff-fee - konnte ich dieses huebsche Kleid aus einem total suessen Japanischem Stoff kreieren. Der gefaelschte Patchworkstoff ist in den Farben lila, rosa, und gruen gehalten.


And check out the cute little boots I made to match this dress! They have a darling butterfly design needlefelted to match one of patterns from the dress. For an even more realistic look the butterfly's feeler are sticking out from the dress.

Und schau mal an welch suesse kleine Stiefel - von mir passend zum Kleid gefertigt! Sie haben ein Schmetterlingsdesign, welches durch nadelfilzen entstanden ist. Die Fuehler der Schmetterling sind aufgestickt und wirken sehr realistisch.

Wood Buttons / Holzknoepfe

One would think that adding a closure to a doll dress was a snap. Well it used to be. Then along came the CPSIA laws. New consumer protections laws mandate that all children's items containing small metal parts will have to be tested for lead come February 2010. As a small business owner I cannot afford to have expensive tests done and my items destroyed in the process. So I decided to change my product.

When I make a doll dress my customers have two options to choose from: velcro or a wood button type closure. I recommend velcro for young children who still need to work on their eye-hand coordination. Also, if kids still chew on their toys, a 1/2 inch wood button might not be the right idea for them.

If you are not a great fan of velcro, like myself, you may prefer the wood buttons. I found some really attractive wood buttons on etsy. One kind of button I discovered are called tree branch buttons. They are more rustic looking. They come with a rougher outer rim of real wood bark or smooth . Tree branch buttons are thicker than your regular sort of button. They are available at the http://www.thebuttonshop.etsy.com/

Of course, if your are the crafty type, you can attempt to make buttons yourself. I drove my husband sheer crazy when I asked him to drill holes in some tiny dried up branches I collected from the oak trees in front of our house. Can you please slice and dice them up for me? What? But the patient crafter will eventually persist. After hours of hard labor I had a handfull of sweet buttons. Now that explains hight price for such things...Sigh.

It was much easier to buy another set of pretty buttons from http://www.LessMagnets.etsy.com/

They are not as cool as the tree branch kind, but almost as handsome. After I added a natural finish to them I was really pleased with myself. It was fun to add a coat of mineral oil and a layer of all natural bees wax made by our pet bees.

You can find instructions for natural wood finishes on this cool site:

www.make-baby-stuff.com

Now what kind do you prefer?

I am kind of tired. Maybe the translation of this post will follow tomorrow...

Ich bin muede. Vielleicht kommt die Uebersetzung dieses Eintrags morgen noch...

Visiting the Rockies...Bilingual / Ein Besuch in den Rockies ...Zweisprachig!

My sister came to visit this summer. We had a great time together visiting the Rocky Mountain National Park. It is about an hour's drive to the mountains from our house. Still, we hardly ever go there. Why? I don't understand. It is so beautiful in the mountains. I took some pictures to share.

My sister complained about how I hardly speak German to the children. I have been living in the US for so long. It is hard when you don't get to speak your mother tongue every day. I find more and more words are slipping from my memory and being replaced with English only. Maybe it is time to actively fight that. I will try and write more German. How about a bilingual blog, I thought. So here it goes.

For all of you who do speak German: Enjoy. And for those who don't just skip the German parts (colored in red). =)

Meine Schwester kam zu Besuch diesen Sommer. Wir hatten viel Spass bei unserem Ausflug in den Rocky Mountain National Park. Es ist ungefaehr eine Autostunde von unserem Haus bis in die Berge. Trotzdem fahren wir selten dorthin. Warum eigentlich? Ich verstehe es nicht. Es ist so schoen in den Bergen. Ich habe ein paar Bilder gemacht, um sie hier mit Euch zu teilen.

Meine Schwester beschwerte sich, weil ich so selten deutsch mit den Kindern rede. Ich lebe schon so lange in den Vereinigten Staaten. Es ist schwierig wenn man nicht jeden Tag seine Muttersprache spricht. Ich merke, dass ich immer mehr Woerter vergesse. Nach und nach werden sie mit dem Englischen allein ersetzt. Vielleicht ist es jetzt zeit diesen Verlust aktiv zu bekaempfen. Also dachte ich mir: Wie waer's mit einem zweisprachigen Blog?

Fuer alle, die hier Deutsch sprechen: Viel Spass. Und fuer diejenigen, die kein Deutsch sprechen: "Lest einfach ueber den deutschen Text (red parts) hinweg!"