Knorr Family Adventures

Warning: this post will truly be a saga of Anton and his kindergarten adventures.  Some people might recall that when we moved here I did not realize that we had to look for kindergarten like right away and waited until April or May time frame to start applying.   (By the way when I say kindergarten I am talking about a mix of daycares and   preschools which attend kids from 3 years old to 6.   6 is the magic number to start first grade.)   Anyway, back to our story – I had to have applied to at least 5 or 6 places last year and we got accepted into two.  One that was kind of far away and was only offering half-day spot.   The other place was great – we could see it out of our window, the staff spoke some English and it was a full day spot.   Well, on the day we accepted the spot the place burned down.   Thankfully, it happened overnight and nobody was hurt.   Unfortunately, they choose not to rebuild and we lost that spot.   We called our local youth administrator and he poin

I have to say I absolutely love the opportunities that we have here for us and the kids.    For us - i n one year we have traveled through so many interesting places that sometimes it's hard to believe and for the boys -  we have found ways to get them involved in many new and exciting things right here in Frankfurt. Andrei and Ilya did track and field for about 5 months last spring.  Ilya loved it, Andrei not so much.   Andrei has been playing chess since July and now we are now looking for a new club for him because the current one is not cutting it (just not strong or organized enough).  He is going to his first chess tournament in a couple of weeks.   Ilya is learning Russian, first at Saturday school, and now in his full time school where he also gets to learn how to draw (something he absolutely loves), dance and play on a recorder amongst many other things.   Ilya also goes to a Saturday class called “Applied Arts” where he gets to do arts and crafts.   Saturdays al

It makes sense that the longer we stay here the more we get integrated into society and start looking for things that we need/want.   One of those things is looking for more medical related services.   Maybe we were just really lucky in Pittsburgh and I have definitely learned to navigate the complicated systems of support services but Germany takes everything to a whole new level. Apparently (from somewhat of a hearsay) for regular visit, a doctor gets paid only 10 euros so that means that they try to push through as many patients as they can and many times it does feel like we are very incredibly rushed but also many times we are in the waiting room for an hour ... I have no logical explanation ... Several examples that kind of drive me up the wall!   At his 3 year check up, Anton failed regular eye test and we went to see a specialist who said that he definitely needs glasses but wanted to refer him to another specialist.   This second specialist said that he is fine, no glass

In the last 2 weeks I met with teachers from Anton’s school and from Ilya’s school for what I am guessing is a semi-annual review.   Both had really good reviews so I’ll start with the youngest. Anton has adjusted really well to kindergarten.   He (usually) goes into the room without any problems barely waving bye to me.   In the last 3 months his German has really increased – he understands what his teachers are saying to him and is starting to say some words back to them.   At this point he still uses a lot of English words but it’s not a problem for them.   He is finally potty-trained!   Anton is very high energy but also plays nice with kids when they play calmer games like pretend kitchen.   Anton absolutely loves puzzles and can spend an hour just working on a puzzle.   As a side note – Chris and Ilya are working on a 1000-piece puzzle together and they left it on the coffee table one night when I told all 3 boys to clean up and Anton in his efforts to listen cleaned A LOT o

I can't believe it's nearly the end of November!  The boys had their 2 week fall break in the last 2 weeks of October.  We knew that we wanted to go somewhere pretty early on and we settled on Hungary.  However, when all the recent issues in Hungary came up we decided that it wasn't so smart and changed it up to Legoland.  That's about all the plan we had until 1 day before we left.  About 24 hours before we left we decided to look on the map and plan our route - advanced planning with 3 kids at its best.  I've heard of spa town called Baden Baden and thought it would be a good first stop.  Thankfully, Chris found out some information and apparently, it's not so kid friendly.  After that we booked a hotel in Stuttgart and decided to take the boys to the pool and then explore Stuttgart a bit. Pool as always was a blast. Stuttgart, as we found out, has a couple of interesting sights - public library, Porsche museum.  Unfortunately, we didn't make it to the m

Saturday before the school started we came back from a 2 week vacation travelling through mostly southern France and spending a week in the resort town Miami Platja in Spain.   Spain is drastically different from Germany.   Starting from the fact that nearly nobody speaks English and neither Chris nor I have any knowledge of Spanish, the supermarkets have different assortment of foods which actually resembles more American in the brands they carry (Hellmann’s, Kellogg’s,   etc.).   Of course it does have really good Spanish ham!     We rented 2-bedroom apartment for a week which was done in a very Spanish style with orange and green walls and tile floors.     It had a tiny kitchen but enough to make a quick breakfast and a sandwich, but the best part was the pool downstairs as well as the proximity to the beach.   One beach was 5 minute away by walking (super local, very few tourists), another was about 7 minutes away by car (semi-local, semi-tourist) and the third beach was about

We've been here for a year and it's been an exciting year at that. We arrived in the last week of October and settled into one month rental in a beautiful Bad Hamburg.  Things got off to a rocky start with Anton's first round of bronchitis and the boys started school . Before too long Anton had another bronchitis but thankfully by Christmas it was all good.  Our first Christmas was good and we decided to head out to Paris. We all had birthdays here and we love getting our boxes full of surprises every time, but miss our family very much. Last year, while convenient to have all the boys in the same school, wasn't ideal for any of the boys.  So this year we made a change and while it's not ideal for me the boys are going to 3 different schools and they seem to be happy and thriving.  The boys are still doing swimming and Ilya does an all around German sport - soccer.  We've been to emergency room way too many times for my taste - bronchitis and

This is one of those lists: you "live in Germany when ..." - you can leave restaurant to go smoke outside or go to ATM and people wouldn't chase you down the street thinking you left without paying - no ice in your drinks - if you want flat (still) water, you have to specifically ask for it and you will pay for it (no free tap water).  If you just ask for water at the restaurant you will get fizzy stuff that my husband has learned to love but the rest of us not so much - you can go 90 mph on the autobahn and it will still free like you are the slowest car on the road.  In fact, it's really easy to get to fairly high speeds without realizing it - when you go to the grocery store you need to bring a coin and depending on the store it could either be 50 cents or 1 euro to get the cart.  You also have to bring your bags because otherwise you will have to pay 10 cents per plastic bag or just stuff everything in your trunk - expensive restaurant and

We are fairly open minded when it comes to food so we really don't miss too many foods too often.  Lots of fruits and vegetables are seasonal here (strawberries and asparagus in the early summer, brussel sprouts in the winter ...) so you need to eat them when arrive because 3 months from now they'll be off the shelves until nearly a year later .  We have found several places that we can get things from - for example, sour cream (very important in our life)  can only be acquired at the Russian store; baking soda is at the Asian store (no, we were not looking for baking soda there but it caught Chris' eye).  However, there are things that are hard to find here and we highly appreciate the care packages!: ) When I recently walked through one of our local supermarkets, I snapped some pictures of "American" foods with prices. Take a look at the price for BBQ - 6.69! German barbecue sauce - 0.69 cents! Better but still ...

Credit cards are not widely accepted.  In Germany (and kind of some parts of Europe) they will not let you pay with anything other than cash.  We've been to restaurants where bills come to 50€ and they wouldn't accept a credit card.  We have gotten used to carrying cash which is funny because in the States we had one credit card for everyday use that we always paid off and it was super convenient.  We got points and never had to worry about having cash. Checks also don't exist here so I have to send cash every time the boys need something at school.  I am still not sure how I feel about it especially since the smallest bill here is 5€ and everything under that is coins (i.e. 2€, 1€ and cents). I went to the Home Depot equivalent today to buy weed killer and apparently weed killer has a season and right now is not it.  They told me to come back in the spring! I really need some new pants and I HATE shopping but decided to bite the bullet so to speak.  Three styles

In the last 2 days 3 members of our family managed to get a pretty nasty cold (Andrei, Anton and myself) so I guess that means that autumn is here :(  Ilya and Chris are holding out for now. As promised though, here is a story of how Anton started his school year.  He is also going to a new place this year - it's much closer to our house, the price is much more reasonable and it's NOT Montessori.  German kids go to kindergarten the year they turn 3 and until they are ready to start elementary school at 6.  Despite the official sounding name, it is pretty much a daycare center with a bit of preschool mixed in but not much. When Anton started last year at his old school they had this weird integration system and I wasn't sure whether it was a school thing or a German thing.  This year I know it's a German thing.  Every mom I talk to right now that has a 3 year old is going through this integration process.  Somehow, I am the only one that thinks it's crazy though.

Last week and the weekend have been completely crazy with all 3 boys starting their respective schools and extracurricular activities.  Starting with the oldest, Andrei, started at his German public school in 2nd grade.  His first day was Monday and there was no special assembly or anything else.  In fact, he came home with homework.  His daily schedule changes daily but overall he has sport, German, math, art, music, religion/ethic, and science spread through the week.  Three days a week classes start at 8:35 and end at 12:20; Monday he starts at 7:45 to 11:20 and Tuesday 8:35 to 1:10.  He is signed up for extended day until 3PM where he gets lunch, does his homework, and hopefully makes some friends.  We did end up buying Andrei the German school bag because every single kid has it.  In math they seem to be repeating what they learned in 1st grade which is not a problem; however, in German the kids are writing cursive words and Andrei didn't learn that last year.  I have a meet