Knorr Family Adventures

For some reason, while I wrote this a while back, it never got published.  So here it goes ... better late than never even if it's 2-3 months late :) Why are extracurricular activities so hard to figure out???   Balancing out individual interests versus having free “boring” time and time driving around… Here is what we figured out so far. Anton, age 4, attends full day kindergarten – has speech therapy and swimming lessons.   He was actually the easy one :)  I am not sure how much speech therapy is helping him but we don't pay for it and he is essentially getting one-on-one German class for 45 minutes.  Swimming - he LOVES.  Andrei, age 9, attends 3 rd grade at German public school – on Saturdays Andrei has English school and swimming.   He will also have chess but we are trying to switch the clubs since last year he went on Fridays at 6PM about 15 minutes away and the timing was really hard.   This year we are hoping to go to the local club that meets after on weekd

In Germany, St. Niklaus comes during the night of December 5 and the kids who put their shoe (just one) outside will get chocolates in the morning.  Do you see where this story is going?  Yes, we actually knew about this tradition and yes, I did remember the correct night because Anton's kindergarten made me go buy him nut-free Santa BUT for some reason the kids didn't put their shoes outside and we never filled them.  The morning of December 6 went without a problem but then the kids started coming home from school where EVERY SINGLE child had a visit from St. Nick. Lusha has decided that St. Nick is a myth. Trying to fix the situation, we decided that maybe St. Nick has  a"make up day" for those that didn't do it right the first time around.  Thankfully, he was extremely nice and stopped by our house nearly 24 hours after the scheduled night. The smiles on the boys faces were amazing as was the statement from Andrei "See Lusha, St. Nick is REAL"

This was my Thursday morning.  All 3 boys were home, Chris was in Boston.  See if you can guess what's going on based on the pictures below.  About 3 hours later I was right there next to the boys :( I am really thankful to have a tailor within 3 minutes of my house. Love it -  I drop off 3 pairs of Chris' ripped jeans, pay 10 Euros and magically 2 days later they are fixed.  Between Chris and I, we can do a lot of fixing ourselves, but jeans are just too much work to do. To offset the cheap price of fixing clothing, I just paid 60 Euros to have 2 comforters cleaned.  They do not fit into our washing machine and I really want them cleaned after the week I've had so far.   

TWO YEARS in Germany!      It feels like a long time but also feels like not enough.   The expression “time flies” is so very true. We originally came here for 2 years with the hope of staying 2 and a half since we didn’t want to move mid-school year again.   At this point we are hoping to stay at least until Andrei finishes 4 th grade which is the end of Grundschule which will make it 4 years since he nearly started first grade here.   Other than that we have no long term plans :) Since Anton was only 2 when we left, he has no memory of our home or his school and his friends. It’s weird to think about it that way. Ilya and Andrei both remember things but it’s actually really funny.   For example, they miss Lucky Charms, Goldfish and corn dogs.   Chris brings Lucky Charms and Goldfish on VERY regular basis; corn dogs, however, are a little trickier.   A little bit ago we tried to make them at home and while they were ok, they were not the same as the frozen ones I used to

It seems it was yesterday that I was writing about the first day of school, but the kids just went back to school after their fall break. Andrei came home at 11AM on the last day before vacation after 2 of his classes got cancelled in order to start vacation early.   I wasn’t exactly ready since in theory he was supposed to have normal day today until 12:20. Surprise! LOL Both boys had Elternabends (parent meetings) and I learned that Andrei will have sex education before his class trip in June.   When I asked his teacher what exactly it entails, she did not understand my question even though I tried several different times in several different ways – she kept saying “normal stuff.”   I guess I will figure it out later.   Other than that, Andrei is doing sufficiently good.   He’s had several tests – 2 in German and 1in math.   He is still not getting grades in German but what I found to be interesting is that the kids are learning to use dictionary, as in a book that contain

We can all “thank” Germany for Daylight Savings Time – it was first implemented here in 1916 (April 30 to be exact) during World War I. Germany ranks 3 rd amongst countries with the highest recycling rate (1 st is Switzerland, 2 nd is Austria), and while ridiculous in the beginning it all makes sense now! The Gutenberg Bible was first published in Mainz, which is only 30 minutes away from us, in 1450s. Ulmer Munster is the world’s tallest cathedral at 161.53 meters or 530 feet; it is also about 3.5 hours away from us and is on our “to visit list.” The longest German word ever published has 79 letters.   And yes, German words are kind of crazy   - they just put words together deleting the space between them to make up a new word.   Or at least it feels that way! Germans invented gummy bears.   They are super popular here! German Autobahn has no speed limit only on 65% of it; all together it’s 11,000 kilometers. There are over 1,500 kids of wurst; we haven’t tried mor

I thought I would separate out 2 special topics from our Italian vacation – food and beaches.   They are not related; yet, they stand out from the rest of the trip.   I can’t really explain it … Italian food … I guess I had little expectations but obviously we all know about the pasta, pizza, lasagna, tiramisu, etc.   We ate out a lot during this trip because we mostly stayed at hotels and because we moved around so much.   Many hotels we stayed at had breakfast included or at least offered for a very reasonable price.   90% of the time it was croissants, breads with fruit spreads, some cheeses including mozzarella, and maybe some meats.   Not bad but a little too much of the same after 14 days on the road, and don’t get me wrong – it’s not like we have 25 different breakfasts at home but having the choice of cereal and eggs was very welcome when we got home.    Lunch and dinner both seem to be fairly large meals in Italy; but here is the thing – for us, Italian food lac