Poor Stella

So Stella has been having a rough week. First, as you can see in the photo at left, she had a run-in with a rose bush. More like a tumble, actually. I was right there, and she fell over, like she does often, only there was a little down hill and she rolled/flipped into the garden (mostly small bedding plants, except for a few long rose branches--oops!) and proceeded down the slope. It all happened so fast, it's crazy how they move like lightning sometimes. Anyway, she had scratches like an Indian warrior on her face, and a few on her legs. She was such a trooper and only cried for like a minute, and not a peep when we washed and fixed them up with some ointment. Now those are gone, BUT...
apparently she was next on the mosquitos' list. Poor thing. And, trust me, it's not nearly as bad as it looks in person! See, we hadn't seen but one mosquito the whole time we'd been here. Well, I guess it was probably because it was no more than 65-70 degrees until last week. Not to mention rain everyday at some point. You'd think we'd have figured that one out. Then last week it got warm. Everyone knows what lots of rain and then warm weather will do. We left her window open a crack (like an inch!) for fresh air because the nights are nice and cool here. Ah, but there aren't any screens on the windows. In our temporary place there were. BIG difference, as you can see. The poor thing. Nick and I got a few bites that night, but she must have sweeter blood (of course she's sweeter, look at her!), because they had quite the feast. Thankfully, they don't seem to bother her much. I've never seen her scratch them or seem uncomfortable because of them. What a trooper, ya know? We bought one of those canopy things for her, and we're looking for screens to put on the windows. German windows are much different than ours, and we love them--Nick will have to tell you about them, he thinks they're the best thing since sliced bread--but there's no screens. We'll get those little buggers...just wait and see! So as for Stella, she's hanging in there. Really, she's having a great time right now, because where we're living (housesitting) there are 3 dogs (including Jackson), a cat, and three rats (they're not as gross as you'd think, though Jackson keeps trying to eat them). She's plenty busy!

Weekend with Domi and family

Guttentag! Last weekend we spent our 4-day vacation with Domi, a foreign exchange student who lived with Nick's folks in SD for 1 year, and his family. They live in Michelfeld, a small town near Schwabisch Hall. It was really great to see Domi again, and fun to meet his parents and brother. Barbara and Bernd were wonderful hosts, and cooked some killer German food for us, not to mention supplying ample coffee, tea, wine or beer, and playing with Stella to boot! (For future reference, to anyone with kids, staying somewhere with people who love kids is awesome!) Their home was really cool, too, as they designed it themselves and have lived there for 19 years. And with a beautiful garden on top of it all, it was a very relaxing stay. Domi played tour guide for us and brought us to downtown Schwabisch Hall Saturday to see the market and just walk around and see the town (Dena-they had an H & M!). It's a classic medieval downtown area with modern shops built into the old buildings, with more modern areas elsewhere, and beautiful views everywhere, especially since it's a quite hilly location, right in the vally of the Kocher River. As Nick says, I could live there. We visited St. Michel's church, with some of the steepest front steps I've seen. They have shows (theatre and music) on the steps and everyone sits down below in the square. The altar was a huge carved wooden fold-in tryptych. My art history is failing me as to what you call those things. Anyway, it was the biggest one I've sen. They also have a little window back behind the altar down into the crypt where you can see stacks of bones. The craziest thing to me about this church is that it's Protestant, not Catholic. It feels just like a Catholic church, with the artwork and stuff. Pretty cool. It was one of the places Luther used to frequent. Later on we went to St. Nicholas' church, which is inside an old castle. That was really cool, as we could walk all around the battlements and see gorgeous views of the valley. Next day we went to the open-air museum in Wackershofen, which is a rebuilt old Medieval town. They brought buildings from all over Southern Germany and reconstructed them. It was really cool and would be a fun place to hang out longer and eat, but with a fussy one year old (hungry and in need of a nap!) it's more difficult. Above all, it was just fun to hang out with Domi and fam and just talk. We also played a lot of 6 nimmt, a card game we'll definitely bring back with us. Tschuss!

Virgin Blogger

So here it is, our first blog. This is meant to keep family and friends updated with our travels and some everyday experiences while we are here in Germany. We hope you enjoy it!