Mainau Island

Mainau Island is part of every good Bodensee tour. There, we visited beautiful flowers, very fun playgrounds, and the butterfly house. It goes without saying that we also sampled the apple cake and the ice cream on the island! (BTW, my photography has improved, oder?)

Afterwards, we ate a little bread and cheese on my balcony.

J drank a coffee and prepared herself for the Autobahn. She drove Ginny and Thayr closer to the airport.

So that in the morning, they could fly back home.

Thanks for visiting!

Meersburg Castle

Yesterday, we took the ferry from Konstanz to Meersburg with Ginny and Thayr to see the old castle.

It's really old.

But the King is quite young.

It was hard to get your picture taken with the King.

Marga in a little purple dress

Hey Grandpa, Where's My Chair?

Hey Grandpa! Margaret and William are fighting over the chair you made! Luckily, they can't read yet, but when they realize that the chair says "William"on the footrest and not "Share With Your Sister or You Get a Time Out", there's gonna be trouble around these parts! :^)

The Wheels on the Bus Go 'Round and 'Round All Over Town

Hooray! Ginny and Thayr are here in Konstanz! Here are some pictures I took while we were on the bus on the way to the downtown .

William and Margaret are enjoying the Richey's too!

A Trip to Tuebingen

Wow! Thanks to J and J and children, our fearless tour guides , for leading G and T and me (ohne Kinder) here! Tuebingen is one of the rare cities in Germany that was spared by WWII, and there are old, beautiful buildings everywhere! Above is a picture of the marketplace where we sat and ate lunch while listening to live music.

This is a picture of the courthouse.

If you look at the courthouse closely, you will see three clocks. The bottom clock tells the time. The middle clock (shown above) is an astronomical clock, surrounded by the signs of the zodiac. The top, tiny clock shows the phases of the moon.

An astronomical clock was a relatively new idea for us, and it had some of us sitting over lunch wishing for our encyclopedia set...and others of us sitting over lunch wishing for a laptop with a wireless connection. The question: what are the symbols and what do they represent on an astronomical clock?

From where we were sitting, we could only identify the signs of the zodiac. Even in the above picture, the symbols are a bit blurry. However, I can now answer the question of what usually is represented by an astronomical clock.

An astronomical clock is geocentric. A small sphere in the middle represents the earth. The sun rotates around the earth in a 24 hour cycle. The moon and major planets and their, somewhat slower, rotations are also represented. The phases of the zodiac and their relationship to the sun, moon, and planets are also shown.

Again, a people-free post. Dr. Hausfrau didn't bring her camera again, but Temporarylibrarian took plenty of pictures for later blogging.

Bloggers Meet, Eat Cake!

Today Dr. Hausfrau and family met Temporarylibrarian and family in the Black Forest! In Germany! Temporarylibrarian enjoyed a piece of *real* black forest cake! Dr. Hausfrau forgot her camera! Woops. It was really nice to see everybody and to explore this pretty little corner of Germany.

Queen Margaret

A German Birthday Song for All the June Birthday-Kids Out There!

This song ( see below), and "Happy Birthday" in English, are the birthday songs I have encountered here most often. Since a good 50% of my friends and relatives are born in June, I thought I better learn the words to this song for once and for all. Here they are, so you can correct my mistakes when I sing it to you!

1 Heute kann es regnen, stürmen oder schneien,

denn du strahlst ja selber wie der Sonnenschein.

Heut ist dein Geburtstag, darum feiern wir,

alle deine Freunde freuen sich mit dir

Wie schön dass du geboren bist,

wir hätten dich sonst sehr vermisst.

wie schön dass wir beisammen sind,

wir gratulieren dir, Geburtstagskind!

2 Unsere guten Wünsche haben ihren Grund:

bitte bleib noch lange glücklich und gesund.

Dich so froh zu sehen, ist was uns gefällt,

Tränen gibt es schon genug auf dieser Welt.

Wie schön dass du geboren bist,

wir hätten dich sonst sehr vermisst.

wie schön dass wir beisammen sind,

wir gratulieren dir, Geburtstagskind!

3 Montag, Dienstag, Mittwoch, das ist ganz egal,

Dein Geburtstag kommt im Jahr doch nur einmal.

Darum lass uns feiern, dass die Schwarte kracht,

Heute wird getanzt, gesungen und gelacht.

Wie schön dass du geboren bist,

wir hätten dich sonst sehr vermisst.

wie schön dass wir beisammen sind,

wir gratulieren dir, Geburtstagskind!

Americans, Don't Look! : Birthday Suits!

Today is my 33rd birthday! This morning, in keeping with my fun personal birthday tradition of the last few years, I ran to the FKK beach (see above for explanation if needed ;^) ) , jumped in the Bodensee, and ran home! The lake was a touch cold at first, but became quickly enjoyable. The water was clear and blue, the Swiss Alps decorated the horizon. I am happy to be alive, and to have a Bodensee to jump in!

Gruetzi mitanand!

Today we drove to the mountains in Switzerland, near Saentis. As we approached, we noticed the sky was full of paragliders! There must have been hundreds of them jumping off cliffs into the valley below!

Here we are starting off on our hike. William is using his binoculars to look for the wolf from "Peter and the Wolf". He usually looks through his binoculars upside-down and backwards and he thinks that binoculars make everything appear farther away. He will not listen to our lengthy explanations and clarifications on the topic of binoculars. Each generation has to figure things out on their own, I guess!

William was tired today. We carried him up the mountain. At the top of the mountain, he ate an ice cream, ran around and scraped his knees, acquired four band-aids, and we carried him back down the mountain. He's still mad that we didn't see any wolves and that we didn't stop at the McDonald's play land on the way back.

Here is the most beautiful mountain lake in the world, and the kid is lusting after the McDonald's play land we passed on the way here.

WOW. Now that's pretty!

I want to put my feet in the water!

There are lots of hiking paths up here, and lots of cows. And lots of signs so the cows don't get lost.

William and I decided that we wanted to stay here forever. (He had forgotten about the McDonald's play land for a brief moment).

Gruetzi aus der Schweiz!

Woo Hoo! A Moment of Peace!

Just when I was ready to pull my hairs out one by one ( then don a wig and not leave a forwarding address...), William and Margaret started to play nicely together for up to 15 minutes at a time. This is BIG NEWS, people. You can get a LOT done in fifteen minutes! This time, I just stared in amazement and took pictures of the calm!

Here, they are both playing "cars" - William on the couch, and Margaret in the box! I've never seen anyone look so pretty while trying to eat a recycling truck in my whole life! (And yes, I *have* seen a lot of people trying to eat recycling trucks lately.)

Der Rheinfall

Yesterday, we took a little trip to see the Rheinfall. We had time to take this picture...

And this one (hurry!)...

And this picture of a Swan and 5 cygnets rushing for safety...

And then we rushed inside because huge black clouds were coming! Thunder and lightening! I loved sitting in the little snack area eating an ice cream watching the huge thunderstorm with the Rheinfall as a backdrop. After about 20 minutes, the sun came out again and we went on our merry way!

De Rhyfall isch dr groeschti Wasserfall vo Europa!

This is the "Rheinfall", the largest (23 m tall) waterfall in Europe. It is in Switzerland, about an hours drive from our house. The Rheinfall is beautiful! Now, I still need to see the largest waterfall in North America!

Sploosh!

Frauenfeld Plaettli-Zoo

Yesterday we took a little trip to a tiny zoo in Switzerland with Darien and family. Here are William and Darien looking for a lizard.

Then there were pony rides!

And ice cream - with smarties!

Margaret had a little ice cream, too.

On the way home, everybody fell asleep.

And I got to listen to the music of *my* choice the whole way home!