Hier Bin Ich

Woo-hee!  It's been a long time since I've been here.  Some things that have happened in the month (er... 5 weeks?) since I last blogged:

K-Pen and Bubbie Sue came.  For a month!  It was awesome.

K-Pen and Micah on the Fernsehturm, Berlin's highest point

We celebrated 23 years of German Unity with a Ferris wheel ride and overpriced (and really quite bad) pizza.  Ad meah v'esrim Bundesrepublik Deutschland!

Right about the time I said "This may have been a bad idea"

German unity from up high

I still refuse to move/turn/take my hands off Dafna

Everyone took a vacation.  K-Pen and Bubbie Sue had an Amsterdam adventure and the Copelovitches went to Garmisch-Partenkirchen to visit the Desais (after Mark went to London to deliver a paper).  They had a snow day from school while we were there.  Yes, in the Alps.

Emily, knowing Micah very well, took him to stand on the Austrian border.  Another notch in his passport!

20 feet into Austria

We took a train, a bus, another train and a cable car to summit the Zugspitz (the Top of Germany) where we sledded on a glacier, made blu-ish snow angels and suffered some light altitude sickness.

Germany's highest point

It was pretty amazing up there

From the cable car going down

Sledding on the glacier

We celebrated our 15th anniversary in Prague while K-Pen and Bubbie Sue held down the Berlin fort with Micah and Dafna.  I think a good time was had by all.  Certainly by me and Mark...  Prague is a great city and has about 2.5 days worth of sightseeing (maybe 3 if you're really interested in which Bohemian monarchs became Saints and all that kind of stuff).  We were there for 4 days which made for a very relaxing vacation-- sightseeing, wandering, massages, dinner with friends who happened to be visiting at the same time, naps, etc.  It was a pace we could definitely get used to.

Trdelnik-- a new favorite snack

Lots of Art Deco in Prague

Beers by the Vltava

Prague Astronomical Clock.  We haven't quite figured it out.  As our friend Steve said "It always looks like it is 4am".

We arrived home to find K-Pen and Bubbie Sue a) still alive b) still loving our children c) constructing a 3-D scale-model of the Taj Mahal in our dining room and d) experts on the pizza scene in Berlin.  Also, Audrey, our dear friend came to visit by way of New York and Zurich.  It was wonderful to see Audrey (many of you know we've gotten used to seeing her several times a year because of her position at Shopbop, a Madison-based company) and not only because she afforded us the opportunity to communicate with our (Turkish-, Bulgarian- and apparently Russian-speaking) cleaning lady (notice no German, English or Hebrew in that list...).  Our charades-based communication was getting comical when Audrey asked if she spoke Russian.  Aha!  Former Communist-bloc education FTW!  After several more days of touring, shopping and good eating, Audrey, K-Pen and Bubbie Sue went home to the States, leaving us alone in Germany until Aunt 'Chelle comes for "Thanksgiving".

Audrey gearing up to communicate with our cleaning lady

Things at school seem to have evened out for Micah (and his teacher, more importantly).  We had a parent-teacher (counselor, principal...) conference last week and we were really prepared for the worst.  His teacher said that he's doing very well, that he's completing work, a bit more organized, etc.  His German teacher said that he's quite good at German, and though he refuses to speak, his written work is perfect.  The science and music teachers (both young American women) really seem to get Micah and how he works and gave us several examples of small, quiet accommodations they make in class for him that make him more successful.  And they did that in front of his classroom teacher, so maybe she'll get some good ideas...

Let's see.  Other things:

Oh, yeah, the RED SOX WON THE WORLD SERIES!!! 

#FearTheBeard, Konrad.

We celebrated with a nap.  Mark stayed up to watch the whole game.  I woke up at 3:30 am to watch the last inning and a half and the subsequent celebrations.  We all celebrated the next night with a baseball-themed dinner.

Mark's food photography isn't up to Smitten Kitchen's standards, but you'll notice hot dogs, Boston baked beans, beer and a baseball diamond salad composed of a cabbage field, cucumber base lines, mushroom bases and a red pepper "B" for Boston.  Micah was quite excited (about the win, not the salad) and it almost made him forget that there's no trick-or-treating in Germany.  At least that's what we told them.

So, that's our update.  Stay tuned as we start learning about lots of Saints in the next month.  Apparently we will celebrate St. Martin and St. Nikolas at the very least.  We'll be headed to Dublin, too, so maybe we'll throw St. Patrick in there for good measure.

Eating German food for the Last Supper