My Once Upon a Time...

The older I get, the more I realize how important Family is. Family is the most important thing in my life and I feel truly blessed by the two families I can call my own and by the amazing people in them. Je älter ich werde, desto mehr merke ich, wie wichtig Familie ist.  Familie ist das Wichtigste in meinem Leben und fuer die beiden Familien, die ich meine eigene nennen kann und fuer die tollen Menschen in ihnen bin ich so unglaublich dankbar. My first family at home: I miss them more than words could ever describe. Many of you will know how hard it is to be so far away from "home", only get to visit every other year or so and keeping relationships alive with weekly phone calls. It can be tough, but you also realize that it doesn't really matter if you live 2 or 2000 miles apart, nothing will ever change. In the good way. I love my crazy family. I love the fact that I can call my mom in the middle of night just to tell her that I miss her, love how she puts her ow...

I love New York.  I fell in love with it when I was traveling to the US for the very first time in 2001, while staying at the Au Pair School. It's been eight years since my last trip to the Big City and I was begging to go back! Ich liebe New York. Ich verliebte mich in die Stadt, als ich 2001 zum allerersten Mal in die USA reiste, während ich in der Au Pair Schule war. Acht Jahre sind seit meiner letzten Reise nach New York vergangen und ich konnte es nicht erwarten, zurueck zu kehren.  My 30th Birthday seemed like the perfect occasion for an escape into a different world, my dad and his girlfriend thought the same thing and traveled all the way from Germany to meet us there. Mein 30. Geburtstag schien die perfekte Gelegenheit für eine Flucht in eine andere Welt zu sein, das dachten sich auch mein Vater und seine Freundin und reisten den ganzen Weg von Deutschland nach New York, um uns dort treffen. We spent three days in the magica...

It's official... my twenties have come to an end and I am thirty years old! Thirty! Wow, this seems like such a cliche, but: Where has time gone? I was just 15 yesterday... at least that's how it seems to me.  Thirty always seemed so scary, I was dreading this birthday for the last three years, but now I have made my peace.  Did I have a choice? No. Am I happily thirty? YES! I took my twenties and kissed them good-bye...tucked them away in boxes with all their sweet memories and sorrows.  It took me a long time to say goodbye to 20, thinking about all the great memories I made as an au pair, the family I met that I now call my own and the start of my love for the US. 21 was a different story, learning to grow up, my first apartment, starting college, heartbreak. Me and 21 never got along that great, so it was easy to say goodbye. 22 and 23 were good to me, lots of great memories, sorrows too, yes, but every box brings that with it and when I thi...

I never buy anything for myself. Literally never. But then I fell in love with this camera and I just knew I had to have her.  That was 16 months ago. The only way I could justify to myself spending a crazy amount of money on a camera was, if I didn't pay it from my salary. So I saved. Long and hard. Took as many babysitting shifts as I could get, and I might even admit to Katie paying me for doing her part of the household chores. Just Maybe. Let me tell you...all those hours of playing Candyland finally paid off! Okay, I actually like Candyland and I love the boys I'm babysitting, but you get my point!:) Ich   kaufe nie   etwas   für   mich .   Wirklich   nie .   Doch dann   habe ich mich in   diese Kamera verliebt   und   ich   wusste, ich   musste   sie  einfach  haben .   Das   war   vor 16 Monaten . Der einzige   Weg, mich dafuer   rechtfertigen z...