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sunday brunch + goodbye

my little brother M is flying to the States today
to do a phD and start a new life in Seattle with his girlfriend L.
I am very happy for the two of them,
but also a little sad to see him leave.

by coincidence M spent the last two months in Stuttgart,
and it was very nice to have him so close by and to see him so often.
last week on sunday he came round for brunch at our place.

...

thank you so much for all the nice comments on my last post!
I have yet to post a picture of the framed print I promised,
mainly because, well, it's still not framed.
T has been very busy at work (more on that soon) and we've had visitors every other weekend,
so we have not had much time to work on things around the flat.
hopefully soon.

summer has finally arrived here last week,
the city and the office are very quiet and empty because everyone's away.
I'm really enjoying it a lot,
but also looking forward to our trip to Portugal
which is now only two weeks away.

how is your summer so far?

kitchen

our apartment came without a kitchen,
and we decided to get a nice one, one that we can sell on to the next tenant some day
because it fits the space (looong and narrow) perfectly.
so at least designing fancy kitchens for the last year did pay off a little.

the kitchen is from ikea,
simple matte white doors with an oak worktop.
having it installed was almost as much as what we paid for the units,
so we decided to do it ourselves,
with T's job at the university coming very handy
because the woodshop let us borrow all the tools we needed.

it was a lot of work, but also fun,
and looking at it every day still makes us very proud!

at home

some random pictures from our flat.
we're still without a proper living room
but the sofa should arrive any day now
and we're working on shelving for our books.

in germany we've got another three-day weekend coming up.
we're going to a friend's wedding in Koblenz (which is where I lived until I was 19).
I haven't been in there in 7 years, so I'm really looking forward
to spending a couple of days there.

what are your plans for the weekend?

hello spring, hello friends

oh dear, it's been a long time!

with lots of things to do in our new flat and with spring outside
I have not really had the patience to sit down in front of my computer at night
after I've spent most of my day in front of one already.

last week I finally picked up three rolls of film,
but now it feels strange to show you wintery black and white pictures from february
with all the colors and smells and sounds of spring outside the window.

so I decided to start with a few taken in our new flat:

01, 06 there's a farmers market across the square from our place every saturday, and I insist on buying a bunch of flowers every time we go.

02, 03 while the front of our flat (living and bedroom) face west, the kitchen with wintergarten faces east, and I love how the light comes in in the morning, blue from the west, and bright and yellow from the east. we've had really nice weather here in the last weeks, so there's always almost sun in the morning. our bedroom has a very pretty ceiling.

04, 07 I inherited this rosenthal china from my granddad when he died two years ago, and it's been stored in boxes in my parents' attic ever since. I love having it with me now, and imagine him and my grandmother (who died before I was born) serving tea on it on a sunday afternoon.

05 more market bounty, and another set of tableware from my granddad (I'll have to show you more pictures of it some day, it's my favorite ever and we use it every day).


we're heading to the north of germany on friday to spend easter with my family.
I wish you happy easter and a lovely spring weekend!

under construction

hello friends,
just a quick note to say I am alive, and very well.

I started my new job six weeks ago, and it's getting better after a few weeks
of feeling a little overwhelmed and not quite knowing where I fit in.

we moved into our apartment a month ago, and while it's still lacking essential living room furniture
our boxes from NY finally arrived two weeks ago and most things are more or less unpacked.
it's a very nice apartment, and we feel incredibly lucky that it's ours.

on thursday we're going to London for the weekend for a friend's wedding,
it's my first time back in over 1 1/2 years and I can't wait to see our friends and the city.

more soon!

almost home

it's time for a little update I think. how have you been?

I'm doing well, things are slowly settling into place here
a little more than a month after we arrived.

we're slowly getting used to the quiet nights without sirens, honking and car alarms,
to trams that make no sound running in their tracks,
to speaking german everywhere (and to being understood everywhere,
which is a little dangerous if you're not used to it!),
to being able to walk most places.
we've been eating insane amounts of sausages and pretzels,
and the excitement of shopping in german bakeries has not worn off yet (oh, I had missed them SO much).
it's nice to be in our friends' and families' time zone again, and to call anytime.

we've been looking at many many apartments in the last weeks,
and while it's not official yet, it looks like one of them might work out this week.
it will be so nice to have our own place again.

a couple of weekends ago we flew up north to see my parents and my grandmother,
and we drove back with the boxes that I stored in my parents' attic five years ago.
I have only unpacked a few things since we are in a temporary apartment right now,
but it was so nice to see a few old friends, like my Tivoli radio.
I can't wait to have our boxes from NY arrive and, for the first time,
have all our belongings in one place.

and while I can't quite call it home just yet
I feel that we've arrived in the right place to stay for a while,
and I know that it will only take a few months (and our own apartment),
until this new city will be home. that's all I want for now.

holidays

some pictures from the last 10 days.
I was very homesick, both for germany and london, in the days before christmas
but a week at home in brooklyn that started with lots of snow, and continued with holiday decorations,
lots of baking and cooking, reading, drinking tea, and watching a few movies* helped against feeling too mellow.

this was our first christmas being married, and although we missed our families a lot
it was also nice to just be at home spending time together,
not stuck at some airport or stressing about delayed flights (like in the last years).
we also bought our first christmas tree!

I hope you had a few peaceful days, too.



* we saw Avatar (not really my cup of tea, this review sums it up perfectly)
and Almodóvar's Broken Embraces (wonderful, go see it!).

K1000 (01): home

these are the first pictures taken with my new K1000.
I'm very happy, the camera feels nice, and it's interesting how
different cameras make you take pictures in a completely different way.

Brian mentioned my photos on his blog today. I feel very honored.
He recently moved from Brooklyn to London and makes me miss it so much
with his beautiful pictures. Go have a look if you haven't seen them yet!

the where & what

so this is where and how I spend my days these days:

1 my new desk and sewing space. I've been sewing a lot this last week.
2 watermelon keeps me cool when it's hot and while I'm updating my portfolio.
3 uten.silo is my favourite piece of furniture. T gave it to me for my birthday last year.
4 little naps at any time of the day. just because I can.
5 lots of iced coffee and lots of reading. just finished "any human heart" by william boyd. very much recommended.
6 the radiator in our flat apartment (am trying hard to americanize my british english) is probably older than I am.

woke up in Brooklyn the other morning

I arrived at my final destination last Thursday.
It feel so good to have arrived after all the travelling and all the saying goodbye.
It feels good to not sleep on friends' sofas any more, but in my own bed,
to be living with most of my books, things, and my sewing machines again.

New York is incredibly hot compared to the London summer, but I'm constantly being
told that it can (and will) get much hotter, and much more humid. I'm a bit scared!

I have lots of catching up to do with pictures and emails.
See you round here very soon!

thanks mom!

lovely food at my parents' place this week.