This music hall hosts 1500 seats and offers a lot of high quality concerts and shows. This time there were children everywhere, they could sit in front or behind the orchestra or even in between. The conductor first explained the instruments and then he told the story behind the piece of music they would play. It was the "Háry János Suite" of Zoltán Kodály from Hungary.

The story goes about Hary who is a farmers son and joines the army where he rescues the princess of Austria. She gives him a music clock and wants to marry him but Hary wants to go home to Hungary and is homesick. Then he has win a last fight against the troops of Napoleon and of course he beats them and finally returns where the whole village celebrates a big feast to honor him. The music is beautiful, very lively and diverse. Even Mattis sat quietly and listened most of the time while Charlotte and Moritz climbed up the stairs to take a look on the orchestra from above. But then Mattis got very tired and had to rest but was still listening.

What I really love here in our town of Halle is the huge cultural programm they offer. Although the town is poor there are theaters, cinemas, the opera and now this great idea of playing classical music for kids and the entrance is free. We are really looking forward to the next practice in public which takes place in May. Then they will play Edvard Grieg -- one of my favourites!

Since we are back, Charlotte had about ten horse-back riding classes and she stayed in a camp for one week in autumn. She really improved her skills also because she is taller and stronger now. I enjoy watching her being completely concentrated on the animal below her. It is still difficult to keep her focused for a longer time and horse-back riding is definitely one thing that works.

We started again at this little farm-like riding club in a village about 20 minutes away from Halle. It is very familiar there and Charlotte is able to try different horses as they are as different as the kids above.

Mostly we went at the weekend when it wasn´t that cold and enjoyed the quiet surrounding. Several times I left Mattis at home with Michael because I wanted Moritz to finally learn how to ride a bike.

When he got Charlotte´s old one, he was very excited and it seemed that this was the little push he needed. So we circled around the village green while Charlotte gallopped through the countryside.

What shall I say? It took him two hours until he was sure enough to ride on his own. Of course he needed to complain and play drama a little but then I could see how happy he was, and me too. I think it is special for parents being the one who taught how to ride a bike or how to swim -- both skills people never forget. We even made a little tour through the park later -- the kids on bike, me on foot. And even though it got dark quickly they just loved biking with their lights.

But at the moment riding bikes or horses is not possible as it is freezing cold and winter is still there. But there are good moments to remember and a new beginning is close.

"I do TV" -- this answer was okay for Charlotte most of the times. But a few month ago she started asking what I really do and I struggled explaining properly. I think she was thrilled of my deep wish to go to back to work and wanted to know what exactly I was doing. So when Charlotte was on holiday, I took her with me for one day of hard, exciting, stressful, cool journalistic work...

Our big office in the main house in Leipzig was not that interesting for her ecxept the televisions everywhere. We broadcast the main programm from Leipzig for the three states of Saxony, Thuringia and Saxony-Anhalt. The whole region is called "middle germany" and that is why the station is called Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk. I went back to work in the news afternoon programms and the educational programm LexiTV. Charlotte soon made friends, got a great breakfast which is a really nice tradition of us being a "cozy office" and she met some of my colleagues again who visited us in the USA. I cannot say that she was very shy. In fact she smiled a lot especially when people said that we cannot really deny that she is my daughter. Because of brilliant planning by me, we had some free minutes to go on tour through the building. I showed her the studios where the programmes are recorded and broadcasted. We took a look in the "Regie"-room where all "lanes merge.

She just loved the idea of seeing different pictures at once on different screens. And she looked quiet professionel in the audio chambers where the voice is recorded for the films we make.

She didn´t ask many questions, I think, she just sucked all the new impressions and at the moment she is filled up. But today she asked again...

Our dear friends, the Meyer family moved right next to us in our street. They now live in a beautiful appartment with wooden floors, big windows, three kids rooms and so on. Of course I got jealous, thinking of our cute house in Hanover. I researched and found out that there will be another of those appartments for rent soon. But when Michael and I discussed that we both agreed that we didn´t want to move again especially as the rent for this new flat turned out to be almost double of the money we pay here. So we decided to improve our own nest and then something happened that made us very busy.

One night I went into the kids room. They all share one big room, the older ones sleep in a bunk bed, Mattis in his baby bed. They all talk while they sleep and dream and I like to listen to them as they sometimes tell proper stories. But this night was different: Charlotte moaned something in her pillow that sounded tensed and a bit aggressive. Moritz cried: "No, Lotti, give it to me. No, Lotti!!!" and I thought by myself that he sometimes is a poor little guy living "under" that sister. When I turned to Mattis I noticed him talking too and he cleary sreamed: "No, Lotti, No!" -- well, you know what came then: Michael and I decided to give Charlotte her own room before she would cause a serious trauma to both boys.

So we changed. Our beloved office would become our bedroom and Charlotte would move into our old bedroom which would become a proper princess mansion. After weeks of planning and pushing the idea of hard work away, we started right after Christmas. First we removed the old wallpapers. Then Michael built a new wooden floor which covered the old carpet and gave the room a really good look.

Our dear friend Sascha helped with the painting and then Michael built a proper high bed for us grown-ups in order to use all the space we have below to store our stuff.

I never thought I would sleep in a bunk bed again but it turns out to be very comfortable. Although we already think of adding a foldable stairway to keep away "guests". Next project is a new cupboard which is ordered and will arrive next week. It should hide most of our clothes. Then the old bedroom is hopefully empty and ready to be turned into Charlotte´s mansion.

To be continued...

I write this after many weeks of training now because I can see that this is his thing. When he wakes up he asks to wear his soccer shirts, every Tuesday and Friday he is so excited to go to soccer training in the afternoon and he gets medal after medal. But one after another...

Almost right after we returned to Germany Moritz started training again. In Halle there are plenty little clubs, almost every quarter has one. Moritz is now playing for Turbine Halle. The field is not far away but it is more comfortable to drive there also because it is located on a hill above the river Saale.

I had to laugh out loud when Moritz once came home, complaining about having a woman as coach now. The coaches changed and now his team is ruled by a young woman who is really tough and skilled. Another good lesson for Moritz.

Now in winter times the coaches managed to "rent" gyms for training. To be honest, I was looking forward to the colder days as I thought we would take a break. It appeared to be quiet difficult to organise who is going to drive Moritz to training. Fortunately both of the grand-fathers are interested in Moritz career and take turns to drop him off, watch him from the edge of the field and drive him home again.

Almost from the very beginning the team was registered for tournaments. As there are so many small teams around the town they like to meet. We could be on a tournament almost every weekend but I decided that the other family members also want to have spare time with me. I estimate that we attend at least every second game and Moritz always has his position which is impressive itself as the coaches already choose the best players for the tournaments.

Moritz even travelled to Dresden once with his team members in the car of one of the soccer-crazy fathers. He was away one long day almost all by himself. He had money to buy him food, he had his sports dress and sneakers with him and he brought a medal home.

I really appreciate his excitement as he made friends outside his day care, he improves his physical skills and eats more and he learns how to deal with the very frustrating feeling of loosing a game (and a mum who only answers: why didn´t you shoot one more goal then, honey?)

Since I had someone tell me "your blog is dead", I feel the strong wish to show this person how wrong he is! So here we go. It is clearly difficult to find the time to write but otherwise there are so many things I´d like to tell, so from now on I will be more diligent.

First of all I have to say that we settled down again. After seven month now home feels home again, we are back in our daily routines except for being even more busy since Mattis asks for his share of attention too. The boys are happy at day care where Moritz is the head of the crowd speaking German and English fluently, teaching his teachers English or German. For Christmas they had a nice celebration and even Santa came.

Left of Mattis is Andrea who is from Iowa and became a really good friend. She was a teacher at the daycare center but unfortunately she moved to Munich now. We miss her, especially Mattis. It would have been great to have her around as she only spoke English to the kids. There is almost only one thing to comfort Mattis: cookies. Fortunately there were lots at the Christmas party too so Mattis could forget his traumatic experience with Santa.

Moritz often wants me to read English picture books for him which I have bought online and we finished the First-Grade-Holiday-Practicing-Reading-Book. And then also Mattis comes and listens carefully. His favourite book is "Good night, Gorilla" which we read at least twice a day.

Charlotte made us first worry and then very happy. She had a hard time finding a new routine in the new school. The kids are friendly and she made friends easily. At the beginning of December she had a really cool birthday party at the Zoo in Halle where the kids were allowed to feed exotic birds.

But at school there was one big issue she had to deal with: all her great skills especially the English language she learnt in America do not count at school at the moment. So she only experienced what she was missing especially in Math. That made her grumpy and sad. Soon we signed her in an afterschool programm to support her math skills and this really helped her. Also her teacher got more sensitive to her goals and the big thing she managed every day: to make herself comfortable in the new school, follow the rules and learn motivatedly all while missing her old friends in Hanover and also the relaxed, project-oriented classes there. Everything got more complicated since this half-year report counts for her transition to the next school form and if she wouldn´t meet the expectations it would have been hard for her to attend the school form she likes to. But she made it! Last week she brought home her report with extra-ordinary good marks and her teachers recommended to send her to the German Gymnasium where students can make their A-levels and later study at the University if they want to. So now the fight for the right Gymnasium starts which is kind of tricky as most of the schools near us are full and there are only two in town who offer a special language programm which would be great for Charlotte. But we take our chances and I am more than sure now that she will go her way, as always.

And this is what Michael tells me, the worried-mum, all the time. He himself has many news to tell. He got a grant with money for travelling especially back to Dartmouth at least once a year. Since I am back at work we really share the care for the kids and he picks them up as often as I do although he didn´t manage yet to take Moritz to soccer training... And he fulfilled an important wish: he bought a gas grill. And the grill works great, we use it quiet often and our friends are excited. As our friend Andreas and I were joking about having BBQ in the snow -- it even snowed just for us to try it.

Of course we had the best burgers in town! Last thing to say for today is that we have a proper winter at the moment. It was heavily snowing one week ago and since then the kids love going sledding and play in the white. Mattis experiences his first rides and he loves it. We had to rescue his cute cheeks from freezing by carrying homewards crying he wants to go back on the sled NOW. It looks like there will be more snow today and the temperature is really low which pushes Michael and me at the limit of our good will to ride our bikes to the station. Nevertheless we have a good time and I will blog more!