It's A...

There are lots of words and/or phrases that could complete this sentence... And for those of you who haven't been living with me in Dresden for the past few months, the word I choose is probably going to be a surprise...

GIRL!

Yes, we're having a baby, and it's going to be a girl :)  Sometime in the beginning of October, our small family of four (of course I count my cats!) is going to be a somewhat larger family of five!

Kind of hard to see her, but there's totally a nose and a mouth!

We couldn't be more excited, though I am a bit anxious about moving from Dresden to temporary housing in NY, to a semi-permanent apartment in NY, to a house in NY, while having a small baby introduced into our lives somewhere in between those three, but it's all going to work out...

Since I'll be leaving Dresden and probably won't be traveling much or have time to make artwork for a while, I've also decided to start a new blog.  I don't guarantee the new blog to be quite as kid-friendly all the time, as sometimes preparing for (and I'm assuming being) a mom is a little stressful and requires some serious venting...   though I do hope to include some awesome art projects for kids...

I'll keep up this blog until we get home and then I'll be posting mostly to dribblesnibblesscribbles.blogspot.com.

A Very Different Commemoration of the Dresden Bombing

Last weekend was the human chain.  A peaceful demonstration by thousands of Dresdners.

This past weekend was nothing so peaceful.  We had been warned in e-mails and by fellow Germans that Saturday there would be a Neo-Nazi march.  This in itself was not to be violent, but in past years, extreme leftists (the opposing party) had attempted to stop the march and to use more violent forms of protest.

We went out on Saturday to view the action from afar.  We weren't sure if we should venture out at all, but this was a once in a lifetime opportunity to see an event that is a huge part of Dresden history.

As we walked from Altstadt to Neustadt (where the march was said to be held), we didn't see any violent uprisings, but we did see trams stopped along bridges to keep floods of people from storming,

more police cars than we've ever seen in Dresden

and police decked out in riot gear.

We passed the riot police blockade without incident, but as we looked back, we were a little worried that we wouldn't be able to cross back to our side of town.

After scouting around and grabbing some coffee, we successfully made it back without seeing any Neo-Nazis marching, or any violent riots.  Reading about it later on the web, I think I'm glad we made it out and back without any incident.

Later that evening, we did hear shouting outside our window and looked out upon a march of hundreds of leftist protestors.

If you are interested in reading more about this event, check out the following webpages:
allvoices.com
dw-world.de

The Human Chain : The 66th Anniversary of the Dresden Bombing

Yesterday was a very important day for Dresdners... The anniversary of the Dresden bombing during WWII.  Over 17,000 people showed up, forming a human chain that stretched from Altstadt to Neustadt and back- over 2 miles.  Not counting the hundreds of onlookers.

Close to our apartment: people getting ready

On left, the bridge to Neustadt, filled with people- across the river, more people

A close up of across the river

Our side of the river.  The bells rang for 5 minutes as people joined hands across the city

We didn't feel comfortable participating, and in fact it was even a little awkward to be looking on, but it was worth the strange feelings to see a city come together in such an awesome symbol of peace.