Three years ago the Don and I agreed that we really needed to learn another language - most probably German since he did four years of it at school and I, well, am half German so don't have any excuse for not speaking it fluently and as a result we have plenty of family to speak it to. A year and a quarter later and once again we found ourselves surrounded by even more people at another family wedding and again realised we were practically the only family that could speak only one language. Most spoke two fluently, many three, some even four... and us Boyds, well, we had to converse with everyone in English.
Full of good intentions we returned to the States. And did nothing. We bandied about the idea of buying some CDs to listen to in the car, we were sent plenty of helpful weblinks by Oma, I even bought the Don a German daily calender. Then we moved here, and the kids suddenly realised that it is normal to speak two languages fluently, in fact, they are some of only a handful in their class that can only speak one language. And that seems to have been the motivation we needed.
So after holidaying with Oma in Scotland and the kids being introduced to Muzzy on YouTube, I finally get out my Post-It Notes and a Sharpie, send an email to Oma with commonly used phrases for translation, and opened up 52 Weeks of Family German. So far we have only covered manners, greetings, and introductions from the book, but the kids are really keen and picking things up surprisingly quickly. We have mastered singing the prayer Alle Gute Gabe (though aren't sure why you dankt ihm but hofft auf ihn, Unless I just copied it down wrong), and "Vielen Dank fur das Essen, bitte can ich den Tisch verlassen" is heard frequently. We know it's der Teller and das Becher and that they have to empty die Spulmaschine and Wasch Deine Hande, though I obviously still don't know how to find the umlaut on my keyboard.
The only question that remains is, when is the next Clan wedding??
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