This is the continuing story of Pitou in the Vollnkirchen Wald with Peter and the Wolf.

This is the abbreviated version of poor quality without the last part. The original version got lost when my laptop crashed in 2006. But it is a good impression of how happy life can be and was.

Enjoy!

also my zoo belonged in the yard

Here's a video file about my zoo.
This is the story of Pitou. My kitten I brought along when we were visiting Steve's family in 2004 in Missouri.

Pitou was/is an extra ordinary kitten. When she was a kitten of 6 weeks old and living in the barn of Steve's sister in Missouri.
I took her home to Germany, where she grew up with our 3 Labrador dogs PSS, Pebbles, Simba and Sophie. She didn't know better she was a dog and you will see her adventures in her story. She is telling about her daily strolls in the woods of Vollnkirchen..
This is her story telling Theresa about her trip to Germany, how happy she is and although small coping with 3 large Labradors 'cats' and another feline like creature Aristocat (only because he was born in France and talks French) .. Check out my adventures I have had with cows and all sorts of other enterprises in the Netherlands in France.. Even though I love Vivaldi, Beethoven would have been more appropriate in Germany.

Nieuwkoopse Plassen

A year ago I returned I returned to my native country after some moving adventures in Tennessee where I would have liked to continue my landscaping business but some unforseen events prevented this.

I came back to the village I lived before and still had my house till 2005.

Nieuwkoop is a lovely little village on the border of a small lake in the green heart of Holland. Only 30 minutes away from Amsterdam. It's a peacefull haven away from the big cities. In summertime the lake offers a lot of watersport activities.

I found a temporary house to live in. It's very old and needs lots of caring, but is the ideal spot. With a view on the tiniest church (not more than 30 people fit in) and at 25 meters from the lake. De Nieuwkoopse plassen (plassen meaning puddle in English).. It's a huge puddle though...

In summertime it's great to sail and all kinds of watersports.

De Nieuwkoopse Plassen is a proteteced nature area in the middle of Holland. Holland are 2 provinces and is part of the Netherlands.

La Douce France

Voila....
I have finally arrived in France. After some moving months in the USA, having to leave all I cared for in a couple of minutes, I have found my old Europe back.

These are some pictures of the area where I am now.
Since a couple of years my sister Anita and her husband Vincent live in a picturesque area of France near the Alps not far from a lovely little town called Annecy and Chambery.

Romancing the Stone

Part of my project is to create a rockgarden at our neighboors. From a non existing part of the yard, removing and replanting a tree a huge pile of rocks arrived a while ago. The result uptill now is this.. There is still a lot of work to be done.. Mortaring a rockwall like this is a time consuming businesess. Placing the first row of rocks is peanuts.. but then you have to choose the rocks to go on top.. It's all a big jig saw puzzle but a lot of fun... When all the rocks have been placed it's time to fill up the holes with smaller rocks and then mortar it... I had several tryouts of mortar mixes (I even used concrete) before I found the best solutions.
This is the result of my schlepping and hours of filling holes with smaller rocks.

I had planned to work on our neighbor's rock garden last week already, but some other job I had promised to do for Jason's grandmother and the weather getting ridiculously cold, has set me back a couple of day. From + 30 degrees C (I still count the European way in temperature as well as measurements... cannot get used to all those feet) 10 days ago, the weather changed dramatically to minus 6 C last night. All our lovely plants, we had justed planted, had to be covered every nights for 6 nights in a row with woolen blankets. All but one, the Wisteria, did survive.
It's a strange sight to see all the trees, which had a lot of leaves already, loosing their leaves again as if we are in autumn.

Well this is the result of our polution and global warming, I guess.

Anyway.. I picked up my rockgarden project again last saturday..
The weather being cold enough to do heavy labour and not getting too hot schlepping my rocks from here to there. It goes a lot slower than I expected though.. The rock pile is large enough.. but I have to dig and look for the right rock.

This is the result of 4 days work.. I expected to have advance a lot more.. but building a rockwalls from river rocks is more complicated that I had anticipated. First I have to select the rocks of a certain shape, then it has to fit with the side of the next one... It all a lot of labor and looking for the right rock. This is only the beginning.. the next row on top of

My rocks have arrived and the front yard is aerated !

It has been a while ago since I devoted some time to this blog wrote last.
Extremely busy with my landscaping projects. Some of which taking shape others not... . Ever since every member of the neighbor's family is now involved into this project, Jason, decided to aerate the front yard... This is the result of his idea of aerating the soil... :)


Last Tuesday a big pile of river rocks arrived. I am so much looking forward to begin building the retaining wall for the rockgarden, if only those huge rocks hadn't fallen have fallen into the garden and I am not strong enough to lift them myself without braking my back.

Being a small woman and weighing 110 pounds with lots of energie and strength... I unfortunately have encountered my limits. :(