Help with family life and brew home made beer with us in Traben-Trarbach, Germany

Details

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  Description

  Hi!
  We are Inga, Florian, Philea and Linnéa. We have moved to Traben-Trarbach in 2020 in an old house and are busy with all the possible jobs. Inga is a web developer (in home office), Florian is a social worker, Philea and Linnéa are our two energetic daughters. Philea was born in September 2019. Linnéa was born in December 2023. So you can count their age by the moment of your possible stay.
  
  About us
  
  A few years ago we were world travellers and a bit nomads ourselves. In 2013-14 we have spent one year hitchhiking through South America. We have been all around Europe. In 2018 we lived four months in South-East Asia working remotely and travelling. We were sleeping in a tent and couchsurfing to save money while travelling. And we were workawayers ourselves twice during our South American adventure. We can share lots of stories, advice and experience. We are happy to host travellers now to receive a glimpse of adventures we once undertook ourselves.
  
  Our family
  
  Raising kids is a hard job. We realised it the moment our first daughter was born, and we were alone in Cologne in a small flat with no possibility of getting help neither from grandparents nor from friends or workawayers. There wasn't just enough space to host help.
  
  There is a proverb that we like: "It takes a village to raise a child". We decided and the universe helped us to create our 'village'. We moved as close as only possible to Florian's parents house. They live literally across our garden. We host workawayers so that they take over playing with our children and certain household duties, so that we have enough energy to provide a secure and supportive space for our children. It is also important for us to continue follow our dreams and have enough private space to not get lost in routines and parenting. We value our partnership and steadily working on creating a save and supportive space for each other. All these things are not always possible without conflicts, but we see them as a possibility to understand each other better and move forward.
  
  Our house
  
  We are located in the middle of Traben. We live in a big house, 220m2, and we like to fill this space with people. We tried our best to produce two wonderful children, but there is still enough of space for friends and guests.
  
  The house was build in 1880, and renovated in the 70s. It doesn't have the most beautiful interior, but it has a soul and it's rather cosy. We usually get furniture second hand or Inga builds some DIY things. The main heating is with a wood oven that is located in the kitchen. Each room has an extra infrared heater. We try to keep the temperature in the rooms at about 19-20 degrees. If you are used to warmer temperatures, take an extra sweater or warm long underwear with you. Also, you can always warm up yourself in the kitchen, it's the warmest place in the house in winter with the temperature usually at about 26C°. In summer though kitchen is the best place to hide from the heat, as it becomes the coolest place in the house.
  
  Traben-Trarbach
  
  It is a small, but very touristy place. Read more about the town here: traben-trarbach.de/en/
  
  
  Length of stay
  
  We prioritise requests from workawayers who can stay for at least two months. Minimum required is two weeks stay. But the longer the better! We had workawayers who stayed with us 4-5 months and it was great. They have improved their German significantly and we created a meaningful connection for life. We wish more of such experiences.
  
  
  Number of workawayers
  
  We decided to host only one person. It allows us to connect better with our workawayers and reduces the organizational effort.
  However, if you have special skills and experiences, like landscaping, painting, renovations, wood working, we would be happy to host one more person, provided we have energy for extra projects aside the family life, garden and kids.
  If we have one Workawayer, we mark our calendar orange. In case you wish to stay during the orange months only write us if you are experienced in landscaping, painting, renovations or wood working.
  
  
  Homemade beer
  
  We brew our own beer (in small amounts for private consume). Each time we brew, we get about 50 liters of bottled beer. As we don't consume that much and we don't sell it, we only brew about four times a year. If you stay longer you have a better chance to participate in all the stages of the brewing process. And of course we share our homemade beer with every workawayer who is interested in tasting it.
  
  
  Other important things to know
  
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  We really appreciate someone with cooking skills!
  But it's not a must.
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  If you stay with us, we try to make it feel like a "Wohngemeinschaft" (aka WG); everyone does their part of work to make living together comfortable, cosy and fun.
  
  During summer season we have a few rental rooms, therefore there are many random people in the house all the time. Just to note, that volunteers will not be asked to assist with any business activities, including but not limited to helping with paying rental guests, such as checking them in or out.
  
  We have lots of friends visiting us every other weekend. We are active on couchsurfing, bewelcome and warm showers. So we often have even more guests.
  
  Florian has ADHD. If you have no idea what it is, it might be helpful to read about this kind of neurodiversity to understand certain aspects of your host's personality.
  
  We like open and honest communication and genuine feedback. It is important for living in harmony to understand the needs of each other. So please, communicate your needs openly and honestly, ask questions, and give us genuine feedback. We'll be doing the same!

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  Types of help and learning opportunities

  Gardening

  DIY and building projects

  Babysitting and creative play

  Creating/ Cooking family meals

  Help around the house

  General Maintenance
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  Interests

  

  Politics / Social justice

  

  Cycling

  

  Camping

  

  Nature

  

  Blogging

  

  Gardening

  

  DIY & crafts

  

  Music

  

  Hitchhiking

  

  Photography

  

  Self development
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  Cultural exchange and learning opportunities

  Lately our brewing days happen rather rarely. We bought an extra pot which gives us possibility to produce triple amount from what we had before. Therefore, we cannot guarantee that brewing happens during your stay. We brew now about four times a year, usually in spring and autumn. But we will definitely manage to organise a tasting if you are interested.
  
  You can practice your German with us, especially with Phili. We also speak English of course.
  
  Frankfurt-Hahn airport (former Ryanair base) is just 20 minutes drive away. Ryanair still has quite a few flights to Latvia, Spain, Portugal, Italy. 1-2 times a month we can plan a longer weekend for you, like 3-5 days in a row, so that you can take a short trip somewhere further away, like a trip to Belgium with a train or a flight to Riga.
  There is a lot to do in the surroundings and lots of cities to visit nearby. So you won't be bored.

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  Au Pair Help

  Further details can be found here

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  Projects involving children

  This project could involve children. For more information see our guidelines and tips here.

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  Help

  Babysitting / childminding
  
  We'll ask you to do some babysitting 1-2 evenings in a week. On weekends and in the afternoon you'll be playing with our children: creative play, teaching them some stuff, going for a walk, etc.
  Phili understands quite a lot of English, because most of our workawayers speak primarily English with her. So if you don't speak German, no worries, it has always worked so far.
  
  
  Garden work
  
  In spring and summer there is a lot to do in the garden. When the weather is good, it is very pleasant to stay outside. During heat waves the plants need constant watering, every morning. Other typical garden tasks are weeding, moving the lawn, cleaning the paths and terraces from unwanted plants.
  During winter we do some preparation work for the garden: building and preparing patches, moving the compost, cleaning up old plants, planning and experimenting with landscape, upcycling pallettes.
  
  
  Structure of the week and daily tasks
  
  You will have to adapt to our family routines and times. You will have two free days: usually Friday and Saturday.
  
  We have a planning meeting every Sunday evening to prioritise tasks for the next week, schedule childminding and other upcoming todos. We also discuss wishes and mustdos and give each other feedback. If you are accustomed with software development, we do scrum with one week long sprints.
  
  There are unavoidable house routines, in the morning, and in the evening, that workawayers are responsible for, for example, load/unload dishwasher, tidy up the kitchen, load/unload washing machine/dryer. We try to arrange the daily working hours the way that they are not split too much and you can take advantage of your free time, but we cannot promise that all the time. There will be at least two days a week where the working hours will be split throughout the day.

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  Languages spoken

  German: Fluent
  English: Fluent
  Russian: Fluent
  Spanish: Beginner

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  Accommodation

  We probably will be hosting only one person, so they will have a private room. We might host two people sometimes. In this case they share the room.
  
  Workawayers room is a spacious room with two normal beds and a foldable couch. There is a wardrobe, a dresser, a table, a few bedside shelves and two chairs.

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  What else ...

  There is a lot to do in the region. Most popular activities here are hiking and cycling. We often go for trips with our car on weekends, so you can join us.
  You can travel easily with a train to Trier, Luxemburg, Koblenz, Cologne.
  If you are looking for flights to get to us, check out connections to Frankfurt-Hahn first. We can easily pick you up from there with a car. (Don't mix it up with Frankfurt international.)
  
  Then check Luxembourg and Cologne, from there you can easily reach Traben-Trarbach by train.
  
  Frankfurt international is not the best, but also possible option. It will take longest to get from there to us by train, about 4 hours.

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  A little more information

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    Internet access

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    Limited internet access

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    We have pets

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    We are smokers

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    Can host families

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  Can host digital nomads

  Inga works online herself. We have a decent wifi connection.

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  How many Workawayers can stay?

  Two

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  My animals / pets

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