Thanks for the explanation, Andy! I never knew that about where the umlauts, etc. came from. That's very interesting about your surname, also. My ex-husband is an "Eisenach." We figure his ancestors must've come from that town. His mother's family were Schleuchers (I've forgotten exactly how they spelled it) whose name was "Americanised" to "Schlauger," go figure. I have a "Froeliche Noel" card which my brother sent to me when he was living in Bavaria. And, my grandma had a caregiver who was German. She was a sweet woman who knew i was learning German in school, so she wrote me simple letters in German which I had to translate, then write back to her in German. She was very patient.