The things we just sleep on...

I returned with oldest DS from school camp today. Completely Slightly different from at home he was lovely, helpful and gave everything a go ;-) I had a rally nice time, the 60 kids were lovely (unlike some of the students I will meet again next week...), great location at MERC at Long Bay, north of Auckland. While the weather packed in today, we had awesome weather for the other two days so what more can you want. Now a long weekend back home before I have to will face the reality = work again!
No bed is ever as nice as your own, so when I got home I changed the linen - and ripped my husband's pillow inner. It is filled with heaps of these little fluffy beads, and as he is a bit particular about many things his pillows AND on night shift again,  I went to mend it straight away. [too many strike throughs tonight!!!] The fabric has become extremely fragile, I doubt they will survive another wash which they are due for.

I was quite annoyed, but I realised these pillows must be 14 years old, a present from DMiL when we shipped our household from Germany to NZ (in case the accent is not 'loud' enough in this blog, I moved here from Germany 15 years ago). This led to a bit of a reflection about the things we just sleep on...

See, in regards to bedding we are still very German. We came here with our regular "double bed" which for most German couples would is 2m x 2m, with two individual sets of slats topped with two individual "single" size mattress - sort of putting two single (twin) beds next to each other, but with the frame around them both. When we could not replace the mattresses for an affordable amount (I think we had a quote of $2000 per mattress), we replaced the bed with a NZ superking size bed - one mattress, approx. 1.80m x 2m. The single sheets we had were passed on to the children. The superkingsize sheets when on the line quite annoy me, and shifting the mattress almost requires a rugby team, but it is very comfortable.

Following the German custom, we also have a single duvet each, no topsheet, no tucking in (would be quite unpractical, too, as you can't tuck single sheets into the middle of the big mattress of course). The size is slightly smaller than NZ singles. I have never been an avid linen buyer, so those times that I buy new covers, I usually buy superkingsize duvet covers and cut them in half to make two singles - cheaper than buying two singles and often nicer designs.

For pillows DH and I have always differed in preference - I like one regular size pillow and go shopping for nice quality when the old one gives me neck pain, but he just loves his two German style 80x80cm pillows - fluffy with heaps of give to make them 'squashable'. I have just researched my options in replacing them given the abovementioned issue, but the largest I find is the 'European' at 26" square. Why on earth all these differences in different countries?? Can't we just for once agree on something? And why of all things call itf European, its's certainy not standard German size at least?

My options are: 
Persuade DH to go for umpteen regular pillows (unlikely).
Buy Eurpoean size pillow inners and start new collection of pillow cases (I could always cut the big ones down??)
Get DMiL to post some (horrendous postage I am sure)
Make some pillow inners myself? There must be something out there in the www, but I can't start to think about looking!

So the things we 'just sleep on' can be very different - and the difference can be very complicated. I wonder how the pioneers went about that??? Well, they probably just made their own and didn't whine like me!

Any suggestions?? Sleep well however you are bedded :)