Late summer 2007: I was 19 years old, about to graduate from high school and still carrying my family name "Thieme. My father told me about a drawing competition in the German BILD newspaper in Berlin for the 10th anniversary of Lady Diana's death and he thought I should take part because: "Nothing ventured, nothing gained!"

So I chose my favorite Princess Diana motif and started drawing. Each week the newspaper presented incredibly impressive submissions from many other participants and each time I thought, "That's more than 1000 participants! I'll never win that!" But then one day my dad calls me at school and says, "You won't believe who just called...Sandra, you won!!!" To this day, I can't believe I got to fly to London for two days with two other winners!