Merry Christmas!

It's really feeling like Christmas around here now. As Anouk declared yesterday in her matter-of-fact way: "We have Christmas." I think she was referring to the tree, which Mark and I put up yesterday while the kids were at daycare. Anouk is really excited - and that means a bit fussy at the moment. But, what would the days before Christmas be without kids being fussy because of the anticipation, Mama being fussy because she doesn't know whether or not she can meet the expectations and Dad caught in the middle...

All is good, all is calm. Presents are wrapped, the goose is the fridge for Christmas Day, the cupboards are bursting with Stollen, cookies and chocolate. Until Anouk announced this morning that Christkind was bringing her a new cuddly: a zebra. Zebra??? Two days before Christmas? Really?
I got lucky - it was the last one in the toy store. The teenagers working in the store were laughing about the people doing their last minute shopping (did they know that customers were in the store??) and it made me smile, because they obviously do not have children at home who decide last minute what  Christkind (or Santa) will surely bring this year.

Amazingly I even finished the quilt for Liam. It's been a long time coming and I did not want to give him a box of quilt blocks with the reassurance that some day I would finish it. Although Liam would have been happy with that, too.
Here is the quilt still in the making:

I wrapped it and put it away without taking another picture. The next picture will be of Liam snuggled into the quilt.

And so we are all ready for the days of celebration to come. We decorated our tree with our collection of ornaments coming from my and Mark's childhoods, ornaments from Denmark, Germany and some new ones from the Vancouver Christmas market.

And of course it wouldn't be Christmas without the Krippe that has been passed along to us from my parents. It's the Krippe of my mom's childhood, made by my great-grandfather for a young family with small children (my grandparents and my mom). It is always a very special moment when I take the old Sauerland barn out of the box and the delicate figures out of their boxes. The figures are old paper mache figures, probably from the 1920s.

Many generations come together in our Christmas room to celebrate with us. That's what Christmas is about this year. Family. Far and near. Family members that have passed away and left their memories with us and family members on their way to join us (Angela, we're thinking of your growing belly!).

Merry Christmas to all!

It's beginning to look and feel a lot like Christmas...

I was actually a bit shocked when I saw today that the last entry was in September... September!!

The fall went by in a blur. Liam is doing great at school, Anouk is doing great at her daycare. I've been super-busy finishing the book and Mark has been busy writing as well. Bookwriting was an all-consuming endeavor throughout the fall, with continuous re-writing, editing, revising and re-revising. And then all of the sudden the December deadline came and it was done. It took me the least two weeks to catch up on everything and catch my breath.

... and then all of a sudden Christmas is around the corner. And it's beginning to feel like Christmas here. Little by little the decorations have begun to crawl out of the Christmas boxes and the house looks more and more festive and cozy. Anouk's assessment: "I like the decorations, beautiful." And Liam is very excited about Christmas.

Here's Liam knitting a hat for Anouk's doll for Christmas:

Liam took his knitting to school for "show and tell" and I was a bit worried that he would get teased, but it went really well and the kids were interested when Liam showed them how it worked. A few weeks later he brought the finished hat to "show and tell". I asked him what other kids bring for "show and tell" and he replied "Things that we don't have, like computers". For the record, we have more computers than we need, but I guess none that I would let Liam bring for "show and tell"...

And here is the doll I made for Anouk that will wear the hat:

Doing some crafting during the bookwriting was really good for me. It was good to just relax, let my hands do the work and let my mind rest. Up to the last few weeks when I just collapsed onto the couch in the evening and then dragged myself to bed - no more creative energy left, actually no energy left at all...

I even started a quilt for Liam for Christmas and joked about how this is a perfect procrastination excuse: instead of writing another 3 study questions, finish another 3 blocks for the quilt... Then a friend confirmed that I was not alone with that method: there is actually a book about quilting instead of writing on your book... I have to ask her about the title...

Now that I can do some sewing without guilt I made some Danish Christmas flags for our window:

And I even tried to make some chocolate treats. There are lots of recipes for this online and it all boils down to a simple: melt your chocolate and pour it out onto some parchment paper, put some toasted almonds (or other nuts, or candies, or whatever) on top, melt some more chocolate and drizzle on top. Done. Easy. And super-good!!!

Encouraged by the almond bark, I decided that making caramels wouldn't be too tough either. And honestly, what can go wrong when you mix together sirup, sugar and heavy cream and bring it all to a boil? Well, it's guaranteed to taste really good, especially when you then stir in copious amounts of butter... But, if the recipe says to boil for 45 minutes, you should probably boil for 45 minutes, not 25. 25 minutes gives you very gooey (but delicious!!) caramels. Too gooey in fact to really cut up and put on a plate or put into little jars as a gift... So, what's a novice caramel maker to do? How about melt some chocolate, freeze the caramel and then dip the frozen caramels into the chocolate - chocolate-covered caramels!! mmmh!!!

And then the treats do all fit into a little jar as a gift. This one is for Liam's teacher.

And here's our kitchen window looking more and more Christmassy, especially with the snowflakes and the star that Liam made and the little gingerbread ornaments that arrived just in time for Nikolaus from Germany.

And since I haven't written a thing here for months I thought I should share some recent pictures of Liam and Anouk.

This is what the kids looked like this weekend as they dressed up:

Liam is off to school!!

This week was Liam's first week of school. He started on Wednesday and the whole family came to send him off! He was a bit nervous but quickly adapted to the classroom. His comment about French? "French is easy!" and indeed he quickly repeated the word of Madame Lisa : "Frapper les mains, tapper les pieds..." "Tete, epaules, genouz, orteilles..." I think he's going to be OK. :)

And this Saturday morning he actually cried when I told him there was no school on Saturdays.

So I sent him off to the library with his new red backpack.

Of course we had a Schultüte for him filled with wonderful school supplies Oma and Opa brought from Germany: a pencil case (Federmäppchen), water colours, a pencil sharpener and of course candy and chocolate.

I cleared off my grandfather's desk for him and he is very proud to have his own space for his precious pencils and notebooks - out of the reach of his little sister!

I think he grew about 5 cm this week.

:)

... and then suddenly she was 2!

At the end of August, Anouk turned 2. My little girl growing up so quickly. So much energy, so much fun, so much talking, exploring, running...

I found this lovely book for her that summarizes all the wishes I have for her, all the blessings I want her to have:

Happy birthday my sweet girl!

Summer vacation

Fun in the sun or fun with daddy's sunglasses:

Relaxing lazy days on the beach:

Anouk throwing rocks into the water:

This beach was really fun until I was spooked by a snake scuttling over our quilt and then a multitude of jellyfish in the water:

Climbing on driftwood:

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catch up

It's September and cool weather is settling over the city. An end to a beautiful summer - although I am still banking on some warm autumn days...

I need to catch up on some posting here and there is no way to summarize this in one single post, so I will just publish a sequence of posts that I should have written and published weeks ago...

Here we go!

"happy goodbye"

"Happy goodbye" is what the daycare calls a child's last day at daycare when the child's time at the centre is celebrated and the child then moves on to either the next centre or to school.

Liam had his last day at daycare on Friday. It was a huge day for him and for me. To think that he was only six months old when I went back to work and he started his daycare days... And now he's five and ready for school! It is these days that we realize how time goes by and how our children have grown up.

I really wanted to mark this last day and so I got organized with the other parents whose kids were going to Kindergarten. I wanted to make a quilt to leave at the daycare, a quilt that would represent all the children who were going to school this year.

Every parent emailed me information about their children and I chose fabrics to represent them. It was an incredibly rewarding and satisfying process.

For Liam I chose fabrics that would show his love for books and for stories. A book reading a book in the centre, stories and music all around and a strip of astronauts. The astronauts are for Liam's goodbye song, a song with which he was sent home every day: "Zoom-zoom astronaut, do you know you name or not?" Then a long pause would ensue when Liam would ponder a character from a story that he wanted to be, then after some prodding he would say "Sophie" or "Harry Potter" or "Saucepan Man".

Here is Liam's square:

And here is the entire quilt:

For his last day Liam wanted me to bring lemon cupcakes with lemon icing for his last snack to share with everyone. I also wanted to bring something for every child. In Germany children get a big cone filled with school supplies and candy on their first day of school: the "Schultüte". I thought this would be a wonderful tradition to share with all his friends. So Mark and I made 24 little cones that we filled with a couple of candies, a pencil, an eraser and some stickers. We bought all the school supplies at the Japanese dollar store (which is definitely one of my favourite stores in town!!).

Here is the making of the Schultüten:

Here is Liam talking about the tradition and what this is:

Liam and his friends eating the lemon cupcakes:

The Schultüten in the kids' cubbies:

One of the many beautiful things the daycare does for the deprting kids is to make an album for them about their time at the centre. Here is Liam's teacher reading through Liam's goodbye book with everyone.

I am forever grateful to the daycare. They have been a fantastic and valuable part of our family.

Giving them a quilt was my way of giving the warmth they have given Liam back. A way to say thank you.

And making the quilt was cathartic as I was wrapping my head around Liam growing up, as he leaves the safe environment of daycare and is off to school.

I am glad we have a wonderful (and much needed!) vacation coming up before we have to drop him off at school for the first time...

The flower lady

These bouquets could be found all over the neighbourhood. People bought them from the flower lady on 8th. She had this amazing garden with these flowers that she cut and bound into bunches and sold them for $1 or 2 each.

She was elderly, a bit hunch-backed and usually either in her garden or in her driveway making the bouquet wearing a large straw hat.

I often bought flowers from her, from her little stand with a jar for the money. I never talked with her, except for a quick "Hello, beautiful flowers today!" - she never seemed like she wanted to talk.

She brought a lot of colour and joy to this neighbourhood and I think not many people knew much about her. I didn't even know her name.

Now I do.

Her name was Georgia. She was born in 1920 and passed away in 2010. The little stand that used to be filled with her flowers now just has note with her name and the year she was born and the year she died. Someone is putting fresh flowers on the stand in her memory, in the same mason jars her little bouquets used to be in.

Thank you for your flowers, Georgia!

Summertime

Nothing says summer like a plate full of cold watermelon on a hot afternoon:

Eaten in the shade,

with juice dripping onto your belly.

Just hanging out in the sun.

Later painting with water colours at the kitchen table:

After painting on paper, trying some body art:

This is the beautiful picture Liam made for me:

Lazy, happy day in the sun!

Bliss.

Ready or not, here we grow!

I cannot believe how quickly the kids are growing up!! Liam turned 5 last weekend and we had am "Enchanted Garden" birthday party. Liam wanted a costume as a garden fairy in yellow with green buttons and an orange wavy border.

This is how it turned out (together with the costume design drawing he made):

Here he is wearing the garden fairy costume with his fairy crown:

We had a puppet show, balloon animals and a wading pool set up for the kids. It was a lot of fun! And we were so lucky with the weather!! It was one of the rare sunny days of this summer.

Yesterday I was helping Liam brush his teeth when we noticed that one of his front teeth is loose. I almost teared up... It seems like yesterday that we went through many tears while he was teething and those teeth came through...

Anouk is talking more and more every day. She loves to sit on the front steps and say "hi!' to everyone who comes by, "hi doggie!" "hi people!" "hi bike!".

This morning when I dropped her off at her daycare and said "Bye-bye, I love you" she looked at me and smiled and said "Love you!" and then ran off to play. She is so full of energy and full of life - and already so independent!

I am very proud of these growing children!! ... although I did make Liam promise not to play with that loose tooth, because if it falls out it really means that he is growing up and I'm not sure I am ready for that. He just gave me his Liam grin and told me it was inevitable, he was going to grow up whether I was ready or not.

How true.

Flying

As we walked to daycare today Liam announced he had a big project today. He was going to work on it all day.

"Oh, that's great" I said, wanting to encourage him to dedicate his day to his wonderful, creative project.

"What is your project?"

"I'm going to fly."

"?"

"Yeah, it will be great."

"OK."

Then I thought of him jumping off the climber, the roof or any other high structure to fly. I saw us in the ER with a broken arm...

"...so you know that flying is only pretend, right?"

"Hmm, I think I can do it. I'll work hard on it all day."

OK, so the whole, if you dedicate yourself to a project and really work hard on it, your chances of success are high thing - he got that. Good. Just not that it won't work for flying.

"Humans can't fly, we don't have wings." I said, hoping that this very reasonable objection would make sense to him and make him realize that nobody is flying around town...

"Oh, well, I am going to use a broom."

OK, I blame that entirely on Harry Potter. So now my picture of him jumping off a high structure has been modified to include a broom.

By that time we were at the daycare. I went up to one of the teachers and let her know about Liam's big plan for the day. Just as we were discussing climbers, brooms and broken arms we overheard Liam announcing that he was going to fly to another parent.

We then talked with Liam about birds and wings and pectoral muscles and how we humans don't have any of those. The we talked about helicopters, paragliders, airplanes and other flying devices. We talked about how a broom is just a broom and can't fly. But, it didn't seem to matter. When we saw his determination, we, the adults mouthed "Ikarus" to each other.

OK, so now my image is Liam on a broom on a climber flying to near to the sun and then falling and breaking his arm.

When I left we had decided that he would illustrate and write a book about Liam flying.

Hopefully this will work. I will be waiting all day long for the phone call that I need to pick him up since he just jumped down from the climber and has a broken arm.

Happiness is...

I just wanted to share a couple of happy moments with you:

We got a new dishwasher ( - the old one was leaking floods into the kitchen...)

And dishwashers come in big boxes and Liam was very happy to be allowed to sleep in the box for one night:

This weekend we had Nutella on bread for dessert. When Anouk woke up from her nap she found the empty jar on the table - it's amazing how much Nutella you can find in an empty jar and how happy that can make you:

This is my windowsill over the sink: rocks that Liam finds for me and the dandelions both Liam and Anouk pick for me on our walks:

I will try to share one happy thing a week all summer, maybe more :)