The boys and I didn’t hardly do anything today. Either that or I forgot. As usual, we were supposed to go to music class, but I’ve already decided that it’s too much trouble for a class that they don’t like. It’s too early too.

In the evening, Angelika and Stefan came over and we went to dinner at the Italian place in our building. Man, I love that place so much. I go there almost every day since I am usually too tired to make lunch for myself. Am I lazy or what?

We actually did really good speaking in German, I could understand mostly everything they said. And Michael and I both spoke better too. I really think we are getting better. I’m sure if we continue these meetings, we can sustain the German conversation a lot longer. It’s really fun, I highly recommend people getting a “sprach” partner!

The boys in sweaters that Ingrid knitted for them
I’ve been promising to take a picture for her forever!
Here it is, finally!

Last night while I was doing my homework for German, I all of a sudden had clarity. It’s like I magically understood things, without any rhyme or reason. Things made sense in a strange way. I just chalked it up to delirium (haven’t been getting much sleep lately) and went to bed.

This morning, Riki called and she had to go shopping and asked if I wanted to come along. So we did and we rode our bikes. Riding to the city center is a mixed blessing. On one hand, you get there faster, on the other, you have to navigate through people, cars, and fußganger zones (pedestrian only streets). But we went anyway, it was a really nice day. We went to C&A first, and then to 2 Karstadts. I had to buy envelopes for our newsletter (wow, I’m actually on top of things for once) and then I bought a bike light for Michael and a lock for the stroller. We took our time and it was a fun morning. I rarely get to spend time with Riki and Frederik anymore (since Frederik is in daycare now). Rowan also is very “loving” in the stroller and tries to always hug or lean on Elijah. Elijah hates it and so the screaming starts. So what I do is take Rowan out to walk. We then put Frederik in with Elijah and I had control of all 3 kids! Frederik is into poking and hitting how, so it didn’t last for very long. Rowan is a really good walker and can go a good ways.

In the afternoon, I went to German lessons. I was really proud of my new way and I like it quite a bit. The previous 3 or so times, I rode on very bad roads (no bike lane and lots of traffic) and it was somewhat dangerous. The way I went today was mostly on bike lane terrain, with a couple of exceptions. The only bad part about it is that it goes through Marienplatz and there are tons of people around and it’s very slow.

My German lesson was the best ever, my teacher was wondering what I did because my German improved quite a bit from last time. That was kind of a shock to me, but I think it was due to my newfound clarity from last night. I was very proud of myself! Don’t get me wrong, I still don’t know a lot of words and nowhere near decent, but it’s getting easier. A couple more breakthroughs like this and I will be very happy. We talked a lot about Christmas and how many presents I have to give to family and friends. It’s a lot!

In the evening, we downloaded yet another show called Heroes. I only did it because Wil Wheaton wrote about how much he loved that show and how the producers of Lost should take note. How could I NOT download it? So, if any of you want to give us a gift, it would be iTunes GC (in US dollars). We spend bucketloads of cash there! Just so you know, the show is good and very interesting, looking forward to watching more!

I stayed up way too late (as usual) trying to finish up Michael’s socks. He’s been hounding me for weeks to do it. I was sooooo close to finishing (at the toe area), but then I realized my stitches were off. Now, I could just do a correction on the next row, but then it would bother me. So I will probably take out all the stitches in the toe area and redo it. No big deal, probably will only lose about an hour of work. But still.

This morning I got up with a “get stuff done” attitude and really did get stuff done. My desk is still a mess, but there was a lot of calls I had to make and things to send. I finally got my act together to get the tax papers together (German) from LAST YEAR. We’ve been so bad about that. I think the accountant guy is irritated with us.

I called the phone company because they haven’t been sending me the bill, only withdrawing my payments from my accounts. I know there are charges relating to the move that I need to get reimbursed for but I need the statements. I’ve been putting this off for awhile, I don’t know why. At the same time, I ordered faster DSL. I tried to do this online like 3 times, but they never switched me over. This would be unheard of in the US! But I got it all straightened out with a combination of German and English.

The boys and I stayed home in the afternoon. I gave them a bath when the cleaning lady was here so that we would be out of her way. I bought the boys this squid thing that goes in the tub and it has a propeller that makes it swim around. I thought they would totally love it, but it was the exact opposite. They completely freaked out whenever I turned it on. Both of them screaming at the top of their lungs! The squid is really lifelike and I thought it was a cool toy. So I turned it off and it was ok. I put it on the side and Elijah picked it up and threw it in the water and was wondering why it wasn’t moving. So I turned it on again and then Elijah started laughing until it came around and was poking at his feet. Then he freaked out again and started screaming and grabbing at me. I don’t know why this particular toy scares them…maybe they just need to get used to something moving?

After the bath, we watched “Babe”. They liked it, I think they like realistic movies rather than animations. Rowan really surprised me because when a horse came on, he said “horse”! I haven’t said horse too much to him, except for when he plays with a little plastic one. But that’s not very often. I think they know a lot more than they let on.

I want to get a decent night’s sleep but with all this Christmas stuff to do, it’s next to impossible. I have so much to do and in only 2 weeks time!! ack!

How old am I today?

My grandma taught me this and I can finally do it, well, sort of:

Wow, we kept them alive for 2 whole years! Amazing! We didn’t do anything special today, except go to class. They were unbelieveably clingy and whiney, don’t know why. My guess is that the class has gotten boring and there are no physical challenges anymore. They are the oldest in the class and most of the activites seem to be for the younger group. But they used to have fun, so I’m hoping they will enjoy it again after a break.

I have been teaching them “I love you” (ah, doh-doh-doh) and “How old are you?” and they say “two!” and hold up some fingers. Sometimes it’s no fingers, sometimes it’s 5, sometimes 4. Trying to get two fingers up is hard.

Happy belated Thanksgiving! The holiday came and went without any bravado (sounds usual for us), but we were invited to not one, but two thanksgiving feasts! On Saturday, we went to the Knipples’ for Thanksgiving #1. It was a great feast, and we were joined by two other families and their American babysitter. Lots of kids all around, and Logan has every toy imaginable so all the kids were happy. The boys enjoyed playing with his “Megabloks” car center. It was a really neat crate that had ramps you could build off of it. Rowan was occupied for a couple of HOURS! Of course, Elijah found a car he liked and did not let it go until we left. The food was really great, De did a super job with everything! I cleaned up a little, but felt bad because we had to leave early. The boys were getting tired and fussy. Thanks a lot De & Steve for the great evening!

This past week has been hard, mainly getting Christmas stuff done and preparing for their birthday party on Sunday (26th). I went on a marathon shopping trip at Wal-Mart to get all the food. By the end, I was all shopped out. I didn’t know how much food and drinks to get, I just ended up grabbing a bunch of stuff. Turns out I did ok on the food part, not so much on the drinks. I should’ve gotten a couple more Apfelschorle. We bought too much bread, but that’s ok. I bought ice cream that I completely forgot about, so we have two things of it in our freezer still.

The party was fantastic! It was really great that we had it at a Kinderkrippe (day care place). There were tons of things to play with, the favorite being the “padded” room where the kids could jump around in. There was a large middle room where we went to open presents and it was the perfect size. We had 13 adults and 7 kids, a pretty manageable group. And can you believe all the kids were boys? It was nice to have almost all of our Germany friends in one place and everyone could meet everyone else.

In case you’re wondering, Rowan blew out his candles, but Elijah needed help from dad. They didn’t understand presents and so we had help from the older kids of the group, Logan and Vincent. They didn’t mind helping out at all! The “Stanton Cupcake Design Center” was a big hit with both kids and adults, probably more for the adults. The cupcakes were really good (from a mix), haven’t had it in such a long time. I’ll have to make it again soon since the frosting will go bad and I don’t want to just throw it away!!!

So now we’re recovering from the party and still trying to get our act together with Christmas stuff. There’s always someone you forget about! But for the most part I’m done with shopping, which is amazing!

And now, for knitting news. I am still working on Michael’s socks. I am done with the heel and slowly making my way to his toes on the 2nd sock. I swear this is too much work for a pair of socks! Since the knit is so tight, it takes for-ev-er. I’ll take a picture of it whenever it’s complete, hopefully tomorrow. I also have my unfinished baby bolero from the “One Skein” book (still waiting for my circs). I am also starting some secret projects for christmas presents soon. I bought the yarn for it today, can’t wait!

Here we are singing Happy Birthday to the boys:

Me and Ingrid in Stash London

I just came back from my trip to London. Michael had a couple more vacation days this year that he didn’t use up (imagine that!) so he said that since I didn’t really have a vacation, he would watch the boys while I take a trip. I decided to go to London for shopping since it cost only 60 euros roundtrip.

It was a great trip! I got in late Saturday evening and took the train to Finsbury Park. Our friend, Christos was supposed to meet me there but I couldn’t find a taxi so he called a “mini cab” and picked me up. It was kind of a scary place to be, but at least there were a lot of people and cars coming and going, so I felt a little more secure. I ended up waiting about 1/2 hour there. But we finally made it to his place and we chatted while he fed me his fried chicken. It was really good, but he just sat there and watched me eat it, which was annoying (he ate earlier). His place was cold and when we went to sleep, the heater didn’t come on. He didn’t have any bedding for me either, so he took off his duvet cover and gave me that. When I lied down, I noticed that there was a plug sitting on the floor so I asked him about it and sure enough, the heater was just unplugged. Unfortunately for Christos, I snored very loudly so he couldn’t sleep. I felt so bad! I usually don’t snore (according to Michael), but sometimes when I’m really tired, I can really saw logs.

The next morning, I planned my route and all the things I wanted to do. I walked to the train station only to find out it was closed due to maintenence. Crap! I didn’t really know what to do so I walked back out on to the main street and caught a bus into the city center. I could’ve gotten off earlier and caught the subway, but it was confusing (even in English) as to what was open and what was closed. I finally made it to Oxford and Regent streets. It was soooo much fun to shop there. I can’t really explain why. Maybe because everything is in English? I don’t know. Or maybe because the shopping area is so much bigger than in Munich? I did a lot of damage at Hamley’s (toy store) and various clothing stores. Of course I bought nothing for myself, mostly gifts and stuff for the boys. I met Christos for dinner at a place called Toku. It was awesome, I loved the chicken karaage there.

Regent Street with Christmas decorations

After that, I went to Ingrid’s place. For those of you who don’t remember, she was my secret pal 8 and sent me all kinds of wonderful goodies like the cashmere scarf and cute sweaters for the boys and also got me hooked on Green & Black’s chocolate! Since there were a lot of weird and confusing train changes going on, I asked a guy how to get to Mortlake and he said that I take a train to Clapham Junction, transfer to Barnes, then take a bus to Mortlake. Crap! How am I going to remember that? So I walked a little further and asked the official info booth. Even though he spoke English, I have no idea what he said, and I even asked him to repeat it twice. Oh well. I went to yet another info booth and she told me to take a train straight to Mortlake. OK! Then I wondered why I got such conflicting advice. It turns out that the train took the LONG WAY to Mortlake and not direct. But it was ok, I got there. Ingrid met me at the train station since she just lives walking distance from it.

It was nice to finally meet her and chat about all kinds of stuff. She had a nice room for me filled with all kinds of stuff to read and look at. I swear, I could’ve stayed there a week without surfacing! She has tons of yarn/craft books, magazines, and even saved me some sudoku puzzles from the paper. How thoughtful! I had a great nights sleep and hopefully didn’t keep everyone up with snoring. I couldn’t do those “super sudokus”, it has 5 sudoku blocks connected, but was confused as to how it worked. I thought it was intuitive, but then I saw two 8’s in one row (printed), so that threw me off.

The next morning I walked to school with Ingrid and her kids, Ellen, and twins Lily and Edward. It gave me a real taste of how 5 year old twins are. They are really sweet kids, but I was amazed at how Ingrid handled so many things at once - lunches, who likes what on their sandwiches, 3 different school plays, getting them dressed, show and tell, etc. etc. Edward told me about his 3 different lunch bags and how they got lost or broken. So cute!

After that, I went back to Oxford Street, this time doing damage at Borders. I was really stupid and I should’ve just ordered the books online and have them shipped. But then I thought why should I pay the shipping when I can just bring them home with me. So I bought bucketloads of books and had to carry them all around with me. I was supposed to meet Christos for tea, but there was a bus strike today (Monday) and so he couldn’t make it. So I went back to the Japanese place again to get more karaage, it’s really that good. I went to the department store, John Lewis. As I was entering, this older woman held the door for me and I said thank you as I was going through. As I passed her, she said “THANK YOU” really loud and sarcastic to me and I realized that she didn’t hear me say thanks as I was coming in. So she gave me “the eye” and so I said loudly as she stomped away “I SAID THANK YOU, YOU JUST DIDN’T HEAR ME”. I really should’ve followed her and thanked her again to embarrass her more, but I had places to go and things to do. It still bothered me though that she didn’t hear me say thanks, because I really did appreciate her holding the door for me. I got my slow cooker and left for Ingrid’s place. This time the trains were working ok and I got there in no time.

Once back at Ingrid’s place, we chatted some over a wonderful dinner she made (couscous with peppers and onions), and then we went upstairs so that I could help her with her blog. She wanted to add some buttons, links and join a knitting web ring. It was easy enough and so I showed her how to do it. She was so happy to get these things added, even happier that she understands how to do it herself now. After that we chatted a bit more. She is really such a nice person and it was fun to talk about life, knitting and kids!

The next morning (Tuesday), I walked with them to school again and then we headed off to Stash, Ingrid’s favorite knitting store. It is run by an American woman and a French woman who has an American accent. I was even surprised that she wasn’t American! It was a real treat to be in a store where I could “fondle” all the yarns. Yes, there are yarn stores here, but they really lack the selection that Stash has. I miss being able to see imported yarns, especially american yarns. We spent a good 2 hours there and I also did some damage. I am excited to knit these little newborn boleros. Now if only people would have kids so I can give it to them. It is a more girly thing I guess, but it can also be for boys too. We went back to Ingrid’s place, I packed up all my stuff, then I headed back out to Waterloo station to drop off my heavy bags. Now, I am used to the wonderful UBahn and all of it’s escalators and lifts. Since the Underground is so old, it is mostly stairs and a few escalators. It was tough to get my bags to Waterloo. Then, when I was there, I noticed that they also had a baggage leaving place at Liverpool Street, which is where I need to catch my train to the airport. So, instead of leaving my bags here and have to come back here, I decided to go to Liverpool Street instead. Whew, talk about sweat! At least I got my exercise. I was bummed I didn’t put on my heart rate monitor. But all was well. It did cut into my time though and I was planning on catching a movie. Instead, I went to Covent Garden for even more shopping, but didn’t really buy much. It was an interesting place though and I promised that I would come back to spend the day there.

From about 4pm, I was in a mad rush to get to the airport and catch my flight at 6:30. I had to miss 2 trains getting back to Liverpool street because they were too full. They had all kinds of train troubles and it was also the beginning of rush hour, so I just had to stand there. I’m not used to this, on the UBahn, they are so big that I have hardly ever heard of people not being able to get on. Maybe with the exception of Oktoberfest. And if you did miss a train, it was only one. The next one for sure you would be able to squeeze on. Anyways, I was rushing to get my bag out of left luggage, rushing to get to the express train, then rushing to get to the ticket desk, where I had to pay a 70 pound fee because I had to check in my hand carry, which was too big. Then I was late getting to the gate, I was the last person on board!!! But I made it and I could finally relax. Then, getting into the airport (we were early), I sat outside waiting for Michael and I saw him pass by and look at me and he pulled forward to get out of the way, but then I saw him drive off! I was running after him saying “NOOOOOOO!” And then I didn’t know what to do. Should I stay here? I figured he would just circle around again and come back. I waited for more than an hour and finally he called me. He was waiting for me at the next gate! Apparently, the gate that we exited out of doesn’t have the “Easy Jet” sign on it, and he didn’t know where else to go. I didn’t want to move from where I was because I wasn’t sure that anywhere else would be better and I didn’t want to miss him again. Argh, comedy of errors! But it was good to be home again. I sure did miss my fambly!

Thanks to Ingrid and her family and to Christos for giving me places to stay and making my trip a memorable one! And also to my great husband Michael for holding down the fort for me while I went off and spent lots of money…

17 years ago, Michael and I went out on our first date in LA. Hard to believe it’s been that long! What special thing did we do today you ask? Well, nothing! We didn’t plan anything this year, but we are planning on going out to lunch and exercising together tomorrow. Pretty romantic, if you ask me! :)

The boys and I made it to gymnastics class, just barely. Getting somewhere at 9:15 is pretty brutal. I did bike though, so I’m proud of that. Audrey was there with her two kids, so it was nice to see her again. Elijah was very clingy during the group exercise. They usually are. I don’t know why that is, probably because there are too many other kids there. So we didn’t really participate. But then there was this “station” that had a wooden bench propped up onto a tall box (about 4 feet high) and Elijah loved walking on it and then rolling down the other side. He wanted to do it over and over and over. The bench going up is only about 8 inches wide, but after a few times doing it, he was able to walk on it all by himself. Rowan wasn’t as daring, but he still enjoyed it. His favorite thing is the little trampoline. Jumping is a big thing around here.

The boys are constantly testing their boundaries (and me). They climb over everything when I’m not looking. I caught Rowan climbing on the dining room chair back (it’s wooden with slats like a ladder), I’m surprised it didn’t tip over. Then they like to knock their books off the shelf and climb on top of that too. They also like to get into the storage closet and see if they can cyphen off drops of coke left over in the recycling container, as well as pull out all the wipes from the container. Kitchen cabinet slamming is a favorite sound, as well as the rolling pin pounding on the floor. Spitting out water is oh so fun and I always find little pieces of food in the strangest places. At least they find ways to keep themselves occupied.

I have to get all of our German tax stuff together from LAST YEAR! Ugh, it’s such a pain. This was supposed to be Michael’s job, but somehow it got put into MY inbox. How did that happen?

We were supposed to go to our music class but I didn’t get up early enough. And because we all didn’t like it 2 weeks ago, I haven’t had the motivation to try. Maybe next week. We had a great day at home though. The boys were just so good! We just hung out, played with legos, read books, practiced blowing out candles and tumbled on the rug. Since their birthday is coming up, I went out and bought candles to practice with. Rowan has got the blowing thing down, but Elijah blows upward. Poor guy, he tries and tries but hasn’t quite gotten the hang of it (see video). Rowan is also learning how to give hugs. He puts his arms around me but doesn’t squeeze. Sometimes he just leans in. He can be so sweet! Elijah has this new thing now that he doesn’t like it if he doesn’t have his pants on. I usually let them walk around pantless if they have cloth diapers on but now he requests for me to put pants on him. So strange. I also have put in a new “payment” system. If I request them to do something, like come over so that I can change their diapers and they don’t do it in a certain amount of time, they need to “pay” me to get up and do it. Their currency is toys. I have a feeling it will be effective with Elijah since he is quite attached to certain toys, but for Rowan it won’t work as well since he’s happy with any and all toys. I’ll have to think of something else for him.

I hymned and hawed about going to Elixia to workout, but it was a nice day today so I decided to do a bike ride instead. By the time I got them fed and changed and ready to go, it was already dark (it starts getting dark around 5pm or earlier). But I still went anyways, I need to get that trophy! It was a nice ride, I enjoyed it. Elijah fell asleep and Rowan sat quietly.

For dinner, Riki and Arne invited us up and we had chinese take out. It was really good, I liked mine a lot. It is always fun to get together with them! It seems like we see them less since Frederik doesn’t come over for babysitting anymore. We’ll have to have them over next week to return the favor.

One last thing, thanks for the clicks on the ads, we made a whole dollar today! Woohoo! Really, what I need to do is talk about asbestos removal. Because I heard clicking on those ads can be worth a lot. I don’t know why! Asbestos is not friendly, asbestos is something that needs removing! I had to mention asbestos so that google can get the key word ‘asbestos’ and show the pricey ads on this page. Click on!

One more thing. I forgot to mention that we figured out how the ads work. I thought just visiting the page is enough, but it’s not. It’s the clicks that count. Anyways, all you need to do is just to CLICK ON ANY AD, maybe once a day, and it will put 10 cents (or more!) in the boys’ college fund! I’m sure they keep track of who’s clicking what, so if you do multiple clicks, only one will count (as far as we know). So do me a favor right now - click on an ad on the right side. Thanks!