Tis the Season

I finished most of my Christmas shopping yesterday (not all books, but many) and today I made Christmas cookies at Roanne's with her and her son Theo. I've also started listening to Christmas music and wanted to share my playlist and get your suggestions.

We made two kinds: shortbread cookies with cookie cutters and these frosted christmas trees. In this picture, Theo is holding them upside down.

As far as Christmas music, I have two main playlists - one which contains Daniel's approved list and one to play when I am by myself . Let's start with the former:

God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman by Aimee Mann
Blue Christmas by Johnny Cash
O Little Town of Bethleham by Elvis Presley
Fairytale of New York by The Pogues
Rudy by The Be Good Tanyas
Away in a Manger by Sufjan Stevens
Good King Wenceslas by Loreena McKennit

And then come the songs I love but Daniel just tolerates:

O Holy Night by Emmy Rossum
The First Noel by Leigh Nash
What Child is This by Josh Groban
O Come O Come Emmanuel by Carter's Chord
Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas by Tori Amos
Winter Wonderland by Tony Bennett
Ding Dong! Merrily on High by Chanticleer

I would love to find good versions of the following:

It Came Upon a Midnight Clear
Do you hear what I hear?
Let it Snow
Silver Bells (thinking of getting the version by Relient K)
Oh Come All Ye Faithful (maybe the Faith Hill version?)
I Saw Three Ships
Rockin around the Christmas Tree (something not so cheesy)

What Christmas songs and versions are your favorites?

Germany in the Euro final!

Now, I don't usually watch or care much about soccer, but it's hard to not get caught up in the excitement of an entire nation when you live here. We saw the semi-final game last night under a tent near the main train station, surrounded by raving fans. The tension was palpable when the Turks made their first goal in the 22nd minute and joy undeniable when Germany equalized in the 26th. Germany made another goal late in the game, but Turkey did too with 6 minutes to go. I didn't want to sit there another 30 minutes for overtime so I cheered like a crazy person when Germany made a goal with seconds to spare to bring the score to 3-2. As we made our way home, we observed (and heard) tons of people honking their horns and waving Germany flags. Some cars had people hanging out of the windows and standing out of their sun roofs. We saw one being tailed by a police car - not sure how that ended. The honking went on until 1 a.m. in the morning at least. Certainly not your everyday occurance.

Emmy comes home

I picked up Emmy on Friday so she's been with us a couple of days now. The first night, she just danced around on us all night, licking our faces and biting exposed skin - not very restful! Saturday night she was calmed down enough that she didn't bother us too much.

She found a spot she really likes - under the sofa in a storage compartment used to store blankets. So if we can't find her, we just dangle a rope in front of the sofa and she runs out. She seems to be adjusting well and is very cuddly (besides the night biting).

Restful Easter Holiday

We are fortunate here in Germany to have Good Friday and Easter Monday off so Daniel I used the time to relax, read (I finished "The Story of Forgetting" by Stefan Merril Block that I got at the book fair -very good, and started "Then we came to the End" by Joshua Ferris), do spring cleaning, buy cat stuff (cat carrier, cat scratching cubby hole column, cat bed, cat water fountain, etc), and visit family and friends.

Last Saturday I went with Tracy to her church for the Palm Sunday/Easter Passion service. But no Easter bunny or chocolate for us this year.

New pics of Emmy

Just one month until we can bring Emmy home! We are sent pictures of her every week. Here is the newest one:

And here is one from last week:

Of course we'd love to have her here already, but we're happy she gets to spend this time with her mother and siblings.

8 years in Germany

On February 27, 2000 I moved to Germany, expecting to stay 6 months. I spent a week at a bed and breakfast in Westend before starting my internship at McCann Erickson. My friend Camilla from Amsterdam came to stay with me and we explored Frankfurt and environs.

My first day at McCann was March 6th and that's when I met Daniel - the main reason I am still here :)

Twins turn three

Daniel and Dennis are godfathers to Florian's twins who turned 3 yesterday. We went out to Butzbach for the party. They got lots of cars and trucks (and books from us).

Happy Birthday Anton and Oskar!

Afterwards, Daniel and I went to Bornheim with Dennis for dinner at Pistazie, the Persian restaurant we discovered back in October. Very delicious - and always a delight to get to hang out with Dennis.

Semi ready for the Oscars

Daniel and I just got back from a free early screening of "No Country for Old Men". The funny thing is we didn't know it was free. I saw on the cinema website that there was a preview playing and when we showed up we were told that to attend, we had to have won tickets from Stern magazine, which we didn't. But they were nice enough to give us tickets that someone decided they didn't want. Free is always good!

Anyway, that means I have seen 4 of the 5 best picture nominees now after having seen "There will be Blood" last Thursday. The only one I haven't seen is "Juno" which won't come out here for another month.

I actually have a pretty good track record over the past 10 years when it comes to having actually seen the best picture nominees.
Let's take a look shall we?

1997 5-5
1998 3 1/2-5 (Saw half of The Thin Red Line and none of Life is Beautiful and do not plan to)
1999 5-5
2000 4-5 (Never saw Chocolat and won't go out of my way to do so)
2001 5-5
2002 5-5
2003 5-5
2004 5-5
2005 3-5 (never saw Munich or Good Night and Good Luck though I'd like to someday)
2006 3-5 (never saw The Queen or Letters to Iwa Jima and probably never will)

Not sure if I will get up in the middle of the night to watch it this year like I usually do or if I will try to record it on the Slingbox my dad has hooked up to his cable for me to access since last week. Such a cool thing - I can even watch Jeopardy from here! So far Daniel and I have watched two Lost episodes and I watched "Dreamgirls" on demand. Thanks dad!

Detox Diet and Fave Foods

Daniel and I only have 1 week left in our 3 week detox diet meant to break our sugar addiction. This type of diet really gets you thinking about what you eat - what is healthy and what is not and thus should be eaten only sparingly. I asked Daniel what his 5 favorite foods are, and this is what he said (in no particular order):

1. Steak
2. Cheesecake
3. Sushi
4. Potato Dumplings
5. Gummi bears

And these are mine:

1. Okra
2. Lentils
3. Green Beans
4. Nectarines
5. Chocolate

The only thing Daniel is allowed to eat from his list during the diet is #3 while the only thing I can't eat is #5. That makes the diet a lot more difficult for him, although I REALLY crave chocolate. The idea is that even after the "strict" part of the diet is over, we'll still follow it 70-80% and keep our healthy eating habits like cooking more at home and eating way more veggies. And hopefully we won't eat sweets every day but only as an occaisonal treat.

Meet Emmy

Today Daniel, Tracy and I drove down to Stuttgart for a cat interview with a Birman breeder. The kitten's official name is Arien von Duesterwald, but since we've been talking so long about getting a magic cat (long story) we're going to call her Emmy. The little ball of fluff is only 1 month old, so we can't take her home with us for another 2 months. But isn't she cute?!

In other news, we bought a navigation system for the car and used it to successfully navigate our way to Duesterwald and Stuttgart Main Train Station (to pick up Florian on our way back home).

I’m tolerating it!

You've all heard McDonald’s slogan “I’m Lovin’ It”. Well this is what www.bestweekever.tv had to say about it on their blog yesterday:

Since when has anyone over the age of 7 actually LOVED anything they put in their mouth that came from McDonald’s? Even for an ad jingle’s forced positivity, this is really stretching it. More appropriate slogans might be, “I’m Eatin’ It” or “I’m Joylessly Chewin’ What’s In My Mouth Because I Lacked The Time Or the Finances To Find Any Better Dining Option”.

It got a big laugh out of me! I haven't eaten at McDonald's probably since I was in Japan 10 years ago. It just doesn't appeal to me ... well, except the egg mcmuffins ... and those only because they remind me of all our family road trips to Kansas when I was a child.

stay in bed

Daniel hijacked my blog to bring you the following daily drawing (which he did for Chris to encourage him to stay in bed instead of going to work - per his request).

Planet "Sleep"

We've been watching the BBC series Planet Earth that Daniel got from my dad and Sandy for christmas. We really love watching it - only we tend to fall asleep toward the middle of an episode. So the other day when Daniel mistakenly said "Let's watch Planet Sleep", I had to laugh!

Happy New Year

We spent New Year's Eve at Tracy and Marshall's with Weina, Dennis and Kirsten in tow. Also invited were Debra and her husband and Max.

We grilled steaks and all brought a side dish (mine was pasta salad) and some wine. Max, Marshall and Debra's husband rushed away to set up the fireworks at Max's and the rest of us dipped fruit into chocolate fondue.

Here's a pic of the fondue group:

Over at Max's we threw firecrackers off the balcony and shot off rockets. The air was full of smoke and driving home, the scene looked like one of world war three - explosions and trash everywhere and people running around at 3 am.

Tracy and me with our firecrackers:

Christmas in Germany...

...was actually more fun than I thought it would be. I did miss my family though (and the first white christmas in 5 years in Kansas which was actually a blizzard that shut down our annual christmas eve celebration).


We did have a bit of snow here. Made for some pretty pictures.



Nora's back yard


We met Daniel's parents, brothers and the Trautner family for a goose dinner on the 23rd. Here's Daniel with Nora and Walter.




Christmas eve we did our last minute shopping (the line for the checkout at REWE grocery began at the front door and snaked around the store) and then headed over to Nora's. Here's an ornament on her tree - Daniel drew it when he was 11 years old.



The major drama was when Chou Chou attacked Carl's hand.



The victim



The perp


When all the guests arrived, we did our gift exchange. I ended up with a basket of homemade goodies from Nora's friend Hardi and Daniel got a Vanessa Paridis CD from Nora's friend Doris. Ruth's daughter Rebekah got Daniel's gift of chocolate and Helga's son HW got my gift of dessert tea, hot chocolate and a mug. Then we had fondue for dinner.


Florian, HW, and Daniel relax after the meal



Christmas day we hosted a lunch for Daniel's father Micha, stepmother Mietzie and all 4 brothers. I made sweet potato cassarole, baked potatoes, and brownies and Micha made steaks and brought salad. We had drawn names for this gift exchange and we opened them youngest to oldest and I took a picture of each.



Frederick (and a good view of our tree!)




Carl


Florian




Daniel


Steffen (with his Zombie from Daniel)



Micha





(according to Daniel, Mietzie does not want her pic to be posted, so I am honoring her wishes)


Next Christmas, Frederick will be in pilot school in Phoenix so not only will I be home for christmas but we might just bring the whole German crowd with us again.

Hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and thanks for reading my blog this year.

Happy Birthday Dad!

We love you! Hope you had a great day despite being practically snowed in.

Last christmas..

Just wanted to share a funny photo from last christmas day at my father's house.

That's Hans (with the bow) and Sydney on christmas day after they've ripped into all the wrapping paper. Silke wanted no part of the action and sat on Sandy's lap. Wild dogs!

Busy December

There is always a lot going on in December, hence the lack of updates.

Monday the 10th we went to the "leaving Franfurt" party of my former boss at Ogilvy, Folker Wrage. Folker is German but he is one of the few German copywriters that I have met here that can also write copy in English. He was a copywriting mentor for me at my first copywriting position and I learned a lot from him. He's not going too far - just to Hamburg.



On Wednesday and Thursday (Andrea's birthday) we were over at Andrea and Oli's to visit them and little Levi. Daniel totally monopolized Levi's time.





Friday I went to Neue Digitale's christmas party. My first ND christmas party was 5 years ago and it's amazing how much has changed. At that time there were 40 employees and now there are 150 in two locations. There are only about 7 people (including me and Roanne - below) that were around 5 years ago. The dinner was delicious and the company amusing - but since it was a private party, smoking was allowed which I am totally not used to anymore.

Roanne and me


On Saturday we visted Daniel's father and stepmother in Wiesbaden and we went out to Hausen to eat rabbit at Daniel's mother's place. There were two big pieces. Nora, Daniel and I ate one. Then we went to look at christmas trees. We picked out a small one and Henning (the employee there) cut it down for us (soooo sad!!). Nora picked out hers and we drove back. Then we discovered that we had left out the other piece of rabbit and the dog had eaten it. Oops!

On Sunday we went to Butzbach to visit Daniel's friend Florian and his wife and twin sons. Daniel is their godfather. Florian has a cafe there where parents can have a drink while their children play. Daniel did the logo for him (as seen below). I tried to get pictures of the twins, but they were just too fast for me.




Daniel was in the hospital for three days for a routine surgery. He got out yesterday is kind of puttering around now, but is happy to be back at home.

La Coruna, Spain

Last weekend we went to Spain to visit Weina who works there at Zara Home designing rugs. Daniel had a cold so we didn't do much on our first day, besides flying in on Iberia (Friday).

Saturday, Daniel felt somewhat better. We went to the main shopping street in La Coruna and walked around. Then we went to the beach for lunch and a walk around. There was a kitten there who was all over us trying to get our food. We took many pictures of it which are hilarious!

Weina and the cat

Daniel on the beach

Sunday we went first to a place to eat Churros - donut like pastries that you dip into hot chocolate.

Then we went to Santiago de Compostela where we visited the church and sat in on the end of the service. A nun was singing and the acoustics were amazing - what a special experience. Here's the outside of the cathedral, an UNESCO world heritage site:

By the time we got back to Weina's apartment that afternoon, I was feeling quite sick. I stayed in and watched a couple of movies from her collection - Hollywoodland, Casanova and Star Dust - while Daniel and Weina went out with a few of her friends.

Monday we flew back with Iberia, and this time we checked in one bag of stuff we bought in Spain (on the way there, we were strictly carry-on) and prayed they wouldn't lose it. Iberia has a very bad rep for losing luggage, so we were wary (Weina's luggage has been lost 5 out the 10 times she's flown with them). Fortunatly, our bag made it. Not that I would book on Iberia again unless I had to.

MIA

I haven't posted in a while for 3 reasons:
1. On Monday November 26th, my 4 1/2 year old HP laptop gave up the ghost
2. From Nov 30-Dec 3rd, Daniel and I were in La Coruna, Spain
3. I am sick with a nasty flu - fever, cold and the whole works

Hope to be back soon :)

In the meantime, I do want to congratulate the Mullins family on the birth of their 3rd daughter Miriam and Andrea and Olli on the birth of their son Levi.