It's A Girl!

Yesterday Tina, Theo, baby Johan, Karl and I ventured out to the zoo to check out ten day old elephant baby girl Jamuna Toni. Luckily we got there sort of early, because she seems to be getting tons of visitors these days. She is after all the first elephant baby at the Tierpark Hellabrunn in the past 66 years!



I told Karl she was his size but weighs ten times more than him which didn't impress him much. I guess she was still too small and too far away. Only the fact that she ran away from the animal keepers when they were trying to wash her sparked some interest.



As usual much more excitement was caused by apes and monkeys. It's always amazing to see our little half monkeys in front of the real ones. Unbelievable that there's actually people who deny evolution since this is clearly where we're coming from.



On a different note: Many thanks to everybody for all your holiday whishes and a happy New Year 2010!

Christmas

Christmas went like... that. So did all the fun people from near and far who were like a resident entertainment troupe just here for the excitement of Karl. As well as the constant stream of presents, first slowly fueled by the Advent calendar with the little package every morning, containing a knickknack or a snack, followed by the presents on Christmas eve and then by the presents from all the traveling entertainers (our favorite: the firetruck/ambulance combination with working sirens and lights that can also double as an alarm clock, if positioned on the pillows of parents). The daddy highlight was of course decorating the tree with junior. Next stop - whittling a boat from a tree we fell ourselves and then taking that boat on a tour of the lakes around here to fish for some tasty carp and whitefish that we prepare over an open fire in the tree house up in the mountains that we built with the leftover wood from the boat.

Santa Clausa 2009

Somehow it looks like Karl has the same expression on his face like last year for the same event. Is it because I told him that Santa doesn't really exist?

4th Advent

It was the now 3rd annual Christmas brunch of our building. Does that make it a tradition already? It always features a great tradition though - "Schrottwichteln", which loosely translated means trashy Santa. Everybody brings something she/he wants to get kinda rid of, but never did, wrapped as a present and puts it anonymously into a big sack. After the meal everybody throws dice. Whoever rolls a six gets to pick one package. Karl got a joke glass, that looks like a mini-champagne glass filled with something that swills around, but never emtpies, Fred got a mini-fog-machine (I guess from the yoga teacher neighbor's DJ son, who at least knew what this weird item of consumer electronics does), I got an inflatable cushions with a huge b/w-portrait of Sigmund Freud that kinda scared Karl, so I deflated it (oooooh, how much of an analogy of parenthood was that little scene).

Later on Karl and I took our new car for a spin to the Christmas market in the park. Karl thinks it looks "fast" (which should make the carmakers' design dept. very happy). Since he fell asleep on the way to the park I took the opportunity to enable his nap and confirm his first impression by taking our new family wagon out to the Autobahn. Afterwards we had waffles at the Christmas market, gazed at the nativity scene (Karl's totally into it, I'm afraid there might be something genetic - his great-granddad was a minister, he sure didn't get the knack for churches and religious kitsch from his faithless, blasphemous, sinful parents), looked at the shiny, crappy things they sell there, gazed some more at the nativity scene, tried to ride the caroussel, had some minor hissy fits, gazed some more at the nativity scene and went home for a nice, hot bath.

Fred made Karl this really fantastic Advent calendar, which is a German tradition. Kids get 24 little packages and from December 1st to Christmas Eve they get to open one each morning. Today Karl's had a can of spray-on soap foam in bright pink. Here I just blasted him with the first round of this strawberry-smelling soap and Karl looks very mildly amused, but more like he thinks I'm way too old to be that silly.

Cold

Today was really cold. So cold that instead of four carrousel rides and one warm waffle only one ride in the Porsche (the 'real' one this time) was requested followed by three warm waffles.

Flash Flood Danger

When Andrian is not around and I'm too lazy to unmount the changing table from the big bathtub I still give Karl his bath in the small one. I guess this has to change. There's definitely not enough space anymore for my little big boy, all his Barbapapas, fishies and duckies.

Mother's Little Helper

After Karls excessive complaining about the three snowflakes that were falling from the sky and the accompanying wind on our way to and from the bakery in the morning, I decided to stay at home for the rest of the day yesterday. We made an apple cake for Andrians return from Copenhagen and surprisingly my son turned out to be a great help in the kitchen: Not only did he do all the dishes afterwards, but he also made sure my apron would get enough wearing time for the rest of the day.

Another Slow Day

With Andrian being in Copenhagen for the UN Climate Change Conference I was happy that Karl let me sleep peacefully till 8:30 a.m. and that we subsequently had a very slow morning. It was snowing like crazy in the early hours (but didn't stick) so it was okay to be a bit late for our soup lunch at the market. But because of our tardiness everything was already jam-packed with Christmas time tourists. Which I really loathe, but Karl doesn't mind. He especially enjoys every kind of street music and doesn't judge between a brass band of blind Christians playing Christmas hymns or a middle eastern looking trio playing Frank Sinatra inspired holiday tunes. I think they were hoping for even more goodwill of the passersby in these times of economic crisis by standing in front of a big shop window declaring bankruptcy.

'Tis The Season For... Carrousel Rides!

There has been a lot of carrousel riding over the past couple of weeks and Karl has certainly become an expert in charming his parents into buying way more rounds than they actually want to. Here he his together with his buddy Theo driving Porsches (their statement) and a police car.



And yes, 'tis also the season for New Years resolutions: I will get back to posting more frequently!

Slow Day

Everybody overslept. Til 9:30! Fellow parents know, what that means. A wonderful day featuring relaxed moods, procrastinated chores, neglected routines and an all around sloppy attitude towards life and it's obligations. We even got to the playground so late, that the light was already too low for pictures in focus. Under the reproachful looks of other parents about to lea e we did get some quality swinging, rocking and seeswaing done. After everybody had left we baked some marvellous looking sand cakes. The reward for staying out that late (alright, not that late - with winter solstice approaching dusk sets in around 4PM) was seeing Santa Claus all decked out in his finest Santa Claus garb driving by in a horse-drawn carriage. Whoever came up with that kitschy idea sure knows how to get that pre-Christmas glow into childrens's eyes. So what, if Karl now believes in Santa Claus. Give him a break. He's two.

Reunification Process

Got back to Germany this morning after five great days in New York, during which I got to see (in alphabetical order) the young and youngest New Yorkers Ben, Bruno, Jacob, Jasper, Julia, Leo, Max, Oliver and Zac. But after a week of having spread our small family unit over three metropolitan areas it feels good to start the reunification process, i.e. I'm at Karl's Omi's house, from where we'll start our journey to Munich tomorrow morning. Not that Karl has missed us. He obviously had a great time, going to parties and the way he knew his way around the Bensheim holiday fair makes me think that he sure wasted quite a bit of Omi's finances on frilly entertainment. Kinda irresistible though to see him either in awe or in complete excitement amongst all those flickering lights. Who wouldn't wanna spend his last money on another three rounds of carousel?

When Night Falls...

...you can still spend half an hour or so on the swing at the playground.



Especially when you need about 40 minutes to get there.

P.S.: Yes, Andrian and Karl are on their vacations in New York and Bensheim, but I still got some posting material left from those past weeks where I didn't have any time to update our dear readers as frequently as I would have wished.

Starnberger See

Having a guest from New York is of course always a great opportunity to do all the things Munich's famous for and you don't really get around to. Like driving out to the Fischmeister restaurant out on Lake Starnberg. I had the very best roast pork ever, Rich had a pheasant pate and pasta with wildboar ragout and Karl snacked himself through a wide variety of our and his dishes. We also ran into Luisa, who was happy to join an experiment on balance and statics on a self-constructed slide made out of beer banks. Her father is an architect after all. Although the experiment did draw some tears. The real draw of course had been the prospect of feeding the ducks, who were nowhere to be seen. Luckily there was a beach full of pebbles to throw, which Karl did with gusto. Nap was taken on the highway again, on the way to the Sammlung Brandhorst, a museum for the collection of super-rich, lawsuit-happy Udo Brandhorst who spent all of his late wife's money on expensive, but very decorative American art. Karl had to do damage, but security there is kinda commando style, so he didn't get to wreck anything, like last time at the Alte Pinakothek.

The Visitor

Rich is here. My best man and best friend from New York. He's on a brief, but very fabulous tour of Europe (seeing us, having Thankgsiving with his sister and his parents in Paris, giving lectures about his book about his hike all across Cuba at the London Academy and the Essex University). We started the weekend in style and went to the Viktualienmarkt, stocking up on supreme fishes, birds and produce, having a lunch at the Suppenkueche, where Rich had the "sour lung", which indeed is veal lung, but tastes so much better than it sounds. Karl immediately took a liking to Rich, christened him "Onkel Ritz" and trails him like a little duckling. He pulls at his various hairs, tells him elaborate stories (still in two word sentences) and makes him read to him. Rich is all uncle and tries to indulge him as good as it gets (they're both picking up some foreign language skills in the process). Fun weekend coming up!

November Sunday

November Sundays are a tricky affair in Germany. With the whole country coming to a pious standstill on every seventh day of the week it tends to get a bit eery in the cites anyways. But while during summer at least the parks and riverbanks are filled with crowds, a drizzly November Sunday can make you believe you landed a role in one of those post-apocalyptic movies (minus the Emmerichesque fireworks). So it's time to get that social calendar kickin'! No more slacking off at the Isar, no more loitering around the playgrounds. Karl got to go on a little tour of Bavaria today. First stop - Schnitzel! With Anna (left) and one of her Kindergarten friends (Anna's in grade school now, but her friend's still in Kindergarten). Karl enjoyed all the female attention and mistook their mothering smothering ways for something else. He got real macho and started to read his books to them. Which they took graciously and made him feel like a million dollars, even though his two-word-sentences are kinda hard to decode, if you don't know the books.



After the Schnitzels at the inn (formerly country, now posh inn) Karl witnessed a dog in a dress. Not like one of those wintery leather coaty things, a real dress. He was as puzzled as I was and we both started giggling, which the dog's owner didn't really appreciate that much. We hung out at Albert's (Anna's dad) for a while, where we were served hot beverages and cookies and Karl got carried and rolled around, womanhandled, squeezed, kissed and showered with toys to try out. After a few rounds on the designer-chair-turned caroussel Karl started to look all drowsy, so he got to take a long mid-day nap in the car on the various highways and byways to....



....Seeshaupt, home of Opa his wive Maria and Karl's auntie Milena. First we had to go down to the lake though and check on the ducks. There was a whole flock of them floating on the water, but I guess they were kinda cold-stoned, because Karl couldn't even lure them in with all his charms and cookies.



So we hung out at Opa's, where Karl was treated to a first visit to my late mother's childrens' book library, which is quite extensive, since she was a photographer specialized in childrens' advertising, so she needed all those books to keep restless models busy.

Finally we arrived back home again, where a long bath was in order. Because Karl better look spiffy tomorrow, because tomorrow is Mom's birthday! I sure hope he remembers all those songs and poems I made him memorize.

Happy Birthday Karl !!

Two years! And of course the day started with an avalanche of presents from all over the country. As is customary in the Western world. Big hits: A lion, a giraffe and an elephant. A book about soccer. A book about construction sites. A little suitcase for toy cars. And then there was the shiny blue bike Maria sent him from Frankfurt. And the train set from Omi:



Breakfast was the legendary banana chocolate muffin that sent my Sunday staff into kiddie comfort food bliss, when they served as guinea pigs for the test-run muffins. Those muffins are so increduiouslectably good that Karl had to defend his from a pack of wild animals circling his plate.

Hello Ducks!

After having requested a trip to the beach that would involve pebble throwing for a while now, we finally made it today. It was the most beautiful Fall day even though there was way more clothing required than last time.



So lots of pebbles were thrown and ducks were greeted (Hallo Enten! = 'Hello Ducks!') as well as fed. But if your really want to put a smile on a little boys face, have him wade through a big puddle next to a construction site. Things don't get much better than this.

Wildpark Poing

I took Karl to the Wildpark Poing, which had already been a great success last year. This year was of course even better, since Karl was definitely getting more of the gist of those beasts. The more excitement the bigger the disappointments though. That pack of deer for example - just didn't wanna follow Karl's well meant advice to approach him for some of the oat feed we bought at the kiosk.

Equally disappointing was the promised big bad wolf, which actually was more dozy and lumpy than big and bad.



Life can change fast though and wandering wolves do look like in the "Peter and the wolf"-book accompanying Karl's CD.



Also Karl showed first signs of chef's pride when two rams fought over a meal of oat feed he had prepared for them on a stump (the one in the foreground won, the one in the background pretended nothing just happened, although going by the headbutts his cranium must've really hurt). Other adventures on the trails of Poing - a hissing lynx charging at some kids who teased him; a massive playground that includes electrical model diggers kids can operate to do some sand digging; a bunch of well fed locals Karl charmed out of their chocolate cookies; a hot dog; a comatose nap on the highway.

Temptations

Fall is here and with it all the temptations of a new season. So some marvels of summer might not get the same enthused response as just a few weeks ago. Like bouncing semi-abstract animals.



What's become an irresistible temptation though are - puddles! The murkier the better. Karl can already make mud jump up eight feet high. Or far. Depending on which trajectory will get more rise out of innocently bystanding adults.

Thinking Outside The Box

The weather was bad so we stayed inside for the biggest part of the day. But Karl didn't only stay inside the apartment. He chose to spend a lot of time inside different containers. After a pretty hard week (he got bitten by a dog and suffered through three days of snow storms...) he probably felt the need to be really safe. His time was spent going through old mail in the paper recycling bin and calling Omi to make appointments for his next visit out of his toy basket. Of course whenever Karl is staying inside a box, he's still thinking outside of it, so no judgements please. When his dad came home with a big piece of marble cake from aunt Milena Karl left the safety of his containers pretty quickly though – did you know that the best way to eat a piece of cake is to hold a fork in one hand, the whole cake in the other and then stuff as much as possible in your mouth? And nose? Now you know.



And yes, he finally got a new hair cut tonight, after he was done with the cake.

Rocking...

We went to a daytime party at Claudia's, Maxi's and their cute-as-a-button daughter Helena's new place in Augsburg (some 19th century stucco splendor spread with a terrace overlooking a little private park most New Yorkers only get to see with Robin Leach's voice-over). Karl managed to really wreck the place rockstar style. To top it off he gave a xylophone performance that Maxi described as very Pete Townsend with a nice finish of Hendrix. Later Karl gently swayed back and forth in Claudia's rocking chair, giving his best sweetie-at-his-best-behavior-performance. Which nobody bought.

Ai Weiwei

I've been a bad blogger lately, I know. But it's not that we don't do stuff. Friday for example we walked by the Haus der Kunst to check out Ai Weiwei's backpack installation for his highly anticipated show there which starts tomorrow. It's pretty impressive and Ai Weiwei is Karls new most favorite thing to say. Apparently he also understands that you can make art out of backpacks, so it will be easy for us to explain to him the whole Campbell soup and Coca Cola bottle stuff.

Crazy Concept

Did you know there was soap you can paint yourself clean with? And it's delicious, too!

Boys' Day Out

It was boys' day out. Tomorrow is "German reunification day", kind of our 4th of July minus the fireworks, good weather and great parties (it's more about somber speeches and endless reruns of footage showing mullet-headed East-Germans flooding through newly opened border crossings in 89). Since I get the day off before any major holiday (sorry, still no paper on holidays around here, because the union don't care about no media crisis), I picked Karl up from daycare and took him on an errand run, restocking our pantry at the Italian food wholesaler. The great thing about his age is that he can already be a useful chore companion. He can stack noodles into the cart, charm meat counter ladies into letting us skip the line, hold on to cookies and point me towards purchase-worthy food items. Afterwards I took him to the museum quarter, trying to get him to go to the newly opened Sammlung Brandhorst again to look at some staples of 20th century art. He was having nothing of it, insisting on the Alte Pinakothek, being the traditionalist that he is. Not that he can pronounce such a tongue twister yet, but he yelled out the main detail of his favorite painting (a 16th century still life by Georg Flegel featuring a "Parrot!!!!"). Of course there's lots of child appropriate fun to be had there. Testing the durability of art history books, proving that security measures are truly lax (both pictured above, and yes, I was surprised that the alarm didn't go off). And of course the home stretch towards the customary Apfelschorle, the local mix of seltzer and apple juice that has become synonymous to summer outings in his vocabulary.