Coffee from a Cardboard Cup

Here are a few random photos. Clair modeling a new outfit from grandma and grandpa today. Her clothes have been building into a massive pile on the floor lately because I had to go through and switch out the old stuff. Once I went through it all, I found this great outfit that Clair got a few weeks ago in her big Christmas package. She looks a little tired in this photo because she is fighting something, I think. She keeps getting a fever since early Saturday morning. It goes down with some ibuprofen, but when it is up, she is an angry little girl (gets that from me). It started going up again right before her nap today. Nothing else seems wrong with her, so hopefully this passes soon.

Clair also has a (fake) coon skin cap somewhere around here! Once I find out where she stuffed that, I am going to get a photo. She has a way of hiding things in the most unexpected places.

Here is our little comedian with her doll named ‘baby’. Her great-great-aunt Sib made it for her, and she loves it. She needed to run around after her bath the other night and show baby apartment.

Here is my husband chilling out after a long week. He is making some home made spaghetti Bolognese and chicken soup. I love that he relaxes by cooking! Fortunately, he does it quite well so Clair and I are happy.

One of the things about living overseas is that some of the American ‘Holidays’ kind of slip by without realizing it. So, really, is it Superbowl Sunday? If it is, who is playing? Does anyone know if you can watch it online anywhere (for the commercials, of course)?

Did you hear that Apple finally invented a new device? Impressive.

I don’t mean life without the country of China. Every once in a while, I come across news stories that get very little press about some horrendous acts carried out by the Chinese government against it’s people. It goes beyond internet censorship that does get a lot of press, interestingly, to the point of what I would call mass murder. Often women are bear the brunt of these harshest of these acts. I won’t go into details here about the stories, but these stories usually touch me deeply every time.

Fast forward to my perfect little life (compared to, say, the life of someone living in rural China). I look at the bottom of my coffee cup to the inevitable stamp “made in China.” From clothes, to dishes, to furniture, so much of it is made in China, and my consumption, in some part, contributes to suffering of the Chinese people. I can’t do much about the top-end politics of how my countries interacts with the emerging super power, but I can do something about my habits of consumption.

I am somewhat aware of where the stuff I buy comes from. I have a mix of things that were a bit more expensive because they were made in Germany or Western Europe with explicit mention about the conditions in which they were produced, and I also have a lot of things made in China. I’d like to decrease that second part until I can live with the idea of contributing to the government of China. I also realize that things are less black and white than painted here (as Chinese prosperity grows, there may be more chances for people there to win their freedoms, etc), but I still want to cut back on consuming Chinese made products.

Any ideas out there? I find that, generally, buying less stuff is a good start, and when I have to buy stuff, I have to read really carefully. I used to think that sticking with major brands helped, but it doesn’t anymore. That little ‘made in China’ stamp has a way of sneaking in there when I thought I have bought something from elsewhere. Has anyone had success in this? It would be nice if they had something similar to ‘conflict-free’ diamonds for Chinese products.

As an aside, I saw a headline about some video the Glenn Beck is promoting about the ‘truth’ behind communism. Apparently, he thinks it is a big secret that Stalin was probably the worst mass murderer in history and the Che Guevara was an actual violent revolutionary. Long story short, from what I saw, the video kind of implied that communism is really bad and that the liberals (AKA Obama and elitists) have been trying to spread lies that communism is great and that Stalin is a hero!!!! OK, that last bit may just be my cynical extrapolation of where the video goes, but you get the idea. Anyway, I was thinking about the people this video was marketed toward (I suspect I am not one of them), and I wonder if the video will inspire them to take a similar stand against Chinese products since China is the largest communist regime ever. Will crazy-eyes Beck try to raise a boycott against Wallmart and most other discount retails who thrive off of Chinese imports? That would be an interesting twist. I suspect it will most likely be blamed on Obama and no one will be asked to sacrifice their cheap stuff, but it could happen.

It’s been a while since I have posted photos, so I thought I’d play catch up today. I do upload them on to our photos sight, but if most of you read blogs like I do, you will never go there.

First, I just had to share this quote from this article in the NY Times by Sandra Tsing Loh about the disappearing Art of Wife (A phrase I love, by the way), “the work I do at home is no longer a gift, but the labor of a mediocre colleague whose performance could be better.” I think this is the best description of our contributions to the house work I have read. I’ve always described us as both doing a half-ass job, so together it almost comes to a whole-ass worth of work.

Anyway, pictures.

First, Clair checking her email in a fabulous new outfit from her Aunt Louise. Matthias stuck an Apple sticker on her kiddie computer to make it into an imaginary Macbook. The screen ooks a lot more like a Linux machine though.

I finally took Clair sledding with our friend Micha and her family. I couldn’t tell if she had a very good time. She was crying most of the time, but some of the crying was because she was scared, and some of the crying was because she didn’t want to stop. Between crying she did say ‘weee’ as we went down the hill.

Clair doing ‘upside-down baby’ (one of her Yoga poses, as I call them).

Clair discovered Sesame Street, and mainly Elmo, this week. I showed her some UTube videos of Elmo, and she was mesmerized. I got an episode of Sesame Street from itunes, and she has watched it a lot lately; actually, it is how I can have enough time to eat breakfast. She says, ‘La, la’ when she wants to see it because of Elmo’s song (which is all about the la, la, la, la). I signed up on Sesamestreet.org where I can compile a bunch of video clips of my favorite ‘classic’ Sesame Street moments. I loved Sesame Street when I was a kid, so much so that my brother and I would fight because I didn’t want to watch anything else, and we only had one TV. I have to admit that I still like it. The episode I have on the ipod is a newer one and it was interesting to see how they have updated it. Anyway, when Clair’s friends Nathan and Luca came over with their parents last weekend, they watched it together and the parents could actually talk - TV is amazing.

This is a rather long video showing how Matthias gets welcomed home in most evenings. Clair goes crazy running back and forth for a while. He can gauge her excitement on whether or not she wants to hug him. When he first gets home and he asks for a hug, she usually says, “Nein, nein, nein, nein” and keeps running around. After a few minutes, she calms down and then runs into his arms (which I didn’t catch in this video).

I was just thinking about statistics in the context of the Amazon.com consumer ratings (we are looking for a coffee grinder). They recommend thing based on the average consumer rating, but mentioning the median might be more useful. I notice that some of the less expensive (often knock-off) brands have an almost bimodal distribution of ratings than some of the more expensive brands. Then, I saw this comic.

I saw a demo of this video a few years ago at a conference. That one was an interactive version that can be used by science educators (If I remember correctly), but this is a video they made by ‘driving’ through the Universe. It is made from existing astronomical data.

You get three guesses to figure out who said this (I used this quote as part of a Yoga practice in remembrance of this day in 2007):

I refuse to accept the cynical notion that nation after nation must spiral down a militaristic stairway into the hell of thermonuclear destruction. I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right temporarily defeated is stronger than evil triumphant. I believe that even amid today’s mortar bursts and whining bullets, there is still hope for a brighter tomorrow. I believe that wounded justice, lying prostrate on the blood-flowing streets of our nations, can be lifted from this dust of shame to reign supreme among the children of men. I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality and freedom for their spirits. I believe that what self-centered men have torn down men other-centered can build up. I still believe that one day mankind will bow before the altars of God and be crowned triumphant over war and bloodshed, and nonviolent redemptive good will proclaim the rule of the land. “And the lion and the lamb shall lie down together and every man shall sit under his own vine and fig tree and none shall be afraid.”

Again with my irregular, random baby updates.

Let’s see. First, Clair has two new little friends out there in teh world, Laila and Maddie, the daughters of Ravyn and Dorota who just came into this world this week!

Aside from pulling out her own hair, she has learned a few other tricks. She can (mostly) feed herself with a spoon. She is even getting the hang of handling a meal requiring her to use a spoon and her hands. Previously, she would poke her spoon at everything on the plate to her great displeasure. My Aunt Louise sent her a nice bowel and plate for Christmas, and she seems to eat better since having a fancy place setting - who could have guessed?

She eats pretty well. Mostly, we just give her the same things that we are eating unless our schedules are off. She doesn’t have any favorites, per se, but she have a nice broad palette. She devoured some smoked salmon pasta with cream sauce and peas the other night, but I claim that was because I am such an awesome cook! She is also a big fan of beef. Bananas were a favorite at Oma and Opas, but as soon as we got home, she wants nothing to do with them. I think she eats differently at daycare too, which makes it hard for us to figure out what to pack for breakfast.

She is continuing to find more words and communicate better. Upon receiving a cool gift in the mail from Grandma and Grandpa, she started saying ‘wow’ and ‘fish’ (you can see why). She is proficient with the word ‘nein’ (’no’ in German). She understands a lot of things we say like ‘bring X to daddy’ or ‘do you want to brush your teeth?’ She seems to use the word ‘Dum’ like Homer Simpson uses ‘doh!’ If she falls or drops something, she says that. I think she may have started saying ‘poop’ today (she was singing along to the ‘poop’ song today - don’t ask). She has some sign language that she has invented as well, but she mostly has verbal ways of communicating things. This may be a result of the example of her loquacious parents.

She is crazy active. I was telling Sarah, the other day, that is it cool that Clair is now a little person, but she is a really annoying little person (and I mean that with all of the love of a mother). She is full of energy, but luckily, she is not yet terribly destructive (at least, not intentionally). She has a little ‘naughty corner’ in the living room, and she gets the idea that when she goes too far, she has to sit there and calm down. The days of having an easy time at a cafe with her are over for the moment. She is sometimes really awesome for about 10 minutes as she drinks her frothed milk and munches on a goody, and then she needs to explore the room. If I try to stop her, a lot of loud ‘nein, nein, nein’ starts happening. I need to just start ordering an espresso and heading out. At the moment, most of my cafe experiences happen on Thursdays and Fridays while she is in daycare. I suspect if we want things to go well at a cafe, we need to bring her there hungry so she focuses on eating the whole time.

The next thing I want to figure out is what the heck to do with her! She is here with me three days a week, and she needs to do more than just hang out with me. I need to get the details on what to do with a toddler during the cold, dreary months here in Regensburg. Luckily, we have a lot of friends with little guys. Maybe we can do some activities more often. I just need to know what we can do! Any Regensburg moms out there have ideas of where I can take Clair?

Toys for us, not Clair, that is. Matthias just downloaded a new Application for his iphone that turns the camera into an makeshift video camera. The quality is not great, but it is perfect for blogging. Check it out (Clair is playing in the pool of balls at Ikea):