Coffee from a Reusable Ceramic Mug

Tammy: (looking at an old frying pan in the trash bag)Are we allowed to throw this in the regular trash?

Matthias:(looking as if he just got caught) I don’t know.

Tammy: In the US, we could just throw this in the trash, but maybe we need to take it to the Recylehof.

Matthias: Can’t we pretend that we are Americans?!

Tammy: What do you mean ‘pretend?’ I am American!

Matthias: I mean ‘REAL’ Americans.

Tammy: Oh

(We are taking it to the Recyclehof)

The new apartment has a much smaller kitchen than the last place, so we have had to become creative with organizing things. I LOVE our pantry, which takes care of storing lots of our stuff (I could only get a photo through the doorway because it’s a little tight on the inside). Today, we finally installed the shelf we bought at Ikea the week we moved in. Now, we don’t have to lay our pans on the kitchen floor - how fancy! We also have a nice, portable counter top because the kitchen itself has hardly any counter space (Matthias is making stir fry in the photo below, in case you were wondering). The only thing left to do for the kitchen is to find a small table that we can use as a tea station/staging area (for larger dinners). At the moment, we are using our old kitchen table, which is a wee bit bog for the space. Besides, we want to lacquer that table and put it on the balcony.

Check out the kitchen photos below - awesome, no?

After reading Christina’s blog this morning, I was reminded that it is international-buy-nothing-day! I totally forgot about it. We didn’t live up to the day, but we avoided buying ’stuff.’ for the most part. We went out to town to get out in the fresh air, and the Stadt was PACKED because it’s the first weekend of the Weinachtsmarkt (Christmas market). We had lunch there, consisting of crepes and Feuerzangenbowle (fire tongs punch) for Matthias. Aside from splurging on lunch, we got our groceries for the weekend - Christina gave us a pass for groceries because of the short notice of the day - Germany closes on Sundays. Still, not a very successful BND.

The Germans really love their Christmas season. The Christmas market has a different energy than most other shopping centers or malls. There are a lot of people, but as any given time, there are a huge number of people enjoying the spiced wine or liquor along with goodies such as Halbmeterwurst (half-meter sausages) in the company of friends. It’s pretty laid back. You won’t see a stampede at a Christmas market, for example. Unless you take away the spice punch, that is. In fitting with the season, one of the building on the Platz where the main part of the market sits has made itself into an advents calendar. The whole city is decked out with Christmas decorations.

As nice as I thought it was, Matthias could only take the crowds long enough to eat our crepes, get our groceries and get out. That was fine with me, because I am a bit wiped out today fighting a bit of an infection. I did get to try out a new way of carrying Clair though. My friend Janda, an awesome seamstress (as opposed to yours truly whose sewing expertise lies in being able to sew in a straight line repeatedly in order to make a quilt), threw together an insert for my jacket so I can zip it over the two of us. It’s awesome! It makes carrying he much simple in winter. You can buy these jackets with inserts, but they are really expensive. Apparently, the nosy German women agree. You see, I have gotten a lot of random mothering advice from strangers on the street - always older German women. As I was walking in the Christmas market, a woman walked passed and said, “Ja, ist das schoen gut.” (oh yeah, that is good) referring to my jacket.

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I was reading a question and answer session with the author of “The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why It Matters” over at Freakonomics, and it sounds really interesting. It is a global perspective on waste management. One thing that I really liked is that she urges people to stop sugar coating the reality of sanitation problems. You don’t often hear how a child dies from diarrhea every 15 seconds! (nice words like ‘water-born’ illnesses are used instead). She also discusses the wipe vs. wash debate and commends the improvements in sanitation made by the Japanese - I am still dying to check out one of their toilets.

The author puts a very good question to the readers - “Do you ever wonder what happens after you flush the toilet? If you don’t, why not?” I wonder what happens after I flush….

I keep telling Clair that she is too little to be standing, but she isn’t listening. It just looks strange when this little teeny person is standing. You can watch a video of her here.

Even After all this Time

The Sun never says to the Earth

“You Owe Me”

Look at what Happens

With a Love like that

It lights the Whole Sky

- Hafiz

Matthias’ sister Sandra and her fiance, Julian, came to visit this weekend, and we decided to have a Thanksgiving feast while they were here. Cliff and Sarah, always up for an occasion to try great recipes, came as well bringing a few good dishes. Rainer, living as a bachelor at the moment because Christina is in the US, also joined us. Being the vegetarian, I cooked the turkey - I made peace with the bird while I was digging out her innards. I posted a few photos on our Flickr site, but Cliff had the money shot (seen above). Cliff and his big fancy camera taking all of the good pictures….

This shot is my favorite from our camera as it looks like Rainer is telling me off about something - I have no idea what he was saying at the moment. Matthias and I had a really good time, and the food was awesome! We had the traditional dishes. Matthias made his family’s chicken soup. We also made mashed potatoes, sauteed mushrooms, brusselsprouts, and, of course, stuffing. Sarah made green beans with red peppers ad apple crisp, and Cliff made some kickin’ curried fruit (it had just a bit of bite to it). Unfortunately, Cliff sacrificed his pants to get the carried fruit to our place - it spilled all over his lap in the car, and he spent the evening wearing Matthias’ lounge pants as we washed his. It’s a good thing we just got a dryer!

All in all, I’d say it was a great feast. It’s nice to know that our little kitchen can handle so much food. Future parties will ensue!

Since I keep talking about our great apartment, I thought I’d put up a photo of the inside now that it is pretty organized. This is our living room - you may need to click on the photo to see it properly. I took it from our stressless chair near the windows looking in. I have this view several times a day as I usually feed Clair from this chair. The room is about 30 square meters, and you can see part of our kitchen on the left.

We woke up to this view out of our balcony (just outside of our bedroom). The Danube is to the right behind the trees. we have a good view in winter once the leaves fall off of the trees. The big Bavarian looking building is an Italian restaurant with good pizza, and the yellowish building on the left is another apartment building similar to ours. The ground below is a common area for the people living there and has a little Spielplatz (play ground) for the kiddies.

OK, off to get the place ready for our Thanksgiving dinner tonight…….