Back to Munich

After racing back to Munich from Provence (crying in our wine at night), Troy headed off to Seattle for some meetings, and the girls & I dealt with an amazing heat wave that had the temperatures in Munich increase by 40 (seriously it went from 55 to 95) in 2 days.  It was such a shock to the system! 

We went to beer gardens,

sat out on the terrace & attempted to listen to Eric Clapton & Steve Winwood while some jerk across the courtyard decided to have a Karaoke party with windows open at the same time! This new art arrived on our street on the back side of the construction wall for the Lenbachaus museum.  I had been quite surprised that no one had tagged the wall (the security cameras from the aEon building probably scared them away), but they finally came up with an agreement from one of the schools because there are now about 25 characters greeting us every time we turn on the street. Sophia & Alexandra decided the floor was the coolest place to be – personally I would have been on the tile in the kitchen, but I was cooking in there.

And ice cream on the terrace!

Given early dismissal on Fridays, we were actually able to make it to the swimming pool after school! Pizza for dinner, eaten poolside.  Nice…

Little miss Alexandra

This is how I found her this morning: So after showing us her monkey skills in Italy by being able to climb out of her pack & play and unzip her sleep sack to be able to walk onto the terrace, she can now strip naked in the 5 min between when she wakes up & when I can get her out of bed (Sophia’s new morning bus schedule is really becoming painful).

Seriously, PJs off & diaper in a wad on her bed.  Oh, how I wish we could just concentrate on potty training, but with all of the chaos over the next few months I don’t think that will be a priority for us…

Munich play with Nana & Papa

On our rainy return to Munich, we spent a lot of time just hanging out with Nana & Papa, and a surprise visit from Uncle Brehan.

Lunch at the remodeled Riding School Cafe.  Delicious and HUGE plates – bring your hunger!! Sophia reading her goodnight story to Nana & Brehan. and showing the pictures to the rest of the class. And playing in the afternoons at Sophia’s school.

Alexandra decided she wanted to take her socks off. You know you get away with everything when the grandparents are around…And seriously it’s been raining so hard that we pulled out the twister game to play!  No park time for us…  but there was lots of time for lots of cuddles…

Sisters at Play

Sophia is really, really into making forts.  Recently she was studying ways people survive around the world, and one of the common themes was shelter, so the class was allowed to make forts.  They get more extravagant as the weeks go on. 

This time, she and Alexandra did a combination of desk, pillows, drapes and Alexandra’s crib.  I think they were also taking orders for something…

When Alexandra finally was able to put her bed back in order & fall asleep, Sophia colored Easter eggs in a very red kitchen. It was a very useable kitchen, bigger than ours in the 16th, and I was back to cooking on gas…  Heaven.

Earlier in the day Sophia had tried out a velib bike, one of the rental bikes they have around Paris. 

Just in case you ever feel like playing chicken with cars & riding around Paris…

Bribery, Munich style

Mondays are tough mornings in our house.  I’m not really a morning person & the bus comes at 8:08 exactly (it’s a bit like the Truman Show sometimes), but Mondays also have the added bonus of being garbage/recycling days. 

In our apartment house, garbage is stored in the courtyard, and bumped down & then back up 8 steps outside the door, up 5 more steps inside our wooden stairwell, before being bumped out  8 steps to the street.  Very loud on a monday when you don’t actually have to get up.

There are very particular rules about the size & shape of the recycle material.  All in all, not an easy process, and one that makes me want to just shove it all in the garbage & look the other way.  (except that my neighbors will come knocking on my door to instruct me in the “correct” way of doing things, and I really try to avoid any kind of interaction).

However, Troy & I have never thought of just bribing the garbage men. It worked too.

Pillow FIGHT!

Sophia decided to go around the entire house & put all of the pillows in our entry way so we could have a family pillow fight!  Great fun, and one of the special things we can do with daddy “working” from home.

Evening of Entertainment

Sophia & I went to the lower school musical yesterday at her school, the Tempest, with a cast of thousands, and so she was home a bit earlier than usual with lots of ideas about Theaters.  So she spent a good 30 min setting up the audience for her puppet show, and then put on a 5 min performance for us.  The idea of having a story line isn’t really important to her right now, she just likes the “surprise” of the puppets.

Sophia finishing up the audience, and Alexandra having a go in the spinning chair.  Troy & Alexandra are thoroughly entertained!

It’s beginning to look a lot like…

Christmas? Already?  Well, things happen pretty quickly here.  And for some reason the Christmas season seems really short this year?  What ever the reason, Sophia is really excited about Christmas this year, and she already has written her first Santa Letter, complete with cut outs from a toy catalogue of what she would like.  I’ll post photos soon.

We went to a friends’ house a couple weeks ago & made salt dough ornaments, and today was the day to paint them.  Sophia & I took advantage of Troy & Alexandra’s nap time to do a serious amount of painting, and then Alexandra joined us when it degraded into finger painting on everything else…

Veteran’s Day

I’m not sure if this is even a holiday in the US anymore, but Sophia had it off today for Parent Teacher Conferences (which is now Student/Parent/Teacher 3 way conferences – hard to hear actually how your child is doing…) and the girls were playing with the flags after our US Hockey Victory last weekend, so enjoy, and thank you to all of the men & women in our nation’s history. 

Days with Alexandra

Alexandra, at 18 months, is amazing and so much fun. Her understanding of language is unreal, and she is just now starting to say yes & no, although she has been nodding or shaking her head for a couple months now. It is so cute to hear the little voice come out of her. A little voice that gets much, much louder the longer she has to call for you. The first “Mama” is quite nice, friendly, eager. But the second is almost a shout, and from that point on it is all earplugs…

Before the weather turned I would often pick her up on bicycle from nursery school & bring her home for nap time.

She fell asleep almost every day! It is just so amazing to have a child that transitions from bike to bed (including taking helmet, shoes, and coat off & putting the sleep sack on) without waking up.

Now that the weather is freezing, she wears her snow suit, and loves putting her hat on. (She is all about the accessories & shoes).

Breakfast this past week has been quite entertaining because she was on fall break, and we needed to mix it up a bit… Unfortunately it left a bit of a mark…

Prep for Winter

The heat is on, the snowflakes are falling, and we are getting ready for the storms that are coming.  There are lots of clothes that are required for schools in Germany.  All students must have snow suits, rain suits (including boots, pants, and a coat), extra clothes for daily use (pants & lots of shirts being most important, and house shoes of course).

We were counting on waiting until we went to France for half term break before buying a snow suit (with the one from last year being such a hit), but I had to splurge on a Columbia suit for Alexandra when the snowflakes came, and luckily we had purchased a hat for her in Whistler (too bad I didn’t buy the boots as well – they are a fortune here!!!)

Falling into Fall

Daily life has taken over us all, in between the snow & freezing weather.  Troy has been traveling like the frequent flier he should be, Sophia has been doing amazing at school, Alexandra walks into her nursery school in the mornings without a glance backward at me, and I am running about in the mornings trying to catch up (in between dr appts, grocery shopping, trying to get our internet back, and the gym). 

But at the same time, the girls look sooooo cute!

(yes, those are Dorothy shoes on Sophia)

(books in French – because German & English aren’t enough!)

and more books.  Alexandra doesn’t care who is reading to her or if she is making up her own stories, she just LOVES books!