Schneepferd

Snowed about 6 inches last night (for Griff’s birthday according to him).    Watching M return from her ride in the snowy woods this morning I got an idea…

You can sit on it and everything!

Bavaria

Took a nice little family and friends trip down south (y’all) to Bavaria for some relaxation, fine dining and a little skiing.  There is a military lodge there.  Could not have been more American in its style and size, but it felt comfortable to know what to expect and that we could get refills on pop and stuff.  Like a vacation.

Ice crystals in the air plus sun = cool.

On the gondola overlooking Garmisch-Partinkirchen area - gosh! it's high up!

clouds rolled in while we were skiing higher up.

Cameron and I on the ride up, trying not to freak.

 It’s true what they say about Bavaria – it’s beautiful, the beer is otherworldly, the ladies are chesty and there are actual oompah bands that play for you when you go to dinner.  We had a great trip. Next week is London and Amsterdam over spring break.  View all the pics by clicking below if there’s nothing on TV tonight!

2010 January Garmisch

So Full of…Recipes!

It’s just like me to post a recipe for something Christmas-y.  In January.  But it’s winter and winter is a time for warm and spicy sweet things and this carries through to March, making this recipe still relevant.  If you don’t believe any of that, then just bookmark this under your “Pre-January Things to Make” file and we’ll see you in about 11 months.

German Gluhwein

2 TBSP.   Gluhwein Spice  or mulled wine spice – find it in a spice shop or maybe here?  (http://www.penzeys.com/cgi-bin/penzeys/p-penzeysmulledwine.html) – you can use it loose, or you can put it in a muslin bag or tea ball if it fits to prevent the need to strain it later. 

1 bottle of dry red or white wine of choice. 

A commonly found item on my counter...

 2 TBSP Honey

2 TBSP Brown sugar, packed ( I use these brown sugar nuggets because, well - look at them.  They crackle when you drop them in hot liquid…or when you eat them out of the box…I’ve heard).

A couple of Splenda Packets (so you can call it low cal)

Citrus Fruits (I used Clementines and Grapefruit)

Rum, if desired (oh, yes)

__________________________________

Pour wine into pot and add all remaining ingredients, except rum. 

Adjust sweetness if needed - it’s a personal thing.  Bring to a NOT BOIL.  Just very hot, or you’ll burn off most of the alcohol in the wine.

Get your mugs ready…and your rum.  1/2 a shot glass will do if it’s strong.  This rum is from Austria and is quite…potent.

Wait about 10 minutes at least for the mulling spices to release their, um…mull?  Optimum time is about 1/2 hour – 45 minutes.  I waited 10.  Strain into mugs, garnish if desired, dump in the 1/2 shot of rum and sit back and watch the snow fall.

Of course you can use a less EVIL mug.

And that, officer, is why I’m so tired today.

Ten days ago:  Griffin developed an ear infection and was put on antibiotics.

Yesterday:  Griffin complained of stomach pain saying “It feels like a toothpick inside.”  Somewhat alarmed, I attributed it to Griffin’s ever-angry gut reacting to the antibiotics.  Dr. Simone and I put him on a modified diet of no fats and sugars and pro-biotics to help it work itself out.

Last night, 3:00 AM (my bedside):  “Hello Mom.   I’m here.” (he climbs in)

Me:  “glurb…” 

(a few minutes go by…)

Griffin:  “Mom?”

Me: “Hmm…wha?”

Griffin:  “The other day I ate part of a toothpick and swallowed it and it’s poking me on the inside.  It really hurts.”

Me: ” ….  ….  ….   …. !” 

I suddenly remembered him and Cameron the previous evening happily munching on cheese cubes with toothpicks in them.  My blood slapped against my fingertips and toes in shock.  HE. ATE. A. TOOTHPICK!

Me:  (consulting Dr. Google)

Dr. Google:  “Holy mf’ing God!  Well you’ve done it this time, Sally.  Hope you enjoyed the last three years with him.”

Me, 3:45 AM, The Foyer:  bundling up Griffin, boots, coat, gloves, bundling up me, boots, coat, gloves, start car, Paul up, apologies, trembling, speeding, driving, snow, slippery, wondering why the hospital is on the top of a mountain anyway?, aaaaand Enter the ER Room 4:00 am

OVER THE NEXT HOUR AND A HALF…

Various Drs and X-Ray Technicians and ER Staff-folk:  “So little man, what happened?  We heard you ate…(checking chart) a toothpick?? (tossing me a look)

Griffin:  “Nope…”  

And after the “nope” he would then choose any one of the below randomly to complete the sentence. 

1. “I didn’t eat ANY toothpicks!”

2.  ”I ate a beetle.”

3.  ”I ate a magic seed that was red and turned into a red toothpick and it’s in my back.”

4. “I stepped on a toothpick and it’s in my body through my foot.”

5. “I’m hungry.”

6. ”I ate really pointy grass.”

7. “Is it time to go now?”

When pressed to point to where the pain was he would point, randomly again, to ears, belly, back, groin, legs, fingernails, hair and knees.  Each medical professional would then turn and leave, chuckling.  They took x-rays to be safe, found nothing (does insanity show up on an x-ray?), and told me, while trying not to laugh, that should he have anything red emerge from any of his openings, come back.

They were very polite, considering.

Me, driving home from hospital at 5:30 AM:  “So Griff, how’s that toothpick?”

Griffin:  (happily) “Good!  It went down in my leg and out the drain that’s in the bottom of my foot.”

Me:  “Good.  Good to know.”

Me (not really expecting an answer):  “Griffin?  Do you know how much x-rays and emergency rooms cost?”

Griffin:  “zzzzz….zzzzzz”

End of Year 2009, A Recap

Let’s not kid ourselves.  If you’re not directly related to my family, I really don’t expect you to look at these pictures.  You don’t have to pretend you did.  Really, it’s fine.

Just a pictorial recap of some things we did this December – Strasbourg, Christmas present opening, various holiday drinks we concocted and my awesome present from Paul (!) – a new dining table and chairs.  

Hope you had a warm and sweet enough holiday season to last you through the dark and miserable first months of the year.  We missed you.

Click the picture to go to the album.

Christmas is Fine in 2009

And Mom and Dad Can Hardly Wait For School to Start Again…

Mom:  OK, Griffin, since you’re ready first do you want to have the KIWI yogurt or the MANGO yogurt?

Griffin:  I want the mango yogurt!

Cameron:  <groan>…Oh MAN, I wanted the mango – I HATE kiwi!

Griffin: Cameron.  I have the mango yogurt (opening it) – Cameron!  I have the mango yogurt.

Mom:  Griff…stop saying that to Cameron.

              Cameron, just eat the yogurt.  It’s all just sugary flavoring anyway.

Cameron:  I hate kiwi.  I don’t want it.

<mom abandons children and goes to other room and listens>

Griffin:  <halfway through his mango> Cameron – you have vakiwi yogurt – eat your yogurt.  It’s good for you.

Cameron:  I don’t want it.  I told you I don’t like kiwi.  And it’s KI-WI – not Va-Ki-Wi.

Griffin:  <quiet…thinking>…ok – here – take my yogurt.  You can have my yogurt.

Cameron: NO!  You’re already eating it – it’s almost gone!

Griffin:  <taking the kiwi yogurt> I’ll just have this vakiwi yogurt and you have mine…

Cameron:  MOM!!!!!

Griffin:  OK Cameron…I’ll have both of them.  I’ll just go ahead and eat yours AND my yogurt.

<sound of yogurt falling on floor>

Cameron:  MOOOOOOMMMMM!!!!!

 

At Least I Can Walk the Walk

There are two reasons I’m motivated lately:

 1)  I keep beating a dead horse (wha-POW) here with my moaning and whining about how crazy it is to be plunked down into a whole country of people who have no idea what you’re talking about. I’m even sick of me talking about it.

 2) I drop my poor 3-year-old, for five whole hours, every day, into a school where they speak no English.  If he has to learn it, well then I should, at least, and as well. 

So I’m motivated to learn this language before we leave this country, and I’ve been throwing myself with all my might at German lately.   While for the most part I’m a little bruised and there are words lying everywhere for me to pick up and put away, some of them have broken the skin.  I know I’m learning, but sheesh – it’s so slow – like checking the mirror every five minutes to see if my hair’s gotten longer.

My methods of learning vary – I do the LiveMocha (www.livemocha.com)lessons, a free language learning site online.  For those of you looking to brush up or learn a completely new language, it’s very thorough and offers the added feature of an online community of people all over the world.  Really, this is a great tool and the creepy factor – about 1% – weirdo types looking to pick up American lady friends and a couple of shady sounding  characters have oozed into my LiveMocha Inbox, but since my own day-to-day- email inbox has a creepy factor approaching 35%, I can’t complain. 

 I also listen occasionally to some German audio lesson tapes I downloaded.   Audio tapes are a very difficult way to learn a language in my opinion.  Avoid buying things with tempting titles like, “Learn German on the Airplane!” or “Easy Audio German”.  You never get to see the words and therefore never would recognize them if you saw them in print.  It does, however; give you a way to hear the language being spoken without things like dialect and sheer speed of talking interfering with how you hear it.  When combined with another method that includes writing, one can get a sense of the musical quality, the rhythm, how words are stressed and how they flow together. 

While these two methods are nice, they rely on my ability to make time to do them.  I was born deficient in this ability, so I needed more structure and I joined a class that meets in person twice a week for an hour each time.  We speak mostly German, and we’re bad at it, but there is an added lesson part of each class and our conversations are question/answer pertaining to the lesson subject.  There’s homework, peers, accountability.  It’s going very well – I’ve even moved into the Intermediate group. 

As I learn and understand more, life is often like a video game where I “unlock” tidbits as my skill level increases.  For example, I’ll drive past a street sign that I’ve driven past every day for the last five months and suddenly one day I’ll look again and it says, “Only residents can park here”.  *Click*  Oh! That’s what that’s said the whole time I’ve been here?   I can now understand the sales circulars with their little blurbs laid over pictures of fruit or hams or whatever.  While before I was only able to guess that a particular blurb might mean “CHEAPEST PRICES AROUND!” or “SALE PRICES START MONDAY”, I can now confirm that indeed it IS “CHEAPEST PRICES AROUND!” and “SALE PRICES START MONDAY”.

Oh, the power.  But regular conversations I eavesdrop in on?  Maybe 2% is recognizable.  This is why it feels like I’m waiting for my hair to grow.

Paul has noticed my improvement, bless him.   Since he hasn’t had time to dive into the language because of that whole pesky work thing he insists on doing, my startling feats of German talk, which could only impress non-German speakers and the most primitive of German cavemen, get shock-and-awe reactions from Paul. Note:  I’m even more impressive when I use my patented combination of staggered and incorrect German and frantic Shields and Yarnell-esque pantomime (I’m anxiously awaiting a situation that might involve a robot.  Or a  box.)  I have fooled Paul into believing I’m all but fluent. 

I wish I could see the progress I’ve made, it would encourage me.  I’d love to travel back in time to when I first got here and follow my wide-eyed and generally confused self around saying things like “Stop pulling that.  It says Push.” or, “No, it doesn’t cost one euro.  Look at it!  Do you think they’d sell THAT for one euro?  It’s solid gold, dufus.  It says – prices START at one Euro” or, “Don’t even try to take the dog into the bakery – just don’t”.  My confused past-self would then turn to my now self and thank me and marvel at how much I knew.  It would be quite rewarding, I imagine.

ps – Changed the appearance again, back to the original!  The snow showed up better on the dark background.

Santa – I don’t really know if the thing is supposed to make the blood IN the box, to keep it contained, you know, or if the whole blood-making thing just comes in a big box or something. Anyway, good luck. – The Schmidts

As promised, the boys’ Christmas Letter to Santa arrived a couple of days ago so of course, I’m sharing their innermost desires with you, the Internet, before Santa even gets to lay a twinklng eye on it.  You’re welcome.  Cameron and Griffin worked on it together in Cameron’s lair unprompted by us.  Cameron was nice enough to ask Griffin what he wanted and dutifully wrote whatever Griffin said down word for word.

Starting with Cameron’s half, it reads:

……………

Dear Santa

this year I don’t want much this year I just [want] a NFL football and a chansh to show my talant & a friend that understands

who I relly am.

Thank you for being here.  Ps. Mabey some patreits stuff and a Lego set or two.

                                                                                              yours truly

                                                                                             Cameron … …

_______________________________________________

directly below was Griffin’s letter:

Dear santa

for christmas this year I want:

- skeleton Hallwen costome

- a thing that makes blood. in a box

- rase cars with baby cars inside

- a box that hold marbles.  and makes yucky stuff.

- a cool movie (ex. Bolt)

                                                                yours truly

                                                              Griffin

 

 

 

Why Griffin is Nuts: Part 343 in a Series of Infinity

Why I am doubting Griffin will ever legally be able to leave my house and live on his own like the normal people.

The first one:  It sounds kind of staged here in the video, but he goes on about him and Isabelle all. the. time and I was just happy to catch any of it for the authorities  posterity. We have no idea who she is if she even exists. If I find her, I have questions:
And sorry for the misplaced apostrophe in my YouTube title – it hurts me more than it does you, but there’s no going back now.

Now this one is a regular thing where Griffin’s belly takes over for him ’round lunchtime everyday and tells me what Griffin would like to eat for lunch.  The conversations usually begin when he comes up behind me and mumbles, “rumble, rumble, rumble”.  I’m like “Oh, HI Griffin’s belly!”

I like to watch his mouth when he talks in his belly voice.

Coming up in the next couple days…More Mommy blogging!

The boys’ Christmas lists were completed in secrecy and the final version sent down from the upstairs by a small serious courier (Griffin) this afternoon.  I will post the entire list as it was given to me.

How I Met My Mother

Well, there’s nothing like a little trip to Prague to interfere with good blogging intentions.  We visited the Czech Republic last week – it was a good trip full of beautiful sights:

This was real! The water was moving and everything.

 and good friends:

Kiddos on the Metro.

and a couple of smells, but we won’t focus on that…Anyway, it’s taken me most of this week to get back into the spirit of blogging and also I haven’t yet called S and she’s going to kill me. 

S, the German lady who lives next door has become such the part of our lives.  I call her my third mother (I already have a mother and a step-mother) because, well, she is.  She’s got the whole motherly thing going one even though she’s almost the same age as I am.  She’s excellent at it and meets all motherly criteria – she lives close – like mothers like to do if they can, she’s always baking things and bringing them over, and she has the grandmotherly superpower of not thinking my kids are ever being terrible, awful little urchins.  She also has those motherly mannerisms and passive agressive ways about her that, while endearing, tend to drive a ”kid” up a wall  - she expects to be called, she can hang around a little long and she’s all WAY up in my stuff with better suggestions on how I can do everything.  But have I mentioned she brings cookies over?

We play a game.  She loves to ask me about my things  - anything – and if it’s an American thing, she’ll get that look someone has when they eat something that’s a little “off” and helpfully suggest the German equivalent which, if you didn’t know this already, is ALWAYS better.  Her particular favorite thing to set me straight on is household cleaning supplies.  For example, she’ll say – Sally, what are you putting in your dishwasher when you run it?  And I’ll say…um…dishwashing detergent?   She’ll counter with -  American or the German kind?  And when I gulp and tell her American, she always winces as if she feels sorry for me that I don’t know any better.  Then, while shaking her head, she’ll launch into a 33 point diatribe on the benefits of German versus American dishwashing fluid.  Then to back up the point, I’ll find a box of it dropped secretly on my doorstep sometime in the week following.   She has done this with  my dish sponge (oh, Sally, you DON’T…),  my kitchen towels, my flour, my coffee creamer (“the GERMAN kind always lists the percentage of real cream in the cream half of the half-n-half – why is the American kind so vague?”), my appliances,  my laundry soap and oh so many more things that I can’t remember right now.

Paul says that the Germans like to think of us as the futuristic humans in Wall-E, the kids movie.  For those that don’t know what I’m talking about, in the movie Earth had been made uninhabitable long ago (except for robots) and the humans all went into space to live.  They had to float around in completely automated space cruiseships, and over thousands of years, since everything was automated, evolution turned us into gelatinous short-limbed blobs that would just propel ourselves around in reclining chairs and order the ship’s computer to wake us at noon and make us our double tall mochas with extra whip.  Unfortunately the humans were then relocated to Germany where they had to learn to actually DO things!  With our arms and stuff!  They didn’t know about such things as mixers, or yeast, or butchers or good laundry soap.  We just always did what the computers said, but now we have a Simone to set us straight.  Again, I go along with this part because she brings BAKERY!  To my house!

So I have to call her to check in. 

I have a lot to do in general.  I have to buy presents.  I have to clean the house.  And pressing on me is the feeling that I have to get to the gym this month.  It’s Christmas, yes, but still.  I’ve been fighting a losing battle with a flu for about a month now, and I’m not drinking water and I just feel…I don’t know…gelatinous I guess.  I need activity to loosen all this…me…up.   But I need help. I need motivation.   What do you do to get motivated to move, to sweat-to-the-oldies, power walk, lay on a giant ball, or whatever it is you do?  Someone – give me something to get me up and going.  

But for now…COMPUTER!  MOCHA!

 

I have longer hair though.