Snap: Pretty Germany

Limburg. COLD Limburg. On the last day of the year!

"I'm Gonna be a Star!"

"I'm gonna be a star!" Tara declared a few weeks back, and at every opportunity since. "I'm gonna be a star!"
A star at the nursery's nativity play and "my Kissmas party," which she's been looking forward to very verbally and very much as well. And she was so proud of her role, different from some of her friends. "Maddy be a donkey," she informed me as well. "Maddy wanna be a king... Maddy be a donkey."
Occasionally I would hear her practise to herself, either singing, or reciting her friends' roles. "There's no room!", says Tara the inn keeper, "NO ROOM!" Says Tara, too, when daddy wants to come into the kitchen through the door that she's slammed shut. Or her little voice twinkles loudly, "Christmas pudding, steaming hot, sprinkle on the sugar, eat a lot!", a favourite right along with "Father Christmas, he got stuck, coming down the chimney, what bad luck!"*

So, the night before Tuesday I sit down to make her costume, privately amused by thoughts of how some 25 years ago my mother would have made my kiddie costumes for other occasions, and how now I'm lovingly making the first for my very own darling daughter. Stitch, cut stitch, glue - just within my skills; if she gets a promotion to angel next year I'll have to buy, I fear!


Her party is a hit! There are soooo many parents and siblings and grandparents (some 200 maybe), and my starlet clings to me for the whole of the beginning, except the little trip up to baby Jesus in the manger who was all by himself and needed a starlet cuddle. But when the big moment came and she got called (along with all the other little twinkly stars) onto the stage, off she went like a big girl. Aaaah, the courage!

Proud mum and starlet

(There are loads of lovely picture of donkeys, Mary & Joseph, angels, sheperds kings and stars, none of which I am allowed to stick on the internet.)

Party snack time

After the play and lots of singing, there is a snack party, a very funny magician, and - oh my - a visit from Santa, who gives everyone a present. Tara grabs it quickly while hanging on to me, and will not for the life of her get any closer than necessary. Bless!
I had thought, maybe she'd like to reinforce the content of her passionately scribbled letter to Santa at this opportunity - A puzzle, a 'present' and CHOCOLATE - but she's more into getting away.
Never mind. I'll have a word with the elves, I got connections. Puzzle. Chocolates. And 'a present'. We're on it. Seven days to go, and my oh my, this Tara? She been a good girl. The best! No doubt about it!

She even sung me my favourite song** for the camera. Here you go. Special treat.

Christmas Pudding

and, as befits a star,

Twinkle Twinkle

My star got attitude, man. I love her to smitherens. And I think I may be looking forward to her first proper conscious Christmas more than she is...

* Melody of Fraire Jaque / Bruder Jakob / Brother Jacob.
** My TRUE favourite is this one, actually: Where "We wish you a merry Christman... good TIDIngs we bring...", Tara goes: "We wish you a merry Christmas... We TIDY up, ok ok..." She has me in stitches over it.

Biggest and Bestest Present

It's a classic 'I-turned-my-back-for-a-minute'. I do not react when the voice behind my back declares, "Meine Kalender!" (My caldendar - i.e. same paper), and a little later "There's nothing in it!" (by now she's 'unwrapped' the cardboard roll the paper had been on).
I finally respond to shouts of peek-a-boo.

"Mami! Wrap me up! Einwickeln me, I'm a Baby!"

*giggle giggle*

Well then... Here you go Papi. Big fat Present.

2008. The year of the crumpled wrapping paper.

Today we went shopping...

...or some such thing... And in a few hours we'll be back on a plane, which is a good thing in a way cause Tara has gotten too used to having a present every three hours. I'll do my counting and the exacts maths later but i'm sure it'll average out at something like this. In every other respect it is, of course, quite a shame that even long weekends are really rather short. Ps. Tara put that thing back, of course. It didn't fit in her jacket comfortably.

Highlight

Of course! Holiday + sun = ice cream! Still on sale in Spain unlike in Ramsgate!

6.12.2008

Birthday kiss for my friend Lia kiss blow kiss blow kiss blow x x x

It's a perfect summer's day!

And look at all those Spaniard, awfully overdressed as they are. Bikini, I say!

We've arrived safely and the weather...

... Is great!

Oh YUK!

This weekend we made some really good use of our time / our child, and did / had her do as much cleaning as we could fit in a day. Turns out the little mounldy patches that had kept us company for the largest part of the last weeks / months / year were a little bigger than we thought - sample of one corner on the side, but only one, and only a small pic because it really is too vile to be looked at in great detail; not to mention the fluffy fur layers on the cardboard boxes by the walls, or the complete coverage of the backward facing side of my very expensive leather coat, or the six loads of washing it took to restore half of my wardrobe to a wearable state. Of course, Tara darling didn't have to do any of that cleaning. Dr. Chemist Daddy undertook the pleasurable task of spreading a liter of bleach round the girl's bedroom. Mummy undertook the pleasurable task of overseeing Tara and the hoover, and of managing the aftermath of the superfluous moment in which Tara (of course) found all her (would have been had they not been found prematurely) Christmas presents in the mess, and the chocolate spread treats...


And when all was clean and smelling of lovely bleach, Ariel and other detergents (mold or all that - which is worse??), I sat down and created Tara's very first Adventskalender... and all the conflict that we'll have over it... "Mami, eMineMs? Übejaschung? ... jeden Tag ein Deschenk... MEHR eMineMs? Jetzt?"


Still, not the best weekend ever. The next one will hopefully make up for it, with treats for all... in Spain!