Giant Easter Eggs

Postdammer Platz Arcaden, always have lovely displays for different times of the year. Their Easter display is beautiful as expected! The enormous painted eggs are lined up on the second floor, and look really lovely. They are still working on them, setting them on top of grassy platforms, with small displays of Spring flowers. There were another 8-10 still wrapped in plastic, awaiting to be set up. The weather has turned cold, 1 -2 degrees in the morning, so the Winter coats came out of the closet again.  

Yesterday was the official first day of Spring, and last night we had about 3 inches of snow fall. We haven't had much snow at all this year, and when it has snowed, it has melted away in 12 hours. This year we didn't get to even make one snowman in our garden!

Legoland Berlin - coming soon

The boys get the Lego magazine, which comes out every 2 months. Alexander was beside himself when he read a large advertisement about a LegoLand Discovery Centre opening here in Berlin, at Potsdammer Platz at Easter.

Today, I went for a walk through Tiergarten with some of the mums from school, and we ended up in Potsdammer Platz.....look what I found!

It is right next to the cinemas. There were workmen fixing this giraffe into the ground, and he was really impressive! Looks like this will be somewhere to visit during the Easter school holidays. I just have to check when it has actually opened! Alexander's philosophy is "A boy can never have too much Lego"

Easter decorating

A German tradition is to decorate branches for Easter. You buy a bunch of branches from the florist or market and pop them into a vase with water.  Decorations are hung from the branches, and soon the branches will bloom with flowers. I am not sure which flowers will spring to life from these ones, so it will be a nice surprise. The shops and florists are overflowing with bundles of branches to sell. Phil says this is just another excuse for me to buy more decorations. (like my Christmas decoration obsession). So, I don't want to disappoint him, I have bought a few for the beginning of my collection I also bought some bags of plastic coloured eggs to hang on the trees outside. 

This is a tree in one of our neighbours gardens. It looks quite pretty when you walk past it. I could just imagine what our neighbours in Sydney would think if we hung these on the gum trees outside our house. I love this tradition. It's bright and colourful and I want to continue this when we go back to Australia.

Phil -BSV Rugby tour to Ireland and Scotland

I joined 21 other guys (including Alan and Gordon) for a Rugby team tour to Ireland and Scotland. It was a super (long) weekend - departing Berlin on Thursday night and returning Monday morning. 

First stop was Belfast, and a big night out. On Friday morning the team had a defensive coaching session from Ulster's defence coach (Ulster is one of the three top clubs in Irish Rubgy). Next came lunch and a few beers, before a ferry ride across to Scotland. 2 hours on the ferry and 4 1/2 by train and we landed in Edinburgh. What a great party city! 

We saw the Ireland Scotland game at Murrayfield on the Saturday, and on Sunday went to Panmure FC, near Dundee, which was Alan's old club when he was a kid. There is even a photo on the wall with him looking like a young Michael Jackson (what an afro!). The hospitality of the club was superb! 

On Monday morning, the bus arrived at 6:00 am to drive us to Glasgow airport to fly back to Berlin. It was a great trip, the guys were a great bunch and we had a super time. 

Of course, being a rugby tour, there are no photos and details.  "what goes on tour stays on tour"

Dahlem Farm

While the dads were on the rugby tour, we took the kids to Dahlem farm near Sonia's place. It was a lovely afternoon, and I think the kids enjoyed playing on the old tractor more than seeing the animals. 

Well, there were not very many animals to see, a few goats, horses, pigs, sheep, chickens and a cow. At least it was an afternoon out in the fresh air.

The highlight of the day for the boys was the seating at the Dahlem train station. They thought the boobie chair was hilarious!

The Travel show

A busy Saturday.

Open Day at school. Alexander was asked to be part of the gymnastics display. He has been doing gymnastics in PE, and as a lunchtime club. 

Cameron had a party for Mohamed, and Alexander and I set off to the travel show at the Messe Hall. 

Lots of stalls for different countries, and Alexander was excited to see many airplane companies in attendance. He was able to look at all their aeroplanes. We collected lots of postcards with the different planes on them, ate different foods, and listened to some local music. Alexander is studying Ancient Egypt for topic at the moment, and we saw this King Tut mask. He got lots of pictures of Ancient Egypt for school as well, and a bookmark made of papyrus. Below is Alexander on an Indian "taxi". After walking around for 4 hours, we met Sonia, Michelle, Bradley, Cameron and Meghan (Sonia collected Cameron from the party), for dinner at an American Diner. 

Meanwhile, Alan, Gordon and Phil are somewhere in Scotland watching a rugby match.

Cameron's Science Experiment

Cameron's topic in Science at the moment is plants. He came home all excited yesterday telling me that we had to buy a bunch of white tulips and food colouring. I had the food colouring already, so when we went to the shops later to get something for dinner, we also picked up a bunch of tulips from the florist. Luckily tulips are everywhere at the moment, and a bunch of 7 cost us a cheap 2 euros!

 

He cut the stems down on the tulips. Filled glasses with water and food colouring and added the tulips

24 hours later, this is what the tulips look like. The food colouring has worked it's way up the stem of the tulips, and changed the colour of the petal. I couldn't get a great close up of the tulips to show you how amazing they look close up. 

This was a lot of fun.

Last Winter Ice skating session

Today was the final iceskating Sunday for Winter this year. We found today a bit difficult, having been skiing the week before, we all seemed to have trouble working out where our body weight should be. After about 10 minutes it was all OK again!



Winter here, has been disappointing with hardly any snow. Phil packed my bicycle away when it first started to snow, but it melted so quickly. I will get the bike out again tomorrow, and start riding it again!.

This time of year in the past 2 years we have still had heaps of snow, and been able to make lots of snowmen in our garden. This year the snow didn't hang around long enough for us to build even a head of a snowman! The boys were keen to make a snow ramp in our garden this Winter, so they could slide down it after school, but it never happened. 

Hopefully next Winter will have better snow.

Happy Birthday Phil and Alexander

Phil turned 38 yesterday, and Alexander turned 8 today. 

We had the McLeish and the Ramsay families come for dinner and cake. Usually I make 2 cakes, one for each birthday, and enough cupcakes for Alexander's class. 

This year, with Phil away in Seefeld, I only made the 1 cake, and 24 cupcakes. Phil arrived home around 7pm, and everyone turned up not long after. After a yummy dinner of apricot chicken curry, we settled down to sing Happy Birthday, and eat this amazing Nigella Lawson chocolate cake, complete with smarties and M&M's. It is the best cake any of us have ever tasted! (Sonia wants me to try some other recipes to add to our cake list!) Alexander got some lovely birthday presents, and of course there was more Lego.

Phil in Austria

Following a week's skiing, and a day and a half at home to do all the washing, Phil headed off to a business meeting in the ski fields of Austria! As he arrived early, Phil had another day and a half skiing, which he loved. 

The resort was really quiet, and he got discounts on his ski hire and lift passes. One morning he had a whole run to himself for 1/2 an hour, before being joined by another 6 or so skiers until the ski schools came out in force at about 11:00. With fresh snow one day (and rain the next) the skiing was quite variable. The local church, covered in fresh snow. A view from the top of the mountain. Part of the ski run The meeting went well, and Phil celebrated his birthday with work colleagues (Cake and Apple Schnapps) and a big night out. 

He would have stayed for the weekend for more skiing, but Alexander's birthday was on Friday night. Phil's aim was to make it home for dinner to see Alexander on his birthday. He had never been away on one of the boy's birthdays before, and didn't want to start now!

Slalom and snowballs

Someone before us had built a small ramp, so the kids decided to ride on the "bum sleds" over the ramp. Not content to just sled, they also needed to see if they could ski jump off it as well...
Cameron has a hidden talent of being able to ski down a slope, find where Nicole is standing, bend down, whilst skiing, pick up a handful of snow, make it into a snowball as he skis towards Nicole, and then throw it at her. All while still staying upright, and going rather fast! Then speeding off down the rest of the slope laughing loudly!

Having a lay down on the snow to cool down after a long day of skiing.
The boys want to go skiing again next week, and the week after, and the week after that!The last day of ski school was "race day". The kids all do a timed slalom course. At the end of the week, they all get a medal, photos and a certificate. Something to be able to take to "show and tell" when they get back to school.

Ski lessons

We got ourselves suited, booted and ready to ski! We went first to the nursery slopes so the kids could get a feel for skiing again, and we met a girl of Cameron's age (Amy) with whom we could hear their parents talking English. We introduced the kids, then ourselves. Here is a photo of Cameron, Amy and Alexander, not that you can see much of them with their ski gear on! The boys and Amy skied together on the nursery slopes and became friends quickly. They were all going into ski school together. Amy's mum (Nicola) was a school teacher with a big group from Lincolnshire in the UK, and her dad (Dave) was a policeman who had tagged along. As it worked out, there were 4 other dads who had tagged along (all good skiers) and Phil was invited to join them skiing. It was quite easy to remember the names, because there were two Phils, two Daves and a John. All were great blokes and across the week Phil caught up and skied with them (and had a few beers, too!). This was half-term holidays, and the ski school was overflowing! I'm not sure the ski school were prepared for such a huge influx of people, there seemed to be a lot of disorganised chaos as groups were sorted. The boys were put into groups for ski lessons but not in the same class,  Alexander and Amy were in one group, and Cameron was on his own in another group. It was all too hard for the teachers to put them together.

Cameron was a bit stroppy about it, and we hoped this wouldn't cause him to 'crack the wobblies' and refuse to go. After the first day, he was OK, and had made a few friends in his group. Later in the week the groups were reconfigured and they all ended up in separate groups! They did get to eat lunch together. Afternoon sessions they were all together, and they played together before and after lessons.

Cameron's teacher was Marc and Alexander's teacher was Franzi. The kids really enjoyed their lessons, and again proved how quick they are to learn new things (also having no fear helps as well). They are able to go quite fast down the slopes, and on the the second day were already at the top of the mountain going down the red (intermediate level) slopes. Alexander went up first on day 2, and Cameron on Day 3. Phil was also having lessons on the upper slopes and kept an eye out for the boys. It was great to see how well they were doing, and to see them about having fun. Alexander (above, Cameron below) It was hard to get a photo of them skiing this year. They are both getting quite fast, and we ended up with lots of blurry ones! They are ready to go skiing with Uncle Stuart now! Nicole started on the beginner runs, and 'graduated' to the top of the mountain on day 4. The resort is great for beginners and intermediate skiers with lots of 'blue' and 'red' runs of varying difficulty, and unlike Werfenweng, it is possible to get to the intermediate slopes on top of the mountain without having to go down very steep slopes (which put Nicole off a bit last year). Nicole's teacher was Hubsi (a bit like skiing with your grandpa, very patient and caring!) and Phil's teacher was Alfred.

Phil had more confidence this year in his skiing and would head off to catch up with the guys by himself after lunch. The slopes in the afternoon were often slushy, with rocks popping through and it was a lot harder on poor beginners like us! Some of the best slopes up on top of the mountain would be really busy, as everyone chased for the best snow. The boys would be back in Ski school after lunch. Nicole would do a couple of runs, pop her skis into storage, watching the boys, shopping, drinking coffee or just enjoying the sun! There were lots of deck-chairs, complete with "nana blankets" to keep you warm, and even wooden hammocks so you could really enjoy the non-skiing time! Cameron testing out the hammocks!Phil and Dave would always plan their afternoons to be back to pick the kids up from Ski school at 3:45, whereafter it was time to put all of the ski-geat into storage and head back to the apartment for a shower and a rest before dinner!Cameron on one of the beginner slope liftsAlexander on the beginner slope lift

Bad Kleinkirchheim Ski Trip

The February half-term holiday is now our 'skiing holiday', and once again we headed to Austria. We were not able to get into the village we went to last year, Werfenweng, but our great travel agent suggested a small village in St Oswald, called Bad Kleinkirchheim. This is only an hour's drive north of Klagenfurt airport, into which we flew on super cheap flights direct from Berlin! 

This year has been terrible for snow. Without the snow-cannons making snow each night, we would have been lucky to ski at all. The weather this week was all above zero during the day, and the snow each afternoon was slush at the bottom of the mountain. Luckily the temperature was colder at the top of the mountain and the runs up there had good snow. 

We stayed in a little apartment with two bedrooms, in an 'all inclusive' hotel - no cooking after a hard day skiing! It was simple, clean and really nice, and only 5 minutes walk from the bottom of the ski lifts! On Saturday, when we arrived, we went into town and got some cash and 'supplies' for the apartment, then took care of all of the ski hire, lift passes and ski school booking. Following this, there was no time left for skiing!

Altes Museum

Alexander's class is learning about Ancient Egypt. This is a topic that has them all amazed! We went on a trip to the Altes Museum, which holds the Egyptian Collection   I went along as a parent helper. I was fortunate to get a great group of kids, Isaiah, Verena, Alexander, and Emily. 

They are all so keen to learn, and were great at telling me all the things they knew about Ancient Egypt. They were able to pick out hieroglypic symbols, tell me the names of the Gods, Pharoahs, and all sorts of other things. As this was my favourite topic in Art History at school and university, it was a real thrill for me too. 

It was great to see pieces that I have only seen in my text books. The Alte Museum in Berlin has the Bust of Nefertiti!  There is talk of a lot of the Egyptian collection being sent back to Egypt. A lot of the exhibits were smuggled out many years ago during excavations. 

The kids were amazed at the Mummies. It was great to see them so excited about seeing the exhibition, and obvious that their teacher has them all captivated!

Pasta Amore

It was our 11th wedding anniversary today. We rarely celebrate our wedding anniversary with anything special. There have been years when both of us have forgotten until later in the evening.

Having our anniversary so close to Valentine's Day, means we can often find something unusual, when we do remember.  I managed to find this pasta last week, so we had our go to salmon pasta meal with Amore!