a cold mom

so i guess the wet cold in germany was not so bad! minus 45 is a little rough. i planned on moving somewhere warmer after i graduated...not sure what happened! sloane was not impressed when i took her out on one the first really cold days. poor girl has no idea about the climate she lives in. heated seats and command start certainly make things easier though. the command start has failed me the past 3 mornings, but it works after my first outing.

i can't believe x-mas is a week away. so far the season has been a blur of gingerbread, icing, snow, friends and family. i have 60 x-mas cards to mail out, which i was looking forward to attaching my ms word/avery labels to, but due to technical difficulties, i will be writing out everyone's address by hand! computers blow sometimes. i typed out those addresses with one finger right after sloane was born. it took FOREVER. whatever.

my starbucks is wearing off and i am tired. those tallnonfatpeppermintmochas having been a lifesaver! how else could i survive on a few hours sleep a night? starbucks and make-up. no mac make-up anymore, the drugstore kind. but it does the job! my girfriend said i look great! that's awesome b/c i feel exhausted. i can see sloanes teeth, but they have a ways to go before they cut. i just hope my sleep sich changes soon. i remember sleeping 8 hours a night in the summer...sigh.

home sweet home

after a ten hour flight from munich and a two hour flight from toronto, julian, sloane and i arrived home. i was so excited the night before we left to finally come home. i do love travelling, but i miss all my friends and family after a week or so. we came home to minus 20 weather, and fresh snow! i don't know if you have to be from winnipeg to appreciate the weather, but it put a smile on my face when i got outside. germany and england were both around zero degrees and wet for the most part. i now understand wet cold. i was freezing over there. i never understood why people would always add "it's a dry cold" when talking about winnipeg winters, and now i do! being wet AND cold is awful! i should know this from taking my heat transfer course in university. wet cold is sort of like wind chill. it feels colder than it actually is. i definitely prefer the minus 20 temps in wpg to the wet cold in europe.

it feels great to be home. i missed cooking, doing laundry, tv in english, sloane's exersaucer, eating when i want, my phone, my computer, friends, family.....the list goes on. it is december, and christmas madness has begun! i will make my to do list today.

munich

still in munich. we leave tomorrow. my first day, s and i went for a walk through a huge park and did some looking around through the shops. munich is much newer than aachen. aachen dated back to the 7th century, where as munich has been completely reconstructed post WWII. munich is very easy to get around with the tram. yesterday j had the day off, so we wondered the streets....unfortunately in the rain. we ducked into a restaurant to dry off, and had some awesome vegetarian food. it was a nice switch from the sausage i've been eating EVERY day. today we are going to walk through the park and do some shopping.

gotta run though...paying by the minute, will upload pics when i get back to wpg.

munich

i made it to munich after a drive and a long train ride. we got in, very tired @ 8 pm last night. train ride was beautiful. i really need to figure out how to pack less!! going for a walk today while j is at work. i really wish i hadn't forgotten my lonely planet! gotta go, internet is over $1 per minute and i'm typing with one hand b/c s is on my lap.

shopping II

i was much more aggressive today on my shopping trip. i even ran over a few toes! the secret is if you don't acknowledge that it happened, it didn't happen. it totally worked. people step on you or whack you with their umbrella and carry on like nothing happened. now, i am doing the same. i need to be sure to go back to my more curtious ways when i get back home to the peg.

shopping and sausage in aachen

s

ummmm, can i have some bun with my sausaage?


aachen at night

aachen christmas market

it has been so hard to access a computer and download pics!! j couldn't get the internet access working in our room in germany, so i was trying to use the computer in the lobby, but between waiting to use it, german keyboards and a lost camera cord, it was difficult. oh yeah, and a baby on my lap! anyways, i'm in my room now, but i don't have long b/c i need to go shopping @ 10 to try beat the 1.2 million shoppers that come to aachen to do the same thing i'm trying to do.

we got to aachen, germany on sunday night. barely got the rental car loaded, then cruised down the autobahn to our hotel. hotel is really nice and modern, and in the middle of shopping paradise. we had an amazing dinner of delicious tenderloin steaks on sunday night with a couple winnipegers and a german that j is working with. monday was filled with shopping mayhem. i thought i would have the shops to myself on a monday afternoon, but i was very wrong! it was shoulder to shoulder everywhere! i now understand what my engineering girlfriend said after returning from germany...people just walk into you and don't even acknowledge you. i need to be more aggresive today! yesterday i was in a shop for 20 minutes, first i picked out my gingerbread, then someone cut in front of me in line, and picked up my gingerbread off the counter and bought it! i wanted to object, but all i can say in german is thank you. oh well.

i bought the biggest sausage on the smallest bun! i think the bun is only there to make it easy to carry aroud your sausage. it was delicious!! crispy skin and oh so juicy. then i saw a guy selling sausage off a stand he was wearing! he had a propane tank on his back and a grill hanging off his shoulders...too funny! i think i will buy sausage off him today.

i gotta go...10 am shops open.

shopping, walk

out on a walk

backyard

i went shopping in manchester yesterday while j was at work. picked up some shirts b/c i only packed 4!!! oops...oh well, got some new shirts anyways. of course i stumbled upon some clothes for sloane. a shirt, a cord dress and some boots. i love shopping. it always makes me feel awesome. it's one of the things i miss the most about being on mat leave.

today we went out for a walk around town...so cold! i thought minus 1 didn't sound too cold, but it's wet. i was freezing! lymm is a very old and very beautiful town. we took some really nice pics. we went to a really bizarre place for lunch. it was a junkyard/garden center/restaurant...you can't understand til i upload the pics. we'll probably head out for fish and chips tonight, then we're off to germany tomorrow afternoon.

pics

lymm

dancing pigs

jet lag


my princess

loving lymm

so i didn't go to liverpool yesterday, b/c i wasn't organized enough, so i went and checked out the town with j and s. it is sooooooooo beautiful here. i'll upload pics when i find my camera (car, i think). i was going to run outside to check for the camera in the car and saw a glass bottle of milk delivered to the door! i didn't know milk still came in glass bottles or got delivered! anyways, j and i took s out in her buggy (stroller) and checked ou the town. it's the cutest town ever! as i'm typing the maid just arrived....sigh.....i want a maid. so, the town is all cobble stone with a creek running through it. there's a cool butcher shop with all the meat proudly displayed in the window and happy pig figurines dancing around. we ate one of their free range chickens for dinner last night.....so good. there were so many moms with cool strollers walking around town, it was crazy! every other person has a stroller here! nice, fancy strollers, too. stroller envy is definitely a thing. they were all black with three wheels and nice fleece covers. my stroller is alright, but i really wanted the next model up, but it was too expensive and sears didn't have the infant car seat in stock when i bought it. i think about that stroller often. my stroller is good though. big wheels and everything. it was actually hard to push it up all the hills. i think i got a bit of a work out walking around. i have never pushed it up a hill! we stopped at a coffee shop for lunch...4 tables including us and 3 had kids. lunch was sandwiches, soup and fries, very tasty. apparently their baked stuff is really good, so i think i'll go back today and try some stuff. we went to tesco (superstore) to pick up some stuff and i got this cool organic baby food that comes in a big toothpaste tube. you just squirt it on the spoon, no bowl req'd. very convenient. i think i'll bring some home. starting solids here is called weening! how sad! i almost didn't buy it b/c it's advertised as stage 1 weening or something like that. s seemed to like it though.

we had a nice dinner last night with mark & jo, while beth was sick in bed:( sat around and chatted afterward. j and mark met up with j's colleague darren for a beer at the pub...the spread eagle....no i think it was a different one. we all slept great. til 9:30. s slept for 8 hours straight, only b/c she was crammed into bed with j and i. j and i tried many times to get her into her cool new travel crib that weighs only 11 lbs and takes 30 seconds to set up, but no luck. today j and darren are working. s and i will probably go for a walk. it is much warmer here than wpg. it was 10 degrees yesterday. people are talking about how cool the weather is.....ummmm, i'll take this over wpg november any day.

the rimmers have arrived...

we made it!! the flight was great. sloane slept wpg to TO and slept/hung out all the way to london. no crying! we got a few compliments on what a good baby she is. the flight atttendent gave her a sticker for her baby book. i, however, did not sleep so well....couple hours maybe. i'm not a fan of the 777 first class set up....no sympathy, i know, but for those of you that know what i'm talking about know that it's not great for travelling with a family. i was able to fully recline and sleep with sloane next to me, but it was pretty crammed. there was a bit of exitement on our flight...a man was taken off our plane when we landed by 6 armed police officers. i asked around about what happened, but no one knew. strange.

we are now in lymm, just outside manchester staying we julian's cousins jo & mark. beautiful house. i am just now able to see outside, as it was dark when we arrived yesterday. we are surrounded by a trees and greenery. it's fall, so some of the trees are bare, but there is still a lot of green mixed with fall colors. there is even a creek running through the backyard. we'll head into town later today down the path that winds along the creek.

i think we got an alright sleep. sloane was up at 1 am, wide awake, ready to start the day. finally she went back to sleep after 3 am and slept til 10 am. not bad. hopefully i'll sleep even better tonight! sloane and i were wondering around the house in the middle of the night and came across casper, the cat. her and casper were eyeing one another up. sloane grabbed her head and i think was trying to put his ears in her mouth....she probably thought they were crinkly like her toys ears. anyways, i got sloane's hands away from casper and no one was hurt.

julian is up now, so i think i'll get ready to head out! first stop: liverpool.

pre-trip anxieties

one more week til i go to europe! i can't say that i'm excited but once i'm there i'll love it. i am definately a home body and the thought of travelling always makes me anxious in goods ways and bad. i am a horrible over-packer, and with taking sloane, it is bound to be so much worse. in past attempts to pack less, i have shorted myself necessary items such as pants and been forced to make a trip to the mall to buy a few pairs.

the thought of being jet-legged with a teething, 6-month old baby has me concerned, but if i think about it, i am able to function surprising well on little sleep. the 8 hour flight i am less concerned about, as i am very used to holding sloane for most of the day....the restrictions of the airplane shouldn't cause any problems, i hope. and of course, the first class seats make EVERYTHING easier. i can probably even change a diaper in my foot space if i'm discreet.

if there's one thing i am excited about, it's escaping winnipeg weather for 2 weeks! man is it cold here, and winter has not yet officially begun. i'll take a grey, rainy day in england over this anyday. i'm not sure what the weather is like in germany, but its gotta be better than this. sloane cries when i bundle her all up and take her outside, and i tell her that she was unfortunately born in winnipeg and she is going to have to learn to accept winter. not that i have anything against winnipeg, but it must be very confusing for babies to be exposed to these frigid temperatures. i am constantly loving and protecting her, then to thrust her outside on a chilly day must seem so cruel.

well, it took me til the age of 29 to make it to europe, and sloane is heading there at the age of 6 months! her first passport stamps...i hope she has a good time.