Cuddle in Hamish, it's going to be a cold winter
There are a lot of things to get used to in Germany for the avid consumer. God knows it's been tough for some of us to get our heads round the shops being closed on a Sunday - taking it one day at a time my friends. One day at a time.
Shopping is more my specialist subject than Stevie's, so why I listened to him saying that we should wait a while before buying the kids snow suits I simply cannot fathom. Oh, yeah, that was it: it was September.
So I left it till yesterday, last night to be precise to go and get them. I was a little anxious before we set off as a guy in my German class had said that he'd heard that once they sell out of things here, they don't instantly replenish the stock like they do in other shopping-friendly nations.
First stop was Karstadt Sports. We got Orla's snowflake outfit there as modelled in the photo above. But nothing in Hamish's size. Then we went to C&A (I'm sure one day it'll make a comeback in the UK, and you'll all go 'Yessica'-mad, and shed a little tear for the fact that you're now in the Yessica category. Best face it now. You are no longer welcome in 'Clockhouse'.). There was nothing there either in small gentlemans size.
After that we went to H&M - nothing, and then we started working our way along the length of the Ku'Damm. The thing about the Ku'Damm is you start off with H&M and Zara and then you get into your slightly more expensive Esprit and it's like, and then you end up like us in Timberland and The North Face. Neither of these had anything for children under 5, but if they had we would have bought whatever they had. We were in the dangerous mindset where desperation had set in, and we had realised that it did in fact seem to be true that stock replenishment is not really very popular. Even normally super-practical Stevie would have handed over a stack of money if there had just been something suitable to buy. I know this because I am now the proud owner of the most expensive gloves I have ever owned in my life.
While we were in The North Face I started to realise that our next stop was going to have to be Chanel or Louis Vuitton. The further you go along the Ku'Damm the more designer-y it gets. It was lucky that we ran out of time and the shops were shutting. I don't know if I could take Hamish to Kita if he was decked out like Posh Spice on a skiing holiday.
I ordered Hamish a more reasonably priced ski suit online when we got home. Sometimes I just don't know what I would do without the internet. E-commerce is a beautiful thing.
You can, though, reassure yourselves that if you were still on the north side of the Border, you really would be too late. Three feet of snow or thereabouts here so far with more to come and no postal services all week or likely to be for a while....
ReplyDeleteAmazing what you can do with last year's cold weather kit....
Crikey! I remember getting snowed in once when I lived in Gala. They closed off the road with a great big gate at some point before you get to Stow.
ReplyDeleteAlas we never really needed any heavy duty winter wear in Derby last year. Hamish's winter coat seems quite thin compared to this years and I've been putting him in Orla's tights and admiring his legs before I stick 2 pairs of trousers on him.
As Milo and I were having breakfast in a local cafe last weekend the mother of a toddler came up to me and asked (with much anticipation) where I got Milo's snowsuit from and I felt bad letting her down cos it was a present and I've know clue where it came from. She'd clearly been struggling too!
ReplyDeleteHe looks adorable in his snow suit! x
ReplyDeleteBelgium's like that - they just run out, and then you have to wait until next year.
ReplyDeleteI had the same problem in November and when I moaned about it, my mom said she always bought ours in August. After I pointed out that it was no longer the dark ages and it would be nice if Germany actually restocked after selling out, I had the husband bring us suits from Munich, where he had no problem finding them. He bought extras and we returned one here in Berlin, where we discovered that there are still suits in Berlin, just in a specialty store we had never heard of that was actually not too far away, down Bundesallee. Although I still don't have ski pants, the kids are toasty warm and I'm so glad!
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