The rain in Berlin falls mainly 3 months after the rain-gear has sold out.

This year I am trying to beat the system. I will not be out-witted by the German way of bringing out vital clothing and accessories at an unseasonable time of year, sell them all within a day and not replenish the stock. I will not end up with either nothing at the right time of year, or having to ship stuff across from the UK wildly guessing at the correct sizes on the internet. Nope, not this time. I've got my eye on the ball. Finger on the pulse. Ready to pounce.

While out and about with Orla I noticed that their was a sort of buzz around the fleeces in H&M. Like flies. Swarming. And the temperature must have been in the mid-20's. When the sun was on you it was scorching, but there were little crowds gathering around the rain gear in Karstadt, Tchibo, and H&M. With a little gasp I realised that this was the 'moment' I should be buying rain gear for the kids. I scuttled the pair of them off to Tchibo and got them both kitted out at a reasonable price, and just as well, as when I stopped off at C&A (looking for nice clasps) the rainwear section lay decimated. I felt like I'd won a competition!

Next up I will be keeping my eye out near the end of September for the hour when they sell the winter snow suits and sledges. And while I am feeling ever so smug and pleased with myself for having the kids prepared for the weather ahead of time, I also have the funny feeling there won't be a single drop of rain or flake of snow until my pair have had sudden growth spurts and outgrow the whole lot.

In the meantime I am waiting, poised like a panther for those snowsuits. (Incidentally, just so you know, we are also just about to enter into 'boys in tights' season. I have seen a 3 pack of nice starry & stripy tights for boys in Tchibo to match Hamish's raingear, and also noticed some nice stripy ones in H&M, but last year I saw a boy wearing rather smashing spiderman ones with a great big spiderman face on the bum, which I thought were superb, so I am holding out.)

Girls Week

We're having 'Girls Week' this week. Hamish is back at Kita, and Orla and I are spending some quality time together. Mother and daughter time. We've never really been able to do too much of that, she was only 15 months when Hamish came along, and normally I have them both together and don't have much opportunity to spend one-on-one time with them.

So before she starts school I thought it would be nice if we spent some time doing some of the things that she would like to do. Admittedly, we've also had to do some things that she hasn't wanted to do, like picking up documents from the doctors and taking Hamish for his U7 tests (that's the standard age 3 tests here), but we've also gone to the cinema and saw Cars 2 in German ( and because the German schools have gone back it was easy to explain the bits that she didn't understand as we were the only ones in the cinema. And we went to an ice-cream shop, and we went shopping for art supplies and things for her schuletute, and we've done some craft projects.

And because I knew it would make her really happy, I finally got my act together and finished sewing the dress I've been making for her. It's been hanging on the outside of her wardrobe for hmm... months, so it was about time. I also managed to make a drawstring bag to hold her school tights in which was easy-peasy and I'm rather chuffed with. We've also done some baking and some craft projects, and while my house is now awash with sequins and Hama beads which keep appearing in the oddest of places (like Stevie's dinner), we've had some really good fun. If you want to see more of the bouncy bed pink dress photos then head over to fiona gray . paints.

Postcards from Germany: The Bodensee & Zurich

Allensbach on the Bodensee.

Zurich - pretty buildings, pretty toy shops, pretty flag. What more could you want? I hear the Swiss also make great chocolate. I'm sold.

Meersburg - quite possibly my favourite place on the Bodensee.

After all our Legoland, Playmobil fun we headed down to the Bodensee for our 'proper' holiday. The Bodensee is right at the bottom of Germany, and everyone raves about it as a great holiday destination. I was in charge of all the holiday arrangements, though frankly, if I didn't think Stevie would be worse at it, and we'd end up staying in a brothel, then I would gladly hand over this responsibility to someone else. But Stevie's view seems to be "You spend all day on the internet, you must be an expert."..."Yes, yes, I am, but mostly at sourcing pointless fripperey at fantastic prices". Hotels, sadly, no. So while we were in Nurnburg, I may have managed to avoid booking us into a brothel, we may well have been booked into a hotel next to a brothel as we were surrounded on 3 sides by lap dancing clubs and sex shops , though there was a really nice looking gallery and design shop too so you know, it was worth it, and even though Stevie couldn't sleep from the music banging through the walls from the nightclub, I had no problem at all.

But I digress, the place I booked on the Bodensee was an apartment within a hotel which I thought would work really well for us as it came with a 'fully equipped kitchenette'. For some reason I packed as though we were flying with Ryanair (i.e. as little as possible) and not taking the car, and assumed that a 'fully equipped kitchenette' would include a washing machine. Alas, apparently it means one of those compact kitchen unit things from IKEA. You get a sink, 2 rings, and a fridge. No washing machine. Now if I was feeling really sorry for myself, I'd tell you I can barely type my hands are so cracked from all the hand-washing I did every evening. (But I'd be lying, really, because I'm quite lazy and just waited until we were desperate and then washed and washed and washed away in my little IKEA sink). Aside from that it was lovely, and the kids discovered they did actually like Nutella, and it was close to the beach.

We stayed in a place called Allensbach and visited a few places around the Bodensee. We went to Konstanz which is lovely though chock-full of tourists (and wasps - though they may have followed us from Legoland) and my lasting memory of it will be Orla going absolutely berserk over a pretzel that I wouldn't buy her and screaming wildly so that everyone in Edeka stared at me with funny looks on their faces.

We also visited Friedrichshafen because I really wanted to visit the Zepplin Museum. Friedrichshafen is not the sort of place you visit for the architecture - it's a bit horrid really. Well, not horrid, but not exactly lovely. We got near the Zepplin Museum, but wouldn't you know it, I didn't get to go in it. Both kids were too hot and fed up and moany, which in turn made Stevie rather moany too. There are times when I just give up for the sake of my own sanity. So I abandoned my secret plan and drove them back to the hotel where they all had a wee sleep and then tottered down to the beach. Pah.

We also took a feery ride from Konstanz to Meersburg. Now if you get the chance, go to Meersburg. It's lovely. Really pretty. Lovely painted buildings along the shorefront, a great big castle on the hill, vineyards rolling down the hill towards the harbour, beautiful quaint streets, vines growing up buildings laden with grapes, shop windows full of cuckoo clocks, and just a general loveliness about the whole place. And if you get bored of all that you can play crazy golf. I think Meersburg was my favourite place around the Bodensee. The kids enjoyed the ferry ride there and back and quite liked the hilliness of the place (makes a change from flat as a pancake Berlin) and so we were all happy.

Oh, and we went to Switzerland. Stevie has raved about Zurich ever since he got stuck there between flights for a day by accident with work. He spent a day in the city with a work colleague and was totally wowed by it's beauty. He says it's the most attractive city he's ever been to, and frankly he's gone on about how I would love it so much that I had to go while I had the opportunity. And it is lovely. It has a gorgeous altstadt and really was worth the trip. I took probably a million photos and decided that the Swiss flag is possibly my favourite. The kids are sticking with the German flag as their favourite. The Swiss is now their second favourite. That's as far as the list extends. I'm a lazy mummy and haven't even bothered mentioning the Union Jack to them. As far as they're concerned when we arrived in Germany it was right in the middle of the World Cup and we were surrounded by German flags and they took it into their hearts as their flag. My little patriots.

Anyway, I also discovered about 3 really lovely little toy shops in Zurich. It was very lucky for me that it was Sunday when we went or I could have easily spent an awful lot of money, and not just on the kids. The windows were full of things that I know could have made my sister very happy this Christmas: lovely little notebooks decorated with anteaters following a little trail of ants in lovely Scandinavian colours, giant wall hanging owls made of paper in beautiful colours, wooden St Bernhards holding little Swiss barrels, beautifully drawn dressing up dolls just asking to be framed and hung on a bedroom wall, boxes containing stacking cardboard cats wearing little jumpers and carrying presents tied with ribbons. Oh, just thinking about it makes me want to go back. (But being the resourceful creature I am I took photos instead so I could Google the brands when I got back)

Postcards from Germany: Legoland & Günzburg

Paddling as fast as they can to get away from the wasps.

Squeal with delight if you want to go faster!

The pretty wasp-free streets of Günzburg

Ah...I've just realised that this photo doesn't really show the curvy roofs. Oh well, you'll just have to go yourself and have a look, as I'm too lazy to change the photo.

So after the Playmobil Funpark we moved on to Günzburg for the night before hitting Legoland Deutschland. This was our second visit. We went in April on our trip to Munich and Regensburg, Augsburg, Bamburg and the CzechRepublic. Ideally I would have liked to have had a little more space between the Playmobil trip and the Legoland trip just to eek things out a bit, but god forbid, we might have missed out on the wasps had we done it that way.

My enduring memory of Legoland is of the wasps. They are everywhere. Gazillions of them. You can't stand still for more than a second or you'll have 3 of them at you with back-ups on the way. So it's best to keep on moving. Which was fine when we came in April because the queues were almost non-existent, but some queuing was required this time round and the wasps were driving us all nuts. Eating was not a pleasure.

But Legoland was still great. The kids loved it. Same as last time. We didn't spend as much time this time round walking round mini-Germany, but I did go back and check out Frankfurt, just to make sure that was the place I fancied visiting. It was - but you know what, I think I prefer the Legoland version to the real version.

Anyway, the other thing about the last time we visited is that we didn't actually go into Günzburg the last time we went to Legoland. We stayed in a farmhouse outside of the town. But we went out for dinner there and if you are planning on visiting Legoland Deutschland, I would highly recommend a visit to the town. It's full of lovely architecture, with buildings with curvy roofs, and all painted pretty colours and little tree-lined streets. And less wasps.

Postcards from Germany: Playmobil Funpark

One thing we realised shortly after our first travels around Germany with pesky kids was that we needed to include quite a few stops, and ideally, if we wanted to see anything of interest to us we had to broker a deal with Orla & Hamish whereby their displeasure at being dragged round lovely architecture was offset by visits to places that they would like.

And so on our way down to the Bodensee, we made our first stop at Nürnberg, which is nice and handy for the Playmobil Funpark. I'd seen this advertised inside the Playmobil catalogue, but had made the assumption that it was for slightly older kids than mine, possibly around 6 or 8 years old. But we decided to try it anyway, and I am so glad we did.

Talk about FANTASTIC!? I loved it. The kids loved it. And I loved it even more. Admittedly, it should be noted that I do have a bit of a Playmobil addiction, and played with Playmobil myself when I was a child, so other visitors may experience different levels of exuberant enthusiasm. But by the same token, please also note, that this is not a sponsored..um...(slightly lengthy, rambling) postcard (I must be turning into my mother), I just thought it was brilliant.

Where to start. Well, the price for starters: It's only 10 Euros per person with under 3's going free, which is quite a bargain compared with other marvellous places like Legoland, Disneyland, etc, etc. And if you don't go in the peak season it's only 8 Euros. So even better.

But of course the best bit about the Playmobil Funpark is all the toys. That's what it's all about. And there are tons of them. Outdoor toys and indoor toys, so it doesn't really matter if it rains. Hamish particularly like the construction vehicles and diggers that they have in an area filled with gravel and sand. There were also swings and climbing frames and spades and all sorts of other things for the kids to do at this bit. But the best bit was that there were enough toys for everybody, so no squabbling, and the ability in Hamish's case to wander around with a digger in each hand.

Orla loved the water play areas. There were a few 'watery bits' and I would probably recommend taking either some swimwear for the kids (if it's nice and hot) or a change of clothes. I forgot and Hamish got soaked and had to wander around in his pants while his shorts dried off. Nonetheless, he didn't care one bit as they had a canal system set up at perfect Hamish height with all the Playmobil 1.2.3. water toys such as little boats, loads of arks, and dolphins and so on.

There was also a bigger canal type thing set up near by with lots of pirate ships, car ferries, various sail boats and dolphins, whales, and loads of other sea creatures and other things that float. But the best watery bit as far as my kids were concerned were the big clams. These were fenced off and children were let in in groups of around 12 at a time. The aim of the big clams is that water flows through them and tiny little Playmobil toys, such as starfish, shells, seahorses, seals and so on appear inside the clam and the children have to reach in and try to collect them. They pretty much have to lie on the ground to get their arms in to reach, and the assistants will 'help' the younger ones find little toys which is great. You can buy a little clam shell for 1 Euro to collect all the little toys you find which you get to keep for free. Yay!

Oh and how could I forget the rafts?! Beside a giant pirate ship you can sail (or rather, punt) a raft around the water with your children. I have never seen so many terrified parents aboard rafts. It was quite funny. Especially as I didn't go on one. But Stevie took the kids on one and seeing Orla stepping rather perilously close to the edge of the raft with her paddle about 5 times before Stevie made her sit down was enough to give me the same frightened look as those parents aboard.

I could go on and on about how great the Playmobil Funpark is. But I'll try to keep it (slightly) brief. The indoor play areas were also fantastic. There's a massive one in the food area which has all the big Playmobil houses, schools, castles, hospitals, safari, etc, etc, and a smaller one near the entrance that has more of the Playmobil 1.2.3. indoor toys and pirate ships, farms, and equestrian centres for the older ones. Frankly we could have stayed for days.

I had never heard of the Playmobil Funpark before I moved to Germany. It's not advertised in the same way as Legoland or Disneyland, but it should be, and I would highly recommend it to British parents as an excellent place to take Playmobil-loving kids. There are also Playmobil Funparks in Paris, Malta, Athens and the USA. Who knew??

I return: unusually slightly brown.

I'm back! I'm back! I made sure to phone my mum just in case she hadn't slept the whole time I was away worrying about internet interviewing murderers and the like, but it seemed that she had forgotten that we might all be lying in shallow Wiesbaden graves as she'd had a marvellous day at Zumba and tap. I was a bit miffed to be honest. Not even a restless night tossing and turning. Rubbish.

As usual in our quest to 'fit in as many places in Germany in the short time we may have left in this country without driving the kids mental in the process' we managed to see a fair amount of German hotspots. We started off in Nürnberg, then jumped right in to the Playmobil Funpark, then off to Günzburg, (which we've visited before) to go to Legoland Deutschland. From there we went to our holiday apartment in Allensbach on the Bodensee, and then visited Konstanz, Meersburg, Friedrichshafen, and Zurich. Then we headed back up through the west stopping at Stuttgart for the night, Wiesbaden (to see the lovely Frau Dietz), and Frankfurt. And then we faced a mammoth journey back to Berlin.

I'd like to say it was non-stop, but there was a lorry fire on the motorway so there was a great big stop for an hour and a half which only made Stevie drive even faster on the Autobahn. I had to close my eyes at 190 kph. I can only do 150kph before I start to feel a little scared. I am not even going to convert 190kph into mph as I'll probably be sick. And as I've just eaten a 95 cent (!) Creme Egg bought today at the British shop and then hidden (and thought about longingly) until the kids were asleep, it's just not worth it.

And now, it's very late, so I'll have to leave all my holiday tales for another time. But I hope you're all relieved that we're still alive, or were you too busy doing the time step too? Man, I knew it!

The very last day of Kita...

...is here at last.

Orla was over the moon. She's been waiting for this day to come for so long and now she's ready to start school. I SO hope 'big girl's school' is not a massive disappointment. But before she starts we've got our holiday to get through - it's looking a bit rainy down at the Bodensee; I've got to try my hardest not to get murdered by someone I've met on the internet (should you not hear from me for months, please send the police here and tell my mum she was right about the sorts of folk you meet on the internet).

We're taking the laptop with us, but I am going to try and not use the internet (oh, who am I kidding? Rainy evenings?).

In other news, I joined Google+ today. But so far I only have 1 friend. I like the idea of being able to divide people up into groups and only show certain groups certain things. I know you technically can do things like that on FB, but it's a bit of a faff. That's one reason why I don't post my blog through FB. Mostly I find strangers less critical about all the things I say about Stevie compared to his family :)