The phone I use here isn’t very good. If I do take photos with it, I tend to forget about them, because the uploading process is so tedious. Here are a few highlights from the past three months.
Reading her favorite “sinosaur” book.
Waiting for Daddy at the Sony Center
playing during a layover at Schipol-Amsterdam
and just hanging out.
“Sinosaur” is S-speak for “dinosaur” and since its a word we’ve been hearing a lot around here, we thought it was the perfect time to head back to the Museum für Naturkunde.
I don’t know if you can tell, but she is terrified in the above picture. Maybe she expected them to look a little more like the cute characters in this Sandra Boynton book?
A brief moment of bravery
It probably didn’t help to tell her that these were dinosaur bones and that bones are inside your body. That became an especially horrifying concept when we walked into the special exhibit on elephants, her favorite animal. At first S refused to accept that the pile of bones had anything to do eith an elephant. It just wasn’t an elephant. “No Elephant! No ELEPHANT!” she shouted shaking her head. Then, eventually she started asking, “Mama, Mama, elephant ok? Elephant happy?” while blowing it kisses to make it better.
It was just too much. So much, that I think we’ll stick with the zoo for a few more years.
Here it is. The Death Pit of Spielplatz lore. Ususally there’s water running around the bottom. You know, the better to slip and crack your head open.
We had a simple, lazy Mother’s Day or Muttertag auf Deutsch. They fell on the same day this year, but I’m not sure if that’s always the case. We took a walk, made french toast, and staring down a long, unplanned afternoon, decided to give the Hamburger Bahnhof another go.
We ended up stumbling into an exhibit of Anthony McCall’s light sculptures. Luckily, S – who has recently developed an intense fear of the dark – fell asleep just as we rolled up to the museum entrance.
One day, I’m going to have to take her there without the stroller. A large portion, at least from what I can tell, of the museum is only accessible by stairs and the docents there aren’t as friendly, again in my experience, as they are in some other museums. Note that I felt the need to italicize “some.” I’ve run into many, many docents in Berlin who clearly dislike children visiting the museums, even in museums with children’s programs. The number of times I’ve been sternly talked to by docents is crazy and very much deserving of its own blog post. The Hamburger Bahnhof docents are more the type to stare at you sullenly while slowly inching towards you in an attempt to encourage you to leave. God forbid children should have fun with art!
Before I get too worked up, I’ll leave you with this very calming, yet overcast photo of the garden in front of the museum. Till next time! Tchüssi.
We used the excuse of returning a pile of library books to the library at UniPotsdam to give visiting a palace mit dem Kind a try. Even though I have yet to make it inside Sanssouci, this trip was devoted to “Friederisiko,” and exhibition celebrating the 300th anniversary of Frederick the Great’s birthday as well as the completion of the renovations on his pet project, Das Neue Palais.
S LOVED the “Printheth House” and yes, we’re apparently in that stage now. We didn’t have the heart to tell her it was actually for a king. The entrance to the exhibit is by timed tickets, which I was a bit nervous about, but turned out not to be a big deal. There was some miscommunication over the stroller with the women running the info-desk giving us the OK, while the docents at the door turned us back to the Garderobe. There wasn’t room for it anyway. Raised, purple paths have been laid over the original flooring for added protection as well as a way to guide visitors through the exhibit. Step off it and you’ll be the target of some good, ol’ German scolding.
In addition to the path, the palace has been divided into easy to digest pieces - Mode, Spiel, Essen & Trinken, etc - with wonderful results. I kept whispering to Jon how much more I liked it than Versailles, which is something of a cattle-call. There is also a daily violin concert, giving us our first chance to expose S to live music. She was perfectly behaved, except for when she shouted “HI!” to the violinist. It was beyond adorable.
Now that I know how much she loves them, I think trips to Schloß Charlottenburg and Sansoucci are in order ASAP.
PS: I love how Germans celebrate their cultural figures. Because its Frederick the Great’s 300th, we’re having a Friedrich-Jahr, a Year of Frederick. Last year was the 200th anniversary of writer Heinrich von Kleist’s death, so it was a Kleist-Jahr. Probably too nerdy for the states…
The cuter the clothing; the faster S will grow out of it.
So I have a rule: I will only spend 20EUR or less on any one article of clothing. Its just high enough that I don’t feel completely tied to boring tees, but I still sometimes have trouble pulling out my wallet when I realize how much that is in USD or when I think to hard about how dirty it will get or whether or not it will last more than a month. I’ve stuck by this rule for two years. This rule and I were very committed.
Then I found myself in front of the children’s clothes at COS and I couldn’t resist. Aren’t the yellow polka dots adorable?
I bought it one size up thinking that she would wear it in California, knowing that I’ll miss COS like crazy among the flip-flops and Ed Hardy shirts, but I don’t think she’s going to let me pack it just yet.
caught mid-twirl
Everything (much to my chagrin) is green; the cafe tables are out on the sidewalks; the people aren’t unhappy. Everything has started to look the way it did when we first moved here. I feel a little sad to think that we only have a few short months left and this sadness has driven me to one of the things I like the least about parenting. Playgrounds.
I know. I’m horrible. I prefer the inside things, the snuggling together reading or laying next to each other on our stomachs with a roll of paper and a pile of crayons. I mean, I actually suffer going to museums with a toddler. Is it that much of a stretch to think, maybe, I don’t like running around? That said, even I have found myself wandering around the beautiful Viktoriapark with my husband and baby in the evenings.
The Spielplatz at this park, however, is pretty remarkable. Its fairly large and seems just as fun for little babies hanging out in the sand (All German playgrounds – in my experience – are covered in sand. None of that funny tire stuff here!) as it is for the bigger kids playing on the zip-line. Yes, a zip-line, and not one of those dinky, barely goes five feet ones we have in the US.
That’s the major difference between playgrounds in Germany vs. the US. The Germans believe more in personal responsibility, so yes, it is much easier to get badly hurt on German playgrounds (this one is nothing! I should post pictures of what I not-so-fondly call “the death pit” at another playground. Its a sunken concrete maze with about an inch or so of water running through the bottom. Let’s all crack our heads open! SO VIEL SPAß!), but then you have no one to blame but yourself. You and your child should have been more careful. In the US, there would be an uproar. Petitions and lawsuits. Fundraisers. A movement to change the playground - that is if something like that could pass whatever building codes we have at all.
Of course, I’m not trying to say one os better than the other and, of course, I watch my S like the over-anxious American mom that I am, but there is something to be said for teaching our children to be a little bit more responsible or – dare I say it? - ordentlich.
Ever on the quest for tastier and fresher soba, we wandered down Kantstrasse on tuesday to try Heno Heno Japanese Imbiss.
Rindfleisch Nudeln-Suppe mit Soba
Soba is one of S’s favorite foods and edamame is one of the only green things she will consistently eat, so we go out for japanese a lot. Nothing in Berlin will ever compare to our favorites in NY or CA, but Heno Heno comes very, very close.
Heno Heno
Kantstrasse 65, U-Wilmersdorferstr or S-Charlottenburg
Our oven broke last week. I was in the middle of baking banana bread and didn’t think to heat up the oven until after I mashed up the bananas and cracked the eggs. Tossing it all made me wince. We’re in the midst of figuring out to do with the landlady. She doesn’t live in Berlin and she doesn’t have internet access at home so it always takes awhile for her to get back to us. At first I was freaking out – how will we LIVE without an OVEN? – but then I realized that I don’t use the oven that much for meals. We’re a stir-frying, pan-searing sort of a family.
Of course, that doesn’t solve the problem with baking. I love to bake. That banana bread is a once a week sort of deal and, of course, as much as some bakeries may try, there really is no where in Berlin to get a good chocolate chip cookie.
Then a few days ago, Jon and I wandered into one of our favorite bookstores, Fürst & Ivan, where I found this:
"Delicious Cakes Made Easy"
The photos are so pretty and with that font I probably would have bought a book about earthworms. I guess I’m just that susceptible to hipster aesthetics. I flipped through out, trying to tell myself to put it down, that the oven was broken and I wouldn’t be able to use it, and then I saw the recipe for Kalter Hund. Kalter Hund, literally “cold dog,” is a German refrigerator cake meaning it doesn’t need to actually bake. Ok, that’s it. I’m sold.
The recipe is really easy; in fact, its barely a recipe at all – something you probably know if you’ve ever seen a Kalter Hund in person. The “cake” is just layers and layers of butter cookies and chocolate. Unfortunately, all of this confidence in making my non-recipe meant that I didn’t buy enough chocolate. I was forced to break into my secret stash to even it out.
waiting to be melted
At this point, S had no idea why I had so much chocolate and why I was not giving it to her for immediate consumption. Luckily, the “cake” is so easy and there’s no raw egg in it, so its perfect dessert little nudniks cooks.
"helping"
After a while, she got bored with just layering and decided that tasting would be a better use of her time and expertise. I made our Kalter Hund in a 9×9 pan, but it should really be set in a loaf pan. Its the traditional shape and your chocolate layers will be a bit thicker. It would also be good with fruit or nuts thrown in. I’ve also had it before with rum-soaked cookies. Obviously not for the kinder, but very good.
And as soon as I have a working oven again, I’m making Amerikanerin or, as we call them on the East Coast, black and white cookies!
