Die Kaffeestube - German and Austrian cyber Kaffee und Kuchen

[admylin]

Kaffeeklatsch for anyone in a German speaking country or interested in German, Kommt herein und setz euch!

Sorry to hear you've been feeling down, Gator. I remember someone who'd just had her second saying to me that she wondered how she ever thought that it was stressful with "just" one (I only had one at the time) - but I think however many you have, it can be incredibly stressful (and one fewer always seems much easier!).

Thatis There's no way I'd want my ILs here for a week either (although there's no way my MIL would even come and stay overnight with us), but I'm just of people who have the option to leave their DC with their parents/ILs for a night or two. Still, at least we have friends who we can leave them with so I can't complain too much.

Jenny Neither my parents nor ILs like travelling, but at least it's fairly easy for us to visit them compared to when we were in the USA.
It's my own fault really, for marrying that unusual breed of Austrian who moves more than 5 km away from his/her parents. My SIL once told DH that their parents didn't want to lose him more than they had already.

I went for a lovely run in the wood with one of our neighbours this morning. I was surprised to find I could actually talk to her at the same time as running (as long as we weren't walking running uphill) and we only saw two dogs, neither of which chased us. I don't think I'd venture up there on my own, however, as I'd be bound to get lost. I do envy people with a sense of direction.

Argh silly homework issue - does Mutter/ Mütter have any other meaning than mother. DD is having a tantrum at me for not knowing what she means. She has to make a clock out of cardboard, and use a butterfly pin to fix the hands in. I cannot see how it makes the slightest bit of difference what she uses to make the hole for the pin to go through, but she is having a 6 year old crisis about the fact Frau G told her to use a "Mutter" which she thinks is a pin???? I looked it up and got Mutter (no ü) possibly having a technical meaning of a "female screw" ... can it mean nail or pin? Thank you!

Hope you feel better soon Gater. When you have more than one the older ones amuse/ distract the younger ones (not in a babysitting sense, but they are just an interesting distraction, but also by playing with them, even if the age difference is small - worked better almost with a 24 month gap between my older 2) so although there is extra work there is also benefit.

DD hates me, ah well. Homework...

thatis this is one if it's any help?!

Good luck - we've been there and had those tantrums. I feel for you.

Linzer you're right to be annoyed about the lack of hands on help from your PIL. They haven't even got the excuse that they don't like to fly or that it's too far really. Mine are abit like yours Jenny, haven't been over for over 2 years but can manage to fly to the far east and other holiday destinations with no problem!

Gator sorry you're not feeling too good, hope the tooth makes an appearance soon too.

thatis I can't believe you aren't getting mothers day at home! Can't you put your foot down? Or get your dc to bastel a card with happy grans day written on it! My dd has announced she's making me a cake by herself (no idea what it'll be) so I have to take her shopping to get the ingredients - she's already bought 3 tubs of Schlagsahne!

Barns

Thatis maybe she means to use one of those flat metal doughnut-shaped things on the back of the clock, rather than a fat nut?

Those barns look fantastic, silken. I was amazed at how reasonable they were until I realised the price was per night rather than per week. Plenty of room for us all, anyway!

Thatis I would normally assume that Mutter meant the kind of nut that admylin linked to, but agree that one of those envelope fasteners would be just as good if not better. Sorry, not much help I know. I'm always worried about using the wrong plural form when I say "mothers" in German and think carefully before I say it so that I don't end up saying nuts by mistake! (I rarely find myself talking about nuts so the problem doesn't occur the other way round. )

Silken a round metal donut thing on the back of the clock makes sense, to help the hands go around, but I don't have such things - dd is lucky we have the split-pins or butterfly pins, whatever the name is - we only have them because we send books "Buchersendung" when we swap on the bookswapper website! admylin of course a "female screw" is a nut, how stupid am I! :o Both my MIL and my own mother appear to think Mothers Day could only refer to them, and utterly block out the idea that the female parents of their grandchildren are, by definition, "Mothers" - they both have a very "because I'm worth it" attitude to Mothers Day and expect their wishes to be law on that day... My mother complained quite bitterly about how "quiet" her Mothers day had been, because the 2 of my sisters who live locally to her (who have their own children) "only" came around late afternoon and cooked her dinner on English Mothers Day and didn't spend the entire day with her... Luckily I send her a large showy bouquet of overpriced Interflora flowers and feel happy with my decision to live over 1000 km away on that day lol! But then German Mothers Day roll around and we only live an hour away.... MIL is quite capable of "not speaking to" DH if we don't go (she has done this before over something, though I forget what, it was when we still lived in the UK and she cut DH out for about 6 months, though FIL kept contact, she cut her own sister out for over 10 years, though they speak again now... she is the only adult I know in real life who does this, FIL says it's because she's Croation by birth and, according to him, temperament... )

Aww thank you, you are a lovely bunch :)

Linzer It's really hard to understand that family mentality when it's not how you were brought up, isn't it. We moved around a lot when I was younger and my parents have even emigrated to Canada, so I really couldn't imagine living round the corner from my grandparents in the same town 5 generations had grown up in or something like that. Saying that, I am sometimes a little jealous when we visit PILs and DH's old friends are all in one place.

Thatis I bet it's really sweet to watch the older DCs entertaining the younger ones. How did you get on with the clock in the end? Did you find the bits you needed? Your MIL sounds like a handful. It seems a bit strange, this sense of entitlement on Mother's Day. We were on our way to Canada last year on Mother's Day (I was about 5 months pregnant at the time) and an air stewardess said Happy Mother's Day to me and it made my day!
Interflora are the way to go in my opinion, you can't go wrong there!

admylin The tooth finally came through last night, but I think he has had a growth spurt as well as teething so the past few days have been challenging, but today was much better and he can suddenly sit on his own for longer without falling over and has worked out how to properly play with a few of his toys instead of just bashing them and slobbering all over them which seems to have made him quite happy, bless him. (As well as looking cuter than cute with his two tiny teeth!)
How sweet of your DD to make you a cake - it can only be good with that amount of cream involved!

I feel strangely relieved that it's not the VHS causing you so many problems, thatis. I hope you sort it out to your satisfaction soon. And you get that clock finished! It is mother's day here too on Sunday, but dh will be on a flight from Munich to Stockholm. No lie-in here either!

Glad ds' tooth has come through now Gator. It makes them so miserable sometimes.

Nice barns, silken!

Sounds like you married a good 'un but his family don't match up to his lofty heights, Linzer!

That cake sounds lovely admylin.

Got to dash and pick up dd from her enrichment class at school. Sleep well.

oh joy
pizza baking

bidet boy for lunch

no moaning
so bye for now

Jenny what's enrichment class?

Cinders I think I'm making pizza for the dc at lunch time today. They have sort of shoved a tiny taste of the past 2 days lunches in their mouth and the rest has been shoved to the side of their plate - hmmm so much for my healthy veggie meals!

Gator glad the tooth got through at last. You'll be able to get him his first baby toothbrush soon!

Yes, very sweet of dd to want to make me a cake but I did say does this cake include tidying up the kitchen aswell and she said it did. Only I have a feeling her version of tidying up will be alot different to mine!

Both my teens stomped off to school this morning - another fight over who spends how long in the bathroom. Think I'll just ignore them tomorrow morning and not try to be the referee trying to keep everyone happy.

jenny what is an "enrichment" class? Do they sit around taking vitamins???

gator glad to hear the tooth is through. Growth/developmental spurts are odd, aren't they? I'm still getting caught out by them, thinking DD is getting ill, or not coping with kiga well, or being overindulged and spoilt by PIL and then suddenly she becomes even more amazing and excellent than she's ever been before.

admylin will your dd manage the cake entirely on her own? I remember driving my mum scatty by starting to make things and then needing her help just at the point when she'd sat down with a fresh cup of tea!

linzer I never realised the plural of Mutter was different depending on the meaning! Which one is mothers? DD has some wooden "Schrauben und ?Muttern?" - wish I hadn't binned the box now!

thatis I am a rubbish daughter/DIL and completely ignore both Mothers' Days. My excuse is that I am a cynic and atheist and the whole thing was presumably dreamt up by either the gift card/cut flower industry or the Christians . Actually I'm just chronically disorganized.

X-posts, admylin!

Also, what is a bidet boy, cinders?

Silken I'm abit like you in thinking that it's all the gift card/cut flower industry, but dd likes celebrations of any kind! She'll manage the cake by herself although she might be abit unsure about oven times so I'll help there but I'm more worried that I'm going to end up cleaning in the kitchen for half of Muttertag!

At Christmas she started making chocolates, really lovely, decorated professional looking chocolates (pic on my fb page) but she used every bowl that we own, every work surface was covered in some sort of sweet or chocolaty substance. It was hard work!

Morning!

silken - impressed you've time for Mnetting this week - are you all packed up? I found it a nightmare packing with the dc around as they need so much stuff day to day. Is your dd going to your IL's while you move? Also impressed at you ignoring forgetting mothers day - there would be a cold war from his mother if dh forgot mothers day. I'm not really that bothered about it since it rarely goes as smoothly as I dream it will.

admylin - the fighting in your house will probably get worse before it gets better. Are they spending ages doing their hair in the bathroom? Or is your ds not at that age yet?

gator - I dont have any idea how I coped with 3 dc when dc3 was a baby. My memories of his first year are vague due to the chronic sleep deprivation. But think you just cope because you have to. Hope you're feeling a little bit better today - his pesky teeth can cause all number of troubles for the both of you but then also makes him super cute.

I also want to know - jenny whats an enrichment class and cinders whats a bidet boy???

thatis - sounds like that school are really trying to take advantage of you. Sounds like a great idea to set up a school but they have to also have a business plan in place to meet their costs and cant expect you to work double the hours for the same pay because they are havign financial problems. Hope you survive grandMothers day

linzer - glad you enjoyed your run in the woods. I often go walking in the woods here on my own & never worry about it. Very rarely meet another person. Got a bit lost this morning tho which soon got the adrenaline going. And it was muddy after the rain yesterday and nearly fell on my arse! But got home in the end.
Really think the other parents are taking advantage of you too over the english lessons. You need to work on those assertiveness skills and say you've got another appointment to go to 15 mins after the lesson finishes and are unable to look after the dc beyond that time. Then the first week make a plan to go out then - it'll soon stop them dilly dallying about.
I also feel like grumbling sometimes about our lack of grandparent help. They are fab at taking one dc to theirs for a few days and obviously took dd on holiday with them but they can never be relied on to help if we need them like your IL's when you wanted to go away. I also feel jealous of friends who's parents live round the corner and they have help on tap. But then wonder whether i'd go quietly mad if my MIL was popping in all the time. Cant decide.

I couldn't see the chocolates on your FB page, admylin - are they in one of your albums? The strawberry tarts look delicious, though!

silken Mothers is (or should that be are?!) Mütter and nuts = Muttern. I'm sure I'm going to end up saying nuts instead of mothers one day. Maybe a good way of remembering it is that both mothers and fathers have an umlaut in the plural, i.e. Mütter and Väter.

Cinders Is that the boy who used your bidet as a toilet?

Jenny I'm another one wondering about enrichment class - it sounds like a bad translation from German!

Gator I'm also a little jealous of friends here who still have school friends living in the same town, although I wouldn't want to live in the same town as either my parents or ILs. One of the reasons we sold our Baugrund next to my ILs' house is that we decided we'd be driven mad living next door to them all out in the sticks. (DH did want to keep it for a while in case we fell on hard times and wanted to build there, but I managed to persuade him that if we did fall on hard times, building a house would probably be the last thing we'd think of doing).

Only 45 minutes of my child-free morning left now, as DD1's teacher phoned earlier to ask if I could go to her class at 11 rather than 11.55 as she wants to do PE with the children in the last hour. I also seem to have spent half my morning so far making flashcards for today's lesson. I've decided that if they don't acknowledge me at this year's Abschlussfest, I shall be storming out. (I tried to do so at Christmas, but I don't think anyone noticed as I had to take all the DC with me since DH wasn't there. This time, I shall leave DH there with the DC. )

Ploom I've got the forest starting just atthe end of our street but I'm abit of a wimp about going by myself. I need a forest walking buddy as the dc won't even set foot near it now!

The bathroom problem is dd - she does her hair for ages, the back has to be perfect too so she needs the mirrors on the bathroom cupboard.
She opens the side ones so she can see the back then smooths it down, brushes it again, ties it up etc all 3 or 4 times with ds standing saying but it looks the same as before (which it does but I guess she sees that one hair that isn't in place).

This morning I got her to let ds brush teeth while she smoothed stray hairs but he had to push his elbows out and gurgle extra long and loud to make a teenage point I resume...sigh it'll pass I know.

I've searched for a fold out mirror for dd's room by the way but no luck - any ideas?

Linzer just forgot to make album public! It should show up now.

You're right to storm out, dare you to slam the door on your way!

Can see them now admylin, they look delicious! Did they last long after the photo had been taken?

Ploom I know, my assertiveness skills are non-existent. The Tuesday group parents are absolutely fine and it's rare for any of the children to be picked up even five minutes late, but the Friday group is a different story. The problem is that I can't really go out as we all need to eat lunch before we leave for DD1's dyslexia lesson (we only have just over an hour at home in between English and her dyslexia tutor). I definitely need to make more of a point by standing in the kitchen cooking rather than coming out to chat with the one mother who always comes in for ages (often leaving her two-year old in the car down by the road), but the other worst offender is chronically late, chronically flaky and usually just phones up to ask me to send her DD down to the road.

Re running, I was quite relieved at how quiet it was in the woods yesterday - not that I mind seeing other people, I just don't want to see too many dogs! I think we only saw two, but I definitely felt more "protected" by the fact that I was running with my neighbour. Was talking to one of our other neighbours yesterday who said that he'd been running along the river, but it was ridiculously busy and he sometimes slows down to a walk to stop dogs chasing after him. I shall definitely continue to avoid that area!

No. they didn't last long Linzer! She made about 5 rounds until I said there's no way we can carry on eating so much chocolate so she's gone onto thinking up icepops as we bought some of those forms to make your own ice lollies! At the moment she's got some mango and orange mixture in the freezer!

The parents are abit cheeky to say the least - they're getting a bargain aswell for the price you charge.

I'm another one wondering what an enrichment class could be, jenny :)

silken I know - I always start to wonder if he isn't well or if I'm not looking after him properly or something and then all of a sudden he's back to sleeping normally, feeding normally & has another new skill or two! How is the packing going? Sounds stressful.

admylin The chocolates look gorgeous! Your DD sounds very creative - I had a look at the mini-food pics as well. I was thinking the other day that it would be nice to have someone to go on my walks with (DS' goi goi and ga ga not really counting as conversation in my book) - shame we're not closer!

Ploom We're back to smiley and cute again today - he's napping just now and I'm making my shopping list for when we're in the UK this summer, yay!
(Are we in Glesgae at the same time?!)

Linzer Good for you on your decision to storm out! It does sound like the school and the parents are taking advantage. Could you mention to the flaky parents that you will have to stop the lessons as people are treating you like a free babysitter and it is making you late for DD1's dyslexia lesson - obviously don't point the finger at them directly. Maybe the threat of no more lessons will make them a little less tardy. It's a difficult one I guess as you can't really just chuck the kids out onto the street and go somewhere for an hour (even if you didn't have to sort lunch). Or just put your prices right up and you might find your problems (with the private lessons at least) solved :)

The two women who run the English-speaking playgroup I take DS to are leaving in the summer as their DCs will be starting Kindergarten so they are looking for someone to replace them. I'm wondering whether to offer my services. It's not much work at all and I could put embellish it on my CV so I don't have a massive gap between my last job and my next. Hmm, what to do.

admylin your dd sounds so lovely. I think I´d probably put on loads of weight if she were my dd.

Linzer One of dh´s patients who goes jogging got attacked by a buzzard (or some other large bird). She thinks she was probably jogging too close to the nest and so it attacked. She ended up with lots of scratches on her arms and was really shocked. I´m not trying to scare you -I was just really surprised.I thought that sort of thing only happens in horror films.

Gator Hope you´re feeling abit more cheerful today. We got our baby photos out yesterday and cooed over how cute they looked at that age.

My brothers twins arrived on Tuesday. Two girls and a good weight for twins. My brother sounded so happy/shocked, but I don´t envy him the next few months. They´re moving house in 2 weeks time, so I´m going down after that and will have to make do with photos until then.

Gator Sorry crossed posts. If it really wouldn´t be much work and you´d enjoy doing it, I´d say go for it. As you say, it would be good for you CV .

Aw congrats to your brother hupa. must be a proper shock to go from no dc to 2!

gator - i'm in Glasgae from the 20th to the 23rd of June - would be fab if we were there at the same time.

Go linzer with the storming out!

Gator it's great to have a playgroup to go to so it'd be a shame if no one runs it although you might try and get someone to share the job incase you can't make it?

Hupa congratulations, bet you can't wait to see them!