Cyber Glühwein und Lebkuchen - the German and Austrian advent thread

[admylin]

A thread for anyone living in Germany or Austria, or anyone else who fancies a chat.

Happy first Advent to everyone!

Previous thread: here

afternoon all,

grinch how is your ds? is he better now? did he drink the yeast? My dh changed dc1 and dc2 nappies all the time, but somehow declared himself retired by the time dc3 came along. But I would change them, while he looked after the other two. However he constantly tells us of how he used to have to change two pooey (sp?) nappies every morning for 3 years. . It's a case of "yes, dear, you hero, don't forget to put your underpants on over your trousers"...

linzer glad the KEL went well. Sounds like a nice set-up to get to know teachers etc. Volkschule feels so cosy, that I wonder how the next school will feel. Sorry to hear about the poor turn up last night, but it was really foul last night. Did you stay long?

nutella hope you got some more sleep?

Jenny- It is beyond belief. A friend on fb posted something about it, and a friend of his (no-one I know) came up with the usual cr*p of 'it's not guns that kill, it is people". I think I broke FB netiquette by a frontal attack on that comment, but I don't care, it just made my blood boil.

Antique- great to hear you are in the house. and hope the unpacking goes okay.

ploom that advert is hilarious. did you ever phone? I think I would not be brave enough to try to explain that one in German....one for dh? I somehow stumbled across the "lost in translation" thread in the mumsnet classic section and had tears rolling down my eyes. one to read when in need of cheering up.

santa good you found santa, or father christmas. No, not fb friend...will pm you and others about it.

ds is better but still not fully so. I shall have a look at him in the morning and decide. Not that I am keen to go back to work...so if you don't hear from me for a while, you know what happened.

Just a quickie - will be back to catch up properly later or, more likely, tomorrow - platanos I can send you friend suggestions for the others on the thread to save you having to PM everyone. (I did send you a message on FB but if your FB is anything like mine, it can be a bit temperamental about telling you when you have a new message.)

Good evening!
I hope everyone has had nice weekends. ours has been reasonably quiet and peaceful! Yesterday afternoon we even dared to take all three boys to the local Christmas Market. WIth all the different lights, noises, smells, lots of people usually means high stress factor for ds1 and ds2, whioch again results in difficult and unpredictable behaviour. we took the risk anyway (at the end of the day, they have to get used to these things anyway dont htey?!) and I am glad we did. They did get to go on a ride when we got there and got promised another ride before we leave if they have been well behaved. And they all really did earn their second ride

grinch about the Kur, you would have to go to your hausarzt about it. Actually I think in the first instance you would need to ring your Krankenkasse and ask for a Mutter/Kind-Kur-Antrag. With that Antrag you need to go to your Hausarzt. He/She'll need to complete it and say why you need to go on one. And you have to complete quite a few pages yourself too. I have heard that most applications get turned down at first...and most women usually just leave it at that as they dont see much point re-applying. I must have been lucky, as my application got accepted within 3 days of sending in my first application!! If you are considering going on a Mutter/Kind Kur, I'd recommend talking to someone from a Kurberatung. There are hotlines where you can go through your application with someone, they'll tell you what to put down so that it's more like to get accepted etc. On the other hand, I wonder if a Mutter/Kind-Kur would be right for you, as you would have your ds with you. BUT the Kurklinik I am going to allows a Begleitperson (doesnt have to be related) to go with you free if you are bringing a young child (I think younger than 4). I think they only offer that in the quieter season (Oct-April) but still very good!
What is your ds sleeping like, grinch. ds1 was the most terrible sleeper!!! he needed us to hold his hand while he fell asleep, and by midnight the latest he would wake up and would not go back to sleep in his own bed, thus we had him with us every single night. it really was hard work, and at the time I was already heavily pregnant with ds2. eventually I let dh sleeptrain him 1 months before ds2 was due. dh was about to start a job as a management consultant and was going to be away during the week. I had no idea how I was going to be able to look after a newborn AND ds1 during the nights by myself. but dh did succeed within 3 nights! and as ds2 was 2 weeks early, I actually had 2 whole sleep-filled weeks!

platanos I believe I sent you a fb invite I do hope your ds gets well soon. How long has he been poorly for now? ds3 is finally well again and I shall make the most of it and finally get him his flu shots, which we originally had an appointment for 1 month ago.

I really cant believe it's nearly Christmas! Do any of you have the Christkind delivering presents? and do you have the presents on the 24th or 25th? We have the main presents on the 24th, as I thought we'd do what the other families around us here do. and those are from the Christkind. Then on the 25th Fahther Christmas leaves some more presents under he tree (usually the ones sent over by friends etc). the dcs think they are special and get presents by the Christkind AND Father Christmas as they have connections to both Germany and England

oh, antique, before I sign off..are you from Manchester? if so, we were not far from you. before moving back to Germany we were in Lancaster, which is also where ds1 was born. ds2 missed out by 4 weeks!

sorry about this far-too-long essay!

outnumbered I do all the night waking myself, always have for all the kids, it just became a habit due to BF and maternity leave with DD, and then I have been a SAHM since the boys came along so it has stayed that way - DH only gets up if I demand he does, very rarely if more than one child is up and one of them is ill, otherwise I just do it. There is nobody I would take with me except DH - and DS2 wouldn't settle for him if I was there (or at all maybe), so it wouldn't work.

His sleep is still pretty terrible but not as bad as it was - it is not the same each night but I usually end up sleeping with him from somewhere between midnight and (if I am lucky) 3am - I move to the boys room and sleep there on a double mattress I keep made up on their floor. I re-settle him if he wakes before midnight but after that he won't without me. Since I stopped BFing at 13 months I do get a break each school holiday as he stays a couple of nights with the in-laws, and MIL sleeps with him and sends FIL to the couch! MIL is helpful and loves the kids but its on her terms in that I always feel I "pay" by having to accept criticism and a lot of unwanted advice if I take help!

A Kur would not be right for me I don't think - it would be a logistical nightmare unless I took DD (because of school and what she would do in the afternoons, DH wouldn't want to take time off work for that) but I don't know if they let you take 7 year olds... I guess I'd take both boys, but it would unsettle DS1 to go away without DD and DH (he has just been very strange at his Kindergarten WaldWeinacht, almost crying and hitting me and wanting to go home but not wanting to, because he couldn't remember exactly what was going to happen so didn't know if he wanted to go or not - then once it was over he was so bouncy happy and said "I'm so glad we went and even more glader its over, I do really love going home" funny boy :D)

All I actually need is 2 weeks uninterrupted sleep :D I don't feel "entitled" to Kur - just a lot of full nights sleep in a row would sort me, the couple of nights I have had the 3 times DS2 has stayed at the in-laws has never really been enough to cut through the fog I don't think. I really, really need to lose weight and I have no self control and know I use food as a crutch when tired, however good my intentions when I am less tired... Ah well, he'll sleep one day, DD was a terrible sleeper too, though never quite as bad as DS2 she was up 2 hourly every night til she was 2! Then magically she just started sleeping through on her own, pretty much within a couple of weeks of me bringing DS1 home from hospital just after her 2nd birthday!

outnumbered that's great news that your boys managed the Christmas market :o Well done them!

Our great news is that the tumble dryer repair was going to cost ?300, but Dh took it apart himself and with a bit of help from The Internet has discovered he can do it himself for the grand total of ?4.99 for 2 bearings! :o He doesn't change nappies or get up in the night with kids, or clean up kid-vomit, or do any form of housework, or any laundry, or any food shopping, or buy kids presents or clothes, or cook ... but he changes winter tyres and mends tumble driers so he has his uses :o Unfortunately he hasn't found a way to drill for the heating oil that's still going to cost us ?3000...

Linzer suggested a fb friend to me and I have taken the suggestion, so somebody is getting a fb friend request from me, but although I know it is somebody on here I don't actually know who! If you accept my request could you tell me on fb who on the thread you are please? :o

Sorry written a load of waffle without answering most of the posts, but I think I have to stop now anyway!

Grinch See my post of 16.10.

platanos, you should have an Fb Friend request from me too, as per Linzers suggestion! Hope your DS is better now.

Grinch, that is great news about the tumble drier. But yikes, heating oil for ?3k? How? How long will that last?
Sorry if we have discussed this already, I can't remember. Are you against co-sleeping with your little one? Only we co-sleep with DS, and I feel I get a brilliant night's sleep because of it. If he stirs, he can feel I am right there, and he nods off again. Admittedly I've not done it the other way, but I have a feeling if he was on his own, I'd know about it if he stirred. He does sometimes sit up and want a drink, but we have a bottle by the bed, so I don't have to get out of bed. Feels like an easier way to me. Well, it works for us.

Nutella, hope you had a nice snoozy lazy day today.

out, am glad you and your boys had a great day at the Christmas market.

Ah thankyou Linzer - and d'oh! :)

Santa I am pretty sure we have discussed it on here before - I can see its great if it works for you, but I do end up sleeping with DS2 part of every night and it is not a good night's sleep! He is so wriggly and wakes so often, and feels compelled to sleep on part of me - usually I end up with pins and needles in my arm and have to move it, which wakes him and he cries and I have to hold him quite tight to get him back to sleep, and when he does he is on some other part of me and I can't move for fear of waking him... sometimes he wants to use my face as a pillow and I can't sleep like that but he won't sleep unless his face is on mine. The problem is I can't sleep totally still (can anyone? maybe they can) and I end up with very poor quality broken sleep.

Speaking of which, he yells... I go...

Oh a full tank of oil lasts a bit over a year... Still its a huge cost!

Hello - I'm on FB too. I'm Linzer's friend who lives in Oregon with my name being pretty obvious!

A Kur sounds marvellous and I hope you get to do it and that your dh gets a job not too far away outnumbered. I can just imagine suggesting it to our health insurance! Still, laughter is the best medicine.

I do hope that ds2 settles down really quickly for you, grinch, as sleep deprivation affects so many aspects of your health. I'm surprised you haven't just fallen asleep with him by now and he's ended up falling asleep of his own accord. [hugs] Glad the tumble drier is sorted though.

Sorry about the lack of attendees Linzer. At least you had a good time with the milk Gluehwein!

Is everyone feeling more Christmassy? Ds2 is wandering around singing 'jimmel bells' all the time! Tis very cute.

Sorry for not namechecking everyone but need to finish dinner now!

Hope everyone has a great start to the week. Lots of snow here so will have to keep an eye on the school website to see if there is a delay tomorrow.

Morning, hope everyone had a good weekend.

Linzer thanks for the friend suggestion on fb!
Wow, that is expensive for the dyslexia training. You'll probably need weekly lessons too? We were told that dd would need atleast a year and that has been bewilligt so is free for us. Hopefully you can get your dd started soon, it has made a difference in dd's confidence. Now if only I could get her to stand up to her brother (he teases her for no reason) then she'd be alot happier.

outnumbered I bet it was really busy at the Christmas market so well done to you and the dc for braving it! Must admit we haven't even been yet and although we could have fit it in at the weekend the radio put us off saying it would be the busiest weekend for shopping and the market. I have a crowd phobia after an incident a few years ago.

Grinch I hope your ds will get into a different routine like your dd did - soon! He must have the energy of 10 horses!

Santa we loved co-sleeping too and I really missed them when they moved into their own room when they were 4 and 3 years old! It doesn't work for everyone though. We also had a really big comfy bed back then so everyone had room!

Well, better get going as I have to post a last minute parcel and get some shopping then start on the flat. How can it look llike a bomb dropped after a weekend? Dd's gerbil died when we were out at a party too so she was upset and we have to organise the Beerdigung in her friend's garden.

admylin Sorry to hear about the gerbil; it must have been very upsetting for your DD.
Yes, the psychologist told us that DD1 would need to have weekly lessons for about a year so it's really going to add up. OTOH it's good to have an "end in sight" as her old dyslexia tutor never mentioned a time limit or that she wouldn't need the lessons after a certain amount of time. It's good to hear that it's helped your DD's confidence. With us, it's very often DD1 who's doing the teasing so hopefully that will lessen as she becomes more confident and/or less jealous of the other two - although I'm not holding my breath atm!

Jenny I knew I'd forgotten to suggest someone to platanos - sorry! Have just done it. (I've also messaged platanos to let her know who everyone is.) I'll never be able to look at white Glühwein in the same way now; maybe I'll ask if I can have it black next time.

Grinch / WhatWould Talking of co-sleeping, DS ended up in our bed last night; I think he must have had a bad dream as I woke up to the sound of someone crying in our bed and it was a bit too high-pitched for DH. Inevitably, he managed to wet our bed too.
I'm another one who can't sleep with children in the bed. I don't have to worry about waking them, but if they're not sprawled all over me, they're kicking me. I can imagine it's great if it does work for you, but it hasn't with any of mine.

outnumbered We spread our present opening over three days - we have an Austrian Christmas on the 24th, British (with most of the presents) on the 25th and DD1's birthday on the 26th. The DC do talk about the Christkind but have never really believed (we've never really told them) that he brings their presents; he brings the Christmas tree and presents to every other family we know here, but they've just accepted that we do things a bit differently! Father Christmas brings them the presents in their stocking, but they've always known that all their other presents are from us/friends and family.
It's not an issue now that SIL's DC are teenagers, but I always used to forget that all the presents are supposed to be from the Christkind and would thank someone (in front of her children) by mistake; labels saying who the presents were from (ones that my parents would send to my ILs, for example) would also have to be removed once her children started reading, etc.

platanos I'm sure it depends a huge amount on the school, but the parents at Volksschule seemed to be much more interested in getting involved or even just attending events than they are at Gymnasium/NMS (have heard the same from a few friends). We stayed just over an hour in the end, but it wasn't too bad as we were able to shelter in a little side bit of the Punschhütte and it stopped raining eventually, so the children went on a few of the rides. At least it wasn't actually too cold - it was freeeezing the weekend before, when we met up with some friends at the same market, and much less pleasant. The atmosphere wasn't quite the same with rain rather than snow, though!
How is DS today? Are you back at work? At least there's not long to go now!

DH changed his Advent get-together bet to one parent, so ended up winning. The teacher, who we were both convinced would actually turn up (she'd given us the date as the only one she could do), texted us after we'd been waiting for about half an hour to say she couldn't make it as she had too much work on. DH texted back to say we were the only ones there but would wait a little longer, to which she replied we should make sure we didn't catch a cold! (I bet that was the real reason she didn't turn up. )

Linzer Sorry to hear the advent get together wasn´t more of a success. I think you´re right that the weather was the reason for the teacher not turning up.

admylin Sorry to hear about the gerbil. Has dd still got one left or was that the only one?

Grinch A friend of mine went on a Kur last year to Rügen and was able to take her school aged children with her. They had lessons in the morning while she did other activities. I think you´re right though, that as sleep is the main problem, it probably isn´t the solution you´re looking for. I hope things start improving soon.

I´m of to bake Plätzchen with ds´s class now, so I´ll catch up with everyone else later.

Phew, just got back from a big supermarket in the Industriegebiet and I think half of Hannover is doing their Christmas shopping today! They even had 5 men directing trafic on the car park! I only wanted one thing!

hupa which recipe are you making? Well done for volunteering! Yes, dd still has one little gerbil, her last for now as it's too sad losing them. The funeral is on Thursday - only hope the ground won't be frozen.

Linzer do you think the teasing is jealousy or to get more attention? I can't figure it out. It could be that ds is jealous as I do alot with dd but then he isn't into shopping, going for coffee, drawing, crafts, baking etc but he always gets asked if he wants to join in. Lets just hope they grow out of it sooner than later!

Got a cute 1,20m Tannenbaum that'll fit in our living room corner so dc can get the decorations out after the orthodontist this afternoon.

grinch you are absolutely right on the design flaw front, I've written my strongly worded letter of complaint but I haven't yet figured out where to send it.

advent sorry about DD's gerbil - hope the funeral goes well just in time for the apocalypse... maybe the Gerbil knew about it?

outnumbered that sounds like quite a lot of fun your DCs had at the market Really lovely to hear they all enjoyed the day out!

Thanks everyone, I had a much better sleep last night! Did my best to relax and prepare myself slowly for bed. Did some yoga stretching (mostly involved sticking my bum in the air to help my back) which made baby swap from lying on the right side to the left. Obviously once I was in bed baby twigged that I'd cheated it out of squishing my liver and it promptly moved back over which was nice.

We had a lovely brunch yesterday, it was rather busy, we tried out a new place because our local favourite was fully booked, and it was really nice to be out of the flat but not doing anything strenuous.

better dash MW has arrived!

grinch you can take children up to 12 years old with you, but like you said, a Kur probably isn't what you need. I hope you are right and that your ds2 will start sleeping better like your dd did!

I am another one who only likes co-sleeping in theory. I just don't sleep well with a child next to me.Very occasionally we do have ds2 or ds3 in bed with us, usually if they are very poorly. Ds2 is mainly ok, sleeps on his tummy with bum in the air and you don't really notice him much. Ds3 likes to cuddle up though, likes to sleep on top of you, sleeps sideways thus using up loads of space in our tiny 1.4m ( width obviously, not length ) bed...

linzer I still don't understand though why dyslexia training would be classed as psychotherapy; isn't it a learning disability? Anyway, lots of things don't make sense or don't seem fair, I just find it odd that you have to pay for it yourself regardless of you financial situation.

I keep forgetting what else I was going to write, and looking at the posts while writing is such a pain when on the phone. Will have to try and catch up tonight.

Just spent the morning being crafty, making little thank-you/ Christmas presents for the Integrationshelfer who support us at home. For me, being probably THE least creative person there is, it was quite a challenge. I did it though

How's your sleeping, nutella?

Does your crowd phobia affect your life a lot, advent?

Anyway, sorry, must go!

Xpost nutella :)

outnumbered I´m glad you all enjoyed the Christmas market. Well done for being crafty - I´m another one missing the Basteln gene, but dd seems to have inherited it from someone along the way.

Nutella How did the MW visit go. Was she able to Butterplätzchen Teig, which I then conveniently left in the fridge - that will teach me to mumsnet just before I leave the house. Luckily lots of children had brought Teig, so I didn´t have to run home to

Sorry that makes no sense - my computer keeps typing text in the middle of other posts and deleting other bits of text - seemingly at random.

What I wanted to ask was wether the midwife gave any clue as to when you might be meeting Nutellachen.

I didn´t have to run home to get my Teig and we must have baked enough Plätzchen forthe whole town lert alone the class. Needless to say I´ve spent the afternoon baking with ds and dd to use up the Teig I forgot to take.

I really shouled give up, but I´ll try one more post.

Tomorrow I´m going in to dd´s class to talk about a traditional English Christmas. I assumed I´d be there for 10-15 minutes, but the teacher asked today if she needed to provide resources. I was tempted to say she should bring a plate of mince pies along, but I refrained. I´ve decided I ought to maybe take in a few things so I´ve got pictures of mince pies, Christmas Pudding etc., a cd with Christmas carols and a cracker. Can any of you think of anything else that I might have lying around that I could take in? I´m really hoping she´s not expecting me to entertain them for the whole 45 minutes.

hupa I usually take in a Christmas stocking (filled with sweets for the children if I'm feeling generous!), took in some holly last year (but couldn't find any in our garden last week) and this year I took in our elf (elf was one of the words used in the Christmas bingo I prepared for the children). I gave my English groups mince pies to try last year but I think only one of the children ate more than one mouthful and quite a few refused to even try any!

outnumbered I suppose as it was a psychologist we went to see and she (or one of her colleagues) provides the training, it falls under psychological therapy - although I agree it's a learning disability rather than a psychological problem. We can offset the cost against tax, but that's about it.
Well done on the presents! I'm sure you must be more crafty than me, as I don't think I would have even attempted it.

Nutella Hope the MW appointment went OK.

Just had our neighbour over for coffee. Rather annoyingly, he agreed with everyone else (apart from DH) that it should be der Billa and not die Billa (a German friend of mine questioned its gender on FB yesterday after I'd used die Billa). As DH would probably tell me, I don't have enough things to worry about.

hupa I was also going to suggest filled stockings.

linzer maybe it's masculine because der Billa markt? Lidl, aldi, penny and all the others I would use as masculine words too.

outnumbered After googling, I discovered that Billa is actually an abbreviation of either Billig-Laden or der billige Laden, so it really does need to be masculine. It just sounds feminine to me, I think because it's a similar word to Kassa (well, same number of letters, order of consonants and vowels, and they both end in a!) and that's feminine. But I'm sure I've heard other people use die Billa too (possibly just DH, who has picked it up from me ).

hi all, just a quick post as I am meant to be cooking dinner and herding little ones to the shower...
I have befriended a few people on fb, but not sure if all. I find the new (-ish) set up really confusing.
and I will probably name change soon- on here rather than facebook - posting under the cloak of anonymity has made me say some things about dh (nothing much but just wining about his workload and his nappy hero stories) which he might be hurt by, and don't want that, cos he is lovely really....
back at work but ds is better; so big

hupa your posts made me laugh today :) are you using a touchpad by any chance rather than a mouse? My computer sometimes keeps jumping to other bits of the text, resulting in me typing right in the middle of something else. I did install touchfreeze or something like that, but every now and then I have to restart my laptop as it starts hte jumping around again. It does make very funny reading though

advent I am sorry about your dd's gerbil :( ours havent had any pets yet, but eventually we will be having a dog. It's heartbreaking having to say good-bye to any pet, isnt it. How is your dd? I hope the funeral can go ahead as planned on Thursday!

linzer I can see why Billa sounds feminine to you. It's the ending on -a, isnt it? Come to think of it, I tend to refer to IKEA as DIE Ikea, and everyone thinks that's really odd.

Hope everyone else has had a good start to the week!

Thanks for the suggestions. I´ve found some holly and will take in a stocking aswell. One last question - I know people can go to a midnight service on Christmas Eve, but do people in the UK go to church on Christmas Day? I think you can tell that we weren´t a very religious family.

outnumbered I´ll have to investigate a touch freeze. As I type on my laptop, I think my wrist must activate something on the touchpad and disaster ensues.