Counting the Days.....

In Germany all children will get their special "before-Xams" calenders tomorrow. The advent calendars usually have 24 little doors to open - when I was small there was a little surprise picture behind it. When I was 5 I got my first 3-D calendar - I'll show it in a few days, as soon as I find the time to dig it our of my treasure box. At the same day my cousins got the first chocolate calendars with a piece of chocolate behind each little door. 

When our children were small I used to get little things like Lego blocks or pieces of a puzzle to put into little boxes. One year I folded up 96 half boxes to make 2 x 24 boxes myself to hang onto a star for both girls. Some of the little boxes got used for other things over the years, but one set is still complete and will travel to our oldest daughter tomorrow. I don't know, if she can hang something, so she'll get just the boxes to put on her window sill.

 Charlotte's advent calendar.

 Johanna's advent calendar

My husband's advent calendar.

Days are too short.....

....to get everything done.
After 3 different recipes of bisuits and the usual chores there was no more time for decorations before leaving for work yesterday. 

At work I unpacked 3 euro-pallets of wine and gift boxes and then had to carry 30 boxes of wine into the basement store room. By closing time I was totally exhausted and really didn't feel like lifting another finger at home.

Too busy to write

This week I'm extremely busy decorating our house and doing more baking for the season. Yesterday I put a huge bundle of fir branches in vases, my advent wreath and plate with lights before going to work. Today I hope to get all the lights to our windows - after baking and before work? I better hurry.

The season begins....

Today the Christmas Market will be opened in town. Until the 23rd of December about 50 stalls will sell hot punch, food and decorations around the Market church. Usually I work too much in December to care for walks in town. At weekends it's often so packed that you are pushed, no matter where you want to go. Still, it can have a special atmosphere, especially when there's real snow. There won't be any today, but 4 years ago we had a dream like December (not for the insurances). Maybe I'll get some photo of this year's market later - these are from 2009:

 Market church

 Glas ornaments

 Real ice flowers at the window of a wooden hut.

 Sweets

4 Advent "candles" made of wood.

The best time of the year

During my childhood the best time of the year started in the middle of November. Then my Dad brought home tons of fir branches and the first real!!!! Xmas trees. The shelves in the work room got filled with candles of all colors and sizes, spools of Xmas ribbons and lots of little ornaments.

The whole family worked overtime. The children (my cousins & me) were allowed to put little pieces of strong wire into the bottoms of candles so they could be fixed on the balls of forest moss, together with fir, ornaments and some ribbon.

On this picture my Mum is heating the bit of wire in a flame to put it into the bottom of the candle in her left hand.

These days the florists have floral foam - much easier to handle. My grandfather and later my Dad spent countless hours winding hundreds of fir wreaths all afternoon and night in the kitchen.

 

The female adults of the family and the staff decorated the fir wreaths and loads of other advent arrangements. When I was older, I was allowed to decorate the inexpensive simple wreaths for the market:

It was a time of hard work, but also of closeness, the smell of fir and homemade biscuits. The ready pieces where stored all over the house and on shelves in the basement.

The weekend before the first advent (like this past weekend), the whole shop was re-decorated. The plants moved into the green houses and the shop turned into a advent wonderland.

Unfortunately a bad cold stopped my preparations for advent last week and I had to work all weekend as well. Now the chores are waiting to prepare the house for the cosy time of the year.

Busy fingers

Although I love making music and knitting, I'm not (yet) very good in creating something new. I can copy bouquets, play sheet music and knitt a ready pattern - but don't ask me to invent something new. Maybe, one day - with my harp???

While my youngest sister is a trained florist and only invents things new rather than copying anything, our other sister is busy with her fingers. She must have a kind of magic time repeater to manage to make all this:

 15 minutes luck in a box, containing a candle, tea-bag, lucky biscuit, some chocolate and a story to read. Each one looks different and she made already more than 50 of them!

 Tea-bag card - to be filled with some special tea-bags.

 "Millions" of 3-D cards and little gift boxes.

 Assembly set for a birthday cake in a box: tiny cake, a candle and matches.

Again - all the sets look different!

Beside all this paper work my sister knitted at least a dozen scarfs and more than 40 pairs of socks this year!

Weekend work for Christmas

In two weeks time Germany will be covered in Xmas decorations, or rather advent-decorations. The two weekends before the 1st Advent are used to sell the latest fashion in decorations - at Florists, garden centres and many craft markets. In the Mall where I work, the before-advent markets are very popular: for crafts (wo)men and shopping addicts. For this event our shop opens two hours longer on Saturday and from 11 am till 5 pm on Sunday. Extra work for me, but I don't mind. These weeks were always special when I grew up - I like the flair of expecting special care to make homes, shops, offices and even school rooms more cosy.

Look what I found at the craft market:

The Mall during the craft market.

3-D cards and hand knitted scarfs are the speciality of my sister.

 Traditional decorations and toys.

You know the town that is famous for rats?

This year owls are obviously the fashion for Xmas.

I love knitting - but I wonder who is mad enough to knitt that many - not for family and friends but to sell them for hardly more than the worth of the wool?

Trying to catch some more sun...

Yesterday seemed another sunny day and I decided to visit my favorite park near by. The sky was blue when I left home, but once I reached the hill with the park, huge grey clouds where in front of the sun. The blue sky was still visible, but I had to walk in the shade. I was a bit sad, but my camera made the best of it! 

After the walk I did my weekly shopping - under a deep blue sky and with the sun heating up the car!

 Can you see the little bear hiding in this tree - I think, he recognises me.

 The farmer was harvesting cabbage yesterday.

 The cloud factory. Our daughter really believed it when she was small, without telling us!

I think, this is a lovely spot for harp playing - next summer!

Man-made lakes

For decades gravel has been dug out of the fields around our village. That way we got the lakes. The wild birds love them and so do I. Unfortunately the ground of the lakes is still unsave and therefore it's not allowed to swim in them, although it's very, very tempting in summer. In some winters they freeze completely and it's interesting to watch the tracks of wild animals in the snow.

This is the journey of the gravel coming out of the ground:

 This is the digger, getting the gravel out of the ground under water.

On these belts the gravel travels towards the sorting shed.

 Here it goes unter the road up to the next belt.

At this place several belts meet and go up into the sorting shed.

 At this place the gravel gets loaded into trucks.

Gravel falling from the sorting belt.

At the end sand it gathered on a hill.