Travelog for: *-Cookie-*

Then we finally got to the Christmas market. This year it was set up in three places.

One was built like a medieval or viking village with a tavern (the big hut on the right) and tents where handmade clothes and jewellery were sold.

The rest of Christmas market was set up - like every year mummy said - around the town hall. (The third and fourth pictures show the part of the Christmas market behind the town hall with the ferris wheel. And the last three pictures show the part in front of the town hall.)

The street lights around the town hall wear Santa hats around Christmas. I think they look very nice and they certainly won't get cold.

We also saw a red telephone booth. Mummy said that German telephone booths normally are yellow - she also said that are only very few left - and the ones in the UK are red.

The part of the Christmas market in front of the town hall is surrounded by very old houses. Mummy said that those houses are the oldest ones in Hildesheim. She told me that they were built as meeting places for different guilds in Hildesheim many many years ago.
And guess what, Hildesheim had one of those big pyramids as well.

I liked all my visits to the different Christmas markets very much. And my history lessons were fun, too.

And mummy said that tomorrow we will go to her parents' home for Christmas. I'm sure excited!

Hello again!

Mummy, I and the Wollmaus arrived here two days ago very late in the evening. We'll stay here for two weeks before classes start up again for mummy. Finally holidays! Mummy promised she will have more time for me!

Today we got out the Christmas tree for the gift giving tonight! It is made of plastic and very small (becaue of the cats living here), but the lights change colours.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to you all!

This morning I snug under the Christmas tree to show you the pretty lights.

Mummy is very sorry for the semi-bad quality of the pictures, but we sure hope you get my point!

Under the tree you can see all the presents from yesterday evening. I even got a present, too!! It's the chocolate bear right next to me! Yummy!

Today mummy asked me if I wanted to learn to craft "onikami" or something like that. I happily agreed! I always love learning new things.

My first lesson was to learn the proper name. It is "origami" I now know and that means "paper folding" in Japanese!
I sure was excited when mummy got out the box of colourful papers and immediately wanted to help.

We decided to start with something easy: a shuriken (Japanese throwing star). First we folded the yellow paper according to the instructions. That was very easy! Then we needed a second paper. I decided on green because it complements yellow very well. And before we knew it the shuriken was finished.

As that was way too easy I wanted to make a dolphin next. After some starting problems we managed to make a nice dolphin. See!

I'm very proud of my two first origami figures and decided to make some more tomorrow maybe.

Just wanted to show you all the things I crafted yesterday and today.

Besides the shuriken and dolphin I made a bunny, a penguin, a shirt, a beetle, a pineapple and the big one is called "kusudama" (a japanese decorative ball). It was a lot of fun making them all!

Today is New Year's Eve and here in Germany it is kinf of tradition to watch "Dinner for One". This film is shown so many times during the day and evening that it's hard to miss it. When we checked the TV guide we saw it listed about 4 or 5 times on different channels.
Mummy said that it's possible to watch it in colour or in Bavarian, but she prefers the original one in black and white and English. So we watched that.

It's a very funny film and the butler James is tripping over the tiger's head all the time.

I'm looking forward to watching it again sometime!

Tonight mummy, her parents and I made fondue for dinner. Mummy explained that you are supposed to put some pieces of meat on the long sticks and put them into hot or boiling oil. We also had meatballs and vegetables (pepper, asparagus, mushrooms and tiny corncobs) to put on the sticks. The olives, tiny cucumbers and pearl onions were not to be put on the sticks but eaten as a side dish. We also had potato salad and different kinds of sauce to go with the meal.
Very delicious I can tell you!

But look for yourselves! Doesn't it look great?!

At midnight mummy and her parents had a glass of sparkling wine to welcome the new year. Mummy didn't like it at all. She made very funny faces! I laughed very hard!

Then we all went out to watch the beautiful fireworks all around us and our own as well of course. They were really, really pretty! But unfortunately mummy's camera didn't work too well in the dark. So we only got one decend picture and that was so small that mummy had to cut me out... Maybe and hopefully we will manage better next year.

But nonetheless: Happy New Year and all the best for 2012!!!

Today mummy took me grocery shopping with her and her aunt. And I have to say I was in paradise! Wow! *sigh* *dream* *drool* Look for yourselves! But mummy didn't want to buy any of those! How could she!?! She said we were looking for big envelopes to safely send me on my first travel in. I will go travelling soon hopefully! It seems I'm a bad luck puppy... My first plan didn't work out, the second might not work out, so hopefully the third will. Keep your fingers crossed, please.
We also got some sweets and I thought that that was a great alternative to sausages and ham!

And see what cool shopping carts they have at this place! The supermarket was totally remodeled and they also got new carts with a place for a pen and paper and even a magnifying glass. Can you see how big my head looks?

After our shopping tour we visited mummy's grandma and brought her some groceries we got for her. It was a bit boring for me so mummy and I were sillying around.

Look, I dressed up as a pineapple or a dragon! *roar* And mummy made me a kimono, but it is some sizes too small for me...

After we had returned home mummy asked if I was up to baking a cake with her. Of course I happily agreed.

We readied all the ingredients and started. First I got out the eggs. Mummy said she always puts them separately in a cup to see if they are still ok to use. After that I checked the butter - put on the radiator to soften - and it was soft enough to use.
Then I put all the ingredients one after the other into the bowl and stirred the mix until it become right. Mummy didn't even need to help! Ok, she mixed the last bit because it was too hard for me to do so, but in the meantime I got out the form, checked the dough and buttered the form. I even got to try the dough. Yummy!
Then I waited patien... I mean impatiently for the cake to finish baking. After some time I checked if the cake was ready. But it wasn't... But it was sure hot in front of the oven. So I let mummy check the second time.

But all the waiting was really worth it! We got such a yummy cake!

Today mummy actually wanted to show me a little around where she grew up. Yet the weather was really bad (stormy, rainy and nearly dark by 3 p.m.) and mummy wasn't feeling all too well anyway so we stayed in and had a nice relaxing day.
For dinner mummy wanted to make pizza and of course I helped or rather I more or less made the pizza all by myself. Mummy only had to pour out the tomato sauce because I didn't really want to get all sprinkly-red and get the finished pizza out of the oven because since yesterday I know how hot it is inside there and I'm sure glad to stay a little farther away.
It was a really yummy dinner!

Mummy promised to try and show me around another day this week. And now I'm really tired. *yawn*
Good night everybody!

Today mummy showed me around the village where she grew up a little. Because of the bad weather and mummy not feeling really well we had to postpone our "sightseeing" a little. But I liked what I saw on the way to the post office to send mummy's first postcrossing cards.

The first picture shows a stork's nest which hasn't been used recently, but every year there is hope the stork will come back or a new one will find the nest.
The little river is called "Mühlenbach" (mill stream) because in former times there was a little mill.
And the last thing I saw was the post office and the yellow post box where mummy put the cards.

Next time I will write I'll probably be back home.

I've been back home for a week now - a very relaxing week for me and a very stressful week for mummy. She had a project for her university due yesterday...

Today we spent very comfortably without any work. And then all of a sudden we saw this beautiful sunset outside. So we had to take some pictures! It looks gorgeous, doesn't it?

Wow, today was such an exciting day! Mummy brought two envelopes back from the mail box! She said two other TVs had arrived. One came from Hamburg and the other all the way from America! Mummy also told me that I will travel to America in a few weeks time as well. First I'm going to travel to Bavaria. I'm so excited to finally go travelling!
So I wanted those two out of their envelopes as fast as possible! After mummy had opened the envelopes I crawled in and persuaded them each to come out. They had brought cards mummy liked a lot and sweets we sure will like a lot. Mummy just told me to say thank you for everything they brought and that I really have to work on my manners or I won't get to travel at all...
After they had shown me everything and had introduced themselves as NiliHH and Scritches we found out that Scritches came from Nili's mum so he had to tell her everything there was to tell. That was a little boring for me, but I was also happy to hear all the things he had to tell. After he had finished recapping I bombarded the two with questions of my own about travelling. They told me a lot and I think we got off to a great start! I'm really happy!