With feisty cats/kitten and a very playful dog, I can just see our housesitters constantly worried about a fallen tree or having to rescue a set of petrified paws from the wings of an tree-top angel! So we'll get a (deal on a) tree on the 23rd and decorate it like they do in Germany -- right before Christmas! Having no tree doesn't mean that we can't decorate for the holidays, though, as you can see.
The Weinachts Pyramide and the "Rauchermaennlein" (as Mom called it) are my favorites. And if you've never heard the Trans-Siberian Orchestra Christmas music, listen up!! (They're playing in downtow Seattle tonight... what I'd give to be there!)
It is nice to see the mixed traditions (German/American).. my boys have grown up bilingual, our Christmases were an incredible hodgepodge of German, English, and American attitudes. Ask your Eva what she misses (besides the Gluehwein)... it is probably the Aachener Printen, and the Weihnachtsmarkt in Bergische Gladbach. I always wanted to have Christmas in Seattle (my sister and my stepmother both live there), so I am jealous. But Hawaii is great too.
ReplyDeleteBTW did you ever ask Eva if she knows Heidi Klum? My girlfriend's son discovered he had schoolbooks she had used in elementary school, I bet he could have sold them for a fortune on Ebay.