Honey

Oskar had been coughing for a couple of days. Nothing serious but somehow getting worse every day. When fever came into the picture together with sleepless nights because of the cough, we took him to the doctor.

Of course, it was a holiday in Germany leaving us with the ER. It would not be a complete trip to Germany without a visit to the ER.

The doctor probably thought we were clueless parents rushing to the doctor to the first signs of a cold. While it is true that we are not used to Oskar  having colds because it is hard to catch one in Singapore, we were more worried about the baptism the following day. Ideally we wanted to have a happy healthy child and not a sick one.

Doctor dismissed us with the good news that it was just cold and that we could manage the fever with paracetamol. And for the cough: honey. We had tried honey the night before but Oskar didn't like it. So I asked, what if he won't eat honey on a spoon. Answer from the doctor: put it on bread. He was barely eating any solid food so surely puting honey on bread will make it easier.

Nevertheless, two days later, Oskar was worse: had not slept at night except when carried by us, was coughing like hell, started a runny nose and had 39.9 fever. We were exhausted and went back to the doctor. This time it was Monday so  we visited Fabian's pediatrician. He confirmed that it was only a cold - did not get to the lungs or ears which was good because we were flying the next day - and gave ibuprofen to help with the fever as well as some syrup for the slime in the throat. He did say that it would take 5 to 10 days to overcome the cold and that fever could last 5 to 7 days. The good news was that we had survived already 5 days. 

And indeed, the same night, doped with all the good drugs, Oskar slept 6 hours in a row (and so did we!). The next day was a festival of disgusting runny nose moments which of course he would prefer to rub on your clothes instead of a tissue. But fever had broke down. Not fully gone but significantly better. Oskar slept a lot throughout the day and we are hopeful that he will sleep through the night (and so will we!).

Keep your fingers crossed and have a teaspoon of honey thinking of us!

 

Originale Wiener Schnitzel

To close a week of celebration, we were all invited by my parents to the Schiff restaurant in Aldingen.

We all enjoyed a broad selection of local specialties. Well except for those who decided to go for the original Wiener Schnitzel.

Portion was huge so Wolfram had to jump in but it was really good. 

Oskar and a mouse

German white sausage and bretzel

For a truly German lunch :)

Snow!

It's snowing. We did not have a white Christmas but we will have a white baptism !

Oskar's baptism

Oskar was baptized on December 27th, just after Christmas in Aldingen.

The grandparents were there.

The two fairy godmothers travelled from Paris and San Jose respectively.

Oskar was there dressed up for the occasion.

(Thanks Alex for the pictures)

Christian and Wolfram had organized the ceremony with the pastor Volker, a friend of the family.

At 4pm we were all gathered in the church and Oskar was exploring the place. At least until the organ started playing which scared our little guy.

Ceremony was in German but Wolfram had foreseen that the booklet would have French translation when possible. This lead to funny singing with the Germans singing in German and the French singing in French. It probably sounded dreadful but somehow it was beautiful to me to have us all singing "together".

We were also lucky that Oskar did not cry  when he was baptized. I think he was more focused on getting his comb into the water than paying attention to what was happening to him.
Yann kindly accepted to record the moment and after quick editing by Wolfram (a million time faster than if it had been done by me), video is available on our shared album about Oskar.

Now Oskar can go on live his life with the protection of god and a blessed comb. 

All I want for Christmas is...

... sleep :)

First week was jetlag.

Second week was teething.

Third week is a cold.

I can only hope that week four with bring complete nights again. 

Joyeux Noël - Frohe Weihnachten

Merry Christ to everyone!

I hope you are as fortunate as me to be surrounded with people you love on this day.

A BIG THANK YOU to Christa and Christian who accepted the challenge to host the crazy family this year :)

Porsche Museum

There are two car museums in Stuttgart: the Mercedes one and the Porsche one. We visited the Mercedes museum in one of my first visits in Stuttgart so this time we planned with my parents to go to the Porsche museum.

Local people say it's not as good as the Mercedes one which is true to some extent. Mercedes museum is about Mercedes cars of course but also show the whole car history so you learn about both. Porsche museum is only about Porsche so if you don't like Porsche, indeed you won't like the museum. But if you like Porsche (like me), it's quite a nice museum to visit and learn about Porsche. 

Boys being boys, Oskar was eagerly trying to touch the cars in display starting with a firetruck and later with a beetle.

Did you know that Ferdinand Porsche designed the very first Beetle car? I did not. It was actually the beginning of a collaboration between Porsche and Volkswagen that gave several other "compact" or "sport" cars. If I dare to say so, they were not as successful as the Beetle.

The museum presented a collection of the different Porsche models through the years. It was interesting to see that the design of Porsche only evolved a little bit over the years. We were also surprised to see a tractor from Porsche. Must have been the fastest one in the fields.

Apparently even the police in Germany was driving Porsche cars. Lucky them.

After the movie Cars, the engineers of Porsche modified an existing car to create a real version of Sally Carrera.

Pink pig: one Porsche got a funny paint job. I thought it was advertisement for a pork butcher but I was wrong. The design engineers identified the different parts of the car like butchers do for pork. 

Porsche workshop:

Porsche family:

And happy new Porsche driver:

Random shots from a week at home

It went too fast as usual, so fast we realized last night we forgot to eat crab :)
Here is a random selection of pictures I took during the week.

1er foie gras de la saison

First one of the Christmas season.

First one of many :)

My Yaris is fantastic

My Dad always says that his Yaris is fantastic. Once again it surprised us by fitting all three of us plus Oskar.

It was a bit packed but manageable for a short distance.

Crêpes

Last night on the way back from shopping I quickly stopped by the Crêperie de Coataudon to buy some freshly made crepes.

I bought two dozens.

By the time we got home, a few had disappeared in the car. No idea what happened there.

After dinner, a significant number of them went missing. They are so good you can just eat them plain. No need to add anything.

This morning, there were only six left and after breakfast they were gone.

Those crepes disappear so fast we did not even get a chance to take a picture.

We have to go back and buy some more for the pictures :)

Tree holder

And there was light

It started with the wish to have christmas decoration outside. My Dad came up with one set that is powered by sunlight.

Today around lunch time the two men of the house went outside to decorate the outdoor tree. 

After some serious thinking, the lights were set and the tree ready for the night.

Now all we need is some sunlight which is going to be challenging given it's raining.

Night update: no light on the tree :( 

It did rain pretty hard the rest of the day. 

One week later, Wolfram figured out that there was a switch button. Once "on", the tree was shining through the night :)

Waiting for their grandson

My parents got everything ready for Oskar's visit: the baby cot in my former bedroom, a changing table and even a table and toys to play with. 

Most likely these toys are as old as me but that's really sweet to have kept them for the next generation.

And what will be Oskar's first bike :)

5 days

It took five days for Oskar to adjust to the time difference. Finally last night he slept the whole night and today we had a happy baby who was very patient while we toured our former office and enjoyed decorating the tree at Alice's.

Happy baby, happy parents :)

The biggest switch ever

Alice's new house was built in the 70s. Most of the house has been renovated except for the guest room where we sleep and the toilet on the first floor.

Thanks to this we had the chance to see what must be the biggest switch ever.

Still wondering who needed such a big switch.

Cranky cranky cranky

There are most likely too many changes at ones and Oskar is struggling to adjust.

A combination of jetlag, unknown places and people is giving us an exhausted baby who is very cranky, cries every five minutes for anything, wants to be carried most of the time and cherry on the cake does not want to sleep in the sleeping bag. 

Did I mention he entered the phase where Maman is everything?

I know it's all for good in the end as he needs to learn to adjust but when it's not highly annoying, it is heart breaking. Let's hope it will get better soon.

A visit to Tante Anna

Tante Anna is my aunt who lives in Belgium. As we were in the country we grabbed the opportunity to visit her. 

As usual there was a great roast beef (Belgian beef please) waiting for us, topped up with her home made waffles (which recipe we all want to get) and plenty of gifts for Oskar. He received an owl that my aunt knitted and a music box.

We all had a good time and it was great to see her and hear her stories about her recent trip to the us... the first one in maybe 30 years!

For those who wonder, the toilets are still outside and going there in the winter is quite a challenge. But a visit to my aunt's would not be complete without a visit to the legendary toilets across the yard from the farm. 

And yes, these are Oskar's new shoes. Still learning how to walk with them but making huge progress every step.

Layers

It's cold in Chantilly. Technically it's winter so such cold temperature is to be expected but when you leave in Singapore you tend to forget what cold really is. People in Singapore do say that it's cold when the temperature "drops" to 24C.

The three of us are cold. It will take a few days for my body to remember how to deal with cold temperatures. But for Oskar, it's only his second winter so it is very likely that he will get sick. In a desperate attempt to avoid this, we are wrapping our little boy in as many layers as possible of clothes. I don't think Oskar has ever worn so many clothes at once.

Jet lag

We were lucky enough that Oskar slept until 3:20 this morning. By 4am he was wide awake and so were we. 

4am is the best time to start repainting the walls.

7-14-3

7 hours delay for our flight to Paris. At least we found out on Friday morning so we could sleep a bit at home instead of waiting at the airport

14 long hours in the plane because Oskar only slept 3 hours in total: 2 hours at the beginning and 1 at the end.

This was the longest flight ever. We must have checked a hundred times how much time was left until Paris.

When Oskar was not sleeping, he was walking, climbing the seat up and down (we were lucky to have a free seat next to us so we enjoyed the additional space), and in our arms so he could see what was happening.

I don't think I ever spent so much time in the kitchen area in a plane before.

This said for the first time I saw the amazing landscape of the desert in Saudi Arabia or the coast line of Greece.