Feeding The Henri

Being healthy for more than a week doesn't seem to be an option around here, so Henri came down with yet another fever last night. It's nothing too serious though (I hope) and he let me feed him not only cookies, but also lots of fruit with lots of viatmins to help him get better.

Eleven Months

Standing. All by himself.

Pain Of The Day

Since Ariane – now at home in Stuttgart – was in town today, we met up with my ex-KMS-coworkers. I was really happy to see everybody, but unfortunately not capable to have a somewhat focused conversation while trying to control the behaviour of my two boys. When Henri poured a full glass of lemonade over himself and me, I realised that it was time to leave the jam-packed place. I hope to see you all again soon. Maybe at a playground this time.



And please welcome the youngest member of the bunch: lovely Greta, two months old, daughter of my friends Sabrina and Michi. Not only Henri enjoyed meeting you...

P.S.: We met at Le Pain Quotidien, in case you were wondering about the headline.

Boys In A Box

It's nothing too unusual that bad weather weekend days are spent in boxes around here. It was new though that Karl had to win a staredown contest before he was allowed in.



Then the boys celebrated Henri's eleven-months-birthday in perfect harmony. Monthly pic to come.



I gotta go black and white these days because the lighting conditions are just too bad – sorry!

Purple Splash

That's kind of a fashion weeky headline, right? And it's purple, too.



Today when I got to the Kindergarten to pick up Karl, he didn't want to come with me and stay till 5 p.m. instead. Okay. Fine with me. I rode back home and went to get him later. So all we had time for this afternoon was a long and purple bath where Karl was trying to fish himself.



Sooki, the Bavarian duck ispretty popular here in Bavaria, too!

Party Time

This is Karl and Henri showing their dad where the REAL party is at.



I mean, who wants to eat at Le Cirque if you can have rice with chicken with a side order of circus-like craziness at home?

Secret Nap

While his brother spent the day with Opa Paul, Henri secretly used Karls bed for his afternoon nap. Don't tell anybody.

Playground Season

Today we officially opened the playground season. Did I miss having sand all over our apartment during the last couple of month? Not really. But what can you do. Karl needed some time to adjust to the fact that there was no book reading and playmobil assembling on top of his bunk bed this afternoon, but Henri was extatic.



Yes, this is Henri screaming happily. Rare enough.



Sand and a rope. Awesome.

Meatball Regatta

Those two pairs of beautiful velvety eyes bathed in a soft glow of a warm February sun were actually watching THIS:



Karl doing his best crazy ostrich impression during his first carrousel ride of the season. It was a blast and Henri was of course immensely jealous not being allowed on the merry-go-round yet. Great lazy weekend though. Karl and Henri mainly running the show by themselves. Karl even entrusting Henri with the role of first shipmate on his beloved pirate ship, patiently reassembling the crows' nest again and again, since it seemed to be Henri's great to just rip it from the mast and wave it triumphantly And since we're on the topic of pirates - we hadn't posted any photos of our wild day at the ERs yet, when some other kid poked Karl in the eye and we sang "Pirate Eye" to the melody of Hall & Oates' "Private Eye" to Karl. Looks funny, eh? Well, it wasn't. Applying antibiotic ointment onto the retina of a three year old was actually a stunt Johnny Knoxville had to leave out of his last Jackass movie, because no insurance would back it.



The whole affair luckily was over in a matter of 48 hours, impressive testament to the healing powers of a kid's body. Sunday Karl and I went to see "Karneval der Tiere" played by the very orchestra that put out the fantastic CD-Box of classical music for kids Omi got Karl for Christmas. Karl went into his usual concert state of mesmerized trance. Back home there was more entertainment waiting for Karl. He's not a great eater, so the only way to get him to finish his meal is to combine fun food with entertainment. Normally it's a story about the adventures of Knight Karl and his friend Cowboy Roy. Today Fred came up with a great new show though - the meatball regatta. Fancy sailracers made out of Köttbullar, chips and cucumber slices. Big success. They all made it to the finishing line.

Ten Months

No, I didn't forget... I hope to get a smile out of him for the next one!

New Adventures

Alright, not to jinx it, but both boys are actually in a phase of healthiness that allows them to be bathed (about time), shipped off to their respective childcare facilities (even more about time) and taken to other places of grooming and entertainment.
Since the nice ladies at the discount barber shop were always very sweet, but somewhat adament to sculpt Karl's nice head of blond hair into a fauxhawk mullet kinda thing, I got tired of the style debates (but aaall boys look like this ... well, lady, Karl is not like other boys ... but it looks cute ... to YOU maybe), we started to go to this hipster barber his buddy Theo goes to who always had these cool haircuts. I know, I've seen the Seinfeld episode where he has his hair cut by a different barber. Well, I guess since our original barber is right around the corner we gotta take massive detours now on our weekend shopping rounds. It was worth it though. Karl looks very Neal Cassady. Alright. Minus all the butch attributes, but very beatnik. Sunday I took him to Circus Krone again. He loved it (of course, what's not to love), although I have to say that circus seems to become a kind of a repository for failed olympic athletes from the former Eastern Bloc and communist Asia. Do I really wanna see high bar gymnastics performed by some middle aged Russians in tights followed by an aging stoner on a BMX, when I splurge on a costly circus ticket?
The lions and tigers and elephants were awesome though. And Karl is bored by most human acrobats anyways. As he should be at his age. Pretty unbeatable though - having the obligatory traditional Eiskonfekt, which is a box of vanilla ice cubes covered in chocolate. And since there's only a short break, you are allowed to wolf them down as fast as you want. Followed by some soda and some sugar coated popcorn. No, Karl didn't get sick. But talking about - now that the kids are all well, guess who got sick now. First correct guess which two members of the Bothe-Kreye household got the nasty bug raging through Munich right now and in which order gets a postcard with a real Bavarian motive.