Getting ready for Fasching: Räuber Hotzenplotz

Lenara is hearing all about Räuber Hotzenplotz in Kindergarten. So she decided she wanted to dress up as Räuber Hotzenplotz for Fasching (Feb 11th). Thanks to Google I know what he looks like... The challenge is that it needs to go OVER her outdoor Kindergarten outfit, as they are outside for the dress up party as well. Today we took some time to make the outfit... tatataaaaah!

I have to admit, I'm a little bit proud of the hat! It's a knitted hat from the dollar store, stuffed on top of a regular Cowboy Fasching hat... and I made the feather from felt. We will paint her face for Fasching. And she insists on 7 knives and a colt. I told her, if she wanted that, she needed to make those herself... she knows how to carve wood. So she can do it in Kindergarten next week. Gee, all the princess outfits are staying in the basement this year... :))

Halloween 2010 in Germany

Our little fairy!
Fly, little Fairy, FLY, right NOW!

We - as a family - don't really celebrate Halloween here. The traditions are sweaping over though from the US. Every year more and more Halloween decoration in the stores. And more Halloween Parties for adults. I have the problem, that we got a cute little fairy outfit for Lenara from our US family. But I don't really know when to put it on her. We celebrate Carneval in February where Kids (and adults, but they usually only use the parties to get wasted) dress up. So I thought about organizing our own little Halloween Party and invite the kids we know. But I was afraid to do it, bc those mothers are so stressed out and I think they would have hated me to make them find (not even talking about making) a costume for the kids.

So we just spent a wonderful family day and celebrated my grandmothers 87th birthday - with our little fairy, of course! She loves the glitter shoes (that her US Nana HAD to get her, although Mommy wasn't crazy about them, as they don't even fit her properly!) and the little magic wand! I'm curious, if she will grow up being a girly girl - having pink all over her room (not that she has a room - haha) and asking for a horse every Christmas. It's not like I really care (like you said, it's not so much about the Moms), but pleeeeease let us pass the horse and kitten phase.... ;)

Little Red Riding Hood

Olivia last Halloween



Olivia this Halloween







Traditions. Some people say they're just silly things done year after year. But we think that they are the classic things that never let moments get old. Instead, they get texture. Classic, refined texture. Those are the kind of moments that I want to provide for our family.

Traditions are important to me. They give me a feeling of history and provide a path to look at the joyful memories made in the past. But, in my family growing up, I cannot think of many traditions that "stuck" through the years. It is one part of being a parent that I want to do differently than my parents did. My mom did lots of things for us, but besides repeated holiday food, we didn't experience anything the same, year after year.

But, one thing that i really love is to look at and be around things that my grandmothers and mother have made. I enjoy cuddling with a quilt knowing that my grandmother quilted it. I love the doll that my grandmother made that looks like me. My mom made our Halloween costumes and all year, I dressed up in them. In a way, it brings me closer to them, these women in my family. I like to sew and create. Perhaps it's in my blood. Nature or nurture, I want to provide these humble offerings of love and labor to my daughter and future children, should we be blessed with more. Hopefully, she finds value in it, as I do. This year I made her Halloween costume. Because I really fell in love with fairytales, I wanted her to be something sweet so I chose Little Red Riding Hood. And, a doll to match.

We all know that at this point, some parts of our children's lives are about us. Their first birthday, for example. I chose the costume because I knew she would be adorable...and because a cape is easy to make. I don't have lots of skill on the sewing machine so I repurposed a woman's shirt. I cut the cuffs of, cut the inner part of the sleeve, attached the top layers and bottom layers (of the bodice) and used the excess material to form the pointy hood. It was made during two nap times.

The summary is that I want to have traditions that breathe life and joy into normal days and special days, too. With Olivia in her second round of holidays, it still feels like her first time really experiencing the festivities. She does not know who Little Red Riding Hood is, but hopefully she feels special and precious, as she is to us.

(I promised not to complain...but I cannot post pictures from the iPad). Grr.