Thank you for “attending” the baby shower for our new baby girl. Stefan and I are getting anxious now that the due date is less than eight weeks away. We both can’t wait to meet our active little baby (she has been very active, constantly kicking her tiny little feet at my ribs and weighing in at about 2000 grams at my 32 week appointment).
I can’t say that it hasn’t been challenging doing this here in Germany, but it has been pretty easy going. The biggest challenge so far has been learning an entire set of new German vocabulary (both for me and Stefan!) Making the baby Wunschliste helped a lot. I quickly learned that the dictionary does not have words like Spucktücher, literal translation spit towel, or in British English a terry or prefold, or finally as we know it burp cloth. (Many of my English speaking friends here are British, sometimes we wonder if we speak the same language). I was at a loss as how to find everything we need until I found a baby magazine that had a new baby needs list in German. I sat one night during a World Cup game and looked up all the items on Amazon. So our baby list has quite a few things on it – serving also as a checklist, reference point and dictionary for us!
One advantage of being pregnant in Germany has been the ability to travel while pregnant by car to fun places. We drove to Lake Como in Italy for Stefan’s birthday in May (no George Clooney sightings though ) Took a weekend trip to Prague by bus at 18 weeks pregnant. And recently we drove to Southern France for my birthday at 28 weeks pregnant (we missed Madonna and her daughter by a few days in Cannes). There was also some hiking in the Alps, but since our summer has been cold and cloudy we didn’t go too much.
Currently we are making good progress on the new baby room. Before it was a sewing room/ office /guest room. It feels like we have been cleaning it out and organizing the storage locker in the basement forever; but finally we have made our way through all those boxes from moving with crap in them that you never know what to do with. A friend here painted one wall for me in the room a nice pale sunny yellow to brighten up the space. The room is under a balcony so it never gets direct sunlight. The furniture we chose is white but with a more rustic white finish so you can kind of see the wood grain. I also made curtains in white with a royal blue floral pattern, and matching changing table pad. Right now we have the furniture, it’s just in boxes not put together yet. Stefan and his friend will hopefully tackle that one weekend soon before Oktoberfest starts in 2 weeks...
We are looking forward to seeing what everyone posts here and how this virtual shower will work! I am a little sad there won’t be a party with cupcakes and the baby poop candy bar diaper game, but this way seems better as everyone in different states, countries and different parts of California can participate at the same time! I am happy to have two good friends and a Mom that put this together for me!
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| 15 weeks pregnant in Lake Como at the Villa del Balbianello |
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| 21 weeks pregnant hiking the Partnachklamm near Garmisch Partenkirchen |
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| 28 weeks pregnant in Saignon, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region of France |
