Tag Archives: crazy Chinese family

Nathan’s 2nd Birthday

February 21, 2016 CrazyChineseFamily 53 Comments

Time flies by so fast that it feels for me that Nathan just celebrated his first birthday few weeks ago. But no, it is already one year now! Today he turned two and we had a very small celebration. Last year my wife planned his first birthday for several weeks and invited a lot of people. This first birthday was mainly for herself rather than for Nathan but that is okay, he won’t remember the chaos anyways and my wife could let her creativity go wild with the decorations.

birthday5 — The table is ready for some coffee and cake business

This year it was just us, my parents and my brother with his girlfriend. Also we did not celebrate in our apartment but at my parents. Not because we are too lazy to decorate our apartment (okay, perhaps a bit lazy) but these days Nathan spends anyways a lot of time with his grandparents. Besides that my mother was cooking lunch for everyone so it would be not so convenient to bring everything to our apartment. This “party” was so different from last year but I also liked it as it was much more peaceful with a lot less cleaning to be done in the end. He got some nice little gifts and thus far he just loves the Brio Train Set he got from his grandparents, at least he doesn’t even wants to leave it alone and eat or drink something.

After this summer Nathan will go to kindergarten and I bet that next year a handful of hyperactive little kids will make the birthday party a lot more interesting/ exhausting than I would like to have. But in the end it is all for the kid so we will play along and try to survive! Now my last strength is leaving me and I am just too exhausted to write any more about this birthday…really wonder about the upcoming birthday celebrations in the next years and how I will survive them.

A simple lunch for us, Nathan looks sceptical

And now, he did not blow out the candle, granny had to help

His beloved Brio Train Set, he will not leave this spot anytime soon

Do you have any tips on how to prepare for a birthday party with many little kids attending?

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Chinese Wife, Crazy Family, Our cute son

Our Chinese New Year 2016

February 14, 2016 CrazyChineseFamily 42 Comments

I know I know I am a week late with this post but I didn’t manage to finish it until now due to all kind of silly reasons. In the whole past week I could read from so many bloggers how they celebrated New Year so here I go with our tiny “party”.

This was the first time since 2013 that we actually celebrated again as we had just no time for the past years. Even before that we usually never did anything special so we always ended up watching the CCTV New Year Gala. Only once we participated in some bigger event and it was just a few weeks after we got together in 2010. Back then we went to the Chinese New Year Festivities in Helsinki. Let me just tell you that it was very very cold back then and not the most enjoyable experience I had in my life (due to the weather!). A couple of years ago I even wrote a little blog post about it which also shows that not much (nothing) has really changed on how we spend New Year.

CNY8 — A bit of food for watching the New Year Gala

So what happened this year? First of all we kind of messed up the actual date for the New Year. My wife and all her Chinese friends here in town thought it would be on Saturday the 06.02.2016. Imagine the surprise when my wife heard from one of her customers on that Saturday that there won’t be any New Year Gala as it wouldn’t start until Sunday… this shows pretty well what living abroad for so many years does to someone when it comes to such big festivities. Anyways after a disappointing Saturday we started Sunday with preparing for the overeating day. My wife prepared several dishes while I was busy entertaining our little Monkey/ Nathan. Pictures were taken, food was enjoyed, the CCTV New Year Gala was watched and many video chats had to be endured during that day. As you can see it was a pretty calm day for us especially as my wife didn’t had to work and thus we spend the entire day together. Besides that Nathan was finally able to wear some of the clothes my wife bought for him in China last year. Only bad thing about the dress was that the hat didn’t fit anymore, Nathan just got too much brain inside.

CNY2 — Calling his grandparents to save him from the New Year Gala in TV

For the next year I hope that we will be either able to travel to China for this event as I would love to witness it once in my life personally or to celebrate with other people together. Sure it is nice to spend the whole day together as a family but to have some bigger gatherings once every few years wouldn’t hurt either.

Do I really have to stand here in these weird clothes?

Where there some Lunar New Year events near your home?

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Something About Me

January 31, 2016 CrazyChineseFamily 45 Comments

Everyone has their refuge where they can relax and perhaps also are able to let creativity run free. In my case it is my desk with my computer and several books all around on some shelves. Granted it is not the most impressive place and by far not the most tidiest in the world but it is the place can relax and write also my blog posts.

Over the years I have lived in several apartments and each time my safe haven was where my computer was located with my favorite books around. Back in Finland it was a really tiny desk with barely any space for my stuff but I loved it. Since winter of 2014 this here in Germany became my safe haven. Ever since I decided where to place my desk I have been working on it to make it more unique and fitting to my liking. Now it more or less reached a stage where I think I am finished. I can’t think of anything more I could do here or change as I just feel comfortable enough. My wife can’t stand all my computer equipment and books there at all (“It’s Trash!”) but in the end she is not complaining as I spend some hours every day there and thus it gives her free time without me annoying her.

As you can see there is a stark contrast between the two bookshelves on either side of my desk. On the left side I have a mix of educational books, some fantasy novels, few classic adventure novels by Karl May and a small collection of comics. The right side is full of my old Manga collection. As I have so limited space here I had to place two rows of books on each shelve which is the only thing I don’t like so far here as I don’t want to have some of my treasures hidden away. By now you might have noticed that the top of both bookshelves do not house any books but rather strange things. On the left side my beloved Lego X-Wing I got from my wife on Christmas of 2014 and on the right side the statue of Molag Bal. Mixed with those are some random items such music CD’s, PC Games, computer parts and a drinking horn which comes to use at the renaissance fair. The two books shelves over my desk are full of fantasy novels with the little Tolkien collection being my most precious possession.

All in all it is nothing special but it is where I can relax each evening. However I know already what will be different in my next safe haven somewhen in the future: It needs to be bigger! I really need much more space for my books as I still have tons of them at my parents apartment and in their cellar. Perhaps also a bigger table would be nice as it is rather small but still a giant compared to my mini sized table in Finland back in the day.