Strange German Holidays #14 - New Year's Eve

 So I finally got around to writing this last post of my holiday-series...and I'm only late by about two months! I'm sorry, I know writing this seems a little pointless by now, but I really wanted to bring this to a proper end. Now I don't suppose this is going to be a particularyly interesting post either - from what I gather, New Year's Eve is celebrated in a very similiar day in most of the western world - but nevertheless, here we go:

Just like Christmas Eve, New Year's Eve is no real holiday, although many people will get off work around noon, and many companies are closed between Christmas and New Year anyway. But while on Christmas Eve even the restaurants close up early, those will usually stay open on New Year's eve, many hosting parties for the celebration. It's not a strict family holiday either - many people will celebrate with friends, and there are even some 'mass parties', like in Berlin, where hundreds of people gather to celebrate the new year together. There usually is good food - often a 'social' meal, like raclette or fondue, where the food is prepared and eaten right at the table, and the room is decorated with streamers, which sometimes looks really funny when the christmas decorations are still up at the same time. There are also many symbols of good look - four leafed clover (either fake or actual life ones in flower pots), horsehoes, fly agarics, chimney sweepers and pigs (those are often made of marzipan), to get as much good luck for the new year as possible.

There are two traditional ways (that I know of) to pass the time until midnight, although I, personally, have only ever participated in the first one, which is watching Dinner for One. If you don't know it, it's a British short-comedy about a Lady and her butler and the celebration of her 90th birthday (curiously enough, it was first produced in Germany, even though the script and the actors are English). For the last fifty years, many television channels will broadcast different verions of the sketch (there's a German translation, and even a few versions in different dialects), and many families will watch it at least once on New Years Eve.
The other tradition I know of is orcales, especially 'Lead Pouring' - a small portion of lead is melted in a spoon over a candle, then it's poured into cold water, were it will set again in different shapes. Those shapes are then interpreted as omens for the next year - we've never done this, but my grandparents did when they were younger, and it does sound like a lot of fun!

Then, when midnight is approaching, everyone is getting ready, pouring champaing to toast with right as the new year begins, and starting the countdown. Right at midnight, the fireworks set in - they are only sold once a year, between Christmas and New Year, and some people will *really* go all out with tons of fireworks. Actually, there's usually some cracking and banging throughout the day, and even the days before, since some people can't wait, but the real fun starts at midnight, and often lasts for an hour before everything has calmed down. Afterwards, we will go in for tea and the New Year's Pretzel, and this is where the circle closes with my first post from January 2015.

Thank you so much for embarking on this journey with me, I had tons of fun writing about or holidays and learned a lot of specific details and history I didn't know myself. I hope you had some fun reading my posts, and that you wil continue reading my blog even now that this series is over - usual stitchy update is coming soon, I promise!

February Gifted Gorgeousness

I know, it's been a while since my last regular post...thanks a bunch everyone for visiting with the Secret Sweetheart Blog Hop last week, I don't think my blog has seen that much traffic before and it really was fun :) Now, it's time for the Gifted Gorgeousness post of the month, and again I have a few things to show :)

First, in the 'gifted to me' category - a while back, Carla generously gave me her Kitsune kit by Unceonventional X Stitch - she loved the kit, which is super awesome (with magic guide fabric, nice small pages, and pre-cut thread), but she said she wasn't going to actually stitch it, and would rather see it stitched by me than sitting in her stash forever. Naturally, I had to start as soon as I got it, and even though I have other pieces to focus on, I'm still sneaking in a few stitches here and there; right now I'm about half way through the first page:

That pieces I *should* be focusing on (and mostly I am) are of the 'gifts I'm making' category. I'm still working on Turtles all the Way Down for my grandma, and I now have seve of twelve full sized turtles done; I'd say that is reasonable progress and I still love playing with all the beautiful threads: In decending order, we have #228 Indian Ringneck, #231 Bee Eater, #30 Peacock Feathers, #104 Rose Ringed Parakett, #229 Robin Redbreat, #232 Lilac Breasted Roller Bird and #71 Lovebirds. Three more unique colours to go, than I have to decide which one I'll use for a second time :)




I also made progress on the knitting front, we hade a few presentations this week which I used for excessive work on the second sock, and I managed to finish it yesterday. I'm much more pleased with the second one than with the first one, and usually I wouldn't be comfortable giving something like this away, but I did warn him that those were my first socks and he still insisted I make him some, so I guess it's okay - plus, the bright colours do a great job at masking some small mistakes. I also have enough of the yarn left to do a pair of really fun wrist warmers for my grandma!

The last thing I want to show you is not GG related, but still something I'm really happ about - over the last year I had a subscription where I would get some 30 skeins of DMC each month for a full set, and during the last week I finally sat down to do the rest of the bobbinating - so now, I have a full set to pull from! I'm still doing an inventory of all the dublicate complete and partial skeins I have, and once I've done that I will hopefully be ablet to finalize the organisation of my stash ^_^

So much for catching up, I'll get stitching now and hopefully finish another turtle or two this weekend~

Secret Stitching Sweethearts Blog Hop

My apologies for being a blogging slow poke again...I've been really into gaming those past weeks, so crafting has fallen to the side a bit, although I'm still making progress. One of the reasons I decided to not make many plans, so I can just spent my free time the way I want to without pressure :) I will try, however, to catch up with your comments and maybe even get an update out later today. For now, this post is devoted to the lovely Jo and her Valentine's Day Blog Hop!

Each participant mailed her a picture of them appropriate stitching, and she randomly assigned everyone a picture to post. I get to post this lovely pair of sheep:

Aren't they adorable? If those are yours, please leave a comment below; I'll go hopping in search of my own stitching later today or tomorrow.

Happy Valentine's Day!

About that new project...

So, I've had quite some people ask me about the new project I've teased in my WIPocalypse post. I didn't mean to keep you in suspense, there's no reason to really, so today I proudly present (haha): Turtles all the Way Down by Ink Circles. It's a wall hanging and here is turtle #1, stitched in horizontal lines using Jodyri's #228, Indian Ringneck, on 28ct Nevermore linen.

This week has started off very successfully...I've also started the second sock and finished the ripped part already! I hope I can continue to be that productive.

January WIPocalypse

January is almost over, so I really need to get my WIPocalypse introdction post up now! If there are any among you who don't know it yet, WIPocalypse is a SAL hosted by Measi over at Measi's Musings. You know that I love low maintance SALs, and WIPocalypse is the lowest maintanance of them all - just about whatever you've been working on, every month or just some of them, doesn't matter. Measi also gives optional subjects to talk about each month, and January is traditionally the month to Introduce yourself, your projects, and any goals you have for the year!

So for any newcomers we might have here: Hello, I'm Leonore, 26 years old, from Germany. I'm a computer scientist, got my Master's degree last year, and now I work at university to get my PhD eventually. I live together with my boyfriend of almost six years, Felix, and the beautiful town of Freiburg in southern Germany, near the blackforest. I love cross stitch, which I taught myself at the age of about seven or eight, crochet, which my grandma taught me around the same time, and knitting, which I just picked up recently. I'm also trying to get into sewing and quilting, but haven't found the time to get very far yet. Most of my crafty projects so far have been gifts for other people - my grandma is my favourite 'victim' to receive said gifts, but I'm happy to craft for everyone who appreciates it. Besides crafting, my hobbies include reading, watching movies/shows, and video games.

Now for my projects, I have collected quite a few WIPs and, I'm afraid, also a few UFOs over the past few years. Here's a (probably not complete since I tend to forget about stuff) list that I hope to reduce a bit by the end of the year:

• Cross Stitch Angel by Joan Eliott
• Game of Thrones bookmarks by blacklupin
• Lady and the Tramp by Candamar Designs/Thomas Kinkade
• Cut Thru' Cottage by Bothy Thready
• Peacock Tapestry by Teresa Wentzler
• Dark Force by Tilton Crafts
• Ornaments of the Month by Magical
• Kitsune by Unconventional XStitch
• Red Velvet Cake by Glendon Place
• Things Unseen Sampler by Lizzie*Kate
• A Perfectly Kept House by Lizzie*Kate
• Autumn-Colourd Half-Granny Square Shawl by Gemacht mit Liebe
• Fun coloured Easy socks by Ewa Jostes
• Baby Suprise Jacket #4 by Monika Eckert

There are also a few projects I haven't worked on in years and that I may or may not get back to, so I'm not listing them here.

Now my long-time reads might have notices a few projects on there that I have not yet shown here, but don't worry, I will get to those soon-ish! (hopefully). In fact, one of them is right here: I started yet another Baby Suprise Jacket as a friend of my grandma and mind is going to be a first-time grandma soon, and I really, really love those colors! The gradient between the different blues is sooo pretty:

 The other thing I have been working on is Lady & The Tramp - I've finished the section I showed you last time and I am now ready to move the hoop up to the upper half of this half-page:

 For now, though, I'll have to put her aside since I just yesterday got some lovely supplies from Joydri...this is for a gift for my grandma, and I'll get stitching right away so I can finish before her birthday in mid-March.

 My other immediate plans are mostly knitting related - I need to get that jacket done, and also start the second sock. As for plans for the year, I have decided to spend less time planning and more time actually stitching! I don't have as many deadlines as I usually do...Cut Thru Cottage should be finished by the middle of the year, I have to big-ish starts planned (both presents for round birthdays with a ~2 year deadline), a pattern my friend Pinky made for me that I'm itching to start, and lots of other stuff that is calling to me...but I'd mostly like to finish some stuff, especially something for myself as our walls are sad and empty and in terrible need of pretty stitched pictures!

January Gifted Gorgeousness

So after much lazyness (last weekend was a bit busy, so was the week before it), I'm finally getting around to  a 'regular' blog post which also doubles as my entry to Gifted Gorgeousness. I've worked on three pieces and coincidentally, those fit perfect the three categories of GG :)

First, the shoehorn: I've stitched another one of the free ornament patterns that Magical has done last year. This oneis Peridot, the birthstone for August, and it had a TON of backstitching - they all do, but this one in particular - but it turned out oh so pretty!

Only four to go for the first batch now, until I can think of what I want to do with the duplicates (there are more than one for some months) - I have several ideas but not yet decided.

Next, things that are going to be gifts. No stitching here, but I did a bit of knitting on my first sock; finished the heel and did a nice bit of the foot already. Actually I've been a bit lazy with knitting lately, I need to get that up and hopefully finish the first one this weekend.

And lastly, stitching on stuff that was gifted to me - when we went to Felix' parents for a funeral last weekend, I took Lady & the Tramp fom the Disney Dreams collection with me. I got it all neeatly packed in a bag, so it's kind of my go to piece when traveling. I made some progress over the weekend which made me realized that I could make some *serious* progress if I was to focus on this for a few weeks, and since I don't have any finishing obligations right now, I just kept at it once we were home. Didn't have a lot of time again this week, but it's still coming along nicely:

I'm pretty busy at the moment, but there are a few big chunks to fill in so I'm still making progress :)

And that's it for today - I hope I can make some good progress over the weekend and show you the results soon!

Strange German Holidays #13 - Christmas

Now before I get to my next regular post, hopefully later in the week, I want to get one of the posts I still owe you out of they way. Only one more holiday to go after this one!

Now, for me, personally, Christmas is usually my favourite time of the year. I love the lights, the smells, the atmosphere, giving and receiving gifts, all of it. Of course the magic has decreased since I'm no longer a child, but I hope that years like the last one - where there were several factors contributing to being really stressed out before Christmas - will remain an exception. So anyway, where do I begin...

In Germany, there are three days of Christmas, from the 24th to the 26th. The 24th - Christmas Eve or 'Heiligabend' in Germany is, however, not an actual holiday - although some companies are closed and lots of stores are only open until around noon. But that's okay, since celebrations only start in the afternoon and evening as well!
In my family, we used to go to church at 5pm - that's the family mass which is kept short and fun, with many well-known songs, and instead of the sermon there is a nativity play by kids from the local kindergarten. For the past two years,  I went there alone with Felix, since my grandparents can't sit comfortably for that amount of time, so they volunteered to stay at home and prepare the food.

We always had food shortly after returning from church - our traditional Christmas Eve meal was ham and potato salad, the ham cooking while we were away and the salad prepared in the morning or even the day before. We're also doing different foods occasionally, like fondue. This year, we had a quite lovely filet of pork in puff pastry. Many families will also have goose or carp as traditional meals. 

After dinner, at least at our house, it's time fore presents! The act of gift giving on Christmas Eve is called 'Bescherung' in German. Now, there are two differnt traditions on who brings theses gifts in Germany: The Christkind and the Weihnachtsmann. And as far as I know, the distribution goes like this: When the reformation first happened in Germany in the 16th centuary, giving gifts on Christmas was not yet a common thing. It first started in Protestant areas, where the gifts where said to be brought be the Christkind. Then, as the Catholics started to adapt, the Protestants switched over to the Weihnachtsmann. So today, you will find the Christkind tradtion predominantly in areas with lots of Catholics, and the Weihnachtsmann tradition in areas with lots of Protestants. As the region I live in is mostly Catholic (although I'm not), we are a Christkind-area, and I honestly don't know much about how the Weihnachtsmann works - I think he is mostly like Santa Clause, like depicted by Coca Cola. If he also brings the presents overnight and the Bescherung is shifted to the 25th I frankly don't know.

The Christkind is a bit of a different story, and I can tell you about that! The Christkind, in the original version, is actually the little baby Jesus. However, over the years this interpretation has changed a little, and on most pictures (there are a lot of children's books covering this) the Christkind looks a bit older, an actual child rather and a baby or infant, and - I don't know why - mostly female, also it could still be a rather feminine looking boy as well. Now, the Christkind lives in heaven, and together with all the little angels it takes care of the Christmas workshop. In early December, children will write a whislist and place it in an envelope outside the window, where the postangels will collect them and carry them to the workshop, where the actual toys are made.

Then on Christmas Eve (or shortly before), the Christkind and its angels will decend, carrying all the toys, visiting every home and setting up a christmas tree with the presents underneath. In praxis, in my family at least, the living room used to be closed of for me starting a few days before christmas - there was an ornament with a bell hanging on the door, which meant the angels were at work in there! And when it was time for the Bescherung, a little bell would ring to indicate that it was okay to go in now. In some families, one parent will go out with the kids the afternoon of Christmas Eve so the 'angels' can work while they are gone, and I know that in Felix' family, they used to set up the Christmas tree all together in the morning, so the Christkind only put the presents underneath later.

Some families will sing Christmas carols together before opening presents, or even play them on instruments if they are musically talented, but we usually just put our favourite Christmas CDs on, then spent a lovely evening with presents and family and sweets :) When I was younger we also had the tradition to watch a specific music show that was broadcast on Christmas Eve, but that was canceled many years ago.

No for the Christmas tree - I noticed from the blogs I read that apparently many people in the US have fake Christmas trees, but in Germany it's still the most common thing to get a real tree. As we only put them up on Christmas Eve or a few days before, and usually leave them until January 6th (Three Kings Day) they will look great for the whole time. Some places and Catcholic churches will leave their trees until Feburary 2nd, and by then they loose quite a lot of needles. But fake trees are up and coming here as well - my grandparents just got one shortly after Christmas (for a reduced price) because going out to by a tree is getting more and more exhausting for them, and they do make some pretty fake ones nowadays.

Besides the tree, the nativity scene is also an important part of German living rooms on Christmas. The most basic version is just the crib with the child, Mary and Josef, but there are also elaborate display that include more characters - the donky and ox, shepherds, lots of sheep, the Magi with ther followers, elephants, camels, other animals and people that have some to see baby Jesus. Some families will just place the figures under the tree, some have a little stable, bought or selfbuild, and some displays include a lot of landscape around the stable as well. Felix' grandma has a HUGE display, about four metres long and at least half a metre wide, with hills and a lake (a mirror) and a bit of sand as desert, a stable with real lights and a flickering fire, many little tools and stacks of wood and a TON of figures. She used to collect those, her husband would always give her a new one every year, and he build a lot of the setup himself before he passed away. I wish I had thought of taking a picture for you guys when we were there on Christmas, it's truly amazing!

After so much blahbing about our first day of Christmas, there's not so much to day about the other two. December 25th and 26th are holidays, called the First and Second Christmas Holiday (very inventive, I know), so everyone has them off. Most families will use the time to visit relatives - for example, you might spend Christmas Eve with your parents, then 25th and 26th with one set of grandparents each. Or you might spend them with friends - Felix and his best friend Frank have started that tradition of a party with punch and old Christmas movies on the 26th. Or you could just stay at home - basically, those are just two more days to be lazy, eat good food and play with your presents!

Please excuse the novel-length text on this post, but there IS a lot to say about Christmas. Just one holiday to go - hopefully a much shorter one - and we're done!