The lyf so short

Yet again, there would have been so much to talk about last month, but the posts didn't happen. But as picspams always seem a good way of remembering stuff and rambling about it, I'll do a holiday picspam! While the holiday season isn't entirely over yet, so this is still relevant! That way, we'll also catch up with the kids? I hope?

(Pics are f-locked, so if you can't see them, that may be why.)

( Image-heavy, bla bla, click on preview will lead to full-size view, you know how it works )

Oof! Quite a lot of text for a picspam. I clearly should have done that photo-a-day meme that was going around my f-list in December. At least in a modified photo-a-week kind of way. A resolution for this year, perhaps? I clearly find it easier to talk about RL stuff when I have a pic to show with it. Hm. Must ponder this. But for now, we're done!

"Not everybody is permitted to go to Brest", as the learned old pirate in the Asterix comics sagely observes. As it happened, we actually made it to Brest - whereas other places of interest, such as Quimper, Concarneau, Pont-Aven or the previously mentioned Douarnenez, dropped off the agenda. On the whole, it felt to me as if we weren't doing anything culturally relevant at all. This is not wholly true (as this picspam will show), but compared to the high amount of educational sight-seeing that I normally enjoy on my holidays, this year the most I seemed to get was a Japanese-style photo stop (rather than the extensive study of ruins, let alone leisurable strolls through museums). I now feel with my father, who began to chafe when my brother and I insisted on a beach day during family holidays back in the day! Now I, too, have become that sort of restless traveller! No wonder I resorted to repetitive photographing and competitive sandcastle-building!

It needs to be said that it wasn't only the kids who sabotaged my educational ambitions; it was also extremely hard to get the mother-in-law and Marc to express interest (let alone delight) in any sort of activity beyond the daily grocery shoping. But they didn't say "No walks or excurses for us, please", either. So Jörg and I made suggestions, they agreed without much enthusiasm, we went, and sometimes they seemed to like our excurses well enough, but it was like pulling teeth. Having to push both the kidlets and half of the grown-ups, all the time? Are you not interested or are you just insecure? Aaargh. No thanks.

Nonetheless, we managed to see a few interesting things. And now you will, too.

( Here goes another cut for length and picture-heaviness. )

Oof, that's again enough for one post! Some hiking, the Holy Mountain of Menez-hom and our journey back (incl. Le Mont-St-Michel!) will follow some other day. Hope you enjoyed!

Another birthday that I did not mention (here on LJ) was that of my dear little boy. Felix turned 2 years old during the Drachenfest. We celebrated after the event, which made enough of an impression that Felix occasionally said Felix hat wieder Geburtstag! ("It's Felix' birthday again!") throughout the following week. He unwrapped his own presents (previously, he left such menial tasks to his parents), tried them all out at once (except for the clothing), and ate his cake (or rather, the icing) with great appetite. His favourite present was a little plastic firetruck. Until this weekend, he blessedly didn't know that the firetruck would make noises (not even siren noises, no - horribly distorted plastic versions of international children's songs), but then we had some friends of Jörg's over for a barbecue and one of them (a teacher -- never invite teachers, they can't leave their job at home!) taught Felix what buttons to push. We've been living with plastic jingle "Alouette" or "Santa Lucia" or "Yankee Doodle" on repeat ever since...
He also enthusiastically uses the chalk crayons he was given - our courtyard has been generously decorated with modern art. We could probably make a fortune if only we did the necessary marketing. :P

Language acquisition-wise, he is now at a point where it is a lot easier to list his shortcomings than it is to list all his achievements. He puts great effort into pronunciation, but some consonants ([r], [l], most clusters) just don't come out properly yet. (According to him, his name is "Feyix"). He hasn't grasped first-person address yet, either using the third person (Felix will aufstehen!, "Felix wants to get up!") or the second person which we after all use to address him (Bist du satt, "Are you full" = "I'm full"). "Ich" is rarely used, and only in set formulae.
Speaking of formulae, he now loves nursery rhymes.
He has an extensive vocabulary now - during the standard "2nd birthday" doctor's appointment, our pediatrist asked how many words Felix knew already and I had to admit that I've long lost count - but has also started to make up nonsense words again. He does this especially when he's tired, but also just for the heck of it. Personally, I'm considering it something good, as it clearly shows linguistic creativity.
Speaking of linguistic creativity, Felix tries to make up for concepts he can't express yet by creating his own (Die Ampel ist grün gegangen!, which would be perfect in English - "The traffic lights have gone green" - but not idiomatic German, where you'd say grün geworden, literally "become green" - but it's a good idea!).
During the Drachenfest, he suddenly started overapplying regular forms - ausgesteigt ("getted off"), weggegeht ("goed away"). Ever since, I've been annoying anyone who wouldn't run away fast enough by explaining how this apparent setback is actually progress, as he has clearly grasped the concept of regular verb forms.
He also uses all the cases correctly, but hasn't yet wrapped his mind around grammatical gender (He'll say things like Müssen wir den Mama fragen, "We will have to ask Mommy^m" or Die Papa soll das anschauen, "Daddy^f has to look at it").
He loves to list various names he has been called: Du bist ein Krümelmonster! Und ein Schwarzfußindianer! Und ein Turner! Und ein Rabauke! Und Omas Herzchen! Und Mamas grooooßer Schatz! ("You're a cookie monster! And a Blackfoot! And a gymnast! And a rascal! And Granny's heartthrob! And Mommy's biiiiigest treasure!")
He has a thing for vowel harmony, saying things like "pinki Bumu" (pinke Blume, "pink flower") or "Woykon" (Wolken, "clouds").

He still wants other people to be present when he is playing, but he makes up his own games (only rarely graciously accepting suggestions or input from others). He even integrates other children into his games now, although he doesn't trust all of them equally (he is very mistrustful of our new tenants' middle children, aged 3 and 4, for instance, whereas when a former co-student of Jörg came by with his three youngest sons, he immediately ran after 3-year-old Elliot; he actually learned how to ride his Bobby Car from watching Elliot - and the 3-year-old who visited her grandmother down at the mill quickly became his friend, and he asked for her for weeks after she had returned home.)

By now, he has figured out the trick of pushing or pulling things with wheels instead of carrying them around. And on occasion, he'll muster enough patience to listen to a story rather than just turn the pages and search for depictions of snails... Snails and slugs (mit Fühlern!, "with stalks!") are his great passion right now, as are open or shut windows (kommt frische Luft rein, "fresh air can come in there!"). He also likes other animals that can be seen or heard around here, as well as cars, leaves, flowers, planes and the moon - but snails and open windows are the best. He not only draws with chalks, but also with crayons and coloured pencils. He demands that grown-ups draw stick figures, cats, trains or slugs, but he also produces his own abstract art.

And of course, he is the most adorable, most handsome and most intelligent little boy in the entire world. But I'm his mother, so you shouldn't take my word for it... ;)

Oof. A lot shorter than it should be, but at least it's a summary!