So what do you get when a Moroccan guy and an American girl create a little something that’s born on German soil ???

WE DON’T KNOW EITHER!

But we’ll find out next May! I sure hope the little tyke gets himself (herself) 3 passports out of the deal !!

And so we enjoyed a national day of celebration here in Deutschland when Sally announced that she had a bun in the oven! A baby on board! A …. a….. ok I can’t think of any other slogans for being PRE-GO !

Sönke wasted no time in organizing a day o’ baby over at the local Baby Dorf… Germany’s answer to “Babies R Us”. Some of us quietly think that perhaps Sönke really just wanted to play with the toys himself….

We met at Poppenbüttel’s Einkaufszentrum (shopping mall) and lunched Italiano while Sally showed off her “Mutterpass” (Mother pass), a German booklet in which the doctor records all the mother’s vital information during pregnancy.

For me, Baby Dorf was an important lesson in how utterly complicated and expensive it is to have a baby! What do you DO with all this stuff? How in the world do you pick a stroller from 500 choices? And why does a nurseryful of baby furniture cost well over 1000 euros?

We may never know the answer to these questions, but a fab time was had by all. I chased Sally around the ‘Dorf trying to photograph her belly, and Sönke tried to convince me that we NEEDED that giant stuffed hippopotamus for our apartment. (No, we don’t.)

By 3pm, Sally was ready for a mommy nap. We dropped her off then headed out to the Alster Lake for some therapeutic, post baby-sticker-shock sailing. Klaudia & Mehmet joined us, then Mehmet treated me to my FIRST EVER TURKISH DÖNER. A döner is a deliriously delicious mix of meat, lettuce, salad, and dressing served up in freshly baked Turkish bread. Mehmet knows the ‘insider’ spots for the GOOD STUFF, most of which were totally full of in-the-know hungry clientele… we found a table at Meram’s in Billstedt and ate our hearts out!

In other fine news, JENNIFER GETS APPROVED FOR A 3 YEAR GERMAN RESIDENCE PERMIT! Watch out all you Deutsch peeps, I’m here to STAY!
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Photos of our totally top shelf day:

Our grand entrance:

The world’s tiniest Levi outfit for a mere 100 euros:

No, you’ve GOT to be kidding me…… suitable for 1-6 year olds? So they’re already playing with FIRE here in Deutschland?!

That’s great… scare the heck out of the little tyke with a big scary SHARK picture right before he goes out into the ocean!

We don’t know what this is, but it was in the baby clothes section.

I think we need some help here.

YES the green one looks pretty SWEET! Tricky umbrella too.

We think the sides are way too low; one hiccup and the baby will bounce right out!

Now sailing I can handle…

God bless the Döner !!

Who has the coolest residency permit this side of the Atlantic ?!?!?!

Before visiting Finland, I imagined it a place that was big on fish and small on daylight (at least, in every month other than August). Being one of the northernmost countries in Europe, it lies dangerously close to the Arctic Circle for a sunshine-loving girl like me. Nonetheless, I was game for a try.

So after an investigative weekend in Helsinki, I figured out what all the Finnish folk must be doing when the sun goes down at noon (or so). They’re going SHOPPING! Heck, what else is there to do?! (They apparently go to church a lot too, based on all the churches we visited). I most enthusiastically joined the Finns in my own dubious interpretation of their ‘venerable’ shopping & churching traditions.

Our Finnish day started with a tram ride down to the main harbor, which offers both outdoor and indoor markets. (Obviously, we hit both.) Outside, the touristy booths sold plenty of *real* fur accessories (seems that the PETA movement hasn’t caught on there), hand-knit scarves and gloves, leather and fur boots, handcrafted knickknacks, and stuffed reindeers. The locals’ booths sold a surprisingly wide variety of fresh produce, including piles of a fabulously rich-looking red berry. Inside, we had kitchen tools, local sweets and breads, reindeer sausage, fresh and smoked fish, canned fish, dried fish, jellied fish, baked fish, scrambled fish, poached fish, and fishy fished fish.

With bags full of market treasures, we enjoyed a quick breakfast at Kappeli on the main square, then headed over to church #1, the impressive brick Uspenski cathedral which overlooks the harbor. With a nod to the Russkies’ previous ‘occupation’ of Finland, the church sports incredibly-shiny, gold onion domes and a grassy hill perfect for napping (which we looooove….).

A leisurely stroll brought us to the big Senate Square and the squeaky-clean, white-and-green #2 church….great for admiration and a few photos, but even better for the nearby shops filled with groovy stuff made by local artisans.

With Soenke now in fully-laden pack mule status, we dropped our bags of goodies at the hotel and checked out church #3, the Temppeliaukio Church, otherwise known as the “church-in-the-rock”. Two Finnish dudes had a unique idea to build a church right into the bedrock, with some pretty cool results. The walls of the church are beautiful colored rock, also providing amazing acoustics for the church’s fancy pipe organ.

Another one of the city’s many convenient trams delivered us to the well-situated Hotel Torni just in time to catch the gorgeous sunset from the hotel’s small rooftop bar. Positioned specifically for sunset appreciation, it was packed with highly appreciative visitors and locals alike. We gazed in awe at the fiery pinks and oranges which blazed over the horizon as the sun vanished. I can say with some confidence that this was one of the finest sunsets I’ve ever seen.

By now it was about 1:00pm. Ok ha ha, not really. But it WAS dinnertime, and we knew we had to sample the country’s specialty: REINDEER. An intimate, corner restaurant called Restaurant Kuu had a good-looking fixed menu with reindeer prominently advertised. Now I was caught a bit offguard when I ordered a glass of wine and the server asked me “8, 16, or 25 centiliters?” You could practically hear my eyelashes bashing against each other as I blinked blankly and hoped for more choices in a measurement system that I recognized (no such luck).

Our first course arrived in the form of smoked salmon and chunky potato soup, simmered in a buttery milky broth. YUM. Our main course of barely-dead, broiled reindeer wrapped in bacon proved to me a bit much too much for me (Soenke loved it). I chowed down instead on my green beans and red potatoes, then on Soenke’s green beans and red potatoes, and left the meat to the real carnivores. A tasty cold cheese course followed, then a peculiar dessert of baked cheese with an orange-colored berry sauce.

Hours later, we were deep in happy-belly REMS back at the hotel when my cellphone rang…. sigh, the biggest tax deadline of the year and one of my Fed-Ex’s bearing a two-inch-thick tax return didn’t arrive at the client destination. With my new chilled-out Euro attitude, I just said “ah yeah, just print out the PDF file and fax me the signature page. You can file it with my fax signature. It’s cool”. So I trotted on down to the huge reception area in my pink pajamas, conducted a little fax business, got some weird stares, and wandered back up to bed. GOD BLESS TECHNOLOGY. My ticket to freedom!
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Here are some Fine Fotos from Finland:

A view of Helsinki’s central harbor:

I scope out the market stalls:

What are these glorious Finnish berries?!

Cutting-edge local cell phone technology (cheeep, too!):

Soenke takes a turtle break:

Church #1 - the Uspenski Cathedral with the super shiny dome:

Church #2 at the Senate Square:

Church #3 built into the bedrock:

A parade of some of my shopping finds, including smoked fish, reindeer sausage, chocolate fish cigars, Finnish spectrolite jewelry, and more:

A truly breathtaking sunset!