21 - 27 December 2009

We seem to be mixing our festivals into a huge Christmas pudding of confusion. Saint Nicholas comes on 6 December. Saint Nick/Santa Claus/Father Christmas, surely, just coming a little earlier, with his white beard, red coat and big sack, to ease the load of Christmas eve? No, St Nicholas is an old bishop. The Weihnachtsmann is Father Christmas and he really only visits children who has been televisually and internationally corrupted. Innocent Austrian children, unpolluted by foreign custom are visited by the Christkind. The Christ child/Jesus? No, a beautiful angel with curly hair who brings presents and decorates the Christmas tree on Christmas eve. What on earth was the Christkind doing visiting our house before the 24th?, the children's friends wanted to know, on seeing our beautifully decorated tree well in advance of Christmas eve. In the end both Father Christmas and the Christkind visited our house and left a little note explaining how much they had enjoyed working together.

14 - 20 December 2009

Caspar's birthday was celebrated this week, a little late, but with much hilarity and bruising on the ice rink at Zell am See with friends. Wasn't quite so much fun a few days later when we enthusiastically and confidently ran onto the ice rink and 2 minutes later ran back off again to take Caspar to hospital with a split chin, bloodied nose and half a tooth missing. The chin and tooth (which we found after much searching) were both glued together again, and Justine, Nina, Mary and Elizabeth enjoyed a skate while Simon and Caspar were at the hospital, only slightly marred by the blood besplattered ice-rink that Caspar had left to remind us of him.

7 - 13 December 2009

As the ski season opens with a distinct lack of snow, Hochkönig's recent 12 million euro investment of snow making facilities comes into it's own. Snow pours from lances dotted all over the mountains. And then the Föhn arrives, a warm, strong, dry down-slope wind which often blows this way, also known as the 'snow-eater'. The temperatures went from minus 12 to plus 13 in twelve hours and the snow melted away. This particular wind can also cause migraines and psychosis. Justine usually gets the migraine and Simon thinks that Justine gets the psychosis too. So on the whole the Föhn is not very welcome.

30 November - 6 December 2009

Simon is finding his latest English conversation class quite challenging. Covering topical, political, social and scientific issues, and often the exchange of good recipes, his English as well as German vocabulary is regularly tested. Last week's discussion, on the topic of clock-making, involved the pros and cons of the double three-legged gravity escapement. Our children, meanwhile, are mixing their language delightfully. Elizabeth complained to us today that Mary had 'broken her feeling'.