Family trip to the zoo to celebrate once more Mait's birthday.

Just taking the turists around in Cologne.

Visiting the Eifeltower of Hiiumaa, build by a single man in only 3 months.

Since today was not so warm we skipped the afternoon beach visit, and instead we went to visit the highest lighthouse in Estonia.

This week we have been with grandpa in Saaremaa, and  we got the chance to attend a concert with Mait.

The music was good and Mia was happy, but the most incredible is that we met several estonian friends from Germany: Kadri, Karin & Heiko.

Wonderful view on the ferry from Stockholm to Tallinn.

Lately almost everytime we go out Mait's knees end like this.

On sunday, we went to Hagen to show Mia.

Mait playing with water at the botanical garden.

Afternoon walk at the botanical garden.

Thanks to Pilleke for the invitation for dinner at El Inca, one of the few places in cologne where you can order a Piscola.

Here there are two videos of this carnival's sunday. On the first one, tiger mother playing with lion son in their natural habitat. And on the other one, father cow sledging with lion son :p

The 'angels' drawing angels on the snow :D

This winter has been specially cold and Mait has been enjoying very much the snow.

At estonian grandparents place in Brussels.

The winter finally arrived very suddenly.

Mait had lots to do on Sunday at the estonian xmas party in Annaberg. First he had to act as a spruce and then he had to unpack his present.

I had my first real holidays since ages!! Mait and Margit went with the estonian grand parents for a 5 days trip to Paris and Normandy. (But i did missing them...)

We went to celebrate the Chilean Independence Day to Antibes, France. In the video you can clearly see that no man can dance...

Last week we went to the Games Com 2009 here in Cologne, and i was hoping to be able to play for the first time Starcraft 2, but at the end i thought it was not worth to queue more than 4 hours to be able to play for 15 mins, so i will have just to wait until the game is officially released :(

Siin oleme me Fühlingeri järve ääres, mis asub 30 minutilise jalgrattateekonna kaugusel meie kodust.

This is really weird, to find a cuban guy offering original cuban food in Hiiumaa. mmm, how do i love yuca ;). And it was also good chance to make friends and practice my spanish!

Beautiful sunset in Hiiumaa at almost midnight.

After Pille's comment i just had to check the rodizio restaurant in Tallinn.

First, i have to say that it works a little bit different than normal rodizio, specially if you go for early dinner and you are alone in the place. Because of the small electric grill they do single portions on the spade.

The rodizio includes salad buffet, one drink and one dessert. We got fried bananas as starter and grilled ananas were missing. The salad bar was not the richest i have seen, but it was ok, and the desert we had was really good: some mandarins on cream, hardly brazilian but good.

And the meat? i have to say that the meat despite not being anything special, compared to the rest of the beef you can get in Estonia, was really outstanding!

And the waiter, a south brazilian, who spoke good english and spanish (no estonian) was kind but a little bit shy and dressed like an argentinian gaucho. My conclusion: quite ok, but a little bit expensive, specially the drinks. But since i have the choice i will continue to eat meet at Pantanal.

The second and last day was completely different to the first one, first the weather was better, second the audience was bigger, about 68000 people. Enjoy these 2 videos.

This was my first song celebration, and despite that nor me or Margit are singing, we were honored to join the 7km walk from Tallinn's city center to the song celebration site with the european choir of estonians along many friends and the rest of the 24705 singers. And, on our way, we were even greeted by ministers and former presidents.

It seems to be that the walk took longer than expected since the celebration itself started at 20:45 almost 2 hours later than planned.

And at the end the weather turned against the event, and we had to leave as well as more than (i guess) half of the whole audience just in the middle of the concert.

Every 4 years Estonia organizes a dance and song celebration. Yesterday we were at the first (of three) show of the dance celebration.

This year the event counted with 7460 folklore dancers and the main topic of the choreography was the sea.

So enjoy these 2 videos of the birth of the sea. But, sadly we were located against the sun :(

Already in Tallinn we organized a big welcome party with many friends, big and small ;)

After 3 Days driving we finnaly arrived to Estonia and we stopped in the south to visit Margit's relatives in Viljandi.

I had no idea that the pope's name was 'Jana Pawla II' in polish, his own language, as written in this street name sign in the middle of Warsaw. We saw this on our way by car to Estonia.

This weekend Mait made a round trip in Luxemburg with his grand parents.

And today we discovered the Bulbflowers world at Keukenhof in The Netherlands.

We are again traveling, this time we are based in Brussels, and went yesterday to Oostende at the west coast of Belgium.

Take a look to this car we saw today driving in the Rhein river! And you can even rent it out.

On the way back from the montains we passed by Annecy, but we should not have because at the end we were really late to meet Radu in Lausanne. Surprisingly, there was a kind of (very boring) carnival.

Just a very cool picture ;)

And finally we did make it to Radu's place in Lausanne, but we were really late and had no time to see the place :(, but it was still nice to chat a couple of hour with this old chilean friend ;)

Here has been snowing a lot, and this is the daily picture. Good that we took tire chains with ;)

We have no picture in action, since we can not go together tothe montain because of Mait. Here is Margit at the end of the slope.

We have been sledging with Mait almost daily and he has enjoyed very much.

It has been a hard week for us. We have been skiing, snowboarding and sledging in Les-Contamines-Montjoie close to the Mont-Blanc in France. And here we are on the way, in Switzerland.

Cologne is just a big crazy party during Carnival...

For the people that does not know yet, we like to eat good meet.

Despite we knew that in Cologne there are 2 rodizio restaurants(for eating all the meet you can for only around 20€), we have been for long time only going to Pantanal Rodizio, but yesterday we tried for the first time Maracana Rodizio.

And i have to say that despite the starters where better at Maracana, and that they also provide desserts. The service and the meet is much better at Pantanal!

Just having some interesting fruits.

First "papayo" some ugly relative of the, for me, familiar "papaya"? That does taste more like a sort of melon.

And huge and delicious avocados, one avocado is like 1500 grams!

Here we are hiking close to the "Roque Nublo" at more than 1800mts above see level.

Seniors dancing under the sun of canary islands in Puerto Mogán.

Mait on a short trip on a ship, we even (almost) saw some dolphins...

Really cool Mait with his sunglasses!

Me enjoying the live ;)

We just realized that we had very few pictures of Margit carrying Mait, so here is an update from the canary islands :D

Mait in the aircraft.

This video features Mait really laughing loud! with Siim.

Mait playing with Siim in Brussels.

Here are 2 pictures of Mait's latest trip to visit the grandparents in Brussels.

Video recorded at Imbi & Siim's place in Brussels featuring Mait playing with a compass.

This is a picture taken during our last few days in Estonia.

Mait ja Von Glehni kivist krokodill Nõmmel.

On the 2nd Xmas holiday we went to discover Saaremaa, our first stop was the Panga cliff in the nord.

Täna osales Mait oma esimesel (eestlaste) jõulupeol Annabergi lossis. Samuti sai Mait nautida jõulutaadi süles olemist.

Eile oli Alkaconi jõuluõhtusöök. Seekord oldi kutsutud Fantissima gaalale ja Michaeli meelest oli see läbi (Alkaconi) aegade parim jõuluõhtusöök... Kuni nad visati umbes kella 4 paiku restoranist välja:D

Käisime sellel aastal esimest korda katedraali kõrval asuval Kölni suurimal jõuluturul :p

Olime kaks päeva Brüsselis, et aidata mu emal leida üürikorterit. Alates jaanuarist elavad mu vanemad mõnda aega Brüsselis.

Kasutasime ka võimalust kohtuda Reesi, Giuseppe ja Tancrediga ning me tähistasime kohtumist legendaarses Mort Subite pubis Kriek joomisega (Mait ja mina jõime miskit muud) . :p

Meil on õues talv- pool päeva sadas tihedat lund ja nüüd katab maad ligi 5cm lumevaip. Kölnlased nautisid täna lumesõda ja lasid linnatänavatel liugu. Isegi ühe restorani kokad ehitasid köögi ukse taha lumememme.

Tänavune aasta on lume suhtes erakordne- aasta esimene lumi tuli alles märtsis (eelmise talve ainus lumi) ja nüüd sajab juba novembris, siin on nii varajane lumesadu suhteliselt harukordne!

Tõeline jõuluilm! Muuseas- jõululaadad avatakse järgmisel nädalal ning kogu Köln on juba jõuluehtes.

Kõrvaolev pilt on siiski tehtud märtsis.

Mait serveerituna pearoana Tartu restoranis Gruusia Saatkond :p

Vaatamata oma noorusele on Mait juba kogenud reisisell. Mait on lennanud 6 korda ja sõitnud 3 korda rongiga. Kõrvaloleval pildil sõidab Mait Tartusse.

Eile tuli Gonzalo Inglismaalt Robertole külla ja Karin kutsus meid sellel puhul õhtusöögile:d

Meil oli väga ilus sügispäev ja Michael tegi mõned ilusad pildid Kölni katedraalist.

Eelmisel pühapäeval käisime Hagenis Maidu vanaisal ja tema perel külas. Me polnud Hagenis käinud pea kaks kuud(häbi meile:$). Kõik olid rõõmsad suure-väikse Maiduga kohtumise üle:d

 Sellel nädalavahetusel toimus Annabergis (Bonn) Euroopa eestlaste koorilaager, kus nad harjutasid eelseisvaks laulupeoks. Kuna mitmed meie sõbrad on kooriga seotud, siis me osalesime laupäeva õhtul Annabergis õhtusöögil ja pühapäeval käisime nende kontserdil püha Pauluse kirikus.

Siin ka mõned videod kontserdist:

• Euroopa eestlaste koor esinemas püha Pauluse kirikus 2/5
• Euroopa eestlaste koor esinemas püha Pauluse kirikus 3/5
• Euroopa eestlaste koor esinemas püha Pauluse kirikus 4/5
• Euroopa eestlaste koor esinemas püha Pauluse kirikus 5/5

Eile külastasime me üle pika aja minu sugulast Anitat ja tema abikaasa Michaeli. Muideks, Michael on suurepärane kokk :p.

Michael on tõsiselt vihane. Viimase 24 tunni jooksul on teda kaks korda tülitanud 'buttinsky' vanaemad ja püüdnud teda õpetada kuidas Maidu eest hoolt kanda :@

Eile ütles üks vanem proua kell 19:30 toidupoes, et Mait ei tohiks nii hilja enam väljas olla, ja täna hommikul teatas teine proua turul, et Maidu jaoks tuleb alati tekk kaasa võtta. (Muideks turul me kohtasime Katjat ja tema 3-kuu vanust tütart Aljennat :)).

Maidu vanaema ja vanaisa olid meil Eestist sellel nädalal külas. Külastasime ilusaid paiku, üheks selliseks oli Altenahr.

Vanaisa ja Mait Kölni botaanikaaias jalutamas.

We showed Siim some of the niciest corners along the Rhine, Koblenz and St. Goar.

Eile tähistasime me Brasiilia restoranis Maidu kahe kuuseks saamist ja vanaisa Siimu esimest külaskäiku Kölni.  Piltidelt on näha suurte ja väikest ebavõrdsus restoranis... ;)

Eile tähistasime Yenni juures Tshiili iseseisvuspäeva... kohal oli palju toredaid inimesi, hea söök ja muidugi ka kangem kraam (peamiselt Tshiilist);)

(Meil oli küll fotokas kaasas, aga unustasime pilte teha, kõrvaloleva pildi tegi Kathi ja see on üleval tema blogis)

Elagu Tshiili!

Me oleme kandelinaga väga rahul, see on tõeliselt mugav ja seda on nii lihtne kasutada. Me võtsime ka vankri Eestisse kaasa, aga me peaaegu ei kasutanudki vankrit. Arvatavasti järgmisel korral me ei võta enam vankrit kaasa.

Esimene jalutuskäik kandelinaga, Michael tundis ennast väga mugavalt, loodetavasti Mait ka...

Meie teine jalutuskäik vankriga, esimesel korral unustasime me kaamera koju:(