Dad’s 75th birthday party was fun & my Black Forest gateau a success (special thanks to hubby for his engineering cake transport solution & smooth drive). 

Last work day in 2025 is completed (thanks for the home office allowance).

The days have busy schedules but are fun, christmassy & beautiful: spending time with the nieces, baking cookies, hot chocolates, building chocolate houses, meeting aunt & uncle for a glass of wine, enjoying mums home cooked dinners, enjoying an evening in the theater, mulled wine & favorite Christmas movies wrapped in a blanket on the sofa and last groceries before the stores shutting down for a couple of days. 

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas. Everywhere you go 💫

Are you excited for Christmas? Yes! Wine, food, good discussions… & repeat 🙂

Have a very Merry Christmas everyone! 

December is beautiful, especially with all the (German) Christmas traditions. 

Writing and sending Christmas cards to the world (yes, by post the good old fashioned way). 

Adventskalender. Another beautiful German tradition. I got a beautiful one from hubby this year. 24 doors with little surprises until Christmas. I’m already excited for tomorrow’s door. 

Christmas markets. Oh, they are so magical. The lights. The smells. The food. The drinks. And a flying Santa Clause. Excellent for meeting friends and be able to invite them for a drink: finally electronic payment is possible —> Germany goes cashless, wohoooo.

Celebrated St. Nicolaus Day on December 6.

December means also the end of a very challenging work year! Time to focus and celebrate achievements. And let me tell you, there’s plenty! Home baked cake included. The team deserved it 🫶

Feuerzangenbowle 🔥 is a traditional alcoholic drink for which a rum-soaked sugarloaf is set on fire and drips into mulled wine. It’s sooooo good 🥰 A tradition we do with the neighbors in the garden on one of the December weekends.

I love living in December in Germany.

2 weeks to go until Christmas! Time to ask the question: which Christmas type are you or run in your family? 

The tipsy grandma?

While the rest of the family is still tasting the sauce, she is already on her third glass of eggnog. “A sip for the heart,” she says with shining eyes – and suddenly belts out all three verses of “Es ist ein Ross entsprungen”. Loud and passionate. Nobody minds because Grandma creates the warmth that really makes Christmas. With her it just becomes more comfortable, somehow magical. And when Grandma sinks exhausted into her armchair at the end, everyone knows: Christmas without her? Not possible!

The stressed one-woman show?

She’s been working through shopping lists for days, running from the market to the shops and back. On Christmas Eve, she juggles roasts, side dishes, and her family’s lofty expectations (or is it just her own?). While the children ask when there will finally be food, she fights against the goose – and her nerves. In the end it tastes heavenly. As always. But next year, she vows weakly, there will be only potato salad and sausages. Who believes that…

The relaxed yoga mouse?

“I breathe in love, breathe out stress,” she murmurs as chaos rages around her. Instead of hectic there is meditation, instead of drama there is only deep breaths. The scent of Ayurvedic cardamom cookies wafts through the house as she shifts from tree to warrior pose. Christmas can come – calm, peaceful and completely relaxed. When the others struggle to build the electric railway, she smiles mildly. Because if you’re in Zen inside, you don’t need a switch – the energy flows anyway.

The gift nerd?

He sorted the wish lists back in October – according to priority, budget and color scheme. No tape is crooked, every package is a small work of art. He watches closely as he unpacks and flinches when someone crumples the paper. The mother-in-law asks for the receipt to exchange something? How can she! The mood is over, the glitter in the gift nerd’s eyes goes out, he sits in the corner all evening with a grave expression.

Last minute Santa Claus?

On the 24th at 2 p.m. we quickly go to the drugstore – deodorant, shower gel, scented candle, another photo gift (if the line isn’t too long). Everyone is happy about that, right? At home, everything is quickly wrapped in newspaper (“Sustainable!”) and secured with packing tape. He is proud to have accomplished everything and sits back on the sofa contentedly. He only overlooks one small detail: the price tags are still attached. It doesn’t matter – the gesture counts.

Couch potato?

Christmas market? Way too cold. Ice skating? Far too dangerous. The Christmas shopping has long been done – all online, with express shipping and discount code. Time for your favorite activity: sofa, snacks, streaming. “Three Hazelnuts for Cinderella” is running for the twelfth time, followed by the complete “Harry Potter” series. After all, tradition is tradition. Chips ready, blanket on, cell phone on flight mode – the sacred peace and quiet must not be disturbed under any circumstances.

The unwavering connoisseur?

From mid-November she wears a Christmas sweater and glitter nail polish. Cookie tins are stacked up in the kitchen and the postman has to try them every day – whether he wants to or not. What began with a simple Secret Santa door has already reached Olympic proportions: this year with real snow in front of the door and a hand-tied mini Advent wreath. “Last Christmas” in an endless loop, flickering fairy lights and the smell of cinnamon that almost bites your nose. Last year was more tinsel? Certainly not with her.

The workaholic on forced vacation?

Finally free – theoretically. He practically checks in the morning his mailbox between pine needles and fairy lights. “Just giving you a quick overview,” he mumbles, a little embarrassed. The laptop is ready to hand next to the raclette in case “something urgent comes in”. While others are drinking punch, he is already planning the next quarter and calls it relaxation. Walks in the snow? Meet family? Nice, but inefficient. For him, the only thing that counts is what is clearly scheduled, controlled and budgeted.

So, which type are you?

I think I have a combination of all types in the family… oh dear! The more, the merrier. Lol. Enjoy the peace & quiet. 2 weeks to go 😅

And just like that, this year’s Christmas season has been kicked off. 

Our weekend was very Irish ☘️

We enjoyed listening to “The Dublin Legends” followed by our tradition with friends: Irish breakfast & finding the most beautiful Christmas tree. 

Sunday morning, preparing Irish Breakfast.

Hubby making soda bread from scratch.

Celebrating the 1st of Advent.

Time to find the most beautiful Christmas tree.

They all look beautiful… difficult choice to make…

No snow but a lot of rain…

Time to warm up with a cup of Glühwein.

And the Irish days continue… Monday nights are great for a little Christmas market stroll (ladies only) and a Guiness in the Irish Pub with Shanghai friends – another beautiful tradition ☘️

Those “Irish days” weren’t planned as such, but needly fitted.

Arrived on short note. The car loaded with goodies. Santa’s helper didn’t stay long. Every day we came back from work we were wowed: 

First day: home made cookies 💫 

💯 compliments from the lucky people who got to try them already 🥰

First Christmas gift 🎁 is ready.

Second day: The most beautiful Christmas decoration 💫

💯 compliments from the neighbors.

Each window is decorated differently. So very creative & beautiful! Such a talent.

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas 🎄

Wondering who the helper was?

We treated her for a beautiful Swabian dinner in a gondola.

A very first visit of the Christmas market 💫

Ludwigsburg is definitely one of my favorite Christmas markets.

T ⭐️ H ⭐️ A ⭐️ N ⭐️ K you, mum! 😘

Thank you for coming and turning the house into a festive Christmas spirit! It all looks amazing!

Back to work. A business trip to Romania. A car accident. Raclette & fog. A little snow. Freezing temperatures (it’s getting to the direction of Glühwein). My least liked month of the year. So…. We focused on the nice things: meeting friends. Lightning up rooms with candles, organizing December, Christmas and New Year’s Eve. Enjoying home-cooked winter-style dinners. A glass or two red wine included. Netflix series (Christmas movies are best in November 😁). The fire is on, keeping us cosy. We are wrapped in blankets…

Our garden is also ready for winter. Picking last red & green tomatoes, hubby producing ketchup with it. 

Last time for this year cutting the grass. 

We are ready for December! 💫

…back in cold, grey, rainy & foggy (sometimes sunny) Germany. Forecast: low temperatures, maybe even snow. 

Italy, we miss you already. Your wine was so good. And the sky so blue. And the sun shining every day. And the locals so friendly. 

That’s why we made a little “trip” last night. Getting the bus to the next village to dine in the favorite steak house. Primitivo included (why do you think we’d go by bus… 😉🍷).

It was delicious. We had a great Italian night out.

Our mind is still in beautiful warm Italy. Not ready for all the Christmas craziness yet. Still time.

Driving along the coast to Palermo, the capital city of Sicily. Time to surprise hubby with a sightseeing tour in a different style. 

Changing cars: Mini Cooper was parked and… we were discovering Palermo in traditional Fiat500 cinquecentos from 1976.

No seat belts. No roof. Not even doors – only in Italy. 16 horse power. And: it’s not true that cinquecentos can park anywhere. 

All we needed: a valid driver license, experience in driving with a stick and closed shoes. Easy for us.

Ready. Steady. Go! 🏁

We had a blast and the coolest tour guides. We “just” followed them and hubby copied their Italian driving style. Good that we had time to adopt that style already. 

Communication between the 2 Fiats via walkie talkies. And that made it feel even more like travelling through time. 

Perfect weather, feeling the Dolce Vita and cruising through Palermo’s iconic landmarks in a green Cinquecento.. passing by Falcone-Borsellino murals, Piazza Marina, Cathedrals,  Massimo Theater… and so much more. 

There’s places, where even cinquecentos cannot pass thru, so we walked. Wow! Beautiful! 

Quattro Canti (Piazza Vigliena): “Quattro Canti” translates to “four corners“, each decorated with statues representing the four seasons.

Parking the cars and visiting Ballaro Market, the traditional market in Palermo selling fresh produce, Sicilian street food, souvenirs… wow! It’s loud, when the vendors are shouting to attract the customers, and the area is characterized by string cultural integration.

Let’s talk about the mafia. Sicily is infamous for being the origin place of the Italian Mafia. Following Sicily’s official inclusion into Italy in the 19th century, the Sicilian Mafia developed as the government failed to maintain citizen control. The Mafia soon became notorious for its extreme violence and involvement in illicit activities, triggering an active anti-mafia movement in response.

While the Sicilian mafia is in decline, street art seems to be on the up.

A beach stop. Including local delicious biscuits. 

Not only we had fun cruising around in the beautiful Fiats. People loved seeing them and would take pictures and give a thumbs up, we felt like celebrities! Lol. 

This was a lot of fun and made us smile. A perfect day to end our Italian Roadtrip. And hubby got complimented as “the best Fiat cinquecento driver on this tour”. Salvo might even consider letting hubby drive this mint Fiat with basket seats. 

Salvo has in total 10 Fiat Cinquecentos, and one looks nicer than the next. Here are some of the other beauty’s:

Unfortunately, it’s time to leave Sicily. Next stop: Palermo’s port for the ferry to Genova. >20 hours on the sea sounds longer than it was. 

Well, we soaked up the sun, got our vitamin C & D storage filled up. iPhone photo storage is also full. We slept a lot, chilled, moved, swam, chilled, read, painted…. So many fantastic memories, and definitely a trip to remember. It was divine!

Ready to go back home, not so ready for work on Monday. Lol. 

A last bit of Italy. Today we had a goal: going home. The air got crisp and fresh. We travelled towards fall, the summer seems now definitely ending.

We had the most wonderful 4 weeks in Bella Italia. Venice – Tuscany – Puglia – Sicily – each stop very different, and we loved them all. Amore 🫶 

Driving along the coast of Puglias heel, passing by vineyards (Primitivo 😍)… all the way to Calabria, the South-West or the “toe” of Italy’s boot-shaped peninsula. First impression: Calabria is very green & lush. 

Tropea for dinner. 

Taking the ferry from Calabria to Sicily via “Lo Stretto” or “The Strait of Messina”, a 3-8km wide strait under which earthquakes frequently occur – the last one in August 2025. Oh! Well, we got lucky. Arrived safe & sound in Sicily. 

Apparently, Italy’s government agreed to start the construction of a bridge connecting Sicily with the mainland, “il Ponte”… but lots of reasons speak against it (earthquakes, the depth of the sea, the mafia…). 

We arrived in Sicily. Up to 29C degrees. Wohoooo. Summer continues. Blue sky, sometimes a couple of clouds. 

The traffic is nuts, hubby an amazing driver, google navigating the way, me the street life: bike from the right, another one left, old man crossing the road, light is turning red, arghhhhhhh.

Well, we made it without incident… you just have to adapt to the Sicilian driving style. That rally training comes handy. Lol.

Once we made it out of the crazy city traffic, the sun is above us, the sea in front of us. It’s a beautiful ride.

We stayed in a farmhouse among vineyards on the slopes of Mount Etna, an active stratovolcano.

And here is the beauty “Mamma Etna” as the locals call Mount Aetna. Constantly active (last eruption in June 2025), today only smoking, and luckily not erupting. It is located above the convergent plate margin between the African Plate and the Eurasian Plate. 

Arrived at 1900 meter. What a ride. Etna’s highest point (at the moment) is 3357 meter.

Moving on from the top of Etna to the West coast of Sicily.

Sicily reminds us about Hawaii (green huge mountains, volcano), Vietnam (the Bays), and Arizona, California (the color of the mountains). And that’s why the “spaghetti western” films (low-budget films being made in Italy during the 1960s and early 1970s) are recorded in Sicily.

It looks like from a different world. Crossing Sicily in the middle was fun. 

We drove between sky and sea, the road winding along rocky cliffs, twisting and turning, leading up and down. And finally, we reached the coast again, always with this constant view of the blue.

We arrived in our final destination in Sicily, a place which was once used as a tuna fishery 🎣

Now it’s turned into a place with a villa located in a large Mediterranean garden that slopes towards the water. Lots of birds, geckos and butterflies included. It’s so very peaceful. Very charming.

Glad to have the geckos, there’s plenty of mosquitoes. They may look kind of different here, with extremely big wings, but eating us up as before. 

Sicily’s coastline is just wow! Stunning!

We enjoyed slow mornings, beach hours with Jack Johnson in my ear, thinking of where to have dinner and finding lots of beautiful places by chance. 

Dinner time after enjoying our aperitif.

We seem to be lucky again. Not only for the weather but Sicily is shutting down pretty much November 1st until March next year. Winter break. We keep holding on to summer. Just a little bit longer. 

Most villages are on top of the mountains in Sicily. Charlie and I took a gondola ride up.

Another day at the coast.

Sicily is different compared to Italy’s mainland. I am in love. Maybe it’s the dramatic and diverse landscape that really caught me. Mount Etna was a really unique experience. I am also in love with the coastal beauty: the variety of coastlines, from rugged, rocky shores to sandy beaches with clear Mediterranean waters. Maybe it is the mountainous areas to rolling hills and picturesque coastal towns? Don’t know what it is, but Sicily caught me 🫶 💛

Pizza in Sicily is different: unlike Neapolitan pizza, it is typically rectangular, with crispy dough, sauce, and less cheese. Toppings of anchovies, oregano, bread crumbs impart additional bold. 

Delicious 🫶

…and then I found this. In the middle of nowhere 🌞

Driving on…

Wow! Just wow!

The sun goes down at 5pm. Enough time to go home, shower and get ready for aperitif & dinner 🥰

Did you know that Sicily has a “Blue Zone” in Caltabellotta, a remote mountain town?

The term “Blue Zone” was coined by researchers studying regions around the world with the highest concentration of people who live to 100 and beyond. The five major Blue Zones are currently in Sardinia in Italy, Okinawa in Japan, Ikaria in Greece and Nicoya in Costa Rica. 

In case you want to get old but don’t live in a sun-soaked Sicilian village, you can adopt longevity-enhancing practices into your own life: keep stress level low, option for a Mediterranean diet, strengthen social bonds, move, move, move, and escape the city! 

Another reason to stay in Sicily 🌞

Our car looks more and more like a grocery store: prosecco from the hills, olives, oil & wine from Tuscany, pasta from Bari, Primitivo from Puglia, more wine from Sicily… mmmhhh, the next weeks are going to be delicious. 

Sicily, you are stunning. Your simple life style. Your fresh caught fish & how you prepare it for dinner. Your beaches, stunning colors! Wow! Magnificent. We loved being here, and we’ll be back for sure 💛 

We are heading on to Palermo. 

We are in Italy, so let’s talk about one of the three important drinks: cappuccino (the other ones are Aperol Spritz & vino 😎)

“Who invented the cappuccino? 

Like all great things in history, the origins of cappuccino are wrapped in legend, but the most popular theory has to do with an Italian monk and an Austrian waiter who had an eye for color coordination. 

Here’s what happened. Back in 1683, Pope Innocent XI sent the Capuchin monk Marco d’Aviano to Vienna to rally support against the Ottomans. At some point, between all the diplomatic negotiations, the friar found himself in a Viennese café, ordering coffee. One sip in – too strong. So, he asked for cream to soften the bitterness. 

Upon witnessing the resulting light brown hue, the waiter allegedly exclaimed, Kapuziner! because the drink now matched the earthy brown robe of the Capuchin monk. And just like that, a coffee icon was born.

But let’s be clear – this early version was nothing like the foamy masterpiece we love today. It was just coffee with cream: zero froth and none of that aesthetically pleasing barista artistry.

It wasn’t until the late 1800s, when the first espresso machine was invented (shoutout to Angelo Moriondo), that cappuccino finally started resembling what we know and love. The ability to brew espresso under pressure led to a richer, creamier coffee base, and with the advent of steaming wands, frothy milk entered the scene. Since then, cappuccino has become an Italian cultural icon.

What about the the “no cappuccino after 11 AM” rule:

If you’ve read anything about Italian coffee culture, you’ve probably stumbled upon the sacred rule: Do not order cappuccino after 11 AM, or risk being marked as a clueless tourist for eternity.

Why? Well, for Italians, cappuccino is typically a breakfast drink, not something you casually consume during your meals or even afterward. It all has to do with milk. 

According to Italian nonnas, drinking milk during or after a meal is basically a crime against digestion, right up there with swimming too soon after eating. A cappuccino post-lunch? Nope, didn’t hear that! And pairing it with pasta? You might as well be ordering a pizza with pineapple! The only “acceptable” alternative to the cappuccino on these occasions is a caffè macchiato, since it contains only a few drops of milk.

This whole “no cappuccino after breakfast” pops up in travel blogs, guidebooks, and articles as if we would actually gasp in horror if you ordered a cappuccino after 11 AM. Well, guess what? Who cares! 

In fact, I’ve personally witnessed Italians drinking cappuccino at night. Yes, at night.

So here’s my advice: drink your cappuccino any time you feel like it. Morning, noon, midnight – who cares? At the end of the day, if people in Genoa can dip focaccia into their cappuccinos without judgment, then why would anyone judge your late-night cup?” – an Italian

And that’s exactly what we did: No cappuccino after 11am? Well, we went ahead and broke the rules! We love our cappuccinos before and after 11am. And we were not the only ones. Lol. Seemed ok after second order was Aperol Spritz. Salute!