Gonis

As I mentioned, I was invited to a Gonis party last week. I had no idea what to expect other than a craft party. I had never heard of Gonis.

It was along the lines of a Tupperware or Avon party. The friend had about ten guests there and a rep. Everyone had a catalogue and a Christmas flyer. The rep highlighted various products from the catalogue and showed us different projects we could use them for.

I put in an order and booked a party for next year. If my German was better and I knew more people, I'd consider becoming a rep myself.

The projects really inspired me with some ideas for Christmas and I'm looking forward to sharing them here. My goodies arrive on Friday and then I'll be off!

Children's Activities

My children now officially have busier social lives than I do!

Last week I took Isabella to the children's reading at the library. She loved it and I find that she's nicer at home when she's busier.

She also went to the children's theater at the weekend and next week she has a picture book cinema, a playdate and a trip to the children's farm coming up.

Joshua starts swimming this week and will be making friends with my post-natal fitness course friends' babies next week!

I love this stage with the kiddos, being more social and being a mum!

Parents' Meetings

Yet another benefit of Isabella being at nursery is the opportunity to meet new people and socialise more.

Both Nico and I moved to Bremen (and now Weyhe) for work, leaving most of our contacts behind and workplaces here in Germany, while friendly, aren't as social as in England.

Aside from getting to know our neighbours better tomorrow, mixing with parents has been one of our few opportunities to meet new people.

Last night I went for drinks with the parents from Isabella's nursery group. There were just four of us but for me that made it easier to follow. It was also a nice mix, two mums, two dads, a range of ages and backgrounds talking for three hours about all sorts.

It was nice because we see each other most days but never have a chance to talk. It's also nice to hear about the little ones who Isabella spends every day with.

It was also good and interesting to hear how the nursery has changed from some of the parents with older kids.

We met in the theater pub in Weyhe which was nice and quiet to be able to talk. We're planning our next drink there in April and hopefully the nicer weather will bring more people out.

Board Game Round Up

Quirkle

Last night we had friends over for games night.  With the wedding and holidays, it's been a while since we had one of these and I was looking forward to restarting my Catan campaign, however, when we offered the guests the choice, they went for Quirkle and Monopoly.  Can you believe our friend had never played Monopoly?! 

Of course she had a huuuge dose of beginners luck and won both games, putting the rest of us to shame.  Next time, I'm going for Catan but it was good to change it up a bit.

Dixit

Saturday saw the first of what I hope will be many games nights in our flat with Ed and Loreto.  We played Dixit.  Loreto has been telling me about this game for a while as she has been using it with some of her course friends to improve their German.

The point of the game is to use a word or phrase to describe what one of your picture cards makes you think of.  All players place down a card which could represent this word or phrase and they must then vote on which they think was the original card.  You play until all the cards are gone.  

It was great fun, we played in English and German and we all really enjoyed it.  The picture cards are especially lovely.  In fact, we enjoyed it so much, we are considering buying it ourselves.