Maximilian

I made a weekend trip to Vienna. It was supposed to be a Struggl family running festival but sometimes things turn out different than expected…

As far as I am concerned I had a pretty good weekend and got the first glimpse of summer this year. We stayed at Onkel Markus and Tante Nicki – so I met my two cousins Alessia and Chiara. Opa and Oma came all the way from Carinthia as well. So the whole Struggl family was together.

On Saturday we went to a really nice playground in the Prater, followed by some shopping in the Mariahilferstrasse, and the Steirerfest on the Rathausplatz where Alessia briefly went missing. On Sunday we watched Papa run a half marathon. In the afternoon we went to the Luftburg restaurant in the Prater with Richi/Kathi and Ite/Valdi. Ite made some great photos of me enjoying the amazing bouncing castles. I displayed enormous courage on the slide where I was by far the youngest among all the children. The weather was great during the entire weekend with temperature rising well into their twenties.

I returned to Knokke on the Belgian coast for my Easter break. I remember well how at Easter a year ago we sat on the beach with our swimming trunks. But this is the year of the never ending winter. This did nothing to diminuish my enjoyment. We went back to the amazing pool (see Christmas holiday) and I could not get enough from the slides. On Easter Sunday I was again searching the Easter eggs.

My parents returned to London and Mamy looked after me. I had a great time with her. I also have a great selection of toys which were carefully sourced by Tata Iza and Tonton Fred. And I had just as much fun on the playground with Dominique and Mamy.

The long awaited ski holiday has finally arrived. To be honest, ski holiday is overstating it a little bit – from my perspective. I should rather call it a winter holiday. I am not yet skiing but my cousin Alessia already started this year. But there are still a lot of other fun activities like sledging, snow hikes to nice Alpine huts, swimming in the hot tub and of course lots of play time with my cousins Alessia and Chiara. This week was also great for advancing my German.

The only complaint is that my parents neglected me a little bit. Almost every day they left me back at home to go skiing. Luckily Oma and Nicki took great care off me. So nothing to complain really.

The ski holiday is coming closer in giant leaps and I am already so excited. But let me report on some of the recent highlights.

Robyn threw a great birthday party. I studied the Happy Birthday to you song and I behaved and did not scream CAKE immediately after the song.

I am also making progress on the playground where I now master the difficult traverse. Papa is very proud and has already announced to take me to some chimneys in the Dolomites. I have no clue what he is talking about.

A bit of culture as well. We went to see the light show in the Hayward Gallery together with little Viola, Anita and Harry. I am not sure how much Viola enjoyed the art installations but I was very impressed. And the following week Tate Britain had the family day with plenty of different fun activities. George was there and so was baby Tony. We most enjoyed the card board boxes

I have so many exciting updates for you. So let’s start with the most important one. I made a New Year’s Resolution despite my parents sceptic view on such. I’m not a baby anymore, so I decided to do away with the dummy. So one evening I hung them on the Christmas tree and the next morning the Christmas tree was gone with all my dummies. My rabbit still has one dummy and I borrow it from him before I go to bed – but in the morning I return it back to him just like a good boy does.

We had our short spell of winter in London. For about a week temperatures were almost at the freezing point and finally on the weekend we got a proper dose of snow – in the park it was almost 15cm. Naturally, I put on my full winter gear and – with the help of Papa – built a snowman and a small fortress. It seems London starts to cope with snow as it is becoming an annual feature.

Soon the Shard will open its viewing platform on the top of the building, the highest of its kind in Europe. Maman organised some preview tickets which gave access ahead of the official open. We took two high speed elevators and finally a few flights of stairs to get up to the top. The views were truly spectacular. I loved all the trains coming in and out of London Bridge station and we clearly saw the terrace of our new flat. I think far in the back I even saw France. Inspired by the visit I build my own version of the Shard at home from kitchenware.

Last Friday I went to the London aquarium with Robin, Annika and Maman. We saw sharks, turtles, crocodiles and many other colourful fish. I liked it so much I convinced Maman to purchase an annual pass.

My bike is getting too small for me. So for Christmas I got a scooter from Maman and Papa and I took it to the park to check it out. I am still a little bit clumsy with the scooter but I have every confidence I will soon master it.

All the best,

Max

I was happy we were finally heading back to Belgium to put a finish to the endless wait for Christmas. As with many good things, Christmas came twice this year:

One day earlier than expected we had our intimate Christmas celebration with Mamy, Tata and Tonton, Maman and Papa. It was the real thing with turkey and all the trimmings. There were so many presents under the Christmas tree. Finally after dinner we opened them and I was delighted to find out that most of them were mine.

On the 24th we celebrated Christmas among the extended family at Jean-Pierre’s chapel. The venue could not be more fitting, everyone was dressed up for the occassion and the atmosphere was festive and magical. I was allowed to stay up a little longer and joined in for the starter (foie gras but no Sauternes for me). I was told the food and wine was excellent.

On the very next day we left the city behind and drove to Knokke. The seaside is much more calm in winter and very enjoyable indeed. We went on walks on the beach, feasted on Mamy’s seafood and discovered the all new in-door swimming pool in Knokke. It has several shallow pools for me, the big wave and 4 massive slides one of which was also suitable for me. With such a pool, I wonder why anyone would still go to the sea

In time for New Year’s Eve we went back to Brussels where we spent two days at the house of Tata and Tonton. They live close to a forest. So we played explorer. We feed on raw chestnuts and built wooden arrows to hunt bears and other wild animals. I loved it. The other day we created our own self made pizza. It is so much fun to do and much easier than I thought.

I also formed a rock band with some of my young friends. Taking initiative, I volunteered to become the lead singer. We gave our first performance to our mothers who enthusistically endorsed our efforts. We are still looking for a catchy name for the group – any suggestions are welcome.

This year Christmas is different. I might even go so far as to say this is my first real Christmas. Two years ago I should not have even been here and last year I did not fully register yet quite what it means. But this year I am absolutely on top of things. It all started with the advent calendar. Comparing the number of open to closed windows provides an intuitive feel how much time is left until Christmas Eve.

Then we went to a Christmas party at Papa’s office. There were so many things to do and they also had a Santa Grotto attended by an old man with a big white beard. I was not so convinced by this man and everybody knows that the Christmas presents come from the Christkindl (Child Jesus).

This was followed on the same day by Maman’s public appearance in a Christmas concert as part of the Bermondsey Voices choir. The concert was great and really well attended.

On the next weekend Papa brought home a Nordmann Fir which I helped to decorate into a nice Christmas tree. But the festive feeling really sunk in when Maman  baked Christmas cookies (Vanillekipferln). It is needless to say how much I (and Papa) enjoyed them.

Luckily the big wait to X-Day was made shorter by two great birthday parties this weekend. On Saturday Amelia celebrated in the Bermondsey Village Hall and today Riley’s party took place at his impressive new home in Kennington.

On November 24th I celebrated my second birthday – and what a party that was!

For starters I had special guests that flew in all the way from Austria to join the festivities. Alessia and Chiara, together with their parents Onkel Markus and Tante Nicki, came to London for four days. And so did Mamy who came from Belgium especially for me.

I teamed up with Harper, George, Luca & Maximilian to host our joint birthday doo. We rented the function room in the Bermondsey Square Hotel. In total between all of us we had 120 guests of which almost 40 were young friends. Papa commented that this party might have been the biggest party of my life potentially only to be surpassed by my wedding. That is if I find a woman as nice and pretty as Maman.

The room was nicely decorated with lots of yellow baloons. Breakfast was served for the adults. An entertainer played and sang with us little people – but I also noticed that Papa seemed to enjoy himself singing and dancing.

There is no birthday party without a cake, or in our case one cake each. You might be aware that I am a train enthusiast. Maman baked an amazing train cake for me. I blew both lights on the cake. After the weekend my parents are putting me through cake withdrawal.

I also got so many generous presents. Extension sets for my train, a train station, a tunnel, a pirate ship, great new books. After so much good fun, good food and presents I can’t wait for my next birthday.

A lot of my friends are having their second birthday (and I am quite impatiently waiting for my own birthday later this month). This means a few things: firstly, there are a lot of parties to attend. Leila and Tristan celebrated in the Bermondsey Village Hall and Bibi had us for a Haloween party. I am a bit of a party animal. It is all about good company and most importantly good cake!

The approach of my second birthday also means that my first passport is about to expire. Is it not unbelievable how fast the time is flying. So we needed to take some passport photos. I am a good boy and I was always told that for picture I have to take out my dummy and smile. That is exactly what I did when we took the passport photos. But suddenly the rules of the game changed and smiling was not permitted. But in the end Maman managed to make a good picture. Luckily the new passport will be valid for five years.

I have been out and about again – this time for a weekend break to Frankfurt. We went to visit Dani & Andi in their new flat in the Frankfurter Hafen and Papa took the opportunity to take an extended jog on Sunday morning. But I am jumping ahead – let’s start at the beginning:

Our flight was delayed by about an hour – so I finally had time for my first ever visit to an airport lounge. Time passed quickly and onboard the plane I got my own seat – no more baby seatbelt.

Saturday morning had some unexpected surprise: snowfall. I quite liked it but I got the feeling Papa was much less enthusiastic, very strange that because normally he really enjoys the snow. My highlight of the day was Bitter & Zart: a chocolatier cum coffee shop which delivered the most amazing cakes.

On Sunday the weather remained cold but at least the sun showed its face – much to the relief of Papa. He disappeared in the morning to go for a run. We went to see him but Papa did not even stop when he saw me but at least he gave me a high-five. After the run Papa appeared pretty pleased with himself. It was his first marathon since I was born and also his fastest at 03:06:35.

I had a really good weekend in Frankfurt and very much enjoyed the time with Dani and Andi. They were really nice to me and I promised them to come back and see them again maybe next year in summer.