Diana Elle Blog

These past two weeks have been cool. I've really enjoyed spending time with Pablo's family. Living in Fort Mill we haven't really visited Charlotte city center, but my mom arrives tomorrow evening and it will be her first time visiting so I will take advantage and take her sightseeing. I haven't been able to get on the computer much, which is always a good thing, no complaints, but I took time out of a lazy evening to write-up this post with five things I'm happy about even if three are from our Christmas eve. FAMILY OUTINGS We went twice to the movies, we watched Ted 2 the first time, and we left the house without telling the kids, Avi got so mad she locked herself in the room, when we got back she told me not to ever go to the movies without her ever again in my life. so the next time we went I made sure to let her know and asked her if she'd like to accompany us to see Star Wars.. she was super excited and had fun. . CONCORD MILLS OUTLETS ...

I am currently on my way to Charlotte, and as we say Goodbye to Hamburg (until next year) I decided I would join in with my Expat Bloggers group-we have a special treat for our readers. Today I am going to share a Christmas Card from Hamburg. We were able to go to a Christmas Market last weekend and I took some lovely pictures to create a cute postcard for you! There are a ton of Christmas markets in and around Hamburg if you happen to be here during this time of year make sure to go to at least three different ones, most won't disappoint.. I also recommend visiting the main one at city hall, as there is a Santa flying with his sleigh at a certain hour, pretty cool! Check out some of the awesome Christmas cards from my expat blogging group : Christmas card from Krakow, Poland - The Twisted Red LadyBug Christmas card from Wroclaw,  Poland - Kielbasa Stories Christmas card from Hamburg, Germany  - Diana Elle Blog Christmas Card from Melbourne Aus...

Saturday Our last full weekend in Hamburg and we needed to take advantage of it, forget going to Luneburg's weihnachtsmarkt, or to the one at the rathaus with some mommy friends. Instead, we go to the mall we usually frequent to look for sweets, something special for our nieces/nephews, and a movie for movie night. They have special events at the mall during the month of December and we got to see an all man's choir singing sailor (and Christmas) songs. We took a break during the shopping to go home and eat, I made us a delicious late lunch/early dinner.  Tortillas, shrimp, bacon, cream and chipotle is all you need, but I added a can of mushrooms to help stuff the tacos. Then we went back to the mall to continue shopping, When we came home we watched the movie we had just bought, avi had gone to bed right after since it was kind of late. I took advantage and took some pictures of the little layout she did for Nikolaus. She left him milk and cookies and a drawing sayi...

From one house to another, with food and more food, spending Christmas with the family can be a little hectic but we do it anyways. T his year we spent Christmas Eve with my family and Christmas Day with Pablo's family. We had a late lunch at Pablos parents house and then we were dropped off at my sisters place so we could go together to my grandma's house.  It was over two years since I had seen everyone so we had a really nice re encounter. The first part of Christmas Eve was spent with my mom's family, a fter spending some time with family members we hadn't seen in over two years (but we would be seeing again in a couple of days for my birthday!) we took off to my aunts house to meet up with my dad's side of the family.  Overall, we had a great evening, fun for the kids! although, my little sister got a little upset that we didn't wait for her to break the pinata, after all, she's one of the young cousins. We waited for midnight...

Happy Holidays! I hope y’all had a wonderful time!   We got to spend Christmas eve with our friends Maria & Alex. They were nice enough to host, we made turkey and they treated us to some lovely dinner, gifts & the kids got to play together. Here are some crappy  blurry phone pictures For my birthday I plan on going ice skating :) maybe I will post some of those pics, for sure you can find them on my instagram/twitter. For New Years Eve, I have invited my friend Rachel over, will cook dinner and then time for some fireworks.  The fireworks here are something else, the Germans love gigantic firecrackers, they are really loud! but a soon as 12 am hits, everything lights up.. last year I got to see this first hand from a hospital window since I had to get my appendix removed. but this year will be better, at least I'll be with my loved ones. Until later,  Diana.

I am so excited that it is almost Christmas, this will be our second year celebrating it in Hamburg. Christmas in Germany is fun, festive, traditional and cold.  Being our second year here we are still not fully aware of how Germans do Christmas, but there are some things I have noticed: Christmas Tree Our "landlords" gifted us a real Christmas tree last year, and they will again this year. The bad thing about this, in my opinion, is that Germans generally put it up and decorate it a day before (or on) Christmas eve. Totally not what we're used to (putting it up at the beginning of the month or end of November) but it's okay, we don't mind. Weihnachtsmarkt Another cool thing about the holidays in Germany are the Christmas markets. They sell food, hot chocolate, glühwein, and a lot of hand crafted Christmas decorations. Every "Weihnachtsmarkt" is decorated with lights, Christmas trees and other ornaments, making it look very festive. :) S...