Dear Clara
This is a fun monthly letter about my life that I share with my pen pal who is also named Clara and lives all the way in Germany! Each time, my friend Clara also shares a letter with me, so I get to read all about the life of a little girl with the same name in Germany. I think it’s really cool – and hope you guys do too!
Oh and I get a little help from mommy when it comes to writing my letter, and my friend Clara’s mommy helps to translate my letter at the bottom of this post into German so my friend Clara can read it. You can drop in on her letter to me right here (which is translated into English at the bottom of her post).
Hi Clara! I’m excited to hear about your Christmas and can’t wait to share how mine went. Here’s how I described these photos when mom held them up for me so I could tell you about them:
“My advent presents! Mommy showed me Germany on the map. Thank you Clara for sending them. Thank you to your mommy and daddy too. My favorite things was the socks. And what else? The tissues!”
“Mommy and daddy made this pretty pretty tree. I like to touch the ornaments with one finger. We have to be so gentle. Burger looks at them but I can touch them with one finger. Mommy and daddy put bags and boxes under the tree and Santa fills them with presents when we are sleeping and dreaming. But I have to be a good girl and Burger has to be a good boy. Burger is a boy and a dog!”
“On Christmas I waked up and my presents were here. I got colorings (markers) and legos and a big green hat. Is that silly?”
“My kitchen! I asked Santa for eggs. And I asked Santa for ice cream. He got me lots of food for my kitchen. And a fridgerator. I love my eggs. They’re my favorite eggs in the whole world.”
“That’s Grammy and Tom Tom’s house. I see Ellen and Travis and Elsa and Grammy and Emanuel and Baby Ben and Aunt Katie and Aunt Kitty and Edison and Emily and Mommy and Clara. We got to open more presents there and eat lunchie. Grammy always has ice cream. We danced to Elmo too.”
“For dinner we had lots of food but it was real food and not pretend food for my kitchen. I see Emily and Todd and Grammy and Tom Tom and Martin and Mommy and who’s that? Aunt Carrie?”
“John’s giving me some yummy ice cream. We’re sharing!”
“That’s Emanuel and John reading with me. Emily was reading a story about trucks. I like those red socks. Maybe Santa will bring me some of those if I’m a good girl.”
“This is my family. I love Jakob and Olivia and Baby Ben and Emanuel and John… and Clara!”
“Buh-bye Clara from Germany! Happy New Year!”
xoxo,
Clara
____________________________________________________________
Here’s our Clara’s letter translated in German for her pen pal:
Hi Clara!
Ich bin schon so gespannt, von deinen Weihnachtserlebnissen zu hören und kann es gar nicht mehr erwarten, dir zu erzählen, wie es mir hier ergangen ist. Hier beschreibe ich dir die Fotos, die meine Mama dafür für mich ausgesucht hat.Mein Adventskalender: Meine Mama hat mir Deutschland auf der Landkarte gezeigt. Danke schön Clara, dass du mir diesen tollen Adventskalender gesendet hast. Danke auch an deine Mama und deinen Papa dafür. Mein liebstes Geschenk daraus waren die Strümpfe. Und was noch? Die Taschentücher! Mama und Papa haben diesen traumhaften Weihnachtsbaum geschmückt. Ich liebe es, die Anhänger mit einem Finger zu berühren. Da müssen wir nämlich ganz besonders vorsichtig sein. Mama und Papa haben Schachteln und Tüten unter den Baum gelegt und der Weihnachtsmann hat sie befüllt, während wir geschlafen haben. Aber dafür musste ich ein braves Mädchen sein und Burger ein braver Junge. Burger ist ein Junge und ein Hund. Am Weihnachtsmorgen bin ich aufgewacht und meine Geschenke waren da. Ich habe Stifte, Lego und einen grünen Hut bekommen. Ist das nicht lustig? Meine Küche: Ich habe den Weihnachtsmann um Eier und Eis für meine Spielküche gebeten. Er hat mir jede Menge Lebensmittel hierfür geschenkt. Und sogar einen Kühlschrank. Ich liebe meine Eier. Sie sind meine liebsten Eier auf der ganzen Welt. Hier sind wir in Omis und Tom Tom’s Haus. Ihr könnt Ellen und Travis und Elsa und Omi und Emanuel und Baby Ben und Aunt Katie und Aunt Kitty und Editson und Emily und Mami und Clara sehen. Wir haben noch mehr Geschenke geöffnet und haben zu Mittag gegessen. Omi hat immer Eiscreme. Wir haben außerdem zu Elmo getanzt. Zum Mittagessen hatten wir jede Menge leckeres Essen. Aber es war richtiges Essen, nicht nur Essen für meine Kinderküche. I sehe Emily und Todd und Grammy und Tom Tom und Martin und Mami und wer ist das? Tante Carrie? John gab mir etwas von seiner Eiscreme. Wir haben geteilt. Das sind Emanuel und John mit mir zusammen beim Lesen. Emily hat uns eine Geschichte über Lastwagen vorgelesen. Ich liebe solche roten Socken. Vielleicht bringt der Weihnachtsmann mir auch solche, wenn ich ein braves Mädchen bin. Das ist meine Familie. Ich liebe Jakob und Olivia und Baby Ben und Emanuel und John … und Clara. Buh-bye Clara aus Deutschland und ein frohes neues Jahr.
xoxo, Clara
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It’s so adorable to hear Clara’s side of the pictures and what she’s thinking!
aww, i want to find a penpal! Can you share the mechanics of finding and having a penpal?
Celia
She just contacted us (well, Clara’s mom Nina) and said that she thought it would be fun for our kids to be penpals and I jumped at the chance!
xo
s
Is that a new light fixture in the dining room? I don’t remember that being covering on the blog? (or maybe I missed it?)the little glimpse here has me very intrigued,I can’t wait to see more pictures.
:/ never mind, I just saw it in the post I missed last week…
No worries!
xo
s
We’ll be sharing those details tomorrow! Can’t wait.
xo
s
“They’re my favorite eggs in the whole world” haha She’s too cute!
Jenn
With Luck
Wow – what an impressing tree ! ! !
Did You know about the tradition of little advent presents?
I love the whole family being around during holidays.
Thanks for sharing Your special time, Melanie
Thanks Melanie! Yes, we love doing advent presents with Clara! Last year we added an ornament to the tree each day as we counted down and this year her friend from Germany sent that lovely little kit – Clara was so into it!
xo
s
How do you translate this? Do you know German? I know that google translate usually makes a lot of mistakes.
Just curious,
Kim
German Clara’s mom has a friend who does it for us! I send my letter and she sends it back all translated and ready for the post!
xo
s
I love this idea. I wish we could do it with our 2 year old.
love it! who wrote the german letter or translated it? what town is clara from? miss my home in germany, especially around christmas time!
German Clara’s mom has a friend who translates the letter for us! I send my letter and she sends it back all translated and ready for the post! As for the other Clara’s info, we don’t want to disclose anything, so it’s up to her mom over on her blog to reveal as much as she’d like about their location :)
xo
s
I’m curious about Santa’s gifts – do you really provide the boxes and bags? He always brings wrapped gifts to my house.at our neighbours he leaves only unwrapped, assembled toys.
We provide the boxes and bags and he fills them and leaves big things like a play kitchen out with a bow on it ;)
xo
s
So sweet! I really hope the two Claras get to meet one day!
How did you start/find Clara0′s pen pal? I have a three and five year old, they would love to do this.
German Clara’s mom wrote to us and had the idea and we loved it so we said “we’re in!”
Not sure how you could find someone – maybe posting about it on our facebook page to see if anyone from another are has children close to your kids’ ages?
xo
s
Is it just me, or do both Clara’s look a lot alike? They are both super cute little ladies!
It’s true! They’re like long lost cousins :)
xo
s
I secretly wonder what kind of an explosion of extra visitors the German Clara blog gets when there is a new letter :-) Must be enourmous !
Lots of love from Belgium,
Silke
How come I knew about YHLove but this is the first I’ve heard of YHLife! What have I been missing, how much reading do I have to do to catch up?! No wonder you two get no sleep keeping up two blogs plus everything else.
Happy 2013!!
Aw thanks Crystal! We have been blogging over here over a year, but just a few times a week, so hopefully it won’t take you tooooo long to go back through if you’d like :)
xo
s
It was very interesting to read about German Clara’s Christmas. I thought people decorating their tree on Christmas Eve only happened in the movies. I’m amazed they put real candles on their tree! That’s a lot of work, but SO BEAUTIFUL.
I love this idea.
Super random question. Did you make your own baby food for Clara?
Yes, in a way. We followed a system called Baby Led Weaning where you go straight to solids with your child (aka no purees). So we never made our own baby food in the sense that we were blending our own traditional baby food. But we steamed the veggies, cooked the pasta, cut up the fruit, etc that we started Clara on. You can read more about it in this article we wrote for BabyCenter: http://blogs.babycenter.com/life_and_home/our-take-on-baby-led-weaning/
-John
Hi Sweetie,
thanx for sharing the most wonderful time with us.
Did you know theres a big difference on Xmas, the german Clara did not tell you ?
Here in Germany, Santa is called the “Weihnachtsmann” and he comes at the 24th . he visits most of the german kids in the afternoon or early evening, after they come home from the church where they heard about the wonder of Jesus birth & sang a lot of christmas songs like “Holy Night”.
You know, this have to be this way. This world is sooooo big, full of kids waiting for him, so he needs a lot of time to get to all of them. I´m sure, thats the reason, why Santa comes to you at night or in the early morning !!
Gteetings from Berlin/Germany,
Maren & Max (8)
So sweet! I love that!
xo
s
I was astounded at your German ability (I’m a German teacher)! :) Google translator is a joke when it comes to that sort of thing. How wonderful that you are exposing Clara to other cultures. You should visit someday. Germany is an amazing country.
I wish I was the translator! A friend of German Clara’s mom is the one who translates. She’s awesome!
xo
s
I took German all through middle and high school and just realized how little I can still read and understand. I’ve just made a New Years + one week resolution to read German Clara’s mom’s blog to let it all come back to me! The translated letters are a good start :)
What a fun idea to have a pen pal for Clara! I especially love the fact that she’s from Germany as well. ;)
And I agree, you should come and visit Germany! I would show you around Bremen.
xo’s!
Vanessa
I thought I’d take a minute to congratulate you guys on your new lighting line!! I saw it the other day while on another blog and just kept forgetting to drop with a big ol “WAY TO GO GUYS”!!!!!!
XO
Aw thanks so much!
xo
s
I thought I’d take a minute to congradulate you guys on your new lighting line!! I saw it the other day while on another blog and just kept forgetting to drop with a big il “WAY TO GO GUYS”!!!!!
XO
oopsie–sorry about that–I accidently double sent-
No worries :)
xo
s
It is beautiful!Thanks a lot!:))