alison: mein geburtstag.

so, i'm officially 23 years old. it sounds strangely old. i remember when i used to think...in 2000, i will be 15 years old. last saturday was my birthday. i woke up to presents from nils, sabine, and the boys and some singing of happy birthday. in the middle of the day, i took it easy and enjoyed the beautiful weather. in the evening, i played with max and tom and we made my birthday cake. it was delicious. i was impressed with us. it was chocolate with a peanut butter layer between and with chocolate frosting. i decided the germans needed a real american cake. none of this cake covered with fruit. a few of my friends from the states called to wish a happy birthday...one of them called while i was sleeping. apparently i answered, had a conversation, and went back to sleep. i don't remember it at all. oops. i feel bad about that one. on sunday morning, i went with the boys to the zoo, so that sabine would have some peace while she was getting things ready for sunday evening. on sunday evening, i had a german birthday party. nils and sabine let me invite over my friends for grilling. some friends from rowing and from german class were here, and sabine surprised me by inviting other people as well. isabel, peter, and moritz came. the peters, (the neighbors from down the street with 6 year old twins also came - all 6 of them), and sabine's sister brigitte. my friends finally saw where i live and met the family that i've been with the whole year...and the family finally saw the friends i've made. max turned on the charm, but tom was having a rough night. there were too many new people around for him. later in the night when some people started leaving, he was a bit more comfortable. one time max when racing down the driveway, and i chased him and picked him up to carry him in because he had on socks and his underpants/undershirt. he was laughing and then he suddenly uses his favorite choice word learned in kindergarten. he starts laughing and puts on the million dollar smile that is going to get him both into and out of a lot of trouble in the future. i stopped, we had a little chat, and several of my friends turned around to watch and laugh (they kept commenting on what a little mother i was). whenever max, tom, or mortiz needed anything they would say alison, alison, alison. it was cute. i got some birthday presents, ate bratwurst, and hung out with my friends - it was a good night. sabine gave a little speech about how it had been a great 11 months, then nils said i needed to give one in german. i politely declined...in german. i think that evening was really the first time he heard me use german. sabine occasionally hears it when i am speaking with the friends of max and tom, but nils tends not to be around at those times. at home, i speak only english. he said he was glad to see a return on his investment of putting me in class for three months. haha. the week was a fairly normal one, and i can't even remember now exactly what we did. friday afternoon, we tried our first tennis lesson. we aren't andre agassi (or maybe i should say boris becker) just yet, and they preferred the slide in the corner to the lesson, but hopefully that will improve with time. max started running a fever friday afternoon which didn't particularly help things. friday evening was the strassenfest (street party). all the neighbors gathered to grill out and hang out. it was really nice even though the weather wasn't perfect. it was clear that max didn't feel well when he asked to go to bed at 9pm. tom, on the other hand, was in top shape. he was having a really great night and kept everyone laughing until he went to bed around 11 pm. he kept telling me, "ich bin grumpy" (i am grumpy), and then he would start laughing. we did a lot of playing, he ate a lot of potato chips, and we took some silly photos. saturday, i did a bit of tourist shopping and bought a few tshirts, paintings, and a cookbook. later in the afternoon, i went for a run. then saturday evening was the schlossbeleuchtung. the castle lightening. the actual lighting of the castle is fairly lame. they shoot of one firework, and then there are red lights on the castle for about 5 minutes. when that is finally complete, they have a good fireworks show. since i didn't get my july 4th fireworks fix, i definitely wanted to go. my friend, ahmet, went along with me, and then we met our other friends in town. yesterday, i ate lunch with my german teacher, ana. she leaves for the states for two months on saturday. this means, yesterday was the last time that i will see her until who knows when. time is quickly winding down. i can't quite believe it. i'm beginning to get sad as i realize i am doing certain things and seeing certain people for the last time. a year is so long and so short all at the same time. these are all birthday party photos. i'll let you guess who is a rower and who comes from german class:

marieke und andy.