2007 - a review

Since this blog is nearing its first birthday, I thought a review of 2007 would save me the trouble of reviewing the first blog year ;-)

One event which hit us pretty hard in January was Hurricane Kyrill, which damaged our roof. The roofer took his sweet time to do the repairs, but fortunately this was covered by our insurance company. January did have its upside though, my sister Fiona had her third boy, Oran, who has proved to be a most agreeable little chap.

In February we attended an assortment of Fasching events including the TraBü Ball and Albertus Saal Prunksitzung. I like to think that I'm well integrated into German society because I can withstand such punishment to my sense of humour ;-)

Skiing was not a family option this year due to pregnancy, but I did manage to get in a weekend with my father in Mayrhofen in March, which was fun. Then over Easter we visited Amsterdam with Hans-Günther, Tina and some other Kurpfälzer Trabanten. This was a lot of fun up to the train home, when Liam got sick after a dodgy sausage. Suffice to say he used up 4 sets of clothing on the way home, and Tina never asked for the towel back which we wrapped him in for the last hour.

Heike and Liam celebrated their birthdays in April. Liam had taken possession of his main present of a Laufrad early, but it was only by about his birthday that he really began to master it. Google "Youtube Liam Laufrad" to find video evidence of his antics.

By the time summer came around Heike was not enjoying the heat. So there was relief as well as joy when Rosalie arrived on the 16th July. The high point of this year for us as well as the traffic on this website.

In August Corina and Christoph got married, and over various weekends Doireann, Aedamair and my parents visited us. Then, after only six weeks, Rosalie's status of youngest grandchild was usurped by Alannah Conneely.

The last few weeks have been pretty busy -we were over in Dublin at the end of November for my 20-year school reunion, then two weeks later the whole Cassidy clan descended on Heidelberg for Rosalie's christening. Then Xmas, which was great for the kids, Liam got the hang of the whole present-opening thing pretty quickly.

These are just the highlights, I encourage you to trawl through the blog for further tidbits.

We wish you all a happy New Year!

Macartan, Heike, Liam and Rosalie

Rosalie's Christening

From Rosalie's Chr...

Rosalie celebrated her christening last Sunday, and I finally got around to posting some pictures to the Picasa Gallery today, 6 days later. I am a miserable excuse for a parent ;-)

The whole weekend was great, especially as our normal sleepy existence was spiced up by house guests from Dublin, London, Erlangen and Barcelona. In the end 6 extra children, 7 extra adults and one extra dog came to stay. This was all too much for my parents, they wisely decided to stay at the nearby Hotel Heidelberg.

Thanks to all who turned up to help Rosalie celebrate, not least her Irish aunts and cousins who travelled so far. Also thanks to Ralf, who spent his time photographing anything that moved, as Heike and I didn't get much time to use our camera much.

Do you know this bird?

From A Peahen who ...

This peahen found her way into our garden a few days ago, and seems to have made herself at home. And yes, those piles on the wall are hers. I'm not sure how to discourage her from this behaviour (short of letting Electra into the garden at the same time, and the results of that might be even messier).
Anyone have any advice on how to move on vagrants?

School Reunion

I've just uploaded my photos of the 20-year reunion from the St. Michael's class of '87, they are to be found in full here. The statistics were good, 50 turned up from the year (of originally 90) and 20 from our class of 30.
I had a great time, and enjoyed catching up with all my old classmates, most of whom I hadn't seen at all in the intervening 20 years. As described in a previous blog post, they have all gone on to lead productive lives, and all seemed in good form.
One culture shock for me were the interminable speeches made by officers of the Past Pupils Union, blathering on about rugby and African missions. Those guys need to stop drinking the Holy Ghost Kool-Aid.