A Duesseldorf German Birthday

This post is going to be a story, filled with a few crafty ideas too, with a 'moral' at the end so if you're not interested in the story, scroll down to find out why this story's relevant!

Well, as most of you will know, I'm currently studying in Germany and today my dad's arriving to visit. As it was his birthday two weeks ago, he's also expecting presents! Now, being in Germany made present buying a little more complicated. I couldn't buy clothes because they'd be difficult to take back if he didn't like them. I obviously can't buy DVDs because a) they're so ridiculously expensive and b) his command of German is nowhere near good enough to sit through a whole film! So as he spent some time working out here in the 90s I decided to do a 'Duesseldorf German Birthday'. What that means is that all of the presents will be things that Germany is famous for, german oddities and german-themed presents.

This is a picture of all of the presents before they were wrapped.

First I'm going to give a quick overview of the presents and how they fit into the theme. And then I'm going to give a little description about how I presented it all (pun intended!).

So let's start with the most obvious and work clockwise!

• Haribo - really doesn't need any explanation.
• The 'Muffins' box, Muffin Glasur, Candles and 2 Pots of Decorations - obviously I'm not gifting him a cupcake mix, decorations and candles so if you look below, you'll find out how they came together!
• Curry Sauce - if you've heard anything about Germany it's probably about sausages. Am I right? In little kiosks, wagons and snack bars all over Germany, you can buy something called 'Currywurst' which is just a sausage, typically something like a frankfurter, with curry sauce on top. I thought that a 'German Birthday' wasn't complete without some curry sauce to take home so I had to include some.
• A German Newspaper - to see just how much German my dad could remember I also bought a German newspaper from the actual date of his birthday. It's also nice to be able to look back in the future and see what was happening on your birthday so a bit of a double win there.
• A German Flag - again, doesn't really need an explanation.
• Axe -  this one is part of the German oddities section. Whilst you might recognise the canister, you probably won't recognise the name. In France and Germany, Lynx is sold under the name of Axe. As my dad does actually use Lynx, I thought he might appreciate a can of Axe, and it's also Anti-Hangover which is essential!
• A Newspaper, A Sponge, 2 Jars and A Potato - now these are part of the presentation so you'll have to scroll down to find out what I did with these.
• A Jar of Brown Stuff - this is a jar of German mustard, but it's not just standard mustard as you can see from the colour, it's a jar of Loewensenf Duessi. Loewensenf is a brand from Duesseldorf and Duessi refers to the flavour, named after Duesseldorf, which is sweet with chillies.
• 3 Painted Eggs - another German oddity. In German supermarkets you can buy pre-boiled eggs which are also painted. I have yet to work out why, other than laziness, that someone would buy a pre-boiled (and painted) egg however!
• A Lebkuchen - if you've ever wandered around a German Christmas Market in Germany or Britain, you will have seen these hanging up. They're a spiced cake/cookie which are shaped (usually as hearts) and then decorated with cute sayings. This one says 'Sparrow, you are lovely', with Sparrow as a term of endearment not an actual Sparrow obviously. Given the slightly silly saying, you might guess that Lebkuchen are pretty hard to find in the middle of May in Germany!
• The Blue Card and Envelope - again, one for presentation that you'll have to scroll down for!
• A Bottle of Fizzy Water - if you've ever spent time in Germany you will have found out, probably the hard way, like me, that Germans have a tendency to drink fizzy water as opposed to still. Another thing that I thought just had to be included.
• Killepitsch - this is a local liquor tasting of herbs and berries. Absolutely disgusting but it obviously has to be in the mix!
• Remoulade - now this stuff is delicious. It is basically a mayonnaise with some mixed herbs in, and although originally created in France, it is particularly common in Germany. My favourite use of it is for egg sandwiches! Yum!
• Chocolate - couldn't cover Germany without chocolate. This is from a company called Arko which is German. The chocolate I chose for my dad was milk chocolate covered Almond Flakes - pretty much a nutty Magnum (without the ice cream!).

Something I also plan to do is to take him around the town, show him the interesting places, and, what I suspect he's most looking forward to, is taking him to some pubs for the most famous German export, beer! For that I also made him a little 'voucher' to put in his card for a beer from me in town!

Now onto the presentation. I really wanted to have a go at potato stamps since I haven't done that since I was a kid. So I decided to use the blue paint to make pretty heart stamped newspaper which I then used to wrap the presents. The finished bunch of presents looked like this.

You can also see that the card's already finished in this picture. For the card I made a bunch of balloons out of newspaper. I coloured them all in different colours, stuck them on and then added all the appropriate messages. The picture below shows my bunch of balloons!

Finally, here's a picture of the finished cakes, I think you'll agree that they look pretty funky!

Well I realise that may not have been the most exciting or relevant post for all of you but before I finish with that and move onto the point, I would just like to say Happy Birthday to my Dad!

So, why did I bore you all with a story about a Duesseldorf birthday? My point in sharing this was to illustrate the thinking outside the box principle. If you have a birthday or anniversary coming up, instead of buying something easy like a DVD, get creative (I know, I say that every week but I'm just trying to reinforce it!). It's always nice to receive presents where it's clear that a little more thought and effort has been put in. So make some pretty cupcakes and buy them something outside the box. Maybe even think of a theme and buy things around that idea? Or expand your idea, if you're planning on buying a DVD, turn it into a movie night set (I will do a post about that in the future!). You could even make personalised wrapping paper. You don't have to use newspaper, you could use brown postal paper (which you can usually buy from the post office) and decorate with potato stamps. As you make the potato stamp yourself, it also means that you can put any picture that you want onto the stamp. I went with a simple heart shape but you could cut out the person's name, a smiley face, a special picture, really anything that you think you can cut into a potato! For an idea of how to do it, the picture below shows the heart stamp that I used, and the picture below that shows the top side of the stamp (and paint and subsequent mess) where I cut two triangles out to make a handle!

If you're really observant, you'll notice that I also had a sponge in my original picture which I used to make another heart shaped stamp. For detail's sake the pictures below show my heart stamp and all of my 'wrapping paper' drying. The red hearts were made with the sponge stamp and the blue with the potato stamp.

Making funky birthday presents doesn't have to be difficult so get experimenting and like always, if you try something, tell me at lovefromlila@hotmail.com.

Love from lila xx