Our city has its own professional children's puppet theatre.  It's got puppet masters who have trained as such in the Soviet era, its own building in the centre of town, and a very active programme with a number of new shows every season.  It's always seemed super cool and super unusual to me that children's puppet theatre is taken so seriously here, that "professional puppet master" can actually be a real job description, and that many families opt to take their kids to see the puppets...

Last year, when we were in the last throes of finishing off our house, I made a vow that on the next Christmas I would go into "pretty homemaker" mode.  I promised myself that I would have a triangle of advent candlesticks in every window, and that the apple tree in the back would be a mass of twinkling fairy lights.  I was going to have a big Christmas tree in Riga and another one in the country.  Oh, and choirs of angels singing all December, and a permanent freshly baked gingerbread...

Best thing about living in Riga is that it is a small, small pond.  Pretty much anyone who is anyone with half a brain and an ounce of creativity knows each other.  Also, as a Latvian who used to live in Australia, we used to act as "homestay" families to Latvian celebrities who travelled around the world doing concerts and lectures etc.  Sort of like if you were an Aussie living in an obscure place and having Michael Hutchence come to stay, because he's short on cash...

I'm finally back.  First off, I'd like a round of applause for Jem for keeping the home fires burning - not only in terms of keeping our children alive and relatively happy, but for building a whole lot of shelves in all the right places, and lastly - for keeping this blog going!  SO happy he took over posting about Riga life, I hope he is now a permanent addition to the hellolatvia crew....  so are you, Jem?  And by the way, wtf happened to our sleek, minimalist design??? The...

Every year we put together an advent calendar for the boys. This year's was inspired by the 30cm pieces of dowel lying around the house. Behold the advent mobile!! Minor flaw in the design I realised this morning....when the prize is taken from one of the boxes the whole mobile is unbalanced and almost collapses....doh! Luckily we have marbles lying around to even things back up again. ...

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My eldest son is a list man.  Like his mamma, he likes to write lists of jobs to do and tick them off as they get done.  Yesterday he came home from school with another lurgy, and luxuriously wrote the above list of things he could do at home to keep himself amused.  Notice the fact that of all the things on the list that have been ticked, "ly down" (sic) is not one of them.  (BTW., I know the list above may seem like a complete failure in terms of spelling for a 9 year old,...

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I have almost talked Jem into making regular photo posts on this blog.  It requires a bit of a rehaul of the site structure but otherwise not so difficult.  I've got as far as having him graciously provide me with this little photo essay of our local - Agenskalns market.  It is definitely one of the highlights of living in this part of Riga.  A big ornate red-brick building, it is no longer at its zenith.  I am expecting one day to wake up and read in the news that...

So this year Tiss started going to a children's Latvian folklore ensemble.  It's funny, but in some ways I think it was easier to educate your child in Latvian traditions when living in Australia - because participation in a folk dance group, a choir, Latvian language school was a must, the thing everybody did on the weekends - and a great emphasis was put on this cultural education in the Latvian diaspora. However, when you LIVE in Latvia, the country and culture are all around you, and...

 I ache. All over.  I've got muscles in my shoulders I never knew I had, and they are making me FEEL them this morning.  Reason is, because we finally cleared our backyard of junk yesterday.  A miniskip parked on the road, a wheelbarrow, some heavy-duty gloves, my husband and me.  Romantic, huh. Our backyard has been a huge tip full of building scraps since before we moved in. When we were building this house it turned out they had to demolish a lot more of it...