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. ...