City sidewalks

If I've learned one thing about blogging, it is that you can't wait until you have the perfect collection of pictures to post or else you'll rarely get something up and online. So I'm going to let you, dear reader, put the pictures together in your own mind. The following photos were all taken within two hours of one another.

This first picture is a left-over from a challenge called "Windows" which I entered on Digital Photography Review. I'm fairly addicted to these challenges. In the end, I think I missed the deadline on this one, but since there is no daylight left when I leave work, I am forced to look for the light in the shop windows. And there is a lot going on there at this time of year! Year-end offerings for the adults...

German Christmas clothes

And enticing offerings for the children...

There are a lot of buskers out on the streets of Stuttgart braving the cold with their fragile instruments. This young woman was playing particularly well on Königstrasse down near the train station.

On Schlossplatz, where the Christmas market is first put up at the beginning of November - including a skating rink - there are several stands that sell Glühwein and assorted goodies for the after-work crowd. These blue hooded helpers seem appropriately dressed to sell their blue packages of nuts.

Am I blue?

A large clothing store on the main shopping drag has two life-size mannequins on either side of the entrance. I thrilled to have time to get a good shot of this shopper unconsciously assuming the pose of one wooded figure.

Jay Maisel would have loved this gesture

 Then it was time to go home and pick up my little girl, who was playing at a friend's after school. Little light rarely stops me from snapping away. At 1600 ISO, I was able to capture the most important features clearly enough. The rest blurs with action, adding a nice feeling to this shot.