Autumn entertainment

Steen's parents and his brother, Christian, were here this weekend to celebrate Nicholas's first birthday (which is on Thursday). As always, we had a great time with them. We visited a traditional Swedish Christmas market in a small town north of here, where we filled up on free tastes of Christmas sausage, candy, cheeses and fudge.


We also spent part of the weekend decorating for Halloween. Matthew and Lucas were in charge of the decorating...




and then they utilized their Bedstefar's expertise with a knife to carve their pumpkins.



Nicholas even got in on the Halloween fun.




Nicholas got to open his first birthday presents, taking great joy in ripping the paper into tiny pieces. He immediately fell in love with this car he received from his Aunt Susanne and Uncle Jesper. It's now the first thing he plays with in the morning.




He also got a way-cool garage from Steen's parents and Christian, as well as a hammer and a board with kid-safe wooden "nails".




It's always a pleasure for us to have family visiting... and the boys obviously enjoy all the extra attention too.

Now we're looking forward to the arrival of mom and dad in a few days!!!

I don't have time to look at you, mom! We're shopping!

Sunrise from our bedroom window today

The long and winding road

I want to start by wishing my cousin Trish and her husband Brian a huge, heartfelt congratulations on the arrival of their beautiful little girl, Kylie! As you can see from their blog, she is a heart-stopping beauty. I can't wait to meet her! Or Zoe, or A.J., or Sophia! Or anyone who is now part of our family but I haven't yet met!

This past weekend, the long-awaited link between the two major highways north of Stockholm opened. The link saves Steen fifteen minutes in commuting time if he goes straight from here to work or vice versa. I tell you all of this relatively irrelevant information because prior to the grand opening, the highway link was opened for a few hours to anyone who wished (for whatever reason) to take a walk along it. Guess what we did?





The weekend before that we spent with our Danish family. Steen's sister, Susanne, turned the magic 3-0, so we joined her for the celebration. Despite my attempt to lose all of our passports and the ensuing race around Sweden to find them again, we had the chance to see Susanne and Jesper's beautiful new home for the first time. We generally had a great time hanging out in northern Zealand.

Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures from the party, but perhaps Susanne and Jesper will send me some and then I can post a few?


Here's a photo of the boys during Nicholas's very first adventure into a McDonald's playland. He absolutely loved it... especially since he got to hang out with his revered big brothers...

The beauty of being a "soccer mom"

A few weeks ago, I was lucky enough to spend four wonderful days in the US and watch as my cousin, Jessie, and her forever-after man, Will, exchanged their vows in front of God, family and friends.

The ceremony was beautiful, the bride was gorgeous, the groom shone with pride, and the reception was a delight.


Jessie, Jeff Jr. and Bradley were the first babies I ever held. I still remember the honor of holding them, and my wonder at the faith their mothers had that I wouldn't drop them or smother them or some other horrible thing. I remember marvelling at their tiny fingers and begging to give them a bottle. How can Jessie, that little baby I was holding just a little while ago, already be married? Such thoughts must have been going through my Unle Joe and Aunt Alice's heads as well, but I could see from the looks on their faces how proud they were of their "little" girl.


Will is a great addition to our family. He's jumped into the inherent craziness that "is" our family with both feet and without a backward glance. I love his sense of humor and the way he's willing to give an honest opinion. Welcome to the family, Will! (By the way, I was never, ever in that room! I don't know what you or Jessie are talking about! Melons on the pillows? Balloons in the toilet??? Who would ever do such a thing?)

As a married person, attending a wedding is always a special event for me. Not only do I get to witness the happiness and innocence of the couple, but I also enjoy the opportunity to recall exactly what it was that Steen and I promised each other so many years ago. When I think back on who we were then -- the thoughts, dreams, hopes and expectations of that young couple smiling so expectantly as Father Sherry led them through the ceremony -- I treasure how immature and gung-ho we were. I enjoy weddings at least in part because they allow me to recall exactly how I felt the day I wed my husband and how I want to feel about him for the rest of my life. Those thoughts are too easily lost in the daily ups and downs.

Like today. Today, my sweet sister-in-law, Susanne, turned 30. I really hope it was a terrific, fun-filled day for her. We'll be celebrating with her this weekend and I can't wait!!!!


However, for me, today has been one of those days where I just felt like crumpling into a quivering heap on the bathroom floor, something like a cup of Jell-o that's been dumped out. The day itself went ok. I'm currently enjoying a week of involuntary single motherhood, as my husband is hanging out at some "very important" surgical conference halfway around the world (and in another hemisphere!). Therefore, I (along with Nicholas) took Matt and Luke to school in the morning, picked them up in the afternoon, and then we managed to get an hour or so of playing (or reading, in Matthew's case) in the sun before I started driving them around in my unmarked taxi to their various activities.


Here Nick is giving Lucas a kiss (notice the sun is really shining!). They are precious, these first wet, slobbery kisses.



But the fun didn't really start until we got home tonight. Matthew and Lucas were so sweet, volunteering to set the table for the three of us while I fed Nicholas his dinner. The lovely tingle of a five-kroner Ikea glass crashing to the floor was the first sign that it was going to be a long evening. I think Ikea makes its glasses so that they purposely shatter into five-thousand little pieces as payback for the incredibly low price. I found glass shards across the kitchen floor, under the table and even on the counter! Matthew kindly fed Nick his dinner while I cleaned up the kitchen.


Within five minutes of the glass crash, Matthew announced "Nicholas is pooping!" We always know when this event is underway, because Nicholas gets a far-away look in his eyes and he makes the biggest smile. Anyway, no biggie right? Wrong. This mom took the poopie-diaper-boy out to the changing table and guess what she found? That's right... the lovely stuff was smeared from his toes to his neck, and then the fun-loving little boy managed to smear it all over the changing table and my shirt. Great imagery, right? As you can see, he has previously been caught in the act of (unsuccessfully) trying to learn how to use toilet paper.



Up to the bathroom we went. Do you know that you shouldn't place a poop-covered little boy over the shower drain if you want to wash him off? Well, I know that now. It's a lesson that is ingrained on my brain forever, since I got to clean up the flood I created in the bathroom while trying to clean my little boy.

Ah well, the adventures of a soccer mom, as Susanne pointed out the other day. Not really who I set out to be or what I set out to do, but a smiles on any one of my little boys' faces make every second worthwhile.



Here our usually smiley Nicholas is angry that I won't let him have the camera. Anything with buttons has got to be fun!

Drumming along

Those of you who know me well, know why I haven't been around in a while. For those of you who don't, well, I can't tell you yet!

Uncle Joe, don't worry. You'll be discussed in the blog ASAP. I'm still awaiting the wedding photos from my sources.

For the time being, I'm happy to share some great video of the newest X-Factor talent. Watch out, Simon Cowell, this kid will blow you away! Pay close attention to his enthusiasm. He rocks!



Or maybe he's going to be into hammers, like his granddad? (note that he is already well aware of a hammer's many uses)

Eight in 2008

One cool thing about Lucas's birthday is that it always matches the year, i.e. he turns 8 in 2008, will turn 20 in 2020, and so on. I know, I know. There are millions of kids who were also born in 2000, but still, I think it's pretty special (maybe because it helps me to remember how old he happens to be at any given moment.)

Last week we celebrated his eight birthday with gifts, cake, balloons and presents. He asked the day before whether we had called his teacher to tell her he would like the day off -- in Lucas's world, no one should be forced to attend school on such a special day. We had to disappoint him on that one, but the class took a field trip so it wasn't all hard work that day.

Earlier this week, Lucas impressed me by bringing home his first real chapter book from school, and reading all 140 pages in a single day. Being of the somewhat suspicious sort, I wondered whether he had really understood everything he read, so I sat him down and asked him a few questions from the book and had him read several pages to me. To my delight, he answered every question correctly and read without much trouble whatsoever. How this huge development happened over the summer, I have no idea. Perhaps it was the brain-building power of Italian pasta?

Matthew has started fifth grade with all the gusto he usually shows for school, with an added dash of excitement because he is now in the school's final class. He is serving as a crossing guard this year (so very proud of his neon orange cape with color-enhancing reflecting stripes when he dons it in the mornings).

Both boys will be doing judo and tennis this year, and Matthew will start on the swim team. In other words, The M&N (mom and Nicholas) taxi service will launch this afternoon and run basically non-stop through Christmas.

Nicholas is advancing by leaps and bounds -- literally. A month ago he couldn't go from laying to sitting by himself. Today he is pulling himself up onto the edges of furniture and cruising around from couch to table to windowsill to adult pantlegs to drawers, and standing for a few seconds without support. He is also rearranging my cupboards on a daily basis and it's all I can do to throw everything back in haphazardly before catching him in the next cabinet.

But he makes up for it all with his smiles and his emerging sense of humor. I mean, doesn't this just melt your heart?