To the Ugly Lady in Fakta.

Dear Ugly Lady at Fakta who told me not to yell at my son,
(and by the way that was NOWHERE NEAR a yell)

If there are children unfortunate enough to have you as a mother I hope they throw a huge tempertantrum the next time you are in a store. Then I hope they have grandchildren that throw huge tempertantrums every time they see you. I hope they scream and flop on the floor. I hope they slobber and yell. I hope they kick and flail about. Then I hope someone as all knowing as YOU shows up and give you their ever-so-insightful opinion on the matter.

I forgive you. I'm sure you are just bitter at being stuck in Denmark indefinitely. Enjoy your grocery shopping and guess what - In America bread is only 97 cents, shopping bags are free, and these things called "chocolate chips" exist but you'll never get them - so HA.

And to the man who threw a little fit in the Fakta parking lot because I went out the wrong way: GET OVER IT!!! Yes, sicking my tongue out at you may have been immature but the look on your face made me slightly happier. And for you guess what...? In America, gas is $3.50 a gallon and you could buy three nice cars for the same price as your one ugly, rusty one.

I never even shop at Fakta (grocery store). I just wanted one little thing which I didn't even find. Needless to say I won't be returning to Fakta. I hope Fakta burns to the ground in the middle of the night.

I wonder if I have free speech here? I'm going to lay down...

Fabric Store

I was at the fabric store (will explain why later...). At the fabric store there is a play area with a slide. It was time to go home and I told Scotty that he had five more "slides" down. Then he tells me "No, Million more". Then he takes his hand and pretends to take things off his shirt and thrown them on the ground. So hes grabbing at his shirt and throwing invisible things to the ground. He does this over and over and then tells me he is starting over and he put back all the turns he already had. I laughed so hard!!

I've been making the girls Halloween costumes the last few days, hence the reason for me being in a fabric store. ...and here is where I publicly thank Jill for giving me several detailed sewing lessons. :) I wouldn't have even been able to get the bobbin started by myself. **Jill, Thank you very much for your help. I know you are moving back to England in a week :( and you have 800 things to do, but I'm very appreciative of your help! ...And I'm not happy you are moving. :(**

My mom has always sewn any Halloween costumes I've requested and if I was in the States I would have had her do it. Actually I would have just gone to Walmart and chosen from the 14 Harry Potter costumes on their shelves. But now that I've been left on my own in a foreign country I had to do it myself... and as I was wandering around aimlessly in a Danish fabric store I realized it would have been easier to learn how to sew in America where the patterns and instructions are in English.

They don't even have Halloween here. They just have a party at school. No trick or treating or candy stuff. Halloween is more of a "scare each other" holiday than a "candy" holiday. I think that's why I'm going to so much trouble for their costumes - out of guilt for them missing traditional Halloween fun. I think that makes me a good mom right? :) Either way, my kids think I'm cool for sewing them myself, but truth be told if I would have thought about it I would have had my mom sew the costumes when she was here a few weeks ago.

Andrea

Andrea is currently my favorite child. :) She doesn't argue with me. She smiles when she sees me. She doesn't yell or scream. She will stay where I put her. She doesn't complain. I don't have to make her lunch. She doesn't talk back. She listens intently to everything I say.

Yep, she's my favorite... :)

Home from Italy

Here's Andrea's picture as DEMANDED by Nana... will get to more Italy pictures soon enough.

It has been hard to recover from our last trip. I've finally caught up with laundry and we have enough food in the house to eat after three trips to the various grocery stores around town. Even Andrea slept for two days straight after we got home.

I make three to do lists every day of things I can't forget to do... and I end up just losing each list. If I lose a to-do list does it mean I don't have "to-do" it? I'm on my fourth "to-do" list today but can only remember four of the things that were on the previous three lists. Oh well, I did buy milk, so at least I can consider the day a success. Oh, and I also translated my way through Danish websites to find AND purchase my kids school pictures!! Felt quite proud after I was done...

So Italy... It was interesting. With four kids I wasn't a fan of the skinny one way streets, so called "sidewalks", and the scooters zipping around everywhere. The big cities we were in seemed run down and cramped, but I think that's alot due to the ancient-ness of the towns in general though. I'm sure smaller hill side towns are quite pretty. : )

The Vatacain was big and the HUGE wall around it was interesting, the Sistine Chapel was impressive... even the curtains were painted on the walls. We saw the Uffizi gallery and I know now that Michaelangelo's David statue is NOT in the Uffizi gallery (despite looking for it for two hours). I think we saw lots of famous paintings though because most were hading behind glass and had their own humidifier thingys. We aren't too big on art though... so I can't tell you what we saw. : ) A picture of two little angel kids looked familiar though.

As I mentioned before, the Leaning Tower of Pisa was my favorite. How "un-sophisticated" is that?! I just think it's hilarious that it's leaning so much! We even stopped by there again on our way back home. ...We started in Pisa, took a train to Rome, took a train to Florence, then took a train back to Pisa and had a "layover" there until our flight left that night. Lots of trains... Some fast, some not-so-fast.

Andrea did great. She was a wonderful little traveler and made us lots of friends along the way. On both flights she just ate and slept... no crying or being fussy at all. Scotty did well too - he had lots of things to amuse him throughout the whole trip and ice cream every day helped. Michaela and Sierra, well... they are seasoned world travelers now so they know the routine. Look at the boring stuff nicely and an Ice Cream and Playground will follow. There was even a few times we got a sincere "Wow" from Michaela, which to those of you who know 10 years olds... a genuine "wow" is a big deal! Pizza and Ice Cream every day. Ice Cream was super yummy and a real treat since I don't like the Ice Cream here in Denmark... Pizza I could do without for a while now. :)

So, no offense to Europe, but I'm done seeing it. We'll make sure to fit in Sweden (I want to go to the Arctic Circle) and I'd like to go back to the Effiel Tower for a few days... Czech Republic is supposed to be nice... Perhaps Iceland (Hilde's idea), China, South Africa (Ingrid's idea)... Faeroe Islands sound fun too. Any suggestions? :)

In Italy!!

Hi Everyone...!

We are in Italy now and having a wonderful time! We've seen/climbed the Leaning Tower of Pisa which was SO LEANING!! It was my favorite so far. : ) We have been here in Rome for the last three days and we are leaving for Florence tomorrow. Lots of sun and warmth so we are happy to be wearing shorts! YAY

It's been great fun to watch people watch all six of us go by go by. We get lots of comments and "Are they ALL yours?" : ) Kids are all traveling well too... they are used to it and Andrea has learned well... : ) Our big family gets us special discounts at restaurants, skipping security lines, seats on trains, hotel suites, and extra large scoops of ice cream. : ) Everyone loves our kids!!! It's fun to travel in a country that enjoys large families. : )

I'll write more later... but we are all alive and doing well! : )

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MICHAELA!!!

My little Michaela is 10! She is super big now... She can walk around the house holding Andrea; she can order her own slush ice from the Danish bakery; she can even call to request cribs at hotels in foreign countries. She's spent more time in London and Copenhagen than I have; and she can spell anaesthesiologist. She's my favorite 10 year old!!! I was a bit worried about her for a while there, but she's turned out okay. :) hee hee!

She and Paul are currently in London having a great time seeing "Harry Potter-ish" things. They will come home tomorrow and I'll be sure to put some of her pictures up... or I'll make her do it on her blog. :)

Signs

Pence to Pee


Loo of the Year!


Tara is a Popular Goddess - duh....


I have no idea what this sign means.


No explantion necessary.


My favorite picture : )


I will print this and hang it in my home. No more kids for us!

Andrea the Canadian

Yes... Andrea is part Canadian! I'm sorry I forgot to mention it. :)

Well, she's probably closer to 1/5 Canadian or something. :) ...but who is really just from America? I'm probably 1/16 of every nationality.

But Andrea will get a Canadian passport too, and I promise a picture in front of their embassy too. Getting another passport will probably require another trip to Copenhagen and this time I am NOT driving over that bridge; I'll take the train.

Okay. I'm off to the store to buy "real" sweet potatoes... (Truth be told, I'm going to try to go to the "ethnic" store to see if they have them in cans first.) Nobody here can understand why somebody would put brown sugar, let alone marshmellows, on top of sweet potatoes! I heard a funny story from someone who ate them at a Thanksgiving with some Americans. She thought it was mashed potatoes on top and was surprised/confused to taste something sweet! :) I laughed when she said how she ate it to be nice. :)

...but I only have large marshmellows so I'll let you know how it goes chopping them into fourths to make "mini" marshmellow. AND my big marshmellows are from Germany and cost $6.00!! not .75 cents like in the States! "Oh well" again.

Skagen

We took my mom to visit Skagen on her last day in Denmark. Skagen is the northernmost point of Denmark. It is where the two parts of the North Sea, the Kattegat and the Skagerrak meet. It's neat because you can actually see the two currents coming in from the east and west and then crashing into each other. It makes the beach sand go into a point. I thought it was cool.

To get out there we rode a little tractor thing out there and it made ruts in the sand. As we got closer to the water the ruts filled with water which we all thought was novel... until we stepped off the little tractor thing into the blasting wind and had to tiptoe around the water filled ruts to the packed sand closer to the water. We all made it except for Sierra who ended up wearing a ziplock baggie on her foot inside her soggy and sandy shoe. Needless to say, Sierra wasn't thrilled with it. : )

We didn't spend too much time out on the beach due to the super wind. We basically got off the tractor thing, made our way to the tip of the beach, took our picture, and scurried back quickly to the tractor thing. We then visted the gift shop like good tourists and headed back into town for ice cream. :) I hope my mom enjoyed it. :) Oh yah, we ate fish balls too. It was kinda like a fish stick, but softer inside ...and shaped like a ball.

The next day my mom left bright and early and 30 hours later she made it home. (only missing one flight along the way). Scotty even misses Nana, which she may or may not believe... :) The first day after she left, Scotty told me he didn't want to come with me to take the girls to school - that he was going to stay with Nana. I had to tell him Nana left. :(

Paul comes home from Germany today. He was gone for a couple days for work... and tomorrow he goes to London with Michaela. I've been planning their trip the last few days (and haven't even begun to plan our Italy trip for next week) ...and I've decided to send them to Oxford, an hour outside of London, so they can see Hogwarts "stuff". I hope they have fun. I hope they end up in Oxford after they use my directions! At the very least Michaela will get a nutella filled crepe on her birthday!!

I will miss her on her birthday. I've spent every one of the last nine birthdays with her. :( I can't believe she is 10!! She is starting to seem grown up. She carries Andrea around the house for me so I can take showers... She brushes Scottys teeth with him... and you should see the story she wrote for school!! It was great! I'll ask if I can post in on here. I couldn't believe how well it was written - and it took her about 20 minutes... (not including the 2 hours of complaining about having to write it though)

I'll do pictures tomorrow. I'm tired... : ) Oh yah, Michaela had her birthday party too... tomorrow I'll tell about it - Good Night!

Lunch in Germany

We went to Germany for lunch yesterday.

That is fun to say. :) ...and that is the main reason we did it.

My mom and I dropped the kids off at school and drove to Germany for the day. It only takes about 1.5 hours to get there so it sounds further away than it really is. Since things are so expensive here in Denmark that alot of Danes drive across the border into Germany and go to a "Costco-like" store. Soda, Diapers, Nutella... it's all cheaper in Germany so it's more fun to buy, and I used to enjoy looking at prices in Euros since it was more "regular" looking. (Bread costing 24,95 kroner just feels weird... 24,95 is too big of a number for a loaf of bread) But this time it was actually easier for me to look at the kroner price than the Euros!

When we were at the cashier to buy our things German cashier spoke ZERO English and she wasn't amused that I ONLY spoke English. I actually got the feeling she disliked me for no other reason than I was American and spoke English. When I tried to pay I gave her my credit card and my Danish CPR card because I knew I had to show her proof of residency in Denmark for some reason yet to be determined. She kept saying "pass" at me and pointing at her head, and then pointing at my cans of soda. I was really confused. Despite my knowing that she didn't understand a bit of my English I kept talking to her... and despite her knowing that I didn't understand a bit of whatever language whe was talking to me, she kept talking to me. It wasn't a real productive conversation but I wasn't leaving that store without my cheap soda and nutella! I finally decided she wanted my passport because it had my picture on it and she wanted to make sure I was me. I'm still not sure why she was pointing at my soda cans. I don't normally go shopping with a passport so I showed her my US Drivers License and after a phone call and a few nasty looks for good measure she allowed me to purchase my things.

I'm still not sure if I am allowed to buy the soda without Danish residency. ??? But I do know I had been saving my empty soda cans in bags around the side of the house for three months so I could take them back to Germany to redeem them for my 30 cents (They had to go to Germany because that's where we bought them.) I had put all the cans in a large garbage bag and we drove with them in the backseat the whole way to Germany only to find out after hauling them inside the store that I can't redeem them at all! So we drove the big bag of soda cans all the way back to Denmark. : ) Way more frusterating than it seems. But now that I think about it, I've never redeemed a can, only the plastic bottles - I wonder if here you don't get money for cans and only get money for plastic bottles; which would make perfect sense only because it's the exact opposite in America.

So while in Germany my mom and I did some shopping, ate our lunch, and experienced some Spaghetti Ice Cream. You really need to see a picture to understand what it was exactly. :) It was really cute and I wouldn't have known what it was if someone hadn't told me it existed. I had first saw Spaghetti on the menu and thought it would have been a good lunch for Scotty, but then I realized we were at an Ice Cream shop. -I just tried to get the picture from my mom's camera but it's not cooperating. It looks like someone squished ice cream through a play-doh noodle maker. ...but it's so cold it holds it's noodle shape. Then they put strawberry sauce all over it and flakes of white chocolate, which I just now figured out was the parmeasan cheese. It was yummy.

Okay I'm off to bed. I'm tired. :) Oh, and my spell check won't work so I'm not going back to proof-read this...

For Hilde!

Alright Hilde!!! - I have FOUR CHILDREN! :) Geez, free time just isn't as common these days! ...and what little free time I do have I spend cleaning or cooking or playing cars with Scotty so he knows I remember he exists! So here I am writing! Happy? :) :)

Actually I've been trying to figure out all our upcoming trips. Tomorrow I am taking my mom to lunch in Germany - just because I can. :) Friday is Michaela's birthday party with some friends from school. Sunday I need to get my mom to an airport and my husband to a train station. Next Wednesday Michaela and Paul leave for London and the following Monday we all leave for Italy!

Trips are fine to take, but I HATE trying to find hotels and figure out trains and buses and subways lines... After the first day somewhere and you actually do it you feel more confident and then it's easy. Planning isn't any fun and it stresses me out trying to get the perfect everything. I've stopped planning activities though. For Italy we will see the Tower of Pisa in Pisa, and see the Colluseum and Vactian City in Rome. We will have to plan the rest of the week as we go along. :) With kids it's easier that way anyways. Our sightseeing usually involves more parks and ice cream stands than anything - which is fine, we like to just city but we don't really need all the tourist stops in between.

Kids are all doing great. The girls love swimming and gymnastics. Scotty loves his little play gym too. He is hillarious! Scotty's "gymnastics" is in a gym with about 25 other little 3 year olds. They run around, jump on things, do somersaults, swing on ropes, crash into each other, cry... It's great to watch him! It's probably the favorite hour of my week! It's also funny because it's all in Danish and Scott doesn't understand any of it, he just follows along with the rest of the group. They run in circles - he runs in circles. They clap their hands - he claps his hands. They jump up and down - he jumps up and down. It's very cute. ...and I get to have 45 Scotty-Free-Minutes!

Well, everytime I have a busy few weeks I think "Just get through these few weeks... then it will be easier and more calm." THEN something else comes up and I have another set of weeks that are busy. Next thing I know it will be December and Christmas and I wanted to go back to Paris then. :) I think with the addition of Andrea I've accepted that things will never calm down. But that is fine with me.

and Hi Trini!!!! I miss you lots. I know we haven't had time to talk on the phone - you and that pesky job of yours. :) Who needs those windmills anyways? Turn them all off for a minute and call me! :) My next little post should be all about who Trini is now... because people will ask me! :)