More Rain and One Year Older

Seriously, is this summer? Midjuly and weather sucks big time. We have had rain three weekends in a row, what are the chances of that?

• The inevitable happened last night. Germany won the world cup. Neighbours had firework and were beeping their horns forever, and ever. And ever after that. Glad life is back to normal again. No late nights watching footie (read: waiting for hubby to come to bed).

• I turned 40 on July 12. Now that sucks. If I felt 39 was kind of a useless age, well 40 is completely nonsense. There is nothing 40 about me. I would still spend my Sundays watching TV in my PJ, hadn`t I had my two little girls. I had this conversation with some girl at lunch today, talking about ages. "-She: you must be around 35 right? -ME: no, I just turned 40." You should have seen her face.40 is the new conversation killer. We had a small party here in the garden. My present to myself was 12 bottles of Champagne from my favourite vineyard in, yep, Champagne. Problem is that I drink it like soda. So nice.

• Today was  the big day. First day we were both working full time again. Time will tell if we sink or float. Currently we are just hanging in there. 

• Olivia has been at the nursery for two weeks. Such a trooper. Why was I worrying so much? (well, she is my little super cute fragile baby still, though she is getting tougher by the day)

Midsommar

I går lördag tog jag och Emily en sväng till IKEA där vi hjälpte till och fira midsommar. Det innebar, binda kransar och dansa och SJUNGA runt midsommarstången precis vid ingången. Jag måste poängtera att jag inte hade någon aning om den senare delen när jag lovade att dyka upp. Måste även erkänna att jag är helt usel på att binda kransar. Det var inte så svårt att binda in blommorna så länge kvisten och blommorna hängde rakt, det var när kransen skulle fästas samman det blev lite knivigt. Men det var kul att stå och surra lite med folk, och Emily var SÅ duktig och satt vid pysselbordet och pysslande och åt glass. Jo, det har nästan blivit en glass om dagen på sistone.

På kvällen satt vi i grannens trädgård och såg på fotboll med resten av grannarna. De hade satt upp en filmduk där de visade fotbollen och det var riktigt mysigt och KALLT. Jag höll lite tyst på Ghana men det hjälpte inte. Oavgjort och det finns fortfarande en risk att tyskarna går vidare.

Tro mig, det finns inget värre en självgoda tyskar. De är de värsta vinnarna som finns.

Grattis Olivia

I helgen firade vi lilla Olivia, tänk att hon fyllt ett år! Herregud vad tiden går snabbt. Bara för ett år sen satt vi är men en liten bebis och inget kök och allt var lite omtumlande efter flytten. Och tänk, vår lilla stumpa som knappt vågade titta på någon eller le under sina första 6 månader, ja nu är hon bra mycket modigare och har blivit en riktig liten charmör!

Är riktigt glad över att vi har en trädgård, vi hade barnkalas med massa barn och det hade jag nog aldrig vågat annars. Inga olyckor, inget gnäll och inga bråk. Och inget regn! Det var så trevligt att ha alla vänner och bekanta på en och samma plats och bara  umgås. Höll på att baka ihjäl mig i lördags, det vet jag inte om jag gör om igen. Två jordgubbstårtor, en annan sommartårta med maräng, ljusa kärleksmums, chokladbollar, bullar..ni som följer mig på instagram har sett bildbevisen. Måste dock säga att mina  kalljästa bullar enligt Lindas tips blev jättebra och jag kommer göra dem igen.

Lägg till bildtext

Nja, Olivia var väl inte så där jätteförtjust i tårta

Bara någon vecka gammal!

Storasyster såg till att alla presenter öppnades

Mitt charmtroll

Gardening

There will be no before and after photos - that is how bad our garden looked after the winter. Full of weeds. Weeding. That is how yesterday was spent. Kudoz to hubby for spending literally all day making the garden look MUCH nicer. And how happy am I that we did take our time to do it yesterday -today is nearly a completely different season. Chilly, rain. grey.

Got some new plants - I like the kind of plants, bushes etc. that survive the winter and require minimum work. Apart from magnolia and lavender I got plenty of seeds too - carrots, all kinds of herbs, chilli, tomatoes. Let´s hope my finger are greener than green this year.

 

And oh, once again we were in full swing with the Weber, but unfortunately I managaged to put the whole damn thing on fire. Geez, never thought chorizos could catch fire. So all you lovelies out there. Be careful putting those fire red sausages on the grill. I seriously thought the grill was about to blow up. Luckily had the fridge full of sausages so the black ones were quickly subsituted by new ones straight from the fridge.

1 Year..

This week it is exactly one year since we left CA and moved to Germany. I am happy to say, we have come a long way since then.

Of course, we miss CA. A lot. May was a difficult month for us all. Looking back now, I have no idea how we got through it. The last 4 weeks in CA were hard. Not knowing what was going to happen.

Now wehave sort of landed. Sure, we kind of wish we´d be somewhere else. But in general, life is good. Work is good, girls are good, we have a good circle of friends and we are feeling sort of content. Most the time. Extra good: we had no real winter and weather has been extremely nice.

Work has taken a good turn, I am back at full swing doing full time again at a new position. Work in Germany IS good. I like working with Germans. Sure, they work late, and they work hard. But they are full on, no bullshit - straight to the point at they get things done. As work is a huge part of my life, I am super happy to say, I still love going to work. Every day. I never think it is hard to get up in the morning and go to work.

Popped by the garden centre today. Bought a magnolia tree and some plants, need to reorganize a few things I have now carrots, tomatoes, herbs growing and they are getting all too big for their current pots so this weekend is all about gardening. Weeding, mowing...You name it.

Tillbaka

Nu är vi tillbaka. Det var många som tyckte vi var vansinniga att köra bil till Gävle. Men oj vad det var lätt och allt gick så bra.

Vi lämnade Köln runt 10-tiden på morgonen och stannade bara en gång på vägen till Kiel. Vi hade lite trafik utanför Hamburg men kom i god tid till färjan. Tjejerna hade hur kul som helst på färjan och äta ute har aldrig varit så lätt.  360 SEK för buffén på båten var lite saftigt (per person!) men det fanns både räk- och kräftbuffé så jag glömde snabbt bort priset. Väl framme i Göteborg så stannade vi till i Lerum för att hälsa på gamla goda vänner och gav oss inte iväg förrän vid kl. 13-tiden. Även här stannade vi en gång och var till slut framme runt sjutiden i Gävle. Allt gick SÅ smidigt! Lite drygt att det inte finns någon riktig motorväg mellan Gävle och Göteborg, att köra 70 känns stundtals som om man rullar fram på landsvägarna. Länge leve autobahn säger jag bara.
Det gick lika smidigt hem, vi var hemma vid fyratiden igår. Tyvärr kom vi tillbaka till ett kallt och regnigt Tyskland. Det regnade lika mycket här som solen sken i Sverige när vi gav oss iväg.

Det här var ju första gången jag varit hemma med båda tjejerna och första gången jag varit hemma sedan 2012! Skönt att träffa nära och kära och att bara vara lite så där, hänga på stan och hos kompisar. Vi hann till och med en sväng till badhuset.


Tyckte att allt var väldigt barnvänligt denna gång, folk kanske inte är sådär jättetrevliga mot barn som de t.ex. är i USA, Emily blir fortfarande alltid lika ledsen när hon babblar på till främmande människor och hon blev lika ignorerad i Sverige som här i Tyskland. Ingen svarar och ingen hejar :( Men det finns dock gott om barnstolar och det var riktigt kul att luncha ute med tjejerna.

Fina Boulongern, hit hann vi många gånger

Svenska påskägg. Bäst!

Stressigt

Det har varit lite tyst på bloggen. Det beror naturligtvis att karusellen Clarke har snurrat lite snabbare än vanligt. Har nytt jobb - samma företag dock - och jag har börjat jobba heltid. Dessutom hade maken och barnen en sväng av bronkit. Imorgon bär det av till Sverige - vi ska köra. Det lär nog bli stressigt värre men vi håller tummarna att det ska gå bra.

Nu har våren kommit

Efter en väldigt hektisk dag med shopping på aldi, Toys r us och Obi kan jag till slut endast konstatera att det blir en tidig kväll för min del. Jag är helt slut! Imorgon får det bli några fina bilder på det härliga vädret vi har - 22 grader! Inte helt fel för att vara mars.

Hello long weekend

When we rang in 2014 there was only one thing I wished for 2014 - more sleep. Obviously I should have wished for health. No health no sleep. 3 down one to go in this family, the one left obviously being me. The sickies are in the mend though. Bronchitis is nasty!

Four quick ones before we are hitting the long weekend,

• Barre concept - folks, do you remeber this great ballet, yoga/pilates workout from OC? I have finally found a course here in Cologne. Not bad but no where near as hard as in Cali. I will keep on taking it for a while though. Just down the road, very convenient.

• Tomorrow is my last Friday off before I am back to fulltime again. Feeling a little sad? Yes.  Stressed? YES.

• We are all in a spring mood here. We are expecting temperatures around 18-19 degrees here over the weekend. Everything is in full bloom and we´re loving it. Summer - hurry up, we cannot wait. We are going to the zoo tomorrow - did you know that when you give birth in Cologne you get a welcome package from the council which among others include a free yearly pass for one adult to the zoo? Pretty great huh.

• We finally found a child minder for Olivia. FINALLY. You have no idea how messed up the system is here when it comes to childcare. I will blog about this separately. We still have a lot of question marks and we have nearly two months during July and August where we have no childcare but we´ll sort something out.

Sötsug

Hilfe, jag har ett fruktansvärt sötsug för tillfället. Kan i princip vräka mig i godis hela tiden. USCH.
Sedan hjälper det inte att vara ledig på fredagar och bo väldigt nära IKEA. Ni fattar va? SMÅGODIS!!
Det är ju bara så mycket svenskt fredagsmys som det går. Och jag hade en väldigt svensk fredag. Tittade på Let´s dance, Nja, var ok. Kollade lite på Babsan. Men usch. Verkligen uruselt. Sen var det dags för Skavlan. YAY! Sannerligen en favorit.

Och till detta, ja, då var det bubbelvatten och smågodis som gällde.

Shop til`you drop

Yay, Saturday turned out to be a day I had been waiting for. Me. Shopping. In town. Alone.
First time in I don't know how long.

Ya!

I had the nerve to stay out for nearly four hours. You hear me, FOUR. And didn't phone home once.
(why should I? They have a great dad).

I had kind of an emergency. I was down to only one per of trousers for work. Fat pants are too big, my normal old collection - still a little tight.  So that was my mission yesterday.

Managed to pay my favourite shop a little visit too. Prego. They have the best, BEST shoes. Expensive, yes, but comfortable and last forever. Seriously, I buy 90% of my shoes there and even after a couple of winters they look new. Now THAT is good (Italian) quality.

The shopping experience is improving in the city. More individual shops popping up again. For a while all I could see was Zara, H&M, Esprit... Yesterday I noticed there is a Vagabond shop, popped in to COS, Urban Outfitters..Scotch & Soda..Variety is the key!

Last time we managed to squeeze in a date night too. When to this fancy new Japanese place and enjoyed some yummy food. You order the food via an ipad. Japanese is definitely a favourite. Seems like I can eat enormous amounts of it without ending up in a food coma.

Runt Bayerkorset i Leverkusen

Ja, i söndags gjorde jag något så galet som att springa stafett. STAFETT. Ja hörrni, ni läste rätt.
 Vi var fyra lag, varje lag bestående av fyra medlemmar, och vi sprang 2,5 km vardera. Puh.

Nu kanske någon sitter och tänker, 2,5 km är inte så farligt?

Ha. Försök och spring - inte jogga -  2,5 km så snabbt du kan. Ojoj vad det var jobbigt. Jag tror att jag har varit ute och sprungit 3 ggr sedan Olivia föddes. En av de tre gångerna var i lördags. Jag var ju tvungen att se till att jag verkligen kunde springa 2,5 km, inte en självklarhet nu för tiden.

Men nu är det avklarat.  Jag sprang i mål med pinnen i handen. Blev visserligen omsprungen hur många gånger som helst av BARN men ja, lagets resultat låg under en timme så vi får väl godkänt:)

Recovering

...from carnival. Imaging that huh! Can`t see another doughnut for a while Yep, doughnuts are traditional carnival snack.Had way too may this year.

One day after the official end and exactly one week after the official kick off - carnival is now over.

We went as cowboys, I have to remember to sort out more than one costume next year. The third time I had to put that western dress on and I was a tad fed up with it. Just a bit. Did I tell you that everyone dresses up? Yes. even at the supermarket. Everyone.
Emily went as Pippi to the carnival party at the kindergarten. She was Pippi and a cowgirl every second day.

On carnival Saturday we went to watch the parade in Bensberg. We were lucky -just as it was over it started raining. The Sunday turned out to be THE highlight, in Brück. A friend lives on the street where the parade starts and the weather turned out to be pretty gorgeous, nice and sunny. We ended up with about 5 bags full of sweets, flowers and soft toys. We gave our neighbours a bag each. Gave away more next day to friends. And brought some to work. After watching the third parade this year, our local one on Rosenmontag, we felt both tired and sore Tuesday morning. Dancing, catching sweets, being busy bees in general.

Here we have a bit of a photo bomb

Emily as Pippi - she had SO much fun


  Waiting for the parade in Bensberg to start




Olivia got to dress up too!


Last wagon with the "Dreigestirn" - the farmer, the virgin and the prince 




 Strüssje


Caught all the soft toys (not the big white one). Emily gave each of them a kiss.
Plenty of sweets!


We are enjoying the parade in Brück


Our wagon with supplies; pretzels, beer, sparkling wine, Emily and also a pink horse:)

Below is the main street in our village. Waiting for the parade to start.

Carnival!

Imorgon smäller det! There is nothing bigger in Cologne than the fifth season - carnival!

Traditionally, the "fifth season" (carnival season) is declared open at 11 minutes past 11 on the 11th of the 11th month November. The Carnival spirit is then temporarily suspended during the Advent and Christmas period, and picks up again in earnest after the 6 January in the New Year. The street carnival is officially declared open at downtown square Alter Markt on the Thursday before the beginning of lent.

Every year there are 3 people (the Dreigestirn) who are granted the titles of Jungfrau, Prinz, and Bauer (virgin, prince and farmer), who pay a large sum of money for their privileges. The carnival prince is deemed to be the highest representative of the festivities, leading the main parades throughout the week. Traditionally, the Jungfrau ("Virgin") is always portrayed by a man dressed as a female. These three people move in to a hotel in November where they will stay until carnival is over. They have a very busy season, carnival is celebrated "behind the walls" until tomorrow, they appear at the carnival association`s stage shows, parades and make lots of public appearances.
So tomorrow is Weiberfastnacht - women`s day. Any men wearing ties will have them cut off and women can kiss any man they want. All shops tomorrow will close in the early afternoon and there will be clowns and cowboys and god know what everywhere. Seriously, there is no escape so if you are not into the whole carnival thing, you´d better off leaving the city for a few days.

Carnival Friday 

In the morning, you might come across the odd "survivor" of "Weiberfastnacht" if you go for a stroll through the city. In the evening: masked balls and parties 

Carnival Saturday 

Following a traditional Cologne "Frühschoppen" or early-morning drink, at 10.30 a.m.
Ghost parade in the city.

Carnival Sunday

Parade through the city centre from 10:30 p.m.: School groups in fancy dress and original costumes of clubs in the city quarters.

In the evening: masked balls and parties 

Rose Monday

The climax of the Carnival with the large official parade from 10:30 a.m., organized by the Cologne Carnival Committee of 1823: It is a colourful spectacle with sweets (“Kamelle”), little bouquets of flowers (“Strüßjer”), pecks (“Bützje”) and over one million of spectators in fancy dress.

Last year the parade went on for 5 hours.  All the carnival associations participate in the parade.

 Monday is an inofficial bank holiday. Shops are closed and most people get the day off.  Evening: the celebrations continue in halls, restaurants and pub.

Carnival  Tuesday 

In the afternoon, parades in Cologne's suburbs with Carnival groups and societies in fancy dress. After the midday parades in Cologne suburbs the party goes on until at midnight, amid great weeping and wailing, the “Nubbel” (a life-size straw figure) is ceremonially burnt out side the pubs.

Ash Wednesday

The end. Carnival "survivors" soothe their hangover with a traditional fish dinner in one of the many restaurants and pubs.   

There is only one thing to drink during carnival  - kölsch. The local beer. Of course there are jägermeister etc, too, but the local beer will dominate for sure.

Photos will come!

Never a dull moment

Just recovered after the whole family having the stomach bug. I got it twice. You hear me, TWICE! In one week. Yep. But now we are back on track again. Getting ready for KARNEVAL. More about that later this week. we live in THE karneval city. There is no escape.

I feel spring is getting closer. We now have blue skies, sun and around 13 C. Now I do believe that winter has skipped Cologne this year. It is not coming. I am happy and said. Happy because this is as cold as it gets, sad because I did stock up with lots of warm clothes, both for me and for the girls. Swedish kind of quality, know what I mean?

Evenings are all about House of Cards at the moment. First season was great. Second season even better. Kevin Spacey is simply outstanding. Robin Wright too. So happy we have found another great serie to watch. It was a bit empty for a while.

Other things we currently watch are Walking Dead, The Following, Justified. Series I haven`t made my mind up about yet (whether to watch them or not): Banshee, Chicago PD, couple of other new pilots I haven`t watched yet.

Have a lovely Monday.

Semlor...and Vistors

Was in a real baking and cooking mood this weekend so if I have to describe Sunday in one word it would be "yummy".

Banana pancakes American style for lunch,

Pastry filled with onions, crayfish, olives, feta cheese and garlic for dinner, so easy to make,







Saturday I went to one of my favourite supermarkets, it is a big Edeka outside town and  it takes ages to walk through it but they have just about everything. Like crayfish. Currently it is the one one that carries peeled crayfish.  And I am always craving for it, in salads, in pastry...always. Now, German supermarkets are not great in general. You can find everything which is German and basic, but small things like chick peas and spices such as cumin are hard to find. There are of course plenty of bread, pork and meat, potatoes and  regular fruit and vegetables, but anything not basic can be tricky.

We had two lots of visitors over yesterday and that is of course the best excuse to bake! 
First we had family B who live just across the border in the Netherlands and are moving to MI, US very soon and  later on Bea & family came for some semlor, cakes and coffee. They have recently moved to Italy from Cologne. Circle of friends is once again shrinking, but we are so happy that we managed to find free slots to meet up.

Semlor, from Leila. Turn out pretty nice too! I prefer them a little smaller than average.

Semlor

Watched Rush Saturday night. Hubby´s turn to choose and I wasn´t thrilled about watching it at all (on my list we now have Dallas cowboys, Mud, Butler left) but I really enjoyed it! What a nice surprise and I recommend it to anyone who wants to watch a movie without special affects and murderes, no cheese and good actors.

Weekend Fun

It was all about cleaning this past weekend. And doing laundry. 6.30 pm Friday night - that´s when the Samsung guy turned up to repair the washing machine. Obviously we spent most of the Friday night doing laundry. And scrubbing bathrooms..kitchens..house needed a bit of a spring clean.

Cleaning activities continued Saturday morning and towards lunch time we headed to Jackelino Safari Indoor playground. Perfect for rainy days, it has all kind of activities, bouncy castles and slides, climbing walls, you name it. We may actually make this a regular activity on Saturdays.Why? Both girls were asleep before 7 pm!!!

I hardly ever watch movies these days, IMHO - there are no good films out, or, at least very few. And there is nothing worse to waste 2 hours on a crappy movie. Saturday night we decided to rent a move from Apple again, first time in a long time, and we decided to go for Blue Jasmine.

I am not a Woody Allen fan and as soon as we had watched about 15 minutes I remembered why. So folks, nothing I would recommend unless you´re into Woody Allen´s style.

Sunday we had fantastic weather, I could nearly smell SPRING. Sunday was all about enjoying the weather and smelling the clean house.

This is Going to be a Big Year

2014. We have nearly made it through January and it is time to plan the next 11 months. Lots of things to celebrate this year, or, not to. January did not end very well though, our washing machine broke Saturday before we had done our laundry. It is only 8 months old and still under warranty but so annoying.

Some of the biggies this year:

• I am turning 40 this year. Yikes. I still feel like mid 30. Not that I have a mid life crisis (yet) but I just don't fancy leaving the 30's behind.
• Met hubby 10 years ago! WOW
• Little Olivia is of course turning 1. We have so much fun with her!!
• In July 1994 I hopped on a bus in Stockholm and...yep, 20 years ago since I moved to Germany. 

You know, upbringing in Sweden is so much different than Germany. When kids graduate from high school here - or school in general (there are several schools heree, once you are 11, it is decided for you which direction you are heading; Hauptschule, Realschule and Gymnasium. Pretty tough, only if you go to the Gymnasium you're allowed to go to college later on), they normally have a plan; college, apprenticeship.."social year (many young girls decide to work for free for a year, with elderly people, kids etc.)..I don´t know anyone who really had a plan when I finished school. Most people went abroad, as au-pairs, did language courses etc. I went on holiday to Ireland for 3 weeks with some friends from Germany. Looking back, I think it is a little weird there were no pressure from home to make a decision. Anyhow, to cut a long story short, that summer I started to work as an au-pair for a family outside Cologne. It didn´t work out but I stayed in Cologne, went to college and here I am. 20 years later. I had so many plans to conquer the world but I didn´t get any further:)

The only plan we have made so far is to go to Sweden for Easter. That is yet to be booked though. I`d like US to be a plan, a holiday around September would suit us well but I need to coordinate nursery etc for both girls first.

New Car

Finally. We have only had one car since we moved back. What a pain. But today it finally arrived. In Germany cars are built to order, depending on the car - if you want a brand new car it´ll take around 3-4 months for you to get it. Patience, patience...

Years ago I promised never to get mummy car...sliding doors, yikes..and here it is.

Seat Alahambra (or something similar). Yaay. So happy we both have cars instead of having to drive each other to work.
I can definitely see us doing some road trips in the future in this one!

Rondorf

So where do we live?  Rondorf is a smallish village/suburb outside Cologne. See, in Sweden it is big enough to be called a small town. Here, it feels more like a village, though officially it is still part of Cologne. If you look on Wiki, you can see that approx. 10 000 people live here.

In true German style, we have 5 bakeries. There are also two chemists, three supermarkets, a couple of hair dressers, a tiny post office located inside a news agent´s and a couple of flower shops. It takes about 20 minutes to walk to IKEA and 15 to drive to Cologne. Not bad for such a small place, huh?

Typically, in a true German village, shops close for lunch. This means, between 12-3 chemists, news agents and other smaller shops are close. Doh! BUT as of 2014 one chemist has decided to stay open all day, trust me, this is news! I wonder how long it will take for the other one to stay open all day, too.

Mainstreet;

Välling

Är det bara barn födda i Sverige som tycker om välling? Ingen av tjejerna tycker om det så nu har jag ett stort överskott i skafferiet.Med Emily var jag tvungen att blanda ut med mjölk så vi slutade till slut.

Gott nytt år...

Lite sent, kanske.

Ja, hörr ni, inte mycket till vinter här. Hela julen var varm, och vi har fortfarande runt 10-12 grader. Klagar inte, men en vecka med lite kallare temperaturer vore ok. Hade toppenväder igår, verkligen ett undantag för annars är det mest grått ute. Tog en promenand i skogen så Emily blev av med lite spring i  benen. Funkade perfekt när det var läggdags senare.

Utsikt genom köksfönstret.

• Köpte ju en TV till mig själv i julklapp. Nu för tiden kostar de ju ingenting. Annat var det när jag 2006-2007 köpte vår första platt-tv, en Pioneer. Oj vilken investering det var. Helt otroligt vad priserna har fallit. Nu har jag blivit en riktig sängis på kvällen. Borstar tänderna runt 8-tiden och lägger mig sen på eller i sängen. Kan ju inte direkt säga att jag ser på TV, nej. det är Apple-TV som gäller, antingen att streama från ipaden eller så hyr vi film eller köper serier. Det är nu vår andra äppel-tv i huset.  

• De senaste två veckorna har jag konstaterat att barnen fick för många julklappar. De flesta ligger i något hörn, oanvända. Nästa år blir det en drasisk reducering kan jag säga. För den som behöver 4 dagar att öppna alla klappar och inte ens orkar öppna alla, behöver nog inte så många. Och vi missade ju helt vad hon helst ville ha. En liten bil. Ni skulle ha sett tårarna när hon försökte kliva i Barbies lilla rosa Porsche. Oj, tårarna ville aldrig sluta strömma ner för kinderna. 

• Jag har gått med i SWEA Köln/Bonn. Jag kan inte bara INTE organisera mig. Måste vara får lite utlopp för den där energin. 

• Igårt körde vi igång med knattegruppen igen. Så kul att komma igång igen.