UK and Sweden - August 2011

Hello...


Will try to add a few updates to our blog while we are away...

Our flights to the UK went really well, Orla was a star! Didn't sleep much to Dubai (10.5h flight)...spent her time watching movies, eating, the odd visit to the very interesting toilet etc! She didn't last long from Dubai to London so got about 5hrs sleep in that 6.5h flight.

We arrived Friday night local time and Farmor & Farfar picked us up from Gatwick. Orla was awake late, I crashed before her!

Sat lunch and afternoon we spent at Fi & Gus together with Helen, Mog & Mark and all the kids. Said hello to Amy and family too!
In the evening we had a lovely dinner at the Woolleys...sadly Orla slept through the whole thing!

On Sun we had lunch and a sunny afternoon at the Gardiners with aunties Judi and Jill, uncle Tim, uncle David, Jo, Nicky, Nora and Howell, Mog plus 2 and us.

Monday my body gave in to a temperature and the start of a sore throat...had to canel Worthing visit (sorry Fia and Freya and Maria) - still managed to pop over to the Tiger in East Dean to say hi to Michele, Laurence, Henry, Jane, Terry, Hayley and all of their not so little ones. That was lovely too!

Tuesday I somehow walked through town to get a little bit of shopping done followed by lunch with Nicky and Tracy. Also squeezed in a visit to Mog & Mark's lovely new house!

Then we packed ready for our departure on Wed am from Gatwick to Gothenburg. Orla fell asleep just as we landed!
Was greeted by my parents and my aunt Ullbritt and uncle Anders!

Thursday am I got a dr's appointment when my throat infection was confirmed so I am now on 10 days of antibiotics. Worse than that are the giant cold sores that I have acquired with it all...shows it's all been a bit too much I guess. I hate them!!!

Thursday afternoon and evening was spent at Pernilla and Thomas' summer house (formerly Birgit's place) - it was a perfect day and evening, including a swim in lake Tolken followed by a bbq. We were lucky with the weather as today Friday it has been raining for most of the day. Perfect for resting and some waffles at Birgit's flat (I had never been there before).

Orla nodded off at 4.30pm...she hasn't surfaced...think I'll have an early night too! Slowly catching up on the phone with friends and hope to catch a few next week.

Right that's us for now!

Sean is ok after 1 week without his girls...! Give him a call if you are in Perth! There are still a few fishfingers left!

Winter in Perth...

It's been a while again...

Have uploaded a few photos of miss Orla today...need to get some more up there.

She is playing with her Pippi house, lego and stickle bricks as we speak!

This is herself when she decided to paint herself rather than the paper in front of her!

Not much to report...we are in our new office so it's all go, have spent a few weekends bringing in tables, kitchen things etc...today it was the server. Looking forward to the custom made furniture!

That's all for today!
Kram xxx

Holidays!!!

Well we are back from our holidays to Shark Bay and Monkey Mia via Dongara and Kalbarri.

We've had a lovely time and enjoyed our much overdue time off together.

I have uploaded 100's of photos to our web album and I will sort out captions for them and I will try my best to blog about it all as well.

We are pleased to have edged a bit further up the coast of WA as there is so much to see and it is stunning!

Talk soon,
Stina

Late May...

Ok it's been a while...not taken too many pics recently either...although I have one or two!

We have been busy as always with work and we have managed to catch up with a few friends...

Grainger and Alli came for dinner tonight and we also fitted in swimming, fika, haircuts and lunch with Colleen at Freo Art Centre.

Last weekend we had Linda and Steven plus Sam for afternoon tea and we caught up at Miss Maud's with Alex and Deep.

Looking forward to our holiday to Shark Bay...stopping at Dongara for a night on the way up and for 2 nights in Kalbarri on the way back plus 7 nights in Monkey Mia. Hoping for some nice weather, lots of relaxing and seeing some wildlife etc.

Before then we'll have a party for Orla's 3rd birthday (on June 3) and we have Simon coming over from the UK Monday night for a few days to help us get the new office ready! Exciting!

Very wet Friday with lots of much needed rain - potatoes are loving it! We still fitten in toddler bop, library and bakery...otherwise spent the day at home.

Time for bed now...

Beautiful autumn day!

May 1...

On the beach at Mullaloo this morning!

Orla got wet...and enjoyed the playground.

Hot choc, chai latte and vanilla milkshake at cafe to follow.

Also been busy clearing out Orla's wardrobe...got some winter clothes out, put some summer ones away and the things she has grown out of...filled another storage box...then we cleaned the car and turned her car seat around. All ready for our road trip up to Shark Bay! Exciting. We head off on June 5.

Back to work and dagis tomorrow...hoping to go to the cinema on Tuesday and my pilates start on Wednesday. Toddler bop kicks off on Friday (Orla will be in the 3-5 class!) and on Saturday we are swimming as well. Orla will be in a new "intermediate" class and Sean will have another training session (he is doing the Rotto swim next year with John J and co!).

Kram xxx

Going to bed...!

After a busy morning and a very long lunch time sleep we ended up with a late night inlcluding a long session putting all of Orla's soft toys to bed!

Miss O eventually got herself to bed after a read, a drink and a cuddle...

Then we had tea and watched Dr Who!

Well I only worked 1.5 days this week with our 2 bank holidays. On Thursday Erica, Jake and Sanna arrived and stayed the night. We had delivery pizza for dinner, IKEA visit on Fri am followed by lunch and swim.

Orla and I then went down to City Beach for a play with Catherine J and her friend Brierly and 2 kids Felicity (4) and Austen (2). We had a good play follwed by a short walk to Floreat beach where we had a yummy tea at the Kiosk. We ended our da
y at Charlie's house watching the wedding. A lovely day!

Saturday morning we went down to the Swan Valley and a "cuddly farm". Cute chickens, ducklings, lambs, goats and bunny rabbits. Train rides, playground and bouncy castle was all lots of fun. Orla then slept for 2hrs!

Easter Sunday

Today we went for a lovely lunch and afternoon at the Jardines.

Easter egg hunt, swim and bbq'd fish for lunch followed by banoffi.
Orla had lots of fun!

It is a bit sticky, around 27 and we've had a little bit of rain!

Saturday we went for lunch at Catherine and Paul's and met C's parents. Very nice!
Friday we had our neighbours over for tea, did some gardening and had a quiet time.

No big plans for Monday and Tuesday so we shall see!

Glad Pask! Happy Easter!

Easter 2011

Happy Easter! Glad Pask!

Orla was the cutest Easter Lady/witch this morning for day care!
It's another (strange?) Swedish tradition!
A bit like Halloween, we dress up and go from house to house asking for sweets. Then we fly to Blakulla mountain...!

Trying to add a pic or two...hopefully this will turn out ok!

More pics in our webalbum here: https://picasaweb.google.com/moosecat

Another Sunday...

And another week has gone by...

Lynn and Brian left on Monday night. Orla cried, she is old enough to understand now about the leaving part. We talk about farmor, farfar, morfar o mormor going on aeroplanes and we say hi when we see planes in the sky. Bless her! They have now arrived safely in the UK after a couple of nights in Hong Kong.

Lionel is still with us. He departs on April 9 so about 2.5 weeks to go. Then we are visitor free for a while...as far as I know!

The weather is finally cooler and our breeze has returned! It's about +29 and a little bit windy just now. Lovely!

Also have our boss visiting from the UK so work is kind of extra busy for about 3 weeks. Sean and Paul went to Melbourne and Canberra from Tues-Fri, all went well. Orla lost a few people early in the week and thankfully her pappa returned during the night on Friday.

Yesterday we had swimming lesson in the am and a visit to Bunnings. Pool and plant stuff. Hope to sort the garden a bit during the cooler months...

Felt quite drained again Sat pm so slept and tried to re-charge. We all slept in fact. It's the "wrong time of the month" as well. It's 2 months since we had our misscarriage confirmed tomorrow Monday the 21st. And 2 periods later so we'll think about trying again soon. All feels a bit daunting and scary...we can only try though...fingers crossed.

In the meantime we have our cutie pie Orla. She is full of beans and too cute!

Scarboro beach this am for a bit of sea and sand. Hope to get down to Cottesloe to see the sculptures by the sea this afternoon. Then another week starts!

Kram xxx

Farmers market

After swimming lesson and session this am we went to the 2 weekly farmers market at one of the local primary schools. It was lovely!

Lots of fruit and veg and bread and we got a lovely quiche with goats cheese and caramelised onion.

A very nice lunch followed and later on a fab fruit salad with whipped cream!

It is finally a bit cooler...have opened the doors up and the breeze is coming through...a lovely evening.

Little Orla is asleep...keeled over around 4.30pm...funny old thing...

Lionel has returned so we have a full house. BBQ tonight (again) and a visit to Guildford (an old'y world'y place about 30 mins from us) plus a pub lunch tomorrow me thinks.

Also have Monday off, Foundation Day in WA. Long weekend! Not sure what we'll get up to.

Have been looking at gardening books just now...dreaming about all the things I want to do with ours! Wish me luck!

Kramar osv...

Dagen efter...

Fredag 4 Mars. Dagen efter B-day...alltsa Birgit Frantzich's 85 ars dag!

Hon blev ordentligt firad med kalas i nya lagenheten tillsammans med slakt & vanner!
Smorgastarta och amerikanare bland annat...och en orkidee med bud just nar jag ringde!
Det blev lyckat!
Lessen att vi inte kunde vara dar forstas...

Klarade veckan med jobb post the flu...hostar forstas istallet nu!

Idag blir det toddler bop och bibblan pa formiddagen. Far se vad vi hittar pa i em.
Simma Lordag morgon oxa.

Lionel aterkommer till Perth Lordag am too sa ett fullt hus tills L&B aker hem den 14e.

Just realised that I have written this post in Swedish!

Kram!

Flu...throat...

Well I didn't get any better...by Wednesday I had a temperature and a massive sore throat! And it kept going on Thursday and Friday...still rough on Sat and I don't feel too good today (Sun am). Temperature calmed down yesterday but the throat is not giving in......I don't often have sore throats so I am suffering big time. Have lost count on all the cold&flu tablets, nurafens, lozengers and stuff I have taken to keep the pain away and the fever down...

Sean had this last week too, didn't suffer as badly as me but he can still feel his throat!

Orla is a bit snuffly and coughing, no temperature though I think so fingers crossed. With Lynn and Brian's return she may be able to stay home tomorrow then we can go from there. They had a good time up north, a few too many flies and crickets I think. It was Brian's birthday on Friday. We got him a bbq cover. Lynn got him a great card! They are all out right now returning their rental car.

Orla did some beautiful swimming this am. I've seen it on film! She also had a great afternoon and evening out on Friday with aunties Charlie and Sharon and her "bonus cousin" Mikey. We are forever grateful to Charlie for all her help and Orla loves her very much. Catherine helped out one day too - thank you! It is a bit tricky being sick when Sean is working and Orla needs to get to day care and back, etc. Worked out ok though.

I missed our seminar on Thursday which was a shame...it went really well with around 60 people. The venue was good and the feedback so a great event all around!

Not much else to report as I haven't really left the house during the whole week...

That's it for now I think
Kram xxx

Tisdag

Hi...

A sore throat, headache, bit of a tooth ache...temperature...not feeling great today!

A month ago since our sad news as well...

We like Fia's (our Swedish Precedent colleague and friend) way of thinking about it...she said that if she hadn't had the misscarriage before Freya then she wouldn't have Freya now...I like that. It means that you appreciate what you get given in the end rather than mourning the loss (too much).

The hardest things is when friends tell us that they are pregnant...I am happy for them of course (as they are very lucky!) - it does make me think what could have been.

For those of you who don't know...We were 11 weeks pregnant - and we had our misscarriage confirmed on Friday January 21. Was waiting for our scan and had been referred to a local hospital.

3 visits to King Edward Memorial Hospital here in Perth over about 10 days gave me the all clear. Visit 1 was hard as I had been bleeding and after waiting, tests and an ultrasound we were told that we had lost the baby. The very next morning I was in great pain so we had to go back...morphine and stuff helped...sent home in the end. As my body was sorting itself out I didn't have surgery. KEMH were great!

I never knew what an ordeal it was to go through this and I now know how common it is and how many friends have gone through it...1 in 4 at my age...

We do have our lovely Orla and we fell pregnant ok so we will try again and hope for happier news next time!

That's me, Tisdag February 22, 2011.

Sunday night...

Another Sunday night...

We've had a lovely night away in Lancelin...with beach, sea, pool, food, sunset and hammock time!

Lynn and Brian have driven north for a few days so we are on our own until Friday.

Seminar time on Thursday am so a busy week preparing ahead. Sean's had man flu...feeling better now and hopefully feels 100% by Thursday.

Orla is fine. Swimming is going great, a new transition class and she loves the water. Spends a lot of time in the pool at home and under water! She still has an obsession with glass (ice cream), chocolate and chips (crips). We try to stick to Saturdays...but don't always last! Day care is going well, must call our local school about starting kindy next February. We've also started toddler bop on a Friday morning, very groovy!

We had a monster bbq last Sunday, loads of food and 14 people. Catherine's Paul sorted out the bbq'ing with Sean's assistance and it was all very yummy. We had left overs for days! Great for lunch!

What else? Hair cuts, Freo art centre, outdoor cinema (ages ago so great to go!) and a short trip to Lancelin. Apart from work and dagis and all the usual stuff.

I have loaded up new photos to the web album as well.

Night!

Sunday am birthday party

Orla went to Matisse's 3rd birthday party this morning! It was lots of fun, food and face painting (her very first!). Orla knows Matisse from day care, she had picked Orla and Charli especially. Very sweet.

The party was at a community family centre so there was a playground, lots of room to play etc. A fairy and a princess came and played games and Orla got her face painted...a rainbow and a heart. Very happy girl.

Gorgegous cup cakes, sausages rolls and birthday cake was enjoyed as well as 2 cartons of juice! She chose a barbie doll when passing the parcel so very spoilt and tired girl who is asleep now. Think I might have a nap too.

More bbq'ing later today...think there might be a fair bit of that with our visitors here. And a visit to the beach.

Sean goes off on his around Australia tour for RSPCA tomorrow so we are pappa-less until Friday pm.

Good to talk to Pernilla and Thomas yesterday and to hear how great Nora's English is coming along!

Nodding off now...

2011! Will I manage to blog?!!

Hello world!

Well I checked in on our blog the other week and saw that I talked about blogging more in 2010...

I didn't! Sorry!

I do hope to make a better job of it in 2011...!!!

We are back in Australia, Orla will be 3 in June and a million other things have happened!

Happy reading (if I manage)!!

Kram Stina xxx