Wine- and exchange of books lunch :-)

Friday wine lunch at Ulrika's place, with exchange of pocket books, great ending of a 'work' week!

We also cheered for the new baby girls of the week: Malou's twin girls Lia & Hedda and the Swedish Crown Princess daughter Princess Estelle Silvia Ewa Mary :-)

Zoo & Play with grandma - and China Town w/o kids

Kids are thrilled to have grandma & Thomas visiting (Matilde even wants to brush her teeth when Thomas helps her, amazing!!!) and lots of time is spent playing at home, the playground and today at the Zoo.

After loads of kids activities, we take off for a few hrs in China Town. Except from the obvious sightseeing, I had a hidden mission getting another zipper for my sewing project :-)

More family - yiehoo

Sunday morning with coffee and beachtime at Sentosa with Andreas & Cecilia. Mom & Thomas came 24 hrs after Andreas & Cecilia and we are hence full house!!

The Oscars at Robertson Quay

Ketti was longing for the 84th Academy Awards and invited a bunch of girls over Live viewing of the Oscars, with breakfast & champagne - at 9am in the morning :-)

I could not have thought about a better way of starting the week; it was great to see some girlfriends (without kids!), watch the Oscars, eat great B-fast, enjoy the champagne, read Ketti's ppt (hehe)... simply just an awesome morning - big applause to Ketti :-)

Saturday family time & Swedish family in town

The man of the house has been travelling non-stop for way to long but Saturday morning at 5am, he finally got back from Australia to stay in SG for a while, jabadabadooo :-)

Had a really active day with pool-time, my cooking class, Morten baking bread with the girls, me trying to finish up my sewing project (almost done!)...

At 5pm, our first guests for the weekend arrived and we picked them up at the airport: my brother Andreas and girlfriend Cecilia. Was great seeing them again, and after resting for a few hours, we went out for dinner and sightseeing of the three Quays of Singapore; Boat- , Clarke-, and Robertson Quay.

Indian Cooking Class

As many of my friends know, I'm not really what you would define as a gormet chef... To do something about this, I decided to take a cooking class, and signed up for the 'easiest kitchen', the Indian one... Ida came along and with instruction of bringing a rolling stick, containers and an open mind, we were quite excited to see if this adventure were to turn us into Master Chefs of the Year :-)

It turned out it was not really a hands-on class, which we had expected, it was LOADS of spieces and ingrediences which I hadn't even heard the name of, and I became sweaty just thinking about how on earth I'd manage to do this myself.... But after the class, I realize it is not rocket science, it only takes a lot of patience to cook Indian food, or food in general... I have now promised myself I will try the dishes at home and hopefully it will be eatable :-)

Menu:

1. Tandoori Chicken
2. Punjabi Daal
3. Garlic Naan Bread

Big girls' playdate

Hannah & Lea haven't seen eachother for a few weeks so time for a playdate without the mummies!
Lea came over and they played outside for a few hours, Matilde tagging along of course, with pancakes for dinner :-)

Wednesday evening fun.... :)

Sewing and watching 'Bridesmaids' and chatting with Annelie based in Shanghai :-)

SEMLOR

Asa from the Swedish mummygroup had gone all in and invited her fellow country-women for semlor in celebration of Shrove Tuesday, or 'Fat Tuesday' or 'White Tuesday', whichever you prefer. I believe 'Fat Tuesday' fits best to today's gathering, as we all went belistic over those 'semlor', some of us more than others....no names to be mentioned ;-)

While the mummies enjoyed the 'fika' table, the kids played by pool and we actually managed to sit down and have an adult conversation AND enjoying the coffee with hardly no breaks, impressive :-)

TACK Asa for ensuring we celebrate our Swedish traditions!

Morning playdate & picking up daddy from the airport - finally he's back!!

Monday morning and Matilde & I have a playdate with Michelle & Rylie. The girls really start to get to know eachother, and it is great to see they get all happy when they see one another. Good friends also share things, normally food & water bottles..., but today, Rylie shared her dummy/pacifier/soother with Matilde, who walked around with it for over an hour...hm... guess I shouldn't do the same mistake I did with Hannah; starting using a dummy at 1.5 yrs old...!

Morten finally comes back from his 10 day trip to Cph & DK and we surprised him at the airport. The girls were over the moon to see him again :-)

Yes, Matilde is wearing a hat inside. She insisted on wearing it, with other words screaming when I took it off, which I find rather ironic as she NEVER wants a hat outside and screams if we put on one...children... :-)

'Fastelavn' celebration - Danish church

Sunday afternoon was spent in the Danish Seamanchurch celebrating 'Fastelavn', a Danish carneval celebration similar to Halloween. Anyhow, Hannah was dressed as Pippi Longstocking with a spider hat (no comments) and Matilde was having a meltdown when we were to get dressed, and hence got to wear normal clothes - and was just as happy :-)

The celebration started with a church service focused on 'Fastelavn', and after bribing H & M with raisins, they sat nicely & quiet at the floor next to me, except when Matilde realize she had lots of funny figures around her and stood up and pointed and laughed :-)

For 'fastelavn' there is a game called "hit the cat out of the barrel", very similar to a pinata, which at this occasion was filled with mandarins. The disappointed kids, who were expected candy, weren't sad for long as got goodie bags (in which mummy confiscated most of the candy) and 'fastelavnsboller' (a bun filled with jam or cream with colorful icing on top. Assume the Swedish version would be a 'semla'). After the sugar rush, they got to run around on the playground for an hour, and I'm sure that last hour help enormously to get them to bed at desent hour...

Tomorrow, the man in the house is FINALLY back...for 22 hrs before he's off to Melbourne...'yiehoo'...

Sunday's ambitious morning activities...

Sunday in Singapore, meaning no assistance from Nady.... Cannot stay inside as the girls will start climbing on the walls and so will I... Decide to meet up with Michelle and family at East Coast Starbucks for breakfast - and decided to walk there with the kids. Would have worked fine as long as I had brought the double-stroller, but oh no, the ambitious Sara (or insane?) decides to take a single stroller to Matilde and a scooter to Hannah. It was fun for about 100 meter, where the fun turns in to a nightmare, 'yiehoo', and we only have a 2 km walk ahead of us!!! Somehow, I managed to get Hannah to get up on the scooter for about 1-k and there, she falls straight on her belly and forehead - why didn't we all just stay at home?!!!
Well, we did manage to get to Starbucks, obviously a lot later than expected, but the kids were happy to have reached the destination (i.e. bagels & juice) and see their friends Paige & Rylie, and mummy to get some adult time, even though most of the time was spent ensuring no spilled drinks, no iPads on the floor, potty visits, 'be-nice-to-your-sister' comments.... but we concluded it was worth getting out :-)

Plan was to take a cab back but Hannah wanted to run in the park, so I won't argue with that. Both the kids ran most of the way, with plenty of stops for patting dogs ("-EXCUUUUSSSEEE me, can I pat your doggy?!?"), looking at coconuts, picking flowers, talking to other kids, you name it. The last kilometer, I convinced them to both sit in the stroller which was a hit - and even better, they fall asleep!! What a great start of a Sunday morning :-)

Just a regular Friday....

So, it's Friday and I have no major plans... Starting by going for a run while Nady takes Hannah to school and Matilde to their weekly 'helpers/kids' playgroup at Royce. I signed Morten up for a half-marathon (hehe) and obviously, I will have to run with him. Starting to get closer to the D-day so I simply don't have a choice but to get my butt out of the appartment and run like crazy! It's actually not that bad, I quite enjoy it, more after than during though I gotta admit... :-)

Today was the first day since we moved to Singapore I brought a book down to the pool, wow was it nice to sit there with no interuptions!! Except I almost fell asleep....

After picking Hannah up, we take a quick trip to Tanglin Mall for lunch and getting Hannah new swim clothes. I insisted she picked a blue shirt but no way, it is all about pink... Yes, she won that negotiation...

Playdate in the afternoon with Ida & Ingrid. Matilde & Ingrid were very interested in one another, patting eachother's hair, or pulling... :-)

Managed to get a pic of the sisters where both were smiling :-)

Grand finale of a Friday with no hubby in sight? Chocolate muffins & girly movie!!!

Hannah missing her daddy :(

Picture for Valentines at school of Daddy & Hannah....

Vietnamese Spring Rolls

Morten got a Gordon Ramsey cookbook from me at X-mas and we have now starting to use it. First out, Vietnamese Spring Rolls - the result was awesome!!! (Ok, Morten & I should not take any credit of the result, it was all Nady, she is the best chef ever!)

B/w, both the girls simply loved the springrolls, at least when we removed all items of greens....

The Pedersen's in Singapore for a super-quick visit!

Our dear friends Anders & Karima with kids Jasmine & Adam from Hong Kong came by for some pool-time and dinner. Was really nice seeing them again, and that Hannah & Jasmine connected :-)
Too bad Morten isn't home but hopefully we all get to see eachother soon again, either in HK, Spore or Denmark!!!

Karima, me & the kids at least get to see eachother Thursday for the Danish children church group :-)

Lazy Saturday morning - and coffee with the Perssons :-)

Saturday morning, we try a new cafe in the neighborhood which apparently have excellent coffee and muffins (Loysels Toys Cafe).
The surroundings were really nice and pretended to be a photographer, mostly with Matilde as the model :-)

The cafe had bike rental service which we of course had to try out - especially since the kids never have tried being in a kids bike seat before... and wow, did they love it!!

Later on, the Persson's met up for morning coffee/'fika' together with another family who moved to Singapore from Hong Kong at the same time we did. We all have daughters and ended up having 7 girls under the age of 4... my gosh :-)

Home alone with the kiddos

Sunday and Morten is off to DK and Nady has the day off.... what to do...

Beach-time at Coastes at Sentosa and we actually have quite a good time, with no meltdowns, halleluja :-)
Only rocky mistake: wrong kid fall asleep in the stroller meaning Matilde exhausted in the afternoon and Hannah bounching on the walls all evening long... oh well!

We ran into Maggan with family and at below picture, Erik is making sure Matilde is not running out in the water, the cutest :-)

The afternoon was really nice, despite a rather tired Matilde, as Ashley from da Honkers came by and entertained :-) It didn't take many seconds for Ashley to become my girls' favorite 'auntie' :-)

Dentist....

I have had a wonderful day - 3 hrs at the Dentist office! Or I guess it should read 'chair'. Thank Godness for anaesthesia, and for the TV showing 'Friends' :-) Got flashbacks from the delivery of Hannah where we watched 'Friends' in the delivery room...!

Yet another playdate...

Another playdate... and coffee/fika... :-)

Markatta - Swedish theatre in Spore

Today we have been to a Swedish family show at OFS. The show was really good, Hannah & Matilde enjoyed the performance (even M sat still almost the entire hour!) and Swedish 'fika' was served afterwards which is always a hit!

Several of the Monday kidsgroup kids were there, and was fun to have the daddies present for once! :)

After sitting still for an hour and gotten loads of sugar in the belly, we spend a looooong time at the school's basketball field running around..... :-)

Thursday Playgroup

Every Thursday, Hannah & Matilde have a playdate with Olivia from Hannah's class. Sometimes there are other kids, but most of the time, it's only the three of them. Today, Paige & Rylie joined and all the 5 girls had a blast running around the playground!

IKEA

What to do an afternoon when no playdates planned and seriously do not want to sit on the floor playing with dolls/puzzles/legos/trains....! Off we go to IKEA of all places :-) Didn't really need to buy anything but of course you never end up leaving empty-handed, right!

Hannah & Matilde had a blast in the children area, playing with all the toys that were on display for +30 min, wonderful! After that, Hannah insisted she got to go to the kids play room, but I though she was to young for that. Anyhow, we gave it a shot and she passed the 'admission test', i.e. over 90 cm (think she is 93 or similar, maybe good their measuring stick was gone...!) She really enjoyed it, and asked if we could go back to IKEA tomorrow again...