Walpurgis Eve

Walpurgis Eve is celebrated in Sweden by burning bonfires and this evening it is for some reason always really cold. So guess our surprise when the warm temperature stayed into the late evening - it was so warm so that people were wearing T-shirts and shorts. And there we were all prepped with a thermos of hot chocolate, blankets gloves and hats haha.

"A sister is a gift to the heart, a friend to the spirit, a golden thread to the meaning of life."

Sunny day

The sun is out: time for sandals and some tunnel making in the sand pit.

Picnic & BBQ season is back!

We love this time of the year when it allows for picnics again. As soon as we can, we pack the bags and today we were lucky and our plans were supported by good weather. This morning was spent with godmother Annelie and her son Elias at the lake with a good play, hot dogs and feeding of the birds. 

In the afternoon we were invited to some other friends for a BBQ at their place. As usual we bring the kids since we're always short of baby sitters. Now when Vera is a little bigger she can sit in the back seat of the pram and they really like riding together, see for yourselves:
On the way to dinner...

...and on the way home from dinner... ;-) 

Spiderman

Our beautiful son came home from daycare with a spider today ;-).

True love

Today, secretly by own initiative Noah made a card for Vera. Check it out! My heart melts...

Playful chic

I'll protect you with my Band Aids :-)

Getting big

Quality time

The best moment of the day: to de-stress in bed with the the whole family for story time.

Daddy's birthday weekend

We celebrated Shawn just the three of us this weekend. We took it very easy and did a family outing to the City Museum on the Saturday. It's a great place where you can bring your own picnic bag and they have a large indoor playground in the middle of the museum. Noah has been there with preschool several times so he guided us inside - he rushed through out the exhibitions and got very quickly to the play area. For the birthday today we had planned for a picnic but once out there, the weather turned quickly and we had did a indoor version of it instead. Equally cosy though..

Deliciousness

I think that one of the greatest joys of this addition to the family is to observe the children interact with each other. So far there has been no jealousy from Noah and he absolutely adores Vera and is so taken by her existence. The first thing he says when he walks through the door, coming home from preschool, is "Is Vera awake?". He kisses her constantly, to the point that he has no more kisses left for us - pretty much we are not allowed to kiss him anymore. "No kisses, only Vera" he says.

At the kitchen table while she sits in her chair keeping us company during dinner, he talks to her, shows her things and tells her what it is, makes funny faces to make her laugh etc. She observes his every move very closely and laughs with excitement to everything that he does. He seems to take her in as well, with all his senses because the other day he said: "I think Vera smells like pancakes!". Considering Noah's favorite food is pancakes, I think it said something about how he feels about her. People love the smell of a new little baby and Noah loves the smell of his baby sister - she smells just as good as pancakes ;-). 

Look around

So the time has come when Vera no longer is entertained by laying down in the pram relaxing whilst out and about. I'm surprised since she is so little but Noah was exactly the same, very curious so on the hand, it's not really a surprise, no. If awake, she wants to sit up but of course she is still too small to sit up by herself. So we have found a temporary solution, stacking up blankets behind her in the pram so that she can get a bit of view. She is all smiles..

Circus time

Long weekends means family fun and today, we all went to the circus! At the circus, there were no animals but magic tricks and a very strong man. Here is a sneak peek from the show...

Easter weekend - breakfast and morning TV

Wild photo shoot

Mormor came back on Monday to assist us during this week as well and Noah is very happy to have her back in his room.

Today there was a photographer at "Öppna Förskolan" so today we did my first outing; to walk down there with the two kids to see if we could get a good sibling shot of them. That did not happen. Noah got his eyes on a train track as soon as we got in to the room so suddenly he didn't want to participate - I'm not surprised at all :-). When finally get Noah up onto the mat, Vera was wiggling in his lap, getting too heavy to hold. In the end Vera was crying and Noah was not happy at all and just tried to slide off the mat reaching for the toys instead. Clearly, none of them wanted to be photographed and the pictures turned out...not good. Truly, they looked like two crazy ones haha!

At least I got to try out my knee again and now I know there will be another few days before life can continue as normal. It was a painful walk and tonight Im'm very swollen and with ice packs on the knees. It can only get better from here :-).

Below are some pics of Vera, trying to gulp down her hands whilst waiting for the photo shoot this morning.

Don't wanna miss out

As I written before, Vera wants to participate in all activities. Yesterday the kids were playing with the garage...

...and it made her so tired so when sitting down at the dinner table later on she couldn't keep her eyes open and feel asleep all tied into the high chair....

Mc Drooly

The last couple of weeks there has been lots of drooling and chewing on hands. Time to buy some more bibs as we go through a few per day... Will the teeth come early maybe?

Relaxing Sunday

Today we just spent together indoors (since I can't walk there is not much choice anyway).

Building Lego...

..."firetruck hotel" by Noah...

...no Lego for Vera yet but she is all smiles anyway...

...and as Easter is coming up; an Arts & Crafts session where the kids made their own Easter cards :-)