Day #1 in Sweden: Traveling and Evening Walk
[Photos from 11 July 2016, posted online 21 July 2016. Coffee houses are awesome!]
This summer we were looking for a change of scenery for the entire family, where it wasn’t too hot, and the flight-time reasonable. Since I’d never been to Sweden, Stockholm it was!
We rented a house on airbnb that looked kid-friendly, which it was. The only drawback was that I hadn’t realized that pretty much all the things-to-to were located on the far side of Stockholm, so we ended up driving the same road-with-a-thousand-round-abouts So. Many. Times.
Still, we had a lovely time, and just returned yesterday after hanging out there for ten days. I guess now it’s time to blog! (10 images total)
Our flight departed at 07:35 in the morning, which meant we had to be up ridiculously early. Grrrr, I hate morning flights!!
Horse Camp Helper
[Photos from Monday 04 to Friday 08 July 2016, posted online 26 August 2016. It weirdly warm outside still. ]
Anna was all sad because after two weeks at horse camp in June, there weren’t going to be any more horses until August. (Ah yes, such a hard life. Princess life problems!)
Anyway, towards the end of the June horse-stint, I approached the very friendly lady who runs the whole madhouse, and what came out of my mouth was “Uh… can Anna come, and just hang around the horses, and maybe help out for a bit at some point? Just, uh, instead of lying in bed all day with her tablet?” She got an affirmative for the first week of July, and it went pretty well, all though it was pretty tiring work, and very little horse riding happened. (15 images total)
Monday 4 July 2016
Anna riding bareback for the short ride up to the fields. That was her only ride of the day after walking kids on horseback around all day.
Bjarki’s 9th Birthday Celebration
[Photos from Monday 04 July 2016, posted online 23 August 2016. Truly.]
On this gorgeous US Independence Day, we hosted a family birthday celebration in honor of Bjarki turning 9 years old.
It was a pretty standard birthday party except there was a small interruption in the middle as everybody gathered in front of the television to watch the Icelandic national football team drive into downtown on a roofless bus, being greeted as heroes by thousands, after their 2016 Euro Cup performance! (17 images total)
Bjarki’s cake, and some extra items. The sword was there to raise the plate up, because the cake was a bit crooked. It sure tasted good though!
July 2016 Begins: Computer, Art, Jogging, and Football
[Photos from 01 July to 03 July 2016, posted online on 15 August 2016. Got a whiff of autumn weather.]
Cleaning up the backlog of pictures. Here’s how July 2016 started in 9 images!
Friday 01 July 2016
Finnur and the big kids assembling a Raspberry Pi computer. They got it running, but it hasn’t seen any action since then. What do we do with a raspberry pi computer?!
Bjarki’s 9th Birthday
[Photos from 28 June 2016, posted online shortly after midnight. Hopefully.]
Bjarki turned 9 years old today! Click here if you want to read up on the day of his and Reynir’s birth, also known as the best of times, and the worst of times.
But, Bjarki keeps thriving, and he was pretty excited to open his presents this morning. He then spent the day at a camp (námskeið) with the local scout group, before coming home in the afternoon, and spending pretty much the rest of the day on some computer or other. It was his birthday after all!
With Finnur slowly making his way back from Nice, France, via Vienna (!), and not expected to arrive until right now (30 minutes past midnight, technically on 29 June) I invited Adda, Halli, and their kids over for some hamburgers, ice cream, and muffins. Bjarki even got to blow out a candle!
Formal family celebrations will have to wait a bit, probably until next week, while Finnur recovers from his football adventure in France, and until the weather forecast gets its act together.
Some photos from the day! (9 images total)
The birthday boy!
Bjarni Graduates from Keilir’s Health Academy
[Photos from Friday 10 June 2016, posted online Saturday 11 June 2016. My laptop needs a new battery.]
My brother Bjarni has been a fitness enthusiast for a very long time, and even won a fitness title this winter. Last year he decided this is a field he wants to build a professional career in, so he enrolled in the Nordic Personal Trainer Certification program at Keilir’s Health Academy.
Yesterday he graduated with flying colors, after working hard all winter. We threw a small party to celebrate, just with the closest of family, as Finnur was still jetlagged, and I was still recovering from being sick. He then took off for a more party-like party with his buddies.
All the photos are HERE (including a few of a friend of my mother’s who was also graduating), but a selection follows: (24 images total)
Bjarni, Personal Trainer, at your service.
Spring Gymnastics Show & 20 Year Reunion
[Photos from Saturday 4 June 2016, posted on Sunday 12 June 2016. Finnur’s traveling to Munchen for four days.]
My last Finnur-less day, for the time being, was packed to the gills, with Bjarki’s year-end big gymnastics show starting at 1 pm, then driving the kiddos to their respective babysitters, before joining my 20 year Junior College (MR) reunion, which had events beginning at 2 pm and lasting long into the evening.
And of course Emma starting the day by falling ill with a spring cold.
Being a third child, I took her temperature at noon (38.5 C/ 101.3 F), gave her fever-reducing medication, dragged her to see Bjarki’s show (It. Was. Amazing!), dropped Bjarki off at Steinunn’s, and Emma off at her grandparents’, and then reunioned until about 9 pm, at which point drove back to pick Emma up, and took her home. (Phew!)
The final numbers of the evening: 39.4 C/ 102.9 F, followed by another fever-reducer. (19 images total, 1 video playlist)
Bjarki, with the pineapple who wanted to be a dictator/king, and was thwarted by the other fruits in the fruit bowl (aka Ávaxtakarfan).
Haircut, Dresses, and an Idyllic Evening
[Photos from Friday 3 June 2016, posted online 9 June 2016. Sick for the past couple of days.]
This Friday was a weird one, mostly because it stayed warm-ish and idyllic far into the evening.
Most of the happenings happened after work. Finnur’s parents’ picked Emma up from daycare, so I could have 30 minutes to go dress-shopping with Bjarki as my fashion consultant. We then zoomed on over to the hair salon, where Bjarki got a haircut, and then more zooming happened to pick Emma up. I believe we took the easy way out and had store-bought sushi for dinner…
We spent the evening mostly outside, and getting the kids (Emma in particular) to go back into the house, was no easy task. (Finnur was still in California.) (8 images total)
(P.s. Anna had taken off earlier in the day with a friend + her family to go camping out in the country over the weekend!)
Yeah, fast charging degrades the batteries, but they’re so much fun (and free!). This is me and Bjarki outside the mall.
Chocolate, Photos, Books, and Weeds
[Photos from 2 June 2016, posted online 5 June 2016. It’s midnight and still bright outside! ]
Thursday was a busy day. I left work early to take Emma to see the doctor (see below), drove Bjarki to gym practice, nursed Emma’s broken spirit after the doctor accidentally drew blood, picked Bjarki up, took both kids downtown to say hi to Lotta who was opening a new photography show of hers, spent some time fruitlessly looking for a certain book in the library, second hot chocolate run next door, and then finally home! (13 images total)
Emma’s hand sprouted a wart around the time she had chicken pox (the two may be related?) which refused to go away by itself. I’ve been taking her to see a doctor weekly, and that afternoon the doctor accidentally drew blood while clearing away dead skin. This left Emma in such a state that I ended up giving her the Professor Lupin treatment, i.e. copious amounts of chocolate. It worked for the most part.
Finnur’s Flying to California
[Photos from 24 May 2016, posted online 24 May 2016. I should go to bed soon.]
Today, Finnur took off on his twice-yearly work-trip to the mother-ship in Mountain View (Gaaah, don’t look at the pictures, doooon’t! Ack, too late. Now I want to go too!) He’s on the plane to Seattle as I’m typing this.
He’ll only be gone for 12 days this time around, instead of a full two weeks, and then some, because I need my sanity, and because the flight prices/schedules lined up that way. Thankfully, school is winding down, so we should all survive. Knock on wood!
Some media from today (4 images and 1 tiny video):
Anna showing us her artwork from this past school year.