October 2009

We took Kay and George over to Copenhagen while they were here. Took them on a canal boat cruise. They said they really enjoyed it, but they probably would have enjoyed it a little more if it weren't so cold...

Tipton and Dave on the train on the way to Copenhagen.

George & Kay waiting for the canal boat tour.

Dave and his dad went out one day to play around with Dave's new camera. Here are some of the results...

View from the end of our street (towards the left) of the wind farm just off shore.

View from the end of our street (towards the right) of the Oresund Bridge.

The Turning Torso in west harbor in Malmö - the tallest building in all of Scandanavia.

George in front of the Turning Torso.

The Turning Torso looks different from every angle. Pretty freaky. Pretty cool, too.

There were great piles of what we thought were potatoes, but what we now think were sugar beets, all over the place out where we live. Huge, giant piles. Everywhere.

Picking out pumpkins.

Pumpkins carved & decorated.

Tipton's class at school has gotten too big to invite all of them over for a Halloween party. So this year he just chose a few close friends to invite over. It was fun making the food for the party. My favorite? Jello worms.

Jenn eating a jello worm. Mmmmmmmmmmm - they slide right down!

Our house has several doors that lead to the outside. So we stationed a grownup at each door and had the children run around the house, stopping at each door, to trick-or-treat. They loved it!

Lilli helped me bake cookies for the halloween party. Lilli loves to help, and loves to bake.

Tipton was Annikan Skywalker, Lego Mini-figure for Halloween. Lilli was Skeleton Girl. I made Tipton's costume. He and Lilli helped me to paint the box black. Sadly, I did not have time to make him a cape.

The gang: Cowgirl (Natalie), Skeleton girl (Lilli), Ninja (Rouven), Annikan Skywalker Lego Mini-figure (Tipton), Dracula (Henrik), Ninja (Ryan.)

Close up shot of the jello worms. At one point we had the kids convinced that they were REAL worms!

Left: Mini Mummies. Right: Potato ghosts.

October was a fun month!

September 2009

September was an exciting month for us. Dave's parents FINALLY made it over to Sweden to visit us!!

On their first day, we had them walk down to the end of our street. Tipton and Lilli were very excited to have Grama Kay and Papa visiting and were eager to show them the end of the street.

Lilli stopped along the way to pick a dandylion.

Here's the view from the end of our street. That is the Oresund bridge in the distance.

This is another view (looking the other direction.) That's the wind farm just off the coast.

Jenn, Lilli, Tipton & Grama Kay walking along the pedestrian street in downtown Malmö.

Dave got a new camera for his birthday. He went walking around downtown with his dad trying out his new toy. He took a picture of one of the bike parking areas near the central train station. Bikes are very popular in Sweden.

Grama Kay takes a break from helping Mommy in the kitchen to read a book to Lilli & Tipton. She's not enjoying herself or anything.

View from the end of our street at sunset.

The pheasant that lives in our neighborhood. Seems we've got lots of tasty bugs in our yard.

A rare picture of Jenn & the kids (usually she's on the other end of the camera.)

We took Kay & George to the Apple Festival in Kivik. This year's giant apple picture:

George & Kay enjoying a lovely fall day in Skåne at the Kivik apple festival.

George taking pictures, what he spent most of his time doing.

An apple hamburger!

Buying apple donuts (äpplemunkar) on our way back to the car. Mmmmmmmmm!

Dave with Tipton and Lilli on his birthday.

Tipton and Papa playing Legos.

Lilli reading a book to Papa.

She's got such wonderful facial expressions.

Tipton lost a tooth! Technically it was the second tooth to come out, but the first one had to be removed by the dentist. So this was the first one to come out 'on it's own.'

All About Lilli

In August Lilli started another session at The Little Gym. She was especially excited because she had received several gymnastics outfits from a friend.

Here is a glimpse of Lilli's unique sense of style.

Lilli also started taking a ballet class.

The class is taught in Swedish, and she is the only non-Swede in the class, but that doesn't seem to bother her at all.

The instructor, Helene, is absolutely wonderful. She has instructed Lilli to let her know if she does not understand something.

Lilli loves ballet. So much so that when it's over she comes running out to me (we were only allowed to sit in on the class the first day) with her arms thrown up and a huge smile on her face saying "I LOVE BALLET CLASS!"

More of Berlin & Donna's visit - August 2009

Dave's cousin, Donna, came to visit. We had just moved to a new "city" and so we set off in search of new playgrounds. We found a pretty nice one - climbing structures and space enough to play frisbee!

Lilli, Tipton & Donna at the top of the climbing structure.

Donna, Lilli & Tipton coming down the slide.

Action photo of Tipton throwing the frisbee.

Action photo of Lilli throwing the frisbee.

Our trip to Berlin:

Standing under the elusive and questionably named "Cow Bridge" (Or was it Cow Gate? Cow Arch?) on our way to Berlin.

Our first full day in Berlin we walked to the zoo from our hotel. Along the way we saw lots of bears. We thought the Irish Bear was particularly amusing.

Lilli's favorite was the Danish bear, because it has pictures from Hans Christian Andersson's stories, including (and most importantly) The Little Mermaid.

Tipton's favorite was the French bear, because it had lots of GOLD.

I forget the 'nationality' of Donna's favorite bear, but she liked it for the guitars.

City Pissoir. Really, this needs no explanation.

Tipton and Lilli being really cute at the zoo.

Standing at the famous elephant gate at the Berlin Zoo.

The zoo had an excellent playground. Tipton liked climbing into/inside/on top of the giant egg.

Lilli liked running all over the wooden climbing structures. She did not want to leave. Dave had to chase her down.

Donna in front of Knut's exhibit (a very famous polar bear.)

Jenn & Lilli in front of the other polar bear exhibit. (Not as famous as Knut, but still pretty cool.)

Dave & Tipton in front of the other polar bear exhibit.

Near the end of our day everyone was really tired. Lilli did a great job of walking almost the entire way. She ran out of steam towards the end and hitched a ride on Daddy's shoulders.