Weekend at Farmors

 Last weekend Søren had to work from 8am Saturday morning til 11.30pm Sunday night.  So the boys, Zoey and I went to Esbjerg to spend time with Farmor (Søren's mom).  When Søren left he said..Way to go wifey - 3 kids, a dog and a mother in law - you can do it!...But we were just joking, because I adore my 3 kids, my dog and my mother in law!  I felt so lucky that we were able to spend the time together, and we had a great time.  I really felt like I was on vacation! The weather was great, and we explored lots of places in Esbjerg including

1) The shopping street - where Farmor, as tradtion, bought Liam a school bag for when he starts school THIS fall! :-)

2) The ocean and the famous Stryhns ice cream store...where we had our first ice cream cones of the season.

3) Vognbøls park in Esbjerg, where we walked around a lake, in the forest and ended at a cool playground.

Zoey was with for all of these adventures and she did really well.  She had been getting car sick everytime we took even the shortest trips, but after all the quick trips around Esbjerg that weekend, she actually stopped throwing up every time we drive! Yay!  She loved all the new experiences as much as we did.

Otherwise we had lots of yummy food, played games, played with Søren and Faster's (Aunt Ulla's) old toys. 

Some other highlights include

1) All 3 boys and the dog sleeping until 8am Sunday morning -what?!!

2) Playing some fun games at the dinner table after dinner Saturday night....We laughed a lot and just had a great time together.

By Sunday evening we headed back to Skjern and were excited to see Søren monday morning!

Easter 2022

 Easter is my favorite time of the year.  The kids and I have 10 days off, when you count the weekends, and the weather is often quite nice.  This year was no exception.  The holidays started off with me getting to go to Århus with a friend for a whole Saturday.  We had a great time shopping and enjoying a nice peaceful lunch, just the two of us.  It was just what I needed to energize me for the week ahead.

Then Palm Sunday, my gospel choir "Joyful Gospelkor" sang 4 songs during the church service at at our church.  It was really festive and I loved hearing the whole choir sing "Hosianna!"....

We had lots of plans with friends and family the following week. Unfortunately the boys were sick on and off.  Mostly fever and pflegm coughs.  They took turns being really tired and then feeling fine again. So we were actually able to do most of our plans.  However, Benjamin had to stay home with Søren, who was working from home, the day I took the other boys, with some friends, to the Ostrich Farm and the beach.  It was a really cool experience to learn lots about Ostriches and pet them etc.  The friends we went with are hosting 2 young women from Ukraine, so they came with, and it was the first time they had seen the ocean! So they were in awe and so thankful.  It was nice to be able to give them a nice day.

Otherwise we were visiting friends and family and going to church to celebrate.  As tradition, we were in Esbjerg to visit Søren's Mom with his sister and family.  We ate great food, chatted, played games,  and had an Easter Egg hunt.  Our nephew Lukas just got his drivers license, so I got to take a short drive with him, that was really nice! He's a great driver and a great "kid"!

Maunday Thursday (Skærtorsdag) festive Tapas after church

Saturday we visited Søren's Dad and Hanne, and Easter Sunday Søren's Mom was here to celebrate Easter Day.  Everyone found their Easter baskets and we went for a nice long walk with Zoey!

Everyone got an Easter "basket" this year

In Denmark you get the monday after Easter off as well, and we have a tradition to be with our American Watermark friends who live in Denmark.  It was a great day, relaxing, enjoying the beautiful weather and speaking English.  All 9 kids had a great time together and it was fun to hear them all speaking English together, even though they can all speak Danish as well.  

Watermark adults + Benjamin + Naomi

Helping Mom

The other day we were going to have guests in the afternoon when Søren got home from work, so Søren wanted to make sure that I had some help around the house to get some of the small chores done while he was away.  He made a list for the boys and put it out in the morning.  Silas and Benjamin had 2 chores and Liam only had 1, so Søren added one more chore, just for fun...See below!!

Silas: Fold laundry + tidy up room
Benjamin: Tidy up room + empty the dishwasher
Liam: Tidy up room + kiss Mommy

When I showed the boys the list and told them what they were to help out with, Liam, was NOT happy.  He did not want to have to KISS MOMMY.  I told him that he could ask Benjamin if he wanted to trade jobs with him. Liam LOVED this idea so he asked Benjamin "Benjamin, do you want to trade jobs with me? I'll unload the dishwasher and you kiss Mommy."   Benjamin was very much on board, so Liam traded the job of giving me a kiss for unloading the dishwasher....😂😂😂 I chose not to take it personally! 😁😕                                               

Happy Easter Lego style

 Benjamin had an idea to make the story of Easter out of Legos! We spent quite a bit of time on it, and had a great time doing it.  It was nice to do together and reflect on the different parts of Easter.  When we were done, we took pictures of each piece and Silas made it into a video.  Here is the result! Happy Easter everyone!

Just a casual update

 There is not so much to report, but I thought I'd check in anyways with some general things.

I think it is safe to say that the boys love having a dog! They love Zoey so much, and she gets lots of hugs and kisses everyday.  We should probably start waking them up earlier in the mornings, as they use so much time saying goodbye to her everyday! She is still a bit crazy at times and likes to growl and bite at their ankles - especially Liam's!  But just 1 minute after Liam is crying that Zoey is biting, he is sitting next to her wanting to pet her and talking in the sweetest voice.  Zoey's behavior is a bit annoying with the biting, but we aren't too concerned, because it seems she just wants to play. She does a lot of the same things when she gets to play with her puppy friend Bailey who lives up the road. It is really fun to watch them tumble and chase each other. 

Benjamin has also really taken to Zoey, and speaks a lot of English to her.  Things like---"Hi, Zoey, oh you're so sweet Zoey, do you want to play with me Zoey."  He uses her name all the time, and it's really nice to hear him speaking a bit of English!  Silas is very happy for Zoey and loves when she runs up and jumps into his lap when he gets home from school.  Silas can get sad if there is a day he isn't going to be home much, as he says "But I'm going to really miss Zoey, I can't leave her so long!".... 

"Helping" Liam dig

Night time nap on the couch!

Play at the beach

My working companion - Looking at me while  I work from home.

 I am also very much in love with her...When she's sleeping! ...Ha ha...No I think she is so much fun to have around, and I like training things with her.  She can now jump through a hulahoop, play fetch and bring back toys, sit, stay, (come...when she isn't distracted, which isn't very often)... We start puppy training with her on tuesday, and I'm looking forward to getting some new tools! So yes, I love her too, but I have to admit, I've had to use a lot of patience with all the things that come along with having her! But that's okay, it'll get better right?

Otherwise, the new news to report is that after 10 years of having our old rusty station wagon, we finally got a new car...New to us that is.  It is a 2018 Ford C max Grand.  It's the closest thing I'll ever get to a minivan, as it has sliding doors...but still only 5 seats, but then a very decent sized trunk storage.  There are a lot of upgrades that have happened since 2006 the year our station wagon is from.  Now we have a reverse camera, navigation system, and my personal favorite, we can hook up our telephone to the speakers and hear other music.  Also, all the speakers in our new car work...you don't have to lock and unlock the car before the radio works, and Benjamin's door now opens from the outside as well! 

As you can hear, our old car had some "problems" and it wasn't going to be able to go through the bi-annually emissions control here in June without some major repairs, so it was time!   And we love it!  

My Gospel projects are still going well, and I have concerts with each of my 3 choirs the next 1½ weeks, so that will be fun.  I'll try to remember to post about those!

Gospelkids Festival 2022

 This year it was finally possible to carry out the annual Gospelkids Festival.  It is a festival where kids from ages 1st to 8th grade can come and sing Gospelkids songs all weekend.  Gospelkids is a concept developed here in Denmark and my childrens choir is one of the official groups - Skjern Gospelkids.  The songs are Gospel in the way that are about God and Jesus, and there are lots of motions and dances to each song.  Our choir in Skjern has about 45 kids.  For this festival there were 9 kids with from our group, including Silas.  (look for him in the video when it zooms in :-))

My co-leader Sanne and I were also with.  It was a great experience.  The kids had so much fun, and the songs sounded amazing. The older kids were really challenged in a fun way, and it was fun to see the concentration by all.  The festival ended with a big concert where family and friends were invited.  There were 250 kids on the stage, and it brought tears to my eyes just to see kids together again - hugging, singing and having a great time.  We are already ready for next year!

Fastelavn 2022

The yearly "Fastelavn" party has come and gone.  It's a tradition in Denmark to celebrate the weekend before Lent (Faste).  The festivities include costumes, Fastelavns boller (special cream-filled rolls with frosting on top), and hitting the cat out of the barrel.  

This year we had Super Mario brothers Mario and Luigi.  And Silas wanted to be Adam Thielen from the Minnesota Vikings!

The boys had 2 parties each.  One at school/preschool and one at our church!

Silas won the "hitting the cat out of the barrel" at the school party and actually won both the "Cat Queen" and "Cat King" crowns!