Beautiful Sunday.

To wake up to the birds chirp is wonderful. Even though it's 6 am and a certain one year old is totally awake and wants to play. After having a very North american breakfast (scrambled eggs, bacon, toast with way to much peanut butter, juice and coffee) we slowly got ourselves ready to face the beautiful spring outside. I ran 5,5 km meanwhile the girls and H played in the park. I joined them and saw Andréa ride a slide totally alone for the first time. Missed her with my camera since she came way to fast and then missed to catch her so she ended up sitting on her bum in front of my feet, happy as ever!

This is the pic that was suppose to perpetuate Andréa's first single ride down the slide... .

Pancakes for lunch, Lovisa beat her record and ate 3,5 pancakes. She couldn't get enough of the little "face pancakes" that H fixed her...

Lovisa: "It's a baby, mum!" Me:"OK, go ahead and eat it!"

Napping together and then coffee and snack on the balcony - for the first time. The girls where so excited they had a hard time sitting still...

17 degrees in the shade on our balcony...

Played football outside our house with the girls. Or rather, H and Lovisa played, I walked around with Andréa. Then a short walk to the store and back. Nice supper, a quite evening and now time for bed. Small miracles on a beautiful Sunday.

Phew...

If you're looking for a total make over you can have two babies and your body is never going to be the same ever again. Now, my body recuperated relatively fast and I'm back at my old weight. However, things aren't really the same. Hips are wider, skin around my belly a bit looser and my boobs smaller and saggier. That basically means I need a new wardrobe, starting with the lingerie, because let's be honest, how sexy is it with a bra that's hanging from your body like little bags because you boobs don't fill it out? Now, I'm proud that my body carried, gave birth and fed my two perfectly beautiful girls and I don't mind that it shows that I actually been through it. But even if I feel this way I can't help that I'm a bit irritated on today's abnormal ideals. And I guess it affects me a little bit even if I don't want to admit it... Pictures of celebrities that have babies and look skinnier than ever is everywhere. Actually it seems like a lot of them look younger and fitter than ever after several pregnancies. Then again they probably have personal trainers, nannies, chefs to cook healthy meals for them and money to get a boob job and liposuction, which we ordinary deadly people don't.

Anyway, lately I've been sneaking around the lingerie department when I walked through different clothing stores and I'm a bit chocked. What a range off different kinds of bras there are! I didn't even see them before I got pregnant but now they're everywhere! Push up pads, control, firm and lift up... Is it more common nowadays or am I just more sensitive to these types of things?

These strange looking push up pads are to be found in all clothes stores with a lingerie department. Did things like these even exist a few years back?

Finally I did something that I postponed for too long. I took the metro to the city alone, took a deep breath and went to the lingerie department at Åhlens. I didn't bye lingerie for years, except for a few breastfeeding bras that I, after the last breastfeeding, threw out with a sigh of relief... One hour later and almost 1000 SEK (150 CAD) poorer I went home with 2 new bras and 4 new panties. But no push up pads. After all, it's very convenient to have small boobs; they're light, I easily carry them around and they fit into most clothes. And I actually like them even if they're a bit saggy.

Sometimes I feel like giving in...

And just give them a big bowl off ice cream. Let them climb in the windows. Give them a big chocolate bar before bedtime. Just say "OK, if you don't want to brush your teeth you don't have to" (OK, OK, some evenings that actually happened). Let them eat supper naked only wearing their rubber boots. Let them eat a toast in my bed. Stay in the bath until their skin look like raisins.

But imagine the bad conscience I would have after... And imagine the brats I would have as children... Brrr...

 Lovisa wanted ice cram for snack but got a toast, that she didn't eat...

She may think she rules the world but she's not (yet)...

Chickenpox...

Then it was time for chickenpox. Which doesn't come as a surprise since Lovisa's best friend at daycare, a blue eyed, blonde, very cute boy, had it a couple of weeks back. I just hope we get it over and done with fast. She has 10-15 little dots spread around her body so far and she seems pretty OK, not to much scratching yet...

One chickenpox dot on her hip...

I just hope Andréa gets it fast so our Yasuragi night is safe... The incubation time for chickenpox is 10-20 days and our date night is in exactly 15 days from now... No, no, no - we are going!

Now it's booked.

And no diseases are to come in the way for this! One night at Yasuragi to sleep, eat, drink, talk and hang out with H and charge our low running batteries. My dad and his wife are babysitting. Oh, I can't wait!

Hello spring!

And hello allergy... It's probably true what they say; that the pregnancy and breastfeeding hormones reduces allergy. Because I don't recall that my allergy was this bad the past years - runny nose, swollen itching eyes and so bloody tired (yes, more than usual if it's possible)... Or is it worse in Sweden than Canada? I just turned down a lunch date with H and that is not like me but I'm just to exhausted.

I seriously have to start thinking about allergy desensitization - is it worth it?

Comparisons you shouldn't do...

But it's so hard not to!

Lovisa 1 year old: 80 cm and impressive 11,8 kg, very active physically, night owl that never wants to go to bed, started to walk around 10 months and was running fast when she turned one...

Andréa 1 year old: 77 cm and 10,0 kg, calmer physically, tired in the evening and sleeps early, just started to walk a few days ago...










Their mother, soon to be 34 years old: 171 cm and 57 kg, wouldn't mind sleeping earlier in the evening and longer in the morning...

Happy birthday Andréa!

Little over a year ago she was born, Andréa Kristina Bouma. I squeezed her out just after 7 pm and the feeling! It's worth a million! Congratulations our little miss sunshine! I can't believe it's been a year already!

Almost exactly one year ago I gave birth to this little girl. I don't lie when I say I think we both look better today!

Andréa, minutes old...

It's easy to get a bit nostalgic a day like this. But I think we handled it pretty good. I focused on the cake and the food, H ran around the house cleaning, picking up and my mother, who's visiting for the big occasion, entertained the kids. Around 2 pm the guests arrived. It was friends and family, a nice mix of cool people. We ate, drank, sang but most of all: enjoyed our beautiful children! 

The cake need a chapter of it's own. I sweated, I almost cried but I made it! A three layer, delicious strawberry, cream cake:

The birthday girl was in a splendid mood and wobbled around showing her new feature: to walk! She ate her cake, opened her gifts, or rather; enjoyed her gifts while somebody else opened them...

 I rule the world... 

 From me and H she got a Mercedes to cruse around in...

 Her first shoes...

The girls are sleeping and the parents are tired - a good party for the best one year old!

The proof!

It's quite amazing. Only one day after she took her first steps she's now really walking! Today we counted to 25 steps before she sat down on her little butt. Hurray!

Proud!

I just have to brag a bit more over my soon to be one year old daughter. She took her first 3 little steps all by herself today. The whole family was here to see it. Way to go Andréa!!!

Otherwise I'm pretty busy preparing for the party on Sunday. Today I bought candles for the cake (that I'm just a bit worried about, H wants (I quote) "A big Northamerican cake" and I'm the one that's suppose to bake it), tons of other stuff for the party and I also made 32 mini quiche. My dad and his wife took Andréa to the Nationalmuseum so I could swear alone in the kitchen while trying to get the dough to fit in to the tiny muffins cups. Now time for bed!

Our little miss sunshine...

It feels like I just complain about Andréa and her lack of sleep. But the truth is that she's also such a bunch of joy and happiness! She's just a big smile when she wakes up in the morning, she's laughing a lot, has a great sense of humor and loves to watch her sister do all kinds of prank and then tries to do the same... She's just adorable...

She started to crawl with a special style that we call "The monkey style". So now she switches between "The butt style" and "The monkey style" and of course tries to walk as soon as she has something to hold on to...

Our little miss sunshine!

The list...

Borrowing this list from my friend "Åretruntparadiset":

1. What did you do 10 years ago?
My god, I have to think now! I worked in my hometown Karlskoga, on my second year as a biomedical scientist, lived a settled life with my ex boyfriend, planning for the future containing marriage, children, work... Little did I know that non of that ever was going to happen (with him)!

2. What did you do 1 year ago?
I was as pregnant as you can get, 4 days over due and going a bit manic to say the least. Hubert and Lovisa had joined me in my hometown, we were living in my mothers apartment and just waiting for the baby!

3. Five snacks that you like?
Five!? I don't think there are 5 different snacks that I actually like but my favorite are salted peanuts. I eat the whole ones first and the half ones last for some strange reason. I also like potato chips, preferably plain salted or sour cream and onion. My number one favorite of all unhealthy things is chocolate but I doubt that qualify as a snack?

4. Five songs you know the lyrics to?
I'm pretty good with lyrics... It gets stuck in my head easily. Talkin' bout a revolution (Tracy Chapman), Ironic (Alanis Morissette), Om du lämnade mig nu (Lars Winnerbäck), Friends (The Rembrandts) and Himlen runt hörnet (Lisa Nilsson) are the first ones that comes to mind.

5. Five things you would do if you became a multi millionare?
Bye a condo in Stockholm, imagine having a house in Montrael, a summer house in Sept-Iles and a condo here - yes!
Fix my eyes with laser so I wont have to wear glasses
Travel, travel, travel
Bye a car (it is easier to have a car when you have two children...)
Spend more time with the family and less time at work

6. Five bad habits
A bit of a control freak
It doesn't take much to get me in a bad mood in the morning
I worry to much and create problems that's not really a problem just yet (if you know what I mean)
I poke my nose when I think I'm alone and nobody sees me
I drink coffee instead of water (my poor dehydrated body!)

7. Five things that you wouldn't wear or buy
A fur (no, not even a fake one!)
String bikini - a big no, no!
Expensive jewelry (I would wear them but not buy them)
Pre-made pancakes
Liver, simply because I have no idea what to do with it...


8. Five favorite toys
Nope, no toys for me... I leave that to the children.

Oh, what a party!

Trying to recuperate after a great weekend. Saturday my sister with family arrived and we all went to my dad's and his wife's party! Celebrating lots of things it was lots of guests, food, good drinks, music, dancing and laughing. The most fun was probably Lovisa and her 3 year old cousin, they played, ran, danced, sang, ate (well, a little bit) and acted up until we left a bit after midnight. Andréa turned out to be quite the party freak too and stayed up to around 10:30 pm...

Andréa having fun...

Lovisa and her cousine are dancing and showing off...

Yesterday the whole family was in a half-comatose state but we tried to enjoy the beautiful day.

 At the park...

 Lovisa and her cousin - best friends...

 It was a bit of a challenge getting Lovisa to daycare this morning. When we arrived she was sitting in her stroller, soother in her mouth,  her eyes half shut. I had to explain to the teachers that she'd been up partying on Saturday and she was a bit tired... My little party animal!

The big perspective people!

Yesterday after daycare I took the kids and went to the patisserie. I felt we needed to do something fun, a break from our everyday routine. I had a coffee and shared a cinnamon bun with the girls (yes, Andréa had a little peace which the bigger part off ended up on the floor). Another mother with her 2 little girls, a newborn and a one year old, was sitting beside us and we started to chat. She told me that her girls were a "surprise". She and her husband tried for 8 years to get pregnant. They'd completely given up when she, all of a sudden, finally got pregnant. They couldn't believe their luck! She gave birth to a little baby girl and 2 months later she fell pregnant again. So here she was with her beautiful little family and it's all a bloody miracle! Right then and there I felt a sudden urge to hug, kiss and cuddle with my girls. I'll take 100 more sleepless nights, I'll take a 1000! Because they're my precious miracles and from time to time, when my sleepless nights takes over, I tend to forget that.

My miracles at the patisserie...

Have a great weekend!

A tired looser...

Andréa doesn't sleep well. Andréa doesn't sleep well at all. And it's slowly driving us all insane. Tonight she was awake between 10 pm and 2 am. I know I said it before but it's slowly increasing to the edge of being unbearable. As a scientist I want answers. Is this really normal? Is she ever going to sleep a whole night? Googling around desperately trying to find some answers i thought this was pretty  good: Dr Markham, parenting expert, says this to another tired mother of a one year old:

"Dear Exhausted,
The challenge with babies is that their genetic makeup is essentially from the stone-age.  
Whether you believe humans started off in the Garden of Eden or a primeval forest doesn’t much matter.  The point is that moms didn’t have to go to work the next day, and babies couldn’t sleep by themselves without getting eaten by predators.  
So babies are designed to sleep with their moms.  When they wake slightly between sleep cycles – which all of us do – they don’t put themselves back to sleep naturally.  They first look around for mom and make sure everything’s ok. 
So the bad news is that many babies do not fall asleep without being held, and do not sleep all night in their own bed, unless they are “trained” to do so.  It simply isn't a "normal" thing for small humans to do, biologically speaking.  But of course that presents a problem for parents who expect to get a good night’s sleep so they can function the next day. 
The good news is that if your baby is over a year old, you can teach him to put himself to sleep. Sooner or later, your child will begin sleeping though the night.  Speaking from experience, as a teen your sleepless baby may well sleep a lot."

So it's comforting to know that this is totally normal, she doesn't want to get eaten by predators and who could blame her? It's also comforting to know that some day it's going to pass and when she's a teenager I'm going to swear about her never getting up. But seriously, before that I have to figure out a way of not going insane. This night I was aggressive. I felt anger. When I, for the 20th time, put her down in her crib I wasn't very gentle and I said in anger "Sleep, sleep, sleep!!!". Then she started to cry and so did I. So there we where crying ourselves to sleep... I feel like such a looser...

Falsely accused...

Yesterday during supper I thought I sensed a poop smell from Lovisa. She denied it but that doesn't necessarily mean she didn't poop. I even asked her twice because I definitely smelled something... But after supper it turned out she was right. No poop! I sniffed myself through the kitchen when I was cleaning up and came to the conclusion that it was the daffodils smelling like... I don't know how to express it better than old, smelly barn... Which I, in a state of confusion, mixed up with poop... I think I have to find another place for the daffodils than the kitchen...

They're pretty but they stink! Or is it something wrong with my sense of smell?

Don't try this at home!

Note: nobody got hurt, gave me a bit of a scare though...

Oops! I did it again...

It's easy to become an unintentional thief when you do groceries with the stroller. Heavy items end up in the compartment under the baby and are easily forgotten when you're at the cash desk. Today I stole a bottle of mineral water, a few months back a bag of potatoes... If I considered going back to the store when I discovered it? Not really... 

Pitiful...

Andréa still sleeps very bad. The other day I told H that she slept 3 whole nights since she was born and he was chocked. He thought it was more than that but I know, maybe it's crazy to keep track but I can't help it. We thought it was getting a bit better but tonight she was up at least once every hour, crying for no obvious reason. She just recovered from her cold so after sleeping really bad for a week or so she slept fairly good yesterday night (she woke up twice and that's a good night). Fortunate for me this night was H:s night. Yes, finally we realized that we have to take turns so that at least one of us gets some sleep. But since I wake up as soon as I hear a little movement from the kids I don't really sleep much more but at least I don't have to get up.

My cold is still bad. My throat swollen, hurting and my body aches. The kids are whining. You could say we're all a bit pitiful.

To cheer us up here's some of all the good food we stuffed ourselves with this weekend:

 On Maundy Thursday we ate salmon pie, egghalves with shrimps and mayonnaise and salad

On Easter Eve we ate the traditional lamb steak

 Lovisa and Lena making the dessert...

 Pavlova!

On top of this we also stuffed us with chocolate...

Chocolate cures most conditions, right?

Easter fun!

On Easter Eve we took off to my dad and his wife Lena to celebrate Easter. Me with a bad cold, popping pills, Lovisa on a sugar high (note; never give a 2 year old a kinder egg for dessert if you want her to nap), Andréa sleeping in a coma looking state in the stroller and H trying to keep up...

 Lena and our little Easter witch coloring eggs...

 Very focused...

 And look at the beautiful result!

 Our smallest witch, don't you just want to eat her?

 H trying to remove the inside of the egg without cracking the shell,

of course a real man uses a drill...

 My dad with the trickiest quest to get a tiny thread through the eggs...

 Egg art!

Lena created this beautiful landscape

Today we're having a relaxed day, all still in PJ:s and it's past noon... 

Happy Easter! Joyeuses paques! Glad påsk!

 Life's hardships - see but not touch...

Lovisa's first creation from daycare!

Guess she wont settle for raisins forever but for now she's happy with just that!

Some people are just plain morons.

I had a really rough day and was taking the metro home after picking up Lovisa from daycare. We were arguing because Lovisa refused to listen to me and basically did everything to get me pissed off. Usually I take the elevator from the platform to the exit but today I decided to take the escalator with Andréa in the stroller and Lovisa by my side. The reason was to try to make peace with Lovisa since I know she loves taking the escalator. This turned out to be a bad move since Lovisa didn't obey me when I asked her to hold my hand but instead, all excited to take the escalator, ran ahead and tried to take it herself. Now, the station was full with people and I couldn't just leave the stroller and run after her (she was just a few meter ahead) and when it was her turn to get on she fell on her bum and was sitting, blocking the whole escalator. A little line up formed behind her as I struggled my way through to reach Lovisa and pick her up. Instead of helping us people just starred and a middle aged woman turned to what I presume was her husband and said, loud and clear, "How the hell can you be so stupid to force your child to go alone on the escalator. Poor kid!" and then she squeezed herself before us and went up the escalator. I'm convinced she saw that Lovisa ran on her own will and against mine (I was shouting at her not to take the escalator alone) but she had to say this in front of everyone, making me feel like a bad mother and making the whole situation much worse than it really was.

A few days later I came up on this article about a mother that forced her 3 year old son to smoke a cigarette and drink beer. And I just want to cry. And if I could I would shove this article in that middle aged woman's face and say "Here, this is stupid!" Some people are just plain morons.

Sickos!

God I'm so fed up with being home! Thank god Lovisa was good enough to go to daycare today, but the baby and I are still coughing together. Andréa lost her voice and sounds like a small crow... At least this night was a bit better and we all slept several hours instead of maybe one or two... Here's a few activities that we do when we're sick:

 Whine and cry - it's not fun being sick...

 Drawing...

Thinking of big questions like: how much snot can a baby head contain? (and here you see just how obedient my children are; Andréa is not allowed to stand against the TV like this and Lovisa is not allowed on the living room table...)

 Cuddling in bed...

 Snacking...

Helping out with the laundry... Well, help and help...

Today I'm going to drink tons of green tea with ginger and go for a walk, we need fresh air!