Loads of carbs and loads of doubts...

It's the day before Stockholm marathon and I'm getting nervous... I did everything according to my plans, rested a lot, drank a lot, ate a lot... Unfortunately it doesn't convince me that I'm actually going to make it anyway... 42,2 km is freaking far... All my colleagues at work wished me luck and I really feel that I'm going to do something big that I never did before... After work I got my tag, the good thing about getting your tag is that you can get your feet in Marathon shape for the cheap price of 150 SEK!

One pleasant thing with running a Marathon is that it's completely mandatory to eat loads of carbs and calories, so that I did!

Yum, yum, yum...

And here I am now, nervously going through that I have everything for tomorrow, worrying about the weather and what to wear... Next time I'll write I'll hopefully not only be a runner but also a Marathoner...

Vårruset and a new PB!

5 K in 20:59 and place 30 among thousands of woman! Not bad for a Tuesday evening...

The first visit to the dentist!

And she gaped wide from the moment we stepped in to the reception!

Retreat in Stockholm archipelago, monstrous mosquito and wonderful Mothers Day.

Another lovely week past by in the blink of an eye. Andréa got her first mosquito bite just under her little eye and it swelled up real bad, looks like she was in a boxing game... It's slowly getting better with a bit of antihistamines...

Summer is definitely here and me and the girls tried out the temperature in Mälaren. Totally OK for dipping but not swimming according to me, totally OK to stay in the water until lips turns blue according to the girls...

And look how lucky I was, retreat with the MRI-group in Stockholm archipelago Friday to Saturday, it doesn't get more beautiful than this... It didn't hurt that I got a whole nights sleep without a 3-year-old kicking me in the stomach either...

We finished this awesome week with Mothers Day, the girls were kind enough to let us sleep til 8:59 am, I was spoiled with roses, a warm sun and good food... Happy Mothers Day to all of you mothers out there! I was watching the girls play on the beach today and my heart just melt. This is life and we're in the middle of it!

Vaccinations, ice cream and an outdoor gym...

This weekend was the weekend when summer came to Stockholm. We were lucky enough to attend a birthday brunch in Södermalm so Saturday morning we dressed up and drove south. It's always a special feeling coming here since this is place where H and I got our first apartment together and here's where we lived when Lovisa was born. But this beautiful morning was about good friends, brunch and happy children!

Of course we had to have some icecream. The little Italian place at Nytorget always has the best icecream but way to many flavors to choose from... Lovisa wanted a "blue" icecream...

Andréa wanted a "brown" icecream. So much easier if you just could choose the color you like instead of reading about the 100 different flavors while trying to figure out what you fancy right now...

Just when we were about to leave I discovered a tent were we all could get vaccination for TBE, which is the severe disease you can get from the "tick". The girls were real heroes and didn't shed a tear and they hold our hands while H and me got the injection.

The rest of the weekend was all about gardening, outdoor playing and of course a little bit of running... And after my run I discovered that our porch is the perfect outdoor gym, I just brought the fitnessball outside and had nature and fresh air surrounding me... And gyms always have mirrors, mine was our window - hello to y'all!

The most amazing thing...

When I read through my blog I realize that one of the biggest topics is sleep. Or rather the lack of it. During the girls first year it's the wake-ups the whole night through that made me more or less insane, the never ending breastfeeding 4 am in the morning... Then it was the early mornings, my girls insisted for the longest time to wake up around 5 am even if mum and dad was up til midnight the evening before... Well, when they finally realized that they actually can sleep til 7 am (well, not every morning but a fair deal of mornings anyway) then we were left with the struggling to get them to sleep in their own beds through the night... I don't know how many times I tried to explain to them that we all sleep better if they sleep in their beds, to sleep 4 people in one bed is nothing I recommend if it is deep sleep you want to achieve...

Anyway sometimes just after Christmas Lovisa started to sleep the whole night in her own bed. The first month I thought that it's probably just temporary, the second month I was in a state of doubt, could this really be permanent? And now, after 4 months I just have to share with you all that it actually happened, she sleeps every night in her bed! She even wakes up sometimes, goes to the toilet or drinks water and voluntarily goes back to her own bed and falls asleep! I'm amazed. Now we only have one little rascal coming crawling in to our bed at night. And when I ask Andréa why she comes every night to sleep with us she answers without hesitation "Because it's so cozy". And even if she takes my cover and kicks me in my belly I have to agree, it is one of the most beautiful things, to snuggle up with your child... I'm happy Lovisa still comes in the morning to cuddle and talk, that's a habit I hope she keeps up for a long, long time...

Happy birthday to me!

I just turned 36 years old. And I feel so privileged. I have a wonderful family, the best of friends, a good job, I'm in the middle of life and most of the time I'm enjoying it. So yes I think it's worth to celebrate! We started one day early by visiting good friends and had homemade "smörgåstårta" - does it get any better?

On Saturday I had some family over for lunch and H fixed another cake, this time chocolate, also one of my favorite...

I also had a bunch of birthdaycards, two of them all the way from Canada and very nice gifts. After cake and coffee H asked me to dress up and off we went on a adventure that I didn't know anything about... We ended up in the old city in the heart of Stockholm where we had a lovely supper at a little Italian resto.



I was honestly a bit worried when we first walked in and H started to talk about starters that the girls would start climbing the walls after 20 minutes but it was such a perfect evening and they behaved like real restaurants professionals!



H and me ate our startes while the girls had their main course and when we ate our main course they had desert... I ate a lovely char decorated with the biggest asparagus I ever seen... Lovisa explained very nicely that she knew that veggie; "Mum I know the name of that thick green line, it's asparagus"...



My beautiful girl...



As a special treat to me and to the girls enormous delight we ended our restaurant visit with our very own musician singing Happy birthday in Italian...



We left the resto very satisfied and H and me in a little state of shock, it's totally possible to bring the girls to a fancy restaurant for a couple of hours, they didn't break a thing! When we got home I got another gift, a beautiful necklace from H and I love it!



Today we're so pooped from all the partying and I feel very grateful, tired and spoiled. So thanks to everyone that made my day special!

32 km later...

Today I ran 32,2 km. That is the longest distance I've ever run in one shot. It was windy, cold, warm, sunny, hard and easy - all mixed together. It made me realize a few things about running and it also enhanced my already enormous respect for the marathon distance. Running this far gives me a huge appetite, it makes me tired and my legs aching but maybe most importantly it gives me confidence that I actually might have a chance to run 42,2 km in less than a month.

Now - time to sleep.