Holiday time...

Do you ever get the feeling that you are not really in charge ? Well we do.

I love this little boy so much but he is 2½ years old and thinks he knows how everything should be done. Like a little master he is telling us what to do and especially what not to do...NO NO NO are words we hear quite often. It is also a lot of fun but one really has to gain the control at least to avoid the judging from other people out there in holiday country. An advice from a friend with three kids was : Dont forget to bring your wallet,cause there is no such thing to solve a conflict as...icecream... !!! She is right ...

We went on a short trip to Givskud zoo and decided to stay at the hostel there for one night. Just relax and figure out all the practical stuff down the road. Just let the kid sleep when he is tired and will fall asleep all by himself. Eat whatever he wants, whenever he wants it. And so on... But no it doesn´t function that way. Guess what... He didnt wanted to take his nap so we skipped it. The result was one angry little kiddo terrorizing the hole zoo and probably also causing the mother elephant to the cute little Dumbo to neglect her little baby. Great frustration for the biologist who had spend so much time on this project ( NOT really the truth but could have been... ) . So we went to the restaurant. The buffet had just closed so we had a not so good pizza trying to make the combination tired kid and restaurants not to tiring.

Next day was great. Seth had a good time. He is not so interested in all the exotic animals but birds and fishes... thats his thing...

The place is great. Big enough to make it possible to have a nice and relaxing time. It can be very streesing to be in crowded places with kids. Grown ups get this very tired look on their face and the childrens are fighting over the few toys, screaming and crying. In the zoo is a huge play area with lots of space and toys and many seating areas under shady trees. The more foreseeable parent had coolers with food and drink in their wagons. They were eating sandwiches, drinking coffee and having homemade cake. well I don´t know if it was homemade but the next time we go we will do the same and yes, the cake will be homemade. The kids were playing happily aronud. One could probably spend 3 enjoyable hours in that place reading books and perhaps knitting...




So the conclusion is : Bring food and a cooler. Dont skip naps and bedtime procedures. Plan just eneough to let the trip be as unplanned as possible. Am I making any sense...?
You see you are out of the usual enviroment and all the habits are out of the game for a while. Thats a good thing but it can also put you in some type survival situation ( a pretty strong word but you know what I mean... ) where you spend all the time on things like : Where can we eat ? Buy diapers ? Wash little sticky fingers and so on. So here it goes, besides the usual stuff here are some essential things to bring on a two day trip to the zoo ( or some other place... ) :

In my handbag: kleenex, towelettes, cash for icecream, one ( maybe two... ) diaper.

Dont forget to get the wagon equipped with small blanket, little pillow, sunhat, a book for John and knitting for me and offcourse the cooler with food and drink.

In the car:

One box with toys for Seth. One box with toys for me. One box with- going on a trip- gear. I will tell you more about these boxes another time...

Electrical Cooler with food to bring to hostels or wherever we are staying. A smaller normal cooler to bring to parks and so.




Bye bye...

Copenhagen trip... for parents

We told our son we were going on a trip to a big city and would be home on film day ( That is Friday in our house ). He looked at us and understood... amazing how much he has grown, every day something new happens and his personality just grows and grows. We called him every day ( we were gone 3 days) but he didn't have the time to chat, he was busy. Through the phone he winked, and then he was of to play with grandma or grandpa.

We stayed at Hotel phoenix right in the centre of Copenhagen. It is a kind of hotel that brings out the little princess in me, getting all excited about the little bottles in the bathroom ( yes... off course I brought them home !! ) and the swirling stairs where it is absolutely plausible to loose a shoe and then wait... Luckily John was with me so I didn't have to risk my health in a maneuver that would look credible waiting for the prince to save me.

Wednesday we went to the theatre and watched a revue. We wanted to see a ballet but I guess the little ballerinas have stopped dancing for this season, so we went to see a revue. That was a gamble since we are not particular fond of the genre, but after all, since it was the Royal Theatre, we decided to give it a try. Yes they were very professional and the theatre was beautifull and impressive but lets just say we looked at each other afterwards and said "been there done that".

Thursday it was time for a stroll in the city checking out all the little specie shops we just don't have in our town, but I have to admit that we mostly sat on cafés. The best café was The royal cafe in the backyard of the royal Copenhagen porcelain shop. Very special atmosphere

And the best strawberry tart ever...

In the evening we had a late dinner at MASH.... Great place.

Friday We had breakfast with an old friend of John at cafe Granola. She is a writer and has written quite a few very humoristic things about being a mum and other things. Both the cafe and Maren Uthaug turned out to be really nice.





Then we were of to see the outdoor exhibition 'My home is my castle'. It was in Frederiksberg Have in the part where the garden of The Danish Royal Horticultural Society garden is located. It was Okay but a little too twee for my taste. we still had a nice time and had some buns before we took a cab to the central train station. Unfortunately there had been some trouble on the rails so instead of the trip beeing with no stops, we ended up changing trains and buses 5 times. We arrived 3 hours later than calculated. Not really a problem when grandma is waiting at home with dinner and dessert...




All in all it is was a nice trip... but next time we will see a ballet.

Another way of life

We went on a barbecue with some new friends. She is from Thailand and he is from Portugal. They live in an camping van with their two kids. They are both 22 years old and have been travelling around the world for the last 4 years. Pedro already was travelling as a kid, since his father was doing exactly the same as he is doing today...selling handcrafted jewelry on the sidewalk. It was as if we were back in the sixties (well that's what John says...you see I can't really know that since I am rather "young"). It is amazing to hear a very young person - Pedro - saying " you can not get anything good quality anymore, everything has changed to the worse". I don't agree, some good things has disappeared, but there is also somethings that has changed to the better.....an example...I love the fact that the the Internet has given me the opportunity to get connected with people doing things similar to what I do....If I want a good quality silk jersey, and I just can't find it anywhere in my local stores...well it is no problem anymore...see I think that is a good thing for people not living in the big cities...

Sunset....

Nights in Paleohora

Every evening we take a stroll in the village, and quite often it involves having cake at Elias. Elias has a café in the middle of the town and during the summer he sells the cakes he bakes at home in his kitchen. He spends winter in the nearby city of Chania where he combines seeing friends and family with his freelance work as movie producer. Before Elias restored old Lambretta scooters…. Now he is a true believer of all new age kind of things, and spends November at a meditation workshop up in the mountains. He is a great guy with very good taste in cakes and other things…don’t you just love that vintage scooter…..? …..When you sit in his café you look at the vegetable grocery…that place seems to always be open and there is always great amount of social activities going on at that place……thinking…I hope he will make his orange cake today..

Paleohora life

I am working on my homepage. It is just so much nicer to sit here doing that. Today is going to be a hot day, and I want to finish all this programming before the heat comes. Later maybe the beach....

Here is a few pictures from around the city, and from our room....aesthetics and Greece....I don't know...!!....why is that ??

mmmmm..........

All we do is basically eat and relax......Like the locals, I would say....."no problem"...

Time…

Very unusual. There I was, just sitting in one spot for one hour. High temperature and high humidity. Drinking water and pushing the camera button once in a while was all I accomplished that hour. Oh yes that’s right… I did leave the chair once for the self portrait. It’s a cliché, but things are slow here. How do they do it ? I get bored so quickly….Are they different ? Is it because of my protestant heritage that I feel guilty not doing anything or is it just a matter of personality. I guess that all the Greek have accomplished in the dawn of our civilization, must have been during wintertime. By the way John is not Greek but he could be. I had no idée that the newspaper ( Weekendavisen ) could last that long…..

100 miles north from Kaddafi… ( we’re in the most southern point of European Union )

It is nice that we by now have all the packing, organizing and to-do-lists behind us. We have rented a room with no kitchen, so we are looking for a small apartment. It is really hot here, 35 degrees in the shade and I am not at all used to it, but it helps having the ocean close by for a dip, when it’s burning and my brain is melting… It is really cool sitting outside sketching; you see I am not really the holiday kind of type, but I sure like the idea of working a bit, having coffee at a café, observing other people, working, eating, swimming, and so on…..Seth has been dipped in the ocean, and he likes it except when the waves are too high. I haven’t been swimming in the ocean since I was ten. It might sound stupid but I am afraid of fish, seaweed and especially crabs, but I want to get rid of my phobia. I have been swimming both yesterday and today…And I am doing just fine….

Johns holiday just started today, so it was time to take a break from painting, sewing and all that stuff. We went to a Fischer village called Hvidesande, it was rather cold, and of course I had to get into just a few secondhand shops.Here is what i found..Now it is bedtime for little ones, and strawberries and cream for big ones.

Our tour to Greece was very nice. John has been there many times, but it was my first time there...(and absolutely not my last). I met so many nice people there in Paleohora. Here is the picture outside Elias´ bakery. He was painting the cafe, and making everything ready for people to come. Seth took the trip so nice, even if he is just 4½ months old. It is so nice to have a child that doesn't cry when he meets new people...but maybe it is just because he is so small...