Happy Birthday Alden

We celebrated Alden’s birthday today, he turned 14 and getting very mature. Lisa and Brad provided us with some great food and drinks as usual and of course the ambiance and setting for a great afternoon hanging out on their farm. The girls spent most of their time in the creek getting filthy and Connor was obsessed with wanting to drive Brad’s tractor, which we finally did when the festivities were winding down.

Sowing Seeds

With the clocks changing last night, Spring in the air and a beautiful clear blue sky morning that was just warm enough to be out, we all dived into the garden this morning. Lynne and Connor went to the shop to buy some seeds and when they returned we donned the boots…I just love this time of the year.

Nasi Goreng and Satay Chicken

On Saturday we all headed over to Steef, Ginette, Marissa and Aneka’s house for a play date. The kids did their usual play activities, we sat around and drank some beers and had a great chat. They cooked some excellent Indonesian food, nasi goreng and satay chicken. It was yummy, they’re from The Netherlands and very versed in preparing this. We had excellent evening guys; we’re looking forward to many more such evenings this year.

Buzzcut

We have a beautiful Saturday here in West Lafayette; Spring is really in the air. There are small signs of life everywhere. Both girls and Connor just had a haircut, or rather Connor just had a buzzcut…it was a painful operation indeed.

Old Pictures....Rodin Sculptures

I have three similar images for my old pictures this week. They were each taken at the Rodin Museum in Paris many years ago. Auguste Rodin was a French artist most notably known for his sculptures. Shown below are us posing in front of three of his very most famous works, The Thinker, The Gates of Hell and The Burgers of Calais. These three works, each cast as a single bronze piece, were amazing to see, no picture could ever do them justice.

Personal Best at 10Km

I participated in a 10Km road race this morning, my first at this distance in over 5 years. It was actually a training series run organized as an opportunity for seeding for the Indy mini Marathon in May.

I finished in 44:00 minutes flat, I was hoping for a little better (isn't it always the way:)) but I can't really be upset with a 7:05 min/mile pace. The weather was perfect, the organization incredible but my pacing for the first mile was terrible (6:35). I knew immediately I was going to pay a price later. My next two miles were steady (7:05, 7:08) but my fourth was starting to hurt (7:19). I sensed the finish in my fifth mile (7:15) and luckily I had a little left for the last mile (6:59) before I clung on for the last 0.2 miles to the end. I enjoyed it, never a bad day when you shave well over four minutes off your personal best. 


We had an excellent night at the theatre last night. Once again many thanks to Randy and Lorraine for watching the kids.

Anniversary and Cat in the Hat

Let the weekend begin. Lynne and myself are travelling to Indy in a short while to have dinner and go to the theatre in celebration of our our 14^th wedding anniversary. We have tickets to see God of Carnage at the IRT  which should be fun.

Shown below is a picture of Anja dressed as Cat in the Hat. She was having a Dr. Suess day at school today and of course this famous cat is probably his most famous character. Isabel was also dressing up today, as a nurse I think. Granny Owens sent over some dress up clothes together with stuff for St. Patricks Day (thanks again Mum). 


Finally, we had some very nasty weather here today; see the pretty large hailstones that we had at lunchtime. Have a great weekend everybody.

Weekend Photos

We had such great weather again this weekend; it really felt like Spring for the first time this year. Indeed many of the bulbs are up and the snowdrops are even wilting. We spent a few hours on Sunday basking in the sun on the back deck. Ginette and the girls even showed up which was great, the kids kicked into high playing gear.

Later that evening we actually went down to Tapawingo Park which has a play area in addition to a sandy beach area by our local river The Wabash. The kids loved it. As usual, see below a sampling of the photos from the weekend.

Old Pictures...of me, Before and Later

This weeks old photo features me in 1997 on the phone with Lynne. For 18 months, Lynne and myself had one of those long-distance relationships, she was a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Wisconsin in Madison whilst I finished up my studies in Bradford. I’m pictured doing what I did virtually every Sunday evening during those months, having a marathon telephone conversation with her that often lasted over an hour. Other than the big mop of jet black hair, you’ll notice that since we were still tethered to the phone at that time, I had to move an arm chair to sit by the phone in front of the front door which we closed off with a curtain.

 OK, so Lynne insisted that since she had an old photo of her up on the blog last week, that I too must have the same….see below a picture of me when I was (I'm guessing) between one and two.

Welcome Home Mommy

It’s late Friday evening and although Lynne has experienced a cancelled flight, a re-booking followed by a delay, she is still on track for getting home from New Jersey sometime before the kids wake up….I hope anyhow because I’ve been promising them all week that she’d be here on Saturday morning.

The kids and I will be glad when she is home. Things went just fine this week, no major dramas, Brooke, Randy and Lorraine were a big help, everybody is healthy, we all slept well and life continued as normal, however, there is nothing more depressing as holding a crying two year old every morning sobbing to the very musical tune of “I want Mommy” for 30 minutes, we all missed her.

Shown below are a couple of pictures of the kids in recent weeks. The picture of Anja is extremely typical right now. She has had a breakthrough in independent reading. She reads about one book a day at the moment (her short books that is) and whenever there is a quiet moment, she steals herself off….Have a nice weekend everybody.

Pancake Tuesday

Happy Pancake (Shrove, Fat, Fettisdagen) Tuesday everybody. Whatever your tradition on this day, the last day before Ash Wednesday, the first day of lent, be it pancakes, semlor or a margarita at Mardi Gras in New Orleans, I hope you enjoyed it.

Lynne is away this week but I still managed to break out the flour, milk, buttermilk, baking soda and eggs for pancakes for dinner. We had cheese and broccoli filled versions for dinner and a chocolate version (to much applause) for dessert. We were all pretty stuffed afterward. Fettisdagen is the equivalent day in Sweden, the traditional day for eating Semlor.