It’s amost 8pm and now I can honestly say I feel better.  I’m lying on the sofa trying to catch up with 1000+ unread feeds while Yentl is playing in the background.  We just finished a late dinner, Sophie is finally sleeping, and I’m doing even more online shopping.  With the lack of time and opportunities to shop for our family I just found it easier to do most of it online.  Ebay, Delight, Roots, and a few catalogue shops have made it such a relief instead of a last-minute headache.

Today was a hard and very trying day as Sophie slept less than two hours (since 6am) and her teething is making her such a crankypants.  At least Magnus had a good day and he’s been much more independent drinking directly from a glass and feeding himself lunch.  We took away his bottle cold turkey and he whined for a couple of days, but now he’s so interested in drinking just like adults that I don’t think he’ll ever want a bottle again. Now if we could only get him potty-trained!  He’s not even two yet but we’re starting to see signs that he’s able to communicate his business.  With so little time to myself today I managed to eat a small bowl of rice for breakfast, an oatmeal cookie at noon, and small bowl of couscous for lunch.  I’d hardly call it nutritious but it was all I could manage.  Not only was I hungry, but I was dirty!  It was after 3pm when I was able to get myself into the shower.  Seeing as how my previous shower was 6am yesterday morning and I had worked out while Magnus ate lunch I was feeling extremely shitty.  No food, no shower, and a house with two screaming kids - Wonderful!  Not everyday is so frustrating but today was particularly rough.

To make matters worse my period is causing such major discomfort.  I know it’s to my IUD but the obscene amount of bleeding, clotting (golfballs!), and the pain is really getting to me.  I almost passed out on the floor yesterday while making dinner.  I’ve been trying to get control of my anemia but lately I’ve been careless.  I can never seem to keep track of my periods either since they come every 6-8 weeks and last anywhere from 8-12 days.

I think Ørjan’s been seeing just how miserable I’ve been and has been so helpful without me even asking or nagging.  He’s been helping with the kids, tidying up after dinner and before bed, and has even let me squeeze in a nap twice this week.  I tell you it’s not nights of crazy passion but it’s the small things that really make you realize that you married the right man.  Now if only this crazy weather would settle down.  In the past week we’ve had two huge snowfalls that have melted away after a day of rain.  Everything is covered with a few centimetres of snow and the skies still have flurries as I write this, but who knows whether it’ll be here tomorrow.  Walking and pushing the babywagon in the snow is a bit harder, but it’s better than being splattered with slush when cars drive by carelessly.

I’ve been in a really horrible mood lately and it shows.  I have no energy, no drive, and certainly no patience for the things I can usually tolerate and tackle.  At least I managed to get out samples of my Christmas Cookies for this year.  I’ve done so much work planning and managing how big this could be, but sometime I turned into a huge chickenshit and started to consider just dumping the idea since we’ll be pressed for time this year.  I made spreadsheets, revised my budget and inventory, and even made and froze the dough so that I could bake the cookie samples quickly, but with so much accomplished I still felt like I was missing something - the drive to actually do it.  I really want to get my goods out this year but my mood is really dragging me down.  Hopefully when my period is over I’ll be back in full-force and ready to take this on again.  I’m completely committed to this, but it’s been such a rough week that I wish I could go back to two weeks ago when I was so excited.

It’s going on 9pm now so I should probably head off.  Magnus had a longer nap this afternoon so he’s still up but at least sitting quietly next to me looking at a book.  I love that he can sit for an hour just looking at his favourite books without making a sound.  I also love that I have a husband that can sit so quietly doing genealogy archiving without making a sound.

Oh, and this year I’m really considering getting a spark.

I’m still alive and will post more tomorrow when I have time.  Busy can’t even begin to express the last two weeks.

Before I write what I had planned I just have to get this out now - Congrats America!  I’ve purposely avoided talking about anything related to the election and American politics and now that it’s over (for now) I’m overjoyed.  Ok, that’s enough.  On to what I was going to say…

I can’t believe we’re already into November!  Earlier this week I already started making sample batches of my Christmas cookies to be sent out and I’ve been trying to revise my budget as much as possible due to items being sent from Canada.  I hope to have everything ready and sent out during the first two weeks of December because we’ll be leaving on the 20th for our Christmas vacation home in Canada.  I am sooooo excited to be going home and finally celebrating a Christmas.  I know I’ve already mentioned this a million times before but I can’t help it.  It’s been 5 years and it’ll feel so good to be back in a city (cities) where I lived and grew up.  I’ve already started making wishlists for items we can’t find in Norway as well as some more luxurious items that are just a heck of alot cheaper over there.  (To give you an idea we pay almost 3x more for goods here.)  I’ve already started searching for items to gift and plan to make send some online orders later next week.  This just might be the first year where I’ll do most of my shopping online and most of the items will be green (eco-friendly), handmade, or fun things from Norway or Japan.  The weeks go by so quickly and now I’m worried that despite how much I’ve planned I still won’t manage to accomplish everything before our trip.  But again, this is always the case in my situation.

On a totally unrelated note here’s a fun video for your enjoyment.  I caught this the other day on Letterman (thank god Danish tv runs current episodes) and couldn’t breathe by the time I saw Spiderman walk by.

Og så, du i Fjellstrand… hvem er du?  Du kan sende en epost til meg hvis det er lettere.  Jeg er bare litt nysgjerrig.  Du behøver ikke å svare på den posten eller med eposten, men siden du har besøkt meg flere ganger i dag jeg vil gjerne vite hvorfor du er så interessert i bloggen min.  Er det meg, Ørjan, ellers?  Er du noen fra flickr kanskje? Venter du på toget kanskje?

Oh well, it’s ok.  No pressure to reply, but it would be nice.

Happy Halloween everyone!

Although we stayed at home it was great fun.  We had so many kids come to our place and more than half of them were definitely scared.  We had quite a setup (for these parts) with decorations, music, and extra candy and chocolate.  Both Ørjan and I took turns answering the door with the vampire mask and groaning and screaming.  The kids were definitely surprised.  I lost count of how many screams followed by, “Åh herregud!” I heard tonight. Over the past couple of weeks I’ve seen kids walk home from school and stop infront of our house to look at the decorations, and yesterday I actually had people tell me that kids have been talking about our house.  Even the visitors themselves told us that they had been tipped off to our house.  Ørjan and I laugh at this a bit because we just think about how many kids had been texting eachother with their phones. If it sounds like I’m complaining I’m not - I loved it!  I’m so happy that almost all of our goodies are gone!  (Something that Ørjan isn’t so excited about since I told him he could have the leftovers.)  Halloween isn’t exactly popular over here but over the past 4 years that I’ve been here I’ve seen more kids going out and more decorations at a few shops.  (Did I mention that this was the first year I saw spiderweb being sold?)

Poor Magnus was a bit scared as well.  A few times he tried to come down the stairs and saw the masks they were wearing and ran back up screaming.  My poor guy.  Maybe next year it’ll be a little more fun and a little less scary.

The entire night I couldn’t help but think about past Halloweens from my childhood.  Halloween was the only holiday we really celebrated and it’s probably the only one that I have good memories of.  For a long period my mother was a Jehovah’s Witness but my dad always made sure to give us a great Halloween.  He’d take my sister and I out during the first week of October to pick up makeup, costumes, and decorations, and there was never a price limit.  In the later years my parents would sit on the bench on our porch wearing masks and would pretend to be dummies.  When the trick-o-treaters would come up to the door my parents would come to life and scare the hell out of them.  Each time I answered the door I thought of my dad.  I think that Halloween is the only time I have fond memories of him.

This year we really had a great Halloween and I can’t wait for the next one.  Our kids will be bigger, we’ll be more prepared, and it’ll fall on  Saturday - party!

If you’ve been visiting my site over the past hour and not just reading the feed, you’ll have noticed that things look slightly different around here.  I’m still sticking with the same template because I like it, but some new colours and minor changes were in order.  It’s been burning in the back of my head that I should try to do something with this place but I’ve been putting it off since August due to a lack of time.  At least that’s out of the way for now.

For the past couple of days we’ve been getting snow and even more bad weather.  It’s more than a painful reminder that winter is almost here and it’s also a sign that I need to get my butt into gear and start organizing yet another Christmas Cookie haul.  I’ve already tackled a draft of the budget and have figured the cost of items and ingredients that I’ve imported from Canada.  Packaging (cello bags, ribbon, tags), vanilla extract, and other items needed have either been ordered or have already arrived.  A few people have actually approached Ørjan about this year’s orders so I guess I’ll have to start printing out a more detailed list and forms for orders.  While I’m excited about this I’m already stressing out.  The holidays are already stressful and now we have a holiday to Toronto at the end of December.  The key is to be organized (I love to organize) but I also have a tendency to put things off if I feel stressed.  Let’s just hope I can keep up with the madness because I really want this to be a good year for my baking.

In other family related news: Sophie is crawling and already starting to pull herself up.  We’re all starting to feel better but I still feel incredibly fatigued.  We spent the weekend out at Ørjan’s mum’s and I couldn’t help but notice just how quickly they’ve grown since the last time we were there.  Magnus still isn’t saying alot but now we can clearly see that he understands both English and Norwegian without problems.  He follows instructions and commands, he signals and points to things we’re talking about, and he’s even starting to form sentences despite the fact that they don’t really make sense in English or Norwegian.

Friday night Ørjan and I stayed up past 01.00 to squeeze in the last minutes of Hors de Prix.  I believe we were watching another movie on Canal+ or Viasat and this was the next film to play.  I thought about getting up from the sofa and just head to bed because I was half asleep but the familiar sound of a French speaking man peaked my interest for a few reasons.  I laugh to myself as I type this, but my only real introductions to the gigolo were found in my old French textbooks back in highschool.  (Yeah there’s Deuce Bigolo but no thanks.)  Can you believe I was reading stories about murder and gigolos to prepare for a test?  At least this time around there was some charm thrown into it.  Gad Elmaleh reminded me of a boyfriend (well, not quite) that did everything to win my heart.  This film was for a lack of better words was adorable!  This film is about so much more than prostitution and its perfectly paired main characters really charm us with their wit.  It’s a silly film but your heart melts, I promise.

I hadn’t wanted to rationalize why I decided to watch this film, but I have to admit that a main factor was that it was in French.  I have many French stations via satellite but never watch this.  This gave me the opportunity to use my French and learn more Norwegian vocabulary.  (I think Norwegian subtitled tv is how I learned the language so quickly.)

In any case, if you haven’t seen this film or even heard about it, go watch it now!  It takes a little time to get into it, but like I said, it really melts your heart.  Gad Elmaleh was so adorably charming.

We’re all sick.  How wonderful.  Magnus’ daycare is just a farm for germs so I’m not too worried when he comes home with the sniffles or a light cough, but now we’ve all been bitten by this bug.  This is the first time that Sophie’s been sick but at least it doesn’t seem too serious.  I’m sick again which makes the simplest of tasks such a pain in the ass and I’m more irritable than usual.  Fantastic!  Fatigue combined with this throbbing-spinning feeling is not easy to manage when I have to care for screaming kids with snot running down their fun faces.  It’s not the worst thing in the world but I wish I could have a day off once in a while.  I just want to sleep and get myself better.  To make matters worse I’m not sure if Sophie’s other arm is aching due to her cold or if she pulled something.  Ørjan rushed her to the doctor’s but he said he couldn’t find that anything had been pulled or slipped out.  She’s moving it well enough but we see that it’s really bothering her to actually use it to hold toys and to keep herself up when she’s crawling.  I hate seeing her cry in pain.

I planned on using today to bake some items for the weekend (Sverre’s birthday) but I never found an opportunity for the menu.  I managed to bake a few dozen coconut-chocolate macaroons and printed out a card from the kids (I know!  But it’s the thought that counts!) and I refuse to push myself to do any more since I’m already dangling from a thread.  We’re going into Mo for the weekend and I’m completely happy with that.  I’ll have someone to help watch the kids, I won’t have to make dinner, and maybe, just maybe I’ll be able to squeeze in some rest!  (I really, really need it at this point.)

Some good news?  Ørjan came home with two pumpkins!  Our shop probably only gets in around 5 pumpkins each year and he snagged two of the three that were there.  I still can’t get over that it cost almost twenty dollars for two pumpkins.  When we come home on Sunday Ørjan wants to carve them but I’d really like to roast one and make something yummy instead.  We shall see.  I don’t think he would mind sacrificing a jack-o-lantern for a chocolate-pumpkin cheesecake.

I made these a couple of years ago (2006?)  I wish I had the time to update something like this for 2008.  Oh well.  Sigh.  I just love Halloween.

+ Futurama was picked up by Viasat4
+ Retail therapy in Mo
+ My new passport arrived last week
+ Sophie is pulling herself up
+ Bought new Halloween decorations and mask
+ Mum is sending me a carepackage of pure vanilla for this year’s Christmas orders
+ My other cellphone is working again!
+ Scored some awesome finds at the thrift shop

- Magnus has been crying for me when I drop him off at daycare
- My cysts keep returning
- More people than anticipated were let go at Trenor
- Can’t find last year’s Halloween decorations
- Ate way too much pizza at the buffet (You know that feeling that hits you 20 minutes later?  I hadn’t even really had that much, but I had one slice more than I could handle for lunch.)
- It’s been raining for weeks
- My jeans now feel looser and are dragging on the ground! (I walked my first hole into the left leg, ugh!)