Christmas Greetings

Pictorial update

An amazing 9 weeks

WOW! How did we get to 9 weeks old so quickly? The weeman has been through so much already. Needless to say he is a smiling, cheeky bundle of joy. He is so happy and is making so much progress. Sara is home with him and she is just the absolute best mother and wife! She is far surpassing any expectations and images I had of her as a mother. I think the little 'un's great start in this world is entirely down to her.  The two of them have such busy schedules most days especially if you include the hours and hours of walking they do. Christmas creativity beckons. Watch this space for a little name celebration film.

The Cookie Monster!

Troubles for our super hero...

New IMAX Blockbuster!

Andy Warhol painting found!

The Eye of the Tiger

Dear all, 

It seems as though we have not written on this blog for such a long time. So much has been happening and we somehow seem to have so little time on our hands. The wee man is doing well although as the previous post suggests, he is still nameless. Now, Sara is quite impressed by his ability to latch onto the breast, in fact his whole demeanour changes and his face becomes concentrated. He looks like a little tiger about to pounce on his prey. Before you suggest it, we have thought about Tiger as a name but it's a little too different for us!

The hunt continues...

Life's A Beach!

Autumn in Sweden

After a short autumn stroll I came upon these two having a great time in the park!

Happy Birthday Aunty Cathy

Seriously have you got tickets?

The cutest boy in the world!

When words become unclear, I shall focus with photographs. 

When images become inadequate, I shall be content with silence. 

Ansel Adams

We are proud to present...

A very special 4 days at the hospital for us both!

If you haven't seen it yet?

The first film starring the little one very early in his career! A very proud moment for both of us.

IT'S A BOY!!!

We are over the moon!

More photos to follow when we get internet.

Without you my life's gonna be...

...forever Tuesday morning...goes the famous kiwi song by The Mockers. Well here in Swedentown, it's almost Thursday morning and we are still waiting for the liitle 'un to pop out and say hi. We are carefully convincing 'him' that although it may seem like a good idea to come out and stretch his legs a little, it's a cold world out here and staying in for just a tad longer will be a little more convenient for Mumsy and Dadsy, as we are moving everything we own into our new abode on Saturday, and also it's a heck of a lot warmer in Mum's tummy. 

Nope not today...

Sorry guys, even though it's now 3 days late. 'Peanut' hasn't come yet, although a few pains last night made me a little worried. We picked up our keys to the new apartment tonight. A mixed bag of emotions really.

Extra Storage

I have been pondering something. I have just purchased a 1 Terabyte hard drive for my computer. For those of you who don't get computers, that's 1000 GB of memory. Admittedly that's a lot of storage but for some reason I feel as if even that won't be enough soon. When I purchased my Mac computer, I upgraded to get maximum memory then, which was 90 GB. That was only 3 years ago! Digital and online memory is one thing and gone are the days of super computers that take up entire rooms or warehouses. The 1 TB hard drive is no bigger than a book.

  So then I got to thinking about all of the other storage we have. We have only a few of our things in the apartment which we are temporarily renting and that somehow is enough. Almost everything Sara and I own is jammed tightly into an enormous storage warehouse in the south of Stockholm (refer to photo). So that leaves me to ask the question, why do we need or have all of these other possessions? Why is it that 10 years ago, no one needed extra storage or massive storage facilities for all of their personal belongings that they couldn't bare to part with. For those of you with a kiwi upbringing, all the unnecessary stuff was put in the roof or stacked in the garage. But even that's not enough now. How can we have that much stuff, which is basically what it is...that we need to rent other places to fill up too. You've spent money through the years on things that have become obsolete and maybe lost a little appeal and even more importantly...value. But we now spend even more money to still hang onto things that we no longer even need. That's crazy when you actually think about it. When you're living in a  city with minimal space available to the average person as Sara and I are, storage and available space is a premium. I'm just waiting for the invention where you can turn real things into digital memory and then store them on your computer. That'll be the day! That's a good idea for a drawing...

Into the final straight....

Well it is a late blog this week isn't it, and just when everything is getting exciting. Sara is well and truly on her way to being a Mum. She is glowing, looking fantastic and trying to keep herself busy, but for a girl who has two jobs and is used to training 2 hours a day, she is struggling to do this. However, I do sense that she may get used to it.

An insane idea struck us last week, that we should go to Ikea on the weekend. People have had similar ideas before and never been seen again, such is the chaos which ensues around Ikeas all around Sweden every weekend. We were in effect, doing a smash and grab. With Rich in tow we were there by 11.00 and hit the 'barn' section straight away, green sheets and duvet with white hippopotamus dancing across was the choice of bed linen we decided upon. Before you get the idea we had bought an enormous duvet set big enough for a hippo print, they were reduced somewhat. Actually it was a very nice experience buying bed linen, a baby changing positioner, duvet and towels...only in miniature size. It felt like I was about to get out my Action Man and start dressing him and putting him to bed in this mini world. Strange feeling, but also illuminating. We were all done by 13.30 as Liverpool vs Man United had to be watched. Luckily Liverpool won in a dominant and mesmerising fashion as always. So mesmerising infact that we spent the rest of the day just relaxing and resting. 

Sunday brought us back to Hotorget for some 2nd hand wheeling and dealing, where we bought an antique side table, an antique stool, 2 antique jewellery boxes and an enormous old eraser. Sounds strange but the pleasure I get from brousing through others goods is extremely satisfying and brings me closer to my father in some strange way. I always hear his voice when I'm there haggling for goods. Like father...

Sara is presently in bed sleeping which is a good sign as she's been up the past two nights for an hour each night only to go back to sleep again. Then when I go to work, which admittedly isn't early, she wriggles and struggles onto my side the softer side and sleeps some more. She has been stone cold snoozing the past two mornings as I have left. A good sign!

Into the final bend...

Hi all, 

  We've just entered inside the 2 week zone and things are going just fine. There wasn't much to report this week with the actual pregnancy. Sara visited the 'mid wife' on Thursday and everything was going to plan and seemed very healthy which was good news. Although the stomach itself doesn't seem to be that much bigger, the shape of the stomach constantly changes as the baby occupies more and more space and therefore has less room to move. In the mornings particularly, her belly is some odd shapes, the other morning it was a perfect square, which I then proceeded to serve breakfast on. (Some of the previous sentence might not be exactly true; the bit about the square stomach, and also the bit about me making breakfast). Sara's belly is holding up to the punishment for now, and she loves to stroke the belly as it seems to calm the baby down and it also feels really nice! She continues to be strong, determined, stubborn and she still doesn't like to be fussed over!

The debate continues whether it is a boy or a girl. Sara has met only one person who thinks it's a girl, the other hundred thousand or so people have told her it's a boy. My general feeling has been switching every few days between boy and girl. Now I 'm almost convinced that we're having a boy! If you are too send us some names...please.

Sara stopped working last Friday, now we are inside the 2 week zone. I don't think she is used to being off  and found it difficult to not be doing something yesterday so she spent yesterday completing several jobs that needed doing around town. We then went to the bank and discussed what we wanted to do with our loan, which turned out to be nowhere near as confusing as I'd expected, but when it involves large sums of your own money it's always a nerve wracking experience!

I will post again in a few days as now the final few weeks are here, things can change very quickly.

Post a comment if you'd like to?

The Baby Name Game

Please play the hardest board game known to mankind...particularly boys names!

The Trans-Pregnancy Express keeps on rolling!

As of yesterday, Friday the 29th, the 3 week mark has been eclipsed and we are staring down the barrel of a fortnight until due date. Another week at school this week was matched only by a busy social calendar and also the last of our 'preparing to be parents' meetings.

After hiking 15 kms the Friday before, I was surprised that the children actually came back on Monday, in fact they were all there! I guess I'll have to get rid of them some other way! This years 6th Graders are a pleasant mix, but also a little silly and giggly, I guess there could be worse traits. They work hard and seem to be very enthusiastic to impress, and they laugh at my jokes which is always nice (and compulsory). The weather this week was a little chilly and our gym lessons are seeming more and more likely to move inside earlier than usual. Athletics day is on Friday so here's hoping we're on track for London 2012. I have a fore arm strengthener which is in heavy rotation, which the kids love as they can't even close it with two hands. The chin up bar that we put up in the fire door frame is up every chance the boys get, but some get no closer to the elusive 1 chin up, but in their weekly journals their goals revolve around sit ups, push ups or chin ups...so at least I have made some impact!?! Hilarious.

The Parent Prepping meeting this week was as equally informative and exciting as last week our now very eccentric speaker went through absolutely everything you will ever need to know about the actual delivery from Step 1 right through to Step Baby!!!  A very fun and at times, self affirming evening, with Sara and I well prepared this time round with fruit, water and even a little candy to keep the sugar cravings at bay...mine not Sara's. It truly is amazing how many things she can put in her handbag. 

Thursday and Friday were here and gone with no real dramas, although Jessica did come over on Thursday night and we chatted about babies, and we also played one of the most fun but equally hard to win board games ever The Baby Name Game. Please write to us with your suggestions asap otherwise we may just have to name him after the taxi driver, Robert DeNiro's character from Taxi Driver, or Number 16 Bus Shelter or Talulah does the hula in Hawaii (legal issues pending). Richie Rich came over on Friday night, not the actual Richie Rich just someone with much less money, who does not live in a mansion or drive a fancy car, but just so happens to be called Richard, although he did show up in a splendid pair of cycling tights which did go up to his shoulders (no exaggerations!). Richard was terrible at the The Baby Name Game so after he'd had a massive meal and helped us chill out as only Rich can, he was off on his bike.

Saturday was here and we drove down to the South of Stockholm to pick up a Baby changing table for a silly cheap price. I half expected there to be a glass dome over this table with a huge array of tubes and a massive control board, where you could actually "change a baby". So after getting there and being a little disappointed it was a wooden table/shelving unit. We agreed we would buy it so the next job was getting it in the car. Well after 20 minutes and many different positions, seats out, seats front, boot up, table in pieces etc we decided to go for in the boot with the boot open, secured by two power cords complete with plugs on the ends, aquired from a nearby rubbish room! What a sight driving down the E4 with this unit sticking out the back, heading for the storage. The storage was full...no I mean FULL! But we somehow managed to arrange the dining chairs in a 6 way twisting spire which now reaches a good 4 metres off the ground...Gustave Eiffel would have been proud. The table went in, the microwave back on top of the bikes and the door was shut...end of story.  We then decided to go to Willy's, a cheaper variety of supermarket close to the storage facility. We bought quite alot and as we were driving back to the city we realised we didn't actually want the car in the city this weekend so we parked the car in our old street as we have done since returning from NZ, and took the train. What I have failed to mention here is that Sara and I didn't 'buy' any grocery bags and we took the baskets to load the food into our car. When that time came we actually just borrowed the baskets and placed them in the boot. Now we were riding a train through the centre of town with Sara carrying two bags and my skateboard, and me carrying two bright red stolen baskets full of food! So the Trans Pregnancy express kept on rollin'.

That was the week that was...

Preppin' to be Parents

Somehow another week flew by and the weekend went up in smoke too. We started the week meeting new children as Stockholm schools had their first days on Monday. A bizarre day in which the children come to school, often with parents, spend an hour with their teachers who proceed to pile them high with paper work and forms, lay on a few whimsical tales and then go home. That was basically our Monday anyway. Sara worked at the clinic until 7 and we met at home for our usual dinner of sandwiches.

Tuesday was actually supposed to bring the first day of real school lessons for the year, however I have abandoned lessons for this week, and Sara had 'Clash of the Classes' at her school. Wednesday flew by and we met mid afternoon for our Parent Preppin' class. It was a real experience too. This was enhanced by the fact that the lecturer was super uber eccentric and placed so much emphasis and enthusiasm on each individual fact and piece of information. It was like going to your grandmother's house and finding out she'd drunk Red Bull and now wanted to give you all the info you ever needed about breast feeding, baby delivery and the first months of being a parent. She used an old school OHP which broke and then a baby doll (never shake a baby). The highlight for Sara was the moment a father to be asked if he could give his baby sleeping pills? There was sounds of exasperated gasps go out in unison around the room. This was an ultra informative event which left us in good spirits, although I left worried about the severe lack of sleep we were about to encounter! 

Friday rolled around and so did the due date...now 4 Weeks to go! I went hiking with my class in the forest 15 kms and then a swim, while Sara met a friend after school for 'fika'. 

Saturday was Dad's birthday, and in honour of this momentous occasion...I dedicate this weeks photo to him.

The Old New Zealand that we love!

We are back in Sweden now after a fantastically relaxing time back in New Zealand. Family Wilkinson and friends were all very welcoming, warm and generous with their hospitality. If any of my friends are ever mental enough to come all the way to Sweden to visit, I am looking forward to repaying the favour. I was thinking about calling it Old Zealand  as I am happy to say it doesn't seem to change much at all, and that is the absolute beauty and charm of the place. Fish and chips on the beach, hotpools, swims in the sea, barefeet kids, 4 Squares, baches, kiwifruit... the list could go on and on. We had a fab time back home, and although very wet from the 'weather bombs' we left feeling refreshed and Kiwified!

5ive Weeks To Go

Well as we swiftly passed through another weekend yesterday, the due date officially became 5 weeks! We are becoming even more excited as each day goes by, but at times the excitement merges with many other emotions. Sara sleeps as if there are small rodents in the bed and to change position every half hour would be the best method of squashing them all by morning. The only problem is that morning comes around too quickly, and the rodents survive to fight another day. I'm really prepping myself for the big day, but to be honest I don't know what I'm preparing myself for. It's like packing for a surprise holiday, should I take skis or surfboard, sunscreen or gore-tex? Don't worry I won't be taking skis into the delivery room, although maybe I should, just to be safe in case? We haven't really discussed the preparation of the hospital bag should we need it earlier. I think I can rest assured that the skis or my skateboard won't be on that list! Although I have half planned my route from school to hospital and I am factoring in saving at least 10 minutes by using my skateboard, assuming it's not raining which is brave considering the tail end of the Swedish 'summer' we've seen.

More to come soon