a supermom's thoughts ...

Back to the real world

2008-03-26T14:33:00.002Z

If you check on my blog regularly, you might think that this little supermom hasn't been doing much thinking lately ... the truth is that this little supermom hasn't been much of a supermom at all lately, but she's been taking a break and been a sloppy'n-lazy-mom.

But good news, I'm getting back into the supermom-gear, and will be posting updates, stories and pictures again. All in due time though, don't want to rush things, all in due time.

Happy birthday Már!

2007-12-10T10:44:00.000Z

It's Már's birthday today! (born in 1975, you do the math!)

The family woke up early to have chocolate-banana-bread for breakfast and watch the birthday boy open his presents, before heading to work/play school. Tonight I'm cooking lamb for Már and a few of his friends.

Cha-, cha-, cha-, changes ...

2007-12-10T10:18:00.001Z

Early this year I decided to become a stay-at-home-mom for a while, while I was winding down from too much work and excitement. It had come as a great shock to me when I came home from a long theater project, that I felt like I was coming home to a house of strangers. I felt like I had to get to know Már and the kids from scratch, it didn't feel good. So I took a break, I stayed at home, took care of the home, the kids, got everything back on track and the way I wanted it ... I also took the time to rethink my priorities in life and after these months of stopping and reflecting on myself and my life, I have decided to take a dramatic turn in life. I'm going to change professions!

I am applying to become an air traffic controller, if I fit the criteria and am accepted to the job, I'll start by taking a course in February, my training then starts in the fall, and I'll get my first rights a year later. I'm really excited about this decision and am really keeping my fingers crossed for the next few weeks.

Tomorrow a friend of mine, who is an air traffic controller, is going to let me watch him at work for a part of his shift, I can't wait!

News

2007-11-04T18:24:00.001Z

Úlfrún

She said her name for the first time today, finally. Up until now she's always been "mamma". She saw a picture of herself and said OOofrooo ... were content with that, it's progress.

Halloween

Yesterday we had a Halloween party at our house, we invited a bunch of kids, decorated the apartment, put on costumes and served gross food ... it was great! We served worms (cut up spaghetti), spiders (cut and fried hot-dogs (they curl up into spiders/octipuses)), crocodile eyes (Swedish meatballs) and thick vampire's blood (spaghetti sauce) ... the kid's loved it. We're definitely making this an annual thing at our house!

Play school

Úlfrún's adjustment to play school is going just wonderfully, and she's loving it ... finally somebody else to play with during the daytime besides her mother ... and of course, Garpur is there, so when the kids go out to play in the afternoon, he takes care of her, helps her on the slide and so on!

Cycling

2007-10-10T10:09:00.000Z

Már and I bought our selves new bikes a few weeks ago. Our old bikes were bought as cheaply as possible 3 years ago, Már's got stolen and mine is rusted through after standing outside from time to time, last winter. Junk! This week we got our new expensive mountain bikes ready to ride, and yesterday I rode mine to the physiotherapist's, with Úlfrún on the back of it. Man, are our bikes ever nice to ride. My bike is extra large, for my long legs ... ahhh, it's wonderful, I feel like it's been custom made for me.

After the hour long ride back and forth to my appointment yesterday, I decided to ride the bike for an hour in the evening as well, alone. I felt like I was 17 years old again, when I used to ride out to the ocean at the tip of Grótta to think alone, or across town to the home of the guy's I fancied to slip them poetic letters through the mail-box.

Már was the only guy who ever answered my letters!

Play school

2007-10-08T14:18:00.000Z

Úlfrún will start to go to play school in two weeks time. I know she will be thrilled because every day when I take her with me to pick up Garpur from play school, I have to drag her out. She already knows a lot of the kids and staff there .. but most importantly, Garpur is there, her idol!

One day when a reading session turned into a photo session

2007-10-07T14:19:00.000Z

Bead work

2007-10-07T14:14:00.000Z

Garpur doing bead work at home, on a calm autumn after noon

And of course Úlfrún doing bead work as well

Busy schedule

2007-10-02T09:25:00.000Z

Our schedule is always getting more and more busy, I've had to make a family-times table for our fridge in order not to forget anything:

Every Monday and Thursday morning, Úlfrún and I go to meet other stay-at-home moms and their little kids at a local playground, no matter what the weather is like ... I needed something to break up the week for Úlfrún socially, so I found these women on the internet who were all home alone with small children, we've managed to meet regularly twice a week for a few weeks now, playing in the sandbox, on the swings, slide ... oh, it's wonderful, even when it's raining!

Every Monday and Wednesday after play school, I take Garpur to his swimming lessons in a school close to his play school. These lessons are run by a very old and respected sports team (KR) and taught by a great coach and his assistant. There are only eight kids in each group, so they get so much attention, and Garpur learns so fast, it's amazing to see the progress form week to week. He´s swimming with a cork and frog-feet across the deep end of the pool now!

Every Friday afternoon, I try to pick Garpur up early from play school, and drive with the kids to Mosfellsdalur to my parents place. It's the day of the week when my mom's not working and we spend some time together inside or in the freedom of Inga amma and Róbert afi's property in the country side.

Every Monday evening I'm planning to go to belly dance lessons. For the last two Mondays I've gone and basically just watched because of my back pain, but soon I hope to be able to join in.

On Tuesday and Thursday evenings Már and I go to karate practices, of course, Már has been going alone to these recently, because of my back, but I'm sure that'll be fixed soon. Edda, our favorite babysitter in the world, comes and takes care of the kids when Már and I go to karate together. On Saturdays, in the middle of the day, there's a third practice, which Már takes advantage of, in stead of my belly dance practice on Mondays.

On Saturday noons, I often teach maternity belly dancing at a yoga center close by.

On Sunday mornings, I meet a group of women who originally met on the internet because we were all due to deliver babies in March 2006, we've kept in touch, and now we've started meeting with all our kids and let them play and run around at my karate club (when it's not in karate-use). We've made such good friends, that we're even going on a "women's only" weekend-trip to Denmark together in two weeks time, we've rented a house in Copenhagen with a hot tub ... I can't wait!

And last but not least, every other Tuesday (or Wednesday) night, I meet up with my "saumaklúbbur" (group of friends who pretend to meet because of craft projects, but actually just meet to talk, eat and gossip)

It's amazing how much free time we do have together as a family though, despite the fact that we're this busy, but I think it's mostly due to the fact that because I'm working as a housewife now, most of the housework is out of the way when we're all together. It's great and it works out wonderfully!

Body news

2007-09-27T16:47:00.000Z

My body hasn't been very cooperative to me this year. It started off with the knee problem when I started practicing karate in the spring, then that got better during the summer, but then less than a week after we got home from Canada my back went.

My back hurt a little when I did certain moves, such as sit down, stand up, get up from a lying position etc. It gradually got worse and worse, until I could hardly move without feeling a lot of pain, just reaching for a pen was bad. Eventually I went to see my physiotherapist, she checked me out thoroughly. Her conclusion was that my right hipbone was loose, and had twisted forwards, away from the spine. I have gone to see her three times now, I'm doing stretching and strengthening exercises daily at home and I seem to be getting better. For a while I wasn't allowed to sit in deep positions, like in a car seat or on a couch, and I knelt at the dinner table and in front of the computer. Now I think it's just a matter of a few days before I'm back to normal.

This has completely thrown all the ideas I had, about doing a lot of exercising and getting into great shape, out the window. I'm registered to be practicing karate at least twice a week, and belly dancing at least once, and we just bought ourselves new bikes ... but maybe after the middle of October.

The important thing is that I'm getting better, it really sucks to have a malfunctioning body ... I'm valuing my good health much more now than I ever have before!

Pictures from many events this summer

2007-09-26T02:32:00.001Z

This should buy me some time ... lets just say that pictures say more than a thousand words, shall we?

In England at Vala amma's

Úlfrún finds her ears

The springtrip to a farm with Garpur's playschool

Photography by Garpur in a moving bus

Garpur and his class performing at the playschool's summer festival

Hiking "on top of" Siglufjörður

A flower we saw on our hike

A five year old birthday boy

Some of the birthday boy's photography in his party

Úlfrún, when she lost her balance for a few weeks

At the Reykjavik beach

Swimming in the (cold) ocean, at the Reykjavik beach

Garpur delivering the neighborhood mail when the postman failed to

Most of the Berman/Elias clan in Kanada

Mother and daughter in a family party at Tony's in Kanada

Garpur and Sonja clicked together right away

More of Garpur's photography

At the cottage

Úlfrún took care of the flies

Már windsurfing

Már waterskiing

Már waterskiing

Surfing, the Stina style

Hiking in the cottage woods

One of several species caught and observed on the trip

Swimming in the warm lake

Freedom

Home sweet home

I feel so loved!

2007-09-25T16:54:00.000Z

I thought that NO ONE was reading my blog anymore, well that wouldn't surprise me really, where I hardly ever do blog anymore ... but I just found ALL the comments that people have been
putting on my site for months. Apparently I'm supposed to approve them manually as they come ... nobody told me!
It's a great feeling reading them all together, I feel so loved!

"New" komments:
June 2007
June 2007
June 2007
May 2007
May 2007
March 2007
February 2007
December 2006
November 2006
November 2006
November 2006
September 2006
August 2006

I know, I know, I'm waaaaaay overdue to write something about the kids ... I'm still going through the photos from all our holidays this year ... and other photos that I've promised to put here earlier, I'm just so busy, being a hardworking stay-at-home-mom (cough, cough). It'll come, it'll come!

Maternity belly dancing for yoga students

2007-06-08T11:51:00.000Z

I'm so excited about a class I'll be teaching in June. An instructor from a yoga center, contacted me and asked me if I would like to try out teaching pregnant yoga students, maternity belly dancing on Saturdays in June ... I'm thrilled about the idea!

I can't wait to try it out. The first class will be with the yoga instructor .... I have to start preparing for the class .... júúúhhhúúúúúú!

Drivers license

2007-06-08T10:37:00.000Z

Yesterday I got my permanent drivers license sent in the mail from the Icelandic police department. So two years ago I got my temporary license, and now, after having renewed it, it'll last me until on my birthday, the year 2048 ... freaky!

Play school

2007-06-07T21:37:00.000Z

Play school is almost over for Garpur for the summer soon, because Már and I have decided to give him a long summer break.

The last month or so has been very eventful at Barónsborg, with the annual trip to a farm and the school's summer festival. The festival was last weekend and each class sang for all the parents outside in the school's garden. It was great, and Garpur made us so proud when he actually sang with the rest of the kids in his class and actually led the singing!!! Up until now he hasn't been too keen on singing, so this was a big character change we were seeing.

I have a few great photo's from these events of our kids and Davíð's kids which I'll put in here soon!

The younge escape artist

2007-06-07T21:19:00.000Z

More about Úlfrún.

Last weekend Már went out to do some work in the garden. He went out the basement door of the house and left it open because he needed to be able to go in and out of the house a lot. I didn't know that the basement door was open, so I let Úlfrún play in the hallway, as I do quite often (to practise her stair balance awareness!). Már didn't know that I often let her play in the hallway. Time passes and I send Garpur out to do some small chore.. he comes back panicking, because he found Úlfrún barefoot, in her diaper and bodysuit, holding a paint brush (she must have found somewhere on the way), on the sidewalk in front of our house, ready to cross the road.

We freaked out, well to be honest, I freaked out.

Two days later Már pops out to put calcium on our lawn, but because he´s only planning to be a short time outside, he leaves the basement door open. I make sure that the door upstairs is closed ... but that doesn't stop Úlfrún! Because the door of our apartment isn't locked, she opens it and strolls out through the basement without anyone noticing. In a while I notice the awkward silence in the apartment. When I couldn't find Úlfrún right away, my first reaction was to run out and into the street to see if she was there. She was! She was in the middle of the street, running down the road towards the crossroads of Stangarholt and Skipholt, and she was almost there!!! I ran after her and carried her back kicking and screaming her little wet socks off.

I wonder what she'll be like as a teenager?

Girls will be girls!

2007-06-07T19:54:00.000Z

Úlfrún is a girl, there will be no doubting this.

Every morning when Már and I finally get ourselves out of bed, Úlfrún has usually already emptied all her drawers of her clothes, tried them all out as various kinds of scarfs, before littering them all over our top floor.

When Garpur, Úlfrún and I went shopping yesterday, she screeched and laughed like crazy when we passed a shelf full of dolls and teddy bears. The closer we went to the shelf, the more she turned up the volume of her noise making. I let her look at the dolls and teddy bears. Úlfrún was in heaven, she grabbed one doll after the other, hugged them and kissed the, before throwing them in a pile on the floor and grabbing the next one ...

... Garpur never behaved this way when he was her age, he was too busy pointing out all the motorcycles and airplanes he saw!!!

Laser-toe

2007-06-07T19:42:00.000Z

Last night I went to karate practice ... and forgot to relax and take it easy in class. We were practicing "kumite" (free form fighting) ... and I ended up fracturing my toe!

Today, at the end of my physiotherapy session, I got special laser treatment for my toe to reduce the swelling. I thought it was hysterical, sitting there in my physiotherapist's office and having her point a laser pen at my toe. My "injury"!

Physiotherapy

2007-06-04T13:03:00.000Z

I've started seeing a physiotherapist twice a week now. It's kind of nice having someone really care about your body and help you fix it!

Back in the days when I was graduating from art school, I decided to start practicing karate again after a few month long break, having gained a few kilos and wanting to get back into shape. My knees and hips were always killing me after exercises. I decided that I must have arthritis, so I went to the doctors to get a cure for my imagined arthritis, and she laughed at me. She told me, after examining me a little, that I was too heavy for the amount of effort I was making my body go through, so I had swelling around my joints. The cure: she told me to rest and loose weight!
That was when I stopped practicing karate, and a few months later I started practicing belly dancing in stead.

Now, six years later I have the same problem when I'm starting to practice karate again. My joints ache a lot after intense practicing, especially karate. At first I tried to solve things by myself by going swimming and trying to strengthen my knee-area by doing a few laps every other morning without using my arms ... but the pain just got worse. Finally a karate-instructor recommended that I see a physiotherapist. My physiotherapist is wonderful, she has taken so much time into studying my knees, watching me move, giving me all sorts of treatment. After examining me she explained where exactly the pain is coming from. It's not actually in the joints them selves, it's my thigh-muscles, where the muscles gather together over the knee and fasten under the knee ... that's where I have massive swelling. And the best way to solve the problem is not to loose weight (all though it probably wouldn't do any harm), but to strengthen my thighs alongside therapy to decrease the swelling.

I'm very excited about this process of healing and getting stronger, because I can feel that it's working. And I love having a physiotherapist care so much about my thighs!!!

New name

2007-06-03T09:48:00.000Z

Due to my new job, I've changed the name of my blog!

Too much choice, too little time to do it ALL.

2007-06-03T02:47:00.000Z

Tonight Már introduced me to TED, the conference in California where 1000 experts and geniuses come together every year and talk about their great ideas. Már selected a few really interesting talks for me to watch on their website ... and that's what I did for basically the whole evening.
One of these talks I watched was with a Barry Schwartz (http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/93) about "the paradox of choice", how much simpler things are when you only have one or a few things to choose between, and how complicated and frustrating life gets and unhappy people get when they have too many choices to make. I loved his talk and thought he was absolutely right, when there are few things to choose between your expectations are low so you are sometimes pleasantly surprised, but when you're confronted with too many choices your expectations are set higher and are more often disappointed ... so even though the choices we make when we have a lot to choose from, are better than when we have little to choose from, we're more likely to be unhappy with our choice because our expectations were set so high!

After having spent the whole evening watching geniuses talk passionately about their interests, I started browsing the web for my own interests. I stumbled across sites with belly dancing in Iceland, I read almost everything there is to read about it, watched all the Icelandic belly dance videos on u-tube ... and more ...
I got so excited about belly dancing that I just wanted to jump up and sign up at Magadanshúsið again.

But then I remembered that there are things in the way of me doing that. There is karate. I love karate, I've only just started practicing it again and I don't ever want to stop doing karate, I even want to become a karate instructor one day. Then I also remembered that I waiting to get to try out salsa at SalsaIceland, I really want to try it out, I'm sure I'll like it and have a lot of fun learning it. Then there's also Tribal belly dance. When I went to see Josy's last belly dance show, I fell in love with Rositsa's tribal belly dancing ... then there's always the guest belly dance teachers at Kramhúsið, I have yet to try learning with them, I've always wanted to ... and I also would love to take up couples dancing with Már again, that was a lot of fun and we were always planning to try going to the group "Komið að dansa" together.

Too many exciting choices are my problem, it doesn't matter what choice I make, I'll always be disappointed that I didn't make all the other ones as well!!!

The Housewife

2007-05-31T08:35:00.000Z

Since I don't have a project lined up for me for a while now, and a summer ahead that involves a lot of traveling for the family, I've decided to become a housewife for the summer, and have Úlfrún at home with me. This is the first time I actually decide to do housework in an organized manner. I've come to realize that being a housewife is considerably more difficult than I had imagined. For an instance, the work hours are crazy! A housewife never gets her guilt-free rest ... I work with Úlfrún playing around my feet, there are no coffee-breaks, meals are work because I'm feeding Úlfrún as well as myself, and as soon as she takes her nap in the day that's when I really fold up my sleeves and to use the time well to work. When evening comes, I'm still at work, cooking, cleaning, putting the kids to bed, etc. It isn't until I have karate practices that I can really take a break!

I heard some time ago, that out of a wide selection of professions, housewives are by far the hardest workers ... I believe that now!

Romeo Dallaire

2007-05-30T23:31:00.000Z

Tonight there was a tv-program about the Canadian General, Romeo Dallaire, and his visit to Rwanda, on the 10 year anniversary of the genocide in Rwanda.

The show was completely mind-blowing, the ignorance of the rest of the world during that time towards the situation there and the images of people being slaughtered are stuck in my mind now. These images join older ones I still haven't gotten over. I remember seeing images of children's heads on sticks in the streets of Rwanda on the news when I was sixteen years old. I cried then, and I cry now.

I just can't believe how horrible people can let themselves become ...

10 year anniversary!

2007-05-24T11:52:00.000Z

Last night Már and I had a 10 year dating anniversary ... I think it's amazing that it has been so long since we first hooked up. Now, ten years, two university degrees, two apartments, two kids and one car later, here we still are, hanging on tightly!!!

Lifechanger

2007-05-18T03:43:00.000Z

Boy oh boy, has our life ever changed over the last couple of weeks ... we finally bought our first car!!!

It's amazing how much time a car can save you if you need to go to several places in the same day. I guess this is something that most people realize earlier in life than me, but hey, I've been quite happy without a car until we bought ours ... I guess it's true what they say, ignorance IS bliss!

I'm now a proud Skoda-owner .. (Skódi ljóti!)

Home birth

2007-05-09T13:58:00.001Z

I'm getting so sick and tired of defending the choice of having a home birth, that I've actually stopped discussing it, especially with pregnant women. There are so many myths and bad stories (especially old ones), that are made to scare people from choosing to have a home birth. But if you look at the statistics of births gone wrong, and compare mistakes and fatality of home births and hospital births the odds are amazing in the favor of home births ... women would probably not defend and rely on hospital births as much if they only knew.

Of course, the comparison isn't really fair. Most women in Iceland for example, are not introduced to the possibility of home birth unless they are really interested in it them selves, so of course they are ignorant and skeptical about it.
The comparison is also unfair because that if there is a slight hint of a problem or abnormality in a home birth that has started, it's rushed to the hospital without hesitation ... if the home birth starts off in a city or a town with a hospital in it, the medical help is given in the birth at about the same time as if the birth had started off in a hospital room, many people do not know or realize this. The risk in a home birth, because you're not close to medical help from a birth-doctor, equiptment or machines, is minimal.

When it comes to horror stories, I've heard more versions and more horrific stories about hospital births and doctor's mistakes, than about home births ... I guess people have just become immune to those stories ... and of course, those are just stories!

I'm not against hospital births at all, in fact I'm in favor of them for those who choose and need them. Hospital births are most often a calm and wonderful experience without interruption, just the way births should be. Most hospital staff that are involved with deliveries respect the womens wishes for her birth, and of course, most births in general are "normal" wherever they are.
But I'm just frustrated about how people are prejustice against home births without actually knowing anything about them or having experienced them. I don't know how many times I hear sentences like: "I'm all for home birth, but I know that if I had had a home birth my child would not have come out of it alive, because of the complications I had in my birth" ... I could scream sometimes when I hear this, because they obviously do not know anything about home births and do not want to know. I've just stopped commenting and try thinking about something else to stop me from wanting to scream.

Points:

If you plan having a home birth you are assigned a midwife that delivers home births. You go to interviews to her, at the end of the pregnancy she'll even come to your house if you prefer her to. The same midwife is with you during the birth and delivers your baby. The same midwife visits you after the baby is born and teaches you what you need to learn and checks up on you.

If there are any abnormalities in a pregnancy, women not allowed to go ahead with the home birth. There are many signs to a possible abnormal or difficult delivery (high blood pressure etc. etc.), and home birth midwives are trained to spot them, they get to know their women well enough to know what is a bad sign for them.

I know many women who've had home births, I've had two my self, I like the idea of having a choice of your own, about where you feel the most comfortable to give birth. But I do not like how people are kept from knowing the facts about home births, and there for kept from having a real choice.

To me there's a difference between being manipulated to going to the hospital by fear of alternative choices and choosing to go to the hospital because you've been properly introduced to all options and you like the hospital one the best!

London Zoo

2007-04-03T12:54:00.000Z

Last Sunday we all went to London Zoo. Garpur, Vala, Steve, Úlfrún, Már and I went together, as well as Sarah, Ren and Ella, Steve's daughter and Steve's son's daughter's. Because that the railway-company was doing some construction that morning, we took the bus from Ely to Cambridge, the train from Cambridge to London's King's Kross and then finally the Tube to the Zoo.

At London's King's Kross, Garpur was very excited to see platform no. 9 3/4 from Harry Potter .. but a little disappointed when he saw that it had been moved due to tourist attraction. We spent the whole day at the Zoo and it was wonderful. According to Garpur, the highlights were seeing the bats and the snakes ... and jumping in the children's "jumping-castle" ofcourse!!

But after a day at the Zoo we were completely exhausted and everyone's feet ached!

The strangest dream

2007-04-03T12:35:00.000Z

Two days ago I woke up after having had the strangest dream. Before I write it down, it's important that I note a few facts:

1. When Úlfrún was sleeping outside Vala'a house the other day, she said that some of her neighbours would have a heart-attack if they knew we kept a sleeping baby in a pram outside her house.
2. Davíð, Ko-leen and my parents are looking into the possibility of extending their house in the country-side.
3. The other day Már bought "Badger beer" in the local supermarket.

The dream:
I had Garpur sleeping outside Vala's house in the pram and when I went to check on him, the pram was nowhere to be found. After a lot of looking for it, I spotted the end of the walkie-talkie-cord that was in the pram, I pulled on it and followed it and found the pram under a pile of dirt in hole in the ground, exactly where it had been ... it had been dug into the ground and some dirt put on top just to cover it lightly. Garpur was fine.
Apparently the neighbourhood Badgers had done it! They were getting very pissed off because of all the digging that Davíð had been doing around the house and decided to get back at us.

I woke up very confused, but then I thought it was hilarious once I had put all the pieces together!
Now you know how my head works!!!

Easter holiday!

2007-03-30T13:02:00.000Z

We've finally gone on our Easter holiday to England. Ohhhhh, It's wonderful. For the last few weeks I've been working a lot, first for a theatre group, and then several small project all over the place. The last project was finished and handed in the day before yesterday, at 4 o'clock in the morning ... then we left for our holiday yesterday.

The trip was fine and the kids behaved really well. We left by taxi, took the air-bus, the plane, then 3 trains and finally one last taxi to Vala's and Steve's place.

This morning when we woke up, Vala and Steve were working already. So, the four of us went for a walk. The highlight of the walk was when we met a man walking his dog. Garpur approached him and asked him very politely: "Má ég klappa hundinum?" ... the man replied "Ofcourse you can pet the dog, mate". We found this very funny. Afterwards we explained to Garpur that people here don't generally speak Icelandic, but that he was very brave and clever to have tried anyways, because the man had understood him correctly when he had asked so politely!

Sick-day at home

2007-03-02T09:54:00.000Z

Garpur, Úlfrún and I had a sick-day at home today. Garpur had a fever last night, but was very energetic today ... and Úlfrún and I were fine. We had a productive day, Garpur got a haircut, the kids played together a lot, I did laundry and Garpur and I baked a cake. We kind of needed this kind of a day to bond after all the crazy workhours I've been doing recently.

Birthdaygirl

2007-02-26T12:41:00.000Z

Úlfrún's heart

2007-02-14T13:11:00.000Z

I have probably not told everyone about this before. It's not that I spesificly tried not to, to me it just has never really seemed serious enough to worry about, and I didn't want people to worry unnessesarily.

But, Úlfrún was born with a hole in her heart. This is something that was never detected during my pregnancy, and many doctors and doctors-students have tried to listen to her heart and detect it knowing that it's there, but they can't.
When she went to the hospital for her first check-up, only five days old, a doctor detected a faint, high pitched sound in her heart. We met a heart-specialist, who confirmed that she was born with a hole in her heart. After an ultrasound-examination he told us that the hole was quite small and shaped irregularly, which made him hopeful that it would heal by itself. He also told us that even though it didn't heal, it would most likely have no effect on her life. He told us to come and see him again when she was 3 months old.
At the second check-up the heart-specialist told us that the hole was smaller and he convinced us that it would most likely heal completely before she reached the age of five. He told us to come back when Úlfrún was 1 year old.

Yesterday we went to see the heart-specialist again. He examined her heart and told me that the hole was the size of a needle-hole now, he joked and said that the red blood-cells almost have to line up to get through the hole. Now he doesn't want us to come back for inspection until she's 3 years old. He told me that the hole will have gone by then, and he probably won't be able to detect that it ever was there, when he sees her again.

I was very relieved, although I've never really worried about Úlfrún's heart, I've always believed that it would just heal quickly ... it dawned on me, when the doctor told me the good news, that Úlfrún was actually born with a flaw in her heart and that we are very lucky that it isn't more serious than it is!

Yet another update

2007-02-14T12:52:00.000Z

I'm quite embarrassed about this blog of mine right now, the more that is happening around me, the less time I have to write, but the more time that passes, the more I have to write about, until I don't dare sit down at the computer to write because I might have to sit here for days writing ... and I don't have time for that!

- So, Christmas has passed, it was wonderful, Vala and Steve came to visit over the holidays, we visited my parents and met my brother and his family ... so it was good!
- The kids are growing ridiculously fast. Úlfrún is walking a little bit although she prefers crawling when she needs to get somewhere quickly, but she still only has the two bottom-teeth! Garpur is such a big and bright boy, he's a delight to be around and to talk to, he's wearing clothes now that are labeled for 6-8 year olds (in China?).
- Work is great, I've hardly ever been happier. I'm working on a high-school theater-production right now that premieres in 10 days, the day after Úlfrún's birthday(*).

I think that that's it for now ...

(*) Úlfrún will be one year old on February the 23rd.

So much to do, such little time!

2006-12-01T10:44:00.000Z

Christmas is in 23 days and I've just realized how soon that actually is! I'm not freaking out yet, but there is a lot we have yet to do before the holidays.

Garpur and I have actually already baked the gingerbread men to hang on the Christmas tree, and my friend Móa came over the other day and we spent a whole afternoon, evening and some of the night, making chocolate-treats with marsipan-and nutfillings!

So some of things are done but what we have left is:
* making the "Aðventukrans"-candle-thing ... here we make a decoration that includes four candles. Then we light the candles one by one on the four Sundays before Christmas. The first Sunday like this is the 3rd of December ... and we haven't made our "Aðventukrans"decoration yet.
* baking the Christmas cake (and watering it with whiskey/rum for 3 weeks)
* cleaning the house; mopping the floors, cleaning the kitchen cupboards etc.
* making the Christmas cards, writing inside them and finding all the addresses for friends and family
* buying presents and wrapping them
* sewing some of the Christmas clothes for the smallest familymembers
* making a menu for the whole holiday period and shopping for it
* decorating the gingerbread men for the Christmas tree
* finding all the Christmas decoration, hanging it up, keeping some for the tree on that gets decorated on the 23th or the 24th.
* there's probably more I'm forgetting ...

1.des

2006-12-01T10:10:00.000Z

Today it's December 1st, so formally we can start looking forwards to Christmas. Finally!

I made Garpur a calender to count down the days to Christmas. Instead of buying a chocolate one like all the kids here get, I made him a little sticker-book, and wrapped in a few stickers for each day of the month. then I pinned up a long piece of string on the tapestry in the living room (sorry Vala) in a zig-zag pattern, so that it's small at the top and gets bigger at the bottom ... and represents a Christmas tree. Each little package is fastened to the sting
with a little clothes-peg, which has a number on it. I'm very proud of this calender, it was easy to make, it won't damage Garpur's teeth, and he LOVES it. He got permission to take the little sticker-book to play school with him today, to finish putting all the stickers he got this morning into it.

Garpur can be such a very sweat boy. This morning when he first saw the new calender, he was so impressed with it that he hugged and kissed me, and told me that he would think hard about what he could make for me in return.
On our way out to go to play-school, he was fishing for compliments for the sweater he was wearing (a hooded "lopapeysa" (icelandic woolen sweater)), ofcourse he got the compliment he wanted from me. Then he said "hey mom, you're wearing almost everything black", I responded "yeah that's right, do you think I should maybe wear more colors today?", Garpur replied "No, I think you look very good mom, I think that what you're wearing really suits you" .... now that's my boy, practicing on his mom, on ways to charm the hell out of girls. Well, it worked for me!

On our way to play-school Garpur was so cute. He was running, jumping, dancing and twirling. I asked him why he was doing these wonderful movements. He explained to me that if he kept moving, "the Bull of the Coldness" (Kuldabolinn) wouldn't eat him. Here in Iceland when it gets cold we often refer to the coldness as "the Bull (of Coldness)", and we say that it's biting us ... Garpur may have misunderstood this slightly, so he was dancing for his life on his way to play-school this morning!

Snow and darkness

2006-11-21T01:16:00.000Z

Aparently I'm in a minority group. I'm one of the few crazy people who just loves it when every thing is covered in snow, and when it's dark outside most of the time. Like now! I just find it so romantic and cozy.

I actually also love flying in airplanes, and I like airports and hanging around in them. Next year we'll be travelling twice with the kids. First to England to visit Vala and Steve, hopefully in March. And then to Toronto to visit all my family there, and Jessica, this will be in either August or October ... we´ll see! I'm really looking forwards to taking the kids abroad, even the plane rides and terminal waiting!

Happy little worker

2006-11-21T00:08:00.000Z

I've found my calling ... in the thearte. You might think you're having a deja'vous when you hear me say this, but I don't think that fashion design is my thing.

A year and a half ago I decided to try out working as an independant clothes-and fashion designer and run a shop with a few other designers ... that kind of work just doesn't agree with me at all. This is the same conclusion I came to, when I graduated from the textile department b.t.w. ...

Now I've turned back to the theatre, and I'm instantly feeling free as a bird, finally I feel like I love doing my work again. The project I'm working on now is the Christmas play at the National Theatre of Iceland. It's a greek play called "The Bacchae", I'm working closely with the Greek costume designer, Thanos, and the sewing department of the theatre, as a textile designer/-worker for the play.
This is the second time I've been asked to come to the National Theatre to work solely on the textiles for a play, the last time I was working on a play with Thanos as well, when he came to the country to do this play, he immediatly demanded that I work on the textiles with him ... I'm so honoured! Thanos's costume design is very rich with complicated and experimental textiles, so I'm pushing my limits of textile knowledge every day I work with him, gaining experience and learning so much ... ... did I mention that I love my job?

I've already got a project lined up for after the holidays, I'll be designing costumes and stage set, for a high school play. I'll be working with one of my favorite younge actors/directors, Ólafur Egill ... he's a very "think out side the box" kind of a guy, so I'm looking very much forward to working with him.

What I love best about my work, is working with fantastic and creative people, working together with them to reach a goal, finishing the project and feeling the closure of that work when it's over. And then starting on the next project, a completely different project based on a different story, different world, and sometimes working with different people. The feeling of working on reaching a goal together, and not having to think about who's idea is who's ... it really doesn't matter, just getting past all that and getting the job done the best way possible.

I've realized that for me to be happy in my work I have to accept my weaknesses and just work with what I'm truly good at, what I enjoy doing. I'm probably never going to be famous or even well known in society for what I do, but if the people I enjoy working with, enjoy working with me ... then that's exactly what I want.

I'll probably never stop doing textile experiments, making gowns and clothes on the side, when I get the urge (and time) to, and custom make them for the few people who know of me ... and who knows, maybe I'll show them at exhibitions every so often. But I know now that it's a complete waste of time for me to even think about trying to manufacture a clothes-line or make a buisness around my designs ... I just simply don't enjoy doing it enough and am not motivated in the marketing field at all.

It's a wonderful feeling to find one selfs role in life ... again. I feel relaxed and happy.

An update on my wonderful children

2006-11-16T18:50:00.000Z

Úlfrún is growing up so fast that it's scary. The day before last Már found her first tooth. Today she figured out how to get about even faster than by crawling ... she found a chair, grabbed hold of it, pulled her self up beside it, and now she just pushes it around and walks behind it! Now she likes nothing more than standing by Garpur's shelves and tearing his things out and tossing them on the floor, then she can sit for ever just going through and examining it, puzzles, lego's, cars, train sets, coloring books ... you name it!

We had an interview/meeting with Garpur's playschool teacher today. She made me so proud of him. She described him as a kind, smart, sensitive, calm, strong and a creative boy. She said that he is one of the most popular kids in his class, he can play with anyone and is a kind of a leader in his class. Not that he tries to lead, he just seems to be so agreeable with everyone that the other children follow his lead. She told us that in playschool it is obvious that his strengths are doing fine things like drawing and building from lego's, listening to stories, playing with others. He still talks about the cats in playschool, tells the teachers how much he misses them, and apparently he talks positively about Úlfrún alot at school. The only thing that he doesn't seem to have an interest in, that is singing! Ofcourse, she wasn't really telling us anything we didn't know allready ... but it's great to hear it from someone else, who knows him quite well, that your son is a great person!

Murder overdose

2006-11-12T12:50:00.000Z

Last night I watched a movie called "Murder by numbers" that was on TV. I couldn't watch parts of it, it was too detailed and graphic. Maybe I'm just getting too old or something, but I'm getting kind of fed up with all the fictional deaths and murder investigations that seem to be everywhere these days. Homicide investigation programs (especially the British ones) used to be my favorite, and murder mystery literature used to be what I enjoyed reading the most as well. When ever I turn on the TV these days though, this is all I se: CSI (New York / Miami), Law and order (two different variations of this show as well), Conviction, Inspector Morse, Taggart, the list goes on and on ...

This has increased very fast since, for example, when I saw the movie "Seven". I remember watching that for the first time and being shocked ... now "Seven" is just a very mildly gross movie, not even as graphic as some of the TV shows today!

When watching the news, I'm also seeing more and more detailed gruesomness. I can see that all of this is having a direct influence on artists as well. Visual art, music, literature keeps going further and further in expressing and describing death, killing and just ugliness in general.

Enough is enough. Last night after watching the movie, I felt that finally I had had enough, reached my limits. I can't take any more of this, my interest is wearing off, and now I feel like this increase in gruesomness has eaten a hollow inside of me ... and now I want to fill it up with images of beautiful things, facts about how wonderful life can be, nice and constructive things.

Mobility update

2006-11-10T11:04:00.000Z

Úlfrún can get to anywhere she wants to now with out trouble. She's crawling, standing up, walking while holding onto stuff, trying to walk between furniture ...
... we're going to have a wonderful Christmas, we'll just have to make sure that we keep all the Christmas decoration ontop of the Christmas tree!

Fresh air

2006-11-10T10:51:00.000Z

These days there are huge storms bypassing the country. Both last weekend and last night, Már went outside to bring our stuff inside or make sure it was tied down, like garbagebins, bycicles, gardenchairs etc. so that it wouldn't be blowing around town ... I love going out in weather like this, prefferably letting my hair loose and walking down the street in the wind and the new, clean air that it brings.

This is why there isn't a big cloud of pollution hanging over Reykjavík ... I wish I could bring a powerful wind like this to Mexico, and clean the air there a little bit!

An empty house!

2006-11-10T02:15:00.000Z

Well, the trouble we were having with finding a home for our cats, has been temporarily solved. My parents have decided to take them and house them in the countryside, they're even planning to train them to go outside! I'm so relieved that we don't have to put them down ... I think I would rather have suffered with my allergy, than doing that actually!

My parents came to collect the cats two days ago. It was heartbreaking, I snuck off cried alone in a corner when they were gone. I feel so guilty about all this. It was I who originally insisted on getting the cats ... and now it's my fault that they had to go.

The house feels so empty without them, I had grown so used to them ... this was more their home than ours ... like Garpur said when we told him about the cats moving "but they live here ... why don't we just move?"

We're going to visit the cats in their new home on Saturday, well, we'll also be visiting my parents ... but, I can't wait to se how they're doing in their new home!

A good home for the cats

2006-11-02T09:38:00.000Z

We really need to find a good home for our cats, prefferably with someone we know, because we want to be able to visit them regularly, especially for Garpur's sake. Garpur is really sad about the whole buisness. He was talking about it in playschool yesterday. The teachers told me that he was very upset and started crying ... this is very much out of his character. He thinks of them as a part of the family, I can't remember when he drew the last family-picture without them.

I wish we could just keep the cats, it would make things so much easier, but I can't keep using steroid-medication forever! I told my doctor that we'd try to find the cats a home where we can visit them, and she eplained to me in detail what I should do when I do: take my medication with me and wash everyones clothes after the visit ... that's it!

The good news and the bad

2006-10-31T09:39:00.000Z

First the bad news. My doctor called me this morning and told me that the results from my blood-testing were back. The misterious nose-clogging-ploblem that has been bothering me for a couple of years is caused by cat-allergies. She said that according to the results, it's not a mild allergy at all, and the only solution to this is for me to get rid of the cats, clean everything in the house, throw out carpets, get the couch deep-cleaned and so on ... and use a steroid-nose-sprey until I'm over the most of it. Allthough I don't want to believe it, it does make sence. My nose is always clogged, it has gotten much worse over the last year, when I've been home at the end of my pregnancy and during my maternity-leave. I've even started to feel like heavyness in the tubes that lead down to the lungs (can't remember what they're called) and they whistle a little sometimes when i sigh. Sigh!

The good news. Úlfrún started crawling properly today. She was even wearing slippery clothes and crawling on slippery floor ... those are some muscles that girl must have! She managed to crawl towards the dining-room shelves, grab hold of them and haul herself up until she was standing. When she started beeing a little to interested in the breakable items in the shelves I moved her into the kitchen and set her in the middle of the floor. She got up on her knees and crawled straigt to the catdishes and emptied their waterbowl ... and smiled. So now when I look over our home I can see that we have a lot of work ahead for us, moving everything up to at least a meter high!

Projects ahead here: Somehow find the cats a new home, rearrange our whole home because of Úlfrún's manouvering and clean everything in order for my breathing to get better. Phew.

Legoboy

2006-10-30T00:34:00.000Z

Every time I open my dining-room cuboard I can't help giggling outlout, because of it's contents. The shelf that used to contain candles has been taken over by lego spaceships and amazing and imaginative lego spacetrucks and lego machines I don't know the names of. Garpur has put them in there for safe keeping so that they won't be ruined.

Now I have to find a new place to keep my candles though.

The kids

2006-10-29T12:10:00.001Z

Logi Garpur - size now: 114 cm and 23 kg

He´s doing very well. It's funny to see changes evolve in his character, one day you think you know him inside and out, and the next day he surprizes you with a change. One of the most recent changes Már and I have found with him, is how he's starting to understand sarcasm and some of our sarcarsic humour.
Garpur also surprizes me every so often when he sais things that make no sense to me what so ever, and I just assume he´s making stuff up and imagining things. Then, hours later, I realize what he was reffering to ... then I feel so bad, because he has such a great memory for details and situations. He isn't very good at explaining things accuratly, but he remebers the most amazing things and really far back in time too!

I love taking Garpur to gymnastics. He loves going there and is exited before every class. He's not the most focused kid at practise, but with enough encouragement and pep-talk, he does very well. His movements and physique are developing so beautifully and it's great to watch him and guide him through the exercises.
Yesterday I took him to practise, Már and Úlfrún decided to stay at home. Garpur cycled all the way to gymnastics (it took about 30 minutes), then he practised for an hour and was totally exausted by the end of it ... I had to carry him into the changing room. Once we were outside though and on the bike again he had miraculously recharged his batteries and was cycling all over the place, he even cycled up the steep hill on our way home. It's amazing how organized exersize can sometimes be exausting and seem like a chore, but once he's free to do what he wants, his energy seems to last forever.

He's such a kind big brother to his little sister. When he gets a treat, he often asks me if Úlfrún can eat what he's eating, because he wants to share his treat with her ... I think that is so cute!

Úlfrún - size now: 74 cm and 8,5 kg

Úlfrún has been a buisy little girl lately.
She's learnt how to sit without support. She's learnt how to sit up from a lying position. She's found the crawling position, allthough she hasn't figured out how to manover much in it yet. She's standing up everywhere she can, if there's anything to hold onto in reach, she'll use it to haul herself up. Even if it's just a towel or a magazine lying on the floor, it's worth trying to stand up against.

Úlfrún is practising her speach as well, a lot of mamamamamamama's and dadabababadadababa's. When were outside in the stomache-pouch, she'll also practise her voice volume, especially when she's happy and excited. She´ll be smiling and giggling and shouting her lungs out down the street.

She can show you how big she is by raising her hands (as seen in the previous post), but she's figured that raising her hands, sticking out her toungue and smiling, is the best way of communicating with people when she wants attention. The last time I took her to her regular check-up, Úlfrún showed the nurse how big she was, constantly for five minutes ... the nurse giggled so much she couldn't continue with the check-up for a while. Two times this last week, when I've looked at her after taking my eyes off her for a second, Úlfrún has been standing in the middle of the floor and had her hands up, without any support, thankfully she didn't get too hurt from her lack of balance, but the girl asking for trouble!

With her increasing need to communicate it's wonderful to see how she and Garpur have started to bond. She can stare at him and laugh at everything he does for hours!

Beautiful people

2006-09-18T14:29:00.000Z

I'm back

2006-08-29T11:40:00.000Z

Finally I'm back on the "world wide web", blogging again. I've been postponing this moment for some time, because so much has happened since my last post, that I feard I wouldn't know where to start ... but the longer I postpone it, the more stuff piles up that I want to write about! So here I am, diving in, starting with a picture of Úlfrún, taken just moments ago. Eventually I hope to get back on track, writing about my buisy summer, the crazy fall ahead, pictures of the kids and family, but for now I'm pleased with just having broken the ice!

A month gone by

2006-06-14T10:18:00.000Z

Wow, I'm not doing a very good job in keeping you guys informed, am I?
I haven't written anything in a month. A lot has been going on lately... I just don't know where to start!

Kids
Oh, the worries that I had in my last entry, have vanished into thin air ... Garpur has become himself again, and has mostly gotten over his attention-seeking-behaviour.
The next problem to focus on: Is Úlfrún sleeping too much? We're getting concerned if this might be the case, because per every 24 hours, she sleeps for 18-20 of them. Mind you, she looks good, drinks a lot, hardly ever complains ... it just seems a little too good to be true, there must be a catch!

Úlfrún started baby-swimming-lessons last week, so far she's doing really well. I hope to post photos of her next class tomorrow!

Work
I started doing felt experiments in the garden yesterday. My plan is to develop a new felting-look for a one-of-kind-coat-and-jacket-collection I'll launch in the fall. The first session of experimenting went really well and I'm so optimistic about the outcome!

I've started collecting buttons in all shapes an sizes, and all kinds of electrical wires (especially phone-wires). Why?, you might ask ... well, I'm making jewellery, believe it or not! So if you have a stash of buttons you are about to throw out, give them to me instead ... please?

I have to go now, so that this day doesn't vanish into me sitting in front of the computor and not doing other important stuff ... like, uhm, yeah, well just important stuff!

More tomorrow (maybe even photos!).

Bits an pieces from our last two weeks

2006-05-18T11:16:00.000Z

the little teenager and the growing baby

Our familylife is getting more and more intense these days ... basically Garpur has come to realize that his cute little baby-sister, who needs a lot of his parents attention, has really come to stay. This seems to lead him to think that by being very negative and trying to controll every situation, he can get a bigger share of the attention ... even though it's hard to admit, he's kind of right!

One of his favorite pasttimes these days, is to argue with us and try to get his way. For example this morning, when I offered him a choice of cheerios, cornflakes or porridge for brekfast, he chose an egg! I know that if I had offered him to choose between cheerios, cornflakes and an egg, he'd have chosen to have porridge ... like he did yesterday, come to think of it!

So we (the parents), are doing our best to keep our calm, discuss the situation openly with him, take turns caring for Úlfrún so that he doesn't feel he's losing one parent more than the other ... and just waiting for this phase to blow over. Thankfully Úlfrún's still such a great sleeper, that we actually have the energy to tackle the situation. But can anyone tell me how long we might have to wait, a week, a month ... or maybe years???

The good news is that Garpur always treats Úlfrún well, sings and talks to her, strokes her ... he doesn't seem to be angry with her, it's us he has issues with.

Úlfrún is doing a great job growing and learning stuff. Now she has noticed her hands and tries to grab stuff with them while looking really hard at them, but she usually ends up knocking stuff over or just bumping her hands into it ... but she's getting there!

CocoRosie

Four years ago, when standing in the middle of a little shoeshop on White Ave. in Enmonton, Már and I heard the wonderful voices of CocoRosie, for the first time. We were instantly fond and curious about the music they were playing in the shop and asked the girl at the counter what music they were playing. She just shrugged and told us to ask the guys next door. Next door to the little soeshop is a little musicshop. The guys there handed us a cd with CocoRosie, and we bought it. We love and enjoy their weird fusion music, and since that trip to Edmonton, we've gotten more of their music.

We never imagined that this wonderful duo/band would travel to Iceland and have a concert here ... but they did, last night ... and we went to it!

It was such a great experience. Well, besides it being the fist time Már and I leave the kids to do something without them, and meeting a lot of people we haven't seen in a long while, the concert was fabulous! There were three of them on stage, the two sisters who actually are "CocoRosie" and their cool human-beatbox-guy. The girls sang beautifully, played the piano, the harp, keyboard, guitar, wooden flute and all kids of electric gizmos I don't know the names of. They put on a great show, danced and performed all sorts of movements and, as a member of the audience, I felt that I got to know their character a little too.

I'm so glad we went out together last night, it really makes a difference to spend some time together without the kids, and "outside the walls of the home" (a phrase directly translated from icelandic).

Eurovision

Along with the rest of the icelandic population, I'm getting very excited about the Eurovision Song Contest, the semi-finals are shown live from Greece tonight and the finals are on Saturdaynight.

I feel kind of sorry for my parents who'll be flying to Canada during the Conests tonight ... I just hope, for their sakes, that our contribution, Silvia Night, does well enough tonight to go to the finals, so they can watch her live on the internet on Saturday (I hope that's possible?).

For those who don't know what I'm talking about, The Eurovision Song Contest has become some sort of a cult here in Iceland. It's a contest held once a year, where the European countries compete in (mostly) pop-music.
Most of the music is usually really crappy ... but yet one a year all Icelanders will sit down to watch it and hope we win. We never do!

Most people in Europe are unaware of this Contest, but here in Iceland, the streets are empty during the broadcast, and loud cheering can be heard from ever tenth house in every neighbourhood, where people have gathered together to watch it.

This year Iceland voted a joke to represent our country, and everyone is as excited as ever, to watch tonight. The joke is a youge actess, playing the role of a selfcentered spoilt brat, Sivia Night, who thinks she's a superstar and knows that she's better than everyone else and that she'll win. She plays the role perfectly and has received a lot of attention in Greece for her superstar-rude behavior to the press and the other contestants. The lyrics, of the song that represent Iceland this year, match the character and go something like this:

"Congradulation for I have arrived, I'm Sylvia Night and I'm shining so bright. Eurovision-nation, your dreams have come true, just vote for your hero, that's what you must do ... I love you."

Bellydancing
(I know it says anything BUT bellydancing, but ... )
... last week I started teaching beginners bellydancing again after a long break from that. It feels so good to dance again ... although I can feel that I'm straining my knees a little too much, I love to be back in the action.

ZeFrank
That's it for now ... well, I have to add one thing. I have recently become hooked on checking out this guy's site every day, I recomend checking out his daily videoblog!

Spring in Reykjavík

2006-05-08T13:55:00.000Z

Spring has finaly arrived in Reykjavík.

This past weekend was very warm (for icelandic standards), so we all spent most of it outdoors together. We've gone down town, to the grad.-exhibition for the Iceland Academy of Arts, to the park to play, up to Perlan and down to "The Beach" in Nauthólsvík ...

Two "firsts" in one day

2006-05-01T22:56:00.001Z

Yesteday was a big day for Úlfrún.

She had her first trip to the swimming pool, with the whole family. She loved it ... well besides the getting-dressed-again part. She was very calm and chatty in the water. Soon she'll start going to baby-swimming-classes and judging how yesterday's adventure went, she'll love them.

Úlfrún also went to her first real party! Bjarni had his 30-year-old birthdayparty and both Már and I wanted to go ... so we called the babysitter to take care of Garpur, and took Úlfrún with us. Amazingly, she just slept through the whole thing ... and we didn't come home until 3 o´clock in the morning!

Unfortunatly, on both occations we forgot to take a camera ... but I'm going to struggle to remember it the next time Úlfrún has a "first" anything!

The sling

2006-04-29T10:31:00.000Z

I've finally started using the sling I made for carrying Úlfrún around in.

Since she was born I have been kind of shy about trying it out, always waiting for a better time to do it. Then finally I had no choice but to just do it. I was cooking, Úlfrún was crying and my left arm was tired from carrying her around.

I put her in the sling and it was wonderful, she instantly fell a sleep and let me use both hands to cook!

The well brought up younge lad

2006-04-26T23:41:00.000Z

When I picked Garpur up from daycare today, he proudly showed me a small blue piece of paper with a smiley face scribbled on it, and told me that one of the teachers had given it to him. I thought nothing of it until another teacher told me the story behind that blue piece of paper.

Today three kids in Garpur's class had been playing in the "doll-corner" (dúkkuhorn), and made quite a mess of the place. The kids were asked to tidy up afterwards, but they refused. Then Garpur, who had not been playing in the doll-corner, decided on his own to tidy up their mess since they wouldn't do it. That's when the teacher scribbled a smiley face on a small piece of blue paper and rewarded him with it.

Garpur is very proud of his reward ... and Már and I are very proud of our incredibly well brought up son.

A little chat with Úlfrún

2006-04-26T12:26:00.000Z

Úlfrún has, in the last few weeks, become very fond of conversation, and is becoming quite the social creature. She'll make sounds and smile at us when we talk to her, stick out her toungue back at us when we stick ours out at her ... and she even has her own little clicking-sound that makes with her toungue which means "I'm hungry"!

Bubbles

2006-04-26T12:16:00.000Z

I just wanted to point out a great game for those who have too much time on their hands. Like Tetris, Bubbles is a complete waste of time, but a game which is easy to get hooked on.

This is by far my favorite waste-of-time-computor-game!

Zzzzzzzzzzzz

2006-04-19T09:54:00.000Z

This morning I woke up and panicked ... Úlfrún hadn't woken up yet and it was almost 8 o'clock and she'd gone to sleep at 11 last night. I started thinking that maybe there was something wrong with her, so I checked her bed, and there she was sleeping peacefully ... like a baby!

She doesn't always sleep straight through the night, but it is happening more and more often these days. It's the second time this week that she sleeps for nine hours straight, before waking up, having a drink and a change, and then going back to sleep for 3 hours. This baby is amazing. So thoughtful!

... and here I am wasting the time I get on my own writing about it, I'm off to do something fun, like laundry ...

Jeans

2006-04-12T10:43:00.000Z

I know this may not be of interest to anyone, but I can button up my tight jeans again!!! They're not comfortable (I'm wearing them now as I sit and type this, fighting the urge to unbutton the top button) ... but I'm wearing them!

Growing and growing

2006-04-11T14:41:00.001Z

Úlfrún is staying awake for longer periods of time now ... and holding her head up when she's held in a vertical position! Her biggest breakthroughs these days are smiling and trying to communicate with little "a" or "aa" sounds.

Garpur is still drawing a lot, these days he´s drawing family-pictures and letters. He's become very interested in letters and numbers, and they tend to end up in some of the artwork along with the subjects of the pictures.

Gluggapóstur

2006-04-05T13:27:00.000Z

This is Úlfrún's first letter from the bank, my heart leapt when I read her name in the window of the envolope (in icelandic, mail like this is called window-mail, or gluggapóstur).

I feel like I've won the mommy-lottey today

2006-04-03T16:20:00.000Z

During the first week of our new routined family life, I've come to realize that the most difficult time of day for me as a mom is the afternoon. Especially if I take the kids home right after I've picked Garpur up from daycare. Then Úlfrún usually wakes up and needs attention, a new diapper and milk, and Garpur is used to this beeing our time together, where we play and read. To make things easier on myself, I've arranged things so that I can spend my afternoon with Garpur, by taking him to the library, to the park or on a walk, and meanwhile Úlfrún sleeps beautifuly in her kangaroo-bag on my stomache or in the pram.

Today I was lazy. It was snowing alot and when I came to the daycare to pick up Garpur, he was exausted after a hard day of playing. So I decided to take the chance and just take the kids home. Úlfrún was strapped onto me in her kangaroo-bag and I pushed Garpur home in his three-weeler-stroller. In the back of my head I thought "If things get to hard to handle, I'll just let Garpur watch a video" (bad mother, bad mother).

When I got home, much to my surprize, Garpur had fallen asleep ... this was not good, because usually Garpur will wake up and be grumpy if I try to take him upstairs and Úlfrún always needs my immediate attention when we get home. I decided to let Garpur sleep in his stroller while I'd take Úlfrún upstairs, give her all she needed and put her back to sleep (this can take an hour or two). I took Úlfrún upstairs took out of her bag and started undressing her ... once I was done, she was still sleeping. I couldn't beleive my luck! One kid down and one to go!

Then I went down to the basement to see how Garpur was doing. He was getting really hot and sweating in his wintercoat, so I decided to take him upstairs too. I carried him upstairs (he's 20 kilo's!), took of his shoes and coat, and carried him into the livingromm and lay him down in the sofa ... this is when he always wake up! But he didn't wake up.

So here I am, a mother of two sleeping children ... and I can't beleive my luck!!!

Ótrúlegt!!!

2006-04-01T15:14:00.000Z

Í fyrranótt var brotist inní Verksmiðjuna (galleríið á Skólavörðustíg sem ég er með textílverkin mín til sölu í). Innbrotsþjófurinn(/-arnir) tók(/-u) útvaldar vörur úr búðinni, þær í dýrari kantinum, þar á meðal næstum öll mín verk.

Það sem er ótrúlegast við þetta allt saman, er að það var einungis stolið verkum frá tveimur hönnuðum, okkur Sunnevu (en í Verksmiðjunni eru 8 hönnuðir með vörur/verk til sölu) ... go figure!

Lögreglan er náttúrulega komin þetta dularfulla mál ... en upphæðirnar sem við erum að tapa með þessu eru rosalegar, sérstaklega fyrir svona fátæka listamenn eins og okkur!!! Úff, ég vona að þýfið finnist sem allra fyrst, ég má alls ekki við því að tapa verkunum mínum.

Meðal þess sem var stolið úr búðinni voru flíkurnar hér fyrir neðan, jakkinn er "one of a kind" úr handþrykktu silki og pilsið úr handþrykktu hörefni, en það eru til þrjú svona pils ... að fólk skuli láta sér detta í hug að gera svona lagað, ég bara skil það ekki!

Úlfrún's wardrobe

2006-04-01T10:04:00.000Z

When I was going through my entries below, I realized that in the two last ones I've put pictures of Úlfrún wearing old clothes that Már and I wore when we were babies.

In the last entry she's wearing a pink dress which I used from age one until the age of five ... first as a dress, and then I apparently turned it into a cool skirt!

In the entry before that she's wearing a striped sweater, which Vala knitted for Már before he was born ... and it was worn by him some 30 years ago!

She's got quite the wardrobe, it consists of old clothes from me and Már, clothes that Garpur wore, lent clothes from friends and family, and lots of really cool (mainly pink) clothes she's received as gifts in the past few weeks!

Lucky girl!

Life goes on!

2006-03-31T09:56:00.000Z

Úlfrún turned five weeks old yesterday, and boy has she ever grown in the past weeks! I still don't understand the wonders of breastmilk ... how can a few hundred milliliters of liquid a day, make a baby grow so fast ... ???
We've had a nurse come and visit us once a week, to measure Úlfrún's growth and see how we're all doing.
The nurse hasn't been able to do much more for us, because everything is going so well. Már and I have joked about what lousy health-care system customers we are ...

Most things have gone back to an ordinary every-day routine here.
Már has gone back to work, taking Garpur to the daycare in the morning on his way to work.
Úlfrún tends sleep through most of the day, while I tidy up the house, do the laundry, read or just sit and watch her sleep.
Then Úlfrún and I pick Garpur up from daycare at three o'clock and take him to the library or the park on our way home.
When Már comes home, we play, cook and eat dinner together, before the bedtime stories...

Family life is wonderful!

Sleepy baby

2006-03-17T16:26:00.000Z

Úlfrún's favorite past-time is still sleeping ... she is staying awake for longer periods of time every day, but we're so buisy enjoying those precious moments, that we tend to forget to take pictures of her while her eyes are open!

Yesterday we went out for our first walk! It was fabulous, Már and I took the girl out in her pram, walked around town with her, and then picked Garpur up from daycare on our way home.
We'll be doing a lot more of this in the near future!

Tonight we're taking Úlfrún to her first dinner party!
The thing is that Vala and Steve arrived to the country last night and are staying with us, and Óli and Hildur (Vala's brother and spouse) have invited all of us over to their place for dinner tonight ... it'll be a lot of fun!

I want to thank everyone for everything they've given Úlfrún ... I'm always planning to sit down to write everyone who has sent her a gift or card, a thank-you-note, but I don't seem to have found the time to yet ... I hope I will, but in the mean time this will have to do:
THANK YOU EVERYONE!!!

Big brother and little sister!

2006-03-11T13:51:00.000Z

Awwwww ... they're such a lovely duo aren't they?

Family flu

2006-03-10T00:32:00.000Z

The last few days have been quite difficult for us, because the three of us, Garpur, Már and I, have been struck by a terrible flu.
Thankfully Úlfrún has just slept through the whole thing without getting infected. I'm so relieved that she doesn't have to go through this, but at the same time it is painful to see Garpur so sick.

My mum has been keeping us alive for the last few days with her visits, bringing us food, supplies, affection and tips on how to get better.

We should all be better by the weekend, then we'll be back on the internet posting more photos and updates on the kids!

1 week old

2006-03-03T12:48:00.000Z

There you have it ... Úlfrún is one week old already! Well, she was yesterday.

Things are going incredibly well with her. It sortof amazes me how easy this all actually is. My recovery was almost instant, and our adjustment to the new family pattern has been very smooth.
It's probably partially because we're doing this for the second time and somehow just "know" what to do and how to do it ... but I think we're also very lucky, because Úlfrún seems to be just a very calm, comfortable and easy-going baby!
She for instance, lets us sleep pretty much through the night (from midnight to 4-ish, and then from 5-ish to 10-ish ... all together 9 hours sleep!)

Garpur is also an absolute angel about the whole situation. It can't be easy to lose the grip you have on your parents into the hands of such a tiny creature, but he seems to manage just fine.
Of course we try to be as aware of his feelings as we can and react to them by listening to him and take turns spending a lot of quality-time with him.
He's really good with his little sister, kisses her good night and cuddles her when he gets the opportunity.

I feel so lucky with the two of them, I feel that I couldn't have had two more wonderful children!

The NAME

2006-02-24T10:44:00.000Z

We've decided upon a name for the little girl: "Úlfrún Kristínudóttir"

Úlf- meaning wolf, and -rún meaning a trustworthy friend (pernounced: oolv-roon)

With this name we hope to match a character of a strong, wild, but yet friendly nature, in this tiny little person.

The reason why we decided on naming her Kristínudóttir as opposed to Másdóttir, is basically just that it is allowed, and we like the idea of equality .. the son bearing his fathers name and the daughter bearing her mothers name.

So far everything has been by the book. Úlfrún takes turns drinking and sleeping. And Garpur is playing the part of the perfect big brother!

A girl is born

2006-02-23T12:40:00.000Z

Written by Már (translated by Kristína), on febuary the 23rd 2006, at 07:16 AM:

The first of the water came at 3:30 AM, the water broke and the first contraction came at 4:00 AM and the girl was born in a bath of water on our living room floor at 5:30 AM.

The birth was smooth and easy, the girl is beautiful and healthy: 10 fingers, 10 toes, 3720 g, 53 cm long, and the head measures 35 cm, she took the breast and drank on request.

Those present were, Inga "amma" the midwife, and Móa and Dóra, Stina's friends and birth assistants.

Garpur was woken up at around six and is quite happy with his new little sister.

Now we all sit together and drink tea and eat cookies, before the helpers are on their way, and Inga and I start, cleaning up washing towels and all of that.

Happy feet!

2006-02-22T09:39:00.000Z

Every other tuesday I go out and meet "the girls", well we take turns hosting the group. Here this kind of a gathering is called a "sewingclub" ... but although we do occationally knit and exchange handcraft-tips, we mainly just eat cakes and gossip for hours!!!

Last night I went out to one of these meetings of mine, our host this time surprized us by having a footbath-theme for us ... a friend of hers came over and introduced us to some footbathsalts and cremes and gels. We all had footbaths and tried out a selection of cremes on our feet and legs.
Being the pregnant one in the group, I got special treatment, a foot scrub, rub and massage and everything done for me ... it was wonderful, just what I needed!

And now when I wake up, my feet feel like royal feet ...

Captain hook

2006-02-19T15:18:00.000Z

We've been getting everything ready for the upcoming homebirth, the baby and everything. Beds have been made, laundry washed, a baby-sling sewn ... and yesterday Már drilled holes into our livingroom ceiling and put up two hooks to hang a rope in!

The initial reason for the rope was for me to use in the birth, for holding onto and so on ... but now we have all sorts of new ideas for the future use for the hooks: like putting up a swing, a rope ladder, a rope with knots to for climbing, or a wooden bar to do pull-up exercises on.

I remembered today that we had in the basement, a swing that was made for Már when he was a baby ... I went and got it, fastened it on the new hooks and let Garpur try it out.
Garpur is thrilled with it and has been swinging around in the living room today with great enthusiasm.

Oh my god ...

2006-02-13T11:37:00.000Z

... is this the same person?

I just found this picture, taken last July, the week we found out that I was pregnant.

Bambi 2

2006-02-12T16:14:00.000Z

We just came home from a family outing to the movies. We went to see "Bambi 2", and I have to say that we were all very impressed with it. It's beautifully done and works wonderfully with the first movie.

In the middle of the film there was a 15 minute break, as there always is in the movietheatres here in Iceland. This intermission is mainly ment for toilet-trips and trips to shop more candies and popcorn, the theatres here make a lot of money on these breaks because Icelanders have become so used to them.

Garpur, who's not used to this custom of breaking a movie in half, didn't quite understand why the movie was stopped all of a sudden, the lights were turned on and every one stood up from there seets, but yet the movie was NOT over!
And since Már and I had brought a packet of fresh string-peas for a family snack, we didn't desire anything from the shop and remained seated with Garpur.

Garpur turned to me and asked "Mom, why is everybody leaving, is the movie over, where is everyone going?" ... Not wanting to cast too much attention to the fact that most people were standing up to buy themselves candies other goodies, my answear was: "Now they have a break for those who want to stand up and stretch their legs or have to use the toilet".
Garpur stared at me with amazement for a while and then said: "Wow, they must have many toilets?"

Maybe only 3 weeks left!

2006-02-05T21:34:00.000Z

I just realized that there are only 3 weeks until this pregnancy has reached the same length as Garpur's did!!!!
Oh my god, this is coming to an end soon ... : )

No hands!

2006-02-05T12:54:00.000Z

This morning Garpur asked us: "why do we have hands?" ... after trying to answear the question, Már decided to just show him why!

Garpur's hands were tied back, with his permission ofcourse, and he realized that there were a lot of reasons for why we have hands.
His discoveries were, amongst others: that he needs them to scratch his nose with, to play with his blocks with, to color with ... and to stand up from the floor with, when he falls!

Sometimes it's easier to understand things by just trying them for yourself!

Getting pretty tired!

2006-02-02T22:35:00.000Z

I'm already getting pretty tired of this state I'm in ... I just feel so huge, slow, old, tired and weak.
Well actually, when I'm sitting still, I feel great ... but as soon as I have to move (scratch my toes for example), everything just feels impossible!

One day I'll look back at this pregnancy and tell everyone who'll listen, how wonderful it all was and how I hope to get the oppertunity to do it again one day ... but right now, I just want it to be over soon!!!

Questionere

2006-02-01T09:45:00.000Z

A bellydance-friend of mine has picked me on her website to partisipate in a game, which basically means that I have to answear a few questions on my site and name 4 people to do so on theirs when I'm done. Here we go:

Name four jobs you've worked at:

Garbageman for the city og Reykjavík
Costumedesigner for various plays
Bellydanceteacher for Josy Zareen
Independant fashion-and textiledesigner

Name four movies you could watch over and over again:

Amelié
Delicatessen
A Nightmare before Christmas
Lord of the Rings

Name four places you've lived in:

105 Reykjavík
Lancaster, England
Toronto, Canada
101 Reykjavík

Name four tv-programs you like watching:

Spooks
LOST
Scrubs
Desperate Housewifes

Name four places you've travelled to on vacation:

Prague, with Már and Ása
Héðinsfjörður, on my honeymoon
The Berman cottage, in Ontario
Ely, on several occations

Name four websites you check out dayly:

mbl.is
barnaland.is
mar.anomy.net
and various friends' sites

Name four cd's you couldn't be without:

Antony and the Johnsons "I am a bird now"
Cranberries "Everybody else is doing it so why can't we"
Portishead "Dummy"
Pearl Jam "Ten"+"Vs."

Name four people to answear these questions on their site:

(I'm still thinking about this one)

Baby-sling

2006-01-30T10:54:00.000Z

Wow, I've been looking at baby-slings on the internet ... craving for one and wondering whether to order one or not.
Apparently this sling is the hottest baby-accessory at the moment, I'm just facinated with the possibility of breastfeeding the baby without having to sit down and actually hold it in my arms every time ... I could sometimes be doing laundry at the same time!!!

Then I found this website on how to make one yourself ... it's so easy that I'm almost embarrassed that I even thought of ordering it in the first place.

Now I'm planning on making one myself, I can't wait to try it out on the baby when it's born!

Ice ice baby

2006-01-28T23:55:00.001Z

For at least the last month or so, I've had this strange urge to eat ice ... like actually crushing icecubes with my teeth and swallowing them!

We've actually had to buy icecube-trays for our freezer to fulfill my icecube-urge because I eat at least 3-4 trays a day.
At first I thought I might just be thirsty and that I needed to drink more water ... but that just doesn't do it for me, I have to have my x trays of ice a day or I can't think about anything else, where and when I'll get my next ice-fix ... like a drug addict!

Mind you, I do get a fair share of kicks in the stomache every time I knock back a full glass of icecubes ... I bet the poor thing can feel them melt right beside her!

Doing the "happydance"

2006-01-26T11:30:00.000Z

The 2D ultrasound check-up was this morning, and we got a bunch of great news:
_
First of all, the placenta isn't in the way of anything ... so the homebirth is "ON"!
_
This baby still seems to show all the signs of being a girl.
_
Her birthsize looks like it's going to be about the same as Garpur's was (3,5kg).
_
The head is facing down and has already burrowed itself deep into the pelvis and is basically "ready" ... a little unusual this early in pregnancy for a second child, but that might be my fault, all this bellydancing I've been doing lately might have forced the poor thing to find a quiet spot to lie in ... hehehe ...

Anyways, we're all thrilled to hear the good news, it looks like things are going to go as smoothly as the last time ... lovely!

3D-ultrasound

2006-01-19T18:27:00.000Z

Last tuesday we all (Már, Garpur, Inga ... and I ofcourse) went to see the little baby in a 3D-ultrasound.
We were a little unlucky because the little girl tried as hard as she could to hide her face in the placenta ... but we were fortunate enough to see half her face, burrowed in the placenta, a foot in front of her face and a little arm and hand beside it!
We got a few pictures of hands and face, along with short video-clips of the little girl moving.

Next week we'll be going to the normal 2D-ultrasound for a medical check-up to make sure that everything is ok. This is because in the early stages of the pregnancy there was a question of whether the placenta would place itself in the opening of the uterus ... but according to what we saw on tuesday, I don't think that that is the case, which means I'll probably be lucky enough, not to have to have a cesarean section.

The expecting family

2006-01-16T08:59:00.000Z

We took some pregnancy-photos yesterday. Here's one of the whole expecting family, taken especially for friends and relatives abroad!

Rising star

2006-01-14T12:27:00.000Z

We took Garpur to his second gymnastics class today ... this time we remembered to bring our camera AND the memory-card for it!!!

Garpur's art-exhibition

2006-01-11T16:36:00.002Z

In our hallway in "Stangarholt 6", Garpur has an ongoing art-exhibition on one wall all year around. This is something he is quite proud of. Every time he finishes an artproject at home, or in daycare, it is very important to make a little ceremony of hanging up the artwork.
Soon there will be no more space to add the pictures, so we'll have to start taking some down in order to make space for the new ones ...so I decided to document the little artists exhibition as it is now.

Bellydancing for pregnant women

2006-01-08T23:33:00.000Z

I can't wait until tomorrow night, then I start teaching a new course of bellydancing for pregnant women.
This is something I started teaching last fall, but recently the participation hasn't been enough, so the courses have had to be cancelled.

I'm so pleased that the one that starts tomorrow has been confirmed, I love teaching this course!

Gymnastics star

2006-01-07T11:03:00.000Z

We've decided to make a gymnastics star of Garpur and took him to his first gymnastics lesson today at a club here in Reykjavik called "Ármann".
Well, that's not really true, we took him because of his physical energy level and the intense interest he has shown sports activities lately.

The first class was very successful, especially due to the fact that we slept a little too long this morning and just made it to class before 9:25 (all dressed and Garpur partially fed a banana and some milk (sportsfood))!

The children in his class all turn 3 or 4 years old this year, and the teaches/coaches started by dividing them into groups of 2, 3 and 4 year olds, 4-5 kids in each group. Then the teachers led each group to a base where they practised various exercises. They did summersaults, hanging from bars, jumping between pillows, swinging in rope, klimbing in bars, running really fast, sliding into a pile of cushions ... and lots more!

Garpur had a great time, allthough he didn't really get the part where when the leading teacher blew her whistle, he had to line up with his group ... but we'll just have to practise that at home before our next class, next Saturdaymorning!

Anyways, we're so proud of our little gymnastics star ... I think we're actually as excited about these classes as Garpur!

Strange porridge!

2006-01-04T22:10:00.000Z

This morning the whole family slept in ... we didn't wake up until 9:30, and since Garpurs' playschool only serves breakfast
before 9:15, we had basically missed it.

There was a panic, Már had to rush to work, Garpur claimed that he was STARVING and that he didn't want to be dressed in
pajamas ALL DAY, and I had to rush down to the bathroom because I felt that otherwise my bladder could explode.

When things had calmed down (Már had gone to work and Garpur and I were dressed properly), we faced another crisis. We had
no milk!
I tried not to panic. I explained calmly to Garpur that this morning we were going to experiment by making oatmealporrige
with cream, and then eat it with cranberry-juice poured over it. I was so releaved when he accepted this and decided not
to make a big fuss about our little experimental breakfast.

The experiment went quite well I thought, we could only make a little bit of porrige, just enough for Garpur.
But when he was halfdone eating it, he stopped eating and looked kind of sheepish, like he wanted to say something but didn't
have the nerve to.
Finally he said "Mamma, I think I'd rather have this porrige when I'm grown up ... I feel so full right now".

I can't help laughing at the clever way he managed to get out of finishing his breakfast. He knows that it's best not to
insult mamma's cooking, but he really didn't like that this breakfast. Who can blame him?

I just hope that he gets a decent lunch at playschool today!

Changing to english!!!

2006-01-03T15:38:00.000Z

In a Christmascard I got from my grandparents in Canada, I got news that they are now taking computor-lessons, and hope to be on the internet one day.

This got me to thinking that it's probably about time for me to swich my writing here, over to english. There are more people who might actually benefit from this than my grandparents, all my other relatives in Toronto, my brothers' wife in Edmonton, my husbands' stepfather in England and my english speaking friends all over the place, here in Iceland and abroad.

So, I'm hereby swiching all my writing here to english, I start by translating the last entry I wrote (last sunday) in icelandic, loosely into english.

Sunday, January 1st, 2006:

I've been a little buisy lately, so I haven't written anything for a long time.

The state of me is coming to a scary point, a new year has come and there are only 10 weeks left of this pregnancy, and only 8 if this one will be anything like when I had Garpur ... can't anything be done to stop time, or at least slow it down a little bit?

Anyways, I'm feeling well. I've just become so big in such a short time ... it was only a few weeks ago that I was complaining about not being big enough, and now I think I'm the same size I was around the time I had Garpur!
It also takes time to get used to things, like not being able to stand up from the couch or car without an effort, not being able to pick up the pace when walking, not being able to run up the stairs, or carry more than two grocery bags, or sit up in bed without rolling on to one side first ... it can be quite comical sometimes when I'm trying though.

Soon this will all be over ... so I guess I should just sit back and enjoy this strange state my body is in, for a few more weeks, in peace and quiet, because soon there will be so much going on around me that I probably won't be able to hear myself think.
OH, I CAN STILL HARDLY WAIT!

I'm so excited!
Maybe it's partly because I don't want Christmas to be over just yet, and I want just one more package to open ... and I also can't wait to see who the little individual inside of me is!!!

Meðganga og nýtt ár!

2006-01-01T23:04:00.000Z

Er búin að vera svolítið upptekin undanfarið og því ekkert skrifað lengi ... en annars er ástandið núna bara orðið "scary", nýtt ár komið og bara 10 vikur eftir af meðgöngunni, og bara 8 ef þetta verður eins og með Garp ... er ekki hægt að stoppa tímann eitthvað núna?

Allavegana, þá líður mér vel. Bara orðin svolítið stór á methraða ... man ekki betur en að ég hafi verið að kvarta yfir því að vera með enga kúlu fyrir nokkrum vikum og núna er ég orðin jafnstór og ég var undir það síðasta með Garp!
Það tekur smá tíma að venjast því að geta ekki staðið uppúr sófanum eða bílnum átakalaust, geta ekki aukið hraðann þegar maður er á göngu, geta ekki skokkað upp stiga, geta ekki haldið á nema tveimur innkaupapokum í einu eða sest upp í rúminu án þess að velta sér á hlið fyrst ... þetta er stundum bara kómískt þegar maður er eitthvað að reyna.
Svo verður þetta ástand bráðum búið ... þannig að það er um að gera að njóta þess bara að vera í annarlegu ástandi í nokkrar vikur í viðbót í friði, því bráðum verður svo mikið að gera að maður á ekki eftir að geta hugsað skýrt.
Ó, ÉG HLAKKA SAMT SVO TIL!

Ég er að deyja úr spennu!
Kannski líður mér að einhverjum hluta svona vegna þess að mér finnst leiðinlegt að jólin séu að verða búin og mig langar í einn pakka í viðbót ... og ég get ekki beðið eftir því að sjá hver þessi litli einstaklingur inní mér er!!!

Endalaus hamingja

2005-12-01T10:37:00.000Z

Úff, ég er að vinna núna við að leggja lokahönd á búningana fyrir "3 systur" í Nemendaleikhúsinu, en frumsýningin verður núna á sunnudaginn.

Þetta er verkefni hjá mér sem óx töluvert núna undir lokin á því, en upprunalega var ég ráðin til að aðstoða Móu með búningana, þar sem að hún var ráðin inn í verkefnið sem leikmynda-og búningahönnuður ... svo einhvernvegin þróaðist það þannig að ég er orðinn búningahönnuður verksins og Móa leikmyndahönnuður þess.
Ábyrgðin og álagið, sem átti bara að vera í lágmarki hjá mér, er að enda bara í hámarki og verkið er gjörsamlega að éta upp allan þann tíma sem ég á að vera að eyða í Verksmiðju-fatalínuna mína ...

En þrátt fyrir þetta þá er ég mjög ánægð, það var rennsli hjá okkur í gærkvöldi og ég er hreinlega í skýjunum eftir það.
Rennslið gekk vel, leikmynd, ljós og búningar eru alveg að smella saman í fallega heild ... og vinnan sem ég á eftir í að fínisera búningana, er merkilega lítil miðað við það að það eru enn þrír dagar í frumsýninguna!!!

Ég hlakka samt svo til að vera búin í þessu verkefni.
Á mánudaginn hefst vinnan mín á fullu aftur á vinnustofunni, jólaundirbúningurinn fær aðeins að slæðast inn aftur á heimilið ... gestir koma að utan ... Már á 30'ugs afmæli ... þetta er og verður allt svo yndislegt!

Nálastungumeðferð

2005-11-17T01:58:00.000Z

Í dag var hringt í mig frá Miðstöð Mæðraverndar, og mér tilkynnt að ég fengi að vera með í rannsóknarverkefni hjá nokkrum ljósmæðrum þar.
Verið er að fara að rannsaka nálastungumeðferð gegn grindarlosi. Ég hlakka svo til að byrja í þessu, ég á að mæta til þeirra tvisvar í viku, klukkutíma í senn, í fjórar vikur!

Sem sagt, ég mun liggja í heilar 8 klukkustundir í nálastungumeðferð fram að jólum!!!

_____
Viðbót, pikkuð inn þann 3.jan.2006:

Rannsóknarverkefnið gekk rosavel, frá mínum bæjardyrum séð allavegana.
Ég fór sumsé í nálastungumeðferð, tvisvar í viku, við grindarverkjum sem ég var byrjuð að fá, og það slokknaði barasta á verkjunum hjá mér eftir þrjár heimsóknir!!!

Ég hef ekki hugmynd um það hvernig rannsóknarverkefnið gekk þegar á heildina er litið hjá öllum sem þátt tóku, en sennilega er enn verið að vinna úr niðurstöðunum. En þetta var æði fyrir mig.
Ég hef enga reynslu af nálastungum og skil ekki hvernig þær vinna á verkjunum, eða hvort þær geri það yfir höfuð ... en verkirnir mínir hurfu alveg, og það í miðri vinnutörn þegar álagið á mér var hvað mest!!! Og ég hef ekki fundið fyrir verkjunum aftur síðan.

Mér finnst þetta náttúrulega bara vera lyginni líkast, en er voðalega sátt við að hafa fengið að taka þátt og njóta ávinnings nálastungnanna.

Jólagjafalistinn minn

2005-11-15T02:13:00.000Z

Ég bið ekki um mikið, mig langar bara í:

Beinskiptan Yaris
Svalir úr stofunni
Góðar stundir

Aumingja ég!

2005-11-15T01:49:00.000Z

Æ, ég hef eiginlega ekki yfir neinu að kvarta, mig langar bara til að láta vorkenna mér:

Ég er að drukkna í verkefnum, vegna þess að allt sem mér býðst er svo spennandi, og ég kann ekki að segja NEI ... ok, þetta verður í síðasta skiptið sem ég geri sjálfri mér þetta!

Mér er illt í mjöðmunum, mig grunar að ég sé að byrja að fá grindarlos ... kannski eru þetta bara álagsverkir af völdum ofkeyrslu undanfarinna daga og lagast eftir vinnutörnina mína að tveimur vikum loknum, það kemur í ljós.

Ég vil ekki fara að sofa á kvöldin, né heldur að vakna á morgnana ... er svoooo þreytt!

Mamma kom heim í gær (sem er æði), en ég hef ekki takmarkalausan aðgang að bílnum lengur.

Már er ALLTAF í vinnunni, þetta er reyndar ekki sanngjarnt hjá mér því vinnutörninni hans lýkur reyndar annað kvöld ...

Mig langar svo að vera alltaf með Garpi, hann er svo yndislegur, en ég þarf víst að eiga mér líf líka.

Fatatiltekt

2005-11-05T12:58:00.000Z

Ég er að taka til í fötunum mínum í dag. Ég hef nefnilega ákveðið að taka öll fötin sem ég passa ekki í, og mun ekki passa í næstu mánuðina, setja þau í svarta ruslapoka og geyma þau í geymslunni kjallaranum.
Svo, þegar mér finnst öll fötin sem ég er með uppivið vera orðin alltof stór og púkó, þá fer ég oní geymslu og dreg hvern dýrgripinn uppúr pokunum á fætur öðrum, og segi (upphátt) við sjálfa mig "Nú dámar mér, ég var einusinni svona mikil smekkmanneska í klæðaburði ... en hvað ég er heppin, nú þarf ég EKKI að fara út og kaupa mér fullt af nýjum fötum!". Góð hugmynd? Svona næ ég svo að blekkja sjálfa mig til að eyða minni pening í föt eftir að maginn er farin.

Aðalástæðan fyrir því að ég er að gera þetta er samt aðallega sú, að ég finn ekki fötin sem ég passa þó í, fyrir öllum hinum sem eru eins og sniðin á einhverja písl (hahaha, stóra písl!) ... ég er núþegar búin að fylla tvo svarta ruslapoka!

Keyri keyri keyri ...

2005-11-04T20:32:00.000Z

Ég er búin að keyra nonstop síðan ég náði prófinu í gær ... það er svo gaman að villast í umferðinni í Reykjavík, I LOVE IT!

Ég fór með Garp í Náttúrugripasafnið í Kópavogi, eftir að ég sótti hann í leikskólann í gær, og skoðuðum uppstoppuð dýr, steina og beinagrindur. Þaðan ákáðum við svo að fara í gæludýrabúð, til að skoða lifandi dýr (ókeypis) ... en á leiðinni úr Kópavogi og niðrá Grensásveg, tókst mér að villast útí Smiðjuhverfi Kópavogs, uppí Breiðholt og Ártúnsbrekkuna.
Þetta var svaka ævintýri, en vegna þess að við vorum nú ekkert að flýta okkur, þá var þetta æðislega gaman!

Í morgun ók ég svo um Þingholtin í dágóðan tíma áður en ég fór að vinna í Verksmiðjunni, og komst meðal annars að því að gjaldmælarnir í bílastæðahúsunum taka ekki debetkort!!! Mjög asnalegt!!! Ég skil ekki hvernig maður á að geta farið niður í bæ á bíl á virkum degi, án þess að vera með hanskahólfið fullt að klinki???

En, það er ýmislegt sem maður þarf að læra sjálfur, sem maður lærir ekki í ökunáminu ss. að rata um borgina og að borga í bílastæðahúsum ... ég á eflaust eftir að reka mig á fleiri hluti bráðum, en þetta er samt rooooosalega GAMAN ... mér finnst ég vera orðin svo stór.

Hiksti

2005-11-04T07:18:00.000Z

Krílið er byrjað að hiksta. Þetta er svo sætt, ég var búin að gleyma þessarri tilfinningu, að finna lítinn kropp kippast reglulega til inní mér, ég fer alltaf að hlæja þegar þetta gerist.
Ég heyrði einhvers staðar að þetta ætti ekki að gerast svona snemma í meðgöngu, en það er greinilega tóm þvæla, nema að mín sé bara svona bráðþroska?

Ökuníðingur aldarinnar

2005-11-03T14:01:00.000Z

Nei, djók ... en helst er frá því að segja, að ég náði prófinu í dag og það með glæsibrag!!!

Ég er alveg rosalega stolt.
Ég er líka bara búin að vera að keyra síðan, er svo heppin að mamma skildi bílinn sinn eftir í minni umsjón á meðan að hún fór til Kanada, hún kemur ekki heim fyrr en 13.nóv.

Nú verð ég úti í umferðinni þangað til .. so be afraid, be very afraid, úahahahahaha ....

Skammtímaminnisleysi dauðans

2005-11-02T00:26:00.000Z

Skammtímaminnið mitt er officially dáið ... ég man ekkert stundinni lengur, er alltaf að taka að mér að gera eitthvað, og er einmitt í 1000 mismunandi verkefnum þessa dagana og man hreinlega ekki neitt og er alltaf að klúðra einhverju!

Ég er meira að segja svo slæm að ef ég hef skrifað hluti niður til að muna þá, þá ég man ekki hvort ég skrifaði þá niður og þá hvar ... veit ekki hvar ég á að leita til að finna allt sem ég þarf að muna!
Var til dæmis að finna litla bók, með fullt af gagnlegum upplýsingum sem ég hafði skrifað til sjálfrar mín, í veskinu sem ég notaði í síðustu viku. Ég var alveg búin að gleyma að ég ætti þessa bók yfir höfuð.

Nú ætlar Már að hjálpa mér að skipuleggja mig, með því að nýta tæknina á einhvern hátt ... vona að það virki eitthvað!

kennsla, nám og jólaundirbúningurinn hafinn

2005-10-31T11:39:00.000Z

Um þessar mundir er ég að fást við, meðal ótal margs annars, kennslu og nám.

Annars vegar var ég með námskeið þar sem ég var að kenna menntskælingum leikmynda-og búningahönnun núna um helgina. Það var æðislegt, mig langaði nánast að verða menntskælingur aftur ... það var svo gaman í MH á sínum tíma, og í leikfélaginu, það fer alveg um mig við tilhugsunina!

Hins vegar er ég alveg að fara að klára ökunámið mitt!!! Ég fer í verklega ökuprófið núna á fimmtudaginn kl.11, og ég hlakka svo til að ég er að fríka út ... ég er líka pínu stressuð, ég gæti alveg klúðrað þessu ef ég læt stressið ná til mín, en mér þykir það samt ólíklegt!

Annars vorum við Garpur að föndra jólakortin í gær. Ég ákvað að taka þetta bara snemma í ár, þar sem að ég er venjulega alltaf of sein með svona lagað ...nú eigum við ótrúlega mikið af flottum jólakortum sem bíða þess að vera send í desember!
Kannski að við Garpur tökum bara jólabaksturinn næstu helgi, eða föndrum aðventukrans, svo langar mig að gera handa honum jóladagatal eins og ég átti þegar ég var lítil!