Long break

For those that still look at the blog from time to time..... we apologise for the long silence. There's been a lot going on, and it's not always been easy to make time for things like this. Before christmas we will provide an update on the house improvements with pictures and of course, give a full run down on the exploits of "Little Miss Militant Millyfant"..... until then.....

Barnehage

On the 16th August we all took our first tentative steps down to life in the barnehage. Fortunately everything has gone like clockwork. Milly took no time at all to settle in, even sleeping without be pushed around in the barnevogn. By Wednesday we were advised that settling in period was over. I´m sure we´ll have periods where it isn´t so simple but at the moment we´re enjoying the fact that Milly seems to think it´s great.

Garden progress

After what seems like, and let´s be honest, is, years nearly getting somewhere in the garden we have finally started work on the terrace. My DIY specialist subject is really a combination of destruction expert and general labourer.... but fortunately we have skilled craftsmen in the family. Bestemor and bestefar came last weekend and then then again on Friday and suddenly we have a terrace. It´s not quite finished...... but it´s definitely big progress.

We have had requests for pictures of the outside of the house after completion of the building work.... the new front door goes on this week..... so after that we´ll reveal the finished article.

Guest babysitters

We´ve been extremely lucky this summer that so many people have volenteered to look after Milly in the period up to Barnehage starting. She is apparently really easy to look after..... something I´ve never found personally, but surely all these babysitters can´t be lying!! First in August we had Helen and Tilly over from England..... everything was great, although they did steal my "fish kissing" idea, but I let it go with good grace. Then the Ødegaard-Olsen´s took over for a couple of days..... followed by Bestemor and Bestefar, who came in for the final week before Barnehage. When they left, Kim and Kristin sat in on Saturday so that we could go to Øya festival. They got the worst day really.... Milly was a bit under the weather and threw up in the evening. (Forunately it was a short term problem and she was beginning to perk up again on Sunday). Milly did came down to the festival for a couple of hours..... her first live music experience outside mummy´s tummy..... but not the last!!

Thanks to all the helpers this summer.....

July..... Holidays

The plan for the holidays was a few days in England and hopefully working on the garden. The weather was a bit up and down but we managed to progress on the garden front...... nothing was actually finished or constructed of course!! We had a hectic few days in England..... 2 nights in Haynes...... 2 nights in Bedford and the last night in Kew. Grampy was still confined to bed / wheelchair..... but his recovery was going well. We had a visit from Belinda and Lewis. Milly got to play in the garden..... a luxury she doesn´t yet have at home..... which is something she absolutely loves. Helen and Tilly were kind enough to drive us down to London, for a night at the Huby´s. Charlotte was in top form..... she was nearly crawling, and was obviously very keen to make friends with Milly. Unfortunately Milly was a bit over emotional..... and burst into tears every time Charlotte attempted a cuddle.

July..... part 2

Marit took the 2nd week of July off so Milly was back to being at home with "Old faithful"..... which I have to admit, she likes the best. I don´t feel bitter..... well, not very..... but for Milly, there is only one mummy!! She actually does show her affection a little too literally sometimes.... leaving several bit marks up and down Marit´s arm. I went off to Scotland for the Barclays Scottish Open..... and had a fantastic weekend even though the weather was up and down to say the least. Marit and Milly went to Hamar while I was away. They had a trip down Mjøsa and a bit of a paddle...... and went out on a trip and visted a cafe out in the countryside.

July...... part 1

The beginning of July saw us both back at work for first time since May 2009. I can´t say it was a joy to be back! Bestemor and Bestefar were in for the week to look after Milly. We had dinner at Uncle Kristoffer´s, which was as ever, a joy. He is actually a really good cook and the blog thoroughly recommends a visit if you get the chance. During that week we were finally rid of the scaffolding around the house. There are still things to finish. The window in Milly´s room and the front door are still to be changed..... but we´re getting closer. The windows and the outside of the house look really good..... we´re not quite cleared up even now...... the roses are still to be hooked back up for example..... but it´s good to have finally got the outside of the house sorted..... we knew it would have to be done sooner or later, but it feels a bit more urgent when, during the winter, the snow starts coming through the front door!!

Happy 70th

..... and it is the grand fathers who are in focus just now. Bestefar turned 70 on Monday...... his reward.... a week of quality Milly time starting next Monday. If that doesn´t keep him on his toes I don´t know what will!!

Grampy

Friday last week Grampy underwent surgery on his knee. Everything went well and he is now starting the agonising wait for the infection in his knee to clear up so that the surgeon can bang in a new one. Everyone has their fingers crossed that it goes quickly and he´ll soon be back up on both feet. He hasn´t lost his touch as a golf coach..... he pointed out a problem to me at the driving range when they were over to visit and it looks like it´s done the trick!!

Aunty Katie

Last Thursday we had another visit from England. Aunty Katie flew in during the morning to be met by grey clouds and slightly chilly temperatures. Fortunately it didn´t last long and we were soon back to summer. Kate, Milly and I went for lunch and then a bit of a wander round the park at St Hanshaugen. Friday, Marit came home a bit early and we went to lunch up at Ekeberg restaurant, Kate and I then took Milly on a walk down to Aker Brygge and enjoyed a nice glass of wine in the sun. On Saturday we took our normal breakfast at Åpent Bakeri..... and then sadly Aunty Katie had to go.... hopefully she´ll be back again with Del boy in tow later in the year :)

It appears that the post link between England and Norway has developed something of a problem as birthday presents dribbled in extremely late, even though they were posted in plenty of time.... thanks to the Mansers, McVickers and Hubys.

Best friends.... no, really!!

Pictures can sometimes be deceiving. Milly´s best friend during the first year of her life has been Sara. They were born within one day of each other and have been meeting from time to time ever since (accompanied by their mummies of course). To celebrate their birthday´s, Mats and Rita (Sara´s parents) came to visit last Wednesday evening. Usually Sara is the cuddly one of the two.... often trying to embrace Milly.... but on this particular occasion the roles were reversed. We realise that pictorial evidence indicates that Milly should be up on a charge of actual bodily harm..... but we can assure everyone that it was an attempted cuddle.

Birthday girl

As requested.... a picture of Crown princess Milly opening one of her presents.

Yes..... 1 year old already. We don´t yet know how Milly feels that it has gone but Mummy and me think time has disappeared extremely quickly. We had lots of messages of best wishes by post and text, plus a small party attended by Kim and Kristin, Turid, Børge, Tias, Lars and Olive (the daughter of Børge´s brother), and Uncle Kristoffer who took time out of his busy schedule to drop by. Lots of lovely presents...... lovely cake.... and a jolly good time for everyone. Pooh bear / Ole Brumm was particularly popular.... although he did nearly get his nose bitten off (but that´s a sign of affection for Milly!!)

Hamar and the party

Milly is, as many will know already, something of a party animal. She was a little bit under the weather at the weekend though. Not exactly sure what was wrong. We keep suspecting another tooth, but she still only has 2, and we haven´t seen evidence of another yet. Whatever the reason she was a little more quiet than usual. Hege had kindly volenteered to come along and keep Milly occupied as the party went on...... which she did with the help of the Apple Corporation. I suspect that Milly´s first word may well be i-phone. In spite of some not so friendly weather Hege walked Milly around outside until she was sleeping like a stone. She woke up with a bit of a temperature so I took her home at around midnight. By Sunday morning the form was improving...... and she was able to take her place between Grampy and Bestefar on the sofa....

Grand parent visit

A week ago Grampy and Grannie Annie arrived from England. It´s been quite a while since we saw them last. We were grounded by the "ash cloud" and couldn´t travel to England in April, so it was Christmas when we last saw them in the flesh. We had a day at home so Milly could get reacquainted..... although of course she has seen them quite often on the webcam. On Saturday we travelled up to Hamar for Bestefar´s 70th birthday party.......

The weekend

Busy weekend..... Hege and Andrea visited on Saturday. The girls went out for lunch whilst I reacquainted myself with my golf clubs. In the evening we popped down to Ladergården for a pizza. Milly has reached the stage where she wants to taste grown up food.... so she had her first nibble of pizza. We haven´t come across anything thus far which she won´t eat.

On Sunday we went to lunch at Kim and Kristin´s. The great weather continued and so Milly got her first real crawl around alfresco. She also got her first taste of strawberries..... which she couldn´t get enough of. Really nice lunch...... after which I went and played 18 holes for the first time since Milly was born..... probably.... can´t remember exactly. Was very up and down..... only to be expected I guess.

The house

Work has been progressing on the outside of the house. We´re at the stage now where all the repair work is more or less done and they will start to put the finishing layer of plaster on top..... oh how I will miss the scaffolding and all the buckets, plaster bags and general rubbish surrounding the house! All we have to do then is order and get fitted a new front door, have the windows changed and start work again on the garden..... so nearly finished then!!

Memory aid

I´m using the blog as a method of trying to recall what exactly I´ve been doing for the last few weeks. It´s very difficult when you´re home every day.... things do just seem to blend into one another and it´s often difficult to remember one day from the next. Here goes....

I think we were up to last weekend. I have a feeling that Sunday was a bit of a write off..... we slobbed about for too long. Monday we had a visit from a colleague of Marit´s who was over from Sweden.... he bought Milly a Dachshund.... not a real one obviously.... a wooden one which you call pull around. Tuesday and Wednesday were not very exciting. Thursday we visited Milly´s kindergarden for the first time. Got to meet some of the other parents and kids. Milly seemed happy enough.... hurtling around on the floor, playing with other like minded hooligans. It is an impressive facility and I fear that coming home after a day there will be something of a disappointment.... as they have better toys, and all manner of different activities. On Friday we went into town to meet the guy I share an office with. He is on paternity leave too. There was a lot of walking that day.... as Milly only seems want to sleep whilst on the move in the mornings too now. We used to get a morning nap indoors but it appears that those days are gone. Fortunately the weather was brilliant all last week so I walked and worked on a sun tan at the same time. When Marit got home we went for a swim.... the first time I´ve been with Milly. She really enjoys it.... but is a little bit more sceptical than her friend Sara who throws herself into the water with gay abandon.

Mummy´s birthday

We got a couple of new books this week which Milly seems to like......

Another eventful week. It was a national holiday in Norway on Monday so we were all at home. The outside of the house has taken a fearful battering this week. It´s been stripped of paint, well some paint.... bad plaster has been hacked off..... so the whole place looks a bit of a mess. Milly and I tried to have a bit more of a stable week..... concentrated on getting enough sleep (obviously that applied to Milly only..... we feel like we haven´t had enough sleep for about a year!!).

On Friday we celebrated Mummy´s birthday. Uncle Kristoffer and Navdeep came for dinner.... Turid, Tias and Lars arrived for a bit of cake. Turid very bravely volenteered to change Milly for bed...... we´re not entirely sure what she did or said but Milly just laid there on the changing mat like a little angel. The strange thing is that she did it tonight too..... so whatever Turid did seems to have a profound effect..... how long will it last I wonder!!

Milly has started to walk with the aid of props. First she pushed around a little chair but now she has a trolley for support. She seems quite well balanced. She´s still struggling to understand the concept of sleeping through the night.... perhaps we need tante Turid to work her magic at bed time!!

Sunny Oslo

After Daddy´s rather testing day on Friday, the weekend has been fairly quiet and calm. Well apart from the fact that Milly was a bit grumpy yesterday afternoon... But she actually slept through the night last night, and seemed to wake up as a new baby. And today we´ve had a really nice day, we went for a stroll downtown in the sun. Milly loves sitting in the buggy looking around, but she´s not very keen on keeping her sunglasses on. So quite a miracle that Daddy managed to take a picture with her wearing them!

What a day!!

Friday.... Milly slept until 7am.... good start. After that it was harsh lesson in what it´s like to be at home with a baby. We had a surprise visit just after 7am.... some guys arrived to start stripping the paint from the outside of our house, we thought they were coming next week. They added to the days excitement by first of all complaining that the water pressure wasn´t good enough. It´s handy that I always have some extra water pressure up my sleeve!! Eventually we `stole´some from the neighbours by connecting up to their outside tap. (Fortunately they were fine about the whole thing). After doing the big shop along with all the old age pensioners in the area I had to rush back to connect up the power supply for the workers. Kristoffer arrived after 1pm and we made our way out to Spydeberg (about 40 minutes away) to pick up a couple of canoes for a stag weekend. Milly slept on the way but howled for about 20 minutes on the way home..... that was a joy. After a couple of nappy changes I noticed that water from the high pressure water sprayer being used to strip the paint outside was leaking into the bathroom..... so I spent some time mopping up whilst changing the nappy. After that there was one more leak into the bedroom and another trip out to drop off the canoe. Kim and Kristin had arrived for dinner at around 6pm.......

Today we´ve had Miss Grumpy to deal with. This afternoon nothing was right. We hope that this is temporary and a good night´s sleep followed by a nice calm day tomorrow will do the trick..... if it´s not Daddy will probably age about 20 years during the next 6 weeks!!

Daddy´s home

As the huge holes in the blog show..... time flies. Mummy went back to work on Wednesday so it´s Daddy´s turn for 6 weeks of the full-on Milly experience.

We started off by getting up at 5.30am, followed by projectile vomiting before Mummy left for work, followed by an overflowing nappy..... so by 10am we were on the 3rd set of clothes for the day. Things did pick up after that however..... and we managed to have dinner prepared by the time mummy came home from work.

Today the weather was a bit overcast, so we spent the day dodging around in the car. More will follow with up to date pictures.... stay tuned blog fans

Milly's first trip to Hemsedal

Last week we went to Hemsedal for a skiing holiday. Well, a bit too early to expect Milly to go skiing.... But we had asked Bestemor and Bestefar to come with us, which meant that mummy and daddy could go skiing together, while Milly stayed with them. We had a lovely time, went down hill skiing 4 days and cross country 1 day. Excellent conditions, a little bit too many Danish beginners on the slopes... but all in all very good. Particularly Friday, which was an absolutely gorgeous day.


The baby sitters claimed they had a good time too, they even volenteered to take her in the mornings! Milly was on her best behaviour and enjoyed being with her grandparents, she was even sleeping well during the day. We suspect it must have been the high altitude that got to her.
A good holiday for all of us :-)

Finally an update...

We are not the best at updating the blog, it has to be said. And it's not due to nothing happening either... Since Christmas, Milly has grown and developed a lot. She is an extremely curious little girl and loves exploring new things, so we can't take our eyes off her for a second. In one week she raised herself up for the first time holding on to the bars in her play pen, she started to clap her hands and had her first tooth! And today we could see and feel the edge of the second tooth.

Last weekend we had a mini break, and went to England to get a look at the new little Huby girl. Lynne and Colin's little Charlotte Alice was born 22nd of December, and we were really looking forward to see her. So it was nice to get to spend some days with them, and for Milly to meet her new little friend. Although she was more interested in playing with Charlotte's toys!

We also got to see the Mansers for a few hours in London. Arthur, William and Tilly didn't know we were in England, so we "bumped" into them in Leicester Square. Of course, the boys claimed that they had already guessed..... yeah right!! We had a nice afternoon.... at Planet Hollywood and then in Covent Garden, where William starred in a street theatre show.