Bubble show

The kids and I went to bubble festival at the Childrens' museum yesterday. An American artist, Tom Noddy, performed the most awesome show. It was amazing what he could do with soap bubbles. Here is a little video of the performance. I think it's easy to hear how excited the boys were about the show.

40

Happy birthday, Ellen!

I believe Ellen had a great birthday. In the morning we exchanged gifts. The kids gave Ellen a gold necklace to match the pendant Mary and Gary gave her in Prague. I had among other things found a gift pack of jelly beans with a collection of 40 flavors.

In the evening we went to a fondue restaurant and then to the opera to watch the Danish opera Maskerade. It was the first time we had the children to the opera and they really seemed to enjoy it. They all stayed awake all the way to the end around 11 PM.

Birthday party

Saturday we celebrated our 40th birthday. We had a lot of fun. As is customary at Danish parties we had personal songs. I had made one for Ellen and my parents had made one for both of us. The children also had a fun song in several "languages" - fx. consisted the Russian verse mostly of Danish words added a "ski" in the end (you can hear part of the song in the video). The song accentuated the global company - we were all together 5 different nationalities from 2 continents.

We had found a caterer who made a wonderful menu:
First course: Potato cake with cod, bacon and red beet, shrimp saslik with aioli, bread and tapenade
Main: Veal tenderloin with pineapple/chili relish, potato gratin with parsnip and carrots and a onion pie.
Dessert: Crepes with custard and rich chocolate mousse.

We had had fun picking a French Gewurztraminer for the first course, an Italian red for the main course and a Spanish muscat for dessert.

It was very good.

Erik, Axel and Rita was of great help. They helped serve and clear off the table.

After dinner we danced and talked. The children managed to get most of our guests to join a game of musical chairs.

As gifts we got 3 electric tea kettles and a toaster. As our friend Laurent said, now we are ready to open a bed and breakfast.

Timemachine

We had a great time today. For Christmas Ellen gave us all tickets for Film X which is a small movie studio down town.

It was fun. First we went to the studio to tape the film. After that we went to a sound studio to add dialogue. Finally we cut the movie and added sound effects.

The kids really got into it. Rita wanted to be a princess, Axel dinosaurs and Erik wanted something with a vampire or mad scientist. I believe we managed to please all.

The story line is as follows. The scientist arrives in the future where dinosaurs are in the streets. Suddenly a knight and princess arrives for the medieval ages. The scientist realizes he has messed up things. He pushes a button and converts time. The scientist swings back into the past to set things straight.

A happy 2008

Erik and Axel had made sure we had lots of fireworks for New Years Eve. We had been to the shop for at least 4 times filling up with supplies. It was great and spectacular.

Kirsten and Jens, David, Nadja and Marik joined us for the evening. The menu was a roll of puffed pastry with spinach, mozarelle and olives served with pureed mushrooms. Salted pork tenderloin, red beet salad and potatoes. For dessert we had ginger mousse in chocolate cups.

It was a wonderful evening.

Happy New Year.