Bob

Ellen and I had a fun game of bob. I think Rita liked the colors.

Summerschool

Last week Rita went to summeschool in English with one of her friends Silke. The programme was English speaking in the morning and cheerleading practice in the afternoon. All was conducted in English and the teacher in fact didn't speak Danish at all. Rita loved it so may be we will do the same next year.

4th of July

I'm running a little behind with the photo documentation here.

Well, the photos of our 4th of July celebration with Baba, Farmor and Merete's girls didn't turn out that good. But we had a traditional cook out with burgers and barbecued chicken. No fireworks though.

One evening last week we went for a swim and as must be pretty obvious Erik and Rita had a blast.

While the cat is out

Rita has been enjoying being a single child for the last couple of days. Today we had a great day at the beach and we finished it off picking lots and lots of strawberries.

Rita the folk dancer

Yesterday, we went to a folk music festival with Rita's music class. It was a lot of fun. As part of the opening act Rita's group marched on to the stage and played with all the other musicians - there must have been about 60 all together. I didn't know they had practiced dancing as well. Here is an example with both music and dance.

Gym diploma

It has been a lot of gym experiences this week. Lene, Rita's gym teacher, usually ends the season with a small gym contest and medals and diplomas for all. The girls had to do 4 exercises. Rita excelled in the "bat". She managed to turn around and lift herself upside down and stay there for a while - all by herself. She had hoped to get in top 3 but almost made it. She is by far the most competetive of all 3 kids.

Gym show

The training is coming to an end for Rita's gym class. Saturday we saw their show for the year. It was a combination of rope skipping and traditional gym or is it acrobatics? Rita has really enjoyed it and put a lot of energy in training rope skipping and all.

Flute concert

A few weeks ago we saw the boys in concert. Yesterday the time had come to Rita. She's been playing the flute for more than half a year. The flute orchestra had band camp yesterday were they played together for the first time. After 2 and a half hours of practice we were invited to see the result. It was really good. And Rita was very happy with herself.

A little video of the concert is found here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDzbmZ2-HZw

Fun in Sweden

Rita, Axel and I took a time out in Sweden this weekend to give Ellen some peace and quiet to study for her exam project. We had a fun visit to Ringsjö where there were plenty of opportunity to climp on mysterious roots and walk in the water. Rita learned the hard way that even rubberboots can take in water if you walk too far out. She sure did get wet. It took 2 days before the boots got dry.

8 years

Rita is 8. It's hard to believe. I just can't imagine life without her. We celebrated birthday together with one of Rita's best friends, Maja, who turns 8 tomorrow. We had a lot of fun. Two birthday cakes, small pizzas and pigs in a blanket. And then we went on a fun and long treasure hunt.

Bowling birthday

Rita really wanted to go out bowling for her birthday. So Friday we had invited my parents, Merete and the girls for bowling and pizza. We had a lot of fun. And Rita was so thrilled when she realised we had ordered 8 pizzas. And we ate them all.

Fastelavn

It was the traditional fastelavn and the kids were dressed up. Rita as cowgirl and Axel well you can see for yourself. Erik had decided he was too old to dress up but not to beat "the cat in the barrel" - Danish pinata where you beat a barrel instead. And he ended up being a double winner. He knocked the bottom out of the barrel and he knocked off the last board. That made him both queen and king.

Stöten 2009

It's a bit overdue but last week was just tremendously busy. We had a great week skiing in Sweden. It was super luck to have 2 feet of snow just before we arrived to the place. The temperatures were mostly ok. The last two days it did get a bit on the cold side. When Rita and I made it up to the hill in the morning it was -16 C. Made your hair freeze. It was pretty amazing because the temperature rose as we took the lift up the mountain. At the top it was -0,5 C. It was like walking into a living room!

More pictures will follow when I've emptied Ellens camera.

Birthday disco dance

Rita went to a birthday party last night. She brought her "fur" and was quite the lady at the dance. And she was a tired girl when she returned after 9 PM.

Giant candle

I have been lazy on the blog but here is a quick update with a picture of Rita and her homemade Christmas gift to us - a yard long candle. Unfortunately it didn't last long. It burned very quickly. But it must have taken some patience to dip it so many times to get the candle that lang.

December 21

3 days until Christmas and I managed to fulfill a year old promise to the children - ice skating downtown. It was a first for all kids. Rita was magnificent. She had hardly got the skates on before she was flying about. The boys were quick learners too. I could certainly feel, it was ages since I had had skates on. I believe it was as a sophomore in Waukesha. I managed and fell only once.

December 11

Rita fell at gym class and bruised her ancle. Rita and I took a day out of school to rest the leg. So we took time to bake sugar cookies.

December 10

Bourbon balls! Ellen made a double recipe but something happened on the way. The cookie jar just didn't seem to get filled.

December 9

Rita thought she had to practice her flute. There probably was too much noise in the living room so she took her notes to the kitchen where she practiced "Jingle bells". We are getting more and more ready for Christmas.

December 4

Axel had in home economics learned how to make creme filled rolls. And now he wanted to try it at home. He and Rita went at it alone right after school yesterday. I tell yea, the rolls were very good but both livingrom and kitchen were covered with flour, spillings of creme and what not. But who's to complain when they had this much fun.