The Change Bag

I apparently caused some confusion with a typo last week regarding MKs new change bag and now that I have had to type bag twice and I have instinctively gone for the " ck" each time, I can see how the "change back" may have occurred.

Anyway here it is:

We have had an uber busy weekend. I finally got the window painted thanks to some sunshine and have used the van to take a load of rubbish to the tip before we are downgraded to a car on Tuesday ;-)

We also had guests on Sunday afternoon/evening and I spent some time making enchiladas and stuff.

It's gonna be ours!

Last night there were a couple if interesting developments chez nous. Firstly we committed to buy the Mazda 6 that I posted about a couple of days ago and secondly, MKs new change back arrived from Hungary.

Ours will look more or less like this, but is metalic grey. Oddly for an estate car (admittedly the sport model) it has a spoiler and 2 big fat exhaust pipes and , wait for it, 160 horses at it's disposal. Wicked chav estate car!

This is another of my custom designs that Bagaboo have make for me and I'll post some pictures of it when I have a chance.

In a short while I am off to the hospital with DK for a heart scan and then I hope the sun keeps shining so that we can have a nice weekend especially as we have some friends coming to visit on Sunday.

Work work work

If all I do is work, eat and sleep then what am I supposed to blog about?
Yesterday I was in the office before 8, home at 6 and worked after dinner for about 4 hours before bed after midnight. I was back in the office before 7:30 this morning and I am getting rather worn out.

Tomorrow we are going to the hospital with little DK for a heart scan. This is one of the last test to see if there is anything wrong with his insides to go with the externally visible things (handicaps as the nurse delightfully referred to them!). Next week we have the big conference with a bunch of specialists to discuss the cleft palate, hopefully that process will be more precise than the clubfoot, because the progress on that is a little vague and frustrating.

All being well, we should be home in time to go and see the Mazda dealer and get down to some serious negotiating!

J managed a full day yesterday at Nursery without needing a change of trousers. This was a big step forward, but he didn't quite get around the supermarket without being overcome with excitement. I am not sure if he left a puddle this time or not.

Rain

I planned to bike to work today, but when I stuck my head out of the front door to assess how much clothing I needed, I quickly decided to take off the cycling clothes I was already wearing and head for the shower. It was pissing down!

Thankfully I decided to take the car to work because I have been out and about visiting suppliers all day and now that it is just after 5, I have a days work to do.

Hence this will be a brief post and I'll spend yet another evening working...

We both have bags under out eyes.

Mazda 6

Having tried a red one on Sunday, we went to a local Mazda dealer yo try a 2.3 litre version instead. It was much nicer to drive - smoother, quieter and faster. Hmmm. It is also cheaper and comes with a set of winter tyres which will no doubt save us some cash come November.

I think we'll probably buy this one.

I suspect I may get a few comments along the lines of buy a Honda or a Toyota, my answer is the Honda's are fairly rare in Denmark and therefore difficult to track down and there is no local dealer at all. Toyota's fetch a very large premium and we would have to invest twice as much to get an equivalent to the Toyota. The Mazda seems like a good deal and we both like the car.

Now I am hoping to plan a trip for my birthday to take the boys somewhere for a night, possibly Berlin or maybe somewhere a little closer to home like Gothenburg.

Happy Birthday Mum and AJ

Happy 49th Birthday apparently.

Have a lovely day and enjoy yourselves

The weekend that was

We've sort of done a lot this weekend, but also not really achieved that much. J and I went shopping on Saturday morning and he chose himself some new clothes, this is a first for him and I think he looks pretty cool

On Saturday evening we made pizza - MK made the dough and J and I did the toppings. The results were great, we had chanterelle mushrooms, goats cheese, Spanish salami, chorizo, peppers and mozzarella.

Sunday I test drove a bright red Mazda 6 estate. It was pretty good, but I think we may go for another one closer to home simply because it seems a better deal. (Relative that is, over $50k for a 3 year old car is something of a joke in many ways)

On reflection though I think my biggest achievement of the weekend was cleaning the oven!

What a week

I can tell by the total lack of comments that I have not been able to spark much interest in my readership in the last few days and I am frankly not too surprised. Today was another busy day, but I managed to cycle home from work into the wind at the end of it so I am starting the weekend with a clear head (other than the large bottle of Leffe that I sort of shared with MK)

DK had yet another hearing test today with the same result as before, namely that they cannot register any hearing in either ear. As a crude test he did respond to a squeaky toy on one side, but not the other. We have been booked for another, different test at the end of September and we can only hope that the problem is just related to liquid and can be sorted out or will sort itself out.

Tomorrow we are off car shopping again, hopefully we'll make a little more progress this time than previously.

Our new Porsche...

Kettle.

I have always lusted after these Porsche designed kitchen appliances and when they had the kettle for less than half price in Føtex last week, I couldn't resist getting one. I was also happy to be rid of the old kettle that was a little awkward to fill and took a lot of space.

We're happy with this and it fits on the windowsill as well.

Can you tell there isn't much going on here at the moment?

I cycled to work in an hour and a quarter this morning, that was an average speed on 35kmph as a result of the healthy tale wind. The flip side of that is that I couldn't face the ride home this evening as it was getting late and I am extremely busy and somewhat stressed at work at the moment.

Never again

Taking a break from work is one thing, but I have never landed in quite so much stress on my return from a holiday before. As a principal, I don't talk about work here, but wow I am busy, I guess the blogging may slow down for a little while...

I am still waiting for my orange Salsa frame to arrive from Germany and I also have a little credit there from some return shipping expenses burning a hole in my pocket. I think there may be some new pedals in my near future or a waterproof jacket. Thankfully I don't have to be in the office at 07:30 tomorrow morning so I plan on taking the opportunity to cycle in to get some fresh air and exercise before putting my nose back to the grindstone.

Out of the frying pan

and into the fire

Today has been a rather stressful day of trying to catch up with 180 mails sent to me during my vacation and the ton of work that people have been saving up for me over the last weeks. It was a lot.

As a result I have not managed to do much this evening other than light the barbecue and drink a glass of wine before hitting the PC again to do some more work. I have plenty to do before bed so this will be mercifully brief.

PRINCE 2 and the boys

I had a tough first day back at work today with a full day PRINCE 2 course. PRINCE 2 (PRojects IN a Controlled Environment 2) is a project management methodology much like the others that I have been taught and am certified in. Just like the others, it uses exactly the same ideas packaged in it's own jargon, silly names and BS.

This was just an introduction day, we were given about 25kg of paper to read before the real course which is a 3 day residential jobby in September at the place above in Helsingør. Joy.

J's potty training is going fairly well although we are still having a few accidents and we are still working on removing sjøper (sut/dummy/pacifyer). DK also had his casts changed today and it seems that the doctor is a little concerned that progress is slow. I am a bit annoyed that the physiotherapists have been doing most of the casting that is a doctors job and I think that is why it has not progressed much. I am going to try to insist that the doctor does it from now on because I don't want to be told that they give up in a few weeks and we have to head off to Iowa.

Some pictures

GBN bought a little sapce hopper for J, but MK had the first go.


A big spider in the garden

J hitting the slide at the zoo

Rlaxing in front of the Olympic Games

The end is nigh

After a busy 3 weeks holiday it is almost time to go back to work. I have not achieved most of the things that I wanted to during the last 2 weeks, mostly because of the weather which has been pretty crap.

We put up new fascia boards on the garage yesterday which now need to be treated before doing a bit of remedial work on the roof felt.


On Thursday we all went to Copenhagen Zoo and even invested in year passes so I guess we'll be back a few times before the end of August next year.


We finished the day at Wagamama with some rather tasty Japanese noodly things.

New toys delivered

Mum arrived with our new toys yesterday and we have been playing with them a bit since. I got a Nikon D40 camera, MK got a small video camera and between us we have a photo printer that we are yet to get going. We were absolutely amazed how GCN got all of this stuff into her suitcase including a big nappy bin!

J got a lot of pairs of pants to soil and he has been working hard at getting through all 10 of them today!

For lunch we went to Holbæk to a very nice fish restaurant for lunch at BHPs recommendation. We had fish all round and it was excellent.

DKs new casts were fitted on Monday and the doctors were very pleased with his progress this week, his feet are now poiting outwards and hos toes are beginning the journey towards his nose!

We'll work on posting some video at some point.

Book Review

I have recently read The Road by Cormack McCarthy and was expecting a lot given that it has won the Pulitzer prize. After all, wasn't Clarke Kent always trying to win one of those? or was it Peter Parker? I forget.
Anyway, this was a thoroughly miserable book from start to finish. A post apocolyptic tale of misery and more misery intersperced with slight less miserable moments. I don't know who would enjoy the book really because it would simply make anyone dipair.
It is beautifully written and imaginative, but really the best thing about it as far as I am concerned is that I got it for free!
I'll try something more cheerful next, I hope...

Ringsted Festival

This weekend is the annual Ringsted Festival . This usually means crap weather and load muic keeping us awake all night from the park at the end of the road.

So far we have had a few small thunderstorms and a bit of rain, but they are getting away lightly compared with previous events. The music even seems a little quieter, but that may be because it is cold enough to have the windows closed and we are tired enough to sleep through anything other than a crying baby.


In the continuing quest to rid my bicycle of annoying noises, I have decided to replace the pedals with some of these rather nice looking Dura Ace ones that are on sale at the moment. MK has refused to let me buy news wheels, but I think that once the bottom bracket is swapped, the chain replaces and the pedals done then it should be getting reasonably quiet and my desire for a new one should fade with the noise.

Like a holiday...

but in Denmark

Today we went to a nearby castle to play in their playground and visit the fire engine museum. The playground was a hit but the fire engine museum has been turned into a fire engine but thankfully we hadn't told J about it so we were safe.

There was a butterfly farm

And some goats

Alarmingly MK and J went on the death slide together!

There was only one pant wetting moment including the car journeys. I couldn't believe that MK wanted to let him in the car without a nappy, but we got away with it this time.

Wrong size

I got a big package from DHL yesterday, unfortunately it was not a big enough package as it contained a bike frame that would be a good fit for MK.

This was as you could imagine rather irritating as I have been waiting since the start of June for it and will not have to wait until at least the middle of September to get the right size. To add insult to injury, I am no doubt going to be inconvenienced by having to return this frame to Germany.

J and I have been out with the trailer again and he took the opportunity for a nap and I think the rest of the family did too whilst I was getting some fresh air.

The theme of achieving very little continued today with a trip to the bottle bank and returning the bottles with a deposit earned me 72 Kr and some satisfaction at the sound of breaking glass.

The weather is continuing to be crap and all in all it is a little frustrating being stuck in the house.

Paternal leave

I am now starting my second week of paternity leave and it has been a normal Monday with a trip to the hospital for DKs legs to be re-cast. The Doctor is happy with his progress and she thinks that he will need another 3 or 4 casts before he is done.

The weather today has been horrid with strong winds and heavy driving rain. We have had 39mm of rain according to my fancy rain gauge.

However, yesterday J and I managed to dodge the showers well enough to christen the bike trailer and contribute to my cyclists tan.

We're back from the seaside...

and we've got some pictures.

Firstly DK had his casts changed again and as you can see here, there is a marked improvement. The hands manipulating his feet belong to the doctor, she was happy with his progress and we will be back for more on Monday morning.

J is in the process of potty training, some days have been better than others and we are not entirely sure that we are making progress. This morning he decided to put on all of his clean pants at the same time, 5 minutes later we had 4 dirty pairs and no clean ones...

This afternoon J and I took our maiden voyage with the bike trailer and it was a big hit. We are planning another trip tomorrow that may involve some ice cream at some point.

And finally as Sir Trevor has been known to say, I have caught up with some sleep along with the smallest member of the family.