Summer

Summer is in full force and we are making the most of the cottage at every opportunity. Summer in Norway is fab. Life slows down, (and in July the country closes down!) the nights are super light (and I often go to bed with daylight outside which is still weird to me) norwegian strawberries are eaten (best strawberries ever) and best of all we swim. A lot, at every opportunity. There is something about a long cold winter that makes you desperate for summer and makes you terrified about missing a single minute of it!
p.s Pic of Henrik was taken at 11.40pm as he beavered away til midnight with cottage jobs (another downfall to the long winter is that you spend a huge chunk of summer fixing things that the winter fucked up!)

I've been without my car all week after wearing out my break pads. I took the car to the garage last Tuesday and it will be ready to pick up next Tuesday. That's how they roll here in Norway. They take their sweet friggin' time and it irritates the shit out of me. I used to drop off my car in London before work,get a service and the break pads changed, pick it up after work and hand over approx 170 pounds yet here I get to wait 7 days and hand over 1100 pounds for the same job.
Our cottage makes shit like this bearable-only just!

May

Ahhhhhh, May. My birthday month and that lovely month in Norway with so many holidays that you are hardly at work. Bliss. It's also the month that summer decided to make an (better late than never) appearance here.
We took off to Brussels for 4 days for my 40th which was fantastic. We dined on mussels, pomme frite dipped in mayonaise and chugged waaaaaaay too much delicious Kriek beer. It was the perfect way to say goodbye to my thirties :)
We opened up the cottage, gave it a good old clean and enjoyed a 4 day weekend where temps reached 27c. There was much lounging,napping,reading,relaxing,planting,an attempted swim(still too cold) and bbq's.
I love Norway during the summer when winter seems ages away and the days are long and light (and I can forget that we had snow on the ground 5 weeks ago!) Bring it on, summer :)

Spring

Every year after the long cold winter Norway throws little glimpses of spring our way and then swiftly takes them back and throws some snow at us. It's been doing this for the whole of April but on Saturday it threw a summers day our way and we took full advantage. No jackets, shoes without socks, toes dipped in the Oslo fjord, 15c, bright blue skies, ice cream and freckles on our faces.

English v Norwegian

When I'm shopping here in Norway I mainly speak norwegian but sometimes I cant be arsed so switch to english and it's really weird how differently you get treated depending on what language you are speaking. I buy a chicken from the same place every week and the first time I asked for a chicken in norwegian the guy simply replied, "ja" handed me the chicken and off I went. The next week the same guy served me but this time I spoke english and he replied in english,"Of course you can have a chicken! Would you liked it cutting?" and after handing it to me he smiled and said,"have a great day and a great weekend!! Good bye!"
Now if you have ever been to Norway you will know that this is not how shop assistants talk to you. They are people of few words with no idea how to be service minded (if they are friendly they are probably Swedes!) so I was wondering why this guy was so nice when I spoke english but cold when I spoke norwegian? hmmmmmm
I have to say that even after 2 1/2 years here I still find Norway really,really odd!! I will be escaping the oddness for 4 lovely days in England from Sunday onwards. Yippeeee!

P.s Please note: NO.SNOW.IN.THE.GARDEN!!!!!  (finally!)

Still winter

It's still winter here, you can still walk across the fjord (someone puts little fir trees on the ice to show you that it's safe, but I don't trust them!) Fleamarket season has kicked off and we went to two today but my heart was not in it, I have enough crap and now I just want to move house (and then maybe buy some more crap!) You know, when you buy a house here it happens fast, you can buy on a Monday and move in on the Friday!

Happy Easter

We've been having a sun filled (and snow free) few days in Gøteborg, wandering, eating and shopping.
You have to love a city that's just 3 hours drive away, is open at easter and is way cheaper than Norway. Go Sverige :)

this week

I'm on Easter holiday right now and it's heeeeeeeeaven to be free. No more getting up at 6am, no more speaking norwegian all day,time to potter around and get stuff done,wander around Oslo with friends, eat cakes and sit in cafes and chat, pretend it's spring and put on your converse for the first time in 4 months only to get home with blue toes and feel like a prick for thinking that was a good idea in the first place, eat the most amazing fish and chips at Fiskeriet and escape Norway for the Easter weekend (when everything closes for 4 whole days)and travel to Gøteborg where the whole population is not up in the mountains eating oranges and kvikk lunsj.

lately

Still winter here, I hate all my clothes, my shoes and that friggin' big, heavy coat which I'm desperate to put in storage and whip out a nice light spring number, but the damn weather is anything but mild!
It was -17c last night and I have not seen grass for 4 months. Cheery, huh?

A cinnamon celebration

We were offered a very nice mortgage on Friday which I am super proud of as we have saved like demons in the last year so we celebrated not with champagne but with cinnamon buns!
It's the one thing that we've applied for in Norway that's actually gone in our favour without a  fight. Now we just need to find our dream house (we found it already but it was just outside our budget and the bidding just keeps on going up and up)  I'm no longer allowed to buy expensive Marimekko cups and probably won't be able to for the next ten years!
Temperatures are slowly rising around here and the days becoming longer which is muuuuuuuuch needed. This winter has made me extra tired and I am no longer able to stay up later than 10.30pm during the week so I am really looking forward to those light summer evenings where you forget it's so late and end up rolling into bed at 1am. Ah, summer, I'm ready for you....

I just came home from work and inhaled a few cinnamon buns which my workmate Johanna made for me. We made a bet last time England and Sweden played football (back in June?) that the loser had to bake something from their country for the winner and Sweden lost so (better late than never) today I recieved a lovely bag of sugary,cinnamony Swedish goodness.Yum.
In other news,it's still snowing heavily here, we fell in love with a house at the weekend and a huge moose (at least 7ft) walked past our living room window and I almost shit myself at the sheer size of that beast :)