Scary...

Marit Kostol
--[noun]:
A person who has the ability to be invisible
'How will you be defined in the dictionary?' at QuizGalaxy.com

And it might even be true...

Converting...

...from these... ...to these...
...and it all started when I first found blogland...there were soooo many pretty patterns for dishcloths! I mean: DISHCLOTHS!!! Way too pretty to use only as dishcloths. So I ended up knitting them in wool, there might be enough for a lapghan or a shawl to put around my shoulders while knitting or watching tv. I just have to sew them together and make a border. It will not happen today. Not tomorrow either. But it MIGHT happen. It might...

Anyway- this will be like an oldtime sampler.

Mr. Blaack feels a bit lonely and left out these days...he is walking across the desert wich is supposed to be our new lawn...the grass HAS started to grow, but it has been too cold and too wet lately to grow decently. Judy asked what had become of him and Tussi. Tussi,I am sad to say, is no more. He started having these strange fits, got all still and stiff, started drooling, and then went off like a rocket. This happened several times, and we took him to the veterinary( she lives on the farm next to us). She examined him,he even got a fit there, and she found out he had epilepsy. We could have treated him with shots or pills, every day for the rest of his life. But since he's a farm cat, outdoors most of the time, we decided it wouldn't be right, so the vet put him to sleep. The vet said he'd probably hit his head severly at some point.

Lady Gray, however, gave birth to 6 little ones last night...in DD2s bed...at 1am... I had to change everything- comforter,bedlinens, the mattress...and the girl went to sleep in dad's bed:-)

Next time you see these, there won't be more than 2 left, we have always left the Lady with two kittens, because that is manageable to give away. I think we'll keep the stripey one, but the kids are to decide. It's part of life, part of living on a farm.

Have a great day!

Home alone!

I'm home alone! What a treat! fter a long summer wth hubby and the kids around all the time, it is finally back to normal. Hubby's at work- he should have been on an oilrig in the NorthSea, but he is at the office in Stavanger. And he'll be away for two weeks. The kids are back in school,already in their second week. 5th,7th,9th,and 10th grade. The house is quiet, it is only me and the cats.
I cherish these mornings. Being able to do whatever I want for a few hours. No one asks for attention.No one needs help with the homework RIGHT AWAY, MUM! I sit down with my cup of tea and my knitting, listen to the radio and watch the everchanging view. We don't need curtains- we have a new view several times a day. The rainbow showed up Monday. It looks like we might have a pot of gold in our seahouse!

Well, I'm off to drink that cup of tea-it is all ready. And then there is some casting on to be done. I actually have a couple of finished items too, but they need some blocking first...

Have a lovely day:-)

More random facts

Gudrun, sorry, I've been thinking of my 8 random things for quite some time...maybe I'll get around to it now:-) I'm supposed to challenge 8 other people do write their random things, but maybe- anyone reading this-feel free to post your own facts! I like reading when other people do this, because it is a way of getting to know each other better.
Here are my facts...
1. I don't like boats.When I was around 14, my sister and I went fishing,we used the motor on the boat, started and restarted and filled the whole darned thing with gasoline...I got so mad I just rowed all the way back(and we used nearly two hours!) Dad was really getting worried, as it was getting darker and darker...We have a couple of boats here too, only small ones, but Hubby would love to have a big one...

2. I don't have much education exept for those 9 years we had to go, and then I went to agricultural school for two years. I was determined to be a farmer when I started at 16, and even more determined that I would never be a farmer at the age of 18...and look where life got me-LOL!

3. After returning from my aupair-job in California, I started school again, wanting to be a goldsmith. On the very first day-after walking around the whole school, it was warm and a lot of people-we gathered in the classroom,all students stuffed together, me in the back.And I fainted...probably my most embarrassing moment so far:-( I quit school only a few weeks later, but not until I'd made the cross in the picture. It is silver, and every student had to make one- not for religious purposes, but because there are so many angles that needs to be just right, so it was a great practising piece! Someone in the class put on the hemp and then mailed it to me while I was in Iceland.
4. I've been a stay-at-home-mom ever since I had the children. It suits me and our way of living, but now they are getting so big, I might consider finding a job. At least parttime...

5. There are city counsil elections in Norway in less than two weeks...I'm on one of the lists, as #5 (4 years ago 4 from my list made into city counsil...)

6.I spend waaay too much time on internet!

7. I've been knitting for ages, but after discovering knittingblogs and free patterns and all that neat stuff online, I've been knitting even more! And this time documenting it in my "little black book"...

8. I don't drink alcohol at all, I settle for CocaCola...

There you go. Please feel free to give your own list!
Have a nice day!

Vacation!

There is a slogan saying :" Norge, ditt næraste ferieland", which means something like " Norway- your nearest vacationcountry". That's what we did this year...we went local... Most years I travel south with the kids to visit my parents and sisters, but weather has been lousy down south, so I didn't want to go! Anyway, they all came here for DS1's confirmation, so we HAVE met.


Well, we had only a few days, we should have left Monday last week, but the sheep kept coming down into the garden, so DS1 and I went to check the fences- and we found a few holes too. We spent all Monday at the mountain mending it. It has helped, the sheep have stayed in place! So we should leave Tuesday...but we weren't ready...BUT on Wednesday morning the car was all packed and off we went. We took the road through Norangsdalen There are several beautiful places there, and it is only a couple of hours away! I've never been there before, neither has hubby.



Then we took the ferry to Geiranger , which is now on the world heritage list. There are several abandoned farms along the fjord, like Matvik, where they had nearly a 100 fruittrees: apples, pears and plums, even apricots! Many -actually most- of the farms are well kept and used by the owners for recreational purposes- it used to be really hard work... We stayed two nights at a cottage in Geiranger, which was okay. One day we drove to Lom to buy bread- there is a bakery there that uses only woodovens...look at that stack of firewood!!! It is gorgeous!!! And the bread was good too-LOL! We also went to Lom Stavkyrkje, a beautiful old church built around 1150,which is still in use. The weekend was spent at Farmors, that is, hubby and I went to a 50year birthdayparty, which was okay, and he saw a lot of people he hadn't met in several years! We used to live there, but moved to this place 9 years ago.
Anyway, we came home Sunday afternoon, to this:

Now school has started, hubby is off to work next week, I'm knitting a bit(there are actually a finished object!!!) and also it's my birthday today- turning 44. I guess I'm supposed to be middleaged...it just doesn't feel that way! Hmmm.

Have a nice week! Hopefully I'll be back sooner...

Gardening...

We've been doing a bit of gardening this last week...the whole area around the house has suffered from the fact that -A:I don't like gardening. B: Hubby's been away at work most of the time.C: We've had a threeyear setback because of the fire and rebuilding the house (which has taken most of our energy...) D: The old garden suited the old house- but it had turned into a mess,mostly due to it being in the middle of a construction site... E:......well, whatever!

We ended up hiring a contractor who knows what he's doing! First we took away a pile of stones. This is more or less what it looked like. Then we added some more stones. Hubby is stone mad...-LOL- also, his first name is literally stone! The result of this:
is this: A brand new stone stair, a shortcut to get down to the seahouse (it is like a hundred steps to walk AROUND the garden on the road...so of course we need a shortcut!) Anyway- it looks good, and it is well proportioned and easy to walk in. BTW: the hegdehogs used to live under these stones. We moved them to another stonefence on the farm, hoping they will settle down there. It is farther away from traffic, which is good, seeing that so many are being killed by cars these days.
Today we finished it, for the time being,that is, it will be lawn now, and then we'll add more rocks and plants and a new stonefence- it WILL be better!
There HAS been knitting too, but not as much as usual. I did finish my August socks though, nice and easy pattern, but I'm not too thrilled about the colour of the yarn (prefer solid or semisolid colours...) The yarn is Regia 4-fädig jacquard color 5273. I made the striping match-LOL! Nice yarn to work with- and plenty leftover! These are made for my sister, so they are a bit short on my feet. Also on my needles is the MS# stole, I've knitted through clue 5, but haven't had time to start on the 6th. It will be interesting to see whether it works out as a tablerunner, though. Oh, well, if not, I can make another piece from clue1 through clue 4 and either graft them together or knit in that little insert ... we'll just see how it turns out.

This picture was taken a week ago, when we came home from farmor (my MIL)We might be taking some days off next week- the kids are due back in school on the 20th, so we'd like to go for a little vacation. Have no idea where we end up, though! We'll just play it by ear, I guess.

I'd like to thank all of you for your nice comments! I'm not good at responding, but I really appreciate it!

And Rani, èg bjò à Ìslandi ì 18 mànudir, vann sem aupair, og stelpan sagdi vid míg: Taladu íslensku!!! (Hún var tæplega 4 ára gömul...ég skíl henni vel! ) I don't speak fluently Icelandic, but I'll manage. In English: I lived on Iceland for 18 months, working as an aupair, and the girl said to me: speak Icelandic!!! She was nearly 4 at the time, I understand her well!)

Have a great rest of the weekend!

Vikingday at the museum...

The kids and I spent last Wednesday at the museum close to Ålesund ,and it was great fun! We looked at the old buildings, made necklaces out of replicas of beads the vikings had traded and used as payment, used a knife, made flatbread, learned how to write runer ,looked at the goats-well, there were lots of activities! We got hungry, so we bought vikingstew- delicious! And it was boiling in these big pans ...it was meat and vegetables simmered for a long time with sour creme and cream...yummi...
And a real bow and arrow! Boy was he exited. It was harder than it looked though.
The area is nice, close to the sea, and they have several boats of different shapes.No pictures...but there should be a couple of links, so if you are ever in the area, take a look:-)

There has been knitting done...clue 5 of the mysterystole...I'll stick with the design,at least so far... I have also signed up for for the BeeFields shawl Knitalong...I ordered the pattern from Anne's ,and wish I had ordered her HoneyBee stole too...it is gorgeous! Go have a look- if you're not already drooling over it... So far I have no yarn-LOL- but I will get it done! At some point...!

Then there are the August socks of Sockamania, the top, the fish blanket, the...and in between some gardening. Hubby is using his 24T diggingmachine, another is using one 18T, they are moving stones, making paths and stairs and new garden...pictures later- I haven't uploaded them yet, and it looks messy outside... Hopefully I won't be away from the blog for so long -but it is still summervacation, hubby is back home, we have a lot of visitors(They stay at the yellow seahouse-that's where we lived for 2,5 years while rebuilding our house. You can step right out from the kitchen/livingroom to the sea...the kids used to fish from the front-it is not a porch, it is what we call a "brygge"-but my Englishskills fails me again,anyway, it is used to fasten boats when coming ashore!), and there is less time than usual, it seems.

Anyway- have a lovely weekend!