to eeeeat the impossible pieeeeee (68/365a)

Today is a holiday here.
In Austria, on a holiday (or a sunday) nothing is open. Nothing  (except for a grocery store at the train station, where the lines stretch out the door on holidays)

Instead we had music lessons. Highlight was playing frere jacques as a quintet with Nadja, henry's teacher, and Thomas, theodore's teacher, and henry and theodore and me.

Since we were on our way to slovenia today, nina took it upon herself to offer her house for dinner and entertainment until we were on our way. (we had to pick up the rental car yesterday, it happened to be brand new - 7km on the odometer)

There's an internet blog called baketotheroots.de where Marc tells of things that as far as I can tell are impossible, and therefore centa and i have said he does not exist, nor do his desserts. nina accepted the challenge and wove rhubarb into the top layer of a tart.

it's not a great hat

but it was truly delicious to eat.

who are you calling a tart?

i met new people

like verena

and snuggled.

i slept on the couch

then it was time to go to slovenia. we're off! see you tomorrow, koper!

west side story on the other side of the Mur (67/365a)

With Michi

Spent the day being thwarted by daily stuff, but just minor annoyances. The street to kindergarten was closed, I could wait a half an hour for them to open it, or I could drive a half hour around the mountain and go up the back way. That kind of thing. No big deals.

Helped Jackie plant tomato plants since we won't be here when they are in full ripe. I had been watching over these since they were barely seedlings, and I was oddly emotional while putting them in

I was oddly emotional all day actually.

At the playground, I tried to decide between two different evening entertainments. Michi and I decided on West Side Story. I wanted to cry the whole time. the music is so beautiful.

On the way back we stopped at a cafe which turned out to be closed, along with the whole area because of a bomb threat. I mean, growing up in Worcester and Syracuse we spent a good percentage of school standing outside because of bomb threats and false fire alarms, but it just reminded me that we live on the "wrong side" of the river. 

Nina and Centa and Brian helped drink some wine at home.

by the light of the blue glow (66/365a)

blue glow

Spending time lately with my computer and in my thoughts and in books. Spent some meditation time at yoga today and at one point my mind wandered to a story I decided to share:

Making banana ice cream involves cutting up ripe bananas and freezing them for later. when we blended some up the kids split it amongst themselves. They were quite happy doing so, until Felix pointed out it wasn't fair that mama didn't get any. Henry said that it was fair, because mama "got to" cut up the bananas, (which I guess is clearly better than getting to eat them)

Quite a happy day today, except for a short tantrum involving Brian removing a tag from an article of clothing by request, and then refusing to fish it out of the trash and sew it back on. For the record, Brian wasn't the tantrum thrower.

Really, other than that just lovely everything. Coffee in the treehouse (nina!) and playing music in the basement, and painting a bench, and crafty things, and practicing, and yoga, and abenteuerspielplatz and yummy food and the first styrian apricots of the season.

Felix's birthday for real (65/365a)

It's actually his birthday today.

Unfortunately it started with tantrums and sadness, maybe too much excitement yesterday.
But it ended up gorgeous, outside with cake (revisited) and presents and projects and music.

my FOUR year old!

blowing out candles

on a walk downtown, taking theodore to chorus.

finally started the great giving away shoe project. there are so many pairs here of sizes and shapes that nobody wears, some nearly brand new. i've been meaning to photograph them and sell them for the last 2 years, and i finally took the first step. yes, my to-do list is years long.

goodbye shoes - maybe someone will buy them.

canceled this action out by stealing dishes out of the trash....... 

and brian and i went to the last swing dance workshop of the season tonight. we are officially LINDY HOPPERs!! <3

Celebrating Felix's birthday (64/365a)

He wanted it at Arthur's house. So I called Arthur's parents yesterday and asked "can we come over and celebrate our kids' birthday there?" They said yes, so off we went this morning, attempting to take a picnic for 9 in cloth bags on the bus.

The cake was a failure. Felix spent 30 minutes collecting currents, and I spent time and ingredients making the thing only to burn it on the top, undercook it in the middle and then have half of it fall out of the pan and the other half stubbornly stuck to the well greased interior. The result was a greasy messy pile of nake (not-cake) that we decided not to transport. We sang with to a candle stuck into a bowl of cherries, from about half of which we then had to remove little wax drippings. fine. it was fun anyways.

we found the brand new, never-before-lit 4 candle in the bottom of our candle cabinet in the house.
"i wonder why i wonder why i wonder why i wonder. i wonder why i wonder why i wonder why i wonder" - Feynman

Arthur's mom also does face-painting, so cuteness was had by all:

felix and arthur

Presents and cake and banana ice-cream will just have to wait till tomorrow. Insta-sleep at home-time.

(also, only 300 more days before one year of posting, haha)

Graz from the top (63/365a)

A photo from yesterday:
A present that theodore decorated for a friend:

Awww... "Fruehlingsartig"

He drew it in the car on the way to pick up kids from kindergarten while we were listening to a Dvorak CD.

And one from today:

Who are you calling a tart?

A yummy strawberry tart that Ingrid made with delightful dark white dessert wine at Manfred's.

looks better in real life. really.

And then with the ladies, Nina and Cecilia, after having drunk an average of a bottle on wine each (as one must at Manfred's) we stopped to try the new view from the hotel at the end of the street. the moon and the mood did not disappoint.

sleepy (62/365a)

Moms are always sleepy, but I was for some reason extra sleepy today, falling asleep on the floor twice.

Once was a normal one, reading bedtime stories.

 Once was rather stranger, at orchestra rehearsal, where i sat down with felix to help him take a nap, and woke up laying on my back with felix on top of me 30 minutes later, rehearsal underway.

In the midst of this sleepiness I still took photographs, but I also left my camera at a friends' house.

So I can't post any of those today.

I will just leave you with the instructions to google Mel Robbins' ted talk, but just remember, you're never going to feel like it.