Bergenauts: My Journal

We've had a lot of fun the past couple weeks. When I looked back into my journal to decide what to write about, I realized I wanted to include it all. So here it is...

Saturday, May 19
Dinner at the house of some American friends from our church--they have two girls, Hannah Grace and Virginia Joy, that my boys get along great with. Ate mass quantities of ice cream with strawberries and chocolate fondue. Met another really nice family from church--they have lots of kids, about the ages of our kids (including a baby about a month older than Izzy, but twice his size...Just when I was thinking that he'd gotten so big!)

Sunday, May 20
Isidore and I went to my Norwegian class and Sunday evening Mass (Jonah and Davin had gone to Mass in the morning).

Monday, May 21
Izzy really impressed the nurse at his check up today. In addition to being very happy and charming, he did a big acrobatics show for her. She laid him on his back on a mat on the floor and he immediately flipped himself over and started rolling over and over and playing with toys and wriggling all around. She said that he's very strong and coordinated for his age (I thought he might be!).

Så sterk! (So strong!)

Tuesday, May 22
Oscar and Sergio went to an ostrich farm with a group from their preschool. I had my neighbor, Stine, over for breakfast while the kids were at school (we ate blueberry puffy pancakes). Then we went Downtown together to run errands and pick up Jonah from school. The weather was really warm and beautiful, so I took the kids to the nearby lake for a swim.

Wednesday, May 23
Sergio hurt his shoulder at school today (he was hit with a swing). He didn't cry when it first happened, but when he moved his arm it really started hurting. He cried and cried, so finally his teacher called and said that I should come get him and that I'll probably want to take him to the doctor. I rushed over with Izzy (it's just across the street) and found Sergio with one of his teachers, whimpering. He could move his fingers, hand, wrist, and elbow fine; but if he tried to move his shoulder, he howled in pain. As long as he was resting he was totally fine, so I brought him home and let him watch a little Sesame Street online (he was thrilled--I don't think the poor kid's ever seen it before), and then I gave him a nap. I figured I'd see how he felt after his nap and decide whether to take him for X-rays then. We'd been planning to have friends over for dinner and to go swimming with them afterward. When he woke up, he begged us not to take him to the doctor and to let him go to the lake instead. I thought it certainly wasn't broken or he wouldn't be interested in going to the beach. I didn't want to add insult to injury by causing him to miss out on all the fun, just to give him an unnecessary dose of radiation and to hear that nothing is broken. Anyway, I figured we could always take him tomorrow if his shoulder is still bothering him. We ended up keeping our dinner plans and all going to the lake, just wrapping Sergio's shoulder in a bandage to keep it from moving around too much and causing him pain. He ended up having a lot of fun, but he wasn't using his left arm at all.

Thursday, May 24

Sergio with his Broken Collarbone

Sergio's collarbone IS broken! I feel TERRIBLE that we took him to the lake instead of the emergency room yesterday! The poor darling! I had no clue he was so seriously injured...He's really tough! The doctor said they really can't do anything to treat it, though. He said we should just leave the arm free and let Sergie use it as much as is comfortable for him which, at first, won't be much at all since a broken collarbone is extremely painful. He said we can let him play as usual (but stay off trampolines for 4-6 weeks), and give him Tylenol if he seems to need it. Luckily, broken collarbones tend to heal very quickly.

Brother Ali, Sims, and Plain Ole Bill had a concert in Bergen tonight. Brother Ali is one of Davin's favorite musicians, so he's been looking forward to going to the show for months. They played at a small venue, so Davin had a chance to talk with the artists afterward. Talking to Sims, Davin mentioned that we'd be moving back to the US soon. The guy said, "Why would you possibly go back? Everywhere you look it's just beautiful here. Everybody's happy all the time. Everybody has money. Everything's taken care of. Everybody looks beautiful. You should stay here." It's not a bad assessment, really...

Friday, May 25
Sergio wanted to go to school today, so I brought him and Oscar for just a couple hours; then we met up with Jonah and Davin for a performance festival Downtown. We watched a bunch of performances by kids from a "culture school," including a band (a drummer, two guitarists, and a lead singer) made up of kids about Jonah and Oscar's ages. They played "Last Dance with Mary Jane" and "Smells Like Teen Spirit." Oscar couldn't believe it--his mouth fell open and his eyes got huge and he said, stunned, "They're my age and they rock so hard!"

We also went to a free "babykonsert" in Grieghallen, a really beautiful concert hall Downtown. They had a live performance of classical music especially for babies. There were dozens of babies about Izzy's age there. It was adorable.

Saturday, May 26
Went to a children's workshop at the art museum ("Flower Fantasy"). Then we watched an outdoor play in Festplassen (I Feel Good--a slapstick comedy about a plane crash) and went to a children's disco party.

I Feel Good

The kids were thrilled to discover that a little park (a teeter-totter and some sandboxes) had sprung up overnight near Festplassen:

When we got back home, Sergie napped and Jonah and Oscar went swimming.

It was sunny and beautiful late into the night, so after all the kids were in bed, Davin and I had a lovely "date" playing Gin Rummy on the balcony.

Sunday, May 27
It was another gorgeous day, so Davin and the boys went to the lake for the 6th day in a row. They'd been sneaking off to swim while Sergio napped, but now his collarbone is feeling much better, so he was able to go along with them. I couldn't come because I had my Norwegian class, but today I was lucky enough to get a private lesson.

Monday, May 28
The Second Day of Pentecost is a National Holiday here (interestingly enough) so everyone has the day off school and work. We had planned to hang out at the ocean, but I got a terrible fever (104.3 degrees!) and stayed in bed all day.

Tuesday, May 29
My fever is gone and I'm feeling fine. Oscar "traveled to Thailand" with the older kids in his section at school. They had pretend passports and plane tickets, and they tried some Thai foods. It was really cute.

Wednesday, May 30
Received a package from my very favorite Norwegian author/illustrator, Anna Fiske. I had written to her last week, telling her how much the kids and I love her books. The package is full of post cards, stickers, coloring sheets, and buttons featuring her illustrations. We're all VERY excited about it.

The Cover of Anna Fiske's HALLO PLANETEN!

Spoke with our realtor. There's someone who may be interested in buying our house in Michigan (I'm not holding my breath, though).

Thursday, May 31
Took all the kids to the science museum for the opening of a new exhibit on dinosaurs. The performance festival is still going on, so I signed Jonah and Oscar up for "Circus School" (Sergie was underage) and took all four boys to a play called "Gutten og Treet" ("The Boy and the Tree").

We had a great time at the dinosaur exhibit...

...apart from one very unfortunate incident.

Juggling at Circus School

Learning other Important Circus Skills

"Gutten og Treet"

Friday, June 1
Yesterday Jonah asked me, "Can we make a movie? Like, with costumes and everything?" I said, "Sure." He said, "Good, because I've already started selling tickets at school." Today he wrote the script and we filmed the opening scenes. It's called VAMPIRE, and I'm guessing it'll earn quite a few Academy Awards.

Saturday, June 2
Went to a huge Viking and Middle Ages Festival. It was tons of fun. It was something like the Renaissance Fair, but much more affordable. There were lots of people in costume, vendors selling "ancient" wares, puppet shows, archery, ax throwing, horse riding, rides on a Viking ship, etc. We met up with friends there, and made some new friends as well.