Joel and Emma's Skandy Adventures

Cami ... and welding!

2011-12-03T16:30:00.001+01:00

No, Cami hasn't learnt to weld yet, but I thought I should mention my beautiful daughter and show her off to the world, at the same time as talking about the progress on my semi-automated brewing machine.

I have been on solo night duties for the past week as we are trying to get Cami settled into a sleeping routine and get used to settling herself back to sleep when she wakes rather than needing a feed from Emma. So waking at 2 or 3am and being up and down a few more times for the rest of the evening is taking its toll especially when you are busy at work. But I shouldn't complain as I have a very beautiful daughter and Emma has had to put up with the lack of sleep for the past 9 months (I did help her a bit on difficult nights but she definitely has had the lions share of sleep deprivation).

Anyway, here is a cute video of Cami on a lazy Saturday morning (a hungover one for Emma).

Anyway, regarding my brewing machine, I have achieved a bit this week but also had some setbacks. When Emma was out last night enjoying a night out with some of her fellow mums, I celebrated a night alone with a lovely sleeping Cami by enjoying some home brew whilst playing with power tools (always a good combination). I decided to drill the 22mm holes in the gas beam where the gas will come and be distributed to the different burners. I used a "step bit" for this task which is a lot easier than a large drill bit, but it is still bloody hard especially on 3mm thick stainless steel which is tougher than nails. So I managed to drill the holes which needs lots of lubricating oil on the bit as well as a slow speed to prevent the stainless from heating up and becoming so hard that it can't be drilled through. There is also a fair kick when the bit bites in to the metal ... luckily no spilt beer! So I managed to get all 4 holes drilled and enjoy a few home brews as well.

Here is the gas beam with the holes drilled.

Today I also managed to tack weld the top part of the frame together which is more difficult than it looks as you need to ensure everything is flush and square. Once it is all welded out there is no turning back so it is essential to get it right. Lots of G clamps, set squares, ratchet straps and leveling aids!

Here is a pic of the top frame when tacked together and also some video of me doing some of the tacks.

Maybe I can blame it on the lack of sleep, but I realized today that I actually cut the gas beam and the other long horizontal 20mm too short (pity it wasn't too long). Lucky I have sufficient spare steel tubing to be able to cut some more but will need to do this with my grinder and a cutting disc as I only hired the metal saw for 1 weekend. Oh well, not the end off the world but certainly a bit frustrating.

Till next time - cheers and beers!

Our blog has been hijacked!

2011-12-01T15:52:00.001+01:00

I just thought I should give some explanation, and an apology for the avalanche of posts lately about brewing! As you are I'm sure aware by now if you have browsed this blog, my husband has a new and engrossing ~~obsession~~ hobby, building his own brewing system. It is occupying his every waking (and probably sleeping) thought, who knew there were so many blogs, forums, you tube videos, websites about home brewing?! Whenever I see him these days he is on the ipad or laptop "researching". It is a world unto itself and there are plenty off hard core brewing geeks out there sharing all kinds of stuff about their equipment, processes, recipes etc. I should mention that Joel isn't really writing all this minute detail about the system for you, our wonderful reader, who is probably related to us or a friend, but rather for the world wide community of brewing geeks who totally dig this kind of ~~nauseating~~ detailed step by step overview of sourcing, building and using this system. So don't feel bad if your eyes glaze over and you barely skim the brewing posts, I will try to balance things out with some more of our usual posts, and if you are a beer geek, well....enjoy and read on! Em.

Welding, pumps, and solenoids ...

2011-11-26T23:00:00.001+01:00

I bought my welding machine last week! I splashed out on an ESAB MIG unit (very reputable brand). The 3 options available were a normal stick/arc welder, a MIG unit, or a TIG unit.

For stainless welding TIG is generally considered the best, but this requires 2 hands coordinating the arc and feeding the electrode in. It is also generally considered the hardest to do well and since I am not even a welders a-hole, I figured to steer away from TIG. They can also be quite expensive machines.

The other end of the scale was a normal stick welder. You can get these units reasonably cheaply and you can get stainless Electrodes with flux on the outside, but it can be challenging to get a decent weld unless you have a heap of practice (welding is an art!). For stainless, stick welding doesn't necessarily provide great shielding gasses from the flux (compared to MIG and TIG) so there is a risk of corrosion creeping into the weld as well.

So the other option was MIG. MIG actually isn't the most recommended type of welding to use for stainless as it generally requires a specific blend of shielding gas (either very expensive tri-mix or a combination of argon and CO2 in roughly 98:2 ratio) and these gasses can be expensive. It also is said to be not the best on thin walled steel such as my kegs so that put me off a bit, but when all things were evaluated, I went with MIG. The main reasons I went with a MIG are that even a welders a-hole can generally get decent looking welds with a MIG unit, I can get reasonably cheap argon in disposable bottles from a shop nearby, you can use pure argon and get reasonable welds (even if they are higher than wider in general), the stainless qualities can be retained, and if you get a good unit, do plenty of practice, know your settings of wire speed vs voltage, weld in a special way for thin materials (focus the heat onto the coupling rather than the thin walled keg) then you should be able to do ok. It is also a good unit to use for general fabrication work down the track. From what I read, you generally get what you pay for with MIG units and the cheaper ones will give you a lot of grief with wire feeding, so I got a very reputable ESAB machine - Origo C141 to be precise!

So I got the welder, got some argon shielding gas with regulator, some stainless wire spools, welding helmet, and all the other necessary stuff and lay down some welds tonight for the first time. I didn't focus on anything critical or that will be on full view, and the welds were ok I guess, but I just welded up one of the brackets that will support one of the burners. I think for my first welds they weren't too bad and I think all the research I put into welding (wire speeds, gasses, push vs pull technique, whip vs weave, weld fit up, tip stick out distances, tip clearances, etc etc) will pay off.

I also picked up my awesome pumps for the system today as well as my gas solenoid valves! The pumps are the brewers standard March pump! These are the 809-HS pump and are a food grade, magnetic drive pump that will be responsible for transferring and recirculating various fluids from and between the different keggles. The solenoid valves will open when told to by the temperature controllers and let gas to the burners for heating the HLT and MLT. They are a NC (normally closed) valve so that they only need to be energized when gas is needed for burning.

So all in all, even though no major progress has been made on the brewing system, I feel as though there is really not much stopping me now from getting this beast on the road. Once I have done some more practice welds on less critical items, I might start tack welding the frame together and get that done before trying out some welds on the keg lids to ensure I have the wire speed and voltage correct to avoid any blow-outs on my precious kegs!

My ESAB MIG unit

The disposable argon gas bottles. Hopefully these will last a decent amount of welds.

My welding station ... with keg stool of course!

Not bad for my first welds.

The other side of the fillet.

My beautiful magnetic drive March pumps - the brewers standard!

My solenoid valves - clever things!

Our little water baby

2011-11-26T21:24:00.001+01:00

Cami and I have been going to baby swimming lessons since august. It has been lovely getting in the pool with her each week and seeing her enjoy the water and learn a lot about moving in the water. Each week we have been building up to diving, teaching her how and when to close her nose and mouth so as not to breathe in any water, and not to be fussed when she gets water in her eyes. She has really enjoyed it and here are a few photos from the classes, including an underwater photo of her diving.

Need a brew system name ...

2011-11-20T16:29:00.000+01:00

Any suggestions for a good brew system name? I have made quite a few small modifications to Lonnie Mac's original and still brilliant Brutus system so figured I should give mine a name of its own.

Am happy to take suggestions in the comments section because Emma isn't coming up with anything decent! ;-)

Some early suggestions:

1. The Tusen Magoosen
2. ...

Brew system continues ...

2011-11-19T16:25:00.001+01:00

Some progress has been made this week on my brew system. I have been doing a lot of extra research much to Emma's annoyance (welding methods and systems, welding gas types, where to get gas, welding wire selection, ways to flare a coupler into the keg, distance of burners from keggles, etc etc etc). It is really fascinating how much information is out there and how complicated you could make it if you wanted! I think the important thing I need to remember is that I am not building a space station so I need to come up with realistic yet robust systems for the brew setup. Saying that however, I have decided to improve on a number of features that other systems have out there and effectively take the best from the rest! But doing it in a reasonably straightforward way!

Anyway the main progress this weekend has been the cutting of all of the framework stainless steel. I hired a big metal saw from "the neighbour" (Naboen.no) which is a really cool rental place which has heaps of cool manly tools! I picked it up on Friday arvo and today got all of the cutting done. It was a very cool tool and managed to slice through the stainless like butter without imparting too much heat into it (which can ruin some of the stainless qualities). One of the improvements over other systems has been to mitre the top corners. This will give me a nice smooth top surface for the kegs to sit on, and it looks cool also. I also cut all of the legs, the support beams, and the second shelf frame work which includes the gas beam. I haven't started to weld it up yet but most of the hard work is done and the metal saw gave some really nice clean cuts as well (which should help a lot with good joint fit up during the welding process). I also cut some scrap sections where I can practice my welding on before hitting the frame itself.

One other improvement over some systems will be the ability to change my burner height. From what I have been reading there are many different opinions regarding how far away the burner tips should be away from the bottom of the kegs. So I have included a shelf system for the burners which will allow them to be adjusted reasonably easily (I.e. no welding required to change height).

The other good stuff that arrived this week was the two Honeywell pilot lights (I only need these on the automated burners under the HLT and MLT (the boil kettle is best to be manually controlled to maintain a rolling boil). I will install these into the adjustable shelf for the burners when I get the burners. I also received my neat little temperature controller (STC 1000). This allows me to set the target temperature of the HLT or MLT and then the STC 1000 sensor will measure the actual temp and if this is lower than target it will then open the solenoid valve to the burner and presto - the heat will go up.

The hired metal saw from Naboen

Some of the legs and horizontal supports

How the top of the brew system will look with the nice mitred corners

The front section and how it roughly goes together (if you have a good 3D imagination)

Some rough preliminary thoughts on how to mount the control panel

Will need some plate I can attach the electrical enclosure onto (food for thought)

These will form the basis for the adjustable height burners

Quick 3D autocad sketchup for confirming all the lengths for the cuts today

The pilot burners

The fancy digital temperature controller and sensor (I need 2 of these to control both HLT and MLT temps)

Brutus Nervous System Arrives!

2011-11-16T20:11:00.001+01:00

Received a care package today courtesy of USPS! Thankfully under the 400kr limit (inclusive of postage) so the Toll Nazi's didn't gouge me for it. What I received today is a core part of the safety system I am including in my brew setup and will work together with the gas pilot safety valves I got the other day. It is some thermocouples which will be used to sense the pilot light and if it blows out then they will tell the gas pilot safety valve to switch off and not send gas to the burner.

Anyway - here they are. I accidentally ordered one more than I needed - always nice to have a spare I guess?!?!

I also found out that the welder I have decided on is in stock so I pick that up on Friday. I also pick up the hired metal saw so I can prep the stainless ready for welding the frame. Good stuff hey!

Now ... off to get myself a beer ... specifically a little creatures pale ale clone!

The Brutus Stomach is Born!

2011-11-13T17:24:00.001+01:00

Norwegian Fathers day today! Thank you to my darling daughter for bringing me a coffee in bed along with some freshly cooked ANZAC cookies! Yum. I was also surprised with a beautiful set of paintings that Cami had done for me.
Thanks to my amazing wifey for helping Cami with all of this. I am a very lucky daddy!

Cami's artwork for her Daddy!

Cami also spoiled me by having a long sleep in the afternoon which allowed me to work on Brutus. Today I made a jig for my grinder that allowed me to make near perfect circular holes in the top of my kegs for the keggles. So today I cut the 3 lids off the kegs and then got a flap disc onto the edges for a nice and safe and neat finish. I plan to weld a handle into the 3 lids and will probably flatten and bend the pick-up tubes from the original kegs and make a nice stainless handle for the lids. I will also need to weld off the opening from the old keg valves. So this is the stomach of Brutus where the wort will be created from pure Norwegian water and crushed malted barley.

The jig for the grinder to make a perfect circle - grinders are as scary as chainsaws!

Close up of the jig - I was still a little nervous using this but it all worked out OK.

First lid cut off - the cutting disc caught in a few spots and gave a few rough edges, but all in all pretty good.

With what will be the lid of the keggle.

The pick-up tubes I will modify and use as a handle for the lids.

The second keg I did was the most perfect - must have got impatient by the third!

All 3 keg lids cut off - just need some buffing up with the flap-disc.

And this is the stainless square section that will form the skeleton of Brutus - next weekends task!

Happy Father's Day to all the lucky Dad's in Norway today!

Crooze-ing along!

2011-11-12T16:41:00.001+01:00

Thanks to Dad and Sharyn Ireland, we have a lovely new Croozer-kid-2! We put this together last weekend and gave it a crack today. It comes in 3 different modes - currently set up in the inspiring but likely under-utilized "jogging-mode". When we get Cami a helmet we will change it to bike trailer mode, attach it to our bikes and can head off on outings and things but will likely use it daily for the barnehage (kindergarten) drop offs and pick ups! In the meantime, hopefully my back keeps on the mend and I can get out with the jogging a little more.

Here is a pic of Em and Cami on their first outing.

Thanks Dad and Sharyn for this lovely gift!

The Brutus Brain and Skeleton is being pieced together!

2011-11-12T13:53:00.001+01:00

I received some goodies in the post yesterday. For those of you interested I received a White-Rodgers 764-742 Gas Pilot Safety Valve (thermocouple operated). This will form part of the brain of the brew system and will provide a good safety system. As the burner system will be automated and will automatically fire the burners when there is a drop in either hot liquor tank (HLT) temperature or also for a drop in the Mash & Lautering Tun (MLT) temperature then I need to make sure that when doing this outside (also for safety reasons with the LP gas) that if the pilot light blows out it will shut off the gas supply to the burners. Therefore I have also ordered some good pilot burners (Honeywell Q314A) and a thermocouple to go with the gas pilot safety valves. These will arrive in the next week or so.

Here is a picture of the gas pilot safety valve.

I have also today gone and picked up some other important parts. The first one is a bunch of fittings for the brewing liquid system. I plan on welding (using a new MIG system) the 1/2" pipe couplers onto the side of the keggles (the BK, MLT and HLT) which will allow me to add various fittings and parts to my keg. The main fitting will be the drain which will include the ball valves. On the MLT I will also include a Tee piece which will allow me to fit a thermowell inline into the system so that I can plug in my thermosensor in-line and have accurate measurement of the wort as it is being recirculated through the RIMS system. This thermosensor will feedback info to the temperature controller and fire the burner under the MLT if the temperature drops below the necessary mashing or sparging temperatures. Easy-peasy!

Anyway here are my stainless fittings (316 stainless no-less!!) which I picked up from Maritim.no down here in Stavanger. Got a very good price on them too!

Here is how the Tee system will be setup with the pipe couple on the end welded onto the keg for the MLT. On the other end at the tee will be a 1/2" thermowell which will measure the mashing temps "in-line". I will then drain or re-circulate from the bottom of the Tee back into the MLT or when I am sparging straight into the BK.

The other thing I picked up today was the skeleton of the system! This is some lovely polished 304 stainless steel which will be cut next weekend (using a hired steel cutting saw). I plan on mitering the top corners for the frame so that it is a nice and flush surface for the kegs to sit on. The rest will be plain square ends. I haven't decided whether to include a gas beam into the system yet or whether I will just have it plumbed externally and secure the plumbing to the frame. I'm leaning towards a gas beam but haven't yet concluded on the final set up for the gas system. So the steel you see on my car roof is 18m of 304 stainless box section (50 x 50 x 3mm) as well as some flat bar which will be used to create an adjustable burner shelf so i can adjust the flame height/position once I see where it fits best. All exciting stuff I can tell you!

My lovely 304 stainless!

I have also decided on what MIG system I will get. It ain't cheap but it's a he'll of a lot cheaper than any other decent MIG system and will provide sufficient power to weld the 3mm wall of the frame. I'll include an argon gas shielding system and for the couplers on the kegs I will have a system to purge the back of the weld with argon to ensure no rusting as a result of the welding process. I'll show my lovely welder when I get it. If they have it in stock next week I may end up being able to perform all my cuts of the steel and start with some trial welding! My lovely steel supplier also threw in a stainless wire brush for polishing the welds after MIG-ing. Champ!

Beer on!

Perhaps the acorn didn't fall quite as far from the tree as previously thought...

2011-11-11T17:41:00.001+01:00

Well Joel is blogging about his latest ~~obsession~~ hobby, so thought I could bore you from a different angle! I come from a family of knitters (on my mum's side) and while mum taught me the basics as a kid I never really took to it. I have made a cushion cover which took about 4 years, and recently finished a scarf started in 2009, so you get the idea...! But now with a cute little person to knit for, and with new inspiration from some of the gorgeous knitted clothes Cami has been given, and with a bit of added peer pressure thanks to Regina (check out her Miss Hermelin blog, link on the side), I have picked up the needles in earnest.

Honestly I think I have been put off a bit by a lot of the knitting patterns I have seen in the past featuring designs and models from 1987. But to my surprise and delight I am finding a whole new bunch of patterns which are really modern and the kids stuff is so cute! I used a Norwegian blog/website www.pickles.no and my first ever attempt at a garment, this vest.

I think it turned out really well! I'm waiting on a wool delivery for my next project, also from pickes the Darling Dress. This will include working with two colors, circular AND double pointed needles and apparently there's crocheting involved, so wish me luck, I'm going to need it!

Important Song

2011-11-11T07:06:00.001+01:00

It's Happening!

2011-11-10T22:45:00.001+01:00

More planning for the ultimate brewery!

More parts are arriving tomorrow! YAY!

Mum-mum

2011-11-04T21:13:00.000+01:00

Cami is just impressing us more and more everyday. Here are a collection of videos of her doing different stuff for your enjoyment!

Brutus is Born!

2011-11-03T20:45:00.001+01:00

Ok, for those non-drinkers out there (a) you will have to be patient over the next couple of months and (b) I don't really like you anyway. I have officially started a project which will consume a lot of my time, thoughts, dreams, energy and money and I hope will give me great satisfaction over the coming years.

The project is to build a sem-automated, all-grain, stainless steel, gas-fired, safety-controlled, RIMS (look it up - highly interesting for beer geeks) brewing system. I have been spending an inordinate amount of time (much to Emma's annoyance) researching how I should go about this. There are quite a lot of different set ups that many fellow beer geeks have made over the years (why are a lot of home brewers engineers?) but one in particular which has been copied, modified and built on over the years is Lonnie Macs Brutus 10 system. I have been researching this system quite a lot, I bought his plans you can buy from Brew Your Own magazine and from reading forums (mostly Aussie Home Brewer and Home Brew Forum).

I have decided to create a system using the best of a number of systems. My main criteria for this system are to have it as stainless steel system where possible, capable of doing 2 batches at once (38L), an automatic temperature controlled system for the HLT and the MLT through use of digital temperature controllers and thermistors through thermowells, pilot lights for the automated gas burners with auto shutoff valves if pilots go out, plate chiller, robust magnetic drive food grade pumps for recirculation for the RIMS as well as for transferring between HLT to MLT to Boiling kettle as well as for the plate chiller for the cold break (more beer geek talk), and a sexy control box/panel/system!

So anyway, the project has started in earnest. I have been in contact with the brewmaster from the Stavanger brewery (Lervig Aktiebryggeri) who gave me some kind pointers as well as offering some kegs for free (unfortunately they were only 30L kegs in Stainless and 50L in aliminium), as well as the main boutique beer pub in town (Cardinal), but I finally got in touch with Ola Vaaland from Bryne ølutsalg (any beer lovers in Stavanger should go there - very impressive - even managed to find a slab of VB there!!!) and Ola found 3 stainless steel 50L kegs for me and put them aside for me. I am planning on converting these into the keggles (keg turned into kettles) which will form the basis for my starting HLT, MLT and boil kettle. I will likely invest in a 70L boil kettle down the track but at least this is a start point. Oh yeah, one of the kegs is about 1/3 full of Tou beer ... It's going straight down the drain!

Kegs picked up tonight waiting conversion to keggles

VB slab ... in Bryne?!?!

I have also been ordering lots of parts for my gas setup. 2x gas pilot safety valves, 2x thermocouples for the valves, 2x solenoid gas valves for automatic control of the gas to the burners, and a few fittings and things.

I plan on getting my stainless steel square hollow section from a fabricator I know through work. Other stuff I will get locally and may even manage to sneak some pumps and Mongolian jet burners in my luggage when coming back from Oz in January!

Anyway, I want to try and document my build as much as possible so will blog regularly about it. Any comments are obviously welcome and I am sure that Cami will have some special apprentice cameo's during the build as well. For now however, it is just getting a few of the bits and pieces together and when it comes to the build I will post a lot more. I will probably start most of the build after I get back from oz in Jan.

Pic of Cami to show I haven't gone completely brewing mad!

Wish me luck!!

Runny Noses and Lazy Weekends

2011-10-30T17:46:00.001+01:00

On Friday night Em and I were free!! We had this annual BBQ event that was put on by one of the local welding companies (Hermes) and Em and I had a big night planned with a babysitter organized and everything. So off we went and had a lovely meal and were getting settled in when our phone rang from the babysitter. Turns out Cami had woken and couldn't be settled. Anyway we decided to call it a night and came home to sort out Cami. Turns out she had a bit of a cold and some teeth coming through (the first one is already poking out). Anyway, the best laid plans went to waste but we ended up having a lovely relaxing weekend and just looking after poor little Cami and her runny nose!

She also tried Vegimite for the first time today sharing some of her daddy's toast! She seemed to like the salty goodness!

Anyway, here are some pics of her eating pâté on bread as well as going for walks today and some from dinner on Saturday night at Ostehuset.

We have a lovely warm fire going tonight and a cozy evening planned. Time to crack open another bottle of red and relax.

Getting Chatty

2011-10-10T16:39:00.001+02:00

It's like Cami woke up on Sunday morning after an overnight revelation that she had a voice she could use to make different sounds. She has been chatting away ever since! We took this video using the iPad forward facing camera so she is actually having a lovely little conversation with herself on the screen!

Cami the Crawling Tower Smasher!

2011-10-02T11:42:00.001+02:00

Yes, she has cracked the code and is now busy hunting (food scraps on the floor) and gathering (Cooba hair) anything within crawling distance.

Enjoy some footage of Cami the Crawling Tower Smasher!

My WTF for the day!

2011-09-14T18:39:00.000+02:00

Running home from work tonight I was bemused by a crowd of people just staring at the entrance to what is obviously some new shop. The crowd just stood there whilst the shop workers stood in a big crowd at the front door without doing anything whilst the flames kept pouring into the sky and ridiculous "computer game style" tune was playing over loud speakers. Certainly a weird enough shop opening. But ... maybe I was just hallucinating again like last run with Kev!

Good Times

2011-09-13T21:10:00.001+02:00

It has been a really cruisy few weeks with a nice daily routine for Cami and I. Joel has been busy and working hard but we have found time to enjoy life's little moments too. We were lucky to win the ballot for a weekend at Laerdal's cabin on a little island in the fjords called Randøy. We went down there with Ryan, Louise and Charles. It was a lot of fun with some kayaking (Joel bought a new sea kayak, apparently he doesn't have enough expensive hobbies!), fishing, walking and of course good food, wine and company. Here are some of out recent photos. We just also bought a new 'point and shoot' camera a Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX5 with a Leica lens. We are really pleased with the results. Enjoy!

A good start to the weekend, J won 2 bottles in the work wine raffle

A beautiful rainbow and our view from the cabin

Joel enjoying his new kayak

Cooba minding the boat!

Cooba and Ryan on the tinny pulled up alongside the grocery shop

Such a beautiful spot

Our little treasure took to the cabin lifestyle! Sleeping soundly

Cuddles and playtime with Ryan

Giggles with Louise

Back home again, practicing sitting up, not quite there yet...!

Fashion parade, I picked up a ton of clothes at the twice yearly 2nd hand sale

Our two little darlings!

Cami sharing fruit with a sleepy Joel 3 weeks ago

2011-09-08T07:00:00.001+02:00

My new job

2011-09-06T20:51:00.000+02:00

In July this year, I changed employer and started work for Ocean Installer. It is a new exciting company with a lot of colleagues from a previous place of work and I am fortunate enough to be also working with some very good friends as well which is a bonus.

We just secured our first vessel which means there is no turning back and it is full steam ahead. Off we go then, to the deep!

Here is a picture of our new vessel we get to play with!

Cami the tower smasher!

2011-09-06T06:00:00.000+02:00

Interesting run to work this morning!

2011-09-05T19:14:00.000+02:00

Kev offered to run with me to work this morning ... which i found a little odd as Kev simply hates running. So my suspicions were already pricked, but I though why not, a run along a beautiful fjord with a mate in the morning can't be all that bad. Little did I know that it would be more dangerous than cycling every day.

The first obstacle was the deceptively stationary barriers at the entrance to the cycle path. This barrier jumped out of nowhere to smash into my left thigh and consequently catapult me into a double pike saulto with twist. After dusting (more like wiping as it was also drizzling) myself up off the ground, we continued along ... me with a dead-leg style running gait ... and all seemed ok. I have a suspicion that there might have been a little nudge just before the barrier from Kev but it all happened far too quickly and was quite comical really ... apart from the deep haematoma to my left thigh!

Then a couple of km's further along the track, Kev "apparently" had to move over to the side to let a cyclist through and this is where the intent appeared more obvious. It might have been the pain from the dead leg causing some mild hallucinations, but I clearly remember Kev pushing me directly into the path of another deceptively stationary object ... this time a fist sized rock. Anyway, after rolling my left ankle, and barely letting out a manly groan, I hobbled along for a while and managed to pick up the pace again later.

Once at work however my ankle started to severely seize up and here I am now lying on Cami's foam play mat, drugged up to the eyeballs on anti-inflammatories, pain killers, icing and elevating and cursing Kev for the offer of a friendly run this morning.

When I can walk again, I plan to offer Kev a bike ride to work ... I have a few tricks up my sleeve.

Disclaimer: Any allegations in this blog are purely allegations. No criminality can be proven until revenge is enacted.

Cami cuteness

2011-09-04T22:34:00.001+02:00

This is a cute pic of Cami that couldn't help but post for all to see.
We love her lots and lots!!!!

How to pack for a business trip

2011-09-04T15:27:00.001+02:00

It's been a while since I did one, but packing for a business trip is a skill I have honed over many trips over many years. Here are my top tips! I wrote this for my sister in law, Sam Cousins in case she might be able to use some of it for her new website, www.chevali.com.au, she is selling new and vintage clothes. Check it out!

Packing for a business trip is a skill which can be learnt with a bit of practise and some imagination. When travelling for work there are some key questions that should guide your preparation of what clothes to pack:

Where am I travelling to?

Think about the climate, terrain, city/country

What activities will I be involved in? Meetings, fancy dinners, conference, leisure time

When I pack for a short business trip (eg. 2-5 days) I always take a carry-on suitcase only. If you're travelling with colleagues and you're the only one with checked luggage you will hold up the whole group waiting at the luggage carousel! But most importantly losing your luggage when going on holidays is a hassle, on a business trip it can be disastrous. You often hit the ground running and go straight into work mode and doing this in your jeans that you were flying in is just not a good look. If you are going on a long trip and need a bigger suitcase always take an emergency outfit and underwear in your carry on, or travel in clothes you can get away with for your first day.

With only a carry on case to fill, you have to be smart. My number one tip is to choose a base colour palette and stick to it. For me its always black, but you might choose brown instead. For me black becomes my base colour and I only wear items that will coordinate with it. This allows you maximum flexibility to mix and match pieces to create new outfits. I will always pack a pair of black pants and a black skirt, black boots and/or heels, a black cardigan or jacket and a belt. You might have a great day-to-night black dress which travels well (more on that in a moment) which would be a great addition.

Shoes take up a lot of space and are heavy so try to take as few pairs as you can get away with. This is one of the greatest advantages for me in sticking with one colour (eg. black) you don't need multiple pairs of shoes to coordinate with different coloured outfits. I often wear my biggest/heaviest shoes on the plane (eg. Boots).

My work attire is almost always 'smart' but not 'suit', so obviously that guides my selections. Once you have
your basic black items you would add pieces to fill out your selection. I would choose tops in black, grey, navy, beige/camel. This might sound boring but you can add brighter colours with a scarf or jewellery which take up less space in your case. Darker tops are easier for me when travelling, especially when flying, there's
something about plane food – I always manage to spill it on myself! Dark colours are more forgiving. Black leggings or opaque tights can be very handy if it's a little cool, it allows you to layer your outfit but still be warm. If I'm travelling in winter I will always carry with me a smart warm jacket (eg. A trench or woollen jacket). Always pack an umbrella just in case.

Regarding clothes that travel well, I never pack items that crumple or need ironing. You never know if you will have an iron in your hotel room so I just avoid the issue altogether. I love to travel with items in wool, wool mix, jersey, and other comfortable, high quality synthetic fabrics that will look fresh straight from the suitcase. Natural fabrics like wool are more forgiving if you need to wear something twice and will dry quickly if you need to hand wash it.

Another good idea is to leave a little space in your suitcase (or buy an expandable case) in case you have time to fit in some shopping. Checking in your luggage on the way home is much easier as consequences of loosing your luggage are not so drastic once you are home.

So to summarise my top tips are:

Take carry on luggage only (ideally expandable)
Choose a base colour (eg. Black) and only select items that coordinate to mix and match
Take as few pairs of shoes as you can get away with, wear your biggest/heaviest pair on the plane
Add colour and flair with scarves and jewellery
Choose fabrics that travel well and won't crumple

Daddy Daughter Chats

2011-08-28T16:28:00.000+02:00

Having chats with my daughter ... about life, love, football, and unicorns.

Cami aged 6.5 months

Family Resemblance?

2011-08-28T15:11:00.008+02:00

I think there are some definite Ireland genes at work here...these are some pics of Eliza our niece (Zac and Fraze's daughter) and Cami at a similar age. Sometimes we feel we could be looking at photos of the same girl! If Cami had slightly chubbier cheeks.....

Eliza

Cami

Eliza

Cami

Back to just us four

2011-08-26T18:32:00.001+02:00

It has been a wonderful few months with visitors galore. My sister Sally was here for a month getting a behind he scenes look at life on maternity leave! A highlight of her visit was a Girls Week in Croatia. We stayed in the island of Hvar. It was beautiful, very relaxing and we had a great time. While it was sad to say goodbye at least it's only a few months until we see each other again in Melbourne. We are planning a visit around Christmas. Here are a few photo from Sally's trip!

Cami's 3rd flight, seasoned traveller!

The view from our balcony in Hvar

Taking in the sights and super yachts at Hvar harbor

Getting into the holiday mood!

Big eyes taking in the world

Beautiful Hvar

On a boat to one of the smaller islands. The baby carrier was a must - so many steps in Croatia = not pram friendly.

A happy morning girl, unlike her auntie Sally (at least until she's had her morning coffee!)

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Summer Holiday in Fayence, South France

2011-07-18T16:57:00.000+02:00

We returned a couple of weeks ago from a fantastic holiday - 2 weeks in the South of France. We were so lucky to be able to take Cooba with us - Joel drove our car down there and Cami and I flew down and met him and Cooba in Nice. It was such a wonderful holiday shared with two other families - Aud Trude, Kristian and Oliver, as well as Mari, Kev, Oscar and Elliot.

One thing I realised when compiling this album is we've become the typical first-time parents and taken 500,000,000 photos of Cami and hardly any of anyone or anything else! We will be sure to remedy this next time. Seasoned Campaigners Mari and Kev are clued onto this and have a much better set of pics showing the house we stayed in and lots of photos of the whole crew, the link to their blog is in the list of links in the top right so feel free to stop by there for some other photos. But boy do we have some cute photos of our little girl!

In other news, Sally arrives tomorrow, and I'm pumped!!

Double click on the photos to view the slideshow.

A Happy Little Girl

2011-05-27T22:01:00.006+02:00

Well I blinked and already its May! Time flies when you're having fun, and I'm finding that so true. Our little girl is now 3 1/2 months old. I glanced back at some pregnancy photos and got a bit of a shock, I struggle to remember now how it felt to be pregnant, to have that huge baby bump and all the baby wriggles, awkward movement and how it felt to have a bladder capacity of an egg cup! I did love being pregnant, but it's fantastic to have my 'old' body back - more or less, be it a little battle scarred.

I really love being a stay at home mum. Its a dramatic change which happened literally overnight, but I feel I'm into the swing of things now. Cami is such a beautiful, happy little girl she makes each day a pleasure. I've been busy with all our wonderful guests (more on that in a minute), a weekly meet-up with a group of other mums who are all ex-pats whom we met through our birthing course, I just finished a 3 week baby massage course... the days fill up so easily and the weeks just fly past.

Cami is absolutely awesome. Seriously. She is amazing. There were times during the first 6 weeks of her life when Joel and I would look at each other and ask "is this what it's going to be like now? Did we get a dodgy one?" and we were only half joking. She is sleeping beautifully at night, and any parent will tell you that if you get a 'decent' amount of sleep at night then you can cope with most of what the day will throw at you. There's a reason sleep deprivation is used as a form of torture! We have a great night time routine with Cami now and she sleeps from 7pm until around 5.30am, with a wake up at around 2 or 3am for a quick feed. Joel usually brings her in to bed with us at 5.30am, and then after a feed he takes her downstairs with him while he gets ready for work while I get an extra 45mins or so of zzzz time (so precious). Then Cami and I usually snooze until around 8 if I'm lucky and depending on what mood she's in!

I know how lucky we are and that for many parents of a 3 month old that kind of sleep routine is just a pipe dream, so we're really appreciating our clever little sleeper! I think it has helped for us to create a definite ritual/routine which we do almost exactly the same way every night - bath at 6.30, swaddle her tightly in a wrap, top up feed (even if her last feed wasn't that long before), and down to sleep by 7. She may stir 2 or 3 times after that, but usually just plugging her dummy back in does the trick and her gorgeous little blue eyes roll back in her head and she's off to la la land again immediately. I also think moving her into her own room really helped, it makes the night feeds much more efficient and effective, rather than us both dozing off in bed mid-feed, this way although I have to get up for the feed I know she's getting enough milk, and I can sleep so much more comfortably when she's not in the bed! The rocking chair I upholstered is getting heaps of use for those night time feeds in Cami's room.

Cami is smiling all the time, in the last couple of weeks she has just started to grasp things and hold them, sometimes bringing them to her mouth. She is really interacting heaps with loads of eye contact and lots of adorable little noises and squeals. She isn't rolling yet, or laughing but I don't think those things will be far away. She's losing quite a lot of her newborn hair which was quite dark and she seems to be growing a new crop which is more blonde. I wonder if she might be a beautiful little strawberry blonde girl like her Auntie Sally. We'll see.

My parents came to see us for 2 weeks and just left early this week. It's still a little raw for me actually, I'm sure you can understand why. Seeing Mum and Dad with their first grandchild was so incredibly special and beautiful. Mum especially just adores babies and children and she slipped into 'Grandma' mode effortlessly and perfectly. She was wonderful with Cami, very hands-on and took every possible opportunity for cuddles and time with her. No nappy was too pooey, no grizzle too daunting. Dad loved his Cami cuddles and kisses, I absolutely loved seeing them together. Watching Mum and Dad say goodbye to Cami at the airport to fly out for the rest of their trip in Europe broke my heart a bit, and to be honest it hasn't quite mended yet. Cami is changing and growing so much, and she's such a special little girl, it weighs heavily on my heart that she is not able to see all her wonderful family all the time, and they can't drop by for cuddles. Thank goodness for Skype and our fantastic family who are going to so much effort to see us and stay in regular contact. We've been absolutley blown away by the generosity shown by everyone with sending their messages, cards and gifts. Cami is such a lucky little girl to be welcomed into the world with so much love and care. It makes Joel and I feel very humble indeed.

In the coming weeks and months we have loads to look forward to. Joel's sister Emma arrives next week to stay with us for a week. She's so excited to meet Cami it's wonderful of her to take a week out of her European trip to come and see us. Not long after that Joel, Cami, Cooba and I are off to the south of France for 2 weeks with some friends for a holiday. We're renting a villa in a little town called Fayence, about 20km inland, north of St Raphael/Cannes area. We're going with Mari, Kev, Oscar and Elliot, and Aud Trude, Kristian and Oliver. Can't wait! After that Sally is coming to visit. So lots on the agenda and an exciting few months ahead.

with Mum and Dad in Oslo (overnight trip to get Cami's Aussie Passport)

Beautiful smiley girl

First cuddles with Grandma and Grandad

9 weeks and counting!

2011-04-22T10:06:00.003+02:00

Cami is now 9 weeks old and is just going from strength to strength. We continue to notice and appreciate the change in her since she turned 6 weeks old. Looking back on that time we think wow - that was tough. Our sister in law Fraze said that the 6 week mark was a milestone and things can improve quite a bit, and how right she was. Cami is now in her own bedroom and we’re able to settle her in the evening between about 7 and 8pm and she will sleep until around 2, or if we’re lucky she’ll even last a few hours longer than that. The two biggest improvements are that she’s happier during the days – whereas before she’d be always grizzling or crying during her awake time, now she is very content and smiling and can happily sit in her bouncinette. The other big change is settling her to sleep. It used to take aaaaaggggeeeesssss and you could only put her down in her cot once she was really truly dead asleep. Now after a cuddle we can put her down and more often than not she will drop off to sleep on her own. This is a huge improvement and it has given us back our evenings and also makes the night feeds much easier.

We’re really enjoying our little girl. She is growing more alert and interacting more all the time. Lots of eye contact, smiles, she is just so unbelievably cute! Joel and I are feeling a bit more in ‘control’ of our daily routine now and understand her signals much better – when is she tired/hungry etc. We’ve also picked up some tricks (or maybe she has gotten used to the things we do to calm her) so now when she’s crying and upset we can sooth her more easily. We find putting her upright cuddling against our shoulder/chest, shooshing and doing squats really helps. We saw a midwife do it in the hospital and it worked brilliantly so we’ve been doing it ever since. Not a bad leg/butt work out either for us!

Joel’s mum Bernadette is visiting us at the moment. It has been wonderful to see her with Cami, her third granddaughter. She adores her and I think the feeling is mutual. She has been a big help to us and Joel has taken holidays while she’s visiting so it has been great. My parents are due in a couple of weeks too, and to say my mum is excited to meet her first grandchild would be a bit of an understatement!

Off now to enjoy some beautiful easter sunshine. Enjoy the holiday everyone!

It's a Girl!

2011-04-04T08:43:00.003+02:00

So blog posts don’t get much bigger than this! Maybe that’s why its taken so long to write this one…! Well that or we’ve had our hands rather full!

On Tuesday February 15^th at 16:05 our beautiful little girl, the wriggly one I’d been taking care of for the past 9 months, was born. Finally we got to see those adorable little heels we could feel poking out under my ribs, see the hiccups that had been gently rocking my stomach, and thank our lucky stars that we managed to bring her safely into the world. She is perfect in every way.

She weighed 2.91kg, or 6 lb 6 oz in the old measurements, and measured 49cm in length. Her name is Cami Louise Ireland.

Her birth was absolutely amazing. My contractions started at about 3.30am on the 15^th, 6 days before my due date. I had an unsettled night’s sleep and was up and down to the bathroom a lot (even more than usual!) and some back pain and period pain type cramps had started. I waited half an hour or so before I woke Joel up as by then I had the feeling this could be it. Well…actually I wasn’t sure as Mum had told me she and Dad were at the hospital 3 times with false labour before I was born, but in any case I had a feeling it was labour, false or not!

Joel phoned the hospital to get some advice as I’d been measuring quite small for the previous couple of weeks of my pregnancy and the doctor had advised us that the baby was 29% below average size. The midwife said to hang in there at home and to come into the hospital when things started to get intense. We stayed in bed until about 5.30am but by then I needed to get up and move around to manage the pain. Joel lit the fire and some candles, put on some music, fed Cooba, and actually we just sort of looked at each other a lot saying “wow, this is it!” The contractions started very regularly right from the beginning – about 5 minutes apart and lasting about a minute. Before too long I needed Joel to help me with heat packs, massage, and a hand to hold onto during the contractions. We felt really well prepared from the birth course we attended so we knew what we needed to do and just got on with it.

By about 9.30am I felt like I needed to go to the hospital. We’d almost used up the hot water already at home in the shower, the contractions were very painful and I wanted to make sure our ‘small’ baby would be ok – I wanted to be reassured that the baby’s heartbeat was strong and she wasn’t being stressed by the contractions (I had been told my amniotic fluid which cushions the baby during the contractions was at the low end of the normal amount). We actually walked to the hospital as it’s literally down the end of our street! A small aside – it had been a really windy couple of days in Stavanger in the lead up to the 15^th, there was a big exhaust tower at the hospital which had been blown by the wind and was at quite an precarious angle and at risk of collapsing taking out the ambulance station and probably the supermarket over the road, the whole street was cordoned off, there were police everywhere, we actually had to cross a police cordon to get to the door of the hospital. They tried to stop us and I think Joel really loved telling them he had a wife in labour and that they had to let us through! Which they did.

Once we got to the labour department they checked me, the baby was fine and I was 2cm dilated. It was at that point as I’m sure any mum would tell you I was of the opinion that I’d been having strong regular contractions for 5-6 hours so my response was “2cm – is that bloody all???!!!!”. We were told we could stay at the hospital or go home for a while, I decided we should stay. We were able to use the ‘fødeloft’ or birthing loft in the hospital – which is basically like a birthing centre up on the 7^th floor. We settled into our room with a nice view over the hospital grounds including the leaning tower. I was very keen to use the bath as I knew the benefits of pain relief that warm water could bring from my experience over Christmas. So we ran a bath, the midwife provided some aromatherapy oil, and off we went. Joel was again doing a great job with the massage and encouragement, iced water, whatever I needed. He was there with me through each and every contraction and didn’t leave my side.

It’s hard to remember the timing of everything as it all sort of went in a blur. It didn’t seem like very long (I guess it must have been a few hours) and I was checked again and was about 6-7cm dilated. So that felt like good progress. Back in the bath for a bit longer and before long the contractions intensified. I think some time around then my waters broke but as I was in the bath it was a bit hard to tell! As things really got going I got out of the bath. The midwife said I was about 9cm and almost ready to start pushing. I think at that stage they did a bit of acupuncture just to encourage the last cm or so of dilation. The midwife also attached a fetal scalp monitor to the baby. By about 2.30pm I went through the transition stage (holy moly) and was ready to start pushing. There is a policy at Stavanger hospital that you can push for an hour. If the baby isn’t born in that timeframe, they intervene to help things along. By about 3.30pm with a lot of pushing Cami hadn’t been born.

At that point things really changed. It went from being Joel, the midwife and I to all of a sudden I was put onto a bed and wheeled down to the 1^st floor. I went into a room with about 8 people in it – doctor, trainee doctor, midwives, nurses. Two nurses were inserting an IV, another doing a catheter (ouch), the doctor prepared the ventouse vacuum device. There was an awful lot of swearing, sweating and plenty of general yelling during the delivery, and that was just from Joel! Eventually, finally, excruciatingly she was born. She was put straight onto my chest, I asked if it was a boy or a girl, someone told us it was a girl. Joel was crying, Cami was crying as they rubbed her down but she was a little distressed after the tough delivery so her breathing and cries were a not as strong as they like to see. So she was whisked off to the doctor for a bit of help breathing. She was in great shape, and her condition improved really quickly.

They wheeled her in her warm humidicrib into my room within about 15 minutes so I could see her but then she had to go to the NICU (neonatal intensive care unit) for check ups and monitoring. Frustratingly I had to remain lying in bed until my bleeding stopped. This took about 3-4 hours so Joel was ferrying back and forth between Cami in the NICU and me. The labour was so tough, but geez being apart from my baby for the first few hours of her life was the worst. It felt surreal “did that really just happen?”. My wonderful husband though managed to convince a nurse in the NICU to hand over her other patients to someone else and bring Cami down to see me. It was a few hours after her delivery but this was the first time I got to have a cuddle and we had a try at breast feeding. That was special. Finally my beautiful, perfect little girl was in my arms. Joel got my vote for ‘husband of the year’ for making that happen. Again, like at Christmas, I think his experience in navigating the hospital system came in very handy – he was able to be proactive and push for the hospital staff to meet our needs.

By about 8pm Cami was back at NICU and my bleeding had finally stopped and I could have something to eat and a shower. Joel and I at that point headed across to the ‘birth hotel’ – a hotel within the hospital for parents with newborns. We were able to go and see Cami whenever we wanted but they recommended we come in every 3 hours starting at midnight to feed Cami. We then had the exciting task of phoning our family back in Melbourne. By then it was about 9.30 or 10pm so we were able to share the excitement with our family first thing on their Wednesday morning. Everyone was so thrilled and excited, it was wonderful but of course bittersweet as they are so far away and it would be a little while before they would be able to meet her.

Joel and I both went over to the NICU for the midnight visit and feed. I changed Cami’s nappy for the first time. We had a bit more success this time with feeding (the first time we only got her ‘latched on’ for a few minutes.

I went over for the 3am feed but Joel slept through. He was exhausted and I guess didn’t have the hormonal ‘high’ to keep him going through the night! But he joined us at 6am, when we were told she would be checked out by the paediatrician in the morning and hopefully could be ‘discharged’ to our care around noon.

So at noon the following day she was checked out by the paediatrician and given the all clear. She needed to have some follow up blood tests as there was a mild elevation in her CRP (infection) levels in her blood, but nothing to worry about and they were trending downwards. She was doing really well and we were so thrilled that finally we could take over her care. We spent 3 nights in the hospital (at the birth hotel) and the midwives were fantastic, available all day and night and they gave us loads of help and advice on everything from bathing to breastfeeding and much more. We came home on Friday ready for the weekend, we walked home with Cami in her pram. It had snowed so everything was white and it was a beautiful day, lots of blue sky and sunshine.

Latest News

Well that took me a while to write over a few snatched minutes at the laptop. Now Cami is just over 6 weeks old. She is growing heaps (4.24kg and 54cm at her 6 week check up) and already growing out of some of her newborn clothes! We have had some tough days and nights with her that’s for sure, but it feels like when we hit the 6 week mark things have taken a bit of a turn for the better. We’re finding her to be more settled with her feeding, digestion and sleep and overall just a more contented baby. We hope this new phase lasts as she continues to grow.

Other changes we’re seeing are that she’s now much more alert, making eye contact, and the big milestone – she’s started to smile! It’s wonderful to know that she is feeling happy! She is thoroughly gorgeous (of course!), we think she has Joel’s eyes, my nose and the rest remains to be seen!

We’ve had a lovely visit from Joel’s dad John who came to stay with us for 5 days in late March, and his mum Bernadette will arrive in a week to stay for a fortnight. My parents will be coming after that during May, followed by Joel’s sister Emma, and then probably Sally will head over mid-summer. It will be a busy time with lots of visitors but we’re very excited to introduce Cami to many of her family members.

Also we had a very exciting event in my family with Brett’s marriage to Sam on the 20^th March. It was a beautiful wedding which we would have dearly loved to have attended in person. Unfortunately Cami’s passport wasn’t ready in time. Luckily though I was able to see and hear all the highlights ‘live’ on Skype! Technology really came through for us thanks to Jeff and Denise Mills who arranged this using their wireless internet and laptop.

I will try to update the blog more frequently, but for now we’re off to start a busy day. Cami is asleep and mothers of newborns certainly know how those precious minutes are to get some things done before she awakes and needs my full attention.

38 Weeks, The Countdown is On!

2011-02-06T20:10:00.015+01:00

It has been an eventful couple of weeks. Cyclones in Queensland, floods in Melbourne, a very special little baby arrived in Stavanger (not ours!).

I’m up to 38 weeks and I’m feeling great. I’m really enjoying being on maternity leave (started a week ago @37 weeks) and am working my way through a long ‘to do’ list of bits and pieces around the house, preparing for the baby’s arrival.

My thoughts now are really on the labour and really I’m just hoping and praying for a healthy baby.

My girlfriends in Stavanger threw me a gorgeous baby shower on Thursday night. I knew they had something planned but thought it was meant to be this weekend, so got quite a surprise when I showed up at Aud Trude and Kristian’s house for dinner only to find loads of pink and blue decorations and a room full of girls shouting ‘surprise’!! It was a really lovely evening, lots of baby talk of course and our mates all chipped in and bought us a beautiful hand crafted cradle which we will keep downstairs in our living room for baby’s daytime naps. Thanks so much to everyone and despecially to Louise and Aud Trude for arranging everything, it was a really special night. A baby shower isn’t a Norwegian tradition at all so for many of the girls it was their first (but hopefully not their last – it might catch on)!

On Monday 24^th January we were so excited to hear about the arrival of Mari and Kev’s baby, a boy, Elliot Murphy. He is a little treasure, absolutely perfect in every way and is sleeping and feeding like a champion. His big brother Oscar is so lucky to have a little brother, we can just imagine how much fun they’re going to have growing up!

I’ve also been asked to be a fadder (Godmother) to Aud Trude and Kristian’s beautiful little boy Oliver. His christening is 20^th February, the day before our due date so we hope to be able to make it either with a big belly or a little baby!

I finished quite a big project I started quite some time ago – a rocking chair. I quite liked the idea of having one for use when nursing. I found a really nice old second hand one and decided to try my hand at reupholstering it. I found some great videos on youtube (http://www.youtube.com/user/diyupholsterysupply#p/u/13/jWyZEbNAnmU) giving step by step instructions on how to do it. I bought some fabric on ebay and had to chase up a local upholsterer to buy some tacks and other supplies as it seems DIY upholstery hasn’t really taken off here in Norway and I struggled to find supplies online. Anyway I finally finished the job today. I’m really happy with the end result. I’m actually sitting in it by the fire as I type this blog post! I learned a lot about how to do it so maybe I’ll find some more projects during my year away from work.

So that’s it from us, waiting patiently and putting all the finishing touches on the baby’s room. We’ve now put up some shelves, a heater and curtains for the nursery. Here it is now almost ready for our little one to settle into.

Bump Watch

2011-01-16T19:13:00.000+01:00

Ok ... so this is my first blog post in a while, so I have decided to show off my lovely wife and her gorgeous bump! I borrowed my company's studio gear (studio flashes/strobes, radio triggers, backdrops, etc) and set up Emma for a photo shoot.

These were shot on 12th December which was the week before we went to Switzerland for Bec and Terry's Swiss wedding. Em was about 31 weeks along at that stage. A lot has happened since then such as our Christmas and New year spent at the hospital. Now Emma is 35 weeks and getting bigger by the day. I hope we will be able to do some more bump shots in the last 5 weeks so stay tuned.

Now for my beautiful wife and her lovely bump.

Getting on with getting excited

2011-01-14T15:28:00.000+01:00

So a couple of weeks on from the surgery and things are most definitely looking up. My recovery has been quite quick and it’s such a relief to be free from pain, apart from the usual aches of being 35 weeks pregnant! I’ve had a couple of weeks off work to recuperate and feel like I’m physically and mentally ready to go back to work on Monday, at least for 2 more weeks before my maternity leave starts. Here in Norway it’s mandatory to start your leave 3 weeks before the due date.

So I’ve spent my days over the last couple of weeks just taking things easy. I’ve had quite a few days doing not much but watching telly and annoying Cooba with cuddles while he’s trying to snooze on his bed. I’ve been making the most of sleeping in, a lazy breakfast, loads of time reading The Age online, facebook stalking, all the usual pastimes!

Joel and I have also been getting the baby’s room ready. We’re planning to have him/her in a cot in our bedroom initially as I think it will make life a bit easier for me with night feeds, but we’ll have a room ready to go with all the other accoutrements for when we’re all ready to have a wall between us at night! Joel had initially planned to do the full box-and-dice renovation on the room (which used to be the study) involving plastering and down lights. But after our Xmas/New Years dramas we agreed it was just too much effort and stress to worry about, so we settled for a fresh coat of paint, new cornices and window/door edging (what’s that called again, the Norwegian word is Lists, I’ve forgotten the English word!) and a lovely new light fitting. Joel took care of all of that over a couple of days, and now has assembled a new cupboard (hooray for extra storage space!), the baby’s cot, change table and pram. We still need to put up some window coverings, add some shelves, a rug for the floor, a heater and some cosiness.

Before the renos

painting done, new light, before the cornices/edging

Ikea flat pack ready to assemble

My handy husband making short work of the Ikea assembly

Cupboard, cot, change table assembled. iRobot doing its thing cleaning up

I’ve pulled out all the clothes and things I bought at the second hand sale back in September and have washed all the little teeny tiny little outfits and things. Wow, cute. I have to say I think I may have overbought on the ‘newborn’ sized clothes and have loads of clothes in neutral white, green, yellow etc. I don’t mean to sound presumptuous at all but if you happen to want to shop for clothes for baby Ireland, he/she could definitely use some 3-6+ mth sizes in girl or boy colours or styles as we are honestly pretty well set now for 0-3mths with lots of gender neutral clothes.

Lots of teeny clothes ready to put into the baby's new cupboard

So this weekend Joel is off on a cross country ski trip with Ryan and Charles. They leave Friday night and ski to a cabin to stay the night, then spend Saturday touring around returning to the cabin again on Saturday night. They’ll ski back on Sunday. I’m pretty sure this will be the last time I’d be happy for Joel to be out of phone range and not very accessible in the lead up to the due date, but he’ll have a fantastic time.

Me? Well I’m under strict instructions from Joel not to do anything remotely strenuous that might bring on early labour! I’ll hopefully be able to spend some time with Louise and maybe some other girlfriends while Joel is away.

A not so Merry Christmas after all

2011-01-03T09:59:00.000+01:00

Well it’s been a bit of radio silence from the Irelands in Norway these last couple of weeks. You last heard from us returned from an amazing trip to Switzerland, and looking forward to a quiet but enjoyable Christmas and a trip to the mountains for New Years.

Well it was a great plan, but unfortunately wasn’t to be. I woke up on Christmas Eve morning experiencing quite a bit of pain. I guess this is a bit of a debrief for me as well just to write down what happened. Maybe I’ll be accused of over-sharing, so be it. I don’t mind sharing what we’ve been through, it’s a bit rare but just goes to show even the most ‘normal’ pregnancy can take a bit of a turn… but as I said it’s all ok in the end so don’t worry! Now if you’re not good with hearing about gory pregnancy details and medical stuff I suggest you skip to the happy ending in the last paragraph!

So yes, pain. Right side abdominal pain. It has been a somewhat reoccurring theme for me in this pregnancy to have some pain – I was hospitalised for 2 days back in October for the same thing and have had a couple of milder doses in between. But then I believe the diagnosis was something many pregnant women experience – constipation. Glamorous isn’t it, this pregnancy caper! During pregnancy the hormones in your system slow down your digestion so that the baby can get as many nutrients as possible from the food you digest, just my luck that my damn system was so good at this that things would grind to a halt every now and then. I was managing it with diet and fluids and exercise (or so I thought) so was quite annoyed when I got this mega pain on the 24th December.

So I just thought, ok I’ll just get through this painful few hours and all will be fine. Problem was the hours turned into a day, turned into 2 days, 3 days and no relief. I was very sick (pain and vomiting) and on Boxing Day we decided it was time to go to the hospital to make sure the baby was ok and to see what was going on. They monitored the baby at hospital and told us he/she was fine, that it probably was constipation again and I should take some pretty simple treatments (I won’t go into details there…!) and it should be ok. By then I had stopped vomiting, and was just feeling drained and still in a lot of pain.

I managed to get my system ‘working’ again, was able to start to eat and drink a bit and thought things were on the improve. But there was still the pain. And the pain if anything got worse. So I soldiered through a few more days at home with paracetamol and hot showers until on 30th December I thought I needed to go to the GP because the pain was terrible and it just wasn’t going away. I was pretty sure this wasn’t just a stubborn poo anymore…

The GP took a simple finger prick blood test which showed some elevated levels of infection/inflammation, so it was over to the hospital for more tests. At the hospital they were thinking along the lines of appendicitis. This wasn’t news to us – it was what they had to rule out back in October during my last hospital visit. Problem was it some of the symptoms didn’t really support it and the stage of my pregnancy complicated it all – everything in the abdomen moves around and changes so much it’s hard to know what is going on. Anyway, they did an ultrasound and found an area of inflammation, and came in on the evening of 30th December and said they wanted to operate on suspected appendicitis.

GETTING EXAMINED IN EMERGENCY ROOM IN HOSPITAL

Joel and I were of course very worried and nervous about the affects of an operation and general anaesthesia on the baby (32 weeks). We were also a little nervous that the particular young surgeon who bowled over to my bedside and announced that they wanted to operate right away seemed a bit scalpel-happy and wasn’t doing the things we asked – ie. To consult with a senior obstetrician and senior anaesthetist (who we would also like to speak to) to get some advice. So to be honest Joel and I were being difficult and asking lots of questions.

Fortunately there was a shift change and the next surgeon who came on duty was a lot more diligent and came and spoke to us at length. He’d sat down with the radiographer who did the ultrasound and his consultant surgeon and discussed what it could be. After much discussion of the ultrasound and my case history (6 days of pain) they felt it was likely that the appendix had already burst and created an abscess and that the best approach would be to treat it with antibiotics overnight and then drain the wound. They could also see if the antibiotics had any affect to shrink it overnight. They/we were cautious about doing any more tests such as a CT scan due to the risk of exposing the baby to harmful radiation. So it was a bit of guesswork and deduction involved.

So I was of course happy that I wasn’t about to be wheeled into surgery, but also not that thrilled with the idea of a burst appendix in my abdomen! The next morning, New Years Eve, they did another ultrasound and Joel, the radiographer and I were joined in the lab by about 4 other radiographers, including we think some pretty senior doctors, and our original radiographer came up with a new theory, that it was actually a twisted ovary, not the appendix after all. There were lots of nods and pats on the back for this switched-on guy as all the pieces seemed to fit that diagnosis, and it was quite left-of-field.

So then I was transferred over to gynaecology, and they advised the only treatment was surgery. Fortunately there was a very experienced laparoscopic gyno surgeon on duty and she would be operating on me. Some calming words from our friend Jonno Evans, an anaesthetist in Melbourne about the surgical risks to the baby (minimal) and I was in the theatre within the hour. I was scared of course but just trying to remain calm for the baby. One of the biggest risks for the pregnancy was that I would go into premature labour, and I knew that I just had to remain calm and composed, I’m quite proud that I managed it. As I was being taken to theatre a surgeon said to me “normally we’d give you some relaxant drugs before you go into theatre but you seem quite calm, I don’t think that you need that”. Our poor baby had already had to put up with more drugs than we’d ever want, so I was pleased that at least I could do that.

So the surgery went very well, they found that my ovary had twisted twice and the tissue had died. There was absolutely no chance to save it so it was removed. Post-op I was moved into a really lovely private room up on the top floor of the hospital with a fantastic view over Stavanger. Joel was with me as we watched the fireworks start to light up the sky on new years eve. We felt quite happy at this point – happy the surgery had gone well, happy the source of my week-long pain had been identified and resolved, happy that I wasn’t in labour! We were happy that we’d worked together and with the doctors to continuously question the diagnosis, the risks and benefits of the plans that were outlined to us, and advocated for ourselves and our baby to ensure we got the best possible care. We also put our faith in the doctors who we know were thorough, diligent and skilled, and who communicated with us about what was going on, including those things they weren’t sure of.

JOEL WITH SMUGGLED IN RED WINE TO HOSPITAL ON NEW YEARS EVE (7th FLOOR WITH GREAT VIEW OF FIREWORKS ALL OVER THE CITY)

JOEL SMUGGLED IN SOME SWEETS AND TREATS (INCLUDING S&V CHIPS) TO HELP ME RECUPERATE

So now I’m into day 3 post-op and although I have some normal post operative pain, I can’t say how relieved I am to have the original pain gone. The focus now is just to rest, get moving again (physio Joel has me on a pretty good rehab plan!), eat well and recuperate. Joel has been an absolute solid rock of support over the 10 days, I couldn’t imagine going through this with anyone else, he is just amazing. He’s been running around after a wife in pain, keeping family informed, talking with doctors, taking care of Cooba. He has spent almost every minute with me at the hospital just going home to feed Cooba and sleep. I am so lucky to have the most wonderful husband in the world. So now we’re just looking forward to a completely uneventful next 7 weeks or so until the baby arrives. We are also hugely looking forward to the arrival in a few weeks of Mari and Kev’s second child, a little brother or sister for my god son Oscar. So much to be thankful for.

Happy New Year everyone!

A Month of Pre-Baby Travel

2010-12-13T11:23:00.000+01:00

This month is a month of travel. Joel has spent a week with 3 mates in Iceland on a bit of an adventure holiday. I had 5 days away at the European Resuscitation Council conference in Porto, Portugal. We’re about to hop onto a plane this week to go and see Bec, Terry, Jade, Diane, Rene and all Bec’s lovely Swiss friends for their wedding in Solothurn! It’s so exciting, one of the biggest bummers about living overseas and so far away is missing out on some of those big occasions in the lives of our friends and families. We’ve missed out on heaps of weddings. So when we found out that there’d be one in Europe, and especially for our lovely Bec who was one of my beautiful bridesmaids, well there’s no way in the world we’d miss it! We’ll be sure to upload some pics.

Late last month Joel and I also celebrated our 1 year wedding anniversary. We made the most of the excuse to get away for a romantic pre-baby long weekend in Italy. We flew into Milan, took a train about an hour north to Lake Como and spent 2 lovely nights there in the little town of Torno on the lake. We spent the days just meandering around, eating well, drinking well, shopping, and taking in the sights. We then went to Milan for a night where we did more of the same. It was a wonderful trip, we talked a lot about our wedding 12 months before and how special it was. He

We are so blessed and lucky to be living this amazing life together. 12 months on and marriage has been a blast! In many ways not much has changed, but for us our wedding was really a milestone in our relationship. It signalled for us a commitment to each other and was a way I guess of cementing that we’re moving ahead together in the same direction. For us, that also meant wanting to start a family. We’re making our preparations, practically and mentally, for our much anticipated new arrival in February.

Pregnancy is a weird and wonderful thing. I’m now up to 30 weeks, only 10(ish) more to go. I’m definitely into the third trimester now and have to say I’m really feeling rather pregnant! I hear that in the next 10 weeks the baby’s weight will double. Given that I’m already feeling pretty big in the tummy, struggling to lean over to tie up shoe laces, need some help to get up if I have to squat down or kneel down or something, the thought of doubling the size of my baby bump (which I actually think is a bit cute just at the moment!) seems a little daunting! My latest trick, squatting down to do something (today it was to put paper into the paper basket) and falling straight onto my bum. Seems my centre of gravity has changed a little these days and my brain is yet to catch on!

The baby’s movements have changed in the last few weeks from being fairly indecipherable wriggles and kicks to something quite different. Now you can really feel that the baby is in there and you can feel very distinct movements under the skin, little limbs pushing against the outside of the uterus. I really am enjoying being pregnant and for the most part have felt really well. I think I’ll need to slow down a bit now though, I get a bit tired these days and my body doesn’t react well to ‘overdoing it’. So I’m going to take the hint and ensure I get enough down time.

In other news, our friends Aud Trude and Kristian (who you may remember from our wedding) had a beautiful little boy Oliver a few weeks ago. Aud Trude is already showing her super mum skills and is managing beautifully. Mari and Kev are next with their second baby due Jan 19th, then it’s our turn!

We’re planning a pretty quiet Christmas at home, probably focussing on ‘feathering the nest’ for the baby’s arrival. Joel is planning to continue the renovation plan and tear down the walls and ceiling in what used to be our study and will become the nursery. Personally I think a coat of paint would do the job, but he’s insistent, only the best will do! I plan to leave him to it and instead focus on reupholstering the rocking chair I bought second hand, reading up about birthing techniques and pondering on baby names. Until next time, Merry Christmas!

Some pics from Joel's recent trip to Iceland:

Bump Watch

2010-11-16T21:31:00.002+01:00

It has been ages since we've posted a blog. Sorry about that, life gets in the way!! Everything is going really well and Baby Ireland is growing like crazy and giving us lots of kicks.

Joel has just got back from a week's project management course in Aberdeen (Scotland), and we have now completed our weekend birthing course. Tonight we did a tour of the hospital including the 'fødeloft' or 'birth loft' which is where we will most likely end up when Baby Ireland decides to arrive. It was great to see where it will all happen and we both feel really comfortable with what's to come.

Here are a couple of bump watch photos, we'll have more to post soon with a long weekend in Milan coming up and Joel's week long boys trip to Iceland in early December. Loads to look forward to.

From Bump Watch Nov

Week 23

From Bump Watch Nov

Week 27

PS. Huge welcome to little Oliver, Aud Trude and Kristian's beautiful little boy who arrived in the early hours of Sunday morning. We haven't met him yet as Joel and I are recovering from a cold, but we hope to meet him very soon.

21 Weeks

2010-10-14T09:19:00.000+02:00

We had our 21 week ultrasound last Friday 8th October. Everything was great, the baby is growing and developing normally. My official due date has now been set at Monday 21st February. Despite some last minute wavering from Joel we stuck with our earlier decision not to find out the gender of the baby.

Here are some pics from the ultrasound, my favourite is the 2D view where baby has its legs over their head. No wonder I’m feeling lots of wriggling from this little baby! Practising their cycling moves overhead perhaps?

Some old pics

2010-10-02T19:41:00.002+02:00

I've just been going through our little digital camera (which we don't often use) and clearing off some photos and have found some really lovely ones that I had to share with you. They are mostly of Bec, Jade and Terry's visit (though strangely Terry doesn't feature in any of the pics! Think we took those ones with Joel's proper camera!). There are also some pics from my trip to Greece with Mum and Dad this summer.

So here they are!

Girls Weekend in Oslo

2010-10-02T19:28:00.002+02:00

(Note: This blog was written earlier this week!) I just returned from a lovely weekend away with Louise in Oslo. We decided that the blokes are always off here or there on boys trips and seeing as Joel was offshore this would be a perfect time to get away for a girls' weekend! We looked into London but the flights were too expensive, so Oslo was our next best option. We went to a concert on Friday night, Amy McDonald. It was a venue called Sentrum Scene, a fantastic venue, really small and intimate, and even short asses like Louise and I had a perfect view!! Amy McDonald is a really great Scottish singer/songwriter, she has a fantastic, unique voice and great songs. You may know her songs This is the Life http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6MRYLWJb1o&feature=channel and Mr Rock and Roll http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tR7SdaXHPH4&feature=channel. She's great, buy her albums!

Amy McDonald playing at Sentrum Scene, Oslo

We did some shopping on Saturday morning and then went to a pub on Saturday afternoon to watch the St Kilda v Collingwood grand final "live". The actual result was known by about 10am on Saturday morning but I switched my phone off and managed to avoid finding out the result. The Aussies out there of course know the outcome of that saga - the scores were even at full time, and unlike most other sports, a drawn grand final means a rematch the following week. It was such an exciting, nerve wracking, depressing, inspiring game of football, I was absolutely beside myself for most of the game. Poor Louise - I'm impressed she didn't leave the pub after my carrying on! It was actually Louise's first game of AFL football (she grew up in the States but spent most of the last 10 years in the UK) so I definitely blame her Aussie husband Charles for leaving her this long in the dark. Louise is a fan of rugby and cricket, so I reckon it's a matter of time before we get her hooked onto AFL!

Game (GF1) about to start

Me and Louise at the pub about to watch the GF1

Dinner at a lovely French bistro Saturday night, then Massages on Sunday, lunch at Aker Brygge and we met up with some of Louise and Charles' friends in the afternoon for a while. We had a ball, thoroughly enjoyable and just the right mix of activities and relaxation! So thanks Louise for being a great travel buddy!

Meanwhile Joel is now up to day 24 offshore, working like a trooper doing really long hours and having to deal with lots of issues due to bad weather. AT this time of year the wind and waves can really pick up and cause a lot of issues for the cranes onboard the ships to lift the heavy equipment off the sea bed and into position. They are doing a lot of Waiting On Weather which at this stage of the project, in what should be the final days/week it's extremely frustrating. They just want to get the job done and get home. His return date may be this Sunday but could very easily stretch into early next week. But there's not much we can do about it, we're at the whim of the weather, so we're just hoping for some calmer seas and good progress out at BP Valhall.

Cooba is missing his daddy

Bump Watch 18 Weeks (2 weeks ago) ....and new hair!

Update Today (Saturday 2nd October)
Baby - We've hit the 20 week mark now with the pregnancy, everything is going well. Next ultrasound was postponed until the end of next week so Joel could be there. Really looking forward to seeing Baby again!
Football - I don't want to talk about it.
Joel - Still off shore, finishing up the last few things at the field and will start heading back soon. Hopefully home Monday night, maybe Tuesday at the latest.

A sign of good things to come?

2010-09-16T10:41:00.000+02:00

Well this little baby of ours is already showing some good signs of being a very compliant and obedient little one, and upon it’s mother’s request for it to ‘get a wriggle on’, has done just that. In the last week or so I’ve gone from feeling some very faint little movements and the very occasional little kick or poke, to these days being able to feel more and more movement. Every day now I can feel him/her wiggling around and it is absolutely thrilling each and every time. Perhaps the novelty will wear off (I doubt it), but feeling our baby moving around is just so reassuring (it’s alive!) and really feels like things are progressing.

Tomorrow will be the 18 week mark according to our current due date and that makes us 2 weeks away from the half way point. That in itself is something I have to wrap my head around as in one way it feels like the time has flown, but on the other hand the weeks have dragged by at a snail’s pace!

Due to a pretty poor weather forecast over the rest of this week, Joel’s ship has come back to the port nearby to pick up some more equipment and shelter from the rough seas. He arrived in yesterday morning and was able to leave the ship at about 6:30pm to come home for a few hours to see Cooba and me. He’s working 12+ hour shifts on the boat (6am – 6pm). The ship will probably be at port until some time Friday night so he’ll hopefully be able to do the same thing again tonight. He prefers to sleep on the ship which is completely understandable – if he stayed at home he’d have to get back to the ship by taxi by about 5.30am. Plus he really needs to be ‘on call’ in case something happens during the night shift and he’s needed.

It’s so fantastic to be able to see him, such a treat and not something we had expected. It really does break up the 4 week stint to have a couple of evenings together half way through. I was really hoping that Baby would be cooperative and try out a few good kicks so Joel could feel it, but even with the patience of a saint and plenty of poking, prodding and verbal encouragement, we couldn’t get him/her moving. I’m pretty sure though that by the time Joel gets back from this offshore trip he should be able to feel the baby moving. It will be amazing to be able to share that together and it’s something we’re both really looking forward to.

Joel was also able to check out all the loot I picked up at the Stavanger Kids Sale last weekend http://www.stavangerkids.no/ and he was so happy with everything I chose. Among other things I bought a cot, travel cot, car seat with base, baby monitor, auto breast pump, baby bjørn, bouncinette, lots of clothes (onesies galore, sleeping clothes, socks), burping cloths, wraps. We need a change table, a bath and a mattress and some linen for the cot (which Mum is going to make for us – thanks Mum!) and then I think we’ve got most of the basics sorted out. I think I saved about 2/3 of what it would have cost to buy it all new. I’m also hunting online for a rocking chair for the nursery. We’ll have heaps of space in there and I always sort of liked the idea of using that for cuddles and maybe feeding. But we’ll see what comes up on http://www.finn.no/.

The view from Joel's home/office

2010-09-10T12:46:00.000+02:00

This is where Joel will be spending most of the next 3 weeks out at sea – on a vessel at the BP Valhall oil field. It’s in the North Sea, between the UK and Norway. The 10m seas that he experienced transiting from picking up the equipment in the UK and getting out to the field have calmed down, and from the picture below it looks like it’s quite pleasant out there indeed!

Map showing the position of the BP Valhall field

BP Valhall taken with Joel's phone camera

Reflections of Motherhood

2010-09-09T09:48:00.003+02:00

This post on mamamia (http://www.mamamia.com.au/) came at a very opportune time. Today is Regina and Ulf's baby's due date (http://www.misshermelin.blogspot.com/), 2 nights ago I felt our baby move for the first time (2 little pokes, amazing! Nothing since but you can bet I'm on the look out!). So motherhood is really on my mind. I don't know if its the hormones or the day or maybe I'm missing Joel and my sister and my mum, but I cried my way through this video this morning over my toast and coffee! I hope you enjoy it too.

An interesting visitor – 52 marathons in 52 weeks

2010-09-08T17:40:00.000+02:00

Facebook is really a weird and wonderful thing. I got a message via facebook about a week and a half ago from an old school friend Amanda who I hadn’t heard from in oh about 15 years!

I was first a bit sceptical – we’ve had quite a lot of visitors this summer which has been fantastic, but I must say Joel and I were quite enjoying having the house to ourselves once again. Hosting a marathon running stranger wasn’t exactly high on our ‘to do’ list that weekend! But then I took a look at his website (http://www.runlikecrazy.com/) and read a bit about his mission, and wow, did I change my tune.
The guy’s name is Tristan Miller. He’s about my age, grew up in Melbourne, and quite likes to run. He decided to sell his apartment and all his worldly belongings to fund a year-long mission to travel the world and run 52 marathons in 52 weeks. He’s raising money for charity (Unicef and Facing Africa). His marathon in Stavanger was his 34th. Joel and I agreed that Tristan was doing something pretty special and we would be really happy to help him and his mate John (An Aussie living in Sweden joining him for part of the trip) with some accommodation.

Tristan has been running marathons all over the world, from Tokyo to Mongolia, Rwanda, South Africa, the Great Wall of China…you name it, he’s run it (or is about to run it). It’s quite remarkable, but honestly what really struck me after meeting him is that running the marathon is not even half of it. In a way that’s the easy bit! Can you imagine crisscrossing the world many times over, spending no more than a few days in any one place, having to work out flight plans, train and bus timetables, travel visas, hotels, maintaining clean jocks and socks, just all of the logistics and headaches and flying-by-the-seat-of-your-pants exhaustion that must come from spending a year travelling? Add to that the physical and mental exhaustion of running a marathon every single week…I just find that utterly amazing and inspiring.

I wanted to help Tristan generate a bit of publicity for his cause. I contacted a couple of local newspapers and managed to get a pretty good response, Rogalands Avis ran almost a full page article on him as well as a snippet on the front page http://www.rogalandsavis.no/nyheter/article5254795.ece. Stavanger Aftenblad ran about a quarter page article in their sports section. Not bad for a PR novice hey?! A TV2 film crew also arrived (through one of Tristan’s connections – I can’t claim that one!) and did a great story for the Saturday night sports news http://www.tv2sporten.no/ovrig/maratonmannen-foeler-seg-som-forrest-gump-3276858.html. Joel also took some fantastic photos. For Tristan, having a photographic and video record of the trip is hugely important. He is getting about with his little digital camera but Joel’s Digital SLR with fancy lenses and filters provided some great pics which Tristan took with him.

What was also special about this particular weekend was that Tristan was running the Stavanger marathon on Saturday, then leaving on a 6pm flight to Denmark, taking a bus down to a ferry port, and then taking an overnight ferry to a little island called Bornholm to run an Ultra Marathon – that is 100kms after travelling all night. The man ran 142km over a weekend. That is just mind blowing.

Tristan at the finish line, Stavanger Marathon

We spent a bit of time with Tristan before and after the race. He’s a fantastic guy, and not nearly as crazy as you’d think! He’s basically a normal guy who’s been given some great (but also fairly “normal” – not unlike you or I) opportunities in life, who found himself in a bit of a rut and decided to just turn it all around, to think big and do something amazing. That was really his message – that you can do anything you set your mind to it if you set a goal and then go about planning the steps it takes to achieve it.

Joel and I have been really proud to help Tristan out over the weekend with hopefully a welcoming smile, some good food and a warm, comfortable bed to sleep in for a night. I hope the publicity helps him get the attention he wants for the charities he’s supporting. We’ve also donated a small amount to Unicef in his ‘everyday hero’ appeal. I also know that each and every donation is so appreciated by Tristan, he was reading his twitter “runlikecrazy” and checking the Unicef donation page and commented about how thrilled he was that people had been inspired by his self-proclaimed “Captain InsanO” double-up marathon/ultra weekend and were making donations.

It was a really interesting weekend, and definitely one that we felt great about – it’s fantastic to every now and then open yourself up to new people and experiences and to give something of yourself and your time to help someone else. However I’d argue that we were really the beneficiaries as we really felt like we’d been part of something special and important. We truly wish Tristan all the best for the months ahead and the many kilometres still to run. He plans to finish up with an ultra marathon in Antarctica (!!) and his final run will be in Melbourne during the daytime on New Years Eve. If you’re interested to read more or get involved (maybe run with him on NYE!) I highly recommend his website http://www.runlikecrazy.com/.

L-R John, Tristan, myself and Joel

Bump Watch, 16 weeks

Get a move on Baby!!

2010-09-06T14:31:00.000+02:00

So I’m 16 weeks and 3 days along now. From what I’ve been reading and hearing from friends, it is around the 16th week that I could start to feel the baby. It’s been described variously as bubbles, a flutter or the feeling like a snake or something in your belly that slithers around. Nice image hey?! The midwife told me the best way to feel it is to lie tummy down with a soft cushion under my stomach. Mari has said she feels it best when lying on her back on a hard surface and applying some gentle pressure to the uterus. Naturally I’m trying both those positions daily but without much success! I have to stop myself from dashing off from my desk into an empty meeting room to lie on my back and press on my stomach! Can imagine how that would look to anyone who happened to walk in!

The thing is I’m told that you may not be able to feel it that often, maybe only occasionally, so if I happen to be busy or occupied when the baby decides to Get Physical I could easily miss it! In fact I may have been ‘feeling’ the movements for days but without being aware of it. Also it’s hard when you don’t know what you’re feeling for! There are so many different movements and things happening in your stomach and abdomen when you’re pregnant. Digestion takes on a life of its own, so I predict it’s actually quite difficult to distinguish between lunch bubbling around down there and baby!

I have to say I’m most looking forward to feeling the baby move as I think it will create a different kind of connection to this little 12cm, 150g person that I am apparently incubating! It’s a weird sort of feeling for me (but I’ll try to explain it), this baby is so wanted, anticipated and is something we feel we’re 100% ready for, and of course I’ve had some physical changes signalling that everything is progressing as normal. Intellectually, I know I’m pregnant and if all goes to plan we’ll welcome a baby in Feb 2011, but emotionally I think it’s a bit of a different story. It seems abstract and theoretical. I just can’t really believe sometimes that there’s a baby there. It still came as such a (wonderful) surprise to hear the baby’s heartbeat at our last check up a couple of weeks ago. I’m not worried about it as I feel that this is something that will develop naturally as the pregnancy progresses, that you start to feel that maternal bond and protectiveness. I think and hope that feeling the baby moving will jump start that process and bring this all into reality for me, that yes there really is a baby – OUR baby in there.

So Joel is offshore now for a month, so it’s just Coobs and I at home. We’re lucky to have some wonderful friends who ensured that my first solo weekend was full to the brim with heaps of fantastic visits and good times. No time to feel lonely. The weather has also been absolutely sensational, such a lovely surprise at this time of year when we expect autumn to really hit. It’s most likely the last taste of warmth and sunshine for a long time, so we’re just soaking it up as much as possible.

I devoted Saturday to spending the first part of Joel’s offshore paycheque (!) and picked up a really comfy and I think quite stylish maternity skirt by Boob http://shop.boobdesign.com/sv/product/263/gravidkjol-once-on-never-off#filter-2 and a fab pair of leggings (tete–a-tete) from the same shop. I can’t remember the name but it’s opposite Rom for Mer and has some maternity clothes upstairs. I hope to just get by with a few essentials (a capsule maternity wardrobe, in fashion-speak?), mostly focussing warmer clothes to see me through autumn and winter. I also found some gorgeous St Tropez ribbed tops made from 70% silk at O’La La in Kirkegata which are really long and quite stretchy which will be good for layering under and over other tops during the winter, but will I hope also be able to be used post-baby, unless the bump just stretches them too much!

I promise, more bump watch photos to come!

Bump Watch 10-13 Weeks

2010-08-25T17:03:00.004+02:00

We've been promising some bump photos, it's still early days but I have made the bold move into maternity jeans and am the better for it!

This one says 11 weeks 3 days but then at our scan the date was put back exactly a week, so that would make it 10 weeks 3 days. Quite a nice belly there, but the disclaimer is that the bump size varied a lot in the first weeks depending on certain things...I won't go into detail but I'm sure every woman who has been pregnant knows exactly what I'm talking about....

The next one here is at exactly 13 weeks:

Not much difference? Yeah I agree! I'll try to wear something a bit more fitting next time so you can compare apples with apples. Anwyay, it's all coming along nicely. I'm at 14 and a bit weeks now so hope that soon I can start to feel the baby moving soon! If I'm lucky that might happen in the next week or so.

Until next time!
Emma.

BABY IRELAND

2010-08-06T22:20:00.015+02:00

Some Pretty Big News!

We are so excited to be able to fill everyone in on some pretty special news in our family. We will in about 6 months time have a new little person to introduce you all to! We are 12 weeks pregnant!

We had a 12 week scan on Friday and everything looks great. We’ll include some videos below from the 2D and 4D scan for those who are interested. These new release videos have been on a high rotation in the Ireland household! Everything looks great and we are just hoping for a safe, boring, normal pregnancy. Our due date is Feb 19th.

We don’t know if it’s a boy or a girl, we’ll be having the baby over here in Norway but if all goes to plan we visit Oz next year. We would love nothing more than to get to Melbourne to be part of Brett and Sam’s wedding on March 20th (and our friends Jenn and Ian who are tying the knot the day before!) but it will depend on when Ireland Junior decides to arrive, and also on the red tape involved with getting a passport for him/her. We’ll have to take that as it comes.

Everything is going really well so far and Emma has escaped the major pregnancy symptoms (nausea, tiredness etc). So far so good! We are really looking forward to the next 6 months and beyond and cannot wait to be parents!

Emma's Bucket List

2010-05-18T16:00:00.007+02:00

So I've been following some blogs lately, one of my latest addictions (in this instance http://www.mightygirl.com/) , and was inspired by one of the posts to start my own Bucket List, as in things I plan to do in life before I kick the.....

you get the idea.

So I'm just starting off and I'm sure will be adding to this a lot over the years (and hopefully crossing some off too). Some are lofty and expensive (...well most of them!), some are simple and free (gotta find some more of those ones!). I just thought sharing this might actually raise the stakes a bit and give me that extra motivation to get off my butt and actually achieve some of these things.

I'd love to hear if you have anything you would add to your bucket list, or if you have one of your own.

I plan to get off to a good start tonight and sign Joel and I up for child sponsorship - our wedding present to each other - which we've been meaning to do for ages. Number 38 - Tick!

Go on safari in Africa
Get my PADI diving certificate
Try snowboarding
Skydive or bungee jump
Make a quilt
Learn to pick up a dropped stitch (knitting)
~~Bake a sponge cake~~ (completed for Regina's baby shower)
Take a wine course
Swim with dolphins
Go in a hot air balloon
Be a mum
Start my own business
Renovate a house
Live by the sea
Hike into Macchu Picchu
Own a holiday house (other than McCrae!)
Stop chewing/picking my nails/fingers
See the grand canyon
Play poker in Vegas
See the running of the bulls in Pamplona
Go parasailing behind a boat
Have a walk in wardrobe
Take a short barista course
Own a convertible
Sail around the Greek Islands
Eat tapas in Spain
See the pyramids
Scuba dive on the Great Barrier Reef
Grow a vegetable garden
Have a compost bin
Learn to stand up on a surfboard
Sing in a choir
Be in a murder mystery party
See the Northern Lights
Visit Antarctica
Stay at a health spa
Do a road trip along the coast in California
~~Sponsor a child in need~~
See Uluru at sunrise and sunset
Eat one 100% vegetarian dinner a week

Peru, Feb/March 2010

2010-04-24T22:56:00.009+02:00

Our return to Norway after the wedding, and the long dark days of winter were not for long. In February we packed up our bags and bikinis again (or boardies...?) and headed back to the sunshine and the southern hemisphere. Our friends Paola and Paul were getting married in Arequipa, Paola's home town, in Peru. Neither Joel nor I had ever been to South America, so we were so excited to visit such a fascinating, unique country.

Paola had promised us lots of dancing, fantastic music, great food and pisco sours galore, and Peru really delivered! We had such a great time, we met in Arequipa with a big group of Aussies over there for the wedding including lots of Paul's family, family friends and mates. My mum and dad were invited too and the chance to visit South America was just too good to pass up! We had about 4 or 5 days in Arequipa to be tourists, see the city and of course attend their amazing wedding.

The wedding itself was undoubtably the highlight of our time in Arequipa. The ceremony was held in a magnificent, huge cathedral with painted frescoes and statuies behind the altar that were absolutely divine. The reception was in an enormous marquee draped in soft white an blue fabric, everything was so beautiful. The entertainment team (and I mean team - lighting, DJ, smoke machine, bubble machine, foam machine, fireworks, movie/slideshow) ensured everyone was alternately crying, laughing and dancing all afternoon and well into the evening! Later in the evening the 'hora loco' "crazy hour" really shifted the party up a notch with everyone geared up in crazy hats and glow sticks, it was just hilarious and truly crazy! The Peruvian dancing was absolutely fantastic and all Paola's family and friends were so fun, they pulled everyone into the circle to dance!

Before leaving Arequipa, I went on a tour to Colca Canyon with my mum and dad which was beautiful. Such a lush, beautiful valley in amongst quite an arid landscape. One of the highlights there was seeing Condors swooping overhead above the canyon. They build nests there and enjoy gliding and hunting using the thermal air currents arising from the canyon. Spectacular. While I was doing that Joel went on a trip with some other intrepid hikers (Simon, Gaelle and Like with a guide) to conquer Chachani, the volcanic mountain rising above Arequipa. It is over 6,000m high, higher than any mountain in Europe. The conditions were pretty horrid, altitude sickness makes the climb extremely difficult even in the best of circumstances, snow storms and wind made it even tougher. Only Luke actually made it to the summit, but wow what an experience!

We then moved on with a group of friends and family to Cuzco. Dissapointingly Macchu Picchu was closed due to flooding and damage to the trails and railway, but we made the best of it with a fabulous tour to the Sacred Valley. We stopped at some breathtakingly beautiful spots and explored Incan ruins galore.

After the Sacred Valley we sadly said goodbye to most of the crowd from the wedding and continued on with Louise (Paul's sister) and her boyfriend Zane to Puno, heading east towards Lake Titicaca. We had some fantastic visits to idyllic Isle Tequile and Isle del Sol, visiting some of the famous floating reed islands on the way. It is the worlds highest navigatable lake (or something like that - means there are ferries and things on it). Highlights? There were many. One that stands out was eating at a tiny local candle-lit restaurant with no electricity at about 4020 metres, the trout was indescribable!

We had such a brilliant time, Paul and Paola went to so much effort to make our stay there so easy and fun, it was amazing and will definitely be back to South America. Joel had an absolute ball taking around 1500 photos. We put the best of them into a slideshow. Grab yourself a cuppa as there's quite a few there...! Double click on the image and select 'slideshow' to see them in bigger format with the captions. Enjoy!

Our Wedding! 21st November 2009, Lorne

2010-04-24T22:52:00.004+02:00

Joel has done an amazing job preparing all these photos! We received the raw files from our photographer and many hours later, here is the slideshow. We still have some more to sort through, but here are the highlights!

2010-04-15T08:54:00.005+02:00

Is this not the cutest little labrador you've ever seen?! Joel shot this in October last year making use of his company's studio equipment (backdrop, lighting etc.). Super cute!

Our Honeymoon!

2010-04-06T18:16:00.006+02:00

I'm putting the cart before the horse here a little bit (seeing as we haven't blogged about the wedding yet!), but we had the most wonderful honeymoon in the Cook Islands (http://getaway.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=1020086) after our wedding in December. We spent a week at Rarotonga (Sea Change Villas), the main island, and then a week on the tiny island of Aitutaki (Pacific Resort Aitutaki http://www.pacificresort.com/). It was everything we imagined it might be - beautiful weather, stunning turquoise water, incredible tropical fish, spotless beaches, warm welcoming people. We stayed in the most beautiful on-the-beach accommodation. It was just simply heaven. We can't recommend it highly enough, especially for a romantic getaway.

Here are some pics that show many of the highlights of our trip. It's a long slide show (100+ photos) but seeing as it has taken us 3 months already to get this posted, perhaps it's better to just put them all up rather than wait longer to edit them down to a more manageable number!

Easter at home

2010-04-06T18:02:00.007+02:00

We had a fantastic Easter this year at home finishing off (or starting...) a few projects around the house and having a very social holiday seeing lots of friends. We had a great party over at Louise and Charles' place on Friday night - a dress up party. Those of you that are facebook friends of mine can see the album there, Joel's outfit was a big hit! Then on Sunday we had 12 friends over for a big roast lamb for lunch. Everyone pitched in and brought something along which made things really easy for us, lunch for 12 wasn't so daunting when we only had to worry about the main course! It was a fantastic day which turned into a very fun evening, the last guests left around 2am!

Around the house we've now finished our living room renovation and actually completed the skirting boards in our bedroom which have been missing since December 08! The living room looks fantastic, very modern and fresh. I'm toying with the idea of a wallpaper feature wall, any suggestions? I also got out into the garden for the first time this spring and planted some flowers in the multitude of pots that I'm a little bit obsessed with and can't stop buying! It's wonderful to have everything thawed out now and some longer days, sunshine and even temperatures over 10 degrees occasionally.

Enjoy the pics from our Easter Sunday lunch, as always double click to see the pics in full size.

Emma and Joel - 2009 the year that was ...

2009-12-24T11:45:00.004+01:00

What a year! Where to even start?! This year has been an absolute cracker! It has been one we will always remember.

It began in great form celebrating New Years Eve with Joel’s brother Simon at home in Stavanger. The rest of Joel’s family who joined us for a wonderful holiday in France and Christmas day here with us (http://skandyadventures.blogspot.com/2009/01/pre-christmas-family-visit-big-surprise.html) had left to continue travelling or head home. We were flying out to Melbourne on New Years Day.

We had about 2 weeks back in Melbourne, as always when we come home to visit it was extremely hectic but so amazing to see all our friends and family. It had been around 2 years since our last visit. Using Brett and Sam’s place (Port Melbourne) as a base we were able to get around to see lots of people and of course experience some of the Melbourne things we really miss.

Our visit culminated in our Engagement Party down at Patterson Lakes (http://skandyadventures.blogspot.com/2009/02/melbourne-extravaganza.html). We were blessed with a beautiful evening with lots of sunshine and about 100 of our friends and family there. Especially it was amazing to see all the babies that have been born since we’ve been away! It was like a crèche in mum and dad’s living room!

Having just been in Melbourne and being able to spend time with my beautiful Grandma Holloway was so poignant, as she passed away peacefully in February. It was difficult being so far away from my family during that time, but Joel was a wonderful support and our friends here were absolutely amazing. Work colleagues too were incredibly supportive. There are some tears as I write this but she had such a wonderful life and lived to the age of 92, I know it was her time and that she was ready.

Late in March we were very excited to welcome the arrival of our first nephew Lenny Ireland born to Joel’s brother Simon and his wife Clare. We have since had the chance to meet him and he is truly a beautiful little boy http://skandyadventures.blogspot.com/2009/04/welcome-to-world-lenny-ireland.html, I don’t know I’ve encountered a baby who is so quick to smile and just light up with the slightest encouragement!

In April, Easter was spent in Sauda with Louise and Charles, where we also got to catch up with Mari, Kev and Oscar (it’s Mari’s home-town). We enjoyed the skiing and it was a fantastic place to celebrate my birthday. http://skandyadventures.blogspot.com/2009/04/easter-at-sauda.html.

In May we sadly mourned the passing of Joel’s Nan, Pat Ireland. She died very peacefully and at the age of 93 having lived a full and wonderful life. Pat was Joel’s last surviving grandparent. With Joel having just supported me through my Grandma’s death, now it was my turn to be there for him, and like me, he felt the pain of being away from family during a time of grief. We were very thankful for the time we spent with Pat during our Melbourne visit, she was a gracious, strong woman and she is missed.

June was a month of work travel for me with a 3 week trip to KL, New York and Toronto http://skandyadventures.blogspot.com/2009/06/kuala-lumpur-new-york-and-toronto-in-3.html. I also had the chance to spend some time with my 3rd cousin Elle. She was celebrating her birthday and we certainly had plenty to talk about with both of us planning weddings in 09! She and her husband James are now expecting their first baby, very exciting!

The highlight of July was without doubt the wedding of our very close friends, Mari and Kev. They had planned a beautiful celebration, a total mix of Aussie and Norwegian guests and traditions. They brought everyone together beautifully and Mari was a stunning, elegant bride. And Kev scrubs up ok too. Unfortunately our camera battery died in the church before it even started (!), but there are some gorgeous pics on their blog http://mariandkev.blogspot.com/2009/08/mr-mrs.html). I loved being part of their celebrations by helping with the hens party preparations and Joel and I had a pre-wedding get together at our place for all the wedding guests. It was such a happy, fun occasion and 6 months down the track, they’re a very happy family with 1 y.o Oscar (Emma’s god-son).

From there the year seems to have flown by so quickly. Joel had a month-long offshore trip in September. It was the culmination of over a year’s planning and was extremely successful. He worked so hard in the lead up to this trip, his overtime was absolutely ridiculous from around May onwards! But I think he would tell you that it was all worthwhile as the project was carried out extremely professionally and he has since received many congratulations and compliments on his dedication and the results. He’s certainly a clever cookie and I’m extremely proud of him. We enjoyed a long weekend in Stockhom hosted by our friends Regina and Ulf. It was our first time to Sweden and we had a fabulous time out at Reg’s parents property http://skandyadventures.blogspot.com/2009_09_01_archive.html.

Our November/December trip to Melbourne was absolutely wonderful. The wedding was such a happy, memorable occasion that brought together so many people who are part of our lives. We were absolutely stunned and so grateful to have 7 friends from Norway join us in Melbourne for the event. It was also especially touching for us to see how even after 3 years living overseas and not seeing much of our ‘people’ back home, they still went to so much effort and care so much to see us and be part of our big celebration. It is very humbling actually to have been on the receiving end of such goodwill and generosity. For those who are closest to us you can multiply those sentiments by 100 – they truly went above and beyond to give us an amazing wedding celebration.

The year has been special for our family as well, here is a quick update:

Ann and Nigel, my parents, have had a fantastic year. Dad celebrated his 60th birthday in April with (in true Cousins style…) a huge party at the Peninsula Golf Club. They have been enjoying lots of trips with their new deluxe caravan heading off to different parts of Victoria and interstate. 2010 is shaping up to be a big year for them with travel as mum is retiring in January and Dad has some long service leave owing. A visit to Peru with us in February for Paola and Paul’s wedding followed with hopefully a visit to us over here some time around Summer are in the offing.

Joel’s mum Bernadette has had a great year especially enjoying her Grandkids, Eliza and Lenny with many trips up to Colbinabbin and down to Frankston. She continues to work hard in her job as a supervising nurse in a nursing home. She is always extremely busy catching up with friends and families, so many times when we phone her she’s off walking or catching up for coffee with a girlfriend. We hope she can come to visit us in 2010, her visit in 08 was so memorable and we would love to be able to do it all again!

John and Sharyn (Joel’s Dad and Stepmum) have also been enjoying their Grandkids. With the building of their home Westbury up on a big property in Trentham now completed they have been able to trade in the weekends of building and hard yakka with some time to really enjoy the fruits of their labour. Of course there is always something to do, with revitalising the ginseng crop, building up the vegetable garden and I’m sure a million other projects. John’s next adventure will be bee-keeping, and at his recent 60th celebration which we were fortunate to be part of during our trip, the gift of a bee keeping course, club membership and some kit to get started will hopefully come in handy. They had a near miss in the bushfires early in 2009 with fires coming within kilometres of the property. In July, Sharyn’s went to India to work as part of a team of doctors and nurses from The Alfred to help build up a trauma training program. The numbers of people who die from traumatic injury in India (particularly from road accidents) is just heartbreaking. It’s wonderful that Australia can share our skilled medical personnel and experience with a country like India where the resources are so scarce, and we know Sharyn found the experience incredibly challenging and rewarding.

Sally has been working incredibly hard this year – her paid job being only part of it! As my maid of honour she has been running around all year to help me prepare for the wedding. From dress hunting in January, to making decorations, planning appointments, sourcing cake makers and anything and everything in between, she has had a busy year and has earned a rest from it all now her big sister is finally hitched! On the other hand her efforts in her job have also been rewarded with a promotion at the end of this year, entirely well deserved and hard-earned. She is looking for an apartment to invest in, and now that her part time job as maid of honour has finished I’m sure that will make the hunt that much easier.

Brett and Sam moved into Clonaig St early in the year and have made it a beautiful home. He spent a few weeks in LA mid-year as part of an acting workshop which not only allowed him to hone his acting skills, but also build on his network of contacts which in the acting world means an awful lot. Brett has been working hard on developing a film script, and his efforts were rewarded late this year being awarded a grant from Film Victoria to further develop the script with funding and support of some seasoned industry professionals. It’s a huge credit to him and his skills as a writer, not just an actor. We wish him all the luck in the world with the script. Sam continues to impress as the seasoned career woman that she is, highlighted by winning trips to Hamilton Island and tickets to virtually any sporting/cultural/Fashion event that’s worth going to. She is a formidable social coordinator herself and the many parties, weekends away etc. that she plans certainly make me rather jealous that I can’t live closer to be part of it!

Joel's sisters Emma and Rebecca have been busy. Emma has completed her studies in nursing and midwifery, doing many hours of practical work experience at The Royal Womens hospital. Her studies and hard work paid off with an offer of a job next year at The Royal Womens - her top preference, and she was on top of their list of candidates. Rebecca continues her Health Science studies, is working part time at Grill'd, and spending time with her boyfriend Ian who we met in Melbourne (a lovely guy).

Clare and Simon’s year has been highlighted by the arrival of their first child, Lenny. They bought a beautiful home in Colbinabbin (about 60km NE from Bendigo), and were able to move in just before Lenny’s arrival. We haven’t had a chance yet to visit their home, hopefully we can make it there on our next trip down under. They are wonderful parents (as evidenced by their totally adorable, chilled out little boy!) and we thoroughly enjoyed spending time with them in Melbourne and Lorne.

Fraze, Zac and Eliza have some very exciting news that they were able to share at the end of 2009, they are expecting a baby! A little brother or sister for our beautiful niece Eliza. It was fantastic spending time with them during our visit, and the change in Eliza since their visit in late 08 was remarkable! She has grown up so much, and you can imagine how quietly thrilled we were when she calls us “unky Joel” and “auntie emma”! Thank you Zac and Fraze for ensuring that we are still part of her life, though we live far away.

So as we are about to get started cooking the ham and stuffing the turkey, looking out over snow-covered Stavanger, we look forward to a very happy and relaxed Christmas Day. We are thinking of all our friends and family at this very special time of year. Really, since the wedding we’ve had some time to reflect on it all and are so appreciative and want to thank you all for being part of this momentous year for us. More than ever before we are really feeling the love and support from everyone in our lives and there is no better way to start out on this journey together as husband and wife.

Wishing you all a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year.

Here is a slideshow of the year that was for Emma and Joel.

Ps: Australia and Cook Island pictures and blog still to come.

A White Christmas!

2009-12-20T09:41:00.006+01:00

What a difference a fortnight can make! This time two weeks ago we were living it up at the Cook Islands enjoying high 20's temperatures and the most amazing beaches you can imagine. Today we are experiencing below zero temperatures and around 40cm of snow in the last 24 hours! It is really quite amazing, probably the most snow we have seen around our home since we moved here. And the timing is perfect - it looks like we're set for our first ever white christmas! Here are a few snaps! Click on the album to view in larger format.

We will be receiving our professional photos soon and will of course make a few blogs covering our amazing wedding and honeymoon, watch this space!

Stockholm Long Weekend

2009-09-20T19:05:00.004+02:00

We had a fantastic weekend just recently, our Swedish friends (who will be at the wedding btw) Regina and Ulf invited some of us to Regina's parents house on a property about 50mins out of Stockholm. It was a lovely weekend, really relaxed. Some pics here:

Mari's Hens Party

2009-07-20T08:43:00.003+02:00

As we’re more than half way though July now Mari and Kev’s wedding date approaches (31st July). So while Kev was off to London for his bucks weekend, the girls took Mari out for the day for her hens party. The forecast was terrible actually – heavy rain all day. So we were so happy to start the morning with overcast skies but no rain (at least for a while). We took full advantage motoring down to Grassholmen to jump onto Nordvik (Ryan, Pete and Mitch’s boat – ref earlier post) to kick off the day. Champers and OJ started things off beautifully and a little cruise around Hundvåg and over to vågen (the barbour) in Stavanger. Unfortunately half way through the trip the anticipated rain started, so we finished off the tour in the cabin.

We then headed off on the ferry over to Tau and drove about 40mins to a spa hotel (Spa Hotell Velvære in Hjelmeland). We had booked a table for lunch followed by a spa treatment. It was lovely – we each had a 50 min treatment and spent some time in the general spa/pool area together before/after the treatment. Later in the afternoon we returned to Stavanger and after a short break when Mari and Merete went home to feed their bubs we all reconvened back at our place for a bbq dinner (cooked by me in gumboots and a golf umbrella while it poured with rain!). It was a really lovely evening with some good food, drinks and in keeping with proper hens party tradition – a few games and quizzes to keep everyone laughing. To me it really felt like this was the beginning of the whole wedding period with now less than 2 weeks to go. We’re really looking forward to the big day – it’s amazing it’s almost here and really brings home for Joel and I that our wedding will be here in no time!

Summer Days

2009-07-12T10:44:00.005+02:00

We've been having a stretch of magnificent weather here in Stavanger, July has been awesome. Joel and I joined Mitch, his girlfriend Hanna and Pete on the boys boat Nordvik last weekend. We putted out of Stavanger and headed towards a little island called Kvitsøy. It's a beautiful, picturesque spot. We did a bit of fishing and caught enough cod and mackrel to feed us all for lunch. We caught up with Merete, Åsmund, Trym, Mari, Kev and Oscar who drove to the island. It was a perfect day.

Joel has been working some major overtime so it came down to me to stain our deck. It's something we've been meaning to do since Joel built it at Easter 08. We're hosting a pre-wedding bbq for Mari and Kev in a couple of weeks so that has given us the push we needed to get the job done. I think the finished result is great. What do you think?! As usual double click and select 'slideshow' to see the pics in large format in picassa.

Kuala Lumpur, New York and Toronto in 3 weeks

2009-06-29T18:23:00.003+02:00

I have just returned from a marathon 3 week work trip which included joining a meeting in Kuala Lumpur with some colleagues from the Asia Pacific region, then on to New York to spend a week with my US colleagues, and finished off with participation at a simulation user group meeting in Toronto, Canada. It was a fantastic trip but as expected quite exhausting. Here are some of the photos to give you an idea of what I got up to for 3 weeks!

Hiking in the mountains

2009-06-07T18:00:00.006+02:00

We have been enjoying some gorgeous spring weather - none better than last weekend which fortunately happened to be a long weekend too. Joel and I had the brainwave to go for a hike and stay in a cabin. It turned out the 16km hike over tricky (but beautiful) terrain stretched my hiking capabilities to the limit and then some. We hiked from Vindalen to Flørlistålen. It was a lovely weekend but I think about half to two thirds that distance would have been perfect! We'll know for next time!

Also Joel spent some birthday money on a new camera lens, a Sigma 10-20 ultra wide angle F4-5.6 (for those of you who are into cameras...). He's pretty excited about it and has been bothering everyone with it! Even as I write this he's waving it in my face! Not annoying at all! Enjoy the pics!

Birthday & 17th May

2009-06-07T17:45:00.006+02:00

We've got a bit of catching up to do on the blog! Since our last message Joel has had a birthday (kjempe gammel mann!), and we celebrated the Norwegian National Day, 17th May with a lovely breakfast at Aud Trude and Kristian's house. Here are some photos, double click on the pic to see the web album.

Easter at Sauda

2009-04-19T22:17:00.009+02:00

Easter in Norway is a great time of year. Last year we stayed at home and Joel built the deck while I finished off painting the guest bedroom, so this year we were keen to join the rest of the norwegians and head to the mountains. Our friends Mari and Kev were spending the holiday with Mari's family up at Sauda, so we thought that sounded like a great idea and asked friends of ours Louise and Charles if they wanted to join us renting an apartment beside the ski field at Svandalen, a few minutes drive from Sauda.

Easter this year also coincided with my birthday, which was excellent timing. Thanks everyone for the messages and phone calls, it was fantastic to hear from you. We went out for dinner to the Sauda Fjord Hotel to celebrate with Charles, Louise, Mari, Kev and Mari's sister Ingvil. The skiing at Svandalen was good, unfortunately as Easter was quite late this year the weather was a little warm and the snow quite slushy, but we still had fun.

Joel, Kev and I were joined on a cross country trip with Mari's dad Alf-Gunnar which was beautiful, blue sky and sunshine, we couldn't get the grins off our faces even despite the fact it was bloody hard work getting up some of those hills (not to mention down them...!). It was good practice for Joel who is now off on a cross country skiing trip with 5 mates, they are trekking across mountains for 4 days, staying overnight in cabins along the way. It'll be a tough trip but I'm sure they'll be having a ball. The weather at least was on their side - we've had some beautiful sunny days over the weekend and looks pretty good for the next couple as well. Joel's out of phone contact which feels quite strange but Coobs and I have plenty to keep busy with while he's away. Enjoy the pics, you probably know the drill by now but click on the album to see them in a bigger size (select slideshow once you get to the picassa page).

Snow Angel

2009-04-17T08:18:00.002+02:00

I just had to share this photo of my snow angel… after about a million beers up at Røldal on a team building trip. This bedtime present was delivered by Ryan who was a little put out that Joel had headed to bed before the partying was over.

Emma.

Welcome to the World - LENNY IRELAND

2009-04-04T09:35:00.001+02:00

We are so excited to welcome our beautiful nephew Leonard John Ireland, born on 26th March up in Bendigo. Lenny’s parents are Simon, Joel’s eldest brother and his wife Clare. We wish so much that we could be there to go and visit them and meet gorgeous Lenny, but can’t wait to see him in November. Here are some photos of our gorgeous nephew, we are a very proud aunt and uncle!

Spring in Stavanger

2009-04-04T09:34:00.002+02:00

We have been enjoying a really lovely spring here in Stavanger. It’s amazing how quickly the days become longer and you emerge from the long dark winter and all of a sudden it’s springtime. The change of the seasons is so much more pronounced than in Australia, here there is genuine excitement when in February you start to see the little snow flowers grow, and tiny green buds start to form on branches and bushes.

We are lucky to have a beautiful forest area right on our doorstep, called Våland Skog. We take Coobs there for walks all the time. Joel has just bought a new lens for his digital camera, a 50mm prime F1.8 (whatever that means) and a tripod, so we tried it out in the forest the other day (and many days since).

What have we been up to? Well Joel had a trip up to the north of Norway to a place called Verdal, north of Trondheim for work. He was visiting a jacket up there, it’s 100m tall and it will be installed this year by a ship that can lift 14,000 tonnes. He seemed to think that was pretty impressive!

He has also been on a ‘teambuilding’ (read: junket) with work up to a beautiful place called Haukeli, and they also went downhill skiing in nearby Røldal. It’s about a 5 hour drive from Stavanger. He said that Haukeli is the kind of place you imagine when you think of winter in Norway. There is snow about 3m high, everything is absolutely white and they were spoilt with fantastic weather, blue sky and sunshine. I hope to get up there myself some time soon.

We were invited up to Joel’s work’s cabin for a weekend in Sirdal with Rob and his lovely girlfriend Inka. We had a great time up there cross country skiing.

We’re spoilt here in Norway with 5 days off over Easter (Thursday is a holiday) so we are going to head up to Sauda (about 100km north of Stavanger) for some skiing over the easter break. We’ve rented an apartment and will be joined by friends of ours Louise and Charles. He is Aussie, she is American and they lived together in London for the past 8 years or so before moving here. We’ll also be able to catch up with Mari, Kev and Oscar who will be staying with Mari’s family who live there.

HAPPY 4th BIRTHDAY COOBA

2009-03-20T19:44:00.004+01:00

Cooba turned 4 today. Happy birthday little fella. Here are some pics of him through his 4 years and also a movie of him at 8 weeks when he came home with us for the first time. He is obviously a big part of our lives and we enjoy every moment we have with him. Have a good weekend.

Det snø, det snø ... tiddlebom!

2009-02-26T21:41:00.004+01:00

Even though it is now all back to normal (i.e. wet and non-white) Stavanger has had a truckload of snow lately. We always love to get out amongst it and it makes everything so pretty. Cooba in particular loves it and loves catching snowballs! We even went walking on the lake a little while ago! Here are some pics of the fun!

The Melbourne Extravaganza!

2009-02-18T19:19:00.006+01:00

We have had this blog entry waiting as a draft for weeks, so it's about time we published it I think!

Here we pick up our story again from the blog entry about Christmas.....

Gradually after Christmas everyone started to head off from our place in Stavanger, John, Sharyn and the girls continued their trip of Europe with a visit to Ireland, Zac, Fraze and Eliza headed back to Melbourne and Simon stayed on a little longer and hung out with Cooba and clocked all Joel’s scores on the Wii! We had a lovely New Years Eve with Simon who prepared (with Joel’s help) a beautiful Bouillabaisse with crayfish and other seafood. Coupled with a bottle of Cloudy Bay Sauvignon Blanc from NZ it was absolutely perfect! I think it was the first time ever I haven’t stayed up until midnight on NYE, we were in bed by 10.30pm and the fireworks woke us up at midnight!

The reason for our early night was not just that we are both over 30 now and feeling the effects of old(er) age, but actually we had a flight to Australia the following day, and anyone who has done that flight will tell you it’s not a good idea to begin it with a sleep debt and/or hangover!

We had an amazing 16 days in Melbourne, we were so lucky to have the use of Sam and Brett’s apartment in Port Melbourne, and although we missed them, it was so convenient to have the place to ourselves for the first week as they were away on holidays. It was fantastic to be back in Melbourne, the sun was shining for us the whole time which was such a thrill after leaving Norway in the dead of winter.

I won’t go into all the details but can touch on a few highlights:

*Catching up with Jenny Guala and co for her birthday
*Enjoying the hospitality of Jules and Matt who hosted us for a BBQ with friends
*A trip to Lorne which included wedding planning and the chance to catch up with lots of Lorne mates plus Katrina, Greg, Brooke and Jade who are our friends from Tassie now living in Canberra
*The ‘Lorne Bowlers’ (Franky, Benny, Zac and Bowie) reuniting (like the Blues Brothers) for another shot at surfboat rowing glory (6th out of 7 in the final)
*Meeting with Anthony Toms who will conduct our service and signing all the necessary documents to ensure we can get married in November
*My parents Ann and Nigel meeting Joel’s dad John and stepmum Sharyn for the first time over a lovely meal in Brighton
*Belated Family Christmas dinners with both Joel’s and my families
*A visit to Pat Ireland, Joel’s nan is so lovely
*Lunch with my grandparents
*Getting to meet little Fisher O’Brien, 2 days old!
*Wedding dress shopping (successful!) and bridesmaid dress shopping (also successful!)
*Getting to eat all the things we miss in Norway – for example fish and chips, potato cakes, meat pies, twisties, cheeszels, Lebanese bread, flathead, tasty cheese, cheap wine & beer (Boag’s Draft), to mention just a few!
*Gathering together our bridal party plus partners for a meal together in Port Melbourne
*Joel having a couple of successful fishing trips with Dad (Emma’s Nigel), Brett and Zac

Hmmm so that is not even half of it actually, so you can see from this list that we were so incredibly busy. It was really fun and just so great to see everyone again after such a long time away, we missed you all! But we have to say it was really exhausting physically and mentally as well and we’re really sorry if you’re one of the many who we didn’t get to spend as much time with as we would have liked.

The culmination of all of this was our Engagement Party on our last Saturday in Melbourne. We had over 100 people there and loads of kids, someone even commented that they’d never seen so many kids at a ‘grown up’s’ party before! We were so lucky with the weather and a beautiful sunny afternoon made for a perfect setting to sit outside by the water at Patterson Lakes. The drinks were flowing and the food plentiful, and everyone had a fantastic time, especially Joel and I. We thanked everyone in our speeches, however it’s just worth mentioning again my mum and dad for all their efforts and work in the preparation for the party, we pretty much just said “hey can we have our party at your house, and can you organise everything too?” and they were wonderful. We also really want to thank Joel’s family – especially Bernadette, John and Sharyn who were incredible with their support.

Here are two photo albums, one of the Melbourne trip and the other of the Engagement party. Those on facebook can also find a lot of pics there, and we have also updated our wedding website www.emmaandjoel.com with some pics from the night (thanks to our photographers for the evening Andrew Lee and Grandpop Cousins!). Thanks to everyone who helped make our short trip back to Melbourne so wonderful, we miss you all and are already looking forward to our return in November for The Big Day!

Grandma (Gwenda) Holloway passed away 10/2/2009

2009-02-11T10:19:00.003+01:00

It is with a very heavy heart that I write that my wonderful Grandma (Gwenda) Holloway passed away peacefully at home on Tuesday 10th February, aged 92. She was a remarkable woman who had lived a full and adventurous life. She will be missed by all of her family and friends who loved her dearly.

Joel and I will especially treasure our time with her just recently during our visit home in January. We had a lovely day with her at Patterson Lakes, and were particularly thrilled that she was able to come to our engagement party, in fact we were amazed that she stayed so long, heading home around 10.30pm! At 92 one could be excused for not being the party animal one once was!

Every time I saw her during the evening she was surrounded by family who were sitting on the floor near her feet or on the arm of a chair nearby, chatting and catching up. This same scene has been taking place for many many years every time there was a family gathering or party, and I felt it really represented how much Grandma meant to us all and vice versa. Her family were so special to her and I think she was never happier than when surrounded by her children, their wives/husbands, her grandchildren and great-grand children.

It is very sad that Grandma isn’t with us anymore, however I am trying to focus on celebrating her life rather than mourning her death. It’s what she would have wanted, and certainly she wouldn’t have wanted anyone making a ‘fuss’! I wish I could be there, especially on Tuesday, and also for the funeral on Friday and certainly feel very far away at the moment, but thanks to my lovely family and friends for your support and kind words about Grandma.

Here is a pic of Grandma from the party, with her carer Carol.

Emma is gonna be a fadder...!!

2009-01-28T17:01:00.004+01:00

Something really exciting happened last week, Mari and Kev asked me to be a Fadder to their son Oscar. A Fadder is a Norwegian godparent. Along with Mari's sister and Kev's sister, and lovely Aud Trude who are Oscar's other Fadders, I will be part of the christening next weekend and given the very important responsibiltiy of caring for Oscar throughout his life. I was so touched and excited to be asked, what a huge honour.

Mari and Kev have also made it clear that the partners will have a very big role too (can we call them fadders-in-law?), especially since all the fadders are women, Kev in particular is keen on having a strong male influence as well! So really it's a huge honour for both of us. Here he is! Also more photos of gorgeous Oscar on Mari and Kev's blog (on the link at the side of ours, or just visit www.mariandkev.blogspot.com).

G'day Fisher O'Brien

2009-01-24T11:38:00.005+01:00

We were so lucky and blessed that during our stay in Melbourne, our dear friends Karen and Pete welcomed their little son Fisher Ross O'Brien into the world. We managed to squeeze in a visit to the hospital to meet him. He is such a beautiful perfect baby, very peaceful and content and with a face like an angel. Here are some early pics:

Pre-Christmas Family Visit & A Big Surprise

2009-01-24T10:21:00.006+01:00

We have had the most busy and fun past month. So much has happened, it’s hard to summarise it in just one blog. I will try to be brief and include lots of photos. Well it all began just after our renovation. The reason (which we couldn’t say at the time) for the big rush to finish was that we had Joel’s family come to stay with us for a couple of weeks. Joel’s brother Zac, his wife Fraze and baby Eliza came to stay with us from around 16th December. Then together with Simon, Joel’s brother who also flew in from Melbourne, we flew to Paris and north into the countryside to stay at a farmhouse that Joel’s dad John and his family had rented for a week. This was a huge surprise to Joel’s sisters Em and Bec, and was in honour of Emma’s 21st Birthday. We spent a night at the farm and then drove down to Paris where we stayed a few nights.

Paris was beautiful, especially as it was just before Christmas so the place was lit up with lights and decorations, and there was definitely a buzz in the air. Joel and I finished some last minute Christmas shopping and enjoyed seeing some of the sights with the others. A particular highlight was visiting Notre Dame during a Carols Concert and hearing the organ in action with a choir. It was absolutely packed, standing room only.

One very special treat for us having all the family visit was that we got to meet our little niece Eliza for the first time. She was born while we were living over here in Norway, so we were so excited and thrilled to meet our little 18 month old darling. She is just a delight, a really happy, fun little girl with a beautiful face and a cheeky grin. We adored getting to know her and miss her already now that we are back.

After a few nights in Paris we all flew back together to Stavanger on 23rd December. Joel took an expedition of those that were game up to Pulpit Rock, not an easy climb at the best of times but even more treacherous in the middle of winter with snow and ice everywhere (just ask Sally!). We also showed everyone around Stavanger including some trips to town and around Mosvanet, the lake near our house. The Oil Museum was also fun, and Joely loves to get everyone involved in a bit of oil industry propaganda!

Christmas Day was a big family affair with 9 of us plus the baby all helping with the preparations and serving a big lunch. It was a really lovely day and so special for us to have everyone here at our home.

All too soon it was all over and everyone was flying back to Melbourne or continuing their holiday in Europe. So then Joel’s and my thoughts turned to our trip home to Melbourne.

Godt Nytt År

2009-01-01T08:13:00.004+01:00

Happy New Year everyone!

We are just getting ready to jump on a plane (well 3 actually) to Melbourne ... YAY.

Looking forward to catching up with everyone (and the sun and beers also).

Joel and Emma

Renovation hell ... the photo chronicle

2008-12-16T21:59:00.001+01:00

renovation madness & The Christmas Table

2008-12-15T09:14:00.004+01:00

It seems that most people have spent the past weekend doing Christmas shopping, putting up the christmas tree, filling the fridge and pantry with food and going to christmas parties. But such fun-filled relaxation (yes, even christmas shopping sounds relaxing to me right now) is a far off memory for Joel and I.

We’ve been working solidly day and night for over a week to get our bedroom finished in record time. Finally, tonight, we will finish!!!! And we couldn’t be happier! We have a fabulous new bedroom with taupe/latte coloured walls and a dark aubergine coloured feature wall. It is looking fantastic and we can’t wait to move back in! Gone is the circa 1979 dim wooden light fitting, and in it’s place halogen downlights, I’m certain I’m going to rediscover all kinds of clothes in by cupboard simply by being able to see them now!

Poor little Cooba has been so neglected that after we finally downed-tools last night at about 9.30pm dead on our feet we just had to take him for a walk. He certainly enjoyed the break from boarder patrol in our back yard which he had been doing for the past week!

Over a week ago just after Joel returned from offshore we both had our ‘Julebord’ (literally translated Christmas Table) Christmas parties. Unfortunately they were on the same night otherwise I could have gone to Joel’s as partners are invited. Our department were doing part of the entertainment. Here is a pic of everyone in the ‘green room’ getting ready for our performance (I’m not in this one as I was taking the photo).

It was a version of ‘Yellow Submarine’ with different lyrics. After our show I caught a cab to Joel’s party and joined him for an hour or so. It was a fun night, although we were home before midnight and up early the next morning installing plaster board...! Such a glamorous life we lead. I will post some pics of our finished bedroom very soon.

Hope your christmas preparations are going well!

Emma.

Welcome Oscar!

2008-11-23T11:08:00.005+01:00

We are so excited that our lovely friends Mari and Kev on Thursday 20th November welcomed their eagerly anticipated little baby into the world. His name is Oscar Olav Murphy, he was 3.2kg and 48cm long when he was born. The labour was of course not a cake-walk but Mari did an amazing job and Oscar arrived in the early afternoon as a healthy little baby boy. He was only one day past his due date, which was a huge relief to his parents who were gearing up for a 2+ week wait!

I was lucky enough to be able to go and visit them at the hospital on Friday evening. They are a beautiful little family and of course Oscar's mum and dad couldn't be prouder. He was very well behaved and slept most of the time, in contrast to how he seemed to spend his time while still in the womb when it seemed he couldn't keep still! He is such a cute little baby with a beautiful little face and big blue eyes. He has his father's dark hair but I think the eyes and nose look quite a lot like Mari. Unfortunately for Joel he was offshore when Oscar was born and hasn't met him yet but I'm sure that will be priority number 1 when he returns.

Here he his with his very proud and happy mum Mari

Like a little Buddah, sleeping soundly

A taste of the action

2008-11-18T16:36:00.009+01:00

Before Joel's ship set sail (or motor...) out into the North Sea, I was allowed to come on board for a Visning (visit)! It was so interesting to go on board one of these huge ships and see how it all works. Joel was so excited to show me the ROVs (Remote Operated Vehicles), cranes and heavy machinery. Of course I was more interested to see the tv room, gym, solarium, sauna, dining room and living quarters! Here are some pics from the visit, and also some additional photos that Joel took while offshore. Don't be alarmed by what looks like fire, it's just the camera doing funny things with the light! Trust me if it were fire Joel would not look so calm!

Joel has a room to himself. He is A, there is no B.

Up on the bridge, straight out of a StarTrek episode! Couldn't use the flash unfortunately, sorry its a little blurry

One of the ROVs on the deck.

Alongside the ship at the dock.

The rig, taken from Joel's ship

He has to write his name on his hat so that if he forgets his name, he just has to look in the mirror. Clever hey?

I'm hanging in there while Joel is offshore, filling up my time with some Christmas Shopping, trips to the gym and watching as many of the tv shows that Joel hates as I can. I've also been catching up with friends and taking care of Coobs. It looks now like Joel will be away for at least another two and a half weeks.

BIG shout out to Mari and Kev, patiently (or not!) waiting for their little baby to arrive. Tomorrow is the official due date, but they're expecting to go into overtime (to borrow the AFL term). It's a hard slog at 9 months pregnant and getting through each day is a bit of a challenge at the moment, so wish them well. Also happy birthday to Janine for tomorrow as well.

Cheers from me,

Em xo

And the walls remain down.....

2008-11-07T14:27:00.001+01:00

Our renovation project got off to a wonderful start with a flurry of activity and action. We had stalled slightly as work demands have increased and more overtime and less energy has taken its toll. However our project came to an abrupt halt today as Joel has begun his offshore campaign. What was expected to be a small, aprox 10 day trip has in the past 2 days blown out to an all-singing-all-dancing-offshore-extravaganza. Joel came home the other day with 4 weeks as a possible timeframe for him to be away! Yikes! We might be sleeping in our lounge room when our guests arrive! He’s taken the camera so maybe we’ll be lucky enough to get some pics of his offshore adventures.

Meantime we’ve had some glorious autumn weather - cool, clear sunny days and very still. Surely it can’t last long...?

BIG congratulations to my cousin Penny and her partner Ben who have a brand new baby girl, Tilkah Lilly. Looking forward to meeting her soon. Also congratulations to Merete and Åsmund, proud parents of a baby boy Trym. Still to come, Mari and Kev are expecting very soon with the due date of 19^th November, and Jess and Joel Carswell also due this month. It is a month of babies, and we wish everyone well. I will continue to be loving (single for now) parent to our little darling Cooba who is as gorgeous as ever, especially now as the fence is finally keeping him in the back garden.

That’s all for now,

Emma.

The walls are coming down!

2008-10-25T17:55:00.012+02:00

We have begun our 3rd major home improvement project (after the deck/garden and guest bedroom) which is to our main bedroom a facelift. We plan to install new downights, put up plaster board for the walls and ceiling (gyprock in oz, gipsplater in norway) and make a feature wall. We will also install some more insulation to keep us cozier in winter.

We have started by emptying the bedroom and moving into the guest room temporarily. We have a deadline of Mid December before our guests arrive and need to kick us out of their room.

There is turning back now as we have ripped down the ceiling and walls. Here are some pics of our progress from today.

We also found it quite interesting to peel back the layers and identify the fashions of the time with the wallpapers that were laid on since 1953 when the house was built. They say that fashion is cyclical but we can't honestly see how any of these wallpaper designs will ever come back into fashion.

Anyway - we can't type much - stuff to do.

Hooroo.

Injuries, London, Zurich, Madonna, Visitors

2008-10-03T10:09:00.002+02:00

It has been so long between posts I wonder if you think we are still around!! So what is our news?

5 days after arriving home from our holiday in

France

back in early August, Joel was competing in a road cycling race. Having just returned from 4 weeks eating and drinking our way around France perhaps he was a tiny bit below peak fitness, but in any case after slightly losing touch with a fast group at the front as he reached the top of a hill, he was trying to catch them up on the descent, and ended up misjudging a sharp corner and had a crash.

He was travelling 60km per hour, just typing it makes me shudder. His head and shoulder took most of the impact. Fortunately the helmet did its job but broke apart with the impact, and he was left on the side of the road with a terrible pain in his shoulder. It was fortunate that he crashed right next to one of the red cross ambulances (not a coincidence – accidents occur at this corner every year – mind you perhaps it never occurred to the organisers to put up signage or warn the competitors…) but Joel had to wonder about their competence as he had to ask repeatedly for a sling, and other than provide him with a blanket and arrange a ride with the time keeping car to the finish line, they were next to useless.

I met him at the finish line and we went straight to the hospital for XRays. The XRays showed he had fractured his shoulder blade. Basically he got off lightly – it could have been a head injury or worse. So he ended up with half his body covered in scrapes and bruises and with a very sore left shoulder. Needless to say this put pay to any idea of a social life for a couple of weeks until the pain reduced. But everything has healed up really well now and he is pretty much back to normal.

We have also had a friend of Sally’s come and stay with us. Shankar is travelling the world for 6 months and was visiting friends in Bergen and Oslo so we invited him to join us for a weekend in Stavanger. We took him up to Preikestolen (of course!), and really enjoyed his visit.

I have had a couple of work trips – one to London for a conference which also happened to coincide with the Madonna ‘sticky and sweet’ Concert at Wembley Stadium. A colleague had bought tickets back in May and happened to have a spare one. It was a sensational concert, she is absolutely amazing. I also had a day with a customer in Lucerne in Switzerland and was able to combine this with a visit with my friend Rebecca. I haven’t seen her for about a year and a half so that was perfect.

Just recently we’ve had my mum come and stay with us. We had a weekend together in Stavanger before she headed over to London to visit with Chris, Berni, Dorothy and the girls. I then flew to London to meet her for a “girls’ weekend”. We crammed a lot in during 3 days including seeing ‘Wicked’ the musical, meeting Sam’s parents for lunch, having a manicure and visiting some wedding dress stores. It was fantastic to have some time with Mum with just the two of us. She headed home yesterday.

So now we are looking forward to having some of Joel’s family visit us in Stavanger for Christmas. And then of course our visit to Melbourne in January.

That’s all for now!

Emma.

Our Bobil Adventure, Summer 2008

2008-08-21T22:28:00.005+02:00

And here it is, the blog entry you've all been waiting for! Our summer holiday photos. We have embedded it as a slide show, so click on the heading above to start the slideshow and enjoy!

Yesterday's highlights, St Emilion

2008-07-12T17:51:00.000+02:00

Highlights for yesterday:
Saint Emilion, near Bordeaux. Beautiful little town.
The smell of macarons being baked, amazing.
Baguettes & croissants delivered to our door at the vineyard where we stayed overnight, mobile bakery, astounding!
Red wine in this area, spectacular. Yum.
Bumping into Bec's friend Matt in a little bar. What are the chances?

Saint Emilion

2008-07-10T22:18:00.000+02:00

Hi again. We are currently in the Bordeaux region in France staying at a romantic little village called St Emilion.

We stayed in Royan until late this evening. I had a lovely cycle this morning through amazing country along the coast and past fields full of blooming sunflowers. When I had a tail wind I actually convinced myself I was in a breakaway in the tour. Then Emma and I went for another cycle along the coast stopping at a lovley outdoor restaurant for lunch. After that we hit the beach which was very relaxing and enjoyable.

Sadly we left Royan and made our way to Bordeaux and are staying amongst cab sav vineyards in an amazing setting with a lovely sunset.

Tomorrow we plan to do a cycling vineyard tour/crawl tasting hopefully many fine drops. Then ... who knows??? Maybe stay here for a couple of days then head to the south atlantic coast to either Biarritz or St Jean de Luz.

Anyway, more adventures beckon tomorrow and beyond. To borrow and bastardise a saying from Mr Sitch and Gleisner ... "There's always a vineyard somewhere."

Go Cadel!!!! Keep your eyes on SBS because he is going to win the tour!

Update from France!

2008-07-09T23:00:00.000+02:00

I am going to send some very brief updates from my pda with the basics of what we are doing. Pls excuse the bad spelling & abbreviations! We'll then use this as a reminder later to do the full update with pics and all. We made our way from Frankfurt across to France. On the way stopped in Kaiser Slautern, great festivel in full swing! Arrived in Epernay in the champagne region. Weather was 20 but very wet. We arrived at Moet & Chandon for a tour looking like drowned rats!

Then drove to Villers Bretteneaux (sp!) and visited the australian war memorial. Next to the Loire valley. Lots of wine tasting, good food, divine little towns to drive & cycle through. Saw famous chateau Chenenceau.

Today we dropped in on Le Tour, rarely have I seen Joel so excited,like a little kid! Saw them all wizz past, tres cool. Will catch them again on the Alps. Now on way to Royan, a costal town recommended by Sam. Next is bordeaux. Our motorhome is awesome, v comfy and well kitted out. Stayed last night on a property with a chateau surrounded by vines on 3 sides. Amazing. More updates soon. Ryan how's coobs?

Emma.

Summer (sort of) in Stavanger

2008-06-29T16:25:00.007+02:00

In 4 days time, Emma and I leave for Frankfurt, Germany to commence our month long degustation, cycling, relaxing, and exploring tour of France (and surrounds).

We pick up our bobil in Frankfurt and cruise roughly around in an anticlockwise direction around France. Coincidentally, the 2008 Tour de France route also takes in an anticlockwise direction (I am not sure if Emma is aware of this). So it should be a very enjoyable month of travelling.

Our first stop will be Epernay in the Central North East of France which is the home of Champagne (well it is Champagne actually) and home to Moet and Chandon. It should be a good start to our tour. We probably won't get a chance to update along the way but we promise to provide a good blog when we are back.

In the meantime however, here is a glimpse of our last couple of weeks in Stavanger.

We (well Emma mostly bless her - I was out riding) finally got around to painting the wall between our place and next doors.

We went to the volleyball the other night after work with some good freinds. Stavanger has a round of the world cup beach volleyball each year (we went last year also and we posted some pics back then). We went along which was enjoyable as always, and then went across the harbour to a lovely outdoor bar and had some fresh prawns in a bucket washed down with more than a few beers. We then caught up with some other friends later in the evening at the lønningspils (pay check beers) evening at a local bar. Lovely evening.

Here is me - we had OK seats this year, but we also had a great view of the harbour where there were 2 big cruise liners in. I got to watch them both leave also. Tough life!

After the prawns on Friday night, we went for a shop to this amazing gourmet food supermarket. Got fresh prawns, fresh baguettes, chorizo sausage, mozarella, salmon, dips, cheeses and quiceish paste and washed it down in the sun with a bottle of our favourite Cloudy Bay.

It was just like training for what will come in France.

The lovely spread.

The lovely company.

Cooby also got a taste for the good life and Stavangerske prawns

Warm up race for Le Tour de France

2008-06-18T11:16:00.003+02:00

Joel competed on Saturday in the Nordsjørittet (North Sea Race). Having opted to drink beer in Belgium (refer previous post) rather than participate in a seeding race a few weeks earlier, he was in the general group 6, rather than the serious riders that left in the first groups. Our friend Justin (he and his wife Nat are the proud parents of Cooba’s sister Brandy) was visiting for the weekend, so we drove down to Egersund, about an hour’s drive south of Stavanger, to see him off. The race is about 90km along a coastal trail combining road and off-road tracks, and is very picturesque winding its way along the south west coast of Norway – a very nice part of the world.

Joel completed the course in 2hr:51min which was a fantastic time, and won his group after strong competition with 2 other riders to the finish. Joel managed to burn them off riding up the last hill – anyone that knows Joel on a bike knows how much he loves the hills – nuts if you ask me. The overall winner completed the race in about 2:25. Joel's time should see him seeded in the elite group for next year’s race. Of course having borrowed a bike from a mate (thanks Al!), because none of his 3 bikes were suitable, I am now being targeted with a very focussed campaign aimed at buying him a new bike. At AUD$5-6K I’m not exactly rushing out to the bike shop, but that does not seem to dampen Joel’s enthusiastic campaigning!

We are now getting ready for our holiday, lists galore of things to take. I hate to think how much our luggage will weigh! After a beautiful 6 weeks or so of sunshine and true summer weather during late April and May, unfortunately it did not last. We have been back to mid-teen temperatures and quite a bit of rain over the last few weeks. Joel and I refuse to believe that was The Summer, and now it is over, and are crossing our fingers for some warm days during August and maybe even September. The warm stretch broke records in Norway, but for us it was just a short taste of what we hoped was a ‘real’ summer. After last years dismal imitation of a summer we (perhaps undeservedly) felt like we were owed a good one! Time will tell.

Cheers to all,
Emma

Enough of the ring already!

2008-05-27T21:08:00.012+02:00

Anyone would think by the lack of updates on this blog lately we have been doing nothing but swan around in loved-up post-engagement ectasy.

Well ... we have been doing that, but we also have been a little busy.

Here is a photo slideshow of some of the things we have been up to. You have to click on the photo below first and then click on slideshow to start. Happy viewing!

Blog update May 08

Joel and Emma

The Ring

2008-04-22T07:00:00.012+02:00

I was surprised by a phone call yesterday afternoon from our jeweller saying that my ring was ready to collect, a day early! Joel had a colleague visiting from Aberdeen and insisted we go and meet him for a beer downtown by the harbour before going to the jeweller. I think he just enjoyed watching me squirm!

Finally we headed to the jeweller and collected my beautiful ring. It fits perfectly, nice and snug without being too tight or too loose. I personally think it is the most beautiful engagement ring in the world, but of course I am 100% biased. But you can make up your own mind....

Emma.

Being Engaged

2008-04-18T11:04:00.001+02:00

One of the best, most fun and amazing things about being engaged is that virtually everybody in our lives, from our nearest and dearest to those we might not have seen or spoken to in years, have contacted us to offer their congratulations. It is truly astounding and fantastic. I’m actually addicted to the messages and find myself checking my email, facebook and our blog each morning with so much excitement and anticipation to get my ‘hit’! I think this has really helped make me feel very connected to friends and family back home, as in an ideal world we would be hanging out and clinking the champagne glasses right about now (having imported all our Norwegian friends to Melbourne of course! I did say it was an ‘ideal’ world!). Fortunately we did plenty of that on Saturday night with all our Norwegian friends, and will continue to do so over the coming days/weeks.

I think now the adrenaline and ‘spaced out’ feeling has now dissipated, but what remains is a very content and happy feeling. As much as I’ve always thought and felt that Joel and I would always be together, I look at him with a different feeling now – this man will be my husband! That takes a little getting used to, even after 4 years, a home we own together, shared bank accounts and our little guy Cooba, who will soon no longer be the ‘illegitimate child’ - kinda!

We’ve been thinking and talking about how/when/where we might get married, but have decided that at least for the next few weeks we’re going to put those thoughts to the side and just enjoy being engaged and celebrating that. Suffice to say one decision that we have made is that we will get married in or near Melbourne, so rest easy - you don’t need to buy the thermal underwear for a trip to Norway after all. Or at least not for a wedding, but perhaps a visit anyway??!

Thank you all so much for helping us celebrate and making this such an amazing experience. I would love to rewind to Saturday and do it all again, it has been so much fun. So thank you thank you thank you!!

Emma

PS. Picking up the ring on Tuesday, can’t wait!

Just another day in the office....!

2008-04-13T17:51:00.010+02:00

UPDATE: HERE ARE SOME PHOTOS FROM THE PARTY.

CLICK ON THIS LINK TO SEE THEM:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/75163841@N00/sets/72157604536426740/show/

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What an amazing amazing last 24 hours it has been! Actually yesterday was the best day of my life.

I set out for the evening to celebrate my 30th birthday for a low-key drinks and dinner with Joel, only 3 hours later to find myself somehow in the middle of a huge party at my house with 30 or so of my friends all dressed up in crazy 70’s outfits, and most amazingly of all, having just accepted the marriage proposal, delivered on bended knee and accompanied by a stunning diamond, from the love of my life!

What a day. I am absolutely exhausted, thrilled, excited and very emotional. But I am just so so so happy. I can’t get the grin off my face!

The party was absolutely sensational, Joel with the help of some of beautiful, generous wonderful friends planned it all as a surprise! The house was decorated brilliantly, the food was amazing, they just thought of everything. Sally and Sam arranged a video compiled of loads of photos and video messages from home which was beamed up on a projector for everyone to see. I was just amazed and of course cried my eyes out from start to finish. What wonderful friends and family I have.

And my Joel, well what can I say. He planned the whole day, and just made everything perfect and special. I think I am still in shock that he actually did it!

We have loved sharing the news with as many friends and family as we have been able to contact, and I’m sure will continue to talk to you all over the coming days and weeks.

We will upload some photos from the party as soon as we can find the camera...!

To everyone who played a part in the best day of my life, THANK YOU. I just can’t thank you enough. And to my fiancé Joel, I love you so much and can’t wait to marry you!

Emma.

PS. I know that the girls will want to see pictures (in fact have already been asking), so here they are. We will take the diamond in to the store tomorrow to pick out a setting for it. In the meantime, I am wearing a mood ring (which changes colour with my moods) that Joel purchased from the toy store for about $3 which is just as precious to me! He says he should have done it ages ago as now he has a 'mood chart' and at a glance can tell exactly how I am feeling. Genuis!

2 Problems:

2008-04-06T11:44:00.025+02:00

(1) We need sun to enjoy our new deck and
(2) The spare room which we never use is now the best room in the house!

Ok - as per Ryan's suggestion, here are some before and afters.

As we never thought the spare room was worthy of a photo, this is about as "before" as you will see. Shows much the same entrance pic as below.

Now with lovely "eggshell white" walls, downlights, etc etc.

From this ...

to this ...

to this ...

to this.

And some more pics of the finished room.

Bedding for all. Come on over.

Now for outside.

Before the fence(s).

With new deck in place.

From this ...

to this ...

Cooby seems to like it.

From this ...

to this ...

to this.

Just got to put on the edging around the deck and all will be done. Just gotta wait for that warm weather to enjoy it. It is nice and sunny today ... the 2 degree temperature just puts you off a little bit.