Finished Another Floral Painting

I finally found some time to do some painting the last couple of days and I finally finished my newest addition for my Funky Floral Series. Thought I would post a picture of my painting to share with you:

Les Tournesols de Samedi Matin

(Saturday Morning Sunflowers), 40 x 50 cm, Acrylic

The Long Summer Days have Begun...

The days of winter are very short in Denmark where the sun sets sometimes at 3:30 pm; however the summer days are very long and the sunsets are very late and beautiful. The longest summer days begin between mid June-July where I have seen the sky quite light until past midnight, and have seen the sunrise at about 3:30 am.

Last night at 10:30 this was the view from my windows of the beautiful sky over the Oresund. Hurray for the long summer days have begun…we just need some warmer weather to go with them!

End of a Nice Visit

After a short 2 week visit my in-laws will be leaving tomorrow morning and we had a nice visit with them. They very much enjoyed our home, view and my cooking or course…LOL. They also had a nice visit to Germany to see very close relatives in Germany and of course our Onkel Kurt’s 80th birthday celebration, which was basically the reason for the trip. I am happy that my husband spent some fine times with his parents. They also very much enjoyed Copenhagen and the beautiful surroundings. Our very good Canadian Friends here, Sue and Tom also had a chance to meet them and we had a great bbq dinner, and it was also very nice that they had a chance to meet our second little family here in Copenhagen.

Some photos of our bbq dinner with the Canadian Contingency and of course, our last filet Sunday dinner.

Andreas and his lovely mother

The Canadian Contigency - Canada Rules!

And our Good-Bye Sunday Night Dinner

Back From Germany

Hi Everyone, Welll, I am finally back home from our little trip to Lorrach, Germany and Basel, Switzerland for our dear Onkel Kurt's “80th” birthday celebration. Andreas' parents are here visiting us for a couple of weeks and we all flew down to Germany.

Unfortunately, our schedule was so busy seeing all the family members that I did not get a chance to see some of my friends in Basel. Nevertheless, We had a great time seeing Onkel Kurt and his birthday celebration was just wonderful.

I also had a chance again to visit the beautiful wine country side and quaint villages of the Markgraferland. When we lived in Basel some 5 years ago, Onkel Kurt, Andreas and I would love to take drives through the country side and stop and all these quaint villages for a bite to eat and some local wine. (photo of Istein - Cathedral).

Here I am outside the Kreiterhof – Strassi in Wollbach, Germany. A Strassi is basically the "Farmer's restaurant" located right on his farm, which is open only during the harvest season and during this time he sells his yummy produce.

It was such a cozy, adorable little place with an interesting outside garden filled with all sorts of old farming tools, colourful pots and baskets.

Andreas had the fresh aspargus and ham and I had a tasty Zwiebelwaie (Tarte Flambé) with delicious local Gutedel wine. Seeing Onkel Kurt again for his birthday and that evening at the Strassi was the highlight of my trip!

The Strassi Terrace

Inside the Strassiand the Zwiebelwaie of course....

Andreas and our wonderful Onkel Kurt at his Bday Party!

Happy Mother's Day

Wishing all our Wonderful Mothers a very Special Day!
What would we do without our special ladies!

Here is a little card I prepared for my very special mother

Happy for my Friends!

The past week, the weather has been just like summer over here so the other night I invited our friends Sue and Tom over for some Chicken Brochettes on the bbq. It has been a long winter, so we were all in great spirits with the warmer weather. It was a really nice evening.

During our cocktails they received a phone call from their real-estate agent about two homes, fitting their criteria, that were available . We were quite excited! So I spoke to Sue last night and I am happy to say that they finally found a place after a stressful, long search! And one with a bath tub and balcony! They will be moving next week and another great thing is that their new home is also in Hellerup...not too far from us!

Beautiful sun shinning while eating

The Chicken Brochettes. Great grilling job by Andreas

A Little Poll: Can you imagine that there are barely any homes with bath tubs in this country? I find it quite strange. I would love a bath tub but my place doesn't have one either, but the view makes up for that! Sue and I are curious to find out from my readers how important bath tubs are for you, so I am taking a little poll. Please do drop me a comment and let me know if you need your bath tub or couldn't even live without one!

Have a great week everyone!

Up and Running

My baby is fixed and up and running. I am very happy. Put in a new hard drive, reloaded all the software again and so far so good. Things are operating smoothly and the weird noises have stopped.

Have been very busy organizing our home for the arrival of Andreas' parents this Friday! Will be really nice to see some people from home. Andreas is very happy and the Copenhagen weather is still beautiful! Enjoying lots of bbqs.

Have a great day everyone!

Computer still down - but the Allergies are up & running

Blaah....my computer is still down! Andreas bought a new hard drive and had many difficulties trying to install it over the weekend. It still is not working, so he brought it this morning to the office to show the IT guys. We will see what happens today. From time to time, I am still working on the little lap-top which sometimes doesn't even want to connect to the internet. It has a mind of its own. This is so frustrating!

We have a very late Spring this year and with the drastic weather change the past 3 days everything is blooming like crazy. As a result, my allergies are really acting up so I spent most of my weekend suffering with a very runny nose, itchy eyes, swollen lips, crazy sneezing fits that just about had me peeing in my pants and all the wonderful things that come with them. I tell you, I almost did not make Andreas' company's "summer" party which was held at Tivoli on Saturday night because of my allergies...Thank goodness for strong drugs! I did not look that great at the party that's for sure...lol. Despite everything it was a very nice evening.

Other than that, I am still feeling like shit this morning and I am so busy getting everything ready for Andreas' parents arrival this week! Will be great to see them!
Have a great week everyone!

My New Toy

and no...it´s not a vibrator...lol
So after my exhausting day yesterday I went out shopping and picked up a new toy: The "FlavoursShaker" designed and created by one of my fav cooks and men…Jamie Oliver.

It is a cool, sleek cooking gadget (and I love gadgets for cooking) that crushes, purees, bashes and mixes all sorts of ingredients together for your spices, marinades and dressings in one good shake. Inside there is a ceramic ball that does all the crushing and grinding work. You can also add liquids like olive oil, balsamic vinegar, lemon juice and cream to make delicious dressings and marinades. You can even make a pesto sauce! It is the perfect little size and won't take much room on your counter top and you can put it in the dishwasher. I paid about 30$cdn for the little gizmo. (pics from Jamie's website)

You can read more about the gadget from Jamie. There is even his sexy little video of him demonstrating how it works along with great recipes to try with the new shaker.

With summer around the corner and lots of yummy bbqs, I think I will really enjoy my new toy. I will give it a try tonight as we are making some bbq chicken kebobs on the grill and let you know how it goes.

I also got a new haircut….

Today is a beautiful day and my computer is still down so I will get out and enjoy the weather.
Have a great day everyone.

Totally Frustrated

Yesterday I ran around getting passport photos done and then visited the doctor to get a check-up for my Danish driver’s license. Yeah, in Denmark you have to go to the Dr. and he checks your vision and hearing and fills in a health questionnaire with you in order to get a certificate to bring to the Police to get your license...and that costs about 80$. So then I am off to the police and they are closed. Yep, they close at 2 pm.

So I head out there early this morning on my bike for a nice 40 mins bike ride and get my number and wait in a long line to be told that there is a new rule and all people with non-EU licenses have to go to a special place in Valby which is quite far and I can't go by bike and the best part is.....that I will have to take a drivers test now! What the hell! I can't believe this. I tell her I have also my Swiss License and if I can transfer that and she says no. Switzerland is also not part of the EU and have to also do this test. So I ask her about the test, and she tells me she doesn’t know what kind of test? Can you believe this?

So I am really upset and I call Andreas and his secretary calls the police station and explains my situation and they confirm exactly what I have been just told. I have to go to this special office for foreigners and do a practical and theory exam in Danish in order to get a Danish License. The New Law! Why did they not tell her that when she called my local police station the other day to find out what I had to do. This is just so unbelievable. I mean what kind of crap is this??? Do they think North Americans and Swiss people can’t drive? I am so mad. I am going to write a letter to the Canadian government and tell them they should pass a law that all Danes have to do the same thing to drive in our country! I have never had this problem before living abroad. You mean to tell me that some crazy EU drivers (and I wont specify what countries in this blog)are better then us....blahh...this is such bull...This whole EU thing gets on my nerves so much. And get this if you fail the test after one try, you have to go back to driving school and pay big bucks. Good job Andreas got his license last year. Well, I never rushed to get mine because a) I never drive and b) I had my international drivers permit so that was valid for one year.

So I leave there totally frustrated to come home and find that my Computer has Crashed again! Totally dead, nada, nichts....It worked fine for 3 days and now it’s just not responding. We will bring it into Dell DK and see what they say or can do.....I am so angry and frustrated! Thank goodness for my old faithful IBM Thinkpad Laptop!
I wanna move back home.....