A Midsummer Night's Boll

Last night we celebrated midsummer with a great big bonfire, and it has been tradition for the children to dress up in costumes for this celebration. Bollan was very sad that she couldn't find a pretty costume in time, but the evening turned out to be fun anyway :) We even built a teeny tiny beacon out of gravel! We couldn't light a tiny fire on the beacon, so we put a pretty white pebble on top instead :)

For most of the evening, Bollan and Glyptodon were both nice and warm snuggled up in my bag, plus it kept most of the smoke (and smell!) away :)

Though the weather was great, it became a quite chilly after a while, so it was nice to move a little closer to the fire than the rest of the crowd to keep warm.

Sadly for Bollan there were no beer around yesterday, but she did manage to steal a few sips of my apple cider. She's a sneaky little Boll!

Apparently she sipped a little more of my cider than I'd suspected, she needed a little rest by the road on the walk back to the house after the party :p

Cheers! Hope everyone had a good time last night, whatever you were doing :)

Come rain or shine...

Bollan came along to visit my grandmother this weekend, and she'd been looking forward to roaming around in her very big garden. Unfortunately it started to rain on Friday afternoon, and it was either raining, windy or wet all weekend. It's not easy being a little Boll, she doesn't like to get her bum wet!

Glyptodon also came with us, but he took one look at the weather and stayed in! But Bollan was determined to come outside with us and do a little gardening, so she made us dig up an old rain hat from the bottom of some closet. It's way too big for her, of course, but at least it keeps her nice and dry :)

On Sunday afternoon, just before we left, the sun came out for a few minutes. The Great Boll was very quick to run outside, but the ground was still wet, so she had to jump from plant to plant like a little Tarzan hedgie :)

We are going back there today, and the sun is still shining, so Bollan is hoping for a lot more garden fun in the week to come :) Keep watching, there may be more cuteness coming up soon :D

Baker Boll

Last Saturday there was baking, and lots of it. Bollan put on her pretty apron and did her best to help with making the Foccacia. Mixing the oil and wine in the flour was a tough job for a little lady...

 

 

But she did good :)

It's important to check on the dough often, to make sure it's still there :p

Watching bread dough rise is a bit like watching paint dry, only it's a little faster and it makes you hungrier! 

But Bollan was good at that, too :)

All the bread was delicious, and we all agreed that Bollan could make a good career as a baker :)

Flower Power :)

The other day we took Bollan out for a trip to the botanical gardens, which we never visit despite the fact that we are practically neighbors. Bollan loves flowers, they are almost as pretty as she is!

There were so many colors and so many different smells, Bollan had to try them all :)

After smelling all those flowers Bollan's nose was covered with pollen in all the colors of the rainbow. Sadly I didn't get to take a picture of it, but it was very funny :)

It was fun to sit in the Rhododendron bush and blend in with the pretty flowers! 

Then she made herself even prettier with a wreath of Dandelions :)

There was even a pond with fish in the garden, but sadly they were a little too quick to get clear pictures of...

After all that running around and smelling stuff it was good to sit down on a park bench and relax in the sun for a while.

We definitely need to go back there some time :)

An exciting weekend

Last week we got visitors, and that was in itself exciting, but then there was celebration of a finished exam, and beer and all kinds of good food. Bollan came along to one of her favorite places and had her favorite beer (because it's so huge!) and yummy pizza!

We went to see the new Robin Hood movie, and of course Bollan came with us! She loves to go to the movies, even if there's no popcorn :) 

The movie was great, Bollan loved all the heroic men running around in heavy armor and fighting with swords and stuff! She now demands I make her a longbow and a bunch of tiny arrows...

After the movie we went to get a cup of coffee outside because the weather was so nice, but  as always Bollan ended up having a beer instead :)

On the way home we stopped to say hi to this hedgehog statue that's outside the university library. His Majesty the Hedgehog is the protector of the student union :)

He looked a little lonely on top of his stone pillar, so Bollan tried to give him a hug! Aww :)

Huzzah, Huzzah, Huzzah!

Today is (or was, it's rather late now) the national day of Norway, the day the Norwegians celebrate their Constitution. Years ago it was made into a day for children to celebrate and have fun marching and singing in school parades, stuffing themselves with hot dogs and ice cream, and play lots of games. Of course Bollan and her family didn't want to miss out on the fun!

Here they are marching away on our sofa, with some embroidered giraffes cheering them on in the background:

Tiny and The Mouse made themselves pretty with bows in the Norwegian colors,  and Iggy got to lead the parade with the flag, look how proud he is (not to mention his mother, I suspect she's very happy that he feels a little Norwegian as well):

Piggen formed the marching band part of the parade, and was so happy about his new saxophone, he got a little carried away and did a little jazz solo:

Of course Diego overslept and missed the whole parade, but he woke up from his slumber on top of the frigde in time to join the others for a little celebration :)

Then it was time to eat: hamburgers for dinner and ice cream with chocolate sauce & peanuts for dessert. Yum!

After all the food they were all very tired, so now they sit on their shelf and relax with Alien on DVD :)

Happy Birthday, Norway! :D

The Swedish hedgehog

I found a Swedish olympic hat sitting on the couch the other day. I have made a couple of these hats, and stuff is always lying around, so I didn't think much of it...

But then suddenly it moved!

I reached out to find out what was going on...

And it was Iggy! That little rascal was trying to steal one of the Swedish hats. He felt he should have one, so maybe I should make him one some day.

I think it's been mentioned before, but Iggy is Swedish. Kind of. When he came into the family his "name tag" said Igge Igelkott ("igelkott" being Swedish for "hedgehog"), so it was sort of natural to make him Swedish instead of Norwegian or Chinese, like Bollan and the rest of her family. That means he speaks Swedish. Not quite fluently all the time, because he's only been abroad for studies, but now he's apparently home for good and learning Norwegian again.

"Hej då!"

Easter surprise

This morning this huge egg was suddenly sitting on our couch.

Bollan quickly came to investigate, she'd never seen such a giant egg before!

She liked the chicks on the outside...

But she needed to find out what was inside the giant egg.

It was Piggen! What a sneaky guy, he was probably trying to get all the Easter candy for himself...

Thankfully he only wanted to surprise Bollan, and he invited the whole family to share in the fun :)

Happiness is a new hat :)

But two is even better!

It's a little back heavy, but that doesn't matter. She can fit her whole bum into it :)

Saint Patrick's Day!

Such a glorious occasion (and perfect excuse) to drink lots and lots of beer :) Green beer! Bollan, Tiny and Glyptodon love the color, though the beer was a little flat...

Dressing in green :) Iggy and Piggen has new stuff to show off:

Glyptodon, Humpty Dumpty, The Mouse, Cousin and Tiny eating green cupcakes that Bollan helped to make :)

Happy Paddy's Day!