A few pics from the last month, posted in a sweltering hot Sweden. Well into the 30's, Liam's outside painting the garage while Andrew and I are hiding indoors in the relative cool (if 30,6 is to be considered cool...). But, I really am not complaining, I love the heat!

After emptying out all the toys he decided the basket was the perfect place to sit.

Who let Grandad loose in IKEA's kids department???

First time in the proper swimmingpool. Loved walking in it, but wouldn't sit down. "It's wet and cold, for God's sake!"

My new favourite fighting face!

With Daddy in the swimmingpool at the family reunion.

Our new house!

Snacking on fresh sun warm strawberries.

Bath time!

My apologies for poor updating lately. Have to good excuses, and not even any bad ones.

Yesterday Andrew had an appointment with his district nurse and I was allowed to come with him.

We headed off a good 1 hour 15 minutes before the appointment, so that he'd have time to sleep before. In my mind, I thought he'd doze off within minutes, he was that tired. Of course things never happen the way I plan them to. We walked and walked, went to look at horses and finally I gave up hoping that he'd sleep before the appointment and started to walk to the hospital. And yes, 20 minutes before the appointment he fell asleep, gone to the world.

Luckily, he was quite easy to wake up, and was in a good mood so all ended well.

While waiting for the nurse he charmed an older woman totally. Well, she wasn't exactly old-old, maybe 10 or 11, but all things are relative!

The nurse then weighed and measured him, 7,6 kg (15 pounds) and 68,5 cm (2,2 ft), and was - naturally, ehrm - impressed at how strong he is sitting steady by himself already.

After that it was time to see the pediatritian for a check up and his vaccines. Check up went well, as did getting two very long needles stabbed into his thighs. He did cry a small bit, but not much at all.

I didn't cry either, but thought the needles looked awfully long!

Today we started off with a long walk with the doggies, kitted out in the fabulous outfit he got from Nanny Mary.

Later in the afternoon we took another stroll, this time to see Mira and mum Helena. Again, Andrew was beyond tired, but stubbornly refused to sleep.

Being doting mothers, we set to work blowing up the paddling pool and filling it with water. An easy task, you may think but oh no. The pool itself was not the smallest model, and we only had one small pump. And my set of lungs, which made me rather dizzy and giddy. After inflating the thing, we carried it out and started filling it with water. This we got from the shower, via Mira's little plastic bath that we then carried out and down the rather steep terrace steps - without spilling a single drop, I'd like to add -and then into the pool.

The manouvre was repeated 5 times, which resulted in at the most 5 cm (2 inches) of water. Thank God the babies are small and don't require more water than that.

They had a great time, as you can see from the photos.

And finally a mother & son photo.

Summer summer summer!!

Jungle City

Last Saturday Liam, I, Andrew and Mulle went to the softplay area Jungle City in Gävle. This, as always, meant that Liam and Mulle were running around and climbing like mad ones. One minute they were at the slides, the next in the ball room, then the trampolines... Pretty much everyw here. I'm not quite sure who had the better time, the big boy the little boy.

What I do know is that the smallest boy and his mother went to the little playarea designated for children under 4 years, and had a great time there. Andrew was decidedly the youngest one there, and very much all the other children's favourite. He had at least one child near him all the time, much to Andrew's delight. With big eyes he watched the other kids jumping, rolling, sliding and running. I could nearly hear him think "You just wait, soon enough I'll be running faster than you!".

Meanwhile we are enjoying fantastic weather, and I am trying to pretend we don't have to start packing very soon.

With Mormor and Mulle

Christening

Now our baby boy is properly christened, by the most fantastic priest. Sadly, I don't have any photos from day, so please send them to me those of you who happen to have some!

The day was fabulous, even though it started off foggy and grey. They fog soon disappeared, and instead we had glorious sunshine all day long. The priest gave a really good service both in Swedish and English, and Andrew was in good form all through the service. He had a firm grip on his yellow/pink toothbrush, and sometimes my brother's paper with his reading on. Only when we sang the last hymn did Andrew think enough was enough, so the priest cut it short and let us step out into the sunshine.

After coffee and cake in the parish hall, we all headed back to my parent's house for BBQ and a game of kubb. Of course the guys had to cheat to win, but we were gracious enough to pretend we didn't mind. Well, not Wilma, cause she threw one of the sticks quite close to someone's head... :D

The Swedish branch of the Higgins' family has bought a house! Well, half a house, I suppose. It's a semidetached house with 3 bedrooms and a good sized garden. We'll move in on the 1st of July, and neither one of us can wait to have more space and foremost a garden! And two terraces. Happy days!!

Laid back Sunday

Bestest friends

Sunday morning, but we still wake up at 7am. And this time it was I who woke first, followed by Andrew. Together we decided to give Liam a lie in, as he treated me to the same yesterday, and then a fab breakfast.

A bit later the whole family took a long walk in the sunshine, did our weekly shopping and then just relaxed.

Liam is away in Uppsala having a pint or two with Michael and Shaun, while I'm enjoying a quiet evening with Andrew sleeping in his bed.

Tomorrow the bidding on the house starts off again, and I hope that it will be over and done with, in our favour, by the evening.

Father & son

Peas please!

Zassi's new favourite spot in the window

Stuck in a snowy Sweden...

...is poor Grandad. Not that he appears to mind to much, getting even more time to spoil Andrew.

With the volcano having a whale of a time in Iceland, and on top of that a very unexpected heavy snowfall today Bill will be here until Tuesday next week.

So far we've eaten loads of really nice food, apart from Andrew who had his first taste of parsnip at the Baby café on Tuesday. Lets just say he was not impressed. At all. But still ate a bit of it. To give him credit it did have a fairly bitter after taste, either from the rapeseed oil or the milk-au-mummy that didn't like being frozen.

We did a new batch the following day, free from additives and that went down a lot better. But not quite as well as the orange he tried today! He sucked and sucked and sucked, not getting enough at all. He went through the better part of a whole orange, and left for me to eat the remains of the orange once he sucked all the juice out.

Went in to Uppsala on day to meet up with the boys, and at the café we went to Andrew made a new friend in a little boy sitting next to us. They had a great chat, about what only they will know, and finished off nearly snogging each other. Very cute.