My October bucket list

It is fall with crisp air, blue sky, colour explosion on the trees and a smell of pumpkins spice in every store and coffee house. I have a few things I really looks forward to this October:

- the "everything pumpkin spice and butternut squash" trip to Trader Joe's. Their so-called fearless flyer for the fall is out and I am drooling just by looking at it:

- a trip to northwestern Michigan. We have booked a camper on airbnb and we can't wait to see the nature up there in fall colors (and try to sneak the dog into sleeping bear dunes now that it is not so crowded......)

- more tea! I have not found the perfect fall flavor yet but we are working our way through different versions

- see Luca participate in his first sports meet. It will be cross country (AKA 1.7 miles🙄) and we are excited to drag Teresa along as a revenge for all the endless hours we have watched her play basketball/fieldhockey or run track. Muhahahaha

- More dog walks like this:

- more of these potatoes while they last

- and if we manage to squeeze in a trip to an apple orchard I really don't think October could be much better

Heat wave and local animal life

When school started the summer turned quite chilly and I was secretly worrying that that would be the end of it with a bitter cold fall and winter to follow.

Well.......

Not so much. The past week has been almost unbearably hot with cancellations of school sports in the afternoon and hot weather alerts from the school district. But despite the nasty heat during the day the evenings are awesome. Warm, dark evenings that feels like velvet on the skin without the constant buzz of mosquitos. I could certainly get used to that. Right now I am sitting on our patio wearing shorts and flip flops while I listen to the insects that are not the stinging kind👍🏻

These warm days also seem to bring out local animal life. There is roadkill everywhere and Sunday night we had the pleasure of a skunk in the neighborhood! I did not spot it, but Bailey sure did and barreled through the bushes for a close and - ehm - spraying encounter. Yikes. The skunk had sprayed him in the face and the poor dog was sneezing like crazy. I tried to smell him and literally teared up from the stench. The poor dog had no choice but to get a late evening bath right there and then as we could otherwise not have him sleeping inside. And for the first time ever he seemed like a bath was maybe not the worst thing to overcome him:

I do hope that skunk finds somewhere else to stay than right next to our place😡

10 reasons this Friday is better than usual

1) last time we shopped for toilet paper we allowed Luca to chose. BIG mistake! Today we finally used the last roll of the horrible single layer "sandpaper" from the giant pack. Never again will we allow him to chose. EVER

2) I took the kids to the school bus this morning, and when I get home I have just a bit of time for myself which I spent nursing all my new little succulent babies ✌🏻

3) we did our weekly grocery shopping yesterday. So there is no rushing to Aldi tonight

4) actually we do not have to rush anywhere since Teresa cancelled her swim practice tonight. Picking her up in the middle of watching a movie Friday night is a task neither Kristian nor I am excited about

5) speaking of movies: tonight we will watch "Olsen Banden" (it's a Danish thing.....) since my sister send the entire collection. Yay

6) and we will have a ton of (Danish) candy to go with that (again since my sister just sent a fresh supply). Thank you Christine❤️

7) the weather is awesome. I even biked wearing shorts this morning

8) I am not doing brain infusions today which means I can drink however much coffee I feel like (I have to stay away from coffee on infusion days as I can't have my hands shaking even just a tiny bit)

9) I have chocolate in my drawer

10) ehm. I ran out of reasons. But 9 is not a bad number either, right?

succulents galore

I LOVE succulents! Those waxy thick leaves and their looks like some of them just got off a spaceship.

When we lived in Copenhagen we had some giant ones we grew from tiny little plants given to us by Kristian's grandmother. And when we lived in California there would be gardens full of them. Sigh😍

And apparently I am not the only succulent lover in Ann Arbor. This weekend there is a sale at the local botanical garden and we thought we were SO smart to leave right in the middle of a football game. Well, succulent geeks don't care about football! The line was crazy long

And it took us about an hour to get the first glimpse of the wonders:

And then it took another hours pushing and shoveling around in a hot humid green house:

But we got our loot:

And now I have to find a place to put them all. Hmmmmmmm

School is back

This post was written last week but would not upload from my phone. Turned it did upload eventually - so here it is. A week late

First week of school is over and done with. With happy kids who have not been drowned in homework so far. Luca is now a middle schooler and I am so grateful that we could send him to a school that he already knows and where these awkward preteens just love to be. He will be taking introduction to French and German as well as acting which frankly makes me feel super old (how did time pass so this little redhead who was 5 just a blink of an eye ago is now learning French?????).

Ulrik and Teresa are quite happy as well. Teresa thought about taking US history AP, as all her friends do it (apparently). Well all her friends are now apparently spending a couple of hours every single night doing history homework. The only thing she is not happy with it taking algebra with a bunch of 8th graders from middle school who passed a test so they can get high school credits while still being in middle school. If only she had figured that out and she had to when shewas in middle school. Hrmpf! And she had to be recognized as her older brothers sister in German. "Ach so! Du bist Ulriks schwester, jah?"

Ulrik has a schedule completely devoid of math, which he is more than happy with. He will be having more ceramics, introduction to art and design, computer science, web design, engineering, and physics. Plus the mandatory English and some literature classes. He is also very close to getting his chairs. An endless saga beginning with him suffering from daily headaches last year, since he is too tall for furniture in the school. Well. We got a form from the doctor, which we then sent to the school nurse, who then requested chairs from the councilor, who filled out paperwork galore, finally getting the school to order in one chair Ulrik could test. That chair ended behind a locked door in the janitors office due to some miscommunication. Just after school ended last year I got an email saying that all chairs were now in (one for each of his classes). Then it was summer. And now the chairs have vanished again. The poor councilor has promised that he will personally track them down if they have not appeared by the end of the past week - which they have not........

Last but not least we are still adjusting to the new morning schedule where all kids need to be out the door at the same (way too early) time. But it works and Luca has been quite the champ getting ready on time.

Well, I'll go back to watching how to make tiny foods with tiny utensils together with med youngest son.

I can't look away

I have been glued to my phone this weekend following all new updates on Irma on CNN and instagram. I am equally terrified and fascinated by this monster hurricane which I have never been before. I guess it is because I have actually been to Florida and can relate much better because of this. It sends chills down my spine to think about what it must be like waiting for a storm that makes wind gusts of more than 100 mph yet inches itself closer with only 12 mph. What if it were the stores in my neighborhood that ran out of everything and I had to weigh the risk of not evacuating with the risk of getting stuck with en empty tank on a highway bumper to bumper. What if I knew that my home might not make it, and even if it did it would be loitered by the time I returned?

I have watched in awe of nature when the storm sucks beaches dry after passing and how it tips over giant cranes.

And I have been worried on behalf of several of my colleagues, who have family and friends down there while at the same time being SO grateful that I can go to sleep without worrying about storms and surges (and earth quakes).

And I feel so incredibly small and I am embarrassed every time I take out a can of plastic and trash feeling like I contribute too much to global warming while at the same time feeling like the tiniest drop in the ocean when I bring my own bags to the grocery store and everybody else binges on plastic bags.

I have nothing comforting or smart to say. But I hope with all my heart that the people of Florida will do their best to stay safe ❤️

Things you do the last day before school starts

- you stress out over the piles of fruits and vegetables in your kitchen because other members of the family got really excited about shopping at Randazzos. And end up making mango/melon/papaya salad just to get rid of some of it

- you shop on amazon for the next birthday coming up. Luckily Luca never reads the blog so I can show a few of the items here:

- you finally get macarons just right after trying quite a few times:

- you take one last dip in the ice cold pool only because it it the last day it is open

- you go shopping for back to school outfits with "camo boy"

- and you do load after load after load of laundry

- and last but not least when you are really exhausted and really want to go to bed you stay up just a bit longer to sit by the bed of the upcoming middle schooler, who does not go to sleep easily tonight❤️

Meijer Gardens

Today was one of those days I wish I could bottle up and pour from sometime in February. Since it is a long weekend we wanted to do more than just stay at home. We talked about going camping but we were too slow and no campsites were available anywhere. And in retrospect that might not have been too bad as it has been quite chilly at night lately.

Several people has recommended The Meijer Gardens to us, but since it is a 2 hour drive (and since we usually have the dog with us when we are in the area) we have never been

Was it worth a 2 hour drive? YES!

They have one of the largest Japanese gardens I have ever seen in my life (sponsored by the Devos family.......😡)

It was gigantic. And the weather was late summer sunshine at its best:

But the part I liked the best was by far the room dedicated to carnivorous plants. A whole room!

And of course I also liked the giant neuron in the sculpture garden. I kind of have to, right?