All grown up.....

 

On Wednesday Leah turned 18!! The baby of the family is now all grown up!!  I can´t get my head around that! Where have the years gone?

We had a lovely day celebrating her big day! It started with a cooked breakfast of egg, sausage and home made baps. Then she got her gift from us - a new phone. Her old one was falling apart - literally, so she was over the moon with this new one.

 

After work and school we all headed out for dinner. Leah didn´t want a big party, she just wanted a family dinner out at the Running Sushi restaurant, so Running Sushi it was. (Kristian and I are not so keen on Sushi but you could also get chinese too, so we mostly ate that.) We had invited two of Leah´s friends to meet us at the restaurant as a surprise for Leah. She was very surprised to see them and very happy too.

 

Since I had never been to Running Sushi before I didn´t realise that 8 people couldn´t sit at a table together. There is only room for 4, so we spilt in two groups - the young and the old! :-)

Andrew, Camilla, Kristian and I had a great time together at one table and Leah, Lasse and her two friends had a great time at the table behind us. We did turn around and chat from time to time so it all worked out fine.

It was then home to open Andrew and Camilla´s gift, her friends gift and Lasse´s gift. I had made apple crumble for dessert, which was what Leah wanted.  We were already stuffed from dinner but some how managed to eat warm apple crumble with ice cream and cream!!

We all really enjoyed the day.

On Thursday we invited Granny Rasmussen for dinner along with Laura, Mia and Mia´s boyfriend. It was time for another celebration of Leah.

Leah wanted me to cook my special turkey breast with potatoes, vegetables and sauce. Then again she wanted me to make apple crumble for dessert because Mia also loves my apple crumble. I HATE making apple crumble haha!!  But the things you do for love. The whole dinner was delicious!! (one of the lucky nights when things went well and everything tasted as it should!!)

We had such a lovely evening together - we are blessed with such wonderful family and friends.

Kristian´s mum came with a surprise gift for us from herself and all Kristian´s brothers, sisters and their better halves. It was for our Silver Wedding Anniversary. What a thoughtful thing to do!!

It was a wooden bowl - which I just love!! Inside, it was filled with sweets and money!!! Now we have some money to go and buy something special from the family. Like I said - we are just so blessed!

Meanwhile Zoey is becoming more and more part of the family. I love that wee cat sooo much! Amazing how such a wee animal can bring so much joy. She keeps us amused with all the funny things she gets up to.

We took it slowly introducing her and Shadow. When we finally introduced them without Zoey being in her pen, Shadow would keep her distance, while Zoey wanted to be friends with Shadow. She followed her around everywhere but sometimes it was just too much for Shadow and she would hiss and growl. Zoey would then totally respect her and give her space.

At the beginning I wondered if Shadow would ever accept Zoey but now I think things will go ok. I don´t think they will ever be close buddies. I think Zoey would like to be, but Shadow just seems cold and distant. At least now Zoey can go past Shadow without her hissing.

Saturday morning I went shopping. When I came home this is what I found (photo above!)  The two of them were sleeping close together on our bed. Mother here was over the moon!!!

On Saturday afternoon and we headed out to another 18th birthday celebration. This time it was my niece who turned 18. She and Leah were born a week apart. She was having a bigger celebration than Leah wanted. The whole Rasmussen clan was invited to afternoon cake and dinner.

It was a great afternoon as all of Kristian´s brothers, sisters and their families were there so we got to catch up on the whole family. 

It has been one busy week but good week! :-)

A year older.....

...but is he any wiser???  On Monday it was Kristian´s birthday. He turned 49!!! Since it was a Monday and Kristian helps in the go-kart shop on a Monday evening I didn´t plan anything big. One thing I did do though was bake his favourite cake. Usually it´s his mum that bakes this for his birthday but this time I gave it a go. I have tried to bake it before but it never turned out like it should. On Monday evening I found a new receipe on line and I gave it a try and already before I baked it I knew it was going to be good. 

I got everything ready for Kristian coming home. When he arrived home at 9pm we had the coffee table decorated, the cake was ready and I had also made hot chocolate with cream. The cake was delicious and Kristian was over the moon to get it (he is so easy to please!)

On Tuesday we went to the movies to see the film Inside out. Kristian told me not to tell anyone that he had gone in to see an animated film!!! haha Leah and Lasse had been to see it and had said it was really good so we thought we would check it out too. I enjoyed it, very cleverly done. We were glad we hadn´t paid full price for the tickets (it was two for one night). It´s one of the those films that I could have just seen on DVD. 

Anyway we enjoyed our wee date night out. 

Kristian was sick on Wednesday, he had a cold since the weekend but it just seemed to get worse on Tuesday so he stayed home in bed on Wednesday. 

I started to feel rotten at work on Wednesday and by Wednesday evening my head felt like it wanted to explode. Kristian´s nose was running and my was totally blocked. 

Kristian was feeling great again on Thursday after spending the whole of Wendesday in bed. I was feeling rotten on Thursday so I took the day off work. I spent the day on the sofa with my duvet, getting up from time to time to put boiling water in the sink and a towel over my head so the steam could help unblock my nose. It really worked, it helped unblock it, at least for a little while.

Today my head/eyes are not sore but I have a bit of a sore throat and an irritating cough. It´s been another day on the sofa. Hopefully I am on the mend.

Meanwhile Zoey is keeping us all amused. 

 We have been taking things slowly between her and Shadow. Each evening they eat their meals together...Shadow in the kitchen and Zoey in her pen in the livingroom, both being able to see each other, this has been going well with Shadow watching Zoey very closely without hissing or attacking. 

We also played with Shadow in the living room, then opened Andrew´s bedroom door and started playing with Zoey. Shadow could see Zoey. We did this for about 10 minutes and it went well. Shadow watched the wee cat very closely and was not interested in playing once she could see Zoey.  We have been doing this the last 3 evenings so this evening we might take it to the next step -  letting them be in the same room for a longer period of time. Lets hope it goes well. 

What have we done????!!!!!

We have asked ourselves this question a few times over the weekend. You see a while back my friend Jette´s cat had kittens, and they were sooo lovely and cute, so it was sooo very easy to say "Yes - we´ll take one and give it a home!"

 

Now it´s one thing to get a kitten when you have no animals. It´s another thing when you already have one cat at home.  So  over the last week  we have been reading about how to introduce a kitten to an adult cat that is already in the home.

 

On Friday after work I went and collected the kitten. She is just the cutest wee thing. She is calm, curious and loving, she seems to have a lovely wee personality. We have made her a den in Andrew´s room and we have all enjoyed going in there to play with her.

 

The experts say the adult cat has to first get used to the smell of a new kitten. So we have been rubbing an old sock over the kitten and leaving it at Shadow´s feeding bowl. When Shadow is outside exploring we let the kitten out into the living area and the rest of the house, so she can explore and so her scent is spread everywhere.

 

The second part is to let the cats see each other. So today we put the kitten in a pen and opened the door to Andrew´s room. Shadow walked in to the room and saw her - I think she got a fright. She hissed at the kitten and then walked away.

It was then I asked myself  "what have we done?" Will Shadow except this wee kitten into the home? Who knows - but we will give it a try. It´s still early days. We will follow the experts advice and give it a month to see how it goes. I really hope they get along in the end for she is just the cutest wee thing.

 

We decided to call her Zoey. We had a vote on Saturday night. Andrew, Camilla, Lasse, Leah, Kristian and I went through a lot of girl names. We had to put an X at the ones we liked. Zoey was the only name that got 6 Xs. Sofie came second with 5 Xs and Chole third with 4 Xs. So Zoey it was!

 

We hope the next few weeks go well!!

 

On Thursday we had Leah´s friend Cecille here. She wanted to show us her new wee pet. She had gotten herself a wee dog!! It was also soooo cute!!! It was the best behaved wee thing. Not once did I hear it bark or whine.  A really content, loving wee puppy.

 

Kristian was sooo happy to make it home from work in time to see it. Kristian has a thing about animals. He just loves them and they love him too.

 

 

Wednesday, early evening, we arrived home from Rome after a fantastic time there. We enjoyed every minute of our silver wedding celebration  but we were also happy to be going home again.

Leah had  asked us to ring her when we got on the train from the airport as she was going to make dinner for us. When we got home she had a lovely table set and had made a delicious meal for us of Salmon and Pasta.  There was also a beautiful card from the kids congratulating us on our anniversary and they had bought us a two tickets for a Lucas Graham concert. (He is a Danish singer.) So we have that to look forward to at the start of December. I was not expecting anything so this was a wonderful surprise.

Kristian also got a wee surprise on Thursday evening - Silver envelope 21!!

It was a bottle of Happy Pills. Inside the pill bottle there are these plastic pills that you can take apart. Inside the pill there is a piece of paper. There are 50 pills so therefore 50 tiny pieces of paper that I had to write something on. It took ages!

The idea with this is that whenever Kristian feels like he needs to  be encouraged or he needs something to smile about, he goes to his happy pills, takes one out, opens it and reads what it says and hopefully afterwards, feel a whole lot better! Kristian loved this idea!

Rome - day 4 and our anniversary!!

I am blessed!! 25 years ago today, I said I would take Kristian Rasmussen to be my husband - that was one smart decision that I made!!   I love doing life with him!!! Through the 26 years we have been together (25 as husband and wife) he has always made me feel loved and cherished. When he´s around I feel like we can overcome anything life would throw our way. He calms my fears and worries and keeps me grounded. My favourite part of the day is seeing him walk up the garden path from work.  Him being around just makes a difference - he just makes the atmosphere better by being there!  He can still make my heart skip a beat and my stomach fill with butterflies! Yes I am soooo very blessed to get to walk through life with him.  I hope we get to walk a lot more miles together!!!

So today we woke at 9am and Kristian surprised me with a sweet home made card and a poem. It´s normally me writing poems to him but this time he out did himself.

He then told me that the plan for the day was to go shopping. He wanted me to find something special in the shops, something that I had fallen in love with, and he would buy it for me! Now with shops like Prada and Gucci in the area that was a dangerous thing for him to say!! haha

So we got ready, had breakfast and went out shopping. It was sooo relaxing, we wandered up and down the different streets and looked in the different shops. I was a little disappointed with the choice of shops, for I couldn´t find a Primark anywhere!!! haha

I did find a jewellery shop with stuff that I loved. The style was a little different and I love stuff like that.

We looked at a few items and tried a few different styles but in the end I settled for a braclet that I had just fallen for. It was just sooo me. Kristian liked it too because it was so different....a bit like me! hahaha

It´s a jewellery shop that isn´t in Denmark so no one else will have this type of jewellery although the man in the shop said he was looking into starting up in Copenhagen. The braclet is silver. I just love the style. I was over the moon with this find!

We had small breaks whenever we felt like it, we ate Italian ice cream, drank cold drinks and walked up and down streets we hadn´t yet explored. It was such a perfect way to spend the day.

We took a walk up the back roads of the town and found a beautiful out look spot. There were wonderful views all over the city.

By 4pm we had had enough shopping and exploring, so we headed back to our hotel and relaxed for the next few hours,

Then it was time to head out for our evening celebration. We went a walk down to the churches at the end of the road. Why build one magnificent church when you can have two!!! We then headed over to the restaurant. We had booked a table at the local restaurant - Babette. We had eaten there earlier in the week and had loved the food sooo much that we decided that we would go back for our anniversary dinner and pull out all the stops - have starter, main course, dessert and coffee.

We were not disappointed. The food was absolutely fantastic!!! The atmosphere soooo perfect! We sat in the courtyard and enjoyed an evening of reminiscing about times gone by and dreaming of things in the future. What a perfect way to spend a 25th anniversary - eating dinner in a fab restaurant in Rome with my best buddy.

We had salmon for starters, then steaks with garnish and then for dessert I had the white chocolate cake with the creamy warm filling and Kristian had their special cake with a secret ingredient. We were stuffed when we left. 

I just love the decor of this restaurant so I had to get a pic!

We took a quick walk around the area before heading back to our hotel.

What a great time we have had in Rome and we feel so blessed to have had this opportunity. God sure has been good to us through the years, this is something we talked about this evening. We really are blessed far and above what we deserve.

So our holiday in Rome is coming to a close. We will leave tomorrow morning at 10am for the airport and late tomorrow afternoon we will be back in Denmark. That´s ok, we have had a fantastic time and we are now ready for home.

Out is good but home is best!!