Kitty’s Place

My baby is growing up. He is out of diapers completely. We all talked about it last weekend and agreed to stopping the night diaper on Sunday. He has been dry through the night. He also wakes me every morning to tell me he did not wet in his bed and went to the bathroom when he woke up. *laugh* I guess that is just in case I don’t notice that myself. *smile* Last evening we were all laying across the bed reading after dinner. My fellow was reading the paper and kept handing it to me to read something funny or interesting. The kidlet was feeling left out during our “adult time”, so he got a magazine and began reading it to us and pointing out things he thought were funny. It was the most comical thing.

Have spent the morning looking at clothes from a link for vinyl pants that I got from Lori. Have picked out a few hundred dollars worth of things I want.*laugh* Good thing I don’t have a credit card. Am finally feeling better.

My fellow will soon be home from work and won’t go back until Tuesday. We are looking forward to some time to just relax and do family stuff.

I coloured my hair and it is really quite burgundy looking at the moment. It was time to spend a bit of effort on my appearance since I have become rather lazy lately. The funniest thing was no one noticed at öppna förskolan until late this morning when the sun shone in and hit my hair. Then one of the moms’ exclaimed “you coloured your hair!”. *laugh* It is much much darker now but I guess we get so used to not really seeing each other that it took that flash of red to make it noticable.

We were at playgroup yesterday and today. Yesterday I addressed postcards and the kidlet played. But he was just not himself and cried for no reason. Things that normally he would shrug off just made him sob. He cried all the way home, sniffled through lunch, then fell asleep in his dads’ chair and slept for 4 hours. He woke with a fever, runny nose and harsh cough. So that explains the moodiness. He had some tylenol and the fever came down and even though he napped all afternoon, he went to bed with no fuss at 2000 and was asleep within minutes of being tucked in. This morning he had no cough, no runny nose and no fever. *whew* Who wants to be ill over Easter?

We had laundry time this morning at 0700 and I did 4 loads of laundry and still managed to get to playgroup by 1000. So we have clean clothes for another week and the kidlet got to play with his friends. When we got there this morning I saw a familiar face. The woman from Canada that I met last fall is back. She and her husband moved to Canada at the beginning of February so it was a real surprise to see her and her little boy this morning. Apparently the economy being what it is at the moment (depressed) meant that their plans to start a business were just not viable. She also said that for the first time she actually missed Sweden and wanted to come back. She has been here 5 years but has spent a portion of each year (3 to 6 months at a stretch) in Canada ever since she came to Sweden. So it was english morning at playgroup since four of the six adults there today came from english speaking countries. *smile* I do find that more and more though, I am using swedish when I am out. Not to the kidlet, but to other people. The kids all got a påskpåsar (bag of easter candy) before they went home today. Wafaa bought the candy and Monica bagged it and tied them shut with yellow and purple wool. Most days the kids cry when it is time to go home, today they were asking if we could leave “now” since they knew they were getting candy. *laugh*

We got a package yesterday from my brother and his family. It was so exciting! Enclosed in it were a dozen packages of kool aid, chocolate chips, seasoning salt, montreal steak spice, Tylenol ES, Tylenol Sinus, kids Benylin cough syrup, Neo Citran, Skittles for my fellow, a truck for the kidlet and a birthday card for me. I hope the package I sent to them has arrived. It was sent over 2 weeks ago.

Today I went shopping and got Easter candy to fill the eggs for my two fellows. I am feeling incredibly bad, have been for a few days now, so I decided not to go in to clean today. That means I have to go in sometime over the long weekend, but I honestly don’t think I could physically do the job today. I am looking forward to having my fellow home for 4 days.

Today was milk shake day! We met up with 2 other moms and their boys and went to MacDonalds. The kidlet finally got a real milkshake and loved it. After we ate we walked through Eurostop and the boys played some. It was a fun morning.

It was a quiet week last week. I didn’t hear that either parcel I sent to Canada almost 2 weeks ago, arrived. So I am a bit worried. We didn’t go too far and I missed the book release party. Went in to clean on Sunday by myself, since the kidlet spent the day with farmor and farfar.

Have been a bit blue lately. Not sure why though. Perhaps it is because I am more homesick than usual. This coming Saturday we will have been here in Sweden for 2 years. Last year at this time I was home in Canada for a month. Yesterday after I made dinner I went to bed and had a cry, just because I felt like there was nothing in life that was happy. After a nap I felt much more my usual chipper self.

Am looking forward to Easter. We spent last easter in Canada but were here in Sweden for it the year before. I am trying to remember what we did then. *laugh* Farmor mentioned we may get together at their cottage on the weekend. That would be nice. The kidlet has made easter chicks and easter postcards at öppna förskolan so we will give them his grandparents and aunt on the weekend.

Friday morning we headed to Stockholm. The kidlet got money from his father to get a milk shake and cheeseburger at Burger King. I said they didn’t have milkshakes at the Burger King at Stockholm Central station but my fellow was sure they did. (does Burger King do milkshakes?) So we waited in line and I held him and his money up at the counter so he could order. We got the cheeseburger and fries but the guy taking our order said there were no milkshakes. The kidlet started to cry with huge tears rolling down his cheeks as he said “pappa said milk shake”. The fellow serving us felt bad and I promised the kidlet we would go this week to MacDonalds and he could have a milk shake, since he has never had one. So he got a kids meal with Sprite and we headed to the subway. Because we left earlier than usual, we got to work just as the women were sitting down to lunch. So the kidlet joined them while I cleaned. Everyone was so happy to see him, since we have been going in on weekends since the first of the year. The ladies chatted with him and played with him. He loved the attention of course.

I finished cleaning just after the rest of the staff left for the weekend. We walked back to the subway and passed a stand with baked goods. The woman held up doughnuts as we went past and so we had to stop and get one for the kidlet. The only doughnuts they sell here are either apple filled with sugar (not powdered sugar) or plain cake, either plain or dipped in chocolate. How I miss Tim Hortons! *laugh* We actually got home before my fellow did since he stopped off at his parents to look at their computer. I made waffles for dinner.

Saturday morning we had breakfast in bed and after a quick bath, the kidlet was ready to go away for the weekend with farmor and farfar. They picked him up at 1000 and we went back to bed. *laugh* We really did just laze around Saturday and it was nice. I made macaroni and cheese for dinner and also baked Pumpkin Gingerbread Loaf and peanut butter cookies. The macaroni went over like a lead balloon. I really wish I could cook. We went to bed early, after watching the Life of Brian and I slept right through until 1100. After the race (I think it is Formula One he watches) we went to the grocery store for a few things. I suggested pizza for dinner but my fellow said he was thinking he would take me out to the asian food place and I jumped at that idea. Sadly though, it was closed when we finished shopping so we did get pizza. We took it with us and ate at his parents. The kidlet had a wonderful weekend and was really excited to get pizza. He has been asking pretty much daily if pappa was going to buy pizza for us. I related the milkshake story to them and farfar got a can of strawberry milkshake powder out of the cupboard and sent it home for the kidlet. It is like strawberry Quik. The kidlet loves it and asks for milkshake every couple of hours. I think he is addicted. *laugh*

Monday it was bath time in the morning and then we went to öppna förskolan. He had lots of fun and I tried to have a conversation with the mom from Somalia. She had trouble understanding my swedish, something I have noticed is more often a problem when I talk to other immigrants. I wonder why? I am still having dizziness and periods of lightheadedness as well as nausea, on a daily basis. Guess it is time to go and see if the doctor has any idea what is causing it. This has been going on for over 2 months so I don’t think it is going to go away any time soon. *smile* So after playgroup and lunch, I went and lay down for an hour, something that I hate doing in the day. It did help though. ER was on at 2000 and I got the kidlet into his pj’s pre show. He didn’t want to go to bed so I just let him snuggle up with me and he fell asleep in about 2 minutes. I carried him in to bed during a commercial break. We watched Boston Public as well. That show is just so bizarre that I love it. I was saying last night that I am happy they air Third Shift here but I wish they would have Law & Order:SVU as well. Soon I will be completely out of the lo
op of the cool new shows in North America. *smile*

Today has been quiet. Picked up some, went for a walk since it is a lovely warm day and now I am dizzy again so am relaxing here with a cup of tea. The packages I sent to Canada should be there soon. The envelope of 24 postcards I mailed to the US the same day arrived there on Saturday (the contest deadline .. whew I made it! *laugh*). The one that went to my fellows’ uncle in Luleå that day arrived there Thursday. His uncle phoned on Friday to ask for my full name, since some family geneologist is researching for a book. I said that if I get to go in the family tree, I guess that means I am here to stay. *laugh*

My fellow has a meeting tonight so I will have to make dinner early so he can leave on time. Thinking about baking some muffins, that would be a nice treat with tea when we watch tv later.

So Tuesday I did laundry from 1730 to 2100. It took the entire time and it was actually closer to 2130 when I got everything folded and got back to the apartment. I had put the kidlet in to bed at 2030 but since he had a nap earlier in the day, he didn’t go right to sleep. The nap came about because he refused to pick up the 10 toys scattered about the bedroom floor and when mom told him he was not to come out until they were picked up, he cried himself to sleep. Yes, I am a meanie and yes, he did pick them up eventually. *laugh*

When I came back with the last two loads of folded laundry, the first thing I saw when I came in the door was the kidlets’ knapsack in the middle of the living room floor, looking rather ransacked. His dad said that the kidlet was looking for something but he didn’t know what. I went into the bedroom to deposit the laundry and he seemed to be asleep. But the minute he heard my voice he opened his eyes and started telling me what he wanted. I was at a loss what he was saying. He seemed to saying “blomma” and “äta” and that didn’t make sense. Finally I even said “you want to eat a flower??” which got an emphatic no. Then I realized that blomma was Blomma, the PowerPuff Girl (Blossom) and I got her for him. But that wasn’t right either. I had pretty much given up when his dad said “did he get something from McDonalds’ with PowerPuff?” and the light went on. It was the PowerPuff girl notepad he had gotten from Burger King on Sunday that he wanted. He had not been saying “äta” (eat), he had been saying “rita” (draw). If it wasn’t for the fact that his swedish father couldn’t understand it either, I would have felt like a real dolt. *laugh*

Wednesday morning Marilyn phoned and asked if we would like to come over and have lunch. Wafaa (goodness knows how she really spells her name) and Mohammed Ali were on there way over there when she phoned. So we went there for 1000 and had a nice visit. The three boys played and we moms talked. It was a hilarious mixture of english and swedish between myself (from Canada), Marilyn (from the Philipines) and Wafaa (from Iraq). We had hotdogs for lunch and then headed home a bit past noon. Wagdi wants us to meet at her home next week and I said I will have them here when we can sit outside, since Marilyn is allergic to our pets and can’t stay in here.

I did more laundry on Wednesday since I had rugs and curtains that needed washing but there has not been time to do them the last couple of times I did laundry. There was an open slot from 1400 to 1730, so I grabbed it up and washed rugs, carpets and the big bedspread. I managed to fall down the stairs on the first trip over. Some days I am such a klutz. I did get dishes done and vacuumed. We had rice and meatballs with gravy for dinner. I was craving rice.

Today we stayed home and I cleaned. Ironed curtains and put spring ones up in the kitchen and bedroom. Vacuumed again and washed floors, did the fun job of cleaning the bathroom and really scrubbed down the kitchen. It is amazing where little hand prints can be found. *laugh* We baked banana muffins and I took a couple picture of the kidlet mixing the batter. Now I am relaxing in front of the computer and smelling dinner as it cooks. We will be having ham and scalloped potatoes tonight. Tomorrow we will go to öppna förskolan in the morning and then to Hässelby to clean. Since the kidlet is going to spend the weekend with his grandparents, I decided to get the cleaning out of the way so I can sleep in for a change. *laugh*

In the mail was an invitation to a book release party. The place where I work is a resource centre that does health teaching for students. The staff has written a book and there is to be a press party at the end of the month. Invitations have gone out to a number of people, likely the bulk to people who would have a use for the book in their own line of work and health teaching. I think I will go. It should be fun and interesting.

It is cool that I am included in these things. I was invited to the staff christmas party and received a gift, just like the other staff who work there full time. It is really a nice feeling. I only go there once a week, most often on the weekend so I never see the rest of the people who work there. Yet they think of me as part of the team and treat me as such. My fellow says that it is because I was handpicked to clean for them. *laugh*

It really smells of spring today. I hope it means it is finally here.

It was a rather quiet weekend. Saturday was a lazy, sleeping in and napping day. I made a bacon and egg breakfast. One of us doesn’t care for eggs but he was outvoted by mom and kidlet. *laugh* Sunday I got up about 0830 and had to run to the store for eggs so I could make pancakes. After breakfast the kidlet and I went off to work. I stopped and got him a burger and fries at Burger King and we took it with us. I had been cleaning about an hour when the door buzzer rang. It was my fellows’ uncle and sambo. He finished working there on Friday and came to pick up the rest of his things from his office. They had hurried so they could get to see us there. They loaded up the car and then took the kidlet and went to Vällingby centrum for an hour while I finished up at work. They took the kidlet into a photo booth and he was so excited with the pictures. He showed us how there were 4 flashes and then the picture rolled out into his hand. He also had to name all 3 of them, 4 times, once for each shot. *laugh* He never let go of it the entire trip home, he even held onto it as he slept in their car going home. So we got a ride home which cuts an hour off traveling time. I made dinner and then called my grandparents. My grandpa was yelling “Hello” into the phone and I was yelling hello back, but he couldn’t hear me. I hung up and tried again but couldn’t get through, so I went and napped instead. They called here about 2030 and talked to the kidlet and my fellow since I was out with the dog. It was almost 2130 when we hung up and I got the kidlet resettled in bed. It was fun to talk to them.

Monday we got up early even though it was my fellows’ Monday off that he gets every 2 months or so. I asked him if he had any plans or were we going to sit in front of the tv for the day. He said get ready and we will go out. So we got ready and headed out around 1100. We did not get back until almost 2000. We shopped in Upplands Väsby at Siba and then went to Barkarby and shopped some more at El Giganten. From there we went to Max for lunch and then to IKEA. We browsed through all the stores in the IKEA mall and then went and got the car and drove over to the outlet mall there. We had picked up a couple games for the playstation and a dvd (The life of Brian) at El Giganten. At the outlet mall we went into the book store and the kidlet got a new Mumin book, while mom got The Hobbit and the LOTR trilogy in paperback in swedish. That will be a challenge. *smile*

I saw the most exciting thing when I was at the bookstore. Jean Auel has a new book coming out April 29th of this year. It is book five of the Earth Children series and is called “Shelters of Stone”. Hooray! I just mentioned to Beverly recently that I didn’t think we would ever see the next book and now it is only a few weeks before it is going to available.

After shopping we went to visit my fellows’ uncle. They got a midi keyboard for the computer and it didn’t seem to want to work. My fellow took a look and did get it working but I don’t think he was really pleased with the results. The kidlet had pizza for supper with them, but we were too full from lunch and coffee and cake at IKEA. Then farmor and farfar came over so it was a real family packed evening.

Today we did öppna förskolan and when we were leaving farmor walked by and stopped to talk to the kidlet. We all walked to the centrum together and I finally got the parcels for my brother and my aunt into the mail, as well as one for my fellows’ uncle in Luleå. Now I have to clean some and then do laundry at 1730.

Another week has come and gone. Friday we went in to Stockholm after my fellow left for work at 1300. I baked banana muffins for him to take in for fika. The kidlet was not impressed that pappa got all the muffins and he got none. So his dad gave him money for Burger King. *laugh* We went in and stopped at Burger King to eat. He got to pay all by himself and was quite pleased about that. We went to work and it went fairly quickly since there had been no classes because of winter break week in Stockholm lan. On the way back we stopped at Pizza Hut and the kidlet got a slice of pizza with the rest of the money his dad gave him. It was one exciting day and he fell asleep on the train home. I didn’t eat though because I had picked up that virulent stomach flu that was making the rounds.

The weekend as well as Monday and Tuesday were spent battling the flu. By Wednesday I was much better. We did bake muffins on Monday. I made blueberry muffins and the kidlet helped. After they were cooked and as they were cooling in the pan, he informed that all the muffins were his and pappa couldn’t have any. Funny kid. *laugh*

Thursday we went to playgroup in the morning and then we went for tea with Lydia. The kidlet had been talking about it all week. It was a really nice afternoon. Llywellyn played with Lydia and Alex and I visited with Beverly, Leslie, Danielle and Helene. It is always so nice to be able to sit and talk without the constraints of worrying if the other person understands exactly what you mean. The majority of the swedish people I know are fluent in english, but they don’t understand the more cultural aspect of the language, since they were not raised with the tv commercials and stories and books that gave us little code words about things. A really poor example of what I mean is “plop plop fizz fizz”. Someone who grew up watching those Alka Seltzer commercials would immediately know you were inferring you had an upset stomach or the thing you were referencing that to was something that would make you feel ill. But if you never saw the commercials or heard the phrase, you would just look in askance at the person saying it. So often here I make references like that when I am talking and the other person doesn’t understand them. Being able to just gab without restraint is a treat.

We have two packages to go out today. One to my aunt and one to my brother. Then we are going to see if the video stores here rent out the games for the playstation2. The kidlet shows me pictures every day of the games he wants. *smile*

I was scanning along on the net a few days ago and read an article somewhere about teenage pregnancy. It got me thinking about just what kids are learning about proper protection. 25 years ago when I was in high school, we didn’t get a lot of sex education but we learned what condoms were and the risks involved if you had sex without one. So why is it that today when there are such scary and deadly STD’s out there, that kids are still getting pregnant in rather high numbers? If there is the chance of contacting HIV or some of these other STD’s I read about this week (wouldn’t it scare you if your spouse just out of the blue began reading up on sexually transmitted diseases one evening *laugh*) then why would anyone have unprotected sex? I guess it all comes back to two things, the “it couldn’t happen to me, that only happens other people” attitude and the fact that many teens really believe they are invincible. It does scare me though after reading about hpv and herpes and the numbers of people infected. If I was not in a relationship, I would be loath to start a physical one I think. I am glad I don’t get the flu often, it hurts my head to ponder on these issues. *laugh*

I was thinking about going in to work today but I decided to wait until tomorrow. Yesterdays trip showed me that I need to gain a bit more strength before I go in and clean this week. *smile*