Schönbrunn Again

We have had an amazingly relaxed Easter with lots of time outside enjoying the beautiful weather, eating lamb Sólvallagata-style and putting together those little toys of Kinder Überraschung, which made for the Easter eggs this year. As we have started to discuss and semi-plan in more concrete terms what will happen after our stay in Vienna, I suddenly find myself being nostalgic about all the things I have come to cherish here and all those things I/we still haven't done (which is a lot!). I should make a list!

Pictures from today's trip out to Schönbrunn

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Easter Market

Pictures from last weekend, when we visited the Easter market at Freyung to check out the stalls with pretty and not-so-pretty Easter decorations, listen to a little bit of Schlager and to have a Curry Wurst & Bio Bier. I like like like the tradition with these seasonal markets in Austria, and the Easter markets beats in my opinion the Christmas markets, because the weather (the past two years when we have been here) has been sunny and warm over Easter, which makes it so nice to stroll around and take in what to me feels like a very Austrian atmosphere. Prost und frohe Ostern!

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Recharging

Because of Easter I currently got two wonderful weeks off from university. This morning when Silja and Bjarni had gone to Kindergarten/work, I left behind piles of laundry, a backlog of required readings and a bunch of other practicalities and ventured off to the 3rd district (to this great bakery/cafe) to eat breakfast, stare out the window and read my book, which has been collecting dust since courses started again. A little quiet moment just to myself, which felt oh so good.

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Having fun (at home!)

Laughing from Dorte Pedersen on Vimeo.

Sometimes you think you do something really funny in order to make the kid laugh (so much so that you are silently laughing on the inside of your own wittiness), and she is just sitting there, starring at you as if thinking: "why the heck is she doing that now?" Completely unimpressed. And other times you do something unintentional, which cracks her up.

This week Kindergarten has been NO fun. All of a sudden Silja realized that we are leaving her with a bunch of other kids and three strange women, and not even the most interesting moving, glittering, noisy toy can distract her from the sadness and anxiety that creates. Ouch! I hope it SOON gets better.

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....Y~N(0,\sigma_g K + \sigma_e I)....

The scientist of the household is crazy crazy busy, and all concentration seems to be directed towards the preparations for an important meeting tomorrow. So much so that things here end up in the strangest places.

(And just for record I did not come up with the title for this post... Obviously.)

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This Little Head

This week our little girl started day care, which seems to be going quite OK so far. (I think it's harder on the mama.. But that's better than the other way around, right?) With the beginning of day care a third language is introduced to this little head: Our common language here at home is Danish, Bjarni speaks to her in Icelandic, and now German in Kindergarten. She is still so small that multiple languages don't really matter, and I know through friends and acquaintances that children are very much capable of being not only bilingual but also multilingual (those small brains are sponges!), but still I couldn't help feeling a glimpse of guilt the first day, when she was sitting in a circle with all the other small kids, and the teachers were singing songs I didn't get a clue of, which made me think about all the new things she will be taught there in German. Now, I am aware of all the benefits that comes with growing up with several languages and I'm excited of our embarkment on this "thing" of being a bilingual family. Whether or not there will be a third language in the long run, I don't know at this point. So even if it shouldn't be a matter of concern right now when she is so young, or if the benefits outweigh the guilt and concern, then I suppose worry is a natural element of parenthood. And perhaps this is a common one, when living abroad?

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Summer?

All of sudden the weather turned all summerlike. This has not been the most productive weekend study-wise, but who can sit still inside, when it is all of sudden so beautiful outside.

Today we headed for the park to hang out, blow bubbles and eat ice cream.

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