Mother Nature

Totally inspired by todays post at Sunshines blog "suchlifeinthetropics.blogspot.com" I want to share a few photos taken by a fjord a couple of weeks ago. I´ll take more pictures during the summer, so I can give a better impression of flowers and nature in Denmark.

The first photo is to locate you in the area by the fjord, and one can see a little rosebush, where the roses later on turn into orange berries. I must admit I don´t know the names of the flowers on the following pictures, but their finesse, brightness and beauti caught me. Yes, the orange-red flower is called a poppy. Its flower leaves are so thin and fine, they look like what could be a perfect skirt for a flower fairy :-))

I´ll let the pictures speak for themselves, and by the way wish you a merry Midsummers Eve, which is tonight celebrated with bonfires all over Denmark.

A "cakey" weekend ...

sometimes life is hard and full of unfair dealings, where one just wants to escape and hide under the carpet. Part of our weekend was like that, when we were at a school concert saturday. None of the girls wanted to get out of bed, and particularely the oldest was not in the mood for playing in the school orchestra at all. In the concert break the Café was open, but when it was finally our turn, there was no more cake left!! SO - what to do? Well, I decided to make a layer cake myself when I came home, and so I did. It lifted the spirit of everyone, and if you want to get a bit of the taste as well, I can descripe what is in the cake:

500 gram fresh, sweet, juicy danish strawberries
1/4 liter whipped cream
a teaspoon of vanilla sugar
6 - 8 tablespoons Bailey Irishcream
10 macaroons or more (mixed with the Baileys Irishcream)
3 sponges

On the top: icing and strawberries

You simply mix the whipped cream with strawberries cut in thin slices and put it in between the sponges, and add the "Bailey macaroons" in between. Make it some hours beforehand, put it in the fridge, and voila!
We had 1/4 leftover for today, and it was even better after one night in the fridge, yummy :-)

After having consumed 3/4 of the cake (!), we opened and looked into the huge package, which our youngest daughter, Selma, had brought with her home from school. On the outside she had written "For mummy, For daddy, For Mie, For the worlds sweetest family". Inside it was an abundance of produce from a whole year in school: All homemade books, some of them with history, some with stories from the old testament, some of them with numbers and figures. But all of them with beautifull drawings and neatly written letters. SO much energy and love and concentration put into each single page - she was so so proud to share it with us!

So - yes, in the end the weekend turned out to be much brighter than it looked like saturday morning - all with the help of a sweet strawberry cake ;-))

Have a sweet and fulfilled week - and remember to find time for a cup of coffee and a sweet :-)

Strictly Ballroom

"So if you really love me
Say yes
But if you don´t, dear, confess
And please don´t tell me
Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps"

If you don´t know the movie Strictly Ballroom, I can really recommend it!
I bought the video many years ago, but eventually our video machine broke down, so I haven´t seen it for years... However, I have now bought the DVD version, and finally watched it again. My daughter, who is 14, had agreed to see it with me (in return I had agreed to see the Disney Movie "Tangled" :-) ). Although she thought it was quite odd, she got caught by the romantic drama. Myself?... well I was flooded with tears most of the time, so not sure I saw all the scenes properly LOL




To me there is such an essential message in the film to follow ones passion, find the origianal sourses, follow a dream - and not live a life in fear. "A life lived in fear is a life half lived" Fran says, and how true is that...!
The movie also brings back my own memories of "Ballroom dancing";

When I was 6 years old I was one year in a dance "school" in our local village hall, it only went on for one year, but I didn´t mind, since my dancepartner was a boy with absolutely no sence of rhythm ;-)

Years later, at the age of 15, I had a teacher in school, whom I fell madly in love with. He was a dancer, and his parents owned a dance Studio in the city of Aarhus (biggest city in a part of Denmark called Jutland).
In order to get a chance to see a glimps of him dancing, I joined a beginners dance class at the Studio. And the way we were taught was so close to the way in the Strictly Ballroom movie!
You would have wanted to see the scene; Since we were not very rich, we couldn´t afford a nice dance dress. So I turned up in my green jeans and a big blue sweater. My father drove me there every friday evening, and whilst I was listening to Abbas "Dancing Queen" in a small transistor radio in the car, I was changing to my "dance" shoes, which were white sandals with thick heels of cork!
I did´t have a dance partner, so I managed to have three different male partners, and none of them could dance!! So in the break we shared a fizzy drink and I tried to show him with my fingers how to do the steps and turn around LOL, it must have looked so strange to the other "perfect" couples!
Whilst dance class went on, my father would go to an automat, where one could put coins in, and buy the left over baker bread from the day - which we would then go home and eat afterwards.
Well, it´s all a long time ago now. But some a few years ago a dance program series started in danish television, called "Vild med dans" = Crazy about dancing. In the program ten professional dancers teach ten beginners (most of them are known from sport, acting etc,) how to dance in a few months. The program really catches me, since many of the amateurs really get passionate about dancing. AND - believe it or not - my teachers (whom I was in love with) daughter is now a professionel dancer, and she and her partner even won the whole competition!!  So - thank God for music and dancing, one cannot not get lifted up and feel totally bright!

Memory Lane ...

Inspired by yesterdays post with old photos and memories, I was caused to look in my photo album again today. Thirty years old photos don´t come out with much quality to the picture itself, however the values and sentiments behind the pictures do;
Ever since my first day on earth, my grandmother (Mormor - my mothers mother) has been probably the human I have loved the most and had the closest relationship with. She was there when I was a baby, and helping to feed me milk from the bottle, so my mother could sleep just a little longer in the mornings during my first two weeks of life. She was always there for me, and when I was 7 years old I spent some weeks of my first summerholiday with her in her house and garden in a beautiful part of Denmark, called Mols. On the picture above you can see a small part of her garden, which she loved and tended to all days during the summer. The other parts of the garden was a lawn with fruit trees, and a large part was with vegetables of all kind. She had all the days of her life been a hardworking woman, helping farmers with harvesting potatoes, milking their cows etc.

This is a view from the area close to her house, where one can see the ocean and the fields. I often took long walks, and since three of her sisters lived in the same small village, sometimes went for small visits by them for a "treat" of cake and a candy :-)
One of the things I LOVED about my grandmother was the fact that she taught me how to play cards! Every day, after dinner, she would go out in the garden for another hours or so, and afterwards she always agreed on playing cards before bedtime. I was always impatient as to when she would be ready for the cardgame, so one evening she told me to call her at 8 o´clock. I tell you, I was looking at my watch every minute, and when finally it was 8 o´clock, I ran to the door and shouted out (very) loud: Grandma´- it´s 8 o´clock!!! - as if the house was on fire! ;-)) So of course she came in immidiately, with a smile on her face, and we could start the precious hour of playing cards!
On another ocation I remember an evening with thunder and lightening; She turned out all the electrical lights an put on a candle, in order to not attract the lightening. I remember I sat on her lab, and although it was kind of frightening, the thought came up in me: If I am to die now I don´t mind, cause I´ll be with my grandmother... so dearly did I love her, that I couldn´t immagine a better way to "go"...

She lived till she was almost 89, and managed to stay in her own house almost till the end of her days. When she had gone I was in a huge grief, and wanted to keep everything from her house, especially some lovely flower plates and tiny coffe cups, that she wanted me to have. I still have a precious link with those items. And after she had gone, I knew that in order to honour her memory, it was now up to me to take up some of her precious qualities and make a space for them in me. I am not sure if I have succeeded, but writing these lines at least give me an opportunity to share with you some of my value for her. And if we meet our loved ones when we die, I´ll surely look forward to "seing" and feeling her again. I hope and believe that she is now part of Gods wonderful garden-team, and feeling as wanted and needed and loved as when she was walking on earth ... <333

The Magic of Books ...

If I´m tired, depressed, or need to relax and forget about the world - I find myself reading a magazine, a philosophical text or - even better - a good book! Now a days my reading is more shallow than deep, since so many daily life activities (or, sorry to say, the television..!) occupy my mind. But when I was a child I simply loved reading books and getting deep into fairytale land. It felt as if I were really there and was lifted into another sphere - pure magic :-)

I´ll tell you a funny tale from my childhood; I had a cousin (or rather my mothers cousins son) who was one year older than me. When I was around 6 or 7 years old we visited his family, and I started playing with him. I came across a book for grown ups, called "Manden uden navn", "The man with no name", and started "reading" the story for him. I couldn´t read books at the time, and there was not a single picture in the book, so I just made up a story on my own. This continued for quite some time till my parents called me, since we were going to go home. My cousin found the story so catching, that he afterwards asked his mother to please continue reading the story for him. Which she of course was not able to! ;-) My mother often told me this story with a laughter, since she was impressed that I had managed to make up a story on my own and pretend that I was reading LOL.

The photos are taken by a professionel photographer. Since we didn´t have a camera of our own, my mother took me there once a year in order to have some photos taken. On the first picture I am 9 years old, and on the one below I am 10 years. The books were not my own, but were used by the Studio as a kind of object the child could hold. And the funny thing is, that on the picture below I totally forgot that I was at the Studio to have taken pictures, since I got so lost in the book and started reading it for real ;-D

And by the way I am quite busy, since I only have 40 days left till I have to have finished my first book; Remember the contract, Joan, when you gave me the "The writers guide to crafting stories for children"?? Well, I shall do my very best..! :-DDD

Have a bright week and keep reading ... <3

Photos by Kehlet, Aarhus, Danmark.

Seek and you shall find..

Two days ago was the day of my oldest daughters Confirmation ceremony in the church, which you see on the picture. And old danish village church built in the year 1150..! It was such a bright and wonderful day, sunny and warm, and with wonderful compagny from family and friends.

After the guests had left, she was studying her many presents and reading in a very special book from her Godmother.
It was as if the day summoned up and crystalized all the best of her and her relation with God, which she has now confirmed to have. I hope she will always feel the company of something "higher" /God, and know that she is never alone.

Perhaps - if you have had the Confirmation ceremony - you have memories of how it was for you and if it has meant anything special to your life?

Have a lovely day, and keep seeking :-))