i am living with an almost thirty birthday boy. thirty is a big year, isn’t it? i thought it should be celebrated in style, so…i planned. and i planned really well. first, i invited a friend to come surprise Andreas. don’t ask me how i kept it a secret for t-h-r-e-e months, but i did. Robi, arrived on wednesday and they have been the dynamic duo living it up midwest style including: jack stacks, baseball, worlds of fun, fork & screen, summer heat and the pool, mexican food, cuban cigars and good wheat beer.

second, another adventure was checked off the list today – skydiving. not my idea, not my idea at all. but i am supportive and we have life insurance, so i said do it once. Robi and Andreas flew up 10,000 feet in a dinky plane, risked their lives, experienced 45 seconds of indescribable free falling to be followed with parachuting to the end. it was hard – i made him say pet gracie before we left, ask where he wanted to be buried and told him he could back out any time. but they loved it, and if asked i’m sure they would do it again.

i could spend hours on your soft sandy beaches

your bright colors are everywhere –  they take my breath away

your romantic side is always there

and you know how to make a fantastic margarita!!

we were so lucky to have these folks make a 15 hour plane ride and a 7 hour car trip, all to come visit us! one of great things about having family far far away is that they come visit you. and let’s be honest, having visitors is the best! i love cleaning the house top to bottom before and after. planning a menu. showing the best of the city.

yes, nathaniel is wearing oshkosh b’gosh. i wanted to gobble him up in these overalls.

what does one do when visiting kansas city during a heat wave?? shop, of course! needless to say, it’s a tad bit cheaper here in kc than in norway. i believe berit knew her way around target just as well as i do by the time she left. perhaps, the best shopping included a trip to lawrence. the boys headed to the pool and left us girls to walk down mass street, oh the danger one can get into on mass street. sarah’s fabric was a treat for this crafty mama, as we spent a good hour drooling over the fabrics.

another must-stop included the lawrence antique mall. ohh the treasures i have found there. no we did not come away empty handed. i grabbed a few (four is a few, right?) glass jars and a serving tray. berit was oh so selective in her purchases. she showed great restraint but in the the end that red canister set had to go home with her. don’t believe for a minute that that is all the shopping done while in kc, not for this lady. but you’ll have to visit her blog to see all the deals she scored. fyi – google translator is amazing!

of course, any shopping and swimming must conclude with ice cream. ben and jerry’s i heart you.

…more to come on our trip to sandy beaches, loads of guacamole and scuba adventures…sigh…i want to go back!

came to visit this weekend. a surprise visit, of sorts. we talked, ate great food, laughed and shopped. all that a weekend should be.

did I mention that we ate this weekend? not only did we eat, we feast on delicious food. it all started with lunch at this place. lunch was a feta and spinach quiche for me. grilled chicken and red pepper panini for amanda. and tuna salad for mama. we all gobbled down the best homemade tomato-basil soup. i’ve had dreams about it. we finished lunch with a moist red velvet cupcake with yummy butter cream frosting.

dinner was a homemade pizza – half cheese and pepperoni and the other half veggie. i think veggie pizza should be required at least once a week, perhaps twice. amanda, made homemade tomato sauce. we licked the pot clean, it was that good. and to finish just saturday, a blueberry cobbler with vanilla ice cream. i seriously forgot how good cobbler is. yet again, there seemed to be a problem with taking a picture of the cobbler before it was eaten. must work on that.

every sunday should be started with flaky biscuit, homemade honey-butter whipped (yes, butter. yumm. oh so good) and jam strawberry jam. of course, only to be followed by a famous fried chicken at stroud’s. wondering how we ate all this food? well, the better part of sunday we sat and watched mad men. one must recover from such an eventful weekend, agreed?

Andreas and I signing our marriage license three ( did I just type three years…??) years ago today.

The goofy looking guy next to me is the judge that married us.  He was such a nut!  But a good nut. He kept laughing which made me even more nervous, his house was painted mint green, and we were surrounded by thousands of little cherub figurines while he performed the ceremony.  I guess we could have been married in front of the court house, not sure why we didn’t (who doesn’t want to be able to say we got married in front of the courthouse??) It was such a sereal day – my dad had flown in from Geneva for the occasion, we went to the judges house and got hitched, and then went to the Cheesecake Factory for dinner.  We call this wedding number one – the summer of 2006 included three wedding: legal wedding, Norway wedding, and Kansas City. If you were to ask Andreas or I when we technically felt married, it was after the Norway wedding. The legal marriage was for the darn (choice word here) INS and so he wouldn’t have to return to Norway.  No flowers, cards, or romantic getaways planned for today. Last year we went a grabbed a piece of cheesecake – I think that might be the perfect way to celebrate from here on out – with cheesecake.  Looking back getting legally married was one of the best decision we made.  Even though: we had just become engaged the week prior (didn’t I mention that?) or the fact that I had yet to meet his parents (forgot to add that little tid bit as well). But all is well and we have hit the half way mark to five years….crazy!!

Suddenly, my house has found itself with a few more treasures lately – actually not suddenly at all.  A while ago my mom and I hit up the best antique in Kansas City – Rivermarket Antiques. Oh the goodies one can find in that place.  I carried a basket with me the entire time, because the one of the joy of thrifting is price – $3.25 for a glass milk bottle from Vermont? Basket. $1 for an white and blue enamel container? Basket (what a steal!). $45 for a Danish sugar, flour, and coffee canister set? No basket (but I am still dreaming about that canister set).

I would not consider myself a seasoned thrifter yet – but it’s in my blood.  My mom and grandma are/were huge thrifter – I remember being dragged to several antique stores, Friday night auctions, and early morning garage sales – row after row of stuff crammed into itty bitty tiny spaces. Somehow between all the hotdogs/peanuts/sodas bribing and hearing “East Germany – ouhh that is good.  Hermes…vintage…ouhhh that is even better”, I’ve caught the bug – the thrifting bug.

Another reason my house seems to be a little fuller is because we just helped my mom move from the house that she is lived in for 15 years. Now, my mom definitely has an eye for anything in need of a home – oh the stores I can tell – boxes and boxes of green easter egg, two brozne statues name Sue and the other (naming rights, Amanda and myself), hoardes of trash ties, beautiful Italian marble tile, the list goes on and on. Our house was known to have a perpetual summer garage sale where deals could be found and made. So combine all my mom’s treasure along with my grandparents – remember my grandma was a thrifter as well and my grandpa loved loved loved paper and to make copies – we had our work cut out for us. Somehow we dwindled my mom’s earthly processions down to 6o boxes – an amazing feat, oh and I am just a damn good purger and packer.   All this to say, my payment was in the form of vintage croquette sets, a wooden train, beautiful children’s book, a Snow White lamp and much more.

Throughout the week, I noticed the concern in Andreas’ eye as I would come home with more stuff.  My three reaffirming points: 1. I am not a hoarder but a purger in nature 2. Utility is important – if I can’t use it, lose it 3. Our apartment is only 900 sq ft. All is well, and everything has found a new home.

Perhaps it’s wishful thinking or maybe it’s because St. Paddy’s day is just around the corner, either way I have been noticing a lot of green lately. Green makes me hopeful – of the warm weather to come, the days growing longer, new life peeking through and Saturday morning farmer’s market. I am so looking forward to planting my first balcony garden this spring. I was very diligently in picking out flowers that like part sun and shade and that would not grow too tall- it was a very difficult. All the varieties made me want to go purchase a plot of land and sprinkle wild flowers seeds all over; as a comprise for now I might go volunteer here this summer. So here is my line-up: cherry tomatoes, marigolds, impatiens, dianthus, pansies, and impatiens. Each morning I have checked on my mini green house that I planted on Sunday – I know, I know, most of the packets said it would take 7-14 days for the seeds to germinate but I just have to check. Much to my surprise, my marigolds have already sprouted! I was thrilled and took lots of pictures of my first sprouts, but now I am worried. Why did they sprout so early? I have kept them out of direct sunlight just like the instructions said, but maybe they still receive too much sun? Is the apartment too warm? It said to keep the box in a warm location but maybe its too hot and it sped up the process? (Keep in mind, I spent 20 minutes trying to find the perfect place that is out of direct sunlight but warm, not super easy in the middle of Arctic-like temperatures (maybe not exactly Arctic). So we’ll see what happens to my little sprouts.

I have been thinking about my grandma, Mimi, a lot lately. She was an avid gardener. She and my grandpa spent countless hours in their garden – pulling weeds, mulching, pruning and watering. I have loads of memories from that garden – we spent the best summer evening on their porch eating watermelon, chasing fireflies and playing in their garden. I am looking forward to connecting with my grandma this spring and summer, as I take care of my much smaller balcony garden. And I know, if I were to call her and tell her about my seeds sprouting early, she would say ” just wait and see. It’s probably more than fine.” So I’m going to do just that.

Me, in Mimi and Pawpaw’s garden, circa 1990.