Hmppffff!

Please scroll down to Sunday posts below or click here to see my gifts from Irene and Mylene (this time in alphabetical order) - I had created a draft post on Sunday and though I edited it now, instead of posting it with today's date, it is mixed with older ones. Bleeeeeh Blogger.

Late birthday post (1)

My birthday was three weeks ago, where does time fly?? Soon it will be time to start Christmas projects :) Thank you everyone for your wishes, I was so surprised to receive many lovely messages and cards by e-mail! They were so important this year. As I mentioned before, this year I didn't celebrate because I was flying to Norway just a few days later. H. invited me for dinner in our favorite restaurant by a lake. This is one of the most beautiful places on Earth to have a dinner and yet it is not expensive. I mean, it is Norwegian expensive, but the prices don't affect the location. I need to find photos from last year, I didn't feel for taking the same ones, so I'll just post the two I took now; however they don't show much.

Still in Warsaw, a funny thing happened. This year my father forgot about my b-day LOL! And I was vicious, oh sooooo vicious, that I only jokingly mentioned it to him 2-3 days later when he called me to say wishes because of the Day of the Child - he still considers it a point of honor to call me every year and always says I'm still his child even if I'm grown up :) I am not sure if this day is celebrated elsewhere, but at least in Poland it is meant more for persons a bit younger than me :) Point is, this time he called me one day early! LOL Then I almost regretted reminding him about my b-day (but one day he found find it out himself and then think I was hurt by his silence) because he went into a sort of hysterical reaction, so unusual of him. He kept repeating "How did that happen? How could I let this happen? My memory fails me, I am getting old!" so I took all the time and care of the world to reassure him that it *really didn't matter* because I knew he wishes me well and it was just a birthday! I heard him shouting to his wife "Do you know what happened? I can't believe this is possible! We forgot about Ania's birthday!" and he was so shocked... Anyway, I did what I could. But the following day, someone rang at the door. I thought it was the mail man with a package Donna announced but when I opened, it was a messenger with a gift basket. I was so surprised! I didn't get that many in my life LOL! My first thought was that it's from H. and the second why he would do that one day before my flight to Norway. The flower would die during the summer... Then I read the card that was attached and... it was a small gift basket from my father. He must have asked to have it prepared for the Day of the Child because except the bottle of egg liquor, the basket was filled up with sweets :) It was such a surprise. We don't usually do gift baskets in the family!

Inspected by The Queen herself :

Food, Norwegians and Sweden

What do they have in common?

See description of the Svinesund bridge from Wikipedia: Svinesund is a sound separating the Swedish municipality of Strömstad in the province of Bohuslän in the county of Västra Götaland from the Norwegian municipality of Halden in the county of Østfold.
Two bridges, the old and new Svinesund Bridge (no:Svinesundsbroen sv:Svinesundsbron), span the sound. The Swedish side is extremely popular with Norwegians who flock to buy cheaply in Sweden, where a large shopping area can be found immediately after crossing the sound. Following the erection of the new bridge in 2005, road taxes must be paid to drive into Norway using either bridge, and to drive into Sweden using the new bridge.

Today we were among the cars crossing the bridge. H. left work a bit earlier, was home around 3pm to pick me up with Happy and we drove to Sweden, about 1h-1,5 h by car depending on the traffic - or much much more. There are road works since I don't remember when and it slows down the traffic a lot.

I'm sure you know Norway is THE most expensive country of the world. My brother lives in Switzerland (which I don't consider a cheap country) and he often says it sounds impossible, but Norway is MUCH much more expensive.

So, what the Norwegians do, is that they drive accross the border to Sweden and fill trunks with as much as they can put into. Customs limitations don't let them buy whole trucks of food, otherwise they (we) would. Today we bought 20 kgs of meat, mostly chicken, which we love, and other needed stuff such as washing powder, pet food, cosmetics, spices, etc. Trust me, the difference in price makes it worth to drive there for shopping. Just a minute or two after crossing the border, an artificial village of big halls awaits - all built for the Norwegian!

It is not possible to stop on the Svinesund bridge, so this is all I could get as a photo today for you, which I always regret, because the fjord is so beautiful there. On one side - Norway, on the other - Sweden. Oh, and I realize these pictures don't show anything. They're just here for the record ;-)

(view to the old bridge)

Late birthday post... (2)

See that beautiful present I received from Mylene!! I was doubly thrilled because I have never done neither received a biscornu before... It's my first and it's GORGEOUS! I was soooo happy to discover it after opening the envelope. Mylene does such beautiful work (and beware, I hear that she's joined the quilting world recently!). I think the cording is made with the same thread as used for the pattern on thebiscornu. And you know what? The little button has "For You" written on it. How suiting!! And the giftie was accompanied by one of Mylene's worlwide famous hand-made cards, which I am now lucky to have more than one! :)

Now, my birthday surprise from Irene for the 2007 exchange within the Stitching Bloggers Birthday/Christmas Club ran by Becky. See all the neat goodies I received! Irene sent it to me directly to Norway and was it a lovely package to unpack! She sent me the cat/mouse Workbasket chart (from my wishlist, thanks so much, Irene!), the Norway heart from The Victoria Sampler, and here is a decription from their website:

Norway - "Tweed Stitch and Hardangersom"

Official Flower: Purple Heather

National Animal: Elk

National Bird: The Dipper

National Symbol: Milk

The Tweed Stitch, right under the Dipper bird, symbolizes dark green trees and deep fjords this country is known for. The Hardanger Heart, represents the specialty stitch technique we know and love, which has it's origins in this northern country. This geometrical drawn thread work takes its name from a town on the southwestern coast of Norway on the Hardanger Fjord. The technique is still used for parts of the festive folk costumes, and bridal wear, as well as household linens.

What else? A beautiful needle minder from Kelmscott Designs, which I always wanted to have, three different skeins in pink, my favorite color! and an extremely cute little tin box with Canadian chocolates, that vanished in a short time! They were delicious.

Irene took such visible care in picking the right items for me that I was particularly touched... thanks so much!

Again, Mylene and Irene, I am sorry for taking so long to show off these wonderful presents!

Pillow for Cheryl

I posted a link to Cheryl's blog before, but just for the record, here it is. I absolutely love the color combination. I picked an odd piece of Lakeside Linens 40 ct. linen - and my eyes didn't thank me for that LOL! and a skein of a color named Melon from The Dye Shop that alas doesn't exist anymore.

Next giftie will be for the ten thousandth reader, but that's a long way to go :)

Design: Pique et Pique (France)

Fabric: Lakeside Linens 40 ct

Threads: The Dye Shop (color -Melon)

The Queen...

Thank you...

...for your numerous messages on and off this blog! It's such a warm feeling to get in contact with you all again, thanks so much for your comments :) I've already sent many late e-mails out, some still wait in the queue :) Today was a bit windy here though sunny and I don't have much work for Monday, so I am sitting at my laptop most of the day and catching up... Watch this space this week-end :)
PETRA - I had a big broad smile when I read your comment :) Actually I had told H. to have his camera ready for when I exit to the arrival hall. Even my aunt kept telling me I am trying to do Mission Impossible. With 3 pieces of luggage and 2 transporters with pets, I wondered myself. What the picture doesn't show well is that one of the suitcases is huge, the other not so enormous, plus hand-luggage and Happy's transporter biiiig. I chose a bigger model than I had to wen I bought it last year because I wanted him to have loads of space inside. I decided not to stress though, chose a very early flight when I had to be at the airport at 5 am (!!!) because I figured there wouldn't be many planes cheking out and that - most importantly - whatever I do, however I behave, whatever ridiculous I and it might all look - at 5 am most people try to fight sleepy eyes and simply won't care. True! I didn't stress too much but I must say that if not for a wonderful family (a father with 3 grown-up daughters) it would have been much harder. They offered to help, carried my luggage, helped at the x-ray stand (pets had to be taken out, their transporters x-rayed and then put again in) etc. I was sooo thankful.
When it comes to photos from here, I'm afraid they might be very local this summer. Money is on the low side and we have tons of expenses related to works in and around the house, so we might not move much from home except for trips in the nature around. We've travelled so much and I've seen most of Norway already, which is not nothing if you look at its lenght and of course I LOVE to see, experience and discover, but it might be so that I won't have that many spectacular pictures to share this time. I realize that people expect to see perfect beauty and fjords when they hear 'Norway'...
SHARON - I am not 'back' LOL, I am here till late August or early September :) And I am so enjoying being here.
NATH - Merci pour ton gentil message ! Dieu que j'envie tes talents multiples ! Le sac est absolument génial :)
ELA - alez oczywiscie, wklej prosze :) Gdanska chyba nie zalicze tego lata, ale co sie odwlecze... :)
When it comes

In Norway!

I'm in Norway already, since 10 days and I haven't updated my blog in a looong while.

First, I would like to ask forgiveness to *anyone* who I haven't replied to yet - especially Donna, Mylene, Linda, MaryK and many others. I feel extremely guilty but I just have to say the last period was pure madness, so if you read this, PLEASE forgive me, I am terribly sorry, I am not ignoring anyone or nor caring, definitely not, I just wasn't able to cope with everything! During some periods days should last 48 h.

I'll update the blog with photos later but now I just wanted to write a quickie to say hei! (the Norwegian way) to everyone and first reply by e-mail before I go on here.

The last period in Warsaw was hot in all ways - weather, work and packing :)

The trip by plane went super fine:

You can only see Happy's tongue but he really is there in the lower transporter. Actually things went excatly the opposite way to what I expected. Toska (aka The Queen) - I thought she would be extremely stressed and need a long week of time to recover, but all the trip (airport, plane, drive home) didn't seem to impress her at all. She was CALM!!! like I don't know what. She amazed me totally. On the other hand, Happy had a great trip last year but this time he was extremely stressed and made sounds from the moment I got the transporter with him at the airport till the moment he could finally go out outside the airport building, and he asked with his paw that I finally open the damn prison, and cried and cried. He's such a calm dog normally so I was really sorry for him this time. The procedure at the customs went super fine. I have to go through the red section (goods to declare plus live animals) and some of you might know that the veterinary procedure to "import" pets into Norway is of the toughest ones. The customs officer was very careful in checking all official stamps, writings etc. but all had been prepared in the smallest details by me and it went fine. I was first a little bit anxious because the man was so "official" and not smiling, but I know they have to be so - and Norwegians often are that way anyway - but usually a big honest smile follows and that's what happened this time too.

H. was waiting for us and we drove home making just a small stop at our fav' pet shop to buy a thing or two more. My darling had bought everything himself the previous day: dog and cat food, litter and litter box, scoop, bowls etc. It was the first time The Queen was about to visit Norway :)

Since then I had tons of work and deadlines (also known as dead lions among translators) to face and many were the days I worked most of the day and night.

I'll continue later but I'll just add I'm making long walks in the nature with Happy, we work in the garden planting trees and flowers, and I only picked my needle yesterday.

I was actually about to reappear here on Monday, but on Monday... Happy escaped and I don't have to tell you what trying to find a lost dog involves. Police, other services, driving around till the wee hours of the night, and FINALLY getting him back a day later. I'll make a seperate post about that to describe how efficient and amazing the Norwegian can be!! Anyway Happy is back, but it's easy to see the whole thing was a huge stress. He slept all the evening and during the night, he hugged to me with his nose on mine, and he was just a ppoooooor little doggie all too happy to be with those he loves - and who love him. Dearly, as would say H., as we had to fork out over 200 usd!! to have him back. Yikes. But all the world knows Norway IS expensive. To those who haven't yet experienced Norway's expensiveness, I'll say: try to imagine it, multiply by nine, raise your hair, say Holy cow!, raise your hair and you might be close :)

Nath from France has received her little surprise and she already stitched one piece :)

Cheryl received the pillow I made for her as a giftie for being the 5000th to visit my blog and I am more than delighted to read the comments :) I loved the result myself and I am so glad she liked it!!!

I just love making new friends through this blog!! :) Thank you so much for enriching my life!

(toldya we all enjoy our time here!)