Back together!!

Long time no see. We've been busy taking care of Lenas mother for a couple of weeks now. We enjoy beeing back together again! Kenneth brought Märta here when he came from Sweden two weekends ago. We met up in Athens where we were having sunny beautiful days!

We stayed at a nice picturesque hotell in the middle of Athens. Some might call it old and shrubby, but I like to call it picturesque and homy, with sweet, hospitable staff.
It was located with the plaka/old city on one side and the fashinable shopping street with the parlament house on the other. Mother made the long walk, together with us, up the hill to Acropolis, we were all happy we didn't have hot summerweather but a nice plesent springsun.

The guards at the unknown soldiers grave.

Random

Now Kenneth has been gone for nine days... four more until we meet again. Looking forward to that.

I've done quite some fixing in our home.

See if he still knowes the place when he comes back.

For weeks we have had this broken kitchen chair, but not anymore! :-)

And the best thing is that I got the material for free! I went to this... place, where they sell things for building houses (wood, stones) and he told me that they normally only sell big things but now he happened to have a small piece of what I needed and he even cut it in the right size for me!

The same day I also went to a friend that has a shop where they make windows and doors, and got myself a piece of glass for a frame that "never" have had any glass (an old nice thing I got from my mother).

I felt very pleased with all my non buying :-)

Then today it's Kenneth and my anniversary. Today two years ago we got married!! Hurray for us. :-) I don't know if I really celebrated it but I took my faithful cat and went to my favorite olive grove to enjoy the beautiful weather we where having today. Sat there in the sun reading and watching our cat being overwhelmed with nature, I never thought of it that way before but he's actually a "city cat". And now he's been sleeping ever since we came back home...

Harald is having his first meeting with a goat.

Separated :-(

Kenneth has been gone for three days and it feels like an eternity!!

Still 11 days to go...

Mattias, Kenneth, Carina and Zion took the big camper on Friday and made their way to Thessaloniki where they stayed the night.

On Saturday morning Carina and Zion took the airplane to Sweden while Kenneth and Mattias started their journey through Europe. They went through Bulgaria and in the evening they reached the Rumanian border. Sunday night they where part of a Church service in Bucharest and this morning they had almost reached the Hungarian border. Last thing I hear, a couple of hours ago, they where still in Hungary but who know maybe they are already in Austria or Slovakia...

At Thassos I feel... half :-( my man is missing!

But I get a lot done, both fun and good things.

And Harald is faithful like a dog :-) taking long walks together with me.

"No cloud without a silver lining."

Our friends from Sweden that came a couple of months ago are now packing for their trip back home. We sure have enjoyed having them here! The winter at Thassos is slow and gray. Many stores on the island are closed, rain seems more common than sun, all the tuorists are gone and if you go to the mainland you most remember that the last ferry back is already at 7pm.
So couple like the Ristholms that are full of new ideas and eageness, and a happy shiny one year old babyboy, can light up any grey day. Thank you Ristholms for making your way here this winter!

As they were packing and sorting out their stuff they also found some extra supplys that they were leaving with us. Among other a package of rye floure with a lovely recipe that I had to try at ones.
So now I have had a nice evening with yummy fresh newly baked bread and a cup of nice hot chocolate.
With our cat in my lap and candle lights on the table it was just to enjoy!

(Lena at the keys and Kenneth is out with Mattias, one last time at the english pub before departure. Not the last nigth for Kenneth and Mattias though since Kenneth will help Mattias drive the camper/trailer back to Sweden. He will be away from me two long weeks...)

Rosetta Stone

We now got going with our interactiv language course, Rosetta stone, and we are very pleased! It's realy a brilliant way to learn, fun and playful (like a computer game, matching words and pictures). The idea is that you learn a new language as you learned your first one, no translation needed but when you got one word you can add an other and then put it in a context. On our stationary computer the microphone is working so there we can't get away with bad pronunciation...

As I was going online to look for a picture I also found out about "the" Rosetta Stone. A stone found by the Frence in Egypt in 1799. It's a stone with one text written in three scripts (greek, Egyptian demotic script and hieroglyphs) that's been the key to the modern understanding of Egyptian hieroglyphs.

Thessaloniki

Friday we took the children of Dimitris (our pastor) and went to Thessaloniki for one night. It was a great time. They are great kids, so fun to spend some time with them and good to get away from the island to the big city for some adventures and entertainment :-)
The first day we went shoping. The girls (Lena and Nasia) enjoyed the many nice stores in a big city! :-) The boys (Kenneth, Kyriakos and Michalis) didn't quite like the same stores so they went on their own and found some nice music and technical stores. In the evening we joyned up for cinema! We saw Narnia- The voyage of the Dawn Treader.

Demonstation on the bus. Big poster, hand outs and loud speaker.
A common sight in the bigger cities. This time about that they are raising the bus fee.

The next day (a bit delayed for different reasons) we went to an icerink together with the family we where staying with. It was the first time for the kids to try the iceskates but they where all doing good. Kenneth was really steady on his skates while Lena felt like Bambie first time on the ice... It was fun, we all enjoyed it. We also been planing for a visit at Ikea before heading home to catch the last ferry- since we been so late in the morning we just manage to go there to have some Swedish meatballs though and a quick rush through the store.

More from Jan 6

Here is a film that Thomas has made. Click here to see the film.
It's from the Blessing of the water last week but from another village on the island,
where the boys did go in the water to fetch the cross.
Thomas is one of the boys that Kenneth has done some filming together with.
And here is a picture of two boys acting...