Cold ears and leftover christmas tea

It felt like I never was going to get home. I pushed the stroller in front of me. Heaps of snow on the ground and the unbelievably hard wind made it nearly impossible to move the way I wanted to go.

Forty minutes earlier I had left the house to get some butter and milk at the grocery store a couple of kilometres from home. Happy it was snowy white outside and only one minus degree celsius in the air, I wore only a thin woollen jacket, gloves and a knitted hat - the temperature was perfect. I barley noticed the black clouds covering the sky behind our house.

When I finally got home again I felt like I had attended the hardest workout class, ever. I'm convinced the wind blew straight through my body the 30 minutes I spent in the very local snow storm, going home from the store. My ears were freezing cold when I got home - the rest of the body covered in ice cold sweat. It really felt like magic that the house was wind-proof. Atlas, amazingly, slept through it all.

Some left over christmas tea did the trick. It tasted like heaven and slowly thawed my body. Two hours later I now feel a bit more alive and am astonished that the weather outside, suddenly, is perfect again.

Hidden treasures

Going through the pictures on my pad the other day, I came over this wonderful little thing.

It's from my sisters place. Being a student, she can't always afford all new and shiny things she likes. She found the lamp in the attic, and as iI see it it's even better than new. It lacked all its crystal prisms, but instead of finding new prisms, she reinvented it as a lamp/jewellery-holder. All her pretty earrings now make lovely shadow/light-effects on the wall when she lets the lamp light the room.

This little treasure fills me with warm memories of coffee, long, cozy evenings and avocado (!). It is a great idea, really pretty, and really something nobody else has got. It gives my sisters bedroom some extra character and is really just lovely - just as the room owner herself.

Last grown-ups kids party

I had the pleasure of enjoying a rather lavish meal with really hearted people yesterday. The occasion was my sons six months "birthday". We grown-ups gorged ourself in delicious cheese, berries, dates, nuts, fig marmalade and excellent wine, while the person in the spotlight enjoyed chewing a paper bag (which came with a gift for him) and smiling unstoppably to all the faces turned at him.

The culinary part of the party was wonderful, but the absolute top moment of the occasion was when we all sung the birthday song for the little troll. He stopped chewing the paper bag, looked up at the faces surrounding him, astonished at the sound of the voices in harmony, and then, with surprise in his eyes, he just broke out in the biggest smile you can imagine. It was a rather extravagant moment - the candles, the food, the people and this little sun ray of an equally extravagant person.

Atlas - I'm so lucky to be in your life. You're my star.

Fading christmas sparkles

December has been all consuming. And still I feel like I haven't been able to take it all in. The people, the glittering snow, decorations, lovely tasting food and beautiful presents - they where all there, and I really enjoyed them, but it's like I didn't manage to save all the impressions in my taste bank.

As I try to remember it all, and taste christmas all over again, I look over to all that is left of christmas in my house: A pine branch covered with lights and silver and white christmas decorations. I took it in after Dagmar, the hurricane, had tampered with our back yard and left giant pine branches on our snow covered lawn.

We had been to these christmas parties, several days in a row, and I felt just a little "anti climaxed", sitting down in our living room, lacking a christmas tree this year. It was at that moment I looked out and spotted the branches... This branch worked as the centre christmas decoration at our own, very tiny new years party, and it will be the last to go, when I, on this twelfth day of christmas, remove what is left of it all.

I'll work on taking it all in again though - in my mind. And even though it will look a bit faded, I'll keep it there, tasting it during the dark and cold winter nights I know will follow this wonderful christmas month.