SKYNI

We had the wonderful pleasure of the Queks visiting us in our humble abode.

Summer is a really wonderful time to visit Sweden. We may not have the opulence of the other European cities like France and Italy, but the ‘no frills’ simplicity can be charming in many ways.

Jon and Linn had a great time with their cousin Juwin and Ki-en. They walked in the forests, biked up to the lakes and we had great walks under the beautiful blue skies.

I hope Mr and Mrs Quek enjoyed themselves. It is rare that visitors get to walk pass the Prime Minister of Sweden and walk on the same red carpet as the Royal Family celebrated Princess Madaleine’s wedding in The Grand Hotel.

Their visit meant alot to me and being with them was really special.

We hope they will come visit us again.

Linn is happy because she get to jump on the trampoline.

I had such a lovely weekend. Thank you my dear sister Pau Ping and mother in law, Irene for coming to Stockholm to visit me.

You made my weekend extra extra special. Thank you so much.

It will be Spring soon and the roads are extremely slippery as the ice melts. Jonathan and I were taking a walk. I was trying to walk slowly as I didn’t want to fall flat on the ground (which happens a lot). But the inevitable happened.

As I was staring at the sky laying flat on the ground, I heard Jonathan saying…

“Mummy are you ok? Do you have blood on your head? Do you want me to call the hospital? Is it painful?”

I had to get up although it was painful as I don’t have enough fat to cushion the fall anymore. I know I could not lie there with Jonathan looking at me, wondering what to do.

I got up and he said ” Mummy, you must be careful, it is very slippery. Come, you must hold on to me so that you will not fall again”

With that, we walked home slowly hand in hand.

I am so proud of my son.

My Fierce Princess

My sweet prince

Last night, Linn wanted me to read her the book called ‘Where do I come from’. (I wonder if I should hide this book). We went through the book explaining how Nicke and I love each other so much that we wanted to have a baby.

Somehow, we ended up talking about how she will meet someone whom she loves and want to have a baby with when she grows up.

My little 5 year old then told me that firstly, she does not want to have a baby and secondly, she already has someone she wants to marry. She happily said ‘I love Wilmer and Wilmer loves me’. I asked her what about Anan her friend back home…doesn’t she love him anymore? She looked at me with a big smile in her face and said…’I do. But mummy, I can have 2 right?’

I think ‘The Birds and the bees’ are not enough these days.

Happy New Year! Hope that everyone is having a great start to the new year!

Apologies for the long silence. This winter is really hard on me. The darkness and the cold. This morning, as I was walking Linn to school, it was -17 degrees. The school usually make the kids burn off their energy in the snow for 2 hours. Today, the school decided to keep them indoors. They told me that it is too cold to be outside!

This really makes me miss the hot sweaty climate even more.

* I miss that I can just walk out in T-shirt and shorts without having to look for scarfs, gloves, thick socks and shoes always and these thick bulky jackets.

* I miss that the food remain hot on the table for a long period of time, unlike here where the food will remain warm only for a few minutes.

* I don’t have to defrost the car every morning, sweep off the snow and can drive off anytime i want in Singapore

* I don’t have to keep track of the children’s winter clothes, which are really expensive and at that age, they need to be ‘upsized’ every winter.

* Actually, sweating is quite healthy. I don’t even sweat here in summer.

* I still don’t appreciate the concept of layering!

So give me hot sweaty weather anytime!!!

Christmas is fast approaching and the family is getting ready for the usual christmas festivities.

Jonathan and Linn are really looking forward to Christmas and the presents that they will get. Jonathan has been behaving well both in school and home as he patiently awaits the wonderful christmas gifts for him as he has been a good boy all year round. My poor boy has lost quite a few of his baby teeth and they have not been replaced.

Now with Linn, it is a different story. When told that if she continues to disobey and not listen to us, she will not get any presents from Santa Claus this year. She will have to watch other kids collect their presents quietly at the side.

The fearless princess said to us with full confidence: ‘Mummy, you don’t even know Santa Claus. If you do, can you give me his telephone number?’

Fortunately, my mother in law sent a card from ‘Santa’ to Linn to rectify the situation, telling her to be a good girl if she wants any presents at all.

Here’s wishing all our friends a very very Merry Christmas and have a great one!

Apologies for the long silence. Have been really busy which i will not bore you with the details.

Today, Linn asked me if she can go to a PRINCESS school. So, if anyone who knows of a good Princess school that will teach her to listen and obey instructions, behave, not jump up and down all the time, do dangerous stunts. Please kindly let me know.

More soon…

I think he must had 3 birthday cake and all chocolate cakes, his favourite.

Jon, mummy is so proud of you and you are so kind to give up your room to Po Po. Most of all, you are so cute whenn you tell PoPo ‘inte sen qi’ when you don’t want her to be angry. He combined swedish with chinese.

Tomorrow, nichlas and jon will go to legoland to celebrate.

Jon, mummy loves you and happy birthday.

Summer was coming to an end and it was really nice for my mother and sister, Pei Yao and my nephew, Ki-en to come for a visit. Before that, my british sister, Pau Ping came for a visit as well. It is really wonderful to have family around me.

I hope they enjoyed our not so warm weather and they did experienced a couple of wet days.

We did not do much but walk around Stockholm city, try Swedish pizza, shop and just sit around to talk.

We were all happy to see them but the happiest was Jonathan. For the week that Ki-en was here, he was a totally different boy. He was spontaneous, he interacted with Ki-en and they built Lego together. We have never seen Jonathan like this. Even his teacher in school told me that he was alot happier and participative in school. And when Ki-en had to go home, he was really upset and cried!

Thank you Pei Yao for coming to visit and bringing Mom here. I really appreciate it!

I recently moved Linn to another new daycare. This daycare is just 200m from our house and it would definitely help with the logistics, specially in the coming winter months.

It was Linn’s first day of school last Friday and I accompanied her to school as Sweden requires parents to ‘school-in’ their kids. She was fine with meeting new kids and teachers and quickly fit into her new environment. In no time, she was dancing and singing with the kids.

When her new teacher, Victoria asked if she has any another sibling, we talked briefly about Jonathan’s autism. Linn then told Victoria in swedish: ‘My brother, Jonathan is special because he does not have many thoughts in his head’.

I was surprised with her description and Victoria thought that it was a really good way to describe Jonathan from Linn’s perspective.

Jonathan also surprises me at time. The other day, he asked me if I am not feeling well and he asked me to sit down to rest. He then told me ‘I love you mummy’.

These moments are truly priceless.

I was playing with Linn the other day and was asking to identify some of the pictures we were looking at.

She was doing good until she stumbled on this picture on the extreme right hand corner

She couldn’t tell me what it was. I was really surprised as it was really obvious to me. She asked me if it was a car.

Then it dawned on me that she has never seen a real telephone. Nicke and I always have our mobiles and we have always avoided landlines.

I think I will start showing my kids things that I grew up with so that they knows how things have changed.

My 2 zombies at Stockholm Zombiewalk