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it’s Lucia today

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It’s Lucia today, December 13th. I’ve always loved this weird tradition we have in Sweden. If you look up who Lucia was, then it’s an Italian saint (just google her). But the Swedish tradition actually has nothing to do with the saint, it just happens to be that Lucia is remembered on Dec 13, the same day as the winter solstice. The Lucia celebration in Sweden seems to have history from Germany but has also developed throughout the years into what today is the Swedish tradition. It’s a woman in a white dress and candles on her head = she brings the light when it’s dark in Sweden. It’s now part of Christmas every year.
After Lucia and her little line of people (santas, gingerbread, terns and star boys ….wow, terrible google translate, haha, but I don’t know what else to call them) have come to sing and play music in schools or at work places in the morning of the 13th, everyone is usually having a morning fika together with saffron buns, gingerbread and glogg (Swedish mulled wine). It’s a cute tradition, but a little weird if you listen to what the lyrics in the songs are, a lot of them doesn’t make sense. I still sing them all through the whole month of December every year. I was in the choir my whole childhood and we sang the same things every Christmas, they still do. Although, I think some people in Sweden wants to get rid of this tradition or at least have boys to be the woman in the dress. I haven’t really followed the Lucia discussions so I don’t know what’s going on. Why change thing we like, is all I can ask…

I was chosen to be Lucia for the school in 5th grade, the first Lucia to
sing a
solo instead of reading a boring poem, which I was very proud of

Ice Skating at Rockefeller

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I felt like crap yesterday after barely 4 hours of sleep during the night, so didn’t get much done all day, I was passed out. So no blogging. But  I’m feeling awesome today, so here is our fun Sunday, yay! 

We left the apartment and Thor (who got picked up by our neighbor shortly after), took an uber to train station and was on Manhattan around 10 am. We walked straight over to Rockefeller Center. There was long line to the ice rink but didn’t seem too bad (or so we thought). I have been talking about ice skating at Rockefeller since I came to NYC, since it’s on every list of things to do there. Every year we just kept saying “nah, we do it a different time, it’s too much people here” but now we really wanted to just get it done. Such a cold day and we had to wait 1.5 hour in line. The rink has it open in blocks of 1.5 hours (they need to fix the ice in between) and we got in 20 minutes before they would close it off for half an hour. They allow you to wait during this time and go on again when they open, but we were both cold and hungry so we ended up paying almost $100 to skate for twenty minutes. Oh well.

It was fun. I have not been ice skating since I was about 8-10 years old. I tried to remember if I went to a rink with school when I was like 14-15, it’s possible but I don’t think I was actually on the ice then. It’s amazing to me how the muscles and brain remembers how to do it. And what I mean by that is that I could totally remember that I was making 8’s and skating backwards, doing side steps, trying to do tricks, going really fast and being able to stop when I was a kid. Non of that was possible on Sunday of course. The ice was wobbly (since it was in the end of the session) and you have to be careful and respectful to the other people. So you go pretty slow and try not to fall. Jim’s right blade seemed to make him fall on the outside, he struggled a little, but what to expect, they probably don’t take care of the skates that well there. I thought it was fun though, even if it was just for 20 min. Now we can check that off the NYC bucket list 🙂 

After skating, we walked back to the Grand Central area and ate at the bar we’ve been to many times before, Perfect Pint. I ordered the shrimp salad as always. After lunch, we took the subway down to 23rd. We wanted to check off another thing on the must-do-in-nyc, the Rolf bar. They have crazy decorations in there. We’ve never been cause the line is always insane. It said on google that it wasn’t too busy so we thought we could give it a try. The line was loooong! So, nope. Another thing that tourists like to go to is Gramercy Tavern, an upscale fancy pants place. Not sure why that’s a huge thing but apparently it is. Luckily we got seats in the bar which was what we wanted. Jim wanted to order a beer for $22 (rated the best beer in the world, he has only tried it once before, it’s really hard to find) but unfortunately they didn’t have it which we expected so he had to pick something else. I ordered a hot chocolate with a giant marshmello to keep warm. 

We continued and walked to Flatiron and Madison Sq Park and from there we decided to go for a walk all the way up to Grand Central. At GC I quickly ran into the Swatch store to change battery on my watch. Free lifetime battery change, can’t beat that. We then walked over to 44th and 3rd to the Wheeltapper, cause they have a fireplace. They didn’t have it on, bummer. I was so cold so I ordered tea. We sat there for awhile until we decided to take the train home. We picked up Thor, ordered Chinese takeout and watched the Bears game. 

We had a lovely (but cold) day on Manhattan. Lots of people but not too crazy like it usually is around Christmas (I don’t understand why people come visit NYC in the winter). I’m happy we could check off from our NYC list. We don’t have that much left but we have to get it done this spring. 

a cold xmas day on Manhattan

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We came home about an hour ago from a long day on Manhattan. We left at 8:40 am and came back around 7 pm. A very cold day in NYC and of course lots of people like every Christmas season. We had a really great day. Frozen but happy day. I’ll tell you more about it tomorrow. Right now I’m going to do absolutely nothing on the couch next to Jim who’s watching the Bears game.

First frozen ground in Stamford this morning at 6:30am
Rockefeller Center“Fanny” 🙂 Flatiron BuildingEmpire State Building seen from 23rd Street

not eating enough?

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Written December 7, 2018, published in February 2019

I am (if you count from first day of last menstruation) 5 + 4 weeks today.

Something that kinda bothers me is that I don’t feel hunger. My belly is very bloated, like all the time, which at times can hurt a little. Because of this I don’t feel hungry, I constantly feel like I just had a five course meal which makes it difficult to eat and I have no taste for anything. My tummy is eventually making hungry noises because I haven’t eaten anything in maybe five or more hours. Food is not on my mind these days, and it worries me a little. I feel so extremely lucky that I don’t throw up (at least not yet) like other women, but I still have the same problem like them that I don’t have enough food to let my little one grow. Our scale is weird so I don’t fully trust it, but according to it I have lost weight so far, not gained.
I do force myself to eat though even if I’m not hungry, but it isn’t the most fun thing to do these days. And for some reason I can’t stand anything salty (I usually love salty food). 

My boobs has gotten pretty sore now. I don’t really notice it during the day but when I’m changing into pjs at night then they really hurt. And I’m not sleeping full nights. That’s not a new thing for me, but it’s every single night now which is annoying.

Other than this, I feel great.