vacation Saturday, part 1 (June 13): living museum, walking around

Fun fact!  The slightly extended Hilldore family was on four continents today: North and South America, Europe, and Asia.

The breakfast was great.  There was bread with brown cheese, which was one of the specialties in Norway.  (It's hard, but possible, to get in the US.)  There was a cold almond/not-oatmeal thing that was weird and good.  And there was a raspberry cocoa ball.  These were possibly the oddest.  They were quite dry, but still tasted very much like raspberry.  It turns out that most raspberry things are not dry.

We had several options of things to do today and Monday, but could mix and match a bit depending on weather.  We decided to to the living museum (Gamle Bergen Museum) in the morning.  Ben worked the public transit system like a pro, so we were able to bus over there.  Then we walked a short ways to the spot.  It was rather pretty and involved walking in a circle, kind of like the entryway to highways.

There were a few things outside the official museum, so we explored those a bit.  We found one of apparently several public swimming access points - and there were several people there!  They were also in the middle of restore a building and had printed out a (probably not paper) facade to put up.  It was rather funny, but at the same time blended in well and was a good option.

The living museum had several buildings to explore and there were several like skits throughout the morning.  The actors did a great job being in character and had to change characters several times throughout the morning.  The first skit was a maid working for the merchant and the 'farmer' boy that would come in from his island once a month.  They were in the middle of the slowest love story ever.

The second story was of the dentist in 1897.  I wouldn't believe it if 1) they didn't go out of character afterwards for a mini tour and 2)I didn't look it up afterwards to find out it was true.  Ok, so the story was of someone about to get married, but she had to get all her teeth removed first so that her in-laws didn't need to shoulder the cost of it happening later.  Her brother paid extra to give her morphine, but she kept running away anyway.  It turns out this is completely true: all the teeth were removed at marriage or confirmation.  Sugar had been introduced into their society but not good dental hygiene, so the teeth just rotted.  Dentures were expensive, so you would get one set and they had to fit you for the rest of your life.  If you were especially poor, there would only be one set of dentures in the whole family and you would just take turns eating.  CAN YOU IMAGINE???  (Turns out this was actually a rather common practice in a lot of western countries.)  After the skit there was more info on dentistry practices that I went to listen to.  I don't remember many specific details at this point, but found it all very interesting.

They had beds that would grow in length with the kids.  The main reason seemed to be the ability to get them into the houses (long ones were harder), but the more important reason might be that it saved a lot of space. No need to have a long bed for a short person.  They also had a few beds that would grow wider - during the day you could push half of it in for more floor space.

We explored for several hours, but I'm pretty sure that Joshua's highlight of the visit came near the end with a cat.  It was a nice white cat.  However, it followed us for the next ten minutes!  I was expecting a quick "hey cool, a cat!" but then we kept seeing it as we walked around.  It even let Joshua pet it's belly.  It seemed as though some of the houses are private residences, so maybe the cat belonged to one of those.

At the beginning, going up:

A small alley with Joshua:

Looking towards the fjord:

First Lunch: a bread with meat

Joshua with the cat:

Amanda and Joshua with cat:

Cat following us:

Ben with cat.  See?  It followed us a long time.

Oh, those silly kids.

Sunday: ok, this happened on Friday

Friday I joined a Google hangout with friends a little bit after it had started.  They were talking about puzzles.  Then Dusty said, "Ok, we're talking about 'old' people hobbies.  We've covered [something] and puzzles.  What else? ...Canning?"

Well, it turns out that I had ordered some canning jars and they had been delivered that day.  I kept forgetting to grab them, so while I didn't have a ton to add to the conversation about canning I was able to make it meaningful topic as I went to bring them inside the house.

Friday: overscheduled

 I overscheduled myself today with too many friend things.  I love friends!  But it was too much people-ing.  I'm exhausted.

Joshua had school pictures, so I took the lens out of an old pair of sunglasses to remove the flash in them.  Then I wore them in the morning.

Wednesday: urgent things finished

Today was full, with boring things, but things worked well.  There were no thunderstorms or even rain when Isaac was going to the bus stop, so I didn't feel the need to bring him.  Then Ben woke up a bit early and so brought Joshua to school.  

I had the laundry washed and dried by 11am, fairly amazing.  I even got most of it put away!  The kitchen was cleaned (and is still mostly clean), groceries and library books were obtained, Hope work was finished.  Several of the things that were "urgent" got finished, although there are several important things that didn't get done.  I feel more on top of things today, but we'll see if that feeling remains tomorrow.

Tuesday: busy

It's been a while since I've had a day this busy.  I woke up at 6am (annoyingly before my alarm) and then felt like I was going full speed until about 7:30pm.  I had a half hour for dinner, then read to Joshua and finished up a few work emails.  It was about 9pm before I decided I was done for the day.

Part of the problem was that there were several problems throughout the day. 
*There was some unexpected cleaning before I left the house. 
*One of the files for my classes doesn't seem to be working correctly on some computers.  It does work on my computers, so I'm having a really hard time troubleshooting the problem.  Is it my file?  Is it the computers?  Was there a weird update to an OS that changed some settings?
*I had a meeting that went longer than I was hoping.
*Traffic on the way to rock climbing is still really bad.  I could avoid some of it by going a slightly longer way, but I keep forgetting because the traffic is only really bad during rush hour.

But even with that, it didn't feel like a bad day, just a long day.

*I went the wrong way from Hope to pick up Joshua, so decided to do a zig-zag to get to him.  I think it might have been faster than any other way.  (Two of the major north-south roads have construction right now, so everyone is taking the highway and it backs up quickly.)
*I belayed with some friends (who also have kids on the rock climbing team) while the kids had practice and it was fun.  There was one route that was especially fun!  And there was one route that we tried to start and it was significantly more challenging than it looked.
*I got several big things checked off my work to-do list.  I'm not quite under control there yet, but almost.
*Isaac forgot his phone in the classroom before lunch.  I got a very nice voicemail from the teacher letting me know she brought it to the front office.  That being said, I am really glad that Isaac is in a place where he forgets his phone and he isn't too attached to it.
*Snaxalotl is going to try frosting with pieces of brownie in it tonight as one of his snacks.  Joshua and I agree that it sounds delicious.

Monday: Labor Day

We went over to Larry and Cheryl's for lunch and some games.

On the way way home the kids were trying to figure out where we were going to to next for a small surprise.  Joshua said Bricks & Minifigs at one point and then immediately said, "oh, I hope we're not going there.  I don't want to go there."

Obviously, we were going there.  We briefly talked at home but decided to go anyway.  I had a great time.  Joshua had at least a good time.  We got some interesting pieces.  They put some Minecraft sets on the table when we were there, so the kids got a lot of Minecraft themed pieces.  We got some normal pieces - there are some that we just don't have enough of right now, surprisingly.  (When you're looking for a specific piece in a certain color and you need several of them, we sometimes don't have enough.)

And with the end of this weekend, we start getting into a busy season.  Isaac's evening stuff starts, Ben has a work trip soon, and I'm just trying to stay on top of everything.  Ben and I have also managed to increase our social calendars, so we're figuring out how to fit that in.  Joshua has a few more weeks before his extra-curriculars start.

Saturday: new litter box

Our excitement today was getting a fancy new litter box.  Joshua came with us to get it from the store so that he could get out of the house today.  He said it was a lot more exciting than he expected because he was expecting a tiny little litter box but instead we got a big one.  And then he helped me get it all set up.  It doesn't really take up less space, but should be much easier to clean.

We had it set up around 11am and I was starting to get a little nervous as evening rolled around and the cats hadn't used it yet.  I know that cats can be temperamental when their surroundings change, and so I was hoping for an easy transition.

They both used it shortly after that.  Yay!