I just HAD to post this picture of my darling Bruce. He is busy eating the Christmas cards. The one he's eating at the moment is from my good friend Pauline Oborne in Adelaide. I knew the lady had good taste, but now Bruce is confirming it :) At least he's having a break from eating my bed. We have an IKEA pine loft bed and he's busy munching away at the support slats. I guess if we crash to the floor one night, we'll know WHO to blame!

Welcome to a bone-chilling day here in Sweden. It's really cold and icy at the moment. I've been watching some young girls running along the street outside and I'm wondering how do they do it? Me, I walk in mincing baby steps, gingerly trying to stay on the areas that have gravel and aren't solid sheets of ice (we had below freezing weather for a week, then 2 days of above with RAIN and snow and then back below again, it's treacherous here) and I STILL fall (on gravel covered ice, no less).

But these four-year olds I'm watching... RUN, SKIP, and HOP on the ice.

Now,I don't want them to fall and get hurt anymore than I want to, but I do want to know one thing...

HOW THE HELL DO THE LITTLE ONES DO IT??? I slip when I step outside and just LOOK at the ice.

I just don't get it....anyone know the secret?

I've been reading Samantha's blog and now I want an armadillo decoration for my Christmas tree. Lars-Göran is rolling his eyes as I make a space on the tree and say "Look! Right there! It's crying out for an armadillo". It got me to thinking about trying to organise a Christmas decoration swap. I'd love to have a tree filled with decorations from AA friends all over the world (starting with people who can supply armadillos, hint, hint.). Must get my thinking cap on and see about that one. I think a few people may be interested.

I also received a lovely letter from a Swedish reader asking about what I remember of Christmas in Australia as a child. I think the thing that always heralded Christmas for me was .... the jacaranda!



I'm from South Australia and in my suburb (Rose Park) these are the usual street trees. I always knew that Christmas was "just around the corner" when these magnificent trees suddenly burst into flower. We used to paint the seedpods gold and sprinkle them with glitter for decorations, but it is those vibrant flowers that I remember and evoke Christmas for me. Last year we sailed to Gotland for a week in August and while wandering through the beautiful Visby Botanical Gardens, I spied a flowering jacaranda and it produced such an overwhelming welling of emotion that I burst into tears.



Other plants I loved at that time of the year are Christmas Bells. My gran had these growing in her Norwood garden and we always picked them for a great decoration. Also the Western Australian Christmas Tree. I just love that beautiful wattle yellow. I'm one of those luckily NOT allergic to wattle flower.












Then there was the lovely NSW Christmas Bush and the wonderful Flame Tree. Our neighbours had this tree in the back garden and it was always flowering in December. These are the plants that I remember being the signals that Santa was on his way pretty soon. I suppose we were not as sophisticated as modern children, so we looked to nature and the changing seasons to give us the clues.

This, my fourth Christmas in Sweden has been the hardest. I really missed my family a lot this year and thought of them often. I also thought a great deal about my (now deceased) grandmother and the good times I had with her Saturday afternoon baking. This was a ritual for me as a kid. I'm the eldest child of a LARGE family, so I think gran realised that it was tough for me and I was always asked over to spend a little time with her. I think I learned my love of cooking from her. I thought about her last night when I made her cheesecake recipe. That rich lemony smell wafting from my oven brought back those times spent with her.

Anyway, 2003 is almost over. I guess my next post will be sometime next year *grin*

Hope you all see in 2004 safely! We are spending ours at home enjoying the Swedes going bananas with fireworks: It's my birthday New Year's Day (International Hangover Day) and we are heading into Stockholm to meet up with some friends from far north Kiruna. I hope that SOMETHING is open as I don't fancy freezing my extremeties off for more than a microsecond.

I leave you with my thought for the day:

There comes a time when you should stop expecting other people to make a big deal about your birthday..........around age 11.