Fish cakes

How to make fish cakes with frozen-hard-as-a-rock fish:

step one: make sure you have one (1) man and axe handy.

Apples, Autumn and Dwarves

Autumn Harvest , Ruth Elassar

We have picked the lot of the apples on our property and Anders made A LOT of applesauce, and a wonderful apple cake involving, well, applesauce, and a cake lid made up of ground almonds, a la Jamie Oliver's Plum and Almond Tart (which is dangerously good btw!)

Last of the apples. Notice the kid nibbled ones. 

Rural living: escaped sheep in the garden.

I have hung up a board. But what to hang on it? Current songs and poetry!
This weeks poem: Come little Leaves, from A Journey Through Time with Verse and Rhyme.

Wonderful collection of verse. 

The book also contains quite a few for Michaelsmas, which has just passed with dragons and jewels and quests. Among others, JR Tolkiens epic "Over the Misty Mountains", which I am going to clip in here for you to understand what I speak of:

Far over the Misty Mountains cold, 

To dungeons deep and caverns old, 

We must away, ere break of day, 

To seek our pale enchanted gold. 

For ancient king and elvish lord 

There many a gleaming golden hoard 

They shaped and wrought, and light they caught, 

To hide in gems on hilt of sword. 

On silver necklaces they strung 

The flowering stars, on crowns they hung 

The dragon-fire, on twisted wire 

They meshed the light of moon and sun. 

Far over the Misty Mountains cold, 

To dungeons deep and caverns old, 

We must away, ere break of day, 

To claim our long-forgotten gold. 

Goblets they carved there for themselves, 

And harps of gold, where no man delves 

There lay they long, and many a song 

Was sung unheard by men or elves. 

The bells were ringing in the dale, 

And men looked up with faces pale. 

The dragon's ire, more fierce than fire, 

Laid low their towers and houses frail. 

The mountain smoked beneath the moon. 

The dwarves, they heard the tramp of doom. 

They fled the hall to dying fall 

Beneath his feet, beneath the moon. 

Far over the Misty Mountains grim, 

To dungeons deep and caverns dim, 

We must away, ere break of day, 

To win our harps and gold from him! 

To Rivendell, where Elves yet dwell 

In glades beneath the misty fell. 

Through moor and waste we ride in haste, 

And whither then we cannot tell. 

We must away! We must away! 

We ride before the break of day!

I love Tolkien. I look forward to the day I can read for my children. I think my dad read the Hobbit to me, quite young, but how young? I don't know. Ten years old? Maybe younger. I have to admit I loved the Lord of The Rings films as well, but they are definitely not for children, . The books on the other hand are exquisite. Reading this poem again has reminded me how important verse, poetry and words are. And I believe young children benefit from hearing it, even though they do not understand, the flow of the voice, the beautiful words are enough. And they listen, they move around, but they listen.

Speaking of dwarves, we made a few of our own, since we figured our dwarf of the day was getting a little lonely in his underground house, with only nuts and silly hedgehogs to talk to all day. It took about ten minutes, plus time for the glue to dry overnight. I found the idea in small craft book for gnomes, but I just cut the jackets by freehand and sowed them up with each kid hanging around my neck. Sorry, no pictures of cute little ones putting wool on their little autumn gnome, due to the dangers of picking up a camera in close proximity to glue, scissors and needles.

Two bodies in the making.

Four little gnomes waiting for a beard.

Busy gnomes on a walk outside on the October Table.

Mother Earth welcoming all the flower children home.
Jasmin's reenactment of the Root Children story.

Two wonderful woman bloggers

Two amazing woman out there doing amazing things.

First Lunchability, she posts her packed lunches everyday. My children get lunch at their Kindergarden, but if they didn't.....

And something that creates order. Jasmin is five, and right in that age where she wants HER things in HER drawer, and she wants to know where things "live", so she has received her own little night stand by her bed, with three drawers. She kindly enough took only one herself, and gave one each to the twins.  And she has her clothing bag, which she opens herself in the morning and gets dressed on her own. Here I found another genius way to put things in order :

Now this is a smart mom.
Shivaya Naturals: Tutorial Tuesday ~ Children's Activity Bag

Autumn Inspirations

"Fugle uro" -mobile #2 and a lot of fog .

We found a real fairy woods up in Fitjadalen. 

Making food on the Primus putside, a little egg goes along way...

When it comes to meal planning and inspiration to veture outside the box, I highly recommend inviting someone to come and stay for a few weeks, and let their "normailities" rub off. Let them make dinner and bake pies, and go shopping, preferably at an arab grocers in Bergen, and before you know it, you have expanded the horizons and are eating the most wonderful breakfast ever, outside in the sun, of scrambled eggs with kale, which you scoop up in a piece of Nori seaweed dipped in soy sauce and sesame seeds.

Amazing. I would never come up with that! Thank you Joshua and Ramona, for the inspirations and pumpkin pies!

Indian summer

our spectacular view! we have had a few visitors lately, and we are constantly reminded how beautiful it is.

(and more to come, sweet ramona and her hubby (i think) are showing up next week!)

Friday gratefulness in abundance. The little ones have been "blessed" with vannkopper- i think the English translation is chicken pox- a mild strand at least . So they are banned from the Kindergarten, but other then a few itchy red spots all over, they are fine. So here we are. Enjoying the Indian summer at it's best.

We have been eating raspberries by the handful, not having the timeto neither make jam or bake. Put them on bread, in porridge, in yoghurt on on your fingers.

Last Sundays baking- little hedgehogs.

Not always so easy to wake Noa and Lea from thier nap...

Jasmin's new Kindergarten has been a blessing. Wonderful teachers, wonderful area and they are outside between 9 and 3. Collecting nuts this time of year is high priority, Jasmin has become quite a climber. And our shelves are overflowing with sticks,leaves and nuts from the slowly descending autumn. What to do with al these pinecones? Mobiles! Several Works In Progress!

Nuts on the nature table.

All comes and goes in phases, Anders is in a baking phase, which benefits all the rest of us. Cookies and croissants- which he completely succeed in. Pure French perfection.

I got him this t-shirt in on the street in Southern Lebanon. Doing what I am doing, it's pretty humorous to own a Hizbullah shirt. BUT I admit it was a little inappropriate with kids, I was not exactly thinking the day woud come when Noa asks: what is that? and points at the semi-automatic weapon in the emblem. Oops.

And since we are on the topic of Lebanon, my theses is going good. Amazing how much time it takes, how ultimately static it is too work in front of a computer and how fast the hours fly by.

Autumn winds

first signs of autumn.

We love couchsurfers. Baz from Australia and Kate from Utah have been with us three nights, left today for Voss. For all the lovely families out there, opening your home for the world is an amazing concept, and works great with kids. They get to practise their English, communicate and feel the importance of opening your home to travelers and strangers.

Baz came back from hiking up Folgefonna glacier, and out of the blue, whipped up an apricot souffle. We had been in a Tiramisu experimental phase, which has now been replaced by souffles. Raspberry today. Tomorrow...

Sunday Serenity

lunch. homemade labneh with garlic and cumin, homemade/slow-food salad from the garden and roasted potatoes.

I love Sundays. And I love trying to make them different from other days. The day is white, according to our Waldorf rythm. White, clean, serene. We show it in our clothes, our table and the way we move; clean and calm.

We baked sunbread for lunch. A ritual I would like to continue everyweek. You can vary the dough, but the concept is wonderful. I had Jasmin hooked on the whole process. She has been fleeting annd not foucused lately, so it was quite a feat for her. Presented it for dad at lunch.

lea loves daddy.

funny thing is, if they get to choose, lea chooses the doll and buggy-

noa his speedster bike.

no point in fighting against nature.

a small ode to my friend charlotte's house out in fykse. they have made this amazing garden area, beautifully done. and noa.

It is raining today. Real rain. First signs of autumn have arrived, back with more later.

Orange Pumpkins

Stocked up on dates, nuts and feta.

Went a little bananas at an arab grocers shop in Bergen a few weeks ago. Everything is so much cheaper and fresher and better in town. Ah, the sorrows of living rural! Well, went a little crazy at this small shop, and came home with f.ex. a 7 kilo pumpkin, 5 kilos chickpeas, beans, parsley and miscellaneous you just cannot get out in the district. Like REAL hot chili flakes...

We have had pumpkin soup a few times, baked it in bread, and so on. Wonderful and nutritious. And very orange. Matches the late summer now well. We are enjoying hot summer days, but the cold autumn is always lurking in the back of my mind, I just keep expecting to start putting hats on the kids, and the rain getting cold, and the oak trees fading. BUT they don't. So, life moves along. Official daycare start gone well. Lucky that Noa and Lea are so old they can speak up for themselves. And say how much they missed me and love me when I pick them up.

I am bunkered down in the office, trying to write and read and do all these adult tasks. Lucky life indeed. Teh break from constant childcare is welcomed. I feel graced to able to just be me for a while, do my yoga and breathe, read what I studying with full concrentration and gusto. Very exciting.

August, by Ruth Elsassar

Am keeping up with the rhythm of our days I feel though all the same. We pick up the children at 14.45. Home to relax, we make dinner together and eat at 16.30. Which leaves wonderful time to DO things. Take walks in the wood, swimming in big basins of warm water out on the deck. We still watercolor paint, draw every morning breakfast and do arts and crafts, though they will mostly be on the days I am home with them all.

Tuesdays wildflowers,pressed on watercolor painted boards

(sample wooden floor boards we receive in the mail for the new house)

Weekend Serenity

Table set for red lentil soup, drizzled with feta, lime and with homemade foccaia bread.

We just had an incredible weekend. We were blessed with a couple couchsurfing OUT of the blue, visiting Europe from the States and Canada. We have had some incredible adult conversation and a well-needed dose of inspiration to cook.

I recommend this wonderful cookbook Rebekah had with her on her travels. We had an incredible linguini pasta with vegetables and a beautiful peanut/ lime sauce. Incredible. The recipe called for bok choy, which we don't have so often here in the outback, but we do have chinese cabbage- kinakål- for Norwegians, mostly used for salads from the 70's. And I never really paid any attention to it. BUT you can stir-fry it. Wonderfully crunchy, new and dirt cheap.

It is in the mail from Amazon as I type! Have been inspired to keep a list now of cookbooks we use on the side here. The Three bowls Zen Book was one we had in the old house, reordered it now. Vegetarian dishes are a good reminder to use more veggies.

Remnants of earth hours rolled beeswax candles. And spring lilies.

And being ever so intimate and loving with her lea-dolly.

my two boys in the sun.

Sunday chocolate chip cookies.

Yellow Wednesday.

Waldorf in the home, back to basics.

In a full fledged dive into IT, we broke our Waldorf fast by going IN TO tuseday with a PLAN: Oh my goodness!!!


Tuesday snacktime. Look at these wonderful two vests my friends mother knitted for the twins. That does it, I have to start to. HAve got the needles and the wool in the mail...


A few shots of story time.





Jasmin and I do sewing and water-color painting when the twins sleep. She has started sewing a flannel-doll, inspired from the Live-Education resources. "Winter work", which lasts until summer, seeing it through with her, I am excited, her attention span is anywhere from 5 minutes to 15.