A new kind of Spring

I am experiencing Spring in Denmark for the first time.  I don't know if this is a 'normal' spring but whatever it is, I like it.  Having spent most of my adult life (and even childhood) in southern states, spring meant cool evenings and mornings and days that start out reaching highs in the 70's but then the 80's creep in and by May (or sooner) highs are in the 90s and summer is definitely knocking on the door.

 I honestly couldn't tell you what the temperatures have been here recently but the evenings and morning are quite cool. By the middle of the day temperatures recently have been so nice.  Nice enough to wear shorts around the yard (though if you go out and see the Danes in public, they still have jeans, coats, and scarves on..why? I don't know)  Anyway, this is what I always envisioned spring being like--a slowly arriving season that says it is actually spring, not the introduction to summer. (I'm sorry but if it is in the 80's in February, it may be nice at the moment, but it only means summer will be miserable!)  

So, I've been loving the spring here so far.  Flowers are popping up all around the neighborhood and in our yard even so I thought I'd show you a few flowers that I have collected on walks with Scout (fyi, these were in no ones yard--I wasn't picking flowers out of anyone's garden I promise!)

When I picked the purple flowers, they looked like a tiny tulip but by the time I arrived home, they were all open like this

I don't know what any of these flowers are called but the white ones remind me of lanterns.

To give you perspective on their size--(and the size of the tiny ball jars!)  A lego baker standing next to them.

 The rest of the pictures are from around the house.  Have I mentioned I love Spring, and Easter too :) 

Tealights on the dresser-turned-china-holding-side-table.

Bottle Brush chicks from Pottery Barn last year.  When I lived in DC, I stalked the sale stuff after Easter making sure I could buy these originally $20 dollar chicks for much, much cheaper. The colored stone eggs came from a store here called Søstrene Grene.  I can't think of what store in the U.S. it could be compared.  

Stacked basket in a bowl.  I used glass tealight holders to raise the basket above the edge of the bowl. I thought it was a pretty clever way to store them, since I was about to stuff them in a drawer.

Ball Jar candle holders

From the other direction

 The eggs in the jars are just plastic easter eggs.  I taped around the opening and then covered them with Mod Podge and scrapbook paper.  I've made about 10 each year for the past 2 years and now have quite a collection of them. 

Birds in my favorite branch

I bought 2 fabric birds and made the rest out of scrapbook paper. 

Mantle.  The bowl and the print were purchased in Germany on our way to Austria in February.

A picture where the print is in-focus.  It is of Rottenburg, Germany. (just south of Stuttgart) We haven't been there but this building can still be seen.

White bunny, another after-Easter Pottery Barn find.  His original purpose was to be a place card holder but I think he serves a better purpose guarding this massive egg.

I suppose I will leave my Easter/ Spring decorations up until it actually feels like summer...I forgot to mention this but, the days are getting much longer now.  Between the time change this past weekend and the shifting of the earth, the sun comes up around 7 and sets a little before 8.  The days will be getting longer until the end of June! I'm loving it now but will be thankful for my black out shades  when the sun is rising before 5 and setting after 10 :)

Happy Halloween and Happy Birthday

Even though my calendar says that it is Halloween, it doesn't feel like it here.  Yes, the danish stores sell pumpkin and ghost decorations...even a few costumes...However, I have yet to see the massive 'shrine to candy' in any store or even a single trick-or-treater (well there is candy but it is, most likely, in the usual aisle and in the same colored wrappers as always). I am okay with this though, because it feels and looks like fall here.  I think it was Friday morning that scout and I set off to find this small lake near our house.  We found the lake and after seeing just a few seconds of it,  I decided to turn around and run home to grab my real camera because I could not get over how amazingly spectacular the colors and overall ambiance were on that morning (that sentence just makes me sound like a weirdo.. spectacular ambiance?)  Maybe the pictures, from just a regular camera will prove this to you :)

Trail towards the lake

The water had been like glass when I was there 20 mins earlier.  By the time I returned, ducks had arrived.

All I can say is that the picture just doesn't do it justice.

It actually looks warm in this picture!  I can assure you that it was still quite cool

Now here the water was like glass

I seem to take a lot of this type of photo

And the humorous part of this particular morning was that there were probably 100 toddler, preschool and elementary school-aged children around the lake at the same time.  I, with a cute-faced dog, am always popular with the kids....only problem here in DK:  most kids only know a few words of english. (such as 'ciao'  which I had to tell them was actually italian)  But, my beginner danish was enough to communicate with them...and they seemed to understand me, which gave me about the biggest boost in my 2nd language quest yet :)  Scout eventually became impatient with all the inactivity and began whining. The kids thought he was whining about the ducks..I didn't really know how to tell them that he was ready to go, but they thought that I didn't know what a duck was in danish.  They started to say "quack" in danish...which I attempted to say back to them..obviously wrong...bc one of the girl did the most dramatic "rappen" (quack), rolling R and all ( & danes don't roll their r's)  It was just so funny to me and I enjoyed it.  I also noticed that the teachers here seem a bit more relaxed with where the kids are and what they were doing.  A group of toddlers was playing by a lake for pete's sake! (and climbing through dense foliage in areas..do kids not get lost here??)  I just don't see that happening in the U.S....unless a fence was installed around the lake and maybe then...

Now I will end this post by wishing one of my best friends a happy, happy birthday...She was told growing up that people dressed up in costumes just for her every year...To Rachael, I hope you have a great day and see many costumed people :)