Minecraft revival

Youngest just mastered Minecraft AND how to play using the TV remote-keyboard with a dodgy glide-pointer mouse. Not bad for small human!

So I tested installing Minecraft on my work laptop (shh!) and much to my surprise it worked. :-)

So all three spawn have now been sharing server and built amasing structures together with me. Lots of fun! :-)


...also - record broken! ;-) TWO posts 2019.

Two funnies brought to you by: babies

Kids bring in the "new thing" nowadays... Trust me, I am introducing them to World of Warcraft and other cultivated things. But they do pay back. :-) A few ones make it through. :-)

Can't help thinking this is the same lady that brought us the infamously hilariously happy Chewbacca (https://youtu.be/GF3wVZMncAE). :-) Love it!

Then there's a ten hour mix of this song below. As catchy as it is, I would not recommend it...

Bubble

Am I allowed to stay in the bubble?


Every day we meet fresh. No history. Sun is shining. In harmony hugs and kisses are given and received. Gentle chit chat.


Then I ask the forbidden question "how was school?".


...


Nightmare ensues.
Tears. Screaming. Threats. Slammed doors.


Tears.
Tears.
Tears.
Tired.


...


What if I never asked the question?
I wouldn't fulfil my half of the deal with school. But oh my. Oh my.
What if I could just stay there, in the bubble, where we were still friends and my eyes weren't puffy from all the crying and he wasn't locked in his room brooding.

Choices

Take the fight with one or feed the others?
Feed the others and let the one keep believing they are unwanted and unloved?
Take the fight and risk two more fights from the two with low blood-sugar levels caused by lack of food?
Take the fight, not make dinner and efficiently teach the others how to get attention. All the wrong kind of attention. But all the attention I seem to have energy to give...

Angry and frustrated

Last comment from kids school: "Be here, come and spend a day here and see what we do". Total 100% guilt-trip. Who am I to want them to figure out how to make school work for my child? Who am I to want to be able to trust them to have education and good ideas enough to manage to make my child want to go to school, stay in school, survive in school and come out of there with enough knowledge to make it into adulthood? Who am I to want them to provide an environment for my child where it's safe and where death doesn't seem like a better place?

I will absolutely go and spend a day there.

Happy happy new new

Another year has passed.
I can't say I know more about who I am. But the kids seem to handle the separation with equanimity. I am at a very interesting point in my career.  I manage the cost of owning my own house. I don't have much spare time. But I suppose my spare time is being with the kids right now. Being with the kids and for the kids.
That'll be plenty and it's plenty more than many people have.

This makes me so happy

(https://www.reddit.com/r/gifs/comments/3cub6t/baby_gets_glasses_and_can_see_clearly_for_the/)

That smile.

Baby wearing glasses for the first time and for the first time able to see clearly. :-)
The optometrists working with my son have done such a terrific job getting him from half-blind to 100%. They've been patient, kind, supportive and our trips there have most of the time been a blast because we try to make it "we time". :-) Naturally some of the success comes from the fact that I believe my son's reaction to his first glasses (the ones he borrowed from nana!) was something like this and he keeps trooping on wearing his glasses all the time. :-)

To pink or not to pink

Photographer JeongMee Yoon took this portrait of her daughter Seo Woo and Her Pink Things in response to feeling Seo Woo's life was being overtaken by pink.
Photo courtesy JeongMee/Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

I have an issue with pink. I haven't been thinking a whole lot about it, it's been more of a fact, something gathered over time - I just don't like the colour pink.

This has changed though. At some point during the pregnancy with my youngest I have suddenly gone from not liking to accepting that it can be a pleasant colour. What? What happened there?

Pink is such an unnecessarily controversial colour! Why is that?

I just read an article where the author Elisabeth Camp looked at that very fact. :-)
http://aeon.co/magazine/society/should-i-let-my-daughter-wear-pink/

Happy happy new new

My Loves.

Another year has reached its end. A memorable year? Yes, I suppose so.
You live, you learn.
I'm looking forward to getting to know who I am next year. :-)

Have a good one!

Minecraft animations - SLAMACOW

My god, I don't even play the game any longer (hardly ever did, but I did at least have a go) but I could watch these videos all day! :-D

SLAMACOW's YouTube playlist.

Fun.
Kind.
Real fun.
Kid friendly.
Fun.
Clever.
Fun.
Real nicely done.
But most of all, fun.

I was introduced the best possible way - oldest son passionately retelling one of the stories with intricate detail then we googled it together and found the first one:


Enjoyed it and looked at another:


Then:

(this one my son spent some time explaining the context for, it was interesting)

I could link the post full, but please just go to SLAMACOW's Minecraft videos on the tube and - Enjoy!

19 rookie mistakes new parents (and old) make

This entire list had me smiling, number 16 hit home alright. X-)
http://www.buzzfeed.com/mikespohr/19-rookie-mistakes-parents-make

16. Staying up late for no good reason after your baby has gone down for the night.

20th Century Fox

The next day you’ll realize just how bad an idea this is.

Well why not?

If I had a cramped attic space - this would be how it would be furnished...

Original from imgur.

Gosh, I could see the space under our stairs looking like this in a few years. A little silver paint, a couple of old car seats and a lot of old displays and buttons and bob's your uncle! :-)

Yeah, where IS that winter?

Scandinavians.

I really, really don't see the point in the type of winter we're having right now. Really.

If I wanted this type of winter I'd settled down somewhere even further south. Or better yet just skip the whole concept of winter all toghether and settle down somewhere nice and cozy, like Australia.

Sure, keeping the house warmed up during winter has never been cheaper, so that's something. But having to buy new rainclothes for the kids SEVERAL TIMES during the same season because they wear them out - unheard of! :-[

Ding 81

Oh my, Glömsk dinged 81 yesterday and I didn't even have to use both hands to do it. 8-)
I reckon it's nice to finally progress the character, experience wise. But Blizzard's made it almost (ALMOST I say) too easy.

I'm really enjoying the peace and quiet offered by sleeping children, almost too much, time to go catch some z's myself now. Hoping for more gaming time tomorrow! :-)

Childrens choir

We are SO going to pep-talk our oldest son to join a choir, imagine sitting in the audience for something like this?! :-) I'd be so proud. Though honestly I'd be in tears for absolutely ANY song performed by my babies... :-)

Original song: http://youtu.be/bGOiIfih8Ls by Crystal Castles.

More from this fantastic London superstar choir, The Capital Children's Choir:

"Who Is It" by Björk - http://youtu.be/XUqexzxj8Vk"Shake It Out" by Florence + The Machine - http://youtu.be/Gj-ntawOBw4 (MY GOD the voice of that first young soloist!)
"So Long You Pretty Thing" by Spiritualized - http://youtu.be/NLyHY00D_W4"Chinese" by Lily Allen - http://youtu.be/GZjcfZ2pWtM

The choir's website: http://www.capitalchoir.com/

Skylanders

"Ninjini"

Oldest son (5½ years) have started playing Skylanders, with passion. He is already better than I am although I have a slight advantage of being able to read...

He and his brother (soon 4 years) have a fantastic kind of cooperation around the game, where the older orders/asks (we try to make him ask politely) the eager younger to place relevant Skylander character on the "portal" (in order to open gates and fight certain mobs etc).

It's interesting to hear, and watch. We've been coaching younger brother to play a little, but he tends to choose to watch his brother for the time being. Younger prefers to play games on the iPad.

I like the fact that Skylanders combines figurines with gaming, much like old school "dungeons and dragons" etc. Figurines look good and are quite sturdy even though a few bits have fallen off due to vigorous playing by younger brother... (some glue and they seem to be fit for fight again).

Gameplay is rather "nice", sure enough you figth/kill opponents, but it's not quite as obvious and graphic as it could be. You select your figurine, place it on the "portal" and the character you chose is magically entering the game. We have the Wii version and the controller gives some feedback on entry (and certain other actions).

I actually like the figurines so much I bought my own last night - "Ninjini" featured on the photo above. :-D

Mother's Day

Today is mother's day in Sweden.
This cartoon seems fitting (and brought a tear to my eye).

Click to zoom in or select the link below.

http://imgur.com/NVASVsk

Little green men

Little green men, my little green men. Those words have taken a different meaning of late. :-)

First char

Oldest son created his first World of Warcraft character the other day. Entirely his creation - "mum, I want to be one of those skeleton dudes", perhaps I should worry about his choice of words there "I want to be.."? 8-)

Initially he wanted to make it a warlock but since that meant he would be wearing a skirt and thus not displaying his skeletal legs he changed his mind and made it a warrior instead. :-D I'm thankful for that since warlocks are the only class I've never played to any level that counts.

I'm quite convinced we won't be playing much with this character since he is many years too young to play WoW still. But we had fun for the better part of an hour just creating the character and walking around finishing the first five or so quests (it was total team work - oldest son did the jumping, youngest son pressed 2 or 3 as required when questing, I did the navigation and reading). 8-)

Kerbal Space Program

Oldest son's rocket.

Above is a space rocket with two engines and an extra powerful booster engine, fuel tank, personnel capsule and not a "nose cone". :-) I had it all carefully explained to me as our oldest son was cutting his craft out of the paper. :-)

So S is playing "Kerbal Space Program" a lot right now. I can tell because it spills over to the result of our kids creative production... :-D I am NOT complaining! :-)

I'm not focussed enough to play anything right now, but I installed the beta for Mech Warriors Online the other night, let's see if I have the energy to read up on it and get it going or not. 8-)