Happy May Day everyone! Traditionally in Northern Europe this is a huge party time, but I have sort of skipped it this year. However, I did take ten minutes to prepare my own celebratory May Day lunch (which is rare nowadays) and it was a delicious one.

So here's my tip for a quick and tasty spring lunch: fried garlic shrimp with rucola, feta and tomato salad. Enjoyed of course with a glass of light red wine and sparkling water. When complemented with sunshine and Colombian coffee and biscotti, it makes the mind and body very happy. A perfect lunch even if enjoyed alone!

I must admit that the Easter sort of slipped by as we just moved house yesterday. I still got 200+ boxes to open and just could not locate my Easter decoration. The store was out of any kind of Easter eggs, but luckily I had at least bought some chocolate bunnies in advance for the kids. Truth be told, I think it was me who was more upset of not getting the Cadbury's Cream Eggs than the kids!

Anyway, we did a little Easter Egg hunt of our own once the snowing stopped - yes, can you imagine sub-zero temperature and snowing in England on March 31st - I certainly was not prepared for it. I mean it's warmer in Finland than here. Talk about global warming...

So each child had their own trail with further stops hidden inside the plastic eggs - colour-coded for each child as they had same pit-stops during the course. Oh it was so much fun for everyone. Little, simple things bring lots of happiness.

The rewards are waiting for egg hunters - Lindt Easter Bunnies and Sheep 

These little egg hunters are ready!

We made tailored clues for each child - pictures for the twins and a trail map for Miss A. 

Miss A. and her map

I spy the rack and my first eggs 

Miss A. looking very determined 

Looking for these maybe? 

...and then happy after collecting her clues in eggs 

Ok, which tree would this be? 

Miss C. in the hideaway under the trees collecting her first eggs and the next clue 

Now where is the circle? 

Found it!

Miss C. on a mission to find her tree 

This is it - last clue collected. Ready to collect my choco bunny!

Little bees buzzing - it's the English Mothers Day! We've got wellies at school, at the boot of my Land Rover, at the tractor shed - and now also on the table filled with flowers. We not live in the countryside and seem to be getting suitable-for-the-theme presents. The same way at the school parking lot it's not the Jimmy Choos that take the centrepiece, but wellies. Mud and puddles, boys playing rugby and girls hockey wellies are essential. Yes, I live in the wellies world!

And therefore, I guess it is obvious that mom got wellies on her day too. I think I'll continue with the theme and ask for a boot rack for the house entrance as my birthday present for all the wellies we got...So all the Mother's in England - I hope you had a great Mothers Day and also got fabulous DIY presents from your little ones like I did!

Miss Anaïs is turning years today: last year we had a lovely party with flowers, balloons, the whole works and it was a lot of fun. This year we are talking about a pop-up party in the hotel - the lack of time and space meant more improvising and less of a fancy set-up. But it seems that maybe it's me who minds it more than the birthday girl, who just asked for one present, a card and a little cake. And she certainty got it -and more (which in turn created a happy mother whose daughter couldn't believe her eyes and wondered how her supermom had time to get all the lovely things she did). Oh the power of sincere thank yous!

Our pop-party was such a great success - talk about decor for under 2 pounds (3 USD), the entertainment being the birthday girl creating balloon figures and organising little party games and food-wise a balanced selection by Miss A. of sugar snap peas, fruits, raspberry sponge cake and some small sweet treats! The topping on the cake was a video call to the grandparents abroad to show her present - ear piercings - and to "virtually" receive her birthday present (until we get to visit Spain next time), as well as a virtual toast of smoothies.  

Even the party frock was thrown aside in favour of the new school hockey outfit (hockey being a new favourite sport where she already played her first match this week!). Happy kids literally fell asleep after the party with their glow-stick bangles giving special effects for their room. All I can think of is the study rule that we all learned in out early school days: KISS - keep it simple, stupid - it's easy to create happiness for kids with little effort (and minimal budget)! 

All she asked for was one thing, but she got a little bit more!

New friends at school got cupcakes - and she got a bunch of cards and little presents. It was pure happiness in the eyes when she was telling about her day at school

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Our little hotel party set-up 

The party entertainer proudly showing her new hockey kit

Today it's time to celebrate Shrove Tuesday - or pancake day as kids better know. IN England it's celebrating by making pancakes, but the celebration varies a lot in different countries - for example in Finland it's a tradition to eat pea soup, buns filled with cream or almost paste and jam - as well as by going to have a fun day sledging down snowy hills. 

Do you celebrate Shrove Tuesday, and if yes, what traditions belong to your celebration?
 

Pancake day in England, yummy! {via}

Laskiaispulla in Finland - bun filled with cream or almond paste and a doppol of strawberry jam {via}

Today marks the start of the biggest celebration of the year in China - the Chinese New Year. This will be the start of the Year of the Snake. Now sadly we moved right before witnessing the huge party in Beijing, but that is not going to stop us having a little party of our own. The kids have decorated our two grand hotel rooms with little snakes and other symbols of good luck.

Later on, it's time for some Chinese outfits and kids singing to Gongxi Gongxi - wishing a good new year and other songs they have learned at school, for which they are rewarded with a little red envelope containing some money - in our case British pounds rather than Chinese Yuans, but still... So happy new year if you are celebrating it now - and if not, maybe take some time and look on the Internet the fabulous celebrations around the world!

... with some lovely bubbly and so deliciously decadent chocolate profiteroles...What's your special something for the first day of the year? 

Today is a family day. This is the kick-off for the winter season and we are ready to add some light and sparkle to our house. Numerous boxes of decorations are waiting for us to put them to good use. This is the Christmas Decoration day no 1!

The goal is to get one tree up, fluff the branches, add lights and ribbons and have kids to start adding their little decorations. We'll see if they manage to finish it off today...

Snack time of mulled wine and cookies from school market (we had the school Christmas tree lighting yesterday)

Quick and simple table decor - silver pines and stars 

The tree is finally up, Kids have fun looking for letter markings in branches and then placing them in correct levels on the structure. I was thinking though that it would be nice to have one of those ready-made trees with lights and all, but this tree still looks fine after all those years; so maybe in a few years time...

First tree is going to be decorated with red and gold again - I hope (as the kids might decide otherwise)

New this year are icicles among a bunch of silver-colured reindeers and birds  

Mix and match of home-made and store-bought decor 

Hip hooray - we got the lights on and they are working...

I love gingerbread cookies!

Crafting, painting, cooking, swimming, musicals - this dark season is the time for all artistic and indoor-sy expressions. We've certainly started strongly for over the weekend we've been painting canvases (as the resident artist never seemed to have time to put those canvases into good use), created Christmas decorations of all sorts and practised Christmas songs in various languages/ We've a;sp learned to make mini pizza faces as master Hugo borrowed a kids cook book from the school library and insisted on the pizza faces- and finally today we've seen the school musical called Ocean Commotion where Miss A. was a shiny little herring. So much fun, but also tiring as this little herring fell asleep in record time of under two minutes!

I hope you get some fun ideas from these, or can share other great ideas with us as there certainly are plenty of cold and dark days to come and new ideas would be highly appreciated...

Our sparkly herring in the Ocean Commotion - musical 

Guess who loves gluing...

Creating felt tree decorations and learning to stitch 

His and hers traditional Finnish Christmas decorations - angels, elves and Christmas tree ornaments 

Making yummy and fun pizza faces 

What is Christmas without red hearts. We heart Xmas...

Guess the favourite colour of this little 'Picasso"...

Happy flowers for the girls!

This year my children asked me if I was going to dress up in something or look boring again like the previous years. So I decided it was time to try something new out and I spotted this carnival-like mask being sold at a cafe next to my language school. In my mind I was seeing myself in a fancy Venice carnival ball with this colourful mask and a ball gown...so it means a good excuse to organise at some point a real masquerade at home!

I got home excited, but the kids were more like screaming when they saw my mask - so I am wondering if it was a hit or miss? Maybe it just becomes a decor on the wall, but for this Halloween I need to team it up with something fun and colourful...

So Happy Halloween everyone and for my friend Miss T. also a very spooktacular birthday!

It's nearly time for Halloween. Surprisingly it has spread also to China - at least among us foreigners and so there are a couple of party options to choose from. And I've got couple of little pumpkins we can carve, so this year we will have a Chinese Halloween. Very exciting!

These beautiful images come from California and Half Moon Bay, which is an area know for having plenty of pretty pumpkin patches, haunted houses and rides this time of the year. And even better, one can do a stroll on the beach, do some kids activities and enjoy a lovely lunch with some shopping in the pretty little downtown of Half Moon Bay - a perfect day for the whole family. 

October is the breast cancer awareness month, and the pink support theme has spread into many countries already - are there are thousands of pink products on offer to support the theme starting from pink jeans and paintings to basic tees and jewelry - not to forget the original ribbon. I am planning to discuss the topic with my eldest Miss A. and then we can try to craft our own pink beady ribbons to wear this month. 

Other than the ribbons I have plenty of pink in my closet to wear, and I normally support some charity or charity-related product every year (and it doesn't need to be a pink product either since it's the donation cause that counts). This year I am quite liking the Stella & Dot and their Shop for a Cause pieces, which supports the Noreen Fraser Foundation's cancer research. Since I have quite taken into wearing bracelets lately, I like this simple and sleek Hope bracelet a lot...

So are you going to be wearing pink or buying some brest cancer-related support product, or possibly participating in some support event?  

Stella & Dot Hope Bracelet 

In a country where everything is pretty pricey (at least for foreigners) the great sport of tennis is still not so popular - and that meant that we were easily able to get tickets to the China Open to see some world-class actions. No traffic jams, two matches for the price of mere $25 USD a head, and some spicy Indian food and nice cakes between the matches. Not too bad.

Sadly we didn't see Maria Sharapova shine as her opponent Hercog didn't seem to have a too good of a day, but in the men's match the 165:th ranked Chinese Zheng wowed us with his serves against the Frenchman Gasquet and rise into victory - which the help of the local crowd and us cheering for him. What a great match that was!

Miss A. in her first major tennis tournament 

National (Olympic) Tennis Stadium 

Maria Sharapova in action 

Sadly the first match was a bit of a short one... 

The winner is ready to hit some balls for the audience - but this time none came on our way 

Zheng and a famous Chinese actor in coin tossing 

..aka month no 10 as it is called here in China. Today we are changing some home decor and kids are all set for some crafting - maybe leaf garlands or so. I can't say that we feel very autumny yet as the weather is pretty warm, but yesterday at the dam we spotted some early foliage already. And a sure sign of course is the length of the day: around six in the evening it's already pretty dark. 

Suitably for the theme on my recent trip to California my daugther's best friend wanted to get hor something that she misses from the US; and her choice were Peeps - which at this time of year come in Halloween theme!

The big party is about to start here - and I mean the city (or probably the whole country) is ready to celebrate the national holiday and Moon Festival for over a week. Almost every street is getting lanterns, flowers, Chinese flags and other red decorations put up, which we witnessed today en masse. All we need now is find our own decor and get a variety of moon cakes. I hope our first Moon Festival in China is going to be a lot of fun!

All parks are extra fancy with flowers, lanterns and other decor (location Beihai Park)

The big Games are about to start - the London Olympics. In the end I got no tickets in the lottery and will be just watching them on TV, which is sort of sad, since I worked on the olympic bid in 2005.

Anyway, I am sure it's going to be a lot of fun and we'll do our own mini-olympics at home inspired by what we see in the games... Anyone else planning to watch and celebrate this great event, or even attend it? 

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This is the start of summer for many - the solstice, or  midsummer... celebrated around the world in different ways. Here in China we have the Dragon Boat Festival, whereas in Northern Europe it's the Midsummer - and celebrated with dancing around a pole, midnight bonfires and retreating to summer cottages by the water.

Whatever way you celebrate, I hope you have a good one this year! So get out the strawberries, the bubbly, heat up the grill, enjoy the summer music and the night-less night - if you are lucky to be located north enough, as the night will start getting shorter soon...

Dragon Boats racing in China 

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Midsummer bonfire in the nightless night of Finland 

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Folk dancers around a midsummer pole 

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For my birthday last week I had the first ever Beijing duck, a dish that is probably on every tourist must-do list (and was also on my bucket list). Yes, it was good and came with its own certificate as a souvenir. The lovely hostess shows us how to properly wrap our little duck pieces - oh it looked so easy, but I didn't manage to wrap even one that didn't collapse on some end... Maybe next time I'll do better.

We even had a bottle of the local wine, Great Wall, and I think that the older vintages are rather drinkable, contrary to what one often hears about Chinese wines. I must also admit that they make a huge selection of delicious vegetable dishes here - I am completely in awe every time I have aubergine (eggplant); it can be prepared in so many delicious ways!

Our duck is being prepared next to our table 

Time to enjoiy the duck feast 

And since it is Friday I'm going to add my curious Friday picture here too. I've posted this in the Facebook account last week, but here goes again the wonderful birthday bouquet the Chinese way - with blue glittery roses, red and white roses and pink carnations! 

Blue glitter roses and more 

I am just amazed when I see posts about the parties and treats people are throwing - so much that I am thinking it is time for me to find some serious cooking and baking lessons. Just look at these bunting cookies and the treats in this baby party from Glorious Treats. I also love the way mason jars were used for drinks.

There are even step-by-step instructions on how to create this fabulous cookies - well wroth checking out. I so adore these creations, and the caprese salad just looks delicious (and is easy to create) so it's going to be the first I'll make!

On our day one in China it happened to also be our twins 3rd birthday. So we wondered into a supermarket and found this cake.

Somewhat spongy, with fruit and sort of cream on top. But the most important thing was that it made our birthday boy and girl happy! Flavour points? 7 out of 10, and bonus points for the fact no-one got sick either as dairy products in any new country can be hard to deal with!

Looking good...

...so I'm gonna taste it!

Say Cheese!

And now gimme me cake, cake, cake...

Hello world outside China! After a long travel we really made it to Beijing. The last days were a haze of of packing, cleaning (I forgot to book cleaners for the house!), kids birthday and leaving parties at school, a walkathlon, last minute shopping for more suitcases, doctor's visit, you name it!

But I did manage to sneak in a couple of moments of relaxation in a Chinese food massage place with miss A. (that girl loves going there!!), a pedicure and a facial and happy moments with friends. I have to admit though that everything ran to a schedule where every minute was counted about 19 hours a day! So glad we can relax for a moment or two now...

The move to China is just days away and frankly we are very busy, but not too busy to squeeze in a couple of birthday parties, movies and swimming... This Hello Kitty-themed party with a magician fairy was very popular with our girls, and they spend ages in the HK store also picking the presents for the birthday girl (as well as for themselves)...

So this mother's day will be a bit different as miss A. is having a sleepover with her best friends and we are having a potluck with a bunch of friends. Happy Mother's day to everyone, hope your day will be filled with fun and laughter!

It is that time of the year again - my twins are soon turning three and we are having a party. This time it is a real kids part at a gym where they have been taking classes, so it's going to be a lot of running and jumping around!

Last year it was about greener theme with cute fabric bags, but this year with just a few days to go until we move to China I just did not have the time. As the little ones love books and will soon start to learn reading I wanted to have meaningful goody bags instead of just only little plastic things.

So we ended up with a quick tour to Target's one-dollar-bins to get these big "sand-claws" and books. This is a great time of the year as one can could have also bought the giant sand buckets and used them instead of the bags... In summary, this year's theme is about playing on sunny days and reading on rainy ones - and all done in one store with a limited budget.

This year Miss C. was also participating in the creating of goody bags, where we had a little bit different toys for boys and girls, but the main ones were the same. It's time to party now!

Spring is a party season for kids, and I have also been gathering inspiration for the twins upcoming birthday party, which will be held in a gym. Miss C. and Master H. recently attended a tropical animal party and got a pair of shades from another one. I am thinking that with the summer approaching a sunglassed, and water related toys could be great for a goody bag!