Heading out for vacation Grunnavik

It is pouring outside and we have spent the morning packing up our food, bedding, clothes, toys, etc... Zelia was pretty anxious and unsure about what was happening. At one point I found a pacifier in the drawer and she sucked on it all morning!!!! Now she is sleeping and we are finishing the packing.

I am a little nervous about the boat ride in the rain, wet, wet, wet, but it will all work out! Packed books, knitting and cards.

Will get lots of writing and photos up when we return:)

Videos....Before we go for a week!

Icelandic Independence Day June 17

Well, I was SO delinquent that I never wrote about Independence Day although I swore I had, hmmmmm.

Here are some pictures. There was a fair in town with music and food and horses and then we continued on for a walk to the Isafjordur forest - the flowers were unbelievable!

Jacob's 32 birthday

All I can say is that it was a huge success and a truly fun evening.

Jacob worked his butt off making a bbq feast for 15 people. I made the ice cream cake. We set all the chairs and table outside and Henry helped cut the wood for the fire. One by one everyone came, Aude, Siggi and Herdis, Gerdur, Gisli, Katrin Maria and Tomas, Henry and Danielle, Tanja, Astrid and Traian, David and Albertina. We hung out, drank beer, ate very very well and ate every last bite of ice cream cake.

Jacob got a whipped cream maker (like everyone has here), an immersion blender, a beard trimmer (he took it off that morning!!!!!), a beautiful mug made by Loa, a local potter, the salt fish book from the festival we went to and a book about Icelandic fishermen - all very cool.

It was a really wonderful celebration of a pretty amazing year!

A Lovely walk in town

On Monday or Tuesday Jacob was cooking and needed me to run to Samkaup to get a few ingredients, probably on Tuesday. It was a beautiful day and Zelia and I headed out for a walk. She loves to walk everywhere now, check out the rocks and sit on every step possible. she also loves to walk up and down the ramp in front of the computer store. Needless to say it takes a long time to get places and I love it.

As we were walking 2 boys came our way and asked her name and I told them. One boy, Gunnar, was on a bike and Trusti, was holding a box of rocks. They had spent the afternoon in the square selling their rocks to the tourists from the boats and people in town. They were very neat rocks, lots of crystals, I knew not from here. They told me they collected them in Akranes. One of the boys turned to me in English and said, "you have been here?" I know that he has seen us around. We proceeded to have such a fun conversation about the rocks and Zelia and the school she will be going to. They went to that preschool so they high-fived and said it was the best. It was very cute. they gave each of us a rock for free:)

We walked through the square and by the shops and at the entrance of one an older man was speaking to a woman in Hebrew!!!! I practically pounced on them. We chatted for a bit and it was SO nice to hear Hebrew and talk. They are in Iceland for 3.5 weeks, doing the ring road and taking some times in the Westfjords. Finally! I invited them for dinner but they declined....oh well.

We eventually made it to Samkaup where Zelia now LOVES to use the small carriages and a while later made it home:)

Heavy Liver

A funny Zelia story....

Whenever Zelia or anyone picks something up that is heavy, I say, ze Kaved (this is heavy) and sometimes we make grunting noises and lately Zelia will make those noises as well.

The day before Jacob's birthday, Jacob made the same chopped liver he made at Pesach that was such a hit and that Zelia licked off of a spoon like a lollie pop. We brought her some in a little dish, but she wasn't interested. I said, aval Zelia ze kaved (but Zelia it is liver) and she pretended to pick the little bowl up and grunted. It took me a minute to understand what she was doing and then burst out laughing!

Grilled whale and beach bbq´s

Well, it was another beautiful summer weekend in Iceland.

On Friday afternoon, Jacob headed out on a boat with Birkir (we met him in the Thai restaurant in September!!!!) He caught about 20 cod and brought several back. At around 8pm we packed the car and headed to Skálavík - a beautiful bay past Bolungarvík. You go through a long valley which opens up into a beautiful sand beach, strewn with large rocks and sand dunes in the background. The sun was high in the sky but we are beginning to see a semblance of a sunset - the colors changing and the reflection on the sea narrowing.

We went with Tanja, her mom visiting from Hong Kong, Astrid and Traian. Jacob brought VERY fresh cod, Tanja and her mom brought whale, there was salad and potatoes - perfect. Fresh cod is like an entirely different food from what you buy in a store, the texture is completely different, hard to pick up with a fork as it just falls apart. Whale meat is as red as can be and parts extremely tender. Zelia and I did no partake, but everyone else enjoyed it thoroughly. Oh, it is minke whale - not endangered in the least. We stayed on the beach until about 11 and Zelia just played and had a great time.

We slept quite late on Saturday, had breakfast and then went with Traian for a hike. We drove past Bónus on the old mountain road (what was used before the tunnel was built), parked and headed out. We were in a very green area with a river, walked by a shooting range, crossed the river and headed up. We brought the wrap for Zelia but she was determined to walk on her own, often without holding anyone´s hand, but she really liked when she could walk with Tray. She did a lot of walking and forced us all to not think about the destination but the walk, she would sit in the mounds of grass and look at the leaves as she watched us pick and eat sorrel, then listen to the jet above, and pick a flower or two, examine some rocks and then move on. Close to the top we had some tuna sandwiches and bananas and then began the walk down.

After a good nap in the car we packed the car up again, conferred with Gisli, Gerder and Tómas and headed back to the beach for bbq #2. This time we had delicious steaks (yes still from my birthday - we have one more pack to enjoy), Gisli made a delicious plaice, we had grilled carrots, truffle cheese I brought from the US, built a fire on the beach and ate Gerdur´s delicious french chocolate cake. Zelia so loves to be with them that Jacob and I can walk away completely out of her site and she doesn´t care. She played in the sand, digging, finding rocks, throwing her ball, it was glorious.

There are terrible flies here though, ugh, the wind would pick up and we would be gratefully. They just swarm but thankfully do not bite.

On Sunday we headed out to Suðureyri, to play and to swim in their pool. It is outdoors which is really nice, plus they have 2 hot pots and a warm shallow kiddie pool - all their water comes from a hot spring, lucky fellas! We ate some P&B - Zelia´s first and then drove for a long time waiting to get her to sleep so that we could fish off the pier. It was pretty cool and windy and greying, but the fishing was great and we came back with 10 plaice. I made a lemon caper fish dish, with pasta and Greek tomato salad, yummmmmmm.

Now we are getting ready for Jacob´s birthday, hummus, chopped liver, bbq´d chicken, cole slaw, potato salad, ice cream cake, perfect!