Preikestolen (a.k.a. Pulpit Rock)

Hiking Preikestolen was at the top of my list since we found out we were moving to Norway. It's probably the most famous hike near Stavanger. I wanted to do it as soon as possible so the weather would still be warm enough and so my belly wasn't too big, making it more uncomfortable, or waiting too long and then we would have a baby to carry up too. We had planned to do the hike two other Saturdays but they got rained out. So when we saw a sunny forecast on this particular Saturday we started making plans. And it ended up being the most perfect weekend we could have chosen to go! We invited Barrett's coworker, who is another intern at Lærdal from Hopkins, Jenny, and the 4 of us set out early in the morning. You have to take a ferry to get there and then a bus up to the base of the hike, so we left our house around 7:30 am and were hiking around 10.

Here we are waiting for the ferry. This bridge is visible from Stavanger Sentrum and we went under it on the way out.

It was quite a foggy morning and the view on the ferry was beautiful with the mountains barely visible in the distance.

The next two pictures are our first overlook of the hike. I should have taken pictures of the flat grassland in the middle and the really steep rocky parts we went up; but when you're focused on hiking you don't stop to take pictures :)

Luckily Jenny was there to get some good hiking pictures of us :) I was a little happy to be pregnant so I didn't have to worry about packing Lily on my back while hiking. Good thing I have an amazing husband to do that ;)

 A couple more Jenny took of us along the way.

There were a couple lakes near the end of the hike. Some people will stop and swim here.

The final climb before rounding the corner to see...

...the famous Pulpit Rock

Here is our friend, Jenny, who hiked with us.

When you google Pulpit Rock or Preikestolen you see all the famous pictures of the cliff edge and the big flat rock spot where everybody sits, so I honestly didn't really think to take many pictures of these. But it is the destination, so behind Jenny is the flat area.

The view was breathtaking! I couldn't soak it all in. You just stare at the view and it's surreal.

When Barrett and Jenny went with CBID last year it was incredibly foggy. Click here for some pictures (scroll down just a little and it's there. It's worth looking at because there is a huge difference!). They said you couldn't even tell you were walking right next to a cliff and it didn't seem nearly as scary. So this was their first time seeing the amazing view too.

 We knew we had to take a picture hanging off the edge, but the pictures just don't do justice. It's hard to get the right angle, but it is straight down and SO FAR down. At first it didn't bother me too much, but the longer I sat the more scared I got, ha ha. That night when I closed my eyes to go to bed all the terrible scenarios of what could have happened played in my head, even though I hadn't thought about it all day. I mentioned it to Barrett and he said he was thinking about the same thing. Ha ha!

This gives you a small idea of the drop, but I still couldn't get the camera out far enough to see the bottom. When I took the camera away from my eyes I realized how close I was to the edge. Scary!

We took time to eat our lunches on the rock and enjoy the view.

The view from the other side of the rock before we started hiking back down. It took us 2-2.5 hours to get up and about a 1.5 hours to get down. Lily did so well! She loved being in "Lily's backpack" and slept most of the hike down. 

It was hard to leave the view. I felt like I couldn't fully soak it all into my body and soul. And even if I stayed there for hours I would feel the same. Sounds cheesy, ha ha. But compared to everything else we do in life, it's such a short time to see God's amazing creations like this. I wish I could step outside and see views like this everyday, but the pictures will have to do.

Another nap riding back to the ferry.

 We had a little mishap with Lily while we had a long wait for the bus to take us back to the ferry. She was playing on one of the benches and it tipped over on her and she fell into some bushes and bit her lip really bad. The bench was so heavy I couldn't pull it off of her myself. We thought maybe her leg was broken because of how she was twisted and part of her ponytail was pulled out; but she didn't have any other scratches or bruises other than the beat up lip. It was bleeding pretty bad, but healed in a week, luckily. We tried to take a picture the next day but it's really hard to see the swollen lip and bite spots/scabs. As soon as we got her cleaned up she said "fell in tree" and most times we asked to see her lip the next few days she'd say "fell in bush". Good thing the bushes were the most traumatic part of the fall rather than being pinned under a heavy bench. It's probably good she did fall into the bushes to soften the landing.

Anyway, goodbye Preikestolen for now. Hopefully we'll see you again...

A few adventures in Norway

We have been able to make some short trips to visit new places in Stavanger so I thought I would post pictures from these.

The first Saturday we were here a family in our ward offered us free tickets to go with them to a Viking Futbol Klub soccer game. We felt at home watching soccer, but a little different when all the commentating is in Norwegian :)

Luckily we have so many nice people in our ward who totally understand our situation and are willing to be our friends! Another Sunday a couple in our ward (who are having their first baby in February) picked us up and took us to one of the nice beaches. You hear about so many of the beautiful places in Norway, but beaches aren't usually highlighted. It's probably because it rains so frequently and is windy, but it should be talked about more. The sand was perfect and of course the view was amazing as always. Barrett took the nice camera so we got lots of great pictures. Sorry for the Lily overload, but he gets so many good ones it's hard not to post them.

It's hard to tell, but there is a lighthouse on that island in the distance.

There were quite a few horses there that day. I had no idea horses loved the water and rolling in the sand so much, but it was fun to watch them.

Playing in the sand while we talked to our new friends.

Another day after Barrett got off work we headed to Sverd i fjell. The Norwegians kept asking us if we had visited there yet, so we finally made the trip. It actually isn't too far from us. You can google sverd i fjell if you want more information, but King Olav had swords like these constructed around Norway to celebrate their independence and honor the Viking heritage. They are tall, as you can tell.

Homemade cream of chicken soup?

Cooking has been a little intimidating here. It is a lot better now that I have translations for most things and have explored the stores more thoroughly. But often my regular recipes just don't taste quite the same as I try to substitute different ingredients. I am grateful we are in Norway where there is a lot of similar food. I can't imagine what it would be like in some other countries that are very different from America. 

This was the case one night when I decided to make a recipe I have for Chicken Broccoli Alfredo, which was one of my staples before. My recipe calls for 1 can of cream of chicken soup. (Now, real cooks probably wouldn't even use this in Alfredo sauce and could just make it a different way, but I'm not very creative and follow exact recipes but that may start to change here.) Well, that soup is hard to find here and the store that has it is quite a distance and it costs about $3 for one can. I decided it wasn't worth it and I could just try to make a version myself. I bought some chicken bouillon and added water to it, because they don't sell cans of chicken broth, at least that I've found yet. And then to make it creamy I thought I would try adding sour cream. One of my friends here suggested the same substitute when I was asking her what she does when a recipe calls for cream of chicken soup.

Here's my chicken broth and sour cream.

And here it is mixed together. Looks a little interesting, but once I had the right consistency in the pasta it didn't look too bad.

The finished product.

It turned out okay. It was a little bland, but it still tasted okay. Looks like I need to start looking for a different recipe or start looking at more Norwegian recipes/substitutes. Maybe this move will help better my cooking skills. We'll see... :)

The Not-So-Perfect Day

Last week was rough with sickness. It was mostly on and off, but last Monday in particular was a bad day. I was in the bathroom all morning, threw up a couple times,  had a bad headache, etc. Just one of those days. But I think I got a small taste of a new dynamic of what it's like to be a mom now that Lily is around. When there's other children around you can't just lay around until you feel better. You still have to function. And try to be somewhat happy and pleasant. I just turned on TV for Lily while I laid there, but I haven't been the normal mom. I mean, when Barrett gets sick he gets to just hide out until he feels better (sorry, honey, but it's true :)) When you're a mom you don't have a day off work. You still do what needs to be done. 

Anyway, sometime in the morning I hit a breaking point. I really wanted to talk to someone, stop my worrying, and thought of several family members or friends I could call and talk about pregnancy with, but then I looked at what time it was back home. 2:00 am?? I just started crying. Not only was everyone asleep, but they would be asleep for a long time still. Luckily, God has been merciful in helping us find friends already here. I ended up texting one of my pregnant friends here, apologized for all the personal information when I don't know her very well yet, and she was very helpful. I started feeling a little better during the day and my landlady upstairs invited Lily and I up to play in the afternoon, which also helped.

Normally Barrett gets home from work by 5, but of course this day of all days, his work was holding a conference so he was gone until after we were in bed. Later that night when Lily was watching more movies while I felt sick again, I got an email from my sister. She sent me a link to a blog post she read the day before and it was perfect. She said: "Hey! So I have this favorite blog I read and each Sunday she does a "good life" post. When I read today's I totally thought of you and thought you might enjoy reading it. It's at: www.beckyhiggins.com -on her blog, Aug 31st post, written by Heidi Swapp. -Brittney" I read the post and started crying all over again for tender mercies. If you're at all interested, go read the post. It's fairly short. But it's about a lady who moved with her family of 5 to Beijing for a year and learning to have a positive perspective about the move.

Then I remembered this song I heard on the radio over the summer and have loved since because of a few lines that I knew I would need to call back on when we moved here. It's by Ingrid Michaelson called "Girls Chase Boys". I know, it doesn't sound applicable. (Sidenote: just pulled up the music video to add a link and wow it's weird. Don't look it up. I think I got a WAY different message than she was implying, ha ha ha. If you want to hear it just listen to the lyrics). Anyway... one of the main lines in the song is "All the broken hearts in the world still beat, let's not make it harder than it has to be" and the bridge is my favorite part. It says, "I've go two hands, one beating heart, and I'll be alright, I'm gonna be alright. Yeah I got two hands one beating heart, and I'll be alright. Gonna be alright." To me it emphasizes that pain/heartache is temporary and really most things are minor and you'll be alright in the end. I am extremely blessed and those small hard times aren't too hard in comparison to what they could be. One email and a song later, I felt quite a bit better mentally :)

To end this long post here are a few fun pictures of Lily and how she keeps herself entertained in our apartment.

This great idea I found on Pinterest one afternoon when I was bored and realized we have literally no craft supplies to do anything different than the usual toys.

 An empty toilet paper roll and part of a medical device Barrett brought home. I thought she looked like Hook, ha ha.

She is OBSESSED with these rain boots we bought for her. She learned how to put them on herself and they are on and off many times a day no matter what she's wearing or what the weather is like outside.

To better days!