Not for the sensitive viewer!!!

So, Chris's surgery was a success. They ended up having to open his elbow and sew up two ligaments as well as a tendon. Quite the operation! (I know the picture is a bit disgusting, but Chris was proud of it and wanted me to share. Gabe, Chris's brother is starting medical school and was allowed to be a part of the whole operation and got some great pictures.)

Chris came home from the hospital yesterday and seems to be in a lot of pain. He's been good at resting yesterday and today and things are okay as long as he has pain killers. He says he just feels nautious and dizzy and tired. (I told him that now maybe he has a small idea of what pregnancy and labor is like...he only laughs).

Apparently, he has a note from the doctors that say he can be out of work for 4 weeks, but after being home two days, he's already getting antsy and wanting to get back. I'm trying to make him take it easy. He'll go in on Monday and see what they can work out.

Anyway, the physical therapists estimates about 5-6 months total recovery time! So, by the time we come out to the States next summer he'll be as good as new.

Family Fun Day

So last Saturday our stake had a family day filled with activities for the entire family. They had relay races, sprinting, and a big football (soccer) tournament for both kids and adults. The weather was beautiful and we had quite a day! Sofia and Samuel ran their races and got gold money medals as their prize. I played on a team with the young women and we ended up winning for the girls. And Chris came home with a dislocated elbow!

He had debated whether or not to play because he's had problems with his inner thigh and he didn't want to mess it up now that he's totally focused on training for triathlons. However, in the final game 5 minutes before they blew the whistle, Chris slipped on the grass and landed somehow directly onto his elbow. He heard how it popped right out of the socket (I know, gruesome!) So many people stepped into help immediately. Chris's sister took Samuel and Sofia and some good friends ran to get their car and drove us directly to the emergency room.

One look at his distorted elbow and the doctors were all baffled. Apparently a dislocated elbow is quite rare and the way he did it even rarer. As you can see in the picture, both the upper and lower arm bones popped totally out of the socket like 5 cm and ripped through all the ligaments!!! Pretty major. Chris felt somewhat of a celebrity having all the doctors come and look at "The Elbow", however is quite frustrated knowing that rehabilitation will take between 3-9 months!

He stayed over night Saturday night, came home yesterday and will go back tomorrow to have surgery. Last Friday was his official last day of vacation and was planning to go back today, but now will probably be home for another week or so! Crazy!

Hopefully recovery will go quickly and he'll be back to "normal" in no time! Talk about turn of events!

First Time Campers!

We just had a great camping trip weekend. Last year, we couldn't seem to time it right with the rain and Chris's vacation to go camping, so we only ended up setting up our tent in our backyard and Samuel and I slept it in for one night. That was NOT camping (yes, we had to explain that this was actually Samuel's first time camping, although he has slept in the tent before).

Yesterday we packed our gear (which is amazingly a lot for only one night!) and headed out to this serene, beautiful lake just outside of Gothenburg called Härskogen. It was so peaceful. The lake is surrounded by tall pines with random summer cabins spread throughout the forest. (Chris's parents had a cabin there a couple years ago, but have sold it).

We got there yesterday evening (after eating dinner at home), got the tent set up and got a fire started. I over-excitedly, wanted to introduce my children to s'mores, so we found sticks, roasted the mallows, put the chocolate on top, put it all on the grahm cracker, and lo and behold, my children did NOT like them, to my udder disappointment. Maybe they're just neat-freaks, but they kept complaining how sticky and messy they were and hard to eat and after one each, they quickly declined another and went straight for the marshmallows. :( (maybe next year!).

After our s'mores, we went down to the lake to wash our hands and face and brush our teeth and climbed into bed. We sat up and read "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" for awhile, sang a couple songs and by 10:00, all 3 kids were zonked out (to our surprise). We strolled the stroller under the canopy of the tent and Emmy slept perfectly all suggled up inside all night. Even though the kids slept great, it took Chris and I ages to fall asleep and it seemed as soon as we dozed off ourselves, Samuel was waking us up bright and early and ready for the day.

Chris took Samuel out on a little morning stroll while the girls slept a bit longer We spent the morning at the lake and rented a canoe to paddle around. Samuel was the only one brave enough to actually go swimming (it was quite cold). The clouds were pretty thick and getting darker as the day went on, so we decided to skip our hot-dogs-over-the-fire lunch and just eat back at home. Good idea, since it started pouring on the way home.

Anyway, the kids LOVED it and Chris and I LOVED it! It brought back so many memories of my family's camping trips every summer. This is definitely a tradition we'll continue.

So, last week, U2 came to town and we got to go their concert! It was AWESOME! We had been training Emmy to take a bottle for a couple weeks now, and everything worked perfectly. (Albiet it was a bit strange (strange, but refreshing) being out for so long without a little baby attached to me (a total of 7 hours!)). Heidi was here with all three kids and said that everything went great. When we got home around 1:30, the place was dead silent and everybody was peacefully sleeping!

The concert was truly amazing. There was a total of about 55,000 people in all and the excitement in the air was contagious! You could feel the beating and vibrations of the bass throughout your entire body. We were singing out as loud as we could and still couldn't hear ourselves. Embarrassing as it may sound, this was actually my very first concert. However, after this one, I don't know if anything will measure up. We LOVED every minute of it!

Malms

Chris's entire family hasn't been together in about 4 1/2 years, so when Carolina and her family came from the States and Daniel and his family came from Switzerland, we decided we needed to seize the opportunity and take a picture. Here's the result:

Last Thursday, we took a trip to the US Embassy in Denmark (closer than Stockholm's) to get Emmy's citizenship declared. It's just a matter of paperwork that probably took a total of 30 minutes, but we took the 3 hour drive down and back with all three kids and it went surprisingly well!

After being at the Embassy, we had a little picnic downtown Copenhagen and then headed back to Sweden to find a nice beach to spend the afternoon at. We happened upon a gorgeous sand-beach that we'd never even heard of (Ängelholm). The weather was beautiful and we spent a good 2 1/2 hours there before heading out to Mickie-D's to finish off our little day trip. It was a lot of fun!

I can't believe it has already been a full year since Heidi was here last. Time just flies!!! Since we didn't make it back to the States this past year, Heidi decided she couldn't stay away from us that long, so she took another trip out here and I LOVED every minute of it! She's been here all last week and flew home Monday.

The past 2 times she's been here, I've been pregnant and dealing with morning sickness, so we've kind of stayed home a lot, but this time, we really got out and did something fun every day. Sofia and Samuel loved having her here as well. Sofia even woke up the day she left asking for Heidi after she had already left for the airport.

There's just something special about sisters and I LOVE mine!!! Thanks for coming out Heids.