Happy birthday to Anders! Gratulerer med dagen! Now a teenager, he is planning to grow taller than me, beat me in arm wrestling, get angsty, and dedicate himself to his art (whatever that may be). In honor of his return to his birthplace, a selection of pictures from his visits to Trondheim.
2006 visit to Trondheim: Ted reads to our friend Hanna and Anders.
2011 Visit to Trondheim
Bursdagfest! Yesterday we took Anders and 9 friends on the bus to Pirabadet for the afternoon, and Nora brought along a friend too. Waiting for the bus, we caught most of them in one spot. There was a lot of chasing around and parkour on the rails, we had to ask them not to crack their heads open, please. They obliged.
It was fun to watch their antics, and to see Anders with his new friends. I think Anders is doing the crazy dab-jump into the water and the rest are his friends.
They spent a lot of time on the big iceberg climbing structure and Ted and I enjoyed the hot tubs and quiet pools, but Ted had to take a turn on the iceberg too! Click to see video of the iceberg.
We took a break for snacks, veggies, pretzels, cheese, chips, and donuts for the bday treat. They sang Hurra for deg, the norsk birthday song, and he blew out candles! Never too big for that. Anders said that his friends seemed a little surprised to get so much healthy food, but they were hungry so they ate it up. And the donuts helped!
After school today we had tacos for middag, Oreo ice cream cake, and presents. Anders’ class sang “Hurra for deg” for him in school today, and coincidentally, they had a party tonight for the 6th and 7th graders, but he came home after an hour. That’s the way this teenager rolls.
His friends gave him presents at the party yesterday, including this “Slam Dunk All Day” shirt. The kids have been playing some crazy 2-on-2 basketball with lots of teams at the same time at recess, on the elementary school-size basketball hoops. Anders comes home with tales of dunking all day and any team he is on is undefeated. One of his friends got him this shirt for his birthday! Thanks Gard, you know him well! He likes it when he and Gard are a team too. They won again today.
He just had to try to fulfill his 13-year-old goal of beating me at arm wrestling, but I beat him 3 times on the right and once on the left (4 for 4). He has all year to beat me, can’t let him win on the first day. I’ll also be doing more push ups to hold out for awhile longer.
