These posters are now hanging in the boot room at Grace's barnehage.  One of my favorite Norwegian sayings is there is no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothes.  And these folks worship their wool.  If it isn't made of wool, it isn't worth wearing.  We are totally converted - I dress Grace and Isaac in their woolens everyday.  They spend the most time outside. 

Cross-section of a Norwegian child in -10 degree Celsius weather 

I needed to go to the courthouse (Tinghus) on Friday to get a document notarized.  These bas-reliefs are in the entryway.  Though most of our experiences with things bureaucratic in Norway have been painful, this went smooth as silk. 

Indoctrinating Jared into the grøt tradition at the university cafeteria at Friday lunch 

The kids loved playing on Jared every evening.

It's coming!

Dave's student Jared has been staying with us the past week.  Today he gave his seminar at NTNU.  He was a great representative of UT Arlington.

Jared in action talking about monomial ideals

Hanging out after school.  At the NTNU bookstore I found a Calvin and Hobbes book in English, so Sam was buried in it all evening. 

There it is.  Those are the hills across the fjord from Trondheim.  Yesterday, there was no snow on them.  Today, snow.  Moreover, Isaac's class went on a fieldtrip up to the city forest today.  It snowed on them.  Isaac is the first Jorgensen to experience Norwegian snow this year.

The vestiges of autumn along to the path to Isaac's barnehage

I have decided that Norway is the land of rainbows.  Since the weather changes so frequently, it is really common that it is raining when half of the sky is bathed in sunshine, thus we are treated to oodles of rainbows. 

Isaac is my digger-spotter.  He has a super keen eye for an construction equipment, and it is all over Trondheim.  

Here comes the tram!  Isaac's class took the tram again today on their fieldtrip.  

Katie - author/illustrator

On Wednesday, when I was picking up Isaac, I got a call from home.  It is always Katie, and her call usually means one of two things:  1)  Katie wants permission to eat something sweet, or 2) Sam is using the laptop and hasn't given Katie a turn.  This time, Katie said, "Mom, how do you spell fairy?"  I sure love that girl.

Note the motion lines under the wings

Table of contents - a bit misplaced, but very informative

We might need to have a heart-to-heart about the virtues of depending on oneself, rather than a prince.

Fiskesuppe

I've been meaning to take a photo of one of these manhole covers for a long time.  They are imprinted with the Trondheim city seal. 

On Tuesday, Dave sent off two grant proposals (yay!)  We celebrated by going down the street to the Baklandet Skydsstation for some of their famous fish soup.  Wow, was it good!

Each bowl of soup comes with brød (bread) and smør (butter). 

So simple and so tasty 

Dave's specialty - the one handed camera self-portrait.   I'm so proud to be this fellow's wife.  (Not just because of his one-handed photo-taking talents.)

Lots of great embroidery lines the restaurant 

From the outside - the building looks like it has experienced a few earthquakes - it sits askew, kittywhompus, and at all sorts of weird angles.  The workers out front were putting in a new front stoop. 

Saturday morning's alright for building

On Saturdays, the kids tend to hang out in one bedroom together, usually playing with the Duplo blocks.  Grace is a tower specialist, and everyone got on board.  They decided to see if they could build a tower to the ceiling.

Mission accomplished

Friday of fall break was low-key.  We spent the morning at the library, then got some ice cream downtown, made a stop at the toy store, watched some movies we checked out, and burned off energy at the neighborhood park.

The ice cream crew 

This statue is in front of the Trondheim Tourist Information Office.  It is called Go'dagen - the good day.  It always makes me smile.

Speaking of smiles, that's a doozy on Grace

There are lots of buildings in Trondheim that have staircases in the front that you can enter from either side.  When we are walking around, the kids like to go up one side and down the other.  Grace and Isaac got a rude awakening on this set of stairs in the Bakklandet neighborhood - only one sided.

On Thursday, I took the kids to the university to have a snack with Dave.

In Dave's office

Snacking in the lunchroom on the thirteenth floor.  Great views of Trondheim.

In the main quad, there is an old steam engine.  Of course, the kids couldn't resist climbing on it.  Dave said on the first day of school, they started it up and moved it a few feet along the tracks. 

Katie knows no boundaries when it comes to climbing these days.  She was all over the roof of that train. 

Sam and one of his smart alec faces

Grace and Isaac running the main controls.

The engine is called the Bjørkelangen 

Katie collected a lovely bouquet of fall leaves.

On the walk home, we spotted this aviary filled with roosters and songbirds.

Grace didn't want to leave - she was captivated.