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I have almost talked Jem into making regular photo posts on this blog.  It requires a bit of a rehaul of the site structure but otherwise not so difficult.  I've got as far as having him graciously provide me with this little photo essay of our local - Agenskalns market.  It is definitely one of the highlights of living in this part of Riga.  A big ornate red-brick building, it is no longer at its zenith.  I am expecting one day to wake up and read in the news that...

So this year Tiss started going to a children's Latvian folklore ensemble.  It's funny, but in some ways I think it was easier to educate your child in Latvian traditions when living in Australia - because participation in a folk dance group, a choir, Latvian language school was a must, the thing everybody did on the weekends - and a great emphasis was put on this cultural education in the Latvian diaspora. However, when you LIVE in Latvia, the country and culture are all around you, and...

 I ache. All over.  I've got muscles in my shoulders I never knew I had, and they are making me FEEL them this morning.  Reason is, because we finally cleared our backyard of junk yesterday.  A miniskip parked on the road, a wheelbarrow, some heavy-duty gloves, my husband and me.  Romantic, huh. Our backyard has been a huge tip full of building scraps since before we moved in. When we were building this house it turned out they had to demolish a lot more of it...

We sold our old renault to a renault mechanic's the other day - for spare parts.  Years of being parked outside in the snow, and driving on country roads and cobblestones had done their worst, and things got to the stage where fixing the car up to get our roadworthy for this year was too much of an outlay. On account of our kids never wanting to throw ANYTHING away - and I mean ANYTHING - we didn't tell the kids the car was being sold for scrap.  As far as they know, the car is still...

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Ooops, is that photo too close?  Had to zoom it in for this new development in Mik's life - may look small to you, but huge for him.  He's been waiting for this for EVER, all his friends at kindy and tennis are already losing their milk teeth, Mik has been wondering if he is tooth-challenged.   So how much is the tooth fairy paying in Oz these days?  The kids were asking tonight.  Our Latvian fairy is paying 1 Ls/tooth (or the one that visits our house, at least),...