/ˈlalɔ/ vs. /ˈlalœ/
Anna kopierede ret tidligt Léons navn for Charlotte, /ˈlalɔ/.
Så begyndte hun at bruge samme navn for begge, hvad der var noget forvirrende.
Men nu har vi opdaget, at hun rent faktisk skelner, idet Charlotte er /ˈlalɔ/, mens Léon er /ˈlalœ/.
Den forskel er ikke helt nem at opfange i forbifarten!
Hun gør i øvrigt noget tilsvarende med mig og Marcel: Jeg hedder /ˈdade/ (den normale skotske udtale af Daddy), mens Marcel er blevet til /ˈdadɛ/ (vokalerne fra Marcel, men konsonanterne fra Daddy).
Dyrelyde
Da min mor besøgte os for en måneds tid siden, læste hun ofte en bog med dyrelyde for Anna.
Og selvom hendes aktive ordforråd stadig er ret begrænset på andre områder, er hun ret gode til at huske, hvad de forskellige dyr siger:
Mange af hendes dyr taler tydeligt dansk, især fåret og fuglen.
Dyr look like animals
A few days ago, I removed a few bricks that had been placed on top of the lawn for a while, and beneath there were plenty of centipedes, worms, spiders, ants and woodlice.
Léon was watching with great interest, and afterwards he went in to tell Phyllis:
– Mum, there were dyr under the stenene, and they looked like animals!
It so typical of a bilingual kid to know the same word in two languages (here “dyr” and “animals”), but not to equate them. Fully bilingual kids are normally crap at translating literally.
Vincent, Thomas and Charlotte van Gogh
About three years ago, I decided to teach myself to paint.
I bought a lot of oil paint, an easel and lots of canvases, and even more importantly, I found a most wonderful book called How to Paint Like the Impressionists
It basically shows step by step how to copy parts of well-known impressionist paintings.
I wouldn’t claim for a second that I was very good at it, but it was good fun.
Shortly afterwards, Phyllis, Marcel, Charlotte and Léon moved in with me, and I haven’t had the luxury to think about such things since then.
But now the book is being used again…
Charlotte got an acrylics painting set from my parents for her birthday.
She didn’t really know where to start, so I found the book again, and it seemed to inspire her, too.
So today she copied a painting by van Gogh that I myself copied three years ago.
See the original and our two copies on the right. Who’s the better painter? 
Eating grapes like a hamster
Has Anna been a hamster in a previous life? 
Oblatspisere
Da Miriam og mig var børn, elskede vi oblater.
Kun at spise én om ugen var noget i underkanten, syntes vi, så vi sneg os ofte ind i vores mors kontor og stjal nogle håndfulde.
Men senere i livet har det ikke været nemt at skaffe oblater, især uden først at gå i kirke, så jeg har vansmægtet en del.
Men så fik jeg i år en vidunderlig julegave fra Miriam: To pakker oblater!
Det er godt nok tyske bageoblater, men de ser ligedan ud og smager også ens.
Phyllis og de ældre børn synes ikke, de smager af noget, så jeg troede først, jeg kunne spise dem alene, men så lykkedes det at lokke Anna til at prøve dem, og nu elsker hun dem også!
Annas fødselsdag
I fredags var det så pludselig et år siden, Anna blev født.
Det er utroligt, hun allerede er blevet så stor!
Jeg lavede naturligvis en lagkage til hende (hindbær), og hun fik gaver, og mine forældre kom også (de brugte Ryanairs nye rute fra Billund til Edinburgh).
Anna kunne godt li’ kagen og sine gaver, så jeg tror, det var en god dag!
Ubuntu for two
Marcel seems to think that computers are for downloading random programs from the Internet, preferably without an up-to-date anti-virus program.
So of course his computer (running Windows XP) got very, very ill. I managed to clean it, but unfortunately this left many programs broken.
Our only set of XP CDs didn’t work on his 64-bit computer, so in an act of desperation I wiped his harddisk clean and installed Ubuntu Linux on it instead.
Surprisingly, he rather seems to like it, and I have had no requests so far to reinstall Windows XP. Is he a new convert to Linux, I wonder?
Having burned an installation CD for this purpose, I decided to reinstall Ubuntu on my laptop, which had been left somewhat useless after the auto-upgrade from version 7 to 8 failed.
It worked beautifully, except that the wireless connection didn’t work.
However, after rebooting three times with a wired connection, it managed to locate and install a proprietary driver on its own, and suddenly the wireless card kicked into action without any action from my part.
Perfect!
Léons danske language
Léon blander sprog pá bedste beskub.
Som nu fx denne samtale vi havde ved morgenbordet forleden:
Léon: I want a clean spoon.
Mig: En ren ske.
Léon: Yes, a clean ske.
Mig: En ren ske.
Léon: Yes, I want a ren one.
Skal man le eller græde?
Dygtig pige!
Anna fyldte elve måneder i går, og hun er simpelthen ved at blive så stor og dygtig!
Se bare her på billedet, hvordan hun for nylig hjalp Phyllis med at slibe kanten af en bordplade af med sandpapir.
Hun er også begyndt at pege på billeder og spørge, hvem personerne på dem er. Desværre kan hun godt finde på at pege på det samme billeder 10-20 gange i træk. 
Hun har også lært at nikke, ryste på hovedet og vinke – vældig praktisk!