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THIS BLOG HAS MOVED TO  WWW.SHEROCKSABUN.COM    Hop on over! You can always read the post here, but for more and updated posts, come join me at my new site!  I’m an iPhone-iPad-laptop junkie. Google is my friend, Pinterest to the rescue and social media to see the latest regarding what my friends are up to. Online dictionaries for quick word translations, Shazam when I hear a song on the radio I like but don’t recognize, and YouTube & Netflix as baby sitters. My laptop was down for a good two weeks, while I struggled with updates and rebooting my computer. It’s still not completely fixed, but it works, I have Office and Google Chrome up and running again, and it’s euphoric. I misplaced my phone last night for a couple of hours, and it bothered me the entire time. Everyone in my family has a lot of screen time, and we’re all hooked.    My husband announced the other day, that when we go on our annual summer holiday this year, no phones will be...

THIS BLOG HAS MOVED TO  WWW.SHEROCKSABUN.COM    Hop on over! You can always read the post here, but for more and updated posts, come join me at my new site!  “A baby changes everything.” An almost worn out cliché but yet such a truth. When we become parents, being a mom or dad defines us. To which extent, I would love to say is up to us, but it’s not. For mothers, from the moment you get pregnant, everything changes, especially in working life.  I don’t know how things are in the rest of the world, but for example in Finland, it’s officially none of your employer’s business if you have a family or not. A future employer is not allowed to ask you at an interview if you plan on having children, etc. Ok, in all honesty, it is to some extent unfair towards your employer if you’re applying for a new job that requires extensive training and introduction, and you’re planning on having kids in the near future and possibly staying at home for the first years. It ...

THIS BLOG HAS MOVED TO  WWW.SHEROCKSABUN.COM    Hop on over! You can always read the post here, but for more and updated posts, come join me at my new site!  I was watching the news the other day, and there was a short clip on a new art exhibition by a British artist, Grayson Perry. His art may not be directly down my alley, but what I fell in love with was his definition of happiness: “Happiness is not ecstasy, and a lot of people get them muddled up. Happiness is sort of bumping along ok, having a drink on a Friday night, walking a dog, watching the TV with your family. That’s happiness. It’s not swimming with dolphins. So I’m happy.” I think he makes a great point. To be happy, your life doesn’t need to be overflowing with constant extreme experiences and excitement, it’s so much easier than that. Learning to appreciate and enjoy the small things, the regular things, the “boring” things. Life is also supposed to surprise you, to challenge you and give yo...

THIS BLOG HAS MOVED TO  WWW.SHEROCKSABUN.COM     Hop on over! You can always read the post here, but for more and updated posts, come join me at my new site!  Want to see lightning bolt through my eyes? Well you better be attentive, as the flash will pass in a split second, but it will definitely be there. Now how I reply to such a delicious statement will depend on the situation. There are pretty much three possible reactions I will generally provide: A shrug of the shoulders accompanied by a heartfelt laugh and reply, “Yup, just a stay-at-home mother, no need to work for me”. And I will probably think to myself, ignorance is bliss. The second possibility is that I will give you a sympathetic wink of the eye and say “You said it sister”. The third, which only a few will have the pleasure of witnessing, is an immense explosion of justifications and self-defense accompanied by a lot of foul language to why you should never ever let such a statement escap...

THIS BLOG HAS MOVED TO  WWW.SHEROCKSABUN.COM    Hop on over! You can always read the post here, but for more and updated posts, come join me at my new site!  Now there’s a question I hear a lot: “Where do you find the time and energy for everything?” First of all, I obviously don’t always. I have my moments of utter procrastination or being forced to race against the clock, even if exhausted out of my wits. But I still manage, I’m rarely late and for the most, happy with my output. I also have a thing for writing lists and setting goals, and love ticking off things as I go. Once I get started with something I like, I might get a bit compulsive and excessive, with the momentum growing until I’m satisfied.   Alone with three kids means I always need to take into consideration a minimum of four variables, i.e. myself and the girls. And this goes for everything; be it going somewhere, preparing for an occasion or simply staying at home for a lazy Sunday....

THIS BLOG HAS MOVED TO  WWW.SHEROCKSABUN.COM    Hop on over! You can always read the post here, but for more and updated posts, come join me at my new site!  I’m trilingual. I was initially bilingual, with my mother always speaking Finnish and my father Swedish to me. Just before I turned five, in the beginning of September 1988, my family moved to Saudi Arabia, where my sister and I started Kindergarten at an international school. Around Christmas, I got a new teacher, who didn’t realize I wasn’t a native English speaker. In three months, I had learned to read, write and speak a foreign language on a native level. The first days were challenging, I still remember once crying all day at school, because I didn’t know how to ask to go to the bathroom, and I didn’t dare leave the classroom without permission. End result I wet myself in class and my teacher felt horrible for not realizing that was the reason for my crying. Maybe that’s why one of the first things I...