My first rose...

"A single rose can be my garden... a single friend, my world" (Leo F. Buscaqlia)

What is a garden without a rose? Is it a garden at all? Well, as a garden owner, I'm finally having my first rose... I sincerely hope she will like to live in my garden and will show me many blossoms in next summer. I'll let you know!

My rose is: rosa 'palmengarten frankfurt'

Celebration of Re-Independence Day and Gerd Kanter's GOLD MEDAL

Today it's the Day of Restoration of Independence. And yesterday, our great sportsman (a discus thrower), Gerd Kanter changed the history of sports - besides the golden medal won in Osaka 2007, he is now the owner of GOLDEN MEDAL from Olympic Games of 2008 as well. ESTONIA IS PARTYING TODAY!!!!
And so are we...

Our hero GERD KANTER (photo from Osaka 2007, http://www.iaaf.org/)

To celebrate both of those events, we (I, Erik, Kristi, Eve and Ragnar) drove to Pille's place. At first, we organized a discus competition. And indeed, we had an original discus (bought by Pille's father as a childhood gift for her) and each of us had 1 attempt to show his/her strength and talent... Here we are throwing it!

Avo, Eve, Pille and Ragnar showing their best moves....

Tanel, Kristi, I and Erik staking all which we had inside us...
AND THE WINNER IS:

AVO! He was the best, unfortunately we forgot to measure how far he threw... I'm sure not much less than Gerd Kanter himself :).

The cows were our spectators.

And after that, everyone was happy and we were able to start partying...

Wine was opened and we said "THUMBS UP, ESTONIA!" Cheers!

Kristi, I, Erik, Tanel, Avo, Pille, Marit, Eve and Ragnar

Eve and Ragnar

Finally, we had a generous dinner prepared by Pille, and 2 honey cakes (coincidentally prepared following the same receipt by Kristi and Pille).

I, Erik, Kristi, Eve, Ragnar, Avo, Pille, Tanel

On a cool summer morning

Photographed by Erik, August 2008, Harju county, Estonia.

Järvakandi Motocross

Today, Järvakandi Motocross took place, where Kert competed, too. He didn't do very well this time as he had some technical problems in the last lap, but surely he got great experience! The next competition will be in August 31, in Viljandi. The start of "leg shakers" class.

Kert's leg-shaker wears a number of 40.

Kert taking a small hill.

Kert on the track.

Kert and his bike.

Kert and one of his team-mates, Elis. One of the rare girls in this sports!

Summer events

Picnic at work - 19 June My colleague Marina, I and my colleague Ülo in picnic, which took place in Tallinn Zoo this year.

Tour of Manour Houses - Part II, 21-22 June, IDA-VIRU county Kristi in front of KALVI manour house

I and Kristi in Narva, the eastest town in Estonia

Rakvere Park

I and Kristi in front of Aaspere Manour House

Visiting Kristi's sister Karin: I, Kristi, Karin, Janek, Sander

Tour of Manour Houses - Part III - 19-20 July, VILJANDI county Kristi on the balcony of Laupa Manour House

I and Kristi in front of Olustvere Manour House

I and Kristi in the ruins of Viljandi Castle

Pärsti Manour House

Kristi in the hall of Suure-Kõpu Manour House

3 days in Muhu island - 29-31 July Kert and his new bike

Emily with flowers

Emily and Anna waiting to get their lunch

Martin, the twins and sauna house

In Lepana seaside

Summer & Home Rainbow over our house

Strawberries from our garden

Our sweet little Tony

Marju's house-warming party - 31 July Erik, I, Kristi, Eve, Ragnar, Rain's friend, Rain, Marju

Eda's 30th jubilee - 2 August The birthday girl

Erik playing with Eda's kitten

4 girls, 1 baby and cat Oscar in the birthday party: I, Eda, Märt, Siiri, Sirje

On the way to hunt...

Photographed by Erik, July 2008, Harju county, Estonia.

Strawberries taste so good...

"Strawberries cherries and an angel´s kiss in spring
My summer wine is really made from all these things..."
(Nancy Sinatra)

Summer is here and so are strawberries. Those sweet red berries have the best taste when you pick them from your own garden... Today, I made a strawberry-biscuit cake. It's one of the easiest cakes I've ever made, since it doesn't require any baking.

Here's the recipe:

STRAWBERRY-BISCUIT CAKE

3 packs of biscuits, each 180 g (I used vanilla favoured and condensated-milk favoured biscuits from Kalev and Selga)

400 g of strawberries (or rasberries)

1 dl sugar

2 dl whipped cream

1 teaspoon of vanilla sugar

800 g cheese paste (I'm not sure, what is the equal name of it in other countries, here we call it "kohupiima pasta")

For decoration:

2 dl whipped cream

1 teaspoon of vanilla sugar

strawberries

Here it goes: Crubmle the bisquits to small pieces and put them to a bowl. Cut the strawberries into quadrants. Whip the whipped cream with sugar and vanilla sugar and add the cheese paste. Then, add it to the bisquits and strawberries and mix smoothly. Compress the paste to the 26 cm of round cake tin and put it to the refrigerator for the night. For decoration, whip the rest of the whipped cream with vanilla sugar, and decorate the cake with strawberries and for instance, peppermint leaves.

Ready to eat!

(NB - Thanks to Eda, who's cooking calendar I used to write down this recipe:))