Assembling Furniture & IKEA Kitchen

Well, big surprise what we did today! We put together a bunch of the furniture we bought yesterday. I should say that Fredrik and Linnea did most of the building. I cleaned and did housework like dishes and laundry. Not my favorite tasks in the world but it is a small house and we run out of things quickly if they don't get washed frequently. Our washing machine is small and it takes a long time to run. Then I have to hang dry the clothes (yuck) which is fairly quick but the clothes are stiff. Our dishwasher also takes a long time to run. Not sure what it is doing but it seems to take twice as long than at home. I heard this is a Swedish/European thing and pretty typical. So, not an exciting day for photos but I took a few.

Fredrik and Linnea building our furniture.

A Day at IKEA

We forgot our camera today but you probably don't want to see a bunch of photos of IKEA furniture. The store looks much like it does at home but much smaller. Anyway, we had decided it was time for a trip to IKEA which is quite an excursion for us. For one thing ... we live out in the country and most decent shopping is 45-60 minutes away from us. Stores like Target or Best Buy which are maybe 10-15 minutes away from our house in the states. IKEA on the other hand is almost a 2 hour drive for us here in Sweden! Plus, we have the problem of figuring out how to get the things we want to buy and get it home.

The trailer we borrowed from Maj & Ingvar.

Another Day, Another Party!

We woke up pretty late on Saturday ... around 10am. We were slow to get ready and eat breakfast so we decided to have our first "American" breakfast of bacon, eggs and hashbrowns. The hashbrowns are different than at home as they have onion, ham and sausage mixed in with the cubed potatoes. This made for a VERY filling meal!

Then I checked my messages and discovered that Erik had texted me that we were invited over to Maj & Ingvars for a BBQ at 1pm. Oops! I usually put my phone on silent at night because sometimes we get a phone call in the middle of the night (which is the middle of the day in the states). So, I didn't hear the message in time to prevent our big breakfast. It was almost noon before I saw the message and none of us had gotten ready for the day ... it took us a while to get out of the house.

We got to Maj & Ingvar's close to 2pm and most everyone had finished eating. We weren't hungry anyway. It was funny to see everything set up outside under tents and umbrellas because it was pouring down rain! Welcome to summer in Sweden! They are determined to enjoy the outdoors because it has been a very dark and cold winter. I guess we didn't get any photos outside but it was pretty funny looking!

Everyone was there ... Bjorn, Carro & Sebastian ... Staffan, Lena, Eddie & Vincent ... Farmor ... Eric, Anna, Vidar, Liv & Mia ... Cattis, Patrik, Ebbe & Vilda. It was good to see everyone. Then we went inside for "fika" and apparently it was time to get me liquored up! I had a shot of a sweet liqueur, cognac and whiskey. Good thing I have a designated driver at all times!

Erik, Patrik, Anna

Birthday at the Cabin

The birthday celebration continued into the evening. We weren't really sure what to do after the day at the spa so we all just went home to sort it out. I got a call from Cattis who invited us over to the cabin to have a birthday dinner. We just had a simple meal of grilled sausages and steaks but it was delicious! We enjoyed some wine again and the men (except Fredrik ... he doesn't drink and he had to drive us home) enjoyed some beer. I can't remember now if we had a dessert or anything. It didn't matter because we had two the day before! It was another day of some great photos so let's just get to those. :)

I guess while the girls were at the spa, Fredrik was teaching the kids how to shoot with a bow and arrow!

Birthday at the Spa

I barely needed to make the suggestion of going to the spa when Anna and Cattis immediately said YES! We did it last time I was here and it was the first time for both of them to any spa. Now I think it is going to become our tradition. It is definitely one I can handle!

We took a photo by my request before we started our spa treatments. 

A funny GIF

Fredrik takes lots of photos. His philosophy is to take as many photos as possible and maybe a few will turn out great. He is usually right but I find it a bit of a pain to sort through them all to find those gems. When he took a photo of the cousins, he just did a continuous photo shoot which I made an animated GIF out of. Check it out!

Birthday Party in Bollnas

Ok, I have gotten behind on posts so I am going to have to go back and try to remember everything. That will be fun because it might be a little fuzzy due to all the wine I drank. ;)

We didn't get photos of the dinner but we did get one of the cakes.
The green one is the Prinsesstarta and the one in front is the Bollnas Cake 

Shopping in Bollnas

We had another busy day today. Our morning was again normal ... waking up around 8am but actually getting out of bed around 9am. Linnea needed a bath today so that took a little longer getting ready. The kids went outside with Fredrik to learn how to shoot a bow and arrow. This was something he learned to do while growing up and so he wanted to pass it on to the kids. I was getting ready so I wasn't really paying attention but it sounded like the kids had fun. Then we had lunch before we headed out for the day.

Burrito Girl!

A Day in Hudik - Photos

Wow, I do talk a lot don't I? I guess there has been a lot of things to do so far. Or maybe I just talk a lot about nothing much? Anyway, Fredrik took quite a few photos from today so here they all are!

Johanna, Anton and little Olle

A Day in Hudiksvall

I think our morning routine is getting pretty good. I woke up at 9am but I am not sure when Fredrik woke up. He went to bed much earlier than me so I assume he woke up a bit early. He and Linnea had just finished breakfast and it took another 30 minutes or so to wake up Davin. That kid can sleep!

Our plan today was to head to Hudiksvall which is about an hour drive to the coast (east) from where our house is. We were invited to have "fika" (coffee & goodies) at Irene & Farfar's house to see Johanna (Fredrik's step-sister's daughter), her fiance Anton, their new baby Olle (same name as Farfar) who is almost 6 weeks old. Farfar and Per (Fredrik's half brother) are away working so they won't be there to say hello. We plan to meet them another day when they are home.

Some Videos to Share

I went through my videos that I took and decided to upload them to YouTube. Two are from midsummer and one is the rain at the family cabin. Enjoy!

Today's Family Adventures

We had a fairly normal morning. I woke up for some reason at 5am but went to sleep after a while. Most of us woke up around 9am but Davin was a hard one to wake up even at 10am! I guess he has acclimated now. We were waiting to see what the weather was like before we decided if we should head to the cabin or have the family come to us. The weather looked promising and Fredrik wanted to see the cabin so we decided to have lunch over there.

Of course, by the time we got over to the cabin ... it started to rain. We just moved our food inside and then it stopped raining. Figures! The afternoon was like that ... spotty showers with some sunshine too. The official report says it was a high of 15 C or 59 F today but when the sun was out it felt very nice. The rain didn't bother most anyone but me so I stayed inside and drank wine for the most part.

The rest of Monday - Furniture store!

Anyway, the rest of our day didn't quite go as planned but that is okay too. Farmor and Liv left to go to the grocery store and prepare the cabin for the family arrival. We decide to head back to the furniture store that was closed yesterday. It is this fairly big store in the middle of nowhere really. You think you are going the wrong way as you drive through a little residential area and then turn down a gravel road to get there. It was actually quite a bit bigger that what I was expecting for this area!

We bought a few things like a new light for our kitchen dining area. Only now that it is up, it isn't quite centered over the table. We also bought some door mats, lightbulbs and little reading lights for the kids.

New kitchen light for over the table.

I forgot we went to Maj & Ingvars!

See, if I don't blog right away I forget stuff. We had eaten dinner and decided to invite Maj & Ingvar over to have some coffee or something but they were too tired as Bjorn & Staffan were just visiting. I guess it was Bjorn's birthday? They did say that we could come over if we wanted and Fredrik wanted to say hi so we did. They had some strawberry and cream cake leftover from earlier that evening so they said happy birthday to us too since they missed Fredrik's birthday last month and mine is coming up in a few days. They sang happy birthday and we ate some cake. They also gave us these great lounge chairs. A black one for Fredrik and a red one for me! Perfect! 

Monday is starting to feel normal

Not much to report on today. We had a fairly uneventful evening last night and went to bed at a decent hour. Actually, the kids went to bed late because they wanted to play a game of croquet. It ended in tears so we sent the kids to bed around 10pm. Fredrik and I went to bed closer to midnight.

We all woke up today around 8:30am or 9am and had breakfast, baths, showers and so on. Fredrik called his mom (Farmor) to find out when the rest of the family arrive and they won't be here until this evening around dinner time. Farmor & Liv arrive around noon and we decide to have lunch together. I make spaghetti with meat sauce. The kids only liked the noodles so I heated up the rest of the fried chicken that Linnea likes and Davin had caviar on a piece of crispbread. It is so hard to find foods that the kids like and often they like completely different things. Oh well, this is pretty normal for us.

Lazy Sunday

Hard to believe we have been here for just over a week already. The boys are still going to have some time to adjust but so far things are good. Fredrik woke up early around 4am. I woke up around 7:30am or 8am. Linnea woke up around 9am and we had to wake up Davin at 9:30am or so. We ate breakfast and talk about what to do today. Fredrik actually has energy and wants to go somewhere. I am a little surprised. He suggested going to the furniture store where he bought the couch and looked up the hours online. I was surprised again that they were open. Most stores are closed on Sunday.

We all get in the car for the 30 minute drive to the furniture store. Our phone GPS had some problems so took a little longer than that. We did get there eventually, only to find out that it was closed today because of the midsummer holiday. Haha! Oh well, we head back and decide to drive through Ljusdal which is very close by. It is also a small town and most of the shops are closed too. We head back to Jarvso.

Photos from the Carnival

Here are the photos from Saturday at the Carnival. I don't remember if I said what the temperature was but it was a high of 7 C or 45 F but it was a LOT colder than that with the rain and the wind. It was FREEZING! 

There was only 3-4 rides and Linnea picked this one first. 

Fredrik & Davin have arrived!

How can I be so tired?? Everyone just went to bed here and it is just past 8:30pm. Perhaps it was the weather today or the lack of sleep or both. I have come to the conclusion that my online temperature app has probably been off by about 10 degrees. Today it was SO COLD! It was 40-45 F but with the wind it felt about 10 degrees colder. Lots of clouds and rain today so things didn't quite go as planned.

Bjorn called me in the morning and said that Sebastian was up all night throwing up so they weren't coming today to the Carnival. Then an hour later, Erik phoned and said it was pouring down and bitter cold as well. Not a great start to the day. They decided to come over to the house and bring lunch. It was a ham and broccoli quiche, some chicken drumsticks and a salad. It was great! It is really nice to have people visit and the kids just have a blast playing together.

Waiting for Fredrik & Davin

I don't know if it was the coffee I drank last night (I never drink coffee past 2-3pm) or if it was the anticipation of my husband and son arriving here in Sweden. I had a hard time sleeping. They left Seattle late last night (our time) so really all I could do was sleep while they flew from Seattle to Iceland. I didn't get to sleep until after midnight.

Linnea burned her thumb on the woodburning stove at the cabin yesterday so she slept in my bed. That could have also contributed to my restless sleep? I woke up around 7am and checked the flight status and their plane was just flying over Greenland. So, I get up and make myself breakfast and coffee and play around with my blog.

Midsummer at the cabin

My other post was getting so long ... Time for a new one! Last time I was here for midsummer, there were so many people at the cabin but this time it was just Erik's family and Farmor and Jan. It was enough but certainly different than what I experienced before. Perhaps it was the COLD weather (only 9 C or 48 F) or maybe it is like Christmas where they take turns which family to spend it with. Many people had plans with other family members. We still had fun but I loved all the silly songs and drinking when there were more people.

My little Swedish summer girl!

Happy Midsummer!

Today I actually slept in until 7:30am so we didn't have as much time to get ready as we usually do. We ate breakfast and I took a shower. Somehow it was 11am already and Erik was due to arrive at 11:30am! I better start lunch.

I didn't have much but I did have the food that Farmor bought for us. This was the first time that I cooked anything in the kitchen at our house so that was fun! I sent a photo of the cooking instructions to Fredrik last night to translate so that worked out fine. We had a bag of frozen chicken which I defrosted last night and we just cooked it in butter in the oven. Then we boiled some potatoes and I made a salad. We also had leftover meatballs which some people had too since we only had 4 chicken breasts. It was fun to have 5 adults and 4 kids at the table. We scrambled to have enough plates, knives, forks and glasses for everyone. Some people used their coffee cups to have some water. We also didn't have enough chairs but we had some stools and one kid sat on someone's lap. We just made it work.

The kids played while lunch was being made.

The rest of Thursday

The days are starting to blend into each other and if I don't blog every day ... things get harder to remember. I was so tired Thursday evening that I just went to bed right after putting Linnea down around 9:30pm or so. I don't really remember what time it was but I thought it was early for me. I actually slept in until 7:30am and we had plans since it was midsummer. I usually blog in the morning but I didn't have time so, now I am going back a day to remember what we did....

In the afternoon on Thursday we waited for Farmor to come to us. Erik and his family were arriving around 3pm so Farmor was picking us up around that time. Ingvar arrived around 1pm to mow our lawn. Linnea got to help too!

Linnea goes for a ride on the lawn mower!

Croquet Video

My video that I took yesterday has finally uploaded. Here it is!

A Rainy Morning

I don't remember what time I went to bed but it wasn't too early. Maybe 10:30pm or 11pm? I woke up today at 5am so not too bad really. As always I try to go back to sleep again but it doesn't seem to work for me. Now I am catching up on house chores, my blog and eating breakfast. So far, this is what I eat every day.

Toast, butter, cheese and sliced turkey.

A Day at the Family Cabin

Gosh, for not really doing much I seem to be writing a lot! My sleep is still a bit off but it is partially my fault for not putting my phone on silent last night. I was woken up at 3am by two phone calls which were not important but they did wake me up. Ugh. So, I tried falling back asleep which took a bit of time but I eventually did. Next thing I know it is 9:30am and I hear that Linnea is awake. She said she has been awake a while but since she doesn't have a clock in her room, she couldn't tell me when.

We ate breakfast and got ready for the day. Farmor was planning on picking us up after she picked up food and alcohol for midsummer which is on Friday. Also, Erik and his family are planning to arrive tomorrow at the cabin so she wanted to put some food there and prepare for their arrival. We first decide to get lunch at Lill Babs Cafe which is named for a famous singer here in Sweden. She grew up here in Jarvso so she has this cafe and museum. I had a mushroom and cheese "paj" or quiche and Linnea had pancakes with whipped cream. Pancakes are not a breakfast food here in Sweden!

A day in Bollnas

It is about 45 minutes to Bollnas but it takes Farmor closer to an hour to make the drive. We enjoy the view of the countryside on the way and we see lots of horses and cows. Linnea eventually falls asleep in the car. We left our house around 11am and had just eaten an early lunch. We decide to find a place to get "fika" (Swedish for "coffee break") so we find a place in downtown and walk to the cafe. We don't go very far but the weather today is cold and wet so it makes the walk a bit more uncomfortable. The weather report said it had a high of 65 degrees today but I don't believe it. Maybe it was the cold wind which made it feel like 50 degrees or so? It was chilly!

So, we have a little bite to eat with our "fika" and Linnea tries out this strawberry shortcake type of dessert. The whipped cream wasn't sweetened so I had to grab some honey to make it more to her liking. The only kind of sugar this place had was cubed. She liked it and ate most of it. She is also drinking Fanta.

My cutie pie at "fika" 

Early Morning

Today was an early morning at Bondarv. I feel like our house here in Sweden should have a name and I suppose this is as good as any. We live at "Bondarv Myragatan 20, Järvsö, Sweden" which is located exactly here:

Monday continued...

Well, for not having any sort of plans at all while I am here ... we seem to be busy! We decided to be lazy around the house until Farmor came around noon. The weather was a bit colder today so in the mid-50's with a very chilly wind. As long as you stood in the sun (which wasn't often due to the cloud cover) it wasn't so bad but really it was a day to stay inside for the most part.

As I mentioned before, the heat was a little slow to warm up the house in the evening so Ingvar and Staffan (Ingvar's youngest son who is a few years younger than me) decided to drop by in about an hour to check on the heating system. Farmor decided to make "dinner" of meatballs and scallop potatoes for when the men arrive. Maybe she meant lunch but no one was really hungry. Linnea and I had just eaten lunch and I think the boys had just done so too.

Monday - People have to work?

I went to bed late and woke up early. I think it has more to do with a certain time of the month for me (sorry guys!) than anything else. It makes me pee a lot and also paranoid about leaking on our new linens. I really don't want to do laundry if I don't need to. The washing machine is small and no dryer. Just a drying closet. It is a warm closet for your clothes to dry in so it is just like hanging them up to dry which means everything is stiff and not fluffy. Ugh.

Drying closet or cabinet

Father's Day? Hmm...

I guess today is Father's Day but I didn't remember until later when I saw all these posts on Facebook. For one thing ... my days are a little mixed up and another thing ... it isn't Father's Day here in Sweden!

Anyway, we slept well and woke up at a fairly normal time so the lack of sleep yesterday made for a solid night rest for me at least. I went to bed around 10:30 pm and woke up this morning around 8:15 am or so. I stayed in bed for a little while to fully wake up, took a photo of the lovely view outside my bedroom window and posted it on Facebook.

Good morning Sweden! It is a sunny day and almost 60 degrees (F) at 8:45am.

If I stand up and look outside from my bedroom to the right, this is what I see.
I hear nothing but the wind rustling the leaves on the trees and Farmor on the phone in the kitchen. 

Arrived in Sweden

The travel to Sweden was pretty uneventful. There was very little sleep on the airplane. I got none and Linnea had about 10-15 minutes total. It was just a long trip and we had just enough time in Iceland to buy some candy. Linnea's ears hurt on the way down in the airplane so we tried buying some gummy bears to help on the flight to Sweden. It didn't.

The real problem was when we landed in Sweden. We got our luggage okay and met up with Farmor and Jan. Then headed to the car rental place. Well, what a surprise there! I had pre-paid for a car through my travel agent so when I got to the counter and they told me there was an extra $400 "Stockholm Congestion" fee, I was quite shocked. It was some sort of daily fee and since we have the car for 41 days, it adds up. I asked if I had to pay it even if I am not driving the car in Stockholm and she said yes. Ugh, great. Fine, I will pay it but now there is a problem with my card. They only take cards with raised numbers and my BECU card is completely flat. Ok, so I have to use my MC but my limit is maxed out and my payment has not gone through yet. Great. Well, Farmor put it on her card but guess what else? I need to pay a $2500 deposit on the car to cover any potential damages! I definitely am not prepared for that either. So, all that goes on Farmor's card but what a pain to have to deal with that.

Off We Go Again!

Linnea and I in the car on the way to SeaTac airport.

I have a few moments to jot down some thoughts before we head off to Sweden this year. Linnea and I are making the trip by ourselves this time as we are leaving a week ahead of the boys. I took her out of school a little early (just Kindergarten right?) so we could enjoy the Midsummer festivities which are next week. I was afraid if we left right after school was out, we would be too jet lagged to enjoy them. Also, Fredrik only has 5 weeks of vacation and so why not take an extra week since I run my own business and control my own schedule? :)

I know I packed too many things and I hope that won't be something I regret later. Fredrik suggested that next time I take Davin instead of Linnea because well ... us girls have a LOT of stuff that we require when we travel. The boys need a pair of shoes, 3 shirts and 3 pants. Or something like that!

I also thought it was funny to read my last blog post almost 3 years ago "Dreaming of a Swedish House" and that is exactly what we did! Not really what I had envisioned 3 years ago but it is a modest home in the country and I can't wait to see it in person. It will be nice to have our own space in Sweden.

I will update as often as I can here! See you soon!