midsummer madness

Although Swedes can be seen as a quite serious breed, they do know how to partay. Midsummer is one, and maybe the main, time of year when they let their hair all the way down and enjoy themselves. Letting your hair down Swedish style more often than not involves singing, dancing and drinking. For me the midsummer tradition of dancing around a flower clad pole pretending to be either frogs or musicians never struck me as being odd. But yesterday at the celebrations in Hyde park I almost felt like an outsider looking in, and I liked what I saw! At the same time there was a sense of familiarity and childhood memories.

You can take the girl out of Sweden but you can't take the swede out of the girl sma grodorna:) ko-ack-ack-ack. ko-ack-ack-ack-ackaaaaathe miniature midsummer pole

got my plopp!:)

you almost have to see it to believe it:


Love Danelles happy face in the video above. She looks like she belongs, perhaps she was Swedish in a previous life...

Dinner with a view

The great thing about summer is that you can take your dinner outside and make it taste one hundred times nicer than it would at the dinner table.

The great thing about London is that amongst all the hustle and bustle you can find a place of peace and quiet to sit and admire the view. Our dinner spot was on the river front in a small local park on our side of the river overlooking greenwich.

Oceans apart....

We received a letter from Harland's sister Rochelle and her family yesterday. Two drawings from Flynn(5) and Gracie (3). And although we haven't seen them for over a year it would appear we are still a part of their life. And it becomes apparent that where ever we go in the world we will always be without loved ones. And somehow that makes me feel very blessed, always knowing that wherever I am, I could be somewhere else, and still be loved. Sounds odd, I know....

As far as I understand, Flynnie drew this picture when he found out that we are engaged and getting married. I love the attention to detail; the aeroplane with us in it waving, all the lovehearts, the two little happy people holding hands; I wonder who's who?:)

Gracie had a go as well:)

Miss you.

Branches of a tree

When saying farewell to mormor on thursday, there were a lot of tears and there were times, even during the ceremony, that I was in denial over the fact that I will never see her again. I also felt that it was unfair that we will have to go without.

But there, by the grave after the ceremony and memorial, a certain little girl whispered something to her lillamormor whilst playing with the gravel and admiring the flowers. This girl is wiser than most adults, it has to be said. "Good-bye, thanks for everything". And there it was; everything that needed to be said.

Hejda, tack for allt

Because we have so much to thank mormor for. Little things, like all the warm memories that we will always have in our hearts. All the skills that she has taught us and knowledge she has passed on. Little things like providing us with support and words of wisdom, sometimes without us realising we were being helped. Big things like putting us on this planet. Because I stem, partly, from her. Had she done one thing different we might not be here. The choices she made in her life has affected all of us. All of a sudden it doesn't seem so unfair, we have been given so much!

And it makes you think; how relatively small decisions we make in life, such as taking up a certain hobby, moving to another town or even just going out dancing on night and then talking to a stranger in the street on the way home, can influence the rest of one persons life. And generations to follow. Ultimately, we are just branches on a giant tree ....

Not so black

Black was for many years the only coloured clothes I had... No real reason why, I don't think. Now days I enjoy injecting a bit more colour in to my life, nothing crazy, just a bit of blue and green etc. and I like it. So imagine my surprise when I found out that for work this weekend (catering, my gig over summer) I have to wear black and there were limited outfits to pick from in my wardrobe...
Speaking of the colour black, how's about a change in colour for the blog?????

stuck in between- time

Having just arrived back from a couple of weeks in Sweden I'm a bit unsure what to do with myself. Although I had planned for this week to be a slow, relaxing, catch up with life kind of week, I can't help but getting restless and bored. I've been loitering around the house for a couple of days now and feel that I need to get out. But at the same time the thought of going outside to face the real world and get on with a daily routine seems so alien and unthinkable. The thought of seeing people makes me feel tired and want to crawl under the duvet until the urge to socialise goes away. So maybe I need to make a choice. Either make my peace with sitting at home watching DVDs or make myself get out there. Maybe there will be a visit to a museum tomorrow. But there is still that empty feeling to deal with...