May and June and July calendars are rapidly filling up. I’m still boggling over the fact that it’s already May. So much going on right now that it makes my head spin, and since it’s full-blown allergy season right now, that’s not necessarily a good thing.
We just had our first long weekend, kicking off the long weekend season. It’s the first holiday since Easter, which was the the beginning of April, and itself the first holiday of the year after January 6th. It’s a long way between January 6 and April 7 (Good Friday this year). You’d think they’d space out the public holidays a little bit better here, but no. Now we have pretty much a long weekend every other week until the end of June. This is a good year for public holidays in Sweden since the ones that move are all falling on weekdays this time. Yesterday was May 1, which is the European Labor Day. Next up: Ascension Day, then Sweden’s National Day, and finally midsummer, before the summer vacation season starts. After that we have to wait until CHRISTMAS for another public holiday. But again, a good year for Christmas as it falls on a Monday, plus we get the day after off as well, and New Year’s Day will fall on a Monday, too.
Our friends Mats and Annelott hosted their annual Valborg celebration with a huge bonfire up on the hill behind their house, with hotdog grilling and late evening sunshine. It was chilly but bearable with the fire until the sun went down at which point most of us women decamped to the warm indoors. They’ve been hosting Valborg since 1986, which is amazing. Annelott said they’ve only missed 2 years in all that time. We’ve been going since we moved to Sweden, with only a few exceptions (Anders’ dad died on Valborg in 2014). Our kids grew up going to Valborg with us, every year, though now they’ve all scattered to party elsewhere for that particular holiday.
But we spent most of this long weekend working on the house, the kitchen, and fixing and doing things that needed to be done. On Saturday morning, Anders and I went and bought the paint for the kitchen and he painted the walls twice during the course of the day. I finished up cleaning in the pantry, and went shopping while he was painting: for new curtains and a rug for the kitchen, new bathmats, hangars, and a nicer container for holding the paper recyclables in the kitchen (until they get carted out to the bins), among other things.
I bought 2 pairs of curtains, and actually brought home FOUR rugs from the rug store, because I bought a half-moon doormat for our front door and BORROWED 3 plasticized kitchen rugs to see how they looked and which one we liked best in our own kitchen and light. Good thing, because the one I liked best at the store was completely wrong color-wise when I got it home, and one of the others was perfect. I was shocked that we could borrow rugs like that, but it sure was great! I’m taking them back tomorrow, and ordering a slightly longer version of the one we want, if it’s available. We decided right away on the set of curtains I liked the best and I put them up yesterday after we moved the table and chairs back into the kitchen. Then I cleaned the fridge, did laundry, and generally tidied up everywhere. Anders was busy fixing and changing to summer tires on 2 of the cars, and mowing the lawn, among other things. We were busy bees! There are a few things that need to be hung, and the mug shelf is not yet up because I am going to paint it white (hopefully next weekend). But it’s 99.9% done and looks amazing. Anders outdid himself! Pictures to come.
It was hard to get up today after 3 days of (more or less) sleeping in. A busy day as usual at work, and then I went to Malmö to get a massage from Emily. Karin is home tonight with Olivia, but Anders is gone all week for work. The sun is still shining and the sunset is shaping up to be another lovely one. I love this time of year.
Mood: content
Music: Born Ruffians—Chrysanthemums