Category: general

12
Jul
2009

THE BEST ANTIQUES TO COLLECT ARE OLD FRIENDS

The last day of vacation was both a lazy one and a busy one. I slept in super late, after waking briefly around 9 a.m. and then dozing off again. The sun was shining most of the day and it warmed up nicely in the afternoon. Martin and I completely cleaned out his room in preparation for Anders to start the re-decorating work. I went to the grocery store, did a load of laundry and baked & decorated a cake. Tomorrow is a crazy day: I’m sure work will be frantic and stressful, though I hope it’s not too bad....

11
Jul
2009

SWEETER FOR THE EATER

Our cherry tree is the second one we’ve had; only 4 years old. The first one died after a year and we were a bit worried about the current one last summer as it had a bad bug infestation which my mom and I treated with soap and water. Two of the branches are dead and need to be removed. Last year we had a total of FOUR cherries. But this year: BUMPER CROP! We had to put blue net up and everything and the crows and jackdaws and magpies made concerted efforts to tease out the dangling rubies through...

10
Jul
2009

BEGINNING, MIDDLE, END

If you have ever reunited with your friends from your childhood or teenage years, you will know this about humans: we are essentially the same people we were when we were 14. My mom says she has read that our basic personalities are in place by the time we are SIX. I spent several days this past week with my oldest friend, Becky, whom I met when we were both 13 and newly moved to Europe (she to the Netherlands, me to Belgium) for the first time. She and I went to school together for 2.5 years and she moved...

03
Jul
2009

THE REASON IS YOU

I know just how blessed I am. It’s not the time away, or the weeks off work, or the downtime reading relaxation. It’s not the wind or the water or the rocks or the little fishing villages with their red houses all in a row. It’s not the things we’ve seen or the things we’ve done. It’s not even the sunshine. Okay. It IS the sunshine, at least part of it is. But mostly it’s these: Photos of Karin, Anders & Simone by John Slaughter; Photos of Martin and John by Anders Ek Cracking Me Up: Where the wild things...

02
Jul
2009

WIND & WATER

Since I was in college, I’ve always liked canoeing. We went on several canoe trips with all our floormates from Akers Hall, and even after graduation, dispersal and my move to Chicago, we continued to organize weekend-long canoeing trips in Michigan for several years. We’ve only gone a few times since moving to Sweden…the local river is a fairly easy one and we’ve only rediscovered the canoeing bug now that the kids are old enough to paddle as well, and we also have access to the canoes that belong to the local Scout troop, which we’re members of. On Friday,...

01
Jul
2009

SOME MORE THINGS WE DID

Busy every day but in a leisurely way with time to sit in the sunshine and read books and walk along the piers of the little fishing towns. On Thursday, we drove north to Tanumshede to see the bronze age rock etchings that dot the area. Apparently there are more than 10,000 boat drawings alone, scattered around Sweden. They are colored red in order to be seen better by tourists, as in their natural state, they’re scarcely noticeable and many have eroded badly due to pollution and weather. The world heritage site at Tanum included a replica bronze age settlement...

30
Jun
2009

SOME THINGS WE DID

We crammed in a lot of activities during our week up north. Even though I could have easily turned into a slug, something about the early early sunshine got me going much faster than I would normally have liked managed. Simone was up in the early yawning every day, doing pilates on the cliffs and she and Anders took turns biking into town for fresh bread and breakfast rolls. We did most of the things on our list of things to do in the area, though we never did actually make it to Smögen. Uri the Amur Tiger at Nordens...

29
Jun
2009

COASTAL LIGHT

The light is incredible along the western coast of Sweden in the summer. It’s one of the sunniest spots in the country, logging more sunlight hours by far than the rest of us. This past week, right after midsummer, the sun never actually set, just dipping down behind the horizon around 1 a.m. and apparently scooching quickly around to the east to rise a short hour or so later. Frankly, sunset photos never do the real thing justice. We drove up from Skåne in rain, which slowed and ceased as we arrived on Ödby Island. There were puddles in every...

28
Jun
2009

IN THE MIDDLE

I am back, but I am not sure I want to be. I am back, for now. I will be gone again. Soon. I am still on vacation and enjoying every sun-packed lazy-ass moment of it. It’s weird being offline for a determined length of time. One gets out of the online habit so easily. It was difficult to open this window and start typing; difficult to think of what to say, difficult to know where to begin, or whether. We couldn’t have had better weather in Sotens Fiskarby: sunny and warm with a constant cool breeze. We went to...

20
Jun
2009

LONGEST DAY

Family, friends, a midsummer pole dressed with 7 kinds of wildflowers, dancing like tail-less, ear-less frogs (kouack kouack!), toads under ferns, swan babies, 6 kinds of herring, strawberries, singstar silliness, a hotdog-begging kitty, reading on the trampoline or alternately, bouncing on it, downpours with hail, giant fluff-clouds, sunshine! a walk in the woods, hotdogs on the grill, 2 puppies to pat, schnaps songs, packing, games, laughter! Happy midsummer everyone! The kids, with John & Simone’s help, were justifiably proud of their midsummer pole! (photo: John Slaughter) Sillybutts! (photo: John Slaughter) Karin, Liz, Martin & Simone (photo: John Slaughter) The Ek’s...