In the Country

Last weekend Micke and I joined his parents for a relaxing weekend at their summer house in Los, a small town 4 hours NW of Stockholm.  The name of the town was derived from the word lodjur (lynx) since there were and still are apparently lynx in that area.

Total permanent population = 387 people

Their house is like many Swedish country houses with a dark red wooden frame and white trim.  The houses are so adorable, I can't stop staring.

In the summer without so much snow, a Swedish house might look more like this: Cute House

The house is so cozy inside as well.  Here is Micke tucked into his snoopy sheets.  Haha! Look how happy he is!

Since there is not much to do, which is the beauty of the place, we filled our days with watching birds outside the kitchen window, snowshoeing, walking to the town church (which was closed on a Sunday morning since the priest apparently has to rotate through other towns), snowmobiling, eating sausages and ham, and napping.  It was lovely.

The town of Los:

Many of the houses have the symbol of a goat on them 

Here I am looking like an eskimo before we went snowmobiling.  I used to think those Russian hats were ridiculous, but they are WARM!  And you can see Ubbe (Micke's dad) cruising by on the '88 snowmobile!  He's by the trees in the top photo.

 

Christmas

It's Christmas time in Sweden.  I've been trying to ignore the snow and darkness and get into the spirit of it.  Swedish-style.

Two weekends ago Micke and I visited a beautiful Christmas Market at Drottningholm Palace, where little stalls had sprouted up outside the royal palace to sell handicrafts and lots of sausage, herring, glögg  (mulled wine) and, of course, candy.

 


We also saw this funny scene with two little kids who had built the biggest snowball I've ever seen.  The little girl was carrying it on her back while the little boy spotted her. Then she just collapsed under the weight of it.

Kids also have a pretty sweet deal here.  Many parents just carry them around in sleds.

Remember learning about the Lucia celebration when you were in elementary school?  The little girl with a crown of greens and candles on her head and dressed all in white?  Lucia day was last Thursday and I was so excited to see the real Luciatåg (the train of little kids all dressed up in white).  I went with two friends to Södertālje, a town 50 minutes south of Stockholm, where my Swedish teacher had told us there was a big parade of children who would walk around the mountain.  We got dropped off in the middle of nowhere only to climb the mountain, find a small ghost town/museum, then slip down an icy slope back into the town when we realized they had the Luciatåg the Sunday before.  There was another train, but apparently poor little Lucia got stuck in an elevator!  We missed all of it.  http://lt.se/nyheter/sodertalje/1.1915256-lucia-fastnade-i-hiss   It was still a fun adventure though!  And we did find some marzipan snowmen, santas, angels and pigs (yeahhh. It represents the Christmas ham.)

Micke's mom sings in a choir so we listened to Christmas carols last week in a church that was originally built in 1190.

Another Christmas tradition here in Sweden is lighting candles and stars in the windows.  It feels cozy.  It's also common to decorate oranges with cloves and hang them in the window.  You can see our handiwork below! Guess which one is mine... (Hint: It's the non-symmetrical one!)

Here are some more pictures of Stockholm at night (2-4pm):

      

        

The last Christmas tradition that I have to mention is Julmust.  The strange-tasting soda that all Swedes love to drink at Christmas time.  I am trying to like it... 

Winter in Stockholm

It's now winter in Stockholm.  The snow and cold temperatures have arrived!  It's currently 5 degrees Fahrenheit.  FIVE!

For Swedes, a good winter means a lot of snow.  One urban myth that I keep hearing is that the worse the winter the better the summer.  The snow does makes everything much, much brighter though when the daylight is so short.

Yesterday was a balmy 10 degrees.  We dared to go running and I wore four layers, including a down jacket.  It felt good to be outside anyways.  (That's me running below.)

It also looked pretty from my classroom window this morning.