Greek evening in Stockholm

So Pia arrived Friday lunch time. We had lunch at the lovely Sally Voltaire & Systrar restaurant at Åhléns before we did a spot of shopping. Then Pia and I went to check in at our hotel, and had a little recharge. We stayed just next to Avicii Arena (or Globen, as most people still call it!).

We met up again at Söder, at a Greek restaurant we had booked for dinner. Erika joined us of course, but also my childhood friend Jenny who had come into the city especially for this from Uppsala. 

We had such a nice dinner, the food was super tasty, the service really friendly and the company amazing of course. 

After dinner we went up to Mosebacke for a nightcap and to enjoy the view, before it was time to call it a night and go back to the hotel.

Waldemarsudde

After a few days with Mormor and Morfar, I went up to Stockholm for a long weekend. 
First day in Stockholm and it was absolutely gorgeous weather, so Erika and I decided to go out to Djurgården and visit Waldemarsudde. 

We started with a bit of lunch in the sun before heading in to the museum.

They had a temporary exhibition on about illustrators of children’s literature, which is where we started. 

We then visited the Mansion itself, so pretty. Imagine living here! 

 

Good taste in books! 

Waldemarsudde was built as the home of Prince Eugen (1865-1947) and is now one of Sweden's most popular art museums. The Museum consists of the palatial Mansion from 1903-05 and the Gallery Building, from 1913. The Mansion houses the Public Apartments, preserved in their original form.

In these apartments, a selection of Prince Eugen's own works are shown, as well as works from the collections. Prince Eugen was one of the finest landscape painters of his time, and a renowned art collector, who focused on Swedish, Nordic and French art.
Here Ateljéutsikt över Gamla Stan, by Isaac Grünewald.

 

 

Edvard Munch, Self-Portrait, 1895.

 

Varietéartist, 1910, by Henrik Sørensen.

 

Bakom ladugården, by Hans Heyerdahl.

 

 

There was also an exhibition about Christian Skredsvig, a Norwegian Modernist.

A wall with self-portraits, and some portraits of Skredsvig painted by friends. None of them seem to depict the same man.

Finally we enjoyed the gardens, and we were not the only ones. There was people stretched out on the grass everywhere, so nice to see, enjoying the sun and the lovely weather, having picnics and just relaxing. 

The smell of lilacs... one of my absolute favourites!

Summer in Sweden is really unbeatable, especially with views over water like here.

The Bird Buddy

For Mormor and Morfars birthday I gave them a joint gift this year. I had kind of purchased it planning to gift it for Christmas, but then I decided that better they get it now, so that I could help them install it. I had bought them a Bird Buddy! 

This is a bird feeding house, with a camera powered by sunpanels on the roof; that is attached to an app where you can see all the birds visiting you, up close!

The app even tells you what species it is, and keeps a record for you of your visitors. It is very cool.

During the summer of course, there are not a lot of different visitors, but we received a Hawfinch, a European Bullfinch and a Great Tit quite quickly. It was really exciting every time a new bird came to the feeder!

The fun thing is that I can access the app from everywhere, so I can sit at home in Abu Dhabi and keep live track of the birds coming to feed. 

I am so looking forward to the winter season though - when hopefully MORE species will come visit the feeder.

Mors Dag

I can’t really blame the kids that it is a bit tricky to keep track of when you celebrate what, since it seems to be different in each place. 

In the UAE Mother’s Day is on a specific date, so not always on a Sunday (21 March), in the UK the date changes every year as it follows the date of Lent, so this year it was 19 March. In Denmark and NZ they celebrate on the second Sunday of May - and in Sweden on the fourth Sunday of May…

Linnea has made sure to just send some congratulations on each Mother’s Day she was aware of, ha ha, why not?

 

I was happy getting to spend this Swedish Mother’s Day with at least one of my kids, well, mostly. 

We dropped him at the train to go back to Copenhagen in the afternoon. Thank you for coming!

Mormor's birthday

I continued my trip by flying across to Sweden to go visit my parents. I landed at Landvetter and they came to pick me up. We then went to Alingsås to pick up Lucas, who had taken the train up from Copenhagen the same morning.

We came just in time for Mormor’s birthday! Hip Hourray!

 

We ended the day with a beautiful double rainbow!

It's great when Lucas comes to visit. Because he is so tall, he can be helpful in so many ways!

 

And, he turned out to be just the perfect height for Elicia, being able to pass clear between his legs, to play peek-a-boo!