Ullared, take 2

After having helped Linnea with her room glow-up, Mum and I continued back up north for the last part of our little trip - Ullared! Yes, again. Well, Mum hadn't been there for a really long time, so I was happy to accommodate and come along.

After arriving late afternoon, we spent a few hours in the shop and had dinner at the restaurant. Then we stayed over at one of their cottages before going back in the next day to complete the shopping. Got ourselves some fika to enjoy during a pit stop driving back home to Skara:

Mum's Ullared-haul!

Single room shopping!

Three weeks into the term, Linnea finally found out that she was getting a single room! Hallelujah!
So one part of our Skåne-weekend was the mission to go shopping for what else she might need now, that she had a whole room to herself. I had promised her a big rug for example, as the plastic red floor in the rooms is super ugly; and some big (fake) plants.

So after our overnight in IKEA-land we picked up Linnea and continued to Helsingborg. The plan was to cover Väla Shoppingcenter, but it took us all day to browse the second hand, and furniture shops. 
All three of us stayed in a hotel in Helsingborg for the night, went to Pinchos for dinner, and the next day we returned to Väla for some "normal" shopping. There was a need for new jeans for Linnea, and some other bits and pieces. 

All in all, mission complete, and we returned to Svalöv with all our new treasures. We set Linnea up, had dinner, and then stayed in a Guesthouse nearby for the night, before we continued on to our next stop.

Ullared shopping raid

Linnea finally got on a flight back to Sweden, after having been bumped several days in a row. She was home in Abu Dhabi to reload a little bit, before she is now going to - live in Sweden!

She has applied to and been accepted into Fridhems Folkhögskola in Svalöv (Skåne, about 40 minutes away from Malmö), to study at 'Allmän Kurs' and get her general qualification in Swedish that she needs for higher education. 
A brand new adventure awaits, and she will be boarding at the school; which means that she took the train from Copenhagen when landing early in the morning, and I drove down to pick her up in Varberg for us to go straight to... Ullared!

I had promised her a shopping raid when she got back, to kit out her new room. 
Unfortunately, she will be in a shared room, so we couldn't get too many things as we weren't too sure how big the room was going to be. We have put her on a waiting list for a single room, but until then we concentrated on her bedding and some storage. Still came away with a completely overfull trolley!

Happy happy shopper!

I bought her a Harry Potter Lego-set as a moving in gift, which she decided to build straight away.

She came in time to spend another week with Mormor, Morfar and me in Skara, before school started. Lots of organising, packing and repacking was done.

The Grand Bazar

Monday morning Linnea, Nathan and I were on our own; so we decided it was time to take on The Grand Bazar.

This is one of the worlds largest buildings, containing a network of over 60 covered streets. It has been in business since its foundation in 1461, and its the worlds oldest covered market. 

We were actually after a leather jacket for Linnea, and there was also a specific handbag she was keen on. But the prices here were not really market prices, like we have been use to from Thailand, Hong Kong or Singapore. They were really hiked up. Even with haggling, we got nowhere near the amount we were prepared to pay. 
So we had to give up, and just had a wonder and took it all in for a bit. A bit disappointing, but there you go.

Swedish Candy

On the weekend there was a big happening here in Abu Dhabi, at least if you were a Swedish person - the opening of the Swedish Candy shop in Yas Mall.
A whole shop full of Swedish pick-n-mix!!

It is run by a Swedish couple, in a collaboration with the Swedish chain 'Hemmakväll'. It felt almost exactly the same, with hundreds of different kinds of Swedish candy. Not just pick-n-mix but also Marabou chocolates, Estrella snacks, flavoured sparkling Loka water and other kind of goodies.

Obviously, the price is not the same as in Sweden... Usually you would pay anywhere from 6,98 SEK (yes, at EKO) to around 14,90 SEK per 100 gram at the usual supermarkets; that is the equivalent of 2,30 AED to 5 AED.
Here, the price is 20 AED (60 SEK) for 100 gram... wowsa!

I still had to pick myself a small bag though, of course! A very small bag, just two of each of my absolute favourites. You have to support small businesses!

So no, I will not come every week for my lördagsgodis (=Saturday candy), but it's good to be able to on the days when the Swedish candy cravings become too big!

Lisbon - Day 6 - Solo day

So, the last day in Lisbon I was on my own, as Nathan got up at the crack of dawn to go catch his homebound flight.
It was a sunny day, and I was on a mission to source a Lisbon Christmas bauble for my tree, so I decided to walk into the city to find a souvenir shop we had passed on the first day.

The city Christmas tree was now fully up, but no lights yet.

I found my Christmas tree baubles, and some other small souvenirs. Mission complete and after another coffee and pastel de nata-break, I then decided to walk up to a view point we had passed in an Uber earlier in the week. I got well rewarded with beautiful views!

Around 15 kms later I stopped by a restaurant not far from the hotel and ordered myself some dinner to take-away. Lonesome dinner in the hotel room, while Zooming with Linnea and Mormor.

And early the next morning, waiting for my Uber to take me to the airport - this little getaway was over.

Thank you Lisbon! It was a great week!

Falkängen

Falkängen is situated in Hällekis, it used to be an industrial street that has a long and interesting history. Nowadays it houses lodging and conference facilities, as well as craft shops during the summer months. We have visited many times before, as it is very cosy, and I love having a browse around the many offerings of the craftsmen selling their creations here.

It was another warm day, so of course we had to take a fika break:

We did end up doing just a little bit of shopping, Linnea bought a silver ring and we got a birthday gift for Morfar.

London shopping

One of the things that was highest up on Linnea's list of things she wanted to do in London, was going shopping. Shopping for brands she cannot find here in the UAE, but mostly shopping for books. She had done her research and our first stop after having reached our hotel and dumped our suitcases Saturday afternoon, was the massive Waterstones bookshop on Piccadilly.

This is actually not only England's but EUROPE'S largest bookshop, with almost 13 km of bookshelves!

We spent a significant amount of time in here. So long that even I got tired in the end after having browsed all the art books, and had to find an armchair to wait for Linnea to finish.
But this visit to Waterstones also included a fire alarm and an evacuation. And as we hadn't paid for our books yet, we had to patiently wait outside with all the other customers, until it was all cleared and we were allowed to enter again.

A very happy girl, with a whole canvas bag FULL of books!

We found many Christmas trees, and did a lot of Christmas shopping. Mostly we were on the hunt for Christmas presents, but of course we also got some treats for ourselves here and there.

On our last day we took the bus down to Harrods. It was a bit of a disappointment Christmas decor wise, but always an experience, of course.

Loved taking the bus, sitting on the top deck of the double deck buses right under all the Christmas lights!

The Dunlops

The weekend after his birthday Nathan went up to Dubai to meet up with - ... Sammy!
Well, Sam and Kicki actually had a weekend away together down here in the sandpit, and Nathan kind of crashed it! No, not really, everyone was happy to spend a nice evening together, it had been a while since we saw Kicki. They went for a vegetarian Uzbek restaurant, which apparently was surprisingly good.

The next day the boys attacked Marina Mall. As Kicki wrote to the below photos on her Instagram, "Busy smashing stereotypes on gender based shopping behaviour", ha ha!

Slight issue

While in Grums, we visited a big outlet, just to have a quick look. I managed to find something though, these shoes in a lovely coral colour, that were down to 89 SEK (30 AED) from 399 SEK (130 AED). Bargain!
Not that I really needed more shoes, but at a price like that... a no-brainer really!

So I grabbed the shoe box, checked that they both had the same size, paid - and off I went. Put them in the back of the car, and it wasn't until I got back to Skara and I wanted to show my new find to my Mum that I discovered this...
Erhm, hang on a minute! Slight issue here... *Duh*

Such a bummer!
Both shoes were size 40 yes, but they were both right foot shoes!! Now what?? A good three hour drive away from the shop I couldn't just pop back.

Well, after a few FB-messages back and forth with the shop, they very kindly posted off both the left shoes to Pia in Malmö, as I was just about to leave Skara and they wouldn't have made it there.
Unfortunately they didn't make it to Malmö in time either for me to bring them home. Lucky Nathan came just a week later, and he could bring them back for me! Pia kept one pair, as we have the same size, and I finally now have a full pair of these good looking (and super good value) shoes!

Sparlösa Rune Stone

On our return to Mormor and Morfar we decided to do one last outing, to somewhere we have been wanting to go for a while, to discover the Sparlösa rune stone.

This is one of the most mystic rune stones in Sweden. It is kept just inside a small building next to Sparlösa church. 

This rune stone has an amazing history, and the scientists are still debating the runes, the images and the exact dating of it.

It was discovered in 1937 having been part of the church wall for centuries with only the front of the stone being seen. When it was removed from the wall, the runes and images on the rest of the stone was seen for the first time.

The runic text on this stone is so mysterious that scholars disagree, on almost everything. Some say that is is a legal document covering a land deal, according to others it is a monument over a fallen king. Probably it was erected in the beginning of the 9th century.

It has the largest runes ever found. They are 50 cm tall and cover most of the front of the stone. Why they are so exceptionally large is unknown (normally runes are around 10 cm in height).
What is known is that when the stone was about 200 years old it was repurposed and reused, so next to the gigantic runes there are more "normal" sized ones inscribed.

Normally rune stones are extremely local, but on this stone experts have found signs of contact with most of ancient Europe: Stockholm, England, Ireland, Rome, Holland and Denmark.

The image here is a viking ship, extremely detailed. You can even see the nails holding together the gunwhale, marked out with dots.

This image shows a warrior on a horse, accompanied by a dog. This is probably a hunting scene even though it is unusual for someone to hunt armed with a sword. This is probably the man named Öjuls, mentioned on the stone.

After the visit to the rune stone we went to Vara to fika at Nordpolen.

And I even managed to do some shopping this day too! I returned to one of the shops I had visited with Carin, regretting not having bought a specific pair of trousers there. Ended up getting the whole suit, as it was on mega sale by now!