Stephanie's Birthday Wkend in Photos

woke up to this... which you just can't beat.

As Andrew has put it "there's really nothing better than her smile, is there?"

Nope. There really isn't. Though her hair in these photos offers serious competition. 

Took the ferry into the Archipelago again- this time an hour trip to the popular island of Vaxholm

Found the (only!) small beach, where mommy got in- Laska CHASED after her and rescued her, and then frantically hurried back to Kitty who was enjoying the shade with Daddy.

 Thank goodness we were all together again, able to relax and play, and climb on rocks!

Kitty fell asleep, and we enjoyed a birthday Fika with this idyllic view- Andrew chose several delicious goodies from the cafe, and they did not disappoint!

...however Kitty didn't sleep for long. I think she knew she was missing out on the yummy treats, so she decided to enjoy some of her own choosing...

namely, these yellow flowers. definitely got mad when mommy fished them out!

      We were first in line for the ferry home so that we could grab an outdoor seat, have a few beers, and enjoy the scenery of the archipelago!

 Laska got rather bored with the scenery.

Kitty did NOT get bored of this pear.

We met this guy in the tunnelbana (subway) on our way home from mass.

(Stockholm's subway system has been called the longest art museum in the world)

Got VERY EXCITED, and a bit scared (and wet) from this fountain near our apartment.

And then completely crashed- it is exhausting being 29!!!

 All in all, a beautiful weekend. Thank you all for your birthday wishes and love- and most of all, thanks Mom for life, the hard work you did for me 29 years ago, and the many years thereafter. I love you!

Our Darling Daughter

Kateri has learned to say "Momma!" She can say this word with many variations. "Mom! MaMom!! and Mamamamamama!!" Are all quite common. She no longer cries at night, just stands up in her crib, and yells ongoing combinations of this magical word until somebody comes to her.

She continues to be a happy, sweet little girl, curious and cheerful. And quite mobile! She scoots and crawls, and pulls herself up on almost everything. I am constantly running around the house trying to 'childproof' things before she gets to them. everything everything EVERYTHING goes in the mouth. and boy does she get mad if you take it out. Her face gets all intense and her head sort of shakes from anger, and she BITES your finger. and then grins at you and giggles while you wince and say sternly "NO NO Kitty!" (or in my case, Nej! nej!- trying to speak Swedish whenever possible)

Lately she has not really been interested in her own toys, but much prefers Laska's toys. Laska sometimes looks at me and wines as Kitty scoots around gleefully with his stuffed animal or pull rope... and the last few days Kitty has been putting our socks in her mouth just like Laska does. (her own as well, every time we take her out in the stroller, after a longish period of silence we peak in on her, and her previously socked and shoed foot is bare and exposed to the chilly weather, and both socks are in her mouth)

We both continue to be madly in love with her. Delighted, charmed, proud, and amazed.

In Sweden, We Leave Notes

We have now been here two weeks, and I'm already the proud recipient of  3 notes! I haven't gotten this much attention on paper and pen since my horde of secret admirers in Junior high:)

The first note we received was slipped into our mailbox (just a slot in our apartment door). It was written in English, and from our next door neighbor. The letter informed us that she (we are only assuming it is a she) is terrified of Laska, and the she has trouble sleeping at night and doesn't want to ever leave her apartment because of our dog. yikes. I wrote back to (her?) that I was so sorry she was scared- that he is a very very nice doggy, and if he has ever barked or growled at her (I have never seen her in the hallway before, so I don't know when this could have happened) it is simply because he thinks she is in our house- Laska completely believes this entire building is our home, and gets a little agitated when others enter:) I assured her we always will have him on a leash, and that he will absolutely not attack her... haven't heard back from her, but I have started referring to our dog as "Laska: The Terror of Solna."

The second note was written in Swedish, and caused me a bit more stress. It was taped to the laundry room door yesterday. The laundry room situation deserves a bit of a back story.

We had been here a full 9 days before we discovered the laundry room. It appeared to be nonexistent. We live in the "A" side of the apartment on the '1st' (up a flight of stairs) floor of a 5 story apartment building. As you enter the building there are a number of warehouse looking cement doors that you pass by on your way up the stairs (or to the tiny tiny claustrophobic elevator) which will get you to the residential floors. I assumed the laundry must be behind these cement doors. No luck. I did have a key that let me in, but one door was full of bicycles, one of cleaning supplies, and the door under the stairs didn't open at all. Upon the discovery that there is a "B" portion of our building, and a back entrance, I went on a journey of discovery in that scary basement area- and encountered several more unmarked, creepy, dungeon looking cement doors. I tried my key on several doors along the windy, abandoned, dark corridor... many remained locked, a few opened to reveal bicycles or empty storage bins... With only a flicker of hope remaining, I tried the last door, and Wah- la! it opened to reveal a dismal, dark,  laundry area! three strange washing machines and a "drying cupboard" that looked like something from a sci-fi movie. Possessing "atmosphere" or not, it was a laundry room, and we could now have clean clothes!!!!! hooray!

Okay- so having discovered the laundry room, I have now been doing very small loads, (the machines are small) and just hoping that the buttons I press will do somewhat of a decent job. Things were going well - I was on a tight schedule, but had prioritized Andrews work shirts since he was out of clean ones (again we had quite a pile built up before we found the laundry) until I returned to the dungeon laundry room and discovered a note taped to the door. Though written in Swedish and undecipherable, my heart sank as I pushed open the door... My fears were realized. There in the middle of the dungeon floor were two loads of my laundry sitting in a wire crate absolutely sopping wet, small pieces of lint swimming in the lake beneath the clothes.

Again, the note was in Swedish, but i think it said something like this

" Dear neighbor,
Welcome to Sweden. I waited until your clothes were as wet as they could possibly be, and then I dumped them out into this bin. Then I poured a few buckets of water on top of the bin. I know you have a baby, and are doing this task in the dungeon while the baby is strapped to you napping, using the few precious minutes that your baby actually naps every day to wash your husbands shirts- but you seemed way to excited by the fact that you discovered the dungeon laundry, and you needed to be taken down a few notches.  You are clearly an ignorant American if you can't figure out our system for reserving the laundry, which involves using a key that you don't have, to unlock a number that you don't know on a board of of locks that you don't understand, and re-lock your lock in a time slot that allows you to be Dungeon Lord of the Dungeon Laundry for three hours. The moat I have created of your laundry is a mere warning. Next time you mess up, I will put you in the torture drying closet machine.

Cheers."

Oh yeah, that third note was from the same woman, in English, inviting me to coffee sometime. Well, I guess Dungeon Lord of the Dungeon might not be that bad after all...unless it's a trick.

Housekeeping

As earlier mentioned, our apartment is quite small, so keeping the place very tidy is essential! I believe I am developing great habits of washing the dishes immediately after cooking! (As I type this my hands are still slightly moist with soap suds from me and Kittys afternoon lunch) Our "kitchen" isn't really a kitchen at all, so much as a strip of counter top space (with a stove and a fridge) that runs along the side of the living room. Pretty quaint and cute to have everything in one spot... but absolutely important to keep clean!

A funny (but serious!) problem we have is that SWEDISH BROOMS ARE STUPID!!!!! I sweep several times a day (thanks to Laska) and the floor space is so small that it should be a simple chore- however the broom that was left us in the apartment is ridiculously short. It seems a child's broom. Okay, fine- we had to deal with a lot of silliness for this rental, this one was a simple fix- buy a gown up broom, right? Wrong!!!! We have been to SO many stores, searching for a real broom, and to our continued dismay (and amazed bewilderment) this mini sized broom is the only kind that is sold! We cannot sweep without bending over, and my back aches after mere seconds ... it is the right height for Kitty, I suppose I should teach her to sweep.

If anyone is planning a visit, you are charged with 'carrying on' an American broom!

Into the Archipelago

Yesterday we took "Cinderella" boat on a two and a half hour voyage into the archipelago. We spent the day on a nature preserve island called Finnhamn. It was very beautiful and rustic. A coworker of Andrew's invited us to spend the day on this island with his family- they have a semi permanent tent on the island set up on some very large rocks. The entire island (in fact most of the archipelago) is very rocky, when people say "go to the beach" they mean, sunbathe on the very very large rocks. Great fun to jump into the COLD water from these rocks. Even Laska joined in the fun- though not Kitty, the water was a bit too cold for her. The boat ride too and from the island was stunning, many of the rocky islands decorated with darling (and surely quite expensive) red and yellow summer houses. We left the house at 9 am and returned at 11 pm quite exhausted and ready for bed!

Interesting stuff we learned:

• There are supposedly 30,000+ islands that make up this archipelago that stretches all the way to Finland
• They were created by glaciers 15,000 years ago that were 3 kilometers thick. 
• The rocks are indeed smooth but have interestingly straight grooves in them. You can tell which direction is generally north by these grooves and the position of the sun as the glaciers slowly melted from south to north because the southern parts became warmer quicker.
• Though there are many state-owned islands in the archipelago, there are only 3 islands that are nature reserves similar to the island of Finnhamn.
• You shouldn't rent a boat unless you are extremely good at navigation due to all the shallow rocks in the area.
• Slippery green algae make getting out of the water quite difficult! Even for dogs ;)

Happy Sunday to all  back home!

Getting here...

...was much more complicated than expected :) I know you probably want to read more about Sweden, but I feel like the days leading up to our arrival (and our arrival itself) is a pretty interesting story.

So after moving out of our house (and forgetting to leave one of our garage remotes, more on that in a sec) and getting everything we packed up to Nick and Erika's house (I did finally get up there before midnight on that last day of July), all we had left to do was:
-fit all of our stuff into a single car
-drive to Chicago
-stay one night in a hotel
-drive to the Airport
-check Laska in
-check ourselves in
-leave our car someplace for Sam to pick up
-get back to the airport
-get through security
-board the plane
-get off the plane
-get through passport control
-pick up our luggage
-pick up Laska
-get through customs
-somehow get to our apartment
-meet the housing relocation agent at the apartment to get the keys
-"continue life as normal"

What could go wrong?

The answer ended up being "none of the truly important things" which were checking in, boarding the plan, and getting through passport control and customs. All of those things went by swimmingly. I was actually a bit (irrationally) upset that the work visa and dog immigration documentation together weren't examined in minute detail. Alls the better it wasn't, but some part of me really did wish they put us through "the ringer."

What ended up providing the most interesting bits of our "getting here" story related to fitting all of our stuff into a single car. All I can say is a big THANK YOU to Nick and Erika for solving our problem for us. We used a large black waterproof (though we put that to the test) bag to tie three pieces of luggage and the BoB to the roof of our Subari. This enabled the rest of the car to be completely filled with stuff. All told, we ended up checking six (6) pieces of luggage, one extra-large dog crate (that took up the entire trunk of the car), gate-checked the BoB, and carried on two bags, a car seat (w/ base), and two long umbrellas. Fun fact: we only ended up leaving Laska's dog leash and harness, the changing pad from our diaper bag, the "Beourdeux's Butt Paste" (could have a more toned-down name but it's the best one out there in our opinion, thanks Erika), and some wipes on the plane when we rushed off - all in all a pretty good outcome. So back to the car: on the way I learned that the ties of the black bag strapped to the roof of our car would loosen to the point of becoming unstrapped due to the friction of the wind over time. Luckily, after stopping at Mirror Lake State Park near the Dells (where Mirror Lake was not too mirror like, quite icky on the beach and covered with lots of green stuff) and attempting to buy Subway (line was too long but, upon walking back from not buying anything I noticed one strap completely undone and the others loose) I re-tightened the straps and tied the ends in a knot (while waiting in the Taco Bell drive thru, FYI their chicken quesadilla is delicious) to prevent it from happening again. Whew. Oh, and Sam, if you are reading this, could you return that black bag from the trunk to Nick and Erika for us? We also left a couple of their baby toy's and two coffee mugs in there. Maybe I should email you too. Thanks Sam. And thanks to Nick and Erika (and kids!) again.

We did arrive in Chicago safely - for those who weren't aware we flew out of Chicago instead of Minneapolis-St. Paul because there was a direct flight using SAS to Stockholm that was ideal for Laska. Any option out of Minnesota made going through customs quite a hurdle. Oh yeah! When in Chicago we took a non-toll way of getting to the hotel that took us through incredibly beautiful farm land where it seemed like every farm house was mansion-esque. It was quite remarkable. Though I was driving and didn't see it all Stephanie was constantly oohing and ahhing over them all. Who would have known? It was on Illinois 64 between 39 and 355. Anywho, we got to Chicago and checked in at our quite pleasant hotel quite easily where they gave Kateri quite the interesting welcome present that changes colors:

We enjoyed walking around the hotel area for a bit and seeing a massive thundercloud-storm-head roll in. Apparently just hours before we arrived it had hailed! Crazy weather, that Chicago. It did end up raining quite a good bit during the night. It put that black bag (still strapped) on the top of our car to the test. Only a little moisture made it through, no damages but duly noted that you shouldn't just leave water sitting on it waiting for evaporation to somehow sneak it's way through the zipper and into the inside (at least that's my assumption on what happened ;) We also took time to mail the remote control to our garage back to our house that we forgot to leave and print out some critical documents, one being a note on Laska's crate to endear him to all the various handlers through the travel process:

When we finally landed in the Stockholm Arlanda airport (one of only two you can fly in to with a dog from the US, the other is in Gothenburg), made it through passport control (quite easily as I mentioned), Laska actually was delivered to us before the bags were! Upon boarding we had actually told one of the flight attendants about Laska in the belly of the plane and she so kindly confirmed that he was okay. It really set our hearts at rest and let us enjoy the flight. All in all superb service (though the check-in process did take about 2 hours). Needless to say,he wasn't happy until he was out of the crate:

We did end up getting all our bags, stacked on a single push trolly and the BoB, and went to the taxi stand...where they all just looked at us. Let me explain, the taxi stand is different there than in the US. In the US, things are a bit more orderly in that you wait in a line, and the taxi's wait in a line, and you just meet up like a zipper. Not so here. There were just several rows of taxi's lined up calling at each person who walks up to them. There was a person to help control the potential chaos, but I only saw him help us while we were there, noone else. So, seeing us walk up: 2 adults, one baby, one dog, 8 bags, and a big stroller - they simply looked at us. The controller-of-chaos did find us two cabs that we fit things in. One of them was a Mercedes van type thing, quite posh.

Well, we made it to our apartment safe and sound. Met our housing relocation agent. Was let in to the apartment, and we "continued to live life as normal"...ha. More on that later ;)

Vi är här!

Hurray! We had a wonderful first week in Solna, Sweden, where we now call home!:)

Kitty did a great job on the flight, as did Laska (we think anyway- he seemed fine when we picked him up at baggage claim, just VERY eager to get out of his crate!). We flew through the night and arrived at 8 am on Tuesday morning... Kitty was quite well rested, Andrew and I were exhausted!

Fueled on delicious kaffe we pushed through the day, exploring our new hood. After an initial discouraging discovery that our apartment was not move in ready (rather dirty, and lots of the owner's things littering the closet/shelves making the already small apartment feel very claustrophobic) we are quite delighted by our neighborhood and building. Though Laska is certainly less than thrilled about the 3 room living quarters, Andrew, Kitty, and I are absolutely making do and we really couldn't be in a more perfect location.

We are minutes away from a small square, complete with a European-style fountain and we are surrounded by cafes, restaurants, and small grocery stores. Andrew has a 15 minute walk to work and we are also very close to the subway (tunnelbana) and train station (pendeltåg). There is a dog park half way through the walk to Andrew's work so Kitty, Laska, and I have met Daddy day after work and we stop at the dog park on the way home. Laska is proving to be a wonderful social outlet for us, we have already met many people (and even exchanged emails!), all fellow dog owners or dog lovers.

It seems small children, and very old ladies, are especially attracted to our pretty pup and interacting with them has been great opportunity for practicing our svenska. (You get much older than the young children, and much younger than the old ladies, and everyone is all too eager to speak English)

We spent a very happy Saturday walking all around our city, stopping for coffee (and then later öl, aka beer) and snacks along the way.  We found a movie rental store and picked out several DVDs to rent - all children's videos since they were the only ones available in Swedish - so we are about to pop some popcorn and watch Frost! (Frozen :)

All our love to our family and friends back home! Some pics coming soon.