Live by the Sun - Love by the Moon: DAYS 132 - 134

July 29 - July 31 - Meeting My Swedish Cousins

Another long train ride going from Copenhagen to Stockholm. We're getting used to waiting in the stations and riding escalators. This one was amazingly long, so I had to take a picture.

This was the LONGEST escalator ride EVER.

When we arrived in Stockholm, we had a quite a long trip to go our host's home. They live about 30 minutes away from the downtown area. What was interesting about this situation was that Malin was nearly 9 months pregnant and she said she wasn't going to accept any more couch surfers, but we were glad when Maurizo did as we couldn't find another host.

This was our "couch/bed" for 3 nights. Camilo & Malin's bed was behind the partition.

Rich needed to plug in the the computer, so he worked in the small hall way.

The two bedrooms on the right were for their male flat mates (one night we saw a female, too)

Camilo & Malin and their two purebred dogs. They are soon-to-be parents, too.

These dogs were the cutest things, but there were 7 of them. CRAZY! There was us, our hosts, the baby-to-be, two flat mates, an occasional girl friend, and a mom and dad dog. That makes 16 TOTAL!!

The puppies stayed in the kitchen except when they were fed. They were let out of the cage and onto the kitchen floor. Two bowls were put out and the food was inhaled in about 10 seconds flat. They were hoping to be sold soon for some pretty good thorough-bred prices.

Rich was invited to eat with Malin for a late-night dinner

Eating together in his happy sun shiney kitchen with the 7 puppies.

We went the next day right away to the Swedish Embassy office where we could look into getting a family extension. We waited our turn for about three hours.

We were on Day 88 for staying in the Schengen countries, and you cannot stay past 90 days (in a 180 day period) or they can send you home or revoke a big penalty on you. Since we had relatives in Sweden, we thought it might work to have them help us to get an extension.

A little family history background:
In 1870, my great-grandpa, Ole Olson came to Kansas from Sweden with two of his brothers. They each staked out a piece of land adjoining each other. An older brother, Daniel, stayed at home in Gardebyn, Sweden.

He ended up taking over the farm and named it Bom Garden. I had always wanted to meet my Swedish distant cousins (a dream that my father never was able to fulfill). My father had a copy of this newspaper article from 1977 when Sven and his family came to Kansas for the 100th celebration of the Olson's coming to America. He and his wife, Ingalil, and their two children - Annette and Peter are shown here.

I have been in contact with Sven, Ingalil, and Annette over the past year, so now we will finally get to meet. Sven wasn't able to meet in Stockholm because of health reasons, but his grandson, Christopher (Annette's oldest son) came and drove us all around. It was a wonderful tour.

Ingalil and Christopher met us at the Embassy with their paperwork.

Getting our first glimpse of beautiful Stockholm - so clean and tidy

Changing of the Guard Ceremony

Ingalil is the leader as we try and find a place to eat in the Old Town.

Vikings & Trolls - they were everywhere

We went to a Turkish restaurant and had different kinds of kebab dishes. Mine was very tasty.

It is great to finally meet Sven's wife, Ingalil, and his grandon, Christopher, who just received his Pilot's License.

Ingalil looks radiant with her handsome grandson, Christopher

What a wonderful afternoon learning about Stockholm and getting to know relatives.

We went about 20 minutes north of Stockholm to Taeby, where Sven and Ingalil have lived for several years. He remembered our conversations on the phone and was glad to see me. I actually had tears in my eyes. I was so happy to finally meet the man I had heard about when my dad was alive and had wanted to meet. I also saw the resemblance of my grandfather in him who had died when I was only about 14 years old.

What a perfect hostess Ingalil was, offering tea and cookies and sharing photos of Sven's family. Sven's father actually looked a LOT like my Grandpa Olson.

Sven and I both share the same great-grandpa, Daniel Bohman Olson.

Christopher barbequed a wonderful steak. The Swedish Bearnaise sauce was scrumptious.

The following pictures are actually of our 2nd visit with them a few weeks later on August 12th. We stopped in again for an afternoon visit after we had gone to Norway. Ingalil had us for dinner again. Sven was happy to see us.

Their patio is beautiful

Although we're not related by blood, we felt like sisters - we had such a nice time together.

Aren't her shoes just the cutest?

She took us on a tour of her beautiful home. This is their spacious family room downstairs.

Such a cute home-made sitting chair. I believe Sven made this as he was a carpenter by trade. So was my father and my grand-father. I'm thinking that my great-grand father was, too. It runs in the family!

An old fashioned spinning wheel where Ingalil has worked hard at through the years.

This is a typical Swedish rug that most households have. I would love to have one one day! She actually made this - can you imagine the time she put in on it?

Ingalil made this quilt, too. GORGEOUS!

1951 - the year of my birth. So many home-made things in her home. She was very eager to show them all to me.

I enjoyed playing on her piano. I have missed mine. I don't think I have missed too many days of playing a piano since I started lessons back in 1957.

Many Scandinavian people have told me that pianos are not wanted any more. People can't even get rid of them for free. A person either wants a small electronic keyboard (everyone has small flats) or nothing at all. So sad!