Medieval Times

After our blissful weekend Dale had to go back to work so we all accompanied him for a tour of his research laboratory. Afterwards we were all going, huh? You're really smart Dale and pretty darn cute too!

Then we took it down a notch and went to lunch for some pizza. Pizza's in Sweden are huge and are meant to be per person but I can never eat more then half, tops. So of course I was yet again the foreigner asking for a take away box and getting silly looks. But it was worth it because I just love the thin crust and piled high with cheese pizza here. 

After lunch while Dale worked the rest of us went to the Museum of Medieval Stockholm. It's a free museum underneath the Parliament. The museum has some pretty cool artifacts, and some pretty creepy artifacts. You can see the original wall that surrounded the whole city to prevent it from being attacked, a viking boat, and some real gallows. We had a good time learning the history of Sweden. 

While we were at the museum there was a Baltic States meeting in the Parliament so we got to see all the big wigs from all the Baltic countries exiting the building. Although, we aren't up to snuff enough to recognize any of them. 

Unfortunately this was our last day with Katie and Martin and they were off to Italy next where Martin proposed. Congrats you two! Can't wait for the wedding. Our time together is always too short but maybe there will be an opportunity at HP? ;)

Love Always,
Matilda

Buffaloes who roam

Sorry for the lack of posts this week. My college roommate Katie and her boyfriend, now fiancee yippee!, Martin were visiting. Then Dale and I went to the Basque country to visit our ex-roommate Edu. So it's been a bit busy with no sign of slowing down. But as always we've been having a blast.

On Katie and Martin's first day in Stockholm I sent them to the Vasa Museum and met up with them for lunch afterwards at the always amazing Rosendal's Tragarden. I just love strolling through the flowers and enjoying whatever tasty dish they are serving.

Then we went to Skansen to see the zoo and the outdoor museum, but mostly to see the zoo animals. Since Katie and I are alumni of the University of Colorado at Boulder, we were particularly excited to see the buffalo! European buffalo are surprisingly different then American buffalo, they are much smaller here. All the animals had recently given birth too so it was fun to see so many baby animals.

Since the weather was good, we made our way to the beer garden at Södra Teatern for happy hour overlooking the city and to meet up with Dale after work. As we went to the beer garden we made our way through Gamla Stan and of course I took the cheesy Stockholm picture at the Royal Palace - and it's too cute not to share!

We had fun catching up and taking in the view. Dale and Martin talked lasers and accounting while Katie and I chatted about more serious things, like shoes. :) Finally we ate dinner at Herman's which is a vegetarian buffet overlooking the city. The food was amazing and our hands down favorite was the eggplant lasagna, yummy! After so much adventure we decided to call it a night and we strolled back home to enjoy a night cap on the patio.

Love Always,
Matilda

Stockholm Pride

Pride in Stockholm was a whole week long event with lectures, movies, and parties at night. I just love when the buses have flags and in Sweden they have flags for Swedish holidays, EU holidays, the royal family's birthdays, and apparently for Pride too. I was soo excited that the buses were sporting rainbow flags all week. It's the little things in life.

The only event Dale and I went to though, was the parade. The Stockholm Pride Parade is supposedly the largest event in Scandinavia. It was definitely the most people we had ever seen in Stockholm. Just before the parade began people walked the parade route selling coffee from a dispenser on their backs in case you need your coffee fix while watching the parade, you are covered here. They love coffee so much! It is pretty obvious that Scandinavians are the highest consumers of coffee in the world (and after surviving a winter here I know why).

What surprised me the most about the parade was that it was very political. It was mostly made up of different political groups marching to express their beliefs.

And of course they hauled people around in garbage trucks. If there is one thing I've learned in Sweden, it's that they think it's really fun to haul a group of people around in the back of a truck. In May when the high schoolers graduate they ride around in the trucks as a tradition. It's pretty silly I think but they all seem to be having fun so that's good.

Of course, there was some of the more American pride parade festivities like dressing up crazy and having a good time. But in my opinion there wasn't enough of that. Of course, I was first introduced to pride parade's in the Mecca of pride parades - San Francisco.

I don't know if it's really the largest event in Scandinavia but it was a lot of people!
Love Always,
Matilda

M/S Blue Charm

In the states I'm a groupon fanatic but the groupon deals in Stockholm are just not as good. More often then not they are for makeup, hair salons, cellulite reductions, etc. I guess we know how the women here are so beautiful! I kid, kid! Anyway, there was a groupon more in my the category recently and I jumped on it. The deal was for a 3 hour champagne brunch cruise through the archipelago on the M/S Blue Charm. Normal it costs 345 sek per person but thanks to groupon I got it for 170 sek per person, a pretty great deal not even on Stockholm standards! The boat itself was pretty and was flying the big Swedish flag just as all boats here seem to do. Dale really wants to buy a boat now and fly the US flag. Maybe someday.

Inside it was very nice and we were greeted with champagne.

 There was also a live piano player and he was a lot of fun. He played all sorts of music and even got some of the people on board to sing, including Alan! We had a lot of fun listening to the music and singing along while watching the islands pass by.

The cruise went out to Vaxholm and back (no stopping at Vaxholm) and we saw lots of the traditional Swedish cottages.

The food on board was mediocre and more of traditional Swedish food then 'brunch'. But we were glad Alan got to try all the Swedish classics like herring, new potatoes, raw salmon, and even snaps!

After the boat was back in Stockholm we sat in the harbor talking and watching the seagulls.

Once we had digested our brunch enough and we were hungry again we decided to go out to dinner for sushi. It's sort of become a tradition for the three of us to eat sushi together so it was fun to make it an international tradition. We have several sushi places by our house but since Alan was visiting in July a lot of restaurants were closed for the summer. After walking a bit we finally found a sushi place that was a bit fancy but it was tasty too! And we all went a little out of our comfort zone and tried some different things then we were used to and we weren't disappointed.

It was fun having Alan here and getting to relax with him!

Love Always,
Matilda

Alan's Birthday

Alan was visiting Stockholm on his birthday but unfortunately he and Dale were sick (and I ended up catching it too). We didn't want to waste the day though so we went and saw the final Harry Potter in 3D! This was the first time Dale and I had been to the movie theater here. The tickets were 140 sek per person, which is just over 20 dollars, compared with a movie in Colorado which costs 10 dollars. But at least it was in 3D and we all loved it so it was worth it. They don't dub the English movies but they do put subtitles up. One thing that was different is they assign seats in the movie theater but that was actually kind of nice. It made it so we didn't have to worry about getting good seats. After the movie we went out to dinner at Bistro Boheme and ate on their glass enclosed patio. The food was decent but more than anything it was just nice to sit 'outside' on a semi crumby day.

Happy 23rd Birthday Alan!

Love Always,
Matilda

Alan in Stockholm

Back in Stockholm we took Alan sightseeing a bit. The guys wanted to go to the Nobel Museum. I had gone in March with Emma and Nicola but I decided one more visit would be ok. We had a good time learning about all the amazing people and their accomplishments. Dale was particularly excited to find a chair Nobel Laureate Jerome Friedman (physics 1990) had sat in. Dale met Friedman a couple years ago and was particularly impressed with him.

Next we went up to the city overlook, we love taking visitors there and admiring the city.

Here's a view from the overlook towards the West and my favorite bridge, Västerbron.

Dale ever got into tour guide mode and taught Alan all about the city. He's such a good big brother.

The weather was great so we went to an outdoor patio at Södrateatern to drink a beer, chat, and enjoy the sun. 

It was a great day exploring the city!

Love Always,

Matilda

Summer in the city

It's summer time in the city! Since it's July the Swedes have made an exodus to their countryside cottages - it seems like almost everyone and everything is closed for July vacations. So the city is currently a tourist playground, at least what's open is anyway. I've been enjoying hearing so much English around and I get stopped for directions enough that I almost feel like a local. Long days mean Dale and I have time in the evenings to go on picnics after work. We did a dinner picnic in Haga Park the other day which we walked to from our apartment and saw this sunset and maybe a dozen hot air balloons drifting by. That was pretty neat to watch!

I also got Dale to succumb to Stockholm prices and take me out for a cocktail. We went to a rooftop bar overlooking Stockholm which was too packed with hipsters to get a good picture of the view, we'll have to return to get that picture because it was gorgeous. I got a Moscow Mule and it made me miss Autumn since she loves those!

From there we went to our favorite blues and jazz joint in Gamla Stan, Stampen, and enjoyed relaxing to some good tunes.

Once the band was done we called it a night and walked home through the beautiful streets of Stockholm. I haven't got sick of this city yet!

Love Always,

Matilda

Good times and great oldies!

After Dale's parents left we got another weekend with Laura and Logan! The weather was great and we spent our time just wandering the city and checking places out. My favorite part though was relaxing at Mälar Paviljongen. I just love that restaurant and I think it's about perfect on a nice summer day to relax on the water and watch the sun slowly go down.

Nothing compairs to a great day relaxing with great friends! I also can't get over the midnight sun. There's something so mesmerizing about it.

Love Always,

Matilda

Midsommar

One of the biggest holidays of the year in Sweden is Midsommar. Midsommar is celebrated on June 24th in Sweden which was the longest day of the year in Roman times. Midsommar is a pre-Christian celebration (although it has come to be the celebration of the nativity of John the Baptist in Christianity) and it is a pagan holiday celebrating the longest day of the year and the fertility of earth in the summer. In Sweden it is celebrated by decorating a maypole with greenery and then raising the pole. Next you dance around the pole and sing songs.

Young girls pick flowers to make into crowns to wear during the celebration and I thought those were pretty cute. Legend has it if you pick seven different kinds of flowers and put them under your pillow you will dream of your future husband. I didn't try this so I don't know if it works. :)

We all attempted to dance along but the singers didn't do such a good job of explaining what you were supposed to do, so after a couple attempts we ended up standing by the side watching the festivities.

After the traditional songs were sung it was time to eat and we headed off to a picnic spot with our Swedish friends. Our friends are really great and go above and beyond to make sure we experience all things Swedish. Like, for instance, aquavit and 3 different types of herring for midsommer. Ok, they probably would've had all that even if we weren't there because that's what you do on midsommar but our friends are still great! 

The aquavit was better then the kind I had tried before and so was the herring so it was a pleasant surprise. While I was photographing the picnic spread Little Miss Jane got right in front of the camera lens. That cute girl is a ham!

We spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing in the park before we came home and crashed. It was a great day in Sweden! Unfortunately, Dale's parent's left early the next morning and we were sad to see them go! Good thing so many people love us enough to visit!

Love Always,

Matilda

Tourists in Stockholm Day 3

For our third and final day of being tourists in Stockholm with Dale's parents, it was a rainy day. So we went to the Natural History Museum to watch an imax show called Deep Sea at the Cosmonova theater. The theater was huge and we all enjoyed the show. It's always interesting to learn about underwater life! From there Dale gave us a tour of his lab before we went to the Ice Bar! 

It's a bar made entirely out of ice, the glasses, the walls, the tables, the chairs, it's all ice. The ice is harvested from a river in the north of Sweden, the same ice used to make the ice hotel. It was pretty touristy but it was a lot of fun, and the drinks were good too!

Once our allotted time was up in the Ice Bar we walked to Rolf's Kök to get some dinner. I later learned they are famous for their Ox Cheek but none of us tried that. I had the fish and it was delicious!

After dinner we walked home and stopped for some godis (candies) from 7-eleven. Despite the rain, it turned out to be a great day!

This was our last day all to ourselves with Dale's parents and it was great to get to spend some time with them. We are so lucky they were able to visit!

Love Always,

Matilda