Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Oh Tannenbaum! The pleasure of chopping you own tree on your own grounds! It is not the most handsome tree on earth but I was up to my waist in deep snow with a rusty small ax- and alas- here it is, spreading heaps of light and pleasure!

Happiness is a warm hairy friend!

Time for a real Christmas kiss of sorts!
Sis and Hälge yesterday. Hälge is a great kisser and a pony with some personality to say the least. Stubborn, with a temper and very authoritarian in a flock of four (Arabs) of which he is by far the smallest! He also one brown and one green eye. Hälge.
Note how he is starting to curl his upperlip in anticipation of the kiss!

My princesses..

Isabella, now 5 months old and growing fast..

And Thalia 2,3 years old. Cousins they are and my two grandchildren as well - but they never met. (So far) The huge, wide Atlantic is between them! So sad. But they surely will when growing older. Thalia has already been to Europe twice. But that was before my sweet Isabella was born..

Assange is reportedly..

..released on bail in UK today.
A small step for man - a bigger step for mankind!
(Photo from: Aftonbladet, Sweden)
PS No no how wrong we were. A few hours after the decision, the district attorney lodged an appeal against this and Julian Assange has to remain in custody. The pending extradition to Sweden of Assange is now called "The Honey Trap" by his supporters. DS

Winter is gaining momentum..

..and the mice are moving indoors. (I don´t blame them!!)
However, I am getting increasingly annoyed that I am never, ever, the first to taste my breakfast bread! Well, that´s the price one pays to live in an old farm in the countryside.
And I guess - it´s worth it!

To kill the messenger:

Life of a whistle-blower is not easy. Looking back on history - a few more of those might have served mankind to avoid a holocoust or a war or two - no matter whether the messages are/were to be internet- or horseback carried..
(Photo: The First Post)

Not quite December yet..

..and we are already drifting into a Christmas mood. Plenty of snow has fallen the last few days here.

I have a constant fire going in my new fireplace! I had it installed just in time! The temperature dropped to subzero in a few days here in Gotland. Before we probably had the "warmest" weather in Sweden due to the fact that the surrounding Baltic has been acting like a radiator. In spring - it´s the opposite.

Christmas market at Bläse Old Limestone Kiln

Lacey snow patterns..

The Bläse Market in the limestone kiln with an old sepia photo of the hard working men who used to work here in the old days.

The Bläse chimney.

One of the huge hearthes in the kiln.

Gotland wool and sheepskins for sale.
Observe the sales lady knitting while serving the customer..

Today we celebrate the first of Advent. And we light up the very first candle.

My backyard today.

Two horses in my sister´s meadow seeking warmth and snuggling up close to each other. I thought for an instance that Dr Dolittle´s Push-me-Pull-you had come to visit us!
Here is another picture on the same theme by Gerry van der Wait of photo-africa

How I love these..

..old greeting cards from the beginning of last century by Swedish artist Jenny Nyström!

Jenny Eugenia Nyström was born June 13 or June 15, 1854 in Kalmar, Sweden; died January 17, 1946 in Stockholm. Jenny Nyström was a painter and illustrator who is mainly known as the person who created the Swedish image of the jultomte on numerous Christmas cards and magazine covers, thus linking the Swedish version of Santa Claus to the gnomes of Scandinavian folklore.

She -her work -is dearly loved by the Swedes-even the younger generations- in spite of a bit of the doggerel, old fashioned touch of those days. She was enormously popular and still is - and surfaces today mostly in Christmas and Easter times in wallcoverings and greeting cards.

She was extremely productive (and commercial alas!) during her lifetime and her artwork indeed reflects a great deal of the dreams and hopes of her era.

Of being a woman driver..selfsufficient and a bit arrogant.
Could this one possibly have been painted around 1920? The time of the suffragetts..
when the women in Sweden were able to cast their votes in political elections for the very first time?

Or the old fashioned housewife happily baking not quite appearing to think about politics for the moment..

The beautiful Santa Lucia - a symbol and saint that the Swedes strangely enough worship when she "comes to life" every December the 13th when in traditional celebrations, she appears as a young woman with lights and sweets.She is one of the few saints observed in Scandinavia. In some forms, a procession is headed by one girl wearing a crown of candles (or lights), while others in the procession hold only a single candle each.

Jolly Easter!

Birthday greetings from Mom and Dad!

"Georgie Porgie Pudding and Pie, Kissed the Girls and made them Cry.."
(Where on earth did I get that from..?)

The young shepardess.
A postcard from Karin saying many dear greetings..

This is from Ester wishing little Erik a Merry Christmas.

I think this one is a prize winner! This Easter witch is scratching her head when discovering a sign arriving at the Brocken reading: "Admission fee with cat: 1 Crown. Without cat: 50 öre!"

Great pics of a young Obama:

I found these photos on the net and have no idea on "when," " where" or "who" snapped Barack in his Panama. Anyone?

Homemade is best!

Anyone who ever tried to assemble an IKEA piece of furniture will get a big laugh from reading IKEAS new a 140-page coffeetable baking book "Homemade is best" presented in a unique and spectacular way:

Inspired by high fashion and japanese minimalism,the idea of the book became to tone down the actual cake and put the ingredients in focus.

I tilt my hat for these great pics by photographer Carl Kleiner
and stylist Evelina Bratell for this great work!

The baking book contains 30 classic swedish baking recipes everything from small biscuits to large cakes.

Thalia sporting Daddy´s white Borsalino ..

..last summer at Martha´s Vineyard - the beautiful island south of Cape Cod in New England.
Here she is almost two years old.
A little lady already!

/Photo by Mum/Dad, mainpulated by Granma in Virtual Painter!/

I finally got around to..

"Izzy"

..make a watercolor of baby Isabella - my second grandchild. Here she is, captured at the age of three months! I almost forgot the satisfaction of handling the paint brushes after months of total focus on "house renovations!"

Finding the truffles..

Nena and Darwin - with the "Black Gold" of Gotland!

Truffle snooping..

Today, we had booked a professional truffle searching Lagotto Romagnolo dog by the name of Darwin, to search our premises for the delicious truffle Bourgogne. As it turned out, Darwin sniffed out half a kilo of the "Black gold of Gotland" in a very short time! Did we celebrate with a glass of Bourgogne! Yes!
Now my whole kitchen smells of truffles...
Here are a few of them after Darwin had claimed his commission!
Not bad harvest for a truffle beginner like myself!
Oh joy!

Picking out lambs..

Yesterday we went to visit a sheepfarmer to pick out two new young lambs for my sister who already had two - Hildur and Signe. The rams that met us were quite impressive, curious, friendly and handsome dudes! Future fathers of the sheep group, so to speak..

Here Sis is picking out one of the year old lambs to bring along as soon as she has been impregnated. The lambs alas. Not my sister!

Sheep are never called "sheep" in Gotland. They are all "lambs" - young or old. The babies are simply called baby lambs ="Lammungar" (Swedish).

Here is one of the lambs we picked. We already named her Gertrude! The other sweetie is pitch black and will probably be named Ruth. All very old fashioned names picked from our grandmothers´generation.

It will take a while until they can be transported back to the farm. Meanwhile, autum is
falling and the colors of Gotland change..