More restoration efforts..

This is one of the loveliest rooms in the old part of the Gotland house. Sunny and with a great view of the lush garden this first part was built in the year of 1900, still with handblown window glasses that "lives" and are a far cry from todays industrial products. Unfortunately, they are totally unisulated as is the whole section of this part of the house. So I close it down for the winter. For this summer though, I made a quick makeover of the rooms with some old stuff I had from before for putting up guests that keep coming. Below is a photo I took of the same room before I bought the house. These are such rewarding excercises and a source of so much joy!

The library in the making..

Lately, I have been working on decorating my new library in the old house. My books which are part of my life as important as old friends had been in the moving crates far too long!
I went to browsing through Gotland´s second hand stores once again and found an old fashioned sofa and easy chair and bookshelves to march. With small means this TV/library room is slowly becoming quite cosy! Below is a picture what the same room looked like before I bought the house!

Sepia portraits..

May I introduce: Edla "Mollis" and Axel Ehrnberg, parents of my paternal grandmother.
An construction engineer, he had been born into one of  Karlskrona´s leading and quite wealthy families, and he was one of the people in charge of surveilling the construction of  the first railway through Sweden, the Stambanan - the principal artery of the railway system all the way from south to north in the last half of the 19th century.
That was quite a distance!

Since the hotels were seldom found in the remote areas in those days, Axel had to put up at various farms en route when on his working missions. At one particular homestead in Jämtland - where he stayed for a long time - he got to know the estate owner´s daughter, Mollis, and fell in love. She was a free, wild girl of the woods who used to ride with flying hair across the estate - which took 7 days to accomplish! A far cry from the corsetted ladies of upper crust Karlskrona in those days. But could the she be tamed this wild girl and moved south to the plush plutocracy of Karlskrona?
He slipped the engagement ring on her finger and left for six years and then he came back for her. Love seemed to have endured and he brought her down south to marry and meet the society of his home town.

I can see her in my imagination, sitting sipping coffee in a beautiful corsetted gown under the measuring glances of the upscale new world around her. She was never to ride again and to this day I wonder how she coped with this transition..
I met her when I was a little girl, when she was very old and widowed, living with my grandma in a huge apartment in Kungsholmen. And here they are, above, she and Axel with a firm grip on to his field glasses, all dressed up and with the traditional backdrop of the photo studio. I think of her off and on and one day I will go north to her farm in Sveg and take a tour of nostalgia. I hope.

This is her daughter - my grandmother - Astrid - in Karlskrona before getting married there to Paul Isberg Sr. Below with her first born (not my father) She had four children. And the well-to-do woman´s choice of monsterhats..

In her old age, she spent her summers in Sandhamn where I grew up, so I got to see quite a lot of my grandma and hear the stories of her untamed mother´s adventures far up in the north in Sweden a long, long time ago. Long before love´s inevitable committments and the restrictions and the absurde hats of another different world put an end to freedom and adventure.
And the feeling of the wind blowing freely through the hair.

Sandhamn - on the the web..

..and dressed in the early signs of fall. The heather in massive bloom, the crisp mornings and the archipelago turning into a new set of colorings. The stillness before the start of inevitable the autumn storms.

The catch of the day..

..the perches of the Baltic in the Stockholm archipleago!
Not bad, hey?

Back in Sandhamn again!

The island is coming to the end of the season - a bit of calming down - and is showing its  most enjoyable side in my opinion. The sea is warm and so is the gentle breeze. The heather is in bloom, and there is a lingering smell of honey over the island´s moorlands. The lingonberries are in glowing red in the underbrush just waiting to get picked.

I have to ride one ferry from Gotland for 3,5 hours to the mainland, take a bus or car to the Stavsnäs outpost some 40 kms from Stockholm and then ride another ferry to the village of the island of Sandhamn (above) and then ride a bike for15 minutes to get to my house here. But you kind of get used to it..
On Saturday we will compete in the Sandhamn Open Tournament in Boule which is one of the high peaks of the season here.

Only the islands inhabitants or people with some connection to the island are allowed compete in this great gathering! The Tournament is traditionally closing with a banquet with prizes and speeches and there is dancing through the night!
The fishing season is peaking too, and there will be fresh turbot on the table tonight caught some days ago by a good friend in the waters close to Sandhamn..

Letting in the light..

Handyman Bosse came in last week and started to tear down a wall
between the living room and the pretty little front porch....

A new front door will be added in a few weeks with a matching window to give the porch a look of a conservatory. "Letting a piece of garden into the living room.." is the idea.

Helping hands..

After a hot summer´s day in Gotland busy working on the house restoration, we took a refreshing break on this decorated beach (all phallos symbols it is widely assumed) with the famous "Jungfrun" in the background, and had some great smoked shrimps with aioli from the little boat house nearby. Immediate rewards are sometimes needed! The renovation miracles take a bit longer!
(Meanwhile, we sold the small Beagle pup below to a nice girl from Uppsala!)

I have new house guests!

Yesterday they arrived! The ten weeks old "Snoopy dogs" - two lovely hunting Beagles!

I would love to have one - they are up for sale here in Gotland - but their owner would prefer that they find masters that are hunters! Which I am not!

They will be posted at Blocket, Gotland during the day.

The first pick..

Yesterday´s "harvest" from my garden- proudly presented!
I am now browsing for all kinds of recipies on "How to make fruit syrup of rhubarbs and that lovely plum marmelade my sister-in-law Ann used to serve with rusks at tea time.." This is all great undertakings but sooo very time consuming! For an old unexperienced "city slicker" like me!
Needless to say, my deep freezer is filling up with jam, marmelades and juices..
Makes you feel quite rich! Satisfied..
In my cellar I recently noticed all the hooks mounted on to the celing. For hanging rabbits and deer after the hunt. The rumor has it that he people who used to live in my present surroundings were rarley seen in any stores. They were quite self contained with milk,eggs, fowls, game from the woods, etc.
Well, good for them!
I feel quite happy with my berries and fruits! And I don´t mind going to the stores once in a while!
But..I have a baking machine! I might try to set a dough in it to make rusks to match the marmelades.
Maybe next year..

Shifting focus..

..from the garden (due to nasty weather for a couple of days) to the neverending interior decoration and renovation work of my old farm house, I yesterday went to the Second Hand Market in Visby and bought this little gem of a drawers chest for my bed room..

And an old card table with a flap for the adjacent morning room renovated this spring..

..and a well kept Emma easy chair..

This it what the room looked like last night with all the new items in place..

..and this is what the very same room looked like one year ago before I bought the old farmhouse..
The weather in Gotland is now gradually turning better, and for me, it will be in-and-out-of-the-garden again today with a big basked to collect all the fruit that fell to the ground during the heavy winds of the past days..
Meanwhile, this lovely little book is kept by my bedside these days of late summer. Check it out on the link above.I am sure you will just love it - as I do.. (Thanks Lina for this great gift!)