I am in the news! (You can too!)

Improvements!

The new staircase! Finally! I can now run upstairs and downstairs without risking to fall on my nose! This is indeed some great improvement!
So I will dash off to Visby for some "paint-over" with a white, transparent color today. I was told yesterday that some of the steps were made of wood produced on this farm since the old owner had a bit of a lumberyard (in this barn below - view from my bathroom window) and had equipment to plane the boards himself from trees of this very ground .This is quite a good feeling to know when you climb the stairs to your cosy bedroom on second floor.

The old "easy-to-fall-on-the-nose" staircase...How happy I am to get rid of you! You filled your function over 100 years now. So take a break!

100-years of layers of wallpapers..

The old house desperately needed a new staircase leading to the upper floor. (See why - photo below). So Bosse and Erik came today and brought in a new and definitely more practical one. (See below). When we were tearing down the old one, Bosse showed me the examples of various wallpapers he found in the house of the staircase.. I think I counted at least 10 layers of various wallpapers, qualities and patterns from about 1918 and onwards. I will save a few and hand over to the Gotland museum.. Pattern tresures hidden in the wall..

Leafing through the decades..

Changing tastes and fashions..

The Art Nouveau/jugend era personified!

A modern staircase arrives Monday morning..Yipee!

The old stairs..

My jolly carpenters, Erik and Bosse on the early Monday morning starting their daunting task..

Happy, happy Valentine´s..

..with a rose for you - for every month of the year..

There are quite a few antique features..

..around this old house I have now moved into. Part of the house was built in the 1880´s and has hardly been touched at all. Today I came down with a cold and spend most of my day in bed dying of boredom..So I amused myself by taking the time to document some of these features with my camera. I have grown quite fond of them over the past months and I assure you that I´ll will keep them all - as long as they functions are reasonably workable..

She is our new ambassador to Chile..

..Eva Zetterberg (top, right) who landed in Santiago two days ago. Eva´s last position was ambassador to Nicaragua where all the Gotland neighbours on this picture came to visit her. Including me who stayed with her for a good month and gave her a hand in moving into a new residence outside Managua some years ago. Eva keeps a summerhouse at Gotland where she threw a marvellous farewell lunch before her departure some time ago. We wish her good luck in her new appointment and I can´t wait - along with the rest of this crowd above - to go to Chile and visit her in the near future.

Yesterday she became an American citizen..

.. Hinda ,my sweet daughter-in-law! She, together with 122 other new Americans originating from a number of countries including Finland, was sworn in a in touching ceremony at the Washington magistrates with judges, and speeches and flying standars.."It was like right out of a film!" reports her husband Malcolm in a mail from Washington. I bet there was a bit of celebrations last night with bubbles etc at the Woodley house! Here is Congrats from Gotland and Pia amidst deep snow!

February flowers in the garden..

It is been surprisingly springlike in Gotland over the past few days. Gotland has about the best climate in Sweden even grapes are grown on this Baltic island!
Today I found these three kinds of flowers in my sunlight garden. Oh joy!
We hardly saw any snow at all this winter and we actually had very few days of sub zero temperatures!

Completely out-of-tune..

This is the supper of last night. Downright out-of-tune.. In Sweden, the crayfish season is August. In fullmoon. Sporting crazy hats, bibs, singing endless and awkward "schnapps songs".
Last night was almost fullmoon. And 6 month too early for the crayfish-eating-tradition. But who can wait? In Sweden, this behaviour is considered almost hedonian. But for a few maniacs like myself it just has to be..
Sunday we spent all day at an auction in Tofta south of Visby. The barn was full with eager buyers partly because of the fact that the auction included a lost property sale staged by the Visby police.
I landed two very good bikes, one old fashioned hand carpented wash stand with handpainted marbling and a beautiful Venetian chandelier for very good prices. This had to be celebrated in a good fashion. With gourmet Spanish crayfish and Swedish Reimersholme schnapps! We just sang once. Too busy gobbling up one packet of those little red things each! Believe it or not - this morning I got out of bed at 7AM and started happily polishing the crisp crystals of the Venetian chandelier and watched the raising February sun sending promising sparkels on the crystals and into the livingroom. I will now go and ride my new bike - some exercise is surely needed!

A rat is a rat is only a rat..

For two days now I have halted all the restoration- and interior decoration activities on the old house and picked up my paint brushes instead. I need to do that once in a while to be able to breathe properly..This is an oil painting I call "Shedding some light" - the very first I made in this house where I intend to fix myself a great studio with all my painting gear later on.. First, one has to focus on getting bedrooms, kitchen and living room the in order.
And to get all the rats out of the basement!
When I first moved in here I was a bit taken by all the strange sounds in the night. "Maybe it were the spirits of all the souls that once lived here who wanted to check out the new owner" I thought and pulled the pillow over my head. But rats they were, simply and plainly, and they all lived downstairs in my cellar connected to my entire house through an intricate system of rat channels.
Ok. I kind of like rats and mice knowing them as intelligent animals i e: I don´t jump on chairs and scream when I spot them - but this was going to far! They even muched the labels of my empty wine bottles being hungry and obviously had a habit of sharpening their long teeth on my plumming pipes. Enough is enough! And I called in the professionals to do the extinguishing job. With a bit of a heavy heart.
"No poison - set traps I said..."
And efficient they were. We caught the first rat yesteday and threw him into the nature. Glossy peppercorn eyes was staring at me. And big it was. And dead, departed and deceased. Its long tail rigor-mortis-erect and stale like a pencil waiting for the sharpener..
I must say I dread a little to decend into the old basement for some time to come. But it is here I keep my washing machine. So I have to face this for a while more. It was estimated that the amount of rodents might be 20. Or 200! explains the Anticimex guy! (The house has been empty for over a year and they really had time of their lives to make themselves at home..) Oh noooo...
However: One the other hand: In Africa in my various homes, I once in a while had snakes in the loo at night (imagine having a hang-over and entering the bathroom in the wee hours looking for an aspirine and discover a couple of snakes intertwined on the mirror shelf - thus multiplying "the snake numbers" in the mirror and in the eye of the heavy headed beholder..) and an occational scorpion thrieving in the bath tub. So..what´s the big deal!
A rat is only a rat..
After all.