The difficulty of reaching 15000 steps a day

The small ferry crossing Glomma river

Glomma is Norway's biggest river, so there is
a lot of logic to the towns of Sarpsborg and
Fredrikstad being located towards the end of
the river, close to the sea.

In Fredrikstad the town is located on the
western side of the river and the old city of
Fredrikstad, actually a fortress, is on the
western side.

You can drive to the old city, but I prefer
crossing the river with this little ferry.
Many bring their bicycles!

In my friend's garden

Scandinavian summers are great.
Usually the temperatures are just like
I love them - not too cold, not too warm.
Cloudy, pleasant breezes,
ocassional rain.
Flowers. Berries. Mushrooms.

Though now it is really hot here in Moss -
a few days with over 30 degrees Celsius.
Weird...

To check the weather here you can click
http://www.yr.no/place/Norway/%C3%98stfold/Moss/Moss/

The perfect seam is not always perfect

It is always interesting to talk to people who are
passionate about their hobbies.

In the old town of Fredrikstad we talked to a man
dressed up in an old uniform showing different
the kind of personal equipment used by soldiers
in the past.

He then told us that when he wanted a uniform
for himself, he first gave the job to a seamstress,
but she did too good a job.
In other words, the old uniforms were made with
much rougher needlework.

To get the uniform the way he wanted and had
seen in museums, he made it himself.

Look closely on the photo!

He also told that he had twice participated in
reenactments at Waterloo.

I was once at Waterloo, but as a tourist.

One window, four doors in the old city in Fredrikstad

Saturday June 27th

My lowest number, so far.

Pedometer June 25th 2009

A little magic

Daddy's magic with Photoshop.
Thank you!

An unexpected surprise

Returning from work today, I found flowers
outside my door.
For the first time in my life, if I remember right.



Who had sent me these beautiful flowers?
Checking the card, I found it was one of
my internet friends from the UK.



Thank you Jackie, it was a wonderful present!

An evening of bonfires

Last night my friend R. invited me and our
Polish friends B. and S. to a public
midsummer celebration.
Around eight o'clock a big bonfire was lit.
Seeing these children trying to stand
closer to the fire, I remembered myself as
a child. There was the fascination of watching
the flames, but also feeling the heat on your
body on the slightly cool summer evening.



When the sun went down around eleven
o'clock, we were standing on a different
beach where a group of young people were
celebrating.



Then we drove to the private home of
R.'s daughter and husband.
There on their private beach, sitting around
this bonfire, they were enjoying the evening.
By this time it must have been close to midnight.



Thank you R. for a great evening!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midsummer

Kate

Getting bigger and bigger.
In September off on her first trip abroad.

Grandmother and greatgrandmother are
looking forward to see you, Kate, and your
parents.

Step by step

Angel in different weather

April 2009

Same angle on different occasions.


June 2009

A white wash cloth

My aunt Ruth knitted these white wash cloths
well into her nineties. They are made in cotton.

This year she died, 95 years old.



Today I was cleaning my kitchen sink, using
one of those white dish cloths.



She is no longer here, but the dish cloth is.

Then the thought came to me that so much of
what women have made through history, have
been practical things.

They cooked the food, but it was soon eaten up.
Perhaps somebody in the family remembered
the recipe.

They wove and made bedclothes and wall hangings.
Perhaps the wall hangings were kept.

They sew and knitted clothes for their children
and their families.
The clothes wore out.

My aunt's knitted wash cloth will still be here
for some time.
One day that too will be gone.

Doors

Old doors.
Doors with a personality.

They fascinate me.

First there is the closed or locked door.
You just revel in the design, the materials.
You wonder what is behind that door.

Then, sometimes, you get a glimpse inside
and you can compare your imagination with
reality.

Sometimes reality is better than what I had
imagined.

In this specific case, I was just interested in
the door itself.

Pedometer June 14th 2009

The Norwegian Lady

Today at the foot of the statue of the Norwegian
Lady here in Moss I saw a wreath.

It turns out that once a year representatives
from the American Embassy in Oslo come to
Moss to attend a memorial service for the ship
SS Dictator of Moss that went down outside
Virginia Beach in 1891.

I was told that those who attend the ceremony
sing the American and the Norwegian national
anthems.

The ship Dictator was built in Moss and had
a crew of 14, our guide told us today.
On the ill-fated day Captain Joergensen also
had his wife and four year old son on board.

Mrs. Joergensen and the boy and five of
the crew died.

An identical statue is placed on the shores in
Virginia Beach.

I wrote about this statue back in 2007.
http://rediscoveringnorway.blogspot.com/2007/02/moss-norwegian-lady.html

Imagine, a ceremony 118 years after the event.

Story about my grandfather

My Swedish grandfather was involved in different
political and social activities where he lived,
as I have told earlier.

This must have been in the 1940's.
It was hard for young couples who wanted to
marry to start a home. My mother says the
government gave small loans to these young
couples.

She says that my grandfather had been
appointed as one of those interviewing the
candidates for those loans.

She remembers how they young couples would
come, riding their bicycles, to the farm to talk
with my grandfather.

How big were the loans?
How long time were they given to pay back?

Was my grandfather's job to help the couple
fill in forms to be sent to some committee
after an initial interview?
Or did he decide himself if they should get the
loan? Probably not.

My greatgreatgrandmothers moving in

Not with me, but with their daughters.

Two of my greatgrandmothers lived on
farms in Sweden.

In one case the mother moved in with her
daughter's family in old age.
No pension back then.
The tradition is that this greatgreatgrandmother
cared very much for her personal hygiene.
Keeping her bedclothes very clean.
Keeping lice away.

This greatgreatgrandmother was taken care
of in that home till the day she died,
one winter.
To bury her in her home village her coffin
was transported over the ice-covered lake.

The second greatgreatgrandmother also
came to spend her old age with her daughter,
but in their case it ended differently.
According to tradition my greatgrandmother
was a strict and hardworking woman, perhaps
traits she had inherited from her own mother.
In any case, after a short time, it was clear that
these two ladies could not live in the same house.

My greatgreatgrandmother then went back to
her home village.

What happened next?
Did she continue to live with her two unmarried
sons?
Or did she prefer to live in a "fattighus" -
a house for poor people?
The story does not tell.

Polishing old wooden furniture

In my other country I think I once bought
some polish for wooden furniture, but I am
trying to remember if I used it and on what
piece of furniture.

Here I find myself surrounded by old
wooden furniture, so my new life has routines
for polishing furniture!

In particular I feel responsibility to keep my
grandparents' dining table in good shape.

One of the locals suggested using JO-NI
for that job, and I am quite happy with the results.

Pedometer

Today at two o'clock I bought a simple
pedometer. Now, as I am going to bed,
I have walked 5640 steps since two o'clock.

Ten thousand steps are considered a good
beginning for your daily routine.
That is also what I usually do during an usual
workday.

My challenge this month will be to increase
my activities to 15000 steps and see what happens.

Lesson from my grandfather: Dream to become a teacher

My Swedish grandfather grew up on a farm.
He was not expected to take over the farm,
that was the task of one of his other brothers.

According to my mother, my grandfather
wanted to become a teacher.

At that time compulsory education in Sweden
meant six years in elementary school.
To add to that, my grandfather took one year
at a "folkhogskola" and probably two
years at a private "Realskola".

When he was 22 his paternal grandfather died.
Following this, my greatgrandfather found
that the financial situation of the farm
and the family was disastrous.

In other words, no money for further studies
for my grandfather.

Within a year or so, my grandfather married
my grandmother. They took care of a farm
belonging to my grandmother's father.
Within the first few years of marriage they
had three children, one after the after.

My grandfather's dream of becoming a teacher
had become - a dream.

To make things even more complicated,
a few years later, fate intervened in a cruel way.
The brother who had continued the family farm,
was killed in a work-related accident.
My greatgrandfather asked my grandfather
to return to the family farm and help out.

My grandfather agreed.

He never became a teacher.

I don't think he enjoyed being a farmer.
I remember him sitting in his study,
hammering away on his typewriter,
talking on the phone, reading newspapers,
driving his car off to some political
meeting, perhaps being in charge of an auction,
helping other farmers with legal matters,
attending school board meetings.

Life's circumstances had moved him from
the dream of teaching to "doing the right thing"
of working on the family farm.
But within the confines of farm life he found
his "escape routes" and his passion in politics,
outside the farm.

That is at least how I see it.

Paths

Jerry challenges me and inspires me with
the quotes he sends me.
Here is the latest:

You enter the forest
at the darkest point,
where there is no path.

Where there is a way or path,
it is someone else's path.

You are not on your own path.

If you follow someone else's way,
you are not going to realize
your potential.

It takes courage
to do what you want.
Other people
have a lot of plans for you.

Nobody wants you to do
what you want to do.

They want you to go on their trip. . . .
(joseph campbell)

Norwegian search engine for kids

Kvasir.no is a Norwegian search engine.

Now they have created a special search engine
for kids aged 6-12.

kvasir.no/jr

The idea is
1. to make it safer for kids to search the net
2. to enable kids to find material relevant
for their age group
3. to direct the kids to material that is
user-friendly.

You can click on the icons on the top of their
homepage and find:

The World
Experiences (like TV, museums, art, music etc.)
Games
Sport
Animals
Nature
Human Beings
Space
Reading
Technology

The cute illustrations were made by artist
Iben Sandemose.

Numbers of Kate in Norway

According to the Norwegian Statistical Bureau,
there are 1279 females in Norway named Kate.

Important life skill

Some of the people I know have this
incredible knack of knowing really important
life skills.
I will have to remember what those skills are...

Today on StumbleUpon a new skill came along
- in a bottle.
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/1312399/a_cork_n_the_bottle_story/

I am just trying to figure out the occasion
where I proudly can tell that I actually know
how to solve that very specific problem.

Age and Wisdom

Wisdom comes with age,
and sometimes age comes alone.....

Success - definition stolen and slightly altered

SUCCESS:
At age 3 success is . . . not piddling in your pants.
At age 13 success is . . . having friends.
At age 18 success is .... having a drivers license.
At age 35 success is . . having money.

At age 53 success is . . . having money.
At age 81 success is . ... having a drivers license.
At age 83 success is . . . having friends.
At age 85 success is . . . not piddling in your pants.

The beach is crowded

Norwegians, in general, like to sunbath on all
possible occasions.
During the summer many local Norwegians go
swimming in the Oslofjord and tell me it is
just great.

As a child I remember taking dips in
the ice-cold river up in the mountains.
No more!
The Mediterranean is too cold for me, so
the Oslofjord is out of the question.
Isn't it good somebody invented hot showers?
:-)

Yesterday and today the temperatures have
reached around 28 - 29 degrees Celsius.
When we passed the public beach near the Kanal
Park in Moss today, the place was CROWDED.

Most were sunbathing.
Some were in the water.

June 1st in Moss, Norway.

Singing ladies

Yesterday I visited Gallery Kvinnelist
on Roed Gaard here in Moss, and found
these delightful singing ladies.



First I did not understand who had made them.
But when I looked closer at the first photo,
there was a note with the name of the artist.
Ingeborg Rørvik Lejon.



Googling that name, I found she had a website,
in Norwegian.
http://www.ingeborglejon.no/

There I found more of these singing ladies and
other figures to make you smile - and even laugh.
http://www.ingeborglejon.no/?page_id=180

I found a website for Gallery Kvinnelist in
English
http://www.kvinnelist.no/content/view/1/3/lang,en/

For those of you who read Norwegian,
there is also the website of Rød Gård
http://www.roedgard.no/xp/pub/topp/hoved/index.html
Rød Gård is worth a visit!