Jade's Musings: Sweden Vacation 2013

We had a lot of fun in Sweden. We were there July 3 (Wed PM) - July 11 (Thurs AM) and time flew! Here's a synopsis of what we did:

7/3 (Wed PM) - Per met us (Bryan, Kimbra, Andrew and me) at Arlanda airport (it's the first time we've traveled w/o Per-and the last time as far as I'm concerned: I feel more comfortable when he's there,) drove for 3 hours (from Stockholm to Väse) after already traveling for 16 hours, stopped in Kristinahamn to buy stuff & snacks at the store, met family at Lövås (Tore, Monika, Ann-Sofie, Sandra, Little Nils,) ate dinner, rested

7/4 (Thurs) - Went to a couple of stores in Karlstad (Willy's and Rusta,) ate Swedish pizza in Karlstad for lunch, celebrated the 4th of July at dinner where we ate Monika's yummy deer roast and mushroom sauce and a delicious American flag cake that Ann-Sofie made (sheet cake/cheesecake - haha!)

7/5 (Fri) - Day trip: Met Peter and Kerstin at their home (3 hours away) near Göteberg, met Per's friends (dinner at Torbjorn's house), (Erika and Torsten arrived from Gotland and Nils arrived from Göteberg)

7/6 (Sat) - Picked wild berries in the forest, celebrated birthdays at dinner (Tore 85, Monika 80, Nils 50, Me 45, and Andrew 20 this year) where we had a seafood feast including shrimp, red crawfish, and huge ocean crawfish from Göteberg

7/7 (Sun) - Looked at old things in the attic (Per looked at his China,) ate bbq steaks (horsemeat that the guys said was better than beef,) played Kubb at Lövås, posed for a family photo

7/8 (Mon) - (Erika and Torsten went back to Gotland,) ate dinner at a restaurant on the warf in Karlstad with Per's friends and spent the evening with them

7/9 (Tues) - Ate a smörgåsbord lunch

7/10 (Wed) - Left Lövås and drove to Stockholm, took pictures in Örebro, drove through the city of Stockholm (not the freeway) to avoid traffic and to find parking, walked in Stockholm for a second but left because we were hungry and cold, ate yummy Swedish pizza at a nice place after accidentally driving in the hood, checked into a nice hotel (Radisson) at Arlanda airport

7/11 (Thurs AM) - Per left early to fly on another airline, ate a delicious smörgåsbord breakfast, check out of our hotel, went on a bus to Arlanda airport

In my opinion, the second best thing about Sweden was the food (the best thing about Sweden was seeing a lot of the people I love.) Back to the food...everything we ate tasted yummy! From the chocolate to the water and in between, it all tasted great.

We stayed at Pirran's house (a smaller house by Lövås which we called her house although she didn't live there.) It was nice to have our own space. Bryan and Kimbra stayed upstairs where Per and I always stayed, and Per and I stayed downstairs where Bryan and Andrew always stayed. We swapped (and I didn't miss walking up and down the steep [and potentially slippery] stairs.)