It's been some time since I've posted... about a week. Let's see...  We've still been working on the fence. It has taken longer than we thought, just like any project. But it is very close to being completed. Lotta and I working together are a force to be reckoned with. Yesterday we worked through the woods putting up the fence and it seems like we were going at light-speed. Today we should be done, and then we can move on the more fun things. Yesterday, after our speedy fencing session, we picked blossoms for dandelion wine and set them in the boiling water. Today, after we finish the fence and let the horses out to roam in their new pastures we're headed to the second hand store to get some bottles for the wine, even though it won't be bottled for another 5 weeks... it's still something to get excited about! 

 Here's a nice picture of Lotta, the farm mother, giving the horses some love. 

 Last Wednesday I went into Uppsala again to meet up with my WWOOFer friends from the previous farm. We had a lovely day walking around the city, I had yet to go into the cathederal so we did that, and wow was it something to see. The painting on the walls were so beautiful and detailed. and it felt just as big on the inside as it did looking at it on the outside. 

 After that we headed over to the parks and botanical gardens. They are the oldest botanical gardens in Sweden.  The gardens were donated to the University in 1787 by King Gustaf III to be used as a new botanical garden. So many different flower specimens. And such beautifully kept gardens. Having worked in peoples gardens before, I have an appreciation to the hard work that is put into ornamental gardens.

 Linaeus, looking good. 

 There were flowers amoung flowers amoung flowers. 

 On Thursday Evening I went with Lotta and the children to see Love play a moose in a school play, Klas Klättermus (Climbing mouse.). It is a swedish story about a mouse, very lazy and plays the guitar. He makes friends with all the other creatures and is very good at getting fed. I don't fully have the whole understanding of the story as it was in swedish, but I very much enjoyed seeing the children dressed as diffent animals singing songs. Lotta's children attend a Waldorf school, and it's very interesting to compare the Swedish Waldorf school system to the Waldorf that I know in Vermont, Aswell as seeing the Waldorf in Sweden fits into the Bigger Swedish school system. 

 Here's Lotta, setting some posts, a strong woman indeed. We've had some New WWOOFers come and go aswell. They weren't as excited about the work to be done here, and I don't think the WWOOFing scene was for them in the first place. 

 I went to Stockholm on Sunday for a graduation dinner and party for Clara's Class. It was so nice to finally get to spend more time with Clara!!!! The party was at a club that was rented out, and they themed the party so everyone dressed as Euro-Trash. So basically every look like they came from the era of  Spice Girls. It was so fun to dress up with my favorite lady! 

 The dinner was fun, it was many speeches in Swedish, class nominations, and whatnot, but I enjoyed myself anyways, it was fun to get to know some of Clara's classmates. I met far to many to remember even half of their names. And somehow I was obviously American. Besides the fact that I speak no swedish, some people could pick out the American in me before I even spoke! 

 Clara and I planned our Euro tour a little more. Our destinations are the following-Copenhagen-Hamburg-Amsterdam-Prag-Kroatia-Albania-Budapest-Berlin-then back to Stockholm. We hope to do this in a little over three weeks, and we Must be back for Clara's mother's 50th birthday. We'll see how it all goes, and that's mostly a rough outline of the place we hope to get to. We'll be doing better planning when we are together again for the summer in a week. 

I Heard about the tornado warning for Vermont, and I sure hope it was faulty. Mostly rain, hail, crappy weather? Let me know how things are for those of you reading! I'd love to hear about what's going on in my home country! 

Happy and healthy!

Things are all going well here! I'm very much enjoying being in a family atmosphere. The last couple of days have been very nice, and it's turning into summer quickly. On Saturday Lotta went off with the tractor to go pick up some friends that are living a home on wheels. Similar to a Tiny House. If you don't know what a tiny house is here's the site-http://www.tumbleweedhouses.com/ . They are parking here until school is out and then I think they are headed to a summer home somewhere near by. They have two children, Another Elvira and Noomi, who are the same age and go to school with Elvira and Ofelia. It's good because they all play so nicely together. After Lotta came back with her new neighbors some more friends of Lotta showed up to butcher some roosters. They had 5 roosters and that was far too many. The roosters were starting to get aggressive towards one another, as well as the children, so it was time to do away with them. After we caught four of them, I volunteered to help so I was handed some birds, holding them by their wings, we took them inside to butcher in the bathroom. I'll save the details, out of respect for you vegetarians out their reading. I can say though that this was my first experience participating in the actually killing of the animal. I can't say i enjoyed it, but it wasn't unbearable either. I did the plucking and saved many of the feathers for the girls. Ofelia and Noomi really enjoyed playing with all the feathers in a big bath of water outside, stirring it like a big soup. The next day we enjoyed the Roosters for Lunch! Tasted like chicken, but more wild. Not really sure how to describe the difference. But it was satisfying to eat something that I helped with providing.

The last couple of days Frank and I have been working on extending the grazing area for the Horses and Sheep and Lotta has joined us when she hasn't been with children, preparing meals, etc. We've taken up all the fencing in the area that will be extended out into a larger field as well as into the woods. By the way they own 40 hectares of land, which equals about 100 acres, half forest, half fields. We're hoping to be done by the end of the day tomorrow. All the post through the woods are set and we're almost done setting the posts in the fields, and we started putting the fence back up today. Wednesday I'm headed into Uppsala to spend the day with my friends that I met at the other farm. I'm looking forward to that. Then on Sunday I'm headed to Stockholm to go to Clara's Graduation Dinner. Her graduation isn't for another two weeks, this is like the pre-party. I'll spend the night with her and come back here on Monday, then join her again a couple days before her Graduation and be with her for another two months. We have a portioned of our summer planned. We have train tickets to Copenhagen at the end of June. I'll also be here for Gabriella's (Clara's mother) birthday and Clara's birthday. We're planning to go to a music festival for the weekend of her bithday at the end of July. And right now it looks like I'll be coming back to the Farm here in August! So far it seems like the summer is flying by, but then again, it's been a little over two weeks. I'm starting to feel the summer settling into my skin....
All the food here is so good. Lotta is a wonderful cook. I've been over eating and can feel my pants getting a bit tighter. I haven't weighed myself, I'm not really concerned with the number, what I am concerned about is my pants fitting me the whole summer, because I didn't put buying new pants into my budget......

Hope everyone is happy and healthy as well and don't forget to wear some sunscreen and drink lots of water! Don't want anyone turning into a raisin in that hot summer sun!

Feeling at home

For those of you wondering how my transition is going, I must say very well indeed. Yesterday was a holiday here, so the kids have a four day weekend. Below is a picture of the family at lunch yesterday.

From left to right, Gunnar, the father, Love (8 yrs), Elvira (5), Lotta, the mother, Ofelia (7), Denise (17) and Frank from Ireland, his shoulder in the right bottom corner. They own 40 hectares of land, half wooded and half fields. They have been developing the land they live on for 10 years and have many aspirations. Lotta is so lovely with a big heart and the same goes for Gunnar. It's so nice to be in a family invironment. There are also two other children missing from the picture, Oliver who is 15 and went off somewhere yesterday and Felicia, 18 with her daughter is in Iran visiting her childs father who is a refuge and was sent back to his country. Gunnar has 5 other children who are all grown, between the ages of 20 and 30. The first night I spent sitting at the kitchen table with Gunnar and Frank for a long time, about the farm here, the lifestyle they live and he described themselfs as not typical swedes. Being from vermont, the lifestyle they live seems totally normal to me, and I'm really loving it. We also talked about Steiner and Waldorf schools. He has had his children in the Waldorf school since 1989 and whole hearted trust in it. 

Since it was a holiday yesterday, the kids had the day off from school, aswell as today. Gunnar got some ice cream in the afternoon. Here's the children having their way with it. 

Ofelia and I made some Dandelion Crowns, in swedish it would be Maskros (translates to worm roast, but is the word for dandelion) Krans (crowns). 

Frank and I spent most of the day yesterday finishing planting hedges and mulching, meanwhile the children played with the hose. 

Frank and Love, cutting some grass.

One of the Dogs

Rasmus, a big playful pup.

Parts of they day was also spent getting the sheep back in the yard because they keep finding ways to get out. That was pretty entertaining. So we'll spend a lot of the day tomorrow fixing fence. I'm really enjoying myself here and really love the family.

Love and Gunnar went off today to the family's summer house to get the water turned on and cut the grass and things like that. We went into Uppsala, Lotta, the three girls Frank and I. Lotta hada  meeting about a teenage boy from Africa that she is hoping to foster, but unfortunatly the system makes it very difficult for Lotta to do so. She has such a big heart and really wants to give this boy a loving home, and he really would like to come live with them aswell, but unfortunatly there are many hoops Lotta must jump through. Right now she is feeling that the people in power are saying no just to prove their power and for her and the boy it's very frustrating. While she was in her meeting the rest of us walked around town and got some pizza. Then Lotta took us to Linnaeus Garden. It was very lovely, and it was fun to run around looking at the flowers with the girls. There was also a wedding going on the same time we were touring around the gardens. 

I feel so fortunate to have fallen into this family. I've been talking to Lotta about coming back in August as well. But I'm trying my best to take things one day at a time, and so far it's been working in my favor. I'm going to head out and take a walk through the woods with Rasmus. Hope you all are warm and enjoying some sunshine where ever you are!!  

Safe and sound

Writing from my new home here in Vänge. Very happy here so far. I walked almost all the way to the house when I was picked up my Lotta, my WWOOF host. She then brought me to her house, showed me around and within the first half hour, she showed me how to drop a sheep to the ground and trim the wool. How about that for a learning experience! They have 13 icelandic horses, somewhere around 11 sheep, rabbits, chickens, 9 dogs, mostly small, and one german shepard for hearding the sheep. He's a sweet heart. Lotta has 5 children, i think she said. Ranging from ages 5 to 18. I'm excited to meet them all. She left after we got the sheep to the ground and I started trimming. She had a conference to go to at her children's school. There is another WWOOFer here too, Frank, from Ireland. He left with Lotta to go do some things in town. So I've been here alone, but it's such a lovely place. I did some trimming, then came up to the house, had something to eat and cleaned up the kitchen a bit. Her husband Gunnar (I think that is the spelling, but i could be totally wrong.) just got home from work but went off again on a bike ride. Very nice man. I feel so at home here and can feel the family atmosphere. Not going to get my hopes too high, but so far things are looking up. I'm excited to get to know the whole family. I'm going to go settle my things into my room and maybe try again with another sheep. 

 One of the rabbits, looks more like a dog.

 New home for the next two weeks

 Doggy

 lovely kitchen

Some of the many dogs

All the children just came home, and in the middle of writing this I had to go outside to fetch the sheep because they were out and about in the neighbors yard. Seems like I won't have a boring moment here!!

Some Photos

Headed off this morning for my new home for the next couple of weeks. Here are some photos to enjoy until I post again.

 Debo and Anna down at the Lake

 Anders, the kind farmer.

 Karin, Lars Silver Hair and Anders at Lunch

Me, Down at the lake, practicing balance

 Planting Onions

 Anna and Debo, in the Kitchen. We spent many hours sitting, chatting at that table.

 Gustav, the Man of the House

 Mine and Debo' room

 Lovely German Girls

 Yay tomatoes!!!

Greenhouse

 One of the horses down by the stream

 Colorful lunch

View from our window

Let's be honest...

So I've been keeping my blog very positive to keep anyone from worrying about me. As you see on the website for the farm I am currently at, it looks very nice. Looks can be decieving. I had quite a lovely picture in my mind about what my experience would be like here and what the farm would be like. Having such big expectations can lead to bigger dissapointments. The farm here doesn't have much order. Not much at all. And the farmers grow veggies for profit. They work very hard, and they do appreciate the work us WWOOFers do, but it's not the enriching experience I hoped for. Debo and Anna are great company, but otherwise we're all working during the day and in the evening hanging around waiting for the next days work. So much chaos, tools everywhere. Not much or a schedule. To be honest Anders is the only one of the two that is working very hard. They are both very nice, but Karin is not so proactive on the farm. And she talks frequently about herself and how hard she works and how tired she is and blah, blah blah. But I don;t want to be too negitive. They don't work us to the bone and Anders understands that we are not on contract and he does not own us, so we can start and stop work whenever we want. |I'm so enthusiastic about making things better than when I found them, and helping other people with their task, and I've been that way a bit here, but realized my enthusiasm and hard work isn't really recognized, being that Anders has his hands full.

So let me explain to you the series of events from the last day or so. So I am in Sweden for four months and wrote to a few farms about WWOOFing in August. Then I thought, if i'm so unhappy here, why don't I find a new place to stay? Then while talking with Anna a bit she said ''You came a really long way to not be enjoying your experience.'' She's totally right! Her and Debo are here for other reasons, but we complain about things together. It's mostly petty complaining. And we are being fed and what not. Debo is here to get out of her comfort zone, find out what she can and cannot go without and to realize the things she really appreciates in her life. Anna is here because she is learning Swedish and making her way into a school in Uppsala for Organic Gardening and such things. They both have about a week left here. I on the other hand still have another three weeks that the farm expected me. So after Anna opened my eyes, I really started to think. She's right. I don't have to put myself through this. I'm only in Europe for so long. Why feel like I have to put up with things that aren't satisfying? I have all the power to change my situation if i'm unsatisfied, so why complain? I decided to be proactive instead. I proceeded to write to three or four farms near by and was planning on how I was going to tell Karin I'm leaving. I was a little nervous to tell karin that I am switching to another farm, Anna has been here since February and seen 10 people come through here to stay, two who only made it through two nights before they left. One said something along the lines of ''it's not you, it's me.'' which Karin understood and sent her on her way. The other girl was honest and said This farm is too crazy and unorginized for me, which Karin then turned into blame on the girl and made the girl feel guilty and wrong for feeling that way. So I was thinking of making up a story as to why I had to leave. Something about a sick family member or something crazy. But then Anna and Debo told me I owe Karin no explination. Anders is the one who should know why I'm leaving considering he does most of the hard work around here. The three of us have a soft spot for Anders. He is genuine hard working person, and always can find something to smile about.

This morning we started working in the greenhouse planting the tomatoes in beds. Anders I think could sense what was going on with me. He then asked in his swedish accent, so sweet, ''Everything okay with you today?''. Since He asked I figured I would tell him ''I'm looking for a new place to stay and will be leaving in the next couple of days.''.  ''Okay, can I ask why?'' This is when I started to get a bit choked up with emotion. ''You don't have to tell me, thats okay too.'' I let some tears fall and started to explain that it is not what I expected here, and I'm not getting the enriching experience that I hoped for.'' Meanwhile I'm trying to hold back my tears. He said ''It's okay, it's good to let your emotion out, so cry if you need to.'' We proceeded to talk, and I, between my tears, explained how hard I worked to get here and how far I came to feel unsatisfied with the experience. Also I told him some of my critsism of the farm and his wife sometimes makes my skin itch. He was absolutly understanding and had no problem with me wanting to leave. He said he gets critisized all the time, but the way his farm runs works fine for him and has for many years. We both have a common understanding there is no reason to change for others. The conversation ended with smiles and thumbs up and I continued my work for the morning.

 On break at 11 one of the farms I wrote to wrote me back and told me to call so we could Chat. I called, left a message and Charlotte, the woman called back within five minutes. She was happy to have me come and I was so happy to find a new place to go! She has been here before and knows Karin. She understands the situation I am in and gave me very good directions on how to get to her.

I then went into the kitchen where Lars-silver-hair and Karin were preparing lunch. ''So I hear you're leaving us?''  I then told her ''Yes, I just confirmed another location and I'm headed there tomorrow.'' She then responded by saying ''Well good because we could all sense your bad attitude and you were bringing everyone down. So better you take it along with you!'' I couldn't believe my ears. I was shocked, I had nothing to say to her. I've been here for a week, been so pleasant and working hard. Whenever she asks how things are I never tell her my complants as to save myself from an excruciating conversation. For her nothing is wrong and she does no wrong. She se's herself as wonderful and hardworking. And we have all sat through many lunches where Karin was the topic of conversation and she was the dominant voice. So I just turned around and walked out of the kitchen. Better to not waste my energy on an ignorant person. But I was enraged! So I decided to be like a Turtle.

Sometimes Debo, Anna and I get into some heated conversations about the rediculousness of this farm and Karin. The other day Debo said ''When I'm here and see the life these people live  I realize there is Nothing wrong in my life!!'' and we both laughed and laughed in aggrement. She then told me about this story her dad told her about a Wise turtle. All the creatures turned to the wise turtle for advise when things in their life seemed so wrong and hard and confusing. The turtle would then respond in a very calm manor ''Take things slow, enjoy every day, live your life and be happy.'' So now whenever we start to get all heated about Karin, or the Crazy life these farmers choose to live, we remind ourselves to be a turtle.

I realized that when I am unhappy, the complaining can become endless. What has now been brought to light for me is why waste all my energy complaining when I have complete control over my situation right now. Better to put that energy into making change.

The farm I am now headed to is a small family farm that supplies for themselves and some neighbors. They also have a few young kiddo's. I don't know too much about it yet, but the woman was very honest on the phone and very kind. Here is the short description they had posted on the WWOOF website.

''Långmyra Gård
Horses sheep dogs hens rabbits cats
Our vision is to only live on what this farm can give us.Many children around us. Activities: contruction of several buildings, preparing the vegetable gardens, training and riding the iclandic horses, , picking berries and mushrooms,cutting sheeps, forest work,
Accomodation in apartment in the barn with heating and kitchen.''


 I'll post more about my new location when I get there.  Wish me Luck!!

Happy Mothers Day!

So today was the first day without rain in since my last post. So cleansing to sit in the sunshine. Working outside, or with plants and dirt when it's raining can be a real drag. But the plants sure do love it. And the rain seemed to come just in time. We had just finished planting the onions the day before, and the ground was looking a little dry. So I imagine the onions are pleanty happy getting comfortable in the soil.

We get one day off a week here and I had yet to take a day off since I've been here. Really though Karin and Anders understand that we as WWOOFers have not signed a contract or anything along those lines so we can really stop working and take whatever days off we want, but they appreciate our help and letting them know when we will be taking off so they can plan around it. And since I live here AND they feed me, I like to earn my keep. Anyways yesterday I decided to work in the morning and made a plan to meet Clara in Uppsala. Above is a picture and that is the cathederal in the center of the city. Really wonderful city. Clara has a friend that lives there and studies medicine at the University of Uppsala. Here name is Also Klara, spelt differently.
From the farm, (which i posted my location from Uppsala one day, but I'm actually in Björklinge) it's a half hour walk to the bus, then it's another half hour on the bus to the city. The amount of bike in the city there is great! next to the bus station on both sides are bike parked row after row after row after row... and through out the city the parking areas for bikes continued and most of the time were filled! There I met Clara and we walked around, got a coffee, peopled watched a bit. Later we met up with her friend Klara, who is so lovely! Went back to her appartment, relaxed a bit then walked into the city for dinner. Klara gave us a nice tour, as a student of the city, she told us all about the student life there, we saw the library and the different sections of city.  They have something Called ¨Nations¨ which is very similar to frat. Maybe not the same exactly, but the same idea. We all walked around the church and saw it up close. I was reminded how small I am in the world standing next to the towering Cathederal.  It was so nice to take a break from the farm life for a bit and get to spend time with my favorite, most lovable Swede.

To be honest, being at the farm is not something very unusual for me. Sometimes I have to remind myself that I'm not in Vermont anymore. The climate is so similar to Vermont in the spring. But in the evening, I remember that I'm in a whole other section of the earth. The sunset lasts literally for hours. It can be 11 at night and for me I feel like it should be 8 in the evening. I woke up the other morning, for a wild dream about almost missing my flight to Sweden, and it was light as day when I awoke, so I figured it was about time to get up, eat breakfast and start the day. When I checked the time it was 4:15!!!! Luckily on one of my flights they gave us eye-covers to sleep with and I've been putting it to good use.

Right now we're spending most of our time moving plants into greenhouses, sowing seeds, planting starters, getting things going for the season. Also the greenhouse that got picked up by the wind, the last of the  strings have been untangled, and now we must pick up the framing, Anders has some welding to do, and I guess we'll be reconstructing it sometime soon.

Oh, and I skyped with my Mom and Sister for the first time today. That was nice. One and a half hours passed and it felt like no time! It was nice to sit and chat with them for so long though. But not to worry, I'm not getting home sick, I'm fully enjoying my time here and taking each day as it comes.

Anna, another WWOOFer has a computer I can use and connect my camera too, so hopefully I'll be posting photos in the next week or so. Until then here is the website for the farm where I am living. If you want to see Photos it's under ¨Bilder¨.
Ramsjögård 
Enjoy!

Rainy day

Today was a rainy day, but the farm work must go on! Since we finished planting the onions yesterday, i guess it's good timing for the rain. I spent the morning in the rain untangling the ropes from the green house mess. I wasn't out in the rain exposed though. From the closet of work clothes I found rain boots, pants and jacket. Fully equiped from head to toe, so I stayed pretty dry. I did find out later though my boots had some holes in the back, so I ended up with wet socks. Oh well. After lunch we prepared the beds in the third greenhouse for the tomato plants. Nothing too exciting going on here beside that. I did find out there is a thrift store near by, and I think we might make a trip there this weekend. Karin said the price is very reasonable. So I guess I'll see when we go...

Tonight Debo, Anna and I made pancakes for dinner. By the way, the WWOOFers have a seperate kitchen from Karin and Anders, so we are free to make what we want for breakfast and dinner, depending on what is available. During dinner I showed them some pictures I brought with me of my "kids". Not really my kids, but the kids I look after. I told them all the names and they laughed at how American the names where. Anna is also German, and they told me in Germany, for a child to be given an American name, like Kevin, is almost a curse. Debo swears she will never give her child an american name. There have been studies done about school children with american names in german school, and usually if a teacher reads the names from a list and one child is named something like Kevin, they automatically assume that child is less inteligent and less able than the other students. Same goes for that person later on in life if they are applying for a job. The person with an american name is seen as less qualified... I found that very interesting. Anyways, I'm going to find some better rain boots in case tomorrow is like today, I'd prefer my feet to stay dry. And don't forget, let me know what you want to hear more about!

I know you're reading this...

So those of you out there reading this... I know you're reading... give me feedback so I know what you want to hear about!!!!! Please! Don't be shy, leave comments!!

Anyways, today was another day of getting aquainted with the farm and the people here. We started the morning in the barn where all the sprouts and starters are. Debo (my roommate, a 28 year old girl from Germany), Sean (a 25 year old guy that is here after leaving his life in England, he's half Swedish half English), and I worked in there for a couple hours putting the winter squash into bigger pots. Time passed quickly with the three of us sitting and chatting. Then Sean and I started moving the celery starters from the barn out to the greenhouse. By the way, the greenhouse that blew over is still in a mess and will be for a bit, quite a shame and the metal will need welding. After that we took a short break, then planted the last of the onions. We all had lunch together. A broccolli quiche type thing, but without any egg and a yellow and red beet in swedish is rötbeta, and they were calling it that the other day. Debo asked me what it was in English and for some reason the word totally escaped me!! Karin does astrology and has offered to teach a class for who ever is interested, but we have to do some sort of special job for her beside farm work. So I think I will be dusting her china in her special cabinets.
     
After lunch we did the last of the onion planting and then we had the rest of the day to ourselves. Sean and I took a stroll down through the horse pastures (they have 4 horses) to take a swim in the swimming hole. And wow, was it refreshing!! After that Debo and I talked about making cookies and found a yummy recipe that we thought we would try. She does lots of cooking and baking at home so it was nice to shadow her in the cooking process. Before we could do that we had to go to the store to get milk, eggs, margerine and whatever else we wanted for ourselves. This was exciting for me because i had yet to go to a swedish grocery store. Not much was exciting except everything was in swedish of course! Lars, the younger one, was nice enough to drive us to the store, but otherwise it's only about a twenty minute walk from the farm. Debo and I proceeded on with our cookie making aswell as cooking dinner with each other. THe cookies are called Skurna Mandelskorpor. They are almost like bistcottis. Very yummy. We also made pasta with brocolli, garlic and onion for dinner. Then we sat at the table in the Kitchen and proceeded to eat too much dinner, then too much cookies. We sat for a long while though and had some nice chats. Ana is another WWOOFer, also german and she has been here since February. She is studying swedish to get into a university and had to go into Uppsala to take an language exam today. She got back in time to sit and chat over tea and cookies with me and Debo. Very sweet girls!

It's so funny to hear about all the ideas europeans have about americans. Like Sean yesterday was going out back to practice shooting and he assumed that I know very well how to  shoot a gun, because I'm american. But truth be told, I've never shot anything more than a pellet gun in my life! And it's very hard for me to learn swedish because everyone is so quick to speak to me in english. I wouldn't really be able to make heads or tails of anything if they spoke to me in swedish, but sometime I can hear somethings that sound a bit English. Anyways I've been learning at least one swedish word a day.

I'm taking lots of pictures, but this is an old computer, so I'm not sure how to hook up my camera yet. So I may not be posting any pictures anytime soon. Also this is a swedish computer, so every time I write a blog, almost all my words get underlined in Red, like everything i'm typing is spelt wrong!! Anyways, it's almost 11, and I really need to sleep. But if you're reading, don't forget to comment!! I want to know who's out there stalking my adventure posts and I want to know what you're wondering! Also, how're you all doing????

First full day

So today is the day that the other three WWOOFers took the day off. Two of them went into the city of Uppsala aswell as Karin, she had a doctors Appointment. I chose to stay here to get familiar with my surroundings. The job today was to get the plastic pulled over the third and final green house. Anders, Lars and Lars-Silver-Hair (that is what they call him to tell the difference in conversation) were the only other three around working today. Lars-Silver-Hair has trouble with his sight, partially blind. He comes during the week, except wednesday and works. It's pretty incredible, he works side by side Anders and the other Lars no problem, but my first impression when I met him this morning was that he was almost completely blind. Since I chose to stay here today, I was in charge of making lunch. Karin usually makes lunch,but she wasn't going to be back in time. Lunch is the one meal during the day when we all eat together. I was a bit nervous to make lunch for everyone, considering what I had to work with, but Karin walked me through it before she left and we figured out a nice potato salad along with some carrots with a nice dressing for me to make.

Since the farm here works with what they have grown to eat, the choice of food changes season to season. Since it is now the begining of a new growing season, we are working with whatever food is still left from last season. Here is what they have in storage-potatoes, cabbage, onions, beets, carrots, beans, grains and oats. There are few things they have from the store like Jams and Cheese. Apparently eggs are very expensive here, so they don't cook much with eggs. I'm curious to find out whether or not it's common to keep laying hens and why they choose not to.They also bake bread here so we have fresh bread all the time. I'm excited to get more familiar with cooking vegetarian dishes and making due with what we have.

I mentioned before how we got the plastic on the third and final greenhouse. By the way, green house is swedish is växt hus which litterally means grow house. Well after we had finished that, while I was making lunch apparently the wind took the greenhouse that was just finished a couple a days ago and pulled it about 100 meters from where it was and left it in a pile on the groud. Obviously very frustrating for Anders. So I think that will be one of the main projects for tomorrow along with finishing planting the last 4 rows of onions.

It's amazing how light it is here into the night. and the sun rises at about 4 in the morning. And it's not even mid summer yet! It's still a bit cold here and Karin says it's colder than usual for this time of year. I definetly didn't pack correctly and there are all sorts of warm clothes from home I wish I had brought, but they have plenty of extra clothes and blankets, so I'll make due until it warms up. Hope Vermont is warming up. Goodnight!!

So far settled...

Writing here from the Farm. It's located in Uppsala, which is about an hour  North from Clara and her family.
   By the way, brunch this morning was SOOO good. We headed over to some friends of the familys house which is located in a very nice suburb area on the water accross from Stockholm. There were about 20 or more people there and SO much food. Anika, the hostess, made everything with her husband, Hans, and their two grown children. And wow, do they know how to cook. THey even made mini american pancakes and french toast with maple syrup!! And after I had stuffed myself with great food and thought i could take no more, that's when they brought out dessert... Dark rich chocolate pudding, cheese cake, creme brule, strawberry rubard crisp. And i couldn't not try a little of everything.... so i did... Soooo fulll... Now I understand how Clara felt after over eating when she lived with us....

After the brunch we headed North. Clara and her dad drove me to the farm. Uppsala is very flat. And flat makes for good crop land. The farm is located at the end of a long dirt road, without a mailing address.  Karin and Anders are the couple that own and operate the farm. They provide food locally to schools and also have CSA's. Such nice people. There are 5 others working here besides me. After I got a tour I assisted with planting some onions. Anders drives a tractor which pulls a cart with three seats. In front of the three seats are foot rests and between the foot rest and the seat is a digger that opens to ground to drop seeds, etc. So there we sit, moving about 2 mph or less feet up, hunched over dropping onions about two inches apart. We did three rows of that and ended the day at 6 p.m. Since then i've been hanging around getting to know the people. Apparently tomorrow is a day off for the WWOOFers, but since i've just arrived i've chosen to stay here and find work for myself to do, aswell as get to know my surroudings.

Feel free to write questions, those of you who are reading, so I know what I should write about and what you want to read about!!!  Take care and i'll be writing again soon.

Landed safely

Hello from Stockholm!!! I'm here with Clara, my sweet Swede. It's way too late at night here. I'm 6 hours ahead of you reading from the states. It's really time for me to go to bed. Clara and her Mom picked me up from the airport today (Saturday) around two and we went around for a bit doing some errands.
     I flew Friday night out of Boston at 7:45, after taking the bus from Leb, NH. From Boston I was headed to London on a 6+ hour flight. I made some friends on waiting for the plane to board, Chloe (5) and her little brother who I cannot remember the name of. Very cute kids, but the littler one managed to stay awake the whole flight crying.... (Props to you mom's who have flown or traveled anywhere long distance with small children.) I did get some sleep on the night plane, about a half hour, when I  awoke to a flight attendants butt in my face. I was sitting in an isle seat and the woman across the isle got sick on the flight.... So the lovely ladies of the plane tended to her and her mess, thank goodness. But in turn I got no sleep after that. At least it didn't smell like vomit! ....
      Besides that, the flight was fairly smooth for me. We arrived in London at 7 in the morn ing, I felt like I had time traveled or something... It'll take a bit to get used to the time change, but not to worry. They've got lots of strong coffee here in Sweden.
       Now it's really time for bed. I'm going with Clara's family tomorrow to brunch at a family friends house then they are driving me out the the Farm. I'll post again once I'm settled there.

Hope the Sun has come out in Vermont!!