Welcome!

I know, I know: it has been too long.  I'm sorry.  Let's put it be behind us, and move on.  

I thought it might be interesting for you to take a look around our apartment.  Although Sweden is different from the U.S., it is not so very different.  I, however, took pictures of some of the things in our apartment that, for good or bad, differ from State-side homes in which we have lived.

The apartment building in which we live was constructed in 1910.  It is very solid.  The walls are, as you can see, quite thick.  I think they may be plaster over brick.  I know when I try to drive a nail in one I meet with limited success.  Also note in the picture that the walls are white.  This is not just common, but I will go as far as saying that having non-white walls is uncommon.  Lastly, and this will be hard for you to see, around the perimeter of the door frame is a white electrical cord, secured with white hooks.  Because the building is so old, and the walls are somewhat impermeable, when one adds electrical outlets, or whatever, the wiring is run this way. One of these days, we will get around to paint over the wire, which is what one does.

What I love about this door is that it is on the interior of our apartment.  It is between the livingroom and what is, for us, the second bedroom and the full bath.  Having said that, the second bedroom has a door to a back stairwell, so it may have once been a maid’s quarters.  Maybe.  I have no way of knowing.  But I like it.

This is the door to exit our bedroom.  I love the pattern on it.  Yes, it is wood.  Above the door is a storage closet.  Note how tall the ceilings are.

City living.  We love it, although I admittedly miss gardening and seeing green.  But I really do love walking out of our apartment and being able to go to a shop or grocery store etcetera.  Again, more white, thick walls.  Notice there are no screens on the windows.  In Malmo, there are, pretty much, no flying bugs.  We are right on the water and it is breezy, and bugs just don’t hang around.  The opposite is true farther north in Sweden.  There, I understand, one can kinda get eaten alive if one doesn’t cover-up (including donning a cap).

I love this little chandelier.  There are few things to say about it.  One it was purchased at IKEA.  Of course.  Two, although electric, it involves (fake) candles.  As .  Three, it is plugged into an outlet on the ceiling.  Convenient?  Yes.  But: because of that, when one moves, one takes their ceiling lamps with oneself.  That is totally fine, but it was a surprise to us, when we moved in, to find that we had no ceiling lights! 

Our kitchen.  It was remodeled around 2008.  Three things of note.  One: our small, weak microwave. Small enough that my large plates cannot fit in it.  Of course I am sure there are bigger ones in other apartments, but this is ours.  Hey, it warms my cup of coffee just as well as another microwave.  Two: Note the electrical outlet above the water-kettle.  That triple outlet (with and electrical adapter plugged in) was the only outlet visible in our entire kitchen.  When the kitchen was remodeled by two owners-ago (how does one say that?), even that outlet was not there.  It was added later.  Yup.  So what did we do when we wanted another outlet on the opposite side of the room?  We accessed the outlet that was in the cupboard above the microwave, plugged in a very long extension cord, and traced it around the wall and window trim and floor boards until it reached where we wanted it.  Sound familiar?

I could write more, and maybe someday I will, but I really need to post this!