Moving to Sweden || one year in

August marked our one-year Swediversary, but I didn't quite get round to writing about it then. Partly because we were on holiday. Also because at that stage we already knew of something momentous that was about to change our life here dramatically and which couldn't possibly be left out of an update, but which we weren't quite ready to share yet. Eventually I did - in October I dragged myself out of bed and announced our soon-to-be Swedish baby. All being well there will be four of us in April. All born in different countries. Isn't that amazing?

So here we are, over one year into our Swedish adventure. Actually, it is starting to feel less like an adventure and more like normal, routine, everyday. This is what happens when you up sticks: it takes a year. My mantra. It takes a year to find out where the best bakery is, who you click with, what will grow when, and how to cope with the climate like a local. Give. it. a year.

LIFESTYLE
I feel like our way of living is driven 99% by the climate. The summer was nothing short of spectacular. Right now I see snow and fog from my window, but as it's predicted to warm up a bit again next week, let's pretend winter isn't quite here yet. Autumn, in all its brevity, is/was spectacular too. 

The difference between the two - spring/summer and autumn/winter - is shocking though. There are four distinct seasons but you do end up thinking of the year as comprising six months of light and six months of darkness (though we don't get polar nights or days this far south). During the light months we were outside all the time and almost experienced two days in one: get up, go to work/school, come back, eat, go out again for lawn games, playground trips or walks. Now that the darkness and cold have set in, we're retreating indoors and into ourselves a lot more. We share hearty meals with friends, watch a little too much Netflix, and build train track after train track. Some Saturdays none of even bothers to get dressed.

Each has its charms, as long as you're prepared. I froze and preserved as much seasonal produce as I could in the summer months, and we've replaced most of our swish Italian wardrobes with more functional, warm, protective clothing. In summer you accept you'll get sand in your knitting, and in winter you stick your inspiration on the wall. 

THE BEAN
In late August the Bean finally went up an age group at preschool, from the 1-3s to the 3-5s. He's was so very ready to be challenged more and, oh my goodness, he's leaped in with his heart and soul. It's not surprising - preschool here is so, so cool. Everything is driven by the children themselves and geared towards fostering creativity. As long as everyone is safe, they're pretty much allowed to do what they please. The big ones help the little ones, and they all come home absolutely filthy. Their days out sound so fun they make me want to join in, too: paddling in the stream, blackberry foraging, leaf collecting, library visits. Once they took two public buses to get to a farm, picked their own sweetcorn, barbecued it and just ate it with lashings of butter there and then. I was especially envious that day. 

All this intense activity comes with challenges too, of course. He is knackered. Most evenings it's a struggle to shovel some dinner into him and put him in the bath before he collapses. Many days I end up with a half-fed, crusty Bean snoring in my bed. 
Always my bed. Though in many ways his confidence has soared, some things don't change. The comings and goings of relatives in the summer holidays always affect his sense of security, and then there is The Baby... He's doing his best to process it all, in his own way, with questions and imaginative play. It's hard though, and there have been some very big wobbles about being abandoned while I'm in hospital in particular. All we can do is reassure him, again and again and again. But every morning I still wake up with his little feet tucked up under my thighs and his face squashed into the side of my pillow. 

BABY
So yeah, I'm bumpy again! Rather more early on than last time too. Baby is wriggling and I'm a grumpy mess of backache and heartburn. Standard stuff, then. Next week I'll have my second scan, at 19 weeks, which will be the last one if all is well. As I've mentioned before, Swedish antenatal care is very hands-off unless there are complications. Since this country is considered one of the safest for women to give birth in, I'm okay with that. 
I will need to chat to my midwife about what to expect from the hospital though. It's always tricky to navigate a healthcare system when you're new somewhere, and our experience of a hospital birth in Italy left both Mr E+L and I pretty traumatised. I would really like to hear it's more midwife-led and communicative here, or they might have trouble getting me to come in at all. My next check-up is in December, so I'll raise it with her then.
Of course, in the meantime I can't resist stroking all the cute wee baby things. It just makes all the discomforts and worries disappear in an instant. I'm making a few things myself, and I've bought a big bag of second-hand newborn clothes. A mixture of fun brights and versatile (gender) neutrals, just like our soon-to-be Big Brother wears. 

WORK
Ah, work. When it works it's great, but... The insecurity I wrote about in my last update hasn't been resolved or even improved yet, unfortunately. On the plus side, we've made up our own minds about a few things, which is of course part of the battle. We'd really like to stay here, so for the first time in our adulting careers we're not chasing work opportunities and changing everything else to fit around those, but rather looking for ways to make sure work supports the lifestyle we want. 
Small steps. From Monday I'll be attending an intensive Swedish course every single morning for four weeks. Then of course from April-ish onwards I'll be on maternity leave, but I'm keeping an eye out for employed jobs as opposed to self-employed jobs. It's nervewracking - I've been independent for 6 years and I'm terrified of losing the creative freedom I've gained - but two of us having unstable incomes is just too stressful. Mr E+L is doing the same so, who knows, a little lucky fairy dust may come our way soon. Who knows where we'll be this time next year?

I'm linking this post up with Chantelle at Seychelles Mama for #myexpatfamily

V.I.P.

Finally, I can share news of a Very Important Project: my Very Important Little Person, still in progress. Baby no. 2. First a Bean and then... a Bug? We will have to think of another nickname. Ladybird, maybe, seeing as the Bean is absolutely convinced it's a girl. 

So, all being well, we will say hello to said VIP in the Spring. It's felt so odd, keeping this big news to myself for what feels like a very long time. It's just a blink of the eye, really, but as with my first pregnancy I've suffered from Hyperemesis Gravidarum (HG) and when every day has to be survived hour by hour, three months is loooooooong. I swore after last time that I wouldn't keep this strange 12-week vow of silence, not about the sickness and the way it completely blindsides any joy you might feel. Nor about any miscarriage, should it have turned out I'd spoken too soon. Why would I be silent about things that people should feel they can talk openly about?

But as it happened I couldn't stay upright at my computer for long enough to write about it. I will though, in another post. We do, really, need to talk about these things. 

First the good news, and I'm pleased to say I'm starting to feel like me again. Me, with added football roundness (it shows so quickly, the second time around!). 

I'm going through my lovely stash of soft yarns and organic fabrics. I'm thinking about tiny crocheted cardigans, itty-bitty knitted beanie hats and dinky leggings with matching bibs. I want to make ALL the baby things, once I'm able to stay awake beyond 7:30 PM. I'm eyeing up pretty muslins, in case we've produced another VVB: Very Vomity Baby. I'm wondering where on earth this ladybug will sleep in our one-bedroom flat. The Bean has decided on bunk beds (him on the top one, obviously), with that infallible confidence in immediacy and limitless potential that only almost-4-year-olds have. After three months of doing almost no work, I have a to-do list so long I can't actually decide where to start. I might just stick with the tiny cardigans. 

One thing is for sure though: having a baby in Sweden is already turning out to be quite a different experience from having a baby in Italy (where the Bean was born). There, I was constantly prodded and pricked, cajoled onto scales and into eating less (yes, less!). I was very much treated as a patient, a female patient with a medical condition, and the mostly male doctors knew best. Which didn't necessarily feel like a dreadful thing at the time, this hand-holding, what with a first pregnancy being such an overwhelming unknown. This time around though, I admit I'm pleased with the Swedish approach: you are not sick, you are growing a baby. We're here if you need us but otherwise, go and get on with it. 

I shall. 

I'm linking up with Chantelle for My Expat Family.

Summer pickings

Snip, pinch, pluck. 

Crunching, roasting, drying, jamming.

It seems incredible that I never did any of this in Italy, because is there a European country with better fresh produce than Italy? 

A north-facing flat, 8 floors above a clattering road and permanently covered in smoggy soot did not lend itself to home growing. And why bother, anyway, when going down to the weekly market and arguing with the traders about how many lemons one small family could feasibly get through in a week (tantissimi, signora, sono stupendi) was such a rite of passage? 

Not here; The Swedes have an enthusiasm for the foraged, the lovingly coaxed out of the ground in the short but intense growing seasons. We live in a garden-less flat now too, but its balcony is my solace. I promise you, there's little you can't grow in pots these days. Cucumbers, strawberries, all manner of salad leaves, herbs, green beans, chillies, and these dinky little round carrots not even the vegetable-averse Bean could resist. 

Yes, I have hit middle-age as well as middle-class, I think, taking pictures of my haul. And what I can't grow myself but am able to pick by the crate-load from a local farm? Recruit the small person (who now mistakes cow parsley for elderflower!), jam it all and show it off to the world. There's nothing better than summer pickings, is there. 

Do you grow or pick your own? What's your favourite summer treat to make?

I'm linking up with Katie for The Ordinary Moments and Chantelle for My Expat Family.

Holibobs

By this afternoon, the Bean will have completed his first full preschool year in Sweden. Tomorrow the two of us head to Belgium to see my family for a week. The holidays are here. 

Not a moment too soon; The last couple of days he has been settling in with an older age group and, while he is developmentally more than ready, emotionally? Not so much settled as tornado-like. A break is much needed.

I feel quietly excited about our first summer holidays since moving here. Right on cue, the weather has taken a nose-dive - after two months of glorious sunshine and (uncharacteristically) high temperatures, it's grey, chilly, damp. But still, there is much to look forward to. There's that at week at my folks', then three whole weeks back here with no schedules, no firm plans, no expectations other than to see where each day takes us. We've got visitors for a few days in the middle, but otherwise I just foresee plenty of picnics, lake trips and PJ days.

(Mr E+L is also trying to convince me to go camping. "Trying" being the operative word here. We had a trial run last weekend in a friend's back garden for midsummer, and the tent collapsed in a storm after precisely one hour.) Finally, we head back to the UK in August for a few weeks. Not without some trepidation, in light of recent developments over there, but I hope we will be able to focus on family and friends in the way we want to.

Most of all, I look forward to slowing down a bit and focusing on my husband as well as the mini-tornado. Maybe, just maybe, I'll also get a chance to do some sewing or a little outdoor knitting. I bought these pretties a while ago to make socks with, because there doesn't seem a holiday project more perfect than socks. I'm thinking of trying the aptly-named Travel Trio by Clare Devine. 

In the meantime though, for the last pre-holiday work day, it's all systems go. I've got one pattern going out to testers later and another to draft, two suitcases to pack, invoices to send, plant-watering instructions to write. There's a pair of bright red wellies drying in the oven after a full-body puddle experience yesterday. 

From tomorrow things might go a little quiet here on the blog, until we get back in late August. I hope you won't mind. I hope you have a really nice summer too, wherever you spend it x

A Maker's Morning

A morning after our first winter in Sweden, THE morning. A Scandinavian morning in spring, any morning, every morning, feels like a deep and invigorating breath.

For months I have felt like a mole. Blind, snuffling, disoriented by the lack of color and nuance in the world. Color... As a crochetwear designer colour is my caffeine, really, and my daily fuel consists of the textures I find outside.

But what do to when there is so little light that seeing true hues is impossible? We tried, of course, to give the darkness short shrift with cosy blankets, bright cushions and twinkly lights. Still, there are only so many candle-lit breakfasts at 9 AM (nine!) one can endure before “hygge” can hop it.

No matter though, spring is here, the light is back, and I wake up to the sun’s delightful trickery. 

Once the boys have been dispatched to school and work respectively and the breakfast table cleared of detritus, my dance with the morning light begins.

The treasures collected the day before come out (I’m one of those people with perpetually crumby pockets, and it’s not due to my three-year-old’s snacks hiding in there), projects are piled on every surface. Yarn is squeezed, textures are tested, everything is arranged and rearranged. 

The big camera comes out. Sometimes the results are good and sometimes (more times), the results are rubbish. It doesn’t matter though; this is a Scandinavian Spring Morning. A breath… it’s all in the process.  

As I take pictures my mind stills. It clears: Winter’s dark cloak has been shaken off and with the light the ideas decide to wake up as well. I have to grab a notebook, quick. 

Now the day’s work can really start. See? I told you colour was my caffeine. Well. That and real tea. 

Moving to Sweden || nine months in

The end of April marked a momentous occasion: a year since we decided to take a leap of faith and move to Sweden. This only a month after the initial offer came through, and by the end July we'd packed up, squeezed our friends and left Milan for good. There wasn't really any time to think.

I think that time might have come now though. Nine months in and we've survived the physical move (barely), embraced the newness (giddily), tackled most of the bureaucratic palaver (grudgingly). We've emerged from the disorienting darkness that is the Swedish winter. Routines have become established, and then April came and the full force of our decision hit us like a bus. Bloody hell. We live in Sweden. 

Most days the hit-by-a-bus feeling is followed by positivity: Bloody hell we live in Sweden AND we like it here. There are so many things to like - I'll get to those in a minute. I can't lie though. There has also been a fair amount of anxiety. 
 
WORK
I think the anxiety is mainly down to our work situation. Mr E+M is on a two-year contract, which means we are nearly halfway through. That, dear people, is a scary thing. 
I freelance, which is always unpredictable, and it just so happens I have exactly zero projects lined up for after the summer holidays. First time in about 5 years that's happened. This is also a scary thing.
The combination of being a bit scared plus knowing you're on to A Good Thing that you want keep hold of is making it quite hard to live in the moment and say "we'll just see what turns up" in the way we always have done. Nevertheless, there is of course more to life than work, especially when all the non-work is good. 

LIFESTYLE
From the moment the sun - real sun with real light and real warmth - returned it was like the entire country came out of hibernation. Neighbours we didn't even realise we had dusted off barbeques and picnic tables (or, in the case of Swedish Super Dad across the green, built one), loaded up their coffee flasks and decamped to the Great Outdoors for the forseeable. On some days it's still bloody cold, but it matters not. The light is here, with it a riot of colour, and it all needs to be adored. I'm all up for adoring. 

Siberian Squills in early Spring

Fritillaries and other meadow flowers in May

So we've had alfresco lunches in our fleece-lined cagoules and taken our thermoses down to the beach. We went to see the cherry blossoms in Copenhagen in April. Next weekend we're off to explore Stockholm, our Midsummer Party invites have come through the letterbox, and we're even planning a camping trip for July (I am not a campy person).
The light is wonderful. It's making it really hard to sleep at night, but I guess before long we'll have six months of winter to do all the sleeping we like.

HOME
With all this light and outdoorsiness, it's impossible to resist trying to turn our flat, our lump of sixties' concrete, into some sort of airy summer cabin thing. Despite the short nighttime darkness I haven't bothered putting up black-out blinds. I spend as much time as humanly (i.e. 3yo human) possible in my crochet chair by the kitchen window.

Also: in with the plants, lots of plants. We have a postage stamp-sized balcony, but I'll be damned if I don't turn it into a model of urban sustainable living. There are all manner of herbs, carrots, cucumbers and strawberries, sunflowers, lavender, hanging tubs full of flowers. The aphids have already got to the lavender and I know we'll be lucky to get even 5 carrots, but I'm having a blast trying. 

THE BEAN
Now that our surroundings look more or less as green as they did when we first arrived here, I can see how much my Bean has changed in the last 9 months. The space, the little forest paths, the myriad opportunities to get properly dirty. He was so afraid and clingy when he arrived, but now he's a happy, confident little explorer. He has his found partners-in-crime at school and comes home telling me, in the same breath, how much he loves them and how one of them hit him on the head with a spade. He eats like a horse, fights sleep like a champ and never has clean finger nails.

He's forgotten every word of Italian he ever knew, too, and speaks way better Swedish than I do (which is, admittedly, not hard). He has days when he's so horrible I consider auctioning him off on eBay, but that has nothing to do with us having moved across Europe anymore, and everything to do with Being Three. The Bean is grand. 

SOCIAL LIFE
Talking of beans, my closest friend in Milan had another baby recently. The ache of missing her, and missing out on this huge experience in her life, is painfully acute. It was always going to be and I don't know how to solve it. One thing is certain though: yay for creativity. Having plucked up the courage to attend a couple of crafter's meetups, I can honestly say I've made real, meaningful connections despite having only been here for a short time. There is an openness, a willingness to just sit, chat and share among the makers in this area that I am truly grateful for. And they bring you wee plant friends when you invite them for coffee, which is always a bonus. 

For Mr E+L the social aspect has been trickier, mainly because making friends with your colleagues doesn't seem to be the done thing here. When your work (and the possibility of there being more) is 100% results-based it's of course difficult to step away from it for long enough to pursue a social hobby. I think we somehow will have to make that a priority soon though. That, and learning Swedish for me. If I really want to integrate into the creative community here (and say more than hej to my son's friends!) I need to swallow my pride and feel stupid in a classroom again for a while. Come September, if the work really does totally dry up, it might be the right time. 

September. Gosh. By that point we'll have been here for over a year, the Bean will have gone up an age group at school, and we'll have had a whole summer of wind-swept barbeques. There is so much to want to stick around for, and so little point in worrying about it.

I'm linking this post up with Chantelle at Seychelles Mama for #myexpatfamily

{The Ordinary Moments} #2 - Weekend Baking

Let it be known that I am not a baker. I do cooking, yes, even if these days it's more functional than adventurous. But not baking. Apart from bread - I used to bake a loaf a week in the Days Before Parenthood. I've managed a shortcrust pie case or two. Okay, maybe I bake a little bit. 

As long as there is no need for precision, and as long as I can change stuff in the recipe (an irresistible thing). I also need a Bean. 

A Bean to sit on the kitchen counter and stuff his face with raisins or cereal, just like I used to do when I was little. To do a bit of weighing, lots of stirring, and OH MY, CAN WE WHISK?! 

I love these little shared moments with him, because they usually happen early on a Saturday or Sunday morning, when His Non-Morningness, aka Mr E+L, is still fast asleep. There is not a whiff of witching hour yet, no rush to get out of the door, no need to even get dressed. On these mornings he's so essentially himself, so very Three. He'll talk about diggers and ducks in the same sentence, and I can sneak him knackebröd with REAL butter. 

Our baking repertoire is pretty tame. Banana bread, cheese scones, blueberry muffins. Anything else stresses me out, quite frankly, and we don't need that. These mornings need an easy rhythm to them, and lots of comfort food. Comforting moments when he's all mine and our bellies are full of raisins.

Linking up with Katie for The Ordinary Moments

Post-Easter Thoughts

More ramblings than thoughts, if I'm honest. Our 10-day holiday is over, and so starts the usual dance with the inbox, the to-do lists (always multiples), the various mismatched socks and half-finished crochet projects dotted around the house. What to tackle first? Slowly does it, now: have another cup of tea and a think.

• It's been an odd holiday, in many ways. Just like at Christmas we decided to stay here in Sweden, just the three of us, and have mini-adventures. Except that Mr E+L got struck down with the flu on the very first day, and so the only adventuring for a good 5 days involved me trying to entertain a Bean solo. It also involved lots of cake. 
• A holiday of introspection, too. With close family in Brussels, last Tuesday was a very, very raw day. 
• We pared it back down to simple, slow days. One day out to the forest, a very happy Bean. What else matters? The newspapers were ignored, for which I was thankful. 

• The Bean carried on Beaning at breakneck speed. Chatting about things like how to tempt the ducks from the pond nearby into our bath, and then on Saturday he discovered the joy of cycling with a purpose: go to the supermarket to buy chocolate. Yes please. 
• The crochet plans took an unexpected twist, too. Yarn I've ordered for the Pretty in Peach Sweater Dress seems to have gone AWOL and the neckline of the Bretonbone Top just will. not. behave. I don't like necklines, I've decided. I do like scarves and fluffy yarn though, and pretty littles violas from the balcony. Because, you know, SPRING! 

• We finally replaced the kick-you-off-every-five-minutes, slow-as-sin internet connection with a shiny high-speed one. Yes this was a First World Problem, and yes it makes me happy.
• It also occurred to me that creativity begets creativity. And vice-versa: with a little voice always in my ear and photo-bombing hands nearby, opportunities to stop, to think, to take photos were rare. After a few days, so were the flashes of inspiration, and by the end of the holiday I could barely string a sentence together. 
• I did manage a little blog reading though, so if you find yourself with five minutes to spare I enjoyed The Anti-News by Emma, Spring is here by Juliane, and The Wisdom of Youth by Carie. As you can see, I'm in the mood for light-hearted! 

Anyway. I´d better get on to those to-do lists then. Always multiples. Have a good one, if you still happen to be on your hols.

{The Ordinary Moments} #1 - Sand in my shoes

Sand in shoes, pockets, backpack, hair. All over the hallway, in the bath, and somehow also always in the bed. My bed, even though I'm not the one who plays in the sandpit. 

Multiple sandpits, Sweden is full of them - I don't think I could count the ones within a square mile of our new home on two hands. 

They are both the best thing ever and the bane of my life. The Bean, unsurprisingly, adores them and will spend hours digging and shoveling and pushing the wheelbarrow around and around and around. People leave old toys behind in them for all the local kids to use, or you can bring your own shiny new Christmas Digger. 

Italy doesn't have sandpits at playgrounds (so as not to encourage stray cats, apparently) so this is a pretty novel thing for us. A novelty that isn't wearing off; Even my Bean, once such a city boy who was afraid of getting his hands dirty, adores them. 

No matter what the weather - thanks to the quintisentially Scandinavian water and windproof overalls neither sunshine nor warmth, nor even dry weather is a prerequisite for outdoor play here. (Although hot flasks of tea {or toddy, I won't judge} are advisable for the parents.) 

So every day after preschool we go to one of the many little playgrounds nearby, and every morning after he's left: that woosh and clattering sound up the hoover, cleaning up the sand he tipped out of his shoes the day before. 

I'm linking up with Katie at MummyDaddyMe for The Ordinary Moments

New beginnings and almost finisheds

When we lived in Milan, we knew winter would be more or less finished by the end of February. The warmth would return, by mid-March the magnolia would be in bloom. In the south of Sweden, however? Not so much. We're well into March now and I've just woken up to snow outside the window again. 

I don't want to whinge, because, d'uh. We moved to Sweden. Of course Spring was going to take longer to spring here and of course we were going to catch all sorts of new-to-us viruses. But still, I am a little desperate for more sunlight and colour, and so very glad we've seen the back of February. I'm clinging on to the sight of all these little yellow flowers that I don't know the name of, and a few timid snowdrops, and dreaming...

Because doesn't Spring make you dream of new starts? Much more so than the beginning of a new year, when my only resolution of any sort is usually to continue hibernation, continue eating, continue politely declining opportunities to excercise. I don't do New Year's resolutions.

I do, however, do Spring Resolutions. Spring cleaning, Spring walks, Spring decorating. A good thing, then, that at the end of the dreaded F-month my new VAT registration came through. I am now officially self-employed in Sweden. It took a wee while and a fair amount of bureaucratic cajoling, but it's sorted, I'm here. And that, dear friends, means new beginnings on an entirely different scale: Emmy + LIEN as a design brand. Something I have been wanted to do for the best part of a year is now a posibility. Hurrah!

That brings me on to what I almost have ready for you:

Lavender Skies 

This will be a 3-in-1 pattern for a skinny scarf, a slightly wider fringed scarf, and a cowl that is a little wider still. It's the perfect mid-season accessory and I cannot wait to release it! If the health-gods cooperate I hope to have it ready by the end of the month. There will be a free tutorial on the Woven Shell, the main stitch for this pattern, so look out for that too. 

Pretty In Peach - a sweater dress

Another pattern I have been saying I will release in multiple sizes for aaaages (the 18M size is available as a sample pattern here), but there's a good reason for my snail-like pace: I want to improve the instructions, to help you be sure you're buying a pattern you can execute. I've also been sent a few organic cotton samples to play with, which will ensure I can recommend a yarn that will look and feel just perfect. It's almost finished. Ish.

The Bretonbone Top

Finally, a sneaky peek at a new top worked in the herringbone stitch. I've become completely obsessed with both this stitch (although doing an entire jumper in it may just cure me of that) and the idea that it ought to be possible to create stylish, wearable knitwear - in the most general sense - with crochet. I just need to figure out the construction of the cap sleeves, and we're good to go. 

So that's what I'll be up this month. Here's to March, to Spring (soon) and all sorts of colourful new beginnings.