I can’t say that the day has been pleasant because that wouldn’t be entirely true. The day has mostly been cloudy and light grey but there was no wind in the morning so it was quite ok anyway. Then the wind arrived and it went from quite ok to rather unpleasant. Then the sun started to shine between the gaps in the clouds and the wind calmed down so suddenly it was quite nice again 🙂 🙂 Now there’s an evenly grey sky again but I’m indoors and I really don’t care about what it is like outside 🙂 🙂
There’s already flower buds on the wild gooseberries...
My home is a mess and has been for quite a while now 🙂 But I decided that I wold clean up a little at a time so that’s what I’ve been doing today, plus I’ve baked two breads and I also made french fries for the dogs and me (and sausages and meatballs for me 🙂 ). Still I don’t think I’ve done especially much at all. Time has flied away though but I can’t expect it to do otherwise since it after all is a weekend. We’re having a long weekend because it’s a holiday on Monday the first of May here (and I think in the entire of Europe). May first is the workers day and back in the days everyone were out demonstrating for workers rights. Nowdays most of us might have a picnic or barbecue if the weather is nice 🙂
..
A couple of days ago I planted the inner seeds from red skinned apricots, I had removed the thick and hard shells and placed the seeds in damp paper towels in a plastic bag and then tossed them in to the fridge. I planted them in one of those see through plastic boxes one can buy grapes and other fruits in and today I could see that the roots had grown down to the bottom of the boxes. I really have no need for more apricot trees but I could do it so why not 🙂 🙂 I have plenty more in the fridge plus some from peaches. Well I can always give them away when they’re a couple of years old 🙂
...
I did also, a couple of days ago, lay a bid on a camera, an Agfa Flexilette. An odd camera because it’s a twin lens reflex camera but in the shape of an SLR. I did not expect to win it and wouldn’t have been especially sorry but of course I did 🙂 🙂 🙂 Ok it’s not a lot of money but I could have bought some plants for that money instead 🙂 🙂 🙂 They’re guessing that we’ll get really nice weather tomorrow so I hope they’re right for once. I guess I better check if some shoots from the sloe and rose bushes have started to grow and if I need to mow that area again already tomorrow. Then again it’s been so cold at nights that I doubt anything shows yet but I guess all those roots are preparing to make my life a bit miserable for a couple of years before they finally gives up 🙂 🙂 🙂
I can’t say that I wouldn’t have preferred to have that sunny and warm weather we’ve had the rest of the week but it hasn’t been that bad today either. Around 10C (50F) and mostly a nice spring rain but also some misty rain that eats its way through all clothes no matter what one is wearing. The kitchen door has been open quite a lot to be honest.
...
I’ve been rather busy doing the laundry, making our Sunday pancakes, walking with the dogs and baking a bread. I’ll also make dinner for work tomorrow before I can sit down and relax again. I was planning on doing lots of things this weekend but I just didn’t have the energy, pollen season has started and even though the worst ones, birch and pines, haven’t started yet I still can react some to hazel if there’s a lot of that pollen around.
From the Voigtländer Bessamatic..
Once again I didn’t win the lottery so I’ll need to continue to work for a while longer 🙂 🙂 The coming week will be gry, a bit chilly and a bit rainy they’re guessing and it really is a perfect week for sowing annuals and spices outdoors. I don’t know how much of those spices I would use but they usually like to live on sunny and rather dry places and my entire garden contains mostly of sand so that’s what they’ll get 🙂 🙂 Also bees and butterflies love them and who doesn’t want many of those in the garden?
Another quite wonderful day here, around 20C (68F) and almost no wind at all. Those are the days I hate to work 🙂 We really should have our vacation when spring has sprung because it is now when we enjoyes the nicer and warmer weather as most. Then again we’ll only have one more of these wonderful days before it changes and the temperatures will drop down to 10C (50F) and we’ll get rain as well. I guess I should be happy that I don’t live further north because they’ll get snow and snow fall in late April is just depressing 🙂 🙂
...
I don’t mind some rain though because I can see from day to day how much lower the water levels are in the creeks and ditches and this is not the time to have low water leves because now is the time frogs and other amphibians lay their eggs. When I moved here I hade a very shallow pond outside my cottage, in the cow pasture and in warm spring evenings I could hear hundreds of frogs quacking there. Then the farmer decided that he should drain that pond so all frogs disappeared. I miss that sound a lot. Talking about amphibians though, today at work when I were driving in materials to paint I saw something move on the floor. It was a toad 🙂 Toads really shouldn’t walk in there but they do a couple of times every year. One could think that all the powdered paint that lies on the floor would make it walk elsewhere but in they go.
...
So I jumped out of the fork lift, picked it up and carried it out to one of the forgotten gardens that belongs to the factory and placed in the shadows behind a small spruce. I do hope it doesn’t continue on its travel because roads are never far away and I really don’t want it to die. I pass a big pond or small lake on my way to work and this time of year I really have to slow down there because lots of amphibians pass that road to get to the pond/lake. I almost drove over two on my way home today. I usually have several toads in my garden every summer, they like to stay close to the root zone where there is some water but also lots of shade so they don’t dry out. Back in the days old Hector chewed on one of the smaller ones and all toads are poisonous so he started to drool something insanely.
...
So I had to drive to the vet almost 50 km away. Hector drooled so much that he had to have his head outside the window and the entire car was covered with dog drool when we arrived. People outside the vet laughed like crazy 🙂 🙂 Hector got a shot of something and finally stopped to drool so back home again where he naturally found what was left of the toad so back to the vet we went 🙂 🙂 🙂 Toads are actually so poisonous that animals who eat them can die, had I known that back then I wouldn’t have driven to the vet so calm and carefully as I did 🙂 🙂 🙂
...
I’m tired as always so I’ll risk a nights sleep by having at least one more cup of tea even if it is after 4pm 🙂 It just isn’t the same to have a cup of cocoa 🙂
I’ve bought another old camera called Meopta Milona. It’s a viewfinder camera from the same company as the Flexaret. The problem was that the lens were unscrewed and i had no idea how far I should screw it back 🙂 🙂 A couple of photos were just too blurry, the joy of having an Alma in the family but the rest turned out quite well. I must have done something to make a light leak because only the last photos have it at the bottom of the photo. I must buy one of those tiny little lamps again so I can check where it is.
I really can’t complain about the sunrise this morning. Minutes after and the sky went bland grey.
We’ve had quite a lovely day here today. It started a bit cloudy but was warm enough for me to only have a sweater when walking with the dogs. That would have been enough even when it was as coldest here as well since it at least was impossible not to boil while walking with Alma 🙂 🙂 She has however calmed down considerable even though she still pulls the leash quite a lot.
...
I haven’t been lazy today though. I’ve done the laundry, like I do every Sunday. I’m baking a bread right now actually and I’ve started to clean my cottage. Well I have at least started to carry out all cardboard boxes out to my car, I’ve also tossed away loads of things that I for a reason I don’t remember had saved. I did also start to saw down a corner of my garden mostly containing old thorny wild roses, thorny blackthorn bushes and false spiraea (Sorbaria sorbifolia). The last one is fairly easy to remove because the roots lay just beneath the surface but it spreads like crazy. I do like it though because pollinating insects love it.
...
I can’t say that I overdid anything but I did work with a bent back, so now I have huge problems unbending it. It’s the rheumatism that argues with me but I’ll have my sack of rice in the micro later on and put it between my back and the recliner. I would have loved to be able to do the entire place but the batteries needed to be charged and I could for my life not find the charger. Not especially strange to be honest because there’s no charger, just an electric cord put straight in to the battery 🙂 🙂 🙂
...
When I’m done cutting down it all I’ll push the the lawnmower over it so that no shoots will get a chance of growing up there again. I would have loved to be able to plant there immediately but most of what I cut down now (except for a birch that unfortunately grew up where it shouldn’t) spread via roots and I’m really tired of not being able to walk barefoot in my garden during summers. Well to be honest I’m hesitant to do that anyway because of the dogs using it as a toilet 🙂 🙂 🙂
...
It is time to go downstairs and check the bread. I still haven’t come up with anything that even remotely could work as french rolls and the scones I make tend to be very brittle. They usually falls to pieces as soon as I come close with a knife to cut them in half 🙂 🙂 🙂
Well we have to take the good with the bad I’m afraid and yesterday I found a tick on Alma. So I brought the tick repellent spray (it is supposed to help towards the biting flies too but that’s harder to check) from the cupboard. It smells like one of those cheap perfumes one can buy when going to (in our case) either the Canary Islands or somewhere along the mediterranean coast. They might smell nice there because You actually think more of the surroundings than what it actually smells but way too much here at home 🙂 🙂
...
Alma has a very well made harness when we’re out walking and it has two attachments for the leash. Well today Alma tore off the one in the front so now there’s only one place. I’m amazed that it lasted this long to be honest but surprised at the same time since she has calmed down considerable. I guess that seeing two deer was one too many 🙂 🙂 She behaved much better on our second walk. Thankfully the attachment that still is there looks like that if she managed to break that one she would rip the entire harness apart 🙂 🙂 🙂
The beekeeper seem to have lost one hive this winter...
I might have to buy a new spray because I just picked a tiny tick from Alma, it walked on her where her fur is lighter colored and the tick was black, the tick is no longer. It is rather nice outside even though we have a rather feisty wind. The morning was dark and cloudy but the cloudy sky has more cracks in it now so we do see the sun every now and again. Tomorrow will be all sun though according to their guessing. They have already started to lower the temperatures they’re guessing we’ll have around next weekend so I’ll have a few work friends who planned to fill up their outdoors bathtubs feel rather sad 🙂 Ever never believe what Swedish weather sites and meteorologists say if it is longer than twenty minutes into the future, sometimes they don’t even get the weather we just had right 🙂 🙂 🙂
.This is the only bush with flower buds I could find unless one counts the willow we passed on our walk today..We call this one Porcelain Hyacinth (Pushkinia scilloides).
Have a great day!
The swamp behind my garage. There was a really beautiful duck swimming around there this morning but Alma refused to stand still so all photos I tried to take were so fuzzy it was hard to see anything.
Well all I could find out about beings and easter is this. It is said that gods power over this world was as weakest between god Friday and easter Sunday and during that time the evil trolls and witches moved around and created problems. That isn’t much, compared to any other big holiday here that’s nothing, there are loads of info about what all the beings would and could do when they had a chance otherwise 🙂 🙂
..
We’ve had another rather nice day here, it would have been a wonderful day if it hadn’t been for the chilly and rather strong wind that just keeps on blowing. Still we had our mostly had our walks where the wind couldn’t reach us and I have to admit that the laundry dried up really quickly. It was however a bit chilly in the cottage because i had the kitchen door open most of the time so that the dogs could run in and out as they pleased. Now the sun is on the other side of the cottage so I have closed the door for the day.
..
It’s just not the last of the laundry I’ve done today. I’ve emptied pots and poured the old soil in to my compost, I’ve moved out two more trees/ bushes from the cool cellar, a hazelnut bush and a Ginkgo. I really have no idea where I should place them and the problem is that I have already ordered a few more trees and bushes 🙂 🙂 🙂 Plus the only place I’ve found where I could plant the walnut (so it has a sporting chance to survive) is where my Laburnum (well call them Golden rain) grows. I have also baked a bread that now is put in the oven and will be ready to bring out after I’ve written this.
..
I think I’ll make this a weekend blog so I’ll see You all here next Friday.
I stopped by the lake Wednesday morning. The sky looked amazing so I took a few photos. Later that evening a new sow storm passed by but all of that latest snow melted away already on Thursday 🙂
So easter has begun, well at least the holidays because I guess one really should say that easter started on Monday. Weather has been so nice the week that no big amounts of cranes has gathered by the lake. twelve thousand as most but there’s still a wall of sound from the lake while they all trumpet like crazy. Instead they have now started to fly to the fields and meadows around the village. For some reason I think it’s more fun to see them here than standing by a fence down at the lake looking at them walking a couple of meters away and loads of them as well.
..
This week another neighbor than the usual gave me a call at work telling me that Alma had escaped the dogyard again 🙂 🙂 🙂 I really don’t understand why she keeps on doing that since she’s miserable when she can’t get back in again. She is however very happy to see me coming back home again though 🙂 🙂 I stayed at home a bit longer this time, the weather was so nice so I made myself a pot of tea before I drove back to work. Alma has been pretty impossible on our walks this week, that is until this morning when she suddenly remembered how to behave. Well at least until we came close to some cranes and she started screaming like obcessed for a while.
I looked up in the sky yesterday to see if I saw any witches up there but all I could see was more cranes on their way to the lake.Today I saw what we call song swans and in America is called Trumpet swans.and of course cranes in the field.
Yesterday evening all witches flew to Blåkulla to have a party with the devil. There are a few places that is supposed to be Blåkulla and I think all of them are remote islands out in the ocean. More close to the ground however yesterday is the day when kids dress up as witches (and now days warlocks) and walks from home to home begging for candy. It is sort of our Halloween. This custom almost died out but has become popular again. But since yesterday was a work day for most of us they might do it on easter eve instead. I don’t think anyone will come here since I have Albin here but perhaps I should buy some candy just in case, it won’t last for long if no one should come anyway 🙂
We came pretty close, they didn’t care about us at all. That is until Alma started screaming as if she was possessed..
I’ve a bread in the owen and the smell has spread in the entire cottage. The kitchen door is open because the sun shines and it gets so warm towards the south heading wall that the radiator in the kitchen is turned off. We’ll have another walks as soon as the bread is out of the oven because they’re guessing we’ll have a cloudy afternoon. From tomorrow we’ll have 10C or over (50F) during the days and a day after or so we will also have above 0C (32F) temperatures during nights 🙂 It does feel like spring has sprung after all 🙂
I had the wrong lens with me so it’s hard to see what I have photographed. It’s a Jay (or Nut screamer as the direct translation would be from it swedish name). They are really shy so one must hide and have patience if one want a good photo of them.
Another rather wonderful day here. The night was pretty cold but after the sun rose the temperature also rose fairly quickly. Yesterday we had around 20 cm (8 inches) of snow on the gravel roads and today big parts of the roads were snow free 🙂 They still haven’t changed the wetaher forecasts so we’ll have this weather until Good Friday (or as we call it Long Friday) with temperatures just below 10C (50F) during the sunny days. Friday will be cloudy but from then on nights will be less cold and sunny days will gives us temperatures above 10C (50F).
..
I’ll have to change Novas and Almas food again. Nova doesn’t like it any more 🙂 I did buy the same food but with chicken in it and she loves that one but one day I ordered the wrong food, it has rein deer instead. She gulped it down in the beginning but now she just sniffs at it and only eat it when she gets really hungry. She has however no problems what so ever to eat my food or treats 🙂 🙂 Alma eats anything that is put in front of her and also things I thought I had placed so high that she wouldn’t be able to reach it. I’ve now learned that Alma can reach anything she want to reach 🙂
..
Sometimes when I have had film rolls developed and scanned some photos are quite grainy. I used to have Adobe Photoshop organizer 11 (I think it was)and it fixed the graininess if I just brightened the photo one step. I don’t have that any more any the one I currently uses for down sizing my photos are quite helpless towards graininess. So I downloaded a program called Gimp and it is so advanced that I can’t understand it at all 🙂 🙂 The only things I do are down sizing photos and tries to fix graininess. It did fix the graininess but when I tried toi save the photo it either didn’t do it or placed it somewhere where I can’t find it 🙂 🙂 🙂 I still haven’t figured out how to down size the photos though 🙂 🙂 🙂
These are from the Voigtländer Bessamatic..
I still have problems after daylight saving time started and will most likely have problems for another couple of weeks. i’m always tired now and it doesn’t help that I had a really nasty cold two weeks ago. So I’ll go downstairs after this and make myself a nice cup of tea, I doubt that any ammount of tea can keep me awake tonight 🙂 🙂 I’ve just made dinner for work next week and it’s time to portion it out in my lunch boxes. Have a great day and see You next Friday perhaps otherwise next Saturday.
Another snowstorm passed by yesterday, must have been the third in four days, so ow the world is covered in white garbage again. I do have to say though that the days has been rather wonderful with sunshine and above freezing temperatures. The photo shows the morning mist we got and it was better than nothing 🙂 🙂 🙂 They’re guessing that we’ll continue to have this weather until at least Thursday, with cold nights but sunny and warm days, after that the cold nights most likely will give up and most likely the sunshine as well but to be honest they aren’t that great in guessing the weather over here so a new ice age might start before the week is over 🙂
. .
We now have a pack of wolves that made my county their territory. Their sort of home area isn’t that far south of the town Falköping so I guess we’ll have many more visits from them in the future unless hunters do what they usually do and poach them. Hunters can be nice people but they really don’t like competition about the wild life they themselves wants to kill. I do know however that the hunters in my village wouldn’t shoot them, they are usually the first ones to see the wolves and then spread the news to us in the village so we all can keep our eyes open and see them ourselves. No such luck for me yet but I know that at least one followed us, out of sight, at at least one of our walks because the dogs clearly showed me that something was close to us for quite some distance and they really didn’t like it.
. .
More and more cranes arrive now and so does the crane tourists. long time since I saw that many caravans and mobile homes down by the lake. Lots of other birds arrive here too of course and I do hope that I one day will see at least one of the very few Black Storks that comes here every year. I know that they one year actually nested here but that’s very rare. They are usually more at home on the other side of the Baltic sea.
These were taken with my Agfa Ambi Silette. .
Last year I bought a pair of shoes that were nasty expensive but they were the most comfortable shoes I’ve ever walked in. Unfortunately the price didn’t show that they were a high quality shoes, I guess they lasted a month or so and the reviews of the company showed that there was no use in trying to send them back or get a new pair. Turns out that the soles just were glued on and with a low quality glue as well. So I’ve been looking at the shoes with some kind of disgust 🙂 until I realized that if I tore the soles off they would work very well as slippers instead 🙂 So now I instead have really comfortable slippers 🙂 🙂 Still to be honest they weren’t worth the price but now I can at least use them again.
. . Sixteen and a half years old, with a bad knee and still has no intentions on walking at the same pace as the rest of us 🙂 🙂 🙂
It’s time to make dinner for the dogs so see You tomorrow again.
It really was spring like here for a while so I thought I might start here again, then the rain came and now it snows. They tend to change the weather forecasts faster than a spinning wind power plants but at the moment it looks like we’ll get nasty cold nights and barely survivable warm days. That will of course change next second but that’s what I’ve read so far.
..
So what has happened since christmas? Well I’ve learned, after 58 years why I’ve always had a wobbly stomach. Turns out I can’t eat gluten. I was at the companies health care service and talked with a nurse there. She asked if I had tried to stop eating products with gluten and I said I had bought one of those rather expensive home tests and it didn’t show anything at all. So she said try and stop eat anything with gluten and see what happens. Well I can tell You that I really don’t use much toilet paper now days 🙂 🙂 🙂
..
Now days it isn’t that hard to avoid gluten since it has become fashionable to not eating it. however the bread one can buy is an abomination to anything living so I’ve tried different ways to bake bread with other kinds of cereal and now I have bread that is just like any other except I really can’t make a good French roll but I’ll keep on trying till I get close enough.
I had a few rolls of film developed and these two photos were taken with the Flexaret II
The dogs are all fine and I must say that Alma has calmed down considerable. She would still be considered awful compared to other dogs but she has really tried to listen to what I tell her. Last time we saw a deer she only screamed for five minutes after she last saw it and that’s a huge improvement. More and more cranes are around now and now I can hear them trumpeting from the lake in the mornings. Well I can hear them for the cow pasture on the other side of the road as well but so far they’ve stayed behind a tiny mound so I haven’t been able to see them yet.
These three were taken with the Agfa Ambi Silette..
Well since the wetaher will be more wintery than what I prefer I’ll come back next weekend again.
So a new year is here and I doubt that it’ll be any different from the last one. Well there’s a risk that many will lose their jobs because of a recession but otherwise I’m pretty sure it’ll stay the same. I never have any higher hopes for a coming year and that’s why I never feel disappointed about how it ended up 🙂 🙂 🙂 Over here the year started grey and dull, some drizzle and thankfully some fog. If we won’t have any sunshine I think we at least should have some fog 🙂
...It was around here where Albin suddenly started to look behind us 🙂
Yesterday when we were out walking in the morning we walked down to the creek. We walk a lot there now since the dogs still are a bit hesitant to walk out on the bog, even when we just walk out on the peninsula they’re a bit more attentive than usual. So anyway we were walking down the long gravel road to the creek when Albin suddenly started to look behind us. At first just a glance every now and again but then he stopped, turned around and took a long look behind us. I must admit that it feels a bit worrisome when a dog like Albin does something like that 🙂 🙂 🙂 Nova rarely cares about what happens behind us and Alma, well Alma is like she is and rarely notice anything 🙂 🙂
It was just as dark yesterday and even though I looked around as good as I could I never saw anything...
We followed the creek out to the fields and then suddenly Nova too realizes that something is close to us and she starts to hurry. I wasn’t really worried until Alma reacted as well 🙂 🙂 but suddenly instead of looking behind us they all started to look towards our left side. I could never see anything but the dogs were all in a hurry to get home. Later when it had become dark and was going outside in the garden they went to the side of the cottage, sniffed some in the air and went back indoors. I was out there too, with my headlamp on but I still couldn’t see anything out there. We walked the same way today and none of them seemed to care about anything and behaved just like always. I must say though that Alma behaved really well yesterday and today she barely pulled the leash at all. That in it self is a very strange behaviour from her 🙂 🙂 🙂
...
Besides that very little has happened here. I wasn’t up when we went in to the new year, I rarely am to be honest. I did start to look at the film Murder on the Orient Express but I must admit that it wasn’t as good as I remembered it to be. Mostly I was annoyed about the man playing Hercule Poirot changed his accent from time to time, he’s supposed to have a french accent byt every now and again he did sound more like he came from Italy 🙂 🙂 🙂 So I never finished it but instead went to bed 🙂 🙂 🙂 There are never any fireworks here since we have lots of cattle and horses here so it was almost as quiet as it always is here. I could hear fireworks from a far distance but that was it. I still have a weeks vacation before I have to go back to work and I’ll enjoy every second of it 🙂
And it was here they started to look towards our left side. There’s an open field just after the end of the trees here but I could still not see anything special...
Have a good continuing of the new year!
Salmiak was sitting in the middle of the road when we returned back home. He doesn’t like my dogs at all but he sat there for quite some time before he decided it was best to move 🙂
Last Sunday when we took a walk out on the bog I found some tracks in the snow when we walked on my favorite island out there. beneath the canopy there was just a thin layer of powdered snow so I really couldn’t see what animals they came from but it was clear that they weren’t from pigs or any kind of deer or moose. Fairly big and my dogs were really unhappy about them. From what I could figure out there must have been at least three of these animals passing by. It looked like the animals had done their best to walk in each others foot steps though. Since the dogs were so unhappy about them I guessed that we must have wolves here again. Today I thought we should walk the same way again but it didn’t take long until suddenly the dogs refused to go on, they all sniffed in the air and just wouldn’t walk. So we turned back and I think that must have been the first time all dogs had the same goal, just to leave the area as fast as possible. So I guess those wolves are still out there and who knows perhaps they were watching us while we left in a hurry.
...
I don’t mind wolves myself but I really don’t want to risk meeting several of them while walking in an area where we not easily can get away from them. A dog is just another wolf in their eyes and will kill and eat them if they can. I’m not sure if they would have come even close to use while me, a human, is with the dogs but I’m not willing to try and test it 🙂 🙂 🙂 There weren’t any tracks from any other animal but hares and a fox out there either and that’s usually a sign that something has changed, like wolves staying in the area. So instead we walked down to the creek and back home again. I talked with my neighbor and he had seen some paw prints behind one of his cars so we took a look at them. The prints were much bigger than Almas but perhaps not as big as the only real paw print I’ve seen in snow that actually came from a wolf, so either a really big dogs or a rather young wolf I guess. Kind of cool that they’ve passed just outside my garden but at the same time I better follow my dogs outside in to the garden now when it’s dark outside. Just in case it will return. Anyway I did send a text message to the hunters that will be out hunting tomorrow, they’ll be using dogs and I really don’t want any dog to risk getting killed by a wolf. To be honest, if I hadn’t had the dogs with me today and thought there might be wolves around I would have continued out on the bog just to see if I could see any 🙂 🙂 🙂
.This is where we stopped and walked back when the dogs refused to continue.Up at the left corner is where we were so we walked back and down to the creek instead.Fortunately I took some photos last Sunday while we were out walking there 🙂
These are the times to also keep an eye open fro trolls and other beings while out walking according to our folklore. Trolls, who actually origins from the Norse faith can be out and about any time of day since they look much like us humans. Well not the mountain trolls up in the north of course, they are really big and human like even though they quite often are rather ugly, shrewd as few but not especially smart and they really dislike us humans. The other trolls however are much more like us but with the difference that they have a long tail. Sort of downy all they way to the tip where they have a big fluffy “ball” of hair. If one leave them alone they’ll leave us along but they will be forever grateful of one help them when they are in need. They occasionally tends to swap their children with ours but it is easy to make them swap back again, just threaten to hit the child and the troll mother will be there in no time to get their child back. A troll would never ever hurt their own child no matter what. Most of the rest of the beings will mostly come out when it gets dark and this time of year it’s dark almost all the time, especially if it is cloudy as it has been today. Never interact with them unless it is to help them (happens extremely rare), they will reward anyone who will give them a hand when they need it. Also it is a good thing to have some pieces of silver in the pockets, they love silver and will help if one give them some of it.
...
The gnome is, from what I’ve read, never seen during daytime. The house gnome or perhaps more correct the farm gnome is said to be the spirit of the first owner of the farm, the one who once built the place. He stays just because he wants to make sure the place is well taken care of. He helps with the animals on the farmers do their best as well. However if the farmer is lazy the gnome will punish him one way or the other and if the farmers are really bad it happens that the gnomes simply burns the place down. The gnome is always a male and he usually wears grey or green, rather worn woolen clothes. One shouldn’t however bring him new clothes as a thank you because if he feels he is too well dressed he most likely will leave for good, he will of course not wear good clothes while working in the barn 🙂 The gnome can live in the barn but he can also live in the care tree that should be growing in every home. A care tree (or vårdträd as we call it in swedish) is a tree that is planted just for eventual sprits and beings to live in. Normally it would be an Elm tree, Ash tree or perhaps a Linden but it could also be, like in my garden a Rowan tree or perhaps an Oak or a Chestnut tree. What ever one does ever never hurt a care tree, not even by mistake, because the spirits and beings living there will punish You, perhaps even with death, if one does. On the other hand if one takes good care of it they will instead make sure one will have a good life.
...
It is time to give the dogs their dinner and I might even have something myself. I’ll be back tomorrow but after that I won’t write anything until new years eve I think.
The Cottage by the crane lake. 