Spring has sprung!

...and it sure doesn't mess around when it decides to show up!  The weather for the past few weeks has been absolutely gorgeous, sunny, and warm....the flowers are blooming, baby lambs are being born, and I'm actually getting a little bit of a tan from spending the past week outside during Easter vacation.  It's amazing how much better and happier Sweden becomes when springtime finally shows up.  In more good news, the daycare where I had an unpaid internship has hired me to work 20 hours per week, possibly up to 30, through summertime.  It's a huge difference not feeling like an unemployed crabby pregnant burden on M and having so much to look forward to this summer.  Here are a few photos from the past couple of weeks:

A brand-new lamb born on the farm on M's parent's island.

I've been getting crafty in anticipation of the baby Sweedie.

 M's new boat, Vixen, is all spiffed up and ready to start his new company.

Every day the buds on the trees are bursting bigger and greener.

You know spring is here when the forest is carpeted with blåsippor.

 More fuzzy buds.

View over the fields on the farm where we live.

Vitsippor everywhere!

The Darkness has arrived.

Here's a typical November weather forecast along with sunrise/sunset times that are rapidly shrinking our hours of daylight:

Usch.  Yuck.  November is by far the worst month in Sweden, weather-wise.  The newest vocabulary word I've learned by hearing people talk about the weather recently is ruggig, which literally means "gruesome."  No kidding...here's hoping for some nice frozen snow to lighten and cover up the cold, sopping, cloudy, muddy mess that is Sweden at the moment.

Snö!

It looks like winter isn't wasting any time in showing up to Sweden this year...last night it was -5 Celsius when we went to bed (or "five degrees cold" as they say here) and the ground was all frosty and sparkly.  We've had our big kakelugn (tiled woodstove) burning off and on for the past few weeks now:

 Once the fire heats up, the whole tower section gives off heat for the next day or two, even if the fire goes out.

 Last night it got cold enough to light a fire in the old kitchen oven as well. 

This morning we woke up to a white, soggy winter wonderland and it's still plopping down as I type.  I've had a love/hate relationship with winter throughout my life, and this is the most snow I've seen since the winter of 2005.  But, I'm a northern girl at heart and I was a little surprised to find myself getting totally excited for the snow:

I've been lucky enough to live in hot, beachy, tropical places (Guatemala, Guam, and the Gulf Coast) for about 7 years of my life, but I never realized how much I missed the changing of the seasons.   Much like the upper Midwest of the US where I grew up (Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota), the seasons here in Sweden blast in and out in a way that's anything but subtle.  It almost seems like every single week here is different in some way, and it has a much bigger impact on the way you create memories and remember years past when it was a dry summer or an early winter or an extra-wet spring.  It's no wonder Swedes are so connected to nature, and forgetting to check the weather forecast here is as unthinkable as going without coffee or wearing your shoes inside the house. 

It's still snowing like crazy outside, which makes being inside with a cozy fireplace that much more enjoyable.  I feel like I've come full circle back to the wintry north now, and even though I'm on the other side of the world, it feels like home.

***** Snow Update, six hours later *****

After I posted this the power went out and the snow kept dumping down...so instead of the wussy little dusting above, we now have this:

 

The perfect fall weekend

We just spent a long weekend out on M's parent's island with M's best friend, wife, two daughters, and a total of four crazy little hunting dogs running around.  Our friends were visiting from Göteborg on the western side of the country, and they brought us fresh lobster and a huge bag of shrimp. The weather was unbelievably gorgeous...bright sun, the water was like a mirror, and just a little fall chill in the air. 

This photo was taken just a few hundred meters up the road from our house.

The bay where we live, headed out toward M's parent's island.

 Island sheep

 Island ponies

 This pony is so teeny, he looks like a dog.

One of the best things about M's parent's house is their wood-fired hot tub out on the dock.  There's something about soaking in hot salt water and then jumping back and forth into the chilly sea that makes you feel like ten pounds of dirt has been scrubbed out of your skin. 

 We stopped to grill hot dogs on the way out to watch seals on the rocks

A grey seal

 Taking photos of swimming seals from a bobbing boat wasn't easy, but with a good zoom I managed to catch this guy's eerily human-like eyes.

Swan launch