It's all in the balance, people..

The past few weeks, the husband and I have been working on creating a photobook as a gift for his grandmother's 75th birthday. I got the idea from seeing displays of photobooks in a store one day and I thought that a woman like grandma Inger (that's her name) and even grandpa Sven-Olof would truly appreciate something like that, seeing how such sentimental people they can be.

So we went around borrowing photo albums from members of the Sjöberg clan to see what kind of photobook we could come up with. We just finished the project yesterday and the end result was a beautiful story of a woman and her husband, their lives through the years and the people who have had the privilege to share it with these 2 incredible persons. We didn't come up with the story, the story told itself. Of their lives at work, at home and of time gone past.

And that has really gotten me thinking. There's been all this blogging about work, life, youth, relationships and what it all means in the end by my dear friends recently and to a large extent I fully agree with them. These are people I have essentially grown up with. We spent our teenage years together and watched each other grow up into adults, thrust into the working world and all it has to offer, the good and bad. We've even shared the tragedy of losing a close friend, someone who we agree have always been the stone support in our lives, there when we needed her and kept us grounded to reality when our imagination and ideals start to float us up into the heavens. That was until illness took her away from us recently.

My point in sharing all of this is that I've experienced my life up to this point in time and so have my friends. We've gone through a lot together, each with a different point of view and as individuals, we've been through even more. But we are only 27 years old. There is so much more to experience, both the good times and the personal tragedies.

Grandma Inger is 75 years and I saw her life through photos and I love what I saw. She didn't have a very high education, she didn't try to climb that career or social ladder or try to get ahead in the rat race. What she does have are her intelligence, her hardworking nature and a love and empathy of people that I envy. And still she had a job she loved, a career that spanned more than a decade and that brought her up to a high state of recognition and admiration and friends, family and acquaintances that love and appreciate her more than she realises. She has interests and hobbies, friends, family and the unconditional love of a husband who has not left her side for more than half a century.

She is the kind of woman I would want to be. She didn't let life pass her by, immersed too much in her work or in her family. Like any other person, she had to make sacrifices but the point is through it all, she maintained Inger the person.

I want to have a career, I want to have a family, I want to have interests and hobbies and friends to talk to. I want all of that but most importantly, I want to remain me. I don't want to get lost in my job like I used to, working 12 even 18 hour days, worrying and planning and scheduling in my mind all the time. But I don't want to get lost in my family either, like I do now, thinking of the husband, of having children, of domestic affairs all the time. And neither do I want to get lost in my friends like I did before I got married, always spending time with them, not going home to sit and just be with my family.

It's a very difficult balance as I toe the line of life, I'll be the first to admit that. But I have the rest of my life to work on that, making mistakes, going through phases, making choices that will continue to help me keep my balance. And I will still have my bad days when I'm anti-people, anti-babies, anti-*n****s, hate my family, my friends, my job and my life. And I will have my days when I'm cooking, I'm baking, I'm loving nature, I'm hating nature, I'm exercising, I'm lazing, I'm laughing and joking, I'm kissing, I'm hugging, I'm bossing people around or loving everything and everyone in sight.

But you know what? I don't care and I won't change as long as I don't focus too much on just one thing. Because that is me and that is how I want me to be, a balanced mix of everything, good and bad. So next time you have to make a big decision ask yourself, is this how I want me to be me?

So You Think You Can Dance

Husband dear and I love the dance program, So you think you can dance. We make sure not to miss any episodes of it, even dropping everything just so we can be in front of the tv, eyes glued to the screen on the night that it is showing. So we have watched all the episodes together, admiring the performances and auditions so far, not missing a beat. And we were rightfully pissed when we realised that Swedish TV had failed to show the 3rd season of it and went straight to the 4th season.

Oh well, such is life.

Anyway, so we were watching an episode of it today and it was showing the auditions in Vegas where they make the final cut to the top 20 dancers. And exciting it certainly was...but this post has nothing to do with the show, or how great we think it is, or even a certain scene or dance routine that played out that we thought is noteworthy.

Rather it was a question by husband dear, totally out of the blue and unexpected that got me laughing so hard and will be something he will not be allowed to forget for a long time...

So there we are watching the auditions. The dancers had just finished their performance and were being critiqued by the judges. The voiceover lets us know that 2 brothers are going to be judged together and will the judges split them up?

Husband dear turns to me and says, I wonder which brother is older.

I then face him and with a very puzzled look ask him instead, Which brother is older? Does it really matter, dear? They're twins.

He looks at me very surprised, What? They are? I knew they were brothers but I didn't know they were twins.

At this point, the 2 brothers are shown on tv, side by side, arms over shoulders looking sad as it turns out they are being split up as one is sent packing.

I glance at the screen and look back at the husband just beginning to realise that this is an absolute DUH moment that will haunt the husband for a long time to come.

I finally said, But dear...they're identical twins....

Hot Summer Days

I never thought that I would be able to do this in Sweden and actually enjoy it. I went swimming in the lake over the weekend.

I've always thought that it is too cold in the lake for me to ever swim but it has been very very warm (in Swedish standards around 27 degrees) the past few days which has helped to warm up the usually icy cold water. I love going out on picnics with husband dear when it's so warm and today was no exception. It was simply too hot in the apartment to eat lunch so we packed up a picnic basket, gathered up some pillows and a blanket and headed down the street to the lake.

The ducks sitting there got very interested with us when we started settling down under a shady tree just by the water and they literally got up and started walking straight towards us which kinda freaked me out. They looked like they were on a war path, so determined their walk was. But it turned out that they weren't really coming at us but rather making their way to the water for a swim.

Hee hee...paiseh..

It's so nice to just enjoy the quiet, the lovely scenery, the great company and food and read a little. The ducks don't really bother us. As a matter of fact, they tend to come and sit close by but it almost feels like they are keeping us company instead of bothering us so one feels peace of mind. It was in the midst of all this peacefulness that I suddely got the urge to feel the water. That was when we realised that the water wasn't too bad at all!

So we packed up, went home to change and made our way to the small island near the harbour in town which is called 'Barnens Egen Ö' which means The Children's Own Island. It's a very very small island connected to town by a bridge which also happens to be a docking site for boats, like a parking lot for boats. So as we crossed the bridge, we passed boat after boat, pretending one of them was ours and if that were true, which boat would we own. We've decided a fairly sized motorboat with roomy seating at the front and back (what do u call it in sea terms? Starboard side?) and a nice roof over oh and a large bottle of sunblock cos I hate to tan.

The island has a nice small beach that has a very gradual gradient so one can walk very far out into the lake, which can be quite dangerous since there are so many boats, canoes, jetskies and even wakeboarders passing by at high speed. It took me a while and very small steps but I finally did end up in thigh high water before taking a deep cleansing breath and diving right into the cold cold water. Brrr.....

But the sun was beating down and the water had warm spots so I managed to cling onto husband dear while he transported me around until we ended up sitting on a huge rock that juts out from the shallow waters. So there I was sitting on the rock, with the sun shining into my eyes, alternating between pretending to be the little mermaid and a sexy siren calling to unsuspecting sailors. The husband found it all very amusing.

So there it was, my first experience of swimming in Sweden and of ever swimming in a lake, the 2nd largest lake in Sweden, the beautiful lake Vättern. What a great experience to swim in non salty water while still feeling like I'm swimming in the ocean.

The Swedish Wedding Party....finally!

A little more than a week ago, dear husband and I finally held our Swedish wedding party. It was a party held for the Sjöberg clan and husband's closest friends. It would have been wonderful to have my family and friends there but for one reason or another they couldn't make it so one can say it was a purely white party except for the lone Asian who happened to be the VIP. Yay! hee hee...

We decided to make it into a garden party held in the in laws vast backyard so that people could use thier vast front yard as a parking lot. That just shows you how big the area surrounding the modest country house is. Anyway, we managed to secure a large BBQ pit, a tent in case of rain, a young uncle who would serve as the enterainment of the day and most importantly, a chef who also happened to be the husband's 2nd cousin. One can say it was a truly family affair.

The Tent
We borrowed a pretty blue tent that really made the party look something special and of cos with my wonderful decorating skills, we made the inside of the tent just as special looking. Surprisingly, the tent managed to fit almost 40 people in it. Didn't look that big when we were building it up. Unfortunately I don't have any pictures of us setting up the tent since I was too busy trying to be helpful. But it was funny setting it up with 2 halfnaked white men (father in law and grandfather in law) who occasionally scream and shout for no apparent reason except cos they think it's funy.

View of the tent from above. That's my sister in law right in the middle looking like she's ready to join fight club. Can you imagie how big the back yard is? This is just part of it!

The inside of the tent tastefully decorated by paper tablecloth, plastic tablerunner (which is actually platic covers for books but necessity is the mother of all inventions right?) and wildflowers that I picked the day before from the nearby woods.
What I really like about the tent is that there are windows on both sides of the tent. Even though they are 'drawn' in and not really windows that one can open and shut, it adds a touch of elegance and light into the tent. All in all it all looked very garden party and very summery which I loved.

The Food
Most of the food we served would be grilled so our dear chef, Jimmy (who really is an executive chef at some high end restaurant in Örebro, the big town nearby) made a lot of different sauces including hummus and salsa. He then made potato salad, gratinated potatoes which we sooooo good and basically made sure everyone was well fed. Even till today, we still get calls from our guests who rave about how good the food was. Thank you Jimmy!!

Our buffet table that was absolutely filled and it didn't even include the barbecued food yet. The famous gratinated potato is at the foreground of the above picture and it is famous cos it is Jimmy's signature dish. It was also the signature dish of a known high end restaurant that Jimmy had worked in before and was very popular and sought after. So I guess one can say that we had restaurant food at our modest little party.

We had grilled beef, chicken, crayfish, prawns, asparagus, mozarella and other vegetables. And just for the kids, we had burgers and hotdogs.


This was what I called Jimmy's office for the day. Look at all the food just waiting to be grilled. One actually goes to Jimmy to let him know what you wanted and he would start grilling it for you then. Food was sooo excellent!! I'm still dreaming of it sometimes.


The father in law was the self appointed bartender of the day. He made sure that nobody went thirsty. Even though in our invites we had stated that we would not be serving alcohol, we made it into a BYOB party, bring your own beer which people did! And so the love was shared by those who brought their own spirits and dad in law had beer so people stll got drunk at our party. Just the way the Swedes do it!Dad in law may look innocent here serving just soft drinks but right next to him was a beer keg that he refilled 3 times which meant that 15 litres of beer was served that day. Very very little for a Swedish party.

The Guests
I knew and had met most of the guests from our engagement party some 2 years ago but it was fun to see them again after so long and especially to see the kids who have grown up since.















Here stand 2 lovely boys, Noel my nephew in law (the dark haired one) and Eskil, one of Mathias' best friend's sons. The last time I saw Eskil, he was only 2 and just as shy. But oh so smart that boy!! I guess that happens when one's dad is a genius.















And this is Leon Georg Viking Gullberg...the very small cute boy with a very big bombastic name. But such a good natured baby, smiling and laughing all the time. And soooo cute! Look at the little pug nose.

The only people who actually danced at our wedding party. My sister in law, Jessica and her 2nd son, Isak managed a twirl around the tent entrance. Jessica says that she's gotten the boys side of the Sjöberg clan now it's our turn to produce the girls for the family.

I just wanted to show off the kids that came since they were so cute. If you notice, there were no girls because it appears that everyone close to Mathias' heart have produced nothing but sons. So I guess it is up to us to produce the girls. Yeah right...

The Wonderful people who helped make it into a Success.

A huge thank you must be said to Jimmy, our wonderful chef and grillmaster for the day without whom the party would not have been as successful as it was.

I still cannot rave enough about just how good the food was. And how nice Jimmy was throughout the whole thing and especially his great philosophy of no one shal go home hungry cos not a singe guest left dissatisfied. How can they with over 10kg of potatoes, salad, animals and grilled vegetables?

Next in line is our entertainment man, Jonny. He's around the same age as Mathias but he is really my father in law's cousin. He had his own little corner in the tent set up to the nines with speakers, mics, guitar and mixer. And even though he started the day singing, it ended with many others, drunk and ridiculously happy, joining him in song and dance.

And where would we be without my in laws? Thanks to them, we had our event venue, a wonderful site out in the countryside. And with their help we managed to set up the tent pretty quick, not to mention all the before and after party help with set up and clean up.

I must say that I am lucky that my in laws are really nice and geerally unassuming people. They don't have preconceived ideas of the roles that a husband and a wife plays and even if they do, they don't pressure or even expect us to be ike that. They just accept us the way we are and for that I am really glad. Lady next to my father in law is his mum and lady next to tiny mum in law is his sister. So now you finally meet the members of my new family, the Sjöberg clan.

*If you notice, there is not a single picture of me during the party. Reason is that dear husband is very very bad at remembering to take pictures. So yup, he FORGOT to take pictures of me during the wedding party...grumble grumble....*

Environmental Conscience...Are you up to it?

I know that these past few years, awareness and action to help the environment have been stepped up. I'm especially aware of it now that I've moved to Sweden. People recycle a LOT more in Europe and a lot of laws are formulated with the climate and nature in mind. They even put a tax on people who use diesel cars simply because they emit certain particles into the air that have as yet unknown effects on the environment. Since they have no idea what effects these particles have on the environment, they've decided to put a tax on it. Just to be safe.

Talk about thinking ahead.

So I am not very sure what to think when I read this article about the Mooncup. It is purely for women and I honestly don't know if I would ever want to try this out. Suffice to say that I was surprised, amazed, flabbergasted, speechless and to a large extent rather grossed and freaked out by this product.

I just wonder how long this product has been around. Seems that it's been around but just not too popular. No wonder. Seriously. Ugh...

Women out there! Would you use it? Ever consider it? Buy it just for fun?

A Glance Through Time

The husband and I have an ongoing project at the moment. We have decided to create a special book with photo memories for his grandparents. Unlike most other albums, it is not an album stuck with printed out photos and decorated. That is a scrapbook.

We have decided to up it a notch by actually sending the photos to a photoshop to actually produce a book with the photos printed onto the pages of the book and bound with a hard cover. It will look sooo classy and I'm excited to actually help put it together.

I have a special soft spot for husband's grandparents simply cos they are the sweetest and kindest and nicest people around. They made me feel welcome almost instantly when I first came to Sweden and when I officially became a member of the Sjöberg family. and for that I'm always grateful.

So anyway, we've been spending the past week scanning old pictures that we got from Mathias' parents and I got to see baby pictures of the husband and he was SUCH a cute baby!!

So here is a brief comparison of childhood pictures between husband and wife.

The Baby















Here we are in our first years. Both cute and chubby. Both STILL cute and chubby many many years later.

The Toddler











He was the calm, stay at home kid while I was out rocking the world, hanging out at the beach getting sunburn on my ears since they caught so much of the damn rays.

The Young Innocent Child














Who would have thought these two kids, so young, so innocent, so different and so far apart would one day end up sharing a life together?

The Teenage 'Find your true self' Years












One of the most painful things one can do is to look back and stare at a picture of oneself at one's most vulnerable and sensitive...the teen years. What a tomboy I was...how very Duran Duran he looked. Ugh!...MY EYES! MY EYES!.... Somebody get me some saline to wash my burning eyes!

A Work In Progress...

At our best and worst looking... (I bet husband will protest unfair that I show my good pic and his bad. But hey, it's my blog, love, so live with it. :P)












We've always enjoyed the beach and clear waters...who doesn't? (maybe not Francine?...)









And finally finding our way to each other...

On our honeymoon...

Speaking of married, next Saturday will be the day we're having the Swedish half of our wedding party. Finally! After the big bash in Singapore, the Swedish party is (thank goodness) more toned down. We will be having a relatively small garden party in the backyard of the in laws modest country home. I'm quite excited about the party since I like parties anyway, and it will be a nice bbq with close family and friends (his mostly). So instead of the 600 guests in Singapore, we will be expecting 35 guests next week. What a difference!

We've borrowed a large party tent from one of the family friends, gotten husband's 2nd cousin who's a restaurant chef to take care of the food, a very young uncle who is more like a cousin to handle the entertainment and tables and chairs from the club that grandma belongs to. So all in all we managed to save quite a lot in terms of decoration which leaves us to splurge on food which is actually appropriate seeing how we are SUCH food lovers ourselves.

Can tell right? Heh heh...