Happy Mother’s Day

Today is Mother’s Day in the US. Happy Mother’s Day to all the mothers in the family. Thank you for all you do. I appreciate you all sooooo much. So here is a special greeting from me. OOOOOXXXXX

Thank you to the mothers who are doing such a great job raising my grandchildren.

 Thank you to my mom for always being so loving and caring, for teaching me the gospel, and helping me have a love for the gospel and also how to manage life and how to work. We are glad you are here with us right now. Too bad it won’t be for long. (But that can always change). Thank you for always remembering any special occasion. 

Thank you Marta for being such a great mom and grandma to our family. A thank you to you also for always remember special occasions. And sorry that we are so bad at it!! We wish we could see you more often. But we know you are now being a wonderful grandma and greatgrandma to your beautiful family in Arizona.

Thank you to all the rest of the family mothers who are a great example to me in all your are doing.

So to all the moms, pat yourselves on the back. I read somewhere the other day that a housewife is worth $117,000 a year, but also that that amount was not high enough. I agree. And it doesn’t take into account the influence we have on our children’s lives. That can’t be measured in money. What a blessing to be able to raise some of our Heavenly Father’s children and hope that we don’t make too many mistakes.

To you in Sweden, I know Mother’s day is not for another couple of weeks, but you might as well enjoy two Mother’s days.

Today, my parents are speaking at church. We look forward to hearing more about their mission. We appreciate them and all their service and for the good example they have set for us in serving the Lord and others.

Spring is here, finally. Back to mowing the lawn, doing yard work, but also enjoying the beautiful flowers everywhere, and the trees turning green. There is still snow on the mountains, and there was more the other day, but it will melt soon, as the days get warmer all the time. I actually love the snow capped mountains as long as possible. It is so beautiful!! 

I love you all!!!

MOM (Gil)

Time Flies

I don’t know where the time goes, but it just flies by. I have been home from Sweden for a month already. April brought another trip, this time down to Oceanside and Mexico, mostly Mexico. Not as relaxing as my Swedish trip. Since we have two homes just north of Rosarito in Mexico, it is mostly work going down there.

The renters moved out of our Calle Mitla house, the one closest to the beach, and we needed to rent it out again. We did get some new renters that will move in at the end of June. The renters are moving out of the other house, too, Calle Tula, so we were trying to rent that out. But it is quite messy and it was hard to show it to anybody and get them excited about it. Besides, we had plumbers working on that house all week, to find the plumbing back up problem. They had to dig up a bunch of concrete, but they finally found it and put in new pipes. Right next to our Calle Mitla house, there is a house being built now, after having been an empty lot for 30 years. Not only that, they are building within a few inches (centimeters) of our house. Apparently, our house was built too close to their property line. So they moved our water lines, our gas lines that were all on their property actually, they tore out our side walk and the part of our roof that was hanging over their lot. Luckily, they were good people and did the work for us. They didn’t just tear everything out. They could have. Our renters kept a close eye on everything, and we kept a close eye on the work while we were there. There are no rules how close you can build houses down there, but if we ever dropped anything between the houses, we could never get it back, and if we need to do anything to our house on that side, forget it.

We did manage a little beach time down there, and a daily walk. The weather was very nice except for a couple of windy days. We also went to a wedding in Oceanside, and Linnea got to hang out with a couple of friends in Oceanside and Carlsbad. She also had the adventure of taking the bus to Tijuana from Oceanside. She was nervous, but she does speak Spanish well enough and we met her at the station.

So now we are back home, back to work and back to school. It snowed here the day we left for Mexico, and it has snowed a couple of times lately, but it doesn’t stay long on the ground. It is time to put in the garden and get our lawn going again. We have mowed it twice. I really like the winters when there is no yard work and no watering to be done. Just shoveling snow now and then.  

Danny is done with school for this semester. He is very excited to be done with school for a while. We have Natalia visiting from Sweden for a month. She is a cutie and Danny is very excited to have her here. We are also excited to have my parents return from their mission this week. Everybody looks forward to seeing them again. I know all of you in Sweden will miss them, but I am sure they will be back there before you know it.

Sean and his family are getting ready to move to Puerto Rico, where he will work as a Federal Prosecutor. We will miss them so much, but we will just have to “sacrifice” and go to Puerto Rico now and then on vacation.

Until next time, Gil

 

 

 

 

Back home

I had a great time in Sweden! And I so appreciate all who made the trip so nice. It was wonderful to see family and friends. I told Mari that I could get used to being pampered, someone cooking my food and doing my laundry,  letting me use their car or driving me around, and also not having a watch or a phone. Special thank yous go to my parents for making me feel special and spoiling me and showing me around Gotland and thanks to all their wonderful friends there; to Richard and Marie for picking me up at the ferry and for letting me stay with them although they were very busy opening their first store; to Louis and Angelica for their hospitality and rides even though they had their hands full with children and work and for Louis helping me set up this site; to Mari and Sigge for totally spoiling me to death, Mari for letting me use her car, doing my laundry, and going for walks with me; to Per and Eva-Li for good food and sight seeing tour to places I had no idea existed; to Lizette for being my guide; to  Eva and Janne for spoiling me and driving me around everywhere, Eva walking and reminiscing with me, for sharing the exciting family history treasure chest with me, and to her children for their food and good company. I love you all!

I am sorry I took the snow with me to Sweden, but it made it very beautiful there. I have some great pictures. It just prevented me from seeing some sights and some family and friends. I think I took the snowy weather with me back home, too. It was warm and nice here while I was gone, and now we have had two days of snow. It is really storming right now.

There are some things that fascinated me about Sweden, things that I know about, but that I thought about a lot more as I actually experienced them. One was how diverse it has become, so many immigrants in recent years. To hear a black or an Arab person speaking “skånska” or “stockholmska” or another Swedish dialect perfectly sounded so weird to me. I also really noticed the different dialects in every place I visited. How two towns so close together can have such distinctly different dialects is amazing. On Gotland, I had to really concentrate sometimes to understand what they were saying. The building style of homes was another thing I thought of. And also how well preserved even very old homes and buildings were.  Historical sites everywhere, such as viking graves, or “runstenar”, castles,  all of Visby, so many old, preserved churches everywhere, etc. I tried to take it all in. I also noticed that in the church congregations I visited, the members really sang well and with gusto, compared to the US wards I have attended. I loved it! I also liked the ease of getting around, great trains and buses.  I had forgotten how much Swedish people “fikar”, that is having coffee, tea, or ”saft” (fruit drink) usually with sweet rolls or cookies. I must have had 10 gallons of herb tea while I was there. It was great! Even though I was royally fed, I was able to keep my weight down, and maybe all that tea had something to do with it. I love cheese, so the practice of eating bread with sliced cheese with every meal is great, too. The prices of everything was more of a shock. I know the dollar is down, so that makes it worse, but how do people survive? Food, clothes, gas, etc. I guess you just have to really aware of tremendous bargains. But that is how I do it here, too.

I don’t think I have ever had such trouble with jet lag as I have had this time. I just can’t sleep. An hour or two here and there and then I wake up. I can’t wait until I get normal again. I couldn’t sleep on the planes, either, as they were very full. I am up at 3 in the morning, even though I might have gone to bed very late. Crazy! But I am managing just fine.

My second night home, we had a big party at our house. Our dear friends, Dennis and Lori Wilson, are here in Utah visiting. We had a big birthday party/barbecue dinner/musical evening for them, and invited lots of family and friends. Our home was packed with people, probably 60 or more. That was with just a few hours notice. While I was gone, Danny had a birthday party and made the  large family room in the basement into a band/dance room. So it stayed that way. Ready for a party any time. Everybody had a great time, even though it was crazy with kids and adults everywhere, playing music and singing and dancing, kids playing dress up and chasing each other with (wooden) swords, playing war, and working on our “fort”. I am grateful for a big yard that is great for kids, and a big house, and that it wasn’t very cold that night. I was a little stressed before hand but we were able to get everything ready, food prepared, and some  house cleaning that didn’t get done while I was gone. I was also worried that I would be too tired, with only 3 hours of sleep in 48 hours, but I wasn’t at all.

The next night, we went out for dinner and a movie with the Wilsons. We saw 10,000 BC. Don’t waste your time on it. I also made it to the temple on Saturday. It was great being back to “my” temple again, almost my second home. I did enjoy the Stockholm temple, too while I was there. That was the first time I had ever been to a session in Swedish. The other times I have been there, they were in Danish or Russian or other languages. And this time in Stockholm, it was also special because I got to see and visit with my “old” friend from school, Elisabet Bautista. What a sweet experience that was!  We haven’t seen each other for 20 years or so. She joined the church as an adult, living on the Canary Islands, but then moved back to Sweden with her husband from down there, and they have been pillars in the church in Sweden for 30 years now, raising a large family. We were just hanging on to each other, thankful for the gospel in our lives and for each other. It brings tears to my eyes just thinking about it.

Everybody survived just fine without me at home. In a way that is good. But I did get lots and lots of hugs. My grandkids told me that it just wasn’t the same without me, and I know Ed missed me a lot.  I know I spoil them all too much.

Life is good!!!!

   

A few days in the city I was born

I spent 4 days with my parents in the city of my birth, Visby, on the island of Gotland just east of mainland Sweden. My parents are there as missionaries for the LDS church just for another month. I just couldn’t miss that opportunity. My dad had a job there at the newspaper Gotlands Allehanda from 1952 until 1955. So I was only 3 years old when we moved from there to Sollefteå. I was back there in 1961 for a week with my dad, but that is the only time. So I was very excited!!!I spent a lot of time walking up and down the streets, taking in all the sights. It is a very old historical city with a wall around the original city. The wall was built in the 1100-1300 and most of it is still standing. There are also lots of old churches and church ruins from the same time period and some very old homes. All three homes (apartments) we lived in are still there, but many others are hundreds of years old. The first home of the Mormon church in Visby in 1861 is still there. It is a beautiful city. My parents’ missionary apartment is within the city walls, close to the south entrance. The streets are all cobble stone streets. This is not the most beautiful time of the year, but the city is called the City of Roses, with roses and flowers everywhere.

The Botanical Gardens, close to the beach, was a favorite place of mine and my mom’s when I was young. We lived right behind it and my dad needed to sleep during the day, so we spent all day there, or walking along the strand or the city. Now, there were some beautiful Crocus and Snowdrops. And the leaves where just starting to come out.

I got to see some of my friends from when I was little, including my first boyfriend (best friend), Yngve. I also got to meet just about all the members and investigators of the church on the island, and other friends of my parents’. I also got to attend a Genealogical conference and had my picture and a little write-up in the same newspaper my dad used to work for.

To get to Gotland, you have to take a large ferry from Nynäshamn to Visby. I left Gotland today and now I am back in Södertälje with Louis, my brother, and his family. But I am staying with Richard’s family tonight. They just opened the first LimitedToo store in Sweden and are planning on opening a lot more. It is a girls clothing store. They are really busy right now. I have been down at the store a lot, too.

In a day or so, I will leave for Göteborg to see my family there.

This is Clara, Louis’ baby girl, who is almost 2. Isn’t she cute?

Another one. I will add some more pictures later from the trip.

Getting started

Hi everybody, I am now in Södertälje, Sweden with my brother, Louis. He is helping me set this up. So there will be more on this site as soon as I learn how to do it. I just arrived in Sweden a couple of hours ago and will be here for two weeks. I am excited to be here and look forward to seeing everybody in the family and also the city I was born in. The weather is typical for Sweden this time of the year, gray and gloomy. I am not here for the weather, that is for sure. But seeing family is great!

This is not Sweden. This is Cedar Hills this winter. We had lots of snow. It really was beautiful but required lots of shoveling.