My friend - lets call her Makaka -
came to my birthdayparty
that was celebrated on the floor
around a nicely set blue tableclough.
Makaka gave me a big towel
with the number 22 sewn on it.

And I begged her
that she would give me a towel
everytime I´ld turn a double-number.

Eleven years later I got a towel
with the number 33 sewn on to it.

Yesterday was not a perfect birthday
(sorry for complaining)
No towel turned up...

------------------------------------

The day before yesterday
was like a fairytale!

Noak and I went with Ingrid to her church...
We walked home together
in the warm, comfortable weather...
She invited us for lunch in her flowergarden.

Yammy sallad.
Nice company.
Sunshine.

Noak walked in and out the house.
Ingrid and he had a secret
they toled me...

My man called and came over too.

After lunch
Ingrid put a scarf around my eyes
so I couldn´t see anything
and Noak led me gently
in through the house
and out into the shade
at the other side.

Ingrid took of the scarf
and they all started to sing
"Ja må hon leva..."

In front of me
was a BEAUTIFUL table
dressed in a white linen clough.
It had old birthday cups - golden and white -
from Ingrids grandmother Hilma,
There were roses,
something good to eat
- still the same good company
There was a gift and a card...

I received notebook!

(I don´t think I had toled Ingrid
how much I lately had come to LOVE
a reall notebook
and a nice pen to go with it.)

So it is.

I love my pen and notebook
even more than my laptop
these days!



--------------------------------



And
today
I got a towel
from Makaka
with "Olga 44" written on it!



--------------- P.S. ---------------
Vote for Maria :: in this competition!

Only friends read blogs

Met a woman on the train
this morning -
a woman that visits my blog
and reads my words.

It is a funny thing
it doesn´t feel unconfortable
meeting someone
who ought to be a stranger -
Meeting someone
who has heard my whispers
and my fragile thoughts.

Funny how I feel
I know her and she knows me
although we´ve never sat down face to face talking.

Quite nice actually!





It is not that my words are that fragile.
No.
They are not private.
No.
But still, they can set me in "shymood"
reading them out loud.
Personal?
Well...

Hedvigs journey

A couple of years ago
I made an empty book
that I named Hedvig
and sent her out on a long, long journey...

It spent some time with a girl that always liked the Inuit look.
A girl who loves knitting
and who makes the cutest little baby conforters.

"May you have warmth
in your igloo,
oil in your lamp
and pease in your heart"
- inuit proverb

Link


Then, sometime in the rainy autumn
she landed in the land of tulips and clogs
in the house of Parker the cat and its owner
where she got to listen to lots of jazz... Link


Then it spent some great time
in the middle-west of Germany
with her who initiated the great idea of
the travelling journals.
Hedvig got to wach her making lots of lovely things
working in, and playing with paper. Link




And so, Hedvig arrived with the winter in Sydney
down on the other side the globe.
She spent her days close to the sea
in the house of a sweet and thrifty girl
who enjoyed making toyrabbits for her friends! Link


From Australia
Hedvig, the travelling journal
continued her journey to Asia.
To a mysterious woman
who made lovely calligraphy. Link


And then off to Lucy the dog
and her owner
who LOVED HER LIFE!


This was in September of 2008
and the following month
the host (on the picture)
a designer and authiur of books
was to turn 40... Link

Happy birthday to you, Dawn a bit late!!

Then my book Hedvig flew back to Europe
and landed in the home of
an ocenographer
(whos father now is a bird)
who loves
paper, facric, stones, sand, leafs, people, kids and toys... Link


Finally, on her long, long journey around the globe
Hedvig spent spring 2009
with Dixie the cat
in a house with a lovely little garden
listening to TRUMPET-music! Link

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .


All the girls that have hosted my travelling jourmnal
have also had their own journals travelling around.
They have all been here visiting with me in Sweden
and I have gotten the oportunity to write in each one of them
about my life and my dreams and my country.

I am the second to have my journal
coming back home to me.
The other are still out there travelling.

Thank you so much, all of you girls
for sharing your life with me
by writing in my little book
and making it magic!!

And welcome back home Hedvig!

I have taken a day off... Hey, it is Sunday after all!
Have had friends gathering around our piano.
We have sung just because of our LOVE for singing.
Then we had a beautiful little teatime together
as it felt as though my friends had always known one another.

Yes, here they are - my flower boots.

She is the blogger - COSIFANTUTTE.
She came over to say HELLO yesterday
when she was in the neighbourhood!
It is always interresting meeting with new people!
Learning about them as well as learning about oneself.

This lady is an enthusiast
with lots of laughter
and sparkling eyes.
Loves life, and many things.

She
sings
like a bird.

She
paints
with passion.

She
is
wise.

Always kind and sweet

I am humbled
to have her
as a friend.

In December last year,
our nextdoor neighbour Britta
walked out of her apartment.

Yesterday we got new neighbours!
Selma has lived her last twenty years
in Karlstad,
the town where I lived
my first twenty years.
Selmas first twenty years she lived in Turkey.

I had wished so for a family
to move in next to us,
that had little children
suitable for Noak to play with.
I had wished so for kind folks...

Guess what!
Selma has a little boy - just like Noak!
His name is Nilam.

It will be so exciting getting to know the two!

Princess
Danait
played with
my
happy
boy
yesterday.

It feels like spring outside. Read previous post!

Princess Evelina sat with Noak
in his armchair waching TV with him last evening
as her father looked around our apartment
for where we need to put lamps in the seeling.
He will come and help us with that this Saturday.

Light is everything.
Hm sorry, I mean- LOVE is everything.
Right?

I think of my old friends but I hardly ever talk to them, nor write them...
In the daytime I work. Then I am with my family. In the evening I am tired.
Although, you may have read here on my blog that I like solitude - I like people too!!!
And what MOSTLY I like is when I am doing something together with the one I meet.
I´m not that found of just sitting talking. Yes that too. But not just that.

I REALLY like doing things.

When I had a talk the other day with the dog Rutger,
I also met Helena who lives in the same house as he.
She is a writer ... and I am starting to call myself a photographer.
So guess what? We are having serious talks about doing something together.

Coming to her place is so inspiering!

(Read about A walk and That house)

For artists


Danait - our little neighbour on first floor
(We are on top floor.)
played with Noak today.


...and here is
something beautiful to read
for you who may strougle
with your artistic endevaours!

This is the Mother and the Father

...of my friend Ingrid,
who is following this blog just like you are.
(Right Ingrid?)
She takes a look at it
every once in a while
when she is tired
after work.
(She teaches Swedish to kids
that have just come to Sweden.)
Ingrid was the one
that first made me think of
how the old are treated
compared to how the little children
are being cared for.
I admire her for how she CARES
for her old ones.

She gets in her car and drives
four hours to their house
every other weekend
and HELPS them.

Your parents are fortunate, Ingrid
to have a daughter like YOU!

These photos are taken by Ingrid and her husband Stefan.

P.S. her Father is on the right side and her Mother on the left side of the picture
...and her Mothers hair covers both of them.

I had the previledge to come and get this little girl
and her brother
yesterday after pree-school.
We took a long walk back home.

Click on the pictures to see them larger.

We baked
...buns this morning ...and some honeysweetened bread that I filled with banana, apple, pear, raisins and cinnamon. It turned out very tasty. And my man imagined having a bakery - named Hildegard - only using "spelt-flour" (instead of wheat) And I imagined living close to a mill...

In the nineties
...I lived in a little white cottage on the countryside on the coast. Not far from a farm that grew spelt. (The Swedish for spelt is Dinkel) On this farm they were building a mill at the time. I got all my flour from them in return of a painting I had done that the lady had liked. We got honey from Sylve who had beehives in our garden. I got milk from Ingemar, a nearby farmer. I "served myself" in his barn and put money in his cap for the milk. Egg I got from another farmer in the neighbourhood. The spices and herbs I grew in our own garden. Onions and carrots I bought from my postman, Lars. I also bought some juicy meat on ocations from his pigs that only lived outdoor. Sometime we also had meat that we had hunted ourselves on our little piece of land. Not to worry - I am not hunting anymore.

I was imagining
...the Hildegard bakery in a surrounding like this - where most ingredients came from close by. And I could see the beautiful Hildegard-logo on the paperbags we would use and the Hildegard-sign above the door!

And when we were baking
...Noak and I, I said it would be nice to share the bread with someone. I asked Noak who he would like to come. He whispered; Marjatta. She and her sons appeared at our door some hours later when Noak was having a nap. (Five months since the last Marjatta-visit.) Noak was soon awake and was SHINING like the sun!

I, Olga have lots of friendly folks around me
but miss a soul-friend
that I may just easily pop over to at any time.
Or who could come knocking at my door.
A friend with whom I could have these kinds of conversations.
I have three good telephone-friends
that are good listeners
and who would make great pop-over-to-friends
if only they lived closer.

I have moved too many times in my life
wich has forced me to make new friends
over and over.
It is fun to make new friends but... tiering too.
Maybe it has made me num in a way
so that I can´t receive or return the friendships
I am being offered by people from time to time...
I hope I´m wrong.

When I get that house
that will be our home
it is going to be a house
full of light, life, friends and laughter!

P.S. Read Thoughts on Friendship here

Are you the listener or the talker?
What do you look for in a friend?
Are friends exchangable?
What´s being a true friend?
Who has time for you?
What is friendship?
What is a friend?