We're in Sweden!

We’ve been here in Sweden for several days now, but I’m just starting to calm down mentally. It’s so exciting to get here, so wonderful to be with family, to speak Swedish, eat the food, breathe the air and enjoy the culture, that it takes me a few days to wind down. The first couple of days were also completely ruined by ‘travel jet lag.’ Although there is no significant time difference between here and Egypt (one hour), because our plane left in the middle of the night, we missed a whole night’s sleep – or at least I did; the boys and Courtney all slept on the planes, but since I had to sit and hold Abraham the whole time, I wasn’t able to sleep. When we finally arrived at my mother’s house, I had to take a nap, which threw me off even more, because I usually never nap. The next night I spent awake holding a crying Abraham, who had got hold of a few too many Swedish treats, and had a tummy ache, preventing him from settling in. Two nights without sleep; another couple of days went by in a haze. I ate a lot of Swedish treats I’ve missed, read books, hung out in the garden with the family, played tennis with Courtney, went to the store, and just enjoyed being here. But in a haze.

Then one morning we woke up and it was Midsummer Eve. It’s a major holiday in Sweden, and most Swedes celebrate in a similar way: first we help set up the neighborhood midsummer (May) pole on a big grassy field, that we then dance around, singing traditional songs, and then everybody goes home to eat “sill” – pickled herring – with new potatoes and drink “nubbe.” It was all really nice, even the weather. The boys were a bit disappointed that it didn’t hail like last year, but they enjoy the dancing and singing so, I choke up every year. It’s so much part of me – I celebrated midsummer like this every year when I was little – and it’s such a blessing that they are able to do it too, even though we don’t even live here. We ended the evening in the garden finishing off our “Hallands Flader”, enjoying the evening sun, listening to people celebrating around the neighborhood. At one point I heard, faintly, Gyllene Tider sing “Sommartider,” a classic summer tune. The sun was still shining at 11 pm, when we went to bed.