Photo time

The view from our boat "room", it was nice to see out!
An exploded view of the boat/ferry
Everyone waiting to get out of there

Our first hostel in Tallinn

Old and new in Tallinn
Soviet tours... Just had to take a photo!
A pretty street in Old Tallinn
An old church in Tallinn
Great view from the bell tower of the church
How cute, you cant see their hairy legs from here, we suspect it might have been backpackers making some extra money
Stephen went for a swin
A nicer beach in Pärnu on the way to Riga
The spot in Old Town Riga where we should have never been...
A church in Riga
Thats all for today!

The Baltics

After a hot couple of days in Riga we have arrived in Vilnius where it is raining. We have internet again, there was free internet at the other hostel as well but we were out of range in our room on the 3rd floor and the common room was so crowded all the time that we didnt bother taking the computer there.

Yesterday we walked around Riga for 2,5 hours on a guided tour which took us around and outside of the most popular tourist places. The tour company is called yellow free tours and is run on a voluntary basis, in the end if you like it you can give the guide a tip. I highly recommend it if you are going to any of the cities that they operate in. We are going tomorrow again here in Vilnius.

So far the trip has been very good, no problems even when we got lost in old town Riga and stopped by the police and almost fined and had no registration papers and Stephen had his SA license and the police asked him to get out of the car and step into their police van. It ended up with them "escorting" us to the hostel. Thank you very much kind police officers!!!

Since I cant find my cable to download my photos from the camera to the computer I cant share them with you just yet =(

Tallinn

We arrived in Tallinn without any troubles, but our first day here has been pretty quiet. It has been raining the whole day. We have been to the shops twice and cooked our own lunch and dinner and are now watching Futurama dubbed to German at the hostel. The other guests here are very nice and I think we are going out for a beer soon. Tomorrow we are planning on discovering the Old town of Tallinn and the markets that are allegedly around the corner from here and run by Russians.

On the road again

Now we are on the boat to Tallinn in Estonia. It is a small and cosy room with ocean view. Today is my Swedish name day for Emma. That will be all for today =)

It is still a mess here, and I am still not moving ever ever ever again. It will change but that is what I feel right now. And I need Stephen here to help out and get this place in order cause it doesnt happen when I am on my own, I take very very small steps forward, hardly noticeable. And I start with other things instead, like "installing" window screens in the bedroom to prevent people seeing in through the windows. Something like this. I am very happy with it, especially since our bedroom window is pretty much right next to the entrance to the building and there are 2 old ladies sitting out there most of the day, I guess they have nothing better to do. I went out and asked them if they liked my geraniums and they were very happy with them, it looks much nicer than the having the blinds down all the time.

I am also looking at fabrics for curtains in the kitchen and the bathroom. In Sweden we leave all our whitegoods when we move but we bring our lamps and curtains. I am thinking Josef Frank, it is expensive but I only need a little bit anyway, one meter for the kitchen and one for the bedroom. Maybe one of these, or another one, I love them all! Check them out here.

New place!

We have moved in to our new place, mum and dad and Kerstin and Max helped out, thank you very much! We have gotten the place in fairly good order and it feels good to have our own stuff. Tomorrow we get the container from Australia with all our stuff, it is a lot of Emmas things here at the moment. It is so much fun to go through my old stuff and old clothes that I have saved, a bit of nostalgia from my "pre-Oz" life. But it will be good to get the container with all our stuff and make this place into our home.

Stephen is in Stockholm now for a week of intensive Swedish course. On Thursday I drive up and join him and we will go out for dinner with Andreas and Fernanda and on Friday night we take of to the Baltic states and Poland. We have borrowed Jonas GPS to not get lost into Russia or Belarus, ours doesnt have eastern Europe, the maps ends at Germany I think.

I realised today that I say all the time that I will upload this or that tomorrow or in the next post and then I never do it. Sorry. But I think you will have to live with it. I kind of upload/write what I feel like when I do it and sometimes photos feels a bit overwhelming. Maybe I should say that I plan to do something in the next post, and as we all know plans dont always work out =)

Still hot

It is starting to cool down outside, I think it will rain soon. Yesterday we went looking for a fan to help cool us down but no luck. Today I am going to Ljungby to meet Malin (my cousin) and I will see if there are any fans anywhere there. If not I will borrow Jonas' fan as he is away this week, coming back Friday night. Sorry for going on and on about the heat but I am used to being able to cool down without having a wet t-shirt competition on my own...

Hot hot hot

It is hot here, hence no running since Friday, it is just too hot. Tonight is soccer final, Spain-Holland, we have just ordered pizza and will stay at home and take it easy. Stephen has helped mum and dads neighbour to re-tile their roof today and he is pretty knackered. Both dad and Jonas and the neighbours two sons were there helping, they probably picked the hottest weekend of the year to do it. Next post I might have some photos ready for you but not now cause I am gonna sit down in the sofa with a big glass of water and do nothing for the rest of the night.

Good girl again!

3 kilometers today, running that is, slowly but surely. After I finished the 2.4 kms track I felt I could do a bit more so I just kept running a little bit more. I am proud of myself!

Stephen has been fishing tonight, no luck this time for him. One of the other 2 guys in the boat caught one fish but that was it.

Apart from that there hasnt been much happening here today, I vacuumed and washed 2 loads of laundry... wahsed up the dishes after dinner... had a glass of red after my run... finished a book. Thats right, I have a new author I can recommend, Khaled Hosseini. The two books I have read in the last 3 days are called Kite runner and A thousand splendid suns. Very captivating and I almost cried a few times and was almost a bit nervous another few times cause I wanted to know what was gonna happen. Highly recommended!

Now it is soon time for bed and tomorrow it is Friday again, incredible how fast the weeks go past, even for an unemployed bum like me. But wait a minute, I have a job!!!

I have a job!

For those of you who are not on facebook I am happy to announce that I have been offered a job at IKEA and I have accepted the offer. I will start as a technician in business area Comfort and Raw material at IKEA Components (I comp) on the 16th of August. For those interested Stephen works at IKEA of Sweden in the business area Kitchen and Dining, and we will be sitting in different buildings a few kilometers apart. But Älmhult is a really small place and I have already met the wife to the guy that will be my manager =) I actually met her before him and without knowing it until I was at the interview, but I had been told that her husband worked at I comp and had the same name as the guy that were interviewing me so maybe it is him . That is why one needs to be careful of what they say and do in this little town where 90% are in one way or the other involved in IKEA. As soon as someone opens their mouth and reveals an accent, or that they speak English you can be sure that they are here for IKEA. Sad but true and in the long run it will be hard to stay anonymous, I wonder how long we'll last =)

And now I cant wait till we have moved and I have started working and we both get back into some sort of routine again and can start planning things a bit better, such as weddings and how to best fulfill Stephens wish to drive on Autobahn in Germany. Sometime in September or October it should all be "back to normal" again. But now I am just gonna enjoy having time off without worrying about not having a job or getting a job or the next interview. And charge my batteries for the 16th of August!

It is hot!

It is so hot that the icing went all over the table when Stephen made a mud cake. Believe it or not. He did! And the icing was supposed to stay on the cake but it didn't. I tried to scoop it back up but somehow most of it ended up in my stomach =)

The end result was very nice with some strawberries and vanilla ice cream.

Back in Helmut

I am back in Älmhult again after spending the night at mum and dads. It has been really hot the last couple of days and coming back to the apartment was like walking into a sauna. I have opened up doors and windows to try and air out a bit and it is working, I hope that the mossies wont find their way in though, at least not too many of them. In weather like this it is not that nice to be stuck in an apartment on the 2nd floor, the only way to cool it down is by opening all windows and doors and if it is hot outside it doesnt really work. I am not really sure why I tell you aussies this, if anyone would know it is you. Anyway. It is hot. And it is cooling down. I am not really sure what we will do on the weekend, but we are not staying in the apartment, thats for sure. And there is a soccer game in Dörarp tomorrow afternoon so we will probably go there after lunch at mum and dads.

I havent taken that many photos the last week or so, I am waiting for my lenses to arrive in the container. As much as I love the one I have now I feel a bit limited without the zoom. And there is only so many pictures that I can take of mum and dad and the lake =) Both mum and dad went for a swim today in the lake but I gave it a miss. Mum even went in twice cause it was so hot. I wasnt there with the camera and I think she appreciated it. Unless you are a swimsuit model I dont think any girls want to have their photo taken in their bathers.

Todays photo is actually of another photo, it is of me and my brother when we were kids, when I was still young enough to agree to wear a dress. Apparently I wasnt very interested in dresses when I was young, but that might not come as a surprise I guess. I think mum made my dress and Jonas pants in the same material, good old corduroy =)

Good girl!

I have been a good girl today, I went for a run. Only 2.4 kms but I ran the whole way and rode my bike to the track and back. In order not to be too good I am having a glass of red wine and some dark chocolate =) Stephen is on his way to Italy so it is not more than fair that I get to have some luxury when I am left here. When he is not here I can watch Swedish TV as much as I want, I dont blame him for not wanting to watch TV when he doesnt understand anything but it is nice to watch some TV I like. And I guess Stephen wasnt a fan of the cooking shows in Adelaide either. I am watching a danish lady cooking Thai food. I have already had dinner but it makes me hungry. And today I think it is time for my beech tree shots, I think I got a few nice ones.