Royal Dramatic Theatre statue

Shortly after her death this statue of Margaretha Krook (1925-2001), a respected Swedish actor, was installed just outside the Royal Dramatic Theatre in Stockholm at the intersection of Nybroplan, Birger Jarlsgatan and Hamngatan. The statue is kept constantly heated year round to 37C (98.6F), due to a heating element inside.  The statue resides on the corner where the actress used to stand and smoke before performances.... wonder whether people touched her belly then?!

clearly, that statue gets felt up a lot!

months ago, the girls warming their hands after ice skating

Howard and Lois' Top 10 List

My parents arrived with Aunt Jan, April 27-May 12, to see for themselves what our Stockholm life is all about.  We had a wonderful two weeks exploring by car, bus, tram and on foot.  Following is their Top Ten list from their visit... since they did not include any commentary, I get to!

Howard and Lois' Top 10 favorite things in Stockholm.... 

1) Being with Nancy, Gordon and the girls

teaching Sofia the fine art of crimping pie crusts

celebrating Grams/Mom's 83rd birthday, May 5th

lighting the traditional princess torte

happy birthday Mom!

the paparazzi

I made Annamaria's chocolate torte for American Mother's Day

Sofia declares it good enough to lick her plate

a really hard map of Stockholm puzzle - the girls let Grams put in the last piece since it was her birthday present, after all!

2) Vasa Museum - Stockholm's treasure.  Look for a blog post on this in the near future. 

3) Millesgarden - beautiful outdoor sculpture garden.

4) Army Museum - free on Tuesdays after 5pm.  Gabby wasn't sure Grams and Papa were allowed to leave the house on their own (the museum is one block away and Jan and I were out).  She stalled them as long as she could.  Happy to report they made it there and back just fine! 

5) Stockholm's City Hall

6) Drottningholm Palace - the official residence of the Swedish Royal family.  Blog post on this soon too!

7) Nordica Museum - this beautiful museum, located on Djurgarden, covers Scandinavian history.

8) The Cafe Tram and fika stops (never met a pastry we didn't like!)

lemon meringue at Flickorna

9) Villaggio Restaurant for Mom's 83rd birthday & other restaurants (Wienercafeét, Prime Burger, Coco & Carmen).  After just four days in Stockholm Dad declared a burger sounded good since he'd only had healthy food to eat... so we headed to Prime Burger, he was satisfied!  Dad was impressed with the great restaurants and food to which I replied 'it's hard work exploring the city every day to find the best food and shopping!' 

Villagio's beef tenderloin

Villagio's warm chocolate cake

lunch at Wienercafeét

chicken club

shrimp

10) Seeing the shops and department stores - NK, Åhléns, Hotorget, PUB, Salu Hall

ice cream outside of Salu Hall with the girls after school

Mom and Dad being very Swedish.... holding down opposite ends of the bench in our boat

wandering Gamla Stan

Exterior - Stockholm City Hall

I forgot to include the photos of the exterior of City Hall when I posted about our tour.  It's a striking building from the outside as well! 

Friday's Walkers and Talkers

Friday, May 24 - Each Friday throughout the school year whoever wants to walk meets at the Stockholm International School (SIS) entrance for a 10k walk to and around Djurgarden.  Sometimes it's a group of 30...  sometimes 10, rain or shine, snow or sleet.  We leave SIS and meet up at the Djurgarden bridge where we meet up with a few others, take a weekly picture and walk the perimeter of the Island.  Every Friday we snap photos of the view along Strandvagen... even though we all have plenty of pictures of it, we appreciate the view anew every week.

Although the path around Djurgarden is the same every week the company and topics varies as different people fall in step and conversation.  We always end at Flickorna Helin Voltaire for fika.  I look forward to this weekly event and an grateful to my friend, Meg Myers, for sending out the Wednesday emails that keep us organized. 

Today was our last walk for this school year... very bittersweet, it means we won't see many Stockholm friends over the summer and we'll be saying goodbye to quite a few as they move on. 

the last walking group for the 2013-14 school year - yes, that's Lucy on the right

the view of Strandvagen

it's Spring!  Lots of babies out an about

the Royal sheep and sheep dog

 

even the goats do fika

2 hot and tired Lucys

my all time favorite restaurant in Stockholm!

A much smaller group a few months ago!

Athletic Day

Thursday, May 22 - Stockholm International School Primary School - Athletic Day

Pre-K through 5th grade traveled by foot, bus and train to Ostermalms IP, the city's large sports complex (soccer, hockey, tennis, horse back riding, etc).  It could not have been a more perfect day... it felt more like Atlanta than Stockholm, sunny and 80 degrees! 

Stations were located around the field with relays, hurdles, long jump, sprints, kubb, etc.  the final event was a relay with two girls and two boys from each grade racing against the teachers. 

on the way to the subway

in the subway station

Ostermalms IP

Ostermalms IP - in the winter this field is an ice skating rink

long jump

beautiful Scandinavian sky!

Audra jumping hurdles

Audra and her buddy, Eva, in the 3-legged race

Audra and Gigi

Audra racing with a bean bag balanced on her foot

Sofia and friends resting in the shade

lunch break!

memento from the day