2020-granny-stockholm

Mon 14.09 - 11.10.20

So now two months have passed again. I have already flown back home to Australia. Time flies by here, even though I have almost the same daily routine. My alarm goes off at 7:30 in the morning. I go upstairs shortly before 8 o'clock. The family is usually out of the house by then. Thomas and Maximilian are always gone for sure. Clarissa sometimes works from home. Luisa has school later twice a week. Then I clear the breakfast table and tidy up the kitchen. After that, I have breakfast and read my Schwäbische Zeitung newspaper. Usually, Clarissa has put the laundry in the laundry room for me to do, which I then take care of. Then I take Sally for a walk, but only for a maximum of half an hour, about 2000 steps. After that, I gather or hang up the laundry, and so on.

Every now and then, I also go shopping. I usually go out around 11:30 o'clock for my '10,000 steps walk'. Mostly along the waterfront or sometimes to a shopping center. I go for another walk with Sally at 2:30 in the afternoon.

Maximilian usually comes home at 3 o'clock, but I am only present in case he needs anything. During that time, I usually prepare dinner. Around 4:30 o'clock, I take the children to their sports activities.

Varies:

Twice a week, Maximilian has soccer, karate, and sometimes tennis or golf. Luise has athletics and gymnastics once a week.

Dinner is usually served around 7 to 7:15 p.m. After that, I often take Sally for a walk. It feels good to take a few steps after eating. Sometimes, I also help clearing the table. That's roughly my daily routine during the week.

But on weekends, I am away:

For example, on the weekend of September 19-20, 2020.

On Saturday, I went shopping in the city of Stockholm. I needed wool to knit a new scarf to match my new skirt. It wasn't easy to find a yarn shop, even online. But I eventually found one. I bought wool that consists of various colors. Of course, I started knitting right away. A triangular shawl! It looked really nice. But unfortunately, I couldn't wear it around my neck, as it was wool for knitting socks. So I unraveled everything and will eventually knit socks out of it. After shopping, I went for a walk along the beach road. I found a nice bench and sunbathed while reading. I always buy a magazine at the train station on the weekends, specifically Die Zeit. In the evening, I took the ferry back again.

On Sunday, I went to Södermalm. The former working-class district of Stockholm is now a bohemian neighborhood for young people and artists. It's bustling with small shops for trendy fashion, great home decoration ideas, vintage, and second-hand stores. You can find a mix of various shops, bars, and restaurants here. I simply went for a walk and enjoyed the great views of Stockholm.

On the weekend of September 26-27, 2020.

The family visited Wilhelm in England, as he is not allowed to travel. He would have to quarantine for 14 days upon his return to England. How did the family manage without quarantine???? Maybe they have a good relationship with the German Embassy????? So I was all alone the whole weekend, except for Sally, of course. On Saturday, I just lazed around. Of course, I took Sally for a walk three times. On Sunday, I enjoyed our terrace in the beautiful weather, knitting and reading.

On the weekend of October 3-4, 2020.

On Saturday, I went to the photography museum (Fotografiska). They currently have a big exhibition there.

1. (my favorite) Arno Rafael Minkkinen with incredibly beautiful self-portraits. Truly spectacular.

2. The Hubble Space Telescope. The exhibition is titled 'Hubble: A Journey through Time and Space'. Again, spectacular images, and they are huge.

3. Maisie Cousins. The exhibition is titled 'Trash, Dip, Grass, Peony, Bum'. These pictures weren't really my thing, they were quite unusual.

4. Tom of Finland. The exhibition is titled 'Darkroom Male Pornography'. That wasn't my thing either.

5. Miles Albridge. The exhibition is titled 'Virgin Mary, Supermarket, Popcorn from 1999 to 2020'. I really liked these. Just look them up on the internet.

6. Lina Iris Viktor. The exhibition is titled 'Dark Testament'. The pictures were too gloomy for me.

On Sunday, it was gray and gloomy again, typical autumn weather. So I visited the Thielska gallery. I had higher expectations. It used to be a private collection that was taken over by Sweden. There are many old masters from Sweden. The special exhibition was quite interesting. It was about the fashion designer Agusta Lundin, who lived from 1840 to 1919. She already developed beautiful clothes in Paris back then. They showed how sewing was done at that time, and so on. Beautiful dresses were exhibited. Unfortunately, everything was very crowded and poorly ventilated, so I didn't stay there for long. I can be a bit of a corona scaredy-cat.

On the weekend of October 10-11, 2020.

It rained on Saturday. I went to the city, but everything was very, very crowded. I actually wanted to go to the museum. But it was too crowded for my liking. No need for that, as nobody here wears face masks.

On Sunday, the sun was shining. The weather was so nice, so I walked to Lidl (the whole route goes along the waterfront), a distance of eight kilometers. I needed a new cream. From there, I took the train to the city. I walked through the city to the island of Skeppsholmen and visited the Moderna Museet. They have a fantastic exhibition by Giacometti. I have already seen an exhibition by him in Zurich years ago and was already very impressed at that time. The exhibition is called 'face-to-face', and you can follow his sculpting and painting from post-cubism and surrealism to post-war realism.

So, these are the routines of my days here. Nothing spectacular so far. Except for:

The beautiful landscape with the many islands.

The beautiful Stockholm with lots of 'old stones'.

Not to forget the photography museum. Simply a great ambiance. They even have a small bar at the entrance. People buy a glass of Prosecco there and walk through the exhibition with it.

What will definitely be interesting is the modern museum. So far, I have only seen the Giacometti exhibition. I have a lot more to do. I have written down a few things that I still want to do. Let's see what the next month brings.