Thursday, 3 September 2026

A Visit to Limmared Glassworks

The photo above was copied from a brochure about the village Limmared, about 30 min drive from Borås. It's famous primarily for its glassworks (Swedish: glasbruk), founded in 1740, and still running. Internationally it may be best known as the manufacturer of the Absolut Vodka bottle - which visitors are now reminded of with the entrance to the museum "House of Glass" (Glasets Hus) being designed to resemble that shape.  

At the museum you can watch glassblowers at work, look at examples of their production through the centuries, and buy more recently made glass souvenirs. They also have a café where you can have lunch. In the village there are also several antique and second hand shops, selling both glassware and other things.

- - - 

My brother drove down here from Karlstad on Thursday last week (27 August). On Friday we had lunch at the restaurant in the park in the city centre, and after that drove "across town" to a big shopping mall for a few errands. Primarily I needed a new rain jacket; and managed to find one. (It will probably appear in a later post, with me wearing it.) But I also happened to find another item on my wish list - a new winter jacket/coat (fairly long, but not quite reaching my knees). I was glad to also get that rather bulky purchase done while I had the company of a chauffeur/carrier! ;) 

"On the road again" - driving to Limmared, 29 August 2026

Saturday the 29th was my 71s birthday; and to celebrate that we drove to Limmared to revisit The House of Glass. We've been there together once before, but that was several years ago now. (Neither of us could recall exactly when. I thought it might even have been back in Before Blogging times - but a search now informs me that it was in 2013.) 

When we arrived, we had a look around in the museum first, then had lunch in their cafeteria, and after that explored the museum a bit more, plus got to watch a professional glassblower giving a "lesson" in that noble art to another visitor (who had pre-booked and no doubt paid extra for that experience). 

I took quite a lot of photos, and might save some for "later", but here is a selection:

Model of the village in the past. The glassworks is the building with the tall chimney.

 
Various old items from the past

 

 
These may look like ceramics, but they are actually painted glassware.

Here you can see the "ghosts" of my brother and me reflected... ;)

 
Old tools

 
▲ Items for sale ▼

I bought the dark blue bird as souvenir and birthday present for myself. 
Back home, it got to join an inherited blue glass bird on the window sill in my bedroom:


 

Wednesday, 2 September 2026

September Calendar Photo

 

My calendar photo for September 2026 is this one (above), from Linköping Old Town, in August 2025.

This year, my brother and I didn't go on any longer road trip; but we still spent a few days together at the end of August, and made a couple of "outings" from here. He went back home yesterday. I'll be sharing some photos in a couple of separate posts to follow. 

August this year ended with rather "mixed" weather, and September has started much the same way. /(Neither "hot" nor "cold" - and not raining all the time, but showers on and off.)

Friday, 28 August 2026

Skywatch Friday

23/08/2026

I'll be taking "Time Off" from blogging for a few days as I have my brother visiting over the weekend - but I'm throwing in this sunset photo from earlier in the week for Skywatch Friday. :)


Monday, 24 August 2026

Old Friends Revisiting

 

In July 2024, I wrote a post entitled Old Friends, or "How Terribly Strange to Be Seventy" * - about a brief visit then from friends of mine (a married couple) from Karlstad (where I lived back in my 20s), whom I then hadn't seen IRL for 38 years. This past weekend they happened to be visiting Borås again - this time to attend a big national family history research society event, at which one of their daughters was one of the speakers. 

M informed me of this in good time, and expressed hopes of us being able to meet up for a while in connection with this as well. While the event was still vaguely "in the future" I had half in mind to perhaps try to attend part of it myself. But as it got closer and I understood how big an event it was (held at a large event center, and with pre-bookings for lectures etc), I realised I didn't really feel I had enough energy for that. Luckily M+K proved more "flexible" than me. So instead of us meeting up briefly in a crowd, they stopped by to visit me at home for a while on Sunday (late) morning, before starting their drive back home. And as then there were no other "distractions", we again had a good catching-up chat both about family history, our own current situations, and mutual old memories and friends. 

And on top of that, they came bringing a lovely bouquet of roses (photo above), wishing me happy (71st) birthday a week in advance! :) 

(Photo edited with a Picasa3 filter)
 
 * The 2024 post includes a video clip with the Simon & Garfunkel song "Old Friends"

Sunday, 23 August 2026

August Skies

 

Monday 17/08/2026 (20:23)

Tuesday 18/08/2026 (20:24)

Saturday 22/08/2026 (14:08)

Saturday 22/08/2026 (19:18)

Saturday 22/08/2026 (20:13)

It's already Sunday Evening when I'm finding the time to put this post together. Perhaps a bit late for Skywatch Friday - but I decided to post (and link) my sky-watching photos from the past week anyway. It's been a week of swiftly shifting skies; and rain showers now and then - but rather brief, with some sunshine in between. Personally I'm grateful for a further drop in temperatures over the past few days, which has also brought down the indoors temperature in my flat to "normal". Since two or three nights I even have the duvet back on my bed. (Just a light synthetic one, but still giving a bit more "weight" than just the empty cover I've been using all summer...). 


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