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:

 

Autumn Flowers

 

 

 

29.8

For my birthday at the end of August I recieved this lovely bouquet of flowers - "all the way from Scotland"... Even if of course the actual bouquet was put together by a florist here in Borås, Sweden. I was quite impressed that they had managed to incorporate flowers to actually remind me of Scotland, though: Thistles (which I recall is the national flower of Scotland) + something resembling heather. (Having done a bit of research now, I think they probably aren't heather though, but some sort of sea lavender.)  

The bouquet seemed to remain totally unchanged for about 1½ week! (I just changed the water in the vase a couple of times.) But then the carnations and chrysanthemum started to fade a bit; and I decided to break up the bouquet. The 'heather' and thistles felt like they had just dried, so I hung those upside down to dry some more for another 1½ week. Two twigs of green leaves still looked just the same, so I put those back in water in a different vase. They still look the same after three weeks!

20.9

Google Image Search identifies these as Ruscus hypophyllum - "a species of shrub in the family Asparagaceae". According to some forums they may remain unchanged for weeks, in water; while other people have apparently managed to get them to grow roots. I guess I'll just have to leave them and see what happens! 
 

The dried thistles and whatever-it-is I have now put in a vase without water, on the shelf by a coastal landscape painted by my friend Lena N; an original water colour of hers which I bought when visiting her exhibition in Smögen on the west coast of Sweden a couple of years ago.

 

No-one is truly sure of how the thistle came to be Scotland’s national flower. A well-known story though attributes the thistle being chosen as the emblem of Scotland to the Battle of Largs (a coastal town in Ayrshire) in the 13th century. A Norse army journeyed to Scotland, intent on conquering the land. The legend has it that they left their ships under cover of night, and were planning to ambush the sleeping Scottish Clansmen. In order to be as quiet as possible, the Norsemen had removed their shoes. However as they crept across the countryside, one of them stepped onto a thorny thistle. His cry of pain roused the Scots, and the warriors rose up and defeated the invaders. 

https://www.nts.org.uk/stories/the-thistle-scotlands-national-flower 

70

I'm not quite done with posting about our road trip yet; but I've kind of been taking a break from that this weekend, to celebrate my own 70th birthday. 

Somehow any birthday marking the end of a full decade tends to cause more "fuss" than those in between.

One friend of mine (living elsewhere), who also turned 70 in August, celebrated by escaping with her husband, children and their respective parnters, plus a bunch of grandchildren, to the Canary Islands. She said she was not planning to have any extra party when they got back; but whether she succeeded in keeping that intention, I don't know.  

Another friend (living in the same town as I) who also turned 70 in August, decided early on to take the bull by the horns, so sent out invitations six months in advance to a big party in mid August - which I blogged about earlier this month. Considering how early she sent out the invitations, I suspect she must have started the planning shortly after her 69th...

As for myself, I probably started "worrying" at least a year in advance as well. But I arrived at the conclusion that my friends these days are so spread out that trying to gather them all at the same time and place would be impossible. And even if by some miracle I'd manage it with some of them, it wouldn't give me the time to catch up with them all properly anyway. So for my own part, I arrived at the compromise of an escape trip earlier in the month (the road trip with my brother); then kind of took advantage of my friend's party to catch up with some mutual old friends; and then spent the Actual Day just answering phone calls and messages and whatnot...

The friend who escaped to a  far-off island for her big day visited me at the end of July; and another friend, just recently retired from work in connection with her own 65th, took the bus here from from another town a few days before my actual BD for lunch + also came home with me for a while. She's another one I've known for nearly 50 years, and we managed to get a good long undisturbed conversation about all kinds of things. 

--- Having come that far in writing this post, my phone rang. It was the friend whose party I attended two weeks ago; wanting to come by. Visitors wasn't in my plan for today (either); and at 2 pm I still I hadn't even had lunch yet, nor been out. Hard to say no, though - and I had some photos (paper prints!) for her from her own party anyway. (She's one of those who miraculously still manage to get by without neither smartphone nor computer.) 

So I had a hasty lunch; and shortly after, she turned up, bringing a pretty pink begonia. Luckily at least I was able to offer her a cup of instant coffee (tea for myself) and a piece of cake. (I did bake one earlier in the week, a sort of mix between cake and pie, that can be eaten with whipped vanilla cream.) ... And a bit later I accompanied her part of her way home, and then extended my own walk a bit on the way back to mine - so got my own exercise in too, after all.

Now it's evening, and I can no longer recall my original plans for this post (if I had any). Ah well. I guess I'll just post it anyway. 

Tomorrow is a New Month. Remains to be seen what that will bring! (If nothing else, I  have some thank you notes to write...)

 

Birthday and Bargains

 

Yesterday was my birthday, and I still have some friends across the world who take the trouble to send me greeting cards by post! (Thank you!) 

Even more greetings kept dropping in during the day via FB and Messenger etc, and they were of course appreciated too.

I also spent a lot more time talking on the phone than I normally do in a week - not least because one friend called with whom I don't chat all that often, but when we do talk, we usually end up talking a lot!

Otherwise I did not really do very much. Weather warnings had been issued well in advance for that day, for both high temperatures and high risk of thunder and torrential rain. So I had ended up deciding beforehand to just stay home - and if staying home anyway, I might as well also order my usual grocery delivery for that day... At least that would bring me a lot of "parcels" to unpack! (haha)

The delivery arrived early, so after that I also managed to fit in a half hour walk - before lunch, before it got "too" hot, and before the expected rain. As it turned out, however, the rain and thunder passed us by here... The afternoon just kept on being hot and humid.

This morning we were back to fresher air and cooler temperatures again, though - a much more pleasant day for a walk downtown for some belated "birthday shopping" (and no need to even bring an umbrella). 

 

My main errand was to the pharmacy - not all birthday-related, but besides a couple of prescriptions I also had a number of non-prescription things on my list for which it turned out that I could make good use of various membership discounts (one of them birthday-related). Checking my receipt now, it seems I ended up with an astounding $37 discount in total.

After that I popped into the book shop next door, because they too had sent me a birthday discount offer, and I decided to make use of that to buy myself some 'luxury' stationery, which is something I haven't done in a long time. So I bought these, below (which should last me a while, as I don't write all that much by hand nowadays).

Adding up the discount from the pharmacy + the discount from the bookshop, I actually got these luxury items for ... nothing! (Now that's the kind of magic math I enjoy...)

Before I returned home, I also went to my favourite tea shop and stocked up on three kinds of favourite teas. (No discount, but never mind! - I just love the atmosphere in that shop...)

Photo from 2011, but it still looks pretty much the same!
 

Goodbye August, Hello September

Decorations on the old chest in my living room
were changed to 'autumn colours' last weekend.

The last week of August seems to have "swooshed" by. For one thing, I woke up on Tuesday morning finding myself 68 years old, while when I went to bed the night before I was still 67. Really quite enough to make one a bit confused about the Passing of Time... ;-) 

I did not "celebrate" as in having a party; but  various greetings kept dropping in anyway - by mail, email and Facebook etc, + four long(ish) phone calls spread over the day. 

In between, in the early afternoon, I also went for a walk into town for a couple of minor errands + had an ice cream in the park. It was a "nice enough" day, although not quite as sunny as in the photos below ...

 

... which were taken a week earlier, when I was in town for a haircut.

Decided (in cooperation with my hairdresser) to have an attempt at a fringe (bangs) again. Not all that much hair to play with these days, though, so we'll see how it goes! 

The day before my birthday, I tidied up a bit on my balcony, after all the rain lately.

My strawberry plants have kept producing some berries in spite of all the rain during July and August. And even the single cherry tomato plant has given me a dozen or so fruits.

Photo from mid August

 

400 Years

On 29th June, Borås celebrated its 400th anniversary. 

(Continuing from my previous post:)
After having been to see the new sculpture Devil Whirls,  I went down to the park, where I discovered that the fountain in the river had been restored in honour of the jubilee. It's been out of order for a whole year or more, and I've been missing it, so was happy to see it again. 

From there, I turned back home again, though (did not go into the city centre). While walking home, I heard an airplane in the air above me, but it wasn't until I was close to home that I looked up to check what was going on. (It's not all that uncommon to hear a plane passing, but more so to hear them circling around back and forth...)

At first I didn't get it.
Then I did.

Not sure I approve of the environmental aspect, but visually it was good day for it!

Back home, I watched the official digital celebration ceremony from the park on my tablet, while having lunch. Part of it was sent live from the park; other parts had been filmed in advance.

(During my weekend with a broken tooth, "mixed salad" took on a whole new meaning as I pretty much had to run all my food in the blender to be able to eat at all... And on Tuesday, my mouth was still sore...)

 A fanfare was played from the top of the tower of the 17th century church.

A new tree was planted in the park

Every year on the town's birthday, they also appoint a new "ambassador" for the town for the next year - usually someone already nationally well-known. This time a former prime minister (Ingvar Carlsson) who was born and grew up here. (Follow the link to Wikipedia if you want to learn more about him.)

...

Speaking of former PMs, we're still in the midst of the national political crisis which I tried to explain here (21 June). After the parliament voted for no confidence in our PM (Stefan Löfven, leader of the Social Democrats), he had two options: Either to call a snap election himself, or leave it to the Speaker of the Parliament to try and seek another solution. The PM chose (on Monday this week) to step down and leave the process in the hands of the Speaker (while continuing to serve as interim PM, pretty much as before).

The Speaker then (quite according to practice) handed the 'ball' to the leader of the biggest opposition party, the Moderate Party. Meanwhile, one of the old government's support parties, the Liberals (at present a very small party) has declared a change of standpoint and joined the opposition. But at the same time, the Left (who kind of started the no-confidence thing) again declared they'd rather see the old PM back than the right-wing alternative. The balance hangs on one (1) vote in the parliament (175-174) but the leader of the Moderate party today declared that he does not seem likely to be able to win; and thus the 'ball' has now once again been handed back to the old PM to continue negotiations with those that still support him; and report back to the Speaker on Monday. They know how to keep the country in suspense...!

Three Young Men (1922) - Sepia Saturday 475

Last week my Sepia Saturday contribution was a Sunday school group photo from my grandfather's photo album. On the next page in that album, there is this photo from "around 1922". My grandfather (Gustaf) is the one on the left. (Easier to identify in this photo than in that other one!) Born in 1904; so in 1922, he was 18. The guy in the middle is his brother-in-law-to-be (although they would not have known that yet!): my grandmother's brother Nils, born in 1902. The third young man is unknown to me, but according to the note in the album, his name was Gustaf too.   

My grandmother Sally was four years older than my grandfather. They grew up in the same village, but when exactly it was that romance started to grow between them, I don't know. They did not get engaged until September 1929 - when she was 29 and he 25. And they got married a year later, in 1930.

As the three young men here are all dressed up, it may have been a special occasion. On the other hand, perhaps just an ordinary Sunday, and they were dressed for church...

But if it was a "special occasion"... like a birthday...

My grandfather's birthday was June 23, which back in those days was always Midsummer Eve. That changed in 1953, so all my own life (I was born in 1955), Midsummer Eve has always been a Friday. But back in my dad's childhood, his father's birthday was always on Midsummer Eve; and used to include big family gatherings to celebrate. 

I'm not sure how big a deal it was back in 1922 to turn 18. Nowadays that is the age of majority here - as in a lot of other countries - so quite a major occasion. But back then, that was not until you turned 21...

On the other hand, it's Nils who is in the centre here, and not my grandfather. So perhaps it is his birthday - which was August 17. Checking the calendar (oh how easy these days to do that online!), I see that in 1922 that was an ordinary Thursday. In 1923, though, it was a Friday - and would have been Nils' 21st...

Ah well. Whatever the occasion for the photo: Tomorrow is June 23, and the 115th anniversary of the birth of my grandfather. (Sadly he died rather "young", at 64.) (I'm calling that "young" now because 64 is what I'll be myself in a couple of months!!) (Gasp!!!)

So besides the "threesome" theme, that's another reason for me to choose this photo for...

Sepia Saturday 475

*59*

On Friday morning I woke up and found myself to be 59 years old, and the sun unexpectedly shining from a clear blue sky (in spite of rain being forecasted for the weekend). I had not made any special birthday plans whatsoever, having been busy with other things earlier in the week (mostly to do with our house finally now being offcially put up for sale – with the internet ad being published on Friday too) – and not expecting the weather to be fine either.

And as I had not invited anyone, and no one had called in advance to ask if I’d be at home, I wasn’t expecting anyone. Two birthday cards had arrived in advance by mail though, which I opened at breakfast:

I’m not sure how much impact it had on my train of thought, that both cards had animal pictures on them…

… But anyway, I suddenly decided that it would be a good day for the camera and me to visit the Zoo.

So we did. And it was (a good day).

Now if you will just bear with me…

… until I get the rest of my birthday photos sorted …