Our visit with ELLA!

Weather report: Minus 8 degrees C. Clear and sunny as usual for us as we travel.

We wake up late today. We sleep so well here. Smörgås and off to take Karli to the library to work. We go to Hemköp to get some candy for Ella. She likes to have candy to give to people when they come to visit. It is fun shopping in Hemköp.

We go to the Hantverk shop in Söderhamn that we went to on Saturday. We meet Annika Jonsson who is the wife of the man we met. She makes the pottery. We buy 2 more things. One for Kennon and one for Berit. http://www.krukis.se/ They love to talk with us and we feel the same. we stay for 1 hour at least.

We go back to Solveig and she has a wonderful dinner for us. Salmon, fish, potatis and delicious mushroom sauce. We get ready to go to Ellas. She lives in a home about 20 minutes away. We go the back roads through the snow. Not sure how we would ever negociate this without Solveig. But we are enjoying the glistening snow and little houses with smoke coming out the chimneys.

The place is wonderful

We have coffee, tea, and treats that Solveig has brought for the occasion. We sing a little and Ella tells stories. Where is that tape recorder? Karli will have to come back to talk with her so she can get all the stories on tape. The room is so nice with furniture from Hå and her apartment. There is a bed, 2 cabinets, kitchen table, small kitchen, bath and entry way. There are photos of the family here and pictures on the wall we recognise. She seems happy here. The staff is so nice too. There is a dining room for them that is across from Ellas room.

We have a hard time saying good bye. At least I do. It will be a long time until we see Ella again. I can not express how special she is to us.

We go back to Ljusne and have risgryngrött and smörgås. We watch TV after. Solveig takes us to see all her sewing or knitting. She has made those triangular scarves that are so popular here, socks, and 2 other items I do not know what to name. They are beautiful. She tells us to chose for ourselves. It is amazing. Is there anything Solveig cannot do???

Karli chooses a lavender scarf. Arvid socks. Me the wrist gloves. They are wonderful and we are so amazed at Solveigs talents.

Tomorrow we leave and go to Östersund. We are coming back from Östersund and stay here one more night on Jan 3rd. January 4th in Linköping. January 5th Stockholm. Then we hope to take a trip to Helsinki maybe before we leave Sweden.