Sweden Day 2

I knew when I came to Sweden exactly what I wanted to see. Hubby and I had been to the Ballenberg Open Air Museum in Switzerland and loved it, so when I saw Skansen Open Air Museum (the first open air museum) in Stockholm, we WERE going. Jorgen was excited that we were going to Skansen and told us to go on Tuesday when they have their "All Sing." Skansen's "All Sing" has been going since 1940, and is a live music sing along television program. Dad and I were excited for both the museum and the sing along.

Rather than walking dad and I rode this rickety tram to the top of the museum.

Timber houses

Family house

Tapestry of Saints

Baby Swing

The green thing in the corner is the husband and wife's bed. You pull the curtain around to....for....umm....to keep the snoring from waking up the children ;) ;) ;)

My obsession with windows prevails.

A weaving loom. We were told that before a girl could marry she had to weave all of the blankets and towels that would be necessary to sustain a household. I think the number was 11? Should have written it down. Anyway, it would take her about 2 years of weaving before she was completed and ready to enter her own home.

I loved these beautiful wooden spoons.

Viking Rune Stone. Most of these stones were to mark the grave of death of a fallen warrior.

This is one of the most popular churches for Swede's to marry in to this day.

Another house

Window obsession

 This house belonged to a blacksmith. Blacksmith's made more money than farmers so they had nicer homes.

This peacock was a total poser!

The All Sing was amazing. It was so much fun to see people of all stages come and enjoy the traditional and new music of Sweden. I felt very much at home here, there were a lot of families and people who were happy and friendly.

The last number of the show had a Jewish person, a Nun, an Arab person, a Gay person, and others performing to a song that was about "it doesn't matter who you are we love each other." It was really quite funny and a bit propaganda-ish, but it had a good message. Looks like they are ingraining it into the young via live music television.

When we left Skansen I suggested we take the scenic route back to the hotel. Scenic it was!

However, just because it was scenic doesn't meant it was a good idea. Dad and I were lost walking the streets of Stockholm at night for 1.5-2 hours. Thank heavens for dad's Swedish and the fact that we were in a great city. Had this happened in Lausanne, Switzerland I am pretty sure people would still be looking for our bodies. We got to the hotel somewhere in the time frame of 11:00-11:30 p.m. We laughed pretty hard on our walk. Dad asked a guy for directions, he told us "You are way way way far away" he then offered to give us a ride, dad declined. Next time I am going to take the ride and let dad find the hotel on his own ;)