Kitty’s Place

Yesterday my fellow met us at the main post office after work. I had ordered some storage boxes from IKEA and some skirt and pants hangers. The notice came saying I could pick it up at the sub post office but a phone call on the heels of the notice, informed me that the package was too big to pick up there and it was actually at the main post office. I was thinking “6 boxes and some hangers, how big can it be?”. Well it was too big to even fit in the trunk of the car. *laugh* Whoever packed it put the flat storage boxes angled into a huge box and then tossed the hangers in the bottom. It weighed next to nothing (6 kg I think) but it was big enough for a small freezer. *laugh* We had to unpack it in the parking lot and then dismantle the packing box. I asked my fellow why they would not have just wrapped the flat boxes in plastic and attached a plastic bag with the hangers, since it would have been more portable. He said it was probably an american packing. *laugh* That man likes to live dangerously.

So I finally got boxes and packed up all sorts of things from inside cupboards and drawers and from under beds and couch. It took a good part of the day but the apartment is now clutter free! In fact my fellow said I should stop packing things up because it was getting too bare in here. *laugh*

There was a man wanting to look at the apartment yesterday, a few hours after it was listed. We put him off until today so I could get the boxes stored away. He came this afternoon and seemed to like it. He took pictures even, which I found strange, but I suppose if he is looking at a number of places, it makes it easier to remember certain things if you have pictures.

Through all of this excitement of buying a new apartment and listing this one for sale, I have been ill with a bilateral ear infection and high fever. So now that everything is tidy and ready for showing at any time, I am planning on resting up tomorrow. *laugh*

This morning my fellow sent me the url to our listing, it actually sounds like a nice apartment. *laugh*

I really need to make a more comprehensive journal entry and will try to do so later today. At the moment I have all the boxes in the bedroom sorted through and am in the process of moving them to storage. Then I need to move some of the things from the living room and the apartment is ready to show people. *laugh*

We sign the papers on the apartment today. We went to see it again on Sunday at an open house. There were 3 people interested and a small bidding war ensued today. We had already set a limit on what we would be willing to offer and after a morning of back and forth, we won the bidding. So we will be moving to an apartment that is 92 sq m (we have 63 now), has 2 more bedrooms and another bathroom, has laundry facilities in the same building (another big yay *laugh*) and is only 5 minutes away from where we live now. Since I really love this area that is a bonus. We do have some work to do on the new place. It needs a tub installed and we want to replace the kitchen appliances and add a dishwasher, but otherwise it is in great shape and won’t need much redecorating etc.

We have all the papers ready to put this apartment on the market but my fellow has already talked to the bank and we can get a loan for the full amount of the new place if by chance this one doesn’t sell before we close on that one. But since this is the best complex in the area, well maintained buildings and property, low monthly fee (and there has been no increase in condo fees since before my fellow bought here 9 years ago) and very centrally located, these apartments sell within days of listing usually. I have boxes to pick up tomorrow to start packing and my fellow painted doors and did little touch up jobs on the weekend, so it will be ready for showing this week. I just can’t express how excited I am at this moment. *laugh*

One week of school down and the real estate agent has been and gone. *laugh*

My fellow came home for lunch and then took LL to school Wednesday and Thursday, so I was at school on time. It is going well and I am really enjoying the classes.

Wednesday we finished up the exercises from a story in the book we are using ‘Bra början 2′ (of course I have book 1 at home but that didn’t help *laugh* I had to buy book 2). Then we read some news articles, looked up words from them, answered questions and then discussed them as a class. The woman I sit with and I were done quickly, so since the rest of the class were only about halfway through the work, the teacher gave us extra work. I told my fellow that there was a lesson to be learned from that … work slower. *laugh* Actually the extra work was really interesting and I enjoyed it. *smile*

The kidlet wanted to have Tova come over after school. I said no, that we would have to sort out a time for another day. I explained we would have to talk to her parents first. He was not happy about that, so after a discussion with his dad about it while I was cooking dinner, he decided that he was going to buy a new mom, one that would let kids come over whenever they wanted to. *laugh* Since pappa was in on this plan, I suggested Tova come over Thursday after school but that was vetoed since the real estate fellow was coming. *laugh* Not just mom is mean in this house. I said we could talk to her dad and she could come and have lunch here on Tuesday between öppna förskolan time and förskolan time. We can also arrange for her to come over after school next week and then we can walk her home after dinner, but it needs to be prearranged so that her dad doesn’t bundle up the other little kids and bring them out in the cold to pick her up from school. All of this has been explained in detail to the kidlet and he seems to be happy with that, but he still wants to buy a new mom. Then there will be one each for him and pappa. *laugh*

Yesterday we read about the swedish political system and discussed it. I thought I didn’t know anything about politics here, but I was wrong. *laugh* Living with a politician, it seems to have been absorbed into my brain without my knowledge. Then we listened to a song, filled in the blanks on the page with lyrics and discussed it. I really like this group and am comfortable with them already, so it is not so very scary to talk in class. *smile*

I did find out yesterday that there is school on Fridays. It is in the mornings though, both morning and afternoon classes combine for workshops and presentations. Today there is a police officer speaking to the group about young people and narcotics. I said I couldn’t come since I have LL home in the mornings. The teacher said that some weeks they have people come in just to sit down and chat with students, to help with speaking swedish. She said those ones I should try to arrange to have someone watch LL, since that is what I really need most. After class I searched out my head teacher and asked for a schedule and bought the book. Then I hurried to pick up LL.

The real estate agent was here at 1630. He walked through, took some pictures, talked about the process of selling (and of buying) here. He told us what the apartment next door (same size and layout) sold for recently. So we need to box up the rest of the clutter and we are ready to sell if we get a new place. The place we made the offer on has had another offer. There will be an open house there on the weekend so we are going back to look at it again.

Today I have a bunch of errands to attend to but for the moment I am relaxing with some tea, watching the kidlet play Freddie Fish.

This morning was LL’s 5 year checkup at the children’s health clinic. This is the pre school one and he was to get his polio vaccination. I had a paper to fill in about his progress (fine and gross motor skills, speech, self confidence etc) and his preschool teacher had one to fill in as well. We got there at 0830 and he got weighed and measured. He is 19.3 kg and 111 cm. He drew a picture for the nurse, she did an eye test and as happened the last time, he had a hard time with the last line. He said they were hard to see and it was hard to see which one she was pointing at. We went through the papers, talked about the speech therapist and about his going to kindergarten in September. She is going to send a new referral for a speech therapist, since they cancelled his follow appointment when they cut back and the woman he saw last November lost her job. She looked at his vaccination record and decided to wait for his polio shot. If I understood her correctly, here in Sweden they give 4 and this 5 year old one is the last one. In Canada he had already had 4 and was due for a 5th one now (and a final one when he is 12). She felt he needed the vaccination updated but that it was best to wait until it was a full 4 years since his last one. So we go back to BVC in March and she will test his eyes again then and give him the vaccination.

We had a nice weekend here. Saturday my fellow called and we put an offer on the apartment. Sunday he had a meeting in the afternoon. So we pretty much relaxed all weekend (except that I did laundry at 0700 Saturday morning and did major cleaning as in walls, ceilings, windows over the weekend *laugh*)

Monday I went to school at 1230. I had a letter that was the same as the one I had before, so I thought I was just going to find out what day I would have evening SFI. I took the kidlet with me because I had to talk to his teacher so it was easiest not to have someone else keep him for the half hour and drop him at school. When I got there, the woman who I spoke to rather vehemently previously about not being able to go to class in the morning (both in November and January) came out to meet me and asked if I was a new student, what was my name, did I have my letter? I guess I really never made any impression whatsoever on her. *laugh* She took me and showed me which classroom was mine and said I was just in time and how nice I brought along an “assistant”. That is when it dawned on me that I was being placed in the afternoon class. I guess my fellow ruffled some feathers there when he complained. I told her that I had to take LL to his school and she said that she would introduce to my teacher first. When she said his name I silently cheered, he is one of my two favourite SFI teachers and I learned so much from his classes before he fell ill mid term and was off work for months. I said to her that I knew him already, but as usual, she never heard a word I said and did an “Introduction”. He shook my hand, said to her that he already knew me and how nice it was to see me. I explained I had to drop LL at school but would be back.

So I started school yesterday. I was 30 minutes late and missed the reading of the little story but had no problem just jumping right in. He called on me as much as the others and I managed just fine. We are a large class, there were 26 students yesterday, 3 of us were new. After class I apologized and explained what had happened. He said no problem, come when I could. So all afternoon I was thinking how I could arrange to be at class on time. I had mentioned this to one of the mom’s before christmas and thought she could keep LL and drop him off with her son, since she lives in the same complex and they go to the same school. But yesterday her son got a place in daycare, so that was no longer an option. I then thought I would talk to the mom of LL friend who came home for lunch with us recently and see if she would mind watching him, since like the other woman, he has known her since we moved here almost 4 years ago. So today we went to öppna förskolan expecting to see her there and had another big surprise. It was her husband who brought the kids. She got a spot in nursing school and he is taking 6 months “pappa leave” to stay home with the kids until they can sort out daycare for them.

I took LL to school at 1300 and raced to school today. I wanted to talk to the teachers about perhaps only coming for the latter half of the classes until I get something worked out for LL, rather than coming in 30 minutes late every day. There was no one in the office except the rektor and he quickly passed me over to one of the teachers, but not my “head teacher” since he was away today. I sat and talked to her and explained everything. I am terrified of this woman. Really. She tends to sarcasm and I am so shy that I take it all to heart. It was her “you don’t need to write the provning yet, you are just a housewife” comment(which cracked up everyone sitting around the break table), that made me go to self study rather than go back to her evening class. But as Ibo so aptly put it yesterday, I am a big girl and I need to stand up for myself. So I was direct in my explanation and my concerns and my request. She did not think it was a good idea to come only half time. She said that she did not mind if I come late and was sure my other teachers would not mind either. She said I would have to make up the study time at home in order to keep up. I was happy with that. So I had class again today and will go 4 days a week in the afternoons. The first writing of the national prov is in March and there is another in May. I am in the advanced class which is great. Today the “guidance counselor” spoke to the class about options following SFI. I will eventually book a time with her about my options.

I have the bathroom and the kitchen cleaned top to bottom and inside and out. I also have sorted out one closet and taken more things to storage. The people did not accept our offer but they did not decline it either, so I understand they are waiting to see if anyone else will offer them more. We have an agent coming here on Thursday to talk about listing this place, hence the mad rush to declutter. Everything is clean, but people will notice boxes piled in a room before they will notice how the floor shines, so I want as much boxed and put in the storage room as I can manage, so we can get our asking price or close to it. *laugh*

All of the above is my explanation of why I have not been reading and commenting the past few days. I am just busy and expect to get busier since I have printed out about 300 pages worth of swedish worksheets to ramp up my self study in addition to school. I mean to pass this test with flying colours. *laugh*

Friday I did laundry, all the curtains, bedding etc etc. Dropped the kidlet off at school and came home and carried all the boxes down to the storage area. Well that is a lie, I left one because my back is bothering me since I slipped on the train platform on Thursday. *smile* I went to the centrum to pick up two parcels and post two letters. I stood in line for 15 minutes at the “post office”. I rang the buzzer twice, every person that got in line behind leaned over and rang it. One of the stock boys came and said he would get someone to come and then a lady who had been bitching at the end of the line came up and said to me in a really snotty voice “did you think to ring like the sign says”. I lost my temper and told her “I have rung it twice and everyone else has had a go too, but if it makes you feel better, ring away and good luck to you”, then I left and paid for the few groceries I had. I had to be at the school to get the kidlet so I just could not wait any longer. *laugh*

Once we were home, we met my fellow and headed out to meet his dad and look at another place. This one was also close by so it was a short walk. What a difference! It was like night and day. The apartments were the same layout but this one was so much nicer. It was decorated in light colours, the kitchen had cupboard doors, the floors were nice, the balcony door worked. *laugh* It is a very nice place and we put an offer on it. There is a lot we will need to do if we do get it though. There are some repairs to be done, nothing major, just little things. There is no bathtub, a priority in our family. The appliances are all really old, so they need replacing and there was no stove hood or dishwasher (but since I haven’t had a dishwasher since 1997, I didn’t even notice that *laugh*). The owner of the apartment took us down and showed us the laundry room, which has two washers, a dryer and a drying cupboard, all are new and they are shared by half the amount of apartments as here. My fellow said “look, you could do laundry every day”. *grin* She showed us the storage area as well. I was not as impressed with it, since it is a cage as opposed to a closed room with a locked door like we have here. There is a cycle/baby carriage room in the basement as well. So now we just wait and see what happens with our offer. We have arranged for an agent to come and see our place next week, so we can get it on the market if our offer gets accepted. We went out for sushi with my fellow’s dad and his sister after looking at the apartment. They gabbed about it and mortgage rates and such all through dinner. It is a guy thing I think. *laugh*

Today I was up at 0645 and did laundry again, this time I washed all the mats and throw rugs. I ironed and hung curtains, did general cleaning, had a shower and then I went and picked up my packages. One was tights I ordered, since it has been so cold lately. The other was a white bedskirt. I have wanted one for a long time and this was one sale, so I got it. I just finished dinner, did a shrimp stir fry. I think tonight I will sort through papers, nothing too strenuous since I am tired. *laugh*

I keep forgetting to journal this. A few weeks ago whole salmons were on sale somewhere. My fellow’s dad got one for them and one for us. On one of the nights that the kidlet slept over there during the holidays, farmor cooked the salmon. It was on the counter and she was going to slice it and clean it out. The kidlet was upset because it was still alive. She explained that it was dead and he said no, it couldn’t be dead because it had it’s eyes open and when fish are dead, they have their eyes closed and there are X’s on them. It is just too funny what kids pick up from cartoons. *laugh*

I suddenly remember what I dislike about moving, finding a place to move to. *laugh*

We went to see an apartment today (the one we were to see tomorrow was removed from the market because friends of the seller decided to buy it). There weren’t any pictures on the net which I thought was odd, since almost all have pictures with the listings. Now that we have seen it, I understand the reason. The place is in need of major renovations but they want top dollar for it. There were missing frames around doorways. The freezer was not working, the stove was very old and in bad shape. Very few of the overhead lights worked, the agent had to carry a lamp into the master bedroom so we could look at it. It was very dark because of a poor choice of colours and most of the floors needed replacing. (the ones we could see, there were so many boxes piled around that it was really difficult to see the 3rd bedroom and the dining area. The balcony door was broken, Ibo was unable to close it and it took the agent a fair amount of work to finally get it shut. There were no doors on the kitchen cupboards and while there was tile on the wall behind the sink and counter, it was ungrouted and obviously had been for a while. The bathtub had a large area where the porcelain was just gone and the plumbing did not look very promising at all. On the good side, it had a nice size kitchen, living room and master bedroom. *laugh*

After we left my fellow said “and I thought our place needed work”. *laugh* The only thing that really needs to be done in this apartment is to repaper and I really think it would be best to leave that to new owners, so they can have what they want. The paper that is here is nice, but someone wrote on a wall in the bedroom (gee, I wonder who did that?) and our old cat scratched one wall in the hall and one in the bedroom (playing with kidlet coat strings and a dream catcher respectively). Otherwise, we have repapered the bathroom and replaced shower head and tub bar, replaced the frames around most of the doors, since they were the old plastic ones and we replaced them with wood. It is bright and clean in here and all the fixtures and appliances are in good shape. So now that I have seen what other people are trying to sell, I am even more sure our place will sell easily. *laugh*

We are looking at another place tomorrow, it is also close by here. It did have pictures on the net and it looks very nice. There is another one that was on the market before christmas and is back up on the website, so I think we are going to call to see it as well.

Today I got the last of the christmas stuff packed up and my fellow took the tree out. Yesterday the kidlet and I went shopping at Väsby centrum. My fellow’s mom told me that one of the stores there had a big sale, so we went. I got a new advent candle holder, some christmas hotpads, christmas napkins and the kidlet picked out two christmas teacandle holders, one for him and one for his farmor. I also got light bulbs for the new lamps in the kitchen and for the new church we got to put out next christmas, as well as a new egg timer. All the christmas things were 50% off and the other stuff was 30% off. We kept passing people carrying these blue boxes with handles and I wondered what they were. After we left the first shop, I saw them in the store across the hall. It was a ceramic Gingerbread Village, with 4 houses, a church, Santa in a sled being pulled by dogs, 3 dogs and dog house, 4 kids, another Santa, a christmas tree and miniature lights that fit inside all the buildings and the tree. It originally was 400 SEK but they were selling them out for 98 SEK. So I bought one for next christmas. *laugh* The kidlet saw a cute bedside lamp with bears on the lampshade at the first store we were in. I talked to my fellow about it and we went back this morning and got it, so he can have it in his room when we move. Right now it is on the window ledge beside his bed and he is thrilled with it.

My fellow’s dad came with us to see the apartment and since it was close to dinner time when we got back here, we had farmor come here from work and they had dinner with us. I was making pasta with a meat sauce but they don’t eat meat, so I just made a second sauce for them, a white sauce with salmon. While the meat and the fish were cooking, I whipped up chocolate pudding and after dinner we had pudding, whipped cream and coffee. There was even enough left over from dinner for me to pack my fellow leftovers for tomorrow’s lunch and for his mom to pack her lunch for tomorrow too. Now I am going to go and change the kitchen curtains and take down the living room ones (I am going to wash those ones and put them back up tomorrow, since I think this set looks best in here for when we start showing this place .. talk about obsessing *laugh*)

Take a look at what has had me entranced this morning, Mosaic Minds. It is a terrific new e-zine that launched it’s first issue today and it is a delight!

After school yesterday I took the sled with me and took the kidlet sledding. He loved it and he loved that his friend David came too. It was a quiet evening and we went to bed fairly early.

This morning the alarm rang at 0400. I got up and made tea for my fellow and he headed out at 0500 to catch a plane to Helsingborg. I stayed up and puttered about here. The kidlet woke at 0600 and we watched cartoons for a while then went and did some shopping. I took him to McDonalds for lunch, the first time he has been there in over a month. *laugh* Then I dropped him off at school. I did get all the christmas stuff dismantled today and most of it boxed. Did laundry and started getting boxes sorted to go back to storage. My fellow fixed the small hanging lamps I got for the kitchen windows, so we still have light even though the christmas ones are gone. I just find it so dark this time of year and the lights make it feel cosier. I hung those today as well. I have new curtains to put up tomorrow in the kitchen and bedroom. We got them for christmas. I will take the boxes down to storage then as well. I need the clutter gone before we put this place up for sale and that could happen anytime, so best to be prepared. *laugh*