Our small Swedish House had three bathrooms!  That’s quite unusual for a house here.  They were all quite small and I think they were probably added to the house in the 1989 remodel.

Just off the entry hall was a long, skinny half bath.

Next to it, but accessed from the bedroom was the long, skinny master bath.  It had a sink, toilet and shower stall squeezed into the small space.

And upstairs, under the eaves, was another small bath.

Bob and I thought bathroom remodels were above our pay grade (read skill level) so we hired a local firm to do it.  We decided that we could eliminate the half bath off the entry hall.  We took the front half and turned it into a coat closet.  The back half we opened up to the master bath and used the space for a shower.

The work happened while we were gone, but our neighbor Anna was good enough to send us update photos.

We opted for floor heat.

Bathrooms in Sweden are ‘wet rooms,” so the walls have a special vinyl covering.  We chose this design for the master bath.

They have the coolest shower doors here.  They’re curved! It makes the corner shower feel quite spacious.

But even better, when you aren’t showering, they can be swung against the wall, making the room feel much bigger!

We got a new sink and toilet, but they are in the same space as before.

By taking space from the hall bathroom for the shower, we were able to bring the washing machine up from the cellar and put it in the bathroom where the old shower was.

We tucked the toilet in the upstairs bath under the eaves and we have the same shower arrangement up there as in the master bath.

Perfect for overnight guests!

 

I’ve known for a long time that I wanted a “kitchen sofa” for the Swedish house, and I’ve been looking for one every time I’m in Sweden.  I’ve seen a lot of these wooden sofas, but I had a very specific style in mind.  Shortly before we left last summer, Torsten called one afternoon to say he was on a service call and the customer had a sofa for sale–a sofa he was sure I would like.  And he was right!

It was in an out building at an old farmstead, and Bob and I took the trailer over and picked it up.  I love the shape of the back, the rolled arms and, best of all, the faux finish.  A lot of antique Swedish furniture is painted with a style meant to imitate a more expensive wood.

Oh, and the front pulls out so it can be used as a bed!  This sofa is missing it’s seat, but that will be an easy fix.  A wooden seat and a nice cushion and it will be good to go!

I had the bright idea that I might make a quilt that could be used to cover the cushion.  I don’t do a lot of quilting with turn-of-the-century fabrics, but their earth colors seemed perfect for this sofa.  Then I decided a postage stamp quilt would be “fun.”  So, I set about cutting a lot of little squares and sewing them together.

I wanted the design to be on-point…

…so I had to construct the quilt diagonally.

That requires a lot of thinking!  Finally, I had the top pieced.  4224 pieces, but who’s counting!

But I had a lot of squares left, so I decided I could use some of them for the “label.”

So, just five hundred and some more squares and I had a label.

I sewed it into the back of the quilt.

I wasn’t sure how to quilt it.  In the end, I chose a Baptist fan design.

You can see it a little better from the back.

I’ve decided it will just be a sofa quilt, not a cushion over.  I have something else in mind for that!

A little footnote.  Last week, the farmhouse and the outbuilding where we got the kitchen sofa burned to the ground in a horrible fire.  I’m so glad the sofa is with us.

 

 

 

 

 

Kryddhylla?  It’s Swedish for spice rack!  I’ve always thought these under-counter spice racks you find in lots of Swedish kitchens are very cool.

You can see a red one behind me here in Skräddar Anna’s kitchen in this picture taken in 1984!

This one’s a little different.  It’s in Berit and Gunnar’s house.

I wanted to find one for our Swedish house and was looking for an antique one that would go under our upper cupboards.  But if you look at the picture below, you’ll see that blank panel on the very left.  It was kind of boring, and kind of bothered me.

It was just there to hide some electrical.  Hmmm.  Why not put the kryddhylla there!?!

It would be a bit nontraditional to run it vertically, but, hey–why not!  I found a source for new ones, that had four containers.

The glass inserts were square.

So they could go into the holder either way!

Five seemed to be right for the space, so we ordered a second one and did some creative carpentry.

And now we have our own kryddhylla!   Yeah!

Oh!  But on the other side of the cupboards, there’s a skinny space.  It didn’t bother me so much.

But then look what I found!

Baby ones!  Stay tuned!

After we demoed the kitchen in our Swedish house last fall, Torsten and Mikael put in the wood stove.  Then, in January, we installed the floor and cabinets and got close to finishing the remodel.

Before we returned to Sweden for the summer, Torsten and Mikael built the hood over our stoves.  It started with Mikael putting a fresh layer of cement over the chimney.  This is the hall side of the chimney.

This is the kitchen–with the wood stove covered up and the electric stove temporarily removed.

Traditional Swedish hoods are very different than the prefab hoods we’re used to in the US.  Torsten built the steel framework…

…and installed it.

Then Mikeal started building the hood with bricks.

While the work was in progress, this was the only photo Torsten sent me!

Once the bricks were in place, Mickael covered everything with a layer of cement.

And I got my second sneak peek!  It’s hard to be half a world away!

Finally, I couldn’t stand it any longer!  I had to make a trip back to Sweden.

Everything looked fabulous, including the white tile back splash.

This summer, Bob painted all the cement.

Traditionally these hoods are painted white, and that’s what we did—with the first coat.

But it seemed so stark white that he put a second coat on with a tinge of gray in it.

And it looks fantastic!  The vedspis (wood stove) and hood really make this my Swedish dream kitchen.

Thank you Torsten, Mikael and Bob!

 

 

I decided I wanted something red and white and simple for the beds in Sweden.  A checkerboard quilt seemed perfect, so I cut  a bunch of 2″ strips from my red and white fabrics and sewed them together.  Then I cut them in 2″ segments.

I hauled them to a retreat with me!

Then it was just a matter of sewing them together into longer and longer strips.

You know the drill.  Once the strips were long enough it was time to sew them together.

Here’s the first one when I finished it at the retreat and spread it on my bed.

In keeping with the “simple” theme, I just quilted diagonally with wavy lines.

But I didn’t go all the way in one direction, I did more of a chevron pattern.

I was really pleased with the way it turned out.

I found this cute bird print for the back.

Each quilt was 40 squares by 50 squares, or 2000 squares!  (Scary when you say it that way!)

Yes, I said “each quilt” because I made two of them!

Here’s Bob getting his.  I gave it to him before we left home so he could put it in his suitcase!

When we first got to Sweden, we had to sleep upstairs because our bedroom wasn’t remodeled yet.

But once the remodel was finished, we brought the bed—and the quilts—downstairs to their new home.

I didn’t like the way the Dala horses showed through the wallpaper.  It looked like they were in jail!  So, I added some fabric to the back of the headboard.

Now I really must do something about pillows!

 

I wanted to embroider something to hang in my kitchen window in our Swedish house, and when I found these chickens doing their days-of-the-week chores, I knew they were the ones!

 

These industrious gals have it all figured out–washing on Monday.

Ironing on Tuesday.

Mending on Wednesday.

Shopping on Thursday.

Cleaning on Friday.

And baking on Saturday!

If only it were that easy!

 

I can’t wait to get them hung up in the window!

I found these patterns online, on Pinterest.

It says they are a TriChem pattern.

I checked their site, and they aren’t listed.

I assume they are an older, discontinued pattern.

Although I don’t know why.

I think they’re adorable!

If there was a Sunday, I couldn’t find it!

 

I love the glass doored cabinets in our Swedish kitchen.  The trouble is, I had nothing to put in them!  On a trip to Anthropology, I saw some cute cut-out letters and thought that would be a simple solution, but what letters?  Our initials seemed kind of weird.

Then it hit me–why not write “kitchen,” but in Swedish.  The word is kök–just three letters.  And there were seven cupboards–three above window.  I went to the craft store and had to get creative to get the two dots above the “o”.

I bought some red paint and gave everything a couple of coats.

I found this scrapbook paper and decided to do some decoupage.

The cutting out was a bit tricky.

But the decoupage was fun!

Bob made some great bases for me–and eventually figured out how to mount the dots above the “o”!

Of course, when I got back to Sweden, I found I could have bought letters there–with the appropriate characters.

The letters worked out great!

It was tricky getting a photo without glare on the glass.

But, the letters served the purpose–filling up some space!

 

I found an inexpensive airfare to Sweden in March and decided to take a quick trip over there to look for some furniture for our Swedish house, primarily a bed so we’d have someplace to sleep this summer.  Instead, with Torsten’s help and encouragement, we remodeled the dining room!

Here’s what it looked like in the real estate listing photos.

The ceiling was natural knotty pine, the walls had plywood panelling….

…and there was a wall of built-ins along one side of the room.

It isn’t a very big room, so we removed the built-ins.  Since you can never have enough storage, we’ll find someplace else in the house to use them.

Then I pulled the moldings and plywood paneling off the walls.  The old glue was quite dry, so they came off easily, but it took a lot of sanding to get rid of the glue that was left on the particle board.

Now we had a bare wall where the cabinets used to be.

And we just happened to have an extra window that we took out of the kitchen when we put a smaller one in there.  So, Torsten cut a hole in the wall and, voila! A new view!

It even makes the outside of the house look better.

I put a coat of paint over the particle board to seal it and mudded the seams–all in preparation for wallpaper above the wainscoting.

Torsten nailed up the wainscoting…

…and I painted it the same gray as we used in the kitchen.

All of the moldings were painted white.

The ceiling got four coats of white paint.  This is my “three-ladder-method” for ceiling painting.  Luckily the room wasn’t any bigger, or we would have needed more ladders!

The old flooring was a yellowish brown sheet vinyl.  It didn’t look so great up against the gray Marmoleum in the kitchen.

The solution?  Winter Oak Pergo!  Here it is, laid out in the bedroom acclimating to the house.

I loved it from the minute we started putting it down.

What do you think?

Then my favorite part–wallpaper!

Torsten is a saint.  Not because he can do everything, but because picking a geometric wallpaper for an old house would make most people swear like a sailor!

He didn’t utter one cross word, and it looks terrific!

The previous owners left us the dining room table, so of course we had to have fika in the newly finished room.

There are still some things to do–like paint the table and the corner cabinet, and put up window coverings, but I think it looks pretty darned good for two weeks work!

And, oh, I did buy some furniture.  On the last day before I left, we went to Ikea and bought a bed and nightstands–and this cute rug for under the table!

I’ll be ready to host a dinner party before long!

 

One of my mom’s health care providers, Sayonara, thought it would be fun to give me a housewarming party for the new house in Sweden!

She enlisted Mom and Sally’s help and they put together a wonderful party at Mom’s house.

Sy decorated the entry with the Swedish colors.

And the Swedish theme continued with the table settings, of course!

Sally has the perfect blue and yellow dishes for just such an occassion!

And she has table linens to match.

I was able to provide something Swedish for the center of the tables, like fold out Dala horses and…

…these charming little candle holders.

This is our dear, dear friend Peggy.

She sent a bouquet of flowers in the perfect colors!

Luckily, there are enough Scandinavians in the Northwest that it’s easy to find special Swedish foods…

…like this Leksands Knäckebröd, which is produced not far from our house in Sweden!

Mmm. Hard bread!

Sally did a perfect Swedish meal–meatballs, cream sauce, lingonberries, boiled potatoes with dill and Swedish cucumber salad.

Melissa made the trip from Bend, which was very special.

The gifts were beautifully wrapped.  How perfect is this for a Swedish party?

 

There was lots of red and white to reflect the theme of the kitchen in Sweden.

Everyone was sooooo generous.  I’ll have the best stocked kitchen in the neighborhood.

And I’ll be able to entertain with the traditional seven kinds of cookies!

I made traditional Swedish “cooked” coffee to go with dessert.  That’s boiled coffee for the uninitiated.

There’s a bakery in Kirkland that specializes in Princess Cakes!

And Karen Rollman made this adorable (and delicious) Dala horse cake.

Everyone went home with a goodie bag filled with Swedish candies.

It was such a fun afternoon, and so sweet of my friends to honor me in this way.  Thank you, all.

 

Once the cabinets were in, it was time to put up the wainscoting, which was painted a pale gray.

I had hoped to find a wallpaper that looked like stenciling, and I did!

Lucky for us, Torsten is a jack-of-all trades.

I couldn’t be happier with the way the wallpaper looks.

You can see how the wallpaper wraps around the room.

Corner and ceiling moldings complete the look nicely.

Our refrigerator didn’t arrive before we left, but Torsten sent a picture.  I love the shape and the color!  Now to find the perfect skinny cabinet to go next to it!

The window still needs molding, but I had to play with placing a Dala horse on the sill.

Or perhaps he looked better in one of the high cupboards?

I even had a few things to put inside the cupboards.

It’s really looking great, but there are a few things to do, like the hood and tile black splash.

I love the little details, like the porcelain knobs on the kitchen cabinets,

We used similar hardware on the door.

We chose a vintage style for the light switches and…

…outlets.

The faucet, too, has a vintage feel.

After weeks of construction, it was fun to put out the towels I’d made.

I had fun adapting some Aunt Martha patterns.

I added a Dala horse to each one.

Even though they are a bit corny!