Visit to Sandefjord Norway

It is very easy to find nice forms of gardening everywhere. I went to Norway and I saw many nice pictures in the surroundings of Sandefjord. Due to the sea climate you can grow many plants, also in Norway. Take a look by yourself!

Midsummer / Midsommar

Midsummer is one of the biggest traditions in Sweden, it takes a weekend. It starts on Friday (midsommarafton), the Saterday (midsummerday) - your put the Swedish flag outside- and the Sunday. It is celebrated between 20 and 26th of June. It is an old tradition, they started in 400.

You celebrate with family or friends. You make flower bouquets and wraiths for in your hair. You have a seat outside (of course), have a coffee with cake, later some fresh herring, new potatoes and cream and as a dessert strawberries with cream.

Det är wel inte riktig nödvendig att förklara vad Midsommar handlar om för svenkarna, eller hur?

Beautiful place Brunstorp Trädgård

What a beautiful place, Brunstorp Café and Trädgården. Beside of the lake "Vättern", with very nice views, friendly people, good coffee and very good appelcake. In summertime, it is a really nice place to go and have a little slow down, just being there and have a look around.

The Secret Garden

Motto for life 

When we moved to Sweden it was our big dream to make a garden again. Around the old days school "Sjöbygget i Vittaryd". We were told that the old lady who was living there, after the school was closed in the fifties, had a beautiful garden. We had a lot of dreams. It should be full of flowers, with a lot of green and grasses, fit in the natural area around it and easy to maintain. The famous Dutch garden designer from The Netherlands, Piet Oudolf is a big inspiration for us. His famous designs show a natural way of planting including the beauty of the circle of life in the garden. You only have to google to find some examples of gardens designed by his hand. It is even easy to recognize his philosophy. Do you want to know more about him and his work? gardenista: 8 favorite landscape ideas by Dutch Designer Piet Oudolf

Typical Piet Oudolf Garden & Picture

When we arrived a lot of borders had nearly disappeared while it wasn't maintained at all. The grass and Sevenleaf was ruling all over. The trees who were planted lang ago were grown to big. New trees grow up out of wild seeds, like mountain ashes ("Sorbus"), Pinetrees en Acers. So there was a big jobb to do. It is a challenge as well, because we are not used to garden in forest areas, we don't know the ground as well as our mothers land, the climate is a little different from The Netherlands and we don not have a lot of money, so you can not change everything in one day...
It takes a lot of work, attention and patience. But we can do it, just do it and enjoy your life in nature every day 😍

Overgrown borders

Old days earth cellar

Fina vårblomsterna / Spring flowers

It took a little time before we got spring, even in the south of Sweden. Half of may we had still snow falling and low temperatures. But finally nature started growing, you can see the results in my garden.

Best life starts out of your comfortzone?

Out of our comfortzone.... It would not be easy, but later life would be better....
You know what happened? Follow our story from now....

Our adventure started one year ago. We decided to follow our heart, even it scared a bit. But that's normal when you step out of your comfortzone. We had to make the step, it would be now or never. Because we were getting older. We already got a wake up call. Peter got a severe illness, which made him struggle with pain every singel day. We needed quality time together now, not later. Maybe it will never come. When we made a wrong step, we could go back anytime. But then a least we tried, even better as feeling regrets for the rest of your life. We could be proud on ourselves.

We dreamed about it, many years. We liked the nature, the silence and peace. Just hearing nothing. No neighbors living too close and making noise everyday, no irritations about a too busy private schedule and no stress about your jobb. We went on holidays in Scandinavia (special in Norway and Sweden) a lot of years, we always had to leave with pain in our hearts.

We decided to give it a try and to go, to move from The Netherlands to Sweden. We left everything behind, good jobs, family and friends and all the habits we were used to and felt so save. But we knew it was necessary to get back even a better life.

So it was time for a new adventure together. We sold our house and bought a lovely red house in Småland Sweden. We would have a life with less money, but with more quality. We should work with pleasure.We dreamed about having a nice garden people could visit or pick flowers in. Maybe we could have a small business with flower arrangements. Like we said to every one for years: Peter should go out for fishing, I should take care of growing the carrots and marmelades...