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Swedish Christmas

Here's my holiday table.  I took a picture going the other direction where you could see both trees lit up, but I'm afraid that the "candlelight" setting on my camera requires a *very* steady hand -- something I didn't have after 2 cups of glogg (more on glogg later. . .)

And here's our smorgasbord (did I spell that right, Pete?)  Swedish Christmas is heavy on the meat and starch.  From top to bottom we have: traditional rice pudding with lingon berries, jello salad, Swedish meatballs, potato sausage, ham, scalloped potatoes, limpa (Swedish rye) and cardamom tea rolls. 

Before dinner there were lots of snacks including Bond-Ost (a caraway seeded cheese) served with knacke bread (hardtack -- like rye krisp kind of).  Oh -- and Sil (pickled herring).   And of course there was glogg!  Glogg is a mulled red wine that you drink warm and it is so good!

The next morning we had cardamom braid and coffee cake from the Swedish Bakery -- yum!

It was lovely to have Pete's mom here for a few days and Pete was wonderful (& so was Maddie).  I will leave it at that, other than to say that I will not be having Swedish Christmas here next year.  I'm glad that I did it for Pete's mom's sake though.  Maybe her daughters will step up next year.

Swedish food resources:

• Swedish Bakery -- I had to have all the baked goods shipped to me from Swedish Bakery because there was bad weather the day we were supposed to go up to Chicago.  Everything arrived here in great condition -- well packed and fresh!  You can see pictures of most of their baked goods on the website.  I ordered cardamom braids, Andersonville coffee cake, limpa, cardamom tea rolls and cinnamon bread.  Yum!
• Wickstrom's -- Wickstrom's is also in Andersonville (in Chicago) and they are a Swedish deli.  You can get the Bond-Ost, Knacke Bread, Sil, Glogg mix and tons of other things.  I haven't ordered online from them, but I have shopped there in person and they are wonderful! 

Winter Wonderland!

We have two *huge* fir trees in the front yard and I love how they look covered in snow.  Up top is tree 1 and here is tree 2. . .

We are supposed to get 4-5 inches south of Chicago where I'm at and having just shoveled our drive and walkway, I can confirm that we have already gotten a couple of inches.  Here's a shot of my "kitchen" garden this afternoon. . .

I like to leave the stems because I think they look very cool in the winter all covered in snow.

And tonight is the Stamping Online / Black Sheep Bags Holiday Party!  I told Maddie this last night and I also told her that daddy couldn't come.  She looked at me incredulously saying -- He can't come?  You mean you won't let him into the house?  Yep, I said.  It was hysterical -- she couldn't believe what she was hearing!  In actuality it is Pete's company Christmas party tonight and he always jokes that Maddie and I hold our company party the same night. 

Ours will be much tamer than his if previous years are any indication.  See, Pete works for this real estate company in Chicago headed by a huge real estate tycoon (he's like the Chicago version of Donald Trump.)  And every year he throws a *bash* for his employees with his own money.  At these parties there are sometimes exotic dancers dancing around in their skivvies -- I kid you not!!  Needless to say the spouses are not invited.  I've seen pictures though and it is wild.

In contrast, Maddie and I will be hanging out, eating Mac & Cheese and relaxing.  We already had our outing to the bookstore earlier in the day in order to avoid the snowstorm.  Time to go knit!

A little bit of Swedish Christmas

Yesterday on our trip to IKEA I saw a lot of Swedish ornaments and I decided it was time to use our second christmas tree this year.  This is a whole Swedish tree and is sitting in the corner of out dining room.  Here's a close-up of a traditional Swedish ornament:

The straw ornaments are very traditional, as are the tomte's hanging from it.  Don't know what a tomte or tomten is?  See my post from last December.

Straw animals are popular too -- darn forgot to photograph our big straw reindeer!  But here is a picture of a cool straw wreath I bought at IKEA:

Pretty cool, huh?  And more Swedish Christmas info will follow.  I'm having the traditional Swedish Christmas dinner for all of Pete's family at my house this year, so I'll be sure to blog about that too!  And if you want to read more on your own, Pete's Mom got me the book Swedish Christmas by Catarina Lundgren Astrom a few years ago.  It has a lot of recipes for Swedish holiday goodies as well as some info on the traditions.

And I'm collecting info on Dala Horses too!  More on that soon!

Tomte

I've been meaning to post pictures of my Tomtes for ages and when Wendy posted about Swedish Christmas last week, I went into action.  Okay, not really.  After a couple of days I talked Pete into taking pictures for me, and now 3 days after that I'm finally posting. 

That picture up top is our biggest Tomte and he sits on the mantle.  Notice his lovely sweater! (which I did not knit.)  So, you're probably asking what a Tomte (or tomten) is.  Well, I found a definition of Tomte here and I found more Tomte info here.  But basically they are little elves that live in your house (on your farm. . . under the house. . .) and they are sometimes thought of as Santa or Santa's helpers.  Oh yeah, and they are Scandinavian.  Here's another. . .

This guy is a little smaller and more freindly looking! than the first one.  Our niece used to be scared of the Tomte in my in-laws house (he looked like the first one up there).

Then there are these little wooden tomtes (here's a website that sells all kinds of them) that come in all varieties.  The tall hat guy is Pete's and was given to him by a family friend years ago.  And here's mine. . .

We bought this a few weeks ago when we went up to Andersonville in Chicago.  While there we ate Swedish pankcakes with lingonberries at Svea and got lots of goodies from the Swedish Bakery. 

I must admit that I only have a touch of Norwegian in me.  However, Pete is almost entirely Swedish and I have loved learning about the Swedish heritage. 

And if you want a cute children's book about a Tomten  check out The Tomten by Astrid Lindgren it's one of Maddie's favorites!