Sunday, December 29, 2013

I went bikeriding in June 2013

I decided to take time off from my gardening on a Sunday in June 2013 when I was in Sweden visiting my mum. My hope was to see if the house my parents lived in when I was born was still standing. It sure was, but no one has lived in it for a while so it was run down. It used to be surrounded by a large forest that has more or less all been cut down as you can see below. 


I parked the bike to walk in and take a closer look at Rosenberg in Vinkoel, where Anders and Maerta lived in 1957. I think they moved in 1948 or 1949 and moved out to Lyckhem in Haerlunda in 1958.

The grass was long but I needed to come closer and peak through windows as well as look around the 'garden'. 

When I walked around the house peaking in through the windows I saw what I thought looked like the kitchen with a wood stove. Mum later confirmed it and said it looked very similar to when she lived in the house. I know that there was no running water then because water had to be fetched from a well a bit away from the house. As I was child number six it must have been a bit crowded in this kitchen. Apparently this is where they all slept cause it was the warmest room in the house, out of the two rooms present. 

Behind the house I found the'cellar' used for food storage. Built from stone and dirt it kept the potatoes safe from freezing during the winter.
It was a very low stone entrance and of course I bumped my head as I entered to see what mums 'fridge' looked like. Well dug into the ground it would have kept a constant cool temperature.

Mum told me that they had a chook house with lots of chickens laying a large number of eggs that were sold. The first five year's lease on the house included the farming of some land and milking of a number of cows. The next five years dad worked at the saw mill in Haerlunda. The family's transport was a motorbike. I don't think mum had a washing machine for many years. So many kids and so much work to keep them clean and feed them. All cooking to be done on the wooden stove. What a different life. Hard to imagine!