Happy Dance

We can go!  We can go!  (If you're the mother of preschoolers, you're now picturing the PBS Cat in the Hat cartoon.  I know you.)



38.  After more than a month of sharing the news of your impending move to Sweden with words like probably, perhaps, perchance (okay, I'm pretty sure I never said "perchance," but...alliteration.) open the email from your husband that says that the trip is officially approved!





39: Do your happy dance!  I'll provide your soundtrack:

40: Make the news official and announce your not-so-secret blog on social media.

41: Resume your dance party.

Culture Clash

36: Perform an in depth analysis comparing and contrasting your own local culture with that of Sweden.  If you could put one steeped in Pittsburgh's unique Steel City culture in the most Swedish environment locally available, you might get this:

37: Take copious notes on how NOT to pronounce Swedish.  Kach...hahaha. 

Create Couch Potato Immersion Experience

31: Hide the remote to your English-laden television.

32: Continue to force them to complete household chores before gaining the privilege of studying watching TV. heehee.

33: Plop your future Swedish speakers down in front of the computer. 

34: Pull up the Swedish Kids' TV site.

35: Trust that these uncensored clips won't need censoring. (See #5 and #5a of my Top 10 List.)

Hopefully something's getting through to those zoned-out little brains.

Swedish Mother's Day

30:  Start celebrating Swedish holidays, or at least the really important ones

(Flower courtesy of the neighbor's beautiful garden. oops.)

We Love the Mailman

28: Get very excited about the mail.

 

 

Roanin said "Now I can leave the universe!"  Umm...we might have some concept of scale issues.

 

 

29: Wait for the government to kindly return proof of your marriage and the childrens' births so you can start the residency request process.  Thankfully the paperwork that came with the passports explained those documents will come back in a separate mailing.  It didn't explain why it's a good idea to divvy up our documents into as many separate envelopes as possible.  But that would be a lot to ask.

Things that Worry Me about Taking my Children to Sweden

A Top Ten List

10: It's very rude to leave your shoes on in a Swedish home.  Even some public places provide disposable shoe covers or socks to wear.  One of Adrienne's first words was "shoe", closely followed by "boot".  She gets her footwear obsession from her big sister.  Prying shoes off these mini Carrie Bradshaws at every threshold is going to be a chore.

 

9: Speaking of feet, these really scare me. Roanin has not changed shoe size in about 2 years. Everything is much more expensive in Sweden. If he decides to "catch up" in Sweden, it could cost us an arm and a leg to keep these feet shod.

8: I often express to the kiddos that a debate is closed (and I win) with the phrase "The end." I will NOT be able to do this in Swedish and feel good about myself as a mother. Here is a currently relevant example of how this would go: "Cora, those shorts are too short. You may NOT wear those shorts out of the house without leggings under them or a skirt over them. Slut." Yup. The end = Slut (sloot). Tack that on to the end of your favorite Disney Princess Movie.

7: These 2 morning glories are up with the sun everyday. The sun will come up at roughly 3 AM when we arrive in July. Holy blackout curtains, Batman!

                                            

6: Translating the number 6 back into English.  Roanin was announcing to his sisters this morning "I'm sex years old!"  Nope, that's not a typo.

5: Swedish television isn't censored.  No bleeping.  No blurry pixels.  No nothing.
    a) The F-bomb in Swedish translates directly to the F-bomb in English.  You're welcome, Roanin's next American classroom teacher.

4: Swedes expect promptness.  I consider myself fairly on time...for a mother...of 3 small children.  We'll see how that translates.  How do you say "grace period" in Swedish?

3: Small children = wolf bait.

2: Public restrooms are coin operated.  I don't mind paying the 5 krona (about 75 cents), but the sheer weight of the amount of exact coinage I'll need to carry with me for a day on the town with 3 small bladders could be a serious issue.

1: Swedes eat everything with silverware.  My kids...not so much.

Things that excite me about taking my children to Sweden:

1: Everything else.

Study Up

We still don't know exactly how long we'll be able to stay in Sweden.  (This is why the blog's still relatively secretive...shhhh!)  Some days it's 2 months.  Some days 3 or 6 months.  Some days the trip's not going to happen.  (I'm not particularly fond of those days.)  So it's still hard to move forward with any real plans for our trip, or non-trip, depending on the day.  But, as L. Frank Baum wrote in The Lost Princess of Oz (part of Scott and Roanin's current favorite series), "No thief, however skillful, can rob one of knowledge, and that is why knowledge is the best and safest treasure to acquire." 

In that spirit:

Step 25: Order Rosetta Stone Svenska and let the 6 year old boy in on the plan to have a family secret code. It's all about motivation. There aren't any used copies on eBay. Further confirmation that, yup...it's just us.

Step 26: Supplement Rosetta Stone with a Swedish language text book. You're planning a total immersion crash course here. I did find a used copy of this one, but it arrived in perfect, unused condition, reconfirming...

Step 26: Put any and all Swedish language movies and TV series available on Netflix in your view list. (We'll finish watching Lillyhammer first. Norwegian is Swedish's kissing cousin.) Studying by being a couch potato. Yes!

Step 27: Order a handful of books on Sweden from the library. (All in pristine, uncirculated condition.) You were reading a book on English history (yes, here is your nerd pin), but these seem more timely at present.

Passport Application - AKA Airplane Practice

Part 2 of obtaining your childrens' passports is the application process.  Here's how we seamlessly pulled that one off:

Step 17: Spend an evening at home filling out the applications online so they'll be all neat and pretty, and hopefully speed the process along.  All necessary information and documents (height, social security numbers, birth certificates) will be in separate rooms of the house.  Obviously.

Step 18: Pick up the hubs for a lunch date with the kids prior to heading to the Post Office to apply for the passports.  (You're such an awesome planner-aheader.  Pat yourself on the back.)

Step 19: Review the pretty printed applications on the way to lunch and realize that information is incorrect on 2 of the 3 applications.  You're batting .333 on your childrens' personal information.  (Unpat yourself on the back.)

Step 20: Brush it off.  Head to lunch and the Post Office anyway.  Madly (but neatly...and correctly) fill out 2 forms by hand at the Post Office while hubby wrangles 3 kiddos in line to start the application process.  Get to the last few lines of the second application (prepare back re-patting) before hubby reports that he had to make an appointment to apply for the passports tomorrow.  They would have done 1 passport application on the spot, but not 3.  (Take hand prepped for back patting and apply once, firmly, to forehead.)

Step 21: Reprint 2 erroneous passport applications (you can try for neat, pretty and speedy again), repick-up the hubs, relunch-date with the kids, reshow-up at the Post Office.

Step 22: Sit in a very small office with 3 bored ill-advisedly self-entertaining children while the very nice man (Joe, really he was awesome enough that I remember his name.) stamps, shuffles, staples and who-knows-what with all the papers necessary for three mini passports.  Simultaneously act as a jungle gym/disciplinarian/apologist/check-writer.

Step 23: When it's all said and done, leave the office with a sigh of relief.  Then slowly realize the terrifying fact that you're worn out after 20 minutes of trying to get your small herd to sit still in a small place, in order to get the necessary documentation so that you can board a plane with said herd for a trans-Atlantic flight.  My husband summed it up best: This is why people have tablets.

Step 24: Add "buy a tablet" to your To Do list.

Happy Mother's Day

When you're in over your head and need a huge, time consuming favor, you should:

Step 16:  Call Mom

I need to make a list of the To Do Lists I'll need to create to get this huge trip to happen.  (Scott's got plenty of lists, too.  I'm letting him deal with the governments.  They're no fun.  And HR.  They're their own kind of fun.)  I also need to continue to do things such as feed and water the children and clean various and sundry items from time to time.  When Scott mentioned he'll probably be out of town for several weeks prior to our trip...I called my mommy.

She, of course, asked the perfect questions like "When should I come?" and "How long do you need me to stay?"  Yea for Moms!

Happy Mother's Day, Mom.  We all love you!

Begin the TO DO Lists

What do you do when you have a massive trip looming, with no helpful particulars?  You've already partially and fully flipped out.  See steps 7 &10.  DO NOT repeat.  At least not excessively.  Here's what I did next:

Step 11: Pull it together.  This is gonna be fun.  And worth it.  And hard.  And worth it.  A wise friend said it well today:  This will be a defining experience in our family's life.

Step 12: Passports.  Scott and I already have passports.  His is well used.  Mine is a bit crumpled from doing hard time locked up in the important papers safe.  But the kiddos have no paperwork that would spring them from our dear land of liberty.  Childrens' passports are valid for 5 years, and take 1-2 months to process.  Sold!

Step 13:  Find the AAA office.  No really.  Track. It. Down.  It moved since we bought our GPS a year or so ago. 

Step 14:  Awaken sleeping children who were not asleep (nor in a foul mood) when you pulled into the empty parking lot where Garmin told you the AAA office resided.  But now - a phone call to the hubby and a 1 mile drive later - they are asleep.  Asleep and not happy about you trying to change that situation.

Step 15:  Herd your tired, grumpy brood into the office, ask for passport photos of your gorgeous offspring, and leave with these:

The Good Example

 

 

The Deer in the Headlights

 

The Mug Shot: Would you let this person into your country?

 

 

 

In her defense, after a loooong overseas flight,

this will probably be the best picture to match her sweet face.

The Announcement

Can I safely assume you're all caught up on steps 1-5?  They only took me about 14 years to complete, counting back to my one and only blind date.  Great!  Here are the next few steps:

Step 6: One night over the clamor and chaos that is your nightly dinner table...
     Cora (age 4): Why did the cow cross the road?
     Roanin (age 6): Dunno. Why? (please read the mumble as created by a large wad of dinner stuck in his cheek while his line is delivered.)
     Cora: 'Cause he wanted to get married to the spoon. heeheehee. (briefly chokes on her own wad of dinner.)*

...Wait...what's that?  My husband's trying to speak to me.  (catch milk glass at half tilt.)  He seems to be trying to relate information in an adult conversation.  (scoop hunk of dinner off baby's bib and back into her bowl.  "Thank you for using your spoon, sweet girl.")   Sweden?  Did he just say Sweden?  Did he use a plural pronoun in reference to Sweden?  ("No more bread until you've finished your veggies.")  Is he really saying this in front of the kids?  Like it might actually be information to spread to every single soul our children come across?  ("No, I can't get you more.  Mommy hasn't started eating yet."  Move food laden fork from precipice of the table.)  "Eeek!"

Step 7: Flip out slightly.

Step 8: Ask approximately 50 pessimistic questions to determine if this does, in fact, have a chance of happening.  (You've been burned in the past.)

Step 9: Realize through further interrogation that, while this trip does seem to have a good chance of happening, there are absolutely no absolutes, details, or other footholds of any kind on which to base any further action on your part.

Step 10: Complete remainder of flip out.

*Actual joke told by my actual comedic genius of a daughter.  All rights reserved.  You may not use this material for personal gain (i.e. over ripe tomato gathering) without her express written permission.  I'll let you know as soon as she can write.

How to Get to Sweden in 5,000 Easy Steps

After many years of anticipation, it looks like I'm going to get the chance to travel to Sweden and hang out there for a few months with my husband and children.  This blog will chronicle our preparations, and then (hopefully) the time we get to spend in Sweden for our family and friends.  Who knows?  Maybe it will even prove useful for the vast hoards of other Americans making temporary moves to Sweden.  What's that?  It's just us?  Oh.

Here are the first steps (of a seemingly infinite number) you'll need to take to get to Sweden:

Step 1.  Marry a highly employable engineer.  Or become one...whatever suits your fancy.

Step 2.  After a handful of years of wedded bliss, encourage your fellow adventurer to accept a position that includes the possibility of a short term move to Sweden.  (This is a critical step...DO NOT skip.)

Step 3.  Move to a very pleasant little American city, bear 3 children, and wait patiently while hubby flits back and forth to Sweden without you for a few years.

Step 4.  Encourage the hubs to gently remind the boss now and again that: Yes, you are still willing to spend a chunk of time in Sweden.  Yes, you do now have one two three small children.  Yes, you understand that's a bit outside of normal, rational patterns of thought.

Step 5.  Wait.  (We really practiced this one, but I don't know if I got any better at it.)