Blidö weekend

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by

Kate Davies Designs
in , ,

What would your ideal weekend involve?

Picking and eating delicious wild strawberries?

Discovering a beautiful landscape on foot?

And getting to spend some quality time with its inhabitants?

(The Roslagsfår sheep are so sweet . . . as are their characterful piggy neighbours!)

Visiting an exceptionally well cared-for wee museum and hearing all about island history?

Discovering the work of local craftspeople?

Finding out that your friend is an incredibly talented baker . . .

. . . admiring her productive garden . . .


. . .and enjoying generous hospitality, in a beautiful home that has been truly built with love?

. . . watching the sun sink beneath the horizon, closing another Swedish summer’s day.

Feeling extraordinarily grateful to have found such good friends and kindred spirits in this lovely country.

Thankyou so much, Kristin and Kalle, for a wonderful Blidö weekend!


If you are ever lucky enough to ever find yourself in Blidö I highly recommend a visit to the Hemslöjdsboden (where you can find beautiful hand knit socks and mittens and hand-made utensils carved from juniper wood) as well as to the Båtsmanstorpet where the local village association organise a full programme of events throughout the summer. Roslagsfår sheep are one of Sweden’s rare native breeds, about which there’s more information on the Swedish Fibre site. I’ve returned home with some fibre, and will let you know how I find it!

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Comments

29 responses to “Blidö weekend”

  1. Lena Andre Avatar
    Lena Andre

    Hello Kate
    My name is Lena Andrè and live in Blidö.
    I’m happy that you bought my socks,that I designed myself.
    I hope they bring you joy.
    kind regards

    Reply
  2. Jack Graham Avatar
    Jack Graham

    Great photos, I can have ideas about learning to becoming a photographer. Thank you!

    Reply
  3. frayedattheedge Avatar
    frayedattheedge

    Let me know if you are going back, and I will come and carry your suitcase for you!! This is definitely somewhere to put on the “to visit” list!!

    Reply
  4. Tereza Avatar
    Tereza

    Have you read Seacrow Island by Astrid Lindgren? Your two posts about Blidö made me think of it quite a lot… I had to take it out and reread some favourite passages!

    Reply
  5. Carolyne Avatar
    Carolyne

    Oh Kate, so much in that post. Things I have to try, tomatoes in buckets, I could move them anywhere in the garden there is sun. Shower caps for the vegetables, I’m sure I can come up with a version that would suit here. Those mittens, that design would be great for embroidery. The animals, especially the clean sheep. To get out sheep, marshmallow, to look look like that we have to use wool wash and even then he doesn’t look as good as this.
    Another one for the bucket list.

    Reply
  6. Mary Planck Choberka Avatar
    Mary Planck Choberka

    I don’t get to go many places and it is with great joy that I can travel with you and see and know about so many things I will never see. I love it! The photographs are wonderful.

    Reply
  7. Nancy (@KnitskiNancy) Avatar
    Nancy (@KnitskiNancy)

    Looks perfect in every way! I certainly want to know more about the mittens which I have always loved and the embroidery!

    Reply
  8. Mette Reinfjord Avatar
    Mette Reinfjord

    Hi!We are visiting Scotland, but i still haven’t found any of the knittingbooks. Does anyone know who sell them?

    Reply
    1. Kate Davies Avatar
      Kate Davies

      If you are in Edinburgh, try Kathy’s Knits on Broughton Street

      Reply
      1. Mette Reinfjord Avatar
        Mette Reinfjord

        Thank you! I’m in Edinburgh a couple of days now before I go back to Norway. I’ll se what i can find!

        Reply
  9. catdownunder Avatar
    catdownunder

    Your two friends in their wellies reminded me of my own all too brief visit to a Swedish island – used as a camp for “bad boys” (so we were told) and we met their sheep, so much cleaner than those in Downunder!

    Reply
  10. Susan Avatar
    Susan

    What a trip! I was very excited to see the Swedish sheep breeds. Thank you!

    Reply
  11. she wears linen Avatar
    she wears linen

    Those mittens! And how tiny are the strawberries, bet that they were sweet.

    I am trying to decide between Canada or Scandinavia for a holiday next year, you have just made the decision even harder (or easier depending on which way you look at it).

    Thanks you for the peek.

    Reply
  12. Anja Avatar
    Anja

    Kate, you’re sweet :o)!!!
    Sincerely,
    Anja

    Reply
  13. woollygael Avatar
    woollygael

    Beautiful photos. The sheep look gorgeous too. Will be interested to hear how the yarn knits up (or spins up)

    Reply
  14. Julia Avatar
    Julia

    Thank you so much for these beautiful photographs. Can we look forward to a book of Swedish inspired designs???

    Reply
  15. Jen Avatar
    Jen

    It looks like heaven.

    Reply
  16. barbara Avatar
    barbara

    All the pictures look very inviting.
    Lucky you.

    Reply
  17. Jeanie Avatar
    Jeanie

    WOW!

    Reply
  18. Gretchen (aka stashdragon) Avatar
    Gretchen (aka stashdragon)

    Oh, memories of a lovely week spent with friends at their summer house years ago, not on an island, but on an old farmstead north of Stockholm. Swedish countryside and the longest days of the year . . . heavenly.

    Reply
  19. kerstiw Avatar
    kerstiw

    Oh, that brings back memories, Kate. We used to spend summer holidays on a small island between Blidö and Yxlan (that sort of crayfish-shaped one in the south), where my Swedish aunt and uncle and their friends from Stockholm all had little summer huts. Salt water pumped up the rock slope for cooking but all fresh water collected on foot (or by outboard) from the centrally sited pump, which is where the wild strawberries grew. Crank telephone party line of the old sort to communicate (one crank/ring for Bethges, two for Hasse och Kristina…). Footpaths covered with pine needles (and red ants) everywhere, and likewise bilberry bushes … Isn’t it just magical? Especially in summer when it barely gets dark. It comes to me now that the ‘Blid’ in ‘Blidö’ must be cognate with ‘blithe’, which in turn is related to ‘bliss’.
    On a more prosaic note, I note the rubber boots being worn in every shot. And the waterproof trousers. Love it, and thanks for the whistle-stop tour. So glad you had a good time.

    Reply
  20. Peggy Avatar
    Peggy

    You had me at “wild strawberries”! I only ever saw Stockholm’s archipelago from those monstrous ferries between Stockholm and Finland, but oh, that photo of the house on the water gave me a wrench.

    Reply
  21. ElaineChicago Avatar
    ElaineChicago

    Another beautiful place to put on my visiting wish list!!
    Thanks so much for the tour.

    Reply
  22. Duni Avatar
    Duni

    How lovely! And I cannot express how gorgeous those ombré mittens with the embroidery are. Yowza!

    Reply
  23. Marilyn F. Avatar
    Marilyn F.

    Idyllic countryside beauty. Thanks for sharing your experiences and lovely photographs.

    Reply
  24. Karen Halchuk Avatar
    Karen Halchuk

    Thank you for sharing the natural beauty of this place and its people. I feel calmed on a stormy day.

    Reply
  25. Tina Avatar
    Tina

    How fantastic – I used to spend my summers as a child on Blido 
    Thanks for sharing it has brought back lovely memories
    Tina

    Reply
  26. greenowldruid2016 Avatar
    greenowldruid2016

    Beautiful :)

    Reply
  27. OneFrenchWord Avatar
    OneFrenchWord

    Reminds me of my Norwegian holidays when I was a child…

    Reply

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