2025-11 – First Snö

There isn’t enough time to do everything we need to do before the snow and low temperatures but we put a lot of effort in to getting things done this month. This is a busy time of year at work and it’s dark in the evenings so the weekends are a bit manic getting everything prepared. Out first real snow was on the 10th, and the temperature dropped below zero permanently in the last half of the month.

Woodshed

The first weekend we made a quick level pad and placed two small woodsheds that I got before our first winter. We put them back to back to make a single woodshed big enough to store a lot of wood. We didn’t have much time before the cold weather so this will have to do for this year. The photo below is from the first week when we were still sorting out all the construction materials so there’s a lot of junk visible that would disappear to its proper place over the weekend.

The next weekend, a neighbour delivered some firewood for us. He couldn’t stay for coffee but we showed him all the garden projects we’d completed this year and I think he liked them. He was good friends with the previous homeowner so I think at some level we also like to show we’re looking after and respecting the property we’ve now taken over.

We then had to move and stack all the firewood. The delivery was all birch and had dried for about 2 years. We could probably fit two of the 1.5m3 sacs in here with some careful stacking. I was glad to have my wife helping, as moving and stacking all the wood myself would have taken a long time.

As a future project, we’ve been trying to decide on a replacement fire but didn’t both agree on one last time we researched lots of different models. I watched some YouTube videos that came up on my feed of various log fires in the UK. They weren’t quite what we wanted but it’s inspired me to have another look around. Our current woodstove is a cast-iron enclosure designed to take a few small bits of wood and be used to cook, but ideally we’d prefer a modern one. The modern designs can take 4-5 hours of fuel, have better gas flow and can take an outside air feed. We’d also like one with a glass front with a visible flame. There’s something about a visible fire in winter that feels essential. This is all for another day however.

Retaining wall

Where the property faces the nearby road, I’d wanted to put in a low retaining wall to divide the new gravel area we put in this year, and the nearby hedge-bank. The new wall would give the edge some definition and stop the gravel area and mud slope from mixing together over time. We had all the posts and I thought there would be just about enough time to get it done before the hard frosts. The first weekend the ground was soft from rain so it was a good time to drive posts into the ground.

Putting the posts in with a manual post-driver was a real workout. After the first day my upper arms and my back were sore. I did some more in the evenings and then finished them off the second weekend. The local hardware store delivered 70 meters of 120mmx28mm pressure-treated wood, plus some thick screws. I dug away behind the wall so that earth isn’t pushing against it, as the frozen earth would swell and push the wall otherwise. There was a surprising amount of earth to remove when straightening the edge and digging behind the posts and I’m starting to run out of places to dump excess earth. I also had a perforated drainage pipe ready to lay behind the wall, but I don’t think I can finish the behind-wall detail in time this year. I’ll get it done next summer.

We got them in the ground just in time, the temperature started to drop the next week and the ground started hardening. Snow was forecast for the second to third week so we had to get a move on. I got all the posts in to a consistent depth and then cut the posts. I had made the wood planks level, and so then tried to level the gravel also, but that’s not urgent and I soon realised it would be a lot of gravel moving if I took levelling too seriously.

The wooden wall was a small project, but since finishing it, it was quite uplifting opening the curtains of the kitchen every morning to a neat wooden sidewall. It’s a visual reminder each morning that we’re slowly making progress on the property.

I got another gravel delivery at the end of week 3 for the far end which I’ can pay for out of the end of months paycheck.’ll get invoiced for after payday.

I wasn’t going to get a length of wood out and a construction level, I just made it good enough for the winter using a shovel and rake. I don’t have a motorized thumper or similar to compact the gravel right now. At the back here is the top of the septic cistern which is a bit primitive and smell-able from about 5-10m – replacing it is uneconomical so I don’t have a solution to it right now.

Northern Lights

As the air gets colder the night sky gets tends to get clearer with less clouds. The northern lights tend to be more visible too. Sometimes they are very faint but other times it’s like a bright dancing curtain moving in front of you. I find it hard to photograph and it reminds me I must practise more with my camera. With your eye the northern lights are whiter, the camera makes the lights greener.

Garage Clearout

We had a all-day clearout in the garage to try and fit both cars in the garage before the snow and ice. It worked but parking both cars takes a lot of shuffling the cars back and forth due to there being only one door. The garage used to have two car doors so we might be able to change this in the future. Inside the cars will deteriorate a lot less from wet and cold conditions, providing the garage is heated enough to evaporate water from the cars. Once in, I set the air source heat pump to 16C and put both car batteries on trickle charge. The black car has been parked outside a few months now and hasn’t had a chance to dry off until now.

My intention is to clean up and sell the black car. I might be able to advertise it at the end of this month which will remove an expenditure, give us more room in the garage for a few months and give some buffer capital. In the multiple-year longer term we might get a larger van than we can use for transporting things or for camping, to complement the short-trip convenience of the small car.

Time for Ice Tyres

Snow was forecast and the temperature is going to drop and stay below zero until probably April. so it’s time for the ice tyres to go on the cars. Changing 8 tyres takes a long time with basic manual tools but because we spent all day tidying up the garage I could change them in the warm.

Two wheel nuts on the Volvo V50 stripped, despite using a torque wrench set to a lower level of 90nm instead of the 110nm that Volvo dictate. Doing an internet search, this is apparently a common problem on v50s to do with the older wheel nuts. It also doesn’t help that the wheels get changed twice every year with impact drivers and similar. Luckily I had some spare wheel nuts ready.

I try to learn from each task, and to try and make it easier for next time.

• I have a cheap wheeled jack that will be quicker to use than the wind-handle jack but the rubber head needed to work with the car sill profile didn’t arrive until the end of the month. This will make future jacking quicker.
• I also ordered some dedicated wheel sockets, as they are deeper and will be easier to remove than the short default socket set I have. They’re also rated for impact drivers.
• For next year I might invest in an impact driver to remove the wheels faster. But this means deciding on a tool range/ecosystem. In the first years in Sweden I invested in the smaller Makita CXT 12volt system which is fine for the wood workshop and small furniture projects. However, to have the torque for removing wheels, a impact driver really needs to be on an 18v system or greater and have a 1/2″ size socket head. Or it could use a mains voltage system, or it could use compressed air. These are quite different options, and the decision affects what tools will be in the garage longer term. It’s a problem that can wait for the next winter.

With the winter tyres fitted, the red car speedometer is now reading further out compared to the satnav GPS reading. This is because the diameter of the wheel and tyre is slightly different to the summertime set. It would be a lot of money to replace all four wheels and tyres to correct this, and in the meantime we’ve aware of the rough offset amount and have a GPS running in the car to give a more accurate speed.

Garage Improvements

At the end of week 2, I spent some time converting the last 3 old fluorescent tube garage lights to modern LED lights. It’s much brighter in the garage now and it feels a lot easier to work in the space. It’s also built up my confidence in replacing basic light fittings and I’ve made plans to replace old failed lights in the basement in the future.

I also fitted a car-door bump guard strip to the wall nearest where the car parks. It was cheap and might save a car paint chip. I used a laser level to help position the strip which was made up of about 6 smaller pieces.

I’d like to tidy up the garage further. I hate everything being a mess but I find it hard to organise it. At the end of the month I placed an order for some plywood. When the plywood comes I’ll make some french cleat strips to hang tools and cabinets from the walls in a reconfigurable way. If it goes well I might use the system in the basement, but one project at a time.

Moose!

It’s no longer hunting season and during the second week some moose had been stopping by in the far field visible from the house. I can just about take a fuzzy photo of them with the long distance lens. Your eye gets very good at spotting anything different in the regular view out the window, and moose are big.

First Snow

The first snow came in the third week, it was just a light dusting but the temperature then headed below zero fairly consistently. The ground started to set solid which was the end of all outdoor digging work.

The snowmobile club came around the fields to put the way-markers for the snowmobiles into the ground before it set too hard to place them later. These look like wooden posts with a big red “X” on the top

Car Repair Work

Some of this months budget went on getting the red car better adapted for winter, and for minor repairs.

• I budgeted this month for an engine block heater with a corresponding electrical hookup point under the front bumper. This would let us plug the car in at car parks at train stations, airports, and similar when it’s below zero. When plugged in, a 400 watt element will put a bit of heat into the engine constantly. This gives the engine an easier time when starting, and if it gets really cold it stops the engine block from freezing.
• We paid for the roof antenna to be replaced as the old one was snapped before we purchased the car. The radio is quite ancient but it works.
• The rear number plate lights and middle high-level stop light needed replacing too, due to failed bulbs.
• I got some hubcaps online to replace the heavily scuffed and split ones on the winter wheels. I think the old ones had had a long and hard life. The new ones are made by a company to look like the original manufacturers hubcaps and are cheap. They also cost about a quarter of the cost of sourcing four undamaged second-hand originals.
• Lastly we had some new number plates to go on as the front one was bent and rusty and the rear one had some logos and similar. They are quite cheap and supplied from the Swedish transport agency (transportstyrelsen) via their options when logged in.

The garage did all the work, but contacted me to suggest skipping installing the engine heater on this occasion. This was because I left a note that next month we want to replace the timing belt and water pump, which means draining the coolant. It turns out the parking engine heater kit they have goes in the water system, not on the metalwork itself (there are different types), so they suggested combining the future work to avoid replacing the coolant twice. That’s fine – we’ll fit it at the start of next month.

My wife was a bit anxious about tyre pressures, having had a summer tyre deflate to a flat tyre, with no obvious sign of a puncture. So to help with providing an easy pre-drive check, I fitted a aftermarket tyre pressure monitoring system. It was affordable at about £20. It was easy to install and just a case of putting on valve caps and changing a couple of default settings on the central unit.

I drove the car back in the night from an event (see below) because my wife asked me to, as at the time she felts less experienced at night driving. The car feels quieter and more predictable than when we first purchased it with a bad rear axle. I’m glad we’ve slowly repaired and restored it, and that having the car has given my wife more confidence and independence.

Snowmobile Club Evening

We went to a meeting of the local snowmobile club. I don’t have a snowmobile, but we pay for membership anyway as the upkeep of the trails and small bridges is an important part of the community. Out of season those same trails and bridges are good for walking and sometimes cycling. Meeting a room full of new people, in a pastime I’m not familiar with, and in a foreign language I struggle with, was way outside my social comfort zone but I wanted to try. I figured we should just try to have a fun evening, leave before we annoy people, and see what happens.

I made a few social errors. The meeting started at 17:30 at small conference venue with a restaurant and bar but we aimed for 18:00 thinking it was an informal drinking-style meeting before the meal at 19:30. It was actually an all-hands sit-down meeting and we got chased by phone as to why we were late, so we arrived to a seated room of people and quickly sat down, although we weren’t the last. My Swedish wasn’t good enough to keep up with the meeting and so as questions and votes randomly occurred, it was a little bit like being sat in the middle of a strange religious service. But now we know what to expect we will be better prepared next year.

During the following sit-down meal we needed to socialise in quite a noisy environment. I get anxious meeting people for the first time when I want to make a good impression, which causes the opposite effect. Luckily people seem to understand my wife a lot more so she is a great wingperson for taking over a conversation when the people struggle to understand my Swedish or my English. She also has a big disarming smile that works on most people. I also didn’t spot that someone we knew (originally from a snowmobile crash) was sat right next to me.

We talked about snöskotters (snowmobiles) a lot and it seems I can drive one on my license, because my license is quite old, but my wife passed her car test recently and so will need to take the separate snöskotter test. It seems it’s roughly £160 equivalent and is essentially a tuition course that can be failed, as opposed to a standalone exam. It’s also delivered in the large town about 35km away which is close in distances here. We’ll investigate more as we’d need a machine to hire and kit.

We also talked about the forestry machines and what it takes to drive them, and the training time which is apparently almost a 2 year course. I also learned the lights on the hill near us the past week had been a forestry operation.

We left early when the musician started playing. There was nothing wrong with the music. It was just that with a language you are learning the threshold of background noise at which you cant make out the meaning of conversations feels lower. Also we didn’t want to burn out the people around us. We thanked them for talking to us, and one of them we’ve spoken to multiple times before said that it was no problem because they liked talking to us which was a good moment. I said they are always welcome for coffee. I also apologised to the organiser for being late and they were good about it.

It’s been quite hard making friends in Sweden so I’m glad we went out of our comfort zone and tried this.

Visit up North

I had to go up north to get my picture taken to renew my driving licence. This is because my ancient UK license entitles me to light lorry driving, which nowadays includes a 3 year mandatory health check. I’ve not done the health check as it’s not worth the cost, so they wanted to remove the category from the license, which is fine. It gave us a chance to pop in some shops and have a day out together.

We visited a lighting shop full of lamps, and went for coffee. We visited the skatepark which has become too icy. We had joint intrusive thoughts about going in the bowl area there. I’m not sure I would have been able to get out of the pit if I went in, due to the ice on the sides. I probably would have had to have the wife lower a rucksack to me to grab to help pull me up.

We went in the sports shop which had loads of skis but no snowboards. I wanted to see if they had a cheap “split” snowboard which would let me walk up the local hills and then board down without needing to take lots of extra gear.

I asked at the artshop if they had any stained glass window kits because we’d had some thoughts about creating some, but they didn’t. My wife had a good look around one of the kitchenware shops, giving me time to sneak away to a nearby shop and get a Christmas present for her that I have now hidden. We went and had an old fashioned unhealthy deep pan pizza, which was great.

We also had a chance to visit Biltema – I cant think of a UK equivalent to help explain what it is like. It’s a gigantic store with its own cafe, and it sells camping, hunting, fishing, car repair and housework own-brand items. And it’s cheap. For example I can get inner tubes for my mountain bike for about £3.20 each in UK equivalent money, which saves me money or lets me buy spares. There’s all the (own brand) repair tools and hand tools you can think of.

As we had the car we were able to pick up big bulky items like 20L water containers, which would be expensive to get delivered. I got some axle stands for safety when jacking up the car and working on it. We also got lots of small items relating to cold weather car use.

First Log Fire of the Winter

We did some work tidying up the wood workshop in the basement as it’s become a bit chaotic and getting far too many spiders. As the temperature is heading towards double digit negative Celsius temperatures, so we used the log fire to burn a lot of construction lumber bits and pieces. These were left over from old projects.

The fire is a Husqvarna oven made in the late 1890’s. It works and it looks the part of a traditional Swedish home oven, but I miss the big glass window and ease of use of the Morso squirrel stove we had when we lived on the narrowboat.

In week three onwards a little more snow came and ice started to form on the lakes. In puddles during week 3 the ice was about 50mm thick

By week 4 the snow was falling in gentle amounts and about 5cm deep or more. I accidentally told someone it was 50cm because I was thinking in mm – that depth of snow doesn’t come until the end of December normally.

The first snowplough vehicles began dragging on the main road. They make a distinctive sound.

On one morning there was a big lorry accident, about a kilometre away, involving 4-5 lorries and causing all the traffic outside the house to get stuck for about 4 hours. Sometimes the lorries here follow too close to other traffic.