Have you heard of Bloggers Unite? The main idea of it is to unite bloggers to do something good at the same day and blog about it.

So far it has been a Organ Donor Awareness Campaign and Bloggers Against Abuse. Now when I’m joining, the 17th of December it’s: Act of Kindness. You’re supposed to do some act of kindness of any sort you can come up with.

My contribution is a donation to “Hugs for the lonely” (Swedish: Kramas för de ensamma). It’s the Swedish Red Cross Christmas Campaign to do something for all the lonely ones in our society. They want to help more of the elderly, sick and lonely persons at hospitals and in elderly homes.

The Swedish Red Cross is trying to build up a operation to recruit, educate and tutor volunteers to make a difference for the lonely ones. This is even to get support to the relatives that is taking care of a near and dear ones all by themselves too. They need unloading sometimes to survive themselves.

They have made it easy for people to donate this time. Examples: to send a hug SMS film clip to dear ones, send a hug as a Christmas card, chain hugs and hugs from celebrities. They are selling hugs in the city. I like that thought too, people getting a lot of hugs when donating money to the Red Cross.

There are also a big hug auktion that’s going to be held. I think that they really have done it this time with this fun and positive hug concept. Let’s hope they come up with more like this!

As we all know, Christmas season can be real tough for all the lonely ones. I’ve seen too many lonely ones, especially in the elderly home when visiting my Mom.

Mr Lifecruiser is doing a real act of kindness every week, he is playing the piano for the elderly at the home. It’s really heartbreaking to see how happy they get by so little.

One of the ladies there is totally in ecstasy when he is playing – I think she is in love with him. She is very pleased with the fact that he is only 55 years old (she keeps repeating that), but she is not at all pleased with the fact that he always got his wife with him…. *giggles*

I remember another lady that liked to sing along with us last year before they splitted the elderly to two different homes. She came from the island Gotland outside Sweden’s east coast where we use to go in the summer. Her relatives were still in Gotland, so she rarely got any visits and were very sad – except when we came. She began to consider us like visitors for her too an got really cheered up, especially when Mr Lifecruiser were playing songs from Gotland.

When we went to Gotland that summer, we were looking up where she lived there. We thought that maybe we could buy something from there as a memory to her. Though it was not possible because there were only countryside with farms. We did buy a postcard from the small old town Visby and sent to her though. Later the staff at the elderly home told us that she were so happy about that postcard that she did wear it all day under her dress….

When he is playing the piano, they don’t only got something to look forward to, but also suddenly get something to talk about with each other too. For the elderly it can be a problem to talk with each other. Some of them not hearing well, others a bit demented and confused. They need some one to be the bridge between them. We – and the music – have been that and it’s fantastic to see how big difference it can make.

Somehow, they forget to socialize with each other and get more and more quiet. The staff haven’t got the time to be that bridge unfortunately and very often they are too work focused. There is clearly a need of many volunteering visitors.

What I’m wondering is: where are all the relatives? We seem to be one of the few that visit there. Surely not all of the elderly can be without relatives?!!! People seem to stop visiting the elderly nowadays.

Is our society so stressful that we can’t even dedicate a few hours of our time to visit our near and dear ones, not even once a week? Where has all the humanity gone?

There is so small efforts that can make a persons whole day!!!

And to all bloggers out there: join Bloggers Unite to make the world a better place – and don’t forget to hug each other

This is what I call cake creativity! Small frogs sticking out their tongues at you! I love them!

I wonder what they’re trying to tell us? That we won’t find our Prince Charming by kissing frogs any more?

But I’ve already found my dream frog – and the only time his tongue is hanging out is when he is drooling over his hot wife! *giggles*

(Remember the drooling kit I used once…?)

…and the plastic cover, is that what they call safe frog sex?

Gil Elvgren, 1961.
© BROWN & BIGELOW INC, ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA

So have you done your Christmas shopping yet?

We haven’t – we sure could need a Christmas cash machine like the above We have been out a couple of times trying to find some special Christmas gifts and we’re going to be in the city all day Friday, trying to finish the last ones.

It’s no easy task though. We’ve mostly found either technical things or ordinary stuff for your home and the same big multiple stores everywhere. Buying stuff for the home is not appliably in this case since it’s for Mr Lifecruisers daughter and she has no own home yet and no where to store things in advance either.

Where are all the smaller stores with nice, fun or other more interesting and unusual gifts which you find no where else? The ones you could see in the past. Are they all gone?

I wish we could have traveled somewhere else to do the Christmas shopping. Have any suggestions for next years Christmas shopping?

The Swedish Christmas sales volumes is expected to increase with 7,5 percentage during this December, up to SEK 62 billions, that’s SEK 4 billions more than last year.

They say that this years Christmas gift over all in Sweden is a GPS since the travel trend is so hot. Well, I must admit, that I wouldn’t mind to have one myself, but preferably a better one than there is in the mobile phones now in that case. I’ll have to wait a little longer for that…

Maybe even Santa got one, helping him to find his way over here and not get lost on the way? Or wait, that may be because of all the eggnogs he drank…. *giggles*

One of the good thing though, is that people buys more and more of the Christmas gifts over the internet, resulting in less crowded stores than it would have been otherwise. Sweden is placed on sixth place in Europe when it comes to Christmas shopping on the internet.

So, give us some good luck kick in our butts so we’ll find something suitable.

How is the Christmas shopping where you live?