Armwarmers

 Remember this jacket? I bought it at a thrift shop. The weird thing with it was that the lining had big arm cuffs in a wool material. It felt just too bulky and warm comparing to the rest of the garment. I haven't got the time until recently to do something about it. The cuffs looked spotless and I thought I could use them for armwarmers instead of throwing them away. I zig zagged on som black stretchy lace on the ends and that was all.

 I took a lunch walk at the wasteland to take the photos of the armwarmers. Some kids have had some fun with spray paint. On a stone further away they had sprayed "cat". I always think this wood would fit perfect for a horror movie or a gothic drama of sorts. My son says it's creepy but I love this place. 

Armwarmers combined with my new wool knit. It's hard to get real wool knits without syntetic blend today, I think. This sweater comes from Gudrun Sjödéns wintercollection and it has my colour and patterns. Clothes with black and grey stripes are impossible to resist!

And this is how all days looks like. Grey thick cover of clouds shutting sunlight out. The red cross sign is a mark for snowmobile paths. It's not allowed to drive them anywere you like because of the damage they can do on treeplants, fields etc. I don't know how the sign got there, doesn't look like a safe place to drive.

Even if the weather is dull, I think it gives the scenery a melancholic beauty.

Spring is surely on it's way. During my short walk I heard lots of birds and particularly woodpeckers. Talking about woodpeckers. Our middle sized white backed woodpecker is almost gone, but a forest like this with lots of rottening trees are their natural habitat. Maybe I could have the luck to see one here and get this place sacred for the future.

 Oh and this hermit-crab will socialize this weekend and it will be fun. We are invited to a couple of our friends for dinner tomorrow and on sunday there will be a magician show, the extra spice will be jugglers with chainsaws on fire.

Walking

These late weeks has just been passing by with studies, work, family tasks and walks.

I've been picking up my lunch walks again, they are necessary for my well being. I don't bother socializing with my coworkers in the dining hall, I need fresh air.

It was too long ago I took a walk in the deep forest by our house, but today I took a very refreshing walk.

I have sceduled some cultural happenings in our calendar the future months. We need to do more events instead of staying at home all the time. What about a steamcon in June, a magic show next weekend and an not sceduled visit at the armour museum with Game of Thrones costumes?? We need more of things like that!

Oh and beside the boring things I've been up to, I have set up a bench for seedlings with fluorescent light above in the basement. I have big plans for my frontyard, visions of a romantigoth flowerbed with lots of drama.

Homework assignment: What makes my heart sing

       Time for the Professors monthly homework assignment! The task is to tell about things that makes my heart sing, what gets me up in the morning, what makes me smile, what helps me balance and focus etc. I won't do a bombastic post with lots of emotions this time, for me it's the little things.

Of course my family is most important to me, my sons, my stepchildren and Johan. Without them, I would have nothing. 

But there are also the small things that is important, those you barely see or think of, the little things that makes you smile or just smirk. Observe that these little things can be things that annoyes you in another circumstance but gives you joy in others, as I said, small things.

Following are just examples of niceties that happened recently.

I received my boots! Yay! Another plus is that I forgot that I paid for them when I put the order (yet another yay). They are comfy but still too small for thick socks, looking good with a petticoat and a shabby tunic dress. This thing made my heart sing only for a little while. The reason was a lovely lunch walk were I got sharp gravel in my shoes. Because I was almost back at work, I let the gravel be. Stupid, desiscion. What I wasn't aware of then was that the little piece of sharp gravel, peeled of the skin on the back of my heel. End of joy. Sorry, I just had to put in a tint of sarcasm here.

Something that has been very rare this month, is the sun. It has been so rare that while sitting at the table and eating lunch with coworkers, we gasped and yelled "look, the sun is shining through!"  The sunshine lasted for an hour long enough for a lunch walk. This is the sunny hour on the photo below. Yep, the sun exist. I have heard by many from warmer parts of the world that Swedes are strange. "They look dull and boring until the sun brakes through, then they lift their faces to the sun and smile".

I love snow and I love winter. Here's the view from my window were I sit and study. The hill with trees in the background is the beginning of the wilderness. From this point, you can walk for at least a whole day and never find a house, this is a place that gives me lots of comfort at any time of year. Oh and food: mushrooms, and all kinds of wild berries. 

Oops as I sat and wrote this, a hunters dog came out of the woods. The traffic on this small street is very fast, so I ran out to call for the dog. The pocket for the gps was empty, but the owner had wrote his phone number on the vest. She had been gone the whole day and had sore feet. The owners wife came to take her home. Happy ending and a very cute dog who made me smile.

A proper swedish fika, always with coffe or tea and sometimes a pastry. I baked my own buns and made an old classic semla. The top of the bun is cut off and the bottom is hollowed out. Mix the crumbs with marcipan and stuff back in the bun, then a thick layer of whipped cream on top of that. The top is put back and sprinkled with powdered sugar. One or a few of these every year are enough. 

 It doesn't matter how bad my mood is, our pets always puts a smile on my face. Pooki came to us in the end of the summer, she was very shy and bit me every time I was feeding her. She is still a bit shy but likes to be pet with when she wan'ts. She liked the grissini's.

Wilma munching on grissini. She's getting old 6,5 years now. She's the cuddliest bunny in the world.

Oskars budgies, Maja and Kim are very shy. this is the place were they sit mostly. 

Other things that makes me smile right now are; Good sense of humour, kind people, studies, a cup of coffee and solitude. 

Tomorrow will be Valentines day, instead of going out with friends, we will stay at home because I'm having the flu. 

Even if things don't go in the direction you wan't, you can make it a positive thing. 

Thanks The Curious Professor Z, for reminding me of the small joys of life :). 

Winter boots issues. Monthly theme post: Outerwear

Time for Sophistique Noirs monthly theme post. It was two years ago the same theme was announced. Back then, I posted a photo with my ski jacket, this time will be all about winter boots.

For a shoe addict, the demands for winter boots are high. They must not brake after only one season, they have to be high quality, warm and comfortable enough for long walks. Of course a shoe addict need them to be nice looking. 

Here's a photo of my not so stylish winterboots and my winter pants, out in the woods for a walk.

These were bought 8 years ago, and have been worn every cold winter since. These are the shoes I put on when the temperature reach below -15 C and if there will be long walks or standing by the ice rink to watch a bandy game (my sons plays bandy).

Along with these ugly but practical boots, I always had another more stylish pair of boots to wear to work or for running errands in town. But those shoes always breake before the winter season is over. Why is it so hard to find good shoes that stays more than one season??

I decided to try an army surplus store called Garderoben to buy a pair of army boots, and found these, and English brand called Invader.

source

I wrote a mail and asked specifically how the sizes were, but recieved a blurry answer. I ordered them in my size and hoped that they would be wide enough for a pair of thicker socks. I waited 3 weeks for the boots to arrive and was very please with how they looked. But they were far too small. They were sent back with a note that I would like to have one size bigger. I have waited over a month now and have written a mail without getting a reply. I have bought fabrics and clothes from that store before and got fast delivery, so this is the first time it fails. I still hope that they will arrive soon.

All my other boots have heels and it's impossible to walk in them as the weather is now.

Talking about heels, I found these on our local thriftstore the other week. They have only been used once so they were in mint condition. I couldn't resist even if I have another two pair of pointy ankle lenght boots the price was only 1€. The heels are tiny stilettos so I'll have to wait for spring to use these.

Do you have troubles in finding good quality shoes for your everyday use?

Just some random stuff from a bit boring life

Hi all! I have been very abscent here because of a busy life. Not sure if it's interesting for you what I have been occupied with for a while, but here we go. ..

snowy appletree

I have visited the University a few days to attend seminars and seeing my fellow students. We were divided in studygroups. Our group is made of a bunch of well educated ladies, two disputated chemical scientists, one artist and a bachelor of art science and (noob) me. We also had a lovely song coach but she decided to study full time and therefore, joined another group. 

I have to say that it's more inspiring and a bigger challenge to study with high educated people.

Next seminar will be in March so hopefully there will be a few photos of the lovely town Karlstad, were the University is.

 lovely walk in the forest

We tried to take care of a large poodle for a friend, but Johans allergy wen't so bad. We are both so sad that we cant have any furry animals indoors, cat or dog. Johans mum took care of Scooby the rest of the week and we helped her to walk the dog. He's back at the owner right now but he needs a more permanent home, He's such a cute, kind, teddybear, smelly dog and I hope he will get a place were people are kind to him.

Yay, photo of one of my jobs at work. I have been shoveling away snow around the roof windows because some of them were leaking. Thats one of the more handy parts of my duties. At least the view is nice.

Unable to throw something away, I have been collecting feathers from the budgies in a jar. Maybe someday there will be nice little fascinators or earrings created...

 We got a fox on the visit. Our bunnies are outdoors all the time, they have two floor cages with free ability to go out in their pen. This visit force us to close the cages at night and that makes them very sour. Late night and early mornings are a bunnies busy time. One of the good things with snow is that we can actually see who is visiting our garden: one mouse that steals food from the bunnies, rabbits that eats the kale stems in my garden, joined by some deers, the fox obviouosly, a couple of cats, magpies...

The later half of last year wasn't very good healthywise. Studies and lot of sitting both at work and at home made me gain a couple of even extra kilos. I downloaded the Lifesum app to my phone (former Shapeup) and started to track my eating habits, again. This app is great, you eat what you want as long as you keep track of your calories, weight and training. It has a bar code scanner so the tracking is very easy. 
Here's a breakfast smoothie made of some blueberries (picked in the forest) and raspberry puree (nonsugar from my garden), a half organic banana and a bunch of spinach babyleaves, it tasted great but I had to check my teeth afterwards.

Inspired by the Curious Professor Z and Save with Jamie; we have been shopping grocerys in our own fridge and freezer to save money and being more environmental efficient. As a vegetable gardener ther is no lack of vegetables in our dishes, we just shop in the freezer. We are eating more vegetarian dishes as well. It's really fun to cook vegetarian when Johan likes it, his favourite is my vegetarian burgers made of my homegrown beans and peas, check my other blog for recipe.