share with lesser fortunate

This is by no means a latte and carrot cake that will end up on a my top ten latte-with-carrot-cake-list - if I had one, which I actually don't - it leaves a whole lot more to be desired as far as savoury quality goes. That said, the place that served it does have its definite pros;

:~ the café, bakery, catering, lunch restaurant is run by Stadsmissionen (the City Mission), so by having a coffee and cake, lunch or bread there you contribute in a small or large way to a better life for those lesser fortunate.

:~ the business is run and situated in a beautiful old building, Grillska, smack middle of Gamla Sta'n (the Old Town) where the outdoor seating area on the inner court yard roof - steep stairs to get there - is such a charmingly tucked away place to enjoy - chose wisely and not latte (the machine and not hand made kind) or carrot cake (apart from the perfect blueberry on top too sweet and dry) - something light to eat in good company. Or for that matter, on your own with a good read.

:~ the buildings and the roof tops surrounding the outdoors eating area are just lovely, there are church towers and there are church bells, birds and a whole lot of blue skies if you're lucky. If you're even luckier it's quite peaceful since not a lot of people seem to have found their way up there. So, shh, you can keep a secret, can't you?

:~ Remember to share he food with those small, rather intrusive feathery ones, the also deserve a bit of sharing. And they somehow didn't seem to care that the carrot cake was both dry and too sweet...

Is that all there is, my friend?

Then let's keep sharing ~

the grass eating contest

I do believe this is a great day for some garden inspection
and exercising, don't you agree?

Let's see who wins the eat a whole lot of grass,
barf first contest, shall we?

I'm so going to win this... from here on, call me, Rutger, the Grass Eating Barf Best Champion.

björk & berries deodorant

Even if I like to think so, admittedly, I don't always smell like sweet roses. As crazy as it may seem - and I must say I feel very brave to admit the things I am about to admit online, is there an award for this type of candidness? - sometimes I do need help to maintain my spick and span image of infinite freshness. I use deodorants.

There I said it. Gosh.

My latest sweet, sweet fragrant experience in the world of deodorants - of which I'm a most discerning user hence finding an alarming amount of them being nasty crap - is a new product from lovely Swedish company Björk & Berries.

The deodorant comes in, so far, two fragrances, one of them being one of my favourite Björk & Berries heavenly fragrances, lingonberry rose. It contains only natural ingredients - one of them being eco certified cotton oil apparently, a new ingredient to me - and no alcohol. So far I've used it once, it felt quite lovely, both scent-, feel- and deo-wise. I do believe I'm pleased.

The other fragrance is cloudberry jasmine. Not a favourite fragrance-series of mine, but the deo had a rather nice, discreet scent.

A whole new scent family has also been semi-launched, raspberry blossom. Hand and body souffle and sugar body scrub. I had a sniff, raspberries being my favourite fruit-berry, oh my, heavenly scent! It went straight to the top of my wish-to-get-list of skincare products.

Björk & Berries beautiful website, now also in English, has curiously enough not been updated with neither deodorants nor the raspberry-series yet. If you want a close encounter with these amazing products and live in Stockholm a few of them can be found for example at Åhléns and NK. For other retailers see the website for contact information.

garden breakfast

Not the first eating in the garden experience this season, but the first breakfast for me I believe. In garden that is. Not the most sophisticated of breakfasts, but quite, quite lovely just the same ~

Tea with milk (of course), a glass of some yellow fruit smoothie-juicey thing, a dark bread roll with butter, cheese and grated carrots - no meal is complete without carrots. One of those indisputable facts of life - served on a tray that offers inspiration for good ways to spend a day, depending on your disposition, without duties or plans.

Weather cloudy but warm, garden lush, birdies chirping, cats lounging and loaf doggie thinking breakfast is meant to be shared with lesser fortunate on four short legs plus tail wag. Kind of a perfect start to a brand new day. If you ask me.

weeder wanted

Clearly the dandelions thrive this season, in my garden and elsewhere. As impressively resilient as they are they also threaten to overpower the diversity in my flower beds. The brits and one woofie couldn't care less, a bit of lazying in the sun, dash of crazy run, chasing insects, eat grass, throw up, we're perfectly happy - talented weeder desperately wanted.

I really, really do not like weeding myself, not only because I clearly lack ability to distinguish flowers from weed - and who's to say one thing is more worthy of a place in the flower bed than the other? - but also because Sisyphean challenges are very less than my favourite way to spend time.

In awaiting for the perfect little helper - and help has been promised but for various reasons the promise hasn't been fulfilled yet, upcoming weekend shows promise for fulfillment though, touch weed, green fingers crossed - I can at least rejoice over the fact that there is still some diversity present in the garden of mine, behold the lilacs, dandelions, tulips and honeysuckle ~

it's hip, so hip to be square

Lately I've rekindled some old passions involving different yarns - and string, but more of that later - and some of them being these totally adorable, versatile, endless combinations, hellish to fix all lose ends granny squares. Yes my grandmother used to make amazing quilts with these squares, myself I don't possess that kind of patience. And besides, I don't really need a quilt...

But I have loads of other neat ideas instead! Problem is to conclude, I can't seem to stop making new squares, in new colour combos, it's really quite, quite addictive. And not (only) because it's a very successful way to procrastinate the fact that one day I need to fix those visible darn lose ends...

The end result will most probably, surprisingly enough, lead to an update in an Etsy shop near here ~

it was the best of times...

Lilacs and rhubarb times. The first, at last, lilacs twigs to fill the kitchen and bedroom with their heavenly scent this season ~

And the first reasonably looking rhubarb of the season from the garden of Pia will shortly be turned into a rather appealing sticky rhubarb cake ~

Ah, this must truly be one of the sweetest, most amazing times of the year, for most every sense...

pink & green

Pink and green, quite possibly the most wonderful colour combination there is. From deep dark to bright to pastel pale, the combination never ever fail to delight me in an all giddy happy way. Cotton yarn about to be turned into something sweet and spring summery...

...and a sturdy, long handled broomstick with dustpan. With greetings from IKEA. Not my favourite place to shop for various reasons, but well, sometimes, even I have to admit they have some interesting - and neatly colour comboed - things on offer. It even have a little smiley guy on the shaft, clearly happy about being all pink and green!

What's you favourite colour combination?

confessions of an earring semi-addict

I haven't been wearing regular pierced ears earrings for very long. In fact the only reason for me - not fond of needles and the notion of getting nickel allergy - getting the ears pierced was the fact that I thought it rather obvious I should be able to sport my own earrings. Because what's the point of making jewellery if you can't use it yourself...?

So 2003/04 I went ahead and had my ears pierced - ouch, ouch - but it took quite a while after the initial six weeks of special earrings to get used to the fact that I could actually stick a needle, a pointy thing, in my ears without causing a bloody trauma and not be borderline fainting. I felt squeamish and very uncomfortable with the whole thing for a very long time. Really long and heavy earrings was just out of the question.

Then suddenly I got used to having a bit of a dangle in my ears, and realised that earrings aren't only easy to make the way you want them yourself, it's very easy to find new and interesting, not to mention often rather affordable, must haves in the earrings realm of jewellery. And if I could pick one, only one piece of jewellery that changes a style so easily, that you can truly make a statement with, it must be earrings (not counting over sized, frumpy bling-bling overload necklaces).

I love bracelets, obviously, and rings - but the latter I rarely change other than within my smallish staple collection of comfortable Yvone Christa ones - and yes, the odd necklace or two have been known to find a haven here, but if there is something I ogle, find drool worthy all the time, everywhere, it is earrings. I'm open to suggestions, but I never ever wear gold. Not my thing. At all. More than welcome is silver, pewter, brass, bronze, (semi-)precious stones, ceramics, wood, even occasionally funky plastic.

So, just to make kind of certain I actually change and wear most of my favourite earrings - long term friends or just at-the-moment-kind - now and then I have an earring board for most of them. An earring board that allows me to do some sweet pondering (if I have the time before I rush to the bus), what mood am I in this day, which precious ones need some fresh ear... air, do they lift my spirits that so need lifting today, oh choices, choices...

Some of these earrings I wear often, very often, others not. But I still would like to, so they keep on hanging until the right moment for them comes. And clearly there's still heartfelt room for more sweet pieces on this board. (And when there isn't I have a larger board ready to go to work.) And yes, I am aware that I'm *slightly* partial to flower, heart and bird shaped ear things. I also know exactly where/from whom I got every single one of them. All included in confessions of an earring semi-addict.

Do you wear jewellery? Any particular kind you love the most? Maybe even a particular piece/pair? If so, what is it and why?

Anything that you find appealing on this earring board of undersigned? Maybe something you'd never ever (if not forced by someone stronger than you) wear?

castle spotting - duntulm, skye

A tad Scottish castle spotting - Duntulm on the very north of Isle of Skye. It may not look much, a stone pile in not the best of shapes. Nevertheless situated in breathtaking, unexpected and peaceful surroundings - wuthering heights and sheep poo... friendly bah - that surely makes a visit quite memorable just the same. A place were imagination is stirred and dreams are dreamt ~