Wednesday, March 30, 2011

a tea party with one ugly cupcake coming up!

Yeah.. I might need some more time to get this one ready as a gift. I was trying to make a fabric cupcake for my beautiful god daughter for her 1st birthday but it is waaay harder then it might seem. I'm going to try and make them cuter because I'm not sending this one over the ocean. I don't want the other kids to tease her because of her ugly cupcakes...

I thought I show you guys it anyways, so you can see that a lot of what I do does not turn out very cute or pretty. That is life. And practice makes perfect right?


It is okay to laugh right now. I did, all the way through making it. I could not give up on it though and throw it away, in case a miracle would happen and it would actually turn out cute. No such luck.

Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Sick?

Again? Or what is going on? I'm not feeling a 100% and don't know what is up with me. Yesterday was awful, I was sooo tired. I worked for three hours in the morning and then came home and lived in the couch for the rest of the day. The thought of getting up from the couch made me want to cry. Seriously. I'm also sore in my back everyday which makes me crazy! I'm working today, right now actually, and will be working over night tonight. I'm alone right now when both kiddos are playing basketball and baseball. I'm about to head of and pick one of them up and go and watch the other one play a game. Feeling a little better today but still sore in my back and a little tired. But I'm working hard for the money.... Yuck!

Sorry about the complaining.. I'll stop right now.

I hope YOU are doing great!

Sunday, March 27, 2011

Elin's Amerika

My hubby came home last night, later than we expected due to bad weather here in the ATL. He walked through the door around midnight, but at least he made it, they were about to take the whole plane to Knoxville for a while, so the fact that they actually got to land at the Atlanta airport was much appreciated. So yeah, we had really bad weather yesterday, why does it seem to always happen when Christian is out of town? I was lying in the couch blocking my ears with the volume on the tv turned up.

When he finally came home, it was gift-time! He is very good at getting me a little something when he's been out of town, whether it is a freebie from the conference or something he actually had to pay money for. This time, I think he spent a lot. He was in Minneapolis, or New Sweden as they call it. He went to the Swedish American Institute and bought us a bunch of things to remind us of my heritage:




Sweet hubby of mine. Again.

Friday, March 25, 2011

jobba, jobba, joooobba!

That is the Swedish lesson for today and it means: "work, work wooooork". That has been my life for the past two days but after tonight I'm off for the weekend. I'm still at work and tonight I'm staying the night. We had a fun night with light's shut off, popcorn, blanket, pj's and a movie all snuggled up on the couch. After that it was time for two books and then "nite nite".

Christian will be home tomorrow night and I CAN"T wait. Miss him mucho.

Sleep tight!

Thursday, March 24, 2011

late nite'

About 11pm here in he USA where I'm at and I just came home from work. I have been working pretty much non-stop since 9am this morning. It's all good though. I was about to stay the night at work when I have to be there at 10am tomorrow morning again. The oldest girl wanted me to stay the night soo badly and I feel bad I did not stay. I told her before I put her down that I may go home tonight and she told me if I felt lonely (my hubby is out of town. again.) in the middle of the night I should drive over to their house and sneak into her room and say: "Psst, I felt lonely at home, can I sleep next to you tonight?". She is too sweet. I work there all day and night tomorrow so I may stay the night then and make a big deal about it with a pj-party and all. Sweet little ones.

                                       "While we try to teach children all about life,
                                           Children teach us what life is all about."


Wednesday, March 23, 2011

a few changes and add ons..

I changed the buttons on the front of the pillow I made the other day. For some reason I did not love the pillow, so I went to the fabric store and bought some different buttons that were more colorful and now I love the pillow. :)

before...
and after. Me like better.
I also realized I had forgotten to put my name on the pillow. I mean, they need to know who made this masterpiece! ;)


~made by me~
Now I'm in my party outfit ready to celebrate being 2 years old!!
I hope your day is going {fantastico}

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

"olivia"-birthday card

The pillow I made yesterday belongs to a sweet little girl by the name Mills. Not only is she super sweet, she also LOVES the show Olivia. So I made her a homemade "Olivia"-birthday card. Turned out pretty darn cute.  

I used my watercolors.. 
all the little pieces.. 
finished product. Cute!
the inside is pretty plain, I just attached a balloon that I made..
this is the envelope..
It has been a beautiful day here in the ATL and I looooove it. Shorts and t-shirt from now on please.
SLeeP TiGhT!

Monday, March 21, 2011

pillow for baby girl

So I finished the pillow and this is how it turned out:



M is for Mildred

cute as a button
That's all folks!

a pillow in the making..

The day is almost over and I have done nothing but sewing and stitching all day. I am making a pillow for a special little girl.  I've gotten this far as of right now: 

these are my sketches, I ended up making the right one. 
I read somewhere that it is okay to be messy while creating.. .. 
buttons for the back of the pillow
stitching on the "M"
That is it for now, I'll be back with the finished product later today.


“Creativity is inventing, experimenting, growing, taking risks, breaking rules, making mistakes, and having fun.” — Mary Lou Cook

new in the kitchen...

my hubby and I stopped by an antique store yesterday and bought this old-fashioned scale. We don't have that much space in the kitchen so in order for us to buy it and bring it home we had to make a decision that we might regret in the long run. We removed the.....microwave! We are going back to the way we use to live, I remember the first microwave we bought as a child, so there was a time when we had to manage without. Plus, less toxins from the microwave I guess.. We'll see how it goes.


The bowls on top of the scale was a gift from C and was bought at the store I use to work; Anthropologie. I loove them, ice cream is so much more fun to eat now. 


Now, I'm headed to the fabric store to buy some fabric for a pillow I'm making.. It's beautiful outside as well, so maybe a quick stop at the garden as well..

Saturday, March 19, 2011

Beautiful Day

our garden in the afternoon sun... 
Today has been fantastic! The weather has been so great, like a beautiful summer day. It was about 25-30 degrees Celsius here and we've spend about the whole day outside. First my hubby had a tennis game in the morning and after that we had lunch on a patio. Since the weather now is so warm we then decided to plant the rest of our garden. So now we're hoping for this weather to stay. It is okay if it gets a little cooler than today, but no frost please. Today we put down two tomato plants, two pepper plants, one squash plant, a few okra plants and some cucumber seeds in a pot. Our other garden is still doing great, at least on the surface, who knows what it looks like underneath...

our newly planted side of the garden.. 
my white legs and our parsley, chives and newly planted cucumber pots
our lettuce and onions are looking good
the carrots are on their way
we had some strawberries after dinner and the "scraps" went into the compost of course....
Thanks for stopping by.

Friday, March 18, 2011

New hair do

Yes, yesterday I chopped off a little over 10 inches (25 cm) of hair and donated it to Locks of Love. It feels great and I love it. It's almost liberating, to get rid off all that hair. I'm happy with it, a little worried about the frizz and curliness after my first shower. But until then, I'll enjoy it! :)


Today on the agenda is work. I'm about to get ready and head over there. I think we're doing the cleanse/detox thing and today's breakfast was in form of a smoothie. It was delicious and contained: almond milk, coconut juice, frozen blueberries, frozen raspberries, a fresh peach and green kale. For lunch we're having a zucchini/basil/celery soup. All blended in the mixer... I'm no too excited about that one..We're not doing the actual cleanse at the moment, we're doing the "elimination week", which basically means that we are trying to cut out all the "NO" foods slowly. I'm expecting this to be quite hard...

Have a great day everyone!

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

A friend told me...

...that I should keep being creative and maybe it'll lead to something.. Sometimes you need a little encouragement and a kick in the behind, so THANK YOU for that.  So, time to be creative! Let's see what I can come up with...?

“A friend is someone who understands your past, believes in your future, and accepts you just the way you are.”

 

 

 

On my bedside table..

My hubby brought home a book yesterday about detoxing and cleansing. He was really excited about it and at first I kind of rolled my eyes at it. For you that does not know my husband, he likes to get totally into things and wants nothing else than to explore this new thing in his life. He loves to read about diet and health and is almost always looking for that thing to help him loose a few pounds or to be a healthier person. For me, who is not looking to loose weight I tend to do just that; roll my eyes. But last night when we went to bed he started reading this book called "Clean" to me. It is about a doctor who, when on his way to a promising career, but a faltering health, decide to step out of the Western world's view on fixing the body and find a more natural way of curing his faltering health. Last night, when my hubby got to tired of reading the book out loud to me I took over and I read it until he was snoozing next to me and my eyes started to hurt as well. This morning I picked it up again and I have been reading it ever since.

I don't know if this is something for me, but it certainly makes me want to go to Whole Foods, become a hippie and live on a farm out in no where far away from this world's toxins.. We'll see where it takes us..

Monday, March 14, 2011

Busy weekend

Yes, we had a busy but great weekend. On Friday night we spend the night with some friends and then Saturday we went to the garden and inspected our sprouting carrots. I have not yet thinned them out, but planning on visiting them tomorrow and get it started. After the garden we went to Piedmont Park and celebrated some friends who had their birthday party there. The weather this weekend has been amazing! About 20 C and sunny. Then I worked Saturday night and came home late and slept a few hours before we got up and went to the Silver Comet Trail and biked 24 (39 km) miles!! It was a lot of fun, but at the end, I was not a happy camper. But we did it! :) I wish I would have taken some pictures but I forgot my camera. Christian has one of me when I'm the most annoyed, I may put that one up here.. :)

So now we're home again in our house. No more dog sitting for now. It is so nice to be home! Today I'm off and I'm cleaning the house. Nothing exciting happening here.

Dylan on one of our many walks
He came to the park as well.. 
My hubby went to work this morning and left this on the fridge.. :)


How sweet it is to be loved by you...

Friday, March 11, 2011

Last night's dinner..

..came out very very delicious! I made Bruschetta with shrimp, garlic and arugula. It may not seem like the biggest dinner and would probably be great as an appetizer, but it was plenty for us and we were more than satisfied when finished.


Here is the recipe (I tend to not follow recipes that closely and eye-ball it to taste/look/how many I'm feeding):

-shrimp (raw is best, not pre-cooked)
-2 shallots (schalottenlok)
-2 garlic cloves
-3 tomatoes
-white wine
-chicken stock
-Mascarpone cheese
-Arugula
-salt & pepper
-olive oil
-ciabatta bread/italian bread



The bread:
Cut the bread in slices and put on a pan and drizzle with olive oil and put in oven on 400 F (200C) for about 10 min. When they are out of the oven cut a garlic clove in half and rub the slices of bread with it.

Bruschetta:
Slice the shallots and chop the garlic and saute in olive oil for about 2-3 minutes. Then add the shrimp + pepper and salt to the pan. Cook until shrimp is cooked through and then take it all out of the pan. Chop the shrimp mixture into pieces.
In the same pan add chopped tomatoes and salt+pepper and cook for a while. Put in wine (1/4 cup or so, or 1dl) and stir up all the pieces on the bottom of pan. Put in the same amount of chicken stock in the pan and cook until all the liquid is evaporated. Then remove the pan from heat and put in arugula (to taste), Mascarpone cheese (1/4-1/3 cup or 1dl or so) and the chopped shrimp mixture. Maybe some more salt and pepper to taste.
Then scoop the mixture onto the slices of bread. SOOOO yummy!


Try it why don't ya!

Chamomile tea

The best tea to start your morning. I usually drink coffee but I am trying to cut down to keep more balanced without the caffeine (which is important to me). I have found me favorite brand, the Celestial kind.
in my tummy right now

Now, off to work.

Thursday, March 10, 2011

In my kitchen...

Well not my kitchen (still dog sitting), but you get the point. I decided to go to the grocery store and buy some coconut flakes and make some "coconut tops". They turned out really good. I also dipped them in chocolate and the coconut and dark chocolate mix is amaaazing.

I mixed 1dl (100ml) of sugar and two eggs and whisked until fluffy and white. Then I put in 50 grams of melted butter and 5 1/2 dl (550 ml) coconut flakes. 
I made little "tops" with my hands and then put them in the oven at 175 C (350 F) for about 15 minutes. 
This is how they ended up after about 30 min in the fridge to get the chocolate hardened. Yummy in my tummy! 

Have a wonderful night! I'm making Bruchetta with shrimp, garlic and arugula for my hubby tonight.

Carrots, carrots!

Yes, the carrots are sprouting in pretty rows in my garden. So so excited! I'm going to let them grow a little more before I have to thin them. Something that I think is the hardest part with being a "gardener"; the fact that you have to pull away healthy little seedlings that I would rather see grow.. But I know, you have to take some away to  let the others grow and become healthy, big and juicy orange carrots. We are going to go over there this weekend and tend to them and we may even plant some more vegetables to get our other bed started. It's so exciting this gardening thing. I hope you are not bored yet, I will soon start other projects that may be more interesting for you all.

"Carrots are an excellent source of antioxidant compounds, and the richest vegetable source of the pro-vitamin A carotenes. Carrots' antioxidant compounds help protect against cardiovascular disease and cancer and also promote good vision, especially night vision."

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Couples Massage

Yes, today we "cashed" in our Valentine's treat and went and had a couples massage. We went to the Spa at Evergreen inside Stone Mountain Park and it was great! So relaxing and such a beautiful place. I also had a Finnish masseuse so that was kind of funny, she was great! I wish I had my camera, so I could have taken some pictures but no.

After that we went to Decatur and had the best burger I have ever had. Amazing! It's called Farmburger and they serve nothing but local grass-fed beef and I swear you can tell a difference. Yum yum!

Other than that, still dog sitting over here and can't wait for tomorrow and my day off to do nothing. :)

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Fat Tuesday

Yes, today is Fat Tuesday, or "fettisdagen" as we call it in Sweden. I'm not sure what happens here in the US on Fat Tuesday, I'm thinking it has something to do with Mardi Gras? I should probably google it after this and educate myself. But in Sweden on "fettisdagen" we eat "semlor". A delicious bun filled with almond paste and fresh whipped cream and some powdered sugar on top. It is quite tasty and I wish I would have some energy left today to make some for me and my hubby, but nos such luck. I have been working non-stop for a week and a half with no break so the thought of baking right now, is not so tempting. Maybe tomorrow?

This is "semlor".. yum!