Set up for holidays

Cleaning day greetings

It is starting to look like Christmas... Today I proved that one can wash carpets at home, even in a tiny bathroom like ours :). 

A lovely friend gave us the candy sticks and the vinyl record bowl. Have you ever tried making one?

Winter blues

It's been snowing almost every day. We live on an esker and there are lot of stairs here. Now they're all about to turn into sled hills!

The wooden, hand painted bracelet is a souvenir from Budapest. The other day we didn't have any bread in the house, so we had to make waffles for breakfast - didn't mind :).

Christmas tree

I really like our little Christmas tree. The only thing that's missing is the scent of spruce...

Dear Santa...

I made a little wishing list of things I don't need but are sweet. What I really asked for Christmas is a respirator mask (you might wonder why but try painting with oil paints and solvents x days a week and soon you'll know...), a shell suit for jogging and a new coffee pot for our Mocca master (the current one is missing a piece) :D.

But let's drop the rationality for a moment.

New Lappish shoes would give joy for years ahead. The ones I have now (seen in the previous post) are bought six years ago from a flea market and are about to reach the end of the road. Pic here.

The Sarjaton ("Seriesless") glass and Kartio ("Cone") jug by Iittala, pics from their site.

The Hauska ("Funny") towels and Fantti linen by Finlayson.

The prettiest chopping board I've seen is called Puutarhurin parhaat which means about "The gardener's best" and the cheerful mug Kulkue ("Parade"). Both by Marimekko.

Colourful lights by La Case de Cousin Paul. Pic here.

And finally one of my favourite movies I would like to have at hand, Marie Antoinette. Pic from imdb.

It's December

Clipped snowflakes

The other day I was thinking: where could I get some white, slightly transparent paper... Like packing paper... And then, the next day, along the blanket I got a whole box of it :D! Made some paper snow flakes as authentic ones are out of sight. 

I have a memory of clipping these with my grandma. Maybe it was the first time, maybe I was so amazed to see the result as we opened the folded flakes. One had to be careful not to accidentally clip the flake into pieces. I remeber how the paper felt. A light friction on my fingertips.

The blanket is here!

The lovely lovely blanket by Ratzer I won from the lottery of Mikko from Uusi Muste came straight to my doorstep. It truly is just as soft and stylish I expected - and doesn't tickle. The blanket was sponsored by Finnish design shop. A big thank you to you all!

At times I'm a bit bored with the colour of our red sofa but for some reason the light grey blanket made it look much better. Or is it because of Christmas time..?

The ceramic candle holder is a flea market find from Helsinki.

Happy Go Lucky

A cozy night home.

Hello there sweethearts! I've just spent a long weekend in Helsinki. I've visited one of the best flea markets ever (Tattarisuon antiikkihallin Löytötori recommended by Kaisa from No home without you), seen the symbolists' exhibition in Ateneum, gone nuts about all the odds and sods in Tiger and hanged out with some dear people.

Now it's time for the grey weekdays again. But who would have thought that it's something grey that made me so happy this morning? What a surprise Mikko from Uusi muste had for me!!! No words...

Pretty Ugly

This mug is so ugly that it's adorable!

Anything similar in your cupboards?

The notebook in the second picture by Absoloot, a souvenir from Budapest. The card is for my little sister.

The Merry Colour Black

 This is the simple diy project I told you about in the previous post! In Finland these kinds of electric candle holders are super popular and almost every grandma has one. You can buy them from every market and I guess design enthusiasts or candle light diggers don't think that much of them. 

 Once again I was too hasty to take before-pictures but as you can see, the candle holder was red. And recommended by Santa Claus! It cost me 6 euros at a flea market.

I think they're so cozy and the light they give isn't that bad either. And they touch the soft spot for kitch in my heart. After a touch of black acrylic paint and jute yarn you could almost put this on sale on a design fair, don't you think?

Unpredictable moments of inspiration

Free me.

Do you know those moments when you, all of a sudden, get this enormous inspiration and you run to the flea market, craft store or your cupboard to get the materials and before you know, your project is ready and you're so proud of it? (This can also happen with some delicious recipe or when you suddenly just need to rearrange your apartment.) I had one of those moments yesterday and my project is ready and wating to be photographed! At the moment it's unfortunately so gloomy that I wonder if I'll be able to take the pic today... Or any pictures for the next five months. Luckily this mysterious project brings some light to the darkness ;). See you soon!

Feather printed curtains

One of the traditions thaught by my mom is having different curtains for summer and winter season. Sadly there are not so many options for different kinds of curtains in our apartment, as it's so small and easily looks too retro, too romantic or too whatever. White curtains are also the best ones for creating an illusion of space. Anyway it felt dull to switch the light white curtains into white thick curtains, so I decided to add little extra with textile paint.

I thought about some graphic figures like dots or squares first, but then I found this Martha Stewart tutorial and decided to go for feathers. Some might think this motive is already a bit passé, but I love it! 

I was a bit suspicious about whether this would work without a press. The result has a home made look, but it ain't too bad, or what do you think? If you want to try this too my tip for you is to use textile colour for light fabrics, that is fluid. I made some tests with more covering colour (meant for dark fabrics) and it was way too stiff to work out properly. You can use a piece of superlon to add the colour.

At the Office

 This is where me and my three colleagues work.

 Paintings by Matti.

 Laura's drawing.

 Niina's workstead...

 ...and her paintings in progress.

 From the windows we see the courtyard.

 My corner.

Wannabe food blogger

A basic bread dough easily turns into something special. Just add some pesto, feta and sun dried tomatoes and roll.

Have a nice Saturday evening!