Linnea 'Ea' quilts...

Okay, this is going to be quite random * , but here we go. I don't like coming up with names for my projects, essays, recipes... Never have, never will. *lets out my breath, because the house didn't crash down around me* Now that that is out, I just came up with a perfect solution. Name generating engines! If you google " name generator ", the first thing that pops up on the list is... .... the  Fantasy Name Generator ! How fitting, since I'm sure all the other ones are really nice and probably works like a charm... but it's the "fantasy" part of the thing that gets me. Yes, you may roll your eyes if it makes you feel any better. I'm still gonna use that one. Quickly browsing through the other generators, I must say that out of the 10 name generators highest up on the list... 3 have to do with creating names for roleplaying. Concerning that, I am so not touching the World of Warcraft one. Why? Well, we have quite enough WoW at home her...

It's my name day today, at least according to the Swedish-Finnish calender. 3rd of August: Linnea. But what I actually wanted to share was that... ... Micke bought me a rose! We've been together for 1925 days, but on this day (the 1926th) he bought me a rose. It smells divine. And forgive me for being totally gaggingly sappy, but I love him so much. First rose I ever got from Micke. Yes, I know, now that I have a picture of it, it'll last longer... Even more of a win for me :)

Okay, Inari shared a tip on her blog about how to see a dynamic overview of your own blog - or anyone else's too - by using the new Blogger "dynamic view" function. Basically, all you have to do is add the string  view/functionsname  after any blogger-url, e.g. for the dynamic view called "flipcard" mine is  http://linneagronstrand.blogspot.com/view/flipcard . In short, the new functions are: /view/timeslide /view/mosaic /view/snapshot /view/sidebar /view/flipcard And I must say, after trying them out... Oh dear goddess how booring the pictures I take are! :( No real scene sense, no flattering poses, no good contrasts. Nothing. Just boo-oo-oo-oring. Not inspiring at all. Crud. What more can I possibly say?

And now - a lovely photo spread of the wedding me an my family attended last Saturday in Kirkkonummi :) We got SO lucky with the weather! After people were getting into their cars to head out to the wedding lunch, it started to rain like crazy! But, nearly just as suddenly, it stopped when we arrived at the venue. Crazy luck, huh? Saved the date, and or whole family (sans Micke, unfortunately) attended. Brother checking to see if the photos he took were succesful. That's Mom in the bright cerise skirt. Running for the car! Told you - crazy rain! And all the pretty bridesmaids :) Dad/Our groom with son. Whole pretty family in place for a photo shoot before the lunch.

Mom and me, just chilling out on a Friday afternoon. I'm gonna be in Kirkkonummi this weekend, since one of my and my brother's oldest friends (from way back in elementary school) is gonna get married this Saturday. As a cherry on top, there's aunt and cousin+her kids still at our summer cottage that I can visit. Lots of people to be with. But more importantly: eat with. Remember my family's unofficial motto ? Lots of wilderness here. And Mom finally got her new garden chair. She says it's comfy. I believe her. True blued. Sounds almost like "true blood".  It's so hot, even if I'm just sitting here by the entrance. 28 degrees Celsius, and really humid. I'm so not cut out for this weather. My body just feels ill.

We got a present! The two guys who came with it put it in our bathroom. Wanna see what it is?

I cut it out weeks ago, then I stashed it. Really good too, I might add, because I didn't find it before I got around and did the huge summer cleaning project we so desperately needed. Or actually, the apartment needed it. I just had to get myself to do it... But, I digress. I found the cloth rolled up, and tucked away, in a glass jar . Whoever thinks a glass jar  is a good place to store a piece of cut-to-size cloth? Well... me, apparently. No idea why, though. I must be crazy. Nothing new there. It just must have seemed logical at the time. *shakes head* Sometimes something seems so very logical when you do it, and then afterwards you wonder "what was I thinking?". Like that time when my mama chose what I should wear to my confirmation.... *mentally cringes* New summer clothes... I mean, a new cover. Ta-daa! Didn't take that long to sew either, compared to the storage boxes I made that took several hours. It's actually part of an old sheet that...

Even though I and Micke live in quite a big apartment, I sometimes still feel as if I don't have enough storage space for every little thing I need to store away while I'm crafting. So, inspired by both Lisa * and by AmandaJean's blog ** , I decided to try and make some fabric storage boxes for our library. Yes, in fabric. Why? Well, since mom let me raid her fabric and cloth stash, I thought I should use it and not hang onto it forever. And with my fabric cutter, it was actually real easy, since I didn't have to spend too much time cutting with the scissors. That fabric cutter really makes a difference, in my opinion, because you don't get that much fabric dust flying in the air. Hence, not that much to vacuum :) * Who wrote how she finally  got around and bought some storage boxes for her overhead cupboards, mainly so that things won't hit her in the head when she tries to pull them out. ** A quilter, who seems to have done it all (and more) when it c...

We have had couch surfers, friends and relatives over for visits during odd days the last few weeks. That's nice, because before all of it I was feeling really unsocial and cooped up in our apartment. Now, I feel like I'm this horrible person who doesn't even bother to clean her house. Not even when her MOM phones out of the blue and says "We'll all be coming for a visit tomorrow at 11 a.m". The only thing that went through my mind during that call was "Argh, my desk is a mess, and I need to put away all the scrap fabrics". Which I didn't do. Instead, I put away things that I had used in Mikael's room. So: the apartment is dusty as heck the vacuum cleaner is hiding in the closet, and it's alternating between hunger striking and threatening me with sucking up all my current "on hold" craft project until I put then away safely. every plant and green thing is screaming for water the trellises on the balconies are covered with...

For those of you who haven't been there already, the  Aboa Vetus & Ars Nova is the museum of history and contemporary art. Located maybe 500 m from Turku Cathedral, it's both near the market square and the rest of the city center. And the museum closest to where Mikael and I live. My good friend Mimi is working in the museum this summer summer, and since her sister came for a visit yesterday, Mimi guided us around the museum. I think she's a brilliant guide, and I'm not saying it just because she's a friend. The museum is divided into two parts. The historic part (Aboa Vetus, or 'old Turku') is located in the basement, and the sections for contemporary art (Ars Nova) is located on the two upper levels. The ground floor is where the ticket office, gift shop and the Aula café is located ('aula' is the word for 'lobby', so it's a slight play on words) . Click on the link to see the virtual tour. The exhibition at the contemporary...

"Och för er som undrar hur jag hinner kan jag upplysa om att jag går upp ganska tidigt och lägger mig ganska sent. Ljuset gör mig pigg. Och sen kollar jag typ aldrig på TV och just nu tillbringar jag väldigt lite tid vid datorn. Det ena projektet avlöser det andra och än så länge går det bra. Då har man ju mera tid." - Anna Neah (singer, blogger and so much more) ( ~ ) Sorry, won't bother to translate for you, that's what the "translate" button on the browser Google Chrome is for. Or Babelfish and Google Translate. Use the tools at your disposal, don't complain. Cobble stones at the Old market square close to the Cathedral. I guess I should take Anna's advice, and just get up a bit earlier in the morning. Goddess knows, I stay up late most days anyway. I never said I'm smart, and sometimes staying up to the wee hours of the morning is really dumb. Dumb like "it will bite you in the [insert body part here] later" kind of dumb. A...

Pin that! And look, it even has one of the buttons I got from Maria 's on it! In a post , I mentioned how I've made ... a few... pincushions. I know, who has use for 9 pincushions? And is currently using 4 of them? And why, on Earth, would you make that many pincushions to even begin with? Well... Firstly , most pincushion designs are real easy to sew, so they're fast to make. 30 min tops, if you have all the materials at hand. Secondly , all of the one I've sewn so far have mainly been "training exercises" for me on how to use the Clover rotary cutter I bought a while back. And, since I still cut myself on it, I think I do need training. Or a new blade for it. Or maybe both. And a safer working technique... (yet another list *sigh* ) Thus, I won't apologize for my sewing behavior. But, to digress, from me cutting myself to showing you a bunch of easy pincushion patterns I've found online. the Purl bee the very easy pincushion ...

~ "My husband has admitted that the way he remembers my birthday is that he knows it happens when it's warm - so one night when it's warm, he waits for me to go to sleep, then checks my drivers license. Is that charming? I think so."   - Stephenie Pearl-McPhee, knitter and writer, aka "the Yarn Harlot", on her blog ~ There are times when I'm so glad I'm literate. In fact, that's pretty much every day. It's nice to get to snigger when you read peoples witty comments. "Knowledge costs, or not". Thanks Emmis for letting me play with your poem-magnets!

"Sorry that I've been away. I am a bad blogger." - Neil Gailman ( ~ ) Why do people apologize when they haven't posted something on their blog for a while? It isn't at all like when people ask other peoples' forgiveness for their tardiness. Or make excuses for their own existence. That last one is seriously despicable. It's your blog. No one else's. Why the stress? o_O On of the authors of a blog I  really truly very much  enjoy to read only posts about once a month. I think it's both the wait and the way he writes that makes it - truly - enjoyable. Henceforth, I will never apologize for such behavior. Likewise, I won't apologize for this photo. Something I think the person who placed this sticker (on the Theater bridge here in Turku) won't be doing either.

Do you ever write blog post that are to be published later , as soon as you've added some things (photos, more text etc.) to them? Well, as the dedicated Post-It girl of my family, I must say that there are soon too many blog post in my "to be written list". I need to finish writing and just publish them, but since most of them don't seem  to be so in the now , I've kept putting them off. And thus, the list has grown. This simply will not do. I need to get the amount of 19 unwritten posts on this list down to 0. Seriously. Life is made out of lists.

A while back, I came across a really cute and simple design for  a pear pin cushion  on the blog of April Moffatt Design. However, since I've already made a ...few * ... pin cushions for myself and really have no use for one more... I only made one. To try out the pattern. * I think I've made 9 pin cushions in total. So far, I've given only 2 away, and I'm currently using 4 myself... *sigh* But we did need to door stoppers. Because the old (read: shabby) ones were not that great to begin with, and since these seemed like it could function as a door stop, I wanted to try and make 2 sturdy ones. Materials : I used fabric I had gotten from IKEA, I think it's the one called "Lenda" or "Minna". Anyway, 100% sturdy cotton. I sewed the seames with the tripple straight seam, so it should hold. The leaf is made from a rest fabric I got from Riikka. The "twig" part is made out of brown satin cord. The "stones" I used to fill...

Helping someone move on a HOT summer day can be both fun... and tortorously sweaty. It was 30 degrees C (and more in the sun!) the whole day, and both the moving van and the caravan we had for driving all the stuff to Helsinki was hot as a sauna. At our first stop (about 50 km down the road) I had already drunk all of my water. Had to fill my bottle with tap water from the restroom at the ABC-gas station. That water wasn't the greatest. Not that you're the least suprised, I bet. Have you seen a caravan full of stuff moving down the Turku-Helsinki motorway? Thought so... but here you can see me wiggle my red-painted tonails in a caravan full of stuff moving down the Turku-Helsinki motorway . Bet you haven't seen that, eh?

.... and with it an increase in the outside temperature. Goddess, it's HOT outside. I know, I know - not only could anyone in Turku deduce that from reading friends blogs' and Fb-status updates declaring the same thing - that I shouldn't whine so much about it either. You could whine, or you could do something about it. Like this; I painted my toenails red.  Or, like this; Me wearing a gray knitted cap, and a long red scarf. Yes. I have gone bananas. Or so you would think. But I haven't. Instead, we started to have the ceiling fan in our bedroom on during the hottest hours of the day, as well as during the night. Hence the fancy flamingo outfit above. I don't want to wake up with my shoulders cramping, or head or neck aches. Micke laughed at it first, because he isn't disturbed by the rotating air at all. It's weird to think that 30 years ago most workplaces didn't have and didn't need AC. Now, nearly every place do. We spend more ...

A part of the "Turku - Culture Capital of 2011" event is the appearance of all these festivals, lectures and musical performances that - at least - a lot of people in Turku has been blogging/writing/updating people about. Now that it's summer, all sorts of events are taking place. Like the  ISD , for example. Held at the new congress center " Logomo ", which is actually a renovated giant warehouse that used to belong to Turku train station,  we (me, Micke, Mimi+her boyfriend Tommy, and we met Pernilla once we got there) spent the morning and most of the afternoon listening to seminars held by some really awesome quantum physicists and artists. ISD home page. The seminars were a collaboration between the University of Turku, the Heriot-Watt University ( Edinburgh, UK), the École Normale Supérieure (Paris, France) and the University of Sussex (Brighton, UK), and it was sponsored by the Finnish Cultural Foundation (Science Workshop on Entanglement)...

I know I haven't written anything lately, but I've read a lot instead. I like reading. Hope you do too. So, to commemorate my return, I'll just post a little more now, and take up writing again next week.