malinmaskros

Usually, when I don´t write, it´s because I don´t have much to write about, but this time, I don´t know where to start.

Last week, I cut my hair much shorter and dyed it red - big improvement, even though my do needs some more cutting - it´s too "nice", and I don´t do nice.

I also went to visit my family up north for the weekend, very nice - we spent a lot of time with the horse (very long time no see!), visited my granny, went shopping at Dollar Store - had a nice weekend overall, even though a bit short. My parents are coming here this weekend, my sister left her children back home, and they need a ride here. It´s good, because we didn´t get to see my parents much, they had to leave on Saturday, because my sister had a horse jumping course that weekend as well.

I´ve applyed to a course, to get a truck driver´s licence, and I think that I´ll get accepted, but I´ve been thinking about it a lot, especially since spending the weekend in the car, and I don´t think my back and neck can survive a career driving trucks - I had to cancel work last Monday, bacause my back was aching so.

I made a decision, again. I really need to lose weight, all the kilos I lost last spring is back, and I really don´t need them.

And to you non-pagans and non-wiccans out there - Happy Halloween!

Hmmm.... What to write? I wrote a couple of posts over at my interior blog (malinmöblerar), on Christmas and on buns, but I don´t know what to write here. Nothing much is new, nothing much is happening. A couple of things: I´m going home to visit my family next weekend, and I´m pretty much accepted to a truck driver´s licence course (I´ve figured out, that to get a job that pays more, I need to find a man´s job - with kids and at stores (which is what I´ve been working with so far) pays like crap). Anything else? I can´t wait for Christmas, I can´t believe it´s more than a month until Advent, I want to bring out the tree, glögg, decorations right now. Not even Halloween (and I love Halloween!) makes the Christmassy feeling any less. I´m in such a crafty mood, but I don´t know what to craft - very irritating, I must say! I made an amigurumi bear, I have socks to knit, I´m thinking Christmas crafting, but no, it doesn´t work. What to do, what to do?! I guess I´ll just head home, I´ve got a pile of books I just checked out from the library, and a cup of tea to go with those, and I´ll be satisfied - for a little while anyway. I wish I had some chocolates at home, though...

I got a package today, from Diane in New Jersey, USA - my long awaited and longed for mushroom knitting needles are finally here! They are so wonderful - that girl sure knows how to make them! Along with the needles came some Christmas stickers, a pink chrystal ornament (very pretty!), beads spelling my name, and two extra mushrooms for ornaments or earrings or whatever else I´d like them to be. It was a lovely package, and perfectly timed with all of my Christmas longings! Thank you so much, Diane!

I can´t believe I haven´t posted about it yet - I got my swap package from Elise in France about a week ago! I got these wonderful things - a Hello Kitty bento, some very kawaii stationary, a lovely box (what to fill it with?!), some cupcake bath bombs, key rings, lip balm... Everything very pretty, thank you so much, Elise!

Yes, you read it right - there´s a Hello Kitty air line - take a look!


How´s that for air plane food!

My bento accessory storage has run out of room - it´s jam packed, and it´s hard to find what I´m looking for, then I saw this great idea on flickr, and remembered this craft tool box I´ve seen at the craft store (not that expensive either!). I went there today, and it was every bit as perfect as I thought it would be, so I got it. Now I need to go home and organize my bento assessories! And there´s room for more as well - when ever I stumble upon some!

I had another great idea this weekend, well, maybe not an idea, exactly, and maybe not even mine, but still... I filled the freezer with bento sized lunch foods - I made tiny bread rolls, I did kind of pigs in blankets (tiny soy sausages wrapped in bread), little apple crumbles, mini Shepherd´s pies with aduki beans... Great things to have at home, when I don´t feel like cooking (hmm...), but still wants to enjoy a nice bento.


(click on the pic to get to Bento Business!)

I made sushi the other day, and brought it for lunch yesterday - maybe not a good idea when working with children - they hardly ate anything of their food, they were so preoccupied by mine - "what´s that? what´s the green stuff? what´s in that container?". On the other hand, it looked quite good, and tasted even better!

I found a top at a store here in Nynäshamn, and really liked it, but it was a bit pricy for my purse. I need to think about it for a while - if they sell it, it wasn´t supposed to be mine, if they still have it later on, I think I´ll buy it. My way of shopping - find somehting nice, wait a while, and if they still have it - get it!

I´m going shopping for yarn - I´m making a lace shawl for s co-worker, we´ve talked about it since last winter, now I´m doing it - hope she´ll like it!

You can´t pack a decent bento on an empty fridge, so I went shopping for food yesterday, even though I wasn´t going until next week - ah, well, now I have lunch for a while! I did some baking too - tiny muffins, perfect to pack in a bento. I brought one today, together with some grapes in a muffin box, but since I work and eat lunch with children, I can´t have the good stuff for lunch, so I had to have it at my morning brake. It tasted good, though! And I did bring a nice, packed bento today, with some spaghetti, mini soy dogs, falafel and veggies - not too bad, and looked pretty good!

What do you know - I had a post in me today! It´s been a while, but I feel the need for beautiful bento lunches again - for a long time, I´ve just put the food in the box (thanks to my earlier bento obsession, I have plenty of great lunch boxes!), now I´ve been looking at the bento group on flickr, and can´t wait to put together great lunches! And now I have some new boxes and accessories to use too!

I found some really good ideas:

Any neat little "bento" tips?

Your indispensable bento supplies?

Bento Boxing in a Nutshell

bento blogs and sites

Healthy and Easy To Pack Desserts

How to use furoshiki

And if you ever wondered: Why do you bento?

And for you people who are like me: Vegan bento

   

I posted a bunch of pics, both here (mostly pics from my three most recent swaps), at malinmerino (socks!) and especially on flickr (I have a link to my account at my link list), but I don´t really have anything to say. So, what I say today is: go check it out!

Today I got my package from Chiara in Italy - yay! I love getting packages (how I´m going to survive when I cut back on my swapping, I don´t know), especially when they are as great as this one! First of all, the things came irresistable gift wrapped, second - they were really nice! Here´s what I got:
A kawaii folder, Hello Kitty paper bag, green yarn, Nutella spread, chopsticks, silicone food dividers (for bento), Hello Kitty stickers, kawaii notebook and memopads, Charmmy Kitty hear clips, candy, hand made crocheted cell phone bag, Hello Kitty key ring and Piglet digital magnetic clock. Very nice things! Thank you so much, Chiara - I had such a good time swapping with you!