malinmaskros

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 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!

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!

I managed to go to Stockholm yesterday, I finally got my money. But I felt the clock ticking all the time - I got there pretty late. I bought everything for my swap with Shelley in Scotland, and a few things for myself - some Opal sock yarn, a black/red nailpolish (my favourite colour), and some Cram Cream kids aprons. I can´t ever use the aprons, they are too small, but the prints! They are so cute! My favourite was a Hawaii style print, very pretty! So the day ended quite good, even though it started bad.

I had big plans for today - I had a package to send to Italy, I had stationary to pay, I was going to Stockholm for some shopping - heck, I had planned to eat today, and what happens? My pay, which was going to get payed today, hasn´t arrived in my bank account yet. So the only money I have is about 2SEK, not even 50UScents. The people I´ve talked to, says that the money will be there sometimes today, but so far (1 pm) no luck. If I don´t get it within the next half hour or so, it´ll be too late to go to Stockholm today. If I get it later this afternoon, I can at least send the package, pay the stationary, buy some food, and then go to Stockholm tomorrow. If I don´t get any money today, well, that´s not good. At all.

for once, actually - I´m not a party girl (I think I did my share when I was younger, and now, at the grand age of 33 (my hair turning grey and all!), I feel I´ve done it). I invited my sisters, their children, and my best friend over, for some veggies and four dips, and it was rather pleasent. We had a good time, but agreed to do it again soon - without the kids. And they brought gifts (pic will come, eventually)! My sister bought it the day before, when I was shopping with her in Stockholm, a black knitted cardigan (soooo needed, and I really love it, it´s perfect!), and two skeins of sock yarn. My other sister gave me some of my favourite candy, and a gift certificate at my favourite thrift shop, and my friend gave me a little bag with cats (a bit kitschy, but cute, and hey - I´ve never turned my back on kitsch!), a fabric patch with a cat ´n bones, and some beautiful decoupage paper, with the promise that I could exchange it if I wanted. And since I don´t do paper crafts, I exchanged it to sock yarn yesterday, it´s actually the first time I´ve ever exchanged a gift - it feels kinda bad, even though she said it´s perfectly fine. And my parents send me a gift certificate for flowers, so I bought an aloe vera plant (I had to give away all of my pelargoniums, since I discovered I´m allergic to them - crap!), and a bouquet of white chrysanthemums. They didn´t have many white flowers at the flower shop, chrysanthemums was the best choice, even though they aren´t favourites.



And Jody in Singapore sent my birthday swap package today, hopefully I´ll get it in the end of the week!

My best friend got two kittens the other day, two tiny grey/black girls. They were so cute, but actually too small to leave their mother - I thought about reporting the seller to the police, but I know they won´t do anything about it, and hearing my friend, they will be much better off at hers, than with the seller. I hope she´s right - they shouldn´t have been separated from their mother for another 4-6 weeks.

I cut my hair today - thank goodness for a sister who´s a hairdresser! It was very much about time! Now it only needs some colour - I need to cover up the gray...

I went to Stockholm today, not by myself as planned, but with my sister, and had a lovely day. I came back with pretty much everything I hoped to buy, and bought nothing just because it´s pretty, but I don´t have any actual use for it. I got myself two pairs of shoes for the winter (they are not really winter shoes, but ine size too big and thich socks, and they work perfectly), a t-shirt with long sleeves (in eco-cotton, amazingly soft!), red tea (two kind, I found a wonderful tea shop, which had loads of red tea - usually they have 3, or maybe 5 different kinds, this one had maybe 20, or possibly 30 - amazing!), sock yarn, then I found a very pretty necklace with a couple of birds (for some reason I love jewellery with birds), not necessary, I admit, but since it was perfect - why leave it? Then I found a black, thick cotton cardigan, which my sister bought for me for my birthday, together with more sock yarn. I had a very successful day! Oh, I tried a vegan bakery for the first time, and had very tasty nut- and pear pie - yummy!

Now I´m off home, I´m doing laundry tonight, and tomorrow morning I´m cleaning my apartment, and preparing for my birthday bash - my sisters and best friend are coming over for a quiet celebration. Nice, I hope!

I really need to learn how to be a "broader" person -  I get so fixated on one thing, everything else is kinda on the backburner. I just began looking at blogs, ones I haven´t even glanced at for months, and I´ve missed so much! Actually, I shouldn´t divide my interests into different blogs (four!), but keep them all in one place, because when I get focused on one thing (my apartment for the longest time, a bit of knitting (mostly yarn...), veganism on occations, just to mention the other blog topics, kawaii, amigurumis, 50s/pinups, Japanese craft books, knitting books, swaps, if I bring up some of the things that have occupied my mind on this blog), I forget about all other, and therefor I miss out on lots of great things. Now, I only clicked on the first blog on my list (angry chicken), and got stuck there, and with er links, for a couple of hours. On her blog alone. Imagine the time I need to catch up with all of the other blogs I haven´t been reading, because I´ve been out straying! And imagine all of the great ideas I´ve been missing! How about I divide the week into obsessions - each get either one morning, one afternoon or one evening in the week - I would get much broader in my crafting, in my blogging, in my conversations (ok, whenever it goes into craft land, you could call them monologues, since I´m the only one I know  who likes to talk crafts)... Hmmm... I might need a new calendar (oh no, an excuse for shopping!)... And I´ve discovered a consequence of my straying - my readers have abandoned me! Only half as many of you come to read me every day now - I need to do something about that!

On some crafty stuff: I´ve got a swap in December, with Stella in Singapore, who LOVES bunnies, and I´ve got just the bunny for her, but it needs clothes, so when I get home, I´ll try to whip up some bunny clothes. Thanks to the generosity of swappers, I´ve got plenty of cotton fabric with small prints - some even with bunnies on! Perfect!

What a day! I went to work this morning, with no packed lunch, thinking I would only work from 8 - 12, on my way they call, and need me til 3 pm on another ward (right word, yes, no?), and then another call, where they need me until 4 am at a third one. Then I´m needed at the second one at nine, and then they don´t need me, when I go there after lunch it turns out they don´t need me at all, but maybe the third ward does, and yes they in fact they do, and in the end they actually don´t. I feel dragged all over the place today, and I´m not liking it one bit. Bad day!

Yesterday my sister and nephew came to visit. For a while my nephew was very quiet, and when asked he didn´t want to tell what he was doing. Well, when I went to bed I found out - he had found my scissors, and cut holes in my new (one week old!) sheets. Great! I have to admit, I got kinda irritated...

Now, that my apartment is coming together, I can´t help thinking of how different the parts of me really are. My apartment is very white, a bit romantic, shabby, almost country (ok, not that much country). And the way I dress is closer to punk than to anything else (still, I can´t seem to outgrow that period of my life, even though I´m 33 next week - I´m so happy my generation is more open to alternative lifestyles than all the generations before!), maybe with a dash of goth. And not to mention my inside... Sometimes things goes on in my head, that really makes me question my sanity, and it´s not just me - if I mention some of the things I think of to friends/sisters, they look at me like I´m loosing my mind, and sometimes I actually literally freak them out (maybe it´s good that I´m writing some kind of detective novel, it helps to get some things out of my system...). Is it just me, or does all people feel this schizofrenic?

Yesterday, I was served such a treat (ok, not just me, actually anybody that walked by...) - this guy in carpenter pants (love those!), no shirt, nice body and plenty of tattoos working in teh street - very yummy! I kinda wished I had a camera, so I could´ve shared him with you!

Last night I saw Brokeback Mountain (I know, it´s getting rather old, I can´t believe i haven´t seen it before), and I cried like a baby - it was so sad in the end. For those of you who missed it, it´s about these cowboys (Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger, and I´m not a Heath Ledger fan, but here - so cute, they both were), who meet one summer up at Brokeback Mountain when they are herding sheep, and they fall in love. Since they can´t have eachother (it´s back in 1963), they meet in secret a few time every year, for the next 20 years, up at Brokeback Mountain, while they have wives and children back home. I sat the entire movie, waiting for the happy ending, and I´m not telling you how it ends, but I cried. And cried. And still now, when I´m writing about it, I still almost cry a bit. It was so sad, and so romantic, and really good - see it if you haven´t.

I woke up this morning to a huge thundering noise - the rain was pouring, and the thunder, oh, the thunder! It kept going all morning, and I thought I would stay in all day. Fortunately, the rain lightened up a bit in the middle of the day, so I made a bee-line for it. With my luck, I bet it´s raining cats and dogs when I´m going home!

My parents and dog were here these last few days, so they should´ve been good days. Unfourtunately they got a bit ruined by the fact that I got my period (I hate my period, I can´t wait for menopause!), and that my back is so bad, I just got to the pharmacy for some painpills. I blame my bed for my back, hopefully I´ll have a new bed withing two weeks (maybe even one!), so hopefully that will help a lot.

A woman owning a café asked me if I could work there for a while, I said I needed to think about it for a few days (there´s a lot of downsides with the job, the money is the only upside), and when I finally decided to take the job (the money!), she had already hired someone else. How typical.

I just came back from Ikea, it was going to be a short, short trip, a true quicky, but everything at Ikea takes a lot of time, so we spent 2,5 hours, instead of expected one hour. But - I got a few things I needed, and I got to borrow money, so I can get a new bed, a sofa and bookcases, just to name the top of the list - brilliant! I will get my bed for my birthday! It´s the best present I could possibly imagine (loads of yarn would actually be nice as well...), even if it´s from me to me. Yay!

You know me - one-track-mind, that´s my middle name, but now my mind feels like it´s about to collaps! I can only uphold one interest at the time (that´s why I haven´t been blogging here much - I´ve been over at my vegan blog and my interiors blog mostly), and now my apartment, yarn/knitting and swapping is all fighting for my attention. I hope to go to Ikea soon, to shop for my apartment, and some white paint should come out of the trip as well, so hopefully that will calm down after that. And after Christmas I´m slowing the swapping down, and will only do a Secret Pal or Vegan Pal (both yarn related), so since that will bring the yarn/knitting and the swapping toghether, maybe my mind will be at ease. Who said that women were good at multi-tasking? Or is it me, do I have more than my share of testosterone? Do you want to know what else - I can´t look at the whole tv-screen at once, I have to focus at one bit at the time, usually keeping to the middle bit. Is it something wrong with my brain?

Yes, that´s what I´ll do today - spend the rest of it in bed. And before you start reading things into it - it´s because I got my hands on the last Harry Potter book. Yay! When I get home, I´ll climbe into bed, and I won´t be getting up until I´ve finished it. Or to get to work, I have to be there at about 7 am tomorrow morning. I can´t wait!

Ok, now it´s released - maybe the most anticipated book of all times - the last Harry Potter book. And I haven´t read it yet. I might have to wait several weeks before I get my hands on it, since I won´t be buying it, but have to wait for it at the library, and there are two persons before me in line. And I can´t wait to see what happens! Argh!

I found a tiny baby bird on the sidewalk, on my way out. I put it under a bush, I couldn´t see a nest, I hope it will make it, but I doubt it, unfortunately.

I just bought the last season of "The House of Eliott" on DVD! Yay! And it was a lot cheaper than the previous two seasons! I can´t wait to get in front of the TV!

I don´t know what happened this morning, but I experienced a sudden burst of energy. First, I washed my windows, and then I brought out my sewing machine, and finished some things started: I did some sewing for a friend, I sewed backpieces onto two knitted cushion covers (the fronts have been lying, waiting, for over a year) and I made a "Chinese" dress into a top - a very good decision! I feel really good about myself, and I am not feeling the least bad for lazying around the rest of the day! Wonderful!

A package from China is on it´s way, and a package from Kentucky will be on it´s way soon!