New Year, Fresh snow.......

I really do live in a winter wonderland. Views from my veranda and front garden taken at 7.30am this January morning.

P!nk

Tuesday night A and I went to see Pink in Stockholm at the Globe arena - which had been spectacularly floodlit in pink especially for the occasion. The concert was fantastic - a carnival theme, not as in Mardi Gras, but more vaudeville and burlesque. I never actually realised Pink had such a great voice until now - she was pretty spectacular live. My favorite number had to be "So What", while Alice liked the low key acoustic version of "Mr President".

This was one of the occasions where I was reminded that I live in Sweden (if I should ever forget!). The Globe was full to capacity at 14 000 people and everyone seemed to be having a great time watching Pink. However this didn't manifest itself in the audience reaction, which at times was reminiscent of the polite applause the principal might get after the end of year speech in the school auditorium. I know that Swedes in general don't often raise their voices and are not prone to outbursts of excess emotion, but this was in fact a rock concert and shouting, cheering and screaming yourself hoarse are usually obligatory.........

September

....... in Sweden has been gorgeous so far. I've been out into the countryside of Habo to capture the mellow evening light.

Goodbye Daphne

We lost a member of our little family during the summer. Daphne allowed us to share her house for 6 years and kept us entertained with her wobbly walk and toe-nibbling, chair-stealing antics. We will miss your little pipsqueak meouw, Daffs.............

The Cake Barn

Well, Garnheim's Bed & Breakfast (aka. my house) has officially closed its doors for the season after a month of guests, mainly family over from England. We have had lots of fun and eaten LOTS of cake.

The cause of this cake gluttony is several visits to "The Cake Barn" as we have dubbed it - or "Lustfyllt" which is its Swedish title, a beautiful converted barn with an all-you-can-eat cake buffet.

If you happen to be visiting Habo (18km north of Jönköping on road 195) then this is the place to go. There are also many antiquey bits and bobs for sale, as well as the owner's pottery. A lot of thought seems to have gone into this concept as every corner is like a scene from an interior design magazine. Judge for yourself from the pics I took.......

Customer Service Part 1

Several people I've talked to seem to think that it's really expensive to eat in London. I disagree. The secret is to leave Swedish eating habits behind (like eating a big meal at midday during the week) and adopt British ones. Buy sandwiches from Boots and eat them in St. James Park, and instead have a main meal between 5 - 7pm when many restaurants have specials on.

I'm going to give a shout out to 2 places I really like in London. The first is Bistro 1 in Covent Garden where the prices are great for such a central touristy location - 2 courses in the evening for just under £10. It's a small restaurant, with a homely atmosphere, serving simple, hearty food. They even have another couple of restaurants in other central London spots. Check them out here.


The second place I have to mention is the Brick Lane Brasserie House of Spice (Brick Lane is the mecca for Indian Food in London) who win my Customer Service Award 2009 ;). We'd just done the spooky Jack the Ripper walk and I was feeling peckish and fancied taking a curry back with me to the hotel, as no one else in the family wanted to eat. This particular restaurant was pretty full, while many of the others were practically empty. Not only did the owner do me a special half portion (to suit my student budget) but actually gave me some of his silverwear to take with me, as he didn't have any plastic forks. He gave the kids little chocolates to eat while we were waiting for the food and even put in some free poppadoms for them. When we then asked for directions to the nearest tube station he came out into the street with us to direct us, even though he was pretty busy.

That's what I call great customer service folks :)

London through a Kodak 620 Junior

On our recent trip to London I dragged 3 cameras around with me. The one that got the most attention was my dad's old folding Kodak 620 Junior, which I am now able to use after learning how to re-spool new 120 film onto old 620 spools.

Here are the shots that I delevoped in the darkroom yesterday. I love the vintage look to these, dust specks and all (no photoshopping needed here!) and how the overexposed edges (due to light leaks??) merge the image into its background.

Covent Garden
View over Thames to Big Ben and Westminster Bridge


London eye Marble Arch, Oxford St
British Museum, covered courtyard
My house!

Spring?

Only people who have experienced countries with loooong, cold, dark winters will understand the longing for spring that people have here in Sweden. The local paper even has a "signs of spring" section where people send in their photos of ice thawing, buds breaking through the earth and birds returning from migration.

For me, seeing tulips in the shops really signals a change of seasons. I saw this lovely bunch in my local supermaket and couldn't resist the gorgeous shades of pink. Snapped them before I'd even removed the cellophane.

London, here we come (again!)

It's always a good idea to have something to look forward to, to help you make it through the long dark Swedish winters. So, this Easter we're heading off to London again. As we had such a fab time there last year, we just had to go back for more. Here's a couple of photos from last year's trip - some sweet houses in Notting Hill (don't you just wish you owned one!) and A enjoying a cuppa in some old dive of a cafe that we stumbled across.

A seed of an idea....

Mmmmm. I have the idea for a little project involving vintage fabrics. We'll see how that develops.

I still have to get my camera fixed. It's actually the flash unit that's bust, and as I rarely shoot with flash, the camera is still usuable - although I'm ashamed to be seen in public as it's cracked with wires sticking out in all directions! So I have been getting on with editing some on the many hundreds of pictures I have already taken.

Here's one which was taken on a frosty misty morning in January in Stoke, my hometown while on a visit over Christmas. It's a homage to Stoke's industrial past, showing the top of one of Stoke's hundreds of disused bottle ovens (where pottery was fired). I had set off with my trusty camera and was wrapped up to the nines in woolly items, telling my mother I would be gone an hour. Arrived back after about three hours, with my mother on the verge of ringing the police ("this is not Sweden you know Dawn!"). Sorry Mum. I tend to lose track of time and space when I'm out snapping.