Equinox, my kind of spring

Flowers found at dog walk in the forest.

I'm doing a three week focus on Alexander Technique-challenge starting yesterday on equinox, the day when time is equal day and night.
Each day we participants give ourselves 20 minutes laying on the floor stretching out our spine, expanding our length in a soft way. Breathing, staying actively awake but relaxed.
My kind of spring :-)

Vätte-hår

Så vackert det är ute nu!

På marken fann jag detta fenomen, kallat "vätte-hår". Iskristaller byggs upp till ett fluff. Förr trodde man att vättarna fått bråttom när gryningen kom och att deras hår och skägg fastnat i grenar när de skyndade sig hem igen.

Morgonpromenad med hund är bland det bästa sättet man kan börja en dag på.

My own fires

Last weekend of September.

I went to the forest, to the north, to the place where the stars in the sky is bright clear like sparkling ice, milky way mesmerizingly visible.

My clothes and hair is full of smoke from all the fires I made.
I’ve been writing, I’ve been reading.
I walked in the forest and picked berries for the winter.

I’ve been reminded in the fullest of how much we all have to live every day with all courage we can bring about. To live our lives deeply and lovingly. One member of the village, a middle aged man, decided to end his sorrows and find his peace in death. My thoughts goes to his family. The whole village is grieving at this loss, his big heart for animals, people, nature, theater and music. His uniqueness will be gone, but live in our memories. We cannot meet him in the local food store from now on. But what we can do is to live totally and make sure that no child or anyone will be left behind. I speak for myself and I will do my best to connect to the more silent, the few-worded personalities in the future. They have so much to tell, but it takes longer time for them to start to tell. This man carried lots of knowledge and good values.

We must create a true belonging for our young ones. Aren’t we all born to be part of a belonging? Where we will be seen and respected for who we are.

I will take this highly important message with me from my weekend in the north. Also the joy of seing the milky way and the stars, the freedom of walking in the forest, making my own fire. Tomorrow it’s the first day at my new job as youth leader in a nearby church, in the suburb of Hjällbo. This will be a golden opportunity to get in touch with our young ones in my own neighborhood, in my lovely Angered-hoods in Göteborg. The job is a part time job, 50% and I will still have many fruitful music collaborations going on. Irmelin, Myst, and my choir Lei-La plus more solo appearances.


Eva

Dynamic work, love my work

Last week was a over dose of administrative work, wich is normal from time to time. Reports, applications, making half year book-work of economy, buying a printer, restoring my broken Sibelius-program.

For the broken Sibelius-program (writing music scores on the computer) successful restoring I owe my thanks to computer wizard Pär Johansson! Feels great to have Sibelius again! I made all music notations for my book Bröllopssånger och Kärleksvisor in Sibelius, and soon after giving away all my material for the making of the book, this Sibelius-program broke down completely. Exhausted program maybe?

So this week starts totally different. To balance up I've made yoga, been singing, prepared for my lovely choir Lei-La tonight. I go out in the sun light and sing for myself, the birds, insects, plants and trees around me.

Yesterday I spend the afternoon walking 3 hours in the forest, in sunshine on magic path systems leading up to a small remote lake. Two women and three dogs having the most lovely time in the fresh air. And this is for free! It's there for us to enjoy.

Today started just great as well. In the morning I had a good time making music with Sara, preparing some ideas of music for Myst.
I also got a phone call wich was very inspiring, on the subject "The mysteries of human voice".

Dog on ice

Ice skating today in sunshine and wind. Leo surpriced me and enjoyed some winter sports!

Small dog on a big ice.

Happy flowers on this stunning maxi long party dress from the 70's.

Fashion by: Aspens made in Sweden

Unfortunately it's wrong size for me, but I'm sure I have saved this gem to now find a new happy owner somewhere.  No more hiding in the wardrobe! New parties are waiting! This dress really makes one shine and I wonder who picked it originally and what parties it has been to in those days.

Leo the dog is sleeping and snoring right beside me now, curled up with his nose under his back leg. Tired after this fantastic day out on the ice.

Eva

Leo the dog, one year with us today!

Celebrating today!


Today a year ago Leo moved in with us. We are absolutely happy with his sweet personality and big heart, it's a delight to have him here.

Leo the studio-dog. Mastering Irmelin CD Monday 4th of March 2013.

Leo checking out water facilities for dogs in Basel. Autumn 2012.

Leo enjoying café-life in Winterthur, Switzerland.

Some unknown friends in the street.

Leo on the day he arrived a year ago. So tiny, only 7 month when he came!

Early picture of Leo, in March 2012.

Well, it's a lot about us growing into the role of being dog-owner. So much more we now can read Leo's signs, and he can read ours. We've learned to communicate quite well. Still learning of course.
A favourite cartoon can tell some more.....
Here's about the paradox of a dog, Rambo the dog.

Eva

Final steps in Irmelin CD-making

Karin, Maria and me in vocal trio Irmelin are just in the final steps of the process of making our new CD. It's a great pleasure to see it come into form. On Monday it's time to do the mastering. I'm very excited about all this. As usual it's also a bit of a labour emotionally. Will this music come out the way we dreamed about it? The stories we want to tell, will it be touching? As soon as the CD is printed it's totaly up to the listener, but at this point it's a fragile and yet strong walk of balance carrying something precious in our hands. A work with lot of heart in it. Everytime you put your naked heart into the work it's also a portion of pain to it.

In this process we are united and working together in the very best way. The Irmelin trio stands strong together! It's a joy to work with Karin and Maria, to unite with their artistry and personality. I learn so much everytime we work together!

Some pictures from this week:

Yesterday I visited a second hand store I've never been to before. Lucky me I found a dress compleetely hand made with fine knowledge in hand craft, probably from the 50th or 60th. I'm happy about the bright colour, even with out the sun shining through it's the colours of fire. Double layers of fabric. i wish I knew who made it and what parties this dress has been to before.

Eva

My favourite photo blogs and some more vintage dresses

Today it's the day when we light the second candle before Christmas. Happy 2nd advent to you!

Going out now makes me so happy with all the snow, white and clean and fresh. Everywhere I see things I want to make a photo of. My photo eye-glasses are often on. I'll share some winter photos here for you.
Leo is not that keen on going out when it's too cold. He's running fast like if he doesn't want to put his feet down.
Leo has a dog-friend, Boogie, who sometimes come visiting our neighbours. If Leo sees Boogie from the kitchen window he starts to cry to get out to greet Boogie. Yesterday we just saw Boogie leaving and we were too late to get out. After this Leo cried for about 15 minutes until we went out to make sure Boogie was not hiding behind the piles of snow.

When I want to get inspired I sometimes look at theese two amazing photo blogs.

Photo by Tekla. The young and talented Maja, visit her blog.

Drömma. The dreamer in Göteborg, Lottas blog.

Lotta has a great interest in dresses, writes about her life with children and many interests and dreams. Her blog is somekind of very poetic, I just love the way she writes.
Oh, about dresses, I found no less than five dresses yesterday at the local second hand, all five for less than the price on one dress in an ordinary shop. Two of them for sunny hot summer weather, but why not? One will be for my balboa parties, a tight grey slightly shiny In Wear-dress:

This is my newest 70th-dress, real vintage.
Transparent nylon with silver threads.

Today we stay at home. Friends coming, we'll bake some ginger bread and create fantasy ginger bread houses.

Eva

Dogs are increadible

Summer memories on a snowy day.

 Our sleeping little beauty.

Sleeping on the dog magazine.

Leo with his friend Sune.

Summer-time!

At the time when we were looking for a dog to buy, we searched every day on internet. Mostly the cutest puppy pictures you can ever think of, and then we found this angel. I hope hen (he or she) also found a new good home.

Eva

 

Our totally lovable and crazy little dog

This lovely little Leo, he's so amazing.

I wish you all a very good day out there! Take good care of yourself and remember how a dog is just himself, not thinking about what other people will think or say.

Just be.

Let it be.

Eva

One of the days, mothers and daughters

...when I miss my daughter. I know, she and I really agreed that friends is number one on a sunny hot day and you are 10 years and there's school holidays. And best of all is to have the chance to stay over night and giggle and laugh and sleep late. I'm happy of all my heart to see her jump for joy to go see her best friends.
But tomorrow our roads will go to different places, and then comes this period of 2 weeks without each other. That's about the longest time I don't see her. And just recently she was away on another journey.

In short time she will be old enough to prio her friends all the time. That's the way it goes, and should be.

I want to share with you a lovely book. It happened that I came across a pocket book by chance, and it was really a good summer reading. Uplifting. Encouraging.

About mothers and daughters. A bit of an insight in the living and thinking in the island Tahiti. And especially for me in theese days of missing my dear daughter, how to let one's daughter go her own way.



Original title: Frangipani.
Written by Célestine Hitiura Vaite, 2004

Title in swedish translation: I kloka kvinnors sällskap

I'll save all our moments in my heart. My daughter, now also our little dog, us together. How happy my daughter is when she's hugging our dog.


The dog has been having trouble with food lately. Sensitive little thing, poor little wee thing in the hot sunny summer days. Not really keeping food and water that well. Went to the vet today and bought really expensiv diet care food, for the sensitive. And some micro bio treatment, equally expensive. Anyway, it feels good to be proactive, before something worse might occur.

Something I found at Jonssons Fik och butik in Enviken.
 Perfume: Shanghai Rose, lime zest.
And green glass in different shades. I had a dream just after moving to this apartment that I found the most lovely green glass items in a second hand store.

I'm even dreaming about second hand shopping :-)

Long live the culture of high quality stuff and re-cykling!

Next concert is tomorrow in Sölvesborg, together with my song-sisters in Irmelin!
I love you!
Eva

My Herräng. According to Leo, small dog.

I'm Leo, 11 month old dog. Small size, big heart. And I've just been to my first Herräng Dance Camp.
I've met so many dancers here, and they all talk in many different languages to me. But lucky, I read them on their body langage and I quickly learned how friendly people in Herräng are. I met many dogs too. It was so much fun!

This is what it looks like most of the time.

It's cool with so many people from all over the world. I feel at home here.

They dance here to celebrate the new road in Herräng: Frankie Mannings road. To Frankie's favourite song, Shiny Stockings. And then everybody did the Shim Sham that they learned from Frankie.

Where did everybody go? Oh, it's the gathering at Folkets Hus.

After all, I need to have my sleep. I'm still a youngster, and I love to sleep. It can be quite intense with all the new people around.

First 10 minutes in the tent on the first evening I was trying to dig myself out of the tent. But then I found out it's such a good little home. Even if there's rock n roll music just outside, I sleep so sweet. The more rock n roll, the better!

The only thing I didn't like in Herräng was when my owner was doing vintage shopping. Why must she go vintage shopping all the time? It's much, much better around the Ice Cream Parlour. I can't imagine any better place to be. People have their ice creams, bananabreads, sandwiches and all good things and they sometimes drop bits and pieces on the ground. I think I'm doing a good job, just cleaning and keep the ground nice.

Ruff ruff!

Leo

Soon off to Herräng!

Soon, very soon, we're off to Herräng. I will not post bloggs frequently from now but totally disappear into the world of dance. My time will for the next week be from midnight til morning. Happily my daugther got a spot at the swing kids course this week, she's so much looking forward to this! Swing kids are like a camp of it's own and I will not be needed there daytime as a parent.



So at daytime I will sleep, hang out on the Herräng beach, meditate about summer and let my subconsious work on preparations for the concert with Bengt Hallberg wich is coming closer. Yes, I've brought my song book to keep the lyrics close at heart, for this special occasion.




It will be Leo's first Herräng, our little dog. He's a young one and I have good hope he will charm people around us. He's learning so quickly, like youngsters, and he will fall into the rythm. If you have any experiences you would like to share about how to camp in tent with a dog, I'm eager to hear!

Stay well everybody! Let the summer take over, and nothing can stop the international openminded crazy creative Herräng spirit!

Eva