SALAD.

Cantaloupe. Watermelon. Cabbage. New onions. Fresh coriander. Lime juice. Chili. With coconut milk. Salted peanuts. Done!

...AND WHAT TO DO THIS AUTUMN?

THIS perhaps?
Tinker Bell and I are throwing a weekly class all autumn with not just burlesque dance but where we'll create a real group burlesque performance, which our students also will get to perform at an actual venue - and possibly more in the future.

You can get more info of the Shangri-La School of Showgirls via our Facebook page - there are still places left. But do note that in order to sign up you need to hae some kind of stage experience, alternatively have taken burlesque dance classes or one of our introduction courses at some point (or some other burlesque workshop by any of the Burleskinistituutti-teachers).

Picture by Kaylin Idora.

WHAT TO DO THIS SUNDAY?

If in Helsinki, head over to Indietori in Hietalahti! I'm making room in my closet (so I can fill it up again, the circle of life, sort of;  you know) and  will be selling some of my old dresses, shoes and tops together with Year's Since Yesterday's Ina there. Most of it is items you've seen here at some point.

Indietori is Finland's biggest fashion bloggers' second hand market and it also hosts the Fashion & Design Market with 28 designers selling their clothes, bags and accessories, as well as a second hand market for records. The market is part of the three-day Bassline Festival, so there will also be live performers and DJ's at the event.

The market is open from 10-18 on June 30; I will be there from ten until one pm! You can find more info about the event and which bloggers will participate, as well at which designers and brands, here: showroom.indiedays.com/indietori

See you Sunday!  (And, erhm, remember to bring lots of cash  ;)

MIDSUMMER

Three lazy days filled mostly with food (and food and food) lots of people and many cats and dogs. Those kind of days when you don't really know if it is noon or evening, but it doesn't matter.

 Dinner preparations on the jetty. A few seconds after this my iphone took a dive in the Finnish Bay...


(Iphone recovering from it's minutes under water and the quick sweet water dip wash afterwards. I am rather amazed that it actually works normally now. Phew!)

Dag and my brother-in-law(-to-be) going WEEEEEEH!

 Dag were the dogs best friend, well, after dinner at least; the spot under his chair being their favorite.

Matching tracksuits are so last millennium - matching ponchos are The Thing!

(Also, apparently, shaving for a months is also tha thang every time it's summer.)

Forget me nots. My favorite flower when I was small.

The boys got a little wind in the end.

I woke up in the middle of the night to the so called super moon. Quite magic actually. (This is taken around 4:am)

And on Sunday evening just before going home this strange sunny total white-out fog hit us, totally managing to hide out the background from everything, even the big harbor behind the bend.

BUTTERFLY DRESS, APRON

This dress has been hanging around the clothes rack for some time (it's a Trashy Diva day dress from some years back) - lots of the items I have been hard to wear due to nursing, but now that Dag is older I am cutting down on the breast feeding which gives me a lot of my wardrobe back. (Plus it's amazing what you can manage squeeze your boobs out of anyway, come the need.)

But, fine dresses and small children. As all of you know I have a little one at home and so I have also had the question of how I dare to wear my dresses around the house and all it's kiddy-goo?

Well, first of all - cothes are made to be worn and my biggest complaint here seem to be the one that I don't manage to do so; wear all of the items I collect. But second, I'm not totally impractical and vain in the sense that I don't wear my 100e+ dresses that much around the house, unless I am going somewhere or in between destinations. But, when I do, there's a very simple solution: aprons. Which actually have been made to protect our clothes and are also meant to be worn and not just hang in the cupboard (something I realizes at one point when opening up that cupboard). So, up with the hair, on with the apron, and one with the mess!

To demonstrate this is a photo that my camera suitably just happened to snap of an actual totally not-staged kitchen cleaning situation.

SUMMER LEMONADE

I've made summer lemonade!

'A dear child has many names' is a saying over here, and this drink has many names: Louhisaari drink, the Marshal's mead (the marshal being Mannerheim, born in Louhisaari manor), the priest's liquor...

It is a fresh drink with a perhaps slightly peculiar, summery taste that can be hard to place - it is leaf juice, made out of black currant leaves.

The lemonade is very easy to do, made by collecting fresh black currant leaves, rinsing them and then soaking them in water with lemon over night. In some versions you boili the water to pour over the leaves, in others you heat the mix up to boil. In some versions sugar is added right away,  in other's the next day after the leaves have been filtered away, before bottling.

This drink is most often made into mead with a little bit of yeast added and the bottles set to ferment. I made all mine as lemonade this year as some of my bottles went a little over last year and exploded in the fridge, making everything smell like cat piss for weeks. (Bit forget about that and think of fresh leaves and flowers and a summery breeze sipping thos out int the garden instead alright?)

The lemonade is best mixed out with water; sparkling water works very well.

(I made my last batch with some raspberry- and mint leaves in the soak as well, and am most hopefully I am zipping it sitting a chair by the sea right now as you read this; I set this post scheduled as I am still in midsummer mode!)

THE COUNTRY CLOSES DOWN FOR A LITTLE WHILE

Midsummer approaching! Soon I'll be here:

 

 The only time a year when pretty much everything is closed everywhere (expect for that one supemarket in Kamppi I guess, that makes a big deal about actually being open every single day ); people head out to the countryside and the islands to celebrate summer, drink a lot and have bonfires and enjoy the light night (and sadly too, drown. People always drown en masse at midsummer, every year.)

I've spent many of my adult midsummers in the half empty city, as I often had a shift in the harbor. (Except for one midsummer when I was in Bali and another I celebrated on a strange small-boat cruise.) Last year we were in the hospital with the little new born Dag of course, curtains down not knowing weather it was night or day and now, for this year, we'll head out to the archipelago to my parent's summer house over the weekend. Lots of food, hopefully sun, no electricity - and no wifi.


Happy midsummer!

ONE YEAR

It's Dag's first birthday today, my little baby is one year old!

Or; he is not even a baby any longer, but a toddler.

Oh my. Time really does fly.

People always say to cherish those baby moths as they go by so fast. When Dag was a little caterpillar curled up in my lap I was secretly just waiting for him to get bigger; in the beginning I was sort of afraid I'd break him or that he'd die at any moment. But now I see small babies around town and think about how tiny they are and almost start missing the baby stage already. Otherwise it's much greater now , getting better and better- even though Dag was quite receptive as a little baby too it is still so different; it's fun haning out together! 

There is also much talk about how you grow into parenthood and how you worry about being a good enough parent, which always annoyed me. I don't spend too much time philosophizing about my role per se, but it is true that you change in certain ways and also sometimes get guilty thoughts (like, I wish he'd sleep already so I can blog.  And then you feel bad for thinking so. For example :). And I of course feel more securein my role as a mother and a parent day by day; naturally. 

Happy Birthday Dag!