The boyfriend and I have started a new tradition. On Fridays we make fruit salad (preferably containing grapes, kiwis, bananas, pears and oranges) and eat with ice cream and chocolate muffins. And then we eat the remains of the salad with filmjölk (I don't know of any English translation besides sour milk, but I tried what I heard was sour milk once, and it doesn't taste as good as filmjölk. So I guess filmjölk is something similar to sour milk but better) for breakfast on Saturday and Sunday morning. It's the best kind of luxury, one that makes our lives better, one that we can afford, but that's still not an everyday thing. It's perfect.

Tomorrow we're going to Nordiska Akvarellmuseet (the Nordic Watercolour museum) to see the exhibition "Pacific Light. A survey of Californian Watercolour 1908 - 2008" on a Saturday day trip. I've been a fan of David Hockney since early high school and there are some works by him there, and the boyfriend is a fan of art exhibitions in general. I hear the weather's going to be lovely. I can't see how I could possibly be more in love with anyone than I am with my boyfriend right now and I intend to live happily ever after with him. That's all.

So I've started scrapbooking.

At first I was sort of opposed to the whole thing. Not opposed to others doing it of course - it just felt So Not Me. Pages I saw were always in dreadful pastels with photos of babies. They had tons of hearts and stickers with seemingly (to me) random words, and cheesy titles in the most horrible typefaces (and you know how I feel about ugly typefaces!). And everything was so pink and cutesy. I know it's just a matter of taste, and that is my point - the pages I saw were totally not my taste.

And there's another thing, too, that disturbs me about it: the whole industry it has become. Buying three paper flowers in a little bag for ten times more than they are worth; and this ... a _tool_ to put rub-ons on? Who buys such a thing? And the ribbons and buttons that cost about fifteen times more at the very special scrapbooking store than in the regular fabric and yarn store. It just seems so ... over-coordinated, and to be honset - a little less creative than finding and choosing your own materials?

But then I realized that some of the things used in scrapbooking are simply lovely. All the amazing papers there are. As a paper addict, how could I not love them?! And the "using just one or two photos per page to give them more attention" concept - yeah, I get the point. It's more fun to work with one single photo that you really appreciate, than sticking a whole bunch of so-so pictures in an album for the sake of it. And then there's rub-ons too. Oh, I could scrapbook just for the rub-ons. :)

So, I started to feel a bit ... "oh, I wish scrapbooking were more for me and not so much only for mothers who don't work" (what's with that anyways? Hm ... Maybe you have to live in the States to understand how someone could want to stay at home with the dishes and the laundry for the rest of their life, while their husbands are off to interesting jobs? And it seems to be only the women, doing that? Someone American please explain! We don't do that, here), but still couldn't quite get around the feeling that it actually wasn't for me.

And then one day, it suddenly dawned upon me: I don't have to do what "everyone else" does! (Also, by that time it had occured to me that there is no "everybody else" in scrapbooking: if you just dig a little deeper, you'll find amazing gems, for example many who mix scrapbooking with art journaling, which of course is a lot more up my taste). I can just pick the elements that suit me, and do what I want! Hooray! I can do the pink and cutesy stuff if I want to - or I can buy scrapbook papers or rub-ons and use them in my art journals instead. I can do the silly titles if I want to. I can also skip it. Oh, isn't it wonderful? To think it actually took me months to figure this out!

So this is scrapbooking, my take: photos I like, papers I like, no babies, and only very few (if any) ribbons and buttons. :)

Here are some of the pages I find stunning, simply stunning (from the always amazing flickr):
Riley's Journal - Broken Clavicle by coreymoortgat
Habit. by flyingmichelle
Se dire que l'on est heureux by les elucubrations de severine
Emotions-Evasion by studio2mers
Escape by patiscrapbook

And you, do you scrapbook?

Oh, teaching today was so much fun! As you know I haven't been dancing much at all lately, but last weekend, during our instructor's weekend with Henric & Joanna (current lindy hop world champions and very inspiring instructors themselves, it was so good to learn a few of their ideas and ways of teaching!) something started to grow, or melt, in me again. I think I'm looking forward to a summer full of dancing.

This is our intermediate class, working on a routine that Kristian (my dance partner and favorite dancer in the world) and I have put together for our dance club's little show in June. If you want to see the routine, Kristian and I are showing it here. It's just a video someone made so that people could work on it at home, so the quality is bad, but the song is great (On Revival Day by LaVern Baker) :)

Above that, Ingrid, Kristian and Torbjörn are "planning classes" (looks more like fika and relax to me :)) outside in the sun.

I've been wanting to show you some photos of my much loved workplace for ages (but kept forgetting to bring my camera, and when I remembered it I was always so busy at work that wouldn't use it). I finally got around to taking some a while ago, but then I forgot to post them ... Now I have only three weeks left there, since I won't be living here on weekdays come autumn, but here they are anyways ...

I have to tell you I'll really miss that place. It's been the best part time job ever, going there every Thursday afternoon, answering some questions, putting back some books, sending books to other libraries, everything calm and quiet and - well, only a library lover would understand, I think. It's been the best, but autumn will bring other good things.

In other news: Summer holiday!!! Yes, it's true, it's finally here. I have THREE MONTHS of complete nothingness in front of me and I could not have been happier. I have some much time to be creative! Any inspirations or ideas you want to share?

Here are some photos from the past two weeks ... I know - I've been gone for too long. It's been a lot to think about - and, of course, do - lately. But well, I got some news ...

I'm taking a year off from the Academy of Music to go to art school.

Can't even tell you how good it feels. It's so the right thing to do at this point in my life. Nothing fancy, it's a very basic education, sort of like an art school for beginners, the basics in drawing, acrylics, oil painting, ceramics, screenprinting ... I can't wait.

You have read how I've been feeling about music and my musicality as of late and I guess it hasn't been fun reading. People are asking me if I don't want to be a singing teacher anymore, if I don't want to sing anymore, if I'm dropping out. The answer is No! I'm definitely not dropping out. Music is still I want to do with my life. I'm only taking a year off and my reason for doing so is that I long for the joy in music to return. If I don't have to sing, I believe I will want to, again.

I'm ridiculously tired, haven't been sleeping well for some weeks, and still have many things left on my to do-list (such as clean up the mess at home, which has been growing for a while). But I've started a new art journal which I like so much it makes me happy to even think about it. It will take me through these last few weeks at school and then it's finally summer.