White

Today, a lovely comment from my sweet blog-friend from JARDIN ANGLAIS reminded me how much I neglected this blog. So here I am ! I am fine, and so it is my whole family. Did I say we already celebrated two birthdays this year ? My youngest doughter turned 12 and I turned 40. She is growing, while I experienced some kind of regression, I probably mixed up forty with fourteen. So in the last month I spent so much time drawing, listening to music, writing and spending time outside. I am dreaming of a long series of teenage-like things I want to do. I wonder if this is just normal once you become middle-aged. I mean, I don't need to prove anything anymore, I don't need to compete, I don't need to behave. It's kinda fun, even if few of your children might think you've gone nuts ...
So what about the odd title of this post ? Wait and see, white is the perfect word in this moment ...

Have a wonderful week, and a great new month <3

Love, Flavia

Following the light

In the past five or six years I got more and more interested in the natural world. I started my journey thanks to Clare Walker Leslie and her beautiful guides to nature journaling and observation. Since then, I kept many nature journals and nature studies, and when we moved here in Finland my interest was especially drawn to how the light (or the lack of it ) impact the natural life, and which are the signs that the outdoors gives us to hint snow, or rain or especially low temperatures. So far I learnt a lot, but so much it is still out there to observe and understand. In the last couple of weeks Finland experienced very low temperatures, friday was the coldest day for us, with -29 here in the south. The amazing side of these freezing days is that usually they are bright and sunny with clear blue sky. So one day I had some fun litterally following the sun during the day, taking pictures every once in a while from the same window. If you wonder why all this excitement about the sun, here some facts: at the solstice, one month ago, the sun was rising at 9:23 and setting at 15:07 ( we had 5 hours and 44 minutes of daylight ), today the sun has risen at 8:49 and the sun will set at 16:10 so 7 hours and 22 minutes of daylight, almost two hours more in less than a month. This has a terrific impact on every living being's life. Birds wake up earlier, and humans wake up easier and feel less tired and in general the energy level increase so much. Life begins anew somehow. But here my four more significant pictures, showing the path of our star.

  Taken at 1:10 pm

 Taken at 1:30 pm

 Taken at 2:51pm

Taken at 3:42 pm

The Creation is amazing, the nature is such a great gift and teacher. If we could only live in armony with it, and with each other, our world would be such a beautiful place to be.

Have a great week !

Morning frost

This is a very strange season. Somehow out of pace. Calendar says december, Christmas, winter solstice, but the sky whisper maybe autumn... we still have mostly plus temperatures and rain. The annoying grey foggy rain you'd expect from an autumn day. Almost everybody I meet ( ok not so many people since my life here is quite secluded ) is desperately waiting for snow and we make no exception. After the glorious one-day-of-snow it all melted away and it has been dark and muddy ever since. So, few mornings ago, once the light finally made its appearence and showed the world, I was very happy to notice the thin layer of glittering white cover the reality and I had to grab my camera and capture some of that beauty.

Few details from today:

sunrise at 9:21

sunset at 15:06

hours of light : 5 hours 45 minutes

Have a lovely weekend !

First snow

Tonight the magic happened again. The water turned into snow and sugar coated the world. May the miracle of snow bring peace to our lives, as we slow down our pace to wonder, nose up to the sky, if the white falling might really be the feathers of angel's wings, as we used to believe as children....

Have a peaceful and happy sunday dear ones !

Be-Longing

One of my sons love old movies. You know those classic italian movies, those that made the history of italian movie making itself. I've never been a great fan of these kind of things, but now we spend a lot of our evenings just watching one of these black and white productions ( btw many thanks to my brother in law, who sent us few more movies to add to our collection ). Being in a rather emotional mood lately, these movies trigger always all kind of feelings. The word that crosses my mind more often in my thoughts is belonging. Yep. I realized that I long to belong. For many different reasons, for my past experiences, for the path I have followed in my life, I've very often felt the sting of loneliness. And the feeling of being 'scattered'. I try to stretch in every possible direction, doing everything doable in order to find my right cozy spot in this universe and life. And I just came to realize that I have become a real control freak lately. I can forgive others 'mistakes' but I can't forgive mine, because each of them makes me feel like it's just because of it that my longing to belong can't be fullfilled. Anyway, those old movies make me long and cry for those time in which life was simpler. Simpler, not easier, I'm not that naive. Simpler, made of few smaller things but real life interactions. Evening spent with family and friends laughing and talking. Visiting for no reason, without the need of calling in advance or texting. Children and grown ups from different generations sharing life together and creating everlasting bonds. Oh my oh my too much thinking and controlling and longing and ... just need to relax and give up and let be and let flow ...a few pics from this morning frost ...

Gifts from the forest

As much as I feel I don't fit finnish society at all, I truly and deeply enjoy the wild nature and the strong connection that here human beings have with it.
Here almost everybody grows vegetables ( those who live in the cities usually have family country houses ) and picking berries and mushrooms is the 'national sport' during the summer and the early autumn. In the four year I have been living here I have learned a lot about wild berries, something that was totally unknown to me, as I grew up in Rome to move later in my life little south from Rome. No forest of course, eventually something more similar to the desert :).
So here I am, to show you the bountiful harvest we had this year from the generous forest, I'd say in total we picked something like 12kg of berries in different day\places.

I already talked about strawberries. I can't really say how many we picked, but for a month we ate plenty of them every single day and still we have a frozen bag for smoothies and such.

 

Blueberries ...

 

Red currant, 1,5 kg ! and black currant (unfortunately no picture of it ) 500gr

 

Cherries, two kilos !

 

again blueberries ( I didn't check the weight )

 

Gooseberries, red and white 5kg !!!

Amazing isn't it ? I feel grateful and provided for. And the beauty of it all it's incredible !

Such a huge blessing !

In the next days I will show the use I have done with my beloved berries.

Have a nice week!

Happy Midsummer

Today it's officially summer. Here in Finland it doesn't look like summer at all. But still let's hope to have a good one :)

Not only a word

I've been silent for a few days, but for a very good reason : for the first time in almost four years we had guests from Italy. Truth to be told my mother usually comes once a year, but beside her we never had the pleasure to have relatives here. So when one of my brothers in law told us that him and his wife were coming here to visit us, well excitement and joy grew and grew until last friday when they arrived. It has been a short but joyful and emotional time together (they left yesterday's very early morning ). Something very new for all of us and especially important for my children, our rather lonely situation here put a very heavy toll on them and feeling loved and cherished from someone else other than me was very needed indeed. I come from a very small family, only child of a single mother. I know loneliness very well, I know the feeling of craving for attentions very well, and knowing that my children experience the same feeling is rather heartbreaking. I know, they're five and we try to be very close to each other, but as they say 'you need a village to grow a child' and we always missed our tribe. The few days spent together gave us a glimpse of what it looks like not being alone, and it is beautiful. All of us feared the farewell, but incredibly we don't feel really sad, the love and joy we shared filled us and knowing that FAMILY it's not only a word gave us strenght.

 

 Dear friends, now please, go and hug your spouse, your children or grab the phone and give your old folks a call.

 Family it's not just a word.

Makes me happy

Today I'm here to share something that makes me so happy. As someone who read this blog or follow me on Instagram, you might have noticed the slight obsession that I have developed in the latest months about up\recycling, and lately, about my newest passion: baskets ! Yep, few weeks ago I started just for fun to make baskets out of old clothes striped down ( by me )  and hand sewn and I loved it. I find it so creative and relaxing and the idea that something so beautiful comes out from old items destined to the trash, well makes me feel so good at so many different levels. Back to the point. Few weeks ago I had the chance to visit this lovely shop here in Loviisa '' Krinti ''. I immediately loved it. It features only very high quality and high standard items, going from wool to espresso machines, from vintage to handmade, everything from local artists\artisans. Usually I am quite shy when it comes to talk about what I do, but something there made me feel at ease to just ask if it would be possible to bring few of my creations to see if something could fit the lovely atmosphere. Long story short, my baskets now are happily waiting for a new home from their spot in Krinti !!!! I'm so thrilled and excited about this collaboration. I'm so happy and excited that finally my creativity is finding its very personal way of expression. Litterally I let my hands and my soul do all the job while my mind just rests and I love the results ! Here few pictures I took today when I brought few more items to sell.

I'm really really happy.

This gonna be a great summer !

Feelings and flowers ...

It's a strange and weird period for me. I have so many mixed feelings everyday and sometime it's quite hard to cope with them. So many horrible things are happening in this world. Anger and violence and carelessness. My growing children ( how long will i dare to call them still children ? ) noticing and asking why and pondering and becoming the grown ups of tomorrow and i'm so afraid for the terrible example we are giving them. I try to pass them a message of peace, of love, of faith and joy, but it gets harder and harder and i feel so lonley in the task. I feel like everywhere anger has become the 'new joy'. Like everybody is looking for the right reason to let it all out ... but where 'all' comes from ? Are my own children growing such a 'all' themselves and one day they will let it out ? And in the middle of these thoughts my own lonliness stabs me with its sharp pain. It has been almost four year since we moved here and I don't have not even a friend. Nobody to talk with. No number in my phone ( beside close family ) to call. I keep telling me that if we've been lead here there must be a reason, but .... if there was a reason not to move here and we simply weren't listening ? What a hard moment. Yesterday as every sunday evening I was listening to my doughter radio program and when it finished my husband started playing italian music. I started to sing along and all of a sudden I remembered of so many nights spent chatting and laughing and singing old songs with friends... and the pain was back ... where is my village ? Where is my tribe ? .... Ah sorry for this rant, but it has been sitting heavily on my heart for a long time now ... but still I try to focus on good, and do good and be good and set a good example for my younger loved ones ... so here I am facing the sun and smiling at it and snapping few shots in the garden, finally showing us that spring is coming. Hopefully spring will come in my heart too...