I may have found the perfect solution (New Blog! http://nordiccabin.blogspot.com/)

As some of you know, my blog has been broken for a long time now. It continues to vanish at will from the reading list and as you might have noticed, my images have started to disappear. 

I have tried other blogging platforms, I have tried all the helpful tips given to me in the super supportive forums, I have tried editing all kinds of confusing computer-y things, but to no avail. 

It's hard to continue writing a blog when your work does not reach your audience. I have never minded about viewer-count or anything of the sort, but I have always had a large group of return-readers and it's so sad that they have lost their way to my blog through an internal fault. We became good friends over the years and losing contact is always difficult to bear. 

The solution came to me the other day. Why not just recreate this blog under the same name, same profile, same everything-but-url? So I tried it and happily, the username was not yet taken! 

So here it is: http://nordiccabin.blogspot.com/ -click me - I may be slow to post while I work on my new content, but for now it seems to work. I'm excited to be able to use this same platform that I'm familiar with and not have to worry about learning lots of new computer-y stuff. (with the exception of google+ which I just cannot work out). 

I do hope that you will follow me there and that the little nordic cabin can get back to normal as soon as possible. Please help me out by letting people know that the cabin is still standing and that they can find me in there at it's new address! 

Flying Away

I'm sorry for neglecting you all, my darlings. I'll have plenty of stories to tell you very soon because I'm leaving my little English house for California tomorrow morning! I'm going there for my very first time and I just cannot tell you how excited I am! 

We're going to have to change from our warm little Nordic snuggle sessions while I'm away! But don't worry, I'll be hunting for any signs of Nordic life while I'm away and will give you sneaky tips on how to find it :)

I've missed you all so dearly, please tell me all about how you are doing ♥

Natural Day - Thursday 13th February 2014

I have been lucky enough to chat with Sanah Jivani these last few days and to hear all about her wonderful movement. Please take a minute to watch this inspiring video and please join us tomorrow on Natural Day. Even if you just post a quick tweet with the above hashtag, it'll help to get Natural Day trending. 

Two Thousand and Fourteen

Happy New Year my dears. Was it sparkly and amazing? 

I spent it here:

Doing this:

And playing with this little cutie:

… who taught me the Swedish word for "snowflakes" and pulled me up on all of my bad pronunciation. The worlds teeniest teacher. 

I'm now safely back in Umeå, where the snow is hiding and it's raining every day. Soon it will be time to move here for real and I'll be posting from my new, real-life Nordic Cabin ♥

St. Lucia

Today is St. Lucia day in Sweden. You can see a short video of the celebrations below:

Girls in white gowns carry candles sing beautiful songs and walk slowly down the isle of the church, a procession headed by a girl wearing a crown of candles. I saw my first St. Lucia celebration in my first year of university, when my department put on a mini version in London. Now it makes me feel ever-so christmassy, and with just 12 days to go, it marks the perfect start to a christmas count-down. 

The day is in celebration of Saint Lucy, or Santa Lucia. Saint days are not very common in Scandinavia and I think that might be why this one is so special. St Lucia day has links to pagan beliefs and as you can imagine, in the cold mid-winter of the Nordic region, a celebration of lights would have been very important. 

What do you think? Is this an important day where you are? We don't celebrate anything in England on this day, but I really like watching the Swedish celebrations. You can find a lot more videos by searching 'st. lucia sweden' on youtube. Some of the singers are really stunning! 

NaNoWriMo Update

Oh hi, let me just crawl out of my NaNo cave for a bit and let you know I'm still alive. 

I literally cannot fathom how you people do this. I know that some of you are hardcore-every-single-year NaNo writers and I am very impressed now that I'm experiencing all of this for myself. 

How is your writing going? Are you meeting your deadlines? 

I'm behind on the word count, but I think I've got it under control. I was wondering today how you guys like to structure your writing. This doesn't necessarily only apply to NaNoWriMo, but any kind of writing really. I assumed I would write in order, from start to finish. It seemed so logical, given the time restraint and the daily word targets. I even had Björn use his newly acquired programming skills to program a little calendar for me with the daily word count, so that I could write it all in one document and not have to do the maths. How naive I was! 

Instead I've been writing in a kind of strange, illogical manner. You see, the story I'm writing has been in my mind for the longest time. I dream about it and I think about it and I imagine my characters and I work out all the little details when I'm in yoga class or wandering about outside. So I've been finding pictures that resemble the story in my head and writing mini stories based on those, that I plan to eventually knit together into a more coherent narrative. It's very much like the writing prompts I used to post here. (Would you like to see more of those, by the way? I have lots of images stored up and ready to have the crap written out of ;) 

How do you guys like to write? Are you strict with yourself when it comes to order and coherence, or do you just let it all flow out of your mind as it materialises? 

Good luck to you, we're nearly halfway there! 

I'll eat you up, I love you so

I'm sure you all know by now about my guilty pleasure of Where the Wild Things Are and everything to do with it, so I was very excited when I stumbled across these amazing book covers based on beloved children's books:

C L I C K M E !

We often say "don't judge a book by it's cover", but be honest with me, how many of you truly adhere to that advice when it comes to the literal reading of a book? Certainly not me, I'm so in love with the illustrated covers of books, especially those of children's books. I'm quite sure you'll agree, then, that these are very special prints. 

They'd make very sweet pictures for a nursery wall, children's bedroom, particularly when hung above your child's bookcase. I remember once looking after a little girl named Sophie who had a bookcase that towered above her bed. On it was every single children's book you could possibly even dream of. I used to spend hours pouring over them with her sitting in my lap, helping her learn to read. One of my happiest memories is of her reading me Green Eggs and Ham (a personal favourite of ours) after I'd been away from her for a little while, leaving her to learn to read fluently and with the most beautiful expression. 

Which of these prints do you like best? Can you spot the Swedish book amongst the titles? 

Another Give Away!

This week, a facebook page I've been collaborating on has been hosting a give away, featuring one of my necklaces. The give away ends tomorrow evening, so there is still time to enter if you'd like the chance to win a pretty handmade necklace! 

I will be giving away a Nordic themed necklace on this blog very soon, so watch out for that! 

Here's the link for my current give away. As always, you may enter on behalf of a friend if you'd like to gift the necklace to someone. I'll be emailing the winner tomorrow, so we can discuss any arrangements, special messages etc :)

And we're back!

I am so happy right now! It was so lovely to open up my blog just now and see the lovely comments from the bloggers I have missed! 

I have lots and lots to tell you but for now I will tell you this:

I am doing NaNoWriMo this November and I'm petrified! My username is 'little nordic cabin' so come and say hello if you're taking part too! 

Can't wait to come back to you all with lots of cosy Nordic stories ★

If you see this in your list...

...please tell me! 

I might have fixed it! Please just leave a comment, letting me know I'm appearing again!

Tumblr + Why is my blog still broken :'(

Hej Hej, 

I'm trying my best to get this blog back up and running but I just don't understand the problem. I don't know why I don't appear in anyones dashboard and I don't know how to fix it. I'm going to email and post in forums and beg for help, so fingers crossed this blog will make a comeback. 

I've just set up a tumblr for this blog, so those of you who use tumblr can now find me at thelittlenordiccabin.tumblr.com, where I'll be posting pictures and all kinds of Nordic things I find around the web. 

Please do a ritual dance for the blog-gods to make my blog work again! 

★

C L I C K M E !

Oh Land and Updates

Hey everyone! 

It's been ever such a long time again, hasn't it? How have you all been? What have you been doing? I miss your updates! 

I have been a very busy bee, working with my new project, The International Feminist Book Club as well as becoming an admin on the group Females of the World, an online collection of art, photography and writing from around the world, contributed to us by our followers. We're hosting our first giveaway over there shortly, so if this group sounds interesting to you, pop along and see what we're all about! https://www.facebook.com/femalesoftheworld

Oh Land, a Danish singer whom I love, has just released her new album, Wishbone. She sings in English and you can see her singing and dancing here:

I'm planning to return here soon with lots of new posts. I'll be starting up my Sunday Writing Prompts again, as well as lots of Nordic loveliness including recipes, music, literature and more! 

Love to you all, 

Nikki x

Memories of Oslo

Arriving in Oslo only 2 weeks after the tragedy that occurred on Utøya, we often sought comfort and reassurance in the beautiful landscape. Following the terrorist attack was a harsh and dark winter. Finding beauty in the wake of devastation is challenging, but Oslo has so much to offer: glittering snow in the few hours of sunlight each day, islands that transport you to a fantasy world, and breath-taking views of the fjords and the ocean are among the many treasures that surround Oslo and its inhabitants. The strength of the Norwegian people is even more inspiring than the landscape, and the combination of beauty and strength within the country grew more and more striking with each passing season.

Calling all aspiring writers!

I'm currently working with a group called Females of the World. We're looking for writers who are interested in submitting a short piece of writing to use in our online projects. It can be anything from a poem to a short story to a journalistic article. We'd love to hear from you! This is a great opportunity to brave a growing audience with a piece of your work! Any experience is good experience, right? :)

GET IN TOUCH! https://www.facebook.com/femalesoftheworld

My Little Swedish Adventure: Part 3

What a fiasco! I actually got here yesterday afternoon but have been occupied by the fact that my airline left my bag in London!

So I am at Björn's house, bagless, and waiting for the phone to ring so I can get it delivered to me. Fingers crossed it's at least in Sweden now!

So it will be phone-blogging until then, since I packed my laptop charger amongst everything else useful in my infinite wisdom ;)

My Little Swedish Adventure: Part 2

Let us begin with a tip. Do not think you can wing not charging your phone before a long journey. Such things cannot be, um, wung.

It's 5am and I'm sitting in a little cafe in Gatwick, finally charging my phone and filling up with a delicious breakfast. I've slept maybe 2 hours in total, sharing a bench with a snoring Spaniard. Happily I made friends with a Norwegian lady and got to practice my Norwegian!

Now it's time to wait for my plane. And perhaps a teeny bit more shopping!

Oh! Last night we drove along a beautiful harbour which was sparkling in the most perfect sunset. I'll see if i can upload pictures here :)

My Little Swedish Adventure: Part 1

Can you believe how hot our little country is, fellow Brits?

Part 1 of my overnight journey to Sweden sees me melting on the coach as we crawl down the motorway.

Three things are making me smile:

1. My business cards arrived, just in the nick (the nikki) of time!

2. It's a beautiful, sunny evening,

3. The bus driver has cranked up the air-con: a gesture I could, quite frankly, kiss him for!

How are you all this evening, my sweaty darlings? I'm blogging from my phone so apologies for the format. Also, it seems i'm not appearing in your feeds again, so am possibly talking to myself. Sad face.

Summer Days

Good evening my dears, how was your Monday? I hope you didn't all have to crawl back into yucky warm offices today when it was so beautiful and sunny outside! 

England was very hot and sunny this weekend. I was home alone for much of it and spent many hours out in the sunshine, eating little treats and reading What Katy Did. Don't you just love quaint, oldish literature? 

Just perfect. 

Tomorrow night I'm going to the airport. I fly to Sweden early on Wednesday morning so I have to have a little sleepover there until I can check in at 4am. It's terribly exciting to spend the night with happy people waiting for their holidays. I hope I will be able to update you on my little adventure as I did before! I most certainly will be blogging from Sweden! 

Have a wonderful week everybody! If you're not gobbling up some nice, cool ice cream then go get some right now! 

the little nordic cabin

x

Tea Party for One

Having recently moved out of a shared flat, I'm really enjoying some time on my own. Sometimes it's nice to take a book out into the sunshine and enjoy some peace and quiet. Reading is good for the soul, after all, and it's so important to treat ourselves once in a while. 

Why not find yourself a beautiful place to take a peaceful walk? I love walking in the woods and through fields of wild flowers. 

Time to settle down with some treats! It doesn't get more British than tea and fruitcake! Can you hear the birds chirping? Does the grass feel funny, tickling your toes?

Watch out for these sneaky ones! They like to steal bits of cake when you're not looking!

Do you enjoy spending time on your own? Have you picked your summer reads? I'm currently reading The Memoirs of Cleopatra by Margaret George. I highly recommend it if you enjoy historic novels.

the little nordic cabin

x

@nordiccabin

help yourself to my pics, just be sure to link back to me :)

A Perfect Weekend

Clockwise from top-left:

1. My baby brother blowing out his candles on his 8th birthday last Friday. Doesn't time fly! I remember holding him moments after he was born and kissing his tiny, wrinkled face!

2. The beautiful sky that I spied out of the window of my coach to London. 

3. Drinks with friends at the Fullham Wine Rooms.

4. The wine came from these vending machines. You put a prepaid card and selected your wine. Neat, right?

1. Celebrating my results and my best friend's birthday with healthy snacks and champagne!

2. Bryony and I. 

3. A wonderful evening wine-tasting and chatting. 

4. Zara-sale! I love these bright trousers and of course, how could I resist a snuggly jumper?!

One final picture...

Smile! It was Bryony's birthday. We've been friends since we were 15 and she was one of the lovely girls who helped me through my difficult times. It was so lovely to spend the weekend with her, especially now that I've been feeling brighter ♥ She's an angel! Thank you and happy birthday, beautiful ☆

How was your weekend, my dears? Did you do anything special? HAPPY CANADA DAY to my Canadian readers and to all of you, have a wonderful week ahead!

the little nordic cabin 

x

Coming soon...

I'm on my way. I'll be back here shortly with a whole load of new posts for you guys. I'm so sorry for my absence, I'm going to follow the advice from the Cosmopolitan event I went to (see post below) and try to be open and honest with you about why I've been so flakey with my blog recently. I hope you will understand. 

I hope I can still find all my wonderful friends here. In the meantime, does anyone have any advice on dealing with spam comments? It seems 'anonymous' has been a very busy bee posting all kinds of rubbish all over my blog! 

Miss you so much, my dear readers ♡ 

the little nordic cabin

x