Rhododendron park

As Alana suggested in a comment of one post I am showing a place close by us. It's not in walking distance but about 15 minutes by car in Helsinki. It is a rhododendron park, I'm not usually a huge fan of the rhodo, but in a settings like this where the rhodo has plenty of room to grow large and it has good conditions to grow these bushes get truly impressive. Some of the bushes had bloomed already but it seems that the flowers are almost as beautiful on the ground as on the branches.

Amazingly I had never been there before, although I have always lived quite close by it. A friend of our suggested this place for us in facebook and also one blogger I follow had been there just a short while ago. 

Pink sweatshirt

Not sure Likka needed this, but I made it anyhow. I guess it's good for colder summer evenings. On day she can wear a sleeveless top and then when evening comes I can just dress the sweatshirt on her. I have had the pink fabric for quite some time. I am bit surprised I decided to make the sweatshirt for Likka from that fabric. In theory I dislike dressing girls to pink (and boys to blue). But it is not the colour I actually dislike. I dislike that girls are only dressed as princesses and boys as superheros. I really don't mind the occasional soft pink dress on Likka if it fits the occasion, but for everyday, that is not my cup of tea. But I think this sweatshirt in hot pink and with the dark blue accents and the stripy lining makes the shirt look very perky and bold. It's not too girly.

Anyway... I love how it turned out. Not only does it look really good in my opinion but I love that I was able to make it look so professional, I'm really proud of it. I finally figured out how to use the double needle and used it on the hem of the shirt. Also the rib knit on the hood is perfectly stretched. There were so many details on the shirt which made me learn new sewing techniques and I think I was able to learn them well. I'm happy I made this, it makes me proud.

Pattern from Ottobre magazine 1/2013 page 12 in size 74 cm

Before and after: True minimalism

We used to have a dining table in our kitchen, but we sold it. The kitchen feels so big, fresh and open to new which makes me feel good. I've been sitting on the floor of the kitchen and just admiring the openness. 

But really, that is not how it's going to stay. We are not true minimalists. We are getting a table. My sister is moving together with her boyfriend and she has a very nice old table and chairs which do not fit into their apartment at the moment. So we have agreed to store the table until they do have space for it. And therefore we sold the old kitchen table which was nothing fancy and my sister's table is much nicer. The table we had sold much faster than we thought and now for a while we are going without a table. We do have a dining table in the living room, although it is bit of a hassle to transport all the food and tableware there all the time. Anyway I have found it quite nice still to have the kitchen so empty, it feels refreshing. Now we also had the opportunity clean the floor and the radiator thoroughly.

What's up

The last post I created was three weeks ago, lot has been going on since then. I've visited two countries and have enjoyed the hot summer weather we had here in Finland (now it's cold again). 

So, yes, I have been traveling. First Likka, me, my mom and my sister left for Vienna, Austria where my aunt and her family live. We all, except Likka, have been in Vienna many times before and so we mainly hung out with our relatives and did not spend much time in the city. We went to see my aunt's garden plot and did some gardening work there which was fun. On one day we visited the morning exercise of the Spanish riding school in the city. We went there with Likka, but after waiting in the queue to get the tickets we found out that children under three are not allowed to get in. That was a bummer and I thought that now I was forced to spend two hours outside alone with Likka, but luckily with the ticket you were able to get in and out from the place so I first went in with the ticket while my mom took care of Likka and then we switched and my mom was also able to see the horses.

We returned to the heat of Finland to notice that the cherries had already bloomed, the apples were blooming and the weather was hot and just perfect for sun bathing on the beach. I did manage to get some gardening done on few mornings and then it was time to leave for another trip.

Two friends I've met during maternity leave and their two children, both just over one year old, visited Tallinn. We went with a boat and stayed there for one night. The first day there was beautiful and we enjoyed a lunch on the terrace of a restaurant. Then we headed to a park to drink some wine. Later in the evening the weather got colder and we walked next to our hotel to have some dinner. Next day was totally different than the first, it was cold and rainy and we spent most of the day in cafes, restaurants and in shops. We had a really enjoyable trip.

Cloth diapering 4-8 months

I wrote about our experiences about cloth diapering from the first 4 months of Likka's life. Those experiences were good and we have continued to use cloth diapers on her. We are also still using the cloth diapers on her for the same reasons described in the earlier post. But I wanted to write another post about this subject since we have changed the style of the cloth diapers.

Previously I liked to use a separate cover and diaper insert on Likka. Those were handy because I most of the time was able to use the cover many times and only wash the diaper insert. But once Likka learned to turn from her back to her belly and started to move much more in general too it became quite impossible to dress those diapers on her. Once I got the insert on place she had moved already so that the insert was not where it was supposed to be anymore. It was quite a struggle. 

The set of used diapers I had bought also had all-in-one diapers and pocket diapers and we started to use those. I also bought more of all-in-one diapers later. Now we only use all-in-one diapers and pocket diapers. We have some diapers that are closed with velcro and some with snaps. I prefer velcro. Ever since Likka did learn to turn on her belly it's been a miracle if she stays on her back for even two seconds, for some reason the need of turning is so strong that I cannot keep her on her back, it's just impossible. And closing those snaps while she lies on her belly is really difficult. I have learned to dress those velcro diapers on her even when she lies on her belly. Velcro on the other hand does tangle in the wash and it wears out over time but so far all velcro diapers we have are working fine even after many many washes. And remember that we bought those used.

If I would need to buy all the cloth diapers now I would solely buy pocket diapers with velcro attachment. All-in-one diapers are handy too but those take forever to dry. We have a few all-in-one diapers that have flaps, that can be opened and that way dry faster. But pocket diapers dry even faster, the insert is usually made of bamboo or similar and flat once opened. It takes only a few hours for those to line dry when with the all-in-ones it can take more than 24 hours. We do not have a dryer so this is big issue for us. Sure the pocket diapers do need to be filled before use, but I have not found that to be a problem.

As you may also notice we have placed the diaper changing pad now on the floor of the bath room. That is maybe not the most ergonomic place for diaper changing but whole less stressful. When Likka was about six months she had started to move so much that we actually had to hold her down so she would not fall off from the changing pad. Few more bending down for us beats broken skull of a baby.

Toy basket

So far Likka does not have a huge quantity of toys but enough to over flow a small basket. In no time she will have doubled and tripled the amount of toys she has, even if I personally would not buy any toys for her.

I personally think it's easier to put stuff where it belongs if the stuff fits there well. So I decided to have a bigger basket for Likka's toys. Since it's bigger and therefore heavier to lift I wanted to add wheels under the basket. My dad found wheels from his supplies and I already had the basket. I wanted to make the bottom of the basket sturdier and so I also got a piece of plywood from my dad. I want the basket to be so sturdy that it can hold Likka when she is older (heavier) in case she crawls in it.

The wheels I attached with screws and nuts. I drilled holes through the basket and the plywood and then tightened the screws. The nuts are now inside the basket and bit pointy, not sure if I should cover them somehow.

I did place the lining of the basket inside, which I had done before, and it does cover the nuts a bit, that might not be enough though. Love the basket. If we declutter the items inside once in a while this basket should be large enough for quite some time.

~ ~ ~

You might remember the basket when we were using it as a cradle. Likka had not slept in the cradle for a while and so it was time to let go of it. 

Pest control

We got an invasion of bees the other day to our conservatory. We have no intention of becoming bee keepers and I decided to do something to prevent the bees getting in. I have no idea if the bees wanted to make nest into our conservatory or if they just collected nest material from there or what was their motivation and I don't mind a single bee flying around in there but there were tens in some point and that was bit taunting.

Most of the bees flew in and out from the opening near the ceiling of the conservatory (those places pointed out on the third picture of this post). From those openings also some wasps fly in during summer and the mosquitoes later in the summer and also some birds have flown in from there once in a while and not to mention the biggest pest the squirrel also finds it's way in from those openings.

I invested in stiff mosquito net, I have seen metal ones too but this plastic one is easier to handle. I cut out strips from the net and attached those with a stapler. I like that the net is white, it does not jump out from the white roof beams. The shorter pieces right next to the ceiling are not attached to the ceiling in any way. Because the net is stiff I'm hoping the upper edge does not need any fixing, it is just stretched between the roof laths. In theory a squirrel could be strong enough to break through the net if it's really motivated to get in.

Now I think the only problem is that if some pest does get in (like from the open door) it now does not have many places to get out from. I hope that does not turn out to be a huge problem.