Wednesday, November 2, 2016

Visby


After 6 beautiful years I left the island I once called "the first place that really feels like home".

It took me 10 days to go through everything I own, sell or donate what I didn't want to keep, pack & send what I wanted to take with me, and store the things I'd need to collect later.

Leaving Gotland wasn't a hard decision to make. I knew I had to.

Saying goodbye to the people who have been closest to me during those 6 years was great fun,
shaking it on numerous dance floors in celebration of the time we shared.

The closer to D-day I came the more emotional I got ... but the plane left with me on it nonetheless :)

That was 2 weeks ago and I'm proud to report that I'm starting to find my way around my new city.
Brussels will be my home until the end of the year and my time here will mainly be spent doing fun things.

I'll be hanging out with family and friends, 
I'll be exploring & wandering the streets looking for inspiration 
(taking a lot of stops in various coffeeshops), 
I'll be doing a whole lot of yoga in preparation for my teacher training in January, 
and basically allowing myself all the time I need to close my last chapter before starting a new one.

Just like how I always need time to sort my impressions when I come back from a trip
I've been going through pictures,
I've been writing, 
I've been sitting in silence ... thinking, reflecting.

And when I've given everything a place in my heart,
I'll make more plans!


Saturday, July 2, 2016

My summer retreat



"When you love what you do, work feels like a holiday every day."

For me that is definitely true this summer. 
The next 3 months I will be holidaying at Orion B&B which happens to be my mother's little corner of paradise.

Besides enjoying the magnificent garden and pool, chilling in one of the hammocks and stopping to smell the flowers, I'll be welcoming guests, cleaning the ecological swimming pool, and doing just about all other imaginable things that are necessary when having guests :)

Serving breakfast is my favourite thing.

The wealth of wisdom people share with each other while sharing a meal sitting around the same big table is truly incredible.
Friendships are built, sightseeing tips are exchanged, dinner plans are made together, conversations get deeper with every day that passes ...

Whether I'm actively participating or listening in while serving coffee I'm both inspired and touched.
 There's something immensely beautiful about a bunch of random human beings coexisting peacefully and happily in the same garden.




Thursday, June 16, 2016

How to organise events as a small business owner



I really like to organise events.
I don't even think I knew this about myself until I gave it a try!
It started with some small gatherings at my previous store location (easy), followed by the 1st b-day of our little company at a local café (win-win for both) and it sort of took off after that.

2 weeks ago I organised a salsa evening in combination with a Vii pop-up at Visby Glasblåseri (the glasblowers' workshop here in town).

There was a salsa teacher, bucketloads of nachos and 4 different kinds of salsa.

The mango-cucumber one was by far the most popular so I thought I'd make a few people happy by sharing the recipe (not my own - I found it on Pinterest ;))



As always I dragged some other people into my mess as well :)
My fellow countryman, friend and coffee nerd Jelle from Gute Rosteri came along and served his cold brew, and since I was selling Halfvede's apple juice I sort of forced my friend Sofia from Halfvede Musteri to show up too :)

As always I took a moment to imagine the worst thing (except natural disasters or other complete bad luck) that could happen (for example: no one showing up) and concluded that:
 *in that case we'd still be 6 people, 
and
 *6 people can still have a good time together


In short. Organising events as a small business owner doesn't have to be a huge thing.
Cooperate with others, use social media, share the tasks, trust your own cooking/drink blending skills, realise that the worst that can happen (no one showing up despite your advertising) still means you got word out about your existence and last but not least: enjoy yourself!

Why not today?








Tuesday, June 7, 2016

Picture taking day



Updating the webshop is a real struggle sometimes.
The picture taking is fine ... it's the editing, the uploading and coming up with a description that suddenly make all possible other activities seem so much more inviting.

Today I found out that the secret to less procrastination is flowers!
I took a walk to the local flower shop and came home with these beauties to play with :)

My new dress also got to play along and made a perfect backdrop for Linn Nielsen's necklaces.

Jonatan's wonky vases are finally for sale online, I've got roses all over the apartment and I now gave myself an excuse to buy a new dress and flowers every time there's new stuff to photograph :) 



Monday, May 30, 2016

My relationship with timepieces



I've been a watch person for as long as I can remember.

I remember every single watch I had as if it were a person I share amazing memories with.
I never felt complete without and loved every single one of them fiercely until fate took them away from me ... (I've always wondered if maybe there's a secret place where lost watches go ...)

It started with a colourful flik flak which I got before I could even read the time,
next was a just as colourful sporty & water resistant one (given to me by my lifeguard/diver aunt if I remember correctly) that I would wear on my weekly mermaid sessions in the pool.
In high school I got a Storm watch that looked like a miniature ufo on a strap (for real!) before I moved on to some more Swatch watches (their ultra thin "skin" wristwatch was my favourite).

My Swatch love affair ended when we moved to France and I fell in love with Akteo ... but that relationship didn't stand a chance once I started diving and sported my chunky Suunto dive watch just because it made me feel cool (little did I know ...)

I switched to wood when I bumped into We-Wood in a cute little eco-conscious store in the centre of Bruges, Belgium, and even though I still love that sturdy unisex number I now own two ... as I felt I just "had to" adopt a slightly more elegant Kerbholz since I now sell those myself :)

Seriously, once you make the switch to wood you no longer get why there's a need for watches in other materials! (except for diving maybe - I still love you Suunto!)

If I could (read: if it were socially acceptable) I'd have a watch on both wrists.






 Ready for a new love affair yourself?
Head over to the Vii webshop for inspiration :) 

#whynottoday 
#varförinteidag?

PS: As usual, contact me directly for shipping outside Sweden!

Monday, May 23, 2016

New week - New energy

and a new block of cheese ... as it turns out :)


For those of you reading this not so familiar with Swedish cheese culture, let me start by explaining this:
In most Swedish fridges you won't find sliced cheese.
The cheese block is standard, and so it the cheese slicer.
People unable to slice cheese in a proper way will be made fun of.
Finding a ski slope in the fridge instead of a nicely levelled block of cheese can cause of a lot of frustration.

How strange it may sound, the way cheese must be sliced is an actual topic.
(so is what side of the knäckebröd butter must be spread on, but I'll save that for another time)

I'd like to make the way cheese is stored in the fridge a topic:

Ever since I adopted the cheese block standard I've been annoyed about having to wrap it in plastic and having to re-wrap it after every breakfast since cheesy cling foil gets messy and difficult to reuse.

I made the switch to plastic freezer bags quite quickly. But reusing them for a fresh block of cheese after finishing the old one also didn't seem very appetising ...

Enter Bee's Wrap.



Made with organic cotton, beeswax, organic jojoba oil, and tree resin, Bee's Wrap is washable, reusable and compostable.

Its use obviously goes far beyond cheese. You can use it for pretty much anything. 
Cover a bowl with it, wrap your sandwich or vegetable sticks with it, keep that half lemon fresh, etc.

It smells delicious, looks pretty both in the fridge and on the table and truly is the most amazing product I have in my store for anyone worried about chemicals from plastic leaking into their food or those simply looking to reduce their plastic waste.


PS: It's not recommended to use it for meat. So go vegetarian! 







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Monday, May 16, 2016

Kombucha Dreaming


I'm quite new to the whole Kombucha brewing thing but I'm hooked already!
My neighbour gave me a piece of her Scoby* a few weeks ago and with her recommendations (and those on this funky website) I got going.

It's a bit hard to believe that brewing 2 liters of extra strong tea,
adding 1 dl of organic sugar,
and letting it sit in a big glass jar for 8 to 14 days together with a "*symbiotic colony of bacteria and yeast" (yum!) and about 10-20% starter tea would produce a drink with numerous health benefits ... 

but it's fizzy and tasty and a pretty cool way to transform tea into a refreshing drink for hot days so who's complaining?

So far I've tried brewing kombucha with Joe's tea co's English Breakfast and Løv Organic's Sencha. 
I alternate the two since I've read somewhere that the Scoby needs at least a little black tea to feed on which is maybe why the green tea one was a lot milder in taste ... 
but my guess is as good as yours :p
(do leave a comment if you know something I don't!)

More experiments are very likely to follow!

Gotlanders who want to join me on this kombucha adventure - let me know! 
I also happen to sell both Løv Organic & Joe's Tea so drop me a line if you want some :)




Now we have a sourdough starter and a kombucha culture going, kefir next? 

Why not today? ;)

Friday, May 13, 2016

Mittemot


Going on road trips is by far my most favourite thing to do here on the island.
Taking the bike only gets you so far in one day ... and it so happened that last Sunday was the most perfect day for one of those semi-spontaneous let's jump in the car and see where we end up kind of outings.

This time I sort of knew where I wanted to end up though. We were going East!

Mittemot, (Swedish for "opposite") is a new store opposite the quite well known restaurant & hotel Smakrike only a few meters away from the sea, in Ljugarn, Gotland.
They also happen to be the first store to contact me with the request to sell Ljusbringare* , which obviously made me one happy girl :)


*the awesome little eco-candles of which I'm distributor on Gotland. Contact me for shipping outside Sweden! I can make exceptions for these babies!





Even if you can resist the urge to buy absolutely everything you won't be able to resist the selection of cakes they have across the road.
I had the most delicious lemon tart but I think I probably enjoyed the setting even more :)

Oh Gotland,
you keep on seducing me ... ♥

Tuesday, May 3, 2016

My 2 cents on Collaboration


From the very start our business has been built on collaboration. 
Had we not asked for help from others we wouldn't have gotten anywhere.
We would probably still be dreaming out loud :)

If I could give any advice to aspiring business owners it would be this:
Open up your eyes and mind to the possibilities that working together bring.
As a small business owner you can simply not figure out or do everything by yourself.
Many with more experience are willing to give you their 2 cents. Even on very specific questions.
Just ask!

Sure, you can get burnt. 
We've learned to be careful working together with businesses without a well thought through concept.
When the lines are blurred you might see them get a little too inspired by the products or services you offer.

That said, businesses who have to steal ideas from others won't be much of a match for entrepreneurs who come up with their own in the long run anyway,
and to be honest, working together with others is too much fun not to take the risk.





 Vii collaborates with businesses with similar values.
Concepts may not always overlap on all fronts but as long as you can find common ground you have something to work with.

We wouldn't have been a part of Visby Fashion Weekend had The Body Shop not been looking for a collaboration.

They stand for vegetarian and cruelty free beauty products, we sell (among other things ;)) beautiful handmade leather bracelets.
We are drawn to the organic, the natural and the plastic-free, they choose synthetic materials for their brush bristles as animal materials are out of the question for them. 

Even though their product choices and ours might not always fit together,
The Body Shop's mission is to make a difference in their customers' lives, and there we've found our common ground!

We all make our own choices, as businesses and as customers.
The important thing (for me personally at least) is that there is a thought behind what we choose. 



Saturday, April 9, 2016

Caribbean Inspiration

"Life is lived forward but understood backwards"

That was my mum's reaction to the changes I've had to make in the way I'm running my business.

Something that initially pissed me off and turned my plans upside down actually turned out to be the best thing that could have happened. 

Before we left to Guadeloupe I made the decision to leave the store space I had just moved into a few months earlier.
I left Sweden knowing that everything would be different when I came back.
After my initial anger dissipated all I felt was relief.
I felt relieved and maybe even a little proud that I was strong enough to jump into the unknown in order to get out of a situation where I wasn't allowed to grow.

The anger that had kicked me into action made room for inspiration. 
And what better place to get inspired than the Caribbean!










Sunday, March 27, 2016

Golden Day




 Fårö, Gotland.
Perfection.

Monday, January 25, 2016

Celebrate the little things


This little clip was made a little while a go by some of our friends who came by for cake.
Right now I feel like I have a lot of little things to celebrate so it fits quite nicely with my mood :)
That's my hands wrapping one of our watches in the video :) Check them out here!
Why not today?
#varförinteidag?
;)





Sunday, January 24, 2016

A place to call home



How nice to come home after a day out in the snow,
to open the door and put your suitcase down after a trip abroad,
to have a sofa to crash into after a long day at work.

I wish we lived in a world where everybody could relate to that feeling,
a world where everybody had a place to call home.




How lucky we are ...