Lucky Charm

A typical lucky Charm for New Year's Eve in Germany is a lucky clover together with a chimney sweeper. Ever since I was a little child this is what people brought as present when they were invited to my parents and when we were invited we gave it to them as a present. Tim and I will be invited to our friends and will celebrate together with them this year.  I wish you a wonderful New Year Celebration and with this Lucky Charm all the best for 2015!!

Happy Holidays!

Merry Christmas to everyone!

I've been in Stockholm with my husband during Christmas and we've just returned so I would like to wish everybody a Merry Christmas, even though it is almost New Years Eve!

I will unpack my bags and get back to you later with some pictures!

Kram,

Isabell

Some pictures from our kitchen

I can't describe how much I love the scent of hyacinths. For me this is a typical smell of Christmas, together with cinnamon and the scent of the fir needles. The old tin you see in the picture is from my grandma from Sweden and is filled with the Christmas cookies I baked.

I also like Amaryllis very much, I have them every year:

One of my newest Christmas decoration is a heart shaped light chain, which is very cosy too and oboe the oven.

And as every year of course a mistle toe:

Christmas 2014

We've bought our Christmas tree yesterday and I just want to show you how it looks like at home at the moment. This year we picked one that is not so tall but has more branches, it will not be easy to enter the door :) Looking forward to decorate the tree tomorrow!

Our Advent candleholder shows that it is only a few days left until Christmas :

I got this little ornament from my mum this year, it will always remind me of a wonderful afternoon together with my parents at Blutenburg castle in 2014:

This is the only German decoration I have during Christmas, this is a typical traditional pattern often used for the traditional costumes in Bavaria and I really like it:

Have a lovely 4th Advent! Tim and I are going to light the last candle on the advent candle holder and after breakfast we will be going to Nuremberg to the Christmas market.

Isabell

Nyblom Kollén

I've been looking for new pillow cases for our bedroom pillows and I found beautiful ones from Nyblom Kollén. My absolute favorite is this one:

Picture Nyblom Kollén

I've already ordered it and I'm looking forward to get it and to prepare our home for Christmas. I'm counting the days… It's only 2 days left until I have one week of vacation. Time for food, time for baking, time for decoration and finally time for my Christmas.

Christmas market Blutenburg castle

I've been at almost every Christmas market in the center of Munich, but this year I found out that there is a Christmas market I haven't even heard of before and which is not so well-known ( which is very good in a big city like Munich). Blutenburg castle is in the Western part of Munich and I will go there this weekend.

Picture: Muenchen.de

Picture: Blutenburg

Have a lovely friday!

Isabell

Lantliv magazine Christmas edition 2014

One of my absolutely favorite magazines is Lantliv and of course their Christmas edition of the magazine. It makes me feel like I was at home in Sweden. But have a look yourself at the pictures below from this magazine and I guess you will understand why I like it so much. I can't help but red green and white is definitely the best mix of colors for Christmas!

Coming home

I had a very long day today with trainings and a lot of talking. Already on my way home I looked forward to coming home and couldn't wait to open the door. I like being at home but especially during Christmas. The lights of the Swedish candle holders are filling the entire room with a warm light and this automatically calms me down, no matter what happened during the day. There is a Swedish proverb : borta bra men hemma bäst (literally: away (is) fine but home (is) best) meaning there is no place like home and I totally agree.

Advent calendar

This morning when I woke up and entered the kitchen I found a little surprise from Tim: an Advent calendar. I took the pictures this morning when it was still dark outside, but I think you can still see the cute details:

Best part definitely Santa Clause :)

Happy first of December!

Isabell

Advent wreath 2014

It is high time to think about this year's advent wreath. I will for sure have the traditional Swedish one with moss, which I will collect together with my family in the forest close to my parent's home at First Advent. This is a tradition since I've been a child. But I also need a second Advent wreath.
These are some inspirations I have for this year.

 A modern style:

picture mad og bolig

 A traditional version

picture fotoagent

 White and green is also very classic and I like it:

Picture: tuinadvies

I'll show you some pictures on sunday.

Kram,
Isabell

Vanillekipferl- Vanilla Christmas cookies

Since I was a child my Mum has baked Christmas cookies. "Vanillekipferl" is my favorite, that is a vanilla/hazelnut dough that are crescent shaped. I've baked these this weekend as these are also Tim's favorite biscuits:

Ingredients

· 260 gr flour

· 1 pinch of backing powder

· 125 gr sugar

· 2 sachets of vanilla sugar

· 3 egg yolks

· 200 gr butter

· 125 gr ground hazelnuts



· Powdered sugar

· 2 sachets of vanilla sugar

Preparation


Mix the butter with the sugar, the flour, the egg yolks and the ground hazelnut, add the backing powder. Work the ingredients until a smooth, homogeneous dough is obtained. Let it rest in a cool place for 1-2 hours.

Form crescent and put them on a backing plate, bake for approx. 5 Minutes at 200°C , let them cool a little but not too much. Mix the powdered sugar and the vanilla sugar and turn them in the sugar mix.

Let them cool down before keeping them into a cookie jar.

Christmas magazines

Since a couple of weeks I have already been in a Christmas mood. ( Mostly this feeling already starts end of August while others are still enjoying the last sunshine of summer, I simply LOVE Christmas) The first sign of Christmas for me is when the home decoration magazines start to sell their Christmas edition. I can spend hours scrolling though these and getting inspiration how to decorate. I often read them on a sunday afternoon with a cup of coffee and just some time for me. I like the magazine Living at home for example:

picture: living at home

picture: living at home

picture: living at home

picture: living at home

Sweets for Advent calendar

Today I've already bought the first sweets for the advent calendar. I felt like a child again when buying these because I often stood in front of this little chocolate store with it's colorful papers and decoration in the window when I was a child. It has the biggest selection of chocolates and you can get 1 of each which is perfect for the calendar:

Picture: Merkur Online

Rice pudding ready to give-away

Each year I'm inviting my family to a pre Christmas dinner, mostly around the 6th of december. And every year I've had a small present for them standing close to the place card. This year it will be something different to chocolate or gingerbread. I found this rice pudding from a company called Michelsen and I decided that it's going this year's present the moment I saw it:

Picture: michelsen-versand.de

Kram,

Isabell

Old tins

This tin is very old and once certainly contained gingerbreads before I found it on a fleamarket in Munich. It is my harbinger for Christmas as I also use it for gingerbreads and I start to eat them before Christmas :). As soon as I open a package of gingerbreads this is the best way to store it. I especially like the city of Nuremberg on it and the horseman on the top:

Isabell

Pre Christmas shopping Ikea

Every year before Christmas I go to Ikea to get some inspiration. I like the small rooms they are decorating with Christmas trees and ornaments. This year I was a little bit disappointed, they do have traditional colors that I like but I only found one thing which I liked. It ended up in the big yellow bag that you are carrying around while running around in circles. Even if you only put there one single item. :) This is the only thing I bought:

Picture: Ikea

Kram, Isabell

Time to start the countdown for advent and Christmas

You all know that I really love Christmas. And this year I can not wait to finally get all the Christmas decoration down from the attic. It is the most important time of the year for me, the best month of all. Christmas for me is tradition, coziness and spending time with my family. There are only 2 weeks left until I can finally start… so I start the countdown to advent with a video from Nigella Lawson, to put all of us in a real Christmas mood:

Have a lovely sunday evening!

Kram Isabell

Natural Christmas decoration

You don't always need to buy new decoration. When I'm out for a walk I try to collect things from nature and use them for decoration because simple things are often the most beautiful things. You know I love Christmas and I also love to have a mix of new things and old things. This is a good example how to create new things yourself and protect the environment:

picture: skonahem

Blouse with tie

My favorite this autumn are blouses with ties. This is something you can wear at work and you still look feminine. Even when having a business meeting with men, I always choose something feminine to combine it with a suit: Ties, peter pan collars or cap sleeves:

picture: hm

picture: asos

My grandma

Today would have been my grandma's birthday. After so many years I still can't believe that she is gone. I would do anything to be able to sit together with her in her little kitchen just one more time, to bake with her, to chat with her, to ask her questions and to stand at the window and watch the snow while she reads her favorite poems and bible verses to me. She was like my best friend, I could tell her anything and she would understand and had a solution for me and where she had no solution she would simply hug me and be there for me and share the pain. I remember the moment my dad called me to tell me she had passed away, my first thought was to call her and tell her. I know she is there in everything I do, I even reaction like she would have done in some situations. I miss her so much.


1.
Så går en dag än från vår tid
och kommer icke mer,
och än en natt med Herrens frid
till jorden sänkes ner.

2.
Men du förbliver den du var,
o Herre, full av nåd,
och våra nätter, våra dar
du tecknat i ditt råd.

3.
Trygg i din vård jag lämnar mig
när solen från oss flyr,
och gladligt skall jag prisa dig
när dagen åter gryr.

4.
Men om det stilla dödens bud
i denna natt jag hör,
det är min tröst att din, o Gud,
jag lever och jag dör.

Christoph Friedrich Neander

Time to collect pine cones for Christmas

We have had an Indian summer here in Munich this autumn. One of my favorite things to do in autumn is to go outside and have a walk, enjoy the colorful leaves and to collect various things for Christmas decorations like pine cones. There are so many various possibilities to use them as decoration:

Picture: Skonahem

Picture: expli

or just keeping them in a jar :

picture: elbgestoeber

Inspiration for my bathroom

We have one of these standard bathrooms: white, tiny and no window. For me a bathroom should be cozy which is very difficult if you have one like ours. My dream would be a room like this with large windows and grey/brownish colors:

Picture: hemnet

But I can't change the color and the size of the tiles. I might need to work with more white and silver to make it look bigger...

Picture: badrumsdrommar

And to increase coziness, I've ordered a bathroom light similar to this one with fewer light spots :

Picture: casalumi

I hope to get it this week and to show you some before and after pictures soon..

Isabell