We're back from a mini break to Sweden and we had a lovely... loooovely time. We went to visit Gästrikland this time and it's so far my favorite part of Sweden. We did a lot of driving around (1350 km) and we did a lot of egg eating. My dear, I've been eating an egg for breakfast a whole week and my stomach is really upset. It's a holiday thing isn't it? I never eat an egg at home but when I'm on holiday I can't seem to get enough of them.

I really envy all the people in all the lovely red and yellow homes I've passed the couple of days and I hope to join them one day.

Let's say that out of 10 e-mails I receive at least 8 of them contain the same question;

"how do you keep such a clean home with a husband?"

Yin

I have an extremely clean, tidy and organized husband and he doesn't want to be obstructive like (sorry I have to say this) most men do. He knows that what I'm doing and keeps me busy makes me happy and he doesn't want to interfere with me being happy. In general he doesn't like to behave as a man man much. He's not embarrassed to show his feminine side and I totally admire him for being like this. The Bo wouldn't function in a messy, unorganized home packed with kids and pets and dirty dishes. He needs to shower each day to feel good, he needs to dry the taps after his shower to feel good, he needs to change his outdoor shoes to his indoor shoes each time he goes in or out (it drives me crazy) to feel good. Living like this I could never go back to living with a caveman.

Yang

But (yes there's always a but because life isn't perfect like that is it?) in return, Bo is always rushing me and I feel at least 12 hours per day rushed by him. I need to shower fast, cook fast, pee fast, shop fast. He also needs a lot of attention and he's constantly silently asking for it. He's twitchy, jumpy and always going ... going ... going. Even when he sits down to paint he's moving around on his chair. He's extremely energetic, hardly ever sleeps and talks non-stop about things such as quantum theory. In a day he either breaks something, makes something really un washable dirty or he blows in my face when he laughs which I hate!

Conclusion

I'm trying to say that it's always something. We can't have the perfect mate. We need yin/yang, good/bad.

Each time when I wake up in the morning and I have to get out of the bed fast and brush my teeth fast, I'm happy I was introduced to him and that we work because that's all that matters.

A couple of days ago I got an email from a Dutch reader asking me about the embroidery on my pillow shams. Oddly enough I was picking up embroidery in the same week. With the Bo being in Rome for work and finding myself glued to the TV re-watching all the past Gilmore Girls seasons on DVD, I needed something to fiddle with. I bought Jenny Hart's book Sublime Stitching almost a year ago but never really played with it - do I regret that!!

I've been having so much fun I can't hardly stop.

I've made two cushions for on the sofa and chair in the living room with the Chinese lanterns.

And I'm working on this table runner.

I super recommend this book, I really super, super do - honestly I can't find an other word for it, highly is too lame. You might also like the Stitch It Kit by Jenny Hart. Both books come with iron on transfers. The stitch it kit is really good for if you starting out because it's filled with the necessary items such as a hoop, a needle, some DMC floss and a bunch of transfers.

Just a couple of weeks ago I discovered Charlotte - Hello Charlotte!! Discovering new blogs and new people is always such an excitement. To quote Proust (ah, doesn't that sound intellectual)

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.

Charlotte's "Once in a lifetime" post put me up a great idea. I'm always suffering from terrible hay fever this time a year and I throw so many paper towel and tissues away that I sometimes feel guilty for doing so. After a little searching I found a great lot of hankies on eBay. Late today I received them in the mail and spent washing and drying them.

I just felt like Charlotte for a moment.