Sinimalist

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DAYBED

Last summer we made an extreme makeover to the upstairs of our summer house. Before the makeover the upstairs room was just one big empty space without any kind of interior designed for living. It had been used mainly as storage space and after a hundred years it was quite a sight to behold.We renewed every possible surface and the only original things we left visible, were the wooden timber walls that are essential to the style of this house. There were no separate rooms and the bottom of the roof and the wooden frame of the house were visible. Even a decent floor was missing, basically the top of the downstairs roof served as a floor.

We decided to divide the space into smaller pieces with a big bed-/ living room, a small bed room, a walking closet and two small rooms for storage. We may convert the storage rooms into something else in the future, who knows…

We had a successful team behind this project. I was in charge of the interior design, and the men in the family (my dad & my boyfriend) took care of the actual construction work. My sister helped me with the main design with some details and our mom served as the voice of reason, since we had some pretty crazy ideas along the way! All in all, we are all very pleased with the outcome, since this is an important place for us all and we managed to make the place even more special than before.

The biggest room in house is a combination of a bed room and a living room. Since the house is an old farm house it has a high, pointy top which makes the room really high, the highest point being 5 meters. I love it! The height of the room means that the room will remain cool even during the hottest summer days and it makes sleeping a lot easier (yes, there´s no modern A/C, since it doesn´t belong into an old wooden house like this).

The floor is of course wooden and wooden floors are the best!  They make lovely sounds when you walk on them. Every floor has its own sound, it´s almost like they have their own personalities!

Now, I´d like to introduce the crown jewel of the room, the daybed. I love it so much, I think everyone should have one. It´s a perfect place for hanging out, chillaxin, watching Netflix and napping. The best part of it is that it´s self-made. I´m usually not big on DIY projects, but this was an exception that came out perfect. We had a couple of hundred old hay poles laying around, so we decided to create something out of them. I got the idea from Pinterest and since my boyfriend is pretty handy, he did the rest.

To make this kind of daybed, all you need is 20-25 hay poles, 10-20m of rope, two 2×4 boards, screws, a mattress and a place to hang it from. Ours is hanging from the wooden frame boards of the roof, which makes the whole thing look pretty nice or what do you think?

THINGS THAT KICKED ASS IN JULY

I´ve made a lot of cool discoveries during my vacation. Being able to spend four weeks in a completely different setting than my normal everyday life has once again been a real eye-opener. Getting away from modern city life takes a while of getting used to, but after I settled down, I could enjoy the little things, smells, sounds, tastes, losing sense of time, etc. Here´s a list of the best things so far:)

Anything made out of linen

Crepes with strawberry jam and whipped cream

Random encounters with feral cats & kittens

White nail polish

Liquorice powder – I could eat it straight from the can

Watching grain slowly turning from green to yellow

Picking raspberries from our summerhouse garden

Rainbows

Wearing my boyfriend´s large t-shirts

Relaxing on my daybed

Walking on old self-made rag rugs

Sipping white wine

Listening to the sounds of tractors in the distance

Using old dishes

Wearing face cream that smells like pear soda from my childhood

Bluebells

Strawberry-rhubarb pie

Island hopping by boat

Hanging at the summer cottage’s pier

Hair braids

Midnight boat rides

Wearing scarfs in my hair

Strawberry mint smoothies

Playing cards

Listening to podcasts (e.g Ysistä viiteen)

Taking pictures with a classic film camera from the 70´s


Dress Akasa

Hat H&M

I NEED MORE BIKINIS

Let´s be honest, things have gotten a little out of hand, once again. I´ve bought at least fifteen swimsuits during the past six months. First I needed them for our trip abroad, then for my summer vacay and then it just snowballed from there. So lately I´ve been spending a lot of time online searching for the best ones.

The funny thing is that I used to dislike the whole idea of browsing and fitting swimsuits. I could write a book on which shops in Helsinki have the worst and the most disgusting fitting rooms (an honorable mention goes to Monki on Aleksanterinkatu). Recently, I have only been shopping online, so the issue with fitting rooms is solved for now, thank god!

Another thing I´ve been struggling with, has been seeing myself in a swimsuit. I ´ve always been really critical on myself. Way too critical if you ask people close to me. In order to get my head straight, I need a steady routine with exercise, diet and rest. If I don´t exercise, my diet is automatically terrible. In return, when I exercise, I eat healthier. It should be other way around, I know, but please tell that to my head. Maybe I´m getting older and wiser, since there are signs that I might get over this issue at some point.

I don´t know why I´m so much into swimwear all of a sudden, maybe it´s the warm summer that has gotten me going, who knows. All I know is now that I´m set with swimsuits, it´s time to move onto bikinis!

PS. If you know any dodgy fitting rooms, please give us a heads up and comment below!

Swimsuit H&M

THE ART OF DOING NOTHING

The last few days have gone by and I have managed to do pretty much nothing. This seems to be the main theme of my vacation –no plans or schedules, which is perfectly fine. Well maybe “nothing” is an exaggeration since picking strawberries is a task that has to be done every second or third day and it takes a good few hours every time. And it does raise my stress level, since there are hundreds of horse flies above the strawberry fields and they bite hard! Talk about a First World problem…

Having a fridge full of strawberries is another First World problem, since they require a lot of space and I need to figure a way to eat and make use of them. One solution has been a strawberry-rhubarb pie that has been on the menu every day for the past week or so. I´m not exactly a specialist when it comes to baking, but I have done this pie so many times by now that I know the recipe in and out, and I´m very satisfied with the outcome. This pie (recipe only in Finnish) is delicious!

My other activities have included animals. I have been visiting our neighbors horses and ponies every day and yesterday I met with a pack of puppies that stole my heart. Then there is a feral cat, that has five kittens. I have tried to make contact with them, but since they are feral, it´s not that easy. The fun part is that they seek shelter under our barns, so basically they live in our yard and it is really fun to follow them through the window.

What else? Yeah, we have finally managed to finalize the upstairs of our summer house and I´m very pleased with the outcome. More of that later, a separate post coming up…

But anyway, the most important thing for me has been the lack of pushing myself too hard. I have been able to do whatever feels right and comfortable at the time. That is something that is easier said than done but so far, so good!

PS. I really like this outfit, what do you think about it?

Top H&M, Skirt Zalando, Shoes Vans