bits & pieces

This photo was taken at Grünerløkka in Oslo, Monday March 9th, outside the Probat shop (obviously!). Before I got on the plane to South Africa, I met my sister Mari in Oslo. We had coffee and scones at Kaffebrenneriet and soup at Cafe Sør. It was so nice.

Check out Probat, they have some really cool t-shirts. If you don't understand Norwegian, you should check out the sister site Norwegian tees. I love it!

Sometimes blogging and Flickr and keeping up with it all are a bit overwhelming. Shanna Murray recently wrote an excellent blog post about this, and it seems like I'm not the only one feeling that way. Sometimes I even consider deleting all my accounts. As I have told you before, I'm easily distracted, and there are days I don't get any work done because I waste the time surfing around on Flickr and blogs. It's fun for a while, but then I get bored yet I can't stop clicking. Why is that? I recommend you read her post and all the comments. I think its spot on.

I'm loving
- Jen11
- Ashley and Leah's new blog; the light collectors
- mav's new website
- 3191 Miles Apart (they did it again!)
- Brian's tunes for March 09 (song #1 makes me super happy)
- little miss twig (yay! she's back!)
- my friend Jakob's dog Hama
- my nieces

Tomorrow is already April. How did that happen?! Well, I think April will be good. Especially since it starts with a long Easter vacation at the mountain cabin.

Look Down

You might remember that about a month ago I told you that I made a second Blurb book. It arrived after I came home from South Africa, and I'm very happy with the result. I'm also very happy to discover that it is a staff pick by the lovely people over at Blurb. Thanks guys!

The book is a collection of "look down" shots from this Flickr photo set. It is a 120 pages square format, soft cover book. Have a look at the preview here, and see a few more photos in this set on Flickr.

South Africa, final batch

So, finally it seems like my South Africa photos have come to an end. Well, there is a grand finale coming up with a few film shots, but that's nothing compared to the complete overload I have given you the last days. It was such an adventure, I just had to share it with you. You can always revisit the photos in the South Africa set and you can read my little stories here on the blog under the label South Africa.

Tha last batch of photos are from the beginning of the long journey home. After the wonderful elephant back safari we had a delicious breakfast, packed our stuff and left for the airport. It took me 32 hours, 4 flights and several layovers to travel from Kapama River Lodge to my livingroom; Hoedspruit - Johannesburg - London - Oslo - Bergen. It was worth every minute of it!

Sandnes in Wallpaper

Who thought that the glossy lifestyle bible Wallpaper would ever find something in my hometown Sandnes worth writing about? Well, they did, and it is a pretty cool thing they found too.

Photo caption (and photo) copied from Wallpaper's website:
The recent series of Norwegian Wood projects has impressed with its experimental sustainable designs in wood. This innovative open-air stage has become a focal point in the centre of the municipality of Sandnes. The glass roof covers a level, flexible space, creating an acoustic shelter within the open public square - sound is amplified during concerts and background noise is reduced. The semi-transparent roof structure is supported on bunched columns in slender sections of solid, untreated oak – reminiscent of a cluster of trees.

Find out more about this project here: Atelier Oslo

Read more about Norwegian architecture here: Architecture news: Letter from Norway

Helen & Hard is also mentioned in Wallpaper's report on the best of recent Norwegian architecture.

South Africa, batch #10

Friday, our last day in South Africa, we got up at 5 am to go on an early morning elephant ride. It was simply amazing to experience these huge animals close up. The skin was rough and warm, and the eyes were friendly. My elephant, Sebakwe, walked in a slow, steady pace. Except when he stopped for some take away and had to hurry to catch up with the rest of the herd; then it got a bit bumpy. We saw several wild animals from the elephant's back - like wildebeests and zebras. If you ever get a chance to go an elephant back safari, you should do it. I highly recommend it!

There are more photos in the South Africa set. It will soon be filled with the last photos from the trip - the journey home. And as I mentioned earlier this week, I have photos shot with film that I also want to share with you.

Happy Friday!

interior decorating blogs

I have written an article - kind of a guide - about blogs focusing on interior decorating. I think you might recognize some of them, and hopefully you will be introduced to some new ones. Enjoy!

Read the article (in Norwegian) over at Klikk.no.

I asked all the bloggers to answers these questions:
1 What is your blog about?
2 Which interior decorating style do you like best?
3 What is your dream house?
4 Why do you blog?

Here are my answers:

1 Hei Astrid is about design, magazines, travel, food, fashion and photography. This is where I collect my inspiring finds and stories of everyday life in general and my life as a freelance journalist and copywriter specifically.

2 I like a personal mix of old and new, cheap and expensive. Design classics, gladly Scandinavian, mixed with thrift store finds and a bit of humour. Functionality and light are important. The base should be white with splashes of colour, for example in art, and natural materials like wood and stone.

3 My dream home doesn’t need to be very big, but the layout has to be optimal and functional for my family. It has to have lots of light and a nice view, and it should be close to both nature and the city.

4 I blog because I enjoy sharing my inspiration with other people, and I like the community feeling that arise between bloggers.

EDIT:
PS! Welcome to all of you who are new to Hei Astrid. I appreciate your visit :-)

South Africa, batch #9

As I mentioned yesterday, this Thursday in South Africa turned out to be really warm, beautiful and sunny. And so was our afternoon game drive. The rhinos and lions were the highlights.

Our first rhino sight was these two and the next day we saw this guy, so it was pretty cool seeing a whole group of them at once. There are four rhinos in the picture, but a fifth came and joined in too.

And then there were the lions. Wow! What a sight that was! You might remember the video of our first sight of lions. This was something different. At dusk we drove along a road were we constantly had to duck for spiders (eeep!), and then we found them - lying there in the middle of the road by the fence. They were so still, so relaxed, cuddling and caring for each other. It wasn't frightening at all to be so close to them in a open car. Not even when the male lion came sneaking on my side of the car. Such beautiful animals!

After watching the sun set over a lake, we had drinks in the bush. And while driving home in the dark, we scared away all animals by singing this children's song out loud - Dyrene i Afrika ("the animals in Africa"). We were actually very close to a female leopard - the only one of the big five we hadn't already seen - but she was too shy to come out from the bushes.

The South Africa set

South Africa, batch #8

After our morning game drive we visited the South African Wildlife College to meet a group of students from Botswana who Amarula sponsors the ranger education for. They were all very happy to be given the opportunity to learn more about the African wildlife. It was already starting to get pretty warm whilst at the college, and by the time we got back to Kapama River Lodge the sun was shining from a clear, blue sky. We had some hours off before our afternoon game drive, and we enjoyed it to the maximum by the spa pool (and at the delicious lunch buffet of course). I think we all got a tiny bit of a tan on our very winter white Norwegian bodies.

The photos of batch #8 are from around Kapama River Lodge, including the spa and my room. So beautiful, don't you think? I'm completely smitten!

Next batch up is from the Thursday afternoon game drive, and then it's time for the photos from our last day - Friday - which included elephants. After that I'll slow down the South Africa overload by posting the photos I shot with film. I hope you are still with me ;-)

The South Africa set

South Africa, batch #7

Batch #7 of photos was taken on our morning game drive, Thursday March 12th. We got up at about 05:30 am and was ready to drive out in the bushveld at 6 am. It was a little cold, so I'm glad a brought a wool scarf and cardigan. Our goal for the morning was to find buffalos and hippos. We found both, although the hippos was not too eager to get out of the water (seen above). At least we heard them.

The South Africa set

Haukeliseter skiing

We skied this weekend and it was awesome!

I mentioned on Friday that we planned to go from cabin to cabin. For different reasons we decided to just stay at Haukeliseter, which was super. Saturday was really, really beautiful, but it was a bit difficult to find the right wax. Either it was too slippery (bakglatt) or we got big lump of snow stuck under the skis (klabber). Sunday started really nice, with a long breakfast and a sunny view. It was really windy when we were out skiing, and after a while it started snowing and everything became white. I'm sure a lot of you know this feeling very well, but if you haven't experienced it... well, it's like walking in the dark, except everything is white. You can hardly see anything, which is quite funny when the people skiing in front of you suddenly fall over because there is a small downhill slope they didn't see... Anyway, we were close to the cabin, so we managed fine. See the rest of the photos here.

Did you do anything awesome this weekend?

FYI: I'll upload more photos from South Africa this week, and soon I'll get back to more varied posts again.

EDIT: March is officially the first month of spring, so I updated the blog header with a less snowy, more flowery photo. But I'm not all done with snow for the season yet. There will still be a lot more cross country skiing during Easter, and hopefully some more downhill skiing after Easter.

South Africa, batch #6

Batch #6 of photos from South Africa is up. They are all from our second game drive, Wednesday afternoon. Luckily it didn't rain like it did on our first game drive. We saw two of the Big Five - rhinos and lions + a whole lot of other wild animals. The lions were quite a sight. Check out the South Africa set to see the video.

I'm off for the weekend to do something very different from watching wild animals in Africa - we're going cross country skiing from mountain cabin to mountian cabin. Read more about this kind of hiking on The Norwegian Trekking Association's website. Happy weekend!

South Africa, batch #5

The new batch of South Africa photos are from around Kapama River Lodge, after our visit to Amarula Lapa and before our afternoon game drive. There are some photos from the lovely view from my room - including the cute little antelopes I saw feeding outside. I don't know what exact type of antelope they are. Our ranger Hailey told me the name, but I forgot it. There is also a short video from my beautiful room.

The South Africa set

South Africa, batch #4

One of the things I love to do when I'm abroad is to visit grocery stores and look at all the different packagings. How about you?

More packaging in the South Africa set.