MERRY CHRISTMAS GOD JUL

I have spent almost all of this Christmas in BED ..with a really bad COLD. BUT before this happened I managed to get our apartment ready for Christmas ...and enjoy it for a couple of days too:) It felt really nice to unwrap the Christmas decorations we used in Berlin ..and put them up in our new home. We also continued the tradition from previous years of making GINGER BREAD cookies and a ginger bread house ..while  drinking CHAMPAGNE. This year we also hosted a Christmas party the day the SUN TURNED ...and are hoping to make that a new Bergen Christmas tradition. This cold on the other hand ..I hope will be a one year thing. Hope you all have had a wonderful Christmas and I wish you all a happy New Year!

A LOVE AFFAIR

I'm having a love affair with these flowers. As stated before; I love flowers. As I CHILD one of my dreams was to be a flower decorator. I didn't pick flowers like most kids do, I ARRANGED them. I picked them deliberately in different lengths and placed them together carefully. Not long ago E and I saw something on television where some kids had made statements/wishes about what every child should be able to do/have the right to do ..in a PERFECT world. After we saw it E looked at me and said; I bet when you were a child, you would have WRITTEN; 'Every child should have the right/opportunity to pick as many FLOWERS as they like'. I think he was onto something.. As a child I spent a beautiful month (I remember it more like half a year) in COPENHAGEN with my mom, dad and little sister. My dad was working there and my mom took me and my sister out of kindergarden for a month to come stay with him. I have a lot of beautiful MEMORIES from that stay, among them are the TULIPS. Flowers were ..and are still, much cheaper in Copenhagen than in Norway. My mother, also a big FAN of flowers, took advantage of this and bought a lot of flowers during our stay there ...and I remember those flowers so well ..I remember picking them up at the store, carrying them home and I remember how they looked placed in big VASES around the apartment. I also remember how E said when we had been together for only a short while that he had noticed that I got this particular expression on my face when I was carrying home fresh flowers. I can imagine it's a very happy, almost PROUD kind of expression. One of the things I really loved about BERLIN was it's affordable flowers. Of course I loved everything that was affordable there ..the food, the rent, the wine, the beer, the eating out... But still, maybe especially the flowers, because buying freshly cut flower feels like such a LUXURY. Ok, maybe I miss the eating and drinking out even more ..but anyway. Moving back to Norway I have had to cut down on a lot of my BERLIN HABITS, the pleasure is therefore even bigger when I do ... for instance ...buy flowers. .and then I of course like to SPLURGE.

When I bought these flowers I had a conversation with the florist about different countries flower habits/culture. Like for instance in Berlin they always liked to make bouquets, they always want to put a lot of green in them ...and combine a lot of different flowers. I can still enjoy a batch of roses, but my years in Berlin ...probably combined with my EARLY SPRUNG LOVE for arranging flowers have made me really love arranged bouquets .. so one of my favorite things is to spend a lot of time when I am in a flower shop ..talking to the florist coming up with fun combinations. Like with this one. That I love.

PERFECT WINTER SATURDAY

Yesterday the citizens of BERGEN got to experience this year's first real DAY of WINTER ..and it felt amazing. After days and weeks with rain and wind the WEATHER GODS finally offered us a BREAK. And I'm sure glad they did. I realized earlier this week that the dark, rainy weather was starting to get to me. My solution was to invite Christmas into our home ..as well as spending a lot of money on candles. It definitely worked.. still, no matter how cosy you make your home during winter, nothing beats glittering white snow and sunbeams. Thank you for yesterday!

WINTER WONDERLAND

Just shipped these two beauties off to VÅLER. E's mom asked me a while back if I could make some pillows for her local Christmas bazaar ...with Christmas motives ... and taken her location the choice naturally fell on some PICTURES that I took this February at ALBY, not far from VÅLER. Looking at these pictures I can't believe it's been under a year since I took them.. feels like forever. Anyway, I really enjoyed having the pillows in my living room for a couple of days before I sent them off ..so I hope their new owner will like them too:)

WHEN THIS IS YOUR OFFICE

A couple of weeks ago I spent two mornings in SOLHEIMSVIKEN shooting the area around DNB NOR's new facilities. I was there shooting pictures for SVEIN BOASSON AS, the company in charge of the outdoor area in between and around these new buildings. The air was CRIST and CLEAR, the shadows blue and the sun was warm ..in other words; a great day at the office. This picture doesn't really show anything of what I was there to photograph (which I will show you later), but I thought this view deserved a picture. The bridge you see in the picture is PUDDEFJORDSBROEN, a bridge I have crossed thousands of times by bus or car ..traveling from where I grew up to the city center. Spending these mornings in this area made me realize that it's not only the city that has changed, it is also the way I view things. It's quite amazing coming back and realizing that these last years of traveling and photographing has completely changed the way I see the world. Or maybe not completely. As a photographer I have always worked with my interest for ...and ability to spot, visual beauty ..BUT it's like these last few years have strengthened this part of me, this sense, so that I now literally see Bergen in a totally new way. I guess it works the same way with all our SENSES, they are strengthened as we stimulate them and use them more.

HOMEMADE SCONES, JAM AND CLOTTED CREAM

COFFEE AND CAKE AT ALISA'S

BERGEN AUTUMN

Since we moved back to BERGEN in September the weather has been UNREALISTICALLY good, at least WAY better than I had feared. In 2012 Bergen had 269 days of RAIN.. also meaning 96 days with no rain.. which is not a lot, so my expectations were accordingly. My experience from this JULY (it pretty much looked like THIS the whole time we were here) did not help either. Even though I am a fairly optimistic person I have to admit that I like to go into situations with LOW expectations, because I function a lot better when positively surprised than the other way around. Like this autumn in BERGEN, which in my eyes have been absolutely DELIGHTFUL. That does not mean that we have had no rain... it means that it has not been raining all the time, like on the day these pictures were taken, right around the corner from our apartment. As I have mentioned earlier; I really like my neighborhood. And I LOVE having all my clothes in one spot again, like this coat that used to be my mom's. She used to wear it with a pair of flared trousers ..made in the exact same fabric. The pants stopped fitting me when I was around 10 ..so I guess we will never really know if I would have been able to pull off that look.. (at least in a more serious context than the dress up sessions my sister and I would arrange in the basement of our house). But one thing is for sure; my mother did. I think I have to ask her the next time I see her if she has a picture of it, I have a vague memory of having seen one a long time ago.. or maybe I am just imagining it. If there is a picture ..I will try to persuade my mother into having her blog debut.

MY STREET

INDIAN SUMMER

HAVE A NICE WEEKEND

MY NEW NEIGHBORHOOD

These photographs were taken a couple a days ago, close to where I now live ..in BERGEN, more specifically; in SOLHEIMSVIKEN, close to DANMARKSPLASS. I can not begin to explain how HAPPY I am, not only with our new apartment, but also with the area where it's located. Moving back to BERGEN made me realize how I really only knew very small parts of the city. I suddenly feel that the only part of Bergen I ever really knew was BØNES (which is where I grew up, a suburban area situated about 10-15 minutes outside the city center) as well as the immediate city center, where I lived as a STUDENT. 

The last time I lived in Bergen, seven years ago, it would have been UNTHINKABLE to live where we live now. When some friends moved out here I remember thinking that their life was basically over and that they were LOSERS. I guess I got OLDER, but I also got used to living in much bigger cities, with longer distances to cover. I remember the feeling of not wanting to go to another bar because it was situated on the opposite side of the city center- so it would take something like 5-10 minutes to walk there. Maybe I was particularly LAZY, but I honestly remember this as a collective idea. Of course it has to do with the weather, all the RAIN, but mainly I think it just has to do with the distances you are used to. Anyway, it feels good to be back and now feel that everything is so CLOSE and easy to get to. It also feels good that so many things have changed in the CITY, and not only with me.

So, the area where these pictures were taken is an example of an area that has changed a lot since the last time I lived here. It used to be the home of a big shipping company, BERGEN MEKANISKE VERKSTED, that produced iron steam boats here between 1855 and 1991. Today they are changing the area by putting in office buildings, apartments ..even a cafe; KRANEN (more about this some other time). I guess what is so charming about the area right now is that you still have the some of the old elements, as well as all the new. Like this wooden pier with the fancy buildings in the background. To me it is just also really nice to live by the ocean again, something I really missed living in BERLIN.