Back in Norway

After a long journey on wednesday, I finally arrived Norway at the evening. The first thing my sister said when I came home (23.50) was: "Hi, can you read 6 pages in ten minutes for me? I have to deliver an article online.". I tried my best to read as much as I could in ten minutes, and even though I didn´t manage to read through it all, I had time to give her a few tips. The next days I mostly spent my time working and sleeping. Which reminds me that I picked the perfect day to work (friday). My company chose to have a christmas lunch that day with porridge, eggs and meat, which was amazing by the way! They also ate cake that another company had sent them as a christmas greeting. In addition to this they gave all their employees christmas presents, and I got one as well despite the fact that I´ve been gone for at least three months! I got really happy of course! :D It included a bottle of wine, a box of chocolate and meat that is normal in norway around christmas holidays (it´s called fenalår in norwegian, but I can´t translate it). Today I´m spending the day at home relaxing and working on a few christmas presents which will be shown in another blog post later when I get some pictures
of them.

"Fenalår", the meat I can´t translate :)

Charlotte 

Purple flowers

I bought some nail polish from Maxfactor yesterday which turned out to be great for water marbling! This does not mean that my water marble turned out great, but at least I got to practice with the new polish. :)

   

Charlotte

Colourful nails

Because I didn´t do so well with stop biting my nails when I removed my fake nails, I had to apply fake nails again. This time Primark had some nails I really liked. I chose not to cut them to save some time, and this made me realised that having long nails is a lot of work. Everything gets harder to do! I both get hurt because they´re sharp and  I´m having trouble writing on my keyboard (bad timing because I had to do my lab-report :P).

Charlotte

My new friend

For my birthday a couple of weeks ago my mother and sister sent me a small package. It included a card saying I will get a present when I´m coming home (hurray) and a small santa. This little friend is now standing in my windowsill on top of some of the psychology books, and I think this is the right place for him. I had to move him in order to take a photo for you to see:

Charlotte

Vest with flowers

I used the model I created to draw a vest I´m planning to make. I have already cut the fabric, but I still need to sew it all together. This is my plan and drawing this far:

The fabric I´m going to use at the front.

The back will be black.

The vest as white.

How I expect the vest to be.

Charlotte :)

Model drawing

I´ve been wanting to draw a model for a while so that I could make drawings of the clothes I´m sewing. I had some trouble finding an existing drawing I liked online, so this resulted in me creating my own. The reason for this is that I tend to not like the models used for fashion/design because they often (not always), in my opinion, are unrealistic. They tend to be really skinny, have small hips and too long legs. When creating my model I tried to make her look like a mix between a model and the way I see the female body. I tried to give her a shorter neck, bigger hips and shorter legs than models in the drawing I saw online had (even though her legs are still long). Here are some pictures of my work so far:

My first model made with pencil.

The same model made with pen.
(I made her neck a bit shorter as well).

The back of the model.
Hard to try to make it look realistic, but this is my result.

Charlotte :)

My assignments

I haven´t been writing so many blog posts lately because these last weeks have been really busy. I had an essay due for wednesday november 20th for my psychology module Individuals and Groups. This week I´ve been working on a lab-report in the module Cognition in Clinical Contexts. Luckily I finished it on time and handed it in earlier today. We were asked to write a report about an experiment that was conducted by our lecturer and that the students participated in. During the experiment we had to watch a video with distracting stimuli and then locate small dots as fast as possible. It was exciting to be a part of an experiment (other than questionnaires), and to get more knowledge about how researchers work. I am also going to participate in another study next month to get all the research credits my module requires. That experiment will contain snack tasting, so I guess I could say that I´m looking forward to it.
My academical writing will continue as I have a lab-report that I have to hand in next week in order to not loose marks. The report will be about a math questionnaire conducted among the students at my university.
Even though I think it starts to get easier to write english there is still a lot to correct in my assignments before I hand them in! It is hard to write as academically as I expect british students to do, but luckily I get some help. I think it has been all right so far.

Charlotte

Green and white

This green and white design was made with water marble. I started with a white nail polish, and chose to use white and green for the water marble and make more random designs. This is the result:

Charlotte

Stripes

While I was waiting for my nails to grow longer, I decided to repaint my fake nails because I was starting to get tired of my old design. I chose to use black nail polish with purple and silver stripes. The two colours last mentioned are very shiny, so I thought black would make my nails look a bit more calm. It would also make them less shiny so that they wouldn´t draw too much attention.

I started with a grey nail polish as a basic layer. Then I added purple (where I wanted the purple stripes to shine through all the other colours), and covered it with tape. Afterwards I added silver for the silver stripes and covered it with tape. I then painted my all my nails with black nail polish and let them dry before I carefully removed all the tape. I finished with clear nail polish, and this is the result:

 Charlotte :)

Black vest

I went to the sewing society this tuesday as well because I had such a good time last week. I already had a pattern for a vest that I bought in Norway, so I decided to make this. The fabric I used was black cotton. I started with cutting the three pieces I needed, and afterwards I sewed them together. This vest was very easy to make, and I think people easily would be able to make it without a pattern as well.

Charlotte :)

Black nail design

Last weekend I tried to make a new nail design using black nail polish with silver and purple details. I started with a black layer on both hands. Afterwards I used water marble on my left hand and mixed purple and silver nail polish in the water. I dipped them and finished with a layer of clear polish. On my right hand I used nail stamps to create butterflies in silver, and then clear polish to protect it. These designs are both very easy to make! I am fully aware that it isn´t a big achievement, but I still wanted to share it with you guys because it is a part of my development in working with my own nail designs.

My left hand.

My right hand.

Charlotte

My nails

I have to confess that my nails are in a really bad shape. I´m trying to make them better, but it will take some time. In the meantime I went to buy fake nails to apply so that I wouldn´t touch or break my real nails. (Fake nails is by the way a lot more common in England than in Norway.) A short time ago my friend showed me a new technique for painting nails which is called water marble. I´ve been watching videos at youtube from a lady who is really good at this. Here is a link to her blog and a post about this technique: http://mysimplelittlepleasures.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/happy-valentines-day.html. I decided to try it myself on my fake nails, and I think it worked out okay concidering the fact that I am completely new at this.

Charlotte

The sewing society

I was looking for a sewing society at the university, and I finally managed to find one. I´ve been trying to go to their meetings, but my assignments have been due to the day after the meetings. Because of this, I hadn´t been able to make it before yesterday. I went to the meeting, a bit nervous and stressed, and ended up having a great time. I will definitely continue going to their meetings in the future!

I chose to make a small purse this time, and a few pictures of the result follows.

Charlotte :)

My new plants

Yesterday there was a market at the university. I really wanted to get a plant for my room, so I went to check what they were selling. I ended up buying two small bamboo plants which I placed on my windowsill to make my room look a bit nicer.

Charlotte

What I´ve been up to

I haven´t been writing in a long time now! I´ve been very busy with work at school, but I will try to write more posts! I also made some small changes on my blog to help separate the posts by topics to make it a bit more specific.

Last week I delivered my lab-report which I had been working on for a while. I had never written that kind of report before, so I was a bit confused. I finally managed to get it done and deliver it, so I got to relax for a couple of days before starting to write my next essay. This week I´ve been choosing the essay title for that essay, and working on finding resources. So I went to the library (again) to find books, and started thinking about what I want my essay to contain.

Last saturday my uncle came to Brighton. He had been in London for some meetings, and before he went back to Norway, he came to visit me. We spent a lot of time walking around, talking, and looking at different things and buildings in the city. After a while we went to eat pizza at this amazing little restaurant, which I unfortunately don´t remember the name of. Afterwards we went to Poundland, which has to be one of the most amazing shops I´ve ever seen. Everything inside is one pound, and they have such a great selection of stuff. Then we went to get latte and hot chocolate before going to the train station. It was really nice to see someone from my family again, because I haven´t been home at all after moving to England. Luckily I´m going home for Christmas and get to see everyone then! :D

Charlotte