a bit of green

We are proud to announce that we’re running on mobile!
Since Alex got a smartphone, it bugged us seeing how weird our site appeared on a mobile screen: the layout was all messed up! With a little research we found Mobify, a mobile web platform. Mobify has a kind of studio in which one can make websites mobile-friendly on any device and then launch them, using a custom domain. Of course, you need to sign up for an account and the mobile version of the page is hosted at mobify.me, but at least it’s free!

_{(C)lovers at the campus.}

Today I did a second short trip to IKEA (results from the first one are here) and got myself some lingonberry juice (Dryck Lingon) because I’ve already tried the lingonberry jam they have and it’s actually pretty good. The product is actually called a “lingonberry drink” because it does not contain enough fruit content to be legally called a “juice” in Sweden. More precisely, it contains 6.1% (I have no idea if this is by mass or by volume, but I suppose it’s the latter) lingonberry juice and 3.9% red grape juice. So it’s 10% juice and the rest is water and sugar. Dryck Lingon also claims to be organic (“Ekologisk”). According to livestrong.com, this drink contains 36 kcal per 100 ml. All of its calorific value comes from the 9 grams of carbohydrates it contains per 100 ml, which is about 3% of the GDA. Now, my impressions.

Today we were at IKEA doing some Christmas shopping (mostly looking, actually, being the poor students that we are) and eating. The restaurant is not bad at all, and very cheap. They also have this little shop just before the exit with a bunch of Swedish products. You can find sweets, jam, köttbullar (meatballs) and, naturally, salmon – both fresh and smoked. You can also find a series of (mainly) apple-based (i.e. cider) alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages. These are labeled “ekologisk” which, according to the translation on the back, means that it is organic. We’ll come to that a bit later. I chose an “Äppeldryck med Hjortronsmak” (appledrink with cloudberry flavour) and Kynthia chose a “Kolsyrad Pärondryck” (sparkling pear drink). We’ll try to briefly describe our impressions below.

We bought the Humble Indie Bundle #2 some days ago. It is the second of a series of packages containing 5 cross-platform (Windows, Linux, Mac) indie games.

The bundle will be available for 3 more days so if you’re interested in some cheap and intriguing little games which are far from the philosophy of mainstream games (graphics-graphics-graphics aaaand more graphics), check it out. It’s a great opportunity to try to eliminate the middleman, a deprecated notion as far as the distribution of games (or any digital media for that matter) is concerned, due to the Internet. This particular package contains the following games:

Recently, we’ve been spending a lot of time in the kitchen, baking all kind of goods. Our latest addiction is bread! From baguettes to country bread, we’ve tried different recipes until we made one of our own: breadettes!

The recipe is based on a traditional french baguette recipe and various other bread recipes we found across the Internet.
Here you go:

Now that my university is closed for winter holidays, I finally have more free time to do all the crafty things I’ve been wanting to. One of these is a lamp made from plastic cups I’ve seen at taf, the art foundation, in the Monastiraki region in the center of Athens.
When I first saw it at taf, I was amazed; I looked closely and I couldn’t believe my eyes! The object itself is so peculiar, modern and alien-like it could be in any design exhibition. With my best friend’s birthday coming up, I decided to make it myself and give it to her as a gift. It turns out it was the easiest craft I’ve even done, the epitome of DIY objects!

Well, I suppose I’m exaggerating a little bit, but I’ve wanted to makeover my bike for quite a while and I’m really excited about it! The makeover is far from extreme right now, but I’ve got some  other projects in mind, such as some DIY roll up paniers (I deeply envy these!) and maybe a polka dotted helmet like that one from ohjoy.
I’ll let you know if I ever find the time to do these… I’ve got a huge list of craft projects that I rarely get the chance to even start. Oh well, at least I’ve got the ideas!

Since Alex told me about his family following the german tradition of Advent calendars, I wanted to make one for him as a surprise; and that’s what I did!

An Advent calendar is a calendar that begins on 1st December and ends on Christmas; it consists of 24 little doors or boxes numbered from 1 to 24. Beginning on the first day of December, one door is opened each day, counting down the days remaining until Christmas Eve; behind each door is a treat, a piece of chocolate or a toy.

Searching for vertical garden examples, I stumbled upon those plans for a free standing hydroponic plant wall.

It’s a proposal for a botanical garden or a public space, that consists of three large curved walls, free standing, with over than 11.000 plants on the sides of the walls. The plans were made by Peter Kastan, the co-writer of the blog Jungle Walls. The design is colorful, a mix of digital and traditional-like media. Enjoy!