blog: fika, shakespeare, and lots of drawing ★彡

Tjena tjena mina vänner!!! (hello hello my friends!) I hope y'all are doing alright !! I've been in Sweden for about 4 days now, and it's so lovely. T^T The weather has been so nice and I'm so relaxed and it feels almost silly. I keep sharing photos on my Instagram stories and a lot of comments are along the lines of "Is sweden REAL????" Connor makes fun of me a bit bc of how idyllic my days sound. I mean, I walked down to the castle on Saturday to sit by the lake and draw. ABSURD !!! 

(I brought along my old Moleskine sketchbook from early 2020 that I still haven't finished so that I could have a place to paint with my little travel watercolor palette)

I think it was earlier that day that me and my mom went to this huge plant nursery ?? Plant shop? Cause she needed new flowers for our balcony and for the front door~

It's been about a week since this day, and I'm having a hard time finding anything to write about cause I've truly just been hanging about doing a bunch of nothing! I've been drawing a whole bunch, and I was even playing Genshin on my phone for a little bit, but then I found out they're doing cross-platform support with the upcoming update, so I no longer need to keep up an alt account on my phone heheh. SO! I've been going on walks occasionally (I do love going down by the water to draw), but mostly I've been hanging out at the house, drawing a lot!! Which has been really nice. 

I did also finally listen to the series finale of The Magnus Archives, and if I think about it for too long I start crying all over again. :') It was so good TT and I'm gonna miss the show a lot but this just means I get to listen to it over again from the beginning :D

This past Thursday (I still can't believe I've been here for a week and a half already) my great uncle and aunt, Tommy and Ingalill, took me and my mom to see some Shakespeare!! It was a production of The Winter's Tale done entirely in Swedish, put on at an old factory that they've now outfitted into a theatre. Even though I only understood about 35% of what they were saying I still had a great time!! Some of the acting was...not great (the actor who played Leontes was good but was a bit of an attention hog which was rather annoying), BUT I still thoroughly enjoyed myself. The actress for Hermione had the best performance imo~ I didn't take any pics of the factory itself cause I was a bit distracted hahah

I've been trying to collect footage on my phone and on my cameras to put together a little travel diary but I worry it's just gonna be like. 10 minutes of footage from around the house and me just enjoying the weather!! I've not been recording too much cause I've been trying to live in the ~moment~ which has been so lovely. But!! I have indeed been recording stuff so I'll at least have a little something to cobble together. I've also been recording snippets to put together a quick little TikTok vlog which I think will be nice to have too :>

My dad arrived on Sunday, and he's already gotten himself busy doing various chores around the house hehe -- he's such a busybody, so I know he's very happy to have little projects to work on. This is the first time I've seen him or my mom in 18 months, and being able to chat with them over breakfast/dinner, or call for them somewhere in the house and have them answer is a bit surreal. I've missed them terribly, and I'm so happy I get to spend this time with them. 

For those wondering, Connor and Soph are doing well!! He says that Soph has apparently been really vocal and seems a bit down, which makes me think that she misses me TT I do love being in Sweden, but I am looking forward to returning to my little family at the end of the month. 

For my tangerine friends: I'm still trying to figure out what I want to do for the postcard this month, but I did just order this little guy for this month's sticker!! 

I've been really into Ibon's work on twitter lately -- their linework makes me *u* so I've started experimenting with an Max Ulichney ink brush and I've been having a blast! I'm having another style crisis -- parts of me wants to draw beautiful anime boys and the other parts of me wants to draw whimsical little cartoony illos so I'm currently desperately trying to find the middle ground while also reminding myself that I don't necessarily have to find a middle ground and I'm allowed to draw whatever I want lolol. There's a really weird superficial part of me that's like 

"people didn't follow you for pretty anime-esque character art, they followed you for cuteness and whimsy!!! you don't wanna let them down!!" 

and i'm like "sometimes art changes!! and if this brings me joy then so be it!!" SO I'm trying to just draw things that bring me joy without thinking so hard about it but it's proving rather difficult ;; but I will keep trying!! 

Today I'm gonna lie on the grass and journal/draw/read, cause while I hate tanning, my legs are...so pale, and if I get just a shade or two darker on my legs to indicate to onlookers that I have seen the sun at all this summer, I will be happy. :D Worry not -- I never forget my sunscreen!!! 

Here's a few more photos from my stay so far, and I will leave you here for today. <3 I hope you're doing alright ! Make yourself a cup of tea for me, have a nap, something to make your heart full. You're grand. Talk soon!!

xoxo, Cheyenne

also omg i can't believe i forgot to tell you about this -- a neighbor's cat has been visiting us in the afternoon and we've named him oscar and he's SO FRIENDLY and he took a nap in our garden yesterday while I was drawing on the veranda TT 

okay, now for the rest of the pics, enjoy!! (the orange cat belongs to my aunt and uncle and his name is Castro bc "he's red like the Communist flag, ja??"

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