Hi :)

I have totally no time for a blog, but I'm glad that after two weeks this crazy semester will be over. But tomorrow I'll finally answer my course work, so it would be so much easier :)

And yesterday world hockey championship ended finally. Finland lost to Czech Republic and is just 4th, while Russia won the championship. And I have an idea to go to championship next year (it will also be held in Helsinki & Stockholm) and attend at least one game - Latvia vs Finland :) It's not hard to imagine which team I will support :D

When Latvia played with Norway, I called my mom with a text `hey, we are losing 2:0 to Norway!` - `Do you mean Latvia or Finland with the word `we`?` :D

And I guess I must finish my presentation finally. *and listen to Eternal Tears of Sorrow*

Have a nice day! :)

Jackie Chan

Hey! :)

Today I was in Jelgava and I want to share some photos with you again. But not simple photos of the city (I'll show you them later). I went to Jelgava to see Jackie Chan ^^ Sounds unreal, right? :) But he's filming some episodes for his new movie, called Chinese Zodiac (it will be released at 12.12.12.)

As I'm not a big fan of him, I wasn't prepared for this event, so I just took some photos. But some people also got his autograph (as they had big photos of him, so staff took them & Jackie signed). But I'm sharing photos with you :)

This is the place where they're filming :)

And this photo I took from the sightseeing tower in the city.

You can see Jackie :)

And here they're filming some episodes :) One woman had a polecat, and actor, who is playing the bad one in this movie (you can see him hanging on this photo), came to her and took this cute little animal :)

There were so many people around, and when they stopped filming, Jackie finally came to us. The poster says `Sorry, I am too tired, but I love you all!`

Jackie also touched everyone's hands *so I'm not washing mine for at least a month :D *

Today was awesome :) Even though I was standing there for such a long time, that my face is red from the sun and it hurts so much now :/
So, if you want to see Jackie, you have two days left (until 2nd of May) :)

Crazy spring ^^

Hey! :) Just returned back from my little bike trip, and I'm sharing some photos with you :)

Each spring I go to Jaunciems to take photos of windflowers (Anemone nemorosa). So this year also wasn't an exception, but after that I decided to drive a bit around, went to the sea and so on.

I so much love this view ^^ It's definitely worth going there every year :)

And this time I also found a hollow, where I think wild bees were living last summer, as there were empty honeycombs. Never saw them in the wild :)

Then I went to a small river called Langa, where I couldn't walk away without taking photos of these water snails :D There are 3 species of them :)

And also I saw water striders there :)

Horsetails :)

And then I drove through a forest, where I found a tower for monitoring forest fires. It was more than 30 m high. And of course I had to climb up there :D Today was very windy and it was shaking so much I couldn't even stand there. And I had just one question - what the hell I'm doing here? :D But the view was amazing.

I could even see TV tower!

Me on the tower & the view from the ground :) Even on this photo it looks so unstable. I am normal? I guess not :D

Some random photos in the forest :) And then I went to the sea. Also very beautiful view :)

And last photo is on my way home. You can see this tower I was at (with red line around).

Hope you liked these photos :) Bye for now! :) *I must finally write my course work, I guess*

100th post

Hi! This one is my 100th post (if I count unpublished ones), and it will be sad, as I can't stay silent again, everyone's talking about it.

We have a nature park in Līgatne, and last Sunday a bear called Made escaped from her territory. She did it last August, too, but then she was found and returned back. But this time it was decided that it's too dangerous, and the bear was shot.

Only a human can do such a thing. To feed an animal for seventeen years, and then decide that it's too dangerous. Although it's so easy just to check a fence - and Made couldn't have an opportunity to escape.

At least she's now in a better world than this one. Without betrayal. Without evil.

More photos.

Swans & Sunset

Hi everyone! ^^

It's time to go to sleep, as I have to wake up early (or I must write my course work instead), but I'm reading blogs and decided to write a post. And tomorrow I definitely will regret that I did nothing for school. Somebody could just sit near me and tell me every second `write your course work!`, or I'll never finish it.

Anyway, the main idea was to show you some photos. My mom finally celebrated her bday (which was on 19th of March) last Saturday, and I went to my grandma's house by bike, so on my way back I drove along the lake. There I saw swans and I was standing for about a hour near them, as they're so beautiful & I love how they hiss at me ^^

Now I'm also trying to go to university by bike when it's not raining. Such a nice way to relax & enjoy nature a bit. The main problem is the 10,5 km distance (hope it'll be easier soon) and the fact that I live on 5th floor, my bike is a bit heavy for me to carry it easily :D
Last Thursday it was a Game Night at our faculty, everyone went home at about 9 p.m., but me and four of my friends had a big party at the basement until 11 p.m., when the faculty was closed :D *someone should also tell me not to party, as I have to write course work* Next day was also fun, as we had laboratory works with fish (and again we had that nice teacher I wrote last year about ^^), and we had to define species.
And maybe I really must go to sleep now :)
Have fun and take care! :)

Photopost: Dumpling soup

This post is especially for Ksu :)

Some time ago I read in her blog a strange recipe, how to make dumpling soup. And today I went to my grandma and me & mum tried to make it :) So, I'm sharing this with you.

For this soup you will need:

400 g of dumplings (I took really small ones, called `little babies`)

200 ml of milk (this was the strangest part)

1 paprika

leek (I took just the white part)

100g of melted cheese

sour cream, rosemary, black pepper.

Hey, Happy Easter everyone! ^___^

Me & Mum just coloured our Easter eggs, so I'm sharing photos with you :) We always spend so much time on eggs & try to make them colorful, using just natural things like onion peels, parsley leaves, rice, tea...

And this little basket with eggs is a gift for every reader of my blog :)

P.S. Dad's listening to radio, tomorrow will be snowstorm and on Monday will be -11 degrees :D

P.P.S. Ksu, I bought everything for soup with dumplings, milk & melted cheese, this evening I'll try to make it and soon I'll write a post, how it was :D

Spring is coming ^^

Hi! :)

Just updated my wishlist finally with a photo from Nightwish concert & also my new mp3 player, and decided to write a post, as it may be last (I hope it won't) until May. Today I finally went to my teacher to talk about my course work. It must be handed in at 15th of May, but then teacher will be busy with Masters, so he said I must write everything at Easter holiday next week (until 10th of April), so he could read it and tell me what I'll have to change. It's easy to say that I must finish it already - but I haven't even started! :D And also I have to write 15 pages at ecology about one species (at least teacher allowed me to choose Carabus nitens, about which I already have literature, as it's part of my course work), and this project must be handed in until 14th of April :D Ahh, wish me luck, I hope I'll be able to write non-stop for 8 days (at Easter holiday week), as this week I can't start because of many tests :D

And some photos :) At 16th of March I went to Jelgava, as one of my relatives had his 30th birthday. Of course, I wasn't sitting at the table (as it's boring), but just walking around :D And took part in a race, where everyone had to drink a glass of ice-cold champagne (I didn't know that before), I thought my throat will simply die, as I did it in 3 seconds *and I also hate champagne* :D

 Cute cat ^^

This Saturday I went to university, as one girl from Masters asked me to read a lecture about our biomimicry project at Young Biologists School. I remember when I went to this School, when someone read lecture I wanted to eat, sleep and everything else, not listening to something, even if it was interesting :D And now I know how students who read these lectures to us felt - it's funny when you're telling something and almost everybody is so sleepy. At least they asked questions and looked at my friend Sandra, when I mentioned her and told that she was also taking part in this project :D But I'll probably show this presentation once again, when I'll finish all my university works and we'll finally start working for Botanical garden :)
And, of course, I can't afford not to put here a photo with these yummy chocolates from Finland ^^ Brought them to my friends, but ate at least one third of them by myself, so tasty they were :D And also big thanks to Katja for telling me to buy that very yummy anti-stress tea (my mom also likes it) & to Ksu for chocolate tea ^^

And this is a present for my mom (she recieved it at work at her bday on 19th of March) :D Last year she also got cucumbers, but they were so crooked, that I don't know where it's possible to buy so ugly cucumbers :D

And now I think I must finally go and study, plant physiology, biometrics & ecology are waiting for me... See you soon! *at least I hope so :)*

Finland, fun & Nightwish ^___^

Hey! ^^ Finally I have time to write this post :) Last weekend was simply amazing! So I'll try to describe it, as I'm still full of emotions :)

... It was in 2008, I think, when my former classmate Aldis (thanks to him :D ) sent me Nightwish's song Bye Bye Beautiful, while we were making geography project with him and another girl. I heard about this group before, but didn't pay attention to it, so this was my first Nightwish's song. I started to listen to them, even though my mom always asked me, how can I listen to this kind of music (especially she `liked` Marco in a video I Wish I Had an Angel :D ). But their songs appeared more and more often in my playlists. At 5th of November last year I wrote in my blog that if they won't come to Latvia, I'll go to Helsinki to see them live. But I didn't mean it very serious. At New Year I decided that my aim for this year will be to do everything I find exciting (as before I very often said `no` just because of my laziness), and also to stop being afraid of talking with unknown people or shy. At 16th of January I bought a ticket to the mentioned concert & at 2:35 a.m. of 10th of March went to Helsinki to hear Nightwish & also meet Katja, her husband & Ksu ^^

Yay! :)

Finally I can officially share this information, and I'm glad to tell you that our team got 2nd place in 2011 Biomimicry Student Design Challenge! :) I could never believe that we'll be in top3, as we're from Latvia and there are so many better countries, but here we are :) Big congratulations to three persons of our team, who really spent so much time on this project - Anna, Anta and Edgars!

`Using the desert snail as inspiration for their design, a team of students from the Art Institute of Isfahan in Iran took the top prize of $5,000 in the third annual Biomimicry Student Design Challenge, organized by the Biomimicry 3.8 Institute. The team conceived of a building that makes use of self-shading, surface reflection, and insulation to create a livable habitat rather than relying on air conditioning. The second place award of $1,500 went to a team from the University of Latvia for a sunlight-induced shading system that mimics how flowers and stomata open and close. The third place prize of $750 went to a team from the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden. They designed click-on facade panels that can insulate existing buildings using snow. A Norwegian team from Oslo and Akershus University College of Applied Sciences won the Autodesk Sustainability Award, a $500 prize for showcasing how resources from the Autodesk Sustainability Workshop were utilized in their design process.`
You can read about projects (short descriptions), who got prizes here. I thought team from Sweden would win (I liked their idea the most), but they were just third.
Have a nice day! ^^