Hi everyone, it’s me Gabrielle here with you today!  Just a short time ago Maja Design opened up their new Facebook page, and I noticed a lot of chatter about ‘Fika’ and something called Kladdkaka!  Well, for those of you who are not Swedish, I should explain that Fika is the Swedish version of a ‘Cafe Clatch’ or tea time, where you enjoy a nice cup of coffee or tea with a lovely desert.  After seeing the yummy photo’s of the Swedish cake called Kladdkaka, I looked up the recipe on Pinterest and immediately handed it over to my oldest daughter Chloe who was off school this summer and really enjoying trying out recipies from Pinterest.  Well, let me tell you, this cake is DELICIOUS!  If you love brownies, you will love the dense rich taste of this Swedish treat!  Above is a photo we took of the cake she made (we added a dollop or real whipped cream (has to be the real stuff not that oil based stuff!) and some fresh raspberries).  You can find the recipe for the cake at my blog post today at Such a Pretty Mess Blogspot (although I hear that Jenny Grotherus’s recipe for Kladdkaka is even more delicious and decadent….we’ll be trying out her recipe next!…thanks Jenny!!)  Here is a photo I took of my daughter with her cake…

Okay, so back to my layout….haha, don’t get me started on topic of food, I can go on for hours!   I wanted to use a paper collection that would best reflect the theme of the page so of course I had to go with the ‘Ska vi ta en Fika collection’.

Here are the papers I chose to use from this lovely collection:  Ska vi ta en Fika: Kärleksmums – bs, Kaffetåren den bästa är…..but I also chose to mix in a couple other collections as well to bring in pinks for the berries and a clock for ‘tea time’.  So I also used Vintage Summer Basics: 1923, and Crea Diem: Den oersättliga tiden, as well as some butterflies from Vintage Spring Basics: 6th of May.  Here are some close-ups of the embellishments I used on the page….

The pleated flowers are some Recollections flowers that I found at Michaels and the chipboard flourish is from Dusty Attic (I wanted to keep it shabby chic looking so I painted it white, edged it with brown chalk ink, stamped on random text and finished with a crackle varnish).  The natural floral clusters and lace trims are from Tresors De Luxe.

You might wonder how I got the flourishes to go all the way around the edges of the inner page even though the page has been trimmed to show the polka dot paper behind?  I fussy cut the bottom and right side flourishes off the page first, then trimmed my page and stuck the flourish edge back onto the cut edges.

Dusty Attic has this cute Mini Cutlery chipboard set that I thought would per a perfect accent to the page, I just painted them with bronze 3D paint and squeezed on the flourish design.

I cut the largest clock from the Crea Diem collection and edged it with some Platinum Stickles and some more Dusty Attic chipboard and another flower.  To get the flaked rusted look to my chipboard, I first stamped the chipboard flourishes with some Tim Holtz Victorian Velvet ink, then I took my flat paint brush with some gesso on it and just lightly dabbed it here and there.  Finally I added a gloss coat to the chipboard pieces.

I hope you enjoyed my project today and hope that I’ve inspired you to try some Swedish baking and maybe make a page about it too! xo