How I Accidentally Became a YouTuber and Found a Simple Life in Sweden

It is minus two this morning in northern Sweden and I'm going to collect some pine tree branches to make wreaths for the front door. I just want to remind you that you don't need to buy brand new stuff to make Christmas beautiful. Good morning and welcome to vlogmas day five. It is minus two this morning in northern Sweden and the snow is coming. The snow is forecasted. I think there's going to be around 10 centimeters for the week ahead which is great because no snow is depressing. I feel like I'm the only person in northern Sweden who says that though. Oh my gosh, it is snowing just a little bit but it is snowing. This morning I've seen Sylvie, Rusty and the little girl that you're helping to name and I've seen some of your suggestions and I think I'll give it a couple of days. This morning I thought I'd share the story of how I accidentally became a YouTuber because it still is wild to me that this is my job. The first year I was here, five years ago, I found the four baby squirrels including baby pear and I wanted to document every aspect of them growing up and learning how to be squirrels and this was the first time I'd really done a big filming project and it was a passion project so I uploaded it to YouTube and within a few months it had over a million views. I decided after that to just try and make some YouTube videos and the truth is at the start I hated talking on camera so what I would have to do is write a script and basically read it to the camera but I would have it on my phone and basically memorize the line and then read it. Memorize the line and read it and that's how I used to make my early videos and I get asked quite a lot how can you get more comfortable talking to the camera and the only real thing I can suggest is practice. It took me a couple of years I'd say that I can just speak freely on camera without any idea of what I'm going to say but I found being with the squirrels and having this sort of interaction and being able to talk to them really helped me with getting confident to talk to the camera. I'm not sure if you can see the light snow, it's amazing that there is a little bit of snow with there being a nice sunrise. The squirrels aren't hungry today at all, they're not interested in food which sometimes happens especially if there's no snow or extremely cold conditions. We have made a bit of a feast for our brunch. Salsa Roja, beans with vegan cheese, vegan chorizo and then some eggs. Oh these beans look good. Yeah. We've not had beans in ages. Yeah I like this. I was thinking of making the bean soup. I just wanted to share an update on squirrel calendars. If you've ordered a red squirrels or wonderful wildlife calendar recently they were lovingly packed by my friend Lucy in London and she's actually sent me some behind the scenes vlogs of her packing them. Hello from a very very gloomy what I'm calling mistletoe HQ. I thought I'd take you on a behind the scenes tour but be warned there is a lot of cardboard. Calendars that I packed up yesterday. This is my little packing station and here we have some of the goodies that we put inside each of the packages. They're so cute, I get so excited when these come through. Look at those ear tufts, that is impressive and you have the excitement of seeing me pack. Enjoy. I'm able to run my calendar shop thanks to the sponsor of this video Squarespace. From calendars, squirrel cards and digital downloads everything on my shop and website is powered by Squarespace. On Squarespace it's really easy to make and manage a online shop from updating product pages to managing orders to shipping labels. It is easy to make a professional website on Squarespace. You can head to squarespace.com slash daniconawild to save 10% off a new purchase of a website or a domain. The sun has set and I'm just behind our house and I'm going to collect some pine tree branches to make reefs for the front door. The trick is to pick the branches that are the longest and skinniest because they are quite easy to move and handle. I think I have plenty now so I'm going to go back inside and start making the reefs. So to make the reefs I have this old fence wiring which I've made into a loop and I have multiple and I basically just thread the pine branches through the zigzags and I don't even need to use string. I have some in case. I then have some bows that I made last year, some dried orange and some pine cones I also made last year with fake snow and I think that's all. Here is the reef for the front door and in the winter the needles won't fall off until it gets warm so this will basically last until spring which is great. I also burned the edges of the ribbon so that they don't fray. Yesterday I faffed around for an hour trying to get this light up and in the end Juan had to break a socket and make a new one in order to get it to work. I'm gonna have a cup of tea. It is time for our little evening discussion. Over the years, especially being here, I've realized that Christmas can really be whatever you want it to be. For me, it's decorating the house in cute animals and making different nature-inspired crafts. It's about baking nice sweet treats and also making the house very cozy but in a world that's constantly telling us to buy more, I just want to remind you that you don't need to buy brand new stuff to make Christmas beautiful. Today for example, I made reefs with old fence wire ribbon that I've had for three years and just branches from the garden and there's something really satisfying about making something pretty with what you already have. Juan and I are going to do a little ornament exchange. I think we might do it tomorrow, where we have bought each other a new ornament. That's one of the few things that we're buying new. I bought the paper light, I bought the hedgehog ornament, but honestly my favourite Christmas decorations are either the ones that I've made myself or hand-painted. So I suppose my message tonight, decorating your home for Christmas can be magical and cozy and pretty but it doesn't have to be expensive, it doesn't need to be brand new and it doesn't need to be wasteful. Sometimes you just need a bit of creativity. Anyway, good night and see you tomorrow. Good afternoon Dani. I've loved following you since you found the squirrel forest and all that. I feel very blessed to be a part of your life in some sort of strange way and some of my favourite memories is when I was growing up, I'm 66 now, spending time with my mom during the Christmas holidays and decorating the tree and putting lights on it. Coming up this year my daughter is getting married. My daughter is 34 years old, 35 years old and I just love the flow of this right now. It just snowed here yesterday in New England. I live in Northampton, Massachusetts and the sky is blue and the air is cold, so perfect weather. Thank you for doing what you do and being who you are. Have a great day.