Selfmade ‘Today in Middle-earth’ – Moleskine Journal

Several years ago, Moleskine release some beautiful Hobbit edition of its notebooks. As a lover of Moleskine notebooks and all things Tolkien, I had to get one too. While I loved every notebook in this Hobbit series, I settled for this notebook in pocket size.

Yet, until recently, I didn’t knew what to use it for. I wanted to use it for Middle-earth related stuff, but I was also too afraid to use it in case I ruin it. You know, the usual struggle every stationery lover has.

A few days ago, as I was thinking of #middleearthmarch I somehow got THE IDEA: Why not use that Hobbit Moleskine notebook to write all Middle-earth dates down?

If you’re like me, March will make you wonder ‘What exactly happened that day in Middle-earth’? The entire year is filled with important days in Middle-earth, but March is, without a  doubt, one of the busiest months in Middle-earth. So whenever I wanted to know what was ‘going on’ in Middle-earth, I’d search the internet. Now, I don’t have to browse the world wide web, I can just grab my Middle-earth Calendar notebook and look up what is going on.

How I created my ‘Today in Middle-earth’ Moleskine Notebook

The most pressing question some of you now might have is ‘Where did you get all the dates from’? The best resouce on the internet is, by far, The One Ring.Net’s ‘Today in Middle-earth Calendar’. It is the most extensive and structured calender I’ve seen so far. No need to reference dozens of different hopepages anymore.

Section 1: LOTR events month on two pages

For my own, analogue version, I created two sections. A ‘month on two pages’ featuring Lord of the Rings Events only and a ‘Chronicles of Middle-earth’ section featuring all dates and events. The LOTR  events only section allows only for the most important event on each day. It serves me as a quick overview. My ‘Chronicles of Middle-earth’ section is the one section I’ll use as a detailed account of events.

Section 2

My system of colour-coding events

In order to make things organized and clear, I’ve decided to colour-code the events in my ‘Chronicles of Middle-earth’ section. Black stands for events  significant to LOTR, blue are events of importance to The Hobbit and purple encompasses miscellaneous events such as Tolkien’s birthday. All in all, I used up about two-thirds of my notebook. Depending on your handwriting or added decoration, it my be different for you if you decide to re-create it.

Section 2: ‘Chronicles of Middle-earth’

I’m not gonna lie, at times it felt tedious to write everything down. However, for the most part, I’ve really enjoyed the process. I’d put on Middle-earth inspired music and pretend to be a Gondorian historian. Now that I’m finished I’m desperate to re-read LOTR again!

Have you done anything similar? If now, what do you think of my little project? Leave a comment down below!

Happy Hobbit Day!

My dear Bagginses and Boffins, Tooks and Brandybucks, Grubbs, Chubbs, Hornblowers, Bolgers, Bracegirdles and Proudfoots, I wish you all a very happy Hobbit Day and a hopefully great start into Tolkien week!

The very first Hobbit Day was celebrated in 1978 and ever since then, fans around the world come together to celebrate  Hobbit Day every year on September 22nd, the day Bilbo and Frodo Baggins have their birthday.

Over time, this one days turned into a week and now we also celebrate Feast Week, starting on September 22nd and continuing through September 29! Each day, you can join and recreate the meals of Frodo’s journey to Rivendell during the first 8 days. You want to know what these meals are or get some inspiration? Why not head over to Middle-earth News? Staff members of Middle-earth News, including us three, created some very delicious meals in the last few years and maybe I’m biased, but the girls have some very delicious treats prepared for this year! So don’t miss out Feast Week!

Personally, I’ll rewatch The Fellowship of the Ring and An Unexpected Journey, play some Lord of the Rings Online, and will try to recreate as many Feast Week meals as possible!

So what are you planning to do on Hobbit Day? Will you participate in Feast Week? If so leave us a comment or a link with your prepared meal! We’d love to see what you’ll create!

Let’s Celebrate Tolkien Reading Day!

Every year on March 25th, Tolkien fans around the world celebrate Tolkien Reading Day. The Tolkien Society organises Tolkien Reading Day since 2003 to encourage fans to celebrate and promote the life and works of J.R.R. Tolkien by reading favourite passages

Now why March 25th you may ask?

The 25th of March is the date of the downfall of the Lord of the Rings (Sauron) and the fall of Barad-dûr.

See more of Maria’s photos on her Intagram account

See more of Alice’s photos on her Instagram account

Today, I’ll re-read my favourite passages from The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion, eat like a Hobbit and play some Lord of the Rings Online where I’ll explore the Shire with my Hobbit hunter.

What about you? How are you going to celebrate Tolkien Reading Day? Do you have any other favourite geeky holiday? Leave us a comment!

Top 10 Fictional Places Travel Bucket List

Frequent readers of Travelling Geek Show know that we three love travelling. While there are plently of beautiful places on this world that are waiting to be explored by us, there are also certain places we’ll never be able to visit because they are fictional. Even when it comes to fictional places, I could go on and on, but decided to settle for my to 10 fictional places I’d love to visit. I further limited myself to pick only one place per fandom. Otherwise I’d be sitting here, listing you my top 10 favourite places in Hobbiton alone! So without further ado, here are, in no particular order, my top 10 fictional places I’d love to visit if I could.

Slytherin Common Room, Harry Potter

Slytherin Common Room as seen on Pottermore

Ok, I know what you’ll now say “You could visit Hogwarts and you pick the Slytherin Common Room of all places? What the efff?”. Well, what can I say, I’m a proud Slytherin through and through so, of course, I’d love to visit the common room first!

Hobbiton, The Lord of the Rings & The Hobbit

Hobbiton as seen in the LOTR & The Hobbit movie trilogies

Of course I can’t write a list about my all-time favourite fictional places without mentioning Middle-earth somehow. While I’d also love to visit Edoras, Lothlorien, and dozens of other places in Middle-earth, my No. 1 pick will always be Hobbiton.

Dagobah, Star Wars

There are so many amazing places in the original Star Wars trilogy, but for some reason I can’t stop thinking about Dagobah. Part of me would love to get lost there and explore every corner of that planet, the ther part is terrified of it.

Fox Mulder’s Office, X-Files

Who wouldn’t want to visit Mulder’s office and go through his notes and X-Files? I think I’d probably sneak in at night, make me a coffee and just explore every corner and every little secret until I get chased out by Mulder.

Wonderland, Alice in Wonderland

Forget Oz, I want to visit Wonderland! Lewis Carroll’s book is one of those that mezmerize you and a part of you never leaves its world entirely. My greatest desire is to meet the Dodo, and then join a tea party.

Arieka, Embassytown

China Mieville’s Embassytown was the first time I had the opportunity to have a glimpse of the wonderful imagination of Mieville. I was actually torn between his vision of London in UnLondon and the planet Arieka in Embassytown, but I settled for the latter because it is unlike anything I’ve encountered before. If you love Science Fiction, linguistics, amazing plot twists, and strong female characters, this book is something for you!

Cheyenne Mountain Complex, Stargate

Ah yes, Stargate SG-1, one of my all-time favourite TV shows, EVER! While Stargate Atlantis and Stargate Universe had their nice moments, I never managed to warm up with either of them. I love everything about Stargate SG-1, the humour, the amazing characters (any Samantha Carter fans out there???), mythological themes etc. Even though I’d die to visit some of the planets, I wouldn’t mind spending some time only at the Chayenne Mountain Complex and talk to the SG teams.

New New York, Futurama

If there is one cartoon series I love more than The Simpsons, than it is Futurama. It is my type of humour through and through. The crazieness of New New York makes me laugh and I’d switch with Fry anytime!

Springfield, The Simpsons

Speaking of The Simpsons, god I wish I could visit this crazy little town. Even though The Simpsons lost their mojo way too many seasons ago, you have to admit that it is a TV legend. And it is now a part of my life for around 20 years (oh my, time runs!). I don’t know what I’d do in Springfield, all I know is that I’d love to spend time with Lisa.

Babylon-5, Babylon-5

Any Babylon-5 fans out there? A few weeks ago, I’ve watched an episode of Babylon-5 after what felt like an eternity and was immediately nostalgic. Yeah, I know Babylon-5 is neither among the best nor among the most popular Sci-Fi TV series out there, but I loved the show when growing up and still do. I have many fond memories of this show and their characters (any Garibaldi fans out there?), so yeah I’d love to visit the Babylon-5 space station!

Do you have a fictional places travel bucket list? Drop a comment down below!

Merchandise Monday | Herugrim Letter Opener

Another Monday, another Merchandise Monday! If you’re curious about our previous Merchandise Monday posts, go and check out our Merchandise Monday category. For more information about where and why Merchandise Monday started, head over to our friends, and creators of this series, Fangirls on the Road!

Now, without further ado, here is this week’s item: A Herugrim letter opener.

This beauty is one of many sword letter openers from The Noble Collection. I’m a big fan of merchandise items from The Noble Collection because they are not your average cheap plastic items that look as if they’re falling apart just by looking at it. Items from The Noble Collection are, indeed, noble.

One of my all time favourite things they offer are their The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit sword letter openers. I know I’ll never own life size replicas of the swords so these letter openers are an inexpensive and space-saving alternative.

Of all the LOTR and Hobbit sword letter openers available, King Theoden’s sword Herugrim is my absolute favourite. So, of course, I didn’t need to think twice when I saw that Herugrim was on sale on amazon.de a while ago. There is only one sword I’d love to own more than Herugrim and that is Boromir’s sword. Sadly, Boromir’s sword is not available as a letter opener (Yet?) Please Mr. and Mrs Noble Collection, please create a letter opener of Boromir’s sword!

Anyhow, I can’t complain, my Herugrim letter opener is beautiful and among my most prized possessions in my Tolkien collection!

Want to purchase your own sword letter opener? Go and check out the LOTR letter openers and The Hobbit letter openers!