Books and fiber

March 21, 2012

What’s On Your Workdesk Wednesday (WOYWW 04)

It’s Wednesday already? Oh wow time flies. Well Spring has finally found its way to the Netherlands. The sun is shining and according to the weather forecast it stays that way the next few days. I love rearranging my furniture in my home, but the urge to clean and change is the biggest in spring. I’ve been planning to get rid off a big brown cupboard which use to hide my big black ugly tv. I ditched the television months ago and the cupboard is still here, containing boardgames and some administration. Stuff I can easily stash elsewhere, if I do a bit of rearranging in my home. After weeks of thinking about it, moving furniture in my mind I think I have figured it out. It requires a lot of moving around so I have started with putting my miniature greenhouse and haberdashery on my desk to make room on a shelve for the first relocation shift.

Making miniatures is also one of my many hobbies. One that has been hibernating for some time but is stirring deep below in my belly. Getting the brown cupboard out of my living room is the first step of making room for my dollshouse. I have what people call a “Painted Lady” A Victorian mansion in scale 1:12, which I named “Mandragora Mansion”. For some time now it’s nudging at the back of my mind telling me it wants back into my living room and into my free time. But first things first: make room for the brown cupboard to move to the studio/bedroom and get myself a new bookshelves end so 1/3 of the shelves in my studio/bedroom (I need a better name for that area ) can go into the livingroom. And on those shelves I wil place the greenhouse and the haberdashery, next to my arts and crafts books. AFTER I really cleaned them up, dusted it and make some repairs. Because that is really nessecary. If you click on the pictures and have a closer look, you see what I mean.

So I might bother you with the progress on the greenhouse and haberdashery the next week too. I’ll let you know how things went with project Bring-Mandragora-Mansion-Back-Into-The-Livingroom. I made about 90% of the content of the greenhouse myself. The greenhouse itself is from IKEA. The haberdashery I made myself from card board, paper, fabric and some beads and embaslihments. The content also made by me except for the sewing basket on the left hand side. That was a gift, as was the small necklace (the silver thingy on the red velvet in the white little box) on the mirror-table.

Anyways. I have a lot of moving around to do, a lot in 1:1 scale as well as a bit in 1:12 scale. I wish you all a crafty and sunny week.

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March 14, 2012

What’s On Your Workdesk Wednesday (WOYWW 03)

I skipped last week since nothing happened on my desk. But last Saturday I got another bag with craft-goodies from my friend Ingrid. A few weeks back she gave me a bag filled with DMC and unknown brands of cross stitch floss and a bag filled with cross stitch fabric.

In this bag are skeins of tapestry wool, cotton bias ribbon, silk ribbon, cotton cords and some more fabrics. I emptied the bag yesterday and started sorting through it a little bit:

And – as usual – Emma sits on my stool as soon as I lift my bum. Here’s a close up from the tapestry yarn. There is also some plastic weaving-thingy..

So. Thats it for me this week. Let’s see if all this found its way in my storage before next week

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March 12, 2012

Gardening and cooking

dan_e and me love to watch programs about gardens and we are huge fans of Carol Klein and Monty Don.

Carol’s book “Life in a cottage garden” has its place on my book shelve for some time now and last weekend dan_e brought “Fork to fork” with him. We have been watching the short series and our mouth watered by seeing all the delicious fruit, herbs and vegetables Monty got from his garden.

It’s on moments like this I would want to say my life in the big city farewell and go live on a farm and grow my own food too. But then practical me chases away romantical me and I’m very glad I live in the big city with all the convenience this city has to offer. But who knows, maybe one day.

Monty and his wife Sarah Don’s Fork to fork is all about food, grown organically in their own garden in Herefordshire. It was first published in 1999 and we have the 2010 reprint of the 2009 reissue.

From the Amazon website:

“This special reissue includes new introductory text and celebrates the vital link between growing, cooking and eating food all year round. For Monty and Sarah Don, a love of eating food must include an awareness of how that food is grown, and a love of growing your own food must include an active interest in how best to cook it. They demonstrate this philosophy in this seasonal month-by-month guide on how to cultivate and cook a range of vegetables, herbs and fruits which is accompanied by photographs that record a year in the kitchen garden at their home. It includes detailed instructions and gardening tips as well as more than 40 recipes to inspire food lovers to make the best use and appreciate the real flavours of home-grown food.”

The book starts in september and takes you troughout the year untill august with tips on gardening and the most delicious recipes. It brings you the food of the season, something I want to switch to for some time now.

One recipe we saw in the series, but could not find in the book is the one with potatoes. New potatoes, the first of the season. Monty digs them up and tells us to quickly go to the kitchen to cook them as fresh as possible. However, he claims, you do have some time to pick some fresh mint from the container next to the kitchen door, before you enter the kitchen.

New potatoes with olive oil and mint:

Wash the new potatoes under cold streaming water, no need to scub them, just wash off the dirt and remove critters if there are any.
Put them in a cooking pan, again with cold water and cook them for about 20 minutes. They are done when you can slice a knife in it, but don’t overcook them. You don’t want the potatoes to fall apart.
Drain the potatoes and put them back in the pan you cooked them in, sprinkle olive oil over them, don’t be too thrifty and then add the fresh mint leaves. Cover it with a clean kitchen towel and let it stand for about 10 minutes. The olive oil will absorb the mint flavours and give them to the potatoes.
Monty and Sarah ate them just like that, served with some olive oil and seasalt to dip. We ate white beans in tomato saus with it. Our potatoes came from the market, but nevertheless it tasted awesome.

Carol Klein’s Life in a cottage garden takes you through her garden the year around. But unlike Monty & Sarah Don, this is about gardening in all its aspects. Carol shows how her garden grows, florishes and dies and how it all starts all over again in the never ending cycle of life and death.
On the Amazon website is information about her book and a 4 minute video clip from the series on which this book is based upon.

Like I said: when seeing these series or reading the books, I want to move out to the country, get me a nice little farm and grow my own herbs, fruit and vegetables. But then I realise how much I am going to miss my city with all the bad and good and I think: “Maybe, some day, when I dont need the city anymore.” Meanwhile I grow my herbs on the balcony and this year I am going to try to grow potatoes. If only I can get just 1 meal from a small container, I’d be a happy big city farm girl.

What’s On Your Workdesk Wednesday (WOYWW 02: special edition)

Last Wednesday I spend the afternoon crafting in the Zoo. I wasn’t actually crafting myself but supervising and helping the kids who came for the crafting afternoon. It’s a school holiday in The Netherlands and our local zoo organises all sorts of events during these days, not just for kids. And as a volunteer tour guide I help out on these events too occasionally

The “paint your own planet” event was just for kids. They could come to the planetarium to change a styrofoam ball into a planet. Since my own work desk is exactly the same as last week, I decided to show you this one. My colleagues and me set the table and that looked like this:

here is a detail:

We had 35 children in 90 minutes at our table and they were very creative. Because of privacy matters I wont show you their faces, but working hands are nice too right?

They all had a real nice time and thats what’s it all about.

***

Afgelopen woensdag was in in Artis voor het evenement “schilder je eigen planeet” speciaal voor kinderen georganiseerd omdat het voorjaarsvakantie is. Mijn collega’s en ik hebben de tafels klaargezet en een beetje geholpen. Aangezien mijn bureau er nog precies zo uit ziet als vorige week besloot ik dit maar te laten zien.

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February 22, 2012

What’s On Your Workdesk Wednesday (WOYWW 01)

I am a lazy blogger, I know that. Its just that I blog whenever I feel like it and sometimes I don’t want to for weeks. That being said I’m going to commit myself to at least try to blog once a week. I have been following these WOYWW-blogs all over the net and I really like them. I first read about it on the Stamping Ground. I decided to dive in and post my work desk on a weekly basis too. At least try it

So here it is, my first WOYWW picture:

(you can click it to enlarge)

I have bought this desk only recently – you can read about it here and here - and I really like it, But I’m still knitting and stitching in the living room where my computer is. I’ll probably post a WOYWW of that desk some time soon.

So, what’s on my desk? Well on the left is a pile of papers with all sorts of information on paper crafts which need to be sorted and filed and some 1963, 1964 and 1965 crafts magazine on knitting, sewing, crochet and embroidery. A friend of mine gave them and they are awesome.. On top of the small drawers cabinet are some small cross stitch projects in progress, in it lots of pens and pencils.. At the back some of my books and pencils, crochet hooks and scissors. There is also my iPad and a small stack of papers which I put gesso on, waiting for some inspiration to get some colour on it so I can use it as an art journal. Also waiting for some colourful inspiration is the mandala thats in the front. here you can see a close up:

(also click to enlarge)

Last but not least also in the back is my “book art” I blogged about here. In short; its an old Window’s Vista manual “molested” into something useful: it holds my notes and cards.

So, thats my desk for this week. I hope you liked it.

***

Ik zie al een tijd op Internet blogs verschijnen met foto’s van bureau’s waarin mensen laten zien waar ze meee bezig zijn. Ik vind dat zo leuk, dus ik ga (proberen) dit ook elke week te doen. Als je op de foto’s klikt zie je de grote versie ervan. De woorden “here” die onderstreept zijn, zijn links naar oudere blogposts met hoe mijn bureau er een tijdje terug uitzag en het boeken-vouw projekt.

In deze eerste week zie je mijn bureau met wat boeken, een klein ladekastje met pennen en potloden, erop wat kleine borduurprojectjes. verder nog meer stiften, pennen, haaknaalden en scharen. Mijn iPad met daarnaast een stapel papier die liggen te wachten op inspiratie voor wat kleur zodat ik er een Art Journal (een zelfgemaakt dagboek) van kan maken. Helemaal links een stapel met printjes die ik moet uitzoeken en opbergen en een paar Ariadnes uit 1963, 1964 en 1965. Gekregen van een vriendin en ik vind ze helemaal leuk Tot slot zie je ook nog het boek die ik omgebouwd heb tot visitekaartjes en knipsel bewaarplaats.

Wat ook nog op inspiratie ligt te wachten is de mandala die je in de 2e foto van dichtbij ziet. Dit was het dus voor deze week .