tinywoolf: April 2011

drawing | fish

i have no idea why my fish, full frontal, became monstrous. they almost keep me running, those scary monsters, running scared (thank you bowie). and they also seem to shut me up, which only happens on rare occasions. intrigued, by fish around the world, via elisabeth.

update, something fishy. i really had to smile when i opened up your snail mail, elisabeth. fetching contents too!

i gave paper fish the breath of life,

and let the red one swim on dry land. (may the chaotic surroundings represent the wild, wild sea). i think i am passionately in love! ☻cheers, ♥!!

supper

bitesize almost. 's been a while, but the 444 project (just named it so) is growing. i should have one serious recount actually. who knows where i'm at? once more. we may get there by winter. 2012.

nose job (111-7) {vintage wallpaper musings}

he lived in a time when a nose job didn't have the inclination it has today. nobody he knew would dream of having anything changed on himself, for features are what defines a true man. cousin vinn had flapping ears, they called him dumbo, but that was a deviatory tool, for vinn was clever, was he ever. his brother harm (short for harmand) walked the village in a size 19. it sure rendered impact, especially when a door needed kicking down. herb himself now carried a nose to be proud of, no more no less. He always said, a good nose is the true path to health, scrubbed in a whiff.

corner view ≈ for lunch

when outside temperaures rise, al fresco dining pops up all around us. i'm saying olé to that.

b having lunch
photo taken inside the glass (lunch) box of
STA•M in ghent

and afterwards, tea in dear a's splendid town patch, which translates as prince's garden [being five months pregnant in the setting simply becomes a ♥]. jane's corner view, Dorte's yummy theme on francesca's premises. bon appétit!

vintage finds | a new flame has come & walkies

mister deer hung observantly by a passage in the thrift shop. i've always wanted a mr. deer, imagine carrying one home! but i also always experienced a pang of distress for the real mccoy.

so since mr. deer here is shining plastic fantastic, elope with me he did. i gather he was only too glad to be lifted off of that doorway.

we ploughed our way through to the station, sweated a little under the midday sun, eventually got there.

on the train he fell rather silent, tucked away as he was. i asked him if i could take off his antlers, since they'd already gotten stuck twice between seats and train doors.

none too proud he agreed. i shushed him confidently, promising his antlers would find their proper spot before too long. do you think he looks a little like an aviator, hornless?

no buy. couldn't figure what i was gonna do with it

thus i've been walking, i've been driven. i have stumbled, and kept balance. i caressed a great many lovelies, and i saved myself from buying too much [add: i hope].

ha! abc-loving. will get back to that. it's brewing

not making the full use of our place called home, many of the treasures that come wrapped, stay so, for another year. or two.

exquisite desk lamp. huge too. must yet be cleaned thoroughly

sometimes i scrutinize objects through the lens. i talk to them when i do. i tell them they will be exposed again. soon...-ish. it's happened they talk back, no pleas.

papa, mama, kiddo, me thinks

they are good boys, generally happy to have been scooped up for a second life elsewhere. or a third. a fourth?

kiddo scooting off to paris. quick learner

must now urgently go find me an egg, before they're all gone and eaten. sophie's [easter] eggs in a basket. happy bells!

dive into the cupboard and ...

chicken soup and peppered cream cheese on toasted bread chunks

one road yummy cookbooks effortlessly lead me onto is larder cupboard fun. i don't know what it is, or why. but i'm looking at mouth watering recipes and a mechanism inside my head goes off and screams, what shall we do with what we've got anyway? this time around i remembered i had some dry mushroom soup in one or other container. too right, only it turned out to be chicken. i fried a small onion and a sliced cornichon into a little olive oil and added some leftover marinated artichoke and a good few turns of freshly grounded black pepper. while snapping the coriander off the life saving plant in the window sill, i grabbed some left over cream from the fridge and poured this in, after i'd added the obligatory cup of water and dry soup sachet. the result? a surprisingly healthy tasting little gem of an instant soup! do try this at home, chances are you will be surprised.

sticks and stones

do your remember the small world melody in disneyland? i'm sorry for reintroducing that chime back into your subconscience, but when sometimes visiting a place, that doozie tune coughs its way back up.

not to say that the STA•M city museum in ghent stands in any way proof to it all just being a small world, nor does it ring disney bells... but when you get the feeling it's all been made for a purpose, and it's held there along a well designed plan, discovery is pure heaven. (pardon my seemingly metaphysical intro).

anyway. sun flooding, wind blowing non existently, friends' laughter brazing medieval stone. just to say, besides renovating, we're so having a break too ... ☻ there's the museum walk here. do treat yourselves to the slideshow.

drawing | map


map of belgium on bathroom wall in the middle brussels, far west the north sea treasures found, scribbled along the borders

i had it all mapped out in my head, both intention and execution. then friday happened and a fresh pair of helping hands were offered, well into saturday. those friend's hands i simply could not refuse. it means the bathroom walls got done, big time. it also means the map stayed at bay, until i decided to create it, the temporary way. as in jotted down, like we oftentimes do, with explanatory maps. i reached for my crayon and scribbled an unfinished wall,

turtle dove grey

until m. strikingly rolled it into nirvana. it is an itinerary of sorts, a pleasant route bell and i drove, just three days ago, on our thrifting adventure. now i go hop-skipping along, exploring the rachel way.

corner view ≈ home

'home is where i wanna be, pick me up and turn me round.... i guess i must be having fun.' - words & music by talking heads. to me, home is a concept, a feeling, one i've been longing for since before i was born. best photos have been made from home (me seriously biased), but there's something about home, the bliss, the velveteen. can't ever wait to get home, throw on some slippers, dive into a soft sweater, and drift off. home, after all, is day dreaming with eyes closed.
home for jane's corner view, don's heavenly pick of the week, hosted by francesca.

frabjous & fudderwupping, assoc.*

when hung over (not me)

two wander, for free

no fuss for fluff nor pleat.

all that we need

are four feet,

to keep upright

and contemplate

the full swing

of spring.

* good heavens!

it's alice!

again.

thrifting goes drifting

i suppose i need to lose a foot before i'll stop thrifting. what then? this morning i turned around my usual itinerary, got myself chased by two recruiting policemen on bikes (were they suspicious of my barely visible limp?) while loafing in and out of favourite shops. a lot of dilly-dallying going on too, especially at cashier tills. i could have easily grown a third foot. (oh, eek!)

i seem to be developing a passion for wooden block letters on the spot, style boggle&co. i feel i want many, because i have a plan. when i find some, i'm downright happy.

somewhere along the line i bump into a crochet shoulderbag that someone lovingly made and the handiwork makes my heart melt,

and a tiny feather filled cushion, which on my return immediately gets claimed by son,

after lunch with (princess) donkeyskin, some plastic drawing curve utensils (coincidentially in beloved vintage colours) and a packet full of images-to-be-cut-up. almost done!

this baby should keep me off the streets of london for a while. london being my first love, but just a little too expensive at the moment, i turn to gay paris and a dutch author (jan brusse) who's walking some seven walks in paris. can't wait to follow his footsteps, to check what all has changed, publishing date going back to the seventies...

these days time is on my side for i've taken time off work to keep on renovating. on the toe side, it's healing, the black and blue way. i'm expecting the nail flying off before long. cheers everyone! for the thoughtful words in previous comments.

later this week, bell and i are taking empty booted skippy out for a whirl along the belgian coast, thrifting exactement every shop that floats our way. we live in a small country, so rural areas are easily covered as such. a little coordinated a-drifting (thanks to nicole the gps lady), and careful packing of a few americanos-on-ice, trying hard not to go about it the patsy&edina way. anticipation is a fine thing. now, sophie's flea market finds for the day.

drawing | mirror

not to say i found this easy, how to interpret mirror? i helped myself to a little 3w search. as you can see i decided to play about with chinese fonts, well, with the border more like [no. i did not draw the chinese signs myself. sorry]. read also this accompanying beautiful love story about a mirror. its conclusion is timeless.

pò jìng chóng yuán
a broken mirror leads to reunion

king chén of the southern dynasty cared nothing for ruling his country, and instead spent his days in pursuit of pleasure. the general, whose name was xú dé yán, felt his country was in grave danger because of the king’s behavior. and if ever war came, he would most likely be separated from his wife. so he took a round mirror and broke it in half, giving one piece to his wife and keeping the other for himself. he told her that if they were separated, they could use the pieces of the mirror to recognize each other. they agreed to search for each other every year on lantern festival, when they would go to the market to sell mirrors.

it came to pass that the kingdom was attacked, and xú dé yán and his wife were separated. they kept searching for each other nonetheless, until finally, two broken mirrors reflected exactly what the seekers were looking for, and the general and his loving wife were reunited.

an afterthought : i'm wondering if perhaps similar stories exist in other cultures? ARIANE is hosting this week's drawing challenge. i'm now looking for reflections in her mirror, mirror...

corner view ≈ [thank you my] time

no moving pictures to this video, just a frozen reflection upon time.

mannequin, singer, comedian, writer, poet and master in medieval and renaissance music, boston-born ANN STEEL had more than one idea up her sleeve, when arrriving in italy in 1979, to produce a one-off record alongside avant garde composer Roberto Cacciapaglia.
over to jane's timeless corner view, dorte's pick of the week, hosted by francesca.

on wearing a sock to bed {renov# 20}

{previously}

if one stays at it the whole time, then the least you're ending up with is some kind of result. all while working on that result, i found myself crossing off stuff from my to do list. okay.

if only i'd worn these boots two pic's down.

so the white on the walls could do with one more lick of paint (i'm telling myself i need to adjust to white first, and if ever i wanted another colour then the last white coat is optional. right). because before i started painting, i had to plaster, and sand, and plaster, and sand, and i'd just about had it with the flaming dust creeping everywhere.

ha. sorting out. me love.

while son was in berlin last week, i did manage to cram it all in (would have to give up the lease of his room anyway). then came the huge moment of building the bed, which had already been sitting in its cardboard boxes since last november (when we couldn't move into the house). i unwrapped the parts, had fun, until one bed wing fell on my bare footed toe.

blues-y

i wailed, i screamed. no tears, it was simply too painful. i woke up son with my bawling, looked at his disheveled hairdo that stood in all directions, and burst out in a bitterly painful laugh. thus i wore a sock to bed for protection, on my first night on the delightfully hard matrasses on the queensize bed, which also, hmm, seems to have rather filled up the room. are you in for a short follow up, right from the very start? then walk the gallery with me, chronologially.