LACE

I feel that I most of the lately time have been running around in my different versions of my "beatnik look" (sans the belly of course, but plus a lot of layers on top of that) - black is easy - as my days mostly consists of hanging out with Dag in-and outdoors, working when he's napping and running to rehearsals and to the gym after that. But otherwise when it's not the all black- or hobo layers look, many of my blouses and shirts have still been put aside due to motherhood, until a time when there will be less goo all over. So I've been wearing lots of basic cotton tops instead. Which sometimes feels a bit blah and too neutral. But they can be pimped up a little though, to better suit some of the other items I have, like the one I put cuffs and a collar on. And this one here! It's a basic organic cotton long sleeve tee, that I sew a lace appliqué on.


Probably best done by hand if you are patient enough - not me; I used a loose zig zag seam to fasten it. When the stitches are somewhat loose I'll be able to re-attach it to some other garment when the top gets too floppy. And to be washed by hand, or perhaps on the gentle program in a lingerie bag.


Fabric- and haberdashery stores sometime sell small lots of lace ribbons and appliqués at a nice price. I've tried to cut out my own from a lace fabric too. That gave me a headache. If you can't find any suitable lace there is of course always the trustworthy internet to rely on too.
I stocked up so there will be more lace on more stuff to come...

A NEW VIEW / THE ROSEY CURTAINS

Here we have the Marimekko Ruusupuu (the Rose Tree) fabric. It has, among many,  been a favourite of mine for a long time. (picture source)

So I got curtains of the fabric in the apartment I had before moving to where we are now. 

Then as I moved the curtains got chopped off to hang in the study.

And now they are hanging in the kitchen! 

As the result of an unexpected little catastrophe actually; I washed the yellow gingham kitchen curtains and they shrunk with some 20 cm... Argh! Because I (finally) am in cleaning-and-organising mode now I thus can't stand things being "not ready" and as I would have packed the rose curtains aside anyway for a kiddo-set of curtains for Dag I made a quick save and hung these up.

Funny how a little fabric can change the whole feel of a room! I really liked it with the yellow curtains, but I am starting to think that this is not that bad after all.

Btw another little funny thing,  Marimekko fabrics / patterns are probably one of few in which it is considered totally alright and normal (and rather fancy too as   'it is after all Marimekko' ) for someone to show up to a, say, wedding in a dress of the same fabric as your tablecloth. Hipsters and old ladies alike.

PS. there is a Finnish survey about blog readership popping up here (once per ip address) on the blog. In Finnish. Thus not useable for many of you, so choose the "ei kiitos"option then to close it.

SOME MAKE UP AND SKIN CARE FAVOURITES FOR WHEN IT'S COLD

A few of my favs for winter:

Most of the year I wear a powder mineral foundation, but in winter with the cold and dy air and the temperature switches that gets too dry for my skin. I use a BB cream instead, sometimes with some powder on top  (and oil up my face a lot). My absolute favourite fantastic love-it-to-dedath BB cream, which I've bought online (fromNaturisimo) before, is now finally available in Finland too (via Jolie)!

The magic cream is Iroisie's Soin Parfait Ultimate BB cream. The first time I used it I was afraid it was going to be a little too rosy-beige, it came on quite dark, but then suddenly it evens out perfectly. I've been totally amazed with it. So, I do use it other than in winter too, those days I just feel like cream instead of powder foundation. The cream is organic and natural.

For those days I want some more make up on, I brush some powder on top. I have the silk powder from Coleur Caramel which also is a natural make up line. It leaves a very silky sheer glow on the skin. I might ave to get a little puff to keep under the lid as I find it a bit hard to carry a brush around in the bag too, but ten again I don't need to refresh my make up over the day, as it stays on perfectly well very a very long time.

When it comes to skin care I mainly wash my face with coconut oil (sometimes black soap) and wipe it off with a tonic, then put some more coconut oil on over night. Or this, pure shea butter! My face becomes a little ball of grease, but that makes it so soft and smooth in the morning to deal with the freezing winds of outside. I use the shea butter for dry hands and elbows and so on too, and also on Dag's little checks (and butt cheeks too).

THE BLACKBOARD DOOR

We have a couple of doors painted with black board paint at home in the city apartment; the door in the older boys' room and then the closet door in the now-study (read: mess room) but-Dag's-room-to-be any day now. It's a quite fun way for kids to draw, because it feels a little like being allowed to do something forbidden while still being totally allowed and encouraged...




So far no artistic try-outs on any white walls or on the floor (and fingers crossed that won't happen either). Perhaps because the door is black and then that's the kind of surface you draw on, the others different coloured ones not as they differ so much. Well, let's see what happens in a year or two when the need for "artistic expression" and experimenting grown stronger.

Blackboard pant is not magnetic but I was wondering if it could work to paint a couple of layers with magnetic paint first and then top it with one coat of blackulrikaboard paint, to be able to put up funny magnets and notes and such (and therefor spare my mint green friend in the kitchen from too many dinosaurs and other magnetic crap)? Hmmm.

Over here at least Tikkurila have both kinds of paint. The paint dries pretty fast so the doors were ready in one day.

A GLASS OF SUMMER

One advantage of living in the almost-arctic is that when it gets helluva cold it's at least easy to de-frost the freezer and fridge. One just puts all the stuff in plastic bags out to the just-as-cold balcony (or, porch or  yard whatever) and have them wait there until the frost free cleaned Smeg is up an running again, then it's back with everything in like nothing ever happened.

While emptying the frige I remembered I had saved some rhubarb juice I had made early last summer and decided that it was now or never, the absolute right time to take out the bottle and have an instant mini summer get away. It's awesome with tiny happy presents from a past self. (I wish I would be that nice to myself when it comes to other things around the house too. Like always do my books one a month instead of leaving it al in a big box for future-and-most-likely-way-more-organised me to  sort then all out.) There was another bottle of pink summery rhubarb juice in the freezer too, but that one I will save for that hopeless moment when I'm banning my head against the wall when it's still snow around  in April.

I will have the great joy of going trough the same procedure of melting and cleaning fridges in the weekend when hitting the countryside... But to make it a bit ore pleasant I know there will be another little bit of summer waiting for me there: the summer lemonade of which I had also tucked a couple of bottles of in the freezer. Smart little me!

EMBELLISHED CARDIGAN

I have a warm 1950's cardigan with pearls and rhinestones on it. I haven't been much for beads or other embellishments the past decade or so (on everyday clothes, ehrm, my on- and after stage wardrobe of course speaks a totally different language...) but now I am having an itch for such. Too bad the Trashy Diva Lorelei dress on sale was out in my size... (yes "too bad" says my economy and sighs peacefully).

This card is from my will work for clothes series. Well,which is not that much of an existing series really, it is  in fact not something that I will not do in general, uh oh, nah nah, no way -unless it's for a friend of mine and can be seen more as a mutual favour. So this one is from  Ina's Year Since Yesterday store,  as thanks for fixing up some pics and graphics for her.

SHOOTING IN THE LIL' PALACE

Today I did the well familiar -I go there often to perform- two hour drive  up to Tampere trough white powdered and beautifully sparkling but oh so cold landscapes. (Too cold to take pictures in, fingers freeze.)

I went there for a photo shoot;  to shoot some wedding dresses for and by a friend of mine. The shoot was in an amazing old house that is still in private ownership (the old lady lives upstairs) but which lower floor can be rented for events.

 It's called the "Little Palace" which it pretty much is.

The schedule was super busy and fast so I didn't have the time to walk around and take any well-though photos but I snapped a few ones with my phone.

And perhaps we'll get to take a look at the wedding dresses some time later.

A WIRE HANGER IN THE KITCHEN

I never seemed to find a suitable hanger or stand for the kitchen paper towels so I made one out of an old wire hanger that hangs from a small nail-turned-hook. I obviously had to cut away a couple of cm n the middle to be able to fit the roll, but just a little bit though - too big a gap would make the frame too weak to carry the paper roll when in use.

BRAIDS AND FOLKY FLORALS

 I bought a seventies vintage dress in a floral pattern with a slavic-ish twist.

 Wore it with folky braids.

(And double earrings, as I couldn't decide which coloured pair to choose.)

To get the braids huge enough (the bigger the better you know) I twined in some extra hair to them.
The whole thing wouldn 't hurt with a couple of big flowers to go along on top but I'll save that for some warm sunny day later this year.

The dress is from Love Miss Daisy and the red lace up boots I cam upon on Sammydress. (You might know I've had the idea of such a very long time and here they are now.) My earrings are by Frollein von Sofa.

RED BLUE BLACK BEIGE AND SNOW

Winter outfit, outdoors mode.
This plaid jacket
This wool skirt
And a pair of red boots you are yet to see.

SUSPENDERS AND A WEARABLE PERFUME AD

Here's an outfit. So -I have this longer skirt that keeps me warm and boots that manage the weather and of course, as always, a beret on and thought that it's pretty whatever, timeless, kind of thirties in some ways and then it struck me: change the beret to a beanie (plus give me a floppy cropped knit to throw on or tie a white shirt in a knot around my waist) and there you have my dream look from about 1995!  Oh my, I laughed.

But I was indeed wearing something rather funny nonetheless, a blast form the past - I stumbled upon an old top of mine that I thought had seen the end of it's days a long time ago already. (Yes funny how you can manage to stuff away, make disappear actual physical, existing pieces of materia in your closet and then just 'stumble upon'  them again isn't it, suddenly they just lie there folded again?).

It's a vintage promo top of some sort for the eau de cologne 4711. (My great grand father imported it to Finland back in the days; you may remember we also have an old 4711 tin ad at home; there were a bunch of those in the wood shed at the summer house.) This was my mothers, she had this in the seventies, and I loved it to bits and pieces around the change of the millenium. It is so fine and ugly in the same time.

My skirt has suspenders (I thought I'd point it out in case you did not notice. Ha ha.) Such a skirt, long and plain with suspenders/straps, has been on my to sew-list for at least five-six years, but no luck in that departement so far. I happened upon this one online, and realised that after this many years it won't just magically put itself together by my machine, so I clicked it home instead. I was a bit sceptic first that the material would be thin and wobbly, unforgiving so to say, but it's thick and soft and I might be smart and click home a couple of more to store for later, the way I've started doing things now (whenever I remember , or don't feel too middle aged doing so); stocking up... You've read me say it before, fast forward forty years and there you have weird flower person crazy cat lady and a closet full of duplicates of a few items because "they were the good ones"... Also, if I'm ever to grow my belly again this would be a perfect piece of clothing to do so in, hint hint, for those of you who are for the moment. The skirt is from Sammydress.


Let's end this one with a bonus pic of Dag photo bombing my blog shot.

PS. my bold move to get myself a non-black beret as in this red one resulted in me misplacing or -gasp- perhaps even loosing the original black one. I feel almost naked without it now.

A POST ABOUT NAILS

I've never been a "nail person". Or so I thought. And by that I mean one that gets her nails done somewhere with fancy manicures, checks out nail pics on the web and so on. No glitter for me. I've always love painting ny nails though (even if I've been rather conservative with my color choices the last decade - red, the occasional pink and coral, then red and red and another red...). But I've never managed to keep them long for long, and that goes way back.

You may recall me saying that I played the piano for almost twenty years. (Mainly classical, if you wonder, later when I was at a high school for music also jazz etc. My first ever job was actually being a piano teacher for one graders :) Well, to be able to play well you can't really have long nails as they affect your touch on the keys. My piano teacher at the institute was a woman, and she would spot it right away if my nails were too long. When upgrading in my later teens I got new teacher who was a man and he did't quite realise what the problem was the times I had vainly let the nails grow; he'd just wonder why something was a bit wrong when I played...

My first year of studies after school was studies in painting at an art school which was a messy thing of preparing canvases and mixing oils and thinners and so on and thus no place for well done manicures - not to mention I was quite the art boho hippie at that time too, and having fancy nails was kind of a faux pas in the goa circles during the late nineties and early 00's. Haha, oh my, thinking of those days. At the same time I started working in the harbour where most of you know I was for more than a decade. And whenever I managed to do something nice with those nails of mine some god damn IMO-sign fastening on a truck or a box I had to carry or whatever work stuff there was was sure to break at least one of them (nails) and ruining the whole thing, the way it goes.

But although sometimes secretly jealous of all fancy nails I never got myself around to really go hav'em done as I wasn't a nail person you know (although I once bought a Groupon deal for myself to use at a salon but it expired. And one other time I got a gift card for a manicure as a present but it also expired. Sorry. I am like that. Don't give me gift cards unless you also force an appointment on me! Sorry again for all other expired ones too.). But, this summer I thought f u c k i t and got them done and HA! On some levels of life that have little impact on the way of the  universe it did make me happier. And life easier, at least from a vain point of view. I can do the dishes and laundry and gardening and what not and there they are still shiny and happy. And I don't have to worry about them being ugly with halt-gone polish either when performing. In certain parts of this life it's a 'phew'.

I started out rather gently from choosing calm classy colours (and having trouble using my phone with my new long nails) to go demanding "they need to be totally corny and crazy!!" by now. And well, if I don't find even find myself doing the occasional nail-pic search on google nowadays and have planned some styles for the next versions to come, hehe. It's kind of fun. Always something to keep me occupied with in my wait for spring. Three styles to go and then it's hello no-mitten weather again!

Umm, well, alright. So that was a story about nails and here are some manicures I've had the past months. Some of you will care while others will not, but here you go anyway:

Christmas bling. And those were pink half moons at the top of this post.

Sparkly for the new year. I added the floral water transfers myself.

French with a little lace. Also a transfer. They are rather genius.
I'll get back to those here at some point.

Barbie nails with tiny bling on the side.

Obviously, they will have to be mint green at some point.

TIGRESS SHOES

These are my favourite dance shoes for the moment, which I use for performing and teaching. (Or, for one performance, as most number have their own shoes, at least in cases like this, with a strong pattern or color shame). They originally came as zebra patterned shoes but I needed tiger stripes so I added the orange stripes myself by painting on stripes of glue (Jewel-it glue, which works best for these kinds of things) and them pour heaps of glitter on, two rounds, and one final round with painting a thin layer of Jewel-it on with a brush. (That works on big surfaces too, like glittering a whole shoe,  and it lasts well, but we can look into that some other time.)

Also, a little hint; if you have a hard time making it the whole night in heels, try it with a pair of dancing shoes. They are softer and flexible which makes them easy to move in (well yes, as they are indeed dancing shoes) and thus also easier to wear for a long time. I can wear a pair of dancing heels trough a whole day of teaching without any particular feet ache! (But, this trick mostly works for indoor parties, daning at clubs etc, as the sole soft and won'tt take bad weather). Which leads us to another little tip at the end - remember to stretch your feet (and calves) afterwards if you have had your heels on a lot and moved around! It is kind of an awkward muscle workout for your feet and calves to be placed in heels for along time so stretching them out afterwards helps you avoid aching sad feet the day after.

These dance shoes are from Light in The Box, where you can choose the shape of heel yourself!
(When it comes to sizing I am between sizes and I went for the smaller, which was the right choice.)

VEGAN SORT-OF CARBONARA

Kind of something like that yes.

I love pasta dishes! They are so easy to make and can be put together of pretty much anything at home. I think of this one here as a version on carbonara, although it rather perhaps should just be called a "veggie pasta. But, potato potato you know. Many vegan recipes I've seen use cashew cream to substitute the creaminess the eggs give, which is delish, but this one here just has zucchini to cream it up.

So you'll need some zucchini, garlic and a meat substitute. Veg bacon is the best in my opinion. But pretty much everything works, seitan, smoked tofu etc. I just had a bit of regular tofu at home so that had to do; I crumble and fry it so it ends up pretty "dry". Or, if you have nothing else then use sun dried tomatoes in small bits. I often use that on pizza as "pepperoni". And like here, with pasta.  I think the tomatoes have a meaty texture when dry and as they are strong in taste I find they replace bacon bits etc. pretty well. (Or then it's because I haven't had any such in over a decade and just can't remember :)

You can make the zucchini in two ways; either grate it and put in the pasta cooking water a couple of minutes before the pasta is done; it "melts" into a creamy texture around the pasta that way. (I sometimes do the grated-zucchini-in-the-water to be able to sneak more vegetables into the kid's food, and with good luck they don't even notice it...). Or, like I did here; chop it in tiny pieces (or grate it) and fry it with oil and the chopped garlic in a pan until it gets soft. If you want a more cheese like flavour to it, sprinkle in some nutritional yeast flakes when you're done. Fry your "bacon" and blend everything with the pasta. That's it!

Serve with salt and black pepper. I added some sun dried tomatoes anyway, because in my opinion they make everything a bit better.

PS. For a super easy two-ingredient ovo-vegetarian version try adding eggs (from as happy chickens as possible) with the pasta in the usual carbonara manner and use sun dried tomato bits as your meat. It's a nice combo!

BLACK AND BLUE AND RED ON YELLOW

Putting my new wool skirt in action in a rather elementary color scheme and timeless vintage fashion.


Also. Stop the press! You saw it right - I am actually not wearing my black beret but a red one. I decided to sport a little variation this winter.

PS. The shoes are the autumn wedges I got myself this fall. I only wore them twice to notice they were way too big for me so I bought a smaller pair. I still got the larger barely used ones - that would be a size 38 - and will be selling them at some point. When that one beautiful day comes when I put up lots of stuff on my sales blog they will be there; but if someone wants them now already let me know.

JAR FLOWERS

I love the scent of hyacinths. Or, I love the scent of most flowers actually.

If you still have large Christmas flowers around that are otherwise doing alright and looking pretty but that are starting to tip over, like hyacinths or amaryllis, you can place them in a high vase or big jar to enjoy them a bit longer.

HOUNDSTOOTH AND STRIPES

I was planning to sew myself a checked warm wool skirt for winter. Or, for autumn already actually, but it wasn't happening and the days getting colder so when I happened to peek in a little on the Tara Starlet sale during Christmas I realised I'd get away a lot easier if I just bought one instead.  So this blue-and black houndstooth skirt came home to me a couple of days later (I have to say, Tara Starlet's deliveries are always super fast! This came in less than a week even though ordered during the holidays!)

The blouse is a basic high street one that I sew cuffs and a collar on.

THE SEVENTH YEAR

2014. Normally I'd go "we're so living in the future" , but this time it's more like "mah, 2014, whatever, been there already". Partly because I've had so many things scheduled for this new year since way back already and  partly since I feel half of what I read in the papers are prognoses and plans for a few years ahead anyway. But mostly since I've been so busy this fall I didn't really notice how fast it went nor have the time to do the usual closure thoughts for the year that was.

As you know I don't make any resolutions, although I've tried it with improvements. Three-four year in a row, the same things to improve, and still no change. I find myself unbelievable! (Although this year I am on in it with the bookkeeping right now, instead of panicking the night before it's due to hand over...)

So. Now it's 2014 and that makes this my seventh year of blogging - that's such a long time already!
My blog itself gets one year older around the same time that I do, in October, and the previous years I've reflected on that during this days.  But this year it's suddenly January already! My first blog post ever was about my 26th birthday. (I remember where we went and what I wore trough that but can't recall what I actually did :) That was back when I only posted with drawings; I had this idea of remaining incognito. Well, that was indeed then and now is now.  My 32nd birthday was, apart from the moments travelling and on stage, spent in a very crowded backstage among feathers glitter and suitcases at the Stockholm Burlesque Festival.  So in the spirit of my very first post, I made a similar drawing of that occasion.

Blogging has changed and developed trough the years, not just for me, as of course one develops as a blogger all the time - hopefully - but also in general. I've see that people also read blogs in a different manners than before. I know some readers have been here almost since day one which is pretty fascinating! I have a few blogs I've followed for almost a decade too. Some blogs come and others go, and I've noticed I seldom keep up with one for more than a few years - they either repeat themselves too much or then never seem to find their own flow, while there are a few that balance there on the golden path in between. Nowadays I hardly ever have the time to keep up with any blogs at all though.

As you've noticed I've had a lot of background ads on the blog the past year, which is part of my collaboration with Indiedays Inspiration. I know their color schemes sometimes lowers the over-all aesthetics of my blog, but it has become rather inevitable to have them there. As each blog post takes up at least a couple of hours time the income they can give me is welcome, especially now since I'm self employed.

I've said it before, that blogs are such a media that mostly only exists on their front page, and have the rest, apart from the well-linked and well-pinned posts, easily vanish into the abysses of the internet (to sometimes pop up in the most weird of google searches). So I've usually had my 'browse the year back-giveaway', to let some air into the archives. But this year I'll skip it. I'll try to come up with something else fun in the near future instead!