Allllmost Jan 1st ;-)

Done

I finished the pillow.

The Joy of New Projects

I love starting new projects. Finding colours for this seat was wonderful. I'm cross stitching figs and leaves from an old Marie Claire Idées magazine. I don't have the pattern -- the picture will have to do. I won't be stitching the letters, and will probably add a few leaves and a different fig. I'll decide when I get to it:) Can't wait to get started (water colour squares were made after finding the photo, before purchasing the yarn)

Illustration Friday: Soar

New Year inspiration: 72 ways to simplify your life, via French Toast Girl
IF: Ania Moderska

Dear Diary -- The Rules

#1: Keep it simple
#2: Have fun
#3: Don't consider or think to much. Let fingers and stomach make decisions.
(making rules for this book was inspired by Marci Senders)

Art-Facts-Tagged

Wonderful, talented, humorous Tascha tagged me for 5 art facts, and to tag someone else, so here goes:

1. the creative process, even of simple projects, usually takes me through the whole gamut of emotions.
2. I love it when my fingers get stained from working
   
3. long ago I took drawing lessons from a VERY charismatic teacher. It took me 2 years to learn to draw like him (not as well as him, but being young and susceptible, I more or less copied his style) and at least twice as long to learn NOT to draw like him. It was very educational.
   
4. years later, another great artist and teacher, Bjarne Agerbo, was the once who, through the wonderful world of etching, opened my eyes to the way I'm still working today
5. artsy medium to bring with me to desert island: my pen and bottle of encre de chine; thick, black, liquid ink. Mmm:)

I'm tagging Neilornstein for 5 art facts, hoping he'll want to play :)

Baedeker and I, 2008

January 1st, I'm commencing a little new project; I found this 1908 Baedeker travellers guide to Mid-Italy/Rome, and I plan to make an illo on every spread throughout the year. I hope to make one every day, but I don't know if that's realistic -- I'll have to see. I will be setting up a few simple rules for myself, more of those tomorrow ...

A Bientôt

The last ornament is back in its box, on its way to the far back of the attic. It's a pleasure to bring the xmas decorations down in the beginning of december, and a bliss to put them back after xmas. A fresh New Year awaits ahead, It's very exciting :)

Illustration Friday: Horizon

Reflections

Photographs taken Saturday morning.
Yummy blog: Kirin Notebook
and cool stuff at Moleskine Project
Something Whenever -- awesome

If you haven't heard these wonderful wise words from Baz Luhrman, please do.
It's not new, but still sooo awesome (just press play):

Another IF: Backwards

I needed to make another, little less sombre IF, so here goes :)

Illustration Friday: Backwards

I kid you not::This was exCACTly what my sunday looked like. It wasn't pretty - but very appropriate for this weeks' IF. Phew. New day ;)

Give-Aways

Please email me your name and adress, and I will send you a couple of sheets with these do-it-yourself x-mas heart and cones.

Illustration Friday: Little Things

When Elsebeth and I did the book, we experimented in numerous ways to combine objects, styles and techniques. One of them were little "repeatings" like this one, made for this weeks’ IF.

Movie Tagged

by Kelly Medina, I'm to name my top 25 movies, and tag 5 people. So here goes, movies rather randomly:
The Shawshank Redemption, The Elephant Man, A Room with a View, The Fifth Element, Au Revoir Les Enfants, Lost in Translation, Snatch, Payback, The Matrix, The Usual Suspects, The Cook, the Thief, his Wife and her Lover, Blade, You've Got Mail, Sneakers, Memento, Das Leben der Anderen, Une liaison pornographique, Once Upon a Time in America, Once upon a Time in the West, Atlantis, Amélie, Muriels Wedding, Romeo + Juliet, American Beauty and Donnie Darko, allthough I could go on ...
I'm tagging Ninaseven, Marie-Louise Sundqvist, Anja Boretzki, Tascha, and Amy, hoping they'll want to play :)

A little xmas deco

Felted wool. More to come.
Catarina Oliveira has a very beautiful blog, Neilornstein makes such beautiful paintings. Patrick Gannon makes wonderful and highly original papercuts.
Have a glorious sunday:)

Illustration Friday: Excess

The text reads: "My first impulse was to take a picture of the attic. I think one should (most of the time) always listen 2 ones first impulses".

Ginger X-mas Cookies

Beautiful altered books, via remakeables. A little film about My first crush, by Julia Pott.

My ceramic love affair/1st::Dec

Yesterday I recieved these two hand made pieces, bought from ceramic artist Marie-Louise Sundqvist, and I am completely and utterly in love. Thank you, again.
As you can see, 1st of December is a rainy deal here. I love the rain, it calls for cozy indoor activities, sweaters, slow food sizzling on the stove and steaming tea. Uhmn:)

Illustration Friday: The Zoo

I wanted to experiment a little for this IF, driven by a strong urge to challenge myself, and avoid doing what is safe and usual. Below is the official IF (selection)

and the whole doodle (please click to enlarge).

The old cisterns

Yesterday I visited an old underground water reservoir, now a museum for modern art, The Cisterns, build in the 1850s to supply Copenhagen with water. We were to see an exhibition with glass artists, but it was the huge underground cathedral-like rooms, and the permanent exhibition with these late 1700 sculptures, that had the biggest impact on me. Water was on the floor and on the walls, and dripstone hung from the ceiling and the arches. Sound smashed from wall to wall in endless echoes. It was awesome! (I only had the camera in my phone, hence the scruffy quality).

Illustration Friday: Superstition

In the neck of time.
Btw; I've been singing Stevie Wonder all week when thinking of IF.

Such a rookie

I'm quite new at this. I've only been blogging since August, and I love it. I was tagged a few days ago, for the first time, and it was FUN. Fun learning odd stuff about people, fun posting.
I love visiting blogs by all kinds of humongeorgsly (not a word, C) creative people from all over the world. I love the positive attitude I find, love beeing inspired on an everyday basis. So cool.

I just recently came across "swapping" on some blogs. Gotta learn s'more about that. It seems like such a cool idea, allthough I don't know how it works. Can anybody tell me a little of what, how, hoo?

On my little evening stroll tonight I came by (I'm in a stitching mood); Floresita and Felling Stitchy. Ummmnn:)))

Retro-stitch

I am, once again, curled up in the corner of my sofa, this time cross stitching for a pillow. An absolute must-have for any car's rear window;-))
No connection; Anna Margrethe Kjærgaard is a wonderful danish illustrator.

I've been tagged

... by Cally, and I will follow the rules:

1. Link to your tagger and post these rules on your blog.
2. Share 5 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird.
3. Tag 5 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well
as links to their blogs.
4. Let them know they are tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

#1: I've never been tagged before, so I actually had to sit down with paper and pencil to brainstorm some random facts, thinking I don't consider myself that weird.

#2: My biggest wish for X-mas (beside world peace and good will t'wards mankind) is a waffle maker.

#3: Last night I dreamt my dad had died from a heart attack, and allthough I knew I was being silly, I had to call him up this morning to hear if he was ok. (He was).

#4: I love Playstation. My favorite game is Tomb Raider, the missions and the riddles rock. I don't work the controller though - my co-player does - I tend to drop the thing in chock every time a shooting enemy shows up ...

#5: I (honestly) believe, that if I REALLY put my mind to it, I would be able to move stuff using only the power of thought. I never tried thought, 'cause I'm kind of scared of my reaction if I should actually succeed. (hmm -- I guess that is a little weird)

Get ready to get tagged: Flora, OttoBlotto, Rachel, Limonete and Marci Senders.

Comin' up for air

Sometimes I fall into the habit of making things a little too planned and well-considered. I get irritated with myself, when that happens. It's a bit suffocating.
So I enjoy experimenting, using an element I can't control. In this case, liquid ink. Goes where it wants to. The "stamp" is a sprig I broke off a bush on my way home. The result is of lesser importance, now I feel I can breathe again:)
(I must have felt it strongly -- I didn't intend this visualisation -- but I cut off my thoughts on this one above. *Haha*, the subconscience works in powerful ways. And I'm a goat:)

Soft spot

Ooohhh, I received these this morning-- (and I ordered a few more today). We're having bread soup for dinner. For a while ...

I liiike them:-) Some of them are much bigger than I thought they would be, which is good, I think, it forces me to do my collages differently than I usually do.

Hamanita ;·)

Amanita Hama brooch (with pin on back). 3,5x3,5 cm.
Visited creator of beautiful pottery (I love her spoons:) Marie-Louise Sundqvist, savoured Lotta Jansdotter, and feasted my eyes on Raquel Marin (via Karins Style Blog). Adam Rex says don't worry - be ..., and Lindsay has some beautiful little women.
A few IF:Scale-goodies: Flora, Eine-der-guten, NinaSeven, Ruyman Gilbert. Enjoy:)

Done!

Last night I finished the Capecho. A, all in all, wonderful knitting experience, in two fases though - before and after The Post on Kate's Knitlit blog. Body done, collar waiting to be made, I was, well ... not that happy with my result so far. It didn't quite match the one on the photograph. So the yarn returned to the basked, new projects were commerced, until I met Kate's blog.

Which makes me want to skip right to the credit lines -- (d'you hear the music? Now? All right -- GO!) -- I'd like to thank Norah Gaughan -- thank you, Norah, for designing an amazingly beautiful piece. Knitting this was a pleasure. And to Vogue Knitting Magazine, for bringing it in their Winter 06-mag. But last, and most importantly, Thank you, Kate, and all your blog readers and writers(roar of applaus) for informing me, through that long debat of yours about this particular piece of handycraft, that there was no way in ... this wonderful piece of knitwear could ever look like the one in the picture in that Vogue Knitting Mag, unless you forced the thing together with clips on the back. Thank you thank you thank you.

So this here (picture above) is a somewhat altered version of Norah's Capecho. I like it. It's warm, it's soft, and it is finished!
On to the next ...

Illustration Friday: Scale

Hama jewelry

Hama strikes again:)) The earring flowers each measure 1,5x1,5 cm (the silver ring is 2x2 cm). The dog brooch (has a pin on the back) measures 6x3,5 cm.

Experimenting ...

Must-obey-rule: Keep it simple (I think I'm having a fase;)










I'd like to make Kathys notelet someday.

Beautiful hats

Mattias (who is - by far - the most productive blogger I've seen so far:) -- his sketches are amazing and highly imaginative), Amy, Anja, Limoon, Ellis, Flora, Tascha, Ottoblotto (she is so cool -- very different). More to come:)

Illustration Friday: Hat(s) ...or is it hair?

What do you think?

A drive in the country

Went on a wee road trip today, and ended up by the sea ...

Curled up, fingers red-hot

Not the most computery activity:) I am knitting this (in petroleum blue), it's great fun, and I am on the collar, so I'll be back soon.
Here are a few go-sees. Enjoy --

Liz Ramos, Kelly Medina, Livia Coloji, Re:makeables' hand made books. Very beautiful. Heather Sloane, who also did this little film on how to make a cat hover :-)) Hilarious.

Sssssscarf

;-) made from bandana, first introduced to me by Amy Sedaris, who made this incredible book: I Like You, Hospitality Under The Influence. Hilarious reading, and quite inspirational in its own odd way:))

On my way to work

this morning. Life is beautiful ...

I wish everyone ...

a very scarry HALLOWEEEEEEEEN:)

Experimenting s'more

Replacing the elderflower stem with a leaf, resulted in an unexpected effect, as the ink smeared. What a perfect hiding place for Owl. It was 7.52 minutes before the other animals found him. Succes!

Camilla Engman had a link to a TEDtalk with Maira Kalman. What a beautiful style she has. Her work made me think of David Shrigley. He cracks me up -- doing off-the-top-of-his-head reflections, in writing and B&W drawings -- so funny. With no relation, Sam here is definately worth visiting, as is photographer Christine Rudolph. Beautiful.

Great IFs

Carousel on the hill, rottentuna, Chichi Parish and Valeria.

Illustration Friday: Trick or Treat