Chair make-over

I made a cover for our chair.
This is "before". Nice, but the chair did not match our new curtains.

This is the result of cutting up eight old jeans (2 from the daughters, 6 from the thriftshop) and lots of energy.

Pillow detail.

And a matchin throwpillow.

More sunlight and shadows

Sunbeams and Roses

Inspired by Heather at Beauty That Moves I started chasing sunbeams this morning. After two pictures the battery of my camera died. But this one is rather nice, I think.

And these roses? My husband gave them to me, to celebrate something. What? I'll tell you later, when I know more details (teaser!)...

Autumn

Bag troubles

I loved this fabric at first sight and wanted to make myself a bag out of it. A messenger bag with a zipper. I thought I would even have enough fabric left to make another bag to sell.
Well...
It was a disaster. I tried twice, but nothing worked out the way I wanted it. The seams kept coming out crooked and I just could not get the zipper in the way I wanted. And when I finally managed to get the flap and the zipper in, there was no way to fit the strap in.
So I took the whole thing apart and made a bag without a zipper. The flap first closed with a magnetic button, but that wasn't strong enought. Than I used velcro, but the self adhering stuff wouldn't selfadhere on the nice soft fabric, so I have to sew it on. But I still think it's a nice bag...

A testing Halloween party...

Reading Anna Maria's post about how a dad-voice makes all the difference, made me smile.
We had the same kind of situation here today. I am not feeling well and was falling asleep on the couch with a book when Deborah walked in. "The Halloweenparty Esther and me are going to is right in the middle of the testweek." she announced.
Oh. I thought I'd asked her about the dates before I gave permission, but she "just found out".
Oh well. So now I had to decide if they could go anyway. My sleepy brain got something about tests and learning so I asked what time they would leave and how late they would be back exactly. I knew it was an overnight party, but I didn't know it would mean they had to leave Saturday at one p.m. and arrive back home Sunday around six p.m.
"So you won't be able to learn much that weekend." my sleepy brain said.
"No, but we have a whole week vacation the week before the tests start, so we can do all our learning than." she replied.
Oh. I decided to let them go, but if there would be any stressing that week (we had our share of that last year) they would never be allowed to do something in a testweek again.

I checked with husband before making it final. Luckily he was a bit sharper than I was.
"So how late you will be going to bed that night?" he asked, already knowing it was a Halloweenparty which of course will last till about 4 am and also knowing a sleepover is usually a keep-awake-over.
"And you will have only one night to recover from that?" Yep, and we know that's not enough. You get the drift: no permission to go. Some tears, some shouting (the teens, not us). Me feeling a bit guilty about not checking the dates myself (but hey, they're sixteen and I did ask).
Husband just being a dad, having made a decision and letting it go.
Sometimes it just seems real easy being a dad...
(I know it isn't, it's just different from being a mom)

Daniel

When our cat died, a few weeks ago, we said we never wanted one again. This was the third cat in two years that got hit by a car on the very busy dike-road we live by.
But the house was real empty, without an animal. Our neighbour offered us a kitten, a friends parents had some too. We could have on if we wanted. But what could we do to prevent another accident?
Call him inside every evening? But who said he wouldn't get hit at daytime? And keep him inside completely? We tried that with our former cat. He kept escaping and he became very neurotic until we let him outside. That just wouldn't work.
This weekend I got a brilliant idea. A cat who is already used to staying inside, is less likely to try to escape.
So today I went to a shelter. And there he was. Daniel. Very big, black and white tomcat. At least ten years old, but very healthy. He looked at me with his big eyes begging: "Pick me, pick me!" So I did.
And now there is a cat exploring the house. He is so friendly, begging to be stroked, giving a lot of love already.
Yay! we have a cat in the house again!

View from our roof

Coasters

I'm working on a bag (again) but it isn't working out the way I want it. So I made something simple first, just for fun.

Cleaning up my act

I had a good day, today. Not that I blogged about my bad days, but believe me, I had a few. But today things were okay.
We have a half-finished spareroom where two years of junk has piled up. But we want to use that spareroom. We are going to move some rooms around in the house. In the back of the house are the bedrooms of dds Deborah and Esther. The spare room is also there, this space used to be a garage, but we needed the rooms.
Upstairs are two small bedrooms. Miriam can only reach hers through ours. Not a lot of privacy for us... We want to move Miriam to the spare room and take both (tiny) rooms upstairs for ourselves. Creating a bit of storage and maybe a small space for me to craft and write (that would be great!).
But first the spare room had to be cleared. So I collected all office supplies that were stuffed in a soon-to-collaps old closet, sorted through them and managed to put them all in a cupboard in the living room where the other half of the office supplies and our administration already was.
Some other stuff I put in the shed and I threw a lot away. I love decluttering! My head seems to become clearer when the clutter dissappears.
The spare room is not empty yet, but getting this mess out was a great start!
I also cleaned a part of the kitchen. I do wipe everything daily ofcourse, but some things needed a more thorough cleaning after these dark weeks. I started with my stove. While I was cleaning I realized how much I love it. It's so big and it has this vintage look but it has a modern feel too.

We had stir fried leek today, one of my favorite dishes. I love the smell (and taste)of leek.

And I love rice. We eat it a lot. I learned to cook rice the easy way when we were camping six years ago and have been doing it this way ever since.
It takes a little bit of trial and error but once you find the right amounts of rice and water it's easy. I put 350 grams of rice in my smallest cookingpan and fill it with water. I heat it until it cooks and than take it off the fire. Than I just let it sit, with the lid closed for about 20 minutes and voila! It works with almost every type of rice, even with surinamese rice, which I find rather hard to cook (it's broken). Usually I have basmati, love those long grains.

Retro tote

I made another bag for my Etsy shop today. My mind is full of ideas and I just couldn't wait to cut into my new fabric, but I didn't have much time today, so I decided to make a simpel tote first. This fabric is so beautiful on its own that the clear lines of a tote work great with it. And there is enough left to try other designs...

It's lined with a simple white linen and has a big zippered pocket on the inside.

I finally did it!

I opened a shop on Etsy. I have been thinking about it for so long, but never worked up the nerve untill now.
First item listed: this nice big tote.

Fabric-shopaholic

I love buying fabrics! I really have to control myself not to buy too much, but today I let myself go on purpose. I went to the stoffenbeurs in Leiden, a market just for fabrics and had a very good day.
I finally found fabric for quilts for our bed (we use very shabby sleepingbags to sleep under). I love the fabrics by Heather Bailey en Anna Maria Horner but those are hard to get in Holland and rather expensive. I think these make a nice combination though. (the one on the left is green and all the colors are much brighter than in the picture).

Also there are lots and lots of bags to be made!


Now I have to wait till everything is washed and dry. Luckily I do have some more fabric in my stash...

17 years

The more often you say it, the longer it sounds. Se-ven-teen years.
It seems like it was only yesterday that I was waiting for him in my white dress, that we had a lot of fun taking pictures, that we promised to love each other for better and for worse.
At the same time it seems a lot longer. I can't imagine my life without him. I was 19 when we got married, he was 21. We grew up together and I hope we will grow old together.