PrettyMade's Fancy

Junior is seven years old!

2012-02-11T08:29:00.000-08:00

Having survived the parties I think I just might be posting something next week. :D
Meanwhile, enjoy this... <3

Junior chose a monster theme, of course... :) Dracula Junior enjoyed himself thoroughly :)

Hugs all around! :)

I crossed the line.

2012-01-21T03:26:00.000-08:00

It has been a fair while again since my last post... January has been quite busy so far, February seems to head towards even more hassle and hurry... But anyway, it's a new year with new plans! :)

On the mini front, my company, Kookaja Creations, has a January sale going! It's the ultimate chance to get some unique stuff for a good price... :) Check it out.
I'm also planning for the new season, fresh ideas, gardening-related goodies and very, very cheerful colours! :) I think we need some sunny schemes now to cope with the winter moodiness! :) I'm going to be on my first ever miniature fair with my products in March, that's just sooooo scary and exciting! :D

I've started learning mini crochet on a more serious basis, too. :) I love crochet, and it's just a natural development to try and make stuff as small as possible... Right? Working on a granny square afghan at the mo, found lovely thin yarns on the flea market last time we did our "rounds". The finished squares are not that small, about 1 1/4 inches, but you got to start somewhere, right? :)

Ok, about the thing in the headline. Crossing the line. See, I never knew I had it in me. I never had an idea. I had considered such things, but never felt I had what it takes. But now I find I do, and that is why I finally have crossed the line.

WHAT line? Well, I think I have now officially become a collector. :D I have always felt it would be nice to collect something, but so far I have only been a hoarder of fabrics, yarns and craft materials. I never really found my passion in the collecting world.

...I was as surprised as anyone when I understood I had gone from admirer to collector. It happened suddenly, and it gave me a kind of pleasure I never felt before. NOT "the high of the buy", not even the passion of wanting something so bad you can taste it, not the envy of "I want that too!". Just a weird kind of soothing delight in knowing what you thing is, as weird as it sounds to even myself.

...Yeah, you guessed it. It's the Bratz dolls!! :D Remember, I told you in my post from December 3rd that I got two Bratz as a birthday pressie from MetalHead. <3 And, I told you in my last post before the new year, that I found some more on a flea market... (Btw, I gave Junior the one "fake" Bratz and he loves it :))

Well, as I said, we did some flea market rounds this week again, and that is when it struck me: I am a collector. This is what I came home with:

Yikes. EIGHT new Bratz! :D

And, my thing seems to mostly be USED Bratz. Obviously in good condition, but I have no great interest in buying Bratz in mint condition in their original packs, not at all. At least not yet... I want to personalize them instead!!! And sew clothes and quilts! Crochet afghans! Build appropriate size furniture and room boxes for them! Ohhhh boy...

This time I was also lucky enough to stumble upon a lot of clothes & some extra feet. All these "new" Bratz came from the same flea market stall!! Some girl's getting a nice little bundle of euros this week from her flea market sales. :D The only ones I left were the two Bratz boys she had. I think they look rather ridiculous. Then again, I might change my mind in time... :D

So here's my whole collection so far:

All this in just under two months. Where will I be in a year?!

*pride and happiness* :D Someone get me to a hospital when I pass the 300 Bratz line, ok??

I'm leaving you for today with this image from my lovely lanterns. They're not supposed to freeze on the inside, but they sure look pretty when they do! :)

Have a good weekend, my lovelies! Hugs!

P.S. I'd rather go blind than live without you <3
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WgtNy2AVdas
(Remembering Etta James, I just prefer Koko Taylor)

Happy New Year 2012, my darlings! :)

2011-12-31T07:43:00.000-08:00

These last few weeks have been a lovely blur of Christmas fairs, Christmas preparations, celebrating Christmas, eating well, meeting family and shopping and... I thought I'd "wrap up" 2011 by getting you updated on the recent events...

Christmas fairs went brilliantly, I'm very happy with that... And being a private entrepreneur gave me the possibility to actually take time off afterwards to prepare for Christmas, both mentally and practically...
I think I'll try to tell you this stuff in a chronological order! :)

I managed to send Craftland and Sognatrice A Bordo their winnings before Xmas, and Narina Näpertää also got her prize for winning the witch naming contest... She also got some extra goodies for Xmas. Irina is a sweetie! <3
You see, I'm one of the lucky ones to receive a parcel from Irina... :) I was her follower nr. 100, and this is how she rewarded me:

Lovely brown satin ribbon, fabric and a golden tablecloth

My first ever kitchen utensil! :) A lovely wreath, a jug and a flower plate...

The cutest little kittykat you could ever find, he's just about an inch long... :)

And a beautiful blue chair! Thanks, Irina... <3

I think I also made one Paul Nik Nak Downie a happy hippie by sending him something I consider everyday stuff, but which apparently is harder to come by where he lives: a pair of leftie scissors. I like making my friends happy! :) Huge hugs to Paul, who gave me a lovely mention in his blog! :) (While you check that out, check out the pics of his nephew, Jude... A 1-y-o heartbreaker if you ever saw one!!)

So, the days went forward slowly towards Xmas... I made some gingerbread cookies with Junior and the baking together nearly broke us both, LOL!! But the decorating was soooo much fun! Here's Junior's artwork:

A heart, a snake, a monkey, a crocodile, a pig and two "blobs". :D Yum yum!!

I got my birthday pressie in the mail about two weeks before Christmas: a Playmobil nativity!! It was so lovely setting it up.This is how it looked at this point:

The animals are eating peacefully... The shepherd cooking his dinner on the fire...

One of the best bits, as always, was enjoying the Christmas traditions with my family.
At noon, on Christmas Eve, we went to the city center to listen to the declaration of Christmas Peace (you can watch it here.). It's been done from the same spot for hundreds of years. Afterwards, we drove to the cemetery to light some candles in memory of my Gran and of MetalHead's Mum. They are buried elsewhere, but there's a memorial where you can leave your candles if your dear departed ones are not buried in Turku. We still have no snow, but the old cemetery looked simply fantastic!

When we came home, we ate the traditional Christmas porridge, made of rice, spiced with sugar and cinnamon. Junior got the almond hidden in the porridge, which means he'll be lucky all next year... :)

Then, a sauna bath, plenty of good food, gingerbread and candy and while Junior was taking out the trash, the elves had come with a huge load of pressies... Santa was too busy to stop by, unfortunately... ;) (Yeah, that pressie thing happens on Xmas Eve here in Finland!)

Meanwhile, Mary and Joseph have arrived in Bethlehem...

Mary is trying to get some rest, Joseph warming by the fire, talking to the shepherd in hushed tones...

After a long night of sweets and playing with new toys we slept well and after breakfast started early on Christmas Day towards my parents' house. And then, more food, more family, more playing and LO! and behold: SANTA!! He didn't have the time the night before, so he wanted to come visit Junior before returning to Korvatunturi... (You DO know that's where he lives, not in the North Pole?!)

The pic is a capture from video, hence the quality... :)

It was the first time EVER Junior got to meet Santa. <3 And lovely he was, too... :)

Then, more playing, more pressies, more food etc etc... *burp* Sorry!

And most importantly of all: the miracle of Christmas! Jesus was born in Bethlehem, the herald angels sing and there's peace on Earth...

On Boxing Day me and MetalHead were packing our stuff to drive home. Junior stayed for a longer visit, he'll come home after the New Year. He loves staying at his grandparents' and we love our quality time together... ;)

...But as we went outside for the first time on Boxing day, this is what we saw:

A #%&*# PINE TREE had fallen on my car!! We had a storm during the night (and a couple of days after, at most there were 300 000 people without electricity and trees worth about 120 million euros fell) but I never thought it was that bad... I heard the wind and just shrugged my shoulders, I mean, what could ever happen to me??

This is what the damage looked like when Dad had cut the tree off the hood and we pushed the car back.

From the other angle.

As luck would have it, NO damage was done to the engine, we managed to drive home. And as frosting on the cake, my car insurance covers the whole thing and it won't even raise my premiums since it's not my fault... <3 <3 <3 Yay!

(Now, if you've read this far, it's about time to take a break, roll your head and shoulders a bit, stretch, jump up and down, get a cup of coffee/tea/whatever. See, I'm gonna go on a fair while yet! :D)

It was actually lovely to come home and relax! :) After a good nights sleep we decided to do a bit of shopping. First, it was the sales... Then, a loooooong day going through almost every flea market in the vicinity! Don't you just adore men who love shopping with you??? :) <3 MetalHead <3

So, what did I find? Here we go, darlings...

Glittery angel decorations! I had one of these before, now I've got three!

A piggybank! Well, a hippo bank. Complete with lock and all! I have a big yellow one together with MetalHead, Junior's got a see-through grey one and now I've got a pink one all of my own! She needs a bath though, she's kinda dirty! They would've had a HUGE beige one at one flea market, but since they are so very rare, it was priced at 12€... I was tempted, but left it.

Lovely self-made barbie clothes, very high quality actually! Neat seams and everything. This one's made of an authentic 60's or 70's cotton... Had to borrow a pair of yellow shoes from Junior's Barbie for this shot. ;)

Nice hippie pants and skirt, with crochet top. You can see the top almost doesn't fit my barbie, mine's from the 70's and they had PLENTY more cleavage than today's barbies...

I also went just a bit Bratz-crazy. Just a BIT.

This is Sally and Jolene's cousin, Lily. Poor Lily was only wearing a yellow t-shirt when I found her, so obviously I had to get her a luxuriously soft yellow bath robe. It's actually made for Barbie, but it fits her just perfectly...

Just a side note: all who make doll's clothes know how much of a job it is. HOW COME the person who made all these lovely Barbie clothes sells them for just 2€ a set??? They would be worth so much more, with all the work that goes in them! And they are so well made...

I also found this adorable mini-Bratz:

She's about 4,5" tall, about the size of a dollhouse child/teenager... :) She's a bit... unkempt, but I think I can fix her. :)

I had found two other Bratz as well, but decided to leave them at the last moment. I thought it would be better NOT to go overboard with my toy purchases... So I went and bought this instead:

It's an actual Barbie knitting machine! With box, instruction manuals and even one of the original balls of yarn! (It was my darling MH who found it among a lot of kids' stuff in a stall, actually... He's got miracle eyes when it comes to bargains at flea markets...) And it works perfectly! Yes, of course I tested it the moment I got it home, what did you think???! ;)

My day was made perfect by this next find. Admittedly, I had to pay a bit for them even if they were half off, but still... Don't you just love them??

A dollhouse table and two chairs, lovely dark green with hand painted flowers!

...And a matching cupboard and chest of drawers, with a REAL mirror! You can actually see my arm and my green shirt in the mirror... The doors open and everything! <3

I'm so happy after finding these you can't imagine!! I only wish I knew where this furniture was made... I'm thinking Germany. Or perhaps Hungary... Any ideas??

So anyway... Today MetalHead asked me if I regretted leaving the Bratz dolls in the flea market... I had to admit I did...And what did my adorable husband do? He went back to the flea market to check if they still would be there, and they were... <3 He bought them for me... <3 And to top it all off, he also found an electric kitchen slicer (You know, the kind you can slice sausages and stuff with) for us for a song...

Here are my newest girls!

I have no idea what her name is yet. She's dressed really innocent, but the look in her eyes says something else... She's got real eyelashes, too!

Now this girl is NOT a real Bratz-doll (al least I don't think she is, I mean, the face, the smile, the feet/shoes...), but she's got such cool clothes and I like her hair and earrings... I think Junior can have her, in other clothing... ;)

...I also have to mention that apart from shopping, I've been preparing 2" x 1,5" icon boards for painting miniature icons... Keep your fingers crossed!!! :)

Phew! I think it's about time to wrap this blog up for this year. Another year awaits, with new things and old things and fun things and...

I don't know what to say but

THANK YOU, once again.

You make blogging such a joy! :)

Your comments warm my heart,

your blogs give me inspiration.

Thank you,

and God bless you all!

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2012!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

2011-12-23T08:24:00.000-08:00

May your Christmas be peaceful and relaxing! :)

...To keep myself relaxed and stress free, I'm going to post more after Xmas... ;)
HUGS and love to you all! :)

Brace yourselves, this is going to be a LONG one! :D

2011-12-03T05:22:00.000-08:00

As I said the other day, I've got LOTS to tell you!! :) Better get to it without further ado!

I just have to start with a couple of yippeekiyays (is that how you spell it??), since my PIF-swap gifts reached the recipients safe and sound! :) As I was too dum-dum to photograph them before sending, you can check them out on Maria Ireland's and El Bichillo's blogs! :)
You already saw the lovely things Maria Ireland sent me in a previous post, now you can see what I got from the Bichillo herself!

Well, the other day I was walking past this waterfall...

Nah, just kidding! This picture is from a lovely postcard of Sierras de Cazorla national park she sent with the gift! :) The gift contained, first of all, lovely fabrics, blue ribbon, a sweet little teddybear guarding some xmas pressies and a wooden jar:

It also contained this lovely oil painting on a curved piece of ceramic, I completely adore it!

And, as le pièce de résistance, a gorgeous handbag and simply beautiful perfume bottles!! I love them all, but the sapphire coloured one looks so luxurious and the brown one is sooooooo retro I could just stare at it all day... :)

Thank you so much, hugs to my mini friend in Motril, Spain! :)

Moving on. I have finally gotten some of my ceramics glazed and I'm pretty happy about them!

The jar got a lovely brown glaze. I was expecting green, actually, but after i saw this I remembered the spruce green glaze only looks green on white clay. :D Silly me...

I made lots of small stuff, leaves and such, trying out different glazes and things...

Here's a close-up of the amazing red-brown glaze, in places it gets such a fantastic metallic sheen!

My favourite project (apart from minis of course!) this year har certainly been my icon, and I tried something similar in ceramics as well:

I used the same image as in my icon. The colours were made with engobe and glaze. I'm especially happy with the glaze in the hair, it's matte brown. And everyone in the class said the eyes (melted glass) seem to follow you around... :D They do have a certain intensity. :) One person even called my work "blessed". :)

Speaking of my icon, it's now almost done! :) It just needs the white highlights in the face and the gospel text in the book! Well, obviously it's going to be covered in egg emulsion and oiled after the Christmas break, but paint-wise it'll be done! :) I couldn't be happier!

During the holidays I'm going to start putting gesso on some balsa wood, we'll see how that goes!! I'm going to paint miniature icons in the spring! :) And I mean TINY, I was thinking 2x1,5"... :D I hope Santa brings me a magnifying glass... Preferably of the kind you can wear like glasses on your head... :D I'm going to need both my hands free for sure...

...In other news, it was my birthday the other day in case you didn't notice! ;) My dearest, darlingest MetalHead brought me flowers, white mums and white roses with GLITTER (he knows what I like! <3) and there was a silver bauble in the bouquet as well! :)

And, being the adorable husband that he is, he never wonders about or rolls his eyes at my quirks but instead makes sure I get the pressies he knows I really want! And so, on my 41th birthday, these two lovely ladies found a home with us:

Sally and Jolene

I have been wanting Bratz dolls forever and now got these, originally called Meygan and Jaylene... But you know what? Who cares about scale, Meygan immediately became my redhead Sally!! She just IS her. So all the Sally stuff I'm going to have to make in about 1:7-scale now. :D No worries... :D Everything I've said about Sally's personality just has to be modified to suit her now. :D
And Jaylene was renamed Jolene, in honour of Dolly Parton (adore her!), plus I think the name suits her! :) She's got a bit of a personality brewing in my head, too... :)
Oh, and LOOK how well the brand new hand bag suits Jolene!! Even in her original clothing!

Now, I'm not much of a fashionista, nor do I actually care about fashion, but I immediately started designing clothes for the girls. In MY style. These two Bratz won't know what hit them after I'm done with my makeover... :D I already started knitting a dress for Sally... I'm going to knit the sleeves and stitch it together as soon as I finish this update... ;) Wheeeee...

And now, for something completely different.
...I just have to say a few words about Debbi Mack. :) She is an American author (and "recovering lawyer", as she puts it), and if you like dark, hardboiled crime stories you must check her out! I know you can at least find her books really easily as Kindle books!
I got to know her via Nik Nak's quiz blog, I think (the place to go if you love quizzes! He does an amazing Daily Teaser! Check him out, too!), or some other NikNak-related web thingy. :) She is a lovely person and her blog is seriously funny, too! Check out the mention she gave me... <3 Adorable. :) The more I get to know her, the more I like her. It's a pity she's not known in Finland... YET! :) Paul (oh, that's NikNak's real name) made sure his local library in Brentwood, Essex got her books... :) So, I'm just saying: get to know them both! :) Now!

Now, where friends, presents and love are concerned, God does sometimes give us some breathtakingly amazing ones. I'm going to leave you with this, the bestest present I ever got...

<3 Junior, aged 6 <3

Be well, my dears! :) Hugs all around!

THE WINNERS!!

2011-12-01T06:12:00.000-08:00

Drumrolls, please!!

...But first:

Thank you ALL for reading my blog, participating in my giveaways and bringing me tons of joy! :) I love you!

...Oh, and secondly: I turned 41 today! :) So A big whoop-whoop to those who have read The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and know that the Answer to Life, Universe and Everything is 42... :) If you haven't read it, do so! :)

And so, the winners of my two giveaways!! I did the lottery the "old fashioned way", with pen, paper and a hat (well, a plastic jar)... Which was nice, actually, because it gave me the chance to remind myself of who you all are... :) And the results are as follows...

The first one I announced was my birthday giveaway, and the prize was a surprise bag of at least five different Christmas minis and one of these, whicever you prefer:

And now, for the drumroll! The winner is...

CRAFTLAND!

Congratulations!! :)

The second giveaway was among all my followers and included these Christmassy goodies

and your choice of these two baby sets:

Drumrolls...

SOGNATRICE A BORDO!

Congratulations to you too! :)

Would you both please email me a prettymade (at) kookaja.com and give me your adresses! I would also like to know your choices on the bedsets! :) HUGS to you!!

Now, I'd have SO much to tell you, I got my swap gift from El Bichillo, both she and Maria Ireland have gotten my gifts, Narina Näpertää is about to get her prize from my witch naming contest, my ceramic stuff is done, my icon nearly ready... Unfortunately I have to leave it all for another day. After all, it IS my birthday... ;)

...Oh well, to be honest, I need to rest a bit. I went to the doctor today and he drained LOTS of icky liquid from my #*&µ# knee... :( It hurts now. Well, he also sent a consultation request to the local hospital, for surgery. I think they finally get the fact my knee needs to be fixed and not just looked at... His pressie to me was a HUGE jar of painkillers, so I'll be juuuuuuust fiiiiiine... :D LOL

Laters, my darlings, and thank you again!! MMMMMMMWAHH!! :)

TODAY IS THE DAY!!

2011-11-30T21:13:00.000-08:00

I will be drawing the winners at noon my time,

that is exactly 12 o'clock GMT +2!

You still have about

5 hours to enter my GIVEAWAY

and if you are a reader,

you are automatically included

in my second giveaway! :)

YAY!

I will announce the winners tonight...

*loooooong drumroll* :D

See you later...

OMG!!! Like, seriously, OMG!!! I've got more than 50 followers now!!! :D

2011-11-15T07:56:00.000-08:00

I'm so excited I don't know what to say but...

My undying blogland love to you all!

It has been such a treat to read your comments to my giveaway post, to get compliments and everything and to visit new blogs and... I try to follow you all, just so you know! If I haven't gotten to your blog yet, I will in time!

In an earlier post I promised to have a giveaway when I reach 50 followers, and I'm a woman of my word! :) But since I've got my Birthday Giveaway still going (SPREAD THE WORD! You have until Dec 1st!!), here's what we're gonna do:

On the same date as my B-day giveaway, that's

DECEMBER 1st

I'm going to raffle off a second heap of goodies

among ALL my followers! :)

So you actually get the chance for TWO prizes! Yay! :) And I'm going to tell you NOW what the second prize is:

A striped blanket set, a pair of "silk" cushions in gorgeous Xmas red, a wreath and you choice of these two baby bedsets:

Good one, huh?? :D

So spread the word in all the mini world and join my blog and win fabulous prizes and read my intelligent texts and... LOL :D ...And most of all: Be My Blogland Friend! :)

So, what's been happening lately? I've got just one thing to say: check out my company website and especially the mini section and you'll know... :) I'm still working on new stuff, more wreaths and baubles and rugs and stuff... :) I'm going to have 5 days of Christmas fairs in Nov-Dec as well, so I need to have lots of things ready and everything's a bit stressy-stressy... But I enjoy it! Autumn and the time leading up to Xmas is SO my favourite time of the year! Especially this year, we still have temperatures on the positive side of the zero mark and NO SNOW!! :) I'm not a huge fan of snow, and the last two years we've gotten more than our money's worth of the stuff...

I'm also still as much in love with icon painting and ceramics as ever, I'll show you some ceramics progress (I hope I've made some, LOL) next week when I get my glazed wares out of the oven... *fingers crossed*
This is my icon now:

The last two weeks I've been working on the face, hands and feet. It's not easy, I tell ya!! But I'm getting there. See, what you do is NOT start from light tones and the go towards darker ones but the exact opposite... I'm afraid my icon won't be ready for Xmas as I had hoped, but anyway... :) It's a meditative process as well as an artistic one, so I'm not in a hurry. :)

I'm working on reflectors and stuff at home right now, too, for the Xmas fair. Stuff like this:

Yes, they are reflectors, so they reflect light... :D

They're not quite finished yet... This tiny trio (unfinished as well) I made for myself:

Oh, yes, the orange stuff is reflecting fabric as well, trust me:

I like reflectors, plus they've become all the rage these past few years which I think is BRILLIANT. If we can save lives just by hanging such a simple, little pretty thing on our jackets or bags, we really should do it...

...And obviously, Junior got two new ones, a football and a smiley face... And this nasty li'l fella hangs on MetalHeads coat:

This might just be a smash hit... :D

I'm making both reusable fabric present bags (isn't that such a GOOD idea?? You get a lovely present in a pretty fabric bag and you can use the same bag next year to give someone else a present and so on and so forth... ) and kitty goodie bags for the fair, too and obviously I just HAD to order some new fabrics...

And my absolute favourite...

I also ordered some flannel, although I don't know what it's for... Yet. :)

The elephants were just so darn cute and the blue one so darn affordable, not to say cheap... ;)

MetalHead's got dinner ready now, yum yum! I'll be keeping you posted... No, not on the dinner, duh, on other stuff. Lol. :D

And Remember My Giveaway!! :)
XOXOXO

MINI GIVEAWAY!

2011-11-01T11:27:00.000-07:00

My birthday is exactly one month away, and I decided to give myself a present by having a giveaway!! Yay me! :) It's my first ever giveaway! :)

May I tempt you with these?
You get to choose your fave of these lovely, lacy and romantic bed sets with double extra cushions and a comforter!!
You ALSO get a surprise prezzie filled with Xmas goodies, with at least 5 different items! All mini! :)

What should you do to be included in my giveaway? There are just two easy steps:
1) Become a follower of my blog,
2) leave me a comment telling you are one and would like to be included.
Simple as that! :)

For an extra entry in the giveaway you can give a correct answer to this: NEXT year I will have the answer to Life, the Universe and Everything. So, how old am I going to be THIS year? :)

For another extra entry, post a link to this giveaway on your blog and leave a comment telling me you did, with your blog adress included. :)

The winner will be announced on Dec 1st with pomp and circumstance! :)
Spread the good news! :)

...In other news, I'm going to bore you to tears with my icon painting... ;) I'm just very into it at the moment. I'm a multicrafter (sounds like a B&D tool!!) and it's also reflected in my blog. So there. :D

I've come pretty far, I'm actually hoping it'll be ready for Christmas. :) The face looks very strange at the mo', because I've only done some of the main features... He unfortunately looks like a drug baron from Miami Vice... :D

In other news, my knee is almost completely better. :) I'm off the crutches but not doing any happy dances yet! :)
Also, with The Season approaching, I'm drowning in work... But I'm trying to keep you up to date anyway! :)

Hugs to all my lovely crafty friends out there, enjoy life and art as much as you can! It's GOOD for the soul!

I promised you some pics...

2011-10-29T02:48:00.000-07:00

And here you have them, although it's just a tiny taste of what our Burlesque show might've been like. :) Obviously I'm not allowed to show anyone else's picture. I'm also not too keen to be recognised myself, sort of. Hence the smudging on the "clearest" of the pictures... :) But here goes:

Here I am in my role as the madame of the cabaret, Madame Harpie (the name simply means harpy, or man-eater. :D Made that one up myself :)). She is a total diva, who thinks nothing could ever happen without her knowledge, her experience, her wisdom... She IS the cabaret, according to her. She's a busybody know-all, quite simply. I think she used to be a showgirl herself when she was young, now she's the queen of cabaret (she thinks), and very successful at that. :)

Here I am the singing bearded lady... :) I sang Marlene Dietrich's "Falling in love again", partly in German, too. :) "Ein Rätselhafter Schimmer, ein 'je-ne-sais-pas-quoi' liegt in den Augen immer bei einer schönen Frau..." :)

This one is from our hotter-than-hot Grande Finale, I didn't do smudging here because the smoke does enough of a job with that. :) I think.

We are doing another performance of the show next year, YAY! :) I'm sooooooo looking forward to that! :)

I'll catch you later, this was just a quickie-update... :) Hugs all around!

Even BAD girls get GOOD swap gifts...

2011-10-09T06:22:00.000-07:00

I have been SO bad not updating my blog lately, please forgive me!

*begs down on knees making puppy dog eyes*

I promise to be good from now on and tell you EVERYTHING immediately! (...Almost, anyway! ;))

Starting with the most heartwarming mini thing since… EVER! About a week and a half ago I got this mysterious package in the post. I had NO idea what it could be… But when I saw my dear mini-friend Maria’s name on the envelope my heart skipped a beat! My first ever swap gift, from Pretty Things Ireland’s PIF-swap!! J And how lovely it is:

Look at all these amazing things!

Adorable towels...

And bedding in my favourite, green, too!!

What about this lovely jewelry box, complete with a set of matching jewelry??

...And lots of lovely, small stuff, beads and bows and a toy car and... :) The little cute teddy bear is definitely going on my charm bracelet!

Lots of mini love and hugs to you, Maria! J

I’ve been delayed with my own PIF-gifts due to one thing and another, but I’m getting there! I just hope my gifts are worth the wait… (Is it just me or do you always feel like you just can’t compare your stuff to other mini makers’ without feeling seriously inadequate in some department or another??!)

...SO much going on! We had our oriental burlesque-show and it was a smash hit! :) We've gotten so much brilliant feedback we're going to do it again in the spring!! Yay! :) We had so much fun and after the evening was over, we were all rearing to go a few times more! We had just only gotten warm... Afterwards, I felt really empty and sad... But new projects await, so no worries... :) I might be getting a photo of me in costume from a friend, I'll share it with you when I can... :)

...Then, last Wednesday, LUCKILY a few days after the show, my right knee went BANG and POP again!!! Those of you who know me from way back also know that my knee has been a pain in the... leg (ha ha) for about 25 years already, and now something tore inside it again. So I'm getting plenty tired of being on crutches... Blahhh. Oh well, it seems to be healing fast this time, I just have to remember to stay off it even if it feels better!! No dancing for me for a few weeks, but after that I'll be strutting my stuff in no time, you'll see. :)

There are lots of nice things to do sitting down, too. :) Here's how far I've come with my icon:

Plenty of basic colour and some shadowing in the red bits already . :)

I actually got "told off" by my teacher, Mari, for being too thorough and perfectionistic. :) "It's GOOD ENOUGH!", she told me... :) Good thing too, otherwise I'd never be ready with it... I tend to hone some details a bit too long... And in this case, I haven't even gotten to the details yet! :D

Now, here's what I've done so far in ceramics, or actually the stuff I've taken photos of so far:

This is my "mystery box". No, it's not a shoe. :D I'm planning on trying to glaze it with colours reminiscent of tree trunks and roots and stuff, we'll see. :) The lid could match better! Oh well, it is my first ever!!

This is my pot, combining the pinching and coiling techniques. I tried to make it look sort of "old", as if it was made a long time ago, maybe used for carrying water and such... It's about 7" high, I think. My first ever, this one, too!

Now, this little spindly-legged thing is a very useful tool I made for making ceramic jewelry. Clay that has been glazed all over, as for example jewelry usually is, can not be placed in the kiln just like that, the glaze melts and sticks into the kiln. So, you hang for example earrings on to hooks like these and place the clay bit on a "pipe" in the kiln so the jewelry doesn't touch the hot surfaces. And hey presto! Perfect, glazed clay jewelry. :) (Provided it doesn't explode in the first burn...)

And to top all this loveliness off, I've got some new fabrics again, and at a VERY good price... That just makes it even better, doesn't it? ;)

And if someone can enlighten me as to why these photos changed direction again although they were horizontal from the start, I'd be eternally grateful! :O Well, they're nice anyway! ;)

Otherwise, my time is mostly spent popping pain killers and making the swap gifts and stuff... I'm actually on sick leave, so I should have all the time in the world to give to my hobbies... Not being able to relax with achy knee is annoying though. And I have constant stress thinking about all the work I should be doing... Christmas is coming, you know... I try not to worry too much, though. :) I just do what I can and let the #%*# knee take its time... :) (Btw, the "begging on my knees"-thing in the beginning was obviously just figurative. Sincere, though. Such things are just way beyond my capabilities at the mo'... :))

Hugs to you all, and remember there's no time limit to the P-I-F-swap, so you can still join in! :)

Byeeeeeeeeee for now...!

Mostly about icon painting...

2011-09-22T03:11:00.000-07:00

I have become very, very fascinated by the whole process of egg tempera painting. I think I just might adapt the technique to more than icons, in the future...

I have started painting my icon this Monday. I don't know how much you know about painting icons, but here are some basics:

Icons are painted on specially made wooden boards. It takes a few aeons to prepare one, luckily you can buy one instead of making it yourself... :) They come in various sizes and forms, this is how mine looks from the side (the supports are made of a different type of wood to prevent warping):

I had to crop the pic so you can't see my vices... There's a coffee pot and a Coke Zero bottle on the table... :D

The colour pigments used are in powder form. I started with what consists of the teacher's recommended basic set: yellow ochre, red ochre, green umber , golden yellow, synthetic vermilion, ultramarine (also called lazuline blue), light iron oxide brown, English red, iron oxide black and titanium white plus something called "sankir", a mix of one part green umber and three parts yellow ochre for a basic hue that is used on skin and hair.

Oh, btw, our teacher is called Mari Zabyshnyi, she's a professional icon artist trained in Russia and has been teaching icon painting for about 20 years... She has written books on painting and has her own web shop for icon painting supplies, Ortiko.

So, moving on. In egg tempera painting, you take the egg yoke (carefully cleaned of all white and the membrane around it) and mix it to an emulsion of 1:1 with white wine, or up to two parts wine if you wish to have a looser colour. Pour the emulsion into a bottle with pipette and it'll keep for ages in the fridge. Then you just mix the colour powder with the emulsion and voilà, ready to paint...

In advance, I thought this would be the boring bit with painting, but actually, I thoroughly enjoy it! It makes the whole process so much more... MINE, if you understand how I mean. Nobody mixes my colours but me, completely according to taste and need. And, well, obviously, the requirements of icon painting. :)

The first thing we did was choose our icon, as I told you last time, and I also picked a suitable board for painting. This Monday we started the actual work. First, Mari fixed me a copy of the icon in a proper size for my board. I rubbed the back side of the paper with red ochre until it looked like this:

Then, I fastened the paper with the red side down on my board with some masking tape and "simply" traced the image onto the board using a regular ball point pen on the paper (blue ink shows well enough on the copy so you can see if you missed any lines). The trick is to follow the lines where the basic colours change and ignore the details. They will eventually be painted on top of the basic colour.

After tracing the picture I gently removed the paper, made a batch of paint with the same red ochre and carefully painted in the traced lines. This is how it looked:

After painting the lines I brushed off any loose colour pigment powder there was on the board. I made a very thin, watercolour-like paint of yellow ochre and gently painted over the whole board. The point with this is to prevent any of the bright, chalk white gesso (i.e. a mixture of plaster of Paris and glue used to prepare a surface for painting) from showing through the paints. It's not necessary to make it even, just to cover every bit. So that's why my icon now looks like this:

...And this is how the icon should look when it's done:

I'm really looking forward to next Monday! I'm so eager to continue with the painting and also with the ceramics...

My "mysterious" (it's a mystery to me too) carved box is ready and drying happily away, so I started making a pot combining two techniques, pinching (if that's what it's called) and coiling (itwic). Our ceramics teacher, Pipa Hytinkoski, is a brilliant and enthusiastic teacher. She does lots of work with special needs groups as well, got to admire that! (Hubby works with people who have special needs, so I know quite a bit about what it is like.) Go check out her website, Koikkalintu!

In other news, my Tumbling Twelve are coming along nicely (though slowly...), as are the mini things I'm making for Irina and my PIF-swap...

Plain to see: four are still missing... :) I'm obviously NOT showing you any pics of the mini stuff. :P

...Just a little over a week to go before our Burlesque-show, and the tickets are nearly sold out, yay! :) Some last minute sewing still to do as usual (the last minute panic brings out the creativity in me!!), but I think it'll be a thorough success... :)

Something fun to look forward to tonight: I'm going to the Diiva shop again, I want to buy some more niceties. I'm visiting the actual warehouse shop they have, that is, not just the webshop. :) (It's open by agreement only.) Woohoo! They have some really lovely stuff for a VERY good price!!

Catch you later, my sweeties, I just might let you know what I got from Diiva! :) Byeeeeeeeeee...

Blog Lag

2011-09-15T07:41:00.000-07:00

Sometimes it’s like this: there are so many things happening at the same time, I just haven’t found the time or energy to blog... I don’t know if I have it now either, but now I took a pause from sewing for a moment, so… J

I’ve started my ceramics and icon painting classes now! Every Monday, art all day! It’s AMAZING and wonderful and I’m really enjoying it… Plus you can see some seriously funny things in class:

Yes, it’s a horse in a trashcan. :D

The first thing we started working on in ceramics was a carved box. Well, you can’t see it until it’s finished. Provided it survives the kiln. So there. :D For now, it’s just sitting on a shelf, drying and waiting…

In icon painting class we use the traditional egg tempera colours, so next time we’ll learn how to mix those. The first time we picked out an icon we’ll try to paint, here’s my choice:

Bad copy, I know...

A detail of the face...

It’s got an insane amount of detail, which you will see as soon as I get a color pic from my teacher… But it's also got a lovely blue colour and a completely gold background... J In at the deep end, that’s my motto! :D

…I’ve also been working on a small series of textiles I’m calling “the Tumbling Twelve”. Basically, it’s a set of 12 different small quilts made with a tumbler pattern, and they can be used as small tablecloths or hung on the wall or whatever… I’ll show them to you in time, too. I’ve made eight so far. Her's the first one, still without backing, batting & binding, obviously:

Plenty of others to come, different colours, different shape, different everything... Same tumblers though.

Miniwise, not much happening. Although I’m going to join my first mini club here in Turku, first meeting in a couple of weeks. That will be FUN! J

The smell of Tandoori Chicken from the oven tells me it’s about dinner time, so laters, babes! J

Deck the Halls and Walls and House and Lawn and Streets and Stores and Office and Town and Cars and Buses and Trucks and Trees and…

2011-09-09T06:39:00.000-07:00

I can't believe I've spent this beautiful, sunny autumn day indoors making mini Christmas decorations!!! :D Oh well... :D

At first, it's a whole heavenful of angels... (Although angels are NOT just for Christmas! :))

These 1" cuties make nice decorations on cards or such, I think... Maybe one could even put one up to the top of a mini Christmas tree?

These minuscule angels I just had to try making anyway, PHEW! They're just about ½" tall and the body is a tiny seashell!

A whole angel choir appeared on my desk, since I found an old plastic bag with some angel wings and wooden pearls and such... The body is about 1".

These table decorations are 1" (or less) tall as well. The first sits in a "stoneware" dish, the second in a box of actual birch bark...

Wreaths, diameter of appr. 1½". They have such nice, glittery details that don't show on the photos...

Wall decorations made on birch bark, larger about 11/4"x3/4", smaller about 1"x½". At least here you can see the glitter... :) I LIKE glitter. On EVERYTHING. :D

I made this small Christmas tree in a pot for Sally, actually. At about 2" it's the perfect size for her table. The glitter (Yeesssss? Why wouldn't I have glitter here as well?? LOL) on the tree hasn't dried yet, but what better place to put a tree to dry than on my trusty Pfaff? :D

Also tried making picture frames for the first time, although this might suit better as a mirror frame, methinks... I used this LOVELY gold and sand coloured scrapping paper... I just might do a whole set of stuff to match...

In case you want to know, this is what my work space basically looks like after Junior helped me "organise" a little... :) Well, he had such fun playing with my tools (the NON-dangerous ones, of course) so I couldn't tell him no. :)

To mention something completely different: My dear friend ever since childhood, Marianne, is a brilliant weaver with her own company Loruloimi, and she wove this gorgeous rug that I'm using sort of... creatively as a table cloth. The quality of her rugs is just amazing, they're so firm and even... *awe* Plus she does lots of other brilliant stuff as well, check her out!

I can't believe we've known each other since I went to daycare at age 5, for 35 years already... (*ahem* Do NOT start counting how old that would make me! ;))

Still working on the Burlesque-show clothes. Tricky, tricky... But I think it'll work out fine in the end... But for today, I think I'm done with Christmas stuff anyway. :D I might just take the rest of the evening off and continue crocheting on my latest scrap yarn project...

Have a LOVELY weekend! Hugs all around! :)

Welcome to Burlesque!

2011-09-07T04:10:00.000-07:00

The situation requires me to do something quite different from my usual minis and quilts. We have an oriental style burlesque show (with plenty of humour as well, as is our style) coming up SOON! It will be with dance troupé Nefer that I've been a part of for some seven glorious years now... :)

All you who are in Turku Oct 1st, COME AND SEE! It's definitely worth it... ;)

Today I went shopping for some supplies, and now I'm pretty much set, I'm just lacking one wig and one beard. YES, you read me correctly, a beard. :D So now I just need to get sewing and changing and fixing and building and... Yes, I will show you the results in time, today you can only see my supplies and the all-ready-to-be-used stuff... :)

This GLORIOUS dressing gown in 100% silk I found at UFF. I'm actually going to use it at home as well... :) It just needs a belt, sadly that was missing. But for 6€, I'm not complaining!!

Black satin corset with diamonds, hard to photograph but lovely to wear... With traditional lacing at the back.

The satin gloves and pink, shiny fabric I had from before. Black lace fabric, silver, white and hot pink (thanks, Kirsi!!) tulle I got for this show, as well as the HUGE false lashes (with gold lamé on top!!) and the sweeter than sweet gold and pink buttefly earrings...

And, of course, my pièce de résistance, these two stetsons... ;) The lilac sequined one can remain as it is, I'll just add some hot pink tulle, but the silver one I'll re-build into something more reminiscent of a musketeer's hat. Hopefully I can manage that without bigger disasters!!

Speaking of hats, this is something I made for our "teaser" for this show last spring, a perky little thing, worn here by my darling friend Kirsi:

The pic quality isn't brilliant, but you get the idea... I wonder why the photographer was shaking so much... ;)

Hot pink tulle, black and pink feathers, electric blue lace ribbon, "diamonds" and glitter made out of crushed mirror, my favourite kind! It glitters wonderfully in the spotlights!

Did you notice her feather lashes? :)

I had a lot of fun making that hat, I'd love to make more when I get the time, perhaps even in miniature, we'll see... :)

My fingers are itching now, I think I'm going to start by removing spiders from another, older corset (remainders from a witch-dance we did a LONG time ago) and sewing on some tulle instead... ;)

Byeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee...
(You can get in the mood with this in the meantime :D)

Sally Belladonna Chamomila Lycanta Woodfain!

2011-08-31T06:29:00.000-07:00

Yes, that will be the name of my witch! :) Now all I need is to make/find a doll that matches the name... ;)

Why this name?
-Sally from Nightmare Before Christmas, my favourite "rag doll" ever :) (I love how she sews herself back together!)
-Belladonna (or Deadly Nightshade) from the poisonous/medicinal plant and from the meaning, "beautiful woman". Also in honour of Donna Noble. ;)
-Chamomila from my favourite tea, I love chamomile in every form, its taste, smell and simple beauty, how it manages to grow just about anywhere... Deep symb olism there! ;)
-Lycanta beacuse of wolves, werewolves and shape-shifters and
-Woodfain because I love trees and the woods and so does she... :) Huge, old trees make me feel very calm and tranquil and focused.
(...She really is becoming my alter ego... ;))

Thank you SO much all who gave me suggestions! I didn't pick any of them this time, but I did get inspiration from them all, they led me to my final choice! Plus I'm pretty sure they will come in handy in the future! :)

...I promised to raffle off a self made mini between all who gave suggestions, and I did! I wrote down your names on pieces of paper and let MetalHead pull them out of the proverbial hat... And the winner of my self-made mini is.... *drumroll*

NarinaNäpertää aka Irina!

Millions of congratulations, Irina! You win a mini quilt with cushions in a colour scheme of your choice! :) Send me an email with your adress! :)

...You know, I really love it here in blogland. :)

I'm very happy to have all you followers,

a million thanks and hugs to you all!

I'm making a promise now:

When I reach 50 followers,

I'm going to have a giveaway! :)

So tell all your friends and it might be sooner than you think! :) Spread the good word! :)

...Laters... :)

Wonky log cabin - my first ever mini quilt blocks!

2011-08-28T00:57:00.000-07:00

...It's not that I haven't made mini quilts before. It's just that I've never tried to make REAL mini blocks before... I decided to start with something simple, and this is how it turned out...

I think I need to practice, practice and practice... (And iron the seam allowances better while building the blocks...! ;))

Wonkety wonk wonk... Oh well. Practice makes perfect, right? ;)

Anyway, today there's news of two lovely giveaways!
First, there's Irina's first ever giveaway on Narina Näpertää! Go now, she's got some lovely stuff there! :)

Beautiful, romantic stuff!

There's also the AhhWahWah giveaway, and let me tell you, it's a doozie (and I mean that in the positive sense of the word!)! There's a pizza prep board, a choko cake prep board, bananas, carrots, pins... All in one giveaway! Plus you can wish for something special! :) Go! GO! GO!!! :D Just look at the pizzas:

(Drool)

And remember my "Name the Witch"-contest! Two days to go! :)

That's all from me today, folks, need to get on with some 1:1 stuff at times...! :) Byeeeeeee...

It's been a GOOD week. :)

2011-08-27T09:57:00.000-07:00

I don't even know where to start! Weather has been sunny and nice all week, we had a lovely chat on Thursday with Junior's preschool teachers about his progress and everything is just fine with him, thanks! :) Here he is, all happy and proud on his way in the morning:

Don't know why he's making that odd face though! :D

I've made good progress, work-wise, so has MetalHead, and we've made a lot of new flea market finds... I've also gotten a lot of food for thought and confidence by listening to Joyce Meyer's Boot Camp. :) So, a good week, in every way!

...I think I'm going to start with reminding you of the three days remaining to take part in my witch naming contest... Make your suggestion here on Aug 30th at the latest and you have a chance to win a self-made mini! :) I'll announce my choice on the 31st and also reveal the name of the lottery winner! :)

Secondly, the Pay-It-Forward Swap is still there! Join in! :) No time limits!

As for the actual new stuff, maybe we'll start with Friday. We drove to my old home village, Hämeenkyrö. My parents live quite near there, in Viljakkala, and Junior is spending the weekend with them. I visited my old school, F.E. Sillanpään Lukio (although at that time I think it was still called "Hämeenkyrön Yhteiskoulu") and met with my former French teacher, Jaakko Laaksonen, who had a small bazaar at the school. Besides coffee and tasty carrot cake, there were some very nice quilts and patchwork potholders and bags to see (and buy), all made by his sister-in-law Riitta Laaksonen.
Unfortunately I only had my phone camera with me (dum-dum!), but I hope you can still enjoy the pics! :)

I loved the heart quilting on this one!

My Mum got one of these potholders from me, she really liked it! :)

I like crazy quilts, unfortunately the lovely decorative stitching in the middle doesn't really show here... :/

I also had the pleasure of having MetalHead off work for a few days, so we drove round local flea markets looking for everything and nothing... :) I like having him for company, he loves flea markets and bargains as much as I do. :)

So, what did we find? Well, for example:

A huge amount of feathers for a few cents! :)
A small tip: NEVER leave a box full of feathers in front of an open window after photographing them. *sigh*

I don't really know what these decorations are for, but each one has a flower, lace, bow, lovely fabric and a small bag I just KNOW I can reuse for something... :) I've got about 80 of these now. :D Any ideas?

After it's been cleaned, this'll make a lovely giant chinese vase for some stately home... :)

This candle holder is doubly useful: the upper part will be a three-legged cauldron, the foot will become a leg for a round table! I was nearly squealing with joy when I saw it... :)

This beautiful crystal (yes, actual Bohemian crystal) souvenir bottle will most likely be filled with some... interesting liquid and find its place in my witch's home...

LOOK at this gorgeous table!! :) I was so happy to find this! Two legs have had their loops broken, but I'm sure I can fix it! I just love the rust on this, it'll look brilliant in a wild garden... :)

This self-made set of furniture is probably from the 50's. The flea market also had a set of larger doll's furniture, obviously by the same maker, and clearly in a 50's-early 60's style. Most likely made by a father for his daughter for Christmas. :) They're well used and pretty worn out, but I'll fix them and give them a new life! :)

As if that wasn't enough, I've also found two pairs of high-heel shoes, a black evening dress with plenty of tulle and some crochet yarn for just a few euros...

I also had the good fortune to stumble upon a gift shop going out of business and bought some of their dollhouse stock, both for my company and for myself. Here are MY prrrreccciouussssss trrreassuressssss:

A lantern, two glass bottles, a glass jug, an iron, a grater, a colander and a mincer! Yay!

Two wooden barrels, just imagine these with a dark staining and brass or copper coloured bands...

A nice stand to hand a beautiful quilt on....

...and an apple basket.

These finds will keep me happy for a loooong time... Plus I'm pretty "flead out" at the moment! :D I think a break from bargain hunting might be in order until I figure out where to put my latest finds... :)

Talking of my company: I've got new stuff in there, more to come during next week! :) For example some of my bedding and cushions and other nice things for decorating your dollhouse... Check it out, pics and product info are already there although I'm still updating the texts! :)

That's about it for now! Have a great weekend, all! Hugs all around! :)

What a cute flea market find!

2011-08-23T05:58:00.000-07:00

The other day I was rummaging round in our local flea market, looking for high heel shoes and laces and stuff for our dance troupé show (I'll tell you about that another time!) and look what I found stuffed between lots of clothes and towels!

Isn't it just the darlingest little elf/fairy/something house?? :) Obviously, it's supposed to have a candle inside and it DOES look nice with the light shining out of all those tiny windows... But I'm just SO tempted to decorate it for living purposes! :) Here you can see it from all angles:

And there's actually plenty of room inside:

I could so easily give a home to some tiny elf! :)

(My husband thinks it's kinda hideous, but he does understand my fascination... ;))

...If you like bears, check out this cuuuuuuuuuttttteeeeee Cloudbearies giveaway! You can win this sweet, pink bear named Lily!

...Was that ALL for today? :O ...I think so. :) Later...

Bzzzz... Bzzzzzz... I've been a busy, busy bee...!

2011-08-20T07:45:00.000-07:00

It's been a buzzzzzzzzzzzzzy week!! *phew* I haven't had much time for blogging or for anything else, for that matter! Well, now I'm around for an hour or two, so I thought I'd show you what I've done this week...

Starting with why I've been so busy, here's a fraction of the ministuff I've been making for my company:

It's bedding and cushions, bedding and cushions, bedding and cushions... And baby sets. And some more cushions... :D
Also, I've been making warm flannel blankets in a huge variety of patterns and colours:

There are about 50 of these in the plastic container...

...And I've cut cushions to make some blanket sets as well, haven't gotten round to filling & sewing them up yet though...

...But it's been a GOOD week, all in all. I got two parcels in the mail, from Fabric Shack and Calico Cottage. Looooooovely fabrics, mostly sale fabrics and remnant pieces, but also some yardage from the Flower Sack-series:

My fingers are itching to get going with these, I've got some lovely autumn projects and a bit of xmas stuff planned already...
I also bought this panel:

This time I can honestly say I have NO idea why I can't get the picture the right way. It wasn't vertical to begin with!!! Usually Blogger has a hard time coping with pics I turn from vertical to horizontal... But this time it's the original direction! Augh... So anyway, about the panel:
I'm not American. I guess you knew that much. I LIKE the US a lot, there's plenty there we could learn from plus fantastic nature and so on, won't get into all that now. But don't you all agree that, from a crafts/design/quilting/such point of view, the US of A has the best flag EVER?? The colours, the stars, the stripes, it's just a perfect combo. Think about all the gorgeous "Americana"-stuff on the web... Can't imagine doing anything similar with the Finnish blue and white, however much I love my country and my flag. Do you agree? :)

This week I also got a nice mention on Lazy Gal Quilting! :) Tonya is working on an amazing quilt of "uglies", so I sent her a bit of my "bad stuff", fabrics I really don't like. She shows all the fabrics people send her on her blog plus obviously the resulting quilt blocks... Check her out! :)

I was rummaging round in "a box of weird stuff", one of those you get when you think "I'm just gonna stuff these in here for now and think about them SOMEDAY..." I found this crocheted hexie-thingy I actually started on almost ten years ago (yikes!)... The hexies are about one inch, I think, and can you even imagine my madness:
I was planning on crocheting a king size 1:1 bedspread!! :O

Well, now I've decided that my witch, what ever her name will be (THANKS for your contributions btw, keep the name suggestions coming to this post!) is going to get a bed spread plus perhaps an afghan of hexies for her comfy chair... :) Much saner, right? ;)

It's been really nice to share these with you again, I feel refreshed and happy! :) Thanks, all, for lending me your craft ears, have a good weekend and see you soon... :)

...Can't leave you without a quote that describes my brain to a tee :D :
You see, I consider that a man's brain originally is like a little empty attic, and you have to stock it with such furniture as you choose. A fool takes in all the lumber of every sort that he comes across, so that the knowledge which might be useful to him gets crowded out, or at best is jumbled up with a lot of other things so that he has a difficulty in laying his hands upon it. -Watson (Sherlock Holmes)-

All my followers have disappeared!!

2011-08-12T11:52:00.001-07:00

Can someone Blogger-smarter tell me where all the pics of my followers went?? :O *confused*
...Better sleep on it. *yawn*

I simply adore Pixie Dust Miniatures...

2011-08-09T21:50:00.000-07:00

...I'm so in awe of the creativity and humor! :) Have you checked out her professional blog? Prepare to be amazed... *sigh* I (almost) envy her talent and her view of the magical world... :)

...And to top it all off, PDM has a giveaway! I do so wish I'm in luck this time!!!! :)

I'd love to be the only one entering (and therefore a certain winner), but I think you should go ahead and enter, too... :) You can win a mini of your choice! (I'm hoping for a Skellington-bottle, although the Grand Candles look great...)

...This might be my only post this week, I'm pretty busy (that's why I'm writing this around 7 am!!) which obviously is a good thing, basically. I'd like to remind you about two things though:

I will raffle off a self-made mini between all who suggest a name for my witch!

Comment on this post with your suggestion for a name and you're in! :)
My time limit is Aug 30th!

And then of course, there's the Pay-It-Forward-swap!! :) There's no time limit, just a limit of five participants! :)

Have a good week, my lovelies! Mini hugs and xxx:s!

I wonder if I'm especially sleepy today... :)

2011-08-06T08:18:00.000-07:00

...since all I do seems to relate to bedding, somehow! :D

I've been making these sets... Sheet, two pillows, reversable (unique, no two alike) bedspread, two cushions. They'll be on sale on my company website in due time, I think...

The sheet has the same pale peach honeycomb pattern as the pillows...

I adore this yellow fabric!!

I also made another kind of sheets, with red leaf patterns:

All this inspired me to sew some bedding for my Witch's Kitchen bed as well:


The red and white is an actual mattress, the blue-white sort of a second, thinner mattress... See, a comfy bed is the most important thing... Plus lots of pillow... Now we need some sheets and a nice, warm blanket...

The bed actually looks kinda nice! :) I tried it out on my "test dummy":

She looks really tiny on the bed, actually!! But then again, in 1:12-scale, she is TITCHY! If she was a real woman, she'd only be 144 cm, that's like 4 ft 7"... So I'm not worried, I think my witch is a little more... robust. :D

Now, I have been thinking about my witch a lot. She is definitely not your run-of-the-mill spiders-in-her-hair cackling old crone. She is more of a herbalist, nature lover, the kind of woman that actually might have been burnt as a witch because of her knowledge of medicines and the human body and such... She's also quite a social woman and interested in all kinds of things... But she still doesn't have a name!! People, please, help me! And like I said before, I'm making this a contest for you sweet readers and I'm changing the parameters a bit:

I will raffle off a self-made mini between all who suggest a name for my witch!

Comment on this post with your suggestion for a name and you're in! :)
Originally my time limit was Aug 15th, but I'm extending that to Aug 30th! Suggestions!

Oh, and don't forget my Pay-it-forward-swap!!! :)

...One more thing before I beam myself to my 1:1-kitchen and start on dinner. I made some progress with the fabric icon as well...

I've used dimensional fabric paint for the detailing, looks nice, I think. Details to come, but I'm pretty proud of this one. :)

Have good weekend, peeps! XXX

Pay-It-Forward-swap!! YAY!

2011-08-04T00:48:00.000-07:00

My first ever swap! It's so cool to be a newbie at this mini and blogging thing, every day I find something I've never experienced before!

I got the inspiration for this from Maria at Pretty Things Ireland! I'm sooooo excited! :) Swapping miniatures, is there anything better??? :)
Here's how it works, people:

The first five people who leave a comment on this post and decide to participate will receive a handmade miniature gift from me. What you need to do is this:

1. Comment on this post!

2. Create a post on your blog explaining how the Pay it Forward 2011 swap works.

You must be willing to send a gift to the first five participants on your own blog. There is no time limit for this. You can take your time to make something special for each person.

Isn't this just brilliant?? :)

And now, for something completely different...

2011-08-01T10:38:00.000-07:00

I've been thinking about doing something like this for a long time. This seems to be the summer of many new beginnings... :) So I started today. I have both a need to become more "artistic" with my quilting and to "testify", to express something important to me.
We'll see where it leads... I have a vision, I'll keep you posted on my progress. Enjoying it so far. :)

I think you get the point? Making fabric icons. :) I also have some additional related ideas, but I'll tell you later... :)

"For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth..." Romans 1:16

...I have also become interested in doing some fabric swapping, if you're interested! Does anybody out there happen to have even the smallest of pieces of this fabric by Sara Morgan, Blue Hill? It's from her Feedsack-series:

I've been trying to find it in online shops everywhere, but the only shop I found it in doesn't ship internationally... *sigh* If you know who has it or where I can get some, or if you're willing to swap some, LET ME KNOW! :)

...I think I'm going to do the halo for the icon tonight, it's not so late. :)

P.S. I DID finish the last bit of my hexie-hexie yesterday... :)

Whenever I feel in need of some therapy...

2011-07-31T10:39:00.000-07:00

...I start hand sewing. Especially hexies. Flowers, rows, diamonds, whatever. Hand piecing/sewing relaxes me in a way (almost) nothing else does... And English paper piecing's the thing!

Today, I have nearly finished part one of my summer project, a hexie-shaped hexie throw for our bedroom. (The indignant grumbling in my PhD-boxes lessened somewhat as a result...) Part two consists of figuring out what I want to do with it; batting, quilting and that.

The "red row" needs a few more pieces... Oh yes, you recognised it: it's the hexies from my blog background... :)

...And this is the best therapy of them all:


Flowers. Just tons of flowers. I can always use them later for something or other...

I've got one "eternity project" as well, a wall hanging of 30's repro fabrics... I never seem to get it finished... ("What??! Just ONE??!" ;))


It's already got part of the "second bit" ready, the center of which is made of squares that make cross patterns... I know I have a pic of it somewhere, I just can't find it a the mo'...

And I'm also making a hexie tablecloth, at my Mum's request... Just begun though.


I love the swirly thing in the middle! Both of these fabrics are from Calico Cottage scrap bags, gotta love those!

Ahh... Even writing/talking about hexagons relaxes me! Maybe I can still get the last few bits sewn to my throw tonight? :)

Have a good week, don't forget my contest:
My Witch's Kitchen-witch needs a name! If you have ideas, comment and let me know!

If you suggest a name I end up picking,

I'll reward you with a self-made mini!

You have time to think of the perfect name until August 15th! :)

...And some more Nanny Ogg: "THEY SAY THAT the way to a man's heart is through his stomach, which just goes to show they're as confused about anatomy as they gen'rally are about everything else, unless they're talking about instructions on how to stab him, in which case a better way is up and under the ribcage." :)
Pleasant dreams! :)

Witch's Kitchen

2011-07-29T11:42:00.000-07:00

It's all about miniatures right now! :) I'm so inspired... And my quilting PhD:s are frowning at me from their boxes (I tend to sort different projects into different boxes just to TRY and keep them straight...)... I swear I can hear them rustling indignantly and even growling when I walk by!!

...But, basically, I just can't help my mini mania right now! I've finally started making my very first room box, Witch's kitchen! It's something I've had in my mind for about two years now... And finally I've begun! :) I'm planning on building the box myself, MetalHead found some abandoned materials I can use, like sheets of very thin plywood and such. And obviously, in order to build a box in a proper size, I need to know what'll be in it!

...And in order to know what'll be in it, I need to know who lives in it... :) Well, she's a witch. Hence the name, "Witch's Kitchen". I don't yet know her name or what she looks like, but I know her personality... She's 40% Nanny Ogg, 30% Mrs. Weasley, 10% bits from other witches I like (such as Noita Röppänä from a children's book I liked as a kid, and Noita Nokinenä plus her two sisters, Vilma Väkäleuka and Hanna Harvahammas from my favourite radio show ever) and 20% me... :) So a kind of an alter ego. Ish.
The room is not just a kitchen either, it's her whole home... An old-timey cottage with just the one room. "Witch's Kitchen" just sounds a lot better than "Witch's Cottage", plus it's the name that popped into my head first, before I had any idea what I'd have in the roombox! Huge fireplace, yes... Dark wood, stone and such, yes... Plenty of stuff on the shelves, yes... But what I started with was the furniture.

This is the first EVER 1:12-furniture I've made and I LOVED the process... :)


First, I made the chair. Well. it obviously needs some upholstering still, but anyway... And then I made the table. I really like the look I managed to get on it, well used and old... It looks even better irl, I promise you!


This is the witch's bed. The weaving looks a bit new, but hey, maybe she just got it re-woven? Now it obviously needs a nice mattress... If you have any tutorials, I'd like to get some links! :)

The candle holder is made of a wooden button and three small wooden beads. The candle itself is obviously HUGE in 1:12-scale, but I kind of thought that my witch might be the kind who sneaks into the local church and chooses the biggest votive candles she can find... They give off such nice, strong light, don't they! And obviously she also leaves a notable donation in the poor box, she's not a thief now, is she!!

I blew out the candle after photographing and moved it a bit and got such nice spill of wax on the table. Just perfect! :) The trouble is, now I can't move it anymore... :D It'll never be as perfect again! :D

Now, this is something really... funny (I was laughing at myself at least):

Do you recognise the thing hanging here with my fabric strips? That's actual cleaned and dried fish skin!!! :D LOL I was making dinner yesterday (lemon and chili salmon) and got the idea to try drying fish skin for the Witch's Kitchen... I cleaned it from all fat and stuff, rinsed it thoroughly and hung it up to dry. :D It's all nice, dry, hard and non-smelly already... I just need to find out what our ancestors did to make it soft and usable again. They actually used fish skin for stuff in the ancient olden days, did you know that? :)

...And, "Waste not, want not", I cleaned some fish bones! They're almost 3" long, we'll see what they can be used for! :D I also tried drying fins, but that didn't work. I couldn't get them clean enough.

...If you want a tip regarding furniture: chopsticks are extremely useful! :D Right now I'm also trying to gather a lot of ice lolly sticks (Luckily Junior loves ice-cream... "Mum, WHY do you want the stick? It should go in the trash!"). I'm planning some kind of a chest or box thingy... :) And her footstool is already glued together, so I think I'll be staining it tomorrow and upholstering it together with the chair. I think my witch also needs a comfy chair to sit in in front of the fireplace, though. Really big and soft.

Now, for something very important, my very first blog-contest:

My witch desperately needs a name! If you have ideas, comment and let me know! Tell your friends too; the more suggestions, the merrier!! Here's the good bit:

If you suggest a name I end up picking,

I'll reward you with a self-made mini!

You have time to think of the perfect name until August 15th! :)

Byeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee for now... :)

"Nanny Ogg looked under her bed in case there was a man there. Well, you never knew your luck."
-Terry Pratchett-

Third time's the charm?

2011-07-26T05:59:00.000-07:00

...Well, not really. :) My third (and MetalHead's second) visit to Mini-Turku was a shortish one, Junior wasn't all too keen on the minis due to the heat although I did hear a few "WOW":s from him... Mostly caused by the mini foods, so obviously like mother, like son! LOL :D

I did meet Sophia from Presento (with hubby), so that was nice... I had the chance to take a few photos from the lighthouse without the plastic in front, Sophia's husband was kind enough to hold it to the side while I indulged in some details... :)

Well, I managed some new photos anyway! Teehee... ;)

Someone had kindly removed the plastic from the toy store, so I managed to get a nice image.

And here he is, Mr. Skellington! :)

Junior admiring Nonna Elizabetta's house.

And some more detailed pics of the lovely lighthouse by Presento!

I really liked this chest!

...That's about it for now! :) Oh, there's this:


Someone had drawn this lovely bird image on the street, unfortunately it had been smudged! Plus I'm too short to get a proper image anyway... :D

Laters, alligaters... :)

I don't usually like to show PhD:s...

2011-07-25T00:50:00.000-07:00

(Project half Done)

...except for when in comes to quilts, because I'd never have anything to show otherwise... :D But this time I'm making an exception with "the other stuff", because I'd very much like the feedback!

I've been dabbling in ceramics, something I really love but haven't done in donkey's years... Let alone done in a serious fashion. (Hence the "dabble"... :))
I got an inspiration, dug up my tools and made some stuff.


First, I made these small... paintings. Just some stuff to hang on the wall. They are about one inch in diameter. My Mum used to have things like this on her wall... I think she still does. Maybe that's why I think they feel sort of... cosy?


This, I thought, might look nice above a mantelpiece, or maybe on a tilestove? I like this one, personally.


I also made my first attempt at kitchen/bathroom tiles... They were actually a lot of fun to do! I made them so they can be either used as a whole or carefully separated to individual tiles. (That was a bit tricky, actually...) The tiles are about 1x1 cm, that's a bit less than .5 inches square.

This might look nice as a whole set of plates on a table set for a cosy dinner... It's 1 inch in diameter.

I also made some bigger stuff, vases and such, but they're still trying to figure themselves out, so I'll show you later... :D

The best thing about making these was it got Junior interested in painting with his water colours, too. Drawing and painting are his least favourite things to do, so that's definitely a plus...
Oh, and we're going to Mini-Turku today, him and me! :) His first time, my THIRD... ;)

Keep on truckin', people...

(And keep on liking Kookaja Creations on Facebook, less than two weeks to go to the lottery...)

Just a small notification...

2011-07-22T10:53:00.000-07:00

...If you go and like my company, Kookaja Creations, on Facebook, you have the chance to win some mini textiles and other fun items in my "lottery" on August 5th! :) Go! Go! Go!

Someone might mistake this for a food blog...

2011-07-22T06:43:00.000-07:00

...So, last Tuesday, I went to the Mini-Turku Miniature Housing Fair for the second time. Alone, with my camera, my small tripod and some extra batteries. MAN, how much I had missed the first time... And BOY did I indulge in photographing all I'd missed plus some favourites from my first visit... I took about 160 photos in all!

As I was choosing the photos for this blog I was thinking about possible picture texts. The words "amazing", "lovely", "gorgeous", "darling" and "wonderful" kept popping up in my mind so often I simply decided to mostly go for the explanatory texts! So, you can take the praising adjectives as read, and let's carry on with the thing itself.

By the way: if you are one of the people who made these minis and would like to use my photos somewhere, just e-mail me at prettymade@kookaja.com and we can agree on format and such. I'm not stingy with my photos. :)

Oh, in case you're wondering what the heading is about: just count all the food pics I have... :D
Here we go!


Did you notice Johanna Kangassalo 's doctor's office has a back side as well?


...And what would a doctor have by the door but hand desinfectant...


I was confused about one thing though: this seems to be a private office, so how come the Doc's got TYKS (Turku University Hospital) ID on his coat...? ;)


"I'm sorry, Mrs Prettymade, you seem to have an incurable condition known as handbrainylungitis, the most common symptoms being an uncontrollable urge to buy craft materials and an inability to stop reading miniature and quilting blogs... There may also be some drooling and panting when exposed to fabrics, yarns or miniatures."


Too bad I didn't get all of Mr. Skellington this time either, but I'm going a third time, so...


Such cute rocking horses in the toy shop by Brita Palmroth...


This chemist's reminds me of an actual shop in Turku I used to shop at, on Hämeenkatu... I wonder if that is what gave Brita the inspiration?

This pic is dedicated to my knit-insane friend, Kirsi. ;)

...Have you noticed the tiny button tubes on the shelf? Shop "Tyyki ja Tilpehööri" by Hanna-Matilda Lundstedt.

I am fast becoming a huge fan of Larissa Vanninen. Here are some of her "matrioshkas"... The skeleton is just about one centimetre tall, I think...

...The monkey and the gingerbread man are the same size as the skeleton...

Also, her wood carving skills are... I mean... Wow??!

This is one of Larissa's dolls. She's beautiful!! And so small, she only reaches to the knees of a regular dollhouse doll... A real charmer!!

A water feature from Marja Nurmi 's garden...

...And her carrots grow in straight lines, carefully guarded by the garden gnomes!


Marja's outhouse immediately made me want to build one of my own, the kind I'd love to have at my Gran's house in Heinijärvi!

In the kitchen of Villa Ilon Pisara coffee and tea is served with freshly baked pie, rolls and butter...

...And someone left a pizza at the coffee table, just waiting to be munched on...


Lovely ceramics made by Jaana Inkinen, who unfortunately passed away two years ago. I was told she left a gaping hole in the mini community and is sadly missed.

...And so, we arrive at the reason this might be considered a food blog. This time around I wasn't even hungry... I guess I just have a thing for food and, most of all, these GORGEOUS minis by Taina Toropainen...

Here comes the bride, aiming straight for the wedding cake!

Traditional Easter pasha, anyone? Or maybe a salad?

I'd LOVE a piece of that sandwich cake, my all-time favourite food... I think Taina likes the same foods as I do: sliced pickled beetroots, shredded carrots with orange, pastries with pink frosting...

...Greek salad, cheese and sausage sandwiches, ham...

The DETAILS!! *admiration*

Fresh from the oven... Yummmm...

Strawberry cake and fruit...

A fry-up, or maybe crayfish? Banana, anyone?

Another sandwich cake... LOVE the salmon slices...

Wouldn't say no to the onion pie, either...


The Föri-ferry takes us over the Aura river every day...

Marja's self made divan and table at Villa Iris are adorable...

...as is this bedside table with its romantic flowers and mirror and everything...

A gypsy woman selling her laces outside Pub Puutorin Vessa...

I had NO IDEA even 1:12-fat was hard to lose... But, apparently, the Cambride Diet did the trick...

You can buy your fresh bread at the marketplace every day...

...And the fish...

I'm not much of a romantic, decor-wise, but I did like Nonna Elizabetta's bedroom.


Especially the chandelier...

Everyone who's ever renovated a house knows exactly what it looks like!!

I'm eagerly waiting to see the results of Arja Välkky's renovation...

I fell in love with this doll's bed!!

Wouldn't we all love to have a shop like this one by Lotta Satomaa on the ground floor, next to her shoe shop?

Everyone who has lived around the 60's and 70's recognises these pots and pans and kettles... Also from Lotta's shoe shop owner's house.

This was funny, a whole Sinooperi-store in miniature... :) We've all been there a couple of times, haven't we?

An old fashioned kiosk, "Elisa's Coffee and Flowers" by Eija Vuorinen, Turku.

And here's Elisa herself, kindly smiling at customers.

In Aukusti's shop by Aino Joensuu and Maija Salo you can find all you need...

...And the friendly shopkeeper is ready to help you with whatever he can...

...before retiring to his home behind the shop for a humble meal of fish and potatoes.

Just a little detail: I love the potatoes and the quilt looks very cosy. We also had a flower like that when I was a kid, it's called "kliivia" in Finnish...

No dollhouse show is complete with a delicious Xmas dinner...

...I wish my workspace was this tidy!

Hamburgers and porridge for breakfast?? And could someone enlighten me as to whose dollhouse this and the previous picture are from? :) Are they from Titta Saarinen's Art Gallery owner's house?

This toy train set was incredible... Kid's room in the attic of Titta Saarinen's Art Gallery owner's house...

More traditional toys, Hakka and Legos and the thing where you put different shapes into holes... What is it called? Love the tiny teddy and the Barpapapa-book too!

What I also completely missed last time around was this mini-mini-Föri, Santa's house and the dollhouse's dollhouse's dollhouse fair!!

I feel greasy just looking at this garage... Well, you know what I mean!

This is the bookmakers room from Luostarinmäki, a part of old Turku . No, not a bookmaker as in bookie, a book binder!! :)

This work room belongs to the saddle maker. Both historic views by Eija Sirjonen.

These miniatures I just had to photograph beacuse of the amazing shadows they cast on the wall. :) The sunglasses shadow is pricelessly funny. :)


...And what do you give as an opening gift at a mini-fair? Mini-flowers and a mini ad sign, of course...

...This is it for today. PHEW!! :) But as I said, I'm planning on going there once more with Junior (the first time I had MetalHead with me and he was completely astonished, I think I just might get some help with my minis in the future... ;)). There may be even more pics in my blog future...

Mini hugs to you all, spread the good word on minis everywhere! :)

I love hexagons...

2011-07-18T04:42:00.000-07:00

...that much is obvious to anyone who's seen my handiwork. However, lately I've started building up a similar passion for octagons! They are just so amazingly simple (ish) to sew and the results are fab...

I really like the quick technique for octagons... You know what I mean?


I cut 7,5" quarters and 2,5" quarters, sewed the corners, cut and ironed. Voilà!

I was making a quilt as a gift for a special someone... I just wanted it to be fresh, simple and beautiful. I used fabrics from the Pop Garden-series, check them out for example at the Calico Cottage Quilt Shop. They are GORGEOUS!!! I also used some striped fabrics from Michael Miller. I really like his fabrics too, the bold colour combos make me drool. For backing, I used a simple fresh yellow. This is what the middle bit looked like...

Something about these patterns reminds me of France and old French patterns, Fleur-de-Lis and such. Right?

The quilt sort of made itself, I had no actual plan, I just went on sewing. But with these fabrics, how could I go wrong?? The final result was a delicious quilt of about 65"x42" (165x125 cm). I didn't do much quilting, just a bit of s-i-d to keep it together and a little leaf pattern stitch around the striped border. I thought the fabrics deserved to be left alone!!

...And finally, here's the happy recipient, my 14-year-old goddaughter Maria!!

In case you're wondering about the size of the quilt and such: Yes, she IS that tall and beautiful... A brilliant swimmer, too! Plus she's an amazing photographer... Just such a LOVELY young woman! I'm very, very proud to be her godmother!

...I have SO much more to tell you about projects I'm working on and I will, soon! For now, I'll tell you this: I received a treasure in the mail a while back, a whole HEAP of back issues of Patchworkideen, one of my favourite patchwork magazines from Germany! I'm in heaven, I'm having such a flood of brilliant ideas surging through my poor tiny brain I don't know where to start! :)

I especially love the fact that they have a lot of paper piecing (loveloveloveit) and patterns with tiny, tiny pieces made into huge quilts... Check them out, at the moment you can get the back issues really cheap, too! Just 3,50€ a piece, and postage for the whole order just 5€ within the EU! Bargain! (I ordered 15 issues... *ahem*)

I'm also visiting the Mini-Turku Miniature Housing Fair tomorrow again, so I'll be posting more pics soonish! 'Til the next time, be sew good to each other and enjoy life!

A free, tried and true tip to you all craft lovers:

2011-07-13T08:48:00.000-07:00

Do NOT start reading craft/quilt/miniature/crochet/whatever blogs while making pancakes!!
(Luckily 80% of the pancakes were edible anyway... I've never seen such a variation of burned, lumpy and just plain weird pancakes... LOL)

Tiny products, huge passion!

2011-07-13T05:29:00.000-07:00

So, last Friday I finally went to the MiniTurku Miniature Housing Fair and BOY was I excited... Such lovely, lovely dollhouses and other miniatures too... True passion and creativity comes in so many forms, but this is definitely one of my favourites!

I don't really know what to say, so I'll just let the photos speak for themselves, selfishly starting with the ones that have my own rugs, cushions, bedspreads, baskets etc. in them...I'm actually really proud, this is the first time I have ever had anything in any kind of show...

The recycled linen bedspread with lace looks just so romantic and comfy on the wrought-iron bed!

A handy basket for storing stuff is always good to have... The lovely armchair was made by Sophia from Presento, apparently her hubby had to give up his shirt for the cover... (We've all been there, haven't we??)

This is the guy who lives in the lighthouse. (Sophias hubby lost his cardigan for this one, apparently... Poor guy...)

The lighthouse kitchen is pretty and romantic, and the blue Airisto-rugs look really cool and fresh! Is it bad to be super-proud of your own products??


An artist always needs his own space to create...

Moving on to the other stuff... Here are my favourite bits and pieces from the miniatures. I apologize for the quality of some pictures, my camera and I don't always agree on small stuff, sigh...

...I think I was hungry that day, I seemed to focus on food, mostly... Well, I'm going to visit the fair again, so more non-food pics to come...


I fell in love with these onion rings...

Cakes and treats in an old-fashioned café by Maarit Kujanpää and Kati Lehtimäki from Piispanristi

Lovely BBQ...

...built inside a mini hothouse by Viljami and Elias Salakari, Turku. Men and boys like miniatures too, you know!

These lovely buns made my mouth water, I just wish I could flip the image!! Any hints?? Anybody??

From the same kitchen come these delicious sweetwater crayfish...

...and more are waiting to be served with orange slices. Unfortunately, the name of the "chef" is lost to me, update to come later on that subject! HELP ME flip this, too!!! UPDATE: the maker of all the lovely foodstuffs is Taina Toropainen, from Kempele!

I really enjoyed this exhibition of modern art in a gallery/cafe´/living quarters dollhouse by Titta Saarinen.

These amazing vases and statues are skillfully crafted by Larissa Vanninen from Kaarina. I was told she is a goldsmith...

...which explains this breathtaking gravy boat and whatchamacallit? in REAL silver!

Larissa also makes beautiful, detailed furniture!! I'm in awe...

No dollhouse fair is complete without a dollhouse's dollhouse fair...

...and some of them are obviously furnished too... All made by Titta Saarinen.

I'd love to have a pair or two of these!!!! Shoe shop by Lotta Satomaa, Helsinki.


Oh, and some more food. Greek salad, ham, salmon... Drool...

...As I said before, I will be going there with my camera again, this time with a small tripod and more batteries...

I was so amazingly inspired by these miniatures, the fair made me want to be sooooo much better at everything I do! And maybe, just maybe there might be a dollhouse on my Xmas wishlist this year... (That would be my first, you know!!)

So, I did it. I started my own blog.

2011-06-29T06:42:00.000-07:00

After a few looooooooong months of wondering whether I have anything to share... Anything others would like to know about, that is! LOL

As it says up there: this is a blog about everything and anything and occasionally about nothing… But, methinks, mostly about creativity, crafts, quilting, miniatures and such.

For me, creativity is always about the Creator. Without the immeasurable amount of gifts and talents we as humans have received from Him, the ultimate Source of all things bright and beautiful, there would be NO FUN in this life at all. So, there it is. That’s where it all flows from. We’ll come back to these thoughts on occasion, too.

...So, how to start a new blog? What to do with that all-important first post? How about showing you something unbelievably bright and beautiful I found in my Gran’s attic last weekend?

Just a scrap of fabric about 15x35 cm in size and SO brightly coloured it was nearly fluorescent!

And what became of it, with a bit of TLC and some purple thread (also from the 70's, from my Mum's old stash) and filling, was a nice flower brooch that'll surely light my way, come autumn and darkness! I love the retro 60's and 70's fabrics with all the wild colour combinations... So I'm a happy hippie now!

To all you mini-lovers! Remember to check out something really cool if you're in Turku, Finland during July and August: the Turku Culture Capital 2011 dollhouse show!

Mini-Turku Nukkekoti Asuntomessut

Craft Shop Presento has built their own maritime dollhouse and I'm proud to say they used some of my miniature textiles for decorating! :) Wheeeeeee...! You'll get some pics as soon as the show is open for public! I'm the one with her camera constantly in her hand, standing in front of the dollhouses and blocking everyone else's view...

...I love the warm summer weather, but right now my brain is melting. The emotional stress of finally being "out there" requires something cool to drink and some time to think... Teehee! Please leave a comment, ask, advise, anything. I'm green and always ready to learn!

P.S. I'm a total sci-fi freak as well! Anyone else out there?!