in the company of women

i have, over the past year, found a really awesome group of women friends to hang out with. one of them was able to borrow her sister's summer house near the west coast this past weekend and we spent a truly blissful 24 hours there together.

earlier in the week, we had been to a salon evening, where we got these red yarn bracelets, which we were to wear for three days with the purpose of looking at it and meditating on all of the happiness and good luck we would have in the new year. we decided already then to take them with us to the beach and release them into the north sea, in a kind of ceremony.

so we each took off our bracelet and released it into the sea in our own fashion. but it felt powerful as we stood there together, giving the little bit of yarn a last moment of silent, individual good intentions for 2014, before sending it out into the waves to be free.

then we wandered down the rock-strewn beach. so funny that just a few weeks ago, there were a few shells on the beach, but no stones at all and now it's covered with stones. (tho' i will grant that this is a different beach, a bit farther north).

we found a small beach ball in the waves and kicked it around a bit. this despite being five grown women. our little groups formed and reformed as we all walked and talked and enjoyed being together in a setting apart from our everyday.

after our trip to the beach, we retired back to the warm summer house, where a fire was soon burning merrily in the wood-burning stove. we got out our art supplies and began both the drink and the draw phase of the weekend. i made a gin cocktail (of course), using homemade pear-ginger cordial as a base. we each brought something to share (both wine and food).

we ate a tuna mousse with some very good bread, followed by a gorgeous fish soup and then my chocolate pots with salted caramel in the bottom for dessert. all along, there was wine. late in the evening, after the crochet lessons (i really learned how to make a granny square this time!), we turned to pomegranate gajol and a smoky laphroaig whiskey that i brought along. happily, lots of laughter and water in between kept it from going totally wrong the next day.

we don't really have any rules for drink and draw, but we did decide that we all had to draw the little silvery fish we saw on the beach in some form or another. other than that, we all indulged in whatever we wanted to. several of us are using an old book as the base, humument style. we had quite some fun reading from one of the books, which had a lot of illustrations as well. old books provide a surprising base for creativity. my own is called talismanen (the talismen) and tho' it's about knights and such, there are meaningful words on every page if you select carefully.

there was much laughter and sharing and deep, serious conversations as well. it all felt very, very good for the soul. i don't know what it is, but as i grow older, i find that more and more i crave hanging out with women friends. our spouses and families weren't far from our thoughts or our conversation, but it was good to just be together, eating, drinking and drawing and even singing. and crocheting. just the girls.

scenes from a weekend on the west coast of denmark

i went away for a weekend drink & draw with my posse of amazing women who make me laugh. we borrowed a wonderful summer house and stayed up very late learning to crochet, talking, laughing and drinking a bit too much wine, gajol (a licorice-flavored tipple), laphroaig and gin cocktails. we also ate some amazing food. but i'm pretty exhausted, so i'll have to tell you all about it soon. these photos of our walk down to the beach, where the north sea was crashing to shore with strangely yellowish-brown rather angry-looking waves, will have to suffice for now. and i totally want that little steep-roofed magical fairytale house in the last photo, don't you? it was quite amazing, coming up over the dunes to see it. kind of like stumbling onto how i imagined denmark would look in reality, after all these years.

here's hoping your weekend was amazing too.

detritus on the beach as a metaphor for life

we always try to take a walk on the beach at the end of the year.

something about the bracing winds coming off the north sea have a clearing effect on the mind and the senses.

recent storms made the beach different. covered in bits of detritus and debris, but no stones.

nature has a way of arranging these things, even bits of string and trash and shell and bone, more artfully than we humans ever could.

i took that heart-shaped bit of wood with me. in lieu of stones, it was the best i could do and i had to have some memento of the trip.

the wind was cold and strong and we didn't stay long, just long enough for it to blow any residual troubles and cares out of our heads.

the bits and pieces of the year, floating in, like so much flotsam and jetsam. quite literally.

the last, remaining carcasses of 2013, left strewn on the beach. undoubtedly to be washed away by the next tides.

leaving us a fresh, clean slate from which to start 2014.

and begin it all over again, gathering the bits and pieces that form our memories and our lives.

tangling it all up, mixing it together, and hopefully leaving something beautiful behind.

an ephemeral history of the wild west

out at the west coast, there's a sand sculpture festival going on. we went on saturday, and as you can see, the weather was absolutely glorious for it.

the theme is the wild west. and a variety of sand artists from all over the world (tho' none actually from denmark), got together and made some seriously cool ephemeral art.

it's nothing more than compressed sand and water and it will erode naturally away after some months.

it both celebrates and encourages thoughtful reflection on the colonization of the north american continent.

only a few of the artists were from the US, quite a few were from finland, latvia and holland, but also spain and germany and new zealand and australia.

it's near the beach, but not on the beach itself. the sand came from a nearby quarry.

buffalo are a big part of the theme and there are some graphic depictions of the decimation of the vast herds of buffalo that once roamed the plains.

these two buffalo bulls are amazingly done. you can almost feel the ground shake as they butt one another.

on the back side of them, more of a statement of the symbiosis with native peoples and with the colonization of their territory.

an old west town encroaches inside the buffalo itself.

this skull was probably my favorite piece.

on the back side, you can see the gold bars on which the west was built.

and here was a train being hijacked by bandits as it came out of a tunnel.

that too was part of the story of the wild west.

this bit was a bit more facetious - poking fun at space cowboys. but also highlighting the importance of route 66 on the american psyche.

a gold prospector and his trusty donkey.

and an old west town. the detail on the tied back wagon cover was exquisite - it really looked like folded fabric.

so much going on in the old west town. and the perspective was phenomenal.

a shoot out in the desert between cowboys.

and an indian family with their teepee.

in all, very much worth the trip. the exhibition closes at the end of october and we want to go again to see the effects of erosion. so symbolic, as history itself is eroded by time.

feeling pretty zen for a monday

my morning started with the first installment of the latest oprah-deepak (shouldn't they have called it oprah-chopra?) meditation challenge. this one focuses on miraculous relationships. who couldn't use more of those? i struggle to quiet my mind enough to meditate, but find these 15-minute-ish sessions to be just about right as a beginning. couple this with my participation in the kylie's fortnight of self-adoration and i'm feeling about as zen as you can get on a monday morning. 

yesterday's spontaneous trip to the beach helped as well. several hours of wind and sun and sand and the north sea pounding in, surprisingly warm (i was actually playing in the waves with husband and sabin for a good hour) quite literally washed all my cares away.  a solitary wander down the beach while they continued to try to surf the waves, i gathered smooth stones. it was a kind of meditation in and of itself. as a result, i had a good night's sleep and have already knocked two big items and several little ones off my to do list. ahh, the tyranny of the list, i both love it and hate it, but am going to be quite zen about this week. 

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i want magical displays of books in my world.

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we need more pop-up design happening in denmark. *sigh*

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interesting, voyeuristic photos taken with homemade cameras.

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realizing zen through running?
i keep seeing articles like this and i fear the universe is trying to tell me something.

the weekend in pictures - or how we actually had an endless summer in denmark at last

possibly our coming papa kitty. we need some orange around here.

a case of chicken envy at the neighbor's house.

cool is a charmer.

do not call husband a social democrat.

summer drinks.

gorgeous vegetarian food at drink & draw

heavenly fennel dish - we might have to rename drink & draw to drink & eat (& laugh)

yum. bacon-wrapped asparagus with a touch of miso.

a spontaneous trip to the beach.

the water and the waves were glorious.

our gorgeous molly.

curious about samba.

a first tree-climbing adventure.

hope your weekend was glorious too.