#38 & spring has arrived!

#38 - spring nest gift packaging

the atelierBB plates are all wrapped up in springlike garb and ready to take to the wedding party today. the sun is shining, they promise up to 18 degrees (C) and it's a completely glorious day to celebrate a wedding. i realized that brigitte's logo, which has two Bs, back to back, is perfect for the couple as well, since both their last names start with B. it just feels so great when you know you've found the perfect present. i love it.

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one more quick thing to share. the wonderful little merfish that margie of resurrection fern created for me, using my own stones from møn's klint, arrived yesterday (and yes, they were ordered and paid for BEFORE austerity april began). i had to photograph them together with some of their now more "naked" brethren:

aren't they fantastic? i'm going to take them to møn's klint next week and pose them for pictures on their beach of origin. i know, i'm a little obsessed, but it's better than eyeballs, eh?

anyhoo, we're off to riding lessons. more tomorrow...

møn's klint was fabulous

despite the fact that it was already 3 p.m. by the time we got there and that sunset feel was in the air,

we braved the 479 stairs down to the beach below at møn's klint.

there were natural wonders on the beach, 

things like fish eggs

photogenic flotsam and jetsam

fossil squid tentacles

and we had to take home some of the beautiful driftwood as souvenirs

(we made husband carry it)

there had been more winter landslides

so there were mounds of chalk changing the shoreline

and many new chalk rocks creating a gorgeous contrast with the dark stones.

the stones sang their music as the waves rolled in over them.

heavenly.

the cliffs are magnificent, even in the twilight

and then, because it was getting quite dark,

we made our way up the other staircase (574 stairs) and home

but not before we had a beautiful burger to tide us over for the trip...

a danish vineyard

i've said before that i'm actually quite ok with global warming because it seems to have a good effect on denmark. both winters and summers have gotten warmer in the decade i've been here and that seems like a good thing. of course, we can talk again when the sea levels rise and the innocent creek that's today a 100 meters from our house is lapping at our foundation...but in the meantime, i'll enjoy.

yesterday, after our visit to møn's klint, i visited a good friend who grew up on møn. her parents still live there on a large farm and she was home for the easter holiday. on the farm, they have a vineyard, with a number of kinds of grapes from the alsace and other regions similar in climate. they grow both reds and whites. rondo and regent grapes are the reds that they grow. one of the whites was related to riesling (but i neglected to note the name of it).

the grapes were not yet showing any sign of budding out, but irene's dad wasn't worried. he said they'd be budding in the next couple of weeks and that was fine. he said it was more important that there wasn't too much rain at the end of june/beginning of july when they flower and set their grapes, because they are self-pollinating and if the rain washes that away, the crop is not as large as it should be. and even more important was a sunny, warm september, when the grapes are ripening.

i asked if they could feel the effects of global warming on their project, but he actually said no. even without global warming, møn has more days of sunshine than anywhere else in denmark. and it's also frost free for 250 days of the year. the rest of denmark has, on average, 180 frost-free days. i definitely learned something there. i knew i loved møn, but didn't realize it was because the climate was so much milder.

irene's dad has gone together with 13 other guys and formed a collective to do this winemaking project. they've bought all of the necessary equipment and have it in an old butchering room on a nearby gods (very large manor-house type farm). a few of them raise the grapes and others do their part in the various stages...sorting the grapes, squashing them (not sure that's the technical term), then the entire process surrounding letting the wines age and eventually blending them. irene's dad said with a bit of a twinkle in his eye that the collective isn't very democratic--those who contribute the most and know the most make the decisions and the others just have to live with it.

they've got big stainless steel vats which were full of reds that would be ready to blend in a few months.

they're really mostly having fun and learning as they go along. they're making very drinkable table reds, port and even sparkling wines in the spirit of champagne. the club gets together and eats a big meal once a year in knight's hall of the otherwise mostly unused little castle nearby and tries out the fruits of their labors. i'd love to be a fly on the wall for one of those evenings.

the picture from yesterday was a close-up of the wax cork in this little oak barrel of port:

we tasted a bit of port that had only been aging for 6 months. it was still pretty grape-juice-agtig. but the deep, rich port color was already there and it will no doubt be wonderful in another 6-10 years.

looking at the oak barrels, i had visions of them branching out eventually into whiskies finished in port casks, along the lines of the good ones from glenmorangie in scotland. i'll have to suggest that next time i visit. it seems like just the thing for this particular gentlemen's club.

the devil's in the details

i'm a big arm movements kinda girl. very dramatic when telling stories and using my hands and arms as much in the telling as my words. i'm loud and i crave attention. totally impatient. everything has to be done with lots of speed. no dilly dallying here. HRH TFM would say, "you're so aries." and she's no doubt right. i am so aries. bossy. taking the lead. me, me, me. and have i mentioned me?

but i'm working on it. one of the many things i love about husband (he's aquarius) is his patience and ability to wait for people to notice things. like small details on which he worked for ages. he's actually ok if it takes a really long time for someone to notice. he's willing to wait. it's part of that patience thing with him that i mentioned last week. thousand year oaks and such.

and so i try to let some of that rub off on me. i do it in small ways. the above photo is an example. i found that perfect eyeball stone on my last trip down møn's klint. about a month ago, i noticed that it tucked nicely into the hole in that piece of driftwood. the driftwood forms a bench of sorts near our grill table (yes, we had a table made with a grill in the center of it--more about that another time).

and i waited for husband to notice it. and it took a few days. and even then, he wasn't sure if i had put it there intentionally or if it was actually already there in the driftwood. but, of course i had put it there. and once he asked, of course i said so.

i have an urge to paint around it or otherwise somehow call attention to it. to make it more obvious, less subtle. because subtle i'm not. but i'd like to be. sometimes anyway.

and if i don't paint around it,  i wonder if others will notice when they come over. and if they don't, will i be able to resist pointing it out and hinting for praise for my cleverness? i'm not sure i will, but i'm going to try. you have to start somewhere.

my happy place

still processing the whole christmas experience (and not really done cooking yet), so in the meantime, some shots of one of my favorite places in the world - møn's klint. when we got to the bottom of all those steps and onto that stone beach, my molecules hummed in perfect alignment. more soon.

recharged

a few quiet minutes to myself while the guests and the child and the husband all make a little trip out to the tarzan cliff--a nearby beach that sabin adores. i'm home, watching over the beautiful garlic-studded organic leg of lamb. i couldn't really leave it behind on its own, now could i?  plus, there's bread to be made and lemons to be squeezed so they have fresh lemonade when they come back.

but, right now, i have a few minutes to relax and reflect on the past days of easter holiday. it's really been glorious.it helped that the weather was exemplary and it also helped that we went down to møn's klint. we spent time with friends, playing cards and we got the garden and the greenhouse ready for the season. we ate lunch outside. we stayed up late watching monty python movies. we went for a walk and an ice cream at a little castle nearby. in all, it's been completely relaxing and wonderful. i was thinking that it made me sad it was ending, but it really doesn't, because i feel renewed and recharged and ready to jump into being busy with a dozen articles for the first issue of the magazine i'm editing (and writing).

and i thought i'd update my "evidence of creativity" and share the things i had the chance to make on thursday and friday, two luxurious days where i never got dressed in proper clothes and just worked in my studio.

#41 - a new "coat" for my french press coffee maker

#42 - a new bag for spring

it's even got a dual pocket inside for my iPhone and my HTC Diamond

(yes, i'm a brand hound)

(and yes, i have two phones)

#43 - 45 a series of painted stones inspired by nordic petroglyphs 

these and a few others will go up in my etsy shop this week.

but now, the gang is back, so more later...

2009: the year in review

looking back over the past year, much has happened. i feel like a different person here at the end of the year than i was at the beginning of it. it's quite fascinating how those changes occur incrementally and one day you suddenly realize that you're transformed. there have been some constants - photography, noticing the world around me, creativity, inspiration, lists, blog crushes, overthinking and general navel gazing. and it seems like evolution comes up kind of a lot, but i blame husband for that.

i've spent some time looking back on the year in a couple of ways. one, by reading skimming back over this blog and two, by browsing back through my iPhoto. shall we take a little stroll down memory lane?

january - moving in to the now-famous blue room was the highlight. i also did a lot of those interviews that were going around at the time. my sister visited and we went to møn's klint and the west coast of denmark. and we played an elaborate practical joke on her boyfriend, who was an extremely good sport about it, tho' he did drink an entire bottle of port afterwards. and our pooka turned 8. 42 blog posts.

february - what can i say, it was the month the eyeball obsession began. sabin started riding lessons. we celebrated our 10th anniversary. i learned about fika. i bought a new sewing machine. i went a little nuts about TtV photography. 39 blog posts.

march - i met and fell in love with a nikon D300. sadly, later in the year, i would have to give it back, because it was my work camera and i left that job, but happily, i found a very lightly used one in my favorite local camera shop a couple weeks before i had to give it back, so that didn't matter at all - and i learned that one cannot stay in a job for the sake of a camera (but that was in november, so i'm getting ahead of myself). i opened my etsy shop and sold my first items. i went a little crazy for stones. i had a gorgeous birthday dinner at my very favorite little castle to celebrate turning thirty-twelve. my kitchen became famous on apartment therapy.  the julie project started. 48 blog posts.

april - i practiced austerity april, a little exercise in buying less, it largely worked, tho' there was a moment of weakness towards the end of the month in the face of new music. a little trans-atlantic learning adventure began. i invented gin & tonic sorbet. moments of perfect clarity was named blog of note by the gods at google on april 21, which was a really good thing, because prior to that i'd been having a really crappy day. i continued to be obsessed with rocks. and the julie project fizzled out, which was definitely a learning experience. we went to a funeral. and a wedding. we visited a danish vineyard. 47 blog posts.

may - spring came in earnest. i visited the west coast of norway for the first time. the idea of blog camp was born and the first blog camps were scheduled. the blog camp blog was created. i got downright obsessive about rocks, particularly one i found on the west coast of norway. me and my gin & tonic sorbet appeared in disco underworld.  i wrote my 700th post and mused on what it meant to me to blog. i outlined my long-held theory that everyone needs their albanian. 49 blog posts.

june - i got flowered chucks. i attended nor-shipping. the first blog camp was held and it was even better than any and all expectations. i received the most lovely little stones from trinsch in isreal and from lynne in south africa (see, even others got caught up in my stone obsession). we celebrated the summer solstice and soaked in the light.  i had a realization (finally) about creativity and about accepting the release of your creativity into the world. michael jackson died and i found that i didn't care. 40 blog posts.

july - i learned how to make my pictures big. i embarked on an insane project provoked challenged inspired by spudballoo - to tell 30 secrets in 30 days. in the end, i told 29 secrets and one lie and no one ever guessed correctly which one was the lie. and i was exhausted by the effort. we spent time on the beach, soaking up the summer sun. kristina and i started across øresund, a photoblog showing the contrasts of denmark and sweden. i developed a sociology of mobile phones. we took a mini-vacation to dublin. and left for a real vacation in singapore via amsterdam. i added a new country to my list: malaysia. husband and me started the livet på landet (life on the land) blog to document our dream of moving to a farm. 52 blog posts.

august - i embarked on a new obsession: robots. i learned that our child is a budding photographer. i concluded that singapore is like disneyland (actually, i concluded that a long time ago, but finally documented it).  i reread the laura ingalls wilder books. i went to blog camp in england.  i visited stonehenge, which was something i had long desired to do. i developed a foot fetish. i had a truly brilliant experience at one of the last shipyards left in denmark. i started participating in postcrossing. and woven underneath it all, i developed a disliking for my job, which i'd really loved until then. maybe because they made me sit with more than $10,000 of their debt in travel expenses for an inordinately long time. 37 blog posts.

september - with the autumn beginning, i started to obsess about light. blog camp 2.0. i felt the significance of 09.09.09. the queen came to town. i found weaving at a museum in randbøldal. i thought about color. i started domestic sensualist together with beth. i discovered the wonderful henie-onstad art museum near oslo. my unease with my job deepened, and even made me ill, tho' i didn't see that at the time - interesting how that works. barbara kingsolver writes in one of her early books something along the lines of how people are so inside of themselves, it's sometimes hard to tell anything. i came to know what that meant in september. 39 blog posts.

october - i turned to embroidery in order to cope with my growing dissatisfaction with my job (phew, at least it manifested itself positively in some way). husband found a brilliant old sewing machine for me at the dump. we prepared for our house to be put up for sale i spent a couple of days in istanbul, one of my favorite cities. we had a glorious few days touring around denmark with an old cat love friend during the autumn holiday. i couchsurfed for the first time and it was fabulous. 34 blog posts.

november - the monocules© were born! i found a real treasure in a used bookstore. i pondered the 20th anniversary of the fall of the berlin wall. i closed in in earnest on my 100 creative things in 2009. with only a minor nervous breakdown, i held a brilliant thanksgiving dinner for friends and family. my work appeared in public bookstore. the gold edition of disco underworld came out and i was included! i voted in the municipal elections in denmark. i thought about and tried to articulate who this girl was, at least for now. and i left the job which had become the job from hell, and even in this economic climate, i still breathed a heavy sigh of relief. 37 blog posts.

december - i did some serious pondering and reading about simplicity. i prepared for christmas and revealed that i'm a bit of a scrooge about christmas cards. i lost my photo mojo a bit and am still hoping it comes back. i've been pretty introspective as i have tried to decide what's next after leaving my job. COP15 took place in copenhagen. i sorted a whole lot of sabin's baby clothes to save and donate. and i have at least three new bloggy-related projects up my sleeve (so stay tuned in 2010). 34 blog posts (and counting).

conclusions: 

: : inspiration was a big theme for me in 2009. i wanted to seek it, understand it, pick it apart,  drink it in, swallow it and digest it. i was a little obsessed about it. but apparently i needed that.

: : i changed a lot over the course of the year. what i want from life became simpler (even if the amount of stuff in my house did not).

: : i became a photographer in 2009.

: : i also became an artist.  even if so far it's still mostly for myself.

: : i didn't fly enough to retain gold status on my two airlines where i've had it in recent years. and i'm ok with that.

: : i was directly (credited) responsible for the sale of no less than ten nikons in 2009. i think nikon should employ me.

: : i made a lot of connections and good friends in the blogosphere (and in real life) for which i'm very grateful. and i can't wait to see what 2010 brings.

the song of the rocks

jason captured this short video of the song of the rocks on the shore at møn's klint. that sound is magic.

as i snapped photos yesterday, i longed for a video camera. so glad jason managed to capture it. 

by the way, weird that i couldn't post this from blogger in draft, but had to post without it and go in and edit (thereby entering "old blogger"  and being able to publish it). hope they're gonna fix that.

yarn candy indeed

i got my posh yarn order in the mail today. i had to pile it up in my yarn basket (which seems to be getting a bit full) and photograph it in the natural light coming in the window upstairs. it's all even more beautiful and soft and luxurious than i had imagined. i seriously need to get better at knitting so that i can turn it all into something lovely. we're feeling a bit tired after our big day out at møn's klint yesterday, so we're going to do nothing more strenuous than rolling the skeins into balls. the green ones on top are last week's posh yarn order, which we already rolled. oops, this is turning into an addiction.

the picture doesn't do justice to how luscious the colors are (i'm trying not to use the word "gorgeous" so much).

and of course, it's all very, very soft (which is in and of itself a sign of superior quality).