All The Live Long Day: August 2011

Wednesday, 31 August 2011

Then & Now

Look! It's a Marco & Me double feature, with a year between photos!
Just for fun, we took a picture of ourselves on our wedding anniversary, in one of the poses from the wedding shots. Somebody really let their hair down since getting married, eh? And I have apparently shrunk...

See how Mae snuck her little bum into this year's shot?!

Tuesday, 30 August 2011

I Am Guest Posting At Atlantic Atlantis Today!

Atlantic Atlantis belongs to lovely Sarah. She is a crafter, a thinker, a music lover, a giver of compliments, a Canadian, and a political scientist.

Head on over to her space and check out my first guest post ever!

It's quite cool! Ehem.

Monday, 29 August 2011

Wedding Month Giveaway - The Winners

The True Random Number Generator has spoken and the winners of the wedding giveaway are:

Commenter number 3: Kim from Not Crazy, Just A Little...

Commenter number 1: Fiona from The Corner Of The Internet I Call Home

Congratulations, you guys! I will be in touch!

Thank you to everybody else for commenting, I appreciate your thoughts and wish I had prizes for you all!

Sock It To Me!

My colleague Christian came into the office one day last week, bearing gifts.

He brought in a huge box - and when he opened it, it was full of socks! His girlfriend works in retail and was given a whole bunch of sample socks to take home. And Christian thought it would be nice to share this bounty with his office mates!

Thanks, Christian's girlfriend, you're awesome!

Here is what I picked from the lot:

My favourites are the red and white ones! They have little skulls and thunderbolts in the design.

And this is what I thought Marco might like:

And by Zeus! Does my husband's sock drawer need a colour burst!

Friday, 26 August 2011

Fine Tuning: Lanu ft. Megan Washington - Fall

I first saw this video when Pip from Meet Me At Mikes posted it. And apart from the table in this couple's dining room, which is very close to what I dream of for our kitchen, I also love everything else about this clip and the song!

The rain, it falls on your face. I called just the same. I know where you've been, I know there's a name.
Alone on the stairs, alone in the morning.
Your face, it shows me the blame. We go round the bend to say that we did say that this is the end. You fell over me, I fell for the line.
You wake, alone with the walls. You know how they change. [...] You go everywhere, a shape in the dark.
You fall out of my hands.
I know that I was asleep that you were a dream. The night like a lake. And now when I wake, I fall over you, alone in the morning.
You fall out of my hands.
The great escape we were born to make, over the edge of the dark. Another day, now I'm awake. I look in your eyes as I fall.
I fall.
I fall out of your hands.
I could not find the lyrics for this song anywhere, so I listened and wrote down what I heard. Did you hear different words? Help me out if you can!
And apart from that: Have a good weekend, everybody!

{via}

P.S.: Make sure to enter my giveaway! You can leave a comment till the end of Saturday to be in with the chance for a prize!

Thursday, 25 August 2011

Commercial Break Thursday: Flaunt Your Thang!

Let me tell you about Suzy and her Artsy Craftsy Sitcom!

I first noticed Suzy's blog because of her Summer Beginner Quilting Lessons, which I was interested in due to me having pondered about starting a quilt for a while. Suzy is a really versatile crafter and has posted a whole bunch of other tutorials, too. Suzy also owns an Etsy shop where she sells the most beautiful painted eggs:

Every Thursday, Suzy runs her Commercial Break Thursday link-up party. This feature encourages other bloggers or shop owners to showcase their wares, no strings attached. Suzy says that "a little bit of advertising and self promotion never hurts", and will pick one person from the entries each week in order to showcase their work. And guess who was the lucky pickee last week? Correct! Moi!
Today, as a thank you to Suzy, I would like to encourage you guys to have a little look around her blog or shop. She is a very friendly lady, so go say hi, be shameless and promote yourself!

P.S.: Only a few more days left to enter my giveaway! Click the button and make my day!

Wednesday, 24 August 2011

Cushy Camper

These are two cushions that I made for my Papa's birthday gift at the end of July. I first saw this fabric on Sew Retro and The Vintage Traveler and immediately thought that it was ideal for making something to give to my dad! My Mama and he own a VW camper and that car is like a second home to him. He also loves the old traditional VW models.

I found out the fabric make ('Happy Campers' by Birch) through Lizzie, and after some googling, I also found the brilliant UK online fabric store Seamstar, who had the exact fabric in stock and pretty much delivered the next day. They stock soooo many other pretty designs, too - and loads of notions and haberdashery.

I measured the fabric to fit 50 x 50 cm IKEA cushion pads. I somehow failed to order enough fabric to make a front and back for two cushions, so I had to go through my fabric stash to find a suitably patterned alternative to make up for my bad maths. The vintage checkered fabric I pulled out was the perfect match, the green and white and orange-brown checks complimented the camping design most adequately. I was very lucky!

I made a 4-button closure on the back and sewed the buttonholes by hand. It looks alright, as long as my Papa decides to keep the buttons tightly fastened! I was not there when he unwrapped his present, but I could hear in his phone voice that he was quite pleased with the cushions. And that pleased me!

P.S.: Have you entered my giveaway? If not, click the button. You know you want to!

Tuesday, 23 August 2011

Guess Who...

... is suffering from Chronic Bitchface?

MISSY!

While Mae usually greets me with shiny round excited eyes and somewhat of a smile on her face, Missy habitually looks like this:

I know she can't help it, I have the same condition!

P.S.: Make sure to enter my giveaway! Click the button to check it out!

Monday, 22 August 2011

Can You Say Awesome?!

Look what Mandy* found and shared on Pinterest!

Cross Stitch Nails! You can bet your bottom dollar that I will try this out!

This is one of the nail designs from The Daily Nail blog, which belongs to a lady called Melissa.

Melissa initially started the blog to document a challenge she set for herself: to do 365 different nail designs in 365 days. She completed this task on October 13, 2010, but now still continues to post many new designs for the sheer love of nail art.

Go check out her place and prepare to be awed!

* I recommend Mandy's Pretty Tips pin board if you are in love with nail polish. And her blog Chocolate & Cream Cake, if you like wholesome, nerdy goodness. Thanks for letting me steal your pin, Mandy! x

The Great Big Stitched Postcard Swap: What I Received.

My partner in the Great Big Stitched Postcard Swap, Kristin, send me this lovely painted and stitched postcard from Virginia.

This scan does not really give it justice.

Kristin wrote that the theme of the swap, BLOOM, reminded her of the painter Duncan Grant, and she honoured him with this painting of a vase. She used acrylic paint, watercolor crayons, Stabilo Marks All pencils and ink.

I am very happy with my postcard and will find a good place for it to be

displayed in my home.

If you would like to see what other people have made, check here.

P.S.: Make sure to enter my giveaway! Click the button to check it out!

Friday, 19 August 2011

Wedding Month Giveaway!

THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED.

Hey, Wedding Month was nice! And it sure made the time pass quickly while I was waiting for Marco's and my first wedding anniversary, which will be on Sunday! We don't have anything extravagant planned, we will go out for lunch at a really cool restaurant to have some fancy food and probably to reminisce a lot about the wedding and our first year as husband and wife.
I can't promise you that I won't mention my wedding ever again, but for now I am looking forward to switching out of bridal mode and showing you what else I have been up to!
So, thanks to everybody for your positive comments and for sticking around while I was waxing lyrical about love and marriage. I hope you enjoyed yourselves a bit, too.
And to thank you for your attendance I give you: THE WEDDING MONTH GIVEAWAY!
Up for grabs are:
one Tolsby frameone vintage handkerchiefone cross stitch heart badgeone copy of John Berger's To The Wedding (my favourite wedding-related book)one tote baga bundle of petite pencilsone CD with highlights from our wedding playlist
And I am giving away all of this not once, but twice. Yes, there will be two winners! Yay! One of you will win all these items, and another one of you will win much of the same, just with a different colour hankie and bag. Deal? Okay! Check below the picture on how to enter.

Entry is open to anyone in the whole wide world. It would be fab if you were also a follower of my blog, but I won't shout at you if you aren't. To enter, leave a comment on this post, telling me what LOVE means to you.
For one additional entry, tell people about this giveaway on your blog. Leave me the link in a separate comment if you do, and that's that.
Please make sure that your email address is linked to your profile (or that you leave it in your comment), so that I have a means to contact you in case you win!
The giveaway will be open until Saturday, 27 August, 23:59 GMT. I will draw the two winners from all valid comments on the Sunday and announce them on Monday, 29 August.
Good luck and have a lovely weekend!

How To Make A Paper Flower Boutonniere or Corsage

Inspired by Martha, I made boutonnieres and corsages for all members of our wedding party from tissue paper and wire. Let me show you how.

Need To Have:
cardboardrulerpencilscissorstissue papera ball-shaped object, ca. 3 cm in diameterartificial stamensgreen florist tapeflorist stub wire (ca. 20 gauge)wire plierssome woody herbs (optional)brooch pins

Need To Do:

First, make a 12.5 cm x 6 cm cardboard template. You will need this to cut out the petals to size.

For one flower, you will need 5 petals. Use your cardboard template and a pencil to draw 5 rectangles onto tissue paper in the colour of your choice. You can fold the paper into 5 layers if you like and cut out 5 petal shapes at once.

To form each petal, wrap your tissue paper halfway around a ball-shaped object. I used a little styrofoam ball for this, but you could also use a marble, a bouncing ball, or any other object that is about 3 cm in diameter. Twist the ends of the paper together like you were wrapping a piece of candy. Be quite delicate with this and careful not to rip the paper, but make sure that both ends are tightly twisted. Then carefully remove the ball.

After you have shaped each petal in this fashion, take one of the petals and about 8 - 12 of the articficial stamens and attach them to each other with florist tape. Add the petals one by one, until you end up with a flower shape. Don't worry if your flower looks a bit wonky at this stage, that can be rectified later.

Take a piece of stub wire and attach your flower to it, with the help of more florist tape. Cut the wire at the required length.

Cut off the twisty bits from the ends of your petals and arrange them in a nice blossom shape.

For our boutonnieres, I went out into the garden the day before the wedding and picked some rosemary, lavender and sage to attach to the paper flowers. I cut the herbs to the same length as the wire stem, stripped the lower leaves and attached them to the flower with the florist tape. this made the boutonnieres look more interesting and they also smelled really nice!