Merry Christmas + Happy New Year

Dearest readers, thank you for following this year's very low budget Christmas festivities on this blog. I do hope that some of the old posts we revisited were new to you, or just forgotten by you, and that some of it was useful.

All that remains is to simply wish you some happy holidays, whether they are about Christmas or something else - and may you have some well deserved rest, peace and quiet with someone that are dear to you.

Alt er love 

PS: I found this wonderful and wild Christmas tree on Pinterest - the photo is by Ellie Chavez.

A Daruma and a Happy New Year

A Daruma is a Japanese painted papier-mâché tumbling figurine, and a very popular talisman, if you want to set yourself some goals in life, but have ordinary human limitations and need a bit of encouragement. 

It is very much that kind of time in my life right now, and I have a very small one (but size does not matter) staring at me, as I type this.

The plump, little guy is actually a portrait of Bodhidharma, the monk who founded zen buddhism, and when used as a talisman, it works like this: first you set a specific goal - and yes, it needs to be quite specific, measurable and not vague. Then you go get your Daruma. The Daruma is born with blank eyes, and the next thing you do is fill in the one eye. Place your Daruma somewhere near you, like at your desk or bedside table, where he will look at you, wink-wink, reminding you about your goal. 

And then one day, amazingly, your goal is achieved. And then you get to fill in the other eye. 

They are to some extend a New Years tradition, but not exclusively. The Japanese use them all year round, and they even come in different colours for different themes: gold for financial matters, purple for health, white for love etc. The red, for general good luck, seems to be the popular one!

Read much more about them here...

There is a zen proverb often connected with them:
Nana Korobi Ya Oki, meaning 'Fall down seven times, get up eight'. 

With that little guy, I wish you all a very happy and healthy New Year, and hope that your dreams will come true, and that you will meet some of your important goals.

Photo credits:
Darumas outside temple: Tony Lopez on Pinterest / Daruma painter: Yuriko Nakao, Reuters

Hi, January!

It's always a bit uphill with January. For me, anyway.

But days are getting longer and - as always - I start to feel a bit more energetic and optimistic, after December, which always drains me completely (this blog actually started as a kind of getting-through-December-therapy, or at least as an exercise in doing the things I like doing in December...).
But enough about that. So, onwards and Hey there, 2017.

This is an Instagram post that just really made me smile yesterday, which is why I will let it not illustrate my point in any particular way..... (?) But it does have two of my bigger idols in it, at once (sort of) and it makes me want to go out and see things, in stead of moping about in here, endlessly sorting our sock drawers.

It's Nick Cave, of course, at Mona museum in Tasmania, in the Yayoi Kusama 'Dots Obsession' installation. From @nickcaveofficial

Golden Stars for a New Year

I made some golden stars for our New Year's Eve dinner table, and I made them from a scrap of very shiny, golden gift wrap that I had left. Thin, pliable gift wrap is just perfect for such zig zag folded stars, and if you follow my tutorial, I promise you, you can make a glamorous looking centerpiece like this (I made six large stars) in an hour or so. 

With these golden stars I wish you a truly happy new year, and thank you so much for visiting my blog. May peace and health be with you, may your boat sail on not too rocky seas.

And may stars twinkle for you and the ones you love!

Let's make it a fantastic 2017. 

Dressing up for New Year's Eve?

New Year's Eve - and what to wear?
I will end up in something black plus flat shoes and big earrings. As always.

When it comes to clothing and fashion, my formative years were the Eighties (and by the Eighties I don't mean the Crystal/Alexis Carrington Eighties). I like black skinny jeans, oversized sweatshirts, t-shirts, men's shirts - and bulky scarves and big overcoats. I wear trainers or sneakers practically all year round, when not wearing flipflops in summer. In my corner of the Eighties girls had either short, spiky hair og big, messy hair. Both kinds usually dyed. I landed on big and messy, sometimes dyed red. And there I've stayed. When it comes to colors in my clothing, I actually like it a lot, but mainly do the safe accessories thing with colorful scarves, bags and outrageous jewellery. Otherwise my clothes are boring and comfortable. I have long since accepted this in a very relaxed way, I am way too old to change this now, I think! I like my clothes exactly the way they are.

But that doesn't keep me from having a lifelong admiration of people who dress very flamboyantly!

I always stated that my style icons were Frida Kahlo, Bette Midler (in her burlesque showgirl 70s period) and Vivienne Westwood. Added to the list would be someone like Iris Apfel - I just saw the lovely film about her - watch it!

So obviously I was delighted, when I discovered the African Sapeur culture!

'Sapeurs' are men who belong to a fashion happy working class subculture, 'La SAPE' (an acronym, meaning: Societe des Ambianceurs et des Personnes Elegantes) centered primarily in the big Congolese cities, Brazzaville and Kinshasa.

A Sapeur is friendly, polite, respectful of others and obeys the intricate fashion rules of his brotherhood. The Sapeurs use fashion as a statement of tribute to life, self respect and personal freedom, and do so with such crazy, creative outfits, in spite of very limited resources and shopping opportunities.

They make the most of us look fairly dull!
Maybe they'll inspire you just a bit, before dressing for tonight?

Curious about them? Check this five minute mini documentary, produced by the Guiness Breweries - they focused a whole campaign on the Sapeurs!

And a fine looking book has been written and photographed on the subject:
'Gentlemen of the Bacongo' by Daniele Tamagni

Per-Anders Petterson's photographs from Kinshasa are great as well!

So here's to pink suits and fancy umbrellas - or what ever you may come up with for this evening - and a very Happy New Year to every reader of this blog, thanks for following it in 2015, see you in 2016!

(Photo credits for this post, from top: the young men posing is by Francesco Giusti, cool dudes with umbrella center is by W. Massamba, next two are by Francesco Giusti again, the green Western boots are by Per-Anders Petterson, and the last one is yet another fine shot by Francesco Giusti.)

Confetti System on the last day of 2014

It's the last day of the year, and I am making very rich chocolate-pecan pie and vacuum cleaning everywhere, in honor of our guests, arriving later this afternoon.

New Years Eve is always a bit weird for me, it will never be my best evening - I get too moody and reflective, but I insist on a bit of celebration all the same. I love champagne, and kids can stay up as long as they like. People may kiss or cry as they prefer, and on this one night of the year we do hook up our mirror ball (on display all year round) with its little spin-around motor.

Let's pretend I was a lady of independent means with enormous ceiling height in some vast space: then I would throw a grand ball for everyone I like - and you, all you out there, who have found your way to these pages and enjoyed them through the seasons - you'd be more than invited.

I know exactly who I would summon to do the blingbling-ing for this fantasy party: Confetti System.
They are my paper craziness heroes: a duo of artists from New York, who have taken tissue paper and all kinds of metallic foil to very sophisticated heights.

Read more about them in this article from www.dwell.com.
You could also check out their blog.

Now, back to my fantasy party. There would be champagne, of course. It is one of my favorite beverages in the world. There would be ice cream. There would also be drinks with fresh mint in them, because we mustn't forget our vitamins, and there would be a salsa band playing all night long. Since no band can play non-stop, they would take turns with this very fantastic classic motown disco-type band, with a kick ass horn section. If you wanted to rest your feet, there would be a bonfire outside and cosy chairs around it.

And you could stay as long as you liked.

On this note I will post the last images this year: various projects by the amazing Confetti System.

Happy New Year!