Keyfob / Schlüsselband

Last week I’d seen a lovely keyfob used by a friend, just the right length not to slip and fall when used as a wristlet and not too tight. I don’t like those long keychains worn around the neck, the look stupid, but I like to find and recognize my keys in the depths of my bags. I took a very close look and then I went home and made Conny and me two fobs. Now I’ve bought more rings and made some more keyfobs for the shop. 

Letzte Woche habe ich ein schönes Schlüsselband von einer Bekannten gesehen, gerade die richtige Länge um nicht vom Handgelenk zu rutschen und nicht zu eng. Ich mag diese Schlüsselketten die um den Hals zu hängen sind nicht, sieht einfach doof aus. Aber ich finde und erkenne meine Schlüssel auch gerne in den tiefsten Tiefen meiner Taschen. Deshalb habe ich mir das Beispiel sehr genau angesehen und zu Hause Conny und mir zwei Schlüsselbänder gemacht. Nun habe ich weitere Ringe gekauft und noch mehr Schlüsselbänder für den Shop genäht.

Berlin

As mentioned in the previous post, I spent last weekend in Berlin. It was something we had been wanting for quite a while, as our friends Conny & Sebastian and their kids had moved from the inner city to the last stop of the commuter-train this spring and we were curious to see their new home. Jens had a lot of work to do, so he stayed home and Marcel and I went by train. Conny is Marcel’s godmother, she picked us up and spent a long time (and some money, I guess) with him in a bookshop, while I made my way to the DaWanda-event. It was not only thought-provoking and motivating (see, I’m writing only 2 days later!;-)), it was also fun, with loads of eye-and-teeth-candy (cupcakes) and many interesting and nice like-minded people to meet. Here you can see some of us in action:

The pics I took of the speeches are unusable, but here’s the cupcake-candy

and here’s me, drying my first ever silk-screen on a tote (with the help of bloodybunny). Behind my nose you can catch a glimpse of Holly Becker. 

Afterwards I got a lift to the station from Eliana (mangarosa-berlin) and made it to my friend’s lovely new home:

It has a beautiful garden where the kids were playing and having a fire when I arrived and after a delicious kid-made pizza for dinner we adults spend a nice long evening on the balcony, chatting. Next morning after breakfast we went to a festival in a tree-nursery and arboretum before Marcel and I had to leave for the train back home. 

It really was a great weekend!

Wie im letzten Post erwähnt, war ich letztes Wochenende in Berlin. Wir hatten das schon seit einiger Zeit vor, weil unsere Freunde Conny & Sebastian im Frühjahr mit ihren Kindern von der Innenstadt an die letzte S-Bahn-Station gezogen waren und wir nun neugierig auf ihr neues Zuhause waren. Weil Jens viel zu tun hatte, sind Marcel und ich ohne ihn mit dem Zug gereist. Conny ist Marcels Patentante, sie holte uns am Bahnhof ab und verbrachte mit Marcel viel Zeit (und wohl einiges Geld) in einer Buchhandlung, während ich zur DaWanda-Veranstaltung pilgerte. Dort gab es nicht nur Anregungen und Motivation (es wirkt, ich schreibe nur 2 Tage nach dem letzten Eintrag!;-)), sondern auch lecker Cupcakes und viele interessante und nette gleichgesinnte Menschen. Die Fotos von den Reden sind nichts geworden, aber die Cupcakes sind zu sehen und ich, wie ich meine erste Siebdruck-Tasche trockenföhne. Hinter meiner Nase ist Holly Becker zu erahnen. Später bot mir Eliana netterweise eine Mitfahrgelegenheit bis zu einer günstigen S-Bahn an und ich kam bei meinen Freunden und ihrem schönen Haus an. Besonders der Garten ist wundervoll, die Kids haben gespielt und ein Feuerchen gemacht, und nach der Abend-Pizza haben wir Erwachsenen noch einen langen Abend auf dem Balkon geklönt. Am nächsten Morgen waren wir nach dem Frühstück noch auf einem Baumschul-und Gartenfest, bevor wir in den Zug nach Hause stiegen. 

Es war wirklich ein schönes Wochenende!

Consistency / Stetigkeit

Well, yesterday I was at DaWanda’s make-it-shop-it-blog-it-event, and Holly Becker of decor8 was there as a guest-speaker, as well as luziapimpinella. Lots of the things Holly advised while spreading the gospel of blogging I already knew (and try to put into practice), but one thing she emphasized really stung: consistency. Of that I know, too, it’s true that I myself are disappointed when a blog I like and bookmark is neglected for a while. But it’s the thing that’s really hard for me to implement. And a good part during the rest of her and Nic’s speech I kept myself asking why. I came up with several reasons: 

My life is busy. My life was busy before I started crafting and sewing more than one or two projects a year. I have a demanding job, more than just a job, a profession I take seriously (and which pays the mortgage). And even more important I have a family, people whose well-being is vital to my own well-being. And friends I wouldn’t want to miss. A household and a garden, duties and joys like most of you have. I decided to share the highlights of this life with you here on this blog.

So the hours I have for myself are rare and usually when everyone else here went to bed. I like to spend this time with you, crafting community, I just have to split it up between reading lots of all your lovely blogs, actually making something, doing the photos and writing this blog. Sometimes Usually something falls when juggling. 

Then I don’t know where this all will lead to, and I came to realize lately that it’s unlikely for me to carve a living out of this. When I came across all these design and craft blogs about two years ago, I was so inspired and yearning to be a part of this community I was almost as rest- and sleepless as a toddler’s mum again. And like a toddlers developmental phases like teething, walking, speeking etc. I experienced a development from reading and discovering all those extremely inspiring blogs to do more sewing myself to starting a shop on DaWanda to finally blogging myself. And whenever there is a new phase in the pipeline it’s time for sleepless nights and daytime struggles to accomodate. But unlike a toddler growing up I’m not sure if and when this morningflower-thing ever matures and: into what? These doubts after the initial enthusiasm may have led to a slightly sluggish attitude towards this blog-thing, as well as the feeling that there might be enough craft-blogs out there, personally I don’t bookmark as many blogs I stumble upon as I used to, I just know I won’t have the time to keep reading… 

And there is a side of my personality that I struggle with (but I’m sure I’m not alone): I tend to avoid something I’ve neglected for too long, e.g. the ironing pile, accounting and filing invoices, going to the dentist, congratulate a friend after her birthday (I really am soooo sorry, Karin!) and blogging after too many things to post have happened. As soon as I’ve thought of doing something, it’s as if I actually did the thing (I know I didn’t, it just feels a bit like). But when I wake up at night I can’t ignore my bad consciousness any longer, I toss and turn, but it’s just not the time to finally make that appointment with the dentist. Next morning things don’t look that bad any more, and, well, life comes in between… besides, it’s really awkward ringing up my friend a month after that birthday I forgot, so, well, today I don’t have the courage, maybe tomorrow… urgs…     Confessions. But don’t worry, usually I do get things done finally, hey, I’m writing this post right now, almost midnight…. The pang (or the kick in the b…) has to be big enough, though. Now I got this kick from Holly. 

Related is my striving for perfection, I tend not to publish before everything is finished, the links, the photos (I deleted some drafts because the photos were more out of focus than usual), the translation. It takes time, sometimes so much that it’s outdated before being posted.

This post will go out into the world without any photos or a translation, because today I choose consistency before perfection, consistency before chronologically posting all the other things I wanted to post before, consistency and honesty before procrastination and consistency before knowing anyone’s interested. Today I even choose consistency before sleep (but after StarWars Episode II the males around here had to watch on eyeTV). Thank you, Holly Becker.

It’s been a loooong time since…/ Es ist schon laaaange her…

… I blogged, and even longer since I’ve shown something new I’ve made. As I’m back to working schedule (holidays are over) I’ll try to get back to posting on a more regular basis again, even though now I don’t have my Friday mornings off any more (sigh…). Having enough computing time is something I have to negotiate very hard with my two ‘males’ here, as we also use our imac as a TV and DVD as well as a console. So, during summer holidays, we all were either outside making trips or, on rainy days, the sofa and the apple were blocked most of the time. And, as I don’t have a studio, I sew in the living-room which means the sound of the sewing-machine interferes with the sound of our home-cinema’s speakers ;-). Well, son and husband tried to restrict my sewing-time to commercial-breaks, but to no avail. 

Sooo …, this is briefly what I made in the meantime:

loads of hanky-holders 

cover for folders

aliens 

messenger bags made with this pattern/kit

more skirts with my favourite last year’s Ottobre-pattern

this tutorial I used for fabric pom-poms

(ideal for letting out tension during the European championships)

and mollychicken also inspired me to these

the source of inspiration for the last two projects can be seen in the first picture

 

dass ich gebloggt habe, und noch länger, seit ich von mir genähte Sachen gezeigt habe. Jetzt, wo ich wieder im Arbeitsrhythmus bin, werde ich versuchen, wieder regelmäßiger zu schreiben, auch wenn ich nicht mehr meinen freien Freitag-Vormittag habe (seufz…). Mit meinen ‘Männern’ sind es zähe Verhandlungen ausreichend Computerzeit zu bekommen, weil wir den imac auch als TV, DVD-Player und Spielkonsole benutzen. Also waren wir während der Sommerferien entweder alle draußen auf Ausflügen, oder, an Regentagen, waren Sofa und Rechner meist besetzt. Und weil ich kein Studio habe und im Wohnzimmer nähe, kollidiert gelegentlich der Sound der Nähmaschine mit dem Sound aus den Heimkino-Lautsprechern ;-). Sohn und Mann versuchten sogar, meine Nähzeiten auf die Werbepausen zu beschränken, ergebnislos.