Goldwork ... in Progress

Some small finished flowers and an unfinished big pomegranate blossom (Anarkali) for my new Balkanese costume. Stay tuned!

Spinning!

 I confess: my latest addiction is spinning. Be it traditionally with wool or with fabric leftovers. Fabric stripes and a whatsoever cone yarn make an absolutely gorgeous designer yarn. Good to upcycle some worn out clothes!

Spinning with wool is much more challenging, but I still like my first handspun yarn. So much that I crocheted it into a cap with ... uhm, a certain character... ;-)

Kalbelia Costume I: Needs a lot of Patience...

For an upcoming workshop of Kalbelia dance I threw myself into sewing a costume.

The skirt is the central piece as the dance is full of whirling and spinning (see the first picture).













With a readymade dance skirt from Hongkong purchased from here, lots of ribbons from my stock and some fabric to recycle the adveture began:

 
 


  The diamonds are cut out from the fabric and basted. A narrow white ribbon will cover the edges later.

Many many hours later: lots of greens and blues. Red, yellow and white will follow....

Sunday of the Frugal Housewife

Partly probably due to my Svabian ancestors (they are the Scotsmen of Germany when it comes to parsimony), partly due to vital necessisty in the years I have perfectionated my habit of never ever throwing away anything that is still good, exspecially regarding food.
So today we have an extraordinary frugal Sunday with homemade marmelade from garden strawberries and a cocktail of very ripe fruits from the kitchen:

 

Yum!

 

Venetian bread cake with apples. A recipe from my mom who taught me never to throw away bread ... "because the child Jesus ("Gesù bambino" is a very common figure in Italy that sees Jesus Christ predominantly as a human being. Its the poor little boy that was born in the hut, a very well known situation in after war Italy) climbed down from his donkey just to pick up a tiny crum of bread." This used to be told to children that (quite naturally) refused to eat bread from the day before.

Additionally the women of the Padan Plain, once a very poor region where my mom comes from, created a lot of delicious ways to use day-old bread. One of our favourite is the bread cake:

You need: 

day old bread cut in cubes (as much you can put in a salad bowl

1 liter of milk

3 spoons of sugar

vanillia essence

3 spoons of butter or vegetal oil

3 eggs

3 peeled and diced apples

raisins (if you like them. My kids are unfortunately rather picky with them)

Heat the milk until it begins to boil. Be careful to stir it while heationg, otherwise it tends to stick on the bottom of the pot. Add sugar, vanilli essence and butter in the end. Then pour it on the bread dices and cover the salad bowl with a large lid. Leave it while you prepare the apples. Mash them with the bread that should have absorbed the milk by now and add the eggs. Butter a casserole and bake for 25 min.

With vanillia sauce it makes a whole meal!

 And finally some pasta al forno, an absolute classic for reusing leftovers from the previous day. Mix them and add eventually tomatoes to make a sauce. Cook some pasta, add the sauce and cover everything with a bechamelle sauce. Done! Super quick and easy.
And how do you celebrate frugality? I'd love to know!
Have a great sunday!

Upcycled: Chandelier

Finally a finished project between a lot of unfinished ones, tons of work and days without kindergarten (too many bank holidays...).
Take: A chandelier from the curb (yes, there are people that throw them on the street!) with a couple of crystals missing (yes, there was a reason for throwing it). And a fistful of glass beads in white, green and blue. Deconstruct and reconstruct the chandelier.

And... tadaaa! a new chandelier!

Maybe it's not the best taste but the cost of the project were 2,50 € for new bulbs. And the living room has finally enough light after years of semidarkness due to a very dull IKEA lamp.
Altogether a successful project, I think.
Have a beautiful summer weekend!

Thirsty Rag Mat for Boots

Finally, a finsihed project to share. Very quickly crocheted from kid's clothes that were too worn to use.

Cut fabric into stipes, knot them toghether and wind into a ball. Crochet a rug for dripping winter boots.

So much fun!

Work in Progress: Boro Inspired Denim Cloth

Here you see the whole project: A Boro inspired cloth with (very simple) Sashiko stitches all over.
The Japanese craft form called "boro" is a method to reuse worn and torn clothes by adding pieces of leftover fabric, often combined with "sashiko", a traditional technique used to reinforce points of wear, or to repair worn places or tears with patches, using a simple running stitch.

It began with a pair of jeans of my little one that I did not dare to throw - too many sweet memories - so I decided to incorporate it into a cloth project. The idea of a boro jeans bag with cute little pockets for a cell phone - or anything small - was born.

 Everything attached with simple running stitches for stability and structure. Now the cloth is in the washing machine for nicely frayed edges - and because somebody wiped her chocolate stained mouth with it :-D

The Art of Recycling: Evelyn Roth

Since I discovered how many ways there are to recycle and upcycle any kind of fabric and a lot more stuff which is commonly regarded as trash I have started to collect a lot of things, mostly textiles and I enjoy turning them into pieces of Wearable Art or any kind of useful thing. I thought initially this was a quite recent phenomenon born out of a new awareness of the absurdity of consumerism, but of course there is nothing new under the sun if you look at the work of Evelyn Roth in the seventies. She has published a book on several recycling techniques for textiles and even more unusual materials like leather, fur and feathers.



More than fascinating I found the section on crocheting with discarded videotape.
Videotape is a very fascinating material, absolutely sturdy and it looks very elegant as it is shimmering and black. I have tons of old VHS cassettes, but the material seems to be highly toxic and so I will probably throw them away with a heavy heart.

Evelyn Roth's Work is very inspiring. She looks at clothing as a kind of scupture which was very forward thinking for that time.



Stunningly beautiful are the Wearable Edibles and other works of art. Look at them here.