Benchmarks: Snelsmore Common

I have always loved revisiting places. And like Dr Sheldon Cooper I have a soft spot for ... the right spot. I also believe that a lot of beautiful things can happen, if you allow yourself to sit still for a while.

Today I was up on Snelsmore Common, a site of special scientific interest in Berkshire. I found my favourite bench, sat down, made a few notes in the small notebook that I carry with me most of the time - and a small herd of Exmoor ponies appeared. They slowly worked their way around me, grazing, minding their own business.

As I am currently without a self timing camera, I will not be blogging about fatshion for a while. But I will revisit some of my favourite spots in the UK. Some of them I found when I was here in 2011, some of them will be totally new discoveries. Come along, Pond.

Love,
Qaroline

OOTD: Sustainable Me

Dress: selfmade

I am still making dresses for a summer that hasn't really showed up yet. After one week of blistering heat it's back to woolly cardigans again, and wearing this white summer dress is an act of defiance. I have just finished it; it is made from thrifted old-fashioned duvet covers with a beautiful white-on-white in-woven leaf pattern.

Obviously I had a bit of help. Hamish insisted on taking care of the leftover fabric:

Hamish hard at work

pulling faces for the camera - glasses: eyes+more; turquoise earrings: gift

almost the same design as the ice-cream cone dress

finally, "Constance Spry" is in full bloom

[OOTD]: Treasure Trove

I have been collecting material for quite some time now but somehow I never got around to posting any of it - so this particular post is a multipurpose one, updating my OOTDs, flower blog an craft project blog all at once!

OOTD

I made this skirt a few weeks ago, using my favourite, very simple pencil skirt pattern which I have adjusted to my size. The cloth is very stiff (needs no ironing, yay!) and almost like canvas. As I love to wear stripes at the moment I thought I'd combine it with horizontal stripes in the same colour range, just for fun.

top: H&M; skirt: selfmade; shoes: my garden clogs

Roadside Bouquet

A week ago I picked the flowers for this bouquet from the roadside: gorgeous lupins [insert Monty Python joke here ...] and daisies. It didn't really last long but was quite stunning.

one day later

Treasure Trove

Looking through some of my stuff I found my tablet weaving box, full of old samples I made back in the days when I was re-enacting Viking and medieval crafts. Although only one of those samples is actually made from linen and therefore more "authentically" Viking than the others [the blue one], I loved finding them all again and will definitely need to get to grips with this craft once more.

Love, Qaroline

Bad Wolf.

I have finally finished the embroidery for my pillow case - just in time to hide a little something for this particular date:

The next paisley pattern will be white on red. Let's see if this is in some way prophetic regarding the impending casting decisions!

Love, Qaroline

Empire Bouquet

My Mom shares a birthday with Queen Victoria - and this is the bouquet I made her for her today. All the plants and flowers are from her garden and the vase is a [not very precious] family heirloom. I used lilac [Flieder], bleeding heart [Tränendes Herz], lungwort [Lungenkraut], lily of the valley [Maiglöckchen], garland spiraea [Brautspiere], rhododendron and columbines [Akelei] and was especially enchanted with finding out the various English names for the bleeding heart: "Dutchman's trousers", "lady in a bath", "Venus's car" and "lyre flower" - love them!

Wishing you all a fabulous weekend, Qaroline

Garden party @ Fatty Fashion Fun Challenge

Hat: Oxfam; cardigan: Ulla Popken; dress: selfmade

I am a bit late for this month's Fatty Fashion Fun Challenge "Garden Party" but really wanted to participate [can't resist an invitation to any garden, really] - and what a brilliant opportunity to show off my latest sowing project!

I haven't found ANY beautiful cotton summer dresses for fat people in a long while and decided that it was definitely time to make my own. I found this inexpensive printed cotton in our local haberdashery and I love love love it! [Big ice-cream fan, too.]

And as you're already here, why don't you join me on a small tour through the garden?

pond with Japanese maple and floating apple blossoms.

mobile radish/strawberry/salad unit in a basket - on wheels!

lawn covered in lady's smock.

icelandic poppies, salads, baby aubergines, herbs and tomatoes.

love the smell of lilac.

any excuse to wear a hat.

Roadtrip: Gütersloh Botanical Gardens

Last week I had the opportunity to visit Gütersloh Botanical Gardens, just a half hour's drive away and stunningly beautiful. I wasn't aware of the fact that Olafur Eliasson designed a "scent tunnel" for this particular garden!

Olafur Eliasson's "scent tunnel"

I love that this quite small garden is so much more formal than the botanical gardens I have visited before, divided into lots of garden rooms with different themes - especially the lavender garden, although not yet in bloom, was amazing - I will definitely come back again! [There is also a very nice café in one of the greenhouses, well worth a visit!]

Lavender Garden

cherry tree avenue

Perfect Start Bouquet

I'm back from my short blog sabbatical - and now that so many beautiful blooms are out I can start again with my bouquet blog. These gorgeous yellow tulips are one of my favourite varieties; the blue vase is handmade [by my Mom] and I guess it is something about the colour combination that always makes me smile.

just a few days later

Thanks to the mild weather our camellia is covered in whitish-pink blossoms - in all the last years frosty nights destroyed almost all of the buds and this is the first year the camellia is able to fulfill her full potential - such a shame that the blossoms have no fragrance!

I have been working on a lot of new crafting projects recently - this is my current one: this freestyle embroidery is meant to be turned into a pillow case [some day soon, hopefully]. I am working with pure white cotton yarn on rough dark-blue linen and because I don't have to count threads or follow any kind of pattern it is actually quite relaxing.

freestyle paisley pattern - very individual shapes ;-)

Wishing you all a wonderful month of May -

Love, Qaroline