One thousand gifts challenge

Last night I started to read this:

I've followed Ann Voskamp on facebook and reading some posts on her blog for what feels a long time. I have her graphics as background on my desktop (this at the moment).
Now a friend of mine and future flatmate in october gave me her book and it had me crying in the beginning. I know this shutting off of the heart, this shutting God out.

I've read three chapters so far and have decided to take the challenge of listing 1000 gifts/blessings, it's about thankfulness. The miracles come after the thankfulness. And because I'm in a rough spot (again), of not wanting to do anything, I thought it would be nice to try something new. Ann says that pictures can hold thankfulness. So after listing some stuff (like 8. a BROWN dove!! or 11. the old babytoys from back then when we were little), I took the camera and took some pictures around the house. I want to share some of them with you!


14. clouds. Man I LOVE to look at clouds. Especially if there's blue sky inbetween ;)

 15. This is a flower I got to pick from a bouquet my father gave my mom.

16. My nightstand at my parents house.

 17. Sun behind a patterned curtain.

18. Gift bags from last christmas. I am the biggest fan of polkadots. Love how the dots in the biggest bag shine through in the light.

 20. One of my favorite flowers: Poppies. They are so fragile and yet so strong.

21. Notes we left in the entrance area
(Saying: A: I am fond of you!
B: I am fond of you, too!
C:I am fond of you (two)!
A: We are fond of you, too!
D:And I am, too (Really hard to translate)!
B: I am fond of you all! )

23. A bouquet from our "garden" in the front. Which isn't supposed to be a garden full of flowers, but i LOVE the wild craziness of that area.

This is actually Nr. 1: Our little fawn in the garden.

Have a great week everyone!

Getting ready to party...

Soo, tonight is kind of the farewell party of my sister, who is leaving to take her masters degree in Sweden (I totally get that choice, scandinavia is simply the best). We're going to a 90ies party, dancing to some great music :)

I was in the mood for a fun outfit and even a little make-up!

 I want to dance, so sneakers are a must. I know the outfit would look a lot cuter with some flats, but dancing away is so much better in sneakers.
These are fun tights which I've only worn once and that needed to get out. I love this dress! I've toyed with putting some different coloured behind the lace....

 I love this picture even though it's blurry!

And me with me make-up has to be shared as well ;)

 Staring you down ;)

And my hair! It's been like this the last couple of days and it's my first attempt at an half-up. It's a little to short to put up entirely, so I had to experiment. This is what's come out of it. Of course my signature twist in it ;)

Have a great weekend!

High five for friday!

 1.  I took this picture with my phone to have a new picture in the background. I really liked how it turned out.

2. Look at this delicious meal my sister made:

3. It really looked like rain on thursday night and I got home dry :) there was some thunder going on overhead!

4. I took a nice walk in the forrest. It felt good until halfway, then I just felt weak. I've had a cold for seven weeks now and my body is working hard on that. But it was definitly good for my mood to get out. thanks Sister for suggesting :)

5. Christian Hiphop: Andy Mineo:
"You're my biggest opponent,
You know me, I know you, we know it,
Whenever I failed, you've always been there,
to simply remind me I've blown it.
You don't see where I'm going,
you don't see when I'm growing,
You only see in the moment,
you know my mistakes you never let go it [...]
Huh, if you know who I'm talking about, then you got me
My biggest enemy is me - and even I can't stop me"

The song "You can't stop me" beginning at 16:48 minutes. I can't help but love it because it's deep and laugh because it's fun. And SOOO up my alley!
Andy Mineo on Youtube


I'm linking up with Lauren:

Mixing patterns

Inspiraton: Lauren

I am not so very pleased with these pictures, because you can't really see the different patterns ;) You can see the stripes, but are you able to see the dots? I will blow up this (blurry) picture, just so you get an idea... It's the same dot as in this one.
I really like the combination of the grey/white/beige with the turquoise coloured necklace, which I got from a friend. The pullover I got from my mom, it's my favorite.

 

Please don't forget to take note of my chaos in the background. ;)

Good night, my friends!
 

Turning from KEEPER to GIVER

Dear friends.

I have always been a "keeper", I have kept stuff. I grow very fast and deeply attached to things. It became very obvious a couple of weeks ago, when my parents wanted us to sort the stuffed animals. My sister and I where doing that together. I had like a zillion animals and a hard time letting go. So in the end I kept about 10 for me and another 10 for giving away to friends who get babies (as if 10 people would get kids soon, but anyways). My sister kept 1! As in: ONE. Well she didn't have a zillion to "choose" from, I don't think it even was ten she had. She almost kept 2, but then she decided to let go of the other bear.
I am proud of you!

Even though I had a hard time letting go of my stuffed animals, I am letting go of my books and DVDs. That's quite phenomenal, because books where my best friends when growing up. But I do not need to keep every book.
I had about 80 DVDs, I kept about 10. The others and some books went to the open bookshelf in the skandinavian department in university (I bought them in Norway, the texts on the back are norwegian, and they are english with subtitles, not very common in germany, and no german subtitles). So here's a little before and after of the open bookshelf. The pictures are crazy blurry, I know!

I am turning from Keeper to Giver. It's a process, it's hard work, but I am getting there!

A little Saturday night fun...

I found this blogger who is blogging about hairstyles and beauty. It's the wonderful Abby Smith with her blog Twist Me Pretty. She has a really beautiful Nail Art with ombre nails. Her tutorial is to be found here:Ombre Nail Art. As I had a day off (I've had a bad cold for like 4 weeks now, so I rest a lot. As well as I decided that I do not have to do any university-stuff in the weekends).

So here is one picture on how it looked "on the way", before the ombre. And then the ombre nails. My colours aren't as vibrant as Abbys, but my fun colours (pink, red, orange and yellow) were a little thicker (and quite old as well), so I decided for the first try to go for my newer colours.

I hope you're having a GREAT weekend so far.

Transforming old tops... into NEW ones.

So, this project has been waiting for me for a long time. I've wanted to do it for ages, but never got the juices flowing. Just to show how long it's been:















Now, being off the medication for depression, energy and motivation have reentered my life. True, I am crazy close to tears all the time. Like yesterday, you know: WorldCup, Germany playing against the USA. I was at university during the game, but we had some laptops so we knew how it was going (1:0 for us in the end). It was nice, but did not touch me emotionally. On my way home there were cars honking and people screaming and making happy sounds. Then I cried. Not a lot, but my eyes were full of tears, one might even have rolled.That's how much I enjoy the recovery of national pride.

Now, back to my project: I have had some tops that were too short. I do not like for my belly to show ;) ... At the same time I've had some tops that were ugly under the arms. Dark spots. So I combined two of those into one new:

All of it is totally eyeballed, I will take you through all
of the steps I did. The fun thing is: It turned out great even though it's not perfect. Nobody takes notice of the plaid that's not precisely in the middle. You will, now that you know ;)





This is how I did it:
1.  I cut off the top section of the top with the ugly top:

2. I put on the shirt I wanted as new top section (you might want to turn it inside out, just because the markings will not show in the end, but nobody noticed the markings, so who cares), I took the lower section to the mirror and decided where I wanted both parts to come together and marked it with blue tailor's chalk (my mom's equipped me well).

3. Next step was actually measuring where the marking was (15,5 cm) from the armpit.

 4. After that I marked 15,5 cm on the other side of the top as well and lay the measuring tape from one side to the other and marked below the tape from both sides for 1cm seam allowance:

5. Now you cut it. I did not take a picture of this ;)

6. Put right side to right side (the upper part was the right way, the bottom part was turned inside out). Put the seams on top of each other first and pin them together. Then you go around pinning it all together.

7. Maybe one section is bigger as the other?  It was like that for me. So I made a plait (roughly in the middle, both front and back). I just tried which way it looked better and decided for this, having the excess fabric on top layed to both sides:

8. Take out your machine and vaccum it. Put it up and sew both sides together. You totally see that I never cut even, I just went with the flow. If you are impatient (like me) you take out the pins as you go and look at how nice it's coming together ;)

 

9. Done with sewing around. (Now I actually pulled it to the right side and took the pictures of the end product - impatience galore). But there's another important step: NOW I cut around it all to make it nice and even.

10. Sew around with a zigzag stitch, you don't want the fabric to dissolve in the washing and your seam get open in the process:

11. Now you can turn it and enjoy your product (I'll be honest, these are the pictures I took BEFORE the zigzagging):

Just now (10 pm yesterday) I took some pictures of me wearing this. I like it best on the hanger, but am getting used to wearing it as well ;)

That thingy in the neckline? That's another post coming soon.

Have a great weekend!

This is now (Saturday 28.06.) part of the Sewing Saturday Link-up at Simple Simon and Company. Check out their page, I love it!