September Goody give-away
By spotogspindel | September 2, 2010
I am so impressed and humble by all the visitors from all over the world. I´ve now reached over 80 countries! And I am so grateful for my faithful followers, especially the ones who leave me comments every now and then. Thank you! Once again I want to show you a little token of my appreciation, by having a little goody give-away.
September´s goody give-away is a small notebook, about 10 x 7 cm, with a hand-printed and sewn dupion silk-cover. On the back it says “Make Waves”.
Want to win?
Here’s 3 ways to Enter:
1. Leave a comment on any of my posts in August, and get an entry.
2. If you leave a comment on the Celebrate September post with a suggestion to how we can Celebrate October, you get 2 entries!
3. Promote my giveaway on your blog and get 3 entries! Feel free to pull this image to use on your blog. And don’t forget to leave me a comment so I know you did.
Topics: give away | 1 Comment »
The August goody give-away winner
By spotogspindel | September 2, 2010
I wanted to splash out a bit in the August goody give-away, in appreciation of all your kind comments. So I made a little freestyle-sewn portrait. And the winner this month is:
Lacy at lacylike
She´s a fountain of joy and really knows how to celebrate life! I was lucky enough to meet her at Artfest last year, and I´m crossing my fingers we´ll meet next year too. She was the light of the party when she was teaching us midnight-yoga:-)
You should really check out her blog, it´s a great place for inspiration.
Topics: give away | No Comments »
Celebrate September
By spotogspindel | September 1, 2010
Here is this September´s new and improved version 
Oh yay! It´s the national sewing month!!! Guess we´ll just have to fill the days with endless joy!
1. Mary Had A Little Lamb was published in 1830 and WW1 began in 1939. So tonight you can either sew something made from sheep-skin (gloves, maybe?) or watch “A Very Long Engagement” with Audrey Tatou.
After a long summer(?) of relaxing, it feels good to be back on track. To feel even better, contact your favorite charity, and ask what you can help them with this month!
2. Rearrange your furniture in one room. Pack away some of your decorative stuff and put it in the attic. Get one, just one, new thing. In half a year, change the things you have out now, with the stuff you put in the attic. This is a cheap way of re-newing the room
Make a very special coat-hanger using an old chair(!), be inspired here!
3. Have a walk along the beach and gather shells. Bring them home, drill small holes in them, tie them up on a string about 2 meters long. Make several and hang them in a door opening like a curtain. You´ll keep summer in your house a lot longer…
Go to the dollar store and get a miniature manicure set. Surround yourself with candles and good music, soak your feet and give yourself a pedicure. Paint your toenails a color that knocks your socks off!
4. Spend an entire day without watching TV. The whole family, too. See what “quality” time it will bring.
Collect doilies. Make something fun with them. Like this maybe…
5. Write a Love List: reasons why you love your daughter…your mother… your partner… Listing the reasons has a trigger effect on your memories, the sweet, endearing side of things. “I love the way you squish up your nose when you are thinking hard”…”I love the way you take care of me when I’m having a hard day”. Keep the list and peek at it every now and again.
International bacon day. Yum!!! Make pancakes (recipe without sugar), fry up bacon and boil potatoes. It may sound strange, but it´s one of my favorite dinners!
6. Make a large bowl of jello, layering it in at least three different colors! Make vanilla-sauce, and enjoy!
Sew a cover to your favorite book. And then read it. (Below are some of my song-books with textile covers, painted, printed and sewn together.)
7. Add fancy trim to the bottom of a skirt or jeans. A ruffle of gauze, French embroidered trim, velvet ribbon. Find your favorite at a local fabric store, on ebay, or cut it off a no-longer-wanted skirt hidden in the back of your closet.
Get a tattoo! Not a permanent one, of course. Just mix henna-powder with a little bit oil, and paint on your skin. Leave to dry, then brush off. Depending on the quality of the henna, it should last a week.
8. Sew a self portrait – even if just 5 x 8 cm. Sign it. Machine embroidery is super-fun! And it doesn´t really matter if it doesn´t resemble you perfectly.
Make home-made lemonade. This can hardly be done too often
9. Teddy bear day. Make your own cute-n-cuddly.
While I leave for London, bringing my passport safely protected within my new passport-pocket, why don´t you make your own?!
10. Swap ideas day. Gather your favorite art-buddies over for a creative evening, and do some ARTing! I am sure you are bubbling with ideas, but you know, just art-journaling can be great fun together.
In Norway the deer-hunting begins today. Maybe I should make a new paper-clay-maché deer-head for my masks-wall…?
11. Make your bed day. What a boring holiday, huh? … no, wait. Lets make it fun. After all it is sewing month. Let´s literarily make your bed. The linens anyway. For one set of a duvet-cover and pillow-case you need 5 meters of fabric and about a meter of ribbon. The sewing is super-easy, but before we get to that part, how about adding a personal touch? Maybe print a motif with your own stamp?
Leave random love notes for your children or partner in unexpected places: the inside of their shoes, coat pockets, in between a closed cell phone, written in dry-erase marker on the bathroom mirror, with a Sharpie marker on the mini bag of chips tucked into their lunch box. No need to write a book…short & sweet can say it all.
12. Make a small idea-notebook, and sew a decorative cover for it. Whenever you come up with a brilliant idea, write it down, and before long you´ll have a great idea-bank! (Or if you´re lucky, maybe you´ll win this month´s goody give-away-book!)
There´s a vintage & antique textile fair in Hammersmith in London today. If you want to join me treasure-hunting, please do! If you´re not in London, see if you can find a local flee-market or charity-shop and join me in the fun of looking for small treasures.
13. There are so many options for this day: It´s the National Peanut day, Positive thinking day and Helicopter day. Feel free to make your own agenda based on one of these, or:
Make a special textile collage in celebration of your Grandparents. Mix in photos printed on textiles, bits and pieces of fabric from their favorite apron or shirt.
14. Treat yourself to a vintage portrait photo on Ebay for under $5. When it comes in the mail, give the person a name. Make up a history. Write it all down on the back of the photo.
Spend an entire evening with the family playing Scrabble, Monopoly, Yahtzee, even Twister (if you dare). And of course, it doesn´t matter if you don´t have a twister game-board. Just sew one! (I did
15. Take a walk in the rain. Just throw on a coat and go for a quickie around the block. Don’t plan for it…just get up and do it. The fresh air will do you good!
Make a hat day. Oh, this could be fun! So many options. Sew one, and send me a picture, and I´ll share!
16. Start collecting something you love. Be obsessive. Perhaps it’s silverware with engraved monograms, heart-shaped stones, or vintage pearl necklaces to hang on your chandelier. Set a challenge…no more than $3.
Myself, I want to collect rocks today. See if you can find pebbles shaped as words or symbols.
17. Fingerpaint with your 5-year-old. If you don’t have a 5-year-old, fingerpaint with your best friend. Get back to the basics.
Go decor-hunting in the attic. Find all those old brass candle-holders. Wash them, and paint them in a bright color. Talk to your local paint-shop people, to make sure you get the right type of paint. Spray-paint might lead to a great result! I want hot pink and turquoise!
18. Clean the car out. Get rid of the garbage (look under the seats…maybe you´ll find that CD you´ve been looking for)…wipe the dust from the dashboard…vacuum the pineneedles. Then buy an ice-cream cone while you´re at the gas-station.
Talk like a pirate today. Learn the lyrics to “A pirate´s life for me” and sing to yourself in public. Add an “Aaaarrrrh” every now and then 
19. Wake up really early on the weekend. Watch the sun rise. Have coffee or hot chocolate and cereal (with bananas). Read the newspaper cover to cover. Stay in your jammies until lunch (maybe all day).
Or, if you get bored of staying in bed all day… sew something beautiful, but easy! Why not make a lacy collar? It doesn´t need to be like these, be creative, make your own special textile fall-jewelry.
20. Learn 5 new words. Open an old dictionary and blindly fingerpoint to 5 different words. Cut each one out and paste them in your notebook. Learn their spelling & meaning. Use them in sentences. Be a scholar!
Make some art, maybe a photograph or a painting or a drawing. Put the art in a nice frame, one that isn’t brand new. Then, hang your framed art in a place you aren’t suppose to, but where people will assume it is supposed to be, like the lobby of your apartment building, in the hallway at your office, on the smallest wall in a motel room, in the quiet corner of a library, outside the downstair’s restroom at a restaurant or bar, the back room of a club, in the bathroom of a museum. (This one is from 52Projects)
21. Monday morning… start the day by putting on your favorite up-beat song, at a loud volume, and DANCE!
International day of peace. World gratitude day.
22. Write a poem. Limit it to 8 lines only. Memorize it.
On this first day of Autumn, make a page in your journal stating all your plans for the fall. It´s somehow easier to get things done, when they are spoken, or in this case written. Take a walk in the park and gather some leaves to press, so you can use in your journal later in the winter.
Make a traditional dinner with lamb, potatoes , cabbage and carrots, or fårikål, as we call it in Norway.
23. Bake brownies. Try not to eat them…but give in to the temptation anyway.
Go outside to pick nuts. My garden is full of hazel-nuts. If you haven´t got any, maybe it´s an idea to invest in a nut-tree. Fresh nuts taste completely different, and even more delicious, than the ones you get in the store.
24. Check out some fashion-designers fall-collection by visiting their web-sites: Alexander McQueen, Jean Paul Gaultier, Vivienne Westwood, Comme de Garcons, … be inspired to make your own fall-couture!
Let´s celebrate Native American day by making jewelry inspired by their art. Look online for inspiration. Or visit the library. (Oooo, I want to make a new bracelet with turquoises!)
25. Have a holiday dinner NOT during the holidays. Make an over-the-top feast of a meal! Invite a few friends over “just because”. Out-do yourself. Appetizers…5-course dinner…a flaming dessert! Find recipes in a cookbook (that has pictures…so you can SEE how it will turn out). Set the table with candles, linen napkins, crystal. And just for fun…give each menu item your OWN name!
Make caramel-apples. The apples should be getting ripe now, and this is caramel-month, so what are you waiting for?!
26. There must be a hundred ways to celebrate good neighbor day, my suggestion is to pop lots of popcorn and then invite them over for a craft-evening. Creating together is a joy beyond words! Or you can bake a big, giant batch of cookies. Bring them to your neighbors “just because”.
Review a book you’ve recently read on http://www.amazon.com/.
27. Buy a vintage slip at a Thrift Store (or find one in your grandmothers closet). Wear it under a dress with a little bit of the lacy hem showing (ooh la la). Or just wear it as a night gown. And come to think of it, since it´s sewing month, trace the pattern of your slip, and sew a new one! It´s really not that difficult. Make it in some funky colors your Grandma wouldn´t have thought of, like hot pink, burnt orange of citrus lime
Continue the evening with mending. Sew back on all those lost buttons, mend the holes in your socks, fix that hemline… and so on. This is both money-saving and environmentally friendly.
28. Venture under the kitchen sink and clean it out. Warning: do not mix cleansers and then stick your head in the cabinet to wash it out.
As a reward, splash out on a gorgeous flower-bouquet. The beauty of flowers is contagious!
29. Change your passwords for everything. Just like batteries in the smoke detectors, better safe than sorry. Oh, and change the batteries in your smoke-detector!
Scotland Yard formed in 1829. See the movie “The nine lives of Thomas Katz”. It´s one of the coolest movies I´ve ever seen! With a secret department of Scotland Yard included
30. Draw the entire alphabet of letters. Have them made into a font for your computer. Visit http://fontgarden.com/ and she can create a font just for you using your handwriting. Font Garden also has oodles of free fonts, as well as inexpensive purchasable fonts available. The quotes are fun, too. Another version is taking your camera for a walk, and looking for the alphabet hidden in the surroundings. Be inspired by Michael at Alfabetfotos.
Make a punk-crazy-kilt and add lots of safety pins! And wear it! Don´t chicken out. You´re too old? Phøh! No, you´re not! Now go and act your inner child´s age!
Oh, and as always, send me suggestions for how we can celebrate October!
Topics: celebrate! | No Comments »
Seahouse
By spotogspindel | August 31, 2010
Above is the latest in the painted Austevoll seahouse-series. Acrylcs on canvas and wood, 20x20cm. I´m thinking it´s a very big and light space in the middle here, and I really want to do something with it, just not sure what… Maybe it just needs more warmth?
Actually I think I´m not loving it, because I´m going back to being conservative in my painting. I want to be free when I´m painting, not conservative. Typical my favorite parts are the red doors!
Topics: Diverse | 1 Comment »
another doily
By spotogspindel | August 30, 2010
Inspired by this image I found here:
I made my own version:
Using a hand-crochet doily, adding a layer of metallic chiffon, and sewing it down on a pale moss-colored ribbon that ties in the back.
And then adding a rather beautiful broach from Accessorize.
And talking of chockers/neck-warmers (in lack of a better name), has anyone seen this type before? I found it at an auction a few years ago:
My bet is that it is home-sewn, with velvet and cotton-lace for decoration.
Here seen from the back. I´m thinking it must be a piece made to be tucked into a dress, probably in the same fabric.
Inside it´s a very fine woven linen. Judging by style, color and material, I´m guessing it´s from around 1900, no later than 1910.
I appreciate any other views, guesses or information on this piece.
Topics: Diverse | 2 Comments »
Artfest sign-up
By spotogspindel | August 29, 2010
Take next year´s summer holiday early!
Just a little reminder: If you want to go to Artfest and have yourself a great Easter next spring, better stop by the Artfest-site now, and send in your registration. They start registration on September 3rd, and a lot of the classes fill up very quickly!
Below is a link to the class I´m teaching:
For even more info, here´s another link to the class.
There are a lot of great teachers there with loads of classes and workshops, among them, my best ARTing-friend, Michelle, and Shelley, who I met last year.
Topics: travel, workshops | No Comments »
If-immovable
By spotogspindel | August 29, 2010
If´s theme this week is immovable. I found a quote I liked “Build your house on immovable rock” which sounds very sensible. but then I found this chap, and he looked so sad, I just had give him a reason for his sorrows…
Topics: Illustration friday | 3 Comments »
Swinging 50s
By spotogspindel | August 29, 2010
My sister came over to get some help with making a pattern for a dress, and while she was here, she helped me in fitting a couple of vintage dresses I got from Fretex (Salvation Army charity shop). It´s always a bit tricky fitting on yourself, so I was happy for the help!
Both are from the 50s and home-sewn. The red one is in a cotton brocade, the black in heavy rayon taffeta. Or at least I think so, from the feel of the fabric, as there are no labels.
Ooo, I´m gonna be stylish this fall! (tji-hi…)
Topics: Diverse | 1 Comment »
A bird-house
By spotogspindel | August 28, 2010
#8 on my list clearly states that I want to build a bird-house. However, I might cheat on this one, and re-decorate a bird-house I from my sister´s shop.
Above is the original. And below is the first layers of color.
It´ll be my weekend-project. I want to add some reds and pinks, maybe flowers and butterflies and other relatively cute stuff. Maybe a dragon-fly.
Topics: Diverse | No Comments »
Dance first. Think later.
By spotogspindel | August 26, 2010
Take a five-minute break. Dance!
Topics: Diverse | 1 Comment »