Outside The Birds Are Singing

Spring is back.

Happy Eastertide!

Happy Valentine’s Day!

I’m spending Valentine’s Day with and by myself, baking and drinking steaming hot tea and sewing and listening to swing music. For me, Valentine’s Day isn’t the commercial horror-that-should-be-erased-from-this-earth that everybody rants about (and I’m also a little bit tired of all the people referencing to “pagan horny werewolf day”. Yawn.). I take this day as a wonderful opportunity for radical self-love (thank you, Gala Darling, for this term!), and why not? Sending yourself holiday cards is one of the best things you can do.

The artwork of the Valentine’s card on the picture is by the incredibly talented Jolly Rotten, and you can find it here.
The muffins are standard with a bit of cocoa, even less clove and cinnamon and some lemon peel and grated chocolate. They make me think of My Father’s Glory and My Mother’s Castle, somehow.

Do you celebrate Valentine’s Day? And if yes, how?

All Hallow’s Monday

Happy Halloween. May all your screams come true!

Preparations Again: Mad Hatter Day

October 6th is Mad Hatter Day!

I already wrote about it two years ago and completely left it out last year, but here we go again!
Here are some (old and new) ideas how to spend this holiday:

1. Dress in rather unusual fashions (in normal standards) or at least something wonderland-related. Blazers and jackets could be nice, as well as knickerbockers, striped pants or victorianesque skirts (no problem here if you’re a Lolita). Speaking of stripes, this is the ideal day to mix any pattern you’d like. Have a look at the myriads of Mad Hatter interpretations made by artists from three centuries. Another point could be not to dress in neutral colours, at least not completely. Try to find accessoires that resemble something from the books, be it chess pieces, card suits, rabbits or caterpillars. Oh, or tiny tea dishes! Don’t forget your pocket watch.
2. Drink tea. Bring out your favourite china and complete tea arsenal, make one cup of each and have a tea-testing session. Invite your friends and/ or favourite stuffed animals and dolls and have a tea party with fairy cakes, sandwiches and cake.
3. Why not have a tea party in public? Get yourself a picnic blanket or sit down on park benches, in your school’s or university’s hall or your workplace’s cafeteria. Take your tea with you in a thermos flask and make a Wonderland-themed bentō with apple bunnies and card suit shaped sandwiches. Don’t forget the cake (as mentioned before) and take enough with you to offer some to a passer-by. Don’t bring your best teacups, go for something rather sturdy instead to prevent the breaking of china and hearts.
4. Wear a hat! Obvious, isn’t it. Decorate it with a pretty piece of thick paper with the writing 10/6 in this style and maybe some needles and pins. If you don’t own one, make one. Which brings me to my last point:
5. Make hats or headdresses. It’s Mad Hatter Day after all. Even if it’s only a paper hat, but you could also follow the many instructions for more fancy pieces. One of my favourites is the infamous Tim Burton’s Mad Hatter top hat from Threadbanger. My favourite German DIY community also has a wonderful tutorial for a tricorn. :)
   Small headpieces that look like tea cups or cake would be great, too, and why not go so far as to make a whole set of matching accessoires?

I hope you’ll enjoy your Mad Hatter day, and if you celebrate and make a blog post about it, leave me a comment with a link!

My Summer Holiday: Tame

My Summer Holiday: Inside

There were two worlds for me during my journey into the Bavarian Forest. The first one, this one, was inside the hotel borders, completely with three pools, four-star-cuisine and a beautiful lush park outside.

The automatic doors in our hotel were beautifully decorated. Come in!

My first sweet treat.

A part of the restaurant. The last table in the row is ours.

Food. And it was always magnificent.

... especially the spiced spaghetti with giant shrimps.

Another restaurant part, close to the lounge. The chandelier was lovely, just as if it had grown out of some fairy's ballroom.

I spent hours here in the lounge, reading.

Switching pools from indoor to outdoor and reverse was awesome.

I really took a liking in this pavillion.

Another pavillion, hidden between the birch trees.

Reception room for the spa part of our hotel.

The lights look like sparkling stars to me...

Whirlpool footbaths. What a great invention.

A fantastic spigot, I wish I had something like this here at home!

Salt crystal wall of one of the several saunas. My favourite was the herbal sauna, as it wasn't just as hot as the others.

My beloved swimming pool. I called it the "Sisi Pool" as the wall painting reminded me of the Austrian empress. The ceiling is designed to look like a summer's sky, too.

Beautiful old-fashioned couches.

My last dessert.

Sadly I didn’t take any pictures of the candle light dinner from our fist evening. I’d love to go there again…

10 Things I Love In January

1. My new MP3 player. Well, it was about time. The only thing lacking are decent headphones as the default ones and my ears don’t really get along well. I like the thougt that what I listen to is a secret to others.
2. 2011. A new year! As always a new opportunity, and I think that’s just a great prospect.
3. Thrift Stores. There’s one only ten minutes from our little white house in the green lane which is great for unique pieces. Sometimes you’ll get a nice story that comes with the clothing, too!
4. Silly Holidays. There are countless of them, celebrating childhood heroes (Winnie-the-Pooh Day, Jan. 18th), favourite food (World Pasta Day, Oct. 25th) or weird behaviour (Mad Hatter Day, June 10th & Oct. 6th). Reasons to party and celebrate are always great, so get a list of these dates (here or here) and pick your favourites. And don’t forget, tomorrow is Bubble Bath Day!
5. My new Pocket Calendar. Since I started to use these wonderful, practical things, they’ve grown pretty dear to me. I collect favourite words there, names, dates and birthdays and even those silly holidays mentioned in point 4. As for the design I’m very fond of paper blanks, they look so fine and old-fashioned.
6. Black Woolen Tights. You can’t imagine how difficult it is to get one, albeit they are warm and look great. Gladly, one of the green fashion shops here in Marburg has them, still.
7. Small Rubber Animals. I used to get them as a little treat from the dentist when I was a child and found them again in my favourite toy store in the upper town. They are great for several small DIY projects such as decorating electronic gadgets or hair pins. I love that small dragon, he sits on the speaker of my laptop as I’m typing.
8. The Dropkick Murphys. Although their music found me years ago I listen to them a lot at the moment. My current favourites are As One and The Auld Triangle.
9. Spaghetti Bolognese. THE ultimate student food, even more than pizza.As I write there’s a pot of sauce on the hearth and water for another pound of pasta boiling beside it. We always make more than necessary to have some left over for the next day, too. Plus, Bolognese sauce tastes even better when it stood to brew for a while.
10. The fact that you’re reading my blog. Yes, exactly. You. :)

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

Today will be full of work, but that’s okay. I’m not only sewing my first apron today but also making some steampunky combs and going through the copies for my assignment. Oh, and there’s a drawer (Irish tarraiceán) in the castle’s kitchen that has to be finally repaired (who says that a princess can’t be practical?).

Bambi and the Satyr are both abroad today and so it is a little bit quiet around here. Maybe I’ll bake some muffins later, to fill the emptiness… ;)

Surprisingly, baking has always been something to earth me. When I’m flying off the handle, baking helps. I thought about a new category for the blog, Teaparty, to write more about the castle kitchen and its production.

Lá Fhéile Pádraig sona dhuit,

Bonnie (today in green)

Preparing for… Saint Patrick’s Day

Well, Saint Patrick’s Day isn’t too big in Germany as… you know… he’s Irish after all. But as I’m at Celtic Studies and as we really want to fulfill the cliché, we celebrate it, kind of, anyway.

Kitschy and stereotype. Who cares? The photo's still great.

Declaredly, I think that pouring paint into a river and dyeing beer is not that… hell no! I’d rather go for these:

1. Wear green. Kind of a must. And if it is only a t-shirt or earrings, but really, you should take a green marker with you to help those who don’t wear something green – make-up can count, too. *g*
2. Bake something green. Besides, you can eat green which would be healthy, too. Mookychick recommended shamrock-shaped biscuits with green frosting, but food colouring can be added to almost everything except chocolate cake (white chocolate doesn’t count).
3. Another thing for lunch could be coloured pasta in orange and green, together with normal one, to represent the Irish flag. Well, yes, I know that it is not orange but heraldic gold, but it looks like orange, go live with it, Leprechaun.
4. Go to your local Irish pub. Most larger cities have one, Marburg not excluded (not as I could be found there tomorrow, it’s way too small and crowded and there’s a band playing, too. I’d really like to hear my own thoughts, thank you very much). It was obvious, right?
5. Surprise, surprise!: Listen to Irish folk songs all day long. Yep, also newer compositions. Yep, also stuff from other countries than Ireland. You know, as long as there’s a fiddle in it… (goth, please don’t take me to serious!)
6. Watch weird to silly videos on Youtube related to Ireland. My favourites are this one from Family Guy, Final Fantasy XI (I admit that I like Riverdance, kind of) and most of all this one (4:57, last sketch) from Smack the Pony.
7. Look Irish. Well, there’s something in for nearly everyone if you go through this article from 1995.