baste-and-bleach.

As soon as I reach for my running shoes, it starts to rain. Not a gentle drizzle, noo... it's pelting down, as if the rain gods are laughing at my attempts to establish a proper exercise regime.
I sigh, withdraw my hand and stare at through window. A half-hearted thought crosses my mind to just brave the weather, and go for it. But my inner Shia laBoeuf  ("just do it!") loses it to my desire to stay warm and dry inside; with a cup of tea and my laptop, writing you all this post.

Baste and dye: the tale of a lost shirt

Once upon a time, a plain green shirt hung on a clothesline in a quiet backyard. It was a cold and windy winterday and there was nobody in sight. The shirt dangled in the wind. But the wind became stronger and stronger, pulling the shirt back and forth until... it finally managed to pull the shirt from the clothesline. It went flying through the air, until it finally landed on top of a pile of wood in the back of the yard. 

There it lie, unseen. days went by...Until, one day the owner of the shirt walked through the garden and saw a glimpse of faded green on top of the pile of wood. She climbed on top of it to investigate it and saw the shirt, faded by sun and wind. She exclaimed " oh my shirt! thou art faded!"

Experiments. Painting on plastic: the ugly duckling brush

We all have those items in our home that are useful, but not specifically pretty. In my case a hot-pink plastic brush. It originates from my days as a student, and I think my mum bought it for me, since I can't imagine having bought something this pink for myself (sorry mum!) It once matched an equally hot-pink plastic dustpan, which has now magically disappeared. I still use it quite a lot. Unfortunately, I really have outgrown hot pink, but since I hate throwing away something that still works perfectly fine, I figured: Why not paint it?

In general plastic is not a material that easily allows you to paint it. The surface doesn't absorb the paint, thus the paint stays as a layer on top of it, which usually ends in a misery of scratching, flaking and horrors alike. But with some experimenting I've done over the past years (read: failing a lot of times), I learned that it can be done if you consider several guidelines.

For those of you who are now wondering: why spend so much energy a brush that costs only €1? You are right. But it was an experiment to see how easily you can paint on plastic items. And since I only used materials that I had leftover from painting the house, so it didn't cost me a thing. If you do buy a whole can of paint for a brush, I suggest you paint a frickin' masterpiece on it to make it worthwhile. Got something ugly that you want to paint? Here we go!

experiments: DIY liquor recipes.

Hey! Guess what? Yesterday Joost and I got united in a registered partnership! Which means in Dutch law that we kind of got married, but then without the "fluff" of marriage ( I know, you can of course also do marriage without fluff, but we saved that option, just in case we need some fluff in our future life). And it was great! Even though the official procedure took less time than ordering a big mac in the drive-through lane, it is a reason for celebration and therefore this post is -again- an alcoholic post!

Remember that I made the pumpkin spiced liquor? Well, after that recipe, Joost and I invented some new ones, simply by tossing coffee beans, spices, candy and all kinds of things into gin, and see what would come out of it. And now, in the light of celebrating our recent bond, we bravely volunteered and tasted a whole bunch of different recipes. Below the recipes and their results!