.

I'd rather not write this, but I think I should. Writing blogs should not only involve the good moments, it should involve the bad ones too.

recycle week day 2: the newspaper basket (crafting with cats gone wrong)

What do newspapers and green cats have to do with each other?

Very little.

Well, that is unless your cat happens to be a MASSIVE idiot named Broen, who couldn't withstand a basket if his life depended on it. Yep, as you may have guessed by now, things are about to go tits up!

But before we get there, we have a recycling-craft to finish. And the material of today is...

- drumroll -

newspapers!

Broen the cat plants a veggie garden

Hi There!

You must be wondering "Why am I reading a blog written by a cat today?" Well, the food-dispenser lady (let's just call her mum) has been very busy last week with publishing her first academic paper. But of course I know that the readers of her blog are much more important than those dusty scientists, so being a good cat like I am, I volunteered to help her with making a blog today!

Giveaway Tuesday... the results!

Hi there!

First of all, thank you all for responding and e-mailing me, I love reading your responses to my blog!

Today I'll choose the 3 winners of the giveaway!
For a few days, it looked as if my poor family would be the only ones receiving my postcards, but after this weekend, they got quite a bit of competition :)

So let's start with it!
Broen, will you be my sparkling assistant?

"Sure thing!!"

I like to keep things old-fashioned, so I wrote all your names on pieces of paper and tossed them in a bowl.

And the winners are.... (drumroll...)

a hand-printed skirt

A while ago, I found a second hand grey skirt that was still in awesome condition. By the look of it, it probably had once belonged to a secretary. A quite boring secretary, that is. But since I have a bit of a soft spot for boring skirts (upcycling is so much easier when something is ugly in the first place!), I took it home with me.

There I decided to give it a little print. There are many techniques of doing so. You can buy stamps, or cut them out of some vinyl or a potato ( yes you've done that in pre-school, I guarantee it) 

Since I didn't feel like cutting stamps out of a potato, I decided to try it in another way: by cutting a form out of a chammy.

The world in close-up

Sometimes making something beautiful just means discovering it: looking different at your surrounding and suddenly seeing the beauty of it. This is why (and when) I love photography: because it is able to capture the beauty of things that are not trying to be beautiful. They just are. 

In this post some of my own discoveries of beauty. I hope you enjoy!

Autun, France

Funasdalen, Sweden

IKEA HACK: Geometrical cat basket made from a lamp shade

materials:
- a JOXTURP lampshade from Ikea (€1,99)
- Glue ( I used all-purpose glue)
- tape ( I used a strongish kind of masking tape)
- if your cat is very fat: an extra lampshade or a piece of carton to cut an extra panel from.

optional materials:
- some thick, non fraying fabric to clad the inside with + sewing equipment
- paint/sharpies/pencils for decoration

level: easy

If there is anything in the world that our cat, Broen, loves more in the world than sleeping and bullying our other cats, it's boxes. He doesn't just like boxes, he LOVES them. Most ardently.

A word of welcome.

Welcome to this blog!

As a kid, there were two things that I loved to do more than anything in the world: making things and going on adventures.

But as I grew older, I sort of got infected with adulthood. So, my days of school and adventures became days of work and household chores. And my favorite things to do in the world became ( at least, so it seemed...) Sleeping, nagging about work, looking on the internet at houses I couldn't afford anyway.. you know the sort of thing. Until, one day I was fed up with it. This kind of adulting, I decided, really sucked. I didn't want to spend my entire evenings watching tv or doing chores.

I wanted to make things again. And I wanted to see the world again as I did as a child: as a place that has all the potential to become an adventure.

This blog contains my stories of making things. To hopefully inspire you to start making things, or just so you can laugh at my efforts :)

But hey! Before I start I should of course introduce you to the main characters of this blog!

Joking aside, I sincerely hope you will enjoy this blog. Feel free to comment, contact or repost!

-Marije