Blooms

The sun is streaming through the windows this evening (revealing how desperately they need to be washed) and the forecast is for a few more sunny days this week, which is great news.  I think I saw one brave little pea shoot poking up in the vegetable garden this afternoon, but I'm really itching to get more seeds in the ground.

It's such a lovely time to walk around our neighbourhood.  Gardens are bursting with tulips, magnolia trees are erupting in pink and white, and the lilac trees are covered in buds - it won't be long now until that wonderful smell perfumes the air.  Looking at all these paintings of flowers makes me with that I had  more roses, but our yard is already packed pretty tight.  We have lots of shrubby roses and some little pink roses, but none of those big, bold, fragrant ones.  That's the upside when something dies; we get to replace it!

Spring: Meadow Sweet

The long, unplanned hiatus was due to some glitch with the blog, not my lack of inspiration.  It's actually a pretty beautiful season, and everything is starting to look good to me.  Flowers, dresses, cute shoes; finally the winter is behind us.  Okay, it kind of snowed a few days ago, but it was quickly forgotten.  

I love this editorial from Harper's Bazaar UK, featuring Sophie Hirschfelder.  It was done as part of a collaborations with the V&A Museum, but I haven't been able to find details anywhere about the sources of the illustrations.

In other news, I had a fantastic long Easter weekend with my parents, though it seems long ago, the garden has it's first few seeds, I went bowling, hung out with babies, got a massage, bought a few things at the thrift store, great some great books, and have generally been getting excited about the return of the sun!

Neckline details

As anyone who sews knows, the collar is one of the fussier components of sewing a shirt.  For that reason, when I make a blouse I often design a super simple neckline for it: sheer laziness.  I keep coming across images with interesting collars though, and it's making me think I should up my game once in a while.  Contrasting?  Lace?  Tie?  Really, for a few minutes more work, I think I'd be pretty happy with the outcome.  I've got so much fabric stashed away at work...

Get Myself Together

I'm always desperate for new music for the gym.  A good song can boost my mood, especially doing cardio.  I'm not a great runner, but last weekend I went for a run in the sun and when this Robyn song came on I started dance-running like a maniac.  It was pretty funny, especially for the families filing into the church I was running past!

Ray of Light

This skirt looks almost like wide pants in these pictures!  It has a seam down the centre front...  Yesterday we had another glimpse of spring, so I figured it was time for it to come out of the closet.  I got it in September, and while I'm not afraid to break pretty much all fashion "rules", it just didn't feel right to wear it in the winter.  My new, shortest ever haircut.  I love it.  It's a little bit Joan of Arc, in my mind...

House Plants

The sunny weather this weekend got my green thumb itching, so I spent a few hours outside cleaning up the winter debris, but it's still a little early for much more than that, which forced me to turn my attention indoors. I'm pretty bad at house plants.  Outside, I can get good results.  Inside, not so much.  I'm neglectful, lazy, and uninformed.  I've been slowly killing a jade plant for about seven years, I have something else that is mostly brown leaves, I water rarely and almost never fertilize. 

But I can do better!  I will do better!  Karl bought me a beautiful pink cyclamen for Valentines, and I got a pretty pot for it, and I did a little shopping on Sunday - nothing I love to buy more than dirt!  I even got a little shelf to try to get my new friends as much sunlight as possible.  So far, so good.  Nothing has died yet.  I'll post some pictures when there's enough light to take a couple of shots.  Below are my inspiration plants - my motivation to take care of my new additions!

Bo Don in Bazaar Turkey

There's something so pretty about these shots - soft and sweet and easy.  Kind of springy.  This in between season - sunny one day, cold and rainy the next - is starting to bug me.  I'm ready for the energy of spring, ready to shed some layers and leave the house without my umbrella.  I got my spring haircut on the weekend too; it's the shortest I've ever had it, and it feels great!

flat sandals

The weather here is still pretty un-springy, but that hasn't stopped me from thinking about my spring shopping needs.  The only thing I'm a little concerned about finding is new sandals.  In the spirit of my newish goal of really wearing shoes out before I replace them, I actually had to throw out two pairs of sandals at the end of last summer.  They were worn to the point of cracked soles and broken straps; beyond repair.  So now all I have is one pair of pretty casual, kind of scuffed up sandals, which will do in a pinch, but aren't quite nice enough for work.  I really need something comfortable enough to wear all day, and versatile enough to wear with everything.  I'm quite cautious about styles that might cause blisters, so I think I'll try to avoid the thong style, which really limits me, as those seem to be the most popular this spring.  I made this little Polyvore collage of some nice options, but they are pretty much all out of my price range, which is "cheap", so I'll mostly be combing the thrift store, as usual.

Me again!

It's been months since I've posted a picture of myself on here, but it's not a sudden case of camera shyness, just a lack of daylight.  Luckily the sun was still out when I got home from work, so I took a few quick pictures.  I wanted to show off the awesome collar necklace my friend brought me from Berlin.  It's heavily beaded with different sizes of jet beads and I got lots of compliments at work today!

I keep reaching for this grey cut-out top.  It's tee-shirt comfy with just a little extra bit of style.

Made myself this new top at work today, and I love the colour combination!  The fabrics are three different silk pieces, just scraps that I've hung on to - not enough for a full garment, but with some creative mix and matching, I'm happy.

Opening Ceremony Lookbook

I thought that this lookbook for Opening Ceremony, featuring lots of Chloe Sevignys, was pretty cute, though I don't like the clothes.  What's cute about it?  It totally reminds me of old sewing pattern illustrations: the campy poses, multiple girls that look almost the same.

The real thing is better though, and I prefer the clothes.  That layout and illustration style would be great for a lookbook, wouldn't it?  There's a reason I have a big drawer full of old patterns that I'll probably never use.

Netsuke

There are a couple of reasons that I love getting books as gifts.  For one thing, I almost never buy books, so it's really nice to actually own a book, which means I can lend it, add it to the book shelf, and re-read it at my leisure.  The second reason is that it's a great way to get exposed to books that just aren't on my radar.  I tend to keep going back to authors that I love, but sometimes it's hard for me to just grab something I've never heard of at the library to read.

For Christmas, my mom gave me a book called The Hare With Amber Eyes, by Edmund de Waal.  It's the story of the authors family, following a collection of netsuke as they are passed from one generation to the next, and moved across three continents.  I had never heard of netsuke before: they are tiny Japanese carvings, originally purely functional, which were used like toggles to fasten pouches hanging from men's belts.  They evolved into finely carved works of art, which were eventually collected by Europeans in the early 1900's.

The book is fantastic.  I'd highly recommend it to anyone interested in history or art; it's really well written and informative and original.  I have seen an advertisement for an illustrated edition since I read the book and that makes sense; there are wonderful descriptions of the netsuke, which were often animals or peasants, but I really wanted to see all of the hundreds in the collection.  I've included pictures of a few of my favorites below, but you can see more of them at the authors website, as well as learn more about the book.

http://www.edmunddewaal.com