It began with a request from my husband...

He asked me to purchase him a new eyeglass case because his old one was falling apart.

So I went to the store, and the one identical to his old one was going to cost more than half the price of his eyeglasses...

No way, José, I said to myself, intent on making him a handmade LaTouchables eyeglass case...

...no, not this one. This is definitely a women's eyeglass case, for reading glasses. Just look at the combination that eats my heart out--handwoven silk with a Bedouin appliqué...sigh!

(going into the shop, now)

It's so byzantine, soooo... 'I don't know what, but the Queen of Alhambra would have loved it!'

That is Normandy lace, and an antique multi-metal button from more than a hundred years ago.

Got this book yesterday...the brilliant Paul Bowles...

Sooo, this is a guy's eyeglass case.

Lambskin...soft...I think a woman would love it, too.

I know my husband does.

Lined in hand-dyed waxed Togo batik cotton. You really can't see it, but those glasses slide in and out like silk. I'll make one for the shop, too, as I have a matching button.

I Heart Yael

I've been wanting to show off my new bag for a while now...no, I didn't make it--the beautiful Yael did! Yael stole my heart a long time ago...first, her work has always astonished me with it's complex design, texture, beauty, and execution. You can view her Bedouin bags here. If you go to her blog, you might miss the sub-headings in discreet grey beneath the beautiful white blossum at the head of her page. Do click on them for a view of her other bags, for if Yael is anything, she's a multi-talent.

One of the reasons I go to Yael's page, every time I turn the computer on, (big cup of coffee in hand) is that I love to wander where she has been. The white flower at the head of her blog is not an accident, it signifies a deep love of nature and of history. We are introduced to her home, Israel, it's surrounding environment, multi-cultural influences, and to all that moves her--craft, art, ideas, family and friends, and we are treated with the more-than-beautiful photos taken by her husband Uri, whose close-ups of wild flowers and panoramas of historical sites will take you there!

I heart Yael, and I carry her bag!

Walk in the Woods

...enjoying the first warm sunrays here.

I use only lavender harvested by young naked males in the light of a full moon...

Now that it has been three years that I've had a blog, I take a moment to examine what it's all about.

Not only do I have an etsy store I show off here, (not that I have anything to show off, but hey...that's me) but I also include small trivial things in my life--what I'm cooking, a little walk I go on, little things I'm working on, big and small, books I like, and so forth. One thing feeds the other. Compared to many other bloggers, I don't pour my heart out, nor lay my soul bare. I left that when I left university art school 26 years ago. And I'm rather quiet and reserved, besides that, though I love to laugh and make strange jokes...

Sometimes it's enough just to know that someone somewhere (it could be anyone of you) checks up on me on occasion--that, and it's part of what I love doing, inventing something new out of bits and pieces...making a genre out of real-life things. I know--there are so many brilliant style-blogs out there, so many much-better bloggers than I.

That's okay.

Looking back and forward to what I want from my blog, it would be a little like this: homemade, from the heart, feel good and quirky.

And I thank you all for checking in, from the bottom of my heart. You never have to write a thing--only if it strikes you.

And maybe, just maybe, intelligence from another galaxy will come across this and think, 'Cool little studio between the woods.'

:-)

Charlotte makes her debut in all her potato-sack-bag glory...

Another potato sack bag, and the second, no less beautiful than her sister, Belle de Fontenay.

Cut from the same cloth, but different, nonetheless...as in the Bronte sisters being different.

What really makes her beautiful, is when she...

...lets her hair down.


I love potatos...and this is what I decided to have for lunch--

...stir-fried with onion and fennel bulb. And a pink lady apple.

And fresh basil.

Bon appetit!

Time

Yael, of PazzaPazza, has challenged us here on the blogosphere, friends and acquaintances, to do a blogpost on ‘Time’. Well, that is one huge topic, and I am no expert. After re-reading her challenge, and these words (thoughts, opinions, philosophies, and perceptions about time, and our personal relation to it) I am convinced I can put in my two-cents worth. I will try to keep it impressionistic and short and I will try not to moralize or gloat …so here goes.

We will begin with some interesting trivia—did you know that the gold-medalists of time are percussionists? Yes, scientific studies have shown that percussionists of all persuasions keep the very best time, within nanoseconds of exact time.

Fact two, smaller people have a better grasp of time. Yes, somehow it has to do with the nerve connections between the brain and the appendages being of shorter distance.

I’m small—yayyyyyyyyy!!!! (gloating)

Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in.
Henry David Thoreau

We must use time wisely and forever realize that the time is always ripe to do right.
Nelson Mandela

What then is time? If no one asks me, I know what it is. If I wish to explain it to him who asks, I do not know.
Saint Augustine

Actually, time is a slippery thing, as I view it. A young child was asked to define the dead. He answered, ‘The dead are those people who die before we do.’ That makes me feel better, because I always felt that I was the only mortal being around. (social conditioning)

'People of the Western world, ...tend to think of time as something fixed in nature, something around us and from which we cannot escape, an ever-present part of the environment, just like the air we breathe. That it might be experienced in any other way seems unnatural and strange, a feeling which is rarely modified even when we begin to discover how really differently it is handled by some other people.' (Taken from The Silent Language, by Edward T. Hall, a really excellent read, especially for the layman--me.)

In our society, western civilization, we are taught to believe that we can control time, and by controlling time are able to determine our fates. Because it is in the fiber of our education, from birth on, we believe it. How outdated, moralistic, and self-defeating this can be is witnessed in the omnipresent self-denial and mutilation of our bodies (in the form of the worshipping of eternal youth), and the destruction of our environment (because we are neither tuned in to the time ‘now’, nor the 'far future' and the consequenses of our present behavior on the future generations). (moralizing)

Which brings me to this point: this is how you can get something out of time, how you can be ‘in the time’, how you might engage time…and experience what some call ‘flow’, or an ‘epiphany’, or ‘a good time’, or ‘time well-spent’.

This is it: go fishing. NB, ‘go fishing’ is meant in the metaphorical sense.

And to close this little chapter on time, some suggested reading about a man who took the ultimate trip in time, and harnessed it (time), against all odds:

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, by Jean-Dominique Bauby

The film is also excellent, directed by Julian Schnabel

Sunday Musings...

...back in the kitchen, stretching a soup, when I observed the part of last week's newspaper I was using to wrap the peels in was grabbing my attention again. How many times have I had to fish the peels out of the trash because I had to get a name or a bit more information...

...countless times.

Photos by Michael Najjar.


This morning I made this pocket...

...this is the strap that will go onto the bag that will carry this pocket that will carry someone's most precious possessions...

...opposite this double-slip pocket with a place for a pen...

...and this is the material that will become the bag that I will list tomorrow night after I get a decent photo, after I cut the material and sew the bag...but...

...the parts have been prepared for assembling, after being sewn, after being laundered, dried, and cut, after being sourced, one bit after the other--some materials sourced more than a year ago, stored in my studio and memory till I knew they were there at the right moment, ready to make their debut.

You know, I hope it turns out, I really do.

Forgive me, I'm listening to the blues :-) B.B. King, he's so good!