Celebrating the Dark

At last the Solstice! In a few days the nights will be shorter, and the light will start to grow. How glad I am. For now I shall revel in the darkness of the longest night and the pause between here and the return of light.

Heaving a sigh of relief, for it feels like the journey to this point has been a long one, I will be spending the next two weeks 'hibernating'. Such bliss. A pause before the next growth cycle, a time for renewal, regeneration, rebirth, recuperation. A space to just 'be' and a time to spend relaxing amidst family, friends, community.

Not everything is done yet, there are still gifts to create and deliver, but I have stayed away from the secular high street frenzy that is Christmas and will continue to do so.

Tonight our tree was decorated and lit, marking the start of seasonal festivities in the House of Marmalade.

Happy Solstice everybody!

Another Day in the Treasure Trove

I've done another shift at Antiques on High in Oxford. My shelf (above) was all but bare! Very exciting to think that people have been buying my handmade bits and bobs, and even more exciting that all the corset kits I had there, had gone! I came away with a fistfull of little brown envelopes full of cash!

The usual range of vintage loveliness was on sale, including these handbags from the 40's. I am particularly in love with the grey barrell shaped bag. The green raffia bag is detachable from it's frame - presumably in it's day, it came with several different shades of raffia bag, so that you could co-ordinate your outfit accordingly!

The poison bottles - of which there are many - caught my eye. So intriguing don't you think? Just like Alice in Wonderland ..

These earrings from the 30's and 40's are to die for! Particularly the sparkly dangly ones.

When I was a little girl, I read all of the Famous Five books, and the Mallory Towers books, and the Naughtiest Girl, Nancy Drew etc., Total escapism. I loved Enid Blyton.

I had my very own "Antiques Roadshow" moment when I showed this comb to one of the resident 'experts'. I bought it years and years ago - perhaps as many as 15 - for not very much money (because I didn't have any in those days!). I was told that because of the Art Nouveau metal work, it's worth quite a lot of money! Not enough to pay my mortgage though!

I never realised that accordions are so pretty. So many rhinestones! And I'm a sucker for those. Shame they're not small enough to wear!

I'm Back!

I worked 86 hours last week in my 'day job'. That's a month and a half's worth of 'normal'. I'm utterly exhausted as from Monday to Thursday my days started at 6am and finished somewhere around 9pm. Friday lunchtime was the end, and since then I've been firmly plonked on the sofa while my left ear, following the example of my right ear a few weeks ago, has decided to become a cauliflour. Boo hoo. I can't bear to be idle though, so I thought that my weekend of sloth would be the perfect opportunity to learn a few more photoshop skills, and with that in mind, I decided to make Jimmy a little something for his stocking ....

This picture was taken back in August during the Festival of Trees at Westonbirt Arboretum. It was a lovely day out.

I'm quite pleased with my first clumsy attempt at photomanipulation ... I hope Jimmy likes it.

Pooped!

Thankyou everyone for such lovely and kind comments on my last post! I am quite overwhelmed!! Thankyou Thankyou Thankyou!

I have just popped in very quickly to say thankyou (did I say that already?) ... I left the house at 06.45 this morning, and got back home at 7.45pm ... today is just the first day of the rest of a loooooooooooooooong week (which I am not especially looking forward to!). Tomorrow, estimated arrival home after work is around 9pm and so it goes on for the rest of the week.

Over the weekend, I shall mostly be sleeping, and then i'll be back next week with another dress to show you! (made a while ago).

I'm hoping the week goes super quick! But until then .. TTFN! And thankyou so much again.