Life and Death

I brought my pepper plants back to life today

Take that death!

Our Metronome

Ok, so not long after The Cat and The Metronome blog entry, my metronome stopped working. I had blamed myself for letting the cat play with it. Fast forward to present time, I recently reminded Phil that the metronome was broken and suggested getting a new one, but it turns out it just needed wound up again. Who knew? Certainly not me!

Today I feel like this...

But just a word of warning...stuffing quick handfulls of M&M's into your mouth might seem like the perfect therapy at the time but trust me, in 5 minutes time you will feel slightly sick...

My Little Red Teapot...

I'm sending you love and tea,
To warm your winter's day.
Think of me as you pour your cup
And all the good things we would say.
If we could be together now
Instead of miles apart,
We'd sip our teas and memories,
The sweet warmth fills the heart.
- Susan Young

I found my old Mickey Mouse tea pot in the back of the cupboard, and it has safely gotten me through the day!

With all the Lace Trimmings

While ambling lazily around town I re-discovered one of Belfast's treasures...In Shops. The dark and mystical mall that looks like it shut down years ago, but still seems to be thriving! I found a lovely little haberdashery shop and bought (quite a lot of) lace and ribbon

One of my previous entries described an attempt to make a bag or two (or three), so with the success of the bag and while my confidence was high I decided to add a lace trimming to it and some beads to make it a bit more interesting. Even if everyone else thinks it looks silly, I'm quite proud of it!

 

This last photo doesn't look pretty, but it shows the finished bag better!

Colour Association and Shirley Bassey

This is the kind of useless crap I tend to think about on a daily basis...why is  red seen as being a symbol of guilt, sin and anger? Why do we stop at a red light and go at a green light? Do all cultures see these colours the same way? But also - why is red also the colour of passion and love?

In China It carries a largely positive connotation, being associated with courage, loyalty, honor, success, fortune, fertility, happiness, passion, and summer.In Chinese cultural traditions, red is associated with weddings (where brides traditionally wear red dresses) and red paper is also frequently used to wrap gifts of money or other things.

In Japan it is associated with a heroic figure. In Central Africa it is seen as a symbol of life and health.

What about Green? 

It pains me to do this - but Wikipedia says:

In some cultures, green symbolizes hope and growth, while in others, it is associated with death, sickness, envy, or the devil. The most common associations, however, are found in its ties to nature. For example, Islam venerates the color, as it expects paradise to be full of lush greenery. Green is also associated with regeneration, fertility and rebirth for its connections to nature. 

It can represent love, jealously, envy and even witchcraft, devilry, decay toxicity and superstition. It denotes wealth through the American Dollar. In our culture it is a symbol of safety and life 


Also - has anyone ever watched Shirley Bassey singing? She seems to have a twitch at the end of every phase she sings....I wouldn't mind having a twitch like that if I could sing like that

At this rate I could open my own bag shop by the time my Thesis is done...

Every so often I take a notion to try something, like knitting, sewing, needlework etc. Most of the time I half make something and get irritated that I'm not any good and give up. I'm currently in the middle of knitting a triangle shawl, complete with fancy lacy holes in it. When I get bored of that, instead of casting off because I can't wait to see what it looks like, this time I got my sewing machine out.

I got it out to make some props for a stag do that my husband is organising, but while it was out and while I saw some unused materials lying about the house I took a notion in my coffee breaks and lunch break to make a bag out of some of Phils old jeans.

Turns out that bag looks crap, but the next two I made actually aren't that bad! I took the pattern from here and after making a few mistakes on the first one (and one or two on the second) I'm pretty happy with the results of the first two half decent things I've ever made on my sewing machine!

One uses some bright material I think I bought in Nigeria, lined with a flannelette old sheet. The other is made from two pillow cases!