l i k e . a . b i g . o l d . s u n . i n . t h e . s k y

Pics of a very low balloon trip, that me, the Glenn and Jocke and several other picnic:ers bore witness to last Tuesday. The basket nearly touched the tree tops - or at least that's how it seemed. I felt for the balloon driver - balloon man? commander? captain? - as he or she with several bursts of shhhhhhhhhhhh shhhhhhhhh tried to make the balloon ascend. In the direction they were going lies a tower block, and it seemed uncertain if they would actually make it. (They must have.)

Two more days to go til marriage...! Our flat looks like "come and help me - but no one came" (it's a good expression), our minds are clearly somewhere else. Saturday, they say it will rain. Thunder I'll abide but please, no tediousness at my wedding.

p i c n i c . f o r . t w o

"A greeting/gift from *address* and the garbage room. Use it with <3."

A beautiful gift I got at my hen party - I never mentioned Monday's event by title until now, but maybe you already guessed - a picnic basket from a friend and her garbage room. That might sound... unsound, but this is the garbage room of dreams. Another friend who lived there sometime ago had more or less furnished her whole flat with good stuff from there, and I used to lust for it... 

I've always wanted a wicker picnic basket of my own but rationalized it away as "unnecessary". This one is a perfect pre-wedding gift since it contains a set for two. Thank you Maya! And thanks dear friends for coming to my hen fest!

On another note - I have lots of long winding posts I want to share with you but there's no time for that during my wedding week. My posts will be short and sweet with photos I don't need to edit or combine. And there will be no time for that blog update I mentioned before, until after my mini honeymoon...

s t u p i d . h a p p y . f a c e

This is how much fun yesterday was (see my mysterious invitation). This is me today - a stupid happy face full of coffee.

This is how confused I am over near troubles, decisions, developments - the wedding NOT included, I have no cold feet.

The "finger mouth" didn't look good - I'm confused, not grumpy. The Muji skeleton will now represent confusion.
 



See how great my troubles get along with my happiness. Best of friends. Hiya!
 
And this is how happy I am over things further away in the future, the grand schemes, the results, and all the love.

There will be a post on my lovely yesterday, but not today - it will take lots of photos, lots of writing, and I have no time for that today. Love love love.

i t ' s . i n . m y . h a n d s

Yesterday I cut my beloved a fake leather boombox keyring for fun...

...and skulls out of fake leather and paper, inspired by a project I once upon a time started. It lingers, lovelike.

Cutting skulls watching The Seventh Seal made me feel all grim and gothy. (Hello smiley cup!)

This morning I'll continue watching The Seventh Seal while mending my last century wedding blouse. It's buttonless!

I also have a mysterious invitation for a "suitability test" at 14.55. I have hopes of what this might mean, but I don't know.

At the end of this week the Glenn and I have a date to get married.

It's a sentence I write so freely, then stop at when I read it.

We joke about what poor wedding planners we are (we honestly have no clue what we're doing) and that we should set up shop as: "Surprise Wedding Planners - not even the planners themselves know what happens!" A great business plan, isn't it?

We have no clothes, the Glenn no ID card (it was lost in Berlin), no photographer and no reservations for our mini honeymoon. Other than that we're fine... Who knew planning a wedding without friends or family could be this tricky? We're not worried, more like... mildly concerned. We're both so sure it will happen - somehow.

I'll keep you posted.

i n . t h e . y o u t h . p r i s o n . o f . n e u k ö l l n

I couldn't see anyone in the tower, but felt watched. Was there perhaps someone in there?

A great net, stretching over this yard and the next, heightened the sensation of being imprisoned, separated from the sky.

A constant electronic jam was provided by musicians from Native Instruments.

Layers and layers of bars separated the floors. You couldn't move freely and you couldn't jump to make an end.

The art exhibition stretched through two floors. The corridors led to tiny naked cells, all overlooking the tower.

See? Alone you must never be alone. (I love this drawing!)

One cell contained tiny models making big shadows.

I'm sorry but I didn't find the names of the artists. If you know, please tell me at: ella@skerries.se. Thanks!

While we were in Berlin it so happened that we visited a former youth prison, part of the 48h Neukölln Festival. We took a long winding walk through cobblestone, tree and house together with Anja and her little daughter Hermine, who was inexplicably in love with great street doors. She would go up close and touch them with her little hands, not wanting to leave.
  The prison was set just by S-bahn Raathaus Neukölln, town hall next to prison. I wasn't sure what to expect. The music and art exhibition seemed bleak compared to the prison. I had the sensation of lives passing through, of a distant despair set in the walls - imagination, location or common sense? I was wondering if they had perhaps - if they always do - built the prison so that you would yourself become an embodiment of incarceration. Does it sound right?
  Afterward Anja told me she had read that this prison was also a place for reprogramming lesbians and "sexual deviants" (troublesome expression). I can't imagine what it would be like staying locked up in there, so close and yet distant from the city, like a tiny Russian doll inside the prison doll inside the city doll, especially as a child.

s a y . i t . i n . g e r m a n

Now you know how I'll spend the day - Happy Midsummer!

t h e . d a y s . b e f o r e . m i d s u m m e r

A Berlin photo booth photo. The one of four where I look the least like an East German prison ward. Look - new glasses!

Like a child making presents for a parent I drew the Glenn a drawing for his birthday...

...and embroidered him a t-shirt. "Trouble is my middle name." I'm your trouble more likely, baby.

I'm making plans for my blog, it's time to change things up - prettier, cleaner, bigger, more personal. It's funny my ambition is triggered when both digital camera and computer "is singing the last verse". I was quite dissatisfied with yesterday's iPhonography (I don't even have the good iPhone camera!), but too tired to do something about it. Let's just move into the future. The changes will come... but not today, I can't, I'm busy.

g o i n g - g o n e

Me, later today - hello!

Dear friends, I'm going on holiday to celebrate Glenn's birthday, back to our favourite city and second home - and maybe, hopefully future home - Berlin. We'll see friends, walk the streets, eat Vietnamese and Korean, frequent cosy little bars and listen to Hanno Hinkelbein at Killekill's three year's party at Suicide Circus. I don't think there will be much if any blogging, I'll be back next week.

Here are four of my favourite posts from past trips, favourites mostly because of the photos:

Revisitation
Silly girl
In reverse
Signs of...

Mmmm, Berlin...

THINK PINK!

"Think pink! Red is dead, blue is through, green is obscene, brown is taboo..." 

To celebrate my childhood habit of watching TV matinée films - everything from svensk pilsner film (i vilken film sade de mitt favoritcitat på klingande stockholmska: "Keeerleken er en keeer lek"?) to The Scarlet Pimpernel to Danny Kaye to Look back in anger (that was bracing in comparison) - I watched Funny Face yesterday . 

These titles somehow makes me miss Midge Wood's flat in Vertigo, one of my favourite movie flats. Did you realize Barbara Bel Geddes later went on to play Miss Ellie in Dallas? 

  Lisa told me.

b l a c k . a n d . w h i t e . d r e a m i n g

Yesterday was very much a Monday as bad as Mondays can go, the recent nights is when I make my plans and draw my designs in my head, the little moments in between events is when I jot my ideas down combining squiggle with doodle, and today is a day when I want to lose myself in photos of Fred Astaire and endless black and white patterns but realize that I actually have Things To Do.

What about you, how are you?

o h . y o u . p r e t t y . d i n o s a u r s

Link 1 and link 2.

Link.

Link.

Link.

I keep returning to my Edward Gorey inspired peacocks that I made in 2009. I have a dream of adding a magnificent tail to the front peacock (I've made good feet for both of them!), but so far all my efforts to do so have been in vain. I've started playing with the idea that these birds are better off without a tail, that it's the idea of the tail that's the trick. Still I want to make one.

Have a lovely weekend, readers and bloggers! I'm hoping for more sun baked days in the grass, perhaps an outing. My longing for unplanned spontaneity clashes with my hopes for making new tracks and expanding our web shop. We have more designers lined up, waiting to make an entrance. But all in good time. Good things you do for yourself should never become boring chores.

PS. I've added a highlights feature in the left column, to keep our triumphs more... well, highlighted.