Stay connected

Hi, y'all,

turbulent times… Saturday I cleaned my windows in sunshine and Sunday there was snow in the air… The weather is somehow under the weather - like we all right now. Nevertheless, I hope you and your loved ones are well.

Hubby and I are feeling fine but when I did the weekly grocery shopping on Friday morning (I had one day off to use my last remaining vacation day from 2019) there was security personnel at both supermarkets. That shocked me somehow. Do they assume chaotic situations which require security? I don't want to think that through, to be honest. As a consequence we ordered some seeds and soil from Amazon (thx, Jeff!) and will be growing tomatoes, zucchinis, strawberries, bell peppers and potatoes. That won't make us self-sufficient but it won't hurt either - even when I originally wanted a decorative garden, only. Anyway, in case we don't like the potatoes we will distill Vodka from them!

By the way, I've got a tipp for you: In case you don't know Bluprint (aka Craftsy) - this is a platform for online classes covering all kinds of DIY techniques. Normally you have to purchase one class or pay a monthly fee to be able to watch all classes. Right now (until 9 April) you can watch ALL classes FOR FREE. I already chose some classes for pen calligraphy, sewing jeans and bra construction and will watch them in the next few days.

And regarding "stay connected" I made some (neutral) greeting cards. If the occasion arises I can personalize them, but I have to admit that I currently avoid post offices if I can.

So, let's have a look!

The first card one is with sign posts which fits for male and female recipients. And when I know the event I can label the signs accordingly. 

The next one is adorned with hearts - multi-purpose 

e.g. valentine's day, anniversary or just to send some love. 

The same with this one - kind of farmhouse decor with the gingham

 and it is a bit smaller than the others. 

The main color of this one is silver, and the buntings are highlighted with pastels. Could use that as congrats for new babies but everything else is also possible.

Same principle, different colors - totally different card.

Now a larger card again - more for the girls, I guess. 

With this one I didn't think, just arranged the shapes and colors somewhat nicely. 

Landscape format, multi-purpose. 

With this one I thought the round shape might come in handy 

for a number (e.g. special birthday)

And the last card has five circles perfectly fitting for the word "happy" and in the box below you could add birthday, anniversary, international women's day etc. etc. etc. 

I attached all the elements with some glue which caused the paper to get wavy in some places, but I can't change that now. And in addition, the cards were a bit reluctant when I sewed them with my sewing machine and that I have to accept, too. It's part of the charm I would say.

Well then, I hope I could distract you and spread some positivity.

If you can, please stay home and stay safe!

Crisis Management

A friendly hello from my desk at home!

When Heinrich was a puppy, hubby put him on the desk and carried on working while Heinrich was napping. Sometimes that furry guy thinks he is still a puppy but unfortunately he doesn't fit on the desk any longer. At least if I have to work properly. But if I have to proofread something he's at least allowed on my lap. :-)

The current situation surely isn't that easy for a lot of you guys but for us there hasn't been much of a change, in fact. Hubby is in his basement all the time anyway and for me it is working from home 5 days a week instead of only 3. 

Apart from that we go for walkies with the dogs and are very pleased with the nice and sunny weather we are experiencing right now.  What else do we do? 

(Translation: Day 7 in quarantine - I knitted a scarf for hubby.)

We recently started doing sports together. We subscribed to Gabi Fastner's YouTube Channel - she presents various kinds of fitness videos and publishes almost daily. Three times a week we put on our sportswear, stream the video onto our TV, and as we don't have a coffee table we can easily do some sports in the living room without having to move the whole furniture. As far as we can tell, Gabi's doing a pretty good job and we feel already better, fitter and healthier. And I can tell you that: Hubby has some potential for improvement when it comes to aerobics and I am good at stretching, although I am old and chubby :-)

Other than that hubby plays World of Warcraft a lot and I am busy using up all my DIY-stock. I turned various t-shirts we don't like or don't wear into undies, my cardboard will be used as greeting cards step-by-step, and every scrap of fabric which can't be used for a pouch or something similar, will be cut into 3 cm-squares. As soon as I refilled my stock of fusible interfacing I can show you for what I use these squares. All fabric smaller than that comes into my bag of filling/stuffing material.

At the moment I am flooded with fabric sale ads which is understandable because all fabric fairs are cancelled right now and people (or their businesses respectively) have to survive. And I am very tempted to order one fabric or the other… But at the moment I have pretty bare walls in my office and I could do with some artwork there. I heard and watched a lot about pouring lately (a technique where you pour diluted acrylic paint on canvas) and I am wanting to try that for the longest time. And then I stumbled over my good old paint box ( I believe it is still the one I used in school). I have more than enough paper - so I think I could practice some watercolor painting...

And in case someone would like to have a list of my favorite YouTubers, just drop me a note. There are gazillions of awesome channels for sewing, baking, dancing and DIY...

Stay crazy but sane!!!

I only wanted a prescription...

Hi y'all,

I just had an interesting experience… I've got an underactive thyroid (Hashimoto's Thyroiditis) and thus have to take medication every morning. Packaging size is 100 pills, so each three months I have to pop in at my GP to get a new prescription. Official reason: My medical condition and thus my requirements could change and then the prescription has to be adapted accordingly. Interesting fact: Blood tests are done every two years (not every three months) and the medication hasn't been changed during the last 20 years. Theoretically there is no reason to deny me a larger package but there is no reasoning with the system...

Anyway, my pills will last until the end of this week, therefore, I have to care for replenishment. To be on the safe side I checked my GP's website yesterday and learned that they restricted their opening hours to mornings only and will see only emergency patients for the time being. But you can order prescriptions via answering machine one day and pick them up the next day. So I ordered, went to the GP and assumed, that would be a quick one - wham, bam, thank you Ma'm. Far from it!

Long queue in front of the medical practice, and not inside, but outside. Only the aforementioned emergencies were admitted into the practice. The idea is not so bad because you could easily keep your personal distance. At first queue from the right to register and then queue from the left to receive your prescription.

Again, good plan in my eyes, but it soon became obvious that there are fast and not so fast foxes in the forest. Or should I say "egoistic"? "I only need a prescription!" "We all do - there is the end of the waiting line." "But I already ordered by phone!" "We all did - there is the end of the waiting line." Then unbelieving amazement. But to be fair I have to say that most of the waiting did that patiently and with understanding. And if one of the "I only need and I already had" guys came too close, a simple "Would you please be so kind and keep some distance?" really helped.

After that, I had to wait again, this time in front of the pharmacy because they only admitted three clients at a time. Which is perfectly fine, I guess, and moreover, it's a beautiful and sunny day, and it felt quite comfortable to just stand there waiting in the sun. Could have been pouring with rain instead. What bothered me is that it took me a whole hour during which I should stay at my desk and work. But in this case I had no other option because the situation won't change in the next few days.

While waiting I could listen to some interesting conversations - you don't believe what deep philosophical discussions can arise in the Ruhr area about the spreading of the virus, the greed of mankind in general and in particular, and of course the cancelled soccer derby Schalke / Borussia while people are waiting for their turn :-)

Only bummer: Against my request to write a prescription for 200 pills I only received one for 100 pieces. I will face the whole situation again in three months. But now I know what to expect and in general I am grateful that my doctor's practice is still open and that I got my prescription as well as my medication.

Oh, and in addition to my laundry situation: I now know hubby's got 110 (!) t-shirts in his closet; if there is a zombie apocalypse and no toilet paper I can easily make wash cloths for a bunch of butts!

And another addition: Ernestine's mama liked the white embroidered bonnet so much that the little girl will wear it at her baptizing ceremony and mama is already looking for a matching christening gown. I am a little bit proud somehow...

Stay healthy and keep your distance!

Honey Bunny

Hi, y'all!

I hope you're doing well and you are only mildly affected by that damn' virus. Our company gave the order that we either have to work from home or use our leftover vacation days from last year. Business trips are to be deferred and if meetings have to take place they have to be approved by management and have to be very small. The capacity of our conference rooms was cut in half - a room where 10 people fit in is now open for five people only to ensure enough space between each meeting participant. My choir rehearsals will take place via skype and I am very curious to experience this. 

I didn't stash any toilet paper but as I used up all my stock in my pantry during fall I now refilled it with rice, pasta, lentils, flour, soy and so-on. We can easily wing two weeks, in worst case even more. At the moment we stay at home most of the time and apart from walkies with the dogs it will stay that way. Due to efficiency and time reasons I do my grocery shopping once a week and from the infection perspective I will keep it like this. After our offices in Essen and Dusseldorf were shut down because of one colleague who caught the virus, now one of our largest locations in Germany had to close due to four infected colleagues. In our business it is easily possible to work from home and I am very grateful for this, but my thoughts are with all the smaller therapy institutions, service providers and craftspeople who will be heavily affected by the pandemic. And I would like to say thank you from the bottom of my heart to all the people in the grocery stores who ensure that all hamsters constantly get their pasta (except the spelt type!) and of course to all people who make sure that our health system stays functioning!

But apart from all precautionary measures please let's talk about something nice. Since last weekend there is a hint of spring in the air! Sun came out and instantly you heard the lawnmowers humming :-) Hubby and me also did some work in the garden and once I got going I couldn't stop myself from making some Easter decorations.

I started with some Easter egg hangers made from some kind of salt dough, only with cornstarch and baking soda instead of flour and salt. Furthermore, you mix it when it's cold but you have to heat it afterwards. And after cooling down you can use it like cookie dough. You could dry it in the oven if you want, but if you've got some time to spare, you can easily let it dry by air.

It's said to look a bit like china/porcelain and when it's still wet, there is a slight resemblance and it looks very elegant. But you have to be careful to roll the dough not thinner than 5 mm because you risk tears in the material. I cut out Easter eggs and stamped them and cut a little hole to be able to hang them somewhere. After drying, several eggs had tears where the material got thin by stamping. I thought I could fix that by filling it with glue and applying a light, slightly iridescent nail polish to cover the glue. a) that didn't work pretty well and b) the nail polish looked tacky. Thus I threw a third of the eggs away. Unfortunately I coated all eggs with the nail polish to look the same and now they all looked the same kind of tacky. Therefore, I gave the remaining eggs another coat of paint but then I used some white acrylic. They are not very delicate and china-like and you have to be careful when sanding them because they chip easily. But I may like them in some forsythia branches for example. 

The planter of our entrance I adorned with the white wreath I already used Christmas two years ago and added some colorful plastic eggs:

Inside I recycled the white pompoms from my Winter twig arrangement and reused them as bunny butts:

Here for a whole bunny bunch:

And a colorful bunny to stick into a planting pot or so:

And last but not least a rather elegant buddy made of silver corrugated cardboard on a picture stand - him I like the most: 

I hope I could distract you a bit - stay safe and healthy!!!