Heute ha-ha-habe ich Geburtstag...

Ok, my birthday is not exactly today (25th September, please keep that in mind for next year ;-) ). But since I'm still celebrating, I dedicate this post to myself and make it a little guessing game for you, dear visitors. The photos I took of my birthday presents look somewhat cryptic, so your job is to guess what they are... some are easy, some not as much. And sorry: no hints!

My favourite, both for packaging and for contents:


I asked for that one:


These were a surprise:



This one I gave to myself:


And as a bonus: the gift wrap I picked:

I beg your pardon...

... I never promised you a rose garden. But if I did, it would be the "Rosengarten" (sorry, no English version of the site yet) in Bad Langensalza where you can find:

roses (obviously):






but also delphinium:

unmanned


and manned


and even lavender:


And that's a German rosegarden for you - no flower would dare to break ranks ;-)


An interesting technical aspect about these photos: I accidentally took my 100 mm macro lens only and left the tripod head at home, so I was limited to that focal length and tripodless shooting. I'm not showing you the misses but I still think I nevertheless managed quite a few hits :-).

All that glitters

Since I was a young child, my parents used to call me a magpie - attracted to everything shiny. It has not gotten better with time, on the contrary, now I'm making my own shiny things. As much jewellery as I make, there is only a number of pieces that I actually wear regularly and I would like to show you some now, all made from polymer clay and something.

Faux turquoise necklace with crystal beads:



Art sheet earrings on sterling silver earwires:


Faux jade necklace with supposedly my name in ancient Chinese characters:



Flower bracelet with renaissance pearls:


PS: I take custom orders, too :-).

The big world of small things

Part One: Blossoms

Fake or real?

This is another version of the famous Sky Disc, the tasty one ;-)

Minsk

Bring me something back please, something small ... and blue.

Y. did and what it was is this crest of Minsk, the Belorussian capital, here pinned to my blouse:

Fly Away

"I want to get away
I want to fly away"

This fly was shot reading an information board ;-)

Bambi

Came across this little glass bambi one cold winter day ;-)

Pending Flower

A bunch of pendants I made these last days:

These feet are made for walking...*

E. made his first really independent step on the last day I was visiting in Brussels, and I took this photo just a day or two before, him sitting in his pram:

* And here the soundtrack to the picture.

Currant Impulse

They don't taste very good, they have too many seeds for such small berries and they're a pain to pluck. But they look as if they were made of pure crystal - white currants:

Wildlife

.. on my kitchen table:

The electronic age

In cafés, you often see more or less original postcards to take away. The other day, I found a particularly interesting one and immediately knew to whom I was going to send it. So I did and I received a postcard - not an email - in response as well.

The year of the dragon

I know it's not this year but 2012 - so what:


Drawn on my little godchild.

Tea roses

Do they have the colour of tea? Do you put them on the tea table? Or do they smell like tea?

So many questions and so little time ;-)

Improving the world

R., my student, came in this morning with a little bouquet of cornflowers in a glass of water. "My contribution to improving the world", she said which referred to our conversation on Tuesday. "Beautiful", I said. "Perfect for decorating the classroom." "They are to take with you..." And so I did:

Monochrome Nature

Finally a really good insect picture and I noticed too late that my camera was still set on black and white (had been taken application photos before but that's a whole other story). Anyway, I ended up liking it, especially for its sharpness and so here it is:

Beautiful Things...

... come in small packages :-) This bracelet was given to me by my student at the end of the term. She remembered that I like little jewellery things, that I had admired a similar bracelet on her and noticed that blue is my favourite colour! Isn't that lovely?!


PS: Since I didn't get around to posting a picture yesterday, you get two for the price of one today ;-).

Celtic Babe

Celtic Babe is what I have been called on my first day on an Indian chat site when I told the inquirer where I am from. So to bring out my heritage, here a triskel-like celtic knot on my palm:

In full bloom

The poppy you have seen before was budding, now here is its buddy ( ;-) ) in full bloom: