necessity is the mother of invention (sounds better in russian: “gol na vidumki hitra”)

work in progress

checked yet another project off of my to do list

my partner modeling

i love textile jewelry

i badly wanted to buy a piece from this amazing etsy shop for my mom who is a real sucker for all things colorful (good thing she doesn’t know about this blog otherwise i’d be ruining the surprise) but totally couldn’t afford it.

so i had no choice but to make it myself. or that’s what i told myself deciding to skip cooking a proper dinner the other night…

other than that i returned to work from my maternity leave
and keep being inventive with various household devices on zero budget and environmental awareness in mind:

maybe looks weird but is quite efficient

 

on a random note: being introvert is exhausting, remind me not to go on these saturday picnics with 15 little children covered in mud running around with sharp branches….

 

take care

and happy christmas to you all

 

 

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dinosaurs and pantyliners

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

one of my most favourite things to do is making gifts.

this week i’ve occupied myself making a baby mobile for a pregnant friend

work in progress. and if you’r wondering it’s dinosaurs

 

then decided my baby needs some sort of mobile too and the quickest way to get one is by making this decoration…emm….thingy from a bunch of thin cardboard packaging boxes

 

 

it’s blurred cause i gave it a spin. it kept spinning for quite a long time afterwards actually and the background is blurred because…..because i know my photoshop and thought a radial blur effect would be appropriate…

 

the flower printed segment of the decoration thingy was once a packaging box of some cheapish pantyliners. not sure why i’m telling you this.
anyways take a good look at it cause i’m switching to reusable ones for good. yes, i’m making them myself.

bottom line: making this paper mobile wasn’t too time consuming, i got to use some of my paper junk and baby thinks it’s fascinating. maybe she thinks it’s a UFO.

dinosaurs and pantyliners……could be a good start to a story (no, it couldn’t)…   you see, when i was little, my dad being a poet and passionate about all things russian language, played a bunch of language related games with me, one of them was just take too things completely unrelated whatsoever and make up a story about them. not so easy as it seems 🙂

 

until next time.

go make some handmade gifts for your loved ones 😉

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a baby bib collection

hi

been quite busy lately with this special project:

a brand new human being!

other stuff i made lately

couple of old nighties and funny fabric scraps, some buttons or velcro…et voila! super easy and quick project to get the crafting germ out of your system. and with a very useful outcome!

i’ve been desperately needing a bathroom organiser but was not sure what’s the easiest way to make one until finely a friend gave me these shorts she didn’t want anymore. i replaced some pockets added an old hanger, some jeans fabric, a really old tea towel (back side and edges) and some thick wire (edges). actual sewing of the thing can be easily done in 40 mins. well, maybe less if u r a pro…

lots of fixing repurposing and upcycling going on around the flat these days

did u know that someone’s old dinner table can make a very convenient changing table?

old bookshelves – a storage unit for shoes? a fan rack – a laundry basket?

well, now u do!

p.s. more baby bibs, great use for smaller scraps i had laying around. and i really think they make a cute handmade gift.

i think i need an intervention… 🙂

other than sewing bibs not much going on right now. just dealing with poop and puke most of the day i’m sure you know how it is….. oh, no wait! in-laws are coming from Kiev to visit in 2  days…guess i’m in deep denial about that…

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war and peace

ahoy there

lots of stuff is going on right now

not sure how to put it all in words. not sure if i should at all bother…

well lets start and then see how it goes

the war, people. the war is real.  the air raid sirens are real. the mortar rockets are real.

my ever strengthening faith is real too. the faith in evil.

the ninth month of my pregnancy is real.  the kicks and pushes to my insides are real.

isn’t that weird…

 

part of my man’s colleagues are recruited so he works double shifts now.  which is hard.

even though, we slowly prep and organise our flat, and do a ton of crafting, fixing, organising progects. which is awesome.

as for the couple-quality-time – it’s long gone.  that’s why i so smartly use the air-raid-sirens-hiding-in-the-bathroom-time as an extra hugging-time.

(officially we should be going to the staircase or a basement every time but we don’t)

 

other things i’m up to:

cooking efforts still going strong. kinda.

redoing and upcycling some of our furniture, all found on the streets or been given by friends and coworkers still going strong.

drawing…. going pretty weak…   🙂

here’s another sketch for my dad’s poem about an old sailor, where he tells picturesque stories about his adventures to kids

 

 

 

 

p.s.   people had been really amasing and just won’t stop giving me all sorts of baby stuff. loads of it. i love it.  i love that it’s all second hand. love that it’s eco-friendly cause i don’t buy anything. love that it’s free. love that people i barely know care enough to do that. and i have so much of everything now i might start regretting i don’t have twins or something.  i was thinking when the time comes and i don’t need these things anymore i’d pass it to new emigrant single mothers or something.  russians are always so confused and smitten when someone is nice to them just because.  sad really.

p.p.s. latest film recommendation – ‘boyhood’.  haven’t seen it myself yet but looks like something extraordinary!

 

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festive flapjacks, beer bread and a sea dog (or a sea wolf) and a theatre backstage. a mishmash really.

my dad’s poem about a sea dog (wolf)

 

so my dad’s a poet. a children’s poet. writing in russian and living there.
he asked me to try to illustrate a couple of his older poems, both sea themed.

although my drawing skills r a bit rusty by now i started straight away. well, not straight away cause i did this before.

note: in russian a sea dog (an old experienced sailor) is called a sea wolf, so this whole poem is based on a play between the words wolf (animal) vs. a sea wolf (person)

and the poem goes like this:

i’ve heard lots of stories

but this one is weirder than most

a peculiar wolf lives in a seacoast village

never saw a rabbit

but often times whales and sharks

he swims crawl and breaststroke

otherwise he’d drown

and it’s not spooky to meet him on the street at night

since its known

that the wolf is completely tamed

he hangs out with a couple of monkeys

and his cap is askew

a bunch of boys running after him all day

is his tail

(be warned: translation mine, rough, lousy and not precise, but the main metaphors are all there)

that’s the half of the poem that u see on the sketches and there’s another half i don’t have sketches for yet

the cookies are my take on nigel slater‘s  festive chocolate flapjacks

i think i like the guy and his easy recipies being a girl who grew up in a family where the mother didn’t cook (AT ALL) and the father cooked just really basic stuff (since he had to). i like how he talks about cooking as an expression of sympathy and appreciation. of love really. i think it puts me in a right mindset and keeps me motivated. most of the time.

and this is what i baked last weekend, a beer bread: bottle of beer flour salt some sugar, that’s it. so easy to make i almost didn’t believe the outcome would be good. but it was.

beer bread. if i can do it and it’s edible – anyone can!

 

 

and lastly a photo of me at work for your viewing pleasure.

love location photos. or should i call it environment or setting photos, i don’t know.

yours truly backstage

 

i work in props and costumes department of a local national theatre, remember?

 

until next time,

be well and exercise,

me

 

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the ‘mother mother’ deceit

hello, world 2 people that read me!

i’ve been away from blogging crafting and drawing as i’ve recently added yet another ‘nowhere’ job to my already impressive collection….

this time in the props department of the local national theater of all places…

so there is this guy, a ‘stage worker’ as we call them (the guys that adjust and maneuver the stage decorations or set or whatever it’s called)

so he was walking towards me with a coffee in his hand

and looked at me with this ‘i work long hours and i’m so underpaid but oh well, whatever, you know’ facial expression
and said ‘mother mother’ and sighed heavily

i was eager to continue the conversation by answering with the same facial expression of my own, further more contributing to it with my own heavy sigh (i’m so good at heavy sighing!)

but instead i was like, what?

so he stopped and explaned that at home they say ‘mother mother’ instead of ‘mother f*cker’ near his kids for the obvious reasons.

so, he said, kids go ‘mother mother’, ‘mother mother’, ‘mother mother’ all day long basically (by saying this he added another funny facial expression which i don’t know how to describe
and a distinctive chicken-like neck and head movement)

with a heavy hebrew accent it sounds more like ‘moZeR moZeR’

aren’t u laughing yet? boy, do i know how to ruin an anecdote….. 🙂

oh, and by ‘mother mother’ he was referring to the whole usual ‘crappy day at work’ situation, just in case it wasn’t clear from my narrative.

disclosure: only the ‘mother mother’/’mother f*cker’ part of the dialog happened in english.

strange, really, how selectively we choose to be affected by the US of A culture. or should i call it a ‘globalization effect’?

p.s. hope u all doing well and hope to resume crafting sometime soon

and here’s another fascinating image from my new workplace for your viewing pleasure

p.p.s.   on a random note, did u notice that the minions in ‘decpicable me’ speak italian?  the way they scream ‘gelato!’ when they see an ice cream van? well, i did notice…not sure if i should be a little offended for the italians…   it’s a beautiful language u know…

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storytime, funtime and a naptime

‘storytime’

here’s another little drawing

many many happy hours spent like this back in the day

and here’s my last crafting endeavour:

bear-headed trash bin slipcover

it’s a trash bin slipcover, matching our bathroom tiles color

what i used:

shabby chrome trash bin, courtesy of our apartment previous dwellers

embroidery thread, most likely courtesy of my grandmother whom i never met, she passed away before i was born

baby rag with bear head , courtesy of some charity shop, bought to go under the cat’s and dog’s bowls to absorb some of the spilled water. i cut off the bear head and just kept it for no good reason at the time

and an odd shirt of an indefinable style, courtesy of my partner, bought  somewhere in mid 90’s.

when asked if he’ll ever gonna wear the shirt few years ago ( i could see it just hung there in the cupboard untouched for a decade or so) the answer was ”i wear it when i have a flue”.   and, surprise! he never did although the opportunity presented itself once or twice.

now every time i’m in the bathroom i see the bin and i smile. don’t need too much to cheer me up really.

and lastly here’s a couple of funtime ideas for you and one of an awesome naptime!

http://www.aidaplace.wordpress.com

take care

and happy holidays to you all

p.s.  well, again, it’s not related to anything but have u heard about linda tirado ? while she is truly remarkable i don’t get why some commenters are so negative about her. thought it’s a russian-jealousy-of-the-underprivileged thing to get all upset when someone does something right for himself. i guess it’s just human nature although i’d rather prefer it was geografically/historically explainable…..

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windows and balconies

“the possibility”

here’s a new sketch…

… and here’s a final drawing:

“the possibility”

 

and here’s a young lady spending some time by the window so as not to miss her daddy coming home from work:

“is it him?! is it him?!”

 

until next time

and take care

 

 

p.s. i thought i’d add something about the drawing.

i have like half a dozen dream scenarios i keep dreaming from time to time most of my life. most of them nightmares (but not all). like the one where i go visit the town i grew up in and miss the flight back home.  this one is the worst…
the drawing above is a contemplation on one of those dreams. and although it might not seem like it, this dream is one of the good ones…

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mysterious look-alike

new illustration of the alan bradley book completed. mostly.

to be frank most of the time i didn’t enjoy drawing it even. cause i had a dead line and …well, an obligation to do it. i don’t like to be obliged to draw, you know. and was afraid to screw it up.

but i’m pretty happy with the result i must say.

in a couple of days it’s gonna be a part of our illustration class small annual exibition

 

p.s.  lets play a little trivia game called who’s this mysterious Stephen Fry’s 1930’s (approximately)  look-alike, or maybe more than just a look-alike?…..

if you answer it right – you are very very AWESOME.

until next time

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back from the R Zone

so!  finally got the wax pencils i’ve ordered a while ago and made some further progress on the “dinner” drawing

um…..i have nothing else to say about it by this point….except that loads of work are still ahead of me

p. s.  i went about 3000 km out of my oh-so-very-narrow Comfort Zone for a couple weeks to visit my family.

most of my impressions from the R Zone can be easily described with 4 words  – i don’t get it    …peculiarly large amount of signs in public bathrooms on how to behave, especially the ones that call out to respect each other or the ones that advise you not to become a youtube star…..coffeeshop managers walking about their workspace in sweatpants….  weird.

p.p.s  my cat has a problem

– from time to time he comes home looking like this…   no, it’s not my hand there on the left. yes, the gray parts supposed to be white.  what’s the problem to just you know not bathe in the dirt?!  so there’s been some chasing around the flat and some screaming and he’d promised that he’d never do this again….well maybe just one more time, when you’ve just changed the sheets or something…and my dog is like, oh,it’s all my fault! i shouldn’t  have been stealing his food for so long!

i’m thinking some family counseling may be in order! or at least a cat shrink!

(it looks like the cat is kissing the dog on this pic, which is ironic, um, because he doesn’t really and he won’t)

 

until next time,

me

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