collage

All done with the witch :) Cut & pasted, two-sided, and threaded to go up. Somewhere. Somehow. Still have to figure out the rest of it, but this is done :) There are days I'd love to join her, broom off into the great blue yonder... But that's another story, I guess ;)

@ Anne, don't worry, her shoes won't come off, I used decent glue ;)

silly

I have joined The Art of Silliness 2 - an online class by Carla Sonheim! A combination of artsy inspiration and... well... silliness! And since I have been taking myself and everything around me way too seriously lately, I'd say that's a good thing ;)
The class doesn't start until Wednesday the 15th of September & you can join until the 15th of October since you can do the worksheets at your own pace. Click the above link or the badge to the right - have a look! I think it will be fun!

Carla sent out a test mail last Wednesday to see if all the links work properly, and there was a test worksheet, to get started! A drawing of a bird and the task to write it a story. I love taking orders, so to speak - especially when my own inspiration is running low - & it was definitely fun to come up with something completely different ;) Meet my bird, BillyBob, and his first wobbly steps onto the glittering stage of showbiz!

dutch

Ah. We lost the World Cup to the Spanish. It was a sad day in soccer history, but I've learned to live with it by now. Between that, the signing of the contract - deed, whatever it's called - for the house (provided the mortgage comes through, we own a house! Yay!) and the chaos in my head, I haven't been able to squeeze out a meaningful blog post till now. But here I am!

Last Monday, my Moroccan friend N - she of the real Moroccan mint tea in my profile - naturalised to this frog country! Despite the sad soccer loss! She was so proud, I was so happy for her :)

Me & Squirt were there, applauding her and other applicants into the fold, listening to half-truths and flat-out lies about what it means to be Dutch. That's hindsight though. As it goes with these things, I was so sucked in at the time that I bellowed the National Anthem along with my new neighbours. Making sure not to look at the piece of paper seemingly lost for words, lest someone thought I was a Dutch soccer player. Actually, actually, for the first time ever I think, feeling traces of goosebumps. While singing the National Anthem. Yes. Ahem. But the moment passed and I'm fine. Dutch, but fine.

I was moved enough to pull out some of the culturally clichéd imagery to create an appropriate card of congratulations for N though. But only because I know she knows we don't all leave our windmills in the morning to walk the dikes wearing our wooden shoes, on our way to our day's work in the R.ed L.ight D.istrict. And we don't hang about picking tulips every day either! Just so you know!