Acanthus mollis.

This is the book I made earlier this year.

I have now decided to use it. I prepared the pages with a wash of grey paint, with a tiny bit of silver.

I decided on a tribute to Karl Blossfeldt. Each page will have a drawing of one of his photographs.
Here is #1.

(Blossfeldt Botanical journal: Acanthus mollis - black ink on grey and silver paint)

Three boys.

Mr Darning Foot has been busy again.

Yes, I know the last one doesn't really look like a boy, but it is. And there are now six boys. But they are all going to be put together in an interesting way, fear not.
(Lesson: Never work on stretchy material.)

Work.

Several times a week we get these little strips of paper in our mailbox. They are quite common in Cape Town. Sometimes neatly handwritten, sometimes typed or printed, they represent job applications.

 

I wish I could help each one.
(South Africa's unemployment rate currently stands at about 25% (official figure). The unofficial figure is closer to 40%. More than 40% of young people under the age of 30 are unemployed. Each year hundreds of thousands of school leavers enter the job market, most with little chance of finding anything.)

  
























(Art journal pages started months ago and recently finished: job application strips, paint, cutouts from primary school textbook lesson about work, paper bag that contained two expensive croissants.)

Black and White.

Synchronicity is a wonderful thing. I bought some black beans a year ago, just because they looked so beautiful and shiny and black in their plastic packet. And black is my favourite colour, as you know. Not having had them before, and having no idea what to make with them, they languished in the cupboard.  So earlier this week I spotted the packet, lying lonely and sad and unused, and was wondering what to do with them. And I swear, that very same day I saw a recipe in a magazine for Moros y Cristianos, a traditional Cuban dish. The recipe also had chorizo as an ingredient (although this is not traditional) and I just happened to have a nice fat piece of chorizo in the fridge.

(Black beans, rice, onion, tomato, chilli, garlic, bayleaf, oregano, crushed caraway seeds and chorizo).
It was meant to be, and it was goooooooood ...
My picture, having been taken at night with a flash, and while it was still bubbling away on the stove, really does not do it justice.

Beautiful Black.

I received this beautiful black crow, an original in watercolour, from Leenie of Sidetrips. It is so damn beautiful that I ordered another one! See here.

Until it is framed, it will reside with some other birdy bits I have.

(Origami bird folded by my youngest son, postcard of an artwork called Birdsong by Greta Matthews, installation of a bird on seaweed by Anairam, watercolour called Murder One by Leenie Black.)

Dress.

I folded some origami dresses. I may use them as invitations - I think I am just about ready for another tea party with the girls. No, dang, dump the tea, these days I need something stronger.

I am going to have to hunt down Ms Whipping it Up, who has disappeared in a most distressing fashion, leaving behind her cake tins and rolling pins and that squirty injection needle thingy that you make swirly decorative thingies with.

Dear friends, have a wonderful weekend! Put on a dress (unless you're a man, I guess, but heck, if you want to, why not?) and invite the girls for tea and cake.

Flap.

The notebook cover I knitted some time ago has really been annoying me. It keeps on flapping all over the place and makes it impossible for me to carry it in my handbag. So I sewed a flap onto the front & back knitted covers to tuck in the notebook, and Mr Darning Foot stitched some doodles.

Ask not about the stains on the fabric. It was my attempt at rust dyeing. Not something I will try again.