My Pocket

room to cook

Last of the rooms, the kitchen. My least favourite room unfortunately. When we first viewed this flat I gasped as we looked into the kitchen with its 70s wooden slat cupboard doors, brown sink and irreparably grotty tiled work surfaces. I need inspiration and inviting surfaces to do my cooking. D was the one to gasp when we got to the wood panelled bathroom sauna - he loves his showers. Since then the kitchen has been refitted a bit, not looking much better, but at least it's clean. I don't feel like showing more pictures of the place though, the window is the best part, a breathing hole in that tiny cramped space. It's a lovely feeling standing right by the open window while cooking, looking down at what is going on in the little open patio below.

We put up shelves a while ago, which made a big difference to how I felt about being in there. Having everything accessible and presentable in old fashioned glass jars just gives me good vibes of quality and simplicity. I think it might partly be due to being Swedish, feeling fussy, I've still not got used to the British standards in accomodation - drafty, poor maintainance and more often than I'm accustomed to: *cough* bad taste. The house in itself is lovely however and there are many old houses here that are wellmade with little flourishes to please the eye and with lasting quality. I love the metal handles on the windows for instance, the small swirl (you can see it better in the bathroom photo).

To finish off I wanted to show you my new lunch box! Isn't it great? I like thermos flasks, I used to bring my lunch in one every morning at uni. I like the autumn leaves on this one and it makes it obvious to people when I leave it in the school fridge that it is mine, no mistake.

room for sleeping

On the other side of the stairs is our bedroom. We both slept on floor level beds before we met, have done so together for years now and we still love it, especially being under the window. I have the sun lighting up the room in the morning to wake me up and at night I might watch the stars for a while.

Actually a lot of things are floor level at our place. We used to sit on the floor to eat our meals or on a cushion in front of the window for a long time before we got a dining table this spring. We've both done yoga for years (though I haven't for quite a while now) so we both have our yoga mats, blankets and props lying around.

I've only recently 'grown up' and felt a desire to have proper tables and chairs and D wanted some arm chairs. Since I was young I've wanted things simple, spartan and tidy. I didn't need reminding to clean my room - I remember age 8 straightening the tassels on my rug, it being the only untidy part left in the place. That's a bit embarrassing... Took me years to relax my standards and for signs to begin to appear in my living spaces that someone was actually living there, using the facilities. :o) As a teenager I removed all furniture except the mattress and a stereo on the window sill to have a room with perfect emptiness. I loved it. White walls, large window and wooden floors. I went through most of high school homework lying flat on my tummy with my books strewn around me.

Nowadays, well it's a different story as you can see from the pictures. I still like having a tidy-up regularly and I like my living area light and spacious, but the cleaning is on the backburner unless someone is coming over and I take silly pride in being a bit cluttered and disorganised, not having been able to do that for so long. Having belongings doesn't freak me out as much though I still have times when I ruthlessly go through inventories in my mind as to what is actually essential and what needs to go to lighten the load. I'll think of Thoreau's quote of men "creeping down the road of life, pushing before it a barn seventy-five feet by forty" and shudder. I'm still very much inspired by gypsies, nomads and the Japanese - having few, simple and functional belongings and very few pieces of furniture, spending much time on rugs or mats on the floor.

I'm so glad D has the same sense of simplicity and quirky sense of interior decorating as I do. I began this stone collection blue-tacked to the wall above the light switch and he has added to it.

And, he doesn't mind my friends hanging around.

room for washing

This be our bathroom. :o) I love the view out the open window in the mornings sitting in the bath tub. Am I the only odd girl sitting down for her shower? Surely there must be others too. I do it because I like it - it's warmer and less splashy. And because I can't stand shower curtains near me, don't like 'em.

The entire bathroom was covered in dark stain wood panelling when we moved in. Not much we could do about that so we just painted the walls white to keep it from looking like one big sauna. It turned out quite nicely, I think. I didn't do any cleaning or tidying for this photo session by the way. Oh, ok so I did do a bit, but not much. The strange blue tea pot on the cabinet is my neti pot, a vessel for pouring salt water through your nostrils in the morning, a yoga body cleansing thing. It's lovely, but I won't try to convince you.

The photo next to the sink is of my summer washing place on the island. It's just around the corner from my little cabin, on a shelf in the smooth rocks going into the water. I can stand there and keep my schampoo and conditioner bottles in little nooks above water while I wash in the water that's up above my knees. The water is clear and not very salty at all. When I need to rinse my hair I just dive in further out and swim underwater for a while. When I'm done I sit on a towel on the warm rock until I dry in the sunshine. My favourite shower ever.

room for living

This week I thought I'd show you around our place. Starting in the living room/study/dining room/craft room, the first of our two rooms. We live on the first floor in a typical British cottage that was built sometime in the beginning of the previous century. It has been split into two levels, the door to the downstairs living areas is bricked up which creates two flats.

This room is our living room where we have our meals, where I do my acupuncture studying and where I have my craft corner. I have a perfectly well suited, spacious desk to do my studying at (bottom right corner in photo) but I quickly made myself comfortable at the dining table as it has the most wonderful view.

Note the piles of college handouts on the floor, I just swipe the table top when it's time to eat. :) I love watching and listening to everything that goes on outside. There's a yearling deer venturing out of the woods several times per day, the wild rabbits are always out hopping around, the doves swoop over the trees and yesterday there were two young boys galloping their horses up the field.

The leaves hanging in the window is a mobile of sorts that I make every autumn. I hang a piece of thread with a glass bead at the bottom to weigh it down. Then I take leaves I've found that have turned vibrant colours and I wrap the thread around the stem to hold the leaf hanging. It's very easy to do and doesn't require any tying but it's a bit difficult to describe. I'll give it a try anyway - you hold the leaf upside down, stem down, let the thread wrap from behind the leaf to the front (basically just crossing the stem once) and then let the leaf drop to hanging down, which should twist the thread into place, holding the leaf in the same place. Err... or you just do it anyway it works! I like having the leaves in the window where they feel like they're still on the tree and the light shines through them.

i made that

I made something this weekend, I actually made something! I have been wanting to sew my own clothes for so long now, but never had the courage to just go ahead and dive in. Yesterday I found some remnant navy blue linen in the fabric shop and thought of this top in one of my Japanese craft books.

So I bought some seagreen lace trim to go with it, all the time thinking it will end up like the other projects I've got the materials for that are still lying on the shelf, and then to my surprise went home and promptly sewed it together. I made mistakes in every stage of the game but I enjoyed it. It turned out not quite like the picture and I skipped the ribbon and bow altogether, but I like it, wonky seams and all.

It's the third garment I have ever sewn, the first two were in school - a white cotton vest and a navy silky ballgown type dress for the 'prom' age 16 (both plain as can be, didn't like frills then either. boy was I fidgety in that dress - this just ain't me). I've been thinking about sewing my own clothes for the last year or two, because I rarely find what I am looking for in the shops, I don't like the fabrics they use and I feel bad about the working conditions of the people putting them together. If I could have it my way I would have mainly woven fabrics in my clothes, instead of jersey which wears out and loses shape so quickly. (Knitted things are the exception of course.) Linen and woven cotton just become more beautiful the more wear they get, softening, getting worn and fading colour with grace.

My choice of clothes has changed dramatically over the last two or three years, along with me feeling much better in myself. The better I felt, the more I felt I deserved to wear clothes that make me feel good, and the more clothes I wore that made me feel beautiful and comfortable, the happier I became. I've been a tomboy most of my life, I never was a dress-and-ponytail-girl, and it took me months to gradually stop feeling like an impostor wearing skirts and eventually dresses. Now that's about all I wear! I suppose it's a romantic/bohemian style - long swoshy skirts, feminine dresses, layers of this and that and a hodge-podge of stripes, flowers and dots. I like it simple though - plain muted colours and natural materials, classically cut mostly. Still, sometimes I glimpse myself in the mirror before going out in the morning and think "Caroline, I don't think anyone else would ever wear that combination of clothes."

Except a gypsy maybe. I like gypsies.

autumn finds

I used to love filling my pockets with all the little treasures I would find on my way home from school as a kid. I've always been the one with her head down scanning the ground for smooth stones and seashells on the beach, curious twigs and pine cones in the woods or acorns and conkers by the road.

I've had a phase of a few years now that I haven't brought things home. I'd still pick them up, say hello, stroke them or smell them and carry them for a while, but then I'd say thank you and gently put them back.

Unless it was something extraordinary of course. Like the jet black, round and silky smooth stone I found when D lived in Cornwall. I didn't look for it, it kind of found me and told me to bring him from the beach with me. He's still with us. Just a bit camera shy - so difficult to capture something so black!

The reason I no longer kept finds is because I thought it was a pity to take them from where they belong to a place where they have no purpose, but lately I've begun to think differently again. They do have a small purpose, to bring me a little joy. Remind me of the outside which I love, of small living things, the beauty of natural purposeful things. To dry up, wither away and go back to the soil, reminding me things don't ever stay the same.

hello september

Goodbye summer colours, light evenings, warm breezes, rustling in the tree tops, bare legs, swims in the pool and lying on the grass.

Hello September, rusty, burning, vibrant colours, high blue skies, fresh breezes, rustling piles of leaves, autumn coat, woollen mittens and dark evenings for cuddling up indoors. I love autumn, I do I do. It inspires me like no other season, thinking what to wear, what new things to learn, walks to go on, places to see, making changes to my life, planning ahead, pouring over books, pulling out my soup recipes, picking up my knitting, wearing my beloved woollen hats again, skipping down the road on a good breezy sunshiny day.

What do you look forward to in autumn?

Some things of summer I bring with me though - I still wear my summer dresses, above the warmer layers, I still wear my sandals for as long as I can, with woollen socks, I wait to put on a coat until I have to because I love wearing only a knitted cardigan or pullover and wrapping my pashmina around me instead. I like sitting on the grass on a dry day, smelling the dry leaves and the soil, lying down to watch the clouds skim by high above, listening to the wind and the trees moving. I want to sit outside to eat my lunch way into October or November, wrapping up warm.

This feels like autumn to me:

"Read me a story inside
Lie if you like
But make the details
True in my mind
We need to feel
Absolutely wrapped
In your glove
Lie back and listen
As I read you my life"

The Wind-up Bird, Tunng

(I know I've recommended that song before, but I'll do it again, it's so sweet.)

Inside, I want to listen to stories, to magic, colourful scenes, details that spring out, seeds planted that grow into dreams. I wish you that and more. Have a good night!

Ile de Re

Warm breeze, barefoot, summer dresses, picnic rug, blue tent, outdoors cooking, green frogs in the bathroom,

freshly baked bread, smell of sunlotion, sultry evenings, palm trees by the swimming pool, sunlight underwater,

laughing at our appalling French, sand between the toes, lost in a book, sound of children playing, tide coming in, making sand castles, lighthouse sweeping at night, evening liquorice and mint tea, snug sleeping bags,

early mornings, French market, sea food stalls, quilt stalls, fruit, vegetables and bread, cycling across the island, salt marshes, egret herons, sailboats snug in harbours, narrow village streets, cobblestone,

colourful doors, whitewashed walls, smiling faces, bonjour, long sandy beaches, refreshing swims, tousled hair, sandals, soft sunset light, smooth rocks,

smell of seaweed, cry of seagulls, salty skin, colourful beach parasols, tanned arms, fresh air, simple life.

simple living

Hello! I'm back, but I won't tell you all about it tonight, tomorrow it will have to be. I can show you why it was exactly what I needed though:

Simple, restful, fresh air living

...with happy people doing the same thing, in the sun. See you tomorrow!

beach dwelling

So, I will be leaving you for a while. We will be spending six days in a tent 50 metres from the beach on a small island off the west coast of France, reading books, lathering on sunlotion and listening to the waves. Well, that's what I'll be doing, not sure what D feels like. He would have liked to do some surfing, but the waves are not looking promising so that might not happen. I'd like to go cycling on the paths all around the island at some stage, when I remember that I can only stand so much idle beach dwelling. Explore the villages, walk along the coast or just get lost. I like getting lost, you find ever so much more when you do. Well, enjoy your week and I wish you adventures big or small and quiet moments. Take care!

Ile de Re and La Rochelle.