Devil Eyes

The FIFA World Cup. Four years ago I couldn’t care less. This year, however, I’m totally into the world football championship. How come? An overenthusiastic boyfriend and a feeling of euphoria, ascribable to the Red Devil’s qualification for and participation in the tournament after 12 years. But there's more to it than that.

At the beginning of the contest, about a month ago, I said to myself: why not give it a try, watching football? I realised that with a companion who wants to watch all the FIFA matches opposing to his obsessive behaviour could only harm our relationship. I thus decided to go with the FIFA flow and support “our” team. Putting on devil eyes (i.e. a pair of red or yellow sunglasses), a traditional supporter T-shirt with vintage Red Devil logo and Jaune citron nail polish, that’s my way of encouraging a hell of a football team.

P.S. Are you nervous and curious too about which team will have to go home tonight?

Action - painting

A black floor combined with white walls and a dark-grey “contrast corner”; it looks good. A white floor that would even be better. Or so I thought after having revisited our new home before we actually moved in. Not only did I think about this “whitening”, I (with lots of help from Le Boyfriend, of course) took action and painted the “blacked” square parquet in the living room snow-white. Black out!

The result: mime pictures of me, myself and I. 

At first sight it seems like a greyscale picture, it’s only when you look closer 

that you’ll see the (camel) coloured furniture.

How do you like the transcendence from floor to wall and vice versa? 

Okay, let’s paint it white, that wooden (chess) floor. 

1)   Clean the floor, meaning: sand down the wood and if necessary remove that way the old lacquer or paint as much as possible. You can do it by hand or with a sanding machine if you want to remove all of the paint. In the paint store they might well tell you that’s not necessary but the result will be much better if you do so. (We didn’t, unfortunately.)

2)   Now wipe the floor clean with a degreaser (white spirit, for example) and have it dry for half an hour. Make sure you don’t start to paint before the floor is really dry. Also, cover your mouth and nose when you work with this dangerous chemical; inhaling the smell might make you faint. A nice scarf is perfect to prevent that kind of accidents in style.

3)    Paint the floor, using special floor paint and a paint roller. (You can use a primer as to prepare the floor for the “real” colour, or do it like us and opt for an all-in-one formula.) How many layers you have to apply? It depends on the light, how well you sanded, etc. One thing I can assure you: if the instructions say two or three layers will do, it actually means at least five layers will. We waited about 10 hours in between the “sessions” and that worked pretty well. What went wrong: we didn’t remove all the black paint, which means an extra layer that makes the authentic "chess pattern" almost disappear. Anyway, we know what to do if we (ever) decide to repaint the floor.

P.S. Do you have any painting tips?

Paper, party and blues

 

Origami boats and salt dough whales combined with a turquoise tablecloth; it was like we were having our birthday party by the water (about a month ago, before we moved). A blue-triangle garland, made from old posters that I found while packing for “the move”, was up in the air as well as apple-blue-sea-green fish balloons. Matching candles shed a soft, cosy glow over the tablescape.

You know, I’m very fond of coloured bougies. At the Dutch household store Dille en Kamille they come in all colours of the rainbow, which enables you to create custom-lit tables. Always a nice final touch, right? What’s even better: they sell them per piece, basically meaning no more unused candles to store and/or get rid of as you simply can't forget you had them somewhere waiting to be lit. 

One more thing: these are the very last pictures of the old apartment ever to be posted on the blog. Next time you’ll get to see someplace new.

P.S. What summer tablescapes have you created so far?

Move made

You know how people say minutes turn into hours, hours into days, days into weeks, weeks into months and so on? It’s kind of what happened to the blog and me; me and not blogging that is. There’s no one to blame for my temporary withdrawal from the blogosphere but “the move” to a new apartment. (Check this out.) To make the “change of house” happen Le Boyfriend and I had to arrange like a trillion things (not including blogging, obviously).

A(n) (p)inspirational "moving" quote has to do it for now 
(no new-home pictures yet).

Anyway, that’s history. I guess it is clear that all moving has been taken care of and that we’re (almost) settled (we even have internet, yay!). To be honest there was nothing much to do except for driving all of our stuff and furniture from the old to the new place and installing it. Okay, one job we had to do (because we wanted to, not because it really needed to be done): whitening the floor in the living room. I hope you can wait a few more days before I reveal the result.

P.S. No need to say that I’ll be back to blog within a month this time.

Louis the Almighty

While I’m busy, getting ready for the last birthday party in the place that we’ve been calling home for the past two years and for the actual act of moving out, the blog is being left alone, un-updated, in the world wide web. This fact makes me feel guilty and so I thought "time for a change and a little post". In times of, well ... let's say lack of time to blog this means just a few pictures, for now of my new Bible, i.e.  "Les Sacs de Ville Louis Vuitton - Une Histoire Naturelle". Enjoy!

P.S. Converted to Vuittonism already?

info: edition de La Martinière - Rizzoli New York, un livre de la LV collection "Beaux Livres" 

In May ...

And off we go, to the holiday season. Les vacances, las vacaciones, der Ferrien, de vakantie.

 

No, (unfortunately) I’m not about to spend some time abroad. It’s just that the month of May inaugurates summer season. The former spring feeling has moved over and made way for summer vibes, allowing the season of sunny days and “beaching”, glorious feelings and leisure to take over our lives.

How come I already feel like being on vacation when, in fact, I still have to wait about three months before I actually have a few weeks off? It must be the May feast days and public holidays (among others the first of May; a good start is half the work, you know) that fill me with, well ... let’s say a sabbatical sense of relaxation. The many birthdays that are celebrated in the fifth month of the year (more about this here) probably contribute to the summer sensation as well.

Anyway, in practice this means: no more Easter decorations (like eggs, bunnies and baby chicks) but a marine atmosphere reigning over the living room. (More about this here and here.) All I want for the moment is a room that breathes summer breeze and that screams “HOLIDAY”. You know, like the aura of the pictures below.

P.S. Thank you Pinners for supplying me with those wonderful pictures.

sources: pinterest & custom vintage

Going nuts

Going crazy, it was blogged about last week. To be honest, I have literally been going nuts lately: I’ve eaten tons of pistachios, peanuts and cashews over the past few months. Where I used to make popcorn almost every day nuts are now on my “snack menu” on a daily basis. It's a matter of getting some variation in the "in-between meals” too, you know.

Nutty picture, right?

So, I eat nuts and being a “vegetarian” that’s a good thing to do. I’ve been living a “meatless” life for the past 12 years and other ingredients must replace the meat. Nuts are said to be (one of) the perfect surrogates here. Not only are nuts healthy, they're also fun. The act of cracking the peanut and pistachio shells makes eating them funny; it’s like you have to deserve what you eat, you know. Unless you go really nuts and eat the shells as well, but that’s not how crazy I’ve gotten (yet?).

P.S. What’s your favourite kind of snack?