Where I live no.2

The barn.

The barn was a mess when we bought this property. The former owner didn't look after it at all. It was kind of hard for him to take care of everything, because he lives in another part of the country. Each time something needed to be done, he had to hire someone or he asked some neighbours that he knew.

Can you see how it's sunk down on the middle? Handyman had a huge job to jack up the construction and replace the broken parts. But, he did it and it all looked much better. The floors inside had to be replaced as well as the timber cladding outside. Some of the roof tiles had to be fastened, and then it was good as new.

In the abowe photo you can see one window and one that once were a window. He fixed it all and made a new door.

If you have a close look, you can see the timber cladding has been cut at both sides of the showing window. That is because handyman has turned the barn into his garage. When he's entering the path in to our house, he presses the button and parts of the wall lifts up. Seen in the photo below.

We wanted to keep the houses as close to original as possible, but they had to meet our needs. The rest of the barn is used to store different things, such as our firewood. Left hand side room is handymans carpentry room. Besides alot of tools he has a good working space in there. The loft is used to store timber cladding and other stuff that needs quite some space.

West side of the barn shows why it's called a barn instead of an outhouse. A barn needs to have a direct access to the loft from outside, kind of a bridge. If the bridge is there, it's called a barn. Easy as that.

This is how it became after all the repairs. Handyman always wants to cut down the grass on the bridge, but I want it to be there. It shows how it often was and is kind of romantic, I think.

Originally there were hens in the barn, that's all I know for sure. There might have been a horse and even a cow, but I have no one to confirm it.

As a curiosity I can tell you, when handyman teared up the floor in the barn, he found lots and lots of ceramic and porcelain eggs. People used to lay these egge into the hens nests. They were meant to make the hens lay more eggs. I can remember from my childhood some neighbours doing that with their hens.

I have washed all the eggs and use them as decoration on my kitchen counter. I've often thought of painting them, and one day I might do that.

Thanks for visiting, I hope you've enjoyed your stay.

Where I live.

The house.

The house we live in were built in 1913. The man who got it built was single and came from the district arouund our capital city, Oslo. He came here to teach in the dairy school ( opened in 1906). He hired a housekeeper and two maids. One maid was the outdoor maid and the other one worked indoors. The outdoor one still lived in our street when we first came here, and she told us a bit from back then.
This house were a large one and had an architecture more used in the cities, not in the countryside as this were in those days. In the year 1916 there were 676 inhabitants here, today we are 12897. Still just a small town, but in 2001 Bryne got the rights to call itself a City.

The house were a beauty in it's original form, but back in 1984 the owner had it fixed,, and during that process most of the beautiful details were removed. Fortunately he had some photos taken, so we can see how it was, and my dream is to bring it back to its original condition

Look at all the beautiful moldings. It's almost impossible to see from this photo, but each of the upper panels ends in an arrow shape and then there is that fat molding across it all.
First floor of the mid section had windows all around it, today right hand side has a solide wall. Not vivible in this photo. Behind the tree branch, you can spot a balcony, second floor, which also were removed because of its condition.

Below is the house as it is today. Can you see how it has lost much of its original soul, even though today, it's very different from how houses are built, and most people think this is very original. This side of the house faces south. We did paint it in 2004, and I chose to use a sand beige color for the house and a white one for the details.

There was a deck stright along the house wall when we first came here in 2000. We chose to open it up in an angle to have a better connection to the garden. Unfortunately we don't use it, it offers no privacy. This photo shows the west side of the house.

Below is how it was originally.

The entrance how it looked from the beginning. A tiny small "house" with a solid concrete stairway. Also notice the window. The condition of the entrance were so bad that we had to fix it. We thought quite much on how to do it. Should it be rebuilt excactly the same? We landed on a better solution, I think. We made a larger one that could meet our needs.

This is what we did. We ordered new windows, similar to the ones that originally were used. The double front door is not how it was originally, but it looks great now. The staircase has a history of its own. I actually sketched how I wanted it to be, and handyman constructed and built it. The two plant "pots" are round like suns, and the steps are like sunbeams from the center of the pots. Left hand steps leads to the garden and right hand side to the backyard. The deck (left side) is what I call the breakfast deck. I can sit out in the sun at 5.30 in the morning midsummer. That early there are no sounds, besides me and the birds awakening. Lovely spot. This side is facing north.

Seen from a distance. Here one can also see the tiny garden house handyman have built. All the windows used were originally meant for the house during winter. One layered windows needed another set of windows to keep the house warm enough during the winter. Now they serve as windows in our tiny and cozy garden house. Notice the stones in the backyard, we spent an entire vacation ( 3 weeks) to put them down and the rain were pouring down the whole periode.

Facing west. Here it's easy to see the stone walls of the basement. Mined stones which keeps the basement temperature fairly cold year around. An important issue back then with no other cooling opportuneties.

More to come.

I've been doodling again.

I've seen some people doodling on shoes and tote bags lately,

so I had to give it a go. I didn't have any of the items, but lots and lots of fabric, so I found some meant for lining curtains and used that. I had to buy some fabric markers, and get started.

I didn't plan anything, so this is wonky and not usable as I see it. I've left it as is, and won't be using it.

Next try I planned a bit more, and I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out.

It's a case for my eye glasses. They're fun to make, easy and quick done.
It was kind of hard to know how close to the lines I should put the color down, because the markers bleed a bit. I did make a drwaing on paper first, so I have the patterns and can easily make the same over again.

I had to try even one more time, but I'm not sure I should have. I don't know where my mind was while drawing this, but apparently it was not with me.

I should at least have mirrored the right side flowers, but this is how they are. Drawing with micron pen on top of the fabric. My pencil drawing shines through, so it was easy to transfere it.

Below is how it looked after coloring.

Next two photos shows the finished case. First I sewed a row of buttonhole stitches and then I crochet it together. Easy as that.

 Fun project, easy to make and I have a case for my eye glasses that nobody else have. We can't ask for more, can we?
I'll share this with Paint Party Friday.
Thanks for visiting.

SOC 4 week 6, last week.

It's the last week of SOC 4.

This was my first time playing along, and it has been so much fun. Hopefully I'll play along next year as well. Thanks alot to Kristin for hosting this event, and to all the participants for their art and visits and not least all their lovely comments. It has been such joy to read all your lovely words, thank you all for taking the time, it's much appreciated.

This weeks colors made me so happy, these colors are my favorites. It felt just like a dessert after a five course dinner. Now, what to make of these beautiful colors?
As usual I sat down to play with the colors without any intention of making anything special.

Just doodles and then colors. I also used nib and ink on this one. I knew this wasn't going to be my work for the week so I continued with a quick sketch on the same sheet of paper.

When this were done I realized that my feeling of dessert colors was going to be what I should make. I added the blue for the plate and grey for shadow and spoon.

When I saw this photo I saw something still missing and had to do a little extra work with my pencil.

It's served!

The lemon yellow I used as vanilla sauce. When I saw this photo, my mouth were watering. Fresh berries is one of my favorites in summer. Now, I'm so looking forward to the plum season, I can hardly wait.
Let me finish off by saying thank you to everyone, it has been a pleasure to play with you all. 

Lots of doodles lately.

I have been doodling letters lately.

Doodling is a very relaxing activity, just to sit down and make patterns. The first letter I made was a T. I have a male friend who's name starts with a T so I made it for him. Couldn't add too much flowers and stuff to it, but I think it came out pretty good.

After that I made an E. My mother and her sister both have names starting with an E, so I had them in mind while making this one. It's fairly quick done and very fun doing them.

I had another one in mind too so I gave it a try. This time I wanted to decorate the E with flowers that had the first letter E. Are you familiar with the flower called Edelweiss? This is my attempt to draw aand paint an Edelweiss. The flower is, in nature, kind of hairy and very soft and that isn't easy to capture in painting. At least not for me.

Since the letter is very curved and soft lined, I thought it would be suitable with some edgy pattern. When finished I feel it looks like a snake. I'm not too happy about this one, a bit too colorless I feel.

The two upper ones are from Judy West's book that I got in the mail. The book is very inspiring and shows lots of different alphabets together with lots of different patterns. I know I'm going to be inspired from this book every time I open it, and I recomment it to anyone who love to doodle. Judy sells it from her etsy shop, so it's possible to get a copy yourself.

This is the last week of SOC 4, and it has been a pleasure to join the fun. I'm working on my last piece and will post it later on this week. What are you up to these days?
Handyman is free from work, so my days are a bit messed up compared to normal. But I'll manage to make some art after all.

Enjoy summer everyone!

SOC 4 week 5

This weeks colors gave me some real challenges.

When do I use bright red, bright blue and a bit light blue together? I felt it was impossible to make anything with these colors. They are beautiful, but not together, alone. If I could add some yellow and orange, I would have had lots and lots of ideas.

I simply had to chew it for a couple of days before a thought came to mind. I were thinking of my maternal grandma, she died when I was 6, 50 years ago. I still remember her, how very kind she was and all the things she did. One thing I always were excited of, was when she were making jam and lemonade from the berries she had in her garden.

I stood beside her (4-5 years old), ready to have a taste as soon as a batch were finished. Oh how I loved that. And then I ran out to play. I don't know if lemonade is the right word for what she made, but it was a consentrate of the berry juice. When we drank it, we added water to it.

Do you remember the rubber caps? She always used them, hot bottles filled with hot lemonade and then the rubber caps.

The jam were stored slightly different. Hot jar filled with hot jam, and then she added a thick layer of wax before the cute little fabric hats. I remember her kitchen counter filled with those cute jars. She made jam from many different berries, but my favorite always were strawberry.

She labeled all the jars and bottles, name of berries used and year. I can still remember how I longed to become a grown up and make all this good stuff and decorate it myself. Well, I've done it a few times. The kitchen is not my place, I do make the food we need to eat, but that's about all.

Thanks for visiting, I hope you've enjoyed my little story.

Some news.

I have been playing with Celtic knots lately.

I found some real good you-tube films to learn the basics on how to draw Celtic knots, and then I made one myself. I don't know if anyone have made this one before me, but it's thinkable. Anyway, I struggled my way to figure it out and were very pleased to make it happen.
First one is the one below. It was quite a challenge to draw it, but after some attempts I did it.

When the first one were finished, new ideas came on and on  so I had to do some more. I were listening to a Norwegian band called : Dance with a stranger, and a song called : Everyone needs a friend sometime. Beautiful song that inspired my next try. Can you see the female is blushing?

Next I tried to make a braid, and wanted to put in another bird. He's singing the most beautiful tunes. The light spot on his chest and a bit on the tail is done with twinks, and it has a beautiful shine to it.

Another special thing that happened some days ago, was that I won a giveaway over at Judy West's blog. She asked us to decorate her drawn letters, A 2 Z, which is on the front cover of her new book. I like challenges, and joined in, and my piece brought me to the top of her list. So, now I'm awaiting a copy of her new book to arrive in the mail. How lucky am I? Below is my decorated piece.

And as I were drawing my knots, I made a special one just to say thank you to Judy. Have you ever tried to do this kind of knots? They're very fun doing, and it's hard to stop when first started.

What are you up to? Summer is here, and my mother is home so I'm kind of busy visiting her, and helping out with groceries and stuff like that.
I hope you all are having good days. 

SOC 4 week 4

This weeks colors wasn't hard at all.

One could always paint some flowers, pink and green and a touch of dark green. But, I spent some time thinking of it and found a better idea.
I didn't use too much pink but it's there and I'm pretty pleased with my result. I felt I needed some warmth in my piece, hence the sunflower. It is actually apple green I've used, but it turned out to look like blue in the photos. Don't know what happened. The pink and green gave a beautiful bluish grey, which I've used on the head and feet.

The paper used is handmade, not me, and I dare say it's of a poor quality. Watercolors needs a stabile paper, but this is very absorbant in some spots and not at all in other spots. With that said, I love the look and feel of this paper, it's kind of rustic, which I love.

The paper is tinted, light brown or sepia is perhaps more correct to say. That made my colors a bit different than I had planned, but I think it works after all.

You know the feeling when in the flow and just creating. One is so occupied that everything else is out of mind. I had that good feeling when making this piece, and couldn't do anything but laugh when I saw what I had done. What excactly is it I have made here? Is it a bug or a fly? It's armed and with wings. Oh well, doesn't matter I'm happy with it anyway.

I've used Twinkling H2O's and watercolor pencils to make this. Some shading is done with an ordinary HB pencil and blending stump.

Thank you so much for all the lovely comments on my post last week, it warms my heart. I'm not sure I got to visit everyone else, but will try this week.
I hope you're enjoying your days.