Friday, November 27, 2009

Sweater for this winter



This time it took only a second to persuade him to put his new sweater on. Strangely, he liked it right away and likes wearing it ever since. How happier could the knitter be? The pattern comes from some magazine, if anyone interested I will post which issue, it is originally a German magazine from Burda. The yarn is, as I have announced several times, from handpaintedyarn.com. I am little curious whether the colors blend after I will wash it. Anyway, it probably wouldn't harm the sweater.

And I cast on a new one the same day. I take delight in this garter stitch on thick needles and with even thicker merino. Again, handpaintedyarn.com. Take a closer look by clicking on the picture.

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Corner view / Menu del día

What is this little guy eating? Apple dumplings! They are halves of apples coated in dough made of ricotta, flour, egg and milk and boiled in hot water. The fruit inside gets hot and you sprinkle the dumplings with more ricotta, cinnamon, sugar and drawn butter on a plate. It sounds like dessert but believe me, we have it here as a main dish. We have other sweet main dishes, we eat strange here. And they are easy to make. The only thing is that each country has little different ricotta, butter and flour so the overall result depends on where you cook it. I have tried it.

I usually make plum dumplings or strawberry. These are raw ones before boiling. Bon Apetit!

For other corner viewers se Jane's page.

Saturday, November 21, 2009


First picture: this is the way they built in Southern Bohemia until the 19th century. There are a few villages that still have majority of these farm houses. Look at the tree, looks as old as the house itself.

Second picture: I was wandering why I felt like putting these two pics together and there is actually that theater portal that is little like the gate into the farm. And there are other things, too, like village houses and folk theater or something. The theater is paper and was found at my friend's cottage when she bought it. Click on it.

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Poems of the Night

A book cover that I like. Vítězslav Nezval, Básně noci, graphic layout Lucie Weisbergrová, Praha 1966.



Don't miss that the word Básně - Poems is written under the paper cover of the book.

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Corner view / not accomplished

I am taking a detour today from our corner view, I have a good excuse for it, although I think the theme was pretty neat. I don't have a mobile with a camera and no one has called me since the last corner view when I was on the street. So this picture is from the opening of a new apartment building round the corner from my house. It is very posh and hyper modern but what is it doing in old Žižkaperk? No, no, I am not going to complain about the intervention of the modern into the old, it is just that people who buy these apartments they wouldn't go in dirty old Žižkov with an apparent criminal activities going on under some business around the place, cheap bistros, strange types hanging out on the corner and pawnshops open all night for little thieves to sell their just stolen stuff. On the picture it looks nice, doesn't it? From the aesthetic point of view, I can't complaint, neither about the town nor the new building.

Saturday, November 14, 2009

This thing

is in the shop. Another attempt to reproduce an image of a mosaic or tile floor like they had in Rennaisance. It is quite rich this one, I would like to do something more simple but at the same time I like this "filling up the space".

There are also some new birds there, too.

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Things for Dominik

Puppets. They are drawn on a piece of thick paper and they are two sided, the stick goes in the middle. The original idea was to make his toys like puppets, I am not sure why, but when it came to make a second one, he wanted daddy. So we made daddy a puppet.

Brooch after Tiny Happy. She makes REALLY BEAUTIFUL ones and they don't look difficult to make. But they are. They are very tiny and require lot of staring at a little thing. I wasn't sure if it was clear what it depicted, Domik said it was a goose. He likes it more than I do and proudly wears it all the time.

Domik likes to have a bag when we go out, like mummy. I have made few bags in my life so he needed one too. This one shows how silly I want to be with embroidery. I was told it is grandpa sitting in the car.
Apron. Again, like mummy. Simple cut and a little pocket on front. Gets used all the time. A little cook.

Friday, November 6, 2009

Knitting

I am almost finished with this one. Dominik's sweater for this winter. I hope I will show you the whole piece soon.
By the way, where are good yarn stores? I bought this yarn through handpaintedyarn.com, it is good but I want to try something different. Any advice?

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

Corner view / contrasts

Taken on the 28th of October in the town where I was born. A parade with lampions (or Japanese lanterns as a dictionary says). On the 28th they celebrate a foundation of Czechoslovakia in 1918. However, for long years this holiday was covered by a different one, the Great October Revolution in Russia, which was supposed to ban a national feast in favor of a then more important one. A lampion parade was obligatory for school kids like me. (Have been talking a lot about living under communism lately, he..) And it is clearly visible what these two holidays absorbed - All Saints Day.

Sunday, November 1, 2009

Suffering the Landscape

We went for a day trip out in Šumava, close to the border. Close to where my parents live. I know that the landscape pictures might be boring but there was a tremendous view over the mountains. And this beautiful blue cottage, just next to an abandoned and huge co-operative cow shed (that escaped my lens). Only later I realized that these had been the forbidden places, still twenty years ago, a so called border zone with the iron curtain on the edge of it. Back then we had no idea how close we were to the West! The border zone spread over a good half of these mountains and for me being a little kid it was like living over seven rivers and seven mountains, far far from the world that maybe didn't exist at all!

Domik apparently didn't like being out on our outing. He was totally scared the whole time. I remember having similar feelings of fear at certain places out in landscape myself. It was only few times in my life but repeatedly at the same places. Very strange and intensive. It disappeared when my school-mates from Prague were visiting and I had to find the most romantic places out here to show them. I started to look at it aesthetically and that was the end of a savage in me. The end of my genuine relation with the landscape. Now Domik has it and suffers.