A window shutter from Kalkbay

On Sunday we went to Kalkbay - a picturesque little village close to Cape Town.

It's main street is filled with arty shops...

... and its location right next to the sea gives a real holiday feeling...

There are lots of little restaurants adding to the relaxed atmosphere...

We could not resist the cosy bookshop...

Then in a little alley way called 'Memory Lane' I found an old green window shutter in a vintage shop that asked to be bought :)

My husband peeled off the paint and gave it a layer of white paint and covered the back with board... Whalla... a pin board for my studio has been born :D

An Art festival on a whim...

One evening early in April while eating dinner my husband and I decided on a whim to go to a grand art festival held 500 km's from us in Oudtshoorn! We organised for leave that same evening as well as for accommodation in Oudtshoorn and at 5 am the next morning we were on our way! At 10 am we arrived :)

It was a week long event with lots of shows.... we decided to only focus on the art that was on exhibition, as this is always a grand occasion.

Louis Jansen van Vuuren had a exhibition of larger than life paintings... as well as some interesting jewelry art pieces...

We were lucky to attend a showing of art by famous SA artist Sandra Hanekom... and had Leon Vermeulen to tell about his art...

Well known SA ceramicist Hennie Meyer told us about his process ... going about an interesting constellation...

Gordon Froud shared his experiences as an artist in his reconstructed studio (especially done for this art festival)...

Jan du Toit exhibited some beautiful work...

...as did Phillemon Hlungwani...

and Jaco van Schalkwyk...

The absolute highlight of this art experience was to meet and experience the phenomenal artist, Willem Boshoff.  To see his reconstructed studio (especially done for the art festival) and to go on a artist walk with him ... to learn from him to look closely to every detail around you... especially in nature walks... there is so much detail to interpret into art...

Willem explaining the artist walk to us before we received a map to the 'mystery destination'...

Some of the detail i saw on this artist walk...

After two days filled with unexpected art we were filled with gratefulness for an amazing shared experience between husband and wife... a passion shared... and celebrated...

(There were so much more thought provoking art and encounters with artists... but all sadly cannot fit into a single blog post...)

A magical festival filled with words and art...

Early in March I took a whole week of leave and for that week I visited Stellenbosch (about 20km from home) to enjoy days filled with a celebration of the Afrikaans language and lots of art were seen...

I loved this poster saying "Mouthful of heavenly Afrikaans"...

The art of Louis Jansen van Vuuren spoke to me...

And it was lovely attending a walk-about of the art by the artist himself...

...and still there was a wonderful selection of art at lots of galleries all over Stellenbosch...

Lionel Smit

Marike Prinsloo

Diek Grobler

...and lots and lots of other artists were featured - very inspiring!!

I met Bart Moeyaert a Dutch poet and saw him in action reading his poems... The Dutch poet Ester Perquim was also talking about her poetry and reading from it...

A lot of South African writers talked about their newest publications - the most well known must be Deon Meyer... who talked about his new action triller "Kobra" (Cobra in English...

Through all the excitement I managed to do a little bit of crocheting too...  :)

It is very difficult to put in words what this week filled with magical words and art meant to me... it let me came alive to the reality of who i am... it gave me the confidence and energy to stay on the route of pursuing my creative dreams...  

Crocheting a mandala

I have the tendency to have this great idea for a project just a few days before I think could be perfect to have it finished...

And so my three balls of red T shirt yarn that just arrived through the post, last Saturday and my idea for a rug that my sister would love.... all coinsided 6 days before the ideal moment to give her this present...

I was very excited on the arrival of my first T shirt yarn via post - which turned out to be cheaper to order from a little west coast town (postage included!) than buying it from my favourite yarn shop around the corner...


So with a beautiful tutorial on hand I started the mandala rug. Even our little garden rabbit thought it had potential...


This time around (just like with my doily rug) I had color issues... only a little bit of dark red yarn - not enough to alternate the reds in whole circles. Then I got an idea which I encountered with an earlier project.
I chain stitched the darker red onto the rug and it enhanced the circles wonderfully.


So a few late evenings of frantic crocheting followed... although still I loved every moment of this growing mandala rug...


...and with a little bit of effort the rug was finished just in time to be presented to my sister on the day we planned a trip to her in Tulbagh.





Ps. the clogs on the rug was inspired by a wonderful crochet blog post :)

Be my Valentine

This week I had fun putting together a lovely flower heart. Thank you Lucy for the pattern in the newest issue of Simply Crochet :)

I needed 18 little flowers...



...and 12 leaves - which came to life late yesterday evening :)



My dear husband assembled everything and eventually my 'Attic24' heart was born...




The reason for making this cutie, was to bring some joy to my colleagues at work...



So now my spring flowers at work have some heart flower company :D

A lovely crochet filled morning...

On Saturday I met friends and other lovely ladies of the "Hekel innie Kaap" (crochet in the Cape) face book group at the Botanical gardens in Stellenbosch for a craft share.

The restaurant is nested between trees ... so although it is summer and we have very hot days... the venue was cool and we had a lovely morning crocheting... meeting new members... and always learning something new about some crochet stitch or method...

I saw a beautiful book that someone brought with...

We had lots of laughs...

Me and two friends that share my passion for crocheting (and addiction too!) had a great time ...

We were crocheting blocks towards a huge yarn bomb (we are talking "Guinness book of records" style!) that is going to happen in Pretoria later on in the year at a yarn indaba there...  and... I will be going there!!  That is going to be SO much fun experiencing the get together of all yarn lovers :)

What a lovely morning! :) :)