The little indie artist and her victory of sorts

I'm upset! My daughter's work has been copied and put on sale by Anthropologie. Please visit Kaija's blog Paperiaarre here  and see with your own eyes. Her journals have been copied. She has also given a link to another case of copying by this firm, so it seems to be their habit to look for beautiful things on Etsy, Pinterest etc. and have them made in a cheap labour country. As little as it may mean to them, I have written an e-mail to Anthropologie and given my opinion about this. I can be as biased as I want; they have wronged my daughter! - I didn't have time to finish this blog post last night, and I'm glad to tell you that meanwhile the issue is resolved and the big company has offered to withdraw their copied journals. Naturally they don't admit they have copied anything, so maybe it was their supplier who did it.

 

 On the knitting front, I have been working on a multi-coloured baby blanket. 

 

 

Here it is all finished. Knitting on the circular needle makes it easier for my hands and arms, as the weight on the blanket rests on my lap instead of on the long needles and my hands.

 

 

Speaking of hands and arms, in a week I will start a long break from all things crafty, and also from writing in any form. I will keep reading your blogs, I hope, but can't comment for a while with my good hand immobile in a sling. The sling thing causes a dressing problem I didn't have 8 years ago when my other shoulder was operated on. It was against the Summer, so I just altered a few tops so I could step in through the neckline. This time I need something against the cold as well, so I took another step as a designer and made a poncho:

 

 

The lining is there to protect me from wind, and I even added an interfacing for extra warmth. Now I'm knitting wrist warmers to give a final touch:

 

 

Today is Autumn Equinox and the days are getting shorter so fast that you really notice it: 40 minutes in a week now. The temperature has dropped close to freezing point for the day as well, but at the end of the week we can expect some +15C days. Warmer clothes are needed, summer dresses can be stored away for eight months at least. Enjoy the colours of Autumn, the fresh air, and cosy evenings in the warmth of your home. 

Old Literature Fair - the joy of second-hand books

On Friday we packed ourselves, our jackets and umbrellas and the camera in the car and enjoyed a beautiful ride through Finnish countryside. You can look with me through the car windows, on the right one of the many lakes called Pyhäjärvi. My original home town is far back where the tower is.

 

 

The road was up and down small hills, some of them steep enough to have sand boxes by the roadside for icy winter weather.

 

Our destination was the old literature event in Vammala about 160 km/100 miles from home, but we had some spare time before they opened, so we went to the farmer's market first. They had not only potatoes, strawberries and flowers there, but also some book stalls. One stall caught my eye immediately, because this was standing in the back corner:

 

Hundreds of buttons sewn on fabric and framed! In the other back corner was another button picture on brown background. Strange but interesting.

 

There is a small park with a water theme and beautiful flowers between the market place and the parking lot.

 

Now it is time to go to the book fair at Sylvään koulu, a school for grades 7 to 9, empty for the summer holidays.

 

 

It was soon getting crowded there, but we always go to the big tent first because during the day the air there gets really hot, and the morning hours can be cooler. Our favourite second hand booksellers are in the tent.

 

 

Books are arranged by themes and the titles are usually visible, so you can see at a glance if a stall has your line of interest.

 

My favourites - children's books - are often placed on the bottom shelves. That can be very tiring for the back and the knees too.

 

 

There was also an exhibition of bookbinding. These were by experienced bookbinders, and on another table were the works of students. I could see the difference as the mother of a master bookbinder. My daughter studied in this town some years ago.

 

Do you want to see my loot? I bought six books this year, never before have I found so many I wanted and could afford.

The old editions often don't have the title of the original book in the front pages, but it was easy to find that the book on top right is Five Children and It by E. Nesbit. This is one of the books I know we had in the family, and I loved the Railway Children by her, so I wanted to read this other book too again. The book we had at home could even be from my mother as it was written in 1902. These two are the only ones of her 60 books for children that have been translated into Finnish. The top left book is one from my own childhood by a Finnish author Leena Härmä. She lived in my home town Tampere and set many of her books in surroundings I could have known.

The bottom row shows my must have classics, the second book about Heidi, and Uncle Tom's Cabin, a book I have "always" known about but never actually read.

 

This book just made my heart jump! Swallowdale by Arthur Ransome, about children living on their own during Summer holidays and experiencing great adventures, with their mother only occasionally coming to visit and maybe bringing some food supplies. Melanie introduced me to this charming series of books a couple of years ago, and it has brought me great joy. I bought all the books in English but have only been able to find the first, Swallows and Amazons, in a Finnish translation before this.

Summer Holiday, Tiny but Lovely

Last Friday Mr. Kotkarankki had his work done by lunch, and we had two whole days for just the two of us. This was carefully planned in March, so we tried to make the best of it.

First we drove to Tampere to see my mother, 92. We did some gardening for her, and them Mr. K heated the log sauna for us. It's been many years since we last bathed there. Come and see, this is the path down to the lake.





My mother can't go there with her walking aid, the grass has started to grow on the path.


This is the door to the sauna cabin. The wooden steps are my favourite place to sit and watch the lake, a sunset late late at night, or the rain, or a thunder and lightning, or just people slowly rowing in their boats.

The water is taken from the lake with a pump, and heated here in the washing room.

This is the kiuas to heat the sauna, in the other room. Here is a link to very detailed information about the sauna in English.

We sit up here where the heat rises. The benches are of aspen, it is not hot to sit on (on the towel called laudeliina).

This is what I can see from the steps, our little cove where I learned to swim.

A closer look, the yellow irises in my garden are from here. They are wild.

Don't you want to try if the water is warm?

This is another favourite place, niemenkärki, the point of our tiny cape, where we used to angle for perch and roach and usually get bleak.

After the bath - lake water makes my hair unbelievable soft - it was time to go back to the house and eat a light dinner.

The weather had been hot all day, but the walk back made me remember the time when this place was my home and we would run back in when it was cold and rainy in the autumn. During winter we bathed in the other sauna in the basement of the house.

Early on Saturday morning we left for Vammala for the Old Literature fair. This year's theme was War and Love. This is where my daughter Kaija was last year awarded the second price in a book binding competetition for this book. This year there was no competition, but the weather was even hotter than last year.

This is the school where the lectures and discussions took place. There were also many of the second hand book sellers' stands.

And there was this tent. Not a religious meeting, but more booksellers, and even hotter than indoors.

We found some nice books; I will show my loot on Vintage Thingies Thursday this week.

We were there already before the doors were opened, just in time to have an icecream. When we had spent more money than intended, we decided to drive out of town for lunch. In my next post I will tell you more about it. It is too hot to sew, and I must see my dentist tomorrow morning and my doctor before lunch, so there really is nothing crafty to show in the near future.

This last scene is from the local market place, where we found the last book or two, OK, two for me and one for him. The water made the place feel fresh in spite of the heat. I know some of my readers are from really warm places, but the weekend's 27 degrees C (80.6F) was too hot for me.

Working for my fabric diet

This is something I found on Saturday when I was digging in my boxes:





And after a little thinking I did this on Monday:





And some of this, too.




Later I will show you what became of it. These were leftover pieces from my Friendship star quilt.

Yesterday I had wonderful news from my daughter Kaija. She won the second price in a big bookbinding competition. You can read more here. I'm proud to have a talented daughter, and especially glad that her talent is in her hands as well as in her mind and her heart.