Lineanongrata

and thus...

Thank you all for your kind and thoughtful comments and emails. I'm still trying to integrate the fact that grandfather is gone. Trying to go from the verb 'dying' to 'dead'. We'll say good bye to him next week Thursday and that will be a very sad occasion, but right now there are stretches of time when I don't think about it and even more time when I do think about him and grandma, but only happy and funny thoughts. About how it was when we were little and they in their prime of grand-parenthood.

Before burying grandfather though, my new godson and I will be baptized. Monday. And to be precise: He'll be baptized and I'll then be his godmother. Lucky him.

Jakob was born in September and is the son of one of my two best friends. Even though he doesn't like his mother to talk on the telephone (thinking she should much rather talk only to him, if she please) and wails loudly when I call, he's the the source of many happy thoughts at the moment nonetheless.

It's as my grandmother always says: 'Thus joy and tears come from the same face.'

sad tidings

Our grandfather passed away yesterday at the age of 86.
It's the kind of phone call we all dread, knowing full well that it must come one day.

What can I say? We'll miss him.
I'll make sure my children and grandchildren can say 'go to the pharmacy' backwards in German really fast. I'll be sure to tell them who got out the water hose when my brother and sister and I had water fights in the garden in summer. We'll be sure to remember how he used to drive off after a visit and had to stop five hundred meters away because he had so many tears in his eyes he couldn't drive.
Oh, and yes, I'll remember all my life how he used to hold Hanna upside down by her legs when she howled because he thought she might suffocate with her own rage (gratifying moment in the life of a sister). We'll remember the funny and the sad stories he told us, and I'll sure never forget the memorable phone calls that started out all happy and ended with him hanging up abruptly and without good bye because he didn't want us to hear him cry.

And yes, once in a while Daniel, Hanna and I will go to a restaurant and tell the waiter we would not like to pay (maybe we'll even wave the money around just a little bit), and when asked how we are, we'll answer 'thank you, bad as well'. Grinning a little bit.

if - seed and a thought on silence

A week ago I realized that I had been listening to one of my favorite author's new release as an audiobook for two and a half hours and and had literally no idea what had happened so far.

That's what I do when I work on my own projects, be it an illustration or some craft project. I listen to audiobooks. It's a little bit like cinema in my head. At the same time I have half an ear open for outside noises. One of the boys having his arm cut off (they did buy the chainsaw they dreamed of and it was only with effort that we could save some of the trees on the winery) or some other emergency. Plus there is a section in my brain that thinks about the blog post I would like to write that day. To that you can add the usual list of projects I would love (no, make that looooooove) to do or make, rattling along in another part of my brain and there is a lot of noise in my head every day.

Mothers with two or more children are bound to think 'hah my dear, that's nothing. You just see and wait...' And that's exactly why I wait to have those 1,52 kids I'm supposed to have while living in France. Who wants to have cute babies when there are craft projects to finish?

When all the uproar inside and outside of me became so loud I couldn't concentrate on a suspense audiobook any more I knew it was time for some silence. That's why this blog has been a quiet one last week. I took time to water plants (aha ! the 'seed' illustration does have something to do with today's post ! What a happy coincidence.), sew some sweet clothes for someone very very special and dream about projects I want to do. Quietly. One after the other.

shh, it's still a secret

Eleven secrets, actually.

the strawberry challenge

I still have not gotten around to planting these poor strawberries, but they don't mind the neglect and produce our first own red strawberries. Nature is wonderful.

Pretending these came from our garden is an attractive thought... you know, me, the star-gardener, working the ground since the beginning of February. Defying icy winds and cold rains... working my hands bloody in the fields...

Lovely. So they were bought at the grocery store but still, they were good.

These ones were served with whipped crème fraîche and sugar. If you have not yet tried to whip crème fraîche, you should. It makes a world of difference.

How about trading best strawberry recipes? If you tell me yours, I'll tell you our favorite of all times.

ps: I have a whole mouth full of sweet teeth, so you better believe our strawberry recipe is worth some comment-recipe-sharing-effort.

Etsy made me do it

That was indeed exactly the question.

I opted for a shop update and shall kiss Vincent later. Lucky me.

The illustrations you can purchase in the Lineanongrata shop now have been published in a German magazine for kindergarten teachers and school teachers for young children. They were linked to context but do make nice illustrations on their own, I think.

a fleeting glimpse

It's in the middle of so much work for the winery that I become impatient and want to go back to crafting and illustrating. Weekends and evenings have been busy times, divided between quiet time and even some sun, some barbecue experiments by Vincent (delicious), watching the plants grow (Honestly. You can almost watch them grow. I look in the morning and nothing is there to be seen. Around noon I look again, just in case, and green things are showing tender sprouts.), and making things.

The second photo was taken by Vincent. I hadn't seen it before but the two photos make a nice pair.

on days like this

On days when things just don't work out the way they were supposed to,

ordinary things are strangely comforting.

chublime

Yes, that's me playing Indian (oh dear, we shouldn't have left her unsupervised with all that unbottled wine. Now you just look and see what's become of her.).

But I'm not out of my mind. Not entirely, at least.

The other day Vincent and I went to a nice-things-and-lady-like-shop. Where you buy perfumes and such things. It was in February so we were scheduled to buy a birthday present for me and it was obvious we would end up in this kind of shop because there isn't much choice in the matter where we live as far as birthday presents go.

Vincent went in city clothes, trench coat and wool sweater, I didn't give the matter much thought in advance and went in holy and paint-stained jeans (Bon Jovi covets my pants).

Of course I felt completely out of place in the perfumery with all the sellers dressed in immaculate white and full of ladylike attention to skin texture, -color and what-not. Vincent was much more at ease, being the one who was supposed to pay. When asked what kind of product I was looking for I could only make vague gestures with my shoulders and grimace. Moreover the lady advising us had a flaw in speech and chpoke like chis.

As gentlemanly as I was dressed I suppressed any kind of giggles this might have provoked.

Until right at the end of the conversation when I had already said yes to a facial cream and she and Vincent had a private conversation about body lotion. I did my best to make a lot of 'no' motions with my whole body and face but my beloved didn't even look at me. Finally the shop lady took off with the facial cream PLUS the body lotion, turning around to say 'You'll chee, it'ch chublime !'.

sorely tempted

... to pull out all the seedlings we planted two days ago to see if anything has happened to them yet.
You won't find any pictures of that because I haven't done so. Yet.

Sorely tempted also to spend more time than I can spare on creative endeavors

that have little

or nothing

to do with wine or labels. And everything with my own private amusement.

You won't find any pictures of that, either. Because I resisted. Of course.

what dreams are made of

Two weeks ago an employee of the Office National des Forêts came to visit us at the winery. The ONF are the guys who think about woods and the possibility the latter might catch fire. Which is a real problem in the southern parts of France because we don't have a whole lot of water down here and the woodlands get quite dry during the hotter seasons of the year.
The nice but very stern person from the ONF told us that we needed to clear the underbrush all around the winery. All of it and preferably this month because afterward he'll come back and fine us if it isn't done (because underbrush is dry, of course, and dry things burn better than young sprouts. Of course.). As we don't have the necessary material to do what we'll need to do, there has been an ever increasing number of catalogs around the house:

... the stuff dreams are made of.

When they think nobody is watching the boys wander around the buildings, eying the underbrush with a light of pleasure in their eyes. When I listen carefully I hear François muttering: 'And while we're at it, this tree... and this bush...'

sun for all

Just a hint of the spring and summer to come. Wearing sandals for the first time. Even my toes got some sunshine today.

It felt so good to start with the spring and summer routines.

Watering seedlings, taking them out in the morning, bringing them back in in the evening.

Taking care of something else than bottles, wine or illustrations.

And don't you like my frog watering can ? It's a gift from my brother and his girlfriend Erika.

In the evening, when the air grows fresh and crisp and the light has a tinge of blue, an apéritif,

an improvised barbecue,

a table with homemade bread and handpicked roses.

Don't you wish summer was already here? And don't you just love spring for making you wish exactly that?

the road (holiday slide show, part 2)

The road goes ever on and on

Down from the door where it began.

Now far ahead the road has gone,

And I must follow, if I can,

Pursuing it with eager feet,

Until it joins some larger way

Where many paths and errands meet.

And whither then ? I cannot say.

J.R.R. Tolkien

arrivederci, Verona (holiday slide show, part 1)

A shot taken with my (very new and exciting) portable phone. My sister Johanna, me and our brother Daniel.

Somebody else's brother and sister but it about sums up how it feels to be with my siblings. Like skipping on a rainy day: Real good.

Over the next couple of days I won't have a lot of time to write many a word because my mother and father came back to France with me and we have to work through all the open problems of the moment (60 000 bottles to fill and such things) until Friday evening. So you'll have to endure the traditional holiday slide show (ha ! let's torture some friends and family ! Just have a seat on the couch and I'll show you all of our lovely holiday pictures. Ready ? You got the potato chips at hand ?).

Verona.

Johanna: 'I looove those pine trees.'

'Those are not pine trees but ... I can't remember their name. Acacia ... ? Come on, Hanna, help me out. Tell me some tree names.'

- blank-

'Don't you know any trees ?'

'Apple trees, pear trees, cherry trees... .'

gone to Italy

For a week I'll be enjoying a little holiday in Verona in Italy.
Because I need to give this to my mother, who's birthday it was in ... February.

Now you're thinking it's not logical to go to Italy to give something to a German mummy.

And you're right. It's not.

But it's ever so charming.

Take care, all of you. Wishing you a good week and hope to hear from you when I get back.