GETTING CRAFTY AT HOME

What I like about the holidays is the fact that you, after having visited all your relatives and such, mostly have no actual things you have to do, but a lot of time for yourself (hopefully). I actually worked throughout Christmas (but did get to spend the Eve with my family) and started my holidays as late as today. But one evening when I couldn't get any sleep I still did one of those things I've been planning forever, one of those thing you do at those days when you have nothing more important to dig in to first (love those moments); I revamped my ugly old kitchen stool.

Here's before: rusty, old and dirty (it's actually "inherited" from my parents, I guess they bought it in the early 80s...). Also note my pink brush :)


And after:


I painted it in a shining white colour and put some of the tapestry from the wall in the old flat on the steps, after which I put a layer of the white paint on the tapestry too. I finished by painting a mix of glue and water on it to make it washable and water resistant.

Turned out quite well -and it always feels good to be able to revamp something old instead of throwng it away and getting something new!

WELL BOYS AND GIRLS, IT'S MERRY CHRISTMAS THEN!

I hope you all have a great Holiday, either way you may spend it!


Last year I cosed up the old flat with a lot of lights in time for the season, this year just the star will have to do since I'm living in a much smaller place now. But it's real cosy this year too - we even got some snow here in time for Christmas Eve! And I got anchor shaped gingerbreas from K.
Christmas ahoy!

If you read my blog last year already you may recall I'm a friend of rather tacky Christmas Cards, the kitchier the better. Last year I photoshopped my cats into packages filled with candy and glitter. This year I've made one for the blog (oh my), which means, you!

You can also cut out the heart and hang it me and my cats your christmas tree (no seriously, don't!! :)

IN-BETWEEN-AND-WAITING-POST

Oh my , seems I'm about to take it off! :P
Photo: Rik Stavale/©Helsinki Burlesque

I'm a patient person in general.
But secretly I can't stand waiting. Hate it.
As a kid Christmas was all about waiting (not for Baby Jesus I'm afraid but for the gifts you know).
Nowadays I wait for other things, and lately I've been waiting for pictures from a photoshoot, but most of all from two of our/my latest shows. Knowing how busy I am myself it's understandable that it takes time for our photographer to come up with the pics too. (But mostly when I finally get a hold of the pictures I tend to have really weird facial expressions in 90% of the live pics anyway, so it's like being a child waiting to get a dollhouse and receive a pair of knitted socks instead. Blah :).

Well, while waiting for our own pictures I'll just have to settle for some random ones taken by others... (the one above however is from Helsinki Burlesque's flickr. Full of funny rubber faces of me there, eh).

I'LL TAKE A SUNDAY TOMORROW TOO PLEASE

I like most songs and videos with ships in them.



Today I'm going to dress up pretty, eat well and spend the day with people I really like. And in the evening I'm going to listen to soft and whiny music and do some drawings. Every week should have two Sundays, at least!
I have a day off tomorrow so I'll let that be my second one :)

WANTED: LEOPARD GLOVES

Sometimes loosing the most material and otherwise non important things can still make you very sad or deeply frustrated - I had these really nice wool leopard printed gloves with a perfect lenght and a perfect slim fit that I stumbled upon in H&M a couple of years ago. I quite recently lost one of them and now I've been searching everywhere in stores here to find a similar pair but without result. I can't seem to find any proper ones on the internet either; they are either too fancy (like velvet or so, ment for evening wear) or then too ugly or cheap looking (like made of fleece or so) fleece. *sniff sniff*

Anyone got any hints?

(the picture is old. It was in the blog once earlier in a post that had nothing to do with gloves. Just in case anyone thought it looked familiar :)

WEDNESDAY

I'm quite hopeless, I know. I went for a bit of Christmas shopping the other day and ended up doing some thrifting finds for myself instead. I came home with this woolen pencil skirt (my explanation to self: nice and warm for this time of year) and leather bag (explanation to self: had to get since it was in such mint condition).


Skirt & Bag - thrifted (well obviously, just mentioned it there above...)
Cardigan - Lucky13; a gift from mom some Christmases ago
Shoes - the same old 67 You's as always

Btw, the only good this about climate change is, ummm, well, there is none, but if there ever were (you want to look at the bright side of life right?) it'd be be the fact that it is dry enough here in December for me to still wear shoes like this!

(Even though just as I was walking outside, thinking of this, it started to snow. Just a little bit, in a nice way. My feet and shoes survived : )

JUST LIKE THAT

When my future children grow up they are going to be just like Kitty Daisy and Lewis!


If I'd be a talented cool and stylish teenage musician I might get pissed by someone slighlty older than me calling me cute but I'm still going to do that because I think they are. Supercute. And cool.

RED & GREEN (ME THE KIND OF CHRISTMAS EDITION GOING ON)

If I've worn red and green before hoping not to remind people of Chirstmas it's totally ok to get some gingerbread or Christmas three vibes at this time of year from that colour combination. (50% of my nutrition this week has consisted of gingerbreads. I'm going to turn into the gingerbread woman soon or something!)

Blogging can be serious business, ummm, at least according to my facial expression...

(...and this picture is just here so I can show off my biiig hairdo)

Have a great weekend :)

Top - S&M dress worn as shirt; Skirt - MissSixty; Belt and tights - Old H&M; Shoes - Blueberry

PAIRING GREY / 7

I haven't done any christmas shopping yet ... except for myself - I gave myself this grey little bag as a pre christmas present. (Umm, or I didn' t actually, my Visa card did. Porridge time in January!). I paired it with a pair of grey shoes and felt rather grannyish until i added the big red bow in my hair. Then I felt like an overgrown seven year old.

Dress - Jenny Hällström
Bolero - old H&M
Shoes - Bullboxers
Bag - Global Accessories
Bow-thing in hair - Selfmade

And speaking of seven (Ha! I'm being real smooth here now :); I was tagged by Betsy (lovely blog, make sure to pay it a visit!) some time ago to reveal seven facts about myself.

So, one has to tell 7 things about oneself, both normal and a bit more strange, and tag seven people (+ the regular : link the one who challenged you and leave a comment about this to the tagged ones...)
Here we go:

1) I don't believe in horoscopes

but

2) I still consider myself to be a very typical libra: I'm very much of this and that black and white; there are a lot of opposites and constrast about me. Plus I am the worst ever to make desicions or to choose between two things

3) I'm a vegetarian. I used to be a vegan, but then sushi and milk chocolate took over... these days I use both dairy products and eat fish (and therefore feel a bit guilty from time to time).
But I'll never have meat or puoltry again.

4) I'm totally addicted to Powercow Chocolate milkshake (those small ones in ugly packing) and Dr.Oetkers Vanilla- and berry pudding. Must have once a day, at least :)

5) I can be quite the heartbraker, both intentionally and unintentionally. Mostly the later.

6) I like fashion as a phenomena and as an artform, but in general I don't really give a damn about whats happening on the catwalk and have no understanding whatsoever for the sort of worshipping of models that some girls have (now some readers are going to hate me I guess :)

7) The other job I have, apart from running my design business, is being a supervisor in the harbour, where I work twelve days out of 21. That's labour in grease and boots, bossing the boys around. As mentioned above, I am all about contrasts.

Uuuh, I always find it hard to tag others and I have no ida how many have ansvered this... This time, in honour of our Independence Day (which was last week), I'll tag only fellow Finnish bloggers: Kitten, Jenni, the Evil Dressmaker, Ranna, Nanó, Ilona and the Suburban Queen!

CLUB WANTED AND MORE...

Photo for ClubWanted by Santtu Särkäs

Now as I'm home fixig on some outfits for our upcoming show on Wednesday I might add a little advertisement about whats to come next year : in less than two months Club Wanted kicks off for the first time! Rock n'Roll and burlesque (that's us! Once a month! And with guest starts later on too :)! What more to ask for?

(We've started to get our lazy burlesque booties out in the web too so if you're in to all of that you can join us on facebook here or add us on myspace here. More pics coming up on those sites oon...)

DON'T STAY IN AND SLEEP ALL SUNDAY!

With reference to my post below; you'll surely find lots and lots of similar and other lovely things if you pop by the Ofelia Second Hand Market at Gloria tomorrow! I know for sure that some of the stores, like Ansa for example, have ben saving special items just for this occasion for a long time. And there will be a lot of handmade treats to buy too!

Otherwise this would be a perfect happening for my Sunday Club, but I will be occupied with doing some slight modelling for Olivia Rouge (who is not only a burlesque dancer but also a seamtress). No Sunday Club for me, but it doesn't matter since I am very excited about the dress I'll wear!

So see you there then?

SOFT PACKAGES

When I was a kid I hated soft packages since they mostly contained knitted socks, undies or pyjamas. But well, I guess you all know that these days I prefer them instead!

Today I've felt really cold so I've broswed the net for some knitted goodies, and who knows, maybe one of these will end up with me as a soft package soon?

Cloche hat and Wimbledon headband- mitten set from Ekawear
Ruffle Gloves from Modcloth, Bowed berets from Dollydagger
(Well, I can bow my berets myself but these were so pretty I thought they were worth to show anyway!)

Some more nice knitted things to look at, all from etsy:
1., 2., 3., 4., 5., 6. and 7!

And I might have to get one of these, because it's so cute and freaky at the same time :D

ME, THE UPCOMING CHRISTMAS EDITION

This month I'm going to ditch my black beret and wear a red one all the time!
When I evetually get my behind dragged to the sewing shop I'll buy some matching red quilted ribbon to make a bow for it, now I've attached a little pin with a ship and a maiden on it to make it more me.

(Jacket - Vintage, Beret and Skirt - GinaT, SHoes - Blueberry, Bag - H&M)

BATMAN'S GIRLFRIEND

Yes I know, I really am trying to outdo myself when it comes to coming up with stupid headlines.

But anyway.


I've always found comics with a touch of film noir as well as superhero- and classic comics rather inspiring (not to mention noir flics themselves too of course). The world that's drawn, the way it's drawn. But most of all, the ladies in them.



The men in this world have troubled minds (they're most often a detective or such), they wear a trenchcoat and hat and have a weakness for alcohol and women. Or then they are the superheroes; in daytime rather regular guys, at night time worldsaving hunks. And they all have a somewhat complicated realationship to the The Woman. *

The Woman is something of a femme fatale, showing up at the office door behind a curtain of smoke.
She has a habit of getting into trouble.

Or, then she is trouble.

The Superhero Girlfriend again is rather preppy but still adventurous, hanging out on rooftops and running around dark alleys in her fitted skirt and always perfetly shiny hair while trying to find out the identity of her superhero boyfriend (while possibly getting into trouble).






Jacket and blouse - oldl H&M, Skirt - Selfmade,
Silk Bow Stockings - Vogue, Shoes - Minna Parikka

*) Most of the guys around here actually fit the first descrition pretty well - the alcohol and women but minus the trench and the hat (and without us being in Gotham city). That, and the fact that Johnny Depp is already taken -he has nothing to do with comics but is worth a mention every now and then anyway- makes me go for the option of the Superhero Hunk. I wouldn't mind being Batman's girlfriend for a while. (Preferrably -ok, only - the Bale version. Oh yeah and with a happy ending).

(The comic and film noir images are googled up and the rest of the pics taken by Ina.)

SOFT DO-WOOP SUNDAY

Today I have had an unbelievable amount of different cakes and pies (mm-mm-mm!)and can now only lie down and listen to musci that would make me want to dance a little bit.

IN TRENDI

I have caught the flue and might give people the impression that I'm related to Rudolph and I still have a bunch of work to do so I'm mostly running around all incognito in my black uniform (no sneakers though, we have snow here so it's all winter boots now!)

So, I'll continue to rely on others to supply me with nicer pics than the ones I'd be capable of taking right now...


Our burlesque group is part of a story about burlesque in Finland in this month's Trendi magazine, togheter with Sally Vanilla, Minna Parika and Kirsi Nisonen.
(Photo by Kaapo Kamu)

I was actually sick at the photo shoot but it went quite well anyway, except for that the hairstylist didn't show up when we were to be shot! I did panic for a while since I hadn't touched my hair after the shower, it was a mess, and I only had a few of my mandatory bobby pins in my purse. Luckily I can manage pretty good by myself and with some borrowed hairspray there was no damage done :)

My black and gold corset in the photo is made by Tyra Therman btw.

(and funny enough, the hairstylist did fix some very nice glamour hair to some of the others who were photographed later but their picture is shot in such a way that the hair doens't even show...)

UMMM...

I'm not usually not much for contests and stuff but if I find myself in one it would of course be nice to, well, win or something.

So if you find me nice and fabulous and stylish and all that why don't go on and put in a little vote for me in the Supermelons Best Real Style Contest?
Time's until December 19th!
Thanks in advance, heheh :)

EDIT : ...but in order to vote you have to register first. You'll get a membership to The Supermelon then, but they won't start sending you any emails or such though.

RED

Another coincidence, although this one is not that strange since chrsitmas seasong is sneaking upon us, and we were infact throwing a so called "Little Christmas" party with our music quiz team. (My feet are the ones with the most practical shoes for the snowy evening, eh).

So everyone was actually wearing black or red or black and red (but I actually broke the code a little bit by having my beige checked skirt on.)

Little Christmas parties are always quite hilarious. I pimped our tomteluvor a bit too.


And by the way, very now and the it's good to remember not to take onself too seriously :)
Have a great week!

VOLT MAGAZINE

Me and my Burlesque group are featured in Volt magazine togehter with Olivia Rouge today! I think the pics are great (sadly though one of our girls is missing since she couldn't attend the shoot), and now you also get to see a bit of the outfits I made for us.

SLIGHTLY PINK FOR A WHILE

Cardigan - H&M, Dress - Selfmade
Belt - Indiska, Shoes - Vintage

I went to the hairdesser the other day to fix my roots (I know, this comes as a real chock but I was actually not born platinum blonde :) and to get a slight tone of colour adjusted. Something got a bit wrong perhaps since my hair got an undertone of soft pink. But I catually like it! Sadly it will dissappear after wash or two...

SOME MORE OF THAT YES PLEASE!

Mission for today; visit Dear Martha!



Dear Martha, run by Josefin, is a delicious blog about crafting, baking and deily luxury. It is full of good looking recipies and decorative, pretty small things to do for your home or to perhaps make a rainy day a little bit more fun. I love looknig at things like that, it gives me a lot of ideas and makes me wish I had more of that luxurious free time! There are also some great links listed at Dear Martha, like one about Tiki cupcakes!

Today Joesfin has posted a little interwiev with me, where I also give a quick tip om how to alter a dress in a simple way.

HIDING IN BLACK

I don’t like leaving home - and seldom do - without being properly dressed and with my hair fixed. But sometimes when I’m really busy; have a lot of freelances jobs to work with and in the same time need to take care of errands around town, or if I have to go to work at strange hours I need to prioritize the comfort in my way of dressing. Even though I might feel like it, I still don’t want to go out looking like I’m about to fetch a pizza on a hangover Sunday afternoon in my pyjamas adn a hoodie. Instead I go for a rather classy and incognito look, which makes me feel a little bit like being in disguise or like I’ve managed to fool the rest of the world that I look good :)

What works for me are the following : I wear all black soft clothes, I put something on my head, I add som detail.

The past week I’ve been living in my black “uniform” ; wearing a pair of comfy velour leisure pants that look like a nice pair of black trousers (which I still don’t own btw) if and only when combined with my black sailor style jacket. I hide my messy hair with my beret or with a black scarf and do a quick make up - a more strong than pretty look; just two sleek and thick strokes of black eyeliner. (I’ve been doing those since I was fourteen so I can get them perfect in five seconds) And then I match the red stripe of my vintage sneakers (yes you read it right; sneakers!) with my mittens and give the whole thing a sailor-ish touch with my anchor bag (which fits things like my calendar, a lot of papers and so on).

In the end it’s actually the jacket that makes the whole thing work so I avoid having to take it of. Illusion ruined, I’m in my leisure wear underneath.

TRIXIES!

Trashy Diva is one of my favourite clohing lines, maybe even my absolute favourite one. Today I ordered one Trixie dress in each colour available, one for each one of us five girls in my burlesque group. I did actually order two dresses of one colour since I'm getting myself two Trixies!

So which two colours do you think I got for myself?

EDIT : I loved reading your guesses and I could have taken all coulurs but the ones I went for now was the red and the bright blue! Looking very much forward to receiving them :)

WELL YES, PLEASE!

I'm still busy and boring (for the ones who wishes me to update my blog more frequently. Otherwise I'm not boring at all :) Well, in such times it's nice when others do somtehing about you instead! Yes please. I'm featured in the Supermelon's latest Real Style section here.

The Supermelon is a lifestyle site with a wide range of articles and features about style, trends, art etc. Their Real Style interviews feature style/fashion bloggers of which some are propably known to you from before.


Then I'd like to thank always positive and nice Pratishtha for giving me the Brilliant Weblog Premio! Recently I haven't had time to read any blogs properly or to answer comments or post any myself, but I'll still pass it on this time; to some darling bloggers that read mine and always leave me nice responce (and that I think I have not 'awarded' before...) :
Sal, Andrea, Wendy B, Mrs.Munster, Pretty Pirate and Sueper.
These are only a few; of course there are a lot more of you out there! So thank you all. And have a great weekend!

OH ARMI

Oh Armi Armi, how I want you. How hard you would be to wear in the Finnish soggy winter, and how hard you'd be to pair with some parts of my wardrobe. But it doesn't matter. I'd still love you very much, if only you were mine.



I did buy a pair of shoes for last winter, but for some strange reason I chose them one size too big - theyr're totally wearable, but they look a bit, well, big (I'm slightly obsessed with having my feet look small). And my mother's suede boots that served first her and then me for ten years each are starting to slowly fall apart. Might need to get something new. You know, so my feet don't get wet and I sick and so on.

But my sister reminded me I could fly back and forth to NY for the price of those beauties. So it might be that -for the moment at least - they'll just remain on my 'dream on' list. *sigh*

But for the price of a ticket to, well, Copenhagen for example, I could get one of these. And that's already considerable:


Minna Parikka by Mantere. Not nearly as delicious, but not bad. And perhaps slightly more easy to wear in crappy weather and snow due to a thicker sole and lower heel. Considerable, indeed.

Buy them here for example (and check out other FInnish design at the same time too :)

(images from www.minnaparika.com and www.finnishdesignshop.com )

AND IT WAS GREAT

Yesterday's show ws a huge succes (resulting in none the less than three new photoshoots coming up!) -and it was a lot of fun too! Today I've spent the whole day inside doing absolutely nothing (I was already thinking of doing an outfit post in my pyjamas but let's not break any illusions here :)

While waiting for some more professional photos from the night and in a lack of any other topic due to my day spent only in bed and by the computer, I'll post a few snapshots I took before the evening started.

Cupcake girls and sailorettes, lots of make up, some champagne
and one pick-up piccolo boy.


Burlesque girls on the phone in a freezing backstage

A LITTLE LITTLE BIT NERVOUS

Tonight is the biiiig burlesque show. The organizers have understood to save the best for last, since our group will be the final performers. Perfect!

This is what I will be wearing tonight off stage :


(Dress - Trashy Diva, Shoes - Bianco)

And this is part of what I will be wearing on stage...




I made five of these sets plus skirts for us all and something for our male performer too! It will be hilarious I'm sure; and visually great since we have nice colours and great props on stage. There will certainly be some great photos taken of the night which I might post here later then...

I LIKE IT WHEN YOU LOVE ME

Thank You Thank You Thank You.

I have been given a lot of awards; one from the darling Alice, two awards (oh my :) from talented Sam and last but not least one from sweet Jess!

Thank you lovely ladies so much for the appreciation! I'm going to be a total bitch (but a very loveable such) and just keep these for myself without passing them on this time.

On top of it all I was given the biggest lollipop in the world by a colleague of mine! It's huge.

Shirt - S&M
Skirt - Selfmade
Grey tights - H&M,
Shoes - Sixtyseven You

I GOT A LITTLE PRINCESSY FOR A WHILE

As I mentioned in my previous post, I have a thing for the circus, but as with many other things; when you really start thiking about it, it's mostly the concept and images that surrounds it that fascinates me.


Think of the red curtain, the golden pollets on the shoulders, the smell of horses and sawdust, the sound of a barrel organ (and a little monkey clapping those cymbals! You know I love monkeys but oh well, let's not get in to those now).

Think of tattooed ladies portraid in old photos, siamese twin beauties, strong men, lions, ballerinas , sideshow freaks and snake women, romanticised versions of gypsies (ehrm, or to be more exact; Johnny Depp in The Man Who Cried. Think of some artwork of for example Johanna Öst, the Tv series Carnivale, Burton's Big Fish...

So when I went to see the circus I dressed up a little bit with a circus princess on my mind (even though I doubt anyone actually payed any attention to it) - as many bows as possible, a puffy skirt, a patterned hairband and switching my basic black makeup (happens very rarely) for some electric blue, gold and purple.



But to be honest, if I would have lived a hundred years ago and joined a circus (I would have done so even if there wouldn't have been a horseman-Depp hangin around :) I might not actually have been so much of a circus prima ballerina princess then. I think I would have been more of a tattooed acrobatic snake lady , the knife-thorwers partner or a musterious oh-so-good-at-faking it clairvoyant. Who knows.

AT THE CIRCUS

On Sunday I went with my sisters and my parents to see the circus.

I've always loved circuses! One of my earliest memories are from when my grandparents took me to Circus Finlandia when I was about three and I saw elephants there (they still had them around when I was a kid).

The past years I've seen more of the Cirque Noveau, like Les Oiseaux Fois, Circque du Soleil and Hurjaruuths Christmas Circuses but there is still something special about the traditional circuses, the ambiance of it. Even though I guess it's mostly the idea of the traditional circus that enchants me (If I would have lived in the 19th or early 20th century I would have ran away and joined an eastern European circus. Sometimes I still wonder if I did a bad choice of career and should've joined the circus anyway even though living in the 21st century. Since my limbs are practically made of rubber I could surely be good for some tricks... )

Cottoncandy and popcorn are a must when going to the circus:

Jacket - S&M, I added the quilted bow to make it "new" for this season
Hairband - thrifted, Scarf - Indiska, Skirt - Nümph
Tights - Nelly (around 3€ at S-market, bargain!)
"Hold Fast" tote bag - Sailor Jerry
Shoes - Minna Parikka

BOOM BADINBANG!

Have you ever visited bang bang industrie?
It's a french style site in blog format. They have a quite fun section with style profile features and the latest is on moi. How nice! You can check it out here to see some of my, heh, words of wisdom.

Or why not sign up to see if they'd perhaps make one of you too?

DOCTORS

Today I had to crawl out of bed and dig out my winterjacket to go see the doctor (have another appointement on Friday and I think I'll be well soon. There are few things some pills won't fix) and also to get to an appointemnt with a client. Sometimes when you feel really awful (and your hair is very dirty) it's a bit hard to dress up, especially in this case when I really had to look proper (since the customer was a bit sceptic about me at first, whatthehell, but they did love my job now. Of course. They always do in the end). I've also ben stuffing myself with food the past days so anything thight was out of the question because I really wanted to feel comfy.

An outfit both comfy and chic is not always the easiest to achieve but since I did pretty good in the end I thought I'd snap a picture of it once I was at it.


Except for that you can't really see any of it in this picture.

But now you can (yeah haha funny enough).


Blouse & Bolero - old H&M
Skirt - selfmade
Shoes - Minna Parikka
More about 'Doctors': I was browsing through some pianopieces I like on youtube and found this darling video (it's sort of a music video from the twenties :) I like it when the toys come alive). I used to play the classical piano for more than fifteen years in the Music Institute and this was one of my favourite pieces to play ( I really enjoy most of Debussy); Doctor Gradus Ad Parnassum. I prefer it played just slightly slower though.



(The suite has six pieces but only three were filmed. If you search "Children's Suite" and "Cortot" on youtube you can see the other two videos made.
Do it!)