T stands for....a lovely tea advent calendar!

I'm late to the T party, but here we go. I got a very nice looking advent calendar from my co-workers, filled with tasty teas. I'm usually ver sceptical, when it comes to tea advent calendars, as I got some over the years, which had very bad tasting teas included (like they were in a cupboard for centuries and just came out to be stuffed in that calendar :D). But this one from Cupper is yummy. And look at that cute design!

And while sipping a cup of tea I'm in full giftmaking mode. This year it's all about beeswax and things from the garden. Like these cute soaps with beeswax.

I also made some lipbalm and....

....hand cream with beeswax.

And on top some tealights, which smell heavenly.

I also made different varieties of vinegar and oil and some herb salt, all ingredients, except the olive oil and the vinegar, are from my garden. Worked on this for the past months and am so happy seeing it all come together.

I'll pack the sets into these upcycled cereal containers, which I think, look great.

Sharing it all with T stands for..... over at Bleubeard and Elizabeth's place.

#10minuteartwarmup or Doodling for Stress Reduction

When I visited my abandoned blog some time ago, I came across a blog post by CJ & Ink about her weekly doodling class for stress reduction. I loved the idea and remembered the #10minuteartwarmup I once participated in. I can't remember who hosted it once, but decided to try and do it daily. 10 minutes of sketching/drawing before office. 

Here are some of the sketches I did so far. Some are done on narrow paperstrips I got from a friend. Those were used for marking transport boxes and go to the bin after single use. So recycling is a plus.

European Robin

Blue Tit

Eurasian Wren

I also got a small sketchbook I carry in my backpack.

Another Robin

Long Tailed Tit

And another Robin. *LOL*

Eurasian Jay

Pied Avocet

I sometimes sketch a whole series of the same bird on an A3 sketchbook page. Here the Eurasian Kingfisher.

T stands for....a new cup (paired up with Christmas card printing and winter gardening)

I finished my Christmas cards and am now looking forward to sending them out to some lovely people. This year I printed them with different techniques like linocut or gelli plate. I found this fun video of creating printing templates for the gelli plate with a hot glue gun. :)

I'm always searching for veggies that can be planted in the garden during winter. Winter here doesn't bring as much snow and cold temps as it did 10 years ago, but it can get quite frosty on some days. So here we have a winter pea, which will bring peas in early spring, planted in November.

There's some winter garlic, which will be ready for harvest in June/July.

I also have some broad beans (Vicia faba), which can deal with low temps and will be ready for harvest in May/June.

And to qualify for "T stands for...." with Bleubeard and Elizabeth, I'll show you a tea can I made at a team building event in office. Was a lot of fun and ofc mine has to picture a bird.

I'll enjoy some tea or coffee from this one in the very near future.

Mehrfarbiger Linoldruck/Multicolored linoprint

Während ich meine Weihnachtskarten gedruckt habe, kam mir die Idee, dass ich für die Tannenzapfen ja einen Hintergrund schneiden und dann einen mehrfarbigen Druck machen könnte.

While printing my Christmas cards I had the idea of cutting a background for the pinecones and try a multicolored print with them.

Die erste Herausforderung war, alles ,,richtig herum" zu denken und aufzuzeichnen. Jeder, der schon mal Linoldruck gemacht hat, weiß genau, was ich meine. :D

The first challenge was to think and draw everything "the right way". Everyone who made linocut at least once, knows exactly what I mean. :D

Passt schon mal sehr gut.

Fits perfectly.

Finde die Zapfen auch einzeln gedruckt sehr schön, vor allem in braun.

Really love the pinecones printed in brown.

Ich habe einige Farben ausprobiert.

Tried some different colors.

Aber so ganz zufrieden bin ich mit dem Linoldruck für den Hintergrund nicht. Eine Bluesky-Followerin hat mich darauf gebracht, es mal mit Siebdruck für den Hintergrund zu probieren.

I'm not completely happy with how the linoprinted backgrouund looks. A follower on Bluesky suggested, that I should try a silkscreen printed background.

Aber nichtsdestotrotz hat mir der Druckabend im Keller eine schöne Ausbeute an Weihnachtskarten gebracht.

But neverthelesss the printing evening in the basement gave me some very nice Christmas cards.

Wie sehen eure Weihnachtskarten dieses Jahr aus?

What do your Christmas cards this year look like?

 

Linolschnitt für Weihnachtskarten/Linocut for Christmas Cards

 Hallo zusammen,

einige Zeit nichts gepostet, also wird es höchste Zeit! Wie sieht's bei euch mit den Weihnachtskarten aus? Schon angefangen? Ich habe die letzten Jahre immer welche gemalt und dachte, dass ich dieses Jahr mal welche drucke. Also raus mit den Linolmessern und ran an die Platten.

Hey there,

long time no see. Have you already thought about Christmas cards? Or have started making them? For the last years I mostly painted them, but for this year I thought about printing some. So I pulled out my linocut tools and some linoleum sheets.

Zuerst mal eine Skizze.

First there's a sketch.

Linolschnitt macht süchtig. Man kann nicht mehr aufhören, wenn man einmal angefangen hat.

Linocut is addicting. Can't stop once you started.

Erster Probedruck des Bäumchens.

First test print of the small tree.

Eine weitere Idee für eine Karte. Daneben sind noch zwei Lesezeichen zu sehen, die ich dann mit Aquarellfarben gestaltet habe.

Another idea for a Christmas card. Besides are two books marks, I paiinted with watercolors later on.

Das in Linol geschnittene Design.

The design cut from the linoleum sheet.

Und ein Probedruck mit farbig gestaltetem Hintergrund.

And a test print with colored backgrounds.

T stands for....notepads from recycling materials!

Last week I showed you some gelli prints I made. I LOVE making them, but....

WTH SHOULD I USE THEM FOR? I'm not a collage girl, so that wasn't it. As a background for my watercolors? Too busy most of the time. But then during the weekend, it hit me like a hammer. I follow a lady over on Blueskyand she makes the most wonderful notepads, sketchbooks etc. from recycling materials.

So here we go. I lately rescued some large desktop calendars from the office paper bin. Lots and lots of white unused paper with a calendar from 2012. Cut off the calendar and you have enough paper to fill hundreds of little notepads and sketchbooks.

I found a cutting wheel in my stash, that can cut perforated lines. Perfect! 

For the cardboard to make the covers durable, I used cardboard envelopes, packages from tea bags or the cardboard pieces, that come with t-shirts or undies. I even saw someone use the packages from tablets or C tests. They all get covered with nice papers, so it doesn't matter.

I used my prints on the outside and added some stamps to add more interest. For the inside I used old gift wrapping paper or the not so nice prints/ghost prints.

That was a botanical print, that turned out not so nice.

I made five notepads with perforated pages, so you can rip them out. When the paper is all used up, you an always cut the thread binding and add new paper, just in case you like the cover too much to throw away. I used a mix of bought and handmade stamps to decorate the notepads.

The 5th notepad was decorated with a feather print. One of the favorites from my very first printing session.

Nice contrast and the feather seems to float above the surface.

And with a good cup of milk coffee, all the cutting and glueing and sewing is easy. :)

 

Sharing with "T stands for...." by Bleubeard and Elizabeth.

T stands for....gelli printing!

Hey there! How are you on T Day? Drinks ready?

Yesterday evening I felt the urge to disappear in the basement equipped with my gelli plate. During lunch break I watched some videos about botanical prints made with the gelli plate. I already tried my hand on this technique, but I wasn't happy with the outcome. So back to watch some videos and learn more, before giving it another try. Much more happy with yesterday's outcome.  The ghost print with the fish on top was an attempt on another technique, but I couldn't remember the single steps properly, so I failed.

Some close-ups. Here with different grass species.

A sedum flower and vetch leaves.

A sedum flower, grass and rose leaves.

A kind of "negative" print in two layers. First layer is a dark mix of colors, then overprinted with a lighter layer of color.

All these grasses, leaves and lovely flowers came from my garden. They remind of herbal tea. Do you like herbal teas (or infusions, if named correctly)? I drink them a lot, sometimes homegrown leaves directly from the garden or in teabags. The one below is among my favorites, a blend of peppermint and chamomile.

 

Sharing with "T stands for...."!