these came in a tube last night from here  -  thank you my courier friend!

they are so beautiful to touch and to look at that i can't quite see myself wielding a pair of scissors .  .  .





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what the chef and the camera saw: a snapshot of baku and the caspian sea.


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my weather predictions were totally wrong. there were at least 6 raindrops yesterday and, at times, it smelled like a wet pine forest floor. we are being spoiled with overcast skies and a cool breeze.




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a moving christening yesterday of a fresh, serene little soul.

eau de nil made the favor necklaces ( :: waxed red/grey thread; opalite; painted japanese glass beads; silver). it was a meditative experience, the production line, like shelling peas . . .





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all the wisterias seem to have bloomed and gone quiet.
except ours which, after a single flower, is pumping all its energy into climbing the height and breadth of the wall.


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our chef and our camera are in baku, azerbaijan. while digging into the photo archives + excavating the fridge, we miss them both terribly!







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we can safely assume we've said goodbye to the last raindrop for the next 5 months. as the heat intensifies, we'll be retreating further into the long shadows of the 'cocoon'.

37C and counting . . .

/ photos 1 + 2 by K
// photo 3 by my sister, N.


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i am cheating a little.

these are from a couple of months ago, but saturday was just the same - minus the clothes. the scoop-and-bucket season is upon us.

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talking of sun + sea,
my favourite beach bag just dropped through the inbox, reminiscent of those colourful, voluminous  baskets local fishermen keep their nets in.




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it was our first ever 'last day of school' today and we'd been wrapping 'thank you' gifts for the teachers.

more emotional than anticipated; our favourite teacher - who built up a.'s confidence brick by affectionate brick, day on patient day, all through this year - is going back home to scotland. but a.'s too young to know. she is still living off yesterday's euphoria and the school trip to the big park: "it was a very happy bus with all the children in it!"




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these arrived today from here (well, actually from here), fitting right in -
only the lines are in slight relief, maybe i would have preferred them flush with the beautiful linen?


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pawling also do great stationery - you could win some here.

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just when we thought it was all over:
wind . . . rain . . . cardigans . . . we are happily confused - as if a sentence has been commuted!

of course it could be just climate change and we are going tropical.




[made a while ago for friends :: red silk thread // sterling silver // turquoise]

the island is celebrating the festival of the floods and everyone has gone to the beach.

the deserted, windswept city is ours.





[from a recent walk in the neighbourhood - the exposed mud brick in the second photo is what our walls are made of]

"this is a lady, mummy"

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"this is a gentleman" (who, incidentally, started life as a tree)

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"this is a cloud letting go of its raindrops".



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most of this went into a lentil stew, then an improvised salad of finely sliced, grilled courgettes and cherry tomatoes . .  .  can you tell? it's fresh garlic season.


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a fun outlet outing with l.  . .  .
coming home with a v w (!) dress and some 120% lino.

"something happened to the human brain, between say 50,000 and 100,000 years ago, that allowed this fantastic creativity, imagination, artistic ability, to emerge - it was probably that different parts of the brain became connected in a new way, and so could combine different ways of thinking, including what people know about nature and what they know about making things. this gave them a new capacity to produce pieces of art."

prof. stephen mithen, in neil macgregor's A History of the World in 100 Objects.


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a tiny personal milestone: after a 3-year hiccup - the first ever and oh so scary - i'm reading again.


[jomon pot: clay vessel from japan, 5000 BC]

by the side of the road, near the sea.
walking to thaleia's christening a couple of weekends ago.

let's hope for a wonderful week!





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bathtime can be a fraught, precarious affair.

but not this afternoon. both entry and exit were consensual, hair was washed with neither fuss nor tears, and mummy + baby duck made a smooth transition from water to towel.


we are suddenly faced with a new child peddling 'yes' for an answer  - and it takes some getting used to, all this sweetness and light!



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