Depressing times

Did the yearly cleaning in the dorm and used Chillit Bang for the first time. And the last, because turns out I’m so allergic to this stuff, I turned into huge ball. Bloated so up I had hard time even to breath.  Did no work yesterday thanks to this, because the swollen nerves gave me headache too.

Today we have another problem. What to wear in theater? I have a skirt I was hoping to wear, but because it is shorter than my so far style, I’m reminded constantly that I can scare people elsewhere too. So we went dress hunting and I came out empty.  I hate those trips, because there are always two sorts of clothing there – either they are built like bags or there is none for my size and I’m pretty much average. But I can’t go with the skirt I chose.

I don’t have my regular work right now.  This is suppose to give me time to study. Today is third day and I feel like yelling, because every time I get concentrated, someone drops in to go food hunting or clothes or so I’d go walk with niece…  In two hours I’ll need to go and take the clothes out the drier. So how is this different from staying at home and working with brother until late in the night?

Or is it just that I’m depressed? The last days at work I received confirmation that I’m doing a seriously pointless work. New community in the FB that calls up collecting the cruelties we’ve done.  Out of the list I recognized five, who came to me only the week before with their unsolvable problems.  It shouldn’t be personal, right? I should let it go, right? I should, but it doesn’t make me feel any better, because I know that my work is pointless.

Which led me to delete my account on FB. I’ve had problems there before, where people ask me not to reply to their headlines, because they haven’t told anyone that they come and talk with me often. That it would shadow them if someone knew that they were related with me any way.  That simply hurt, but I got over it.

Then an old class mate had a birthday. I commented like I usually do and received minutes later a personal message, asking who I was. Person, who I was in the same class for three years. How classy!  Then I looked on the posts I did on my wall and realized that the only reply I had received on any of my update dated year ago, reminding me how I often talked with on-line friends and when I mentioned I had gone through something, they told me to hold on until they scrolled down the facebook wall to check what I had written there a month or two ago… So remind me again, why we need to post things there? So others could keep fresh update on our lives?

I took closer look at my friends list there. I have close to 200 people there.  Most of them have asked to add me, but never come to chat and only say hello. Then there’s my old classmates, but, well, nothing goes on in that world that has at least once brought their attention. I only told one person that I’m deleting the account, because it seemed fare on her, and then went on and deleted it. No excuses, no explanations – why should I if deleting the account removes anything remaining from their lists anyway? – just pushed down the button and now will have to sit without logging in for 14 days and then that’s it. Result? Only one person noticed. So it wasn’t much of a loss.

We planned… I should say I planned a small trip to Elva for next week. I’m getting tired of even trying to get the timing right. One gave me times she could go and that’s in the middle of the week. The other one said she’s free at the beginning of May and now, every time I try to contact her, she rushes by only saying hello and continuing talking with her friend. Can’t get hold of her at all to ask when her times would fit.  And the third has already said she can’t in the middle of the week. And they always ask if sis and her child are coming too, so I know they are not doing this to enjoy my company, only to spend some time with them again.

So now I’m in dilemma if to go through with this or not? Perhaps I should call this all off considering how hard it is to get them all free at the same time. As this has been going, I think it will continue through the rest of the year.  Perhaps it’s just not meant to be.

Reading all this through once more is confirming me that I’m simply stressed and depressed.

How badly article can stir you up

I realized suddenly that I don’t want to move to town. That I do want to make our home livable, get rid of the dirt and make it as sustainable through harsh winter as I possibly can. Why? The darn news again that gives me gibbers! Article in Daily Mail talking of global cooling again.

I read this article and realized that if I think of history, the most frightening time thatI know there is the Small Ice Age that lasted 200 years, caused half of the population in north to die and the rest hardly survived it. I am scared of it. So, while still reading, I realized I was again making the list of things I should do this year to get as much food stored as possible. I know my fears have increased tremendously thanks to the fact that every tree that could provide any support in food sense has been removed from our property and this is making me very uneasy person to live with. I want them back. Now! They were my security – at least I could depend on them to prepare sweet compotes for the winter and different salads and all… Now I have nothing but rhubarb, currants and gooseberries that have been sick every single year and give barely what they could give. And then reading something like that from the news is seriously unnerving.

Stuff that popped in my head immediately:

1. Pay back any loan that I have. The worst thing I can imagine is to own anything to bank.

2. Get the upper floor empty from all the paper and trash. It is not needed there. It is dangerous. It is irritating.

3. Get the recipes vital to sustain life as I know it written in the notebook. Not in internet, but in a notebook. The basic stuff- house chemicals, bug repellents, marinates, syrups, remedies, fermenting…

4. Buy aloe and get it growing in the kitchen. Seriously. I am constantly missing it.

5. Learn to knit mittens and socks. I like doing lacey stuff and embroidery, time to get back to the basics that I have managed to skip so far. Also, it wouldn’t hurt to learn to make slippers.

6. Get proper overview of stocks we have. Hate finding out that we are out of rice or any other meal. This should also consider chemicals and essential oils.

7. Teach Madli and Pontsu-Ontsu to be silent on command. Now that’s a challenge.

8. Get mushrooms this year and other forest fancies. Last year I got 2 half a liters of presentable mushrooms and minced for 6 meals. That is hardly enough. This year I will try better. Same goes with other not-sweet products and stuff I can collect from the forest. The thing for example, that if you smoked, mosquitoes hated being near it.

9. Make enough hanks of birch (viht) to last for entire winter, at least one per month.

10. Make enough wood for winter. I’m guessing we need half a bit more than we bought this year to last until next season. But this year we had low temperature for considerably longer than the year before. That’s why we’re out faster. Still, this mistake can be fixed.

11. Use rhubarb as much as possible for juice. Last year I missed the season, but I think we can’t afford it this year.

12. Learn to use wine yeast. I think it would be better choice for mead and our wine than the usual yeast we’ve used so far.

13. Make the protective bags for my favorite tarots and get that part of my life organized, including small altar somewhere to get my peace with the spirit world.

What a year it is going to be and we’re already in May!

Little things you can do to make your household more spiritual.

 This is response to TipToeChick video.

I don’t do videos, but I do write, so here it goes.

I practice in a household that is open all sorts of spiritual views, but it is obvious that it is not my own, so I can’t do whatever I want there. No smudging the place up before moving in or such stuff. Right after moving in would be the only time the place would see any smudging anyway, because I’m not into smudging and that I have talked about why and when and all the reasons behind it.

So what can you do if the place is not your own, you live with your parents and animals and tiny kids, whose eyes go wild just seeing the tangles you have around?

Here’s what I’ve done.

• On my table is a small coconut wood bowl with lots of seeds. It has one seed per each meal for entire year. The idea of this is that you put seeds in a bowl and keep it near. You think or thank deities for having the food on your table each day when moving the seeds around in the bowl, feeling their weight on your hands. This will help to keep you food on the table. It’s simple, yet over the year I’ve had it, it has worked wonders in cases I hadn’t even dreamed of at the beginning of the year.  
  I noticed that after a while it started picking up coins and someone’s tiny toys or some apple seeds were tossed in the punch, sometimes you find that some seeds had gone traveling at some point. I spent quite some time trying to explain my folk that I didn’t want anyone going about the bowl, but after first shock, I realized it didn’t feel like the spell had gone off, it was more like empowering it more. And honestly, no one cared for that warning like they do when I lit candles and the bowl kept collecting whatever someone felt like putting in there. It seems that we all do agree on one thing though – what’s in the bowl, stays in the bowl.

• I keep one white candle holder and candle with lighter on my shelf. Always. I don’t have problem if I need to light any other candle anywhere in the house, but I keep one there for longer purposes. I think this has helped to get them used with the idea that I do candle spells. Take it as always-on-site things and I think it’s one thing all starting out people can do. Keep a candle, unlit, in one place and if someone asks, what it’s for, you don’t have to have a purpose for it, but you just “like” that it’s there.
  If you do get asked about lighted candle, you should keep one thing in mind – don’t lie about the purpose you have lit the candle for. If you do, you might as well blow it out yourself, because you have messed the spell up. If a friend asked you to light a candle for her, then that’s what you’ll say to your dad. Don’t lie about it – in craft lying doesn’t mix well with spells.
• I keep pine cones in a bowl next to my writing table. Sometimes I find one or two I like and I add them to there, same with sticks of wood like oak, birch, elm, lime – whatever fancies me. I keep them there for two reasons – for protection, because I feel good to have them around and to have materials near if I feel tempted to do a spell.
• I have a small Evil Eye pendant with elephants hanging near my working table, just half way to my workplace. It’s not facing the door, but it does create the sort of barrier that no one can come through that have something mean to say. So as far as I know it – it works.
• If you’re cleaning, then cleaning takes place always in the same direction – towards the front door. To get everything negative out.
• Clearing my special jewelry energies – I got two necklaces of carnelian pearls. I broke them up in a small wooden box and now every time I need to clear the energies I simply hide the pendants in there.
• Add drop of lavender, rosemary or any other protective, cleansing essential oil once per week in your washing water. Or after every time you’ve had people around. Makes sleeping in the room much easier for me.
• Against molding and to brighten the energies – 2 drops of Tea Tree Oil and 2 cups of water. Mix, spray and smile .
• I like an air freshener that consists this: spray bottle full of water, one spoonful of baking soda (against acidy smells), one of lemon juice (against alkalinized scents) + few drops of your favorite essential oil. I like adding green tea essential oil, because it helps creating soothing environment and it smells fresh and wonderful.
• I never leave dough on counter without making sun cross on top of it or a pentagram. It keeps the evil away. It’s more like a habit, but still, better make it than regret it later.
• Never leave cut bread with cut facing the front door. The bread luck will leave the house if you do. Also, never clean the crumbs from the table to floor nor do it with your hands or you’ll dust away your bread luck, too.
• When I know I have meeting coming up that takes place at my place or an evening with friends, I put few drops in oil lamp to set the mood. Sweet orange for friendly conversations, peppermint for business, lime for late night study sessions (or lemongrass), birch before sauna… I don’t use spice oils, because those can be well used in cooking and boost the meeting through this as the aromas fly from the kitchen.
  P.S. The videos that go around in Youtube how people eat cinnamon raw – tannin anyone, courmarin? Already 1 teaspoon of cinnamon consists enough toxin to be poisonous, what on earth are those people thinking?!?
  Moving on.
• Use few drops of lemon juice on the pooch withers (hump?). It both protects your dog energy wise and it’s a mild thing against flees.
• Always have salt near by. If you have older wooden table, then one way to kill the bacteria there is to sprinkle it now and then with salt before scrubbing it clean with water. I tend to do it with whatever surface I’m dealing with (except glass – it scratches), because it’s how you clean energies from your altar too and I, like I said, use my kitchen table for it should I need one. Joys of small living space.
• I do have a house doll I guess? My old  bear, all fixed, sitting on her separated shelf and carrying small bag that holds protection spell for entire household and property. Where I move, it will follow.
• Keep chestnut in your pocket to bring in money. My pockets tend to be filled with them most of the year and I like keeping 7 nice ones over the year in small bag.

I guess the list could go on quite some time, but these are the ones that I remembered first. I didn’t list here the herbal uses, but it is obvious that I keep them around and we use them extensivly according to our needs.

Dream reminders for preppers

I saw a dream last night and though I have a separate diary for them, there were little things in there that made me think in the morning.

The dream was dealing with survival and prepping. I haven’t watched the videos lately, so I’m not sure what triggered it. It was mostly about the crises, when you actually need the results of your prepping. The crises? Some huge wheel-like metal covered ship flying over the big city and crashing down after releasing a-bomb on the city centre.

There was more of the dream, but the little things that are useful to any prepper to think about:

1. Don’t add electronically operating code locks to your bunkers. In hurry, exhausted and under pressure – you will not remember that code on the moment of crises. No point in carving it in necklace either.
2. Pulling soft sofa over yourself to hide from nuclear blast – not good idea. Why would we even do something like that?
3. Tell your wife how to open the door from outside if someone has locked themselves in there before you.
4. Oh, the family that got in the bunker before us suffocated. Word of a wise – those bunkers are food storage only.

Know-It-All or Justified

„Know-It-All or Justified“ is this week’s topic at Pagan Perspective duo an article that was published on this site. Like so many before me – please read the article.

 In “The Wicker Man”, sergeant Howie exclaims after long conversation with lord Summerisle: “He brought you up to be a pagan!” and lord Summerisle responses with saying: “A heathen, conceivably, but not, I hope, an unenlightened one.”

 Also, if we are in movie world for nothing-to-do-with-the-religion sort of references, I’d bring out Midsomer Murders’ episode “The Magician’s Nephew”. In that episode, Ernest Balliol is the high priest of theTempleofThoth, a pagan cult, and is extremely upset when Aloysius Wilmington, an old friend and local magician, publishes a book declaiming the cult as nothing more than a drunken invention. During the Cabinet of Death routine in Aloysius’ magic act, his assistant Jean Wildacre is stabbed with poisoned daggers and a ritual knife is left in the cabinet. Meanwhile, Ernest is relying on his daughter Isolde to charm Aloysius’ nephew Simon into finding a book in Aloysius’ library that her father thinks will prove the existence of the cult.

 Many Wiccans follow in their core Raymond Buckland, Robert Cochrane, Alex Sanders, Scott Cunningham or any other initiators of what is today modern Wicca. I would ask them – how many have actually doubted in what they read from their books? If you recall, in their books, they too only interpreted what they had heard, collected, researched on. Reading that article, I felt as if adding anything to the knowledge you’ve read from people before you is sacred. Like texts in Bible – they must be copied without doubt or you’ll face the rage of your people! Isn’t it strange? Fearing to doubt those that come before us.

 When I started, I drank anything that had the word “pagan” in it without thinking much on source texts they came from. There weren’t any Buckland or Cunningham around when I got my first lessons. They came mostly from 3 local magazines on paranormal, introducing the local witches and through interviews explaining why they believed one thing or another. So when I finally got my hands on those so-called classics, I though on several occasion – how on earth did he come on that? Or how is that relevant?  So I researched it and drew my own conclusions.

 I don’t believe in thousand and one thing, but the ones I do believe in, I take seriously. With previous said, I think most of us agree that we do get offended if someone tries to change our point of view. Parable in the Bible about faith is I think best described in Luke 6:48-49 and it talks about choosing good foundation for your beliefs, to your house.  In Universities, when they begin new course, they always have the sort of introduction lesson, where they explain what this course is about and with what disciplines it can be used with. It’s one the most important lessons you’ll ever have, because it gives you ideas how you can actually use your material and that’s important – being able to adapt and mix. There is nothing more boring than talking with someone, who is at home with their own subject, but know nothing outside of it. It’s like wanting to cross a muddy lane and though the house is across the street, you must still take six street round to get there.

Same way is with Wiccans and believing in what you prefer. It’s nice that you have community where you can talk about religious topics, but you don’t have to leave your other hobbies aside because it has pagan in the headline. I think it’s wonderful if we have historians, folklorists, anthropologists amongst us, because they can give us good information to base our own beliefs on. I would take a good historian or anthropologists word over religion any time. Religion, after all, is theoretical, but the evidence to back it up comes from other disciplines. And if it has been proven by historically that the god is god, then he is a god and not goddess. Personal experiences are personal, but in general I think we should keep close to originals. There are angels for example where it is doubtful, which they actually were, Gabriel and Uriel come to mind, but if the god has been depicted as male, that’s what, in my opinion, we should see them as.

 “Everything is acceptable, no matter what it is.” As much as I am in favor of religious freedom, I always get angry when I happen on this sentence again. On one side it’s nice – you can do whatever seems right for you, even if it looks wrong to you. But try getting more exact response and you don’t know if just laugh or cry. We are like neutered to have an opinion or accept history as factual evidence. I often see this in writing communities too – do whatever you want. How is that helpful to anyone? We don’t learn from it, we’re left to sink in that mud hole others call street, but crossing it is even harder because others won’t help us to the house we need to go and all this together we’ll be late for our appointment.

And no, everything is not acceptable. Boundaries are there for a reason. It’s not without reason they worn you against doing some rituals at early years of your practice or praise god/dess according to developed practice. Zeus- imagine someone putting food out as if you were to goddess? I doubt there are many who would be brave enough to even fathom such image or honor him as goddess. Some gods do get offended by disregarding information.

 If my essay here did come out as opinionated and confident (know it all), then that’s probably because I do believe in it. We should embrace opportunities to take part of discussions on theoretical side of our faith, not immediately act on insult we read out of it and get defensive. Research the topic and then prove the man wrong if you must, but the reality is – there have been thousands before us and to think that you are the only one right is simply…

 Now that I think of it, I think the entire placement of the question has been wrong. We are quite into punishing both sides for acting harshly on each other. Instead we should put it this way:  How much information outside religious texts should be let in our religion? Because right now, that seems to be the issue – someone used history to prove their point to pagan community.

New kid at the block

Last week-end I stumbled on a name. It was simple and catchy. Then I saw a Liv doll. Also seriously catchy. It was in the lap of a five-year-old girl talking with her mother. More like trying to convince her mother that she saw her outside after dark and she was upset that mom avoided the topic. My mind exploded, like instead of one light you get the entire forest full of glowing bugs. That doll had limbs and it stood up! By itself!

I put the wheels rolling for my very first ooak doll. Nothing big will happen – change of wig, highlights in the wig, perhaps eyes in later future…

Ok, so I did some reading about the doll. It turns out the doll can (with trouble) stand for short period of time. The joints are all plastic, so no changing of elastic if it breaks. The wigs stay on with some sort of a plug, but the wigs come in various styles and that is a selling point. Especially if you have just as changing mind about what the doll should be like, like I do.

Big selling point here is also the fact that the doll is cheep. So I have no worry of messing up.

I’m drawn to one doll particularly, Katie, though the hazel eyed Hayden’s eyes are also cute. It’s just the pout that does it – I don’t like it. Reminds me too much of those duck faces and I can’t have my brother take up duck hunt on her.

It can wear Barbie clothes. Win-win! As I understand Liv dolls are with much shorter legs, but dresses – why not? It does make a difference on the way they look though. Just seeing the images I would have guessed them to be much bulkier on size. Breasts are strangely placed though. Awkward teenager body? Stretched from one end while the rest hasn’t grown after yet? I can still use one Barbie to make the gowns and they would fit all three.

I thought at first that I wouldn’t like that the wigs can be removed. After looking the images gong around and seeing the prices, I feel it’s quite a nice option. I don’t want to have six hundred different dolls around to have different doll each week. Wigs fit much better in a big box and can be changed – styled regularly. Doesn’t mean I don’t like my Barbies – the Basic nr 1 is gorgeous looking piece and I am really glad I took it up getting her and Sinatra Barbie has personality I wouldn’t change to anything anymore.

Back to the wigs. Taking up monster load wig-making for the first time is taunting. Even to me and I fear it would launch into some half-a-year projects I’m so “fond of”. But I see no problem meddling around with some of those wigs. I should keep the original natural as it is (some Katie’s wigs do look adorable) and play around with the ones they sell separately. Like the wonderful monster length brown wig on Amazon that none of the sellers ship here (mumblemumblemumblerrrrrrrr!), but I’m sure that if I end up using Liv doll for making my first ooak, I will find the way to get either the blond or the brown very lengthy wigs and several at the same time so I can make nice Rapunzel out of her. With poison ivy colored stripes. Now that would be cool looking hairstyle. With few ivy colored braids running over her thick locks… Ok, I have my imagination going.

Bubbling fingertip condition

 As nasty as it sounds, it is surprisingly common – you get small blisters under the skin of your fingertips. It looks ugly, but it doesn’t itch. That is until they break and suddenly you wake up in the middle of the night realizing you are just about to scratch your fingers off. If that happens, they multiply and soon after infection gets in and it gets far worse.

I get it every spring like clock work since I was 8. So far nothing has helped and for two weeks up to a month I get irritated, because nothing helps – no expensive cream, no hiding from the weather, no nothing.

Until a week ago, when it started itching again and I was ready to put it under scorching flame just to get it stop and rampaged through my essential oil box for anything that would make it burn so I could get some sleep. I was thinking on oregano, eucalypt – anything! It’s not fungus infection, I know that already, but I figured they should at least ease the infection.

I found Tea tree instead. Tapped a bit on the finger and it soothed down the burning sensation, but didn’t make the bubbles go. The infection went down, though.

Then, while being in sauna and staring at the painful bubbling finger, I had epiphany.

 1 teaspoon propolis
(1 teaspoon liquid honey)
7 drops of Tea tree essential oil
1 teaspoon vegetable glycerin
1 teaspoon of Calendula petals or Calendula oil
2-3 cm of wax – candle or beeswax, doesn’t matter as long as its natural

 Melt in one small pot (I use old metal cup) together propolis, Calendula petal powder and beeswax. I would recommend using Calendula oil which you can make very well yourself by infusing dried Calendula with equal amount of oil for 2 weeks in dark place, shaking it through once each day. Add glycerin, essential oil and if you wish, some honey. Only, I think the honey made it granulated, so I’m thinking of skipping it. Immediately put in the small container and stir it a bit while it cools. That will help to keep it better mixed. After cooled, store in cool dark place and apply 2-3 times a day until completely healed. 

 Half an hour later – the bubbles were gone, the itching was gone and the skin was almost normal! By normal I mean the tiny scars were there, but the red inflammation is gone, there is no fluid in the bubbles and it does not itch.  Seriously – no itching! That is so weird I keep touching the place, just to check if there are still nerves in that area.

Fantastic!

So if you have problems with bubbly fingers and don’t have allergy to beeproducts – it might help you too. Took me less than 5 minutes with warming the stove and it worked far better than I hoped for.

Yoville Nettle Cross IV

WHITENETTLE

The last house in Nettle town, placed on Nettle Cross.

The front garden has the classical elements – firs. Gotta love living in such area where you have trees around you. This front looks whole different from the original, because I covered up the roads and made new one, far more estetical-looking. I call it WhiteNettle, because of the color. Seemed right.

The living room has the fireplace instead of the front yard. With puppies and strawberry cake .

Place to write all the racy romance novels one could dream of. Sort of a dark, windowless place, but any writer needs one to hide now and then.

And if you have scarlet red writing office, then there must be light pink bedroom to balance the sensation and rest from all the bourlesque red. The parrot is called Colly. I got her as a surprise gift. Didn’t know what to do with her for long time until I fixed this room. All parrots should be kept in livingroom – for the company, but she is visited often .

A real spa! I would gladly live in a place where there is a full room covered in moss and grass and then have just one bath, lit from the skylight, in the middle. A paradise, I tell you, a paradise!

Kitchen . Couldn’t find a good cooking plates for this one, so I bought middle fire place instead and to balance it out, added corner of live green garden.

And to finish this all off – a peek in RoseNettle, the on-going spa project.

 

 

 

 

And the final, but not the least room – library!

I do have other things to do with my life, but now and then the brain needs rest and what better way is there than indulge your inner designer and design yourself a good nice hideout.

Yoville Nettle Cross III

BLUENETTLE

When I first saw this, my immediate thought was – Victorian era garden houses! Love them so much. They are unpractical, but so cute with their white fences and terrace…

The front yard of it is like image from a fantasy picture book, where a rich citizen would live. Just imagine – not a fountain, but a real rock based waterfall! Of course there is the little fire pitcher, too. There has to be one. Always.

The living room is traditionally light. I would guess it should be, considering the small size of the house. I do wish they would plan in also the small corners that cut in the main plan, but it’s just a game.

The bathroom next to the living room. It’s tiny, but I figured it doesn’t have to be full of light, but instead have this masculine line on it. For long time the bathroom here used to be bitch black and golden. Now it has a bit Hawaiian inspiration to it.

The heart of any house is the kitchen. I kept it red like I first made it. Though without the so-loved red fridge, because that would’ve been too much. Red fridge is an accent, not another filler, so it’s not here. But I added here bread stand instead.

The grey bedroom. One would think this would be awful choice for bedroom, but it’s surprisingly soothing by the tone. Add few details for color and hearth for warmth and you’ve got one fancy girly bedroom. If you don’t think so, the bed will spike you through. Gotta love the Halloween furniture! It’s got such spirit!

The backyard of any proper Victorian middle class house is, of course, full of blossoms and is as wild as the owner so the pictures can seem like paradise on earth! And no, I’m not kidding. Type in “victorian garden” in google and you get just as enchanting paradises, though probably more organized.

Back garden, the secret garden that you could disappear on Midsummer’s Eve, listen the water in fountain, watch birds fly, perhaps listen a small concert and at the same time enjoy few drinks.

Yoville Nettle Cross II

CHERRYNETTLE

Cherry Nettle started off as Japanese Courtside House. I fell in love with the house, because it’s Japanese. To me the traditional temple-like Japanese houses is like heaven on earth.

The entrance. Must have fire by the entrance. Clears the air and energies.

The inner courtyard with cherry tree.

 The living room should always be place of peace, so it is with this one, too. Lots of flouing water and plants and view to zen garden. Also possibility to taste good tea and play Go.

 The most modern kitchen I have in the houses. I’ve never been keen on those aluminium rust-free metal places that are so sterile you could eat on from the floor. But this one I liked and so I arranged it to be airy and full of green life.

I wanted the first floor guest room to be as gentle as possible. Plus I liked the bed colors a lot.

The first floor bathroom! Who hasn’t imagined having ofuro at home? I know I have. I can totally see Japanese love for minimal space.

Inspired by their sand gardens. I can’t see them as something that would surround the entire house, because I always prefer their moss gardens, I thought it would be nice to have a miniature one somewhere in the house, a nice place to exhibit all the well-cared bonsai.

The upper floor bedroom. Now that’s what I would love a good bedroom to be - place to sleep near cosy fire place, place to sit and have tea and place to write. All in one room – who could want anything better? Good to write some mystery stories, ne?

This is upper bedroom. I’d say – take it more as if you happened on a weird inner courtyard with surprise finding. I got the plant as a reward in some game and had no idea what to do with it, though I must admit it’s one of the best free prizes I’ve ever got in this game.

The living room on the first floor that leads to the memorial garden. When someone is having a birthday, I like to decorate a room for the party. This one doesn’t quite have a use and I didn’t want to make another just-sitting-room, so I made it like a permanent party place. Renti-it-out-village-centre place. After all -temples are that.

Though I don’t support endless crying over the dead, I do think there should be place where one can respect them. I believe there should be proper mourning time and then remembering services according to the need, not endless crying over what could have been. I’d rahter have one memorial place where everyone can bring flowers no matter what’s the date, where fire burns for them and that’s it. I don’t like cemetaries – too much space lost under them and too many left uncared after a while.

This is the last room of the house. The terrace that sould it to me. Look – there are birds flying! And fish swimming! After all the years tiredlessly collecting anything that can bring the place alive, I was nicely surprised when here you didn’t have to – it was already here. So I made an open-air place for silence, game of Go and even fishing should one want to do that.