Chocolate dessert..

Oke oke and as it's Friday the 13th (what a great day!) and to go with the previous article: 3 video happiness recipe a superb chocolate dessert:

View the newest Cadbury and just remember: when you where a child weird things didn't freak you out and you just had fun!!!


Soooo cool! Go Cadbury's


and if you want more we also have the runway video (who wouldn't dream of working on an airport after seeing that!?) and the Gorilla drummer (a classic!).




Such fun at work these guy have...




Classic!!!

3 video happiness recipe

So my Christmas job at the bookstore came to an end at the beginning of January and just as I caught my breath I got employed by my local council to design a Community Safety website. Now I've done some website building, but not that much and not recently at all. So I've been working all day and learning CSS all night via Lynda.com. They saved my behind so far. Today I presented the first set up of the site and people where happy. Lets hope I can keep up with demand eh!

But enough about myself. Lets me give you a precious gift: a happy weekend. Starting tonight!!! And all you have to do is watch three video's. Oke here we go.

To start off I want you to realise that we live in a SUPER AMAZING world. Really we do. And Louis CK told Conan O'brien so. Have a look at his "Everything is Amazing, nobody's happy" video. He says: "We live in an amazing, amazing world, and it's wasted on the crappiest generation of spoiled idiots". And when you stop and really think about it, he's absolutly right.

So now you know that it's time for the next fase: Letting go and having fun in a normally boring enviroment. And all you need is a boring office, lots of post-its and some fun! This video just makes me happy!!!


EepyBird's Sticky Note experiment from Eepybird on Vimeo.

And as a bonus. The classic to close the week and chime in the weekend. The coca-cola and mentos experiment:


Yay! The best way to use 101 bottles of coke.

And don't forget: HAVE FUN!

Don't click please!

You are never allowed to push red buttons in real life, unless it's an emergency (which it never is). This can be very frustrating so in order to get rid of some of this frustration I bring you the

BIG RED BUTTON

A must click for all you 'rule-abiding-citizens' out there that want to have a go at breaking this particular one. Happy Clicking!!!

Where the hell is Matt?

I love this video. Our world is so beautifull and everyone dancing is so much better than everyone fighting. We should dance more!

Plurk-mania

I blame Miss V from Lime & Violet. In her last three podcast she and co-host Carin didn't shut up about it and I finaly checked it out. And yes, yes it is as expected the black hole of no return. Once you take the plunge you won't ever see daylight again. Well, sort of.



What I'm talking about? Plurking ofcourse. Yes, for all you Dutch people out there, I know it sounds like a scold word, but it's all very decent. Decent and all consuming. Plurk is like one giant message board. You post a thought or sentence and people can reply. The more people you know the worse it gets. And again we have Miss V. to thank for an unlimited source of knitting friends.

So why should you Plurk? Well I've made about 10 friends from all over the globe in less than 1 day. Which is great. Most of them are, ofcourse, knitters.. which is great too as we share an interest. It's fantastic to see others thoughts, share tips, progress on socks and other general knitting related talk. It's like having a community that is spread all over the world.

Find me on Plurk!

Yarn! It ties people together or better it show the ties that are there without us knowing. :)

Cleaning a Le Pliage bag

A few years ago I bought a new sort of white canvas bag from my local bag shop. It was a Longchamps, a real one and at an affordable price. Grant you it wasn't all leather but it was cute and above all practical. Ofcourse we now are all familiar with the Les Pliages bags from Longchamps. You can even have design your own Pliage, but back then it was a very new and lovely surprise.


Stylish and handy... Les Pliages!

Through the years I've not used the bag a lot. I mostly took it out and about during the summer time, but about 2 years ago it got a bit dirty. A white bag that is not white no more is not a good thing. I tried cleaning it but failed... until last week!


The big bother of my Le Pliage

My colleague has two Les Pliages she uses regurarly and I always felt a pang for my perfectly fine, yet smudged little tote. It was in the attic waiting to be loved once more. So I searched around on the internet and found a very old forum post that mentioned Woolite. I tired it and it worked a charm. My Le Pliage is so white it almost hurts to look at it now. It is happily coming out and about with me and we all lived happily ever after.

Here is how you clean your nylon / canvas tote:

Place your bag in the sink and slowly fill it with handwarm water. Add a good dash of Woolite. Don't let the water come too high. I left it about 2 cm underneath the handle base. This is leather so either protect it or like me fold the top of the bag over the side, letting the handles hang. If you want you can place an object on the handles to stop your bag from flipping back.
Leave for 5 minutes.
Drain the water from the sink and lift your bag. Some water might have entered it. You can leave it in the empty sink to empty itself or if your impatient like me, tip it out. Do this carefully so you get as little water on the leather as possible.
Lay it flat on a clean tea towel and dry your bag with another tea towel. Now if the area around the handles need cleaning get a sheet or two of kitchen roll. Use pure woolite and rub it carefully over the area. Use new wet towels of kitchen roll to clean the soap off and dry this area too. Repeat for other side.
Et Voilà!

YNZzzzzzzz

Spotted on the net! This funny gadget you can use in your bedroom to communicate silently. After a short explaination I'm sure you can guess the use (don't scroll down, just read on, unless you don't want to guess).


What is this mystery object used for...

Clue:

Y stands for Yes!
N stands for No!
Z stands for Zzzzz (I'm sleeping/need sleep)

There is a forth side (an upsidedown Y) which you could use to represent indecision. An unspoken 'Maybe' if you like... so you guessed it yet?

One more guess?

Alright I'll tell you. It's to indicate ones willing to make love. You can display this item in the bedroom and based on it's facing communicate silently what your mood is. Other than that it just looks like an oranament. Funny eh!



The YNZ is a design made by Tomohiko Sato.

Brand new look

As you might have noticed Happy Living has a new look. I decided to make a header for my blog. It's been inspired by my new Cashmere hat. More on that project soon! I hope you like it.

You have the choice!!

A new year so time to drop in with a heavy topic: Climate Change.

It's either an elaborate plan to make us all spend money on bags for life and living carbon free OR it's basicly the end of life as we know it. I'm sure it's more complicated than that. Orrrrr it's simpeler than that. But I'll leave the explaing to someone else if you don't mind. You have to make up yourself and remember 'you have the choice!'


Make up your mind please...

Happy New Year

Lighting design and photos by Durham Marenghi, Fireworks by GroupeF, Courtesy of Jack Morton Worldwide

I hope every one had a great 2007 and hope you will have a fantastic 2008. May you all be healthy, wealthy, creative and happy!

For the last two weeks I've not been posting much. This because I've been busy and spend time with family and friends. My christmas has been great. I've been spoiled rotten and am quite happy too that my presents seem to be liked.

As it is the beginning of the new year I think I should once more talk about new years resolutions. The only big thing I decided on a month back (as you might know from my blog post: Healthy Living Update 1), but couldn't start as December in England is like being sucked into Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I tell you the British obsession with chocolate is unbelievable. Anyway from next Sunday, January 6th, my week will turn to normal again and I will start my journey to become healthy before my 30th birthday.

More on resolutions later... Feel free to mention yours! I'm quite curious.

Face Training

I'm very much into my DS and I can't wait for Nintendo to release their face training here in Europe. Face Training on a DS? Isn't that a kiddies handheld computer console you ask. Well, yes and no. Nintendo are releasing more and more 'games' that are targeted to the aldult market. Things like Brain Training, Suduko and a new release Sight Training. This last 'game' helps you improve your eyesight (or so I'm told).


Train your face...

And now you can train your face, well if you're Japanese. They get all the super cool new stuff. The idea is that you insert the camera that comes with the 'game' into the DS and switch it on. You can then rest it on it's stand (also in the 'game' pack) and start making funny faces that get displayed on the screen. This should make your face less wrinkly and more fresh looking. I'm all for silly gadgets and crazy new (non operative) beauty tricks, so I can't wait till it's available here. I know, I know... why spend money on such things but I like them and I can't help it. I'm a gadget freak. :D

Have a look at the Japanese Face Training site.

... And where back!

Did you miss me? I missed you, well a little. I shall be uploading some Egypt pictures later in the week, when I get my routine back a bit. Which after two weeks of doing nothing, and I mean NOTHING (except two dives in the Red Sea) is not easy. More on Egypt later.


Italians got style...

I've got two things on my mind at the moment. The first is Fitness and style. At the hotel where a lot of Italians and my my my did they look stylish. I felt I have forgotten these last few years how fantastic it can be to be stylish. And I want to feel that again. So I'm going to focus on being stylish this winter season. Unfortunately I will not have the budget for any investments in clothes until at least april, but I'm sure I will manage with some improvisation. Also these Italians where very fit and so I've decided to give myself the best present ever for my birthday in September: a fit body and a healthy weight. So from now you will see regular updates about my journey to achieve this. I decided to start now and not tomorrow or next week or even the 1st of January. I want to reach my goal by September 24th and so I better start moving.


Getting ready for the season of lights

Second thing on my mind is Christmas. Being in cosy lovely warm and sunny Egypt it felt more like summer than November. I loved it but thought how awfull it would be to spend Christmas somewhere not cold. The holiday season should be dark with twinkling lights, hot cups of chocolate or spiced tea, people being generous and in good spirits, etc. When we arrived at Gatwick there where two big Christmas trees in the arrivals hall. Granted it was cold enough for it, but personally I think it's a bit early. No decoration for Christmas until December. But as a knitter this is exactly the time I'm thinking of making presents. So again in the next few weeks expect lots about getting ready for Christmas :).

See ya soon!

To Egypt

Right guys I'm off to Egypt for two weeks. See you all when I get back....



Ahhhh!!!!

What was the name of that song?

Sometimes you just don't know. No matter how hard you think, you just can't get your brain to work. It's in there and you know it is, but you can't get it out. So what do you do?? You get online and type.

I was plagued by this know-but-don't-know phenomenon every time I saw this add for ITV's XXL Thursday night. The programs are crap, but the music is good, very good. I knew it, but what was it again? After hurting myself for about 20 minutes I gave up and searched online. The good people at TV Ad Music came up with the same question and answer:

We used to be friends by The Dandy Warhols

Yes Ladies and Gentlemen that was indeed it. And now forget the silly programs on ITV no one cares to watch, anything is better. Trust me! Even two hand puppets. So enjoy the tune and check out the green hand puppet ladies. Ain't he something!! I'm convinced the yellow is the female and the green is the male, it's the way they move you see! But do feel free to disagree! They're only puppets.

Lotusan

There are things that never stop to amaze me. One is the ingenuity of humans. A few years ago I saw a program on Dutch tv, Noorderlicht, that had two Germans show a paint they had developed that had characteristics they took from the Lotus plant. They saw that the leaves didn’t seem to get wet. Water didn’t cling to the surface and rolled off taking dirt away with it. This they made into a paint and I recently discovered this website where you can buy it. It’s called Lotusan and you can paint the outside of your home and it will basicly clean itself with every shower.

The lotus effect

They also developed another paint that filters the air!! Talk about innovation eh!

New Britney Songs

If you haven't heard them yet, you better get going and drop by The Perez Hilton Blog or for a download visit Pop Music Kingdom and search for Britney for the songs to show.

I'm not sure if I've heard enough to have any sort of opinion on it yet. Most of the songs seem happy and very Britney-ish. Not high quality but then you don't turn to Brit-brit for that. I always view her music as good stuff for drying the dishes, cleaning the bathroom or cycling (against the wind) to the next village. It's bouncy and keeps you going.



Anyway I do hope Miss B will get her life together soon. Being unhappy and on a road to self destruction is not something you wish on anyone really.

The Big Knit

The Big Knit is back. Last year I missed it but this year I'm planning to knit at least 2 little hats or more if it goes well. If you haven't heard of this project than pay attention it's GREAT!

Delicious Juice maker Innocent is calling all knitters to use their leftover yarn to knit these cute little hats for Charity. They then sell their mini bottles in the shop wearing these super cute hats and for every bottle sold 50 pence (= 1 us dollar) goes to Age Concern.


My friend Louisa trying on my socks... on her head

Louisa my super cool colleague has already made two earlier this year. She should add the pictures to the Flickr pool and add the hat-o-meter (see on the right) to her blog. If you want to add it too here's the url:

hatometer
http://www.innocentdrinks.co.uk/thebigknit/?Page=hatometer


One of Louisa's hats (photo made with mobile, sorry for quality)

For this project there is also a blog you can check for updates. And to end this whole blogpost I've got this funny little film:

Tour de France

For the first time ever the Tour de France will start in England. Why? I have no idea. You would think it would start in France, not the UK, but I’m not complaining. They came here this weekend and me and Kevin went out to see them in action. We got up bright and early and walked down to the town center. It wasn’t at all busy then and there where no event from the council. I was a bit dissapointed by that I must admit. But the Caravan was funny enough. This is the big commercial spectacal that proceeds the actual cyclist. One car after the other drove by. Some all converted as if for a carnaval parade. They also handed out goodies like caps, sweets and Huge Giant hands:



I managed to snatch one and waved with the hand to everyone that passed. One of the cars was tiny but they had made this big tire on top of it. I swear if it toppeled over it would just roll back down the hill we were standing on. The best was a series of vehicles for a brand of mineral water. They had cars shaped like bottles of water on wheels and they also had trucks that looked like a six pack of water bottles. On top of one was a guy with a water spout spraying the crowds. On the front it said: L’eau Fraicheur or something similar. The cloud of water that came down on the crowds looked impressive, but then he came to spray us it was just a big cloud of very fine water drops and indeed it was very refreshing and nice. We wanted him to come back!



Anyway in the end the cyclist came by. A large group that zoomed up the hill as if it was as flat as any road in the Netherlands (so very flat indeed). They passed very quickly, but it was great to see them go by. I’m sure that if you support one or a team it would be a lot of fun. It’s also fun because of the colours. So many teams mix so it’s like seeing a rainbow move. In short it was great fun and I’d do it again if they pass through my home town. So strange to have the tour pass one street from where you live. Especially as I live in England and it’s the Tour de FRANCE. Oh I mentioned that already. Ah yes I forgot. Well it’s still odd, but fun. So if you ever have the chance go and see!!!

Stalker

Oh my! I think I need some help. This whole craft explosion is not very healthy at all. Not only am I completley obsessed by yarn and fabrics, patterns and craft podcast (on which I should do a blog entry, there are soooo many cool podcasts out there), but now I’m turning into a freaky person. I’m a on the spot stalker!!

Here is one of the pics I took:


You see why? Isn't it nice!!

I have no idea who this person is and I secretly took a picture of her. Why? Well her top ofcourse. I just couldn’t let inspirational material like that walk by. I would have forgotten. My lack of a photographic memory is to blame! The world is filled with great idea’s, that is not the problem. Remembering them all is! So I’ve taken to snapping pictures of strangers on the streets. Every day I walk to the station and if I see a top, jacket, coat, bag or anything I like, I match my speed with that persons. Take out my phone and set it ot silent so it doesn’t make that clicking noise when I take a pic. Open the camera and snap snap. It’s done. It’s very easy and not obvious at all. I could be flicking through my pics or texts. You think there is a cure? Do other crafters have this need to snap inspirational material, even if it’s on peoples backs?



This one is quite too don't you think. A daring colour but it works.

Today I'd also like to mention our new stalker. It's the neighbours cat. Isn't it a pretty cat? Ofcourse I'm bias as I love cats and had to leave one behind in the Netherlands when I moved to England. I couldn't let him stay in quarentine for half a year. The poor puss had just lost his brother in a car crash and was quite upset already. He missed my ex a great deal too, so I gave him to my ex. I sooooo wanted to take him, but this was best for him. Last I heard is that he's doing great. We might get a cat later in the year, but until that time I'm trying to make friends with the cats in the neighbourhood. :D This one, forgot his name, comes through the garden so often I wonder if I should make a special crossing for him. hehe.


"Just passing!"

Fair clothes and Portobello Road Market

It's been a very social week for me. Finally after being in the U.K. for almost a year I'm beginning to not only FEEL at home, but also BE at home in this new country. For many months I've been dealing with my affairs back in Holland. And now it’s all moving along. I still have to be carefull financially, but there is a bit more breathing space and I’ve got more time. So, I’ve been busy. As you can read below, Sarah and I went to the Renoir Landscape exhibition at the National Gallery on wednesday.

Then on Friday, my new friend Lisa and I went shopping to get me my summer clothes. I’ve bought an awefull, shamefull, lot of clothes for little money as we went to a store called Primark which is a cheap store with fashionable clothes for very little money. I went and bought and am very happy with the booty. But and yes there is a but. But I still stuggle with the idea of cheap clothes. Not because I feel I’m too good to wear them. Not at all. I struggle with the idea that I can buy a pair of jeans for £6 ($13 / € 9.50). That is not normal. I know the effort that goes into making your own clothes. The fact that it’s so cheap means several things.
1. It has been made in vast quantities. The fabrics can only be so cheap because they bought an awefull lot of it.
2. It has been made in a conveyor belt style. In a factory.
3. By someone who didn’t get a lot of pay.

Now I’m not saying this garment was made in a sweat shop by children somewhere. It might have been, but I can’t find evidence it has. I’ve looked up information about Primark and they seem to make a lot of their stuff in Spain. Some of the items I’ve bought even mentioned this. And there is also no garantee that if you spend £60 ($130 / €95,00) for a pair of jeans, that it’s been made in a better or fair way. Anyhow I didn’t have the choice this time due to financial circumstances. But in the future I hope to find the budget to buy fair trade clothes. And I also hope they will become more available.


Fabric brooches and very cool door nobs or are they for wardrobes? I like them anyway..

After this shrink-sofa-moment. It’s time to discuss one of life’s greatest pleasures: markets. Sarah and I went to Portobello Road Market on Saturday. This is one of London’s most famoust markets. It’s consists of three parts: an antique section, a fruit and veg (food) section and a clothes section. We met up near Notting Hill Gate tube station and set out. The antiques section was very cool. We saw countless items we really wouldn’t mind buying at all... if it wasn’t for out budget and cramped living spaces. I really liked the old victorian prints that where for sale. Especially the botanic ones. I would love some of those. Sarah saw some her dad might like with old motorcycles. This obviously where prints from the early 20th century. I bought a brooch with a cat on it. It’s from Fish a sixties designer the lady told me. The cat called to me and I handed over the £5 she asked with no trouble. Great buy. Sarah bought a pair of very nice silver and mother of pearl earrings.


Cat's where everywhere as where these cute little pouches


On we went and a lot of stalls and some time later we had bought a few more nice things. Best of which was a fab skirt that Sarah bought for £15. It’s green, white and yellow and very very very nice. She found matching earrings and a bracelet. Great day so far. Then we went to a haberdashery. It was a little corner shop filled to the ceiling with ribbons, tassles, and other bits and bobs. It was like a treasure trove! Luxurious trims everywhere. How I did it I have no idea. But whilst waiting to pay for ribbons I spotted a roll of Laura Ashley fabric in the corner. It was wrapped in plasic and labeled ‘reject’. It was half price so I payed £15 ($32 / €24) per meter. I got two meters and am still fondling the fabric. I’ve got it on ‘display’ at home. Ofcouse I will post whatever I will make of it. I’ve got some idea’s but these are depended on other factors. More later...


Cakes at Bossa Nova! Yum Yum!
After this gorgeous find we sat down at a cute little tearoom, Cafe Bossanova. If you go to Portobello Road market and walk it through to the last, continue a little bit futher and plunk down in this super cute little eatery. Sarah and I had a cup of tea outside untill it started to rain so hard they asked us to come in and shelter inside. Such care for customers aaaahhh.


Kimono style clothes very hot in London this year. Me like!!