Christmas Presents, an AliExpress Order & Tea Time

Hello everyone,

with Christmas 2017 being over for more than a month now I am finally able to share this Christmas present I hooked for my friend Kristin :)
I found this lovely Fox Head Scarf thingie over at pinterest. Unfortunately, the link to the pattern doesn't seem to work any longer. Luckily, I downloaded the patter before it was taken offline. So in case you're looking for the pattern but can't find it, let me know, I've got a copy stored somewhere on my hard drive and am willing to email it to you :)

This project was definitely fun to crochet. It took me quite a while but it was all worth it.
I used a 100% cotton yarn for it by the way. To be honest, I prefer using cotton yarns for all of my crochet projects lately.

Apart from self-made things I also love to give local products as presents. For example coffee from the two local roasters Seegert and Die Kaffeerösterin.
Lately, I also discovered wonderful products made from Kassel City honey like honey liqueur, honey vinegar or even mead. And an all-time favorite are the mug cakes from Tüpfelchen.

What things do you like to give as presents? Maybe also some products from your area?

Alright, change of subject. My AliExpress Order arrived last week! I love ordering planner and crafting supplies at AliExpress. You can get the cutest things and the prices are pretty low. And then it's always wonderful to finally receive your order which is always a surprise - because it takes quite a while to be shipped to you and in the meantime you normally forget what you've order ;)

Okay, here's what I got:

A transparent A5 planner for some memory keeping
A felt A5 planner for my spritual art project
A set of rings for filofax inserts archiving

Lots and loooooots of stickers :)

And in case you're interested in one of these goodies as well, here's a link to the AliExpress shop: JIANWU Shop

And last but not least, I had my friend Carina over for tea last weekend. Carina prefers drinking fruit tea so I brewed us a pot of my all-time favourite fruit infusion Roasted Almonds by TeeGschwendner. It's a seasonal tea that is only available around Christmas. Last year I bought an extra large package of it so that I can drink it all year around.

We had IKEA almond cake and Dongles donuts for tea :)

Well, that's it for today, see you soon :)

Yours
Uta

Outgoing Happy Mail

Hello everyone,

today is about snail mail. I sent out some cute letters just recently and I thought I could share the designs with you. Unfortunately, I forgot to take photos of some so today I'm just sharing a selection.

1) This one was sent to my friend Kristin back in August. The envelope is DIY, made from a Flow magazine cover. The writing paper is simple tea dyed paper.

2) The next one was sent to my friend Melanie. I used a plain blue envelope for it and glued some nice paper as well as some animal stickers on it. The writing paper are pages from a Flow magazine notebook.

3) Last but not least, this was a birthday card for a former neighbour of mine. Again a basic blue envelope enriched with some stickers plus a basic blue card on which I glued a Flow magazine post card as well as some stickers.

That's it for today!

Have a great week, everyone, and see you next week...

Yours
Uta

Happy Autumnal Equinox

Hello everyone,

as many of you might know, today the northern hemisphere celebrates the Autumnal Equinox!

Today, night and day are almost equal. As its name already implies, the Autumnal Equinox is the beginning of Autumn. By Pagan tradition it stands for the second harvest as well as thanksgiving. In Wiccan tradition the Autumnal Equinox is also called Mabon as a reference to Mabon ap Modron, a character from Welsh mythology. ¹

I decided to celebrate this special annual occasion quietly while engaging in some journaling.

Cookies (digestives with milk chocolate), tea (see picture below for details),
my journal and two of my favorite Lamy fountain pens

One of my favorite teas for Autumn and Winter:
Roasted Almond by TeaGeschwendner.
It just arrived in the mail today. This tea is also available in the US by the way. 

Autumnal Equinox journal decor - this is one of the leafs I pressed last year.

Are you celebrating the Autumnal Equinox this year? Do have special plans for Autumn in general? And what about Autumn inspired crafting projects? Let me know in the comments below :)

Thanks for stopping by.

Have a wonderful, warm, and cozy Autumnal Equinox!
Sending many blessings your way :)

Yours,
Uta

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Sources:
¹ Wikipedia, The Wheel of the Year: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheel_of_the_Year .

Inside my Journal: Tea anyone?

Hello everyone,

I just recently started to give my journal a more personal touch. This includes dedicating pages to topics that don't involve the average journal writing. As a tea lover it was clear for me that I somehow had to incorporate my little tea addiction as well. To do so, I took the labels of the different teas I love/tried/disliked, glued them into my journal and simply added a small description. So nothing fancy but for me quite a lot of fun to be honest.

Let me show you some examples:

Any fellow tea loving journalers/tea-lovers/journalers out there?

Yours
Uta

Let's have tea, shall we?!

Good afternoon ladies (and possibly gentlemen as well, one never knows),

so this lovely Monday turns out to be another public holiday over here in Germany. Pentecost I assume is the correct English term for it. Anyways, I thought this holiday would be a nice occasion to have tea together, don't you think? I even made some sandwiches.

I brewed us black tea because you can't go wrong with black tea, can you? O'Sullivan's Favourite it's called to be exact and it's from TeeGschendner, one of my most favorite tea companies. Doesn't it taste wonderful?

So how's the weather in your region? Is it also raining? I remember this morning the sun was shining bright but around lunch time it turned rainy. And the temperatures also fell quite a bit. I even had to turn on the heating again. Can you imagine, it's the end of May and you have turn on the heating to not feel cold? Dreadful.

Even all the housework that kept me busy up until now couldn't keep me warm. Well, at least now all the laundry is done. Furthermore, I even managed to finally tidy out my office. Quite a successful day, though.

Now wasn't it nice meeting for tea? I think we should do that again soon.
Have a lovely evening my dear!

Yours,
Uta