Eclecticism - a marriage of the old with the new, the past with the present, and the native with the foreign. It is a challenging treatment that immediately expresses the owner's personality.


Ok, i love a "challenging treatment" and i'm all for eclecticism, but where did the windows go?

I'm a bit disappointed. Life keeps testing me. Yesterday i went to see the Orthopedic Doctor for my hip and back. It's now 3 weeks after the accident and all though i see progress i still have pain. I was so happy last weekend that i could walk a bit better and even was able to go out without my walking cane! But then the doctor tells me he doesn't want me walking until i have a MRI scan done. I understand it, but i'm not happy about it. Crutches? Yes. But so not me.
Guess i don't have a choice here. I will be back resting again. And i will need a lot of physical therapy to learn to walk right again. But i expected that.
Thus not a lot of thrifting and flea market visits for me in the near future. I was so planning to stock up the shop with new vintage finds! I have a couple of items to list still and a box of vintage magazines and children's books.
Today i went out (yes doctor i know you told me not to) to get some new yarns and other craft supplies. What does a girl need when she is faced with more time inside? Craft goodies of course!
I'm planning to crochet a big round throw to put on our couch and there are some smaller Christmas craft projects that i want to do and write tutorials for.

Yesterday i also sent out all additional paperwork to the immigration services. Now it's out of my hands again. Praying that i will receive good news soon. I'm scared, but cannot let the thought in that it will end otherwise.
I'm staying strong, keeping my head up and staying focussed. Better times will come again.
Thanks for all the support so far. I really really appreciate all the messages and comments!
Special thanks to the sweet Maartje from Mamutopia for sending me the most adorable Hema Care Package! Love it!

My hubby said to me, i will be picking up a surprise for you at 10 o'clock. A surprise? Ooooh!!!
Ok. Let me tell you this about myself. I love surprises. But i don't. I am bad with surprises. I want to know. But then when i get asked, ok, shall i tell you what the surprise is, i say, no, i don't want to know. And i ask questions. A lot of questions.
Are you sure i will like it? Can i use it or is is for display? Is it vintage or is it something new? Where did you get it? And again, will i really like it?
So i kept bugging my hubby with these questions until he went out to go get it.
The only thing he had told me about the surprise was that it was for my business.
Which made me even more confused. lol.
When he came home he was holding a big vintage box! I already loved it.
Told me to close my eyes while he put the box down in the middle of the living room floor. Made me sit down. And one by one he pulled out all these adorable figurines out of the box!

My heart jumped with joy with every cutie that appeared!
How sweet are these? How sweet is my husband for getting me all these?
Most of them are vintage or will be vintage in a few years. But i don't even care about the dates, these are precious no matter what!

Hubby told me these were for my business in the way that if i didn't want to keep them here, i could sell them. No hard feelings of selling something that was given to me, there was permission to do so. And no bad feelings towards the figurines, they had lived with their previous owner for so long, that they didn't mind going on adventures and travel to new places.
How adorable.
I love.

Woman's Day July 1969
from the article 100 ways to stretch your storage space

Ok, let's be honest. I want this closet. With all its boxes and clever storage tricks. I want all my closets to look like this. Maybe go a little crazy and pick different color themes for different closets. How i dream to be so stylish and organized!

So what are we learning here? If you have a closet with a bit of room inside, you can do like they did back then, build a frame-and-shelf unit and nail it to the door. A strip of lattice is attached to shelf edges to keep things from sliding off.

And how clever, they clipped painted metal bookends to the door to keep rolls of gift wrap organized! One thing i ask myself when, in my mind, i'm already getting my toolbox out, i wonder where i would ever find those triangle book ends!

Oh, here you go, The Kitchen. Tell me you love it.

Hey wasn't putting empty baby food jars under shelfs a big hit like, last year in the crafting blogs? They were already doing the exact same thing, screwing the lids to the shelf, in 1969!
For the record, i'm not hating, if i had a shelf and a collection of babyfood jars, i would want to make that set up too.

I also like the blue baskets holding the utensils on the left very much, they are set on dowels drilled into pine strips. What? Don't ask me, i'm just reading to you what it says in the magazine.. Continue. Dowel ends are finished with wooden knobs.

I must say, their use of color is sublime. You can love it or hate it, but back then they knew what to do with color.
Put it everywhere!

I don't want this blog to become a depressing place to visit. I hope this new month will bring some more good news than bad. But i do want to give a quick update on what happened last week before i move on to more fun things (crafts and vintage adventures!)
About my sprained hip due to getting hit by a car, i am getting better. It has been a week ago today and i haven't been outside yet. Yes, i am a bit of a homebody, but this is crazy even for me. I am finally starting to "walk" again, even though it's still with a walking cane. I can definitely see and feel progress in recovery!
I am still feeling blessed that i came out of it like i did. Thank you for all your support!

And thank you for all the love and support in regards to our worries with the CIS. The worries are still there, but we are working on getting this straight. I still cannot truly believe they don't believe us. But no time for all that, i'm getting more paperwork together and we've already received some affidavit letters from friends testifying our love is true. And more letters are on their way. I cannot think of what a worse case scenario would entail. I just cannot let my thoughts go there. This must be solved. It must.

Just before the accident i found this adorable 1970 Fran Mar print. Isn't it fitting with what we're going through right now? I loved it before, and i love it even more now. It hangs on the wall next to my desk, and every time i look at it, i think, we can do this!

I'm still recovering from the accident. I now can move around the apartment a bit with my cane, but no way i can get outside yet. Can sit up for like 15 minutes before my hip protests. Even though i am still hurting, at least i see there is progress. I will get better. Thank you all so much for the well wishes. My hubby read them all to me and they really gave me some needed support.

So what's happening now? Well if you have been following my blog for a while now you will know that me and my husband we're in a 7+ year long distance relationship before we got to the point of getting married and filing for my visa to be able to finally be together here in NY. It was a long road to travel, but being here now makes it worth it. The last i told you all about was that i had to apply for a renewal of my greencard since we hadn't been married for over 2 years before i moved here. Again that process asked a lot of us, sending in proof that we are actually a loving married couple living together. We sent in everything we had, utility bills, our apartment lease, photographs, affidavits of people that know us, joint health insurance, joint tax returns, everything. It's a humbling experience, but if that is what it takes, we'll do it. We know we're legit so what could happen right?

Well, wrong. Yesterday i got a letter from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.
The evidence submitted with your form is insufficient. ... The evidence you submitted with your petition does not establish that you and your spouse have entered into a legitimate marital relationship. ... may result in the termination of your conditional resident status and your possible removal from the United States.

This is not my week. I can still not believe it. It's one of those things. We try to do everything the right way. We work hard to make a living, we try not to bother anyone, we do everything the system asks of us, and they just tell us they don't believe us.

Again they have sent the list of documents they think would prove a loving marital relationship. We've been through that list and everything we had we have sent.
Sorry that we weren't lucky enough to have already conceived a baby together.
Sorry we are not rich enough to own a house and have a mortgage. Or own a car, vacation home or time share.
Sorry we don't have any debts and thus loan papers to show.

So what's next? After the sadness, frustration and anger its now on to more action. I have already printed out all the blogposts i have written throughout the years about our process, about our love. The interview my husband did for the Heart Handmade blog as part of the Other Half series. We will send them even more photographs of the two of us together. I will send them a copy of my book where there is a special note to thank my loving husband, we will ask everybody that know us for a affidavit letter testifying that they know us and know our love is real. How many people didn't tell us over the years that because of seeing us together they believe in true love again? Apparently the CIS doesn't feel that.
I will step over any pride i may have left and ask for help.
The US government doesn't believe us? We will have to make them believe. They have never met us, didn't come by on an unannounced visit, didn't do an interview, just went through our paperwork and decided they think we are not legitimate.

I woke up this morning thinking for a split second this whole week was a bad dream. Until i felt the burning pain in my hip and saw the blue letter laying on my desk.
We need to be strong now and get this done. We are for real. We are.
Now only to convince the system of that.

If you follow me on twitter, you might found out already. The title of this post is not cryptic nor meant to be funny. I was really hit by a car while crossing the street yesterday.

The car that hit me was speeding and ran a red light. There was nothing i could do except yelling No No No NO until i was on the hood of the car and fell to the ground when the car came to a stop. Everything went real quick and i was very scared. Out of nowhere there were all these people around me i saw some making phonecalls (later i found out 911 got a LOT of calls for me, thank you unknown people for doing that!) There was this nice nurse that happened to see me and she kneeled down beside me and started talking to me, helped me call my husband and she stayed with me until more help arrived. I remember seeing the lady that drove the car, but she didnt speak to me. I don't know what happened to her. I don't know if she stayed until the cops came, i don't know what she told them what happened. I do know i heard sirens real quick, i was told it was a firetruck but i could see it. Then there were all these firefighters surrounding me, taking over. Putting me onto one of those hard boards, strapping my neck and taping my head to the board. They asked me a lot of questions. I don't even remember what exactly. I was so embarrassed being on the road like that. I do remember i kept saying it wasn't that bad, that i just wanted to get out of the street. But since i was pretty far away from the crossing they had to strap me like that. Than i felt someone cutting my pants open and i freaked. No i didn't care about the pants, but i was already so embarrassed. I didn't want to be there on the ground in the rain exposed like that. So i started yelling at the firefighters. Really. Freaking out. (i apologized later) My left hip was hurting like hell but i could still move my right leg, so i crossed my right leg tightly over the left so that man that was cutting couldn't proceed. Yes i understand, they need to do that. They need to check if i was bleeding. But i wasn't. I told them. I said have some compassion. If it was your mother or sister laying here, you wouldn't want her to be exposed like that. Please do it somewhere inside or when the ambulance gets here. Please. So the only thing they could do was strap my legs as they were, crossed. At that point the ambulance got there and those two men were really kind to me. But i was so scared being lift up and put in the ambulance. You know, you really have no say in what happens when you get in an accident. People just take over your life at that point. They took my heart rate which was crazy high. Someone else entered the ambulance at that point. With my head strapped to the board i couldn't see nothing that wasn't right above my face. I was told it was a cop for my statement. As good as i could i told him what happened. I really needed to calm down. I was so scared and felt very alone. Especially realizing all my family is living on the other side of the globe. Plus my parents happen to be on vacation in Portugal somewhere. I was relieved when we started driving, at the emergency room it wasn't long before my husband arrived. Oh how great it feels to see your Love at a time like that.
I wasn't so scared anymore.

So i went through the motions of checkups and got xrays taken and was told nothing was broken. It was an experience i wish i hadn't experienced, but i know i am very blessed to come out of it just heavily bruised up and with a sprained hip. The hospital gave me a cane, but i can't say it help a lot with walking. It hurts! So i'm on painkillers and need to lay down for a couple of days to let it heal.
It took me like almost 15 minutes to get from the bed to the computer, so i doubt i will be online a lot until i feel better.

I met a lot of caring people yesterday and i came across some very annoying people. Nevertheless i am so thankfull to be here. To be healing. It could have been way worse.

Let me start by saying this, i think you could wear an elegant short faux fur cape every day.
But since we're nearing Halloween this tutorial might come especially in handy.
You have this wonderful costume but you don't want to completely cover it with a jacket?
Whip up a stylish stole! Quick and easy!

What you need:
Faux fur (39" or 98cm by 12" or 30cm)
Lining fabric (39" or 98cm by 12" or 30cm)
Piece of Velcro (1.5" or 4cm)
Pretty brooch (optional)

You don't need any special patterns, you can measure, draw and cut the needed pieces directly on the (wrong side) of the fabric.

Now call upon your inner Tim Gunn and make it work!

Since i adore everything that is soft, i went for pink fleece for the lining. Ofcourse you can use pretty smooth and shiny lining fabric!

- Do a "test wrap": Place the two pieces of fabric on top of each other(wrong sides facing) and locate where you want the cape to close, where you need to put the pieces of Velcro. On your right side it will be somewhere on top corner of the (right side) of the faux fur. On your left side it will be somewhere on the top corner of the (right side) of the lining fabric. Mark these locations with a pin.
Note: Keep a 0.5" or 1cm seam allowance in mind! Don't place the Velcro too close to the edge of the fabric.


- Sew the Velcro pieces where you just placed the marks. (i used some pink Velcro, since it matches my stole, but the color doesn't really matter)
- Pin both pieces of fabric (faux fur and lining) on top of each other, right sizes facing. Make sure the pieces of Velcro are on the same long edge on opposite sides.
- Sew all the way around, leaving an opening of approx 6" or 15cm to turn inside out later.
- Cut of the corners.

- Turn the cape inside out through the seam opening and sew the opening shut.
- Wrap the cape around you and pin the brooch on the faux fur where the two corners come together. The brooch won't be what keeps the cape wrapped, the Velcro will do this. The brooch is purely for decoration.

Voila! Enjoy your stole wrap!

Oh, i got to mention this in case you don't realize this already, it's for non-commercial use only. You may not sell items made from this tutorial.

image taken from craftcult

Hard work is starting to pay off.
It was a nice surprise seeing my views jump up recently. Immediately i knew my shop, or something in it had to be featured somewhere for this to happen so suddenly.
Thanks to sites as craftcult its easy to track down.
Not only were my vintage puppies lithographs in an Etsy vintage giftguide, now also the mounted deer head got its share of attention. In the Storque of all places!
Ok, not actually in one of the Storque articles that is send out in the Etsy newsletters, but in the related items list right under a Storque spotlight article! Top row!

You know, a while ago one of my handmade items made it to the frontpage. That was a rush. If you frequent the Etsy forums you will quickly notice making it to the front page is a big goal for a lot of sellers. I think it can work for your views and sales very well. But don't forget the front page lists rotate a lot, so your item will be there for a relative short while only. If that's at an off peak time you won't necessarily notice a lot of action in your shop.

The feature in the giftguide was special. Since my husband made the "Ismoyo on Etsy" song not too long before that feature. So we were extra excited. And a good thing about the giftguide is that your item stays there for a while. I don't know how long, i heard stories that when it sells, it disappears. But also that Etsy admins can decide to take things out again. It got me lots of views, some hearts and a couple of sales that might or might not came because of the giftguide.

So far the Storque has been the best exposure for me. Lots of views, not only on the item that made it into the storque, but also my other items were viewed more. Plus many new shop hearts. And as a business owner, the most important one, extra sales! The Storque article went live this past weekend, then Monday we had Columbus day so Tuesday i went to the postoffice with my arms full of packages. Lovely!
Just as with a feature in the gift guides, the Storque stays up there too. So shoppers can still find you through there. The deer head has sold, but the listing is still there!

I can only dream how wonderful the day would be when one of my items makes it actually into the Storque article or any other Etsy email.

Really looks like we have a very stylish Westclox alarm clock. Appears to be from the Big Ben Ladies series.

Westclox almost always stamped the date of manufacturing on the clock. To find the actual date of manufacturing, you have to go inside. Many times the date is stamped on the inner side of the plate of the movement.

Hm. Does not sound like something i should go and do. I know myself. I will start out confident. Get a screwdriver and open that beauty up. Looking inside i get puzzled. Trying to figure out what exactly that plate of movement should be? Laughing at myself. Why did i think it would be obvious and in your face? Of course you should look under something. So you have to move things around on the inside. Ohoh. There you go. That wasn't hard. But then, i would have the date. Joy. But all of a sudden the clock won't close as well as it did before.
I know myself. I have to leave that one alone.

So if you want to go on the hunt, you can pick the clock up in my shop as is. With a small stain on the lower inside and with some scratches on top. But with a lot of style, class and attitude.

Found this lovely set to add to my vintage big eyed kids art collection. I am looking for the perfect frames to put them in. They have a bit of wear on the edges which would be covered by a frame, but i haven't found any that fit yet (4"x5"). Let alone pretty frames that fit..

I could of course do some sort of passe partout and put them in bigger frames, but that won't solve the hiding of the edges. So for now they are still here on my desk and not yet hung on the wall with the other pieces.

Both are signed Huisel. Don't know anything about this artist, but i have seen pieces before with fruits, florals and animals. All done in black and white. Will do some more research, maybe i'll find out some more.

Vintage craftbook 1978

Whenever there are photos of young kids in vintage books, i always think of what their current age would be and how they will look now, what they are doing and if they themselves still have a copy of that book somewhere in their bookcase. Is that weird? That my thoughts go there?

If i would be better at woodworking and if i had a work space that could handle heavy working like that, i would definitely make on of these kids body length measuring things. I love the design and the pretty flowers and ladybug painted on it. For my US friends: don't be confused, those measurements are obviously marked in centimeters.

From 1,001 decorating ideas book 33 1970

Brush-On Paint Design
Forget about decorating with wallpaper, pictures and mirrors. Open your eyes - and your mind - to painted wall designs, as designer Lawrence Peabody did here. Notice how the free-form supergraphic on wall flows right onto the conversational seating arrangement.

This room makes me very happy. Yellow as the sun. And it looks like the couch is supersoft! I would love to lay down on a velvet coach. Anything soft is good in my book. As a little girl i often walked around with cotton balls in my hand, just to feel that softness. Weird? Not to me.

And the fact that Mr. Lawrence Peabody painted the wall makes the room even more special. One of the most prominent home furnishings designers of the last half of the 20th century. The daughter of late Mr. Peabody once said his mission in life was to beautify everything. I feel that.

Pfew... sometimes life just catches up to you. I took care of things and am ready to get back to work full steam ahead!
It's October already. Oh my. Time flies. 3 months left to this year. Only 84 days till Christmas. I think i will put up our tree early this year. I got such lovely vintage ornaments, can't wait!
Oh yes, i am sorry to say that due to my offline 'adventures', i missed my blogiversary! When i started i didn't know how long this would last, how long i would be able to keep it up, now it has already been four years!
Four fun years. Its so amazing how this blog made connections happen that otherwise would not have. It has been an outlet for me to show my crafts, my collections, my thoughts and feelings when i was moving from Amsterdam to NY.
I love all my visitors, the ones that only read my stories and the ones that leave me comments. I love the ones that have been with me from the beginning, and the ones that just recently found my little place on the net.
I don't think i would have lasted so long without all your feedback! Thank you so much.

On this note, my loving hubby has just started a blog, taking his first steps. He is a great songwriter and maybe that makes it only logical that he is a great story writer too. He does this daily talk thing, sharing poetry, sharing his thoughts on music, life and new york. I have put a statcounter on his site and now he has discovered that he can check how many visitors he got every day. Not that many yet since he just started out. So do me a favor, click on this link and check out his blog, it would make him very happy. And seeing his happy face makes me happy. Oh, hope you don't mind a little slang, he writes as he talks.

I'm out for now, prepping a lot of new exciting things.
Lets make the end of this year count!

Just a quick note to let you all know i will be Missing In Action for a little bit. Got to take care of some urgent things in my offline life that require time and attention. Don't worry, i'm handling things. I will keep my shop going allthough i doubt that new items will be listed over the next couple of days. I will try to answer emails as soon as i can, but maybe not as soon as i normally do. My apologies.

I hope to be back in full force real soon (hopefully a couple of days, maybe a week or so), i miss you all allready.

New designs in 1974 for babies' and toddlers' hand crochets.

I think they look adorable. If i had a little one i would take my crochet hook and yarn out right now!

I did a happy discovery yesterday. The Vintage Puppy Lithographs in my shop made it into Etsy's Vintage: What's Old is New Gift guide! Very nice and very much appreciated.

Is it a case of hard work paying off, is it a matter of chance that they stumbled upon the lithos and just happened to love them or would it be a result coming from the ismoyo on etsy song my husband put out on YouTube recently?
No matter the actual reason behind it, it made my day!

Look what Love surprised me with!
I always wanted a vintage vanity table like this, so he made me very happy.
And it gets better, it doesn't only look pretty, it's very functional too.
The two sides on the top flip open to reveal two large built in jewelry boxes!
Many velvet covered compartments for all my shiny knick knacks. J'adore!
The front drawer is covered with all velvet inside too.

I just can't stop looking at it.

The blog has a new banner. What's going on?
Since my shop has gone through some organic changes, going from mostly handmade, to primarily vintage finds, i think it is only logical if my blog goes through a similar change.
Plus i must admit it has been awhile since i last did some actually crafting. How can i define my blog as a craft blog when there is hardly any creating going around?

I have always posted vintage finds and scans from vintage books mixed in between the craft posts. Basically it will be turned around, more vintage with a bit of crafting (i'm thinking tutorials). Oh, and i also have a lot of vintage craft books i can share from!
And i will continue with my Etsy finds, just because there are so many wonderful goodies on Etsy and i love windowshopping!

So at first i thought to post vintage photos and write witty comments under them. That would have been nice, but i am not that witty. Well sometimes i am. And then mostly in my native Dutch tongue.
Then i thought to keep it simple and just share the photos, maybe with a caption here and there and that's it.
Too easy.
So i'm gonna try this: Share some of my thoughts about what it is i'm showing. When i look at the photos in an early seventies interior decorating magazine i am happy.

I hope my loyal readers will still enjoy dropping by and who knows, we might meet some interesting fun new people along the way!

From 1,001 decorating ideas spring-summer book 1968

Decorating with pictures.
"Etcetera Art" makes delightful, inexpensive picture wall, including cookie cutters and tiny salt spoons (lower left), pasta painting, woven fly swatters dressed up with cords and tassels, trimmed cheese grater turned into wall planter, wire whisk "balloon", and still life of paper party favors and small artificial fruits.

This used to be an ordinary room. With a white ceiling, light wallpaper, cold vinyl on the floor.
Until DoItYourself advised "lets do something with color. Pick out a nice wallpaper, have paint mixed in matching colors and most of all, don't be scared: dare to make combinations"
You see the result in the photo. A nice, warm bedroom, where you can really live!

I am a big fan of Green.
Did you notice the model put on her favorite green outfit for the occasion? Got to love it.

From 1,001 decorating ideas Spring book 1971

Since my own Etsy shop turned more and more into a vintage shop i think it's time to give some love to some of the wonderful vintage sellers Etsy has. There are a lot of sellers out there with a great eye for pretty vintage finds and today i'm sharing a selection of my personal favorites. 1. JollyPollyPickins: a very colorful shop with funky decor and houseware items - 2. Shop66: i simply love everything she lists! - 3. ModishVintage: lovely and cute, just the way i like it! - 4. Spacejam: vintage items from Europe and Soviet Union - 5. Jens Closet: she always has lots of gorgeous dishes and dinnerware and if you love milk glass, you should also check out her other Milkglass Shop!

Tada!
Unveiling my husbands song to feature my shop on Etsy.
Yes, this is where the squirrel has her cameo! She's sitting next to me right now, all excited and waiting to get some views and be discovered!

Tell me if you like!
ps yes i'm in there too. at the end.
psps posted about the song on the Etsy forums. getting some sweet responses!

Something is coming. Can't say too much. Cute thrifted squirrel will be included. She will have a cameo.
This is her pre-appearance.
I'm still here. Just working hard and prepping lot of cute and creativeness!