"Cloisonné" necklace

Today's piece isn't actual cloisonné, but it was inspired by it.
Cloisonné is an ancient technique in which metal strips or wire are attached to a metal baseplate and shape compartments ("cloisons" in French). At first gems were used to fill up the gaps created, later enamel which was also colorful, but not as expensive.
I remember having been fascinated by cloisonné pieces even as a child. I don't do metalwork, though, and have never worked with enamels.

Some of my ideas come out of the blue. I like to see what's in my current "workbox" - I really should empty the last one because I'm sure I'll discover some surprises in there - and then work from that.
This time I found a leftover irregular triangle of beading foundation and a cut length of a narrow faux suede ribbon which I had shortly contemplated to use in my Big Hug necklace.
It was probably the flat look that made me think of the metal strips in cloisonné and wonder what it would look like if I glued (oooh, ambitious) the ribbon to the foundation, not flat down, but on the edge which allowed curves. Then I would fill the gaps up with bead embroidery.
Of course it would have been interesting to make an actual pattern like in real cloisonné, but the ribbon was too thick for that. It took me a good while just to get that closed "circle" done. Apart from that, though, the glueing went amazingly well.

At first I started filling the empty spaces with rows following the course of the ribbon, but like in the "Big Hug" I quickly noticed that I didn't like that look.
So I ripped the rows out and did it bead by bead instead which worked much better for the narrow spots.
Also, the original plan had been to use each color once and make the focal really colorful. Had I really thought about it beforehand and not wanted to use the ribbon that was already cut, however, I would have used black instead of the blue. Again I started ripping out and limited myself to random placement of green and blue tones instead. Of course a combination of green and blue always evokes ocean feelings for me and the ribbon enhanced that coral reef vibe for me, so I had to fight the urge to use pearls as well.
I think that just would have been too much.

Next decision - a rope.
I really love the look of a three bead Herringbone twist rope in contrasting colors and chose a dark rainbow green, a metallic blue with a hint of mint, and a beautiful dark blue.
Can you imagine just a bunch of ropes like these in different colors and length around your neck?

I had big fun playing with this one and almost wish I had the patience to try another piece with black ribbon this time, but while my hands need a break, my brain is already on the way to the next WIP in my workbox which has been waiting in there for far too long because I can't decide on the way I want to put the focal on!
What do you say - drop with the tip up or down?

Random Saturday - How could you?

We spent almost 34 years together.
I thought you were the one constant in my life.
You would always be there for me.
I counted on you day and night.
True, you weren't bright enough for everyone, but you were for me.
Then you left me, though, without a warning.
You were just gone and left me behind, in the dark.
I guess I should have been prepared that this would happen eventually, but I felt preparing would have looked as if I didn't trust you.
And then I just couldn't turn you on anymore one day.

We had a good run together, though, didn't we?
Farewell, little fluorescent tube. I'll miss you.

Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot - Week 139

Welcome to the Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot!
My posts for the link up will go live on Thursdays at 9:30 p.m. EDT or, if you live in the future like I do, on Fridays at 3:30 a.m. CE(S)T.

Veganuary ... dry January ... no buy January ... how is your January going? Are you doing any of those challenges?

How about you? Ready for the weekend?

As part of the reboot, we will be featuring a different blog every week.
How about stopping by and saying hello? Let them know we sent you.

This week our spotlight is on Esme Salon.

Esme from Esme Salon says "Welcome, I'm so glad you're here, and I hope you will find some wonderful homemade, tried and tested recipes from around the world to make at home.
My goal is to provide the best homemade recipes that are healthy for all families to enjoy. I also endeavor to showcase and share other bloggers and promote them on my Blog.
I grew up loving to bake and cook, as I watched my Mom so lovingly prepare meal after meal for the family and all our friends.
Furthermore, I am in Vancouver, B.C. Canada, since 1997, but originally from a then small village called Somerset West, just outside of Cape Town, in South Africa."

Marsha from Marsha in the Middle started blogging in 2021 as an exercise in increasing her neuroplasticity. Oh, who are we kidding? Marsha started blogging because she loves clothes, and she loves to talk or, in this case, write!

Melynda from Scratch Made Food! & DIY Homemade Household - The name says it all, we homestead in East Texas, with three generations sharing this land. I cook and bake from scratch, between gardening and running after the chickens, and knitting!

Lisa from Boondock Ramblings shares about the fiction she writes and reads, her faith, homeschooling, photography and more.

Cat from Cat's Wire has what she calls a jumping spider brain. She has many interests and will blog about whatever catches her attention - crafts, books, old movies, collectibles or random things.

Rena from Fine Whatever Blog writes about style, midlife, and the "fine whatever" moments that make life both meaningful and fun. Since 2015, she's been celebrating creativity, confidence, and finding joy in the everyday.


Here are some of my picks from last week's link up.

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade - Jeanne shows us her lemon tree.

Sally tells us something about snow from a Southern US perspective.

Have a look at Natasha's marshmallow snowmen. Aren't they cute?

Paula shares some great tips with us on how to keep pets safe during winter.


Let's link up!

Guidelines:
This link party is for blog posts only. All other links will be deleted.
Please link only blog posts you created yourself. Please link directly to the URL of your blog post and not the main address of your blog.
Please do not link to videos, sales ads, or social media links such as YouTube videos/shorts, Instagram or Facebook reels, TikTok videos, or any other social media based content.
Please do visit other blogs and give the gift of a comment. 

Notice:
By linking with Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot, you assert that the content is your own property and give us permission to share said content if your post or blog is showcased.
We welcome unlimited, family friendly content. This can include opinion pieces, recipes, travel recaps, fashion ideas, crafts, thrifting, lifestyle, book reviews or discussions, photography, art, and so much more!
Thank you for linking up with us!

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Silent movies - En ny hat till Madammen

About 35 years ago, the ex suggested that we should take Danish lessons. For different reasons, most of them outside our control, we only managed about four lessons. So I still know how to say that the room is big and that I come from Germany, but that's about it.
I can tell you, however, that today's film from 1906 is called "En ny hat till Madammen" which translates to "A New Hat for the Madam". There are not even title cards, so it was no problem to follow this short made by Danish film pioneer Viggo Larsen.

Madame is choosing a hat and it's big!

It may look like it, but this is no cheese.
It's the hatbox and hubby just had to
yank out part of the window frame to
get it through the window at all.
That's what I call a supportive husband.

After Madam has been "attacking"
some people with her new hat and
has trouble handling both the hat and
her hobble skirt, but hasn't been able
to board a taxi, hubby buys her
a little wagon for easier transport.

Their friends think it's a marvelous
idea and join them.

Oops. It might be more difficult than
they had expected after all.

Teatime ends in a duel because the
hat knocked off the cap of the military
guy on the left and he hit back.

Oh no! Hubby got wounded! At least
the hat makes a useful stretcher.

It's only a flesh wound (any Python fans?).
Nevertheless, after kissing his wife hubby
is begging her to get rid of the hat.

Once again I learned something new.
Denmark was one of the big shots in early film history, both commercially and historically. It had stars like Asta Nielsen who were internationally famous.
From about 1910 to 1914 when the First World War broke out - the Golden Age of Danish silent films - the Danish film industry was even a world leader before Hollywood took over.

The website "Danish Silent Film" launched by the Danish Film Institute aims at making more than 400 works from the country's silent film history freely available online, with the addition of "posters, photos, thematic articles, scripts and contemporary reviews".

Back to our short, though.
At first look it may seem like it's just a silly little slapstick comedy, but it very efficiently pokes fun at the fashion fads of the time while hinting at them possibly being dangerous - huge hats and hobble skirts (the latter actually caused accidents, even fatal ones).
And it's not only the ladies who are affected by the madness of an absurd fashion, but also the men. A duel over a hat? I'm still amazed how quickly one of the men at the tea produces a saber for the husband to use.

Huge headgear wasn't limited to women's hats. Men wore really high top hats, for example. They were not as wide, granted, and didn't diminish exotic bird populations the way the huge hats embellished with feathers did (still a danger today, by the way).
Also don't forget about the elaborate wigs people used to wear in the olden days, both women and men.
The First World War was just one reason for those fashions to disappear as women were needed in the war effort and clothing became more practical.

As someone who has never been fashoniable and prefers comfort over looks in her own clothing, I had a good laugh at this film. Absolutely a recommendation from me!


Sources:

1. Website "Danish Silent Film"
2. Fritzi Kramer: A New Hat for the Madam (1906) - A Silent Film Review. On: Movies Silently, August 1, 2022

How and why did you start watching silent movies?

This was a question asked in a comment a while ago, and I had to think about how it actually started.
On March 11, 2025, I wrote my first silent movie post and ever since I have one every Thursday. To be honest, I was surprised about that myself - and hadn't even assigned a day to the "series" in the first post - and I would be lying if I said it was always easy.

"Wanna watch a silent movie with me?"
"Oh boy, looks like he's a weird one.
Good looking, but weird."

Sometimes I had to resort to presenting shorts simply because I didn't prepare ahead and then didn't find the time or, even more important, the concentration to do a long one (expect a short next week as I'm back to work tomorrow, by the way).
That doesn't just have to do with the runtime of a movie, however, but also with the way I write those blog posts. I know I'm not a gifted writer to start with and on top of that I sometimes have writer's block. Yes, for a "simple" blog post that not many of my readers are interested much in, anyway.

In March, I wrote about my attention span and how I wanted to work on improving it again after a friend had said that movies had become much too long for her attention span.
I had done a "Little Lord Fauntleroy" marathon with different adaptations for Christmas and couldn't make myself watching the silent one with Mary Pickford. That gave me the idea.
"You need a lot of attention for a silent movie and some are really long, too.
So I thought that could actually work quite well as a part of my "training". I'll be watching silent movies and writing about them here."

"You still haven't watched my movie.
Do it quickly or you're gonna get it."

Little did I know then that I wouldn't just watch movies, but also read blog posts and reviews and even some academic articles which didn't always make it easier for me to get to the actual writing in time.
Little did I also know that I would really enjoy jumping around like that, so much in fact that I now started reading biographies and treated myself to a fat book (second-hand at a great price) on the history of silent films in the US (which I haven't dared to start yet, though).

The question remains how I even got the idea to use silent movies for this "project"?
I also wrote in March "Watching silent movies has never been easy for me although I grew up with them. No, I'm not that old, they were re-runs on TV, thank you very much." Thinking about it, that's probably not completely true. I doubt I really ever watched a whole film, but snippets in the compilation shows broadcast on weekends, for example Bob Monkhouse's "Mad Movies" which actually had a narration.

So my first real watch was probably the night before my English-"Abi" (the final exam in my "Abitur" before I left school). My plan had been a last moment vocabulary cram, but instead we watched "Phantom of the Opera" with Lon Chaney and we laughed so hard at some of the scenes.
Years later, I had a classic horror phase - Dracula, Phantom, Nosferatu, Frankenstein, etc. - and suddenly loved the film.

"So you thought we were funny, did
you?" "Actually, Nosferatu, I thought
you were creepy as heck. Still do."

Even more years later, the TV channel ARTE, which I have mentioned before, showed several silent movies. I recorded a few of them and watched them in installments. Then the hard drive on my TV broke, interrupting my efforts abruptly. I had never finished the almost three hour long "Die Frau im Mond" by Fritz Lang and couldn't get myself to pick it up again (on YouTube, for example).
Film documentaries are my favorites on ARTE. History, life stories, reviews. Mostly classic and black and white, though. I have always loved old movies.
One of those documentaries was about Douglas Fairbanks and it was really interesting.

Now I'm going to blame Lisa from Boondock Ramblings for the final kick (along with Pickford of course).
When I joined her in the "Winter of Fairbanks" watching movies with Douglas Fairbanks Jr., I remembered that I had been wanting to see his dad's movies for so long now.
His "Thief of Bagdad" was the one to start my project, and if you have been following my posts at all, you may have noticed that I have a soft spot for him.

"Girl, you would have fangirled over me so hard
in the 20s. Come on, admit it." "Yup, I would have.
Especially when you laughed, you rogue. Even
if your son looked much better."

Well, there you have it. That's how I came to bore you with a silent movie post each week.
I don't regret a thing. There are more of us out there than you may want to believe 🙃

10 on the 10th - Things I won't do this year

The 10 on the 10th are back!
When I read Marsha's prompt, however, my first thought was that this could prove to be more difficult than I could handle. Let me explain why.
I could, for example, list things like "I won't be eating as much carbs as last year.". Sounds like a resolution, doesn't it? Resolutions can be worded either way, "I want to buy less ...." or "I don't want to buy as much ...". I don't do resolutions, so those things are out.
Let's try something else. "I probably won't be visiting a museum this year." Hm. "I probably won't be taking a class in person this year." Like that I'm either going to depress myself by listing things that I would like to do, but can't anymore, or I'm going to sound incredibly negative, whiny, and annoying.

So what are my options?
Marsha replied to my comment "Have fun with all the wild and weird things you won't do." Oh Marsha, a challenge, eh?

This year, I probably won't ...

1. ... participate in a winter expedition.

Picture via pxhere

 
Yeah. No. You gotta be kidding me, people, look at that. Haven't you seen "The Gold Rush"? Shoes, I'm just saying shoes!
Seriously, though. I really don't like snow and I could happily live completely without it.

2. ... go deep sea diving.

Picture via pxhere

Do you know what those helmets do to your hair? 😜
I love watching documentaries about the ocean, but whenever I was at a beach and saw the vastness of the ocean, I felt strangely overwhelmed. Calling it thalassophobia would probably be too much, but I never went into the ocean further than ankle deep.

3. ... climb Mount Everest.

None of the translation apps have Yeti on their list and what other reason should I even have to climb up there?
Ok, so these days I have problems with a simple hill, but I don't have that gene of needing great adventure in my life, either. I'm fine with tiny adventures.

4. ... read "Ulysses" by James Joyce.

Can you believe a family member once suggested a read along and discussion of "Ulysses"?
If you read it, good for you, but my ten brain cells founded a union and threatened to quit. Can't have that.
There are things I don't need to have done to prove myself. Struggling through "Ulysses" is one of them.

5. ... go to a rave.

Picture via pxhere

I can hear and feel this picture and both isn't good for me.
Of course I wasn't even a fan of discos when I was young. Can you tell I was never a dancer? 😂
I managed one dancing class (thanks to peer pressure and I didn't enjoy it), but while I like to move with a rhythm and occasionally danced with some of my cats, I preferred doing so in the privacy of my home or from a chair.

6. ... eat snails.

A friend of mine, a polymer clay
artist, made this little beauty for me.

Too bad I'm a vegetarian, isn't it?
I have never been a very adventurous eater even before I was. I wouldn't want to try ants in chocolate or mealworms. How about you?
I did try my rabbits' vitamin pellets once, though, to see why they were SO crazy for them. Kind of dry. I guess you had to be a bunny to appreciate it.

7. ... keep my cats, but foster a bunch of dogs instead.

"Could someone make her stop
talking, please? Can she get any
more embarrassing?"

Ok, you didn't believe that, did you? Neither did my cats.
I really love dogs, but I would be a terrible dog mom because I'm notoriously bad at setting limits, so I would probably be eaten up in the first week or dragged into the streets.
Once I told friends that I would gladly babysit their two smaller dogs for a few hours in their own home, but that I had to draw the line at taking them for a walk.

8. ... take up playing the violin again.

No one, absolutely no one, would want that. It just has been too long.
I played the violin for about 5 1/2 years until I was 16. I wasn't bad, but I don't think I was good, either. My heart wasn't really in it and the violin hadn't been my own choice (long story).
I tried again in my 20s, but unsurprisingly, my motivation was even less.

9. ... become a 3-star chef.

Picture via pxhere

More like -10. I just don't find any joy in cooking or baking and love everyone dearly who does it for me.
There was quite a short phase when the ex and I moved in together and it felt that cooking was just a part of it. I even tried out things then.
I would happily blame my lack of motivation on the ex and his love for his mother's food which I could never match (I liked it, too), but that just wouldn't be true. I simply don't like to cook, no matter how good recipes sound to me.

10. ... write the great German novel.

Picture via pxhere
(a recipe, not a novel, I just liked the picture)

Maybe next year ... 😉
I never had the ambition to write a book and I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have the patience to do it. I told myself stories on walks back home, for example after the violin lesson when I had missed the bus, to make them less boring, but never wrote any of them down.

That was really random and completely unplanned, but in the end you learned a bit about me after all. Not sure you wanted to learn it, but there you are.
It's practically a miracle I made it to 10!

Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot - Week 138

Welcome to the Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot!
My posts for the link up will go live on Thursdays at 9:30 p.m. EDT or, if you live in the future like I do, on Fridays at 3:30 a.m. CE(S)T.

I can't believe that my long winter vacation is almost over. Next week it's back to work and my motivation is quite low. I'd rather stay in hibernation for a bit longer ...

Picture by Sandra Seitamaa on Unsplash

How about you? Are you ready for the weekend?

As part of the reboot, we will be featuring a different blog every week.
How about stopping by and saying hello? Let them know we sent you.

This week our spotlight is on Melody Jacob.

Melody says "My name is Melody Jacob, and I am a travel and lifestyle blogger in Scotland, United Kingdom. ... I take trips at least one to two times every week to nature reserves, castles, hiking spots, tourist attractions, and other places that catch my interest.
I love being in nature because it is the balm of the soul. I also love looking good, which is why I share my style preferences on the blog. I share tips on mental wellness too, and I am discovering more practical approaches as I travel and explore every day."

Marsha from Marsha in the Middle started blogging in 2021 as an exercise in increasing her neuroplasticity. Oh, who are we kidding? Marsha started blogging because she loves clothes, and she loves to talk or, in this case, write!

Melynda from Scratch Made Food! & DIY Homemade Household - The name says it all, we homestead in East Texas, with three generations sharing this land. I cook and bake from scratch, between gardening and running after the chickens, and knitting!

Lisa from Boondock Ramblings shares about the fiction she writes and reads, her faith, homeschooling, photography and more.

Cat from Cat's Wire has what she calls a jumping spider brain. She has many interests and will blog about whatever catches her attention - crafts, books, old movies, collectibles or random things.

Rena from Fine Whatever Blog writes about style, midlife, and the "fine whatever" moments that make life both meaningful and fun. Since 2015, she's been celebrating creativity, confidence, and finding joy in the everyday.


Here are some of my picks from last week's link up.

Nancy's vegan minestrone looks so good!

We don't have cardinals over here, so I always enjoy pictures others share like Linda does here.

Wendy is sharing a recipe for whole wheat muffins which you can turn into pumpkin pie, apple pie or banana bread muffins.


Let's link up!

Guidelines:
This link party is for blog posts only. All other links will be deleted.
Please link only blog posts you created yourself. Please link directly to the URL of your blog post and not the main address of your blog.
Please do not link to videos, sales ads, or social media links such as YouTube videos/shorts, Instagram or Facebook reels, TikTok videos, or any other social media based content.
Please do visit other blogs and give the gift of a comment. 

Notice:
By linking with Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot, you assert that the content is your own property and give us permission to share said content if your post or blog is showcased.
We welcome unlimited, family friendly content. This can include opinion pieces, recipes, travel recaps, fashion ideas, crafts, thrifting, lifestyle, book reviews or discussions, photography, art, and so much more!
Thank you for linking up with us!

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter