Tag Archives: Rustica

When the air is fresh and crisp as new snow.

A Fine Day For Moving Today

Portland is on its third day of snow. We are a city ill-suited to snow. Most people don’t know how to drive in it. We have lots of hills that are quite steep and can get slippery, we have bridges that get icy, and we have snow so seldom, there is no huge fleet of snow removal equipment nor deep knowledge of living with snow. I hunker down and so does my best friend, and we are both from snow country. She’s from Buffalo, I am from the Northwoods of Minnesota. We know snow.

I remember the first snowfall after I moved to Oregon. I was living way up in the Cascades, in a river valley, closed in my mountains, a deep canyon that ranged from 1/4 to a few miles wide. There were places where the road was carved into the canyon cliffs, with a fall down into the river below and there were wider valleys that made room for truck farming, but life centered on logging. It was rural, so I was surprised when I got a call saying school was closed and there was just a dusting of snow, barely two inches. I thought it was a prank and went to school anyway, discovering it was closed. Deciding to take advantage of a weekday off, I decided to drive to the State Capitol and take a tour.

It was then I discovered why they closed school for a light snowfall. Driving up one of the big hills, the traffic was so slow the cars lacked the speed that would keep them from sliding backwards, pulled by gravity on the slick highway. It was quite frightening, more frightening than anything that had ever happened to me in a car before. I managed to avoid them as I chugged up the hill, but it was nerve-wracking. I am sure they thought I was a speedster, but really, I just understood the laws of physics.
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The Story of Nisse

It's a Fine Day For Moving

“Where’s the measuring tape? Did you move it?”

“I didn’t touch it.”

“Must have been the Tomte.”


“Who ate the last piece of gingerbread.”

“Not me”

“The Tomtenisse, then.”


The Norwegian Nisse, the Swedish Tomtenisse or Tomte, and the Finnish Tonttu are always convenient when something is missing, though they also are credited with bringing good luck sometimes. Mostly though, they were seen as tricksters. My favorite story about the Nisse was one told to me by one of our old neighbors whose Norwegian accent was so strong that even the bears in his stories had accents. “The bear, he went, oomph-ya!”

So the village of Geiranger was beset by a Nisse who was constantly leaving the cattle gate open or letting the sheep loose in the square. He would toss pinecones down the chimney and put vinegar in the lemonade. He made them so unhappy, they decided to just pack up the whole town and move across the fjord to Hellesylt.

And so they did. With great stealth, because Nisse can be anywhere and everywhere, the people of Geiranger put their clothing and household items into barrels, to look like they were going to market. And then one day, as the Nisse was sleeping, they put all their stuff on carts, and drove all their pigs, sheep, and cattle to Hellesylt. The entire town moved in just one day. Every man, woman, child and mouse.

They slept that night, a righteous sleep of relief and exhaustion. It was hard to start over, but they were certain the Nisse, bound to the land, was left behind. But then, when they got up in the morning and went to draw water, who should they see relaxing on the well housing but Nisse, who stretched and smiled, and said, “It’s a fine day for moving.”

Mon Cheri Nisse Greta & Hans Red Rare @ Arcade
Ariskea Winter in Canada Cabin @ Arcade
Kalopsia Metal Deer @ Arcade
Rustica Charles Browne Xmas Tree

Lots of Living to Do

No place like home

Nine more hours to pull your heart out. I am particularly fond of the YS & YS buffet. It’s very retro-mod. Don Draper might have it in his living room.

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Things That Go TOK In the Night

I was so wound up from my exciting and happy Friday that I just couldn’t sleep properly. I decided to read for a while to see if that calmed me down but you know then my mind got going with all the beautiful things I was seeing and I was even MORE awake. Continue reading

Gidge + Me = Radarpar

Radarpar (Norwegian) (n.): Two people that work very well together.

Screen Shot 2016-05-21 at 11.23.30 AM

So I am still enjoying that list of untranslatable words. This one seemed so perfect for Gidge and me, though then I decided to Google Translate it and discovered it was Swedish, not Norwegian.  However, the full meaning was even more appropriate, two people whose work together make them more well-known than their separate identities, a dynamic duo if you will. Like BeBop and Rocksteady or Hans Solo and Chewbacca. Speaking of which…
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At home with the macabre

“We make up horrors to help us cope with the real ones.”

Barnesworth Tabor Cottage, Vespertine upcycled fence town/autumn; 8f8 Storyteller’s Burrow Reader’s Pier, Botanical Aspen Trees, Half-Deer Deadwood Trees, Skye’s Enchanted Woods, 3d Trees Spruce 01, Pixel Mode Fall Harvest Barn

I do not decorate my home for Halloween and only add a bouquet of colored glass bulbs and a gold tabletop Christmas tree for Christmas. My apartment is small and I don’t waste my limited storage space storing decorations. My second life, though, seems to have infinite storage space so I love to decorate there. Also, it’s much less work to pack up and move and also less expensive. Here,then is my home for fall inspired in part by the macabre aesthetic of Tim Burton. I began by tinting my Tabor Cottage from Barnesworth to saturated dark colors instead of the natural stucco that it was originally. There’s a barn in the background with a few animals and a dock on the water.

“We make up horrors to help us cope with the real ones.”

Barnesworth Anubis Tabor Cottage, Verspertine upcycled fence town/autumn, Cheeky Pea Autumn Step Frame Dark, Striped Mocha Swing, Pilot Pumpkin Mice Black, Striped, Orange; Ariskea Terre Automne Branches Vase, PILOT Fall Garden Night

I added this prop fence from Vespertine because I loved the bright colors and though it did not add anything macabre to the home, I liked the colors and the idea of it. Not everything needs to be macabre.   Continue reading

Beach Blanket Bingo Is For Ugly People

To celebrate the opening of THE GARDEN this round, there was a beach party over at THE NEST. It just so happened that I had a new bikini and nowhere to be for at least an hour, so I failed to touch up my roots yet ran over anyway to frolic in the sand with everyone. Continue reading