Slippers

Hello Everyone!

First I was bragging that I tun my blog again - and yet another long break, life was so very busy..My Dad had his latest check-up, and right as we wanted to celebrate that he´s doin´so well they told us he has two recurrences in his abdomen. Er have been told before that this is very possible, yet it was a like hit in the face.

Since two months he´s on an oral chemo now, which is a bit different like a common chemo, cause kidney cancer is very different to other sorts of cancer. The oral chemo doesn´t come in circles and though it has side effects it´s a bit milder and he can do it at home. The good news I have to tell is, that my father is coping really very good with his treatment and it WORKS for him. He doesn´t feel sick and he can EAT - and boy he´s eating a lot! Thank god. The side effects he has he said are bearable, nosebleeding here and there, skin rashes and fatigue. But he´s very brave and very active. The recent check showed the tumor shrunk of 8mm already - yay!

As for me, I took it a bit too far with crocheting my aliens. They sold so good that I nearly made one every day - and then I developed what´s called a "tennis elbow". I had no other choice like taking a little break. I have to wear a brace on my forearm to spare the affected tendons and I hope it helps, cause I was always tending to have a problem with my arms and I don´t want this to become chronic.

Nonetheless I HAD to be a bit crafty and as I felt a bit better I did some knitting instead. I know I shouldn´t, but it´s a bit different flow and as long I take it slowly I think I can do it.

One of my Dad´s side effects are constant cold feet, so I thought a pair of warm slippers are the perfect gift for him.
I remembered that I still have some balls of pure sheepwool left a friend who´s keeping sheepies once gave to me, perfect for felting.

You simply knit some oversized slippers and then put them in the washer, that is doin´the felting job all alone by tumbling. What an awesome an easy way to create something so useful.

After washing I shoved some smaller shoes in it what gave them the right shape through drying.



The pattern for these shoes you can find here:

HOBBIT SHOES

And as I was just on a roll I made another pair of home slippers for my Mum too:



The pattern for those is really really easy, but I have it only in german language. If you need the pattern, please just message me your shoe-size and I will give you the instructions :)

Hope my next post won´t take me so long again.

Please all be well, fellow bloggers.

Mahalo ~ Bettina

Allee Willis Portrait

There are people in my life who are constantly inspiring me to live out my creative veins - and Allee Willis definitely is one of them.

Who is Alle Willis you´re might wondering now. I´m sure you know her work very well without being aware of it! Allee is a Grammy, Emmy, Tony and Webbie award-winning and nominated songwriter, has collaborated with hundreds of leading artists and composers from all fields of music, her songs have sold over 50,000,000 records, like for starters many songs from Earth, Wind & Fire, Pet Shop Boys and the Pointer Sisters. She is the source of many earworms you know by a heartbeat when you hear them.

But Allee is not only a songwriter, she´s also a very gifted and accomplished multi-media artist, designer and with no doubt the most enthusiastic collector of KITSCH that ever walked on this planet - why she really deserves to hold the undisputed title "The Queen of Kitsch".



Her pink painted Los Angeles home, which she fondly calls "Willis Wonderland" is an incredibly amazing omnium gatherum of beautiful colorful curiousities and she also created AWMOK ("Allee Willis´Museum of Kitsch"), an international platform for Kitsch-Lovers from all over the world, which you can find here:

AWMOK

As a passionate Kitsch-Lover I became a a regular contributor to her page and got to know her as one of the most gorgeous personalities I ever met, a woman that´s constantly radiating happiness and creativity, very open-hearted, genuine and supportive.

As Allee loves everything artsy her followers create I painted a very colorful portrait of her, which now found it´s new home in Willis Wonderland, what makes me very happy!



You can also find it perpetuated and awarded at AWMOK here:

Allee Willis Painting by BeeJay von Schneyder

More about Allee and another work of mine related to her soon. I will close here for today and hope you enjoyed.

Thanks for dropping in and - stay creative, fellow bloggers!

Mahalo ~ Bettina

"ADOPT AN ALIEN" and my brandnew Dawanda Store

Hello Everyone!

First of all I wanted to inform you that I switched from Etsy to Dawanda, which is practically the same, just more user-friendly for germans plus in this way I can reach German AND other international clients.

The link to my new shop you can find in the right sidebar here on my blog. Like on Etsy making an account is 100% free for every buyer, you can choose different languages and can use the same payments as usual, like Paypal for example.

The store is still pretty empty, as I just opened it, but I´m adding new items on a weekly basis, like for starters the new category "Adopt an Alien" :)

I never sold Amigurumis before, but I fell so in love creating those little creatures and so many of my friends asked if they are for sale, that I decided to include them in my Shop repertory.

The three fellas below are listed "for adoption" already. Enjoy!

Wishing all of you and your loved ones a wonderful, happy and most important - HEALTHY New Year.

Mahalo ~ Bettina


This is Bruce. Bruce comes from Planet Lurz. He likes popsicles, peanuts and strawbery-lemonade (preferably with a straw).
Bruce loves to watch old movies with Elvis Presley and also loves karaoke.





This is Kurt. Kurt comes from planet ChomChom. Kurt´s hobbies are curling and taking photos from extraterrestrial mushrooms. He´s a devoted fan of Barbra Streisand and takes very good care of his teeth.



This is Moira. Moira comes from planet Ulk and her hobbies are Bingo and Tele-Tennis. She likes music from The Ramones and pink lipstick, cause it brings out the beauty of her single tooth. When you hide a marshmellow she can detect it by telepathy.

First Amigurumi Steps

I was not sure with which of the current works I should start after my long absence - and then decided to post something I´m doin´right now :)

A friend of mine recently sent me a page with funny little crocheted things called "Amigurumis" (編みぐるみ, lit. crocheted or knitted stuffed toy) what is the Japanese art of knitting or crocheting small stuffed animals, food, and anthropomorphic creatures, knowing I was a passionate knitter and crocheteer.

I immediately fell in love with those petite little things that I looked up the basics and gave it a try. Definately something I´ll look more into, once you start it´s really addictive!

Here are some of my first attempts.

Hope you all had a wonderful christmas with your loved ones!

Mahalo ~ Bettina

I´m back

Hello Fellow Bloggers

First of all I have to apologize that I disappeared without any goodbye or telling what happened. I missed you all dearly, and I missed blogging as well.

The very sad reason for my absence is that our family got the most unwanted guest one can imagine - last december, pretty exactly one year ago, my beloved Father totally unexpected got diagnosed with advanced kidney cancer at the age of 72.
Unexpected, cause my Dad had no symptoms at all, was an extreme agile and active man for his age and never been severe ill before.

I can´t recall anything in my life before that left me so entirely devasted and heartbroken.

This year have been an extreme rough journey for us all. First being told in the local hospital that they can´t do anything for my Dad anymore we luckily went for a second medical opinion, after I learned in the internet that the worlds leading specialists for kidney cancer is located only 50 miles away.
To make a very long story short - my Father went through two very severe surgeries, including 2 weeks in induced coma, followed by two oncologic rehabs for each 5 weeks and found his way back to life, what even his Doctors call a miracle.

After all he went through, a re-staging was done a few weeks ago - and sadly we learned that he developed a recidive located where his kidney got removed. The good news are, that now my Father will join a medical study that contains a brandnew oral chemo that isn´t even on the market yet, what sounds very promising and gives us new hope. My Dad is an absolute amazing and brave man and thank god he doesn´t even waste a thought on giving up!

During this year my brushes helped me a lot to keep my mind steady. There were times I couldn´t even think of painting, but also other times painting was definitely my only escape of upcoming depressions.

Whenever I had some spare time I painted or did a lot of other crafting, so I have to share a lot that mounted up during the last months, which I now wanna share piece by piece with you.

I dearly hope that all of you are well and spent a more happy year like me and I want to thank all of the bottom of my heart, who contacted me when I silently left the blogging world.

Mahalo ~ Bettina

Painting again :)

Juhu Folks!

Your uplifting comments worked and I started painting again. The biggest heat-wave is over and we had a lot of rain these days. Gosh - what a HUGE relief to me..

When I was sick in bed I was often thinking of my favorite place in Scotland - North Berwick. A beautiful little village on the East Lothian Coast. And that´s why I choosed this motive.

The Rock you can see on the right is called "Bass Rock" and is always covered with thousands of seabirds. It´s not that small as it looks like here, it´s actually pretty large. But ifyou look at it from the shore it appears so small due the distance.

It was kind of relaxing to paint this. It took me far away to my most beloved place ever.

I´m so happy I am able to paint again. And I´ve started with another project right away. My best friend will get married end of the month and it will be their wedding-pressie. I will post more about soon :)

Thanks again for all your love and support. You´re the best!

Mahalo ~ Bettina

Back, but not in the Saddle

Hello fellow Bloggers

It´s been SO long ago since my last post and I almost don´t know where to start, I´m totally out of the "blog-flow", but dude - I missed you all so much.

It´s been a hard time for me and it´s still not really over. I hope you all don´t mind me whining a bit, I just feel the need to explain why I haven´t been here for such a long time.

As many of you know I´m suffering from a disease that´s among other impacts specially triggered by heat. So, let´s talk about SUMMER...

My plan for this year was clear and simple: "Summer won´t beat me this time. I will walk through it with my chin up and make the best of it." Well, what can I say, I was never very good in making plans. I ultimately failed and this summer turned out being the worst of all since I have to deal with my condition.

I lost my battle in the first hot week already. My skin and my tissue flaired up big time and didn´t calm down for 6 weeks. I felt like someone poured a pot of boiling water over my body, was covered in hives and oedemas day by day including ongoing fever, nausea and vertigo. Imagine being like sun-struck for weeks. Within three days it spread into my joints and it turned really nasty. I couldn´t eat, I couldn´t sleep, I couldn´t move. My body didn´t manage to switch its natural "cooldown system" on anymore. And no break of this heat in sight..

My body - my temple? My body - my torture chamber. And no chance to escape.



In week two we desperatly tried to get an air condition. As most of my readers live in the US I have to mention - AC´s are not very common here in germany. It´s really hard to find one in general and even harder to find one that is affordable. My Dad and my Hubby were running through the stores - sold out, sold out, sold out. We spent another evening looking online for one. Again - SOLD OUT wherever we were looking. We checked shops in other countries and it was like jinxed - either they did not ship to germany or they had a delievery time of two months or even longer.
I was so much in pain and the moment I figured we won´t get an AC I just sat down on my bed and cried like a baby. I felt ashamed crying like a brat about something I wanted (NEEDED!) so bad but cannot have, but I couldn´t help - to realize that I would be helplessly surrendered to this heat that caused me so much pain suddenly totally broke my spine and all my hope.

I ended up spending six weeks in bed and on couch, surrounded by fans and the biggest moves I made where changing my icepacks, going to the bathroom and trying to get some food down. Once a day I granted myself a cool shower or a cool bathtub, what turned more exhausting with every day that passed, cause my energy was fading away more and more. My meds are giving me a bit relief of course, but the sideeffects unfortunately are draining like something else. The cortisone and antihistamines are causing water retentions, kick the guts and make so tired that sometimes it´s really a battle to stay wake.



I always tried to stay tuned and keep in touch with everyone over Facebook, but the last two weeks I more and more drifted in a lethargic state. I do not really know how to describe it. I just kind of seperated myself from my body and was spending my life with laying around, my eyes closed, trying to escape this misery by daydreaming or simply fled into sleep. That kind sleep you wake up even more exhausted from like you have been before already.

Short version: This summer is a MESS for me. It´s year five for me I have to deal with UF, but this summer is by far the worst since. It´s a battle I simply cannot win, no matter how hard I try.

5 days ago a wonder happened and it started to rain. Constantly. And I cannot tell HOW GRATEFUL I am. It was such a relief that I was sitting at the balcony at night and cried of happiness about the rain.

Seriously, what has my life come to? The former surfing summer-girl is spending the best days of the year in bed, all in pain and praying for rain..

You all usually know me as trying to be confident as good I can. But at the moment, I´m so sorry, I´m just SO exhausted and depressed. I´ve spent 6 weeks like in prison, didn´t take a step outside and this is just so devastating to me.

Monday I will get in touch with my doc to make a plan how to get halfway back in the saddle again. Please wish me luck, Guys. Actually I am glad if I can walk around a bit in my own home. I started cooking and cleaning the house again and hopefully I will pick up my brushes soon again as well. I miss painting so so so bad.
It helps me so much dealing with my stuff and if I can´t even paint anymore I feel completely lost.

My whole family is affected by my condition and this makes me sad the most. My Dad and his twinbrother celebrated their 71. birthday and I could not even join them on their special day, as I couldn´t leave the house. My parents were showing up at my home instead to bring me some cake and to look after me. My husband, my parents and my sibblings are taking so much care of me and it makes me so sad I´m causing them all so much worries.
My parents looked after us kids all their lifetime and now that they turn older I wished so much to give that back to them. It breaks my heart that now they have to deal with 35 year old "crippled" daughter that is causing them so much sorrow instead. I know they don´t mind - they are my parents and love me dearly. And I am so grateful being a part of such a caring and loving family.
But...you know..it just feels not right.

I´m 35. I want to GIVE and not to take.

Enough of whining now. Life must go on.
And I hope my next posts will be more positive again.
I thank you all for your time and all your support. Many of you sent me emails and well wishes. I thank you SO MUCH for that ♥

Until I can share some of my works again I will now take time to stroll around in all your wonderful and uplifting blogs. I noticed I missed so much the last weeks - you have all been so creative and "blogalicious" :)

I hope you are all well and in good spirits. I cannot wait to read all your news!

And - thank you all so much for listening.

Mahalo ~ Bettina