Made of clay

 While time is slowly but surely making its way towards mid-February, my blog, as usual, is still struggling to catch up with the past. January's final weekend might only be a matter of two weeks ago, it somehow seems a lot longer to me. 

Meanwhile, I'm feeling as if life keeps dealing me the wrong cards. There's nothing I can put my finger on exactly, but work-related stress keeps on poisoning my days (thank you Janice for this very apt description in my comments) and I'm sure the ongoing grey and rainy weather hasn't been any help either.

Here's to hoping Spring will bring solace!

However, the weekend which is this post's subject was a good one. Although I was still suffering from the odd coughing fit, they had definitely subsided, which in its turn had brought back some of my joie de vivre and revived my energy levels.

We'd slept late on Saturday the 28th of January, waking up to a layer of frost and lots of sunshine, with highs of about 8°C. In short: the perfect weather for my beloved flower basket frock!

The frock in question is vintage, and if you've guessed it was a Think Twice find you are spot on! I fell hard for its pattern, its midi length and dropped waist, which, together with its wool content, makes it the ideal jammy dress, as Sheila would say.  

I picked green for my opaques and charity shopped Mango cardigan, its tired and worn out buttons replaced with more appropriate vintage ones from my stash.

My berry-coloured necklace and flower corsage were charity shops finds as well, while my brooch - which for some reason I'm wearing upside down - is part of my haul from January's indoor flea market.

If Vix's garden is a bewildering wilderness, ours is a junkyard jungle, with the bags of compost mixed up with building rubble from next door's kitchen extension still cluttering up the courtyard at the back. But our revived passageway, sheltered by the new and higher wall, is a triumph. 

It was only a matter of a couple of weeks ago when I noticed the first of the flower buds in the Hellebore (Helleborus sternii) I re-homed here last Spring, and lo and behold: not only had they multiplied, the first of its creamy, pink-veined flowers was showing her pretty face.

That morning, I worked on a blog post while Jos ran an errand and made a pot of delicious tomato and paprika soup for our lunch, after which we decided on a wee trip to the charity shops. Or rather, shop, singular, as we only visited our most local one.

Among my finds was this short-sleeved millefiori vintage dress, in perfect condition apart from missing its belt and needing a couple of split seams repaired. No big issue, even for someone with limited sewing skills like yours truly.

I wrestled the marigold jumper from a shop dummy, and stumbled across this zig-zag patterned item, which is a pair of velvet-y lounging trousers. Much appreciated by Bess and me alike.

The wide, unstructured, minty green leather belt with its round white metal bucket is Italian made.

I'm always on the lookout for leather watch straps and unearthed these ones, in two different shades of blue, from a box of boring black sisters and brothers. I initially thought that there was only one of each, but found two matching pairs when I released them from their plastic bag at home. Not bad for € 2 surely.

Finally, the book shelves yielded no less than four new additions to my TBR pile!

We stopped for wild bird seed and some packets of bread mix at the garden centre on our way home. No risk of making any impulse purchases this time, as most of the plant tables were quite bare. 

In spite of a frosty start, Sunday developed into a deliciously sunny, almost springlike day, with the mercury climbing to 12°C.

My dress of choice was another Think Twice find and its label claims that it's a Ralph dress and was made in West Germany. Needless to say, the Internet wasn't very helpful in finding any information about this label, as my searches resulted in links to Ralph Lauren, rather than just Ralph. 

Appearances can be deceptive, as rather than black, the dress's predominant colour is a rich chocolate brown. It's got three buttons at the cuffs which echo those decorating each shoulder. 

From its clusters of flowers, I picked turquoise for my belt and pink for my beads, both items being charity shop finds. As was the blue Zoë Loveborn cardigan with its orange buttons. 

The cameo brooch I pinned to my dress is another one from my recent flea market haul, while my cardigan was proudly displaying a single orange paste gemstone in a nest of gold thread.

After lunch, we drove down to De Schorre in Boom, a Provincial domain and nature reserve at the site of yet another former clay pit.

In fact, De Schorre isn't just your run-of-the-mill place: it is the the scene for Tomorrowland, the largest Dance Music festival in the world, which takes place for two consecutive weekends in July. If the wind is right - or should that be wrong - its deep thumping basses can be heard and felt at Dove Cottage, more than eight kilometers away.

A quick trawl on the blog revealed that our last visit was almost two years ago to the day! It was in January 2022 that we first came across some of the trolls installed in the summer of 2019 in honour of Tomorrowland's 15th anniversary.

Sets of wooden steps take you from street level about 25 meters down to the bottom of the former pit, where a network of boardwalks leads you through the wetlands created by months of rain.

Soon we spotted the first of the trolls - there are a total of 7 to be discovered - sitting astride the boardwalk. This one is called Arvid and apparently she is looking for dead branches in the forest, with which she is making of works of art. 

Judging from her back view, she's been using some of those dead branches for her wild punky hairdo as well. 

Eventually the boardwalk ends at the junction with a broad path which leads to the domain's commercial heart, which has venues for parties, events and meetings. It is home to some sports clubs as well and there's a climbing and adventure tower which makes me wobbly-legged by just looking at it. We wouldn't even have ventured that far if it weren't for its sanitary facilities!

About one third of the domain is coloured in as a nature reserve, where nature has reclaimed what was rightfully hers after the brick-making industry declined and clay-digging came to a stop in the 1980s.

At the sight of such natural bounty, it is hard to imagine what it must have been like in the industry's heyday, but here's a photo to give you some idea.

On our return journey we came across another one of the trolls. This one is Hannes, who apparently loves making necklaces with wooden pearls he forages in the forest.  

On this beautiful Sunday afternoon, there were lots of families with children out and about, and it wasn't easy to photograph Hannes and me hanging out together with a constant stream of children wanting to tickle the poor giant's feet!

The trolls, by the way, were created by Danish artist Thomas Dambo using old pallets, recycled wood, broken branches and fallen trees, and they vary in height between 7 and 18 meters.

The ruined brick building Hannes is perched upon, and the elevated track on tall brick pillars, are remnants of the area's industrious past.

The fabulous graffiti artwork was added in 2023. It is called 'Formica' (which is Latin for ant) and was created by the artists of a collective called Treepack. The worker ants refer to the many workers who used to mine clay and make bricks here. 

This photo, which was made by Jos who used to live in the area, shows what it looked like in the early 1980s, before the factory closed down. 

On our way up to where we'd left our car, we spotted a third troll on the further reaches of a pool, which is of course actually a water-filled former clay pit, ruled over by a rusty dredger.

This is Mikil, who is scooping water from the pool with a bucket. There's a rather vertiginous muddy path leading down to him, which we didn't dare to attempt.  

We've still got the other three trolls to check out, which we are planning to do on a less busy and muddy day. Perhaps on a Friday in April?

We'd managed to avoid the worst of the sticky clay, but in one's hour of need there's this contraption.

Boomse kleiverwijderaar translates as remover of Boom clay ... I do wonder who those shady characters in front of it are?

Back at home, I settled myself on the sofa with my latest read, which was quite good. In fact, Anne Tyler never disappoints, and it's testimony to her talent that I finished this one in no time.