Have you seen her dressed in blue?

The day after our little trip abroad was the 21st of July, which is Belgium's National Holiday. As this year it fell on a Sunday, this would have entitled me to a day off on Monday. However, our office is in the habit of saving days like these to fill in the gaps between Christmas and New Year, enabling us to enjoy a week off at the very least.

So, back to work it was on Monday, which thankfully wasn't too much of a hardship as it was rather quiet. The day was further enhanced with a lunch-time catch-up with Inez at Think Twice's coffee corner, followed by a quick dash around the shop. Sales prices being down to € 2 by now, I snapped up a flower-infused skirt - with pockets! - which you'll get to see me wearing later in this post.

The day's outfit was built around this cobalt blue dress with its eye-catching pattern of orange and white dots and swirls, found at Think Twice earlier that month. This is my contribution to Nancy's August edition of the Good Buy/Good-Bye book, a monthly series where people are invited to share either a Good Buy or a Good-Bye, or Bad Buy, if you must. There's a different theme every month (August's was the colour blue) and although I have participated a couple of times, it had been a while, as either I forget to send in my entry on time or the theme isn't one I can relate to. September's theme will be wide-legged trousers, which I can do if my memory doesn't fail me. 

Anyway, back to the dress, which I accessorized mainly with orange. The beaded necklace came from a long-gone vintage shop, while the enamelled brooch was part of my haul from this year's Shropshire holiday. There was a plastic orange ring too - charity shopped in Bridgnorth last year - which you can see if you squint at the first photo. The stretchy belt came from the high street.

Speaking of the latter, look what I found in the Summer sales during one of my lunch breaks later that week: a glorious pair of ochre wide-legged trousers with a massive white-ish flower print. They've got generous side splits and are from the Danish Vero Moda brand. Nancy, if you are reading this, I know what you're thinking :-)

It was a week of sunny spells and showers, highs of around 25°C, and lots of neighbourly building noise in the evening. If you thought all that was finished, you've thought wrong. After months of relative peace and quiet, we're now back to evenings and weekends filled with drilling and hammering. Will it ever be finished, we wonder?

Anyway, it's part of the reason I only felt up to making outfit photos again on Thursday, when I wore the vintage cotton C&A skirt I was lucky enough to bump into at Think Twice at the end of April.

Its companion that day was a rainbow-dotted King Louie pussy-bow blouse I charity shopped many years ago. My navy translucent beaded necklace was a charity shop find as well, and so was the € 0,50 lizard brooch I'd picked up on the Saturday. In fact, I think this particular chevron-patterned stretchy belt had its origins in a charity shop too. 

Although Friday was my day off, there was no avoiding going into Antwerp as I had a hairdresser's appointment for a colour and cut. So, Jos drove me all the way there and afterwards I took the tram back to Mortsel - the nearest town to ours which can be reached by tram - where he picked me up again.

My tie-neck Diolen frock with its veritable explosion of red and pink flowers has been in my wardrobe for close to ten years. It came from yet another long-gone vintage shop called Vintage Styling which sadly closed down back in 2016. Although it came with a matching belt, I once again opted to replace it with a chevron patterned stretchy one. So comfy, particularly when one has to sit in a salon chair for nearly two hours.

Back at home, I did a bit of housework, something we've been sorely remiss in lately. After ticking a couple of tasks off my list, I indulged myself by sprawling on the sofa - joined by Bess obviously - with my latest read. And very good it was too. My second Barbara Vine novel but definitely not my last! I am on the lookout for more but so far the charity shops haven't obliged.

The sunny Summer weather continued into the weekend, although the weather gods, possibly taking a breather before the next week's heatwave temperatures, only came up with a moderate 22°C on both days.

As promised, here is the € 2 skirt I found at Think Twice on Monday. The green short-sleeved knit top I wore with it has been in my wardrobe forever. After racking my brain as to its origins, I'm now inclined to think it came from the fabulous Blender Vintage Shop, another one which closed down in 2016. 

As for the stuff, as Sheila would say, it consisted of my stretchy belt with hexagonal faux-tortoiseshell buckle (high street), multi-coloured necklace (charity shop) and yellow perspex ring (flea market). The cat brooch deserves special attention, as it was a gift from Goody, who sent it to me all the way from Omaha back in 2018!

A peek at my life-saving journal tells me I caught up with blogland and - wait for it - did a stint of ironing. Oh, and we went for a rummage in the charity shop in Duffel, where I found this 1950s style fit and flare dress from retro label Voodoo Vixen. If you look closely you can see it's got some stylized black cats among its print.

Neither black nor stylized, our very own furry creature was basking in the sunshine streaming in through the sitting room window. As she'd claimed the sofa and didn't seem intent on leaving it any time soon, we took this as our prompt to go for a walk.

We hadn't been to Middelheim sculpture park since before our Shropshire holiday, so that was our destination sorted. At the time of our previous visit, preparations for the park's Summer exhibition, Come Closer, had been in progress, although a handful of participating artworks were already in place among the half-finished installations.

Case in point is Gilt (below, top left) by London based artist Hew Locke. There are a total of four of these richly decorated golden trophies. Made of gilded resin, they are just beautiful façades and rough at the back, meaning that they are literally imposters or cheats. 

Clockwise from Gilt, you can see one of three sculptures comprising Berlin based Zuzanna Czebatul's Macromolecule Exploiting some Biological Target. They are actually XXL versions of popular party drugs.

The television screen in the middle of nowhere is showing a performance called The Dreamer of the Forest by Paul Kindersley (UK, 1985), in which he brings the ‘characters’ in the Middelheim collection to life. One can see the actual performance on a stage on an island across the moat (above, bottom right) on eight different occasions during the exhibition.

I'm standing in front of Symptomatic Relief by Monika Grabuschnigg (Austria, 1987), which incorporates which looks like a piece of church furniture. According to her website she engages in themes such as longing, grief and melancholy by processing domesticated and commodified objects like clothing, home appliances and plants into sculptures and installations.

The skeleton riding a bike in the canopies of the trees is part of the museum permanent collection, Zwart Schaap (Black Sheep) by Belgian artist Johan Muyle (1956).

We wandered at will, ending up at the Organic Brutalist Braem Pavillion, where some kind of alarm seemed to be going off. Peeking inside, we couldn't see anything untoward going on. One can never be sure what's real and what isn't here, so perhaps it was just part of the exhibition ...

Anyway, our next stop was the Open-air depot where - I'm quoting the museum's website here - works of art that are being restored, or have been removed from the display of statues in the park for other reasons, find their home. Quite a few of my favourites are here, including Colonne, the reflective column by Belgian sculptor Félix Roulin (1931).

In my opinion, it's just a sorry and quite disrespectfully displayed jumble of works of art for which, surely, they could have found a more appropriate spot in the park. The mind boggles, as clearly there is more than enough space elsewhere.

Poor Sibilla (above, bottom right) by Italian artist Pericle Fazzini (1913-1987) clearly shares my opinion. After all, she has been sidelined after residing in the park since 1956!

Feeling more than just a little dejected, we crossed the road into Middelheim-Low, passing the delightful thatched warden's cottage called Aubette, sadly now being used to store some of the iconic gold and silver painted chairs one can find all over the park. 

Then our walk continued past the Pillared Pavillion (above, top right) by Belgian architect Charles Vandehove (1927-2019) and the aluminium monsters of the intriguingly named Silver Fruit, Silver Cakespoons, The Garden by the Antwerp artist Peter Rogiers (1967).

We were now in the Urban Nature zone of the park, where strange encounters are rife.

Take Blue Barrel (above, top left) for instance. It is part of a series of actions in which its creator, Swiss visual artist Roman Signer (1938) launches objects using a ramp. The performance at Middelheim Museum took place in May 2012. From a height of 15 meters and over a distance of about 35 meters, a metal barrel filled with water rolled down a ramp at high speed and exploded against a concrete wall. What you see now is a remnant of that action, a lasting reminder of the moment for those who were present, and a stimulus to the imagination for those who were not.

A clear case of now you see me, now you don't is Setting, dating from 2019 and by Filip Vervaet (1977) and consisting of four glass panels creating as series of garden rooms. In one room is a vase sculpture, while in the other one is a tree, but one the artist made in aluminum. When you walk around the artwork you alternately see the real trees in the park, the vase sculpture, and the bare tree trunk. The windows sometimes offer views of the interior and sometimes of the exterior, but it is never quite clear exactly what you are looking at. 

Can you see me? Answers on a postcard, please!

I will finally be wrapping up July and make a start with August in my next post. And that's a promise!