My allmoge cupboard

Allmoge konst means peasant art. Lately (sort of, it's been for years) it's become popular again in the new whitewashed french country type of style all over pictures on my facebook, but I really like that original brightly coloured version..

So that day when I walked by the charity shop and saw a little pink 60's cupboard for 2 pounds I had the same thought as some of my girlfriends has when they see an emotionally crippled man: I want to fix it!

Luckily its way easier to pick up a random cupboard off the street, take it home and fix it up into something you actually want to have in your home! Just a little wallpaint sample, some acrylic paints and some inspiration.

I must say, I think I did really well, especially considering the early 60's is one of the least charming eras to work with! Even though it does kind of look a little bit like an evil octopus on the front there.

 

In a way I think painting this peasant art is a little like a mix between dressmaking and genealogy.  It's an artistic expression.. a reaching out for a past and a belonging that I can only barely touch, one that seems to always slip trough my fingers. So I keep reaching. 

Keep creating.

Happy 1st of May!

Today is 1st of May and in true Scandinavian style it's a celebration.

The celebration of the last day of April and the first day of May has two reasons:  First one is that the last of April was, in the old farmers calender, the first day of spring. So on Valborgsmässoafton (as it is still called) the farmers let their animals out on the fields and had a bit of a feast with a fire (cause it wouldn't be a feast without some driving away of evil spirits!) and mead and things made out of eggs because..that was the good stuff in the olden days..?. I'm assuming with other farmers now..not the animals.. And that's still what people do. Minus the cows and the eggs.

Secondly, the first of May is the workers day so everyone has that day off. Apparently that's because of a massacre in America in the late 19th century. Did not know that. But it's also the students day and even if I never actually wore my white students cap after graduation day..the first of may to me is socialist demonstrations and white caps. And candy strings.

So yeah, mead season started a bit early this year, about two weeks ago when I felt like it. A little alcoholic this years batch I must say! still, it's pretty much the only place where raisins are acceptable. In mead. 

Other then mead, for a 1st of May celebration, you need balloons and some other decorations.. and this year I thought I would try making struvor. Now, I have never made struvor before but I have seen them been made and thought..that seems fairly easy. So I wanted to give it a go. With a slightly horrified expression on his face my husband asked if I know anything about handling boiling oil.. "No but I'll wing it, how hard can it be" may not have been THE most calming answer to that but he was eventually swayed.. ("I have read about it on the internet, actually!") 

It may look like 10 oddly shaped flying spaghetti monsters because let's face it, internet is a sucky teacher, but they do actually taste amazingly good..!

The masks doesn't actually make a lot of sense..for some reason I just thought it would be a fun thing to do. Like a new tradition. I quite like masks and dressing up as animals for some reason.. Not in a sexy-halloween-kitty kind of way, more like that scene in the Shining. You know the one. 

Also it was a lot of fun to do! easy to find patterns, very child friendly, doesn't take a lot of time, I definitely recommend doing animal masks out of felt and elastic if one has easily bored kids around but don't want to pretend to be interested in scooby doo!

And even if spring already came to England long ago I wish you a happy Valborg and a cosy 1st of May from all of us.

Recipe for struvor

2  eggs 

1 eggwhite

1 teaspoon vanillasugar

1dl sugar

1½ dl milk

3½ dl flour

Whisk eggs and sugar, pour milk in then flour. Heath up oil to 180 degrees and pour the struv mixture into an icing bag. Cut a hole and make struvor in the boiling oil. Let cool on paper and sprinkle with icing sugar.