Halloween Chills & Thrills!

From the Little Big Book of Chills & Thrills, published by WelcomeBooks in 2005:

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French Friday: Tintin covers!

From: http://bit.ly/1IYaS2

I had the great fortune of taking a Belgian Lit. class when I was getting my Masters. We read just one Tintin text (Les Bijoux de la Castafiore, which you’ll see pictured below), but the commentary from my (Belgian) prof completely turned me, and the entire class, into a Tintin convert.

In homage to Professeur LeRoy, I give you a selection of covers representing the misadventures of Tintin and his beloved pooch Milou.

All images below borrowed from THIS CATALOG.

Throwback Thursday: Notgeld, German Emergency Currency

If all money looked this pretty, I’d definitely be more apt to save it.

The images presented below represent a selection from Lliazd’s unbelievably expansive Flickr set of Notgeld, which was German emergency currency used during the post-WWI years. Lliazd’s provides us with an in-depth look into the personal, political, and aesthetic significance of these images on his Flickr page:

After 800 years of life in the same region, my wife’s family left Germany. In 1935 Nazism had become unbearable. They were lucky enough to understand the risk it posed for Jews living in Germany and they left. Until then, her family was part of a comfortable and prosperous middle class, involved in the tobacco business in the city of Karlsruhe.

At the end of the First World War her grandfather started collecting Notgeld produced by many German and Austrian towns and companies to make front to deflation first and inflation later with the objective of providing stability to workers and residents. Notgeld (emergency currency) was issued by cities, boroughs, even private companies while there was a shortage of official coins and bills. Nobody would pay in coins while their nominal value was less than the value of the metal. And when inflation went on, the state was just unable to print bills fast enough. Some companies couldn’t pay their workers because the Reichsbank just couldn’t provide enough bills. So they started to print their own money – they even asked the Reichsbank beforehand. As long as the Notgeld was accepted, no real harm was done and it just was a certificate of debt. Often it was even a more stable currency than real money, as sometimes the denomination was a certain amount of gold, dollars, corn, meat, etc.

They made it very pretty on purpose: many people collected the bills, and the debt would never have to be paid. It was printed on all kinds of materials: leather, fabric, porcelain, silk, tin foil. (Read more HERE)

Behold, the beauty of Notgeld:

Wordshop Wednesday: Miss Bella’s Room

Some people are obsessed with checking themselves out. You know the ones: can’t pass a window without rubbernecking to see how they are being seen. Some people are obsessed with checking to make sure makeup hasn’t smudged, that lipstick hasn’t transferred to a front tooth, that there’s not a blob of unblended concealer chilling under their eye… I get it. I know the paranoia. But mine might be a little more focused. See, rather than a general concern for a potential makeup mishap, I am haunted by a very distinct, cave-dwelling demon: cliffhangers that like to reside in my nostrils. I am CONSTANTLY paranoid that one of those cave-dwellers wants to expose him/herself. CONSTANTLY. Not the most aesthetically pleasing topic of a blog post, I realize. But here’s where it becomes relevant: I’ve been on the hunt for some cool little pocket mirrors (sometimes my reflection in my dark laptop screen just doesn’t suffice) to stuff in my backpack and subtly bring out on (frequent) occasion.

So, of course, I went to Etsy.

And I found these extremely affordable little handmade pocket mirrors over at Miss Bella’s Room. Some contenders to help assuage my fears:

Halloween surprise!

I’ve been way over-tweeting and over-posting about my Halloween Paper Pack. But I can’t help it. It’s so cute! And the little Snoopy and Winnie the Pooh activities are so fun! And there are coloring pages! And vintage French and dictionary pages! And awesome decorative papers! Some are double-sided! And did I mention stickers and gift tags?!? And that it’s chock-full of goodies for kids and scrapbookers/collage artists alike? And that it’s now 50% OFF?!?!? It’s a measly $2.50!!!!! Well, as if that’s not rad enough… now I’m throwing in a surprise gift to whoever the lucky buyer is. *Note: Gift tags and red & white baker’s twine may or may not be involved.

For images and ordering, click HERE!

Blickfang: German book covers

The other day, I was fortunate enough to have a FABULOUS new Twitter friend retweet the link to my post on Carl Jung’s Red Book . This new Twitter friend, @roundmyskull, just so happens to have an amazingly overstimulating blog devoted to the treasures of “forgotten literature.” There, I discovered that, in German, “blickfang” means “eye-catcher,” and it is part of the title of a fabulous collection of thousands of book cover designs from Weimar Berlin, from 1919-1933. (Click HERE for a link to the book)

All images below have been graciously borrowed from the highly seductive blog, A Journey Round My Skull. I majorly encourage you to visit the blog… and the STELLAR Flickr stream. You’ll spend HOURS…

Quotes & Notes

I just discovered the exquisitely lovely Quotes & Notes via Craftgawker. The mix of printed basswood, creamy fabrics, and unique quotations (some even in French, HELLO?!?) make me kind of swoon. And get me excited for Christmas. (Yes, I know it’s not Halloween yet, but just look at the images below! You’ll see what I mean, I swear.)

Every item in the Quotes & Notes Etsy shop is available for customizing! Visit this lovely little shop HERE.

Target’s One Spot

You guys have all been to the One Spot/Dollar Spot/Whatever Spot at Target, right? A lot of times it’s overrun with holiday-themed items — usually headachingly BRIGHT holiday-themed items. But sometimes you can find that rare gem if you dig around the fluourescents long enough.

Yesterday, I found a set of alphabet stamps for a buck. Each individual letter = its own stamp. They’re awesome. They’re like these, except minus the numbers:

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And these are listed as $11.00 on Target’s website. And that’s just $10.00 too much.

So, I decided to bust open the pack and christen the stamps while using them to personalize the sleeves for some CDs that I made for friends.

So, that’s pretty fun, right? Sunday afternoons are great.