As it was our first visit to the Summer house this year, my sister and I got to work. I was cleaning and airing the little house and she cut the grass and pruned the bushes. We also collected some strawberries and had them with tea.
Life can be blissfully lazy on dzialka (that's what we call it in Polish, but the word actually means allotment). The atmosphere there reminds me of Chekhov's plays. Endless rounds of tea and cake (my aunts and cousins have Summer houses in the same area), reading and talking, yes, mostly talking.
I recently got married to my Mr Partner (in March this year) in London and we decided to have two wedding parties. One in London for my husband's English family and our friends, and the other one in this Summer house, in August, for my Polish family and our Polish friends. So I used my time on dzialka to start the preparations for our party.
I have been collecting glass jars for some time, with the intention of making them into lanterns. I got some glass paints and brushes and asked my sister and niece to help me.
We used the only three colors we had: green, red and turquoise, painting each jar with a single color.
The rough idea was to use some of the lanterns for the tables, some for decorating the porch and some for hanging on the trees. I have no idea what it will look like, the only thing I know is that the party decorations have to be colorful and happy, with the element of surprise.
Here are some of the lanterns we prepared:
and some more:
Later a neighbor came and contributed some designs too. We had a good time. We left the jars outside to dry overnight. In August we will fill them with candles.
I will be writing about other party preparations in my next posts.
See you later
Yolanta
Oh, I love these! I soooo wish we could be there for the party. I'm going to really enjoy watching your prepare. Savanka would ADORE doing this with you. She has definitely inherited your creative talents.
ReplyDeleteI know, it is a pity... But we are planning to visit you in the Spring and we will have some nice painting sessions then.
ReplyDeleteI can see these in the trees, lighting the festivities. Sending out light and colour falling over the happy faces. Beautiful!
ReplyDeleteNice vision Viktoria, thanks :)
ReplyDeleteWhat a lovely post, and it reminds me of when i go to Sweden. Lots of tea, cakes and chatting!
ReplyDeleteAnd your lanterns look very sweet and they become even sweeter thingking of how many helping creative hands made them.
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Hi Elisabet, I also thought of you and your family's Swedish Summer house. Europeans often live in blocks of flats without gardens but have little Summer houses to go away to for the weekends. They also relocate to these houses for the Summer and commute to work from there. Thanks to this system I grew up with regular contact with nature which was priceless. xx
ReplyDeleteHi there,
ReplyDeleteI've been collecting loads of jars to make lanterns for our wedding next year. I'm about to order some paints and I want to make sure I get the same stained glass effect that you've managed to get. What paints would you recommend?
PS. Love your blog: will be hunting through it for other ideas for the wedding.:)
Hi! Thank you for nice words about my blog!
ReplyDeleteI bought and used the paints in Poland and I don't remember what brand they were (I cannot check as I am in UK) but I would just use any glass paints from any good art supplies shop. They should be strong enough to handle any temperature and any weather conditions.
Good luck with your wedding plans!
Yolanta