Away from the trouble that takes place prior to All Saints Day on the largest cemetery of Ljubljana and Slovenia, a walk through the Garden of All Saints.
Created by master Plečnik, it was meant to be a garden of goodbye that would enable a modernised, and yet personal funeral service as the growth of the city increased the need of burial sites, and especially a mortuary that would replace the custom of keeping the dead at home until the funeral.
Just like any of Plečnik's work, the entrance is magnificent: collonades in two floors, arranged in a huge semicircle that separates the city of the living from the city of the death.
Atop of it, a double-statue of Christ the Saviour and Mother Mary.
Each side of the entrance porch houses administration offices, straight ahead lies a worship place.
Instead of one central mortuary, the areal hosts 14 small chapels, each of them being dedicated to one of Ljubljana's parishes resp. their patron saint. Their styles are unique and worked out in detail, from an antique temple to a byzantine church to a Renaissance-like pavillion.
Between them - gravel roads, fountains, alleys and benches.
On the other side of the place, a carpentry for coffins. Unlike the rest of the buildings, that are covered in peaceful white, its facade is quite dark, but lit up with golden mosaics.
And just as you think "What a wonderful oasis"...
... you realize there is a whole lot of life going on just across the hedgerow.
I refuse to accept that my little no-radio-no-TV-world changes the minute I go online.
I refuse to believe negative things are to rule our lives.
I refuse to believe there is more terror nowadays, bad news is just more accessable.
I refuse to let fear and hatered take over my feelings.
I refuse to condemn whole groups of people because of the actions of individuals.
I refuse to measure people with double standards based on race, religion, status or anything.
I might be hard, but I'll do anything to be fair. Even if that means I have no contact to many of my relatives. If I cut you off, I sure had my reasons.
What matters is not who you are, or how you talk, but how you behave, and above all - what your actions are like.
And my actions shouldn't be one of hate, skepticism and dislike.
People knocking at our doors have been living in war-like conditions over the past few years. They have been running away from the very same terror that is occasionally seen in European cities.
Isn't it contradictory to update your profile pictures and flood social media with hashtags after something happens a little closer (and still probably doesn't affect anyone you know or paces you've never been to), when you don't seem to care about similar attacks that happen in the Middle East on a daily basis?
Isn't it contradictory to evacuate tourists as soon as things get tense, and at the very same time tell people coming from the very same regions to go back to where they came from?
Isn't it contradictory to feel socked when you see traces of terror on TV, and at the same time deny people protection from the very same terror they have experienced firsthand?
Again, I might be hard, but I'll do anything to be fair.
Borders and fences are not something I want to see in the 21st century.
With this in mind, it looks like this weeks' projects were dominated by two colours: red & white.
It started with beautiful amaryllises I've seen at the local supermarket last weekend. I just had to take them home, where I changed the wrinkled foliage with some cherry laureel from the neighbour apartment building.
They have opened their blossoms bit by bit through the week, and are ready now to pop over to Friday-Flowerday at Holunderbluetchen.
It continued with discovering beautiful red background paper with tiny white flowers that I had to use with some new stitching patterns. Matching the amaryllis blossoms, I've chosen a flower-like ormnament that I've stitched with red and white shimmering yarn. In the end, I decorated it with white and silver pearls and star-shaped gemstones. Is it a fantasy flower or an early Christmas star?
challenges:
- 613 avenue create: ATG
- basteltanten: stars
- clear it out: white + one more colour (red), stash ATG (pearls)
- C.R.A.F.T.: Christmas
- crafting from the heart: ATG
- crafty calendar: sparkle, bling & embellish
- craftyhazelnutspatternedpaper
- craftyhazelnutschristmaschallenge: ATG as long as it's Christmas
- creative fingers: ATG
- inspiration destination: ATG
- glitternsparkle: use some red
- scrapping4fun: traditional Christmas colours
- through the craftroom door: ATG
- wordart wednesday: ATG
- 12 months of Christmas: ATG with optional theme (sparkle, sparkle everywhere)
Finally, some beadwork: a rather simple pattern that will be used to cover my tea lights this season. I'm not the person to use candles, so they will pobably end up as gifts to my dear ones.
After all, only light can conquer darkness - just like only love can conquer hate and only hope can conquer fear.
challenges:
- allsorts: ATG but a card
- alphabet challengeblog: T for Tis the season
- C.R.A.F.T.: Christmas
With my practise ending earlier than expected, I found a little time to get crafty again, so I decided to make another sympathy card for he challenge at craft-alnica.
Actually, I planned to make two cards - one featuring a black angel, and another one with a silver stitched frame with a comforting quote in the center. But somewhere between finishing the sewing and putting the cards together, the two images overlapped and I thought I might as well combine them in what might be a rather unusual sympathy card.
I cut the framed motif in half, used the angel as the central motif and placed everything on a black cardboard.
To add a little bling to the black-and-whie combination, I used a shimmering white, black and silver background paper and a couple of pearls.
Given it's a stitched sympathy card, it could also be a reminder for you to play along in the current Fadengrafik Challenge - feel free to show your sympathy projects, as long as they include some stitching.
Talking about black-and-white combinations, the sight of swallows lining up before their journey to warmer places certainly is something that involves saying goodbye, a long way ahead and the wish for a happy return.
However, I've never seen as many as on a rainy day a couple of years ago. For a moment I'd wonder whether the air fills with a sadness for leaving or an expectation of a better place?
challenges:
- craft-alnica: sympathy
- 613 avenue create: ATG
- cardz4guyz: more than one fold
- clear it out: white + 1 colour, stash ATG (pearls)
- come and get it: lots of sparkle
- crafting from the heart: ATG
- crafty calendar: sparkle, bling and embellish
- craftyhazelnutspatternedpaper
- creative fingers: ATG
- fan-tastic tuesday: ATG with a twist - something with B (black)
- inspiration destination: ATG
- through the craftroom door: ATG
- wordart wednesday: ATG
