Archives for posts with tag: vacation
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Winter blues

July 16, 2013 //
8

winterblues

Ah well, it had to happen sooner or later. I have the winter blues. But from now on things can only go up.

The Dedes are fighting over who should be allowed to come with me to Melbourne this weekend. I want to take one of them to have some company when I explore the place. I have never been to Melbourne before so it will be good to share the experience with someone. Devil thought – as my favourite – he will be the chosen one. Unfortunately he is a bit too big headed and awkward to pack, as I’ll only take a cabin bag. I might take one of the new ones as their characters are not formed yet. I have added their pictures to the Characters page. Does anybody have any suggestions? Who would you like to hear more about?

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Relationships, Social Network

Mouse has done it again

March 15, 2013 //
4

mouse again

Last night, Mouse came running in shouting “I am the winner, I am the winner”. The others looked at her in surprise. They weren’t aware a competition was going on. “Whoohoo, what did you win?” Devil asked.

Mouse stopped and had to catch her breath. “My cup sold first. It was the first cup that sold!” The others looked at each other. It was obvious that some of them just can’t understand how a tiny grey thing like Mouse can always be the winner. She won the “Super Dede” competition before Christmas and obviously she won the heart of someone out there so they want to have her close.

“I don’t understand it” Devil said. “Admit it, I am the most beautiful of all!”

“Come on, you are grumpy. Who wants to look at a grumpy old bugger all day long” Alien replied. “It should have been me. I make people laugh.”

“I knew it wouldn’t be me” remarked Cash Cow, rather depressed. “Nobody will ever want me. I will be sitting on the shelf forever.”

“That is why I don’t take part,” said Pavlova. “You all think it is a beauty contest. You are so superficial. Our true value can only be unearthed when one engages with us over a longer period.”

“Leave it guys” I said. “It isn’t a competition and especially not a beauty contest. You never know what people are looking for!” I am so sick of them bickering over little things. It might have something to do with me being overworked and ready for a holiday.

If you want to check out what they are talking about, there is a link to the Zazzle store at the bottom of each page now. Also if you have a favourite who is not featured yet, or have a special wish, let me know….

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships, Social Network

Exhibition

February 6, 2013 //
6

sunny scavenging-1-2

Today is a holiday in New Zealand. It is Waitangi Day. On this day in 1840 some (but not all) Maori chiefs signed a treaty at James Busby’s house in Waitangi. The document put the inhabitants of this country under English protection. Unfortunately the translation into Maori sounded somewhat different from the English version. And of course it is wide open to interpretation.

I am relatively relaxed today and finally summoned all my courage to tell the Dedes that I will have a Solo Exhibition at the end of June for two weeks. I haven’t signed the contract yet, but it is pretty much teed up. So, why did it take me so long to tell them?

When I first started to discuss the exhibition with the gallery back in November, the curator suggested I should sell the puppets at the show. But I am very hesitant, after all they are the protagonists of my books and my blog. I can’t just sell them off. But of course, the gallery needs to earn some money. So I will have to have something to sell. Fortunately I still have four month to think about it. It could be large photographic prints (but would someone be interested in buying them?) or some specially made puppets that don’t appear on the blog (How much use is a single puppet?). Questions and more questions and I don’t know the answers yet. I had to promise the Dedes though, that all the existing puppets are safe. Don’t tell them, but I crossed my fingers behind my back, when I promised. I admit, it’s not a very nice thing to do, but who knows what happens in four month. Never say never!

The Dedes seemed to have mellowed a bit since I last broached the issue of sales back in November. Then I had a riot on my hands and it took nearly a week to calm them down. Today, they just said it was wonderful news and they are looking forward to having a gig in the real world. Then they went off and continued doing their own thing. It makes me wonder if some of them aren’t ready to emigrate. Maybe Bobby is looking for a new job, or Cash Cow wants to move out of the garage. Who knows!

After my announcement, I made myself a cup of tea and sat on the deck for a while. I watched Sunny scavenging through the builders rubble and putting stuff to one side in a little pile. Sunny is a wannabe artist and he even imitated L’Artiste’s dress today. Personally, I don’t think I have ever seen him do any work. Though he is very good at talking about what he is going to do one day, when he has found a patron. So, I was more than surprised, seeing him dragging bits and pieces onto the deck.

“What are you doing there?” I asked as the stash grew.

“An artwork of course, I thought, now that you have organised a gallery space, I might be able to slip one or two of my artworks in. You wouldn’t mind, would you?”

“I can’t promise right now, I have to see them first.”

“I have this brilliant idea and you have to brace yourself… You will be blown away, just wait!”

First I have to see if he actually finishes something by the end of June.

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships, Social Network

What a welcome?!

December 28, 2012 //
2

her fault

I arrived back home late last night.  I didn’t take any of the Dedes with me on my holidays, as they accused me of favouritism as soon as I picked one of them up to pack into a box. So I left them all behind. This wasn’t a good move as it was raining non-stop where we were and a bit of hands-on puppetry would have gone down a treat. Never mind!

When I came home, all the lights were blazing. I tip-toed into the house to surprise the Dedes. It was a really bad idea as I overheard their discussion. They were sitting around on the living room floor lamenting about the poor participation in the poll.

Smug Little Devil said: “It is really her fault isn’t it? She should not have gone away in the hot phase of voting.”

“Why, what could she have done?” Socialite asked.

“Don’t you know the old saying ‘out of sight out of mind’!” Smug Little Devil replied. “She should have reminded our readers throughout week that they should vote!”

“But she was somewhere with no internet connection and anyway… maybe we only have nine readers?” Foxy Lady pointed out. “No way” Mouse butted in, “we have way more than that…”

“You know how to use the computer” Socialite turned to Mouse now. “You could have reminded the readers!”

“I am not doing anything without being given a mandate. She didn’t instruct me to send out reminders.”

“So we are back to what I said… It is all her fault, isn’t it?” Smug Little Devil pointed out with his unpleasant smirk on his face.

“Give her a break” Philosopher entered the conversation “She is allowed to have a break from us from time to time… She has put so much work into us all year… Where would we be without her?” Tears welled up in my eyes when I heard this nice remark and I was about to enter the room and hug Philosopher, when Smug Little Devil countered Philosopher’s words: “That point of view is futile really… you might as well say where would we be if we had a more driven Master? I believe we could be out there known by heaps more people. We could go travelling and could have a new exhibition somewhere every month. You can’t convince me that she is best for us!”

This made me turn on my heals and leave the house again, so I could come back making a  big racket this time, announcing my arrival to even the deafest of puppets. They all came running out of the living room towards the back door and shouted “We are so happy to have you back.” Leading the pack was none other then Smug Little Devil. I won’t tell you what I thought…

We are very close to the big finale: the winner of the ‘Super Dede 2012’ competition will be announced tomorrow! If you haven’t voted yet, here is the poll again. When I checked last, Mouse was leading. To read a summary of their performances, have a look at the previous post.

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships, Social Network

Devil at rest

December 15, 2012 //
2

devil hammock

The week of interviewing the candidates has taken its toll. I have never seen Devil so exhausted, honestly. He finally admits, it is not that easy to deal with all the different characters. As soon as he got up this morning, he took down the theatre curtain and made himself a nice hammock in the backyard. I don’t think we will be seeing much of him today.

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life

That little schmoozer

November 23, 2012 //
6

I have noticed the Dedes who were at the gallery are somehow different from the home crowd. The ones at home are a lively bunch. The travelers seem somewhat sedated in comparison. I expected them to be brimming with new ideas and stories.

Far from it!  Boy, Liar and Ms SM sleep all day (and night). Alien – who needs no sleep – sits in the middle of the lawn speaking to his people at home, where ever this might be. He doesn’t even need a phone. He just sits there and smiles and from time to time laughs out loud. Watching him, I get the feeling he is terribly homesick.

That leaves Smug Little Devil to bath in the attention of the home crowd. Of course everybody wants to hear some stories and he is the only one who likes to talk about it. I heard through the grapevine that he loves to tell everyone how terribly I failed in selecting the best team for the excursion. He could have done a much better job.

He uses a silly little trick… He schmoozes each Dede by telling them they definitely should have been chosen for the trip and he would have so much preferred to have stayed with them for six weeks than with the other losers he had to go with (… the ones I had selected). I am not entirely sure what he is trying to achieve….except unsettling everyone.

Help! What shall I do now? If I don’t nip this in the bud right now, I will have another riot on my hands.

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Photography

Home coming

November 20, 2012 //
0

I am so happy… our heroes from the “Wallace Art Award” came back home yesterday. All the Dedes were excited and organised a ticker tape parade for their return. But boy, were our five travelers exhausted. Actually only four were exhausted and guess who was the chirpy one?

“Aliens don’t sleep”, a very grumpy Liar told me, and I think he was telling the truth for a change.

Alien had wanted to party all night, every night! And since the other artworks were very different and a bit stand-offish, he pestered his four friends, who gradually turned into his enemies. Ms SM, who can be a night owl herself, said they got so annoyed with him they even hatched a plan to push him aside, but  he fell off his stick instead. They felt bad about that, but luckily he didn’t break. The next morning the curator came along and put him back up. So they got a few hours reprieve, but didn’t dare try again. From then on they just gritted their teeth. They all agreed it was extremely difficult to live together in those crammed conditions for such a long time (they were away for six weeks). And they pledged never to go on holidays with friends again.

Very much to the disappointment of the Dedes who stayed at home, all the returnees retired early last night. Only Alien was prepared to tell a few more tales, but he had to make a quick phone call first and so went into the garden. When he didn’t come back for ages everybody toddled off, rather disappointed.

What a fizzer of a party! Some of them agreed we will have a proper home coming party on Saturday. If the travelers are up to it, that is!

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships

Who still sends Postcards?

November 13, 2012 //
2

Something unexpected happened yesterday: The Dedes got a postcard! Yes, a postcard – Who still sends postcards?

What a wonderful surprise. We love to get letters and postcards. But nowadays when we trundle down to the letterbox it is usually to get bills and real estate advertisements, not handwritten notes, not even around Christmas time. I sometimes wonder what future historians will research when they want to find out what was going on between two like-minded greats. Their twitter accounts? Mmmhm, I don’t think so.

But I am digressing. Yes, indeed the postcard was addressed to the Dede puppets at my place. I couldn’t identify the handwriting at first. It was pretty scrawly and I had a very hard time deciphering it. But of course the Dedes wanted to know who thought of them and in the end Foxy Lady, who has really good eyes, took on the job of reading it out aloud. It said: “Dear Dedes, I am having a lovely holiday and will have lots to talk about when I get home. I have  been at a dress factory. You wouldn’t believe how many dresses there are!!!…I am looking out for a nice one, but it is so hard to choose. They are all so groovy.” At this point I felt a knot in my stomach, because I had ordered 10 plain black robes again. After all I am a designer and I love black myself. None of the Dedes has ever complained about my lack of fashion sense before, but now I could  clearly hear it between the lines.

Mouse was sitting in the corner chuckling away to herself. Of course it was her, but by dede… her handwriting! It looked as if she had too many G and T’s while sunbathing in the wicker basket there.

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life

Puppy in the Poo

November 9, 2012 //
2

Mouse really should have been the first one to hear about Lou‘s confession. Unfortunately, I had sent her to a friend’s house on Wednesday to help with the new Dede dresses we have ordered for the workshop tomorrow. I rang my friend yesterday, but Mouse couldn’t come to the phone. My friend said she was sitting on the deck in the wicker basket sunbathing. So much for her help!

Now, since Bobby and Clay Head had announced they were going to interview us yesterday, I had to tell them that Lou came clean. I am not a gossip. I haven’t told anyone else yet (apart from you of course, but I trust you explicitly. I am sure you can keep a secret, can’t you?)

I cancelled the appointment with Bobby and Clay Head as their services were no longer needed and expected them to basically forget the whole incident and let Mouse come up with an appropriate punishment. Oh, am I naive or what? Bobby looked at me with his stern face and said: “That is not how it works, Missy! You called the police and you can’t just cancel on us willy nilly. We are not like a plumber and or an  electrician. We are the police! We have to write a report!” And out they got their big pens and started writing.

“But there are no lives endangered! It was just a juvenile joke”

“You should have thought about this before you engaged us…” lectured Clay Head, but was interrupted by a short sharp “Ha!” from Bobby. We both looked at him “Juvenile joke!…” he exclaimed “I have seen Lou‘s record… he is not a first time offender. He already has a strike against his name. Back in June he attacked Skeleton Edeltraut.”

Oh no, not this old story, I thought and said: “We never really solved this one. It was just a matter of two different opinions.” I remembered clearly, it went  on for ever with he-said/she-said and all the Dedes took sides. I was so happy when it finally got quieter around the story and I was so sure time would heal the wounds of all involved. I was surprised to hear now that it was on Lou‘s official record.

“Hang on,” I continued, “you can’t just put a strike against a name and not notify the person, or me in this case, as I am his guardian. He is still a puppy!”

“You have to make a submission… then we might re-open the case. You have to go through the official channels!” Bobby said coldly and continued writing on his report. It was obvious  I wouldn’t achieve anything here today….

Pleeeeeeaaaaase, give me a bottle of wine and send for Philosopher!

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life

Welcome home

October 28, 2012 //
2

Philosopher and Lou returned from their boating trip today. I haven’t seen either of them so cheerful and chatty for a very long time.  Lou couldn’t stop telling us how wonderful their trip was and they proudly produced their early morning catch from the last day. I’ve never seen Lou so animated. When he was telling us all the gory details of how they wrangled the great fish from the sea, all the dede puppets listened their mouths wide open. But somehow their story seemed a bit fishy to me, even though I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.

I took Philosopher to the side, looked him in the eye and asked him if this was all true. I know Philosopher can’t tell porkies and he readily told me  me what really happened:

They left last Sunday. Mouse had organised the charter boat for them. After they stocked up on supplies for the week from the supermarket, they went down to the marina to pick up the boat. Philosopher was asked to show his paperwork as proof that he can handle a boat. Unfortunately Philosopher doesn’t believe in paperwork, certificates and the like, so he doesn’t have any. “She’ll be right” is his general attitude in life. Usually he manages to convince people of his abilities and knowledge without a problem. Not this time… These people were insisting he showed them the correct papers, as if they were the border police. There was no way they would entrust him with their boat without the right stamp. So in the end Philosopher had to give up.

Now they were in a pickle… Mouse had made it very clear to Philosopher, Lou had to be out of the house when the party was on. He believes it had something to do with Skeleton coming to the party on her own. (Skeleton is the object of Lou’s desire. It’s all very complicated and I don’t want to go into detail right here. But I can assure you, it is all very awkward). So Philosopher convinced Lou that roughing it under a bridge for a week is almost as exciting as going away on the boat. They went to the park to find themselves a nice place under a bridge and stayed there for the week. And they really had a wonderful time. Lou made friends with other puppies running around in the park, chasing balls as young puppies do. In the end he didn’t want to come home today. But Philosopher came up with their tall story and they had a bet going about whether anybody would notice it was all fibs. Of course Lou then couldn’t wait to get home and see who would win the bet about the tale of their week.

 

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life
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