Hand-Drawn Flyer

This flyer took me way too long to make BUT i sure did learn a lot doing it. Slowly getting better at that hand lettering stuff! So here it is, the latest flyer for our little shop, The Jumping Flea Market.

Inkalicious Dip Pens

How i love them. Haven't mastered this ink stuff yet and my fingers have the 'Havana Brown' stains to prove it but i sure am enjoying trying to figure it out. My latest...

Coquettish Crochet

I've been making a few new items for the summer festival markets this year. And what better fashion accessory for summer festivals than a sassy little crocheted Bikini Top & matching Tote Bag? I can't think of any.

Pen & Ink

I found some really nice wooden nib holders at a flea market and have since been playing around with Pen & Ink. I absolutely love drawing with a dip pen.

Working on Some New Signs

for The Jumping Flea Market..

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Bitchin' Kitchen Potholders

Just finished up a batch of crocheted potholders which will be available at WAUW in Den Hague. For those of you who would like to order online... a fresh batch will be available next week via The Jumping Flea Market Etsy Shop, in time for Christmas shopping. Won't Grandma be pleased. F*CK YEAH!

DIY Farmville

I gave my buddy Howlin' Quin de Vreede a piece of property for his birthday. It came with a cow and a windmill. Quin's figures in his art often have 3's... 3 eyes, even 3 breasts. Quin's cow has 3 eyes.
Click on the image to ZOOM.

Dudes, what's up?!

Full Screen-Shot
of this month's
Jumping Flea Mail.
Look at all those events!

Good grief, my last post was mid August?! Dang. That's pathetic. Blogs are like diaries, when things get going really good, you just don't have time to write it down. Ashame really. Now i feel the need to catch up but if i do that, this post won't get written either. I do hope to sit down one day and recap the summer. It was an eventful one.

What's up now? Lots. Start of the cultural season which means way too many events in one month. Kind of irritating really. There are months that are really horrible for creatives then suddenly, there's so much work you have to turn down stuff because it's all falling on the same dates. DAMN. Anyway, it's good we're busy now. Let's hope we can sustain this momentum.

Besides the varied engagements out and about we are also very busy with upcoming events in The Flea and we've got some pretty damn cool ones, including a Soul-Food Dinner on the 2nd of October -  which i am to cook in a kitchen which we haven't quite finished building yet. YIKES-O-RAMA. I'm sure we'll pull it off in time but man, why do we do these things?! The adrenaline running through me the last few weeks could light up a small village. Oh wait, i know why we did it, because it would force us to finally get the damn thing done. Yep, i see my reasoning now. It was probably a smart decision.. Yep.

More importantly, the main reason we want the Flea to be extra swell is because we have two legendary musicians coming... Del Rey and Steve James. Masters, both of them. Steve James gave a Master Class (Acoustic Finger-Picking Style Blues Guitar) on the 25th which was exceptional and Del Rey is coming next week to give a Master Class (Memphis Jug Band just for Ukes) on the 1st of October and a day later on the 2nd she's playing a parlour concert in the shop while i whip up a classic Soul Food Dinner.

Along with the events we have two ukulele classes starting up, one for beginners and one for intermediates. So, that's the scoop. Oh, one other cool thing...


The 'Maritza', My 3-string Cigar Box Guitar got the white-glove treatment at an art auction by Galerie de Aanschouw during the Wereld van de Witte de With Festival. SOLD! (Awww, Look how sad the handler is to see it go. : ) Me too.

We're off to Burning Uke II in Ghent!

Marko and i will have The Jumping Flea Market set up there at the DOK in Ghent and will be doing some live Cigar-Box Ukulele building. The finished uke will be raffled off later in the evening. We will also be selling these awesome Kits with which you can build your own ukulele. There will be plenty of awesome performers there at the Fest like Ukulele Uff & Lonesome Dave from Liverpool whom we ADORE! And, there will be workshops, funky stuff, weird shit, great food and cold beer. Oh, and of course, the ritual burning of the ukulele. Looking forward to seeing y'all there. BURN, BABY, BURN!

Pictured Below 6 of the 7 CigarBox Ukulele Kits i designed for Burning Uke II this weekend. Pictured Below That: The dude that saved my ass by building them while i was in bed being a grumpy, fevery, flu-y, snotty mess. Which explains why he is threatening me with the drill. Aaargghhh, he's so damn CUTE when i drive him to madness! 

Route du Nord 2013!

Next weekend is THE big yearly art happening in our neighborhood called Route du Nord. Literally hundreds of artists will be showing off their talents throughout Rotterdam Nord. Marko and i will be at the Marché du Nord Art Market which is a new edition to the festivities this year organized by the awesome Christy de Witt of TWC Network. It takes place on the Teilingerstraat this Sunday and we hope to see you there!
This is the flyer which i designed for Marché du Nord

Broken Pinkie

Oooooo.... Just received my Mack Tidwell 'Broken Pinkie' brush set and One-Shot Sign-Painter's Enamel. Stay tuned for Hand-Lettered Goodness.

F*ck Yeah

Hello World. Just returning from a week of hibernation... No email, no telephone, no going out, very little social media. Just rest and reflection while listening to radio shows and crocheting potholders that say, 'F*ck Yeah'.

Sometimes you got to do that kind of thing. Play hooky from life for a while just to find out where you want to be going next. Especially important when you know it's time to venture down a new path, which is something i'm feeling intensely. Next week, spring cleaning…both the windows in the house and the windows in my head. F*ck Yeah.

Crocheted Chicken Leg

Yes, it's true. I have foolishly sank into the sordid world that is Crochet. It started seemingly harmless...couldn't find a winter scarf and decided i could better make my own. And then it happened. I became hooked. My latest creation is this Chicken Leg Baby Rattle. It was made for Flip de Jong, new-born son of Inge de Maat & Petor de Jong; bassist of The Small Time Crooks. Apparently it was a hit, which isn't good because it only encourages me. Woe is me. Where will this wooly madness end?!!
Pattern available via Etsy at Candypop Creations 

A Symphony for Waterlanders

Museum Night in Rotterdam is THE night that the City's Museums pull out all the stops in creating wow-ing exhibits, spectacular shows, join-in-the-fun happenings, blow-the-roof-off parties... It's a big damn Cultural Fandango, a Wild Evening of Fantabulous Art and all the Essential Fantastically Wonderfully Weird People and Things that goes with it.

Tear Bottle
(ca. 1870)

The theme for the coming edition of Rotterdam's Museum Night on the 9th of March is Waterlanders. We've been commissioned by Museum Rotterdam to create an interactive musical composition using 'water' instruments.  For this we are composing a symphony which we are calling 'A Bottle of Tears'.

The name was inspired by the ancient ritual of collecting ones tears, usually a womans, in small tear bottles or lachrymatory. There are stories of hired mourners who were given little bottles to collect their tears. At the end of the funeral for which they were hired to grieve, their bottles would be measured and so the mourner would be paid accordingly. It is also said that a widow would start collecting her tears in a bottle directly after the death of her husband till after his burial at midnight. The bottle would be left upon her husbands altar perhaps on her mantel. The moment the tears had all evaporated signaled the end of her first phase of grieving. In Victorian days these bottles of tears were corked and saved as a momento to their departed loved one. On a more joyful note, upon the birth of a child, the mother's tears would be saved in a small bottle as a keepsake. 

The theme of 'tears' takes on yet an extra poignant meaning for Museum Rotterdam. Due to drastic and idiotic cut-backs in the funding of Arts and Culture the museum is being forced out of their original location in the beautiful Schielands huis. Tears of grief, thus. On the otherhand, there are tears of joy for the fact that the Museum will be opening it's doors at a new location unlike countless other cultural organizations that have been forced to close their doors for good. Museum Night is the last event that Museum Rotterdam will be holding in the Schielandshuis.

So far in preparation we've constructed such hydrophones as a Glass Harp, A Bottle Xylophone, A Human Bottle 'Organ' and we've also used the sounds of Drops of Water into various receptacles. We've been collecting glasses and bottles for a couple of weeks now and there have been bottles and long stemmed glasses and measuring cups and water all over the place for days. The tuning of these various intruments is the 'cussing' part of the creative process. I'm now teaching myself to play a glass harp and that ain't easy, y'all. All respect to this smart ass. DANG.

We still have LOTS of work to do. After we get the piece written and a demo recorded we have to figure how to make it interactive so that the audience can participate plus there is the staging, technical aspects of sound, lighting and extra curiosities which we want to add to enrich the experience. We have lots of nifty ideas. A tearful update is bound to follow in the coming weeks, hopefully joyful tears rather than tears full of 'what-the-f*ck-were-we-thinking-of' woe.

If you would like to know more about the interesting history of Tear Bottles, get your hanky ready and click here for an interesting article on the subject. 

'The Queen's Tear Bottle', illustrated by Norman Price for
'The Golden Apple Tree' written by Virna Sheard, 1920

Bringing back the Sunday.

I didn't do Sundays very well last year. I nearly worked myself to death last year. This year, i'm making a conscious effort to bring back the weekend, or at least the Sunday.

Today it was gorgeous outside so Marko and i took a little ride on the back roads towards Leiden and there abouts to visit some Flea Markets. On the way there we listened to Roland Vonk's Radio Show on the local station, a long-time Sunday tradition. He collects records, tells storys, and plays obscure and curious recordings. Todays episode was an especially Vonk-a-delic edition with both Hawiian tunes and Yodeling! I highly recommend starting your Sunday morning with yodeling.

My mission was to find lots of cheep glasses with which i could build a Glass Harp, a project i'm working on for Museum Night. (More about that later!). I needed stemmed glasses and was especially looking for Cognac glasses. I found a load of them for just .20 cents a piece. Oh, and i bought the boot for just .50 cents because i thought it would kick ass to drink beer out of a glass cowboy boot.

I also found stuff for my new, weird, nerdy-ass past time...Crocheting. It all began when i crocheted myself a shawl and a hat last fall because i just couldn't find ones that i liked in the shops. I had absolutely no intention of carrying on with this crochet thing but it turns out that it's very relaxing. It's something creative you can do when you 'aren't doing anything'. The only thing is, you have to count. I'm a daydreamer...i usually miss a stitch. But, today i found a nifty craft book entitled 'Modern Haken' from 1973. It is mostly about 'Free Form' Crochet which is done by stitching an organic form using your repertoire of stitches and your intuition, no counting involved. SCORE! It looks pretty cool too. More folky. I dig those cushions. And what about that freaky ski mask? Looks like something you'd wear to a Cajun Mardi Gras. I also found some balls of wool for just 1,-euro a piece. Big Nerd Cheer!

I invite you to click on the image and ZOOM!

And lastly, i bought myself a medal for .50 cents because i liked the Orange Tree on it and two tacky/awesome needlepoint pillow covers for €1.50. DANG, i Love Flea Markets! I hope you too began your morning with Yodeling and enjoyed the hell out of your Sunday. Take care. x,s.

More Mysterious Scenes from the Abita Mystery House

Besides all the amazing collections and freaks of nature to be found at the UCM Museum there are also many handmade folk art animated scenes of Southern life made by the owner of the Abita Mystery house, Louisiana inventor & artist, Mr. John Preble. 

The Abita Mystery House & UCM Museum

Abita Springs, Louisiana is one of my favorite small southern towns. It's a one stoplight town with only 2,300 inhabitants yet it has it's own Opry House, Beer Brewery and the weirdest damn attractions i've ever seen, The Abita Mystery House & UCM Museum. I am a huge fan of this place and i applaud the sense of humour and dedication it took to make it. To others it make look like a big heep of junk and quite frankly, it is. But, the way this junk has been presented makes it a work of art.

The UCM (pronounced You See 'Em) has all kinds of amazing and ever-wacky collections and exhibits. Some of the collections are: Combs, Paint-By-Number paintings, Barbed Wire, Electronics, Paint-Can Lids, Garden Hoses, Utensils, Bikes, Hot Sauce. Like one sign says: 'If you have 3 items you have a collection and it takes 3 collections to make a Museum' and it's as simple as that.

The main building used to be a gas station a long long time ago. As you enter the front door you find yourself in an amazing gift shop filled with both hand-crafted items and insanely unusual new items. I'm not much of a shopper and i'm usually broke as an artist/musician can be but i can't help but buy something every time i visit. This time i chose a book called 'Weird Louisiana' and got some postcards of the 'Bassigator' (Half Bass Fish/Half Alligator). Which brings me to another realm of collecting to be found here: Freaks of nature such as a 'Mermaid', a 3-Headed Chicken, and the Doggygator just to name a few.

There are many different little dwellings behind the Main House such as 'The House of Shards' made of a bazillion pieces of broken ceramic crap, 'The Hot Sauce House' which of course houses a collection of Hot Sauce and there is even an airstream with a UFO stuck in it thus giving us proof of alien landings in Louisiana...but everybody know that already.

Personally, i think the thing that really ties all this junk/art/collected crap together are the hand-painted signs. Everywhere you look there are words of wisdom, warning and wacky-ness. Some of my favorites, 'Free Possum with Every Purchase' & 'Create Art & Get Rich'.

Even though this place is relatively small, one could visit it a 1,000 times and never see it all. Abita Springs (-wiki link) is in general just an absolutely fabulous place to visit for so many reasons.  It's named after the crystal clear springs which run through it and from which the world famous Abita Beer is brewed, there are also beautiful bike trails running through it and it's only about 20 minutes away from New Orleans. And, if your timing is right, you may even catch a live show at the Opry and hear some amazing Country, Cajun and/or Bluegrass Music. So, if you are ever in these neck of the woods and can't resist seeing a 3-headed chicken...Don't Miss It! Want to see some moving pictures of the Abita Springs Mystery House? Click Here!

Do yourself a favor, click on these images to ZOOM!

Bad Girls & Mean Women Songbook

Ooooolala... This is a very naughty songbook indeed! This little black book contains 10 songs, some dating back as far as the 1600's, that are so raunchy that they would make Snoop Dog blush. Each song has both the ukulele chords and the musical score. Also included are 2 recipes and 5 potions plus a fold-out ukulele chord chart.
WARNING: ADULT CONTENT!

My book is available in our store in Rotterdam or via My Etsy Shop.
Click on the image for a closer look

Our shop front

A lot of times when Marko and i are walking back to The Jumping Flea i'll tap Marko and yell out, 'LOOK, WE'VE GOT A SHOP, LOOK HOW COOL IT IS!!' Hehehee.

Plein du Publique this Saturday!

Come join in on the fun this Saturday at the creative market, Plein du Publique on the gorgeous Pijnackerplein in Rotterdam North. There will be food, art, music, performance, curiosities and much more.

Marko and i will be there with a small stand from The Jumping Flea Market and we'll also be performing throughout the day. The market starts at 12pm and is open till 19pm. Don't miss it!