via Provence Mon Amour

Braids

(from a Fb page... forgot to write which one!)

*   *   *

I do always try to put the source and/or photo credit when I can... something that's geting harder with the multipliation of image sites. Having no luck with trying to find the origin of the photo above (google: "llama pink cottage llama in front thatched roof" ), BUT... I did find this!

from 4 feet 2 mouths: Cozy Cafayate (by Carmen)

Just no braided thatch! 

Far Island

"Blackhouses of old - the traditional homes of Lewis crofters"

From Chris Duff's blog Northern Reaches.

Itsy-ibtsy-teensy-weensy

As I've said: love those teeny houses, buuuuut...

A house I'd love to fit in!

Actually, the laundry of Withy Mills Farm!!!

To see to what heights, or smalls, an itsy-ibtsy-teensy-weensy cottage/house obsession can take you!
(There's always the addendum: just make it a little larger and...)

More Hobbity...

Of course, coming across those photos yesterday set me off on another safari for hobbity houses....
And I found this!

A romantic engineer, who outside his businesslike, professional exterior, must be just dying to find someone to build a house for! My interpretation, as I certainly would be, if I were in his shoes!
(and as I also have a dream of building one...)

Of Hobbits

Don't you just love this window?

I came across these today of "Hobbiton", the film set in Matamata, NZ being rebuilt.
There are tours during this rebuilding, up to the actual filming that should be starting at the end of this year.
If a Tolkien fan and in that part of the world, it would certainly be interesting to visit.

Bag End and neighbor

Hobbiton coming back...
this part of the set had burned down at the end of filming

Can I go in, please?

The Party Tree (right) near the lake

*All photos from Spinky

That time comin' round... and Rosehill Cottage

Warning!: Looooonng post! (with lotsa images!)

Already at the beginning of October the shops' Christmas decorations have been going up... a bit freaky, as just the other day was the beginning of the year!!!

Another sign of that time comin' round is the Christmas movies starting to be shown on tv.

One that I saw again a few weeks ago was The Holiday. I fell in love all over again with Iris's cottage! The next day, stopping quickly by a store on the way to wherever and looking through the sale table, I found the dvd of the film! Very inexpensive, which makes the joy even better!

Then, with the pleasures of googling and actually finding things as we can do nowadays, I found many references and, joy, joy,joy: images!

First the sad: The cottage wasn't a real one, but a life-sized prop at the location in Shere, England, complete with fake snow in June. (How do they get the vapor clouds from the mouths that we read as cold, cold, cold? digital effects?). The interiors were sets built in a studio in... LA., I believe. (writing this from memory as waiting for hair-coloring-goop to work its charm)

Oh, so that's why the cottage was so much larger on the inside than the out!!!

I realized that the interiors were sets when I started perceiving the Old Lady in The Shoe effect (how can you fit those "so many children" in the shoe without it being MUCH larger inside than out? I never saw it as such a huge boot as in the drawing below! Even so...)

Drawing of There was an Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe by Kronheim, c.1875

                          There was an old woman who lived in a shoe.
                          She had so many children, she didn't know what to do;
                          She gave them some broth without any bread;
                          Then whipped them all soundly and put them to bed.

The earliest printed version in Joseph Ritson's Gammer Gurton's Garland in 1794 has the coarser last line:

                          She whipp'd all their bums, and sent them to bed.

from Wikipedia

(They were were so much more direct in 1794, no?)

But I did think that the cottage, by any other name, was still a Rose ... -hill cottage — that is, a real cottage.
I found that it all being a fake is sort of freeing. Now I can imagine my own little Rosehill Cottage, build it in my brain, and all will fit marvelously inside.

I also found out that the producer of the movie, Nancy Meyers, has made many of the movies that I watch over and over, many for the storyline, but all certainly for the "backgrounds": the houses! Something's Gotta Give and It's Complicated are just two of these.

"... the production team was led Jon Hutman - but Beth Rubino, so wonderful on the set of SGG, was absent for The Holiday.  And just as with Something's Gotta Give, Nancy Meyers' personal interior designer has photos of "The Holiday" houses on his web site, but he is not mentioned in the film credits." — Côte de Texas, The Holiday Houses. Meyer's "personal decorator" is James Radin, James Radin Interior Design.

The Holiday's story and acting is in my "ok" range... Cameron Diaz a bit over at times. It is an enjoyable movie, in the light&cute style. The imagery is lovely... Jude Law's blue eyes (grey? turquoise??... does it matter, as long as we can look?) are always a nice holiday touch. The LA house is also beautiful, but it doesn't warm my cockles as the cottage does.

I believe this movie is based on one I saw many years ago about house swapping. That one was between a Colonial home in perhaps New England?, and a cottage in Ireland? The two women were also trying to forget problems... I think one a love affair, and the other the death of her child in the pool (???... of the Colonial?). As I can't remember the actresses or the movie's name, I can't find any references of it. And "house swap movie" and its variations only come up with The Holiday. So far.

The best definition images I found were from the site OutNow.ch - "Bilder zu The Holiday (2006)". I've posted them below, but they aren't as large as the ones directly on the site [my image hosting sites automatically cut down the size : (  ]
Click on the images to see the larger ones, with all the amazing detail that went into making these sets.

Iris's Rosehill Cottage

*all imagines from OutNow.Ch unless otherwise noted
 (I don't know who the original photographer is)

I want one, I want one, I waaant one! Pleeease!

"Rosehill Cottage 'The Holiday' film set; Shere, Surrey, England (via pg tips2)"
via Sinopse

Snuggly Living Room

Fireplaces all over!

I just love this little library/study that was made of
this little mudroom-type lean-to, with its "home-made" shelves.

 The Mysterious Bathroom
No skylights or windows on the exterior roof!

Rare back view by Paul Orford at Panoramio

Links to more information and sources:
 • Hooked on Houses - "The Holiday": A Tale of Two Houses
 • Movie Real Estate - Movie Real Estate: The Holiday
 • Côte de Texas - Holiday Houses
 • Silver Screen Surroundings  various posts
 • A day in the Life of a Dracofly - "The Holiday" Country Cottage

For more exterior images:
 • The Shere "The Holiday" Film Set  by pg tips2

Other Meyer films:
 • Architectural Digest - Something's Gotta Give
... and many more sites & images on the web...

The Holiday (2006)
Director: Nancy Meyers
Production designer: Jon Hutman

some Christmas candy
(don't forget to click)

 I want one, I want one, I waaant one! 

Carnaval II

On Monday, Hubby and Middle Son took the afternoon off, and we went to his friend's parent's sítio, country place.
Lovely people, lots of laughter, and a... cottage!!!

The wife, two years younger than I and also an artist, remodeled the run-down, simple house into a cozy, beautiful, welcoming cottage.
They have there all I've been collecting information/pictures/desires about the last years...
   • pink dappled walls
   • white washed beams and panelling
   • roses, real and pictures
   • lavender bushes!!!
   • stone balls!!!
   • Neem trees!!!
   • and on... on... on...
Mama, I waaaaaaaaaaaant a sítio just like it, tooooooo!!!

Roosty with young galinhas d'angolas — guineafowl (Numida meleagris)

Leo The Brave facing the Guineafowl Gang
Who will run this time???

Lavender!!! My dream!

* one of them... ; ) *

Little House in the Woods

   Casinha no Mato

Here is a cute little house, could be from a fazenda — a farm!
A little cottage, one of my passions.

I found here in my computer, songs by Victor & Leo that my Son² had uploaded.
I'm now listening to one of them: the house dances and chugs along in the same rhythm!

The song is cute also... something about a "frog in the lake... what a good life"...
{in Portuguese it rhymes: "sapo na lagoa... que vida boa"...!}

When I first heard it on the radio, I would understand
"kibes das boa" instead of "que vida boa" —
"goood meatrolls (kibbehs*)" instead of   "goood life"!...
Didn't make any sense at all. Perplexity abounded.

Son², when asked what were they saying?, of course thought his mother completely ridiculous, as I had , also of course, propounded the kibbeh theory — hey! I read a lot of fanatasy fiction!
With that resigned shake of a child's head when confonted with a parent in her dotage, he informs me of The Truth of the matter.

Completely apart of mother-child relations, feeling that strong desire to head for the hills, or rather, to the countryside, attacking me! (even without no meatrolls!)

*link to Youtube (can't be embedded)

Here are the lyrics from the internet:

Vida Boa
Victor e Leo
Composição: Victor Chaves

Moro num lugar
Numa casa inocente do sertão
De fogo baixo aceso no fogão, fogão à lenha ai ai

Tenho tudo aqui
Umas vaquinha leiteira, um burro bão
Uma baixada ribeira, um violão e umas galinha ai ai

Tenho no quintal
Uns pés de fruta e de flor
E no meu peito por amor, plantei alguém - plantei alguém

Refrão:
Que vida boa ô ô ô
Que vida boa
Sapo caiu na lagoa
Sou eu no caminho do meu sertão

Vez e outra vou
Na venda do vilarejo pra comprar
Sal grosso, cravo e outras coisa que fartar, marvada pinga ai ai

Pego o meu burrão
Faço na a estrada a poeira levantar
Qualquer tristeza que for não vai passar do mata burro ai ai

Galopando vou
Depois da curva tem alguém
Que chamo sempre de meu bem, a me esperar - a me esperar

Refrão

* Kibe, quibe; English = kibbeh: "is a dish of minced meat with bulgur and spices with many variants, both raw and cooked"[Wiki]; here, when spoken as just "kibe" refers to the cooked meatroll version

Little house on the prairie

This little house on the prairie (well, maybe not the prairie?) was built by Cody. You can read her story here, or click on the image. The plan she used was the "20'x30' 1-story cottage plans".

These build-your-own little houses and cottages are from J. Show and CountryPlans.com

Leeetle House!

A itsy-bitsy leeeetle house/cottage. So cute.
I really would like to fit in one!
I think I would have to have several over some land.

This cutey from Ross Chapin Architects. On his site there several more, some a little larger... all delicious.

Blue Sky Cabin

from Ross Chapin Architects