little things & old yarns

our new flat is a tiny tiny studio the size of one room in our old ithacan apartment. having gotten used to our old place, which had a universe of square footage, we decided (before we moved to london) that we would give our new space a kicking nickname to ease the resizing issues. sort of like we were banding together and bracing for the sure to be smallness of our first place post marriage. we decided it would either be dubbed le petit bateau or le petit gateau, a.k.a. petit four (meaning: the little boat or the little cake). as we work at moving in, we are still on the fence on which is a better fit. any thoughts?


in the meantime, since we aren't able to do much in the way of art or furniture decorating (who wants to invest in too many things when you are living impermanently) we have been turning to our favorite on-the-cheap-but-beautiful craft. those of you who know us (and witnessed the papering of our wedding) already know what i mean: garlands! garlands are a rocktastic way of brightening up a white-walled and no-nails-allowed room. and, considering one of the nicknames for our new flat, it seems we found the perfect etsy shop. oldyarns is an etsy boutique with marvelous items: intricately reclaimed old linens, postcards mobiles, and garland-kits galore. plus, i love a well-crafted pun.


we ordered one of her (aptly named) le petit bateau kits, and have been origami-ing mini-boats since. the kit itself didn't come with as many sheets as we were expecting, but we cut down most of the included pages and folded smaller & smaller bateaus. we've also been adding paper of our own, including vintage book pages, tube maps of london and the metro from paris, and various other sort of memory-abilia. we are still in the process of origami-ing, but soon will be stringing our tiny boats on the included bright red & white butcher's twine and then hanging our final work between our two windows. in the meantime, a sneak peak of the shop and of our beginnings!

(images via falsereality748, myself, oldyarns)