Serious delicious

Okay, it is an excellent Christmas dinner choice, but I think it needs pre tasting, no, I know. Not a fan of Brussels sprouts, but I won't be difficult if you make it with the rest.

Recipe from BBC Food by Simon Rimmer

For the new arrivals

We've kept ourselves low profile regarding making birth announcements the last year. We had several reasons for this:

1) there are plenty others who specialize in this and make lovely cards 2) pregnant women are full of hormones and judging from how I was when pregnant we felt to stay far a way from those.

We just didn't offer them, and did them only rarely on request (and than they even had to push us). As it turned out, not all women in that state are completely hormone driven & aren't impossible to work with. So when a client asked us to make some kind of leaflet giving more information on our birth announcements as they got a lot of requests, we felt it was time to change our previous point of view.

Here's the front cover. Like?

This weeks favourite artist

Joss Stone

Photograph via So Singles

Never made it

Going through my files, finding some designs for cards that never made it to the printers. This is one of them.

doable?

Last week I received as a present from Happinez some inspiration cards, very nice. I'm not a morning person and starting the day in a relatively easy pace is essential for me. So we have breakfast in bed every day and I've added the inspiration cards to this morning ritual. During the day, when certain behavior is shown which isn't in line with the card, our son is mercilessly telling us so.

Now, almost every card I took this week I could relate to (except for the one telling me to end an old dispute, 'cause not having one). But this morning I got 'I put all the energy in doing and don't worry about the result'. Hmmmm..., is that actually doable for me? I'm one of these of people who feels strongly about 'it's not the effort but the result that counts'. We'll see, but to be on the save side I haven't told my son.

Bag ladies

Honestly, I can't say I've met a woman who isn't the proud owner of a (huge) collection of bags.

And this is a shame, we know, but we need them! for all kind of occasions: big bag for every day of course (you won't believe the things we have to carry around), a purse for our Iphone (can be found in the every day big bag), a hip bag to go to a festival, park or chill out party. The clutch for nights out, or can be used as well as a make up bag (must fit in the daily bag). The normal sized bag for shopping events & the special occasion bag when dressed fabulously chique.

Now, there are women who simply love their bags and find such joy in finding a new one which fits their outfit perfectly. I know some of these women, and one in particular always comes to my mind when thinking of bags. So Sandra, this one is for you.

All these lovely bags were found via Cargoh

1. organic lace purse by JWRobel

2. Iphone case by Byrd & Belle

3. Grass green 3-1 purse by Zangha

4. Camille rose hip pouch by Ira Grant

5. leather & virgin wool by 11 square meters

6. the clutch by Excessary

Watch out

I was strolling along Etsy when I came upon this amazing watch studio.

Watches are difficult for me, as I'm always (except on holidays) wearing one I'm quite precise in selecting the needed accessory. It took me at least a year to find the one I'm wearing today (a vintage one). But this studio made me hungry, not only for me, but also for my husband (love the religious one for him, doubt he'll think the same) & for the kids.

Marianne Handcrafted Watch Studio

Innocent creatures

I'm always amazed by the creatures little children make. These two are made by Ernest I think at the age of 4 & 5. The racing car he made after eating an icecream and looking at stick which was the only thing leftover, he came up with this.

The other one, is a (hopefully) nonexistent creature which he created when he found this little piece of wood at my fathers shed having all the needed tools available.

As they grow older the pieces become more sophisticated but less wildly imaginative, like if the innocent way they look at everything looses its magic.
That's why pieces like these get a special place in our bookcase, so we always remember that it's an asset & a joy to think OUT OF THE BOX.

Joggers

Needless to say, I don't like running and this is why. But have no doubt, I have a huge amount of respect for all these people running incredible distances (like a lot of my friends).

Found by..

...my husband. He's still doesn't understand anything about blogging, but when he came upon this blog, he immediately emailed it to me. Well done dear!

via Judith van der Giessen

Wannahaves

My Birthday is coming up, mostly a bigger deal for the ones around me than for me. Still I always love the getting presents part. As my loved ones fired their usual question I thought let's do this different this year and actually give this some consideration. Took me a lot of hours, but here it is, my (modest?) wish list.

1. Love these prints of The Twitterpated Toad

2. Don't like real birds in a cage, but this is simply art by Ige Design via Loulou le Chien

3. How special can a key be? Keys from the Greener grass design

4. Excellent small empty cards to be written on. By Usem

5. Would love, love to have these with the initials of my kids. By One life jewelry

6. Stamps! at least to fill up the empty cards from Usem :). By Cavallini via PSikhouvanjou

Thank you!

Today we I had the privilege of giving a workshop palmistry together with my teacher & fellow student, arranged by Happinez.

It was such a joy, from the beginning to the end. First of all the location, all was arranged by De Kamers in Amersfoort. Now, you don't think of Amersfoort as first place you can find exceptional hospitality, but I must say from the warm welcome of the chamberlain Jos van Oord, the catering by Amanda (my God, YOU can cook!), the decoration, till lights & sounds done by Marco, everything was perfect.

And the students, what a nice bunch of people. So much enthusiasm & trust. It's been a pleasure to have met each one of you.

Hmmm & easy

No more chickens this week, back to veggie's. You'll enjoy this meal simple & easy.

Via Sunbeam

Absolutely Gorgeous

I should be studying now and I will, but I came across the gorgeous creations of Lush Bella. Look at these object photographs, such a delight.

So NOW I'm really off.

This weeks favourite artist

Miss Montreal. You can listen to some of her songs under the music section. For more news go to her website .

Photograph via muziek.nl

Add & Edit

What are Add & Edits? They are notebooks filled with papers saved from the bin.

You know, all the little notebooks you used at school and never completely filled up? Or the leftovers from the notepad you used at a conference? Or the old envelopes with the ancient PO BOX on it? Well all these unwritten papers of different sizes & quality are used again in the add & edit notebook, for you to fill up again. These papers, need to be cut at the desirable sizes, so yesterday I spend most of my time cutting up papers. Thanks Ruben for your help!

We are lucky enough to get all these papers from people, you know why? Of all their written pages of the school notebooks, color books etc. we make a collection and compile them in a special Add & Edit book for them for free. What could be more lovelier than to have all your school memories in one book & get rid of the piles of papers at the attic.

So if you're interested to have that done, shoot us an email. You can buy the Add & Edit Notebook at several places like Imagine, Bemvindo, Juffrouw Splinter & Skoon Ecodesign or at Liefgoed of course

work in progress

It's always a challenge when people ask us to create something special of fabric based on the baby announcement. This is gonna be a cuddle made of a piece of fabric.

Happinez!

Probably told you before, but I'm finally finishing my palmistry study at the beginning of 2011. This coming Saturday there is a Workshop Palmistry arranged by the popular Dutch magazine Happinez, the third one in a row. And this one, I'm gonna do together with my wonderful teacher Ellen Duim & one of my top-notch fellow students Geri. Looking forward to it!

Now sometimes it's hard to see everything with the naked eye, so a magnifying-glass isn't a luxury. Thank you mom for getting me one. As Ellen suggested after reading the knitting story yesterday I should try to knit a cover for it. Such a nice suggestion Ellen, but NO! This, on the other hand, I can do.

Oh and something else, turns out that my scarf is a crochet one. Fortunately we do have knowledge of a lot other stuff.

Knit knit knit

We can sew, we can design, we can cook, we can be lovely creatures sometimes, BUT we can't knit. Now as winter is coming up and I came upon an article about Wool and the Gang I started wondering:

Almost everyday I'm wearing this scarf, made by one of my aunts Ria, not for me, but about 30 years ago for my mom. I remember her wearing it at a summer evening garden party.

Do I want to be able to make these wonderful creations myself, Yes! I do, but do I have the time to actually learn it, hmmmm, No! So maybe next summer spend my time knitting in Bali?

Something like this extremely large scarf, that must be possible. A bit less large otherwise I'll be falling flat on my face every time I would be wearing it, or when wrapped many times around my neck you would see a huge pile of wool wandering around the streets. 

Anyway, have a look at the shop of Wool and the Gang 'cause they make you want to knit.

Need restyling? recycle your wardrobe

Well ladies, we think this is a wonderful idea. We love to shop & love to create and most of the pieces in our wardrobe we actually liked when we bought them. But as we all know, we need change & new & different and, and...

So why shouldn't we make a whole new dress out of that nice skirt and that other top together, or maybe put the fabric of the skirt as a top and the top as skirt. So many possibilities.

Well at recycle your wardrobe you can do this, under the guidance of two experienced fashion designers. Such fun, and you'll know for sure, that there is no one wearing the same dress as you are. I want to create a whole new evening gown, got so many and as all of the women often wearing those know, you can only wear the same twice a year.

Forever friend

I think it's been two years ago since we made our acquaintance with the phenomenon called Purl Soho. This excellent shop in New York, which we never visited in person, has everything crafty bees like us could possibly want. So when my niece went to the Big Apple quite some time ago, she left with orders from us. Lovely girl as she is, she did as she was told making us very happy.

Since then, we've been so busy that (I can only speak for myself now) I haven't thought about this place till recently. So when I looked at their blog, I found a review of Wee Wonderfuls book.

As soon as I saw Marie Antoinette I was sold. Being born on the same day as Marie Antoinette, but still having my head on the place where it should be, I think I deserve Marie Antoinette specially made for me as a forever friend. So this is to anyone who feels the same way I do about this, please make me one. 'Cause I don't want to do it myself this time.

For more extremely cute forever friends of Wee Wonderfuls.

Harriets birthday

Within less than two hours Harriets birthday will be over, but for sure the celebration will last for years. So sorry we couldn't be there in Paris with you. But soon we will. Enjoy girl.

Photograph balloons from: A place for twiggs
Happiness on the line via Wide open Spaces

This weeks recipe

Under the assumption that Monique can live with one chicken instead of two, she chose the following recipe.

More recipes at Epicurious

Yesterdays trash becomes todays gift

Friday is trash day in our street, and you'll be amazed about the things people throw away. I used to bring everything home that I found still useful and could, just by some paint, look wonderful again. But at a certain point, your house is full.

On Thursday evening, a lot of people who make money out of selling old things wander around the district. I remember an evening, bringing my son to bed and while closing the curtains he saw a guitar at the trash just in front of our house he wanted to have. I ran downstairs and even in these few seconds, one of these secondhand dealers picked it up and refused to give it to me even seeing my little son crying in front of the window. I could buy it from him for 10 euro!

Anyway, yesterday I saw some old vinyl records & took one home. Today we turned it into a lovely bowl. Than we remembered we had loads of them still at the attic, so we made a whole collection of different shaped bowls. Want to try it? I must add, that 8 to 10 minutes as described in the tutorial is way to long when the oven is heated. So the first one leave it in the oven for 3 minutes, if you want make more it took a bit more than 1 minute each to be melted the right way. Another thing, I used aluminum foil on the griddle, otherwise the edges melt. I doubt this is a healthy experiment, so leave the windows open.

Some more lovely vinyl record art, haven't found out yet how to cut these excellent silhouetted shapes, but I will soon.

HopeHope Magazine

There is this wonderful online magazine publisher called Issue. If you have some spare time, eat your heart out. Below you can flip through the HopeHope issue 5, a Swiss magazine.

Give your laptop a sweater

Personalize your laptop with your own old woolen sweater. You would have thrown it away anyway, so give it a second life. We have some sweaters available here, but if you want us to use your own, just send in the sweater & we'll make one for you for the price of 39,95 Euro. Just shoot us an email

This weeks favourite artist

John Mayer. You can listen under the music section on your right.

To:

Last week we finished all our business cards. Excellent reason to develop a new one. As we use old brown paper for our gift wrapping, we thought we keep it in the same style. When I wanted to put a little card in the small envelope as a reinforcement, it was just a bit to large. Bummer I thought, than it hit me, all our postcards have a serrated edge so by giving this the same edge people will easily remind it. Like it?

Stockings

These were the very first ones I made years ago for my own family. We make them of old woolen sweaters & personalize them. For more details Please shoot us an email.

One of these places!

New blog project: Once a month we like to highlight one of the shops that sells our products & have some more inside information about the people who own them. All of the places that sell our products are selectively picked by ourselves as we want to keep them as exclusive as possible.

This month, Juffrouw Splinter at the Prinsengracht in Amsterdam. Juffrouw Splinter has been with us almost from the start of our postcard line, which has been I think a bit more than a year ago.
Hope you enjoy!

Who is Juffrouw Splinter & what was your motivation for starting the shop?

Jolijn Bosma (36) started the shop 8 years ago out of a passion for antiques, brocante and all kinds of curiosities. She used to work as a legal advisor but that wasn't satisfying enough. She decided to start doing something totally new and so Juffrouw Splinter was started (she is still happy with that decision). Since 1,5 years she runs the business together with her boyfriend and they share taking care of their 1 year old daughter.

Your favorite article all times in the store

The first piece that I bought for the shop was an old tin in France and you can still find a big variety of old tins in the shop. I love tins myself because their beautiful decorated, and they're usefull as well. It's an article we sell almost every day.

The worst day of the week & why

Worst day is when you find out something is stolen....we put a lot of effort in to make the shop look nice, there are a lot of small items for sale, but when someone takes it without paying for it it makes you feel sad.
Besides this, we like every day because every day is different and we're always excited what's gonna happen.

Your biggest wish for this coming year
We would like everyone to know and experience the shop. We get so many good comments that we want to share that with everyone. We're now busy with selling by internet, so people from outside Amsterdam or Holland can buy our products as well.

You sell Liefgoed products because…
We sell Liefgoed postcards because they fit exactly in the shop; the postcards are nostalgic with a twist and that's what we like and the customers as well. We sell the cards everyday and it makes people smile and that's good.

Lots of sweets at Sugarless

Our eldest son, well not actually mine I'm his wicked most evil step-mother since the age of eight, but still feels like mine as well, went to Barcelona for a couple of days. So his cats needed feeding and on Sunday we went with the whole family.

Turns out that downstairs there is this new wonderful sandwich, high tea and excellent coffee place called Sugarless. And, this is most important to me, all biological. Now in Amsterdam there are a few places with excellent biological sandwiches, but ones with really, 'aaaaiii, these are to good' cakes, sweets, muffins, all without refined sugars or any of these unhealthy flavors & fragrances, are quite rare.

Joyce & Jennifer, the two sisters who own the place, were kind enough to invite us in as a replacement for their absent upstairs neighbor, for their opening celebration. We did our best to duck into the sweets & champagne, kids loved it as well (not the champagne, don't worry).

So dear step-son, next time leave the dinner invitation and ask us for a cup of coffee or lunch downstairs instead. I'm not implying that you're a horrible cook, 'cause you're not, but you can't beat Sugarless.