Valentine :: Be ready!

I know it's a bit early to start about Valentine's day, but this time I want to be prepared. No last minute gift making! For the past five years or so I have crafted a little Valentine's gift for each of my girls. And yesterday I worked on my first Valentine project for this year. No pictures yet, as I'm not completely done with it and because M. happens to read my blog from time to time. All I can tell is that it involved fabric, ribbons, a photo, iron transfer paper, colored pencils and markers and a couple more things that I can't remember right now. One hint maybe: gri-gri. No, I'm not taking my girls rock climbing -- I'm too afraid of heights! Because of its clutch, gri-gri in French also refers to an accessory mainly women or girls attach to their purse or bag. Voilà! That's all I can tell right now.

But I can show you some of my previous creations. Last year, I made a personalized collage on canvas for each of my girls. They absolutely loved it and still do!




More pictures of previous projects will follow, I promise.

Smog alarm

This evening one of the girls came running to me: "Mommy, mommy! Come and look at the sky. You should take a picture!". It was a beautiful sunset indeed. Unfortunately, the beauty of it was mainly due to the high smog intensity (particulate matter). For the last couple of days, the air quality has been extremely bad here .
Not only can you feel it, you can even see it...

Also tonight, as I went into my room to get something, I found this in our bed:

All I could think was "ain't she sweet, our little baby...".

A piece of white paper...

...and a little sun in my room is all I needed to take these pictures, all thanks to this post which I happened to run into yesterday! Next thing I'll try is to built my own light box set-up (as in this post and this one), though I'd like to come up with something I can store away easily. We don't have that much room in our small apartment to have boxes sitting around... I think this post might be a good starting point.

The above pictures show some of my needle felting projects (except for the flower brooch in the top right hand corner, which is just embroidered felt). The orange baskets in the middle are the ones I mentioned in an earlier post.

A splurge...?

Not really.
You guessed it. I went to the sales yesterday. I was in need of a winter coat. Really! Except for the short winter jacket I bought last year, I was still wearing the "before-California" era stuff. Old stuff, that means. So, I went out yesterday, spotted a couple of things I thought I liked, showed them to K. over his lunch break, only to hear that maybe I should spend a little more time looking unless I wanted to look like the Michelin-guy. So that's what I did. I took my time. No pressure. And I found this (weathered) leather coat I'm so happy with. It was on sale at a posh store. A store where I wouldn't dare to enter unless (even?) during the sales. (At some point, one of the posh ladies shopping at that store thought I was a sales person - got the picture?). It's like it was meant to be, though. Not only did I find this coat, in the right size and the right color, it was affordable too. I actually couldn't believe it. About the same amount as what I would have had to put down for a regular fabric winter coat on sale.

I'm so happy with my new winter coat!

"La petite souris"...

...will have to stop by tonight.
Little H. lost her first tooth this afternoon, with a tiny little help from the dentist, I admit (we were at the dentist for M.'s braces to be tightened). But that's only a minor detail. Helena is as proud as ever (and so are we). Makes me only realize our girls are growing up. Fast. Too fast even, I believe.
And so, now we're waiting for "la petite souris" to show up. No Tooth Fairy here in France but a little mouse. And according to Helena la petite souris has little butterfly wings. This she came up with when I told her I hoped the mouse's little feet wouldn't freeze off or get stuck in the snow or ice - not exactly a nice thing to say for a mommy to an excited little girl who just lost her first tooth. But H. has a huge imagination and promptly accessorized the little mouse with little wings. The cold weather is definitely no excuse for the little mouse not to show up!
And hence, tonight, I had to go through the goodies I keep at hand to find something suitable for a little mouse to carry, and which would also make my little girl happy.
The dentist, of course, had no idea mommy wasn't prepared...

Yes we can coffee!

The holidays are behind us, all presents are unwrapped, the Christmas tree dismantled and decorations stored away, we even got rid of the pine needles on the rug, "les buches de Noël" made room for "les gateaux des rois" at the bakery, winter sales have started today. All signs the new year has begun. But let me get back to the holidays one more time. Right before we left for the holidays, I found this present in our mailbox: the Obama "Yes we can coffee". It was definitely this season's coolest present! So, thank you, Liz, for thinking of me. It was MUCH appreciated! When I told M. I would brew some coffee from it on the 20th of January, which is not only inauguration day but also K.'s birthday, she got a little upset. She thinks we should leave the package as is. It's way too special to be cut open, she said. Initially a Hilary-fan she turned into a real Obama-adept. A couple of days ago, she spent some time in her room working on an Obama-report. Not because she had to for school. No, just because...

As to me, I'm a bit puzzled now whether to open the package or not? I have a little less than two weeks left to make up my mind...

Felt like...

...felting again. I started this project last winter and somehow never got to finish it. It's supposed to become a felt basket like this one (see also for tutorial). I already made a couple, more colorful ones. The inspiration for the flowers, I got from the book "Les Ateliers du jour. Laine cardée. Créations pour toute l'année", a lovely book with beautiful, inspiring projects, one for every month as the title suggests. Ccil, the author, also designed a bunch of gorgeous stuffed animals for the store "Le Pain d'Epices", which are available as kits (a bit pricey, maybe, but oh so cute and fun to make!). I mentioned this store in an earlier post already, and what a store it is! They carry the most amazing selection of traditional toys - the kind of things we or our parents grew up with, as well as more recent toys (but never the ugly plastic stuff!), supplies for making bears, art kits for children, wooden toys, supplies to built doll houses (into the smallest details possible), everything you need for felting etc.. Again, "Le Pain d' Epices" is one of these stores, where I find it really hard to leave without buying anything. But you probably already guessed that... I don't even remember how I ended up there, but I do remember I got really hooked to the needles ever since and I do have a huge collection of carded wool in all colors imaginable by now ...