Art journaling

For years and years I've been frustrated that I can't draw properly. At least, that's what I tell myself. Of course I can draw but I don't think it looks really good. It doesn't look like all the artists that I admire in their drawings. But then, each has his/her own talent, right?
When I have an idea, I do see images in my head on how it should look but to transfer 'em onto paper is another thing.

I remember when I was in art school, the teacher insisted that I would draw my idea onto paper even though she already understood my idea while I was explaining what I was going to do/make. She said: 'if you can put it on paper, you can make it'  Hard work for me but it somehow forced me to pick up a pencil and draw...

I love seeing people's sketchbooks and art journals and I wish I had one of my own.
I must say that I often attempted to draw something and I have sketchbooks laying around with only one drawing in them. I always give up somehow.

I started another one, and I have a feeling that I will keep up with it as I want to do this for our daughter Julie. I plan to write & draw stuff about her and her little adventures that she will most definitely have. It's a challenge for me and I will have to learn to be satisfied by the fact that my drawings are not quite as they are in my head... but I still want to capture all these precious moments so I think it's worth it!

Do you keep a journal or have you attempted art journaling?

Visitor's gifts

It's been a month since my last post and I really don't feel bad about it. I'm taking all the time of the world to spend with our newborn, Julie. She's already five weeks and growing really well.
I'm a nursing mommy so I really have to steal moments here and there in between feeding so I'm not back to claying yet. I did reopen my shop on Etsy since I have stock already made beforehand.

I wanted to share our baby announcement cards and gifts with you. The card is made by my good friend, Anna from LilaRubyKing. Not her usual style but that's because I asked her to do something with the red gingham fabric. I love 'm, they are really pretty.

And as I mentioned in an earlier post, in Belgium it's a tradition to give a little gift to people who come to visit the baby. Both my partner and I made something. We decided to use jars that are used for conserving goods. My partner grew strawberries and rhubarb in the vegetable garden and made jam from it and I made a mould of the jars and casted little porcelain jars and filled them with chocolate coated beans and they can be used as tealight holders afterwards.

 

Here's how it's displayed in our home. The little glasine bags are filled with sweet candy for the little ones. The big jars in the back are filled with candy too, just for eating while visiting. :)

  

Remember I made name labels to attach to the baby gifts but couldn't show 'em yet since the name and gender was still a surprise? Here you can see them on the jars.

 

Thankfully, the visitors really love the gifts so it's nice to know all the work is not wasted! :)

Welcome to the world little wonder!

Julie came into this world on Tuesday, 31th of July at 2:26pm.
She weighs 2760grams and measures 48cm.
Our hearts are bursting of LOVE.
Delivery was induced, without epidural, painful but reasonably quick (6 hours of labor).
We're over the moon with our little wonder!
I'm having troubles uploading an image of her on our Ipad but will soon show you how pretty she is!
Just didn't want to keep you in suspense any longer...

'till soon!
XO
Mitsy

Waiting impatiently...

We are ready as can be to meet our new best friend! 

We bought two the same soft toys for our little one. From my sister's experience, the soft toys are often cuddled to death and then there are tears and sadness of course. So we bought a back up right away and will use both of them simultaneously so that they will both 'suffer' as much...

At the moment, we're 14 days away from delivering our baby. Since yesterday, I've been put on close watch and need to go into the hospital daily to be put on the monitor. I have a blood and urine test every other day just to make sure I don't catch eclampsia. If there is any indication, they will induce the delivery. Something I hope to avoid but I know it can be every day now...
We're excited to meet our little mini...

37 weeks

The belly is getting big and as you can see, I'm counting the days... 21 more if our baby decides to come on the due date. YAY!
My absence on this blog will continue for a while I'm afraid. I'm trying to rest up as much as I can and focus on the next chapter in our lives and therefor I just have to put some things on hold.

Big hug

The other day, Nathalie from Pot en Papaver, pinned a fun idea on Pinterest that I just needed to make. My niece, Anne, (14) is on summercamp and loves to receive snail mail. But I usually don't just send a card or letter but always try to surprise her with something fun or silly. So when I saw the idea on Pinterest, I made my own  interpretation of it. I sewed a 'Big hug' scarf and added padded hands on the end. I hope she will love it! :)

Today I'm 30 days away from my due date but secretly I hope that our baby will arrive a slight bit earlier - just can't wait to meet, greet & cuddle. And really, for those who say 'enjoy your pregnancy while it lasts, you'll miss it once the baby is born'. Well, I can tell you that this last month is not exactly enjoyable for me so I rather have it over and done with. ;)
Unless you are willing to take over my numb hands, elephant feet and heartburn... But I shouldn't complain since these are really the only complaints I had during my entire pregnancy - I feel blessed!

Traditions

There is this tradition in Belgium that when you give birth, you have little gifts to give to the people who come to visit the newborn. It's usually a little box, jar or bag filled with chocolate covered beans. Beans stand for fertility and new life and this tradition dates far back in time as the Romans already used to hand 'em out but back then it were beans covered with honey.

Anyway, you can buy these gifts in many shops or make 'em yourself. As a maker of course, we make it ourselves. Obviously, you think there is about 9 months time to do so but really, in the beginning we didn't make it as things are still so uncertain, then halfway, the idea came to life but then you think: 'ahh, plenty of time' until about 2 weeks ago we realised things were going really fast. My partner made his share of the gifts. I made some samples but the mould I made didn't work properly so I had to make new moulds and they took a long time to dry. A bit stressful as I thought they would never be ready in time. But now all is in the kiln ready to be fired. I'm just finishing the name labels to hang on the gifts.

We've had a hard time choosing a name but we finally decided and since my partner doesn't know the gender, we have a boys and a girls name of course.  I'm glad I know the gender so that I don't have to make 2 type of name tags as they are quite a bit of work. :)

If you care to take a guess on the gender... :)