Queen of all runs

4h29’30” it took us, V and myself, to run the Dubai Standard Chartered Marathon.

V raised the idea to run the marathon, queen of all runs, about two months ago. I love a goo challenge so we eagerly subscribed ourselves.

Because of lack of time (training for a marathon just takes too much time) and a bunch of other lame excuses we nearly didn’t train.

Friday everything ran smoothly: misty weather –so thankfully not too hot the first part of the course-, we had ‘good legs’ and I had a motivated partner to pep me up. We ran the whole marathon (not even walked once) and are pretty proud of our time.

To all the other marathon runners a genuine sorry: we laughed with your clothes, the color of your running shoes, the way you run, your coiffure,… there was no other way, as we would never have finished without having a laugh with all of you.

A genuinely amazing experience! Burj Khalifa was sitting by and approved our performance.

  

After reaching the finish line I finally took the time to draw the names of the winners of the Petit Pan GiveAway. Congratulations to Storm & Co and Het Meisje van de Zeppelinfabriek, you both won two meters of Petit Pan fabric.

And in the flush of victory we launch another fabric GiveAway; two packages with each 2 meters of Michael Miller’s Little Chef fabric.

Thank you Tahir!

You can participate by joining/following this blog and leaving a reaction at this blogpost. Once there are 339 followers, on the English and Dutch blog altogether we will randomly pick two winners!

Good luck!

Crown with chalkcloth

Here you could already see a glimpse of him! Our birthday party crown. 

We made it easy on ourselves by copying this model for our version of the crown.

Just like her we like continuity and even more we aim for sustainability. So we made a crown that can easily be reused.

To avoid ‘last minute’ unpicking of wrong numbers, followed by sewing on the correct one, we attached a small round of chalkcloth on the crown. So we only have to write down the correct number on the fabric with chalk or a chalkboard pen and after the party you can just remove it with a damp cloth. And … ready for reuse.

Some of the rounds were attached following her guidelines to make ‘Rrrounds’ and other rounds of chalkcloth were just sewed on with a coarse zigzag stitch.

The crown is also reversible; a nice scrap of fabric either side, a round of chalk on both sides and now visible seams unless the purposely colorful ones to attach the chalkcloth. At least our birthday party pictures will vary a little.

The elastic at the back ensures the crown fits the head of all our kids, ranging from 18 months till 9 years.

When I make something and I am happy with the result I tend to make a couple of them in series; a matter of always having gifts at hand.

Jade proudly presents you her favorite specimens.

And then she had enough of it!

The giveaway has come to an end and Saturday we will announce the winners and the next giveaway is ready to be launched, so join this blog if you want to give it a try.

'Architextures'

A short post about a pencil case ...! I know it is not the most creative item as many pencil case posts in blog world have preceded this one.

Nevertheless I want to show you this particular one, in the front of the picture. 

I bought the ‘Architextures’ fabric of Robert Kaufman as my sister and brother in law are both architects.

As the fabric itself is very sober, I decided to use the printed side of the fabric showing the manufacturers information as a decorative element.

A simple pencil case and the ‘Architextures’ is nicely accentuated by the fluorescent stitching all around.

Birthday Girl

Saturday it was the ninth birthday of our eldest daughter. Saturday she had cake, she had a friend come over to celebrate, she wore a crown and she got presents.

The crown was put back on today because one gift she didn't receive yet, as it wasn't completely finished.

Our daughter is a diligent child! She loves sports, reading, and doing craftwork, but above all she loves cooking.

So we wrapped a homemade apron and put it in this little brown bag. The apron was only assembled very last minute out of a patch of Little Chef fabric that was just bought the day before yesterday.

The other side is made of Wasabi Blue of our favorite brand Petit Pan and finished off all round with fluorescent orange bias binding.

Our daughter often comes trotting along –once in a while really untimely- asking if she can cook something. Mostly that means mixing up really bizarre combinations of food in our Babycook machine.

She writes down the recipes and photographs the dish. A glimpse on one of her ‘famous’ recipes: ‘Le mosarela et les trois tomate’ and ... have a look at the picture she took of the dish! There are at least twenty tomatoes covering the mozzarella instead of just three. Hilarious!

Anyway, the notebook she uses costed only 20 eurocent and so the cover does not really look nice or anything. So I made an oilcloth cover for her precious recipe book!

She also got an oilcloth purse, because if she cooks, she needs to buy ingredients.

She also got a reusable shopping bag.

The shopping bag was currently stuffed with 2 cooking books for kids. She was well pleased and an hour later her first tomato-zucchini soup was simmering.

The pattern of the shopping bag comes from ‘Zo geknipt’. I do not necessarily need a pattern for such a bag, but then I bought some books and I might as well use them. Honestly … I have to give credit where credit is due: the bag was ready in no time and without gnashing! The pattern and assembling method are ideal as you can also use the bag inside out without revealing ugly seams.

Consequently we decorated the inside of the bag with a fluorescent pink star; if ever she wants the inside to be the outside.

Tahir has my phone number

A couple of months ago, when I purchased this, mr Tahir asked my phone number; so he could call me when he had new fabric that might interest me. Knowing that my number would disappear in a drawer with numerous other phone numbers, chocolat bar wrappers and used paper tissues, I assumed he would never ever call me.

This morning he proved me wrong! ‘Madame, mister Tahir from fabric shop, I have good roll, nice fabric, you will like, you should come to shop now!”

Honestly I did not really have the time to leave my workroom for a trip to the fabric district (it is just around the corner but it is impossible for me to go and quickly come back).

I couldn’t resist! Result: A full roll of Retro Little Chef from Michael Miller! Timing couldn’t be better, this fabric is just what I needed to add a finishing touch to the birthday present of our eldest. I started to work on it and tomorrow I will reveal the result to you all.

The previous Give Away isn’t even rounded off yet and I already know the content of the next one! Don’t forget to Join this blog and stand a chance of winning some Petit Pan fabric now and Little Chef later.

I also bought some meters of Rocket Launch Club and Children @ Play Aqua Balloons both from Sarah Jane Studios for Michael Miller.

Nothwithstanding the sandstorm, it was a beautiful day, thanks again mr Tahir! 

Welcome to this world!

Since the day they left the hospital –they came home two months after they were born as they started their life in the incubator- our twins hardly ever wear identical clothes. We do buy and make identical items in different colors but they do not wear them the same days.

As parents we are not fond of putting them in identical clothes, because we want to raise them as two individual little boys, especially as they have two completely different characters.

On top of that Omar and Elias don’t like to be mistaken for each other and by wearing different outfits we reduce that problem significantly. Our boys would love to be just brothers and no longer twins!

Here a golden oldie (2006), they just left the hospital!

Regardless of my own aversion to identical outfits, as soon as someone else delivers twins, I do offer matching clothes!

Welcome to this world Enrico and Alessandro. We flocked a short and T-shirt with their names on it for the ‘identical’ brothers, as well as a vest (I love sleeveless shirts for little boys). One vest says ‘Copy’ and the other says ‘Paste’.

Also Baby M and her two brothers get a present today. The brothers of Baby M are members of the same rugby club as our kids –The Hurricanes. A member of the club is called a Hurricane. So we found some (P)inspiration at this blog and flocked Big Hurricane, Little Hurricane and Baby Hurricane. All three the kids get their own pajamas with matching slogan.

Congratulations to the proud parents!

First 2013 present

During Christmas holidays a group of our Belgian friends came over to visit us. We offered to celebrate New Year at our house. So we did grocery shopping, cooking, set the table, …; all of this for 15 adults and 14 children.

And then it was time to make each of them a present! The adults got a home decorated napkin.

The children got a T-shirt or a vest decorated with ‘SuperSky’.

Dubai has an amazing ‘skyline’ and the teenagers taught the link with the brand SuperDry was SuperCool!

As we watched –from our garden- the fireworks displayed on the Burj Khalifa the caption in Arabic writing says ‘828 Burj Khalifa’ (the height and the name of the tallest building in the world).

The presents were wrapped with a home stamped name tag and placed at the dinner table.

To anticipate your doubts: the prints were not carved by hand! I made the designs with the computer and consequently they were cut out with our plotter. 

Bye bye 2012

We did many, but the day before yesterday was our last trip to the desert for 2012!

BYE BYE 2012!
Hope to see you all in 2013!