Coming Soon! Canvas and Leather Mason Bags made by Heritage Leather Company in California with a stamped The New Domestic leather patch. Available in two colours, process yellow & basic red – hand painted by us using waterbased screen print ink. Hope to have it in the shop within a week or so…

Currently working on our next product line for the upcoming Christmas season. I’m a little late on my schedule but hope I can pull this through in time for Christmas.

I was experimenting with some ideas on photographing the tote bags with essentials you would put in your diaper bag. With a little one in the house, I have to work really fast as she’s always so curious on what I’m doing. Usually, I set something up, I walk away for a minute then when I come back, half of the stuff are gone. I usually have to look into our rain boots or underneath the couch looking for them… I do like the set up against the wall and Luna got pretty excited about it too but after a few tries of laying out all the stuff, my idea wasn’t quite working out. So off to the next idea. But I do like the bunting flags and the alphabet poster set up against the wall. Will have to use this for something else in the future.

Starting this week, all orders will get these fun little bookmarks! All materials used are recycled from past projects. I have a hard time throwing stuff away as I always find a use for them later. So when you receive your bag in the mail, expect to get 1 or 2 of these tucked in your bag. We’ll be giving these away until they are all gone!

We got an overwhelming response the first week we opened our shop and thank you to all of you who have expressed interest, sent us lovely comments and for featuring us on your blogs. It’s all so greatly appreciated and we are so happy to have such an awesome community that supports creativity! And for those who have sent their orders, we try our best to send out the bags right away so they can find their new home. Thank you guys! You’re all so sweet. xoxo

We are happy to announce the Grand Opening of our shop, also called The New Domestic! The New Domestic is a homeware line designed for Domestic Living 2.0. Our products beautify your space, add joy to your life and accompany you through your domestic living adventures. With a nod to decorative arts tradition and a wink to worker bee attitude, The New Domestic combines functional utility with effortless style.

Our first line of products are heavy weight recycled cotton canvas tote bags with screen printed patterns. All bags have a diagonal pattern on the back for a two-in-one look. These bags are now available in The New Domestic Shop!

This season, we celebrate the Triangle – strong with its geometric precision and bold in its shape & structure. Look around the world and you’ll see the humble Triangle all around you, in nature, in myth and in design. Mix in colour and pattern and the Triangle tells different visual stories. We took one basic shape and created a myriad of playful permutations to match every personality. There’s a bit of drama, a bit of whimsy, a bit of flash, a bit of understated. Why not collect them all? Hope you enjoy!

Much love,
Nerissa

We are working hard to get the online shop up and ready to go by end of April. Then it’s design mode again for the summer line. Hope everyone is enjoying Spring so far. It’s been cold & wet here the past week but really hoping for some Spring weather soon. I’m still finding myself drinking warm beverage to keep warm. Spring, where are you?

I got a happy surprise in the mail today. I completely forgot I ordered these Japanese tape a few weeks ago and they arrived today. Isn’t it so nice to get special little things in the mail? I can see myself happily taping lots of things the next few days with these awesome tape. You can get them here.

We’ve been busy! The New Domestic Store will open in April. Our first line of products are large screen printed graphic totes made from 12oz. heavy-weight recycled cotton canvas. Each bag is printed with a bonus diagonal pattern on the back (so you get two looks with one bag). We are launching with four designs to start with. The one shown is called “Dreaming of Marrakesh”. More products are coming in the Summer.

I love making things for people but making fun things for little people is even more special. We were at our friends’ girls birthday party yesterday and I wanted to give them something creative and productive. So I came up with an idea of an artist kit. Awhile back, I found these great wooden boxes at a local crafts store and I loved them so much that I bought a few. I decided to use those boxes and stuff them with all sorts of art supplies like oil pastels, paint, glitter paint, brushes and a wooden number 3 as it was their 3rd birthday. I then personalized each box with the first letter of their name. ‘O’ for Orla and ‘L’ for Lucy. I know little kids appreciate anything that is made especially for them – and after all, turning 3 is quite special!

I used bakers twine to bundle a little canvas with each box and then sewed a wooden button around the middle of the twine to finish it off. Happy 3rd birthday Lucy & Orla. We can’t wait too see your masterpiece!

Christmas cards from Luna to all her lovely baby friends. This year, I wanted to make something crafty that she could be part of, like a mommy and daughter project together to give to her baby friends. The initial idea was that I would make all the cards (using materials we already have at home) then get her to participate by scribbling whatever she wanted on each and every card. Well, she managed to do one but that’s about it. I layed her on the floor with all the pencil crayons and she screamed with delight from excitement. It started off pretty good as I showed her what to do and she happily started scribbling. Then, she started chewing on the pencil crayons and wanted to rip the card and eat the paper. So it didn’t quite work out the way I had imagined (she’s not digging baby labour).

So, I did the rest of the scribbling on all the cards and made it look like Luna did it (shhhh…). But I assure you, there’s Luna love in every single card! Merry Christmas to all the little people out there!

This past year, I’ve been working on a special book documenting Luna’s first year of life. When we had Luna, everyone kept on telling us to take a lot of photos as the year will go by really fast. Well, we did and we took A LOT! In this digital age, I was a little concerned that the photos we were taking were just getting lost in our computer. I grew up (Which I’m sure all of you did too) where we had tons of albums at home documenting our life. I think that’s been non existant lately as our computer has become our photo album. But I don’t find the satisfaction looking through photos on my monitor screen – I feel less attached to the photos I am looking at. It’s just not the same. I want to be able to hold a book, go through the pages, feel the paper… it’s more intimate and feels more special.

So I came up with this idea and jumped right on it the first month Luna was born. It’s a 276 page book with different chapters for every month of her life. Here’s a little write up taken from the book:

To my daughter Luna,

I made this book, for you, to document your first year of life. Whenever you were having your afternoon naps or dreaming away in the evening in your cozy room I would be working on this book – creating something special for you to have. For such a little person, you sure have taught me so much about patience, love and to see the world with fresh eyes. When we first laid our eyes on each other when you were born, it was as if you knew who I was already and I felt the same. The love that I feel towards you is so powerful that I always have a hard time describing what it feel like. This book shows how much you have impacted our lives and how much love you have brought into our lives too. I hope that when you grow up and look at this book, it will be a nice reminder of all the special moments we have shared with you during your wonderful first year of life. All the milestones you had accomplished, your first frustrations, first solids, first rollovers, first vacation, first birthday… everything you learned and discovered, we were always there beside you, watching you discover your world and grow to become such a beautiful little girl. We are so proud of you, our dear daughter and thank you for coming to this world to be part of our lives.

Love, Mommy

I plan to do one for every year of her life (crossing my fingers), kind of like an encyclopedia with different volumes. It’s really not that much work. I just take a few hours per month working on a few pages. Looking through this book now after a year has past, I can’t help but get a bit emotional as it’s really been such a special year. We now look forward to what year 2 will bring!

I like to change our table centrepiece once in awhile to freshen up the space. I bought almost a dozen mason jars from a vintage store probably a year ago and use them for storing random stuff like rolls of thread, bookmarks, pebbles etc… They are great to have at home as they are so versatile and can be used for anything really. For Luna’s birthday party, I decided to use them as vases to put on the buffet table. I wrapped them individually with different coloured fabric to give them some life and texture. The plants come from the garden. I really like the simple and homey look to them so they now have a new home and are placed on top of my cake stand in the middle of our dining table.

We celebrated Luna’s birthday this weekend at home with family, friends and a whole lot of balloons hanging from the ceiling. We filled our dining table with food and treats for everyone to enjoy. It was a sweet little homey celebration and seeing Luna so happy playing with all her baby friends and being surrounded by so many balloons makes for a perfect 1st birthday.

On the dessert buffet menu: Chocolate mousse in little cups, marshmallow swirls in sticks, cupcake, yoghurt raisins, old fashioned lollipops, brownies, m&m cookies, strawberry wafer sticks, vanilla birthday cake and an assortment of little round mousses. I was happy to see it almost wiped out by the end of the party.

For the goody bags, I used little brown lunch bags and filled them all with a package of yoghurt raisins and sweet berries. I always have a lot of great little fabrics lying around my studio so I cut up two different fabrics using pinking shears to cut the edges. Pinking shears create a saw-tooth pattern that’s graphic and fun. Then I printed thank you notes on thick watercolour paper using my epson printer and cut the edges with pinking shears as well. Mini red & blue clothes pins were used to hold the thank you note and fabric in place. To finish it off, I wrapped bakers twine around the bag and tied it up like you would a ribbon.

It was so fun making these goody bags and the best thing about it is that it’s cheap and really easy to put together. There’s also a folky but modern feel to them which I really love. The little packages of yoghurt raisins and sugar berries were individually wrapped with paper I already had at home. For the yoghurt berries, I used these newsprint zine magazines we bought awhile back from WeWorkForThem. The sugar berries are wrapped with picnic cloth patterned paper that I’ve been waiting to use for a special occasion.

Below is the balloon-themed e-card invite we sent out. We hung up balloons on the ceiling of each room which created a sculptural mobile ceilingscape. It’s so fun and festive were keeping them up until they all deflate or fall down on their own.

Using inkjet sticker paper, I also created customized water bottles and cups. Each water bottle was a solid block of color with a celebratory word on it like “HIP”, “HOORAY”, “JOY” & “LOVE”

If you haven’t noticed yet, I have an obsession with wrapping and packaging things. I will make all the effort to wrap a loaf of homemade bread, fresh cookies, herbs etc… to give to friends. I also love the feel of paper and fabric together. I guess it’s the smoothness of the paper and the raw texture of a fabric that always seems to work together nicely.

This little present was a wooden alphabet ‘A’ train for little Avenir. The fabric and paper gives a homey feel while bakers twine wraps the preciousness inside and seals it with love.

I’ve been wanting to make this simple bunting project for quite sometime now and finally had a chance to work on it yesterday. We changed our internet and cable tv provider so I was stuck at home yesterday waiting for the new carrier to hook us up and get it working again. Without internet, I couldn’t help feeling like I had nothing to do. But I shook that idea off my mind and decided to to take full advantage of my day at home and went back to the simplest pleasures of life – back to the sewing machine! So I sewed all day and finally made this simple bunting project that’s been lingering in my mind.

Ariana, from Crow Rooster Crow inspired me to make this gorgeous bunting. Hers are made from vintage cocktail napkins but I thought it might be easier for me to source fabric instead of searching for vintage napkins. So off I went to the fabric store over the weekend and went straight to the clearance bin where I found these scraps of fabric that seemed like they were just waiting for me to take home and bring them to life.

To make the bunting, I cut my fabric to about 7″w x 9″h. Repeat this until you have enough. The seams I just eyeballed which I think are about 1/4″. Once you’re done sewing the seams on all your fabric, evenly space them along the bias binding tape (I spaced them out about 2″ apart), folding the shortest edge over, and pin in place. Then sew the flags with a straight stitch and voila, you’ve got your own handmade bunting!

I love having them hung up in our dining/kitchen area. It brings a lot of colour to the space and I also love how the light from outside shines through the fabric. When I first hung it up, Luna kept on reaching up wanting to touch them all. She also couldn’t stop admiring all the different colours as she ate her dinner last night. So I couldn’t resist and made a smaller version for her room and hung it up by her window. I think it’ll be a nice sight for her to wake up to every morning with the sun shining through all the different coloured fabric.

This is a simple project that anyone can do. Happy sewing!

Even though I ignored them all season long, my cherry tomato plant pulled through and produced a crop of sweet fruit all on its own. Having too much for a single family to eat, we always share our harvest with friends. For one package, I created a gift box packed full of cherry tomato goodness. These little guys are sweet like candy. Fittingly, both metaphorically and physically, I found an old bright red candy tin to use as a container. The ribbons are book headbands and the card is a vintage miniature playing card scavenged from eBay. The embossed overalled girl licking her lips on the front of the box is too cute for words. Delicious sweetness, indeed.

For my birthday, Nerissa made me a Terrarium Kit with all the parts needed to make a terrarium: rocks, charcoal, soil, decorations and a glass vessel. It’s an awesome gift because I’ve been wanting to make one of these for a while now. You can find lots of instructions on Google and many how-to videos on YouTube. The only tip that I’d add is that an oversized pair of chopsticks works really well for placing objects neatly where hands can’t reach. I put the arrangement below together in half an hour, racing against time as the sun set. For a first attempt, I like it. It’s pretty rewarding to design your own miniature eco-system. I can see why it turns into an obsession for some people.

Recently, we went to my friend Janice’s birthday party for her little boy Kai who turned 1. The party was filled with little packages of popcorn for everyone to help themselves with, party favours in blue packages filled with their favourite teas, water bottles with custom labels, cupcakes and other yummy treats. I like how everything was cute and on-theme. It was lovely how it all came together. With a little imagination, it’s not really that hard to do. It’s mostly finding readymade packaging and re-imagining it by dressing it up with some ink jet stickers and nice simple designs. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that Janice is a professional graphic designer (we both worked together at Kevin Louis Design before we went on mat leave). Kids birthday parties are a fun way to make and experiment with DIY projects. And, it’s also an excuse to treat yourself with all the sweets you wished you could eat everyday. Happy Birthday Kai! Thank your mom for a lovely party.

Photographs taken by Jason & Lena from Jaylena Photography.

Yay, I received my bakers twine in the mail today and i’m so excited (my simple pleasures in life)! I found a fantastic site where you can get them super cheap ($8.95 each + shipping). Each twine is a 2-pound cone – that’s approx. 3,400 yards! I got a red and white one and a lime green and white. I’m so loving them!! These should last me for many years.

You can order them here. Happy twine shopping!

Our Weekend Art Project has been making the blog rounds including mentions at Apartment Therapy, How About Orange and Craftzine. Welcome, everybody! Even more exciting is the fact that others have been inspired enough to create their own versions of the painting. Neat to see DIY examples from: The Late Afternoon, Hanna Kim, Holley Simmons, Chic Coles and The Clueless Homeowners.

Nice work, folks! Have fun and send us a pic of your creations. As always, see our DIY/Make section for more project ideas or the Arts section for more inspiration.

I share a birth date with our friend, Anita Modha. We’re birthday twins, as we like to say. I made this card a couple years back to honor the co-celebrant. The stenciled letter “M” was painted onto a window envelope with neon acrylic paint. The envelope acted as the gift wrap. Using pencil crayon, on a sheet of Eames paper, I filled in a few of the cirles to form an “A” onto the dot pattern. An oversized paper-clip held a couple of Vancouver Art Gallery passes to the sheet. A note was hand scribed onto the back. This formed the card.

When the card was slipped into the envelope, part of the letter “A” is framed in the envelope’s window while the “M” appears to the right forming an abstraction of Anita’s initials. The package was finished off with a thin black ribbon. I still really like this one. It’s simple, graphic, and personalized with just a touch of clever craftiness.

I can never seem to have enough tote bags. Peter’s mom came to visit and stayed with us for a week so I was able to find some time on Friday to sew myself a new tote bag while she happily entertained Luna while she was awake (a nice break for me!). It was really nice to get back into sewing again and having that time to myself.

For those of you who are looking for amazing hand crafted bags and scarves, Breanna Musgrove from Scout & Catalogue who I went to art school with makes the most amazing bags. Each piece is dyed, hand studded and all made with love. Check out her etsy store here.

Glass beer or soda bottles can be used as vases for tall slender cuttings. The weightiness of the bottle keeps it upright and steady. The tapered neck and small mouth gathers the stems snuggly together while keeping the arrangement neatly in place. Look for bottles with a nice shape and labels that are easily scrubbed off. To dress it up, drape some pins over the neck. To get extra sparkle, you can loosely fill the bottle with clear glass marbles. This tends to make water changes and rearrangements a bit fussy, though. So, in this case, we didn’t bother. All that was needed for a finishing touch was Pee Wee Herman.

Finding imaginative vessels to display our garden clippings is always a joy. We found these vintage-looking glass bottles at Ruby Dog’s Art House, near Kingsway and Fraser. They were in a section with test tubes and petri-dishes, so I assume the little bottles are for pills or medicine. In any case, they were a steal at 35¢ a piece. The only catch is that vessels this small, even when filled with water, are really light. They’ll topple over if the clippings they hold aren’t as light as a feather. Pictured from left to right are: (1) a sprig of mint, (2) buds from an unknown shrub, (3) bamboo leaves, (4) chive flower, (5) berries from an unknown shrub. Thanks in advance, if you can ID numbers 2 and 5 for us.

Aoi, daughter of our friends Doni and Genevieve, celebrated her 4th birthday today. We wanted to get Aoi something creative for birthday gift. We found a wood box at Rudy Dog’s Art House and filled it with various activity items from the store such as letter puzzle pieces and sticker sets. One door down from Rudy Dog is Collage Collage where we filled the rest of the box with crayons, necklace beads and little toys. We glued some of the letter puzzle pieces to the front of the box spelling out A-O-I in a crossword pattern. The box was tied up with a red ribbon and we attached a wooden gift tag to the ribbon with a mini-clothespin. We love the wood box. It’s only $3 which is cheaper than a sheet of wrapping paper and it’s reusable!

We’ve been on a lookout for a high chair for Luna the past weeks. Instead of buying a brand new high chair, we decided to go for a used one and customize it. I found this wooden high chair on craigslist for $25.00. It had a nice shape to it so I bought it, sanded it, primed it then painted it red. A small can of paint was $20.00 so all in all, her high chair only cost us $45.00! It’s a great looking high chair for a small price tag. And, it was customized especially for her.

We made a painting this weekend! We’ve been wanting a large scale art-piece to go up on our dining room wall. We had a large framed photograph up but, at 26″ x 32″, it didn’t have the right scale for the room. We wanted to go big. Like, 60″ x 36″ big. Now the last time either of us did any painting was in art school. Back then we didn’t enjoy it much, mostly because neither of us were particularly good at it. Undeterred, we gave it a try. Things tend to be more enjoyable when you do it yourself and it turned out to be a lot of fun.

Inspired by color field paintings, I made a sketch in Illustrator and we tried different color combinations til we were happy. Then it was off to the local art store to buy the acrylic paint, the canvas and some 1/4″ painters tape. A few hours later, we were done and it was up on the wall. We’re enjoying it. It’s the bold, large-scale signature piece the room has been waiting for. We call the piece………“Untitled.”

Update: To complete the dining area, we painted a high chair red to add another splash of color to the room. View the post “Red High Chair” for the full room view. Check out the DIY/Make section for more project ideas. If you love this style of geometric art, patterns and triangles see our line of graphic tote bags. You’ll like!

Also, congrats to everyone who has been DIYing there own versions of the Weekend Art Project. You can see a few examples our reader’s handiwork here.

Spring is here and the flowers are starting to bloom. However, none of our flowers right now are big enough for a regular size vase. So, I created a mini-centerpiece using a spare spice jar as a vessel. The flowers are crocuses which were the first to sprout up in the backyard. Our rosemary bush stays vibrant all year long and I added a sprig for color & contrast. The cut crocuses opened wide shortly after hitting the water but the delicate, paper-thin petals are starting to expire after only a few days. No worries. We have lots and they’re all free for the picking.

I wanted to put together a special package for Valentine’s for Nerissa. While searching through our hard drive, I found a photograph of scooters and macarons Nerissa shot in Paris. It’s a beautiful image and it was a shame it only existed in our digital archives. I came up with the idea of printing and framing the photograph and packaging it with a set of macarons. Unfortunately, sourcing macaroons in Vancouver was more difficult than I anticipated. There was none to be found near home or near work. With a little one in the house it’s hard to sneak out on long secret missions and I wasn’t able to put all the pieces together for the 14th. Luckily, the next special occassion, Nerissa’s birthday, is soon after Valentine’s. Perfect timing since I figured I would need one or two more weeks to get everything together.

I sent a message out on Twitter asking where in Vancouver I could find macarons. I was told La Baguette et L’Echalote on Granville Island or Thomas Haas. I chose Thomas Haas. I then packaged the macarons in a Ladurée souvenir box we bought in Paris; fitting since Ladurée started Nerissa’s macaron obsession. The framed photo and box of macarons were stacked together, tied with a ribbon and, viola, there it is. Bon Anniversaire!

Peter gathered all the green chilies we had growing out in the garden and I was surprised to see almost a full bowl of chilies! There was no way the two of us could use that many chilies so we decided to share some and give them away as presents. We gathered bunches of peppers together and created custom packets for each. We experimented with simple paper/tape techniques, different ways to tie thread and finished it off with an ink-jet sticker label.

(Updated: Jan. 30, 2010 with new photos.)

How time flies…I can’t believe it was 5 years ago when Peter and I were making journals which we called Bricolage. I had a lot of fun making these journals. I would spend my days searching for great fabrics in the city then would excitedly go home to start making. We were living in a tiny condo in Downtown at that time (I think it was 550 sq ft!) so I would practically use the whole space as my working studio. I had fabrics all over the floor, ironing board in the middle of the living room and stacks of journals in every corner of our condo. It was really great fun! Peter’s job as soon as he got home from work was to make all the pins with the little hand-held pin maker we bought.

When I started making these journals, I honestly didn’t think anyone would buy them. But as soon as the orders started coming, I was really excited that people wanted them. I had orders from Europe, Canada & the States plus I had a store in Belgium that ordered a few dozen. I was happily busy!

After a few months, our journals were sold-out and I was ready to start something new. That was 5 years ago! Now that I am on maternity leave, and spend my days at home, I am ready to start making products again. I am so excited! I’ve started working on it already but things just take a little longer to do now with a baby in the house. As soon as it’s nap time, I quickly run to our studio and squeeze in as much creative time as I can get (vacuuming and other household chores have been ignored…they can wait!). I hope to launch our new products in late Spring or early Summer. They’re not books this time. Stay tuned!

On another note, our DIY Place Cards have been featured in a design and style blog called Paper n Stitch. Thanks Brittni!

I had a housewarming dinner party with my friends from work last year and I decided to make it a little bit more special by making everyone their own place cards that they could take home with them. I chose my favourite origami patterns and created little envelopes by folding the origami paper in half and stitching the side for a more hand crafted look. And to make it even more fun, I put random goodies inside each envelope which everyone excitedly opened to see what they got. It was like Christmas all over again!

I always like dinner with friends to be more interactive and add an element of playfulness to it. These are super easy to make and your guests gets to take home something special that you personally made for them.

Our DIY Eames chocolate bars has been featured in Modern Findings – a blog that features all things mid-century modern.

Girls day with my neices Sarah-Jane and Isabelle meant a chance to spend quality creative time together. We took turns making throw-pillow covers. It was fun, easy and they both get to bring home something memorable to decorate their rooms with. See you soon, Sarah and Izzy.

I was able to squeeze in another sewing day for myself so I took the opportunity to make myself a tote bag. I’ve had the book Simple Sewing by Lotta Jansdotter for quite sometime now but I just never had the time to make anything from that book. It’s such a wonderful book with so many easy and fun sewing projects for the home. I’m obsessed!

We often like to wrap presents in newsprint or butcher paper. It has a nice raw texture and neutral palette. All you need is some nice ribbon to finish it off but sometimes you just want a splash of pattern. A couple months back, YouWorkForThem was clearing out their book collection. They were practically giving away their newsprint zine, “Sentence 01“, for 95¢. A different artist designed each page of the 16 page zine full of abstract black and white imagery. At the risk of offending the artists and author, I bought three copies not to read but for the sole purpose of using each sheet of the zine as wrapping paper. And it works wonderfully. Rissa put the package above together for Doni, Gen & Aoi. Inside is a loaf of home baked cinnamon raisin bread (Rissa’s go to gift for 2009). Newsprint ink tends to run, so if you don’t want ink on your gift, you’ll want to wrap your gift in an additional layer. In this case, Rissa wrapped the raisin bread in cling wrap before wrapping it in the newsprint.

Below is a gift given to Luna by my sister also nicely wrapped in newsprint with a simple pattern of chinese characters. So simple. So lovely.

Fifteen more days until Christmas. Yay! I usually like to make something festive every year to give to friends. In the past, I’ve made cards, notebooks, baked goods etc… This year, I’ve decided to make Christmas cards to send out to our lovely friends. This is the most realistic task I can do as lately, Luna decided that she wanted to be in my arms ALL DAY! So the idea of baking Christmas goods have been scratched off my list including other crafts that needed cutting and gluing. There’s only so much I can do with one arm!

So I’ve been sitting in front of the computer designing these cards the past few days. As I am designing them, Luna is laying in my arms fast asleep & snoring away. But having a baby at home also means that things just take longer to get done which is something I am still getting used to. When she cries, I have to get up and cradle her to put her back to sleep. When she’s hungry, she cries for milk so I have to move to the couch to nurse her. But having her always so close to me is really so special. She will never, ever be this small again.

When I started designing these cards, I wanted to stay away from the typical Christmas shapes, ornaments and colours used to design anything for Christmas. Though, I still wanted it to look fun and festive. The base pattern shapes are taken from Kids & Toys Petite Pattern Book which is full of fun patterns you can customize or use as is. The colours I used are inspired by what I see outside my window. The chilly winter air, smoke from chimneys, fallen branches, pine cones… Yes, this is winter!  These cards have been printed using my epson printer on card stock.

I hope to send out these cards within a day or two so it can soon find it’s new home. Happy Holidays everyone!

The day I started my maternity leave, I had a list of personal projects I wanted to work on like making throw pillows, designing posters, cards etc… But I guess Luna had enough being cooped up in a dark watery world in my tummy and decided to come out 2.5 weeks early. We were shocked but super happy to meet her early!

Having a baby at home means doing as much as you can while they are fast asleep. While Luna was snoring away this morning, I finally was able to make her throw pillow. I love how easy and fast it is to make one. I plan to make a few more but I’m on the hunt for nice fabrics. Next task on my list: finishing up her birth announcement cards!

Rissa and I are currently working on Luna’s birth announcement. We sketched up some ideas together on the weekend. Rissa spent yesterday reformatting some of them into InDesign files to print out and mock-up on paper. Other than posing for cute photos, Luna wasn’t actually too helpful on this task. Her favorite activities continue to be eating, sleeping – I think she dreams about swimming in rivers and oceans of milk – and something new: stretching out and exercising her limbs. Maybe one day soon she’ll have fun putting stuff together with mom and dad. We’re hoping to finalize the design and production this week and send off the announcements asap.

Peter and I wanted to make something special as giveaway presents at our baby shower. We were constantly bouncing ideas with each other on what to make, or what to bake… So after days and days of coming up with different ideas, we settled on something so special – chocolate bars wrapped up with our collection of Eames paper!

This is a simple project anyone can do. We headed to a grocery store after work and bought organic chocolates with hazelnuts. But we made sure these chocolate bars were wrapped with aluminum foil as it would look nicer once we customize the packaging. We removed the outer paper covers and replaced it with nice bold prints. Peter was in charge of designing the tags and I voted to be in charge of choosing which Eames paper to use and carefully wrapping them individually and got creative with the ribboning.

Our friends loved them and we were happy to have made something special for them. The joy of making and giving things to friends!

Peter and I always have so much fun making things together. We had music playing, pieces of ribbon & paper all over the table and floor… It makes me realize even more how much I love our studio space as we are able to make things together!