Sweet memories

Long time ago I made these series of photo books for M. Now L, who got 10, was really longing for a book with her pictures as well. So this was one of her birthday gifts. Such a joy to make! And in no time this time. I'm becoming an expert ;).
Because the book is about her being a baby, I thought a little rose for the inside of the cover would suit.

Into science

Our youngest is having her 8th birthday in a few days. This week she mentioned nonchalant: 'oh, in two years I will be ten.' Ten! We were quite shocked. Our little one!
Together we made invitations for her kids party next week, based on the invented theme of this year: doing cool science tricks. We were inspired by this beautiful and great booklet, one of her Sinterklaas presents.

The drawings and the crafting she did herself. And F's heart already blossoms. Together with L he's choosing and preparing the tricks.
(Don't worry, she won't invite 10 kids. She always makes invitations for us as well.)

Pour ma fille

Just great to work on, such a photo book! Already finished and written in french, I'm glad. Pour toi M, ma chère fille. Here are some of the pages to get a peek:

Slumbering

M isn't quite a fan of slumber parties. She normally simply quits these events because she knows what next day will bring for her: not bode well.
Some time ago we started to brainstorm about her birthday party, that will be in two weeks. M totally surprised me by suggesting a slumber party! Ok, I said, and the next moment her idea turned out into a slumber party completely our way: we'll leave the city and pitch our (great!) tent next to a natural swimming pool in the Biesbosch, a lovely nature reserve south of Rotterdam. Six girls will cozily fit in the large tent, while F, L and I will pitch our small trekking tent a little bit further away.

Last weekend I was making the initial plan for the invitations. Of course I had in mind that M had to do the job, but sometimes things are just coming out of one's hands in the evening... Btw till too late, so next day didn't bode well for me!

M agreed with the design, as she did doing an InDesign course with me to make it herself. She finished the paperwork and is delivering them right now!

Let's knead

Next week our house will turn into a bakery: eight little bakers will put their little fingers into the dough, as L is giving a baking cookies party.

This is the invitation we made together. Making it improved my Photoshop skills. I made a picture of L at the table and separate photo's of the supplies. Some are Google images. The tablecloth is a pattern I made with my new books (read about it later). In the end a lace was added between the folded card with double sided tape and corners were punched.

Her own Penny

Let's unwrap the small present on the left! M is still a horse lover, very much, even more. And like all girls like her she is fond of the Penny, a Dutch kids magazine for horse lovers. She can't wait for a new one; every second Tuesday our postman makes her very happy.
Now her mother: I don't like the Penny. Don't like the kitschy style, the level, the fact that she's no longer reading a normal book... And I can't stop telling her that once in a while. Poor girl.
To compensate my complaining I made her a special edition of the Penny: a mini photo album full of pictures of her, hugging 10 horses in the Schwarzwald last Mai. A little surprise for her birthday, that made her more happy than the chair she got as well.

Update: the posted animation doesn't work anymore.... I'll repair it after holidays.

To climb climbed climbed

M will be 11 soon. At the moment she saw some climbers in Luxembourg last Mai she knew at once that she wanted to give a climbing party. As we have no mountains at all, we'll go here in two weeks.

Doing the photo shoot for her invitation was great fun (and inspired by this). M loved to get into the right laying position. Quickly done before the rain started again, pouring away our drawing. Later I discovered that her tail was hanging to the right, so that had to be Photoshopped!
Btw, plenty great locations to be found around the Erasmus bridge and the SS Rotterdam, if you want to copy this idea.

50!

The very first of our friends is reaching 50 years! A is a dear friend for 25 years already. Tomorrow we will be attenting his birthday party, starting with a cooking class followed by a dinner.
My other dear friend A and I decided to buy ànd to make him presents. This very beautiful book, which is totally designed and written by Yvette van Boven, is what he will get for present when published in a month. Tomorrow he's getting two booklets: this winter edition and this same-sized and same-styled booklet that we made. About all we know about him, all we share and how we love to have him around. It's hard to express incredibly precious things like that on paper, but... I hope and secretly think he likes it!

The making was great fun: to work in a team with A, to layout the booklet and last but not least to design the cover, inspired by the very beautiful paper cuts of Yvette. Btw, in this case there was no paper cut at all, but the cover grew out of scanned handsketches, that were composed in Photoshop and in the end provided with a digital shadow.
For those who want to know: we had it printed and finished with a hardcover right here (just like these books).

Ordering

Our kitchen has a high ceiling. While sitting here behind the computer, you can look into the kitchen, smell the cooking and ask for a coffee easily :). It's a great spot to make pictures during birthday parties too.
Actually this furniture consists of three parts: a cabinet you see in front, a tabletop and a floating cabinet above the tabletop. Because our house is our own design we made the opening in the wall as wide as the tabletop we had already. This week we mounted the floating cabinet again. For years it was standing on the ground, filled with Lego. As our girls are no Lego lovers, we decided to use the cabinet again where it was designed for in our former house.

Furthermore I made new labels for the folders to make them a bit more attractive. Covered each paper label with adhensive foil, slightly bigger than the label itself and sticked them to the folder. I'm happy, because it took some time to administrate and order the folders. Now it's up to date again, pfff. The view on the folders will hopefully stimulate to do the administration on a more regular base.
Btw 1, do you see that hole in the side of the cabinet? It's made for the printer, which is housing together with the hard disk inside the cabinet. And btw 2, do you see that little hole in the corner of ceiling and wall? I'll write about that later...

This is M

For M's eighth anniversary I have been working on this project (yes, it was a kind of project because it took so long...). Next summer she will be ten, so I'm talking about a while ago. We have a digital camera since the birth of L. Selecting about 1500 pictures out of all our digital pics took me several months! Then some more for layouting pages in InDesign. But it was a great job to do! The books measure about 30 to 30 cm and got a hard cover, which I covered with felt. Yesterday evening we browsed through one of the books again instead of reading a book. We love to do this once in a while.
Now it's going to be L's turn. To finish it in a year I better get started soon ;).

Doing business

My boyfriend is freshly starting a new company. And he's enthusiastic! Last week he was suddenly in need of business cards, to spread on a network meeting. Though unquietly surrounded by children, we managed together this design. He ordered a stock at Moo and for direct use some at the local copy shop. The site of Moo makes me greedy too...
Yesterday the colorful cards arrived. M was the first receiver. She picked a pink one. Of course.

Reading

Last winter our little L finally could join her big sister at school. We loved to give her a matching present: a schoolbag with a lunchbox and her first reading book. The book was a personalised one: for every letter of the alphabet I made drawings of her dress, her softie, her bike, and so on. But also things in our house like the lamp above our kitchen table, her little wooden kitchen, etcetera.
 

Just take a look!