Birthday party - again...

Last thursday Niels´s co-workers came to visit Ruben, a belated visit, but better late than never. It was a bit of a journey for them since we live about 125 km away from his work. Ruben was spoilt as you can see.

Today we had a birthday party for the boys for family and friends and they to were very spoilt. Lots of books to tell stories from, playmobil and other toys and clothes.

Nic wanted a spiderman cake, so here it is:

Peter is into trucks and cars, so his grandpa bought him this truck cake, isn´t it fun? I think it looks fantastic.

Thank you very much everyone. The boys loved their presents.

Swap with An

I did a swap with An from vANalles en nog wat en this is what the postman brought me yesterday. I love the deerhead and I gave it a special place in Ruben´s bedroom. This is a picture of the head hanging on teh wall already.

I also love the reuseable flap for my sandwiches, I already have it in use, it is great. Thank you very much An, great swap.

Wanted: coffee addicted swappers

I admit it, I am addicted to my coffee. Not so much as I used to but still. I need my cup of coffee in the morning, noon, after lunch, in the afternoon, after diner, ...

So after the succes of the cupcake swap, I would like to organise a coffee swap. For this swap you must make at least one handmade item related to coffee, a miniquilt, a cup stuffie, a painting, etc. and some other coffee goodies.

And because I am quite busy myself, I suggest we swap at the end of april. Who´s in? I think this could be a fun theme for a swap, and I know I am not the only addicted to coffee.

Hex quilt finished and given

Welcome sweetie pie, this is Arno, the wee one for whom I made the white and blue hexagon quilt for. I finished the quilt on sunday afternoon, and Arno was born monday morning. An, you must be very proud of such a beautiful son.
And this is a picture of the finished quilt, I think is turned out great. I hope it will keep you warm and comfy.

Birthday

Today son#1 turns 5. I made him this brooch yesterdayevening because I was inspired by Blij als mij. He was very excited about it and wanted it pinned on his uniform this morning. I also made him a nice cake to give to the kids in his class.

How I remember him being born. The bombing in madrid hadn´t taken place yet, he was born at 00.10 on the 11th. And around 02.30 we left the hospital with a crying baby (because he was cold we guess, it was freezing that night). We went home and there we were, the three of us... nobody knew yet that he was born, we thought we would call friends and family in teh morning.
We didn´t know how to make a hot water bottle for him. DH thought it would be too hot, so he put in luke warm water, but then son #1 started crying, so DH held him until the nurse rang our doorbell in the morning and explained everything.
How fast the years go... Happy Birthday !!!

Treats

OK, as you can see, we are ready for the birthdayparty. I made these cupcakes before I treated myself on an issue of Living... I left a couple of the cupcakes unfinished because I noticed that a lot of kids don´t like the icing.

And this gorgeous address book came with the mail yesterday. It was a belated birthday present from a friend in Holland. Tania, thank you very much, it is wonderful.

And this is what I treated myself on this morning. A copy of Living, a polka dot picknick blanket which is folded like a bag with a handle, so very handy... And some keycaps.

Party tomorrow

Tomorrow we are having son #1´s birthdayparty for his schoolfriends. Since most kids like the guinea pigs we have, and want to hold them. So I gave them a bath. So Chocolate and Mousse (that is the name son #1 gave them 4 years ago) are very nice and clean when children want to pick them up.

Have been busy with the babyquilt I am making for my friend An´s baby who we expect any day now. So I am quilting like a maniac to get it finished in time. When it is finished I will publish a picture of it.

Relaxed weekend

This weekend, we had no appointments, so we had some quality time with the kids. Yesterday we walked through teh park in Brasschaat, which is the town where I grew up.
In teh middle of the park, near the castle there are some very old trees and this own reminded me of some smock work I did. Isn´t the bark wonderful?
We walked to the playground were we had something to drink and I can show my newly purchased snack bags from Mama Made. They are wonderful and such a good alternative to disposable bags.
The polka dot bag I got as a birthday gift from Niels´s cousin. I love this little lunchbag.

Today we visited the market at Heist op den Berg where a lot of small farmers sell their own grown vegetables and animals. SO we bought some nice veggies and eggs and some fresly baked waffles, hmm. I have been quilting like a maniac to finish the babyquilt on time, the baby of my friend is due next week, so... we are very excited to see this little fellow.

The great international stash busting giveaway

Look what the mailman brought? Or actually, I picked it up at the postoffice. The package was delivered to our home on friday but i was doing grocery shopping, so there was a note that I could pick it up today at the postoffice.
When the lady came with this big box, I was still wondering what it could be, until I saw that it came from Shean (dairy of an unconscious mind).
I love the stuff she sent me. The boys loved the two toys and my personal favorite is the sock monkey... we don´t know them over here but it looks so funny.
Shean, I love everything but how did you know I collect coookie cutters? They are very hard to find overhere, espcially fun ones, so I love it and my kids will love making cookies with it.
The frog fabric will find good use in my frog quilt and the planet fabric in my planned rocket quilt. So thank yiu very much, you were very generous.

Belated birthday gift

My husband gave me these lovely two books, Jules Puppenstube and Huttenzauber (crafts inspired by the alps). There was also a lovely Melly and me pattern and some nice cupcake fabric for my girly quilt.
Wow, I am really spoiled, the books are so nice, I can look at them over and over.

Me day

Today was me time. I took the day off work and went with a friend of mine to Roosendaal in Holland to buy some fabrics and to do some serious shopping.
When I arrived at Evelyn´s, she had a birthday present:
I love these japanese magazines, so thank you very much for this wonderful gift Evelyn.
Then we took off to Rossendaal where they have a big market on Monday with quit a lot of fabric vendors. SO this is what I bought:

Some pale blue vichy fabric for my blue and white hex quilt. Two more pirate fabric´s for Nic´s pirate quilt and some pincs for a girly quilt for a very special little lady.

I also did some serious clothes shopping since I really needed some new jeans. But I ended up with a lot more than only jeans...

After our shopping we had a wonderful lunch and headed back home to pick our kids up from school. But I must say I really enjoyed my me-time.

Surprise !

Look what the postman brought today... It is a lovely package from Sara . She made the loveliest pink petaled pincushion, a lovely heart and so much more cupcaky things. I love them all. Thank you so much Sara. You are the best.
Her first attempt on the Cupcake swap stranded somewhere between the UK and Belgium, because it never arrived, but Sara was so generous to offer to send another package. I told her she shouldn´t but voila, to my surprise this was handed to me this morning.

Back from hospital

The operation went fine, this is son #1 in recovery.

This is him 30 minutes after his surgery...

As you can, everything went fine and he is back home, so I am very glad.

Fabrics

This is my collection frog fabrics I have collected over the last couple of months. Son #1 is in kindergarten and all the classes have an animal as a recognition sign, his is a frog. And since his teacher is such a wonderful teacher I will make her a frog quilt. I also have a green frog fabric for the back and these will be cut up into blocks for the front. I think they are cute.

And these fabrics I got from Lucy in the FQ swap. She asked me if the fabrics could be smaller and a couple of them and offcourse I agreed. They are some lovely pinks, so they will come in handy once I start making my own girly quilt.

I love the card so much I will frame it and hang it by my sewing table. Thank you very much Lucy.

This afternoon I will take son #1 into hopsital for minor corrective surgery. But because it is under general anaesthesia, it is more than just a quick visit. Hopefully he will be discharged around & o'clock tonight. So I will bring my crochetwork and quilt box with me.

Birthday!

It´s my birthday today. DH went out to get fresh buns and pastry. My best friend and her family came over for a birthday brunch and my parents came by later in the afternoon.
DH had bought me some craft books but he had them sent to his work and since he was sick last week and stayed home... But I know I will get them.
The party will be held later in the month so this was only a small preview today.

Crochet

Since the ´boys´ are sick again, the doctor came on thursday and declared three of the four ill, so our fridge is filled with antibiotics... DH is upstairs in bed and teh rest is lying on the couch under one of my quilts.

We are not going anywhere so I spent some quiet time crocheting. I made this little plane and I think it came out OK. At the moment I am making a pink one.

We´ve got a winner!

It is friday and time to pick a winner. I had to wait until my sons came back from school. son#2 was planning on doing something else, hence the long face.
But he picked a winner and she is:

So CassH, congrats and I hope you like the stash I am sending you. I will contact you for your address.

Thanks Katy to organize this event, it was fun and I saw a lot of new blogs, which I intend to visit on a regular basis.

Thanks all for stopping by my blog. I never expected some many of you (123!), so that was a bit overwhelming.

The Great International Stash Busting Giveaway - EDITED

Goodmorning, here in Belgium it is wednesday morning February 4th, so it is time for the Great International Stash Busting Giveaway.
No picture of the stash yet, but I will place a picture tonight after work, so it will be a surprise what you can win.
If you want a chance to win the stash I am giving away, please leave a comment to this post and I will announce a winner on Friday February 6th.

Enjoy!

It is thursdaymorning so I closed the comments. One of you will be picked by the innocent hand of my two year old. Who will it be??? This is very exciting.

Weekend

We had a slow weekend. All the boys were sick, so me ;ostly stayed indoors. I almost finished Peter´s Cars quilt, but it turned out I have not enough fabric to finish the borders. So will have to go out to market and look for some bright colored fabric to finish the front (the back is already finished) so I can start quilting.
I also did quite some work on my blue and white hexagon quilt, so I am really happy with that and I started crocheting on a KTB designs pattern called ´Cupcake teapot´.
The picture above is what I have send to my FQ swap partner, will reveal it when she lets me know that it has arrived.

I´ve been tagged

I have been tagged by An from vANalles en nog wat.

The mission: put the forth picture of the forth folder on your computer on your blog. So here it goes:

Our friends and us had a great idea about have a picture taken of our children by a photogragpher. We bought them matching T-shirts with their names on it and went to the studio. This is the result: three children didn´t want to be in teh icture, one boy walking away angry, three crying babies and a very funny picture... at least that is what I think of this picture. I think it is really cool.

I tag: Evelyn, Jill, Molly and Mee

The Great International Stash Busting Giveaway

Katy over at I'm A Ginger Monkey is hosting a great event which I joined.

On wednesday February 4rd I shall have a giveaway on my blog like some many others, I will be giving away a selection of fabrics from my stash. I haven't decided what yet, but it'll be a nice little stack, and the colors will go together, so it can be used for the same project.Check out all the other Great International Stash-Busting Giveaway participants via this link and come back for the giveaway on the 4th.

Blue and white hex quilt

This is my faithful little sew box that I use for my Blue and white hex quilt. As you can see, it has everything I need, siccors, fabric pre-cut, little wooden pegs, etc. It is the perfect little plastic box that I received free in the mail from a butter brand. It is a lunch box but I saw other purposes...
What do you use to put your WIP in?

Crochet

I bought this crochet magazine in Austria. It came with another German magazine called Lea, also a crochet magazine.

The reason why I bought it is because I love the crochet rug in the picture. I looks really neat and I wanted to know how you can make it.

Looking at all my magazines I realised that I haven´t heard from my subscription to Sew Hip. I received the first issue without the present, and haven´t heard from them since. So I contacted the subscription Manager and she responded very quickly and ensured me that something must have gone wrong since they are already at issue 3. She will resend the magazines so I can´t wait to see all those lovely patterns.

So great service from the people at Sew Hip Magazine!

This weekend I have been working on my Cars quilt for Peter. Teh back turned out bigger than I thought, so I have to look for a solution for my front part, since I don´t have enough black and whiet chequered fabric. Will have a look at the market to see if they have a matching fabric.

Cupcake swap pictures

For those of you that joined my cupcake swap, please see this link for the pictures of all the goodies you made for the cupcake swap 2008. Sorry that it took so lon, but we are still missing one parcel. No problem since it was a parcel sent to me, so I don´t feel bad that someone didn´t get a parcel. I will also email all the participants this link.

Back home

We arrivedyesterday evening back home, so now I have internet acces where I can upload pictures. The chalet we rented was great but we missed (OK, I missed) an internet connection. As you can see, we had a great week. The weather was great, great snow so we all had a good time.

This is me on the longest Roddelbahn in Europe. It start around 2000 meters and you descend until the village of Bramberg. There the skibus brings you back to the parking at the Talstation where you took the gondola to the top. I can recommend this roddelbahn, the beginning is a bit steep, but then it is great fun and most of the course is situated on the sunsite of the moutain. The first picture is taken half way where there is a small bar where you can heat up with a hot cocholate with rum, before you further descend.

On thursday the weather was not so good, so we visited a local museum on the local wildlife and life in the Alps. And no, this is not a living cow next to son #3. It is part of the display at the museum.

The next picture is at the Murmultiere. These are local animals that hibernate, but you can see their daily routine in the museum.

DH on the skies. He loves to ski.

Son #1 on skies, he is so proud of his first medal, he even sleeps with it. Great job Nic, we are very proud of you.

And offcourse all the stuffies of all our sons went with us. We always take a picture of them on our holidays. We started with only son #1´s on our first holiday, and continued the habit. So here they all are: sheep, bear and dragon/crocodil.

Son #2 is still too small to start ski lessons, so he spent his time well as you can see with coloring, even on the skipiste.

So it is already over, I am glad that we all made it home safe, because yesterday we past quite some accidents on our way home, and since Germany has limited speed limits, they are most of teh time serious, especially when foreigners are envolved. We are not used to the speeds the Germans drive, so a miscalculation is easily done.

So we are already looking forward to next year.

News from Austria

A small post without pictures, since I only have internet access in a local internet cafe, but you are not allowed to upload pictures.
The snow is perfect here in Königsleiten, the sun was shining but since yesterday a fog entered the valley and it started snowing, so teh wether turned a bit.
Nic had lessons since Monday and he was sooooo nervous. The quickly passed once he learned that the teacher spoke dutch and that most of the kids in his group were dutch. He had to ski and was allowed to ski with a higher group, and he did very well.
Yesterday the had a slalom contest and he was so focused on doing well that he forgot his speed, so he came in seventh, but he didn t fall and he passed the flags the correct way.
We then left him since it was snowing hard and Ruben was getting snowed in. Around 14.50 we returned and we just could see that Nic s group was coming down and that Nic felle and could t get up.
By the time the reached us, I could hear him cry for me. It turned out that after lunch they went to the highest point being, Königsleitenspitze (2315 m) and came down, it took the kids two hours to get back to Königsleiten (1600 m), so Nic was completely exhausted, poor thing, he was the youngest in the group, the oldest was 11 years.... so maybe it was a bit high fedged for him, but he did well.
At 16.00 there was the official end of the course and the small ones all got a medallion, so Nic was all proud and won t take the thing off...
We are very proud of him. Tomorrow morning we go riding with a horse drawn carriage in the snow and tomorrow evening, we have to pack so we can leave on Saturdaymorning.
So few time, so much to do...

Leaving for ski holiday

Just letting you know that we are leaving for one week of snow fun in Austria. Normally tomorrow I would have the day off to prepare everything, doing the laundry, packing the suitcases, but nothing ever goes as you plan.
I was called by school during lunch that Peter was sick and needed to be picked up, since I was at work in a client´s company, I told the people there the situation and the told me it was offcourse OK to leave. So I rushed home, but now I have to go back tomorrow morning to finish the work.
When I got to school, Peter was lying on a bed so I picked him up and we went to Nic´s class to get him as well, since I wouldn´t be able to pick him us a couple of hours later if Peter was sick.
But he wanted to stay in school so his teacher proposed to bring him home after school.
And she will also pick him up tomorrow morning. Isn´t that sweet? She is a wonderful teacher. Nic and we are very lucky with her.
So tomorrow afetrnoon I will load up the car and we will be on our merry way. I will pack my craft things as well, so if it snows, I will stay comfy in our chalet.
I will try to post from Austria - provided I find an internet connection.

Homespun - help wanted

Does any of you crafters know where you can buy this copy of Homespun magazine in Europe or for a resonable shipping price somewhere else. My son loves the rocket.
I asked my cousinwho lives in Melbourne, but she couldn´t find it. Do any of you ladies in melbourne know wher you can buy it?
I looked in an online australian bookstore, but the charged 16 dollars to ship it... A bit high for a 9 dollar magazine.
Or is there a crafter out there that wants to swap the magazine for an European magazine?
Any help is much appreciated.

Still snow

As you can see, after three days the snow is still here. For our part of the world, this is rather weird, it has been a couple of years now since the snow stayed put...
Peter had great fun this afternoon, when he made a snowman with his dad, as you can see on the picture.

The cupcake test

You can do a Cupcake test and check out what person you are. This is my cupcake:

At parties, you tend to be a social butterfly. You enjoy making conversation and making sure everyone is having fun.You hardly have any restraint. You only hold yourself back when absolutely necessary.The most important thing in your life is your significant other.You are dominant, vain, and a bit of a show off. To know you is to worship you.

It is a bit true...;-)

Alien bunnies

During the holidays I made these ´Alien´ bunnies. I think I will make a little pink vichy square skirt for the girl bunny, to make her more girly, although the pink color cannot be interpreted wrongly. The blue-ish bunny is a boy and I think they both turned out great.

As you can see, we have quite a bit of snow. Yesterday night it started snowing and at the moment it is still freezing so I think that it will stay for a bit. This morning a car got stuck in our streeds because of the slipperly road.

But for the kids it is great, I brought the boys to school on their sled, it hasn´t been used in quite some time, so it was big fun this morning.

Mushroom swap

This morning I went to the post office to pick up this parcel. Because we weren´t at home when he came by there was a note in the mailbox. It said a parcel for den Heijer, it didn´t say a forename. So this morning in the postoffice, the lady behind the counter refused to give me the parcel, because she said that it mentioned den Heijer on teh note. And my maidenname is Aerts. But on my ID card, it said Aerts, married to den Heijer. But she said that is was cleraly a parcel for my husband, and that I couldn´t pick it up... so I went home quite frustrated...

My husband went to the postoffice and showed the note and the lady left the counter and somebody else helped him out. What turned out? It said on teh parcel Margy den Heijer... so she gives the parcel to my husband who says, I am not Margy den Heijer, as you can see on my ID card. My wife was in here fifteen minutes ago and she was refused the parcel...

The lady said nothing and justed handed over the parcel. So I am no going to write a complaint... I am fed up with Belgian Post.

But the parcel is lovely. It was form Maria who was my swap parnter in a mushroom swap. She made three mushrooms for each of my sons. Thank you very much Maria, the boys love them.

January 1st

OK, so we survived 2008 with all our fingers and eyes and are all save and sound. As you can see I have real boys, who love fireworks. They spent an hour outside last night watching DH and his friends lighting fireworks.

We were one minute late looking for an accurate clock at our friends home, LOL, but we had a wonderful evening.

And according to Dutch tradition, we ate Oliebollen (the dark brown ones) and Appelflappen. Not really my cup of tea,but these were from a friend of ours that has a bakery and they have tasty ones. They received a 7/10 for their oliebollen. Last year they were the best Oliebollen bakery.

And according to Belgian tradition our children gave their best wishes for the New Year in the form of a Nieuwjaarsbrief. It is a poem that they memorize and tell to their godparents, grandparents and parents and they expect a little financial stimulanse for it. So here they are at breakfast.