Our musicians

Playing an instrument is no easy-peasy for our girls. The practising every day is responsible for a lot of chagrin in our house. But when I ask whether the girls want to stop playing, they say they don't. Last sunday they played in a string-orchestra for the first time. Practise all day and a performance for the parents in the end of the afternoon. These moments completely make up for all those annoying ones! Goosebumps, seeing two daughters play there. To pass time during the day, A and I went into the city of Eindhoven and discovered a wonderful lunchroom called 'onder de leidingstraat'.

Pide

A simple pide from the cookbook Veggiestan. Very easy to make, especially with my bread-baking-machine at hand for the kneading. Unfortunately I forgot to add salt to the dough. Which was a little bit compensated by the delicious salted butter my husband brought from France a few weeks ago. But I still would add salt next time I'll bake this bread. And I will because I love this Turkish bread.

Ten!

We have two teenagers now. Our youngest reached the age of 10 last week. And although modest in size herself, her wishlist becomes longer every year: earrings, eau de toilette, clothes, make-up bag, make-up, preferably a horse, pony camp, candy, topmodel colouring books, riding clothes for matches, felt tips, pencils, a flight to Thailand, doll or barbie, money (more than my sister has got), schoolbag, books, plants for my bedroom, games, chocolate, high heels, cinnamon cake, lime cake and go to an old church filled with trampolines for my birthday party. Many of her wishes were fulfilled, but I think you can guess which ones weren't.

Jan de Bie

My new job at the Grafisch Atelier offers me ample opportunities to spend my money right away. On my first day I met Jan de Bie, the artist that made this beautiful linocut artwork, who came in to sign this series before they went off to the museumshop. I love his work! Number 1 of 25 already found its way to our living room. And for our youngest, because she likes to be seen, I bought this small work of Marieke Peters. A work of Willemijn van Dorp, who's also working and always experimenting in the Grafisch Atelier, is now high on my list of must-haves. But first work some more. Here you can find more work of artists working there. Maybe you'll find something you like!

Looks

These apple cake roses were all over Pinterest a while ago. They looked so good! Mine looked fine too. Only a little too dark around the edges. But we were a bit disappointed by the taste. The puff pastry was not completely done. We still vote for regular Dutch apple pie!

Passing on

To me, kiwi's seem to be a bit out of season. But I got a bag of small kiwi's from my mom. She had gotten them from a friend of hers, who had already made more kiwi-jam than she could eat. This friend got the kiwi's from someone who obviously had a greenhouse full of these green vitamin bombs. By the time they arrived at our place the kiwi's were almost overripe and I had to make jam right away. And I passed on the jam again. Two jars back to my parents, one to my friend for loaning me some kitchen-utensils and one to mrs Lightbluegrey when we went there for a visit. The last one stays with us.

Summer bracelets

Last year I single crocheted simple two embroidery stand bracelets for the girls. They wore them until they fell off some weeks ago. I tried to let them knot their own bracelets, but couldn't persuade them, alas. There's hope, I wasn't interested in crafts and certainly not talented in my youth and see how all turned out. So, till then, I am happy to make my sweeties some new bracelets. These are made like a fishtail braid. This tutorial shows how to braid with three colours. For some, I used four colours and that worked out perfectly too.

Egg cakes

One daughter hates them, the other loves them: egg cakes. Never knew they were so easy and quick to make. No tricks, just mix and bake. We had a similar recipe like this one, but added some lemon zest for a fresh note. No store-bought 'eierkoeken' for us anymore from now on.

Screen-printing course?

Spring has arrived here, but I'm still having a cold. Tissue time is not over yet. Some time ago I have sewn a set of tissue pouches and one of them is in my handbag all the time. Lovely project for small scraps of fabric. I used my screenprinted constellation fabric. Would you like learn how to screen-print too? The Grafisch Atelier in Den Bosch has some spots available at the crash course (april 16th) and basic course (may 9th, 23rd and 30th) in screen-printing.

Retro

Two new supplements to our living room. The Ferm Living plant box was on my wish-list for some time. Not cheap for a plant box though and not something necessary. So it had to wait. But now it's here. Such a good addition to our seventies house without window-sills. The new constellation in the living asked for another item. A knotted plant-hanger. Just 5 minutes of work and very easy to make.