took down our studio wall-collage to make way for a new one
brought/found fabrics to for new lounge room cushions
have one child with a black eye (ari – over-zealous climbing accident)
started re-organising raph’s office with bonnie (our awesome new helper!)
had much fun with cut paper
enjoyed a brief moment of sunshine (hurry up spring!)
was spoilt with presents from raph – welcome home papa! we missed you xx
and still coming back down to earth and feeling slightly surreal after our tokyo rendezvous. as expected it was amazing, inspiring, delicious and super-fun, and also at times sweaty, exhausting and exasperating (mostly due to travelling with small children in a huge and humid megalopolis with A LOT of stairs). i am still sorting through my photos but will be posting about all my favourite parts and discoveries soon.
in the meantime here is one of my favourite discoveries – textile company tafca. i happened across a display they had put together in parco books (pictured below), where i couldn’t resist buying a scarf in the “dancing” print (also shown below). most of their site is in japanese, but there is an english description in the “concept” section which is so sweet – have a read here
more tokyo soon!
p.s this is my 100th post!! who would have thought? not me! as i have said many times before i am loving the blog-life – apart from providing a way to show new work its also been a great form of therapy and support for me. thanks to anyone out there for who takes the time to read my excessively wordy babble xoxo
three more sleeps!
ari turned 2! i made chocolate blue dinosaur cake (ari’s request) for his party and coconut cake with passion fruit icing for his actual birthday. happy birthday to the one we like to call “thug life” – can you please stop growing up so fast?!
i finished the art direction for the new whitley album. artwork turned out a treat. here is new logo (much better than the old new logo).
I had really big email dramas that went on for 6 days. it not only affected my email but also my site and this blog (i notice my last post has disappeared somewhere into cyberspace? anyone seen it?). apart from the pure frustration of communications breakdown while trying to meet 2 deadlines – i discovered i am quite O.C.D when it comes to my email and cant survive more than 15 minutes without checking my inbox, so i was quite freaked out. and yesterday afternoon when it was fixed, more than 350 emails poured in. so awesome.
i wore my new favourite dress for the first time – the “noon day” dress from latest PAM collection. shauna.t really does design the best dresses. i wish i got a few so i never had to wear anything else.
wallpaper samples from pottok arrived in the mail. i will be the first to admit i am a geoff mcfetridge groupie. proper. just to get these samples was like touching a piece of his artwork *shivers*. and check out the cute scalloped edge. after a week of placing them in various places in our house, i think i have now found the perfect spot for my GM whale wall (wallpapering has now moved to the top of my “house projects to do” list)
i found some pretty geometric circular objects around the house. i feel (yet another) a collection coming on….
suitcase packing madness. tomorrow we are going on our first family holiday in 3 years – to malaysia! we are going to visit raph’s relatives and then indulge in some tropical island resort luxury. we will also arrive just in time for hari raya celebrations. right now i am out of my mind with mental lists, excitement and nervousness, and wondering how a sqiurmy 2 yr old is going to cope with an 8 hr flight.
i am planning to stay as far away from computers as possible so blog posts might well be absent of the next 2 weeks. til next time – jampa lagi!
will be posting about the special kit giveaway tomorrow or thursday… stay tuned!
to be honest, i am not much for surfing the internet. not that i have anything against it, but i guess generally i dont have time. but this week, i have come across 2 blogs that i really like. one is playscapes - a blog about playground design. i love anything creative and educational designed for children, and this blog has some great stuff – such as these 2 amazing photos
either of those in my backyard would be fine thanks.
the other blog dragging my attention away from work/children/masterchef (well maybe not masterchef) is hello sandwich - a blog by ebony bizys – senior designer at vogue living and also an amazing artist in her own right (see below and also design files interview here) .
she has a great mix of design, craft, cute fashion and green issues/tips (including a promo for 1 million women cutting carbon action – i just joined – you should too – if you are female that is). she is also obsessed with japan (like myself) and sometimes has great competitions with lovely vintage prizes. ebony, consider yourself bookmarked!
my grandma has alzheimer’s, and recently it has become more severe, so she has had to move from her retirement village into a home with 24 hr care. the effect of the alzheimer’s is pretty awful, particularly for my mum who cops the brunt of her moods and paranoias such as – “this new place is a prison! they are posioning my food in here!” and the delightful ” i wish i had put you and your brothers in an orphanage”. but occaionally, it has its comedic upsides, such as her proclaiming recently at lunch – ” i am going to try something i have never had before – spaghetti bolognese”, and also, making mum remove the new flatscreen tv she had just brought her as she liked what was on her old one better.
anyway, whilst packing up her stuff from her old place, mum came across a box of grandma’s pretty, neatly folded, hankies. mum saved them for me. they look amazing all together (below is just a small selection) and are an awesome hand-me-down. they almost seemed to be some kind of symbol of how she used to be (and sometimes still is) – gentle, very cheery, a little eccentric, and always thrifty. so thanks mum, and thanks grandma.
on a brighter note – on the weekend we went to our friend sofia’s 6th birthday party . here is her present wrapped in the paper i created for frankie magazine (lovely ladies there gave me a bunch extra so if anyone wants some please email me!), cupcakes by olivia, and sofia’s birthday mask / pinata mask
oh, and i am now also on twitter. along with this blog, facebook and ebay who knows how i will find the time. one of them might have to go. and it wont be ebay.