bonjour celine header

30.10.09

happy halloween!

ahh!!

space invader pumpkin

Yesterday, we carved our pumpkins! Jin carved a space invader, and I carved a pumpkin coming out of another pumpkin. Scary!! Hopefully these lanterns will let all the children in the neighbourhood know that we are candy friendly!

I need to learn how to take good photos in the dark. Practice practice practice.

We also started making our halloween costumes yesterday. Ours are made out of cardboard and paper, but it looks like it might rain on saturday night. Hmmm...we didn't think this one through did we? Hopefully we will have some pictures to show you! For now, I will keep it hush hush as to what we are going to be.

Today is
Nikole's birthday! Happy Birthday dear friend!

And, did you see the
illustration by my friend Yukiko? I think it is really adorable!

Happy halloween everyone!

28.10.09

Jammin'

IMG_2875

Melinda

hi Dre

lots of cinnamon

plum jam in the making

gingham top

This past weekend, Melinda showed me the steps to can food in jars! We made cinnamon plum jam to go in them and they match perfectly with their red gingham lids!

Dre kept us company while we were busy in the kitchen. He was posing for me, so I had to take a portrait of him. I also couldn't resist snapping some shots of her beautiful wall decals! (I am in love with her home!)

I have never had plum jam before, and we both agreed it turned out delicious! I love how cinnamon-y it is! We drizzled the jam over some apple turnovers Melinda made before I came. Yum!

I got an advanced peak of the book she illustrated
(LE GÉRANIUM), and I must say, every single illustration is stunning! I already have my favourites! I cannot wait to see them in real life at her gallery show coming up next saturday!

It was a lovely saturday Melinda, thanks for having me over!

27.10.09

And the winner is....







thank you

Congratulations Jen Hsieh! I drew your name out of the jar!

And a double congratulations to Jen, because, her and
Kyle recently got married!!! I got a sneak peak of her wedding photos, and it looked gorgeous!

Thank you all for entering, the response was more than I ever expected! I am so glad you all said hello, now I met a lot of new friends!

22.10.09

snap and tumble letterpress

Tanya's press











birthday card

Remember, I mentioned about a letterpress workshop I took with my friend, Mark? I am finally posting about it now.

We went over to
Tanya's home and she introduced us to her letterpress machine! I was so excited, because I have been looking for an opportunity to try letterpressing for awhile now! We made some beautiful cards, and Mark made business cards of MoFUN (Ministry of Fun!). I knew letterpressing would be accurate, but I was still so impressed at how crisp and precise each letter came out. I would love to have more opportunities to do this in the future. Thanks Tanya! You created the perfect workshop for people who are curious about the process, and have never touched a letterpress before.

The reason it took me so long to post this is because I took some film shots at the workshop, and it took me this long to finish the roll. My resolution for next year should be to take more film photos.

20.10.09

muffins cure

mmmmmuffins!

sharing

I had a slight headache last night, so I didn't feel like doing the work I was supposed to do.

I made carrot muffins instead!

Melinda posted about this recipe, and as I read it, I realized that I had everything in the house to make this, except walnuts and yogurt! I happily ran to my corner store to get these two ingredients.

I have never made muffins before. Can you believe it? In Melinda's photo of her muffin, she had a little puff of white cream on top of hers, and it reminded me that I wanted to learn how to make cream cheese frosting, which, I also had all the ingredients for!

Baking wouldn't be right if we didn't share it! I left two muffins for my neighbour upstairs by his door, along with his mail that came in today. If you came by, I would give one to you for your breakfast tomorrow too!

And now, my headache is gone. I definitely think it was the muffins that made it go away.

mmmmm!

19.10.09

bonjour! giveaway!

My first giveaway!

monthly

weekly

bon voyage print

Hello everyone!

Thank you for all your kind comments on our ballooning adventure! I was so flattered with the response! I hope you all get to try it some day, and I advise you to dress very warmly if you go on an autumn morning. My feet were frozen when we were up in the sky!

I have something I want to tell you, and I hope you will like it!

Remember my
schedule book? Well, the 2010 books came out, and I have an extra one this year. I want to give it away to one of you, my dear friends.

I love these schedule books by Shinzi Katoh, they are filled with his playful illustrations on every page. I love the practical layout they created, perfect for someone like me, who needs a lot of space to write out really messy, ever changing lists. This year, they made the book smaller than the previous years, so it is the perfect size to fit in your bag.

I also wanted to give you something by me in my very first giveaway! On the theme of planning, I remember when I took this photo, I was anticipating how much fun we were going to have on our upcoming trip to PEI. I hope 2010 has a lot of exciting things in store for you!

Do say hello, and leave a comment here by Monday, October 26th, 12:00 am EDT. I will draw a name and announce the winner next week! The lucky winner will get a Shinzi Katoh schedule book, and a 10cm x 10cm "bon voyage" print, printed on archival paper with archival ink.

I hope you all had an amazing weekend!

13.10.09

from above

air ballooning!





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from above

from above


7 people floated into the air in a cozy wicker basket. We were 1500 ft above ground, and I wasn't as scared as I thought I would be. I didn't feel that funny tickle in my stomach, the one you get when you go really high up on a rollercoaster.

Jin and I finally went air ballooning! We were planning to do it for our anniversary, but the weather was not cooperating then. We were lucky we only had to wait a month later to take flight. I think it was better that we waited, we got to see some autumn colours.

We took flight at dawn, so it was very peaceful. We floated above farms, and some dogs were barking at us from below, but they looked like tiny tiny ants from where we were.

After we landed, we all had a toast of champagne! It is a ballooning tradition, dating back to the first balloon flight from Paris in 1783. Farmers thought that the hot air balloon that landed in their field were demons falling from the sky, and they came after it with pitchforks. The pilots offered the farmers champagne, to prevent them from destroying their balloon!

We had a more friendly greeting when we landed, farmer's children in their pyjamas happily running towards us instead!

12.10.09

textures

swatches

rows

above

Jin and I went on a little adventure today, can you guess what we did?

I promise to post more about this soon.

Happy Canadian Thanksgiving everyone!

6.10.09

featured on KITKA

display


Juli and John run the amazing Toronto design blog, KITKA. I love their blog because, they make me aware of where to find some amazing local vintage furniture (currently, I have been searching for lighting), and they always post up the most inspiring images of architecture and interiors, and it always makes me itch to build something for our apartment (or, knock down some walls, if we could!). But most importantly, their blog makes me realize more and more that this city I call home, is such an amazing place to be.

Today, Juli and John are featuring our orange bookshelves on KITKA!

Wow! Thank you! Go over there to see more images of our metal library shelves.

5.10.09

Fall

fallen

I was walking up my street, meeting some friends to eat what I did not know at the time would be one of the best portuguese chicken places I have ever been to,

and I saw this, fallen on the ground.

I thought it was so pretty.

4.10.09

soft white animals

sleeping Kai

little Chai

Kai's Paws

Chai chomp

Roz has two pets, and they match eachother! They are both mostly white in colour! Roz and Andrew just got Kai, a Siberian Husky, a week ago.

I wanted to meet puppy Kai before he grew into a big dog forever. He was so full of energy and was pouncing on me, like a cat! After hours of fun, he fell into his puppy sleep, and he looked like such a peaceful boy. I love how clumsy and big puppy paws are compared to the rest of their body.

Chai is their bunny! He is a pooping machine! I have never seen a floppy eared bunny before, and I kept playing with his ears! He totally didn't mind. He also doesn't mind it if you touch his incredibly soft cotton tail.

Thanks for having me over Roz. It was cute overload!

1.10.09

skills that pay the bills

skills that pay the bills


Look what I learned at work today.

I had to send out some large drawings, and I asked someone if they could show me how to properly fold one.

There is a proper way.

He pulled out his old technical textbook, with this diagram in it! It clearly shows the folds one should make depending on your drawing size.

I don't know what it is, but I think I was enamoured by the technical drawing. I like technical drawings, but I don't like them when I cannot figure them out. Thank goodness that this one was easy to read. Now I know how to fold a drawing.


Hey, did you know that it is October already! Happy October everyone!