A present for Eloise

We have been shown so much love ever since Eloise came into our lives and when Christmas came, she received some beautiful and thoughtful gifts. This gift in particular is very special to me.

Rosalyn made this sweet play mat for Eloise with a community of houses appliqued onto it. I love the design and the details she put into it (look at the patterns on the roofs!). I can only imagine how much love and heart went into this, I was in shock when we opened this gift.

Because to me, quilts equal love

handmade equals love, and we love you Roz.

Thank you so much Roz! Eloise is so lucky. We are taking this upstairs, downstairs and to the park with us.

decadent girl brunch

I have never had dessert at brunch until I started brunching with these girls!
We certainly are treating ourselves to the finer things in life.

I had a beautiful Sunday brunch at l'ouvrir with Anabela, Charlyn, Melinda, Nikki and Nikole. This brunch was especially lovely because it was the first time we were all able to come out.

All the more reason for dessert at brunch.

watch them make it

If we are lucky, we will see bungeoppang's being made at the Korean grocery store and we always get a freshly made one. These ones being made have a red bean filling.

Watching food being made is just as fun as eating it don't you think?

This definitely goes on my "favourite snacks" list.

some gifts for our near future

We have received some really sweet gifts so far from some of our dearest friends and I can’t stop gushing over them because they are all tiny in nature!

A peach dreamcats 2012 calendar from Anabela and Geoff that will go so well in char siu bao’s room! It will be such a treasured keepsake to have for the year she is born.

Nikole gave us this sweet little plush lamb on wheels and this adorable shirt dress I want to have in a full size version for myself!! My mind still can't believe a little human will fit into something so tiny.

A sweet glow in the dark blanket from my brother and his girlfriend by Electrik Kids. It is made with the softest organic cotton and silkscreened with make believe constellations in glow in the dark paint. I love the illustrations!

Melinda knitted the tiniest and most adorable baby mittens I have ever seen!

Thank you so much! Char siu bao is such a lucky little girl!

A Christmas Surprise

All I want for Christmas is a Mojo bouffant for me and a salt and pepper Mea beard for Jinny!

A little while ago, Jin and I commissioned Melinda & Chris to do collaborative cat portraits of Mea and Mojo with no rush of a timeline. We were surprised when they handed us two lovely packages in time for Christmas and were even more surprised when we opened them to find that they snuck Jin and I in the portraits too!!

Just imagine howls of laughter when the paintings were revealed to us! Jin and I were completely blown away! And for the cherry on top, Chris handmade the frames for the paintings! What an amazing Christmas surprise!

Happy holidays and Merry Christmas from Jinny, Mea, Mojo and I (and char siu bao is hiding in there!), courtesy of Melinda & Chris!! This year has been an amazing and eventful one for our growing little family and I am very much looking forward to spending time with our family and a few quiet days at home with Jinny and Mea and Mojo this week.

Now I must head back to our Christmas festivities (which translates to "eating all day")! Bye everyone!

(I replaced the images of the paintings with scans Melinda provided me. They are much more accurate to the real paintings!)

(Thank you Henry for taking the photo of Jinny and I!)

treasures I brought home

I love what I do because I feel like people ask me to take pictures and hang out with amazing people and this weekend was the ultimate amazing-people-hanging-out-time. When Becky approached me asking if I'd be interested in taking photos and documenting City of Craft 2011 a few months ago, I didn't even hesitate to say yes! I knew it would be a weekend of inspiration being surrounded by so many talented vendors. Now City of Craft has come and gone and it was amazing. I hope you had the chance to drop by.

I wanted to bring home so much more but I had to practice much self-restraint.

I got a Squirrel Crest Bottle from rcboisjoli for my brother because I saw him eyeing it when he came to visit me at the show.

Some very soothing balm from Truth & Beauty for my ever growing belly (it has worked really well so far too!)

I couldn't resist getting this pretty necklace for myself from the talented duo, Caboto!

This lovable Lucky Number 13 Cat from Fools Gold will probably keep char siu bao company in the nursery!

A few shots I took this weekend are already up! You can see them in this flickr set. Watch for more in the coming weeks!

Victory Patterns!

Kristiann is the talent behind Victory Patterns, a line of fashionable and unique sewing patterns for various skill levels. I was so excited when we met a few months ago to talk about shooting the line and I am so proud to see how everything came together! She launched Victory Patterns yesterday!

Kristiann made my job so easy, she put a beautiful girl in beautiful outfits in front of my camera and the outcome is amazing! Thank you Erin for being such an amazing model! It is hard to choose which pattern my favourite is but I am quite fond of the Madeleine skirt and the Hazel dress! It is definitely on my sewing to do list post pregnancy.

See more pieces from the launch here.
And if you sew, take a look at the full pattern collection in her online shop here.



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Thank you sincerely for all the heart felt comments, emails and tweets on char siu bao’s gender reveal! I thought it was really sweet that some of you wrote that you teared up a little! I am so happy I could share this amazing moment of our lives with you.

Kinfolk

The cats gathered around as I opened this lovely package I received from Nathan in the mail. I think they sensed how excited I was to take a peak at the first issue of Kinfolk Magazine.

Nathan compiled an amazing group of people for the first issue; I have read all the articles, poured over every image and I am so inspired by each piece. Congratulations to everyone involved!

I was lucky to be part of the first issue in a small way. My photo of a house from our travels is placed at the end for farewell. I quite love it in that spot.

I spent the evening reading through the magazine with the cats sitting close by. I mentioned before that I never really had success getting Mea and Mojo in the same photograph together but for one reason or another, they both decided to sit with me that day. I loved that I was spending time with my cats while reading about time spent with yourself, or with loved ones.

Polyhedron

Look at this giveaway I won from Caitlyn of Lemonade! I have been loving faceted geometric shapes lately and the colours she chose goes so well together! I love her style, and if you are lucky enough to know Caitlyn in person, you'll agree that she is one of the cutest girls you'll ever know. I am so happy I have this necklace! Thank you so much Caitlyn!

I always get a little nervous when showing my work for others. Your extremely kind comments always make me feel silly that I even worried! So, thank you for your kind words on my last post, from the bottom of my heart.

Is today the first day of spring? Well, if it is, happy first day of spring! I am going to try to make this for dinner today! It looks so good!

as if it was for me

Tanya printed these cards for the PAL-SAC social letter writing night last week and I was very excited to pick one up.

I joke to Tanya that these were made, just for me.

That yellow burst makes me so happy!

I hope you all had a lovely weekend. I can't believe it is over already!