Red

 Oh yeah, we could harvest our first red tomato before our vacation starts.

And there are more to come:

Will there be some tomatoes left for us

when we come back?

Beginning of the Blues

No, I am not sad. Quite the opposite. I am actually very happy, because the blueberry self-picking season has started this week. We have discovered a blueberry farm last year and this year the blueberries have grown even bigger there (as have the girls).

 Hello fresh blueberries galore, smoothies and muffins!

Hubby's Veggie Garden 2.0

Hubby's garden activities started later then intended this year, 

but now they are taking form:

Zucchini, pumpkin and self-sown potatoes from last year.

A new addition:

 tomatoes

... and built just yesterday:

a herb garden

with rosemary, oregano, thyme, parsley, cilantro, chives, ruccola

and a bean plant.

We'll see what this season brings!

Summer Time Out

... just my favourite time of year.

Carolina's Garden Bath

... soaking up every bit of pre-summer.

Carolina's Garden Art

She asked for rose petals and collage paper, 

got herself some white paper and got to work.

the proud and happy artist:

Have you seen those amazing

flower mandalas here?

Beauty for the moment.

Sun Sun Sun

 ... sorry, no time for blogging.

I am soaking up the sun in the garden.

Analogue and simple life

at its best.

Pink Moment of the Week

... this Sunday: our first family outdoor lunch of 2014.

Chocolate on Monday

Valentine's Day is over.

But feel free 

to help yourself to a little self-love this Monday.

The Power of Orange

Do you remember the Veggie Box I used to photograph in 2011 (here)?

We still get it delivered to us and enjoy its contents.

Last time we had so much orange goodness in it,

I just had to take a picture:

Oranges, 

blood oranges for juicing, 

clementines

and a hokkaido.

Wishing you a vitamin-filled start of the week!

1.1. 2014

 2014 - I love that number!

And I also love New Year resolutions.

You might have already noticed in the top right corner of this blog, I am starting another 365 days project today - a year of daily decluttering. I have tried before in 2011 (here) and I am a lot better now at cleaning and house-keeping, but there is still too much stuff. We moved into our house 1,5 years ago and decluttered then and we did a flea market last year (here), but still stuff accumulates. Stuff, you have forgotten about, stuff you don't need and stuff that doesn't make you happy. This year I am serious and what helps me more to keep decluttering than blogging about it? Just the good feeling it gives me. So if you are interested in how decluttering is coming along, you are kindly invited to visit my blog:

http://365declutter.blogspot.com

Maybe you would even like to join me in this project and we can share experiences and be happy with less stuff in our lives.

Less clutter means also more space for creativity and fresh ideas. My inspirational book stack for things I would like to try in 2014 looks like this:

The other day I found this yarn graffiti at the door to a local bookstore:

 (Read again)

And of course!!!, there will be knitting and sewing. Last year I wanted to make socks and I managed to knit three pairs (here, here and here), each pair trying new techniques. 2014 I want to knit a pair of green socks, toe-up, on one long circular needle. I also will finish a green knitted spring dress from 2011 and and a white summer sweater from 2010.

The rest will be a surprise. I already love it.

Flow

A new magazine at the news stand caught my attention last week - Flow magazine, the first German edition, saying: "the magazine for women, who want to see life a different way" (ahem). The magazine started in the Netherlands five years ago and also has an English edition since 2012. Now it was time for the German marget, target group women aged 30-45 (ahem).

It is a magazine for paper lovers - up to last week I didn't know I was one... (ahem), the magazine is printed on different kinds of paper and comes with free paper goodies, e.g. this time: wrapping paper, gift tags and a specially designed notebook by artist Natascha Boels (who is also featured in the magazine).

Other main topics are positive psychology, creativity and the ever-popular mindfulness (see also the last magazine I bought here), the different sections are titled: "feel connected", "live mindfully", "spoil yourself" and "simplify for life".

Craft-wise,

I found an article about granny-square-mania all around the globe ...

... and another inspiring article about 365-day-projects 

to boost your creativity. 

You can also learn how to make your own stamps, 

glimpse into the lives of creative women,

read about the 5 favourite books of a bookseller 

or just look at clouds to practice awareness.

I will watch out for more.

Potatoes

After the zucchini (here) it was now time to harvest the potatoes in Hubby's little veggie garden.

They look like potatoes, the taste like potatoes (good potatoes, for their pure taste best cut in slices and simply baked in the oven for half an hour), but they are something more to us. Our potatoes, from our backyard.

And even though I must have eaten hundredweights of potatoes in my life, only now I understand their true earthy quality, a food so grounding - coming from the ground.

From the Garden

Hubby came in with these two bowls from his garden today. Arugula and pink chard. You can't get them fresher or more organic, I guess. I would prefer those greens over flowers anytime. Some of them went into my jogger's juice and most of it into the Big Dinner Salad. Even Clara devoured it and she usually doesn't even look at the salad. Feels so good!

Garden Man

Hubby has just said: "I am going in the garden and make some place for the new plants." That fits today's blog topic perfectly.

Hubby's vegetable garden - his new pride and joy. 

This year Hubby started out on his gardening adventure, he dug up patches (and removed the remains of my last year's attempt at gardening), put bricks around them and bought seeds and plants for potatoes, chard, zucchini, lettuce, kohlrabi and arugula. And his garden is doing fine. More often than not I hear him disappearing at night to "water his garden" or talking about how the potatoes are doing.

Word has spread about his garden, I guess. So at our birthday party we were gifted with those:

Flowers, lavender, hokkaido and zucchini plants, a pear tree and a blackcurrant bush. They really need some garden space of their own. Personally, I am still waiting for my thumb to turn green, but I suspect that I am more of an organic vegetable lover/cook/eater. But, you know, in a marriage there must be balance, one in the garden, one in the kitchen.

So I am very proud of my garden man who also deserves a break now and then (under the roses that he cut back so well).

Pink Moment of the Week

... at the Flea Market on Saturday. Great sunshine weather, great location at the Oldenburg Castle, nice people and a great opportunity to let go of old stuff (the money made is a nice by-product of the process).
Extra info: this was actually only the second flea market of my life.
What sold best: my CD collection and books.

Pink Moment of the Week

... with a little bit of white frosting.
First snow is always special.

Sniff, Sniff

Thank you, headless Mr. Gingerman, for giving yourself to us, so we could have soothing ginger tea.

What Carolina likes to do at Home

If you ever wondered what life with a 10-month-old baby girl can be like, here is some insight.

Carolina likes watching the washing machine in process...

... and helping me to sort the laundry afterwards.

She plays with her own toys every now and then...

... but finds the toys in her big sister's room much more interesting.

Carolina also sneaks into Papa's room...

... to tear at the not-so-very-adhesive cover of the sitting room table (here is how we made it), that has found temporary asylum in Papa's room, so Carolina has free access to the couch for walking along.

The most engaging thing in Mama's studio...

... is the wheel of of the antique Victoria sewing table.

Felt feels good to play with too...

... maybe Carolina feels that this is the fabric of her coming birthday present.

But also other rooms of the house encourage roaming about...

 










... crawling through a chair in the living room...

... and taking a well-deserved 2-seconds-rest afterwards.

The furnace offers some technical power of attraction...

... as does the dish washer in the kitchen.

This little girl already likes to help...

... her Mama when it comes to cleaning.

Exhausting thing, I tell you...

... getting up from another 2-seconds-rest.

For fortifying, eating noodles is a favourite...

... but dropping them and picking them up from the floor tastes even better!

Also delicious...

... tearing up and eating paper...

and how can it be not... Mama's wool and knitting.