Keukenhof

Keukenhof, the most beautiful spring garden in Europe. I had always wanted to visit it and finally after 4 years since knowing about this place, I made it last sunday.

 

My mother is here visiting us for two months and knowing that she would enjoy this garden, I arranged for a weekend trip to Amsterdam and Keukenhof in Lisse.

 

We arrived in Amsterdam on Saturday and left on Monday. On Sunday, we spent the day in Keukenhof. There were many flowers. The garden was perfumed with the scent coming from the beds of blooming hyacinths. The tulips in the open garden were mostly still in bubs. This spring is chilling so I guess the tulips would bloom a week later.

 

There were four pavillons with different themes. Each of them were amazing. Flowers were everywhere. There are many different kind of species. Just on tulips alone, there were many different kinds like 'Barbados', 'Lambada', 'Brooklyn', 'Sensual touch', 'Wedding gift', 'Victoria secret' just to name a few.

 

There were many people from all over the world. We even met Singaporeans who took photos for us. I took tons of photos but I am such a lousy photographer. Below are some photos from Keukenhof. Though a picture tells a thousand words, it is best to visit Keukenhof in person. My mother and I truly enjoyed the garden. It was wonderful for flower lovers.

 

Dandelion

Dandelion in french is called Pissenlit. Its direct translation would be 'peeinbed' due to the strong diuretic effect of the plant's roots. I was told that Pissenlit though consider a weed can be eaten as salad.

With just a few days of warm spring weather, my garden is full of weeds.

Seb is starting to dig a perimeter of 3m X 4m in the garden. It would be our vegetable plot. And looking at this area, it is already a vegetable garden full of dandelion to be used as salad. 

 

I have never tasted Pissenlit. I will be looking up for receipe online. Will update about my salad of pissenlit once it is done.

I'm a godmother

I am a godmother to a little MY since saturday. MY's mother and I are close friends since many years. I feel honored to be chosen as the godmother for this sweet baby girl.

The ceremony was held at the Greek Orthodox Church in Paris. This place is a hidden gem. Look at the beautiful façade. This side of the building is facing an inner court and opposite it is a 6 storey residental building. This façade is hidden from the public except the people living in the residental building.

 

 

 

The ceremony was intime with only families and a few close friends invited. MY's cousin was also baptised on this day. The two babies were well behaved. As the godmother, I had to carry MY all the time while the priest carried out the ceremony. It was long but MY did not cry much in my arms. She was so sweet.

 

After the ceremony, we headed to my friend's place for a meal. Though it was raining, the family prepared a BBQ and we had a great time chatting and festing.

Egg hunting

On Easter monday, we went to the kids' grandparents for lunch. It was a tradition for the kids to hunt for chocolate eggs during Easter. It was the first time that A2 hunt and pick eggs by himself. He went 'Wow' each time he found some eggs.

The older cousins helped the boys to point out the hiding places. I could tell that the boys had fun.

In the end, all the eggs were divided equally among the four grandchildren.

 This was the collect the two boys brought home. There were also bigger chocolates. Now, the boys asked for chocolates non-stop. I hid the basket and rationed an egg or two for them each day. Like my neighbour suggested, maybe these chocolates would end up as mousse au chocolat.

Two more bags

I made another two bags last week. The one below is a grab bag. It was not difficult to make. The finished bag was stiff as I used interface instead of craft fleece as indicated. It was my first attempt using iron on interface. I will make another grab bag but without the interface. I think the fabric is sturdy enough.

 

There are four pockets inside the grab bag.

 

 

 

I made a bag for my boy. It was supposed to be a 30mins boy messager bag. I thought: 'Great, just 30mins.' So when the boys slept, I started working on it at 9pm. At midnight, I was only half way through. I continued the next day. The bag below took me 5hours in total to make it. I find the front pocket too shallow. The next time, I will make it bigger. But I wonder when the next time will be.  

I am taking a break at the moment. I will most probably start making a new bag next week. Will post it once done.

Five stones

As I mentioned earlier in my post, the first thing I made from my sewing machine is five stones. Five stones are basically five little pyramids containing rice or beans inside. To play the game, we toss a stone into the air and try to catch it before it hits the ground. At the same time, we must use the same hand to pick up a stone or more (as the game advances) that is on the floor.

I bought some lovely fabrics and spent about an hour to made about two sets. Yeah, the slowest process is hand sewing the opening after putting in the rice. I guess I am good at making these. But I am a lousy player.

 

I went obsessed and made a jar of stones. Guess how many there are in the jar. If you get it right, there is a free set of five stones for you. Start counting. . . . .

 

Sewing bags

I asked for a sewing machine for Christmas and Father Christmas granted my wish. As a novice, I started making five stones. It was really easy. I will do a post about that later.

 

Now I am into bags. I found some interesting sites with free tutorials on making bags. Thank God for generous people who make an effort to share their talents on internet.

 

This is the first bag I did. As promised in the tutorial, it took an hour. I spent more time shopping for fabrics. It is not very practical to carry but I like that pocket in front. I use it to go to the library or to fetch A1 from school.

 

I bought a book titled 'Me and my sewing machine'. The book showed how to do stitches and hems and seams. At the end, there were various projects. I chose to do the bag illustrated and had done five of such little grocery bags. I love the colorful fabrics.

I also did a foldable grocery bag and had given that away before I took a photo. I have printed two other bag patterns and will try them out. I do not need all these bags and will surely give these bags away as gifts to friends. My mum-in-law requested for a beach bag. I hope to find a beach theme fabric and get it done by summer. Hopefully.... 

 

Sewing is fun.

Merry Go Round

Yesterday we went to Rambouillet which was a town nearby our village. The weather was spring like and everyone was out sitting at the terrace having a drink.

We had afternoon tea, ok, Seb had a glass of wine, I had a beer and the boys had orange juice. I asked the boys if they would like to go on the merry-go-round that was just beside the cafe. They said ok.  A1 never wanted to go on any merry go round but I felt that he had grown up and was curious about this beautiful merry-go-round in the town square.

Seb bought the tickets and for the first time, the boys took a ride on the merry go round. A1 wanted to be on the airplane and A2 chose the horse. We stayed beside the boys. It was a big merry-go-round and the boys had fun. A1 even asked for a second ride. We told him he could only do it once and it was time to go feed bread to the ducks in the castle garden.

The photo below is the said merry-go-round. It was closed when I visited Rambouillet with my friends from Singapore in February. Photo credit goes to Rachel.

  

When we go to Singapore this summer, I will propose the kiddy rides to A1. He refused it each time. I wonder will he accept it by then. 

Sonia Delaunay

The two weeks school holidays starts for A1. As usual, the teacher gave the parents the children's workbooks.

 

I am impressed with what they learn in school. Apart from the usual drawing horizontal and vertical lines; grouping images; coloring the différences etc..they had interesting experiments. One was playing in the snow and observing the frozen state of water. Then melting the snow. And freezing the snow in the freezer to get back to ice state.

 

 Recently, the teacher brought a little mouse to the class and everyone observed what the mouse was doing in its cage. Suggestions were given on what the mouse ate and the children experimented by feeding the mouse with suggested food. They then noted down what the mouse liked and disliked. In the end, they came up with three names and voted for the name 'Curieux' (Curious).

 

I saw this nice painting by A1 in his workbook. I do not know how much help he received but it was nice. The caption said 'Observing the master pièces of Sonia Delaunay and creating in one own's manner'.

 

I googled 'Sonia Delaunay' and realised she was an artist who used strong colours and geometric shapes. These 3 and 4 year old kids were exposed to arts at such a young age. I discovered an artist through my son.  

 

For my first Christmas in France, my sister in law gave me a book titled 'Petite encyclopédie de la Peinture' (Small encyclopedia of paintings). Then, my knowledge of arts were limited to what I learnt during those weekly hour of art lesson in Singapore. Over the years, I had learnt to appreciate arts more with visits to the abundance museums here. From now, I think I will learn more from my sons school work.  

Lo Hei (Prosperity Toss)

This was the second time I had it in my ten years in France. Lo Hei is a popular dish during the chinese new year in Singapore. One usually has it several times during the chinese new year period; with family, colleagues, friends, etc...

 

Every ingredient has a good meaning and while mixing them with raw fish (usually salmon) using chopsticks, we have to say good things. A good explanation can be found here. The higher we toss, the better. Imagine the mess on the table if the plate was not big enough.

 

On the 15th day of chinese new year, I invited Seb's family to celebrate chinese new year. We had lo hei and they enjoyed it a lot. This was a good starter. Maybe when my mum comes in April, we will toss it again.

Snowman creation

It snowed these few days so we had plenty of snow to practise on snowman building. This morning, after bringing A1 to school, A2 and I made this snowman in the backyard. A2 asked for a carrot for the snowman's nose.

When A1 came back from school, he wanted to make a snowman too. So we did one in the frontyard. He asked for a carrot but I told him to use the plastic bowling pin instead. Handsome had been stealing the carrots. A1 wanted to give the snowman arms but I only managed to find a twig in the snowy garden. Thus, the snowman only had an arm. He had ears and a hat, all made of snow so it is hard to notice them in the photo.

I quickly took photos of the snowmen with the boys. As I expected, once Handsome was out in the garden, there was not much left of the snowmen.

I am proud to say that our snowmen looked pretty decent this time round.

Chinese New Year visit

Chinese New Year 2013 was on 10 Feb. I am so fortunate to have two friends from Singapore visiting. Rachel and Aileen are part of the gang from my University days in Brisbane.

 

I was so happy to have reunion dinner with my family and my two old pals. We had steamboat. The girls bought me lots of Singapore goodies. Aileen surprised me with a box of freshly packed frozen durians. Wow. I had it on a late night chat. It was so good. Seb was surprised the next morning when he smelt something strange in the house.

 

 

The ladies visited Paris, Rambouillet, Chartres, Versailles and even spent a night over at Bordeaux and visited two wine properties. It was cold and rained during most of their stay here. It even snowed on the sunday we were at Notre Dame Cathedrale in Paris.

 

We drank lots of wine as "it was so cheap"; exclaimed my friends. We chatted into the late night and I put on 2 kilograms with all the pineapple tarts, mini spring rolls that my mum made, snacks, and good food that we had in Paris restuarants.

My boys enjoyed their presence and A1 was still asking for Rachel and Aileen after they left. We are meeting soon in July when we are heading to Singapore for summer vacation.

A1's drawings

Recently, A1 likes to draw. Given some pens and crayons and papers, he could spend long periods drawing. He would draw family members including his grandparents.

Seb and I can't draw for nuts so we are not able to guide him much.

I am delighted whenever he presents his drawings. He insists that we place them on the bedboard.

Here are two recent ones.

 

A1 explained that he was drawing his papa. I pointed at the dot and he said it was the bellybutton. He then opened wide his hands showing me what his papa was doing in the drawing.

 

 

After that, he presented another drawing showing me. I asked where my hands were and he said: "Like this"; and he stood straight with his hands by his side.  I also asked about the thing on top of my head and he said that it was a hat. Funny boy.

I like the way he drew smoke coming out of the chimney. He is an observing boy and always draw five fingers on each hand. This was the first time he included the bellybutton.

He is drawing better. A week ago, there was a gap between the house and the roof. And it was a frown on the face. There is still no smile on the face but he is getting there, I hope.