Bloglovin

Follow my blog with Bloglovin

Cute and Original Origami Elephants for the Nursery

 
Using Origami for decoration is relatively new to me.  I've played with Origami, I made a swan once and I was impressed by the origami balloons (a cube made out of paper where a gentle blow puffs it up into a balloon), and I even fold my plastic bags using an Origami technique, but never really though of it as a decorating alternative.  That is until my mom started trying Origami last summer.  She made boxes, stars, and some animals.  She even made a whole bunch of Christmas ornaments in beautiful pastel colors using paper with intricate designs.  The combinations were really gorgeous.  I have another post on that coming up.

origami elephants

Well back to my first Origami for decoration experience...when she showed me the things she had made I was really impressed.  At the time I was looking into original ways of decorating my new baby's nursery following the jungle theme of the bedding set I had bought for him.  So naturally my first Origami trials were animals.  I tried a giraffe and the elephant and even a butterfly.  The giraffe was not so easy and I did not have enough patience to finish it so after about an hour of trying, I gave up.  The butterfly wasn't so bad, I was able to finish it, but I was having a boy so that was not going to cut it.  I looked into lions, but couldn't find anything that seemed easy enough for a beginner.  However I was able to find a youtube tutorial for an elephant which was easy enough for me to repeat and make more than one.  (My mom actually made the other two for me).  Here is the link to Leyla Torres elephant blog and video tutorial.
 http://www.origamispirit.com/2013/04/how-to-make-an-origami-elephant/
 

I think this ended up looking really cute and I think it adds a lot of color and personality to the nursery.  I love the way it sits with the rest of the room.

Wonderfully Golden Crunchy & Crispy Homemade French Fries (from scratch)

I love french fries! and when I was living in Belgium I was able to get fries often in the many Friteries all around town. But since moving back, getting fries means going to Mc Donalds, Burger King or buying oven fries at one of the grocery stores.  I am not a really picky eater so I can eat all this fries, but there is nothing better than actual fries made from scratch.  

So, I ventured to make my own fries after calling my mom as she used to make them for us when I was growing up.   After a very simple few steps, I ended up with these amazing fries! seriously they were really delicious. 

Ingredients:                                                          

-Potatoes (I like gold potatoes)         

-Vegetable oil                                                         

-Salt                       

-Water

-Mayonaise, Ketchup, any other sauce

Ingredients

How to:
1. Pour oil in a small pan (fill about about half the pan) and heat in medium high heat.
2. Cut all potatoes into long strips
3. Submerge them in water with lots of salt for 20 minutes
3.  Dry the potatoes with kitchen paper towels.  (very important, because otherwise the fries will absorb the oil and end up soggy instead of crispy and crunchy.)
4.  Lay small batches of potatoes in oil and fry until golden, about 10 minutes each batch.

5.  Add salt to the fries as soon as you take them out of the pan so that the oil help the salt to stick to them.

6.  Enjoy the fries with mayonaise

Submerge potatoes slices in salted water

Dry potatoes thorougly

I love to eat them with Mayo instead of ketchup!

DIY: Fun, quick and Easy Pipe Cleaner Snowflake Tutorial

I have not mention it yet, but me and a friend are teaching and Intro to Spanish class for preschoolers.  We are in our trial period right now, and depending on how things go, we might make it into a full class for September this year.  We will see...In any case, for the lesson I prepared for this past week, I wanted to have a fun activity.  The theme was "The Weather" and textured, colorful little snowflakes were a perfect visual aid for the little guys.

The good news is that after the lesson,  the kids can keep these snowflakes and use them as  fun winter decorations.  (They would've also been great for Christmas but I had so many other projects around Christmas time that these one never popped to mind).

So in any case, I took my Spanish lesson as an opportunity to create a tutorial about how to make a simple pipe cleaner snowflake.  I am sure there are a lot of snowflake tutorials out there, but on purpose, I did not Google any of them, so any similarities with others you might see are pure coincidences.   

Let's begin:  they are very easy to make, you can make them small using just 1 pipe cleaner or big using 3 pipe cleaners. Personally I think the snowflakes look much cuter in the smaller version, so I thought it was better to make  a lot of small snowflakes versus one or two of the bigger one.
If you are making the bigger version (using 3 pipe cleaners) just go to step 5 and tie the pipe cleaners as on the picture

Step 1: "Z" shape the pipe cleaner

Step 2: Gather all the sides

Step 3: "tie" the pipe cleaners in the middle

Step 4: Cut the loops

Step 5: this is the way it should look once you cut the loops.

Step 6: Make a "Z" on each of the 6 legs

Step 7: then pull the "Z" down towards the rest of the "leg" and form a "Y".  Repeat for each side

Doodling on Glass Canisters a quick and easy DIY

One morning, back in October last year, I opened my pantry and a moth flew out.  I thought it strange, but didn't worry about it until a few days later, when I was killing time reading my local discussion forum and one of the titles read: "help: pantry moth infestation."  P A N I C! Did I have an infestation I did not know about?....It turns out I didn't, but I did google "pantry month" and realized that moths could enter your pantry, feed on anything that is not fully and properly sealed, lay eggs and create and infestation pretty quick.  Also, this apparently is a result of very warm summers and leaving back doors open.  So basically my open oatmeal or flour packages were a moth feast just waiting to happen.

Needless to say I went on a pantry cleaning spree, taking everything out and throwing out every opened box.  I guess the moth I found had probably just entered the pantry and I caught it just in time.  But in any case I got enough glass containers to put all of my pantry staples to avoid any chances with infestations.

The glass canisters were  just plain, transparent glass with silver colored lids.  They looked good enough for a simple pantry glass container, but I thought it would be an added benefit to "beautify" them into differentiation (flour or powdered sugar?) so I took a fine tip over-projector marker and started doodling.  It literally took me all of 5 minutes, and it brought me back to my high school days when I spent lots of time doodling in the back of my notebooks.

My idea of beautifying the plain canisters .......a moth. 
Simple, efficient, and DIY were you can put your personal stamp on!


And by the way, when you want to change the content of the glass canisters, just clean the doodles with water or rubbing alcohol

Plated Dinners: The Experience

I have been wanting to try Plated dinners for a while now and today I got my first trial box.  Just in case you don't know Plated, they are a company that provides customers with weekly menus and ingredients portioned for an easy cooking experience.  All dinners are supposed to take 30-40 minutes and customers are able to choose the type of menus they want to receive.  It's not a cheap option for a family of 5 (as every plate costs $10) but it is a great alternative for young working couples who don't have much time for grocery shopping before dinner but still enjoy the idea of having a homemade meal at the end of the day.

Well, I'm not single, or working full time, but I still LOVED the experience!  I guess that is part of what this is all about... a whole experience which starts when you first get the box delivered home.  When you open in it you see a world of culinary possibilities! With beautiful recipe cards and all fresh, organic ingredients to make healthy, tasty, and beautiful looking dishes.   It just makes you want to keep buying their menus on a weekly basis.

 

Although for me this will not happen,  I have to say that my first experience has been great!  The recipe I made today was Vietnamese Beef Pho and the taste was very pure.  All ingredients were fresh, rightly portioned, the meal took about 40 minutes to be ready and the recipe was easy to follow.
My husband and I really enjoyed it. 

Look at the pictures, do you see what I mean?

Treasure finding: Vintage Marx and Guntherz (Carslbad )Tea cups

Treasure finding in second hand stores or garage sales is one of my favorite things.  I really got into it while living in Belgium.

Many expats, English speaking families and thus my own lived in the town of Waterloo (close to Brussels).  Famous for the Battle of Waterloo, ABBA's hit single, and most recently, for its Antiques' Market that happens every other Sunday at the Carrefour (Walmart-type French super store) parking lot on the road to Braine L'Alleud.  It is a HUGE market and very popular with tourist and Antique collectors throughout Europe.  

So when I moved to NJ, I thought I was bidding goodbye to my treasure searching days but I'm glad I was wrong.  In this area, northern New Jersey, during Spring and Summer, there are so many garage sales on the weekends that you can make it a whole day out sort of thing.  Also, on average there are four Estate Sales per month throughout the year mostly from homes that are close to a million dollars.  However I have yet to attend a Estate Sale, I guess I don't feel the need when I can shop from my local SWAP facebook page.  Seriously, it is very easy to get addicted to it.  There are always great deals.  So it is here where I got these beautiful vintage stamped and numbered, pastel colored set of 7 tea cups and saucers from Marx and Guntherz Carslbad.  And the best part is that I only paid $20 for the whole set

Well, I don't know much about them except that this specific type was made between 1895 an 1919 in Germany.  And somehow that is all I need to know.  Maybe its because the lack of information lets my imagination take over and I can see rich beautiful women at Hightea somewhere in England.

Maybe too much Downtown Abby ;)

My new Nikon D3200

...finally arrived!
I am still playing with it whenever I have a chance although with 3 kids under 5, and no school yesterday or today, it's been a little challenging to find the time.

I was able to get a good 10 minutes ;) after lunch when the kids sat to watch some Octonauts and my little one sat quietly next to me so I decided to photograph my beautiful vintage Marx and Gutherz tea cups and saucers set.

Have a look at a couple of the pictures, I love these cups!(most on these cups coming up later this week)

 

And we are back....

...After a long break. 

Many new things to add, first my sister and me are not at opposite sides of the pond anymore so I guess we might have to change the name.....I moved to New Jersey, Yay!  
Other big news, I had a baby in Sep. 2014 and my sister had two girls,  one in 2013 and the other in 2014.

Lets see how things go, but we hope to keep adding some of the things that have kept us busy during these time.  Lots of delicious and healthy recipes, organization projects, creative decoration and wall art.  A lot of it is related to the kids but a lot is also just for the moms.

I just order a new camera so as soon as I can start taking some good pictures, I will start posting again...  Fingers crossed is here by the weekend, cant wait!