Molka

I love good coffee..and am basically a fixture at our new local cafe - Molka....you know you come in a lot when you are have barely sat down before they have already brought out the coffee, just how you like it, without you needing to say a word!   We were so happy when Molka opened - great coffee, great food, friendly people and well designed.  The owner trained at the Istanbul Culinary Institute and apprenticed at 360 - she really cares about good quality ingredients - which of course I love! After only having been opened for a few months they have already been featured in Marie Claire Maison and Time Out.  The image to the left is from the Marie Claire Maison Turkey article in their March issue.  So we are so lucky to have them as our local cafe!

And, now I love them even more because they asked if I would like to stock my cards, notebooks etc there!   :)    I love the big industrial/rustic shelves they have for them.

If you live in the area I definitely recommend stopping in for coffee, lunch and, if you have room left, some of the delicious cakes!  The cafe is on the sahil yolu (seaside road) in Yenikoy next door to Pasa Firin.

Commissioned Work - Portrait of a very sweet little 2 year old!

I just got a very sweet message from the lovely woman that commissioned this portrait of her 2 year old daughter - so I can now happily share it with you!  I loved working on this!  She had asked for a portrait in the style of my I Heart Milk print.   The photo below shows a little of the process of making this.

 
This was one of the later drawings I did for it (after many initial ones!)   Portraits can be quite difficult - especially of children I think - they grow and change so quickly don't you think?   I worked on capturing her shining eyes, the little curls that poked out from the back of her hair and the sweet innocence I could see in the photos of her.

This is the final portrait (unfortunately I only quickly snapped some photos on a grey day before I sent it off)
so here is the digital image to see it more clearly.

I was so happy that she was so happy with the portrait when it arrived!  It makes the crazy number of hours I always end up putting in to my work worth it!

Euro Week!

This week is Euro Week on Etsy!  I don't know about you, but I am definitely a europhile, if that's even a word...and, living on the European side of Istanbul, I just make the continent cut off!  These are some favourite things from some of the many many awesome European shops on Etsy.

The Stockholm Bag - Ika Bags in Paris, France

Owl Pin - Moloco in Kiev, Ukraine

Arturo the Bunny - Contemori in Tuscany, Italy

Postcards from Europe mail organiser - Tuuni in Helsinki, Finland

ps - a quick note because I have been wanting to reply to comments and leave comments on other peoples blogspot blogs - I can't!  The ban of blogspot blogs here in Turkey continues.  Although I have some means of getting around the block to view blogs and publish my blog, I still can't leave comments  :(    So please, everyone, pretend that I have written very nice and thoughtful comments and replies  ;)  Hope the ban ends soon!

Ahhh...so many ambitious plans

...mainly of making papier-mache birds after being inspired by this photo of crepe paper birds on marthastewart.com  (image from marthastewart.com)

and then remembering the branches with fabric birds on them at Hatice's (the very lovely portakal agaci and kirmizi minder blogger)   - which I was lucky enough to see in person when I visited. These birds are made of fabric and look gorgeous close up.

so hopefully you will see some birds being made around here later in the week!

and speaking of birds - I am now tweeting - I just joined twitter!   I can already see it is going to be a slippery slope to addiction  ;)   So if you are a fellow tweeter you can find me here and/or let me know if you are on twitter so that I can follow you  :)

Spring Styling: Heather Moore aka Skinny laMinx

Something about today made me think about Heather Moore aka Skinny laMinx.  I think it might have been the lovely Spring weather that reminded me of her beautiful prints.   So I thought that it only fair to share something about this eternally cool artist/illustrator and designer with you! The image above is a laundry bag made for one of her 'Making Friday' posts on her blog using her cloud birds fabrics.  It looks so fresh for Spring don't you think?

Skinnylaminx is one of my 'go to' shops when I want a lovely present for someone.  At Christmas I bought this tea towel and the tea towel pictured above and this gorgeous 'pincushion' runner in charcoal as presents - and the recipients were very very happy - and asked me how I manage to find such beautiful things!  That's the kind of response I like  :)

Heather makes her images using papercuts and drawings and has a simple, natural and bold style that I love.   She has also just recently opened her own bricks and mortar shop in Cape Town - I wish I could visit!

Have a great weekend!

All images are from the Skinny laMinx blog and shop.

Making Mondays: 3 Sail Boats in a Box

My sister bought this cute little set for Yashar for Christmas.  It's such a great idea!  And of course, me being me, I loved that involved something creative to do.   It comes with 3 little timber boats that you can paint if you like, little paper sails and a spool of 'rope'.  The box is cleverly designed to then become a little display stand for the boats (you can see it in the photo above).  It comes with the little stickers you can see Yashar stuck all over the sails and boats - he got pretty excited about them!  Now I really want to make some up myself!

I'm not sure where my sister bought this one - but a did a quick google search and found them on amazon here and in a 'Pirates' shop here.  Don't believe what it says on the front of the packaging - making just one of them took us far longer than five minutes!

Like everyone I guess, I have been thinking alot about the devastation in Japan and have been wondering what I can do to assist - so this week I am donating 20% of all proceeds from my shop to the Save the Children Japan Eathquake Tsunami Relief.  So if you have been thinking about buying something in the shop - now would be a great time - or donate directly here.  You can read more about the important work Save the Children is doing here.

Some design work and a snow day!

**edit - I forgot to mention that the sale in the shop has been going well and there are just a small number of items left.  It will finish on Monday - so if you have been thinking about taking advantage of it don't miss out  :)  **

You might remember me posting about the children's clothes shop my sister in law opened a little while back.  It's all going along very nicely and last night I designed some business cards for her.  Which reminded me that I had never gotten around to sharing the logo I designed for her when she first opened! 

So here it is - the business card with the logo.  The name of the shop 'Kebelek' is a play on the word Kelebek  - which is Turkish for butterfly.  Kebelek is how some very cute little kids mispronounce the word.  I printed them on my favourite thick textured card and was happy with how they turned out - sweet and simple I think...I hope you think so too!

And can you believe we have had snow here for the last couple of days! Yashar was squealing with delight when we walked outside! This is Yashar, staring out while standing up on the window ledge, when we first got up in the morning to find a little snow blanket over the rooftops.

Hope you all have a great weekend!

I'm a dedicated coffee drinker, but...

...these super awesome illustrated Bathing Girls teacups from Dutch illustrator Esther Horchner could turn me.

And these are perfect for the hot chocolates needed now that it's snowing here!

Hidden Animal tea cups from Ange-Line Tetrault

Making Mondays: A room in the clouds

This is another little DIY we did for Yashar's room a little while back - a billowing cloud like ceiling.

I have to say, getting this to happen should have been much easier than it actually was!  Poor Senol - I made him do most of the work on this!   (I think mostly it was hard because of the concrete walls in this apartment and because all of that fabric ends up being very very heavy!)

The way we eventually made it was to screw hooks into the ceiling with metal wire strung between them and then white material billowing over them.  I won't go through it here because, really there must be a better way!  What ever you do, it needs to be super strong - you don't want there to be any chance of it falling down on your little one.

It was inspired by the room below on design*sponge that I posted about a while back. You can find more images and info about the rocking room makeover Melissa did here.

PS The blogspot ban continues here in Turkey but it seems I can now access the part I need for publishing my posts so am happy about that!

Crafty Gatherings: A Few Favourites

Blogger.com and all the blogger blogs (including mine!) has been blocked again in Turkey :( Very frustrating! It makes it very hard for me to publish posts and people here in Turkey can’t read it (unless they use a proxy site). It has really bummed me out! I hope things are back to normal soon...

Anyway, here I am, subversively bringing you a crafty gathering of super cool things to make:

This apple pie from Sweet Paul seems to have perfect timing…makes me think of early spring days… as the greys slowly turn to greens and the days are still crisp and cool…rushing inside as the sun disappears to some warm apple pie. Yum!


Stenciled floor  from Ashley at Design*Sponge - Beautiful idea…not that I could do this in our rented apartment…but one day I would love to have this in my studio

This doodle tablecloth from Cox and Cox reminds me of our family outings to a French restaurant with paper tablecloths we could draw on. Mmm French food and ‘fine art’…a perfect match.


This craft paper wall art, also from Sweet Paul, looks like something that could also be made with kids - and even the most super stylish Mum or Dad would be proud to have it hanging around.