Okay so I haven't been here in ages, sorry! Here's a really overdue update on how things have been for us. My midwifery training got very hectic, I helped delivering four babies myself, of whom two were born at home. Witnessed 11 births in total this schoolyear. I scored straight A's for all of my tests, I was so thrilled with those results!
Our tiny happy home will become quite a bigger home from next year on as we're moving, it will still be just as happy though ;) I've been collecting loads of ideas and tons of inspiration on my pinterest boards for that. I'm really looking forward to decorating our new house, the kids rooms etcetera. Will be posting some of the inspiration later on.
Also, I'll be writing more about food and cooking the coming time. My youngest daughter is most likely celiac, we're waiting for a biopsy to confirm the diagnosis, but the odds are against us. It would explain a lot of things actually (why is she always crying, why does it always look like she has stomachpains, how come her growth has stunted so much, why is she quite lethargic during the day. Why are her legs bend is if she has rickets? Etc. the list goes on and on.) The same goes for her older sister. So we are entering the mysterious world glutenfree cooking and living with a celiac diagnosis. I'm not a big fan of ready packed and pre cooked foods, so I'll most likely be making our own foods and experimenting a lot. Follow us on this trip! And if you have any tips or advice, it is most welcome.
For the rest, I'll be entering my 2nd year now, my eldest daughter has started dancing classes and apart from the health issues, we're still a very happy bunch!
02/09/2012
16/02/2012
p.. p... p... pinterest!
Yes, okay, so, I'm kinda hooked. Big time~!
Find me on pinterest as well!
http://pinterest.com/tinyhappyhouse/
Find me on pinterest as well!
http://pinterest.com/tinyhappyhouse/
15/02/2012
Heidi and Finn's urban unisex hoodie
Oh my, I'm going to make a lot more of these!
What a great pattern to make, I've had so much fun making this hoodie.
The Urban Unisex Hoodie.
Pattern can be bought in their Etsy shop, here.
First version I made, I used leftovers of some sort of thick cheap fleece. Very synthetic, probably very warm. But my 2 year old is fond of it and won't take it off anymore. I had great fun puzzling the pieces together and sewing the whole project. It can be done fairly quickly.
my camera-flash makes the color and fabric look very erhm... strange, but in reality it's just dark-blue fleece. (I wish I had this color fleece though ;) )
It is lined with red riding hood fabric and I used big red-and-white dots buttons. I think they look cute together.
Then I remembered having quite some knit jersey lying around and I decided to make another hoodie.
she picked the buttons herself!
I made a mistake in the lower left corner of the hoodie and also at the hood, will fix this later but for now I'm done with hoodies.
The girl absolutely loved it so I'm happy ;)
What a great pattern to make, I've had so much fun making this hoodie.
The Urban Unisex Hoodie.
Pattern can be bought in their Etsy shop, here.
First version I made, I used leftovers of some sort of thick cheap fleece. Very synthetic, probably very warm. But my 2 year old is fond of it and won't take it off anymore. I had great fun puzzling the pieces together and sewing the whole project. It can be done fairly quickly.
my camera-flash makes the color and fabric look very erhm... strange, but in reality it's just dark-blue fleece. (I wish I had this color fleece though ;) )
It is lined with red riding hood fabric and I used big red-and-white dots buttons. I think they look cute together.
Then I remembered having quite some knit jersey lying around and I decided to make another hoodie.
she picked the buttons herself!
I made a mistake in the lower left corner of the hoodie and also at the hood, will fix this later but for now I'm done with hoodies.
The girl absolutely loved it so I'm happy ;)
I got a partial thyroidectomy for my birthday...
In the category for most original birthday gift, I definately win.
One day I found a lump in my neck, went to see my GP and he concluded that it had to by thyroid (ah so that's where the thyroid is was my only thought...) almost a year went by, the first punction was fine, then the second punction... I forgot the appointment, what a fail; Came back for a second-second punction and didn't expect anything weird coming from it. Then the docter told me she wanted the thyroid to be partially removed to check if it was cancerous. Can you imagine my shock?
An appointment with the surgeon was made, he said it could be done fairly quickly, he had an open spot only a few days later! However, it was my birthday that day. Fine with me, and so I went, on my birthday. I don't think I've ever received so many birthday wishes, since half of the hospital staff came by to wish me well and to wish me a happy birthday!
I went there at 8.30 in the morning, nurse directed me to my room and there was my OR-shirt ready for me. Yikes... Also a calming pill (1 pill of dormicon I think), which was welcome and there we went.
All went very well, apparently I woke up quite quickly but I don't remember that, I do remember annoying the nurses because I kept pulling out something they stuck in my nose.
I had a visitor who dropped by several times a day.
After a night in the hospital I returned home. A whole week followed of recovery in which I could barely moved my head or tilt it. I had never realised how many muscles you use while moving your head! Then after a week and a half the bandage was removed and the scar became visible. It's a tiny scar and I have good hopes that it will be hardly visible in a year from now.
And the results from the operation? All was well, fortunately it was not cancerous. I don't think I've ever been that relieved.
For my birthday, I have the best boyfriend ever! We celebrated one day early, he got me a gorgeous bag filled with all kinds of goodies, from magazines to facial masks and Rituals shower/bath products. Oh and chocolate, loads of chocolate!
He also gave me another two of those vintage looking metallic commercial plates. I love those <3 I'll blog about that later though ;)
My friends and family gave me very nice gifts as well, I received a Sabon scrub. I love Sabon! And I received gift certificates from my favourite webshop, from which I ordered a bunch of stuff, amongst others, this:
Also, my dad and his girlfriend gave me a Tamron 18-200 objective for my Canon camera! I'm soooo thrilled! I'm not too good at handeling it though, so if anyone has some tips on great tutorials, I'm looking forward to hearing about them.
And on top of that, the next day, my boyfriend gave me another bag, which he knew I liked. Yay! I'm a lucky girl.
One day I found a lump in my neck, went to see my GP and he concluded that it had to by thyroid (ah so that's where the thyroid is was my only thought...) almost a year went by, the first punction was fine, then the second punction... I forgot the appointment, what a fail; Came back for a second-second punction and didn't expect anything weird coming from it. Then the docter told me she wanted the thyroid to be partially removed to check if it was cancerous. Can you imagine my shock?
An appointment with the surgeon was made, he said it could be done fairly quickly, he had an open spot only a few days later! However, it was my birthday that day. Fine with me, and so I went, on my birthday. I don't think I've ever received so many birthday wishes, since half of the hospital staff came by to wish me well and to wish me a happy birthday!
I went there at 8.30 in the morning, nurse directed me to my room and there was my OR-shirt ready for me. Yikes... Also a calming pill (1 pill of dormicon I think), which was welcome and there we went.
All went very well, apparently I woke up quite quickly but I don't remember that, I do remember annoying the nurses because I kept pulling out something they stuck in my nose.
I had a visitor who dropped by several times a day.
After a night in the hospital I returned home. A whole week followed of recovery in which I could barely moved my head or tilt it. I had never realised how many muscles you use while moving your head! Then after a week and a half the bandage was removed and the scar became visible. It's a tiny scar and I have good hopes that it will be hardly visible in a year from now.
And the results from the operation? All was well, fortunately it was not cancerous. I don't think I've ever been that relieved.
For my birthday, I have the best boyfriend ever! We celebrated one day early, he got me a gorgeous bag filled with all kinds of goodies, from magazines to facial masks and Rituals shower/bath products. Oh and chocolate, loads of chocolate!
He also gave me another two of those vintage looking metallic commercial plates. I love those <3 I'll blog about that later though ;)
My friends and family gave me very nice gifts as well, I received a Sabon scrub. I love Sabon! And I received gift certificates from my favourite webshop, from which I ordered a bunch of stuff, amongst others, this:
Also, my dad and his girlfriend gave me a Tamron 18-200 objective for my Canon camera! I'm soooo thrilled! I'm not too good at handeling it though, so if anyone has some tips on great tutorials, I'm looking forward to hearing about them.
And on top of that, the next day, my boyfriend gave me another bag, which he knew I liked. Yay! I'm a lucky girl.
22/01/2012
upcycling daddy's old jeans
My boyfriend quite frequently needs new jeans because he totally wears his jeans out. I always find it a shame to throw out these jeans because other than some holes here and there, the fabric is fine. I decided to see what I'd be able to make from one of his old pair of jeans.
Turns out, I can totally make a pair of skinny jeans for my 2,5 years old, and then I'm still left with enough fabric to make a dress for my 1 year old. Yay! Ofcourse they won't be there tiny selves forever so in the future I'll be able to get less from one pair, but so far, I'm quite pleased! No wasting of perfectly fine fabric, and, as a bonus, nice jeans for my girls ;)
Eventually I lef out the application, I'm still undecided as to whether or not I should add grey fabric on the bottom as well...
Men... I should really work on my photography skills... Lost my cardreader so most pictures are taken by phone... sorry ;)
Turns out, I can totally make a pair of skinny jeans for my 2,5 years old, and then I'm still left with enough fabric to make a dress for my 1 year old. Yay! Ofcourse they won't be there tiny selves forever so in the future I'll be able to get less from one pair, but so far, I'm quite pleased! No wasting of perfectly fine fabric, and, as a bonus, nice jeans for my girls ;)
Eventually I lef out the application, I'm still undecided as to whether or not I should add grey fabric on the bottom as well...
Men... I should really work on my photography skills... Lost my cardreader so most pictures are taken by phone... sorry ;)
20/01/2012
Recykleren // Upcycling
Aaah yes... a few months ago I was planning on taking part in the upcycling project by Oon and others. I loved the idea and I certainly worked on it. But it turned out I was so crazy busy that it wasn't doable for me to really follow the project.
However I did upcycle some things, some are transformed into new items, some have been changed but remain basically the same. I hope to finish all the projects that I had in mind. Should be doable, so as long as I don't set myself a timelimit. ;)
This is what I started out with:
A pile of fabrics and stuff. Most of them were handed down but were not to our taste or they had minor things like tiny holes in them. I decided to use them for this project.
First of, the shoes. The print wasn't entirely my taste. So I grab some nail-polish remover and it came right off!
Before
After
After, I washed the inside fabric. The girl is thrilled with her pink shoes, I'm happy to have another pair of croc-ish shoes that are easy to clean when playing outside. No good shoes wasted because of a print! Yay!
Then there was a pair of long pants that was also not to my taste (I'm sorry, I'm very specific with what I like...)
I decided to turn these into board-shorts, giving them a biais and shortening them. They are now very cool for summer, I can see my girl wearing them when's she's tan and with a white t-shirt or whatever above. Surf-chique!
This is what I started out with...
And this is how it turned out. I'm quite pleased with the result and how the biais works nicely to establish that surfy look.
More coming up soon!
However I did upcycle some things, some are transformed into new items, some have been changed but remain basically the same. I hope to finish all the projects that I had in mind. Should be doable, so as long as I don't set myself a timelimit. ;)
This is what I started out with:
A pile of fabrics and stuff. Most of them were handed down but were not to our taste or they had minor things like tiny holes in them. I decided to use them for this project.
First of, the shoes. The print wasn't entirely my taste. So I grab some nail-polish remover and it came right off!
Before
After
After, I washed the inside fabric. The girl is thrilled with her pink shoes, I'm happy to have another pair of croc-ish shoes that are easy to clean when playing outside. No good shoes wasted because of a print! Yay!
Then there was a pair of long pants that was also not to my taste (I'm sorry, I'm very specific with what I like...)
I decided to turn these into board-shorts, giving them a biais and shortening them. They are now very cool for summer, I can see my girl wearing them when's she's tan and with a white t-shirt or whatever above. Surf-chique!
This is what I started out with...
And this is how it turned out. I'm quite pleased with the result and how the biais works nicely to establish that surfy look.
More coming up soon!
Japanese shirt
I love those Japanese pattern books. I got one as a present for Christmas in 2010, and finally, last month I found the courage to make a shirt from it ;) It was fine for me to work with but hey, I studied Chinese, though Japanese and Chinese are hugely different, It makes all the difference in the world if you can make up the characters for back/front left/right up/down etcetera. This made it easier for me to work with these patterns.
I really like the simplicity of those clothes in the books, though I often find that there cut is quite "Asian" or "Japanese". With that I mean, wide, or square, or however you want to describe it. Some of you will probably know what I mean.
Anyways, for Christmas I also received some fabric, buttons and ribbons so I decided to use them for this project. The colour of the fabric is not something I'd have picked myself, but it looks fine on my 2-years-old.
Initially I wanted to make the shirt using Elephant-buttons, since the eldest adores elephants.
But along the way I decided that these buttons look a lot better with the flowery ribbon. These are buttons that come of from a pair of H&M pants. My friend bought a pair of pants for her son and replaced the girly buttons, she handed them to me. Yay!
I decided to sew in a small ribbon in the neckline, I think it gives it a more polished look.
ofcourse it needed a robot... everyting needs a robot <3
tadaam... I'm not quite the neat seemstress that I'd like to be, but I'm learning ;) (neither am I a great photographer or good with photography software... should train myself in that a little more.)
And here you can probably see best what I mean with the square boxy look. Though the girl loves it and didn't want to take it off.
I really like the simplicity of those clothes in the books, though I often find that there cut is quite "Asian" or "Japanese". With that I mean, wide, or square, or however you want to describe it. Some of you will probably know what I mean.
Anyways, for Christmas I also received some fabric, buttons and ribbons so I decided to use them for this project. The colour of the fabric is not something I'd have picked myself, but it looks fine on my 2-years-old.
Initially I wanted to make the shirt using Elephant-buttons, since the eldest adores elephants.
But along the way I decided that these buttons look a lot better with the flowery ribbon. These are buttons that come of from a pair of H&M pants. My friend bought a pair of pants for her son and replaced the girly buttons, she handed them to me. Yay!
I decided to sew in a small ribbon in the neckline, I think it gives it a more polished look.
ofcourse it needed a robot... everyting needs a robot <3
tadaam... I'm not quite the neat seemstress that I'd like to be, but I'm learning ;) (neither am I a great photographer or good with photography software... should train myself in that a little more.)
And here you can probably see best what I mean with the square boxy look. Though the girl loves it and didn't want to take it off.
Home improvement -- part two
A while ago (a long while :') ) I've blogged about home improvement and how I wanted to change some things in my house. Ideally I would like 2 huge pretty bookcases, but hey, since they don't come for free, I've tried to move furniture around to create more space in our living room.
Before our table was in our living room, we've now moved it to the kitchen, the good thing is, not only do the girls have a play corner now, I also have a desk! Yay! No more putting away my sewing machine every time, no more sitting on the coach studying. I love it! The new lay-out feels better, though it needs tweaking and it needs some more posters or something on the wall.
Don't mind the Christmas-tree in these pictures, the pictures were taken last month, our tree is long gone by now ;)
As you can see our living room is not that big, but it's comfortable and homey and I like the beams. It has a nice feel to it.
Before our table was in our living room, we've now moved it to the kitchen, the good thing is, not only do the girls have a play corner now, I also have a desk! Yay! No more putting away my sewing machine every time, no more sitting on the coach studying. I love it! The new lay-out feels better, though it needs tweaking and it needs some more posters or something on the wall.
Don't mind the Christmas-tree in these pictures, the pictures were taken last month, our tree is long gone by now ;)
As you can see our living room is not that big, but it's comfortable and homey and I like the beams. It has a nice feel to it.
Another birthday
Oh my... less then two weeks left before my baby is turning one. One! a whole year has passed but it seems to have been only a few months or so. Time flies.
She will be handing these out to her "friends" at our babysitter, I'm not in a mood for making these myself at the moment (need to have a major operation, my head is exploding with stuff to think about...), look at how cute they are!
in there tummies they hold a small box of m&m like candies. For my hyper-allergic one year old there will be a small box of strawberry pieces (Hema <3 )
Along with it some stickers and play-books for some good fun. I hope they'll enjoy.
I'll be celebrating my own birthday as well in 10 days, I'm hoping my boyfriend will get me something from this website PSikhouvanje (meaning: PS: I love you), look at what a great things they sell! <3
and sooo much more that makes me want to spend every dime I have haha. As you can see I'm a real sucker for stationary and paperworks. I just love how having a cute notepad to write down your scribbles can make you smile.
She will be handing these out to her "friends" at our babysitter, I'm not in a mood for making these myself at the moment (need to have a major operation, my head is exploding with stuff to think about...), look at how cute they are!
in there tummies they hold a small box of m&m like candies. For my hyper-allergic one year old there will be a small box of strawberry pieces (Hema <3 )
Along with it some stickers and play-books for some good fun. I hope they'll enjoy.
I'll be celebrating my own birthday as well in 10 days, I'm hoping my boyfriend will get me something from this website PSikhouvanje (meaning: PS: I love you), look at what a great things they sell! <3
and sooo much more that makes me want to spend every dime I have haha. As you can see I'm a real sucker for stationary and paperworks. I just love how having a cute notepad to write down your scribbles can make you smile.
Food Waste Friday...
Okay, so I opened my fridge this morning, in order to see what I wasted this week, to discover a disgusting smell... alright... It's definately not going to be nothing that needs to be thrown out.
Turns out I totally wasted these things that once were fine, but due to my lack of knowing what's in my fridge, they've gone bad.
* a small piece of smoked chicken (could've been perfect in a salad or on a sandwich or something, why why? )
* a chicken breast. Again, why... why?? Would've been perfectly okay to use in quick a Thai-style curry, could've served 2 + 2 children...
* 3 small leeks.
So, I've wasted a lot. ARGH!
Where's the learning curve? I'm picking it up again, since we are quite tight on a budget, these things shouldn't be happening, why do they still happen? I guess I should plan my grocery-shopping a little more. Thoroughly think about what needs to be bought and what are luxuries that aren't necessary.
Well... New week, new chances, this week I'll also try to not spend as much as I did last week on grocery shopping (and nothing on take-away for that matter. Sigh.)
Turns out I totally wasted these things that once were fine, but due to my lack of knowing what's in my fridge, they've gone bad.
* a small piece of smoked chicken (could've been perfect in a salad or on a sandwich or something, why why? )
* a chicken breast. Again, why... why?? Would've been perfectly okay to use in quick a Thai-style curry, could've served 2 + 2 children...
* 3 small leeks.
So, I've wasted a lot. ARGH!
Where's the learning curve? I'm picking it up again, since we are quite tight on a budget, these things shouldn't be happening, why do they still happen? I guess I should plan my grocery-shopping a little more. Thoroughly think about what needs to be bought and what are luxuries that aren't necessary.
Well... New week, new chances, this week I'll also try to not spend as much as I did last week on grocery shopping (and nothing on take-away for that matter. Sigh.)
12/01/2012
Midwifery training.
I took some tests today, and all went well, very well actually. So I'm quite happy with that. This trimester we've been studying everything around birth, going into labour, catching a baby, doing a neonatal research and everything. Extremely interessting, very cool to see the stuff you learn in school during your training period in a midwifery-practice.
As I'm updating this concept-message, my results came back. I'm doing really good so far, so yay me!
Anyways, wanted to show you some pictures to give you a feel of what we're doing in training here in the Netherlands.
This one makes me laugh :)
studying anatomy
This is what I'd bring with me if I'm called for labour. An obstetrics set, an oxygen set, and of course my visits bag.
A sneak-peek of the contents of both the oxygen set and obstetrics set.
Midwifery is a 4 year training program (in my case) at Rotterdam University. In those 4 years you'll be spending a great deal of time in different local midwifery practices to become experienced and to train on the job.
In order to graduate, you must've caught at least 60 babies (meaning you guided them out of the birth canal), you must've performed at least 300 follow-up appointments and a whole range of different things like examining the neonate and actively take part in a breech birth. Quite thorough!
As I'm updating this concept-message, my results came back. I'm doing really good so far, so yay me!
Anyways, wanted to show you some pictures to give you a feel of what we're doing in training here in the Netherlands.
This one makes me laugh :)
studying anatomy
This is what I'd bring with me if I'm called for labour. An obstetrics set, an oxygen set, and of course my visits bag.
A sneak-peek of the contents of both the oxygen set and obstetrics set.
Midwifery is a 4 year training program (in my case) at Rotterdam University. In those 4 years you'll be spending a great deal of time in different local midwifery practices to become experienced and to train on the job.
In order to graduate, you must've caught at least 60 babies (meaning you guided them out of the birth canal), you must've performed at least 300 follow-up appointments and a whole range of different things like examining the neonate and actively take part in a breech birth. Quite thorough!
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