New room make-up

We have been changing a lot in Sofia’s room lately to make it more cosy and suitable for an almost 2-year-old girl.

The bay in the room has changed to a cosy place where she can sit and read or play. We have recently added some curtains to make it look nicer.
She has liked it the very moment she saw it and now loves to snuggle up in the cushions and ask us to read a book.
Some pom-pom in one corner help to bring some colour.
I have bought these at a lovely shop called PinkFisch. When I bought the pom-pom, I thought they were quite a lot and would fill the whole corner. I like the result but I would like to add some more of them.

We have also bought a second-hand romantic bed in case she should decide she wants to sleep in her own room. For now it is a place she likes to sit now and then to look at a book.

And there is one little open project. While visiting one of the many markets during our holidays in Provence, we found these:

I don’t know the name. They are used to do cross-stiching etc. but I once saw them as a decoration.
We found a lovely haberdashery shop in Avignon, full with wonderful fabrics, called Le Cartonnier de Marie, where we spent quite some time. I just looove these kind of shops, filled until the last corner and full of little surprises or things you don’t even know they existed.
The web site is a bit of a mess but if you like little shops with fabrics, buttons and such other things, it is worth a visit.

The last thing to do is to place the fabrics into the frames and to hang them up. I am not sure if I want to use some paint and stencils on the fabrics…
Will show you the result once it’s ready.

The sling thing

Sofia is now 19 months old and I still carry her a lot.
That means that although I use the pushchair, the ergo carrier is always at hand.
Until now it was the perfect solution when she was tired of the pushchair and needed more closeness. But since she has started to walk, she wants to quickly decide when she wants to walk and when she wants to be carried. And the procedure with the ergo carrier is too slow for her, so she also refuses to sit in the ergo. What she prefers is to be carried one-armed, but this is a pain and not very comfortable for me.
So I have done a bit of a research to find a sling that is quickly put on and easy to take Sofia in and out. Of course there are millions of options, but I have decided to try this one:
The SUPPORi baby sling

This sling can be used for children that can sit upright and weight up to 14/15 kg. It is easily put on, is lightweight, does not need much space when stowed away, is washable and made out of a fabric that prevents sweating. In my eyes perfect if you want to carry your child in the summer or even at the beach. You don’t even have to bother if it gets wet.
The only negative point I can see at the moment is that it is not adjustable, so depending on your and your children’s height, you have to choose the correct sling size. This means that it is not probable that your partner is going to need the same size, but you can still buy a second one. Especially if you choose the pink one, ha!

I am waiting to receive my SUPPORi baby sling (and have been moderate with the colour: cream) and will let you know if it works!
If you are interested, you can find them here if you live in Switzerland.

Mini-me

Mothers that dress their daughters like themselves used to give me the creeps.

Now I am one of them.

Paint it!

Here is a nice idea I have found in Paris:
A tablecloth which children can paint on. Once the party is over, you can throw the tablecloth into the washing machine and reuse again, as the ink is washable.

There are several sets you can buy. We opted for the “Paris Monuments”.
And you can find them here.

I recommend buying an additional pen set, as they dry very fast (and children usually forget to close the pens).
I must confess, I had a great time painting! I cannot even draw a stick figure, so I am quite happy to fill in the blanks!
It says it is not suitable for kids under 3 years old. I can imagine it is because they could put the pens into their mouths. In any case, my daughter is 18 months old and I do not leave her unattended when she is painting.
She really likes it a lot and asks me to take it out when she feels like painting. In this age, she is not really interested in filling the blanks but paints around wherever she wants and likes looking at the many figures that are drawn. This is perfect as long as she enjoys what she is doing!

And in case you want to keep the “art d’oeuvre” for ever and ever, you can buy special pens for clothing.

Have fun with your little ones!

Berlin, Enfant Terrible!

Here we are again, back from Berlin. It is truly amazing how time passes by, specially when you are having a good time!
Sofia was 5 months old when we went to Berlin last year, so this time many things were different.

We travelled with City Night Line, which was quite cool as we had a so-called “deluxe” compartment with our own shower and toilet. I like travelling by train and I guess this will be an adventurous form of travelling also for my daughter for as long as she is a child. Sofia and I are sound sleepers, so we were quite relaxed and fresh when we arrived to Berlin. Also, there is nothing to worry about if she wants to play on the floor, get up to the bed again, cries, screams or laughs out loud. It is like a very small hotel room and I guess that even travelling alone, this could be a good solution. Of course I am very happy that the 3 of us were travelling together on both ways, but should we need to travel separately, the night train would absolutely be my preferred way of travelling.

Berlin is a very nice city when travelling with the little ones. The city is quite big but you never feel like it is over crowded. A plus are the many many playgrounds and green areas. So there was always a playground at hand when Sofia was bored with the pushchair, the ergo carrier or my shopping!
They are very child friendly as well. Every restaurant or café we have visited had some sort of amenity for children. And if not, they created all the comfort needed, no matter if food wise, a better situated seat or whatever necessary. I like!

There are many shops for children clothing, children room decoration, toys etc.
One of them is Enfant Terrible.
Great place if you want to find children clothing for all kind of budgets. The owner, Audrey (by the way, what a lovely name!), has created a great place for moms and children, as there is a play area. She offers children clothing from known companies but also from not known designers at very good prices.

Sofia, who usually does not leave my side, adventured all the corners of the little fortress with slide. It was quite difficult to get her out to go home!
The funniest thing was that she took her trousers off in the changing room and then went playing! I guess she thought this was the thing to do when she saw me doing the same when trying on some clothes!

In case you are thinking about a city trip to any european city, think of Berlin! Shopping, eating, partying, sightseeing or for a family holiday. Everything is possible!

Handmade clothing

More about children clothing…

I guess many of you know Dawanda. It is quite similar to Etsy I think, but mainly with German Products.

One very nice lady is Miriam from “Liebkind”. She has lovely handmade clothing and is really fast in sending an order!

I ordered the cutest overall and received it in just some days! But some days later I saw that she had designed the same overall in two more patterns. Awwww! I want to have them all, they are just lovely. Plus, I really like when children clothing are versatile, adaptable and wearable during more than one season. The overall ca be bought one size bigger as the cuffs on the legs can be folded to make it shorter. The straps can also be adjusted.
And of course it can be worn with a one piece and stockings during colder days.

I want to show you some of my favourite pieces of her collection:

Here is where you can get in contact with Miriam or order your favourite clothing through Dawanda.

Have a lovely week!

Stars and Stripes, the neon way

I have to confess, I am a children-clothing addict!

During our holidays in London we discovered a very nice shop in Camden, Heavenly Monsters

They offer a really nice range of brands you cannot find here in Switzerland. And through this shop, I discovered a real cool brand from Berlin, Noé&Zoë.
Now this is a shop with addictive power!

I bought some clothing for Sofia for next autumn/winter, but it is quite big, so I think it will take some time until she can wear it. The colours are so bright, that I am sure it will chase away all bad weather moods and bring a huge smile on everyone’s face.

I have seen a lot of stars-and-stripes-patterns until now, but they combine everything: dots, stripes, stars… and are really daring using strong neon colours. The two designers, Nici and Nadine are having a really meteoric start with their clothing line. So watch out for them, wherever you live. You can order online!

Since I am going to travel to Berlin in some days, I am sure I am going to stroll around to find more cool children clothing and who knows, maybe I will gift myself a cool Noé & Zoë piece!

Back to writing

Hello dear readers!

Yes, I am back! Or at least, I hope I am going to find my way back to writing and posting.

The last few weeks have been quite hectic. Flues, bacterial infects, (luckily Sofia has skipped all our illnesses) working more than usual and a little girl who is a real toddler now.

Sofia Luna has changed a lot lately. Well, to be honest, she has not changed in terms of character. It is just that her character is showing more and more. She has a lot of temperament, no patience at all and has shown quite an amount of humour.
She is a lot of fun to be with, but this means more attention for the little girl and less time for me.
It is very interesting to see the continuous changes she is going through.
The teeth, coming out first by pairs, are coming out now by 4 at a time. With 16 months she already has almost all 12 teeth and 4 molars out. And this means: constantly drooling.
She is talking all day. Usually without understandable meaning (at least for me) and some days in an understandable language. I sometimes try to imitate her language. This is a lot of fun. Usually she starts giggeling like mad.
She says ‘heiss’ for ‘hot’ and ‘ässä’ for ‘eating’. No spanish word until now. Let’s see what comes next.
And what is really fun to see is that she can express quite clearly what she wants without talking. She wants me to pick her up from the floor, then points the way I should go and then to whatever she wants me to take / make / show.

The other side of the story is that she is quite frustrated when she wants me to show or tell me something and I do not get it. I guess it is a hard time. She understands so much but has a lot of limitations in expressing herself.
So she spends an incredibly high amount of time crying because of this frustration…

Now I am looking forward to some holidays in Berlin. Our Easter Holidays in Paris were not really enjoyable because Alex spent 4 days in bed due to his illness.

And: the sun is shining! I think I have forgotten how it is like to have warm temperatures in Zurich!

Embellishment II

We got a lovely t-shirt for Sofia from our friends. It had a really cute little cat on it and I thought it was a pity to give it away once it got too small for her.
So I cut out the cat and sewed it to a cardigan.

And once the cardigan will be too small, the cat will stay with us on another piece of clothing.
It takes only some minutes but it gives a simple h&m cardigan a new and individual touch.

Happy Weekend!

The most important thing

Attachment parenting.
This is apparently my parenting style. I did not even know there were names for parenting. Or that there was even anything called parenting.

I read one or two books during pregnancy. Usually the time when you still have time to read, so you want to prepare. What is the best baby cot, diapers, clothing, pushchair, parenting style, birth style? The good thing: as soon as the baby arrives, everything is different.
Now, where to begin?
With the time I had to find out that you do not even begin ‘doing’ anything. Not planning or ‘training’. What I did understand from the beginning she was born was that she is a person who has her own character. And they are able to express this much more than I thought!
In the first months I did not even get to think about doing anything that I had read. I completely forgot everything and only acted out of instinct.

Basically, I think I did everything wrong of what is to find in the regular books: Sofia fell asleep in my arms, night after night, I took her in my arms whenever she was crying, she slept with us, I did not care about routines or fix timings but just reacted out of impulse on answer to my daughter’s signs.

I often thought that I was doing everything wrong and that sooner or later, I would have to ‘pay the price’ for being so attentive with her. Or I thought: when she gets a bit older, I will start a routine or I will do this or that. But until now I have not changed a single thing. And I am happy I did not, because it has shown that for my daughter and for us, it was the best thing to do.

Well no, not absolutely correct. If there is one thing I would change, it would be to have skipped the mashed food phase and let her lead the way with food instead. I have found out with so many things, that if I let her lead (eating, playing, sleeping etc.) she is happy and relaxed and does everything out of her own will, which works perfectly. I only have to give her the time to figure out things, to try herself to do things. That does not mean that she can do whatever pleases her and whenever she wants, but she has a lot of space to develop her personality.

What I am trying to say in the end is not that what I do is best or that I am doing it better or worse than anyone else. But I think it is really important to only do things that come from the bottom of your heart. If this or that technique, this training or that way of routine: Do what you see suits your child best. At the end of the day, you should be able to go to bed with a happy heart, knowing that you are doing the best for your child. And this is not to be found in any book, because your child is as unique as you are.

One thing we all have, rich or poor, tall or small, working parent or full-time carer, is a lot of love to give. And this is something which is never too much!
Enjoy the day!