Claire got me all excited about this celebrity sighting thing so I'm going to play along.
About 3 years ago when we went to New York with the girls Giao and myself crossed paths with Ethan Hawke, his new (old?) lover and his kids. Giao and I were chatting, enjoying the sun and Central Park when Giao suddenly said "it's Ethan Hawke!!!" He was dead close we almost stood eye in eye. The first thing that popped in my mind was to run to Kathleen who walked just a couple of meters in front of us, and apparently missed crossing paths with Ethan, and tell her "there's Ethan Hawke!!". The next thing we should have filmed because Kathleen went nuts and ran after family Hawke, armed with camera, and took some paparazzo shots. A couple of hours later we met Rachel Ashwell in the park but we knew she was going to be there so that doesn't really count but I have this great shot of her anyway.
On my way back to The Netherlands, from that same trip, and only Dutch readers will know her I stood next to Loretta Schrijver waiting to collect our luggage. I so wanted to ask her if she could talk to the Bo on my mobile because he loves her but I didn't dare and kept it cool.
When I was about 14 I declared my love and my everlasting devotion to Donnie Wahlberg. I even picked my study year abroad to be in Boston because that way I was close to him - now isn't that romantic? Over the years I grew over it though!
Now at 33 I still have mad actor crushes and often dream about Edward Norton and Ewan McGregor. I've never dreamed about them at the same time but I honestly wouldn't mind. A dream filled with both Edward and Ewan is maybe even better than freshly shaven legs under clean cheats. It's like freshly shaven legs under clean sheets and my toenails clipped.
Just watch Ewan on Ellen ...
I think I've must have met so many other celebrities but to be honest I wouldn't even spot my own mother in a crowd. I'm not much of a people watcher. I love to window shop, watch trees, birds, buildings and other things that happen around me. Sometimes people call me arrogant because I haven't greeted them when they waved at me on the street. I just don't see them! Even if people honk I don't react because I always think they must honk for someone else.
Please play along because this is fun. Leave a comment with a link when yours is up.
Thanks so much for your well wishes. You can imagine it's a bit of a chaos in our heads. We kind of made an order of events we wanted to happen and selling the house was last on the list. So in a way we have to throw everything round and start all over with the list. But it's great of course and the new owners are super lovely people (hello Matthie and Joyce) and only super lovely people deserve this house - there!
I have some other great news concerning Yvestown shoppers; as from today I can officially announce that I'm up to date with all my Paumes orders. It's been a bit crazy but everyone should have or get their books by the weekend. Orders that were placed 4 days ago and up will get their books next week and as from next week shipping will only be 3 days - Yay!!
I've been placing a bunch of orders with the Paumes people this month and they are extremely happy business is going so well. So yay for keeping the Paumes people happy too. I've found a brilliant system with 'nails' from the post office. We've nailed (ha ha) it down to a 5 minute routine of shipping an order of 45 parcels to various parts of the world, now that's what I call fantastic!
The top 3 bestsellers are
1. Children's Rooms London
2. Ateliers de Filles 2
3. Paris Brocante
My favorite top 3 is
1. Children's Rooms London
2. Stockholm's Apartments
3. Stockholm's Ateliers
Also for people in Europe and especially The Netherlands, do not hesitate to e-mail me to place an order if you don't have the opportunity to pay with PayPal.
That's my shop talk for today, back to regular blogging soon. Thanks!!
... means 'so, in this way, like this' in English and the Dutch often use this word to express their feelings after they've finished something. Thus zo, we have sold the house and have a moving date for Sweden. We still have to get some financing sorted out to buy the property we want (can't show it yet because it may bring bad luck) and than it's exit Dutch life .. enter Sweden life. It's all a bit of a mess right now because we didn't expect to sell the house in just one week. The day after tomorrow we're going to sign the provisional contract of sale and as from September the first The New Old House is no longer ours.
Thank you so much for the many orders I've received this week. By Saturday (one day after my announcement) I was sold out and already had to place a new order the next day. Again I sold out two days after and placed my third order today. So please, please, please bare with me to get all these books to you. I've ordered quite a large new stock so do not hesitate to put in an order because those Paumes books will get to you and will make you extremely happy.
Today I've put my delivery bike to use and took the first batch of Paumes books to the post office. I was so scared that I was going to have one of these women put into hospital but it turned out to go quite well. I hate the women at the post office in my town. I call them tits, nails and grandma. Tits has big tits and always wears a tight t-shirt without a bra so I'm instantly focused on her tits. Nails doesn't know that Japan is not in the EU and has unsightly long (fake) nails with various art on it. Sometimes of the Empire State Building and the American flag and I wonder if she knows that there's actually an Empire State Building and that America isn't a part of the EU. Grandma is one of those women who successfully raised a bunch of kids and is bored because now that they all left home there's nothing else she can do. She's by far my favorite because she doesn't have an attitude. I can just about accept the fact that one doesn't know that Japan and America aren't part of the EU but than one isn't allowed to have an attitude! The path from the main entrance to the post office counter (this is a post office in one of those "we sell everything as long as it sells" shops) is quite long and sometimes when they don't have any costumers and I approach the counter I can hear that awful Coldplay song starting in my head and I hear them thinking "hide, hide, hide under the counter ... there sheeeeee iiiiiis!!". So yes, it's always a little party for me to go there.
Nothing else to report today, have a lovely weekend!
I'm utterly excited that as from today you can shop for Jeu de Paume books in my shop!!
I'm starting off with selling new and newer titles but once I know if it's a success I'll be adding older titles too. I just can't tell you how much joy this brings. Last night when I was making the page I was grinning and giggling and the Bo asked me what was so funny and I could only say "I'm going to sell Paumes books" and he totally got me - bless him!
So please spread the word, the books are a little bit more expensive but the shipping much lower so I'm cheaper than Amazon.co.jp ... oh and add, it's in English and I have pink postal bags.
And yet another new thing in the shop - Scrap Sacks, have fun!!
We always stay in hotels or B&B's when we go on holiday but this time we decided to stay in a cottage. Sweden is of course famous for it's beautiful holiday cottages and I found the one we stayed in after a long web browse. I'm not one for dirty seventies decor with previous guest odor. I was already brave enough to wear fungus slippers worn by god knows who, something the Bo refused.
This is Andersborg our home for the weekend. It's owned by Junette and Inge and they have 4 more all as lovely. Do you spot the curtains? It was just like being home.
This is the bedroom we used and it also could've been my house only not for the candles because I'm terribly scared of candles. I'm very energetic and move around a lot so I'm always scared I'm going to knock over a candle. Or like last week when I was at my friend Mandy's house I almost had my hair on fire. I was sitting on the sofa and she had this big tray full of candles in different colors and sizes (really pretty to look at, not to actually lit) next to it on a table and when I swung my head back Mandy shrieked and I even shrieked harder .... ooooh it was dead close!
Sweden was most magical this time because we saw a moose. I've never seen a moose before so if you want something to shut us up, put a moose on the road. Almost a minute after we almost hit her I turned and said to the Bo "what the hell was that animal about?". They are so massive, so impressive and so incredibly big and ugly but yet so beautiful. Apparently it's not very common for tourists to see a moose so we already feel we are true Swedes ;o)
We also viewed our dream house with the realtor on Saturday and we've decided to buy it. Tomorrow we are going to stick the sign the Bo made on our window and is our house officially for sale. I can not believe it but we might spend this Christmas in our new home in Sweden.
I'll be back with shop news tomorrow.
ps: I've also started a Flickr collection called "Decorating Family" in where I'm going to show you how my family and friends decorate.
Thank you, thank you, thank you. I feel like blowing kisses in mid-air. It's lovely reading all your comments and they definitely go in the memories book. I feel even more excited about the move now. I don't feel it's time yet to explain and tell why we are moving and why we are leaving The Netherlands because everything is still in it's baby shoes and I don't want to jinx things - superstitious me.
What I do want to tell is that the new shop is up and running. As I liked selling on Etsy I felt that I wasn't able to get to please everyone. Eventually the idea came to build a store where you can combine your own choice of fabric (within my selection) with your own choice of letters. This goes faster, is more fun and I can make your cushions fresh and they don't have to sit and rot in my boot room.
I have a special new shop discount on all the sample cushions so go get yourself a Box Letter Cushion pronto!
These two samples are traveling to the offices of Real Simple tomorrow. I'm so excited they are going to be used for an extra family edition this August. You should've heard the shriek I made when I read the e-mail they sent me. It's like the mother ship is calling me home.
I often get the question how I get the cushions to smell so lovely - this didn't occur to me but I think it's what we do isn't it, smelling something we've bought? I for example never put new clothing on before it's washed let alone new bedding or towels. I need to have stuff smell like me first. I'm a bit like a cat I think.
I use Robijn laundry detergent and Robijn Aloë Vera fabric softener. Robijn is an Unilever product and is sold in a lot of EU countries under the name of Comfort. I've checked the site and it's actually called Snuggle in America but they don't have the same products as we have in Europe. To top it off I use the Robijn/Comfort ironing water for my iron. Ooooh and for some good booty shaking check the dodamoves website. The Bo already danced around the study and can't believe they've used the phrase "feeling irie" for an ad in that context ;o)
