Stitches and Thrills

Friday November 22nd the  Etsy Pop-Up Winter Pop Up Shop (organized bythe Ka-Ching Collective) was officially opened with a small party. My compliments for Babette , Margriet , Annabel and Barbara : they created a wonderful shop. There is a lot of variation in the items they selected, yet it all works together perfectly. From both my shops items are available in the pop Up Shop ( MissMinoes and AllFairness ): Apart from the familiar Etsian faces I also met some nice new shop owners. I talked to Nelleke of RedCheeksFactory , the girls from the bows at StrictlyAmsterdam , and to Beau from TheHelloShop . Beau is both designer and soap maker. But THE gift idea for this years holiday season is her home made beard oil . It softens the beard and nourishes the skin. Apart from the socializing we also had first choice in doing our shopping. This even created a line at the cash register! A great success on the first day already. I couldn't leave without Muscle Man Paper ...

The Nordic Island Hat: Inspired by the wind, the dune, the colours and the atmosphere at the Wad&Design festival on Schiermonnikoog, at which I was a part of an Etsy Pop Up shop last September. I designed The Nordic Island Hat on Schiermonnikoog and i knitted the first hats there from Drops Eskimo wool. Cute and cosy on the couch in the Etsy cottage where we stayed with fellow Etsians Babette, Margriet, Nynke en Barbara. De Nordic Island Hat shall be available in my Etsy-shop next week. I'm also working on writing out the pattern.      

Last week I was on Schiermonnikoog, a small Dutch island in the Waddensea. It is a beautiful island and with beautiful sea views and walks in the dunes . I was on Schiermonnikoog as part of an Etsy Pop-Up Shop during the Wad&Design Festival. One of the participants of the design festival was the designer duo Soepboer&Stooker . They gave a new take on cross stitch samplers by enlarging the design. You could also participate in the project in a short workshop. In the city hall there was an exhibition of old cross stitch samplers to illustrate the traditional background.   Coincidently a couple of days after I got back two family heirlooms came back together: my aunt showed 2 cross stitch samplers my great-aunt had made when she was 10 yrs old. This great-aunt had later tragically died at the age of 19. Then my father said he had saved her box of needle work which had been at my great-uncles mill house. We all decided these items should be kept together f...

Nowadays I usually start the day with either of these 2 shakes. The Barley Grass Detox Breakfast Shake is a detoxing shake to start the day freshly. I usually take these on my work-at-home days or weekend. The Soy Protein Soy Shake is my energy shake, to get ready for a more physically demanding day at work. Barley Grass Detox Breakfast Shake : Ingredients: 200 ml Coconut water 1 banana 1 tablespoon barley grass powder 1 tablespoon oat bran 1 teaspoon maca powder 10 drops Vitamin D oil Extra fruit for taste variation: strawberries, blackberries, melon, pineapple. All in the Magic Bullet blender...& breakfast is served! You can also use wheat grass in stead of barley grass. Personally I find wheat grass to have a more earthier taste, barley grass has a softer taste and is less dominant. Soy Protein Energy Shake: 200 ml soy milk (unsweetened) 1 banana 2 tablespoon (approx 25 gram) soy protein powder (unsweetened) 1 tablespoon milled flaxseed (my favouri...

In my revamped Etsy shop AllFairness (previously called BonnetsByMissMinoes) I've added a fun new product: Wire Headbands. Although these headbands are already very popular in the US and Britain, they are still fairly new to the Netherlands.They are a prefect accessory for the trendy 1940s 1950s retro fashion of this season. The wire headbands that I sell are handmade by me, from either GOTS certified organic cotton, or vintage fabric from the 60s/70s/80s. What makes the wire headband so fabulous is you can wear it in so many different ways. I know there are already English YouTube videos around, but I thought it be nice to make one in Dutch, to show the different styling options.The sound is very soft though, as I filmed it with my compact camera. So you might have to switch the volume to 11. This is the first video I ever made... (For Big Bang Theory fans: I had to think about Sheldon and Amy's flag instruction video.) ;-)  Bunny Twist  Hairband ...

When I was a young baking girl I was terribly unsuccessful in baking cookies. They'd usually end up being very dry tooth breakers. Cakes & tarts however was a different story: I excelled at banana or apple loafs and vegan cheesecake. The fact that I couldn't make a decent cookie did quite bother me (or at least that little perfectionist voice that resides in my head). A friend brought me on the path of baking cookies again when we were choosing to try to get rid of all the refined sugar in our food and drinks. Based on several recipes on the internet and my own experiments I made these delicious soft Chewy Banana Oatmeal Cookies. Chewy Banana Oatmeal Cookies. (recipe for about 22 cookies) Ingredients: 50 gram raisins (= 1/2 cup) 100 ml water (=1/2 cup) 75 gram flour (= 1 cup) 1/2 tsp baking soda 1/2 tsp baking powder 2 tbsp coconut oil, extra virgin (soft, but doesn't have to be melted) 125 gram oat meal (=2 cup) 2 ripe bananas 50 gram chopp...

As promissed: On reaching 100 followers at my Miss Minoes Facebook page , I will share with all the lovely  100+ of you this knitting pattern I made for a chevron knitted phone cover. Thank you for following! =^x^= Chevron Zig Zag cover for mobile phone. Used materials: - 4 Sock needles metric 3.5 / US 4 / UK 9 - 20 gr colour A, 20 gr colour B (Double Knitting DK yarn) - Big embroider needle. - Button with 4 holes. - Optional: crochet needle (metric 3.5) Gauche for pattern 10 cm (4”) = 22 stitches and 22 rows. (Fair isle knitting can be quite stiff. If you are a tight knitter, you might want to go for a bigger size needles.) You’ll keep the thread of the other colour yarn at the back of your knitting, try not to pull this to tight. Pattern in 2 sizes: Small phone (11.5 cm x 6 cm) Medium phone (13 - 13.5 cm x 6.5 - 7 cm) There is a little stretch in the cosy, so you can pull a little in either length or width to get a snug fit. If your ...