uh... hey...

Hey guys...

For all of you who read my last post, I KNOW, I lied, I'm sorry... I was supposed to make a post everyday until Thursday but I got busy... and tired... is that a good excuse? Let me explain, when they all arrived my cousins kidnapped me and tortured me with their eternal cuteness and games. When I wasn't playing with them I was busy eating chocolates and spending some quality time with my family which I don't see very often. And of course, since it's Christmas, I stayed up very very VERY late every night spending even more quality time with my family. So when I finally went to bed, I actually went to sleep (how could I?) because I was dead tired. 

So there. You are now allowed to judge me. Please don't be too harsh...   please...    don't look at me like that... It wasn't my fault!

So after all that judging you need to do, you might want to know what is going to happen next. To make it up to all of you I am going to do a somewhat brief summary of all four days in one post. If that's not good enough then... you creep me out... 

Anyway here are my last words before I start writing my Christmas post which I have the feeling is going to be very very very very long... daaaah, I don't feel like writing it. meh. So, for all of you who still think I'm not a huge disgrace to society, wish me good luck. I shall be needing it.

Oh, one last note, I made a twitter account for all of you twitter people who like to tweet things. Here is my user: @natsdaydream

OK, now, bye.

P.S: sorry!

Coming up...

Hi there!!!

Happy that all of you are still alive after the tragic death of the earth we have experienced on the 21st of December 2012. May there be a minute of silence in respect of the earth and all of the wonderful things it's done for us over thousands of millions of years. 

Now putting that aside I would like to give you a quick update on what is to come. Over the next four days my parents and I will be receiving our family for Christmas. We're going to be ten people in our house and this is not one event I want to be forgotten as the years pass. So to keep the memory alive, I'm going to write a new post everyday about everything that has happened. This may or may not be very interesting depending on what will or will not happen over the next four days. 

So that everything is clear, here is the list of people contributing to this event:

1. Me (Obviously, and no, my name is not obviously. ... obviously)
2. Mum (Valentine)
3. Dad (Olivier)
4. Half cousin number one (Thao who is half Vietnamese, nine years old and incredibly cute)
5. Half cousin number two (Thuan who is half Vietnamese, six years old, still believes in Santa and is also incredibly cute
6. Half aunt (Celine who is the Mum of my cousins and the half sister of my Dad. She has the same Dad but not the same Mum)
7. Grandma (Eliane but I call her Babouchka and she is the Mum of my Mum)
8. Half aunt's Mum (Genevieve)
9. Half aunt's half brother (Pierre Axel. I know this is getting confusing but stay with me. He has the same Mum as my half aunt but not the same Dad so I'm not related to him)
10. Half aunt's half brother's girlfriend (Currently her name is unknown and so is her nationality...)

So I hope this wasn't too confusing (I know that I'm lifting my hopes up for no reason) but I thought it would be less confusing to tell you now instead of trying to explain it in the middle of the next posts... please leave a comment if you're still confused! I will be happy to help :) Unfortunately I can't post any pictures of them because 1. I either don't have pictures of them or have some but are not very recent and 2. because I am not allowed to post pictures of people. Personally, I think those are two pretty good reasons not to post pictures.

There you go, a somewhat quick update on what is coming up. Oh, and by the way (BTW for all you cool kids) tomorrow there will be two posts, one on our hasty preparations before everyone arrives/arrived (if you are reading this in the future which you probably are) and a post on the first day. 

ttfn :)

T Shirts

Suit up! OK, that was a really bad entrance but it was gonna be awkward otherwise... Anyway, a few weeks ago it was my friends birthday. Actually, it was two of my friends birthdays! So, for their birthday (this is like the third time i'm saying birthday in only three sentences...) I made them T Shirts! And they arrived today! (I know, I'm really late on the present giving thing but I did give them a small one before hand to wait! Check out my post called Movember if you want to know what it is!) I know this may not sound like the most amazing idea ever but if you're ever hesitating or don't know what to get for your friend/family member/annoying person who demands a present from you, a personalized T Shirt is a really great idea! 

You can do this in a few ways, you can:

• Draw on a light colored T Shirt with special pens made to draw on fabric (these are usually found in toy shops for little kids. At least that's where I found mine...)

• You can iron a picture on a blank T Shirt (I've never done it but my friend has... I would deeply recommend looking it up on the internet... mostly for security reasons and if you ever want to see that picture ever again.)

• Or you can send it to a company where they print out your own personalized T Shirt. If you live in the US or Canada, there's this great side called http://www.customink.com/ where you can design sweaters, pants, hats, shirts, water bottles, anything! And they have a wide range of fonts and pictures you can use (in addition to your own). For people who live in other countries (like me), I went to a near by printer shop where they will gladly print your picture to a T Shirt. If that doesn't work you can use a little website I like to call Google!

So, as you may have guessed, I used the third option for my friends though in the past I would amuse myself with drawing pretty pictures on white shirts (if you have kids, this is a great activity to do at home!)

Here are the pictures of the finished shirts that I make for my friends Jiwon and Lea.

Front

Back

Front

Back

You can really be creative when you make these shirts for your friends/family/annoying person who demands a present from you! You can put a friendly message, an inside joke, a picture of their favorite band, anything! Another fun thing to do is to add a few "accessories" to it. Sew on buttons, ribbons, some fancy lace on the sleeves (this is more of a girly thing boys unless you really enjoy frilly ribbons on your shirts) anything to make it personal! If you want a more trashy look you can rip the sleeves or add something more rebellious... I don't know what that would be, that's why I put three little dots. 

...

Bye!

P.S: For all of you who desire to see my shirt in action (which means being worn) then please go to my my friend's - Jiwon - Blog! Click on the MUSTACHIO (by mustachio I mean the word.... but not this one, the one before that). For all of you who are following my blog (thanks!!!) then you will have already found a link to her blog earlier on.... and now for the final word: Bye.

Pros and Cons on Winter

Winter is finally here! Yay!!

I woke up this morning to find the scenery coated with a thick layer of snow. This made me overly excited and anxious to kick some butt with a snowball fight except for one small detail... I woke up with a fever of 39 degrees (Celsius because last time I checked, I was European) and a huge headache.

What kind of person is sick on a snow day? Not me! At least that's what I thought but I was betrayed by... my body? I don't know... But still, I could be running around in my garden making failed snow angels (though they still look pretty to my eyes), bringing to life my half melted snow man or sledging down a half a meter hill. As dumb as it sounds, I still want to do all of those things. But, unfortunately, my body is warm enough to melt all the snow off our car (that, my friend, is a lot of snow!) in an instant and... I seem to be a little over attached to my bed... But, who isn't?

Anyway, so now I am going to make a list of the pros and cons about winter. Here it goes:

Pros:

• Snow Men
• Snow Women
• Snow Children (the list goes on...)
• Snow Angels (snow devils?)
• Snow ball fights (my personal  favorite!)
• Hot Chocolate drowned in Whipped Cream
• Thick Socks
• Snow!
• Ice Skating
• Ice Fishing (didn't think of that one did you!)
• Christmas! (or any other holiday you celebrate depending on your religion!)
• The beautiful scenery
• The Warm Fire Place
• Holiday lights!
• First Snow

Cons:

• Wet feet
• Colds (way too many of those!)
• Frostbite
• Runny Nose
• Fever (I am obviously not having a good time with that!)
• Nostalgia of the summer
• A lot of sneezing
• Not attaining your New Years resolutions (you have to be a beast to be able to complete all of them! If you did though, well done!)
• Annoying Christmas adverts on TV
• Dirty snow on the Streets
• Short Days or Long Nights
• Bruises from Ice Skating (Though usually they're worth it!)
• No Pretty Flowers :'(

So there is my list of pros and cons for the winter though I do love the winter... a lot! But like every other season, it has its down sides. I hope winter doesn't feel offended... I didn't mean to hurt you winter!

Anyway, while I fix winter's feelings, here are some pictures of the snow that I took. I wanted them to look something like this:

But my camera is incapable of taking nice pictures so they ended up like this:

And I just found out that all the others are blurry... Well, I at least hope you enjoyed this beautiful picture that I took (I am being sarcastic, please don't freak out) and that you have a lovely winter! 

Oh, and just before you leave, I would like to annoy you with the video of my favorite winter song! Bye!

RICKIE-TOUS! RICKIE-TOUS!

The creepiest thing happened to me last night... I think I might have started a new horror story...

In my room I have a small balcony that is faced towards the street. Our street is quite calm, there are only houses in that street and not many people walk down the road. Cars come every five to ten minutes... So, anyway, at night, if I can't go to sleep I will open up the windows and just stare at the house across the street. This relaxes me and makes me feel cozy. So, you can guess where the story is going to start. I couldn't go to sleep and so I opened the windows to soak in some fresh air. It was windy out so I brought a white blanket to wrap around myself.  I sat there for about five minutes, counting how many cars passed (three if you must know) before I heard voices coming from further up the street. Usually the only people who walk down the street in the middle of the night are people walking their dogs in a rush, so I don't bother trying to take cover. But this time it was (I think) a family of around eight people. It didn't cross my mind that I should take cover before it was too late. So, there I was, sitting in my room with the window open covered by a white blanket that seemed to glow a bit in the light of the lamp post outside. There was one lady who was in the front and seemed to walking her dog (she was still part of that mob of people) when she stopped right across the street from me and stared at me. You would not believe how scary that can be! After a few seconds of staring she pointed at to show all the others what she had 'discovered'. There were probably five children/teenagers and two other adults. They all turned to me and started muttering to themselves (I could have sworn one of them let out a small yelp). I quickly got up and ran to my bed. Then I heard one of them cry RICKIE-TOUS! RICKIE-TOUS! No idea what that means! They sounded like they were speaking a mixture of Flemish, Spanish and German... Which obviously meant I didn't understand a word they said. The tone of their voices sounded like they were trying to call me back outside. This freaked me out even more. I stayed there listening to them for a few minutes not daring to look outside before I heard them go away. I crawled down onto all fours and crawled over to the window to check if they were still there. Gone. Finally! I closed the window and went back to my bed. So much for my plan to relax myself, I stayed up another two hours thinking about what had happened. And the weirdest thing is is that I scared myself into thinking there was a mysterious girl in my house. When I was that mysterious girl..... I can just picture them talking to their friends back home about the night they saw a 'ghost'. Now that I think about it, it's actually pretty cool!!

ATCHOO!

Bless me! Sorry about that... I stumbled on some pictures of flowers I took two years ago. They made me a bit nostalgic of the summer... but let's get back on track! I took them in a botanical garden in Alsace where there were some truly GORGEOUS flowers. Flowers are my favorite subject to photography because of the bright colors that reflect off the petals in the sunshine.

So here they are, waving goodbye to the last rays of summer before the snow fall. Though, don't get me wrong, I love the winter! Just a little too cold...

Lena Grace

Recently, one of my best friends ( Lena Grace ) was re-doing the header of her blog. She couldn't find any ideas that would match her theme/blog. I then remembered that a year back I had drawn her with one of her dolls. This drawing was a newer version of one that I drew about two years and a half ago. I then asked her if she wanted me to send the picture that I had drawn to her ( she said yes! yay! ) and use it for her header.

Also, today one of my friends asked me how I became so good at drawing. I know this is the cheesiest thing ever but, practice, practice, practice! And I have proof for this! Here is the original and new version of Lena ( The new version is the one she's using as her header)

Original Version

New Version

So hopefully this will motivate you in drawing or any other activity you do. Practice really does help!

AND if you would like to check out Lena's blog click here. 

P.S: I do know that the thumb on her left hand is the wrong way. I apologize for that biological error...  

Blue and Green Music

For all of you who didn't know, this is my 5th year playing trumpet at my school. We have a proper band (only wind instruments and percussion. Sorry strings) with a really really awesome conductor, Mrs. Stock.

For our December concert Ms. Stock is making us play a song called " Blue and Green Music " composed by Samuel R. Hazo which was inspired by the painting called " Blue and Green Music " Painted by Georgia O'Keeffe. And I find that, well, truly and utterly inspiring!

I love how it starts out really mysterious and creepy and sounds kind of Egyptian. But then there is this whole twist and it becomes hopeful and really beautiful before once more going back into a dark mysterious place. To really enjoy this song, listen to it until the end. The beginning might be a bit boring, but when you get to around 2:30 there is this big build up before releasing my favorite part (which is the hopeful and beautiful part I was talking about).

Here is the painting and the song recording! Hope you will too feel truly and utterly inspired as I am after you've heard/seen this!

Oh, and another thing. The mallet solo at the beginning and end, my friend Thomas is playing it in our band. Just, FYI.

(This is not our band playing but a recording of my band may be posted in December after our concert.)

Accordion Athena

My friend Athena is dying to learn how to pay the accordion so to motivate her I drew a picture of her with... can you guess??? An accordion!!! 

Thought I would share it with you guys too in addition to the fastest accordion player in the world! (He's pretty amazing!)  So sit down and relax!

Good luck Athena!!!

Twit - a - woo

Did you hear that? I think it's the owl with my Hogwarts acceptance letter!!!

That's what I would have liked to say the day of my eleventh birthday but never did! I never understood why... Maybe I should send a quick e mail to Dumbledore and tell him that my letter hasn't arrived yet... BUT if you have a friend that is simply dying for theirs (like I do!) then here is a crafty solution just for you!!

You will be needing:

- White and yellow paper
- Paper in the color of your choice (this will be the color of your owl. I chose brown)
- A black Marker
- A metallic green pen
- A cream colored envelope
- Glue
- Scissors

1. Cut out the outline of the owl (without wings and feet) from the colored paper

2. Cut out the outline of your wings from the colored paper and an outline of a tail.

3. Cut out the feet outline from the yellow paper

4. Make an origami beak out of yellow paper. Click here for a tutorial. I cut out the edges of the beak to make it fit on my owl.

5. Cut out 2 large circles (eyes) from the white paper and 1 big oval (stomach)

6. Draw 1 small circle (pupils) in each white circle with a black marker to make the eyes. You can also draw small curved lines in the oval (see final image) in the oval for its stomach.

7. Stick the eyes and stomach onto your owl. Secondly, stick the beak right under the eyes. Then stick the wings and tail on the BACK of the owl.

8. Stick the feet just over halfway up your owl. DO NOT stick the toes!

9. Take your envelope and write on the outside the name and if you want their address with the metallic green pen. (e.g: Mr. Daniel Radcliffe  22 unknown street in a land far far away)

10. Finally stick the MIDDLE toe of each foot at the front of the envelope (where the name and address should be) and the outside toes at the back (where the flap is).

There! Now your friends can stop worrying about their letter and get on with their magical studies at home!

P.S: I THINK I JUST SAW AN OWL OUTSIDE!!!!!!! :O

Cloudy Socks

I was looking through my wardrobe yesterday and found my FAVORITE PAIR OF SOCKS EVEEEEEER!!!! I used to wear the all the time in 6th grade but since then I completely lost track of them.
I tried them on and they still fit me!!!! I am SO excited for spring so that I can wear them!!!!!
Here's an edited picture of them so you can enjoy them just as much as me!!!!

I love the little clouds on them!!! They make my legs feel freeeeeeeeeee!!!

Chilly

Starting to feel a little... I don't know! Chilly? The summer is already long gone and winter is right around the corner. Does anybody feel like time has grown wings and flown by? It feels like just yesterday I started school again...
But lets not dwell on the past! Let's move forward and make the most of upcoming events (I know I'm excited!!!)
Time to put on some thick layers and drink some nice warm cocoa by the roasting chimney... mmmmm..... What a wonderful life it is!
So to celebrate the coming of winter I drew a little something just for you ;)

Enjoy!!

P.S: My toes are starting to get numb...

Movember

Happy Movember everybody!!! Hope yours is growing long and shaggy!
But what about girls you say??? Well, here is my cunning solution for all girls who would like to participate!!
I have made a simple stache that will make your friends laugh so hard their mustaches will fall off!

You will need:

- Cardboard
- 1 lolly stick
- Glue (strong)
- Black paint or marker
- Transparent nail varnish (optional)

1. Cut out a mustache shape out of some cardboard.
2. Color / paint the card board and lolly stick COMPLETELY
3. Stick the lolly stick on the side or center (depending on you) of the mustache
4. Leave to dry
5. Coat the whole thing with nail varnish and let to dry (optional)
6. Voila!

You can also add a top hat by cutting half a toilet paper roll (cardboard part, not paper!) and sticking it to a circular shaped piece of cardboard. I stuck a bobby pin under it so that you can keep it in your hair!

So, here are a few pictures of my friend Jiwon with the mustache! If you would like to visit her blog (which she would deeply appreciate!!) click here.

Giant Acorn

So, this morning i wake up and see this giant acorn in my garden. I looked up to see if there was any sign of, well... anything! But no. The sky was clear and there weren't any trees near by.

Here is my hypothesis:

While i was sleeping, aliens from the planet Zorg came to earth to do some biological studies on acorns. Since the aliens of planet Zorg measure an average of three meters they need to increase the size of the acorn to investigate it. So increase the acorn they did and after they did their studies they left the acorn on earth BUT forgot to shrink it to its normal size. This then comes to my conclusion.

Starting from today, i believe in aliens.

Farewell from the planet Zorg

P.S: For all of you who are freaking out, aliens from the planet Zorg are allergic to chocolate chip cookies. 

Halloween Cupcakes

Like cupcakes? Like Halloween? I do too! A few weeks ago (the Monday before Halloween FYI) me and my friend Sara made the most delicious and epicly awesome Halloween cupcakes EVER! They were half chocolate (Starbucks hot chocolate powder was used. mmmmmm! ) and half vanilla with a thick blanket of icing! Not only was the icing good, but fun too! We made monsters, pumpkins, more monsters, mummies, an alien and some others that were off topic... These may look hard to make but with just a tooth pick you can make pretty good stuff!!! We also used some chocolate for decorating too (which tasted even more delicious!!!). We got some of our ideas from the internet but most came right from the top of our heads!!! Here they are:

Not really sure what this one was supposed to be... Looks a bit like a dragon's egg or some sort of green spiderweb... 

Some cool swirly cupcakes made with the leftover icing

Monstrously delicious!!!! 

Not Halloween themed though my friend is convinced it looks like a witches hat...

Cute alien from outer space ready to eat every cupcake it can get its tentacles on!!!

My friends amazingly made pumpkins. Inspired from the internet

The mummy is watching you!!! Also inspired by the internet.

And my favorites and, in my opinion, most delicious! Hairy monsters made from chocolate!!! How cute!!!

2nd Post... exciting!!!

Hello again!
As a second post I thought I would show you what kind of drawings I do. This is one of my favorites which (in my opinion) looks welcoming!! Please give feedback, it would mean a lot to me!!
Cheerio

Do I hear a knock on the door?

Hey!!!
Welcome to my blog! I hope you find it nice and cozy and that you settle in just fine!
So what is this blog about???
It's all about my memories, dreams, hopes and creations! I will be posting creative things I make and give you some step to step instructions if you feel like doing it at home! I will also be sharing drawings that I do because, well, I LOVE drawing. I usually draw in my free time and find it quite relaxing!
So, I hope you will enjoy this blog since this is also the first time I make one! I also hope that you will enjoy the things that I make/draw and that it will stretch a smile across your face!
Enjoy!