Santa's Little Helper

It turns out my custom recipes are a wonderful gift for Christmas! Of course I thought so already, but apparently I was right. I like being right. Because of this I have been promoted to be Santa's Little Helper. So instead of trying to get organized, I have been making an even bigger mess, working on the custom recipe requests.

So here is a little sneak peak of what I have been working on and what will be under the Christmas trees around the US. While they will make their family happy with a personalized recipe poster, I am happy as well. Not only because I love to illustrate and I sell my work, but also because I found a great way to get my hands on some family recipes. I will definitely try these ones!

If you are thinking about getting one of these posters on vintage (90 years old!!) paper, you have to hurry. I only have two sheets left. Of course I will try to get my hands on similar, or even better, paper. But if this is the one you want, hurry! You can order it right here.

My First Mosaic

So I had a mosaic workshop a week ago. We had three hours, a selection of colored ceramic tiles, hammers, tile glue and either a mirror on a piece of wood of just a piece of wood. Where to start? Of course I was not making this easy on myself, so first of all I wanted the wood without the mirror: more room for a design. The second thing I did was draw way to many detailed things on that piece of wood.

For some reason everyone rushed to collect their tiles before they even had the time to think about what they were about to make. Mad women, dying to get their hands on the right pieces, like Crazy Summer Sale. I looked at the scene and shook my head. Soon after, deafening noise filled the room. Hammers crushing those poor tiles into pieces. After I finished my sketch and decided on the colors, I collected the left overs to get started on my design.

Half way through the evening, headache around the corner, starving, I realized I was the odd one out with a vegetable and a fruit in front of me. The teacher looked at my work with a big question mark in her eyes. She asked what no one wants to hear: "What is it?" A little offended she didn't see, I answered: 'A beetroot'. She mumbled something like 'I wouldn't know, my kids don't eat them' and moved on to the lady next to me. She must have sensed I didn't take her very seriously after her question, because she ignored me the rest of the evening.

Three hours and two sore hands later I was covered in tile glue and not even halfway finished. As expected. I took some tiles with me to finish it at home. And here it is.

Weekend Treats #1: Cherry Pie

I have been busy all the time and now all of a sudden I have whole weekend with kind of nothing... the strange thing is that I am still in that efficiency mode. So instead of relaxing and doing nothing (which I used to be extremely good at!), I keep looking around to see what can be done. Fun things of course. I am not cleaning my house on my free weekend, are you crazy?

So I found some good things to do. One was finishing that mosaic piece I made at a workshop last week. The workshop lasted three hours, my piece took about 7. Why make it easy on yourself? I'll show you when it's all finished. It still needs a finishing touch. By then the day was half gone. 

So I went to the supermarket to get the ingredients for the mouth watering red curry recipe I wanted to make (yes, it's a candidate for the Recipe Cards pt. 2). I also wanted to make a nut bread a friend gave me the recipe of. Spending about 30 minutes searching for ingredients they didn't have, I changed the plan. Instead of baking that nut bread, I decided to bake a cherry pie! 

It turned out great, so I want to share the recipe with you. It doesn't take a million ingredients and it won't take you hours. Maybe one. But you'll be proud of the result. 

This what you need: 

- 300 grams of all purpose flour

- 6 tbsp of sugar

- a little salt

- 1 tbsp of butter

- 7 grams of dry yeast

- 150 ml of milk

- A jar (700 grams) of cherries in syrup

- 1 tbsp of corn starch

- dry breadcrums

- 1 egg

- a little sugar for decoration

And this is how you make it:

Mix the flour, 2 tbsp of sugar and a bit of salt in a bowl. Warm the milk (not hot, just warm), dissolve the butter and the yeast in it and add to the flour. Knead it all together untill you have smooth ball of dough. Let it rest in a warm place for about 30 minutes. Preheat the oven at 175 degrees.

Separate the cherries and the syrup. Put the syrup in a pan with 4 tbsp of sugar. Bring to a boil. Mix the corn starch with one tbsp of cold water and add to the syrup. Let it boil until it starts to thicken. Mix in the cherries. Take of the heat. The mixture will become thicker when it cools down. 

Roll out half of your dough, big enough to fill your pie plate (mine is ø 30 cm). Put it on the plate and cover the dough with the breadcrums. Put a piece of lining paper on top and fill with marbles or baking beans (blind baking). Put it in the oven for 15 minutes. 

Rol out the other half of the dough and take out little diamond shaped pieces. I used a piece of firm paper / carton that I folded into a square. I like it if it looks homemade, so no need to worry if it's all symmetrical. 

Remove the baking beans and the lining paper from the pie plate. Pour the cherries onto the pie bottom and cover with the second half of dough. Brush some egg on the top and sprinkle with sugar. Put in the (still preheated) oven for 25 minutes. Et voila!

Custom stuff

I've been having quite some 'Etsy Conversations' lately. Someone who wants to know something about my products, someone who asked if I do some custom stuff as well and customers giving feedback on their order. It's great to have direct contact with (potential) customers.

The custom stuff made me think. Someone had asked if I could make a Recipe Card of a her own recipe as a present. Printing one card is not an (affordable) option, so I had another great idea. It has been in the back of my head all week and yesterday I had the time to act on it.

Here it is. Instead of having the (custom) recipe printed as a postcard, which is too expensive unless you get a shitload printed at once, I can print it on this beautiful vintage (very vintage: over 90 years old!) empty bookpages I have. And that kind of makes it a little poster, so it needs a frame as well: making it the perfect present for yourself and every foodie you know!


Can you see it on your kitchen wall? Your own personal favorite recipe, illustrated just for you. How cool is that?

There are a few options: you can get one of the five recipes from the Recipe Card set, like the one below. Framed and gift-ready. No hassle with choosing a good recipe. The second option is a custom recipe, framed and ready-to-go. And the third is a custom recipe illustrated to frame yourself (in case you are in the United States and don't want to pay 18 euro for shipping, I understand).

So I am very proud to announce that these three options are for sale at Stoffer + Blik now. Perfect timing for the holidays! Put me to work!

Happy mornings

It's like Christmas every morning at the moment, because every time I wake up and check my phone for the time I see this: 'Etsy: New order from .......'. Then I happily jump out of bed and enter my little Stoffer + Blik factory, that has become a giant mess by now.

I leave a trail of paper, washi tape, stickers and twine while I make pretty packages for lovely customers all around the world: USA, Australia, UK and of course good old Holland! These holiday gift tags below are on their way to Megan in the United States.

Oh how I love doing this. Can I quit my dayjob yet!?

Color preferences

Working as a designer there are three key things: typography, shape and color. While I was trying to find some sleep somewhere last night I realized something about that last thing: color. Your preferences are determined very early on. I remember lots of colors from my childhood. From the color of my favorite sweater (white & pink), my blue parakeet, the color of the room of my brother (red & white) and sister (mint green). But what came to mind most were some pieces of clay. I had a set of square clay sticks in different colors and I remember I really loved three of them. And I still can see these colors very clearly. I made sure to never mix the clay: they had to stay the perfect color. I could look at them for ages.

Here they are:

My childhood bedroom has been that exact color green and later that color pink. I now have some additional favorites that are a little more subtle, but these are still 'my colors'.

I looked it up this morning and read that as an infant you start developing color preference when you are just 12 weeks old. It changes over time, but positive things from your childhood linked to a certain color, will stick with you throughout your life.

You can see it in Stoffer + Blik and you can see it my home and my wardrobe. I guess you really choose your favorite colors very early on, I was no older than 7 when I was so smitten with these colors of clay. And it really never changed. These colors look familiar?

This set of Christmas cards is for sale at Stoffer + Blik.

Pinecone Stamp

Just a short notice. Still busy.

I have made a new pinecone stamp. The previous one was shipped all the way to the United States. Since it's handmade, it's not exactly the same. Believe me, I have tried. I have about 5 trial & error lino pinecones now. This one turned out best.

I thought it was now or never (or at least now or next year). Since it is still fall, you might want this now. It's for sale at Stoffer + Blik!

Of course the photographs are new, so this is the one you're getting!

A little sunshine

If you're here in The Netherlands, as I am, you know it has been raining and raining and raining. I don't particularly like rain. Surprisingly. If you're inside and don't have to be anywhere (and you're not mopping the floor to get rid of the water coming through your window panes), I guess it could be kind of cosy, in a way. Although snow is more effective for cosiness.

The thing is, I needed something to cheer me up. I have been working non stop for the last couple of weeks, as you may have noticed by the reduced frequency of blog posts. So I am a little tired and I need some white sand, a palm tree, a gentle breeze and an ocean of warm blue water. That's not going to happen right now (it actually will in a few months...yeaah). So the next best thing: cookies, ice cream, red wine (it's a little too early for wine) and flowers!


I had the cookies and the ice cream as well of course, but I wanted fresh flowers. It feels like a special treat. So I found myself some pretty flowers in pretty colors, looking pretty on my new tables in the living room.

Etsy Gift Cards
And there's a little Etsy shop announcement as well: I now accept Etsy Gift cards!

You can buy a Etsy Gift Card from Etsy here. You can get one from 20 euro or more. You pay for it the way you would for anything on Etsy. Print the gift card or email it to the recipient with a note.

The card is valid for every Etsy shop around the world that accepts the Etsy Gift Cards, including Stoffer + Blik! If you have ever spend a few hours browsing Etsy, you now that the shops here are filled with unique, beautiful, handmade and special items that are absolutely perfect for just about everyone.

And they never expire! How great is that? I think I want one under the christmas tree!