Drahtesel…ähm, pferd

It's time to feel wild and free on the bike again! This week's topic at Illustration Friday seemed just fitting.

Eggciting

Happy Easter!

Easter eggs

Easter preparations! Sun painted some eggs today. I have some Easter links for you to get in the mood too: Origami Bunny Box Easter Bunny Macarons Cute little Easter Card by Marie Geissler. I will probably lack the time, but maybe you would like to make a little Pompom Bunny? They are cute! There are a PDF. and a video on the site to watch how it's done. I couldn't eat them! A recipe for Osterbrötchen by BastisRIKE.

Sun roof

Wonderful sunday. No fever, a nice brunch with Sun on a roof top and afterwards some lovely finds on the fleamarket. What about you? Having fun too?

Outside

Resurfacing. Not only all the colours and smells and bird's songs arise again, but also me. I brought a mean virus flu back from Bologna, so I missed the first days of bloom and stayed in bed with a fever (that's why Sun was missing on Sunday). Even more so was I astounded yesterday how progressed everything is. Oh happy spring time! Some goodies I found: I wanna make myself these wings! I love Giula Sagramola's Family Album. He is soooooo cuuuuute!!!! *Gnaaaaaaaaaaa* Although it seems the blog stopped last autumn, I still have fun looking through this street style blog ;) The Catorialist! I can totally feel with this little ballerina. I wanna be their groupie! Have a wonderful weekend. Und alles, alles Gute Mama!!! :)

Bologna treasures

As I promised here are my personal gems that I found at the bookfair in Bologna. Be prepared for a rather long post! First is an awesome pop-up-book by the publisher Helium Editions, that became instantly one of my favourite publishing companies when I drooled over nearly every book at their fairstand. »Dans la forêt du paresseux« is published by Helium Editions and illustrated by Anouck Boisrobert. She also illustrated Popville, where a town grows throughout the book. In »Dans la forêt du paresseux« a rainforest is cleared, but a gardener's seeds bring it back. Beautiful, isn't it? And here is a video, so you can better see how awesome it's constructed. With every turn of a page your mouth drops even more. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . And here comes the next book by Helium, the forest plays a role in it too. »Adieu Chaussette« by Benjamin Chaud (if you find a page of him, please tell me!). As much as I understand the French text, the story seems to be about a boy and his rabbit (with oh so cute ears!), whom he abandones in the woods, because a rabbit is just too boring as a pet, but soon he regrets it. I like how Benjamin Chaud draws the forest and his characters are just too cute, especially this chubby rabbit. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Helium book No.3 (as I said, I became a fan ;) »Á quoi penses-tu?« by Laurent Moreau. I like her style and I was thrilled by the use of paper flaps in the book. By turning them you can see what every person is thinking. One person thought of nothing, so there was just the blank space when you turned the flap. Great idea! See: . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . *cough* Helium again, and another book by Laurent Moreau: »Les Beaux instants«. A gorgeous colouring book with a beautiful use of blue and black. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Collections of things popped up in the blogosphere a while ago, but more and more it seems to become a topic in children's book too. I found many books that were about certain collections and then had beautiful double spreads showing all the things side by side. One of them is »Sånt som er« by Svein Nyhus and published by Gyldendal. Eli is collecting things and then puts them into categories, that are shown on the right side (like wet, old, hard etc.) Here is an interesting blogpost (in Norwegian, I translated it with Google) by Svein Nyhus about developing the book. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Another book, that I liked (and bought right away), has been »Miasteczko Mamoko« which has been made by the Czech designer duo Aleksandra and Daniel Mizielińscy. They founded a studio called »Hipopotamstudio« and already did some great books. It has this quirky line style, that so reminds me of my Eastern European children's books that I had as a child. And since I like busy picture books anyway, it got high on my list. You can follow the characters throughout the pages and one can search for all the apples, that the turtle has lost because of a hole in her bag which she discovers at the first page. By the way, is there an English word for the German »Wimmelbuch«? Does anyone know? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . And last but not least there is »Crazy Pic-Nic«, published by »Les apprentis rêveurs« and illustrated by Chamo. The crazy picnic consists of a leporello that shows a picnic. The guests (e.g. a camel drinking lemonade through a straw and other cool characters) are stickers that the kid can apply to the scene. »Les apprentis rêveurs« has some cool colouring posters too (e.g. by Magali Le Huche) which you can find here. Have a nice weekend!

Bologna 2011

I'm back from Bologna and it were some great few days! Although Sun kept us waiting till Tuesday, the downpour on Monday didn't matter, because of us being at the bookfair anyway. I've seen sooo many gorgeous and fun books (especially the French ones), beautifully designed to the last detail. I felt so inspired! Beside googling over all these beauties (I will do a post soon about my »discoveries«), we ate delicious Italian food (like these superjummy handmade popsicles above). Mine has been a strawberry one dipped into white chocolate at the top *mmh*. We did some shopping, saw Camilla Engman's and Ana Ventura's exhibition (the pic with the tea cup is from that exhibition), shared some fun talks, enjoyed coffee (of course) and Sun on our faces. I love Bologna! It's definitely my favourite book fair during the year.

I'm off to Bologna. *Hooray* to days filled with tons of childrens' books from all over the world, *mmh* delicious food and some spring days in Italy! I do hope Sun is joining us, although the weather forecast doesn't look very promising. Pleeeease Sun! See? I drew you a sign which way to go, so you can find us. Have a happy week all of you!

Have a happy first day of spring! »We heart endpapers« is a nice blog.

Yeah, spring is definitely here, birds are singing again! Blackbird's arias now fill the evening's darkening hours. Sun's birdie already arrived this weekend, as I promised Sun last October and he has much to tell about his adventures in the south.

Happy 100th International Women's Day to all the ladies and to all the men who have the luck to live with and beside them ;)