Urso Yarn co

Photos : Flowers from the Wedding

Paule T.B.3 Comments

 I wanted to have a little post about the flowers, since they were a big deal for me. I love, love, love flowers. Getting to pick them and working with the crazy talented Anaïs from Les Petites Excuses was seriously one of my favorite things about the whole wedding planning process. 

 She listened to me and made sure I got exactly what I envisioned... while coming up with ideas to replace what was not in season in March (like peonies..or Dusty Miller) and also bringing her own touch and making every thing just so lovely. 


 I don't know if you remember the palette I had planned for the flowers.. but we managed to be pretty close! My bouquet was all white, off white and blush, since I wanted it to be very similar to my dress. It was mostly ranonculus and double carnations. Those two flowers were a discovery for me, and I fell in love, hard. (so did pretty much all the women at the wedding, I think!) I also had some rosemary, sage and lilac buds for fragrance. It was a real dream...






 The flower girls had bright fuchsia, magenta and peach. We went for small roses and hyacinths since those are all fairly inexpensive. We even got some extra baby's breath for people who wanted some in their hair. It was a nice subtle addition. :) 




 For the restaurant, we went with as-affordable-and-as-simple-as-possible. One big fluff of hydrangea a bunch of baby's breath's per table. We collected some tomato cans for the vases. Super cheap, and maximum rustic look. It came out really pretty, in my opinion ;)



Once again, thanks to Emilie Iggiotti, our amazing photographer. Those pictures are perfection. 



Suburban life : Gardening

Paule T.B.Comment


 Something relatively new to me? GARDENING. I have a pretty bad case of grey-thumb concerning indoor plants. I usually just avoid those. (They gather dust and die. Why would I even go there?) I have an ongoing love affaire with orchids... But that's a subject for a whole other post in and of itself.. 

 Basically, I have enjoyed making little flower beds for my balconies. It's usually going alright until that one super hot week where I forget to water them. But I mean, I enjoy gardening.. I think. 

 Enter LIVING IN THE SUBURBS. Everybody, and their mother, have lawns like they spent 48hrs worth of weekend on all four in their flowers and shrubs, every weekend of their life since before I was born. (And actually, I think they did, or hired someone to do it.) It's pretty intimidating. And overwhelming. We have a bunch of things planted from previous girlfriend owners and we're trying to figure out what we want. And.. how to get there. Baby steps. My boyfriend is actually really cool with helping me out.. He's not like super-into-it-going-to-breed-roses kinda thing, but he's pretty darn good with the shovel and likes to spend time with me and the dog outside when it's sunny. I also bribe him with cold limonade / beers and bbqs. We're only just starting to figure out the garden, but it's been really fun so far! And I'm looking forward to seeing things grow or die. 


 Front garden : We have a lot of tulips coming out every year. We're pretty lucky! They are the Mc Donald's color kind ;) We have those really cute shrubs that are all red tiny leaves right now. (see top picture) I know they are not red during the summer.. more like lime green. And they make tiny grape-like bunches of pink flowers.. If anybody knows what it is, holla. 

 I'm a sucker for Forsythias. I had one as a gift last year when I had just moved in. (It was actually a really special gift to me, so I'm extra found of those now) We just bought him a friend last weekend, and planted it right beside. We figured, it did not die during the winter, so... capitalizing on that. :) 

 We are doing as much Juniper as possible. The bluish-grey types are super nice, and they seem low-maintenance and hopefully will crawl a lot within a couple years. 


 Last summer a nice surprise was some Iris, and even some tiger lilies! I did not even know these grew here!! We have a buttload of Hemerocalles (I hate those, I don't know why). Overall... that's a LOT of color.. but hey.. it's summer? And those are already there, I'm not about to kill plants, on purpose. 

 I received poppies as a birthday present last year, looking forward to see if they'll grow back this summer! They were all sorts of color.. yellow, red, orange and purple. 

 We already have a hosta in the front, we just planted two spirea, and I'll try and steel some white hydrangea from my Mom, to sort of add more white to this rainbow. 


 The backyard is pretty much all shade. We have more hosta there and we just planted some japanese fern. Hoping they'll come out and look healthy! Such beauty, right!? 

 I adore double-begonias. And we both love dusty miller. I'll probably make big flower beds out of just those two things. We had begonias last year and they did really good all summer. My gardening mentra is: stick with whatever works ;) 


 The flower beds in the front are on each sides of the front door. (I use my old flower beds boxes that are made out of wood, that I painted matte black.) I like to keep things simple, and white. More dusty miller. More, more, more. Velvety goodness. 

I just wrote a freakin' lot about flowers... I'm such a grown up. 









Photos : Wedding Party

Paule T.B.Comment

 I've been wanting to share some photos from the wedding.. but it's hard. I don't want to share everything since I want to keep some parts of that day private with the people that were there. 

 What I do feel like sharing, is how some of the little details I obsessed with turned out. Things I mentioned here in those posts... I felt like such a bridezilla at times, being so critical, or so an&l about some tiny details, the color of this, the color of that, the shape of this. But the truth is.. everything was so beautiful on the Day. Everything came together so magically. I don't regret any obsessing. I would not have wanted it any other way.


 People around me know this, my nieces are pretty special to me. I grew so so found and close of them, they were my two flower girls, and we were all thrilled about it. The elder was also out ring bearer and she took her job ever so seriously.. it was pretty darling. A close friend was my only bride's maid. She helped me a lot all throughout the wedding planning process, and also spent most of that weekend with me, getting ready and helping out. (even though 7 months along in her pregnancy ;))


The girls wore those amazing Noémiah head pieces. I'm pretty sure they felt like royalty. 
We got the dresses from J.Crew and the shoes at Joe Fresh. I made those flower brooches. 





 I am so happy with how our tiny "wedding party" looked. We wanted to keep it as minimal as possible. Flower girl, ring-bearer, bride's maid, groom's man, which were also our witnesses. They looked so beautiful and handsome.. subdued and wintery. And those flowers.. man, Anaïs really out-did herself. 




It was such a perfect day. So many emotions.. I'm so glad I have those amazing photos to cherish. Thanks tones to Emilie who did a stellar job. 

Flowers from Les Petites Excuses, headpieces from Noémiah. 


Minibulles :: New Collab !!

Paule T.B.1 Comment
I've had a lot of fun with Julie & Sophie, the minds behind the new blog Minibulles. They really trusted me with the look of their site, and it was a real blast to work on. Lots of watercolor, spring colors, very very fresh!! 





It's been in the works since early spring, and I cannot wait to work with them again. I have a couple of illustrations I can't share yet, but be sure to check out their blog! Et partagez avec vos copines! 
;)



(This sketch did not end up being used, but I liked it too much not to share.)

Mardis Manger : Lean Pulled Pork

Paule T.B.Comment
Well.. Oh! Yeah! 

 Earlier this year I had been having good feedback from people about the Mardis Manger, and I've wanted to bring it back on the blog more often. But I also wanted to make it into more an an illustration project for myself. So, I'll be experimenting, and most probably trying different looks and styles, while having fun and sharing some personal recipes. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do! 


 I love pulled pork. Most people have it in sandwiches. I also love it on rice, with eggs, in omelets, in salads, with roasted veggies.. really it's a big favorite in my tiny family of three. (Constance loves it even if she never gets to taste it. She just knows she loves it.) 

 I'm always trying to eat better.. and well, pulled pork is normally made from pork shoulder, and that's pretty fat. (Especially if you keep the skin or the big chunks of fat. Even if you don't eat those, it cooks right in it..) So this time around I came up with a low-fat version, and it was just as delicious. I even preferred it actually. It's definitely more dry, but I love drier meats. Up to you to try it both ways and see how you prefer it. Either way, you can cook it in a slow-cooker. At high-speed I usually cook it for about 3-5 hours. Just start testing if it's ready after 3 hours. You should be able to break the meat very easily with a fork. 

 I rubbed my rôti with salt, pepper, paprika and dijon mustard. I added 1 cup of water (you'll need that because the meat is lean, and you are at high-speed. If using fatty pork, 1/2 cup will be fine). Generously add bay leaves (like 8-10) and cloves, and a whole head of garlic, crushed. 

 Then I covered it with some Physalis preserves. (We call them cerises de terre, ground cherries. Or husk tomatoes.) But really that was just to sweeten it with something else then sugar. It could be brown sugar, maple syrup, a couple of apples, pears or plums, even molasses.. try with what you have at home. It's a good way to ad extra flavor, and not just sugar. You get to decide how much sugar and salt you ad, which is always a great plus of making meals from scratch. 

 When I took the meat out to "pull" it apart, I incorporated some of the cooking juice left in the slow-cooker into the meat and tossed. It's some of the water you added at the beginning, and you'll see how much you need / want to add to make your meat more or less moist. I also tossed a table spoon of apple cider vinegar, to add some kick. 


 * I am drawing my ingredients in French, since it is my first language, and it is what feels right to me, right now. I have no ambition of having the blog bilingual 100% of the time, nor do I want to write in French all the time. I think I'll keep posting in English and have the images in French, seems like a good balance to me! 

Paule T.B.Comment

We had an amazing week in Maine.. And the wedding was just.. perfect. We cannot really wrap our brains around just how perfect everything was, and everything went. 

I'll share some pictures as soon as we have them. 

In the meantime, back to normal life and work schedules! 

xo

Life and Death

Paule T.B.2 Comments

Both on the blog this week.. 

A little early birthday present for my dearest friend Audrey-Frédérique. She is +1 right now, expecting what will most likely be the cutest little rocker ever. 

xo

Ps: she will be my bride's maid this sunday.. and yes, we are getting married in like 3 days. Exited, tired, overjoyed and reckless. 

Pps: I lazied out and drew her so you could not see her tattooed arm.. I'm bad.