4 years ago I made a baby and he was the chubbiest sweetest thing in the world. Now he’s a big boy who still wishes he could wear nappies, who loves food and cars and pink. He’s quick to scare (Santi the cupboard!!!) and also quick to console. He loves his big brother probably more than anything else, and also to twirl his fingers around my hair, especially at 3 in the morning.
Since next year we’ll be in England, who knows if we will have time for a party, and since he’s seen Damiano’s party, a bash of his own was mandatory.
The invitation was a trace for a paper plane, of course.
The cake was a whipped cream cake base from the usual book, layered with strawberries and strawberry compote and frosted with 7 minute frosting. It’s a slight variation on the one cake my grandmother used to bake when I was little. For the lettering, I piped his name with melted chocolate on a piece of parchment, froze it for a few minutes and carefully placed it on top of the cake.
We had around 18 kids so we sealed our parking lot with construction tape.
He got a ton of presents. His favorites? This (he will go to sleep hugging it), and this. (yep, that’s right) oh, and this.
And tattoos. (I don’t think I’ll ever throw a kid’s party without them)
Besides folding around a hundred paper planes, mostly taking inspiration from this kit, I folded tiny ones to put in the favor bags. Very relaxing. My favourite pen (White ink!!!)
tic-tacs in the favor bags=happy kids.
For the bags I used my tracing paper and I sewed them into pyramids, which was very satisfying.
I don’t have many photos of the actual party because I was too busy taking kids to pee, making sure nobody threw themselves in front of a car, and keeping the wind from blowing all our cheese-puffs away, but my friend Chrissy did so I’m waiting…
On Saturday we woke up at dawn (if you think they look tired you should’ve seen me), hopped on a train and went to Bologna.
We got our bibs and tried some cheap neuroscience to boost our confidence.
And we ran.
And ran.
Until the finish line!
The boys got medals, as did every other kid in the race. (funny story: Damiano, upon realizing that everyone got medals told me: “mommy that was a fake race”, clever boy). We had a lovely lunch, a lovely ice cream and we plodded through Bologna in a very hot afternoon. My feet were sore, and on the following day…
My friend Claudia and I were all clad in pink…
and with bibs of our own.
It was really fun, and it was a bit like childbirth because running 10.5 km in the heat and humidity with no water really sucked balls but now I don’t remember that, I only think that it was really fun and I can’t wait to do it again. I’m nuts.
Today I went on a little field trip to a very cool Museum of Modern Art that opened 10 years ago in the small city of Rovereto. For their 10th anniversary they’ve put up an exhibition combining objects and artworks from their collection, as well as objects they’ve shown over the years in different exhibitions. It is great because it’s a combination of very famous pieces (or rather, pieces by very famous artists) and other less prominent, almost apocryphal artworks and artifacts. Anyway, the whole thing is a little typography feast so you’re welcome.
It is no secret that I love My University, and how could I not? This time it took me to meet one of the most important graphistes of the past century (may I also say philosopher?) and I got to spend the whole day learning from him and his philosophy. It was one of the best experiences in my career so far.
Sooner than I had anticipated I managed to take my boys to Paris. Fed by an obsession with dubious pixar films and high speed trains I got them all excited and it totally paid off.
The TGV does go really fast.
The Eiffel Tower was explored, on foot, somebody’s acrophobia notwithstanding.
Le Jardin d’acclimatation. A lovely trap once the kids discover the rides and bumper cars.
The metropolitain was explored intensively, more than any landmark. We also got around by bus a lot, so the kids could grasp how big a city can be.
On our way to the Citè des Enfants, inside the Citè des Sciences.
After a few hours there the kids were so whacked that we even managed to make them sleep in the late afternoon and go out for dinner together. Thumbs up!
We stayed at someones apartment via airbnb and it was a great experience: not expensive, very flexible, and with a child’s bedroom full of toys.
The kids ate: Sushi, Thai, Lebanese and uncountable pains-au-chocolat. As did we.
Soooo…. I’ve got a ton of things to do and surprisingly a ton of enthusiasm, too.
The new semester started and it’s called SUMMER SEMESTER. That means winter will eventually end and the sun will shine on us. Don’t get me wrong, I love winter, especially since I discovered my favorite thing in the world which is cross country skiing. But I’m still a depressive piece of work, so summer is very welcome. Also, this semester is awesome because I pretty much adore all the courses that I’m taking. It’s very hard work and very hard fun.
I wanted to be prepared to hustle like a real nerd, so on the train ride this morning I whipped out a little weekly planner in inDesign. I printed it when I arrived at the uni, and I bound it just now. It’s pretty banal, but it does the trick of having a lot of space to write ideas and stuff, and it’s so simple and cheap that I don’t have to worry too much about my awful handwriting, which makes me sad on those posh moleskines.
The design is pretty simple: It comprises the 19 weeks from next Monday until the end of the exam session. I used one of my favorite typefaces which is Caecilia, by Peter Noordzi. The signatures of the book are made of a single A3 sheet of paper, printed on one side. On every A5 quarter there is one week and the coptic stitch binding is done on the inside only, so the paper can be unfolded revealing a whole A3 blank space to work on.
I had never tried to bind a book using the coptic stitch method entirely by hand, so I tried and it worked pretty well.
It’s one of those things that give instant gratification.
If you want to try your hand at this lovely book-binding method I found this tutorial extremely good.
Finished 4 exams with decent results and survived. Enjoyed 12 days of vacation doing mostly cross country skiing and lolling around at home, playing with the boys and having a ball. Tomorrow it all starts over, my hopefully final semester and it’s going to be a tough one. I have a big project and 4 big exams, as well as a race in May for which I’d better start training soon. Thank gawd I have these two things here to keep me focused:
