Category: Dias importantes

Looking back at 2018 and forward to 2019

I like to end the year with a roundup of what I did in the previous 12 months. On the one hand, I need to feel that time didn’t escape through my fingers; on the other, I love to go back and relive the moments and reflect on the growth that has happened in the meantime.

2018 was the first year I truly felt that if I worked towards my goals every day, even if for a shorter time than I would have wanted, I could achieve them.

Working in a creative field means – at least for me – that there’s a lot of action that does not immediately translate in results. Several pitches for articles and illustrations may or may not result in an article in a magazine. And that’s ok, albeit slightly (very!) frustrating.

So 2018 was a new experience for me, most specially with running. 2018 was the year I turned 40 and I set out to become fitter at the end of it than I was at 30. To achieve that, I decided to train for a 10k race per month, always improving my time.

I “ran” my first 10k in March, 3 months post-partum. It was actually good that I took 1 hour and 18 minutes to finish the circuit, because it could only get better from that point. To my dismay, though, it wasn’t until September that I actually started to make serious progress on my time. In August, I decided it was about time I made my running schedule work and actually followed through with it. Having two young kids at home, having time to go running isn’t always easy. But I couldn’t wait until I had the opportunity, so I decided to create it for myself. I started running once during the week, in the early morning before everyone else is awake; then once during the weekend, when daddy is home with the kids. And I found out that it is consistency more than frequency that leads to results. In September I completed my first 10k without walking; in October I was able to take 10 minutes off my September time (the circuit, with less inclination, helped); in December I finished at 1 hour and 4 minutes. I know there is a lot of room for improvement, but I am incredibly proud of this achievement.

But that’s not all! I feel fitter, more agile and generally have more energy. And I have found that my running deeply impacts my yoga practice, not only in my ability to focus, but also in increased flexibility and ease of recovery after an effort. 

I can say that my running goal of 2018 was smashed with more than the expected success. 

Next goal: keep training to complete a 10k in 60 minutes (or less!). 

 

 

The air Embroidery Club was one of the projects I needed to tweak. As much as I love the idea of receiving one fresh project per month and stitching it at the same time as the other members do, I came to the conclusion that for many of the members this wasn’t the case. Members would often tell me they were “late”, or had a backlog of patterns to stitch, and I don’t think we need a hobby to put more pressure on our daily activities and give us the feeling that we aren’t doing enough. So I changed the Club to a new model, one that I hope will be better both for the members and for me. You can read more about the Club and join (it’s free!) right here

Next goal: In 2019, I want to foster our community at the air Embroidery Club. Our “meeting room” is our facebook group, and I want to make it more dynamic and create more opportunities for interaction among members.

 

Another embroidery-related goal for 2018 was to start selling embroidery originals. Errr… I didn’t get to that yet, I suppose my insecurities get a front seat whenever I consider that option. I may give it a try this year, though. Right now, many of them are up on a show over at Companhia das Agulhas craft store, here in Lisbon. 

 

One of my goals for 2018 was to finally publish my first pro knitting pattern. I had it written, tested and tech edited… and also stuck inside a drawer so that no one would see it. November came and I thought I’d be forever annoyed if I let my insecurities get the best of me and not publish a pattern that was a labor of love. So I rolled up my sleeves, designed the layout, exported the PDF and published the pattern on ravelry. I’m proud of this pattern, I’m proud of the lovely team of test knitters who were so kind to test it for me, and also for the lovely Madeleine, who tech edited the pattern and whose sharp eye was essential to bring more clarity to the instructions. 

Next goal: I have so many ideas for more sweaters and so few hours in the day to work on them all. But! I want to commit to publishing another sweater pattern this year. I will keep you posted on that!

Now, on to 2019! 

Above I have mentioned how I want to build on my 2018 goals and get to new places with them. But below there will be a few goals I want to mention, too:

Less plastic: I want to go on with the “de-plastification” process I’ve been implementing here at home. We started by replacing our regular toothbrushes with bamboo ones (we have both bam&boo and babu and they’re similar in quality and in price). I swapped some personal hygiene products, like shampoo, toothpaste and body lotion to ones that do not come in plastic bottles (I love Saponina’s products but fortunately there are more and more options available).*

We use reusable shopping bags but there’s still the occasional plastic bag and I want to be more careful about that, too, and passing that habit on to my kids. 

Do you have any tips on how to use less plastic in our daily lives? Please let me know!

I want to make more art in my life: I miss the fun of sketching, painting and experimenting with art supplies. I want to bring more of that playfulness into my life, along with knitting and embroidery. Also, I will be doing the Artist’s Way again.

Overall, I want to embrace more challenges, take on jobs where I can learn new things, new techniques and new ways of telling stories. Because telling stories is what I do.

 

How about you? What are your goals? Happy 2019!

*Just to be clear: these are not affiliate links and I do not get paid to mention them. I’m sharing these brands with you because I like them! #notanad

Looking back at 2017 and looking forward at 2018

I’ve been writing this post in my head for the last few weeks, mostly while nursing my baby girl, who was born on November 25th. As you can imagine, her safe arrival was the highlight of 2017, without a doubt. And so have been the last few weeks, spent in a state of loving hibernation, my heart a constant explosion of joy whenever I am with her and her older sister. After my previous experience, this post-partum period has been exceptionally smooth and joyful.

After this introduction, which could be called “the cherry on top”, let’s get to the muffin, shall we? 2017 was a pretty good year.

January 2017 at the air Embroidery Club

February 2017 at the air Embroidery Club

March 2017 at the air Embroidery Club

Work: In 2017, I had plenty of work to keep me busy. I taught knitting classes at Companhia das Agulhas. This is something I really enjoy, because I meet lots of interesting people. People of all ages come to my classes and everyone has an interesting story to share. Knitting is always more than only knitting: it’s a connection to elders in the family, it’s a therapy, it’s companionship. And those are the stories I like to discover and bring to the table while teaching stitches, increases, decreases.

I also worked at a tech company, AGORA Systems, as a documentation specialist. I organized, created standards and produced documentation for their software, while being integrated in the development team. I learned a lot as I settled in a team where all members were men, mostly younger than me, working within the agile methodology.

At the same time, I freelanced for several clients. I created designs and illustrations for different companies, in different countries. I had a lot of fun creating smartphone ad campaigns with my friend and colleague Joana Paz.

I created twelve new embroidery patterns for the air Embroidery Club, twelve designs that make me happy and proud, and showcase, at least to me, the progress I made during the year. The Club grew as new members joined. Apart from my human babies, the air Embroidery Club is my non-human baby, my creative baby. Seeing it grow and creating community is one of my biggest work-related joys.

Anita no Trabalho, the podcast my friend Eliana and I host together, is also one of my biggest work-related joys. We started the podcast almost two years ago by recording our own conversations about female entrepreneurship. There are several of such podcasts in English, but we knew none in Portuguese, and we wanted to fill that void. It has grown in audience and in scope, and we now have regular conversations with people we both admire about the issues that matter to us. We found out, via comments and feedback from the audience, that these issues matter to our listeners, too, and we couldn’t be happier about the space we have created, where we share experiences and grow together.

April 2017 at the air Embroidery Club

May 2017 at the air Embroidery Club

June 2017 at the air Embroidery Club

For fun: I sketched. My commute to work took one hour, of which 24 minutes were spent in the train. Those 24 minutes became my slice of time for doing things just because. I brought my knitting or my embroidery along for some time, and then I started sketching my fellow commuters. These sketches became one of the most fun exercises I have ever done, mostly because I was doing them just for the sake of it. Not because I was going to use them for a project, but just because I could. And doing things because I can, well, that’s the best.

July 2017 at the air Embroidery Club

August 2017 at the air Embroidery Club

September 2017 at the air Embroidery Club

Personal: I healthily gestated my baby girl and practiced yoga up to two days before giving birth. This pregnancy went by smoothly and diabetes-free. After my first pregnancy, I decided that if I were to be pregnant again, I would be determined to live it with joy, not fear of something going wrong. And so I did. Not that I didn’t know of all the things that could, indeed, go wrong, but because I decided to do so. Yoga and keeping a normal life were a big part of it; stopping work when I decided I should slow down and enjoy the last weeks of my pregnancy was also important. Having an older kid who needed care certainly helped, too.

During the year, I had lots of wonderful moments with family and friends. Our summer vacation took us on a trip to Copenhagen, Denmark, and Malmö, Sweden. This trip included a reunion with my dear friend Rebecca, whom I hadn’t seen for… twenty years, maybe?. We enjoyed a lovely Summer day in her hometown, walking by the sea and sightseeing, all these with three young children who seemed to have a lot of fun playing with one another, even if they didn’t speak a common language. When we returned to Portugal, we spent the next two weeks at the beach with family and friends from abroad.

In September, to celebrate my mom’s birthday, the whole family spent a weekend hiking the Passadiços do Paiva. It’s an 8km walkway along the river Paiva, from which one can see a landscape otherwise inaccessible. Gorgeous, and very much worth the visit if you can.

I think that, as we grow older, it gets harder to meet new people and make new friends. However, I have found crafts to be a great catalyst for new friendships, and this year was no exception: I met new people to whom I feel connected and who energize me.

What I lost, and it came quite as a shock to me, to be honest, was my knitting mojo. This surprised me to no end: as soon as I got pregnant, I felt absolutely no desire to knit. I felt even a bit sick. No morning sickness, fortunately, but knitting sickness – oh yes. I kept teaching my knitting classes, as that thankfully didn’t make me sick; but I did not pick up the needles on my ongoing projects for several months. I crocheted a little blanket for my baby, though. My knitting mojo started to creep back in as my second trimester came to a close and Fall started to appear on the calendar. My eldest kid requested I made her and her sister matching sweaters, and I complied, and thus returned my knitting mojo. I’m now looking forward to making new (matching?) sweaters for me and the girls.

October 2017 at the air Embroidery Club

November 2017 at the air Embroidery Club

December 2017 at the air Embroidery Club

Speaking of looking forward, 2018 is the year I turn 40. So far, every new decade has been better than the previous one. This has been true for the last two decades and I want it to be true for as long as I live. My 30s did bring me a fair bit of sadness, but all in all I feel like I grew and learnt that what matters is how I face adversity, and not let myself believe that I am at the mercy of fate. I know I cannot control what happens to me (the death of my son being the most obvious example of that), but I can choose how I want to live a life that contains not only joy, but also frustration, sadness and loss. And I chose then, and choose now, to live a happy life, not because only happy things happen to me, but because I choose to live that way despite of the bad things that happen to me and around me. This has been the major lesson I learnt during my 30s, and it is priceless.

So, to celebrate the year I turn 40, I decided I wouldn’t restrict celebrations to just one day (my birthday). I want to celebrate year round – and why? Again, because I can. I gave it a lot of thought and decided that I am going to run (or walk, if that is the case) a 10k race every month this year, starting on March 4th. I will be three months and a bit post-partum, so I’m being gentle with my goal setting. I want to complete each new 10k I run in less time than the previous one. I’m not setting a specific time goal, but I want to know that I will be improving with each month of training and experience.

In the year I turn 40, I also want to finally release the knitting pattern I designed. It is written, tech edited and tested by lovely knitters. The only thing missing: layout, exporting the pdf and releasing it on ravelry. I hope setting this goal and sharing it with you will keep me accountable and help me achieve it.

Another goal of mine is to grow the air Embroidery Club. It has been running for four years now and it has grown, but not as steadily as I would like. This year, I want to introduce a few changes that will make it easier for members to join and have an overall better experience.

I also want to start selling some of the embroidered originals I have. These were made with love and care, and I think it’s time for them to find joy in new homes.

How about you? Did you make a recap of your 2017? Did you set goals for 2018? Please share in the comments, or send me an e-mail.

Happy stitching, and happy 2018!

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This post is part of a series of essays I intend to write and publish, with the goal of (re)creating, even if only for myself, the sense of space we once used to have in blogs. If you want to follow along, you can check back this space or read posts directly in your e-mail inbox. Read the first personal essay here.

Um novo projecto: o podcast Anita no Trabalho

Read in English

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Olá, olá! Nem acredito que já passou um mês de ausência aqui do blog. Muita coisa aconteceu neste último mês, sendo que uma delas, das mais importantes, por sinal, foi o lançamento do podcast Anita no Trabalho, um podcast sobre empreendedorismo no feminino que lancei juntamente com a minha amiga Eliana Soares.

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A história deste podcast já vem de há uns meses atrás: depois de no Outono termos falado sobre o tema, foi só entrado o ano de 2016 que conseguimos, finalmente, sentar-nos a trabalhar no podcast e a pô-lo a funcionar. No fundo, sentíamos que faltava um espaço de reflexão sobre a experiência de sermos empreendedoras em Portugal, um espaço onde pudéssemos discutir e partilhar os desafios com que nos fomos deparando nesta vida de trabalho por conta própria no feminino, e as estratégias que fomos encontrando para superar esses obstáculos.

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Com o lançamento do site e a criação da secção “Querida Anita”, queremos também abrir a antena à participação de todos quantos nos queiram escrever e que queiram partilhar um pouco da sua experiência, quer seja semelhante, quer não.

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Convido-vos então a irem ouvir os episódios que já estão disponíveis no site do podcast Anita no Trabalho. Em breve, estará também disponível no iTunes. E, já agora, aproveito para vos pedir que façam “like” na página de facebook e que partilhem os episódios com as vossas redes, e que não se coíbam de partilhar as vossas experiências connosco com a Anita. 🙂

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Quanto ao logo do podcast, não poderia deixar de ter uma parte bordada, não é? Para além de adorar a ideia do contraste do bordado – e de toda a conotação de lavor feminino que tem – com a vida de empreendedora contemporânea, sempre com uma presença digital importante, achei que essa ideia seria uma boa metáfora para o que desejamos conseguir com este podcast, um espaço de reflexão e de partilha dos desafios que a vida de empreendedoras, enquanto mulheres, nos coloca.

Neste post, poderão ver algumas fotografias do making of do bordado. Espero que gostem!

Links úteis: site da Anita no Trabalho | Facebook da Anita no Trabalho 


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Hi everyone! I’m so sorry for the radio silence here.

Uh, funny that I describe it as “radio silence”, given that this whole post is about a podcast!

Yes, this is an announcement: my friend Eliana Soares and I launched a couple of weeks ago a new podcast called “Anita no Trabalho“. It is all in Portuguese, I’m afraid, but there is a good reason for it: there aren’t many spaces to reflect and share experiences about entrepreneurship for women in the Portuguese sphere, so we thought it was high time we created one.

If you speak Portuguese or know someone who does, please come listen and share our podcast with your networks. We truly appreciate it!

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And a note on the embroidered artwork: both Eliana and I thought that it would be a wonderful visual metaphor to embroider the logo, mixing elements of a woman entrepreneur’s life with a technique that is somewhat anachronistic and described as being “old-fashioned” and “for grannies”. Here are a few pictures of the process behind the final artwork. Hope you enjoy them!

Useful links: Anita no Trabalho’s website | Anita no Trabalho’s facebook page

Behind the scenes

Ler em português

Last weekend my legs shook considerably, as the time to video shoot the free, fun and fantastic air embroidery e-course arrived. I’m very camera-shy and have always been quite protective of posting pictures of myself online, so you can imagine how much of a challenge stepping in front of the camera is for me. But I did it, ignoring the little voices in my head who commented on my accent, on my intonation, on those crazy facial expressions we all make when we talk. And I tried my best to be myself and to focus on the passion that I do have for embroidery in particular and craft in general.

I created this free course because I love the way I feel when I’m embroidering, and I want to share that with everyone. There are many pleasures in seeing a sketch that once was just that – a sketch – become a piece of art you can frame and hang on a wall. It gives me a great sense of accomplishment.

But I think that even more than the sense of accomplishment I feel is that I really enjoy myself when I make the time, be it a few minutes or a long hour, to be focused on one thing only, and seeing my hands moving almost by themselves. My mind wanders away while, paradoxically, it stays put and focused on what I’m doing. It’s in this meditative state that I often find solutions to problems in other areas of my life.

So if you’ve been thinking about learning to embroider, come register for the free training right here and you’ll be able to start as soon as it is live.

Hope to see you over there!

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https://www.flickr.com/photos/airdesignstudio/21467121588/in/dateposted-public/“>This week I've been editing the video lessons of the #embroidery e-course I'm preparing to launch at the end of the month. Registrations are open at http://www.airdesignstudio.com/embroidery-e-course/ #airembroideryclub

No fim-de-semana passado as minhas pernas não pararam de tremer (pelo menos metaforicamente) enquanto não terminei as gravações das lições do curso de bordado air. A verdade é que tenho muito pudor de me pôr em frente da câmara e tenho sempre tido bastante cuidado no que toca a publicar retratos meus online. Por isso, podem imaginar o desafio que foi não só colocar-me à frente da lente como, ainda por cima, conversar! Em inglês! Enquanto revia os vídeos tentei ignorar as vozes na minha cabeça que criticavam a minha roupa, o meu penteado, o meu sotaque, as minhas expressões faciais. E tentei focar-me ao máximo na paixão que tenho pelo bordado em particular e pelos crafts em geral.

Criei este curso gratuito de bordado porque adoro a forma como me sinto quando estou a bordar, e quero ter o prazer de partilhar isso com toda a gente que quiser aprender. A sensação de transformar um esboço num bordado que podemos pendurar na parede é maravilhosa, de realização pessoal.

Mas mais ainda que essa sensação de realização é a calma que sinto enquanto bordo, quando faço tempo para bordar, sejam uns minutos ou uma longa hora. Concentro-me nos pontos e vejo as minhas mãos a mexerem-se, sozinhas. A minha mente escapa-se, ao mesmo tempo que, paradoxalmente, se mantém concentrada na tarefa em mãos. E é neste estado meditativo que, muitas vezes, me surgem soluções para muitos dos problemas que tenho noutras áreas da minha vida.

Por isso, se tem vontade de aprender a bordar, inscreva-se já no curso gratuito de bordado e poderá começar a aprender assim que o curso for lançado (fim de Setembro, início de Outubro).

Espero-vos lá!

Thank you, thank you – an update on the fundraiser in memory of our son

Ecstatic and overwhelmed with your generosity regarding the fundraiser in memory of our son. Trying to stay calm with the help of #embroidery #airembroideryclub

Ler em português

Thank you, thank you, thank you. These are the words I can muster in the midst of all these emotions. Last Friday, we celebrated the one year anniversary of the death of our baby boy, and launched a fundraiser in his memory, to benefit the Portuguese Red Nose foundation. Our goal is to make a donation of 2000€. And guess what? We’re two thirds of the way there, in just these very few days. I have no words to describe our gratitude.

On Saturday, as I was seeing the notifications of your donations landing in my inbox, I couldn’t help being overwhelmed with many emotions – so I turned to a little embroidery to calm me down. (It’s June’s project over at the Embroidery Club, and this time it’s an actual garment I’m embroidering on!)

Please keep helping us by donating, if possible, and sharing the fundraiser page with your own networks, via email and social media (the URL is very easy: http://www.airdesignstudio.com/daniel). And please keep checking the page to see the updated amount raised.

Thank you.

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Bem hajam, queridos leitores. No meio de todas estas emoções, fica difícil articular muito mais do que o nosso sentido agradecimento pelo vosso imenso e generoso apoio. Na sexta-feira passada celebrámos o primeiro aniversário da morte do nosso bebé Daniel e lançámos uma campanha de angariação de fundos para que possamos fazer um donativo, em memória do Daniel, à Operação Nariz Vermelho. Nestes poucos dias, e graças à vossa ajuda, já atingimos dois terços do nosso objectivo!

Foi com imensa emoção que no Sábado, enquanto via as notificações de transferências e de donativos via PayPal a chegarem à minha caixa de correio, tive de me acalmar com um pouco de bordado. (Desta feita, o bordado de Junho do Clube de Bordado. É a primeira vez que bordo uma peça de roupa!)

Por favor continuem a ajudar-nos a espalhar a palavra: a campanha continuará a decorrer até ao dia 21 de Junho, e quanto mais dinheiro angariarmos, mais crianças vamos poder ajudar. Se puderem, façam um donativo; e partilhem por mail e nas redes sociais, por favor, a página da campanha, que tem o seguinte link: http://www.airdesignstudio.com/daniel

Bem hajam!

Join our community and get your free illustration. Seja o primeiro a saber as novidades e receba uma ilustração gratuita!

In memory of our son.

Um aniversário muito especial passado num lugar muito especial, o #oceanário de #Lisboa #lisbon #Portugal #p3top #tile #pattern

Ler em português
Today is a very important day. Yesterday was a very important day, too, so much so that we took the day off and spent it with our sweet birthday girl, who turned one yesterday. We spent a lovely day visiting the Lisbon Oceanarium. It had been ages since I last went, and it is fantastic and definitely worth a visit if you’re in town.

But today marks the one year anniversary our sweet boy died. He was born twenty minutes after his sister, and lived only a few hours. One year ago today I lived the worst day of my life. I am incredibly thankful to be here and now, and not then and there, as we all have come a very long way in processing our grief, while watching our girl develop and become the happy one year old she is today.

We celebrated her yesterday, and today it’s the moment to remember Daniel. We gave a lot of thought to how we would like to commemorate his life, and came to this conclusion: we will be running a fundraiser for the next thirty days. Our goal is to raise 2000€ to benefit the Portuguese non-profit organization Operação Nariz Vermelho.

To achieve this goal, we need your help, dear readers. Please help us by

Thank you, thank you. The support of this community means the world to me.

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Hoje é um dia muito importante. Ontem também foi, tanto que tirámos o dia para estar com a nossa pequena aniversariante, que completou ontem o seu primeiro ano de vida. Passámos um dia óptimo, com uma visita ao Oceanário de Lisboa. Há muito que não ia, e continua a ser um lugar fantástico para visitar (desejei ser criança outra vez para ir lá dormir com os tubarões!).

Mas hoje celebramos também o primeiro aniversário da morte do nosso rapazote. Nasceu vinte minutos depois da irmã e viveu apenas algumas horas. Este foi certamente o pior dia da minha vida, e hoje estou incrivelmente grata por estar aqui e agora, e não nesse momento fatídico. Foi um ano de muitas emoções e em que fizemos um longo trabalho de luto, ao mesmo tempo que acompanhámos o crescimento da nossa bebé, que hoje é uma menina feliz, já com um ano.

Ontem celebrámos o aniversário da nossa bonequinha, e hoje é momento de recordarmos o Daniel. Depois de muito pensarmos, decidimos organizar uma campanha de angariação de fundos para fazermos um donativo, em memória do Daniel, à Operação Nariz Vermelho.

O nosso objectivo é angariar 2000€, e para o atingirmos precisamos da vossa ajuda:

Muito, muito obrigada a todos vós. Não tenho palavras para agradecer o apoio e o carinho que me têm dispensado e que tanto me ajuda!

It’s my birthday and we’re celebrating!

Almost done! It's April's project for the #airembroideryclub

Hello, hello!

Today is a special day: ten years ago today I became an auntie for the first time! My first niece was born just four days before me, so I always told her she was my special birthday present. Ten years have passed, I became an auntie of two, then I became a mom. All this makes for a very special celebration come next Sunday, my birthday!

I want to share the celebratory mood with you, so I’m offering a special 37% off on all embroidery patterns available for sale on the shop. Just type “37OFF” to get the discount and join the party! (Hmmm, can you guess how old I will be on Sunday?)

Go get your embroidery pattern now!

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Olá!

Hoje é um dia especial: faz hoje dez anos que fui tia pela primeira vez! A minha primeira sobrinha nasceu quatro dias antes do meu aniversário, por isso ainda hoje lhe digo que ela foi o meu presente adiantado. 🙂

Nestes dez anos muita coisa aconteceu: fui tia mais uma vez e também fui mãe. Por isso, este Domingo vai ser muito especial para mim, o meu primeiro aniversário como mãe!

Como as melhores celebrações são as partilhadas, quero oferecer-vos um desconto de 37% (conseguem adivinhar quantos anos completo no Domingo?) em todas as receitas de bordado disponíveis na loja. Basta usar o código promocional “37OFF” aquando da compra. Escolham já a vossa próxima receita de bordado!

Join our community and get the news first! Seja o primeiro a receber todas as notícias!

Featured in Flow Magazine

air Embroidery Club featured on Flow Magazine

air Embroidery Club featured on Flow Magazine

air Embroidery Club featured on Flow Magazine

Back in February, I received a friendly email from Irene Ras, a journalist writing a story for Dutch Flow Magazine. Irene was writing about learning new things online, and she wanted to talk about the Embroidery Club. I couldn’t be happier about it: talking about embroidery? About the pleasure in making things with our hands? About the power in creating beauty with a piece of fabric and colored floss? You got me, here I am, more than ready to talk (and talk) about it.

We had a lovely conversation over skype and I learned that the article would be published sometime in July, in Dutch Flow. It felt like a million years away, more so given the fact that I was expecting my twins to be born in late May and to be head deep in baby land by July. May came and went, my life changed in more than one way and the truth of the matter was that I wasn’t paying a lot of attention when July came around.

Fast forward to a few months later: I saw many of you joining our community from Belgium and The Netherlands, and I slowly (but surely) woke up and realized that you probably found me via Flow. So enter the power of community! I sent you an email and you helped me out: Chayenne sent me pictures of the article and Mauri got in touch with the lovely ladies over at Flow, who graciously mailed me a few issues (see photos above).

It’s true that it takes a village to raise a child; the same applies here: it takes a community – albeit virtual – to make things happen. And beautiful things do indeed happen, thanks to the power of you.

(In the spirit of American Thanksgiving, I want to thank you all for making the improbable possible, for connecting with me and for the support you have shown, specially during this very tough year. Thank you, obrigada!)

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Parece que foi há anos, mas não: em Fevereiro, recebi um mail de uma jornalista holandesa, Irene Ras, para falarmos sobre o Clube de Bordado a propósito de um artigo que iria escrever para a revista Flow. Não podia ter ficado mais feliz: falar sobre bordado? Sobre a sensação de criarmos peças novas com as nossas mãos? Aqui estou eu, prontíssima para falar (sem parar) sobre o tema.

Encontrámo-nos por skype numa tarde de Fevereiro. Na altura, a Irene disse-me que o artigo seria publicado em Julho, data essa que parecia estar a milhões de anos de distância. Grávida dos meus gémeos e com uma grande barriga, Julho parecia-me quase ficção científica, um mês longínquo em que estaria entre biberões e com fraldas até ao joelho. Entretanto a vida mudou e eu deixei Julho passar sem sequer me lembrar do assunto.

Eis senão quando começo a ver a nossa comunidade aumentar com muitas de vós chegadas da Bélgica e da Holanda – aí entendi que o artigo já deveria ter saído! E como Julho já tinha passado, pedi a vossa ajuda para localizar o artigo. A Chayenne enviou-me fotos da revista e do texto e a Mauri contactou as senhoras da Flow, que imediatamente me enviaram vários exemplares para eu ver (e fotografar!). Muito e muito obrigada!

Diz-se que é preciso uma aldeia para educar uma criança e eu acho que o mesmo se aplica aqui: é graças a esta comunidade – ainda que virtual – que estas coisas boas acontecem!

(No espírito do Dia de Acção de Graça, que se celebra amanhã nos Estados Unidos, quero agradecer-vos a todos por fazerem o improvável acontecer e por todo o apoio e carinho com que me têm rodeado neste ano tão difícil. Muito, muito obrigada!) 

The Embroidery Club is one!

the air Embroidery Club turns one!

…and how this baby has grown!

It’s the perfect excuse to host a new giveaway, as it has been a long time since the last.

So… this is how it goes: use the form below to enter for a chance to win a one year free membership to the air Embroidery Club (45€ value). You can enter by choosing one or more of the options below. The more you choose, the better your chances of winning!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Thanks for playing along and celebrating this special anniversary with me!

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O Clube de Bordado já fez um ano! E por isso vamos celebrar com um sorteio de um ano inteiro de Clube de Bordado gratuito (prémio com um valor de 45€)!

Basta usar o formulário:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

E usar uma ou mais opções; quantas mais, maior a chance de ganhar!

Obrigada por se juntarem a mim nesta celebração!

While away

Seven weeks.

Celebrating the year of the horse (my year!) with #embroidery for the #airembroideryclub

Walking in #lisboa #lisbon

Urban beach in #Lisbon. Gostei da praia do jardim do Torel #lisboa

Summer in the city #lisboa #lisbon

July's #airembroideryclub project in progress. A stitch here, a stitch there while the baby sleeps. #embroidery

#Summer solstice, allegedly.

O Zêzere e a Beira, coisa mailinda. #portugal #p3top #summer

Summer in #portugal

Thus ends our week at the beach. #summer #portugal

In green, satin stitch on the left, backstitch on the right. For the #airembroideryclub #embroidery #illustration

Foggy summit #monchique #portugal

#faro #portugal

Fim de verão na ilha de #faro #portugal #p3top

Many things happened while I was away. This, first of all. And after the shock of such abrupt and unexpected change, things started to slowly go back to a new normal.

Summer was spent between diapers, embroidery, ice cream, fun weekend escapes and a bit of traveling too. We went north and south and touristed around the country. Our baby dipped her toes in the ocean and smelled the sea breeze.

We had fun.

Now it’s time to ease back into work mode. There’s a new knitting workshop date announced (October 11th, here in Lisbon); the Embroidery Club is one year old and growing (come join the fun!); and I have some fun illustration work to share with you soon.

Thanks for being there.

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Muito se passou enquanto estive ausente. O nascimento dos meus gémeos, em primeiro lugar, e a perda do meu bebé. E depois do (enorme) choque, a vida, como só ela sabe, começou logo o seu processo de regresso a um novo normal.

O Verão foi passado entre fraldas, bordado, gelado (finalmente sem diabetes!), escapadas de fim-de-semana e curtas, curtíssimas férias. Passeámos pelo norte e sul do país, ficam a faltar as ilhas. A nossa bebé molhou os pés no oceano, porque nunca é cedo demais para lhe incutir a nossa identidade atlântica.

Foi bom.

Agora está na hora de voltar ao trabalho: há nova data de workshop de tricot; o Clube de Bordado já fez um ano e continua a crescer (vamos?); em breve partilharei novos trabalhos de ilustração.

Obrigada por estarem aí.

The biggest joy, the greatest sorrow

biggest joy

No fim de contas são poucas as palavras
que nos doem de verdade, e muito poucas
as que conseguem alegrar a alma.
E são também muito poucas as pessoas
que nos fazem bater o coração, e menos
ainda com o correr do tempo.
No fim de contas, são pouquíssimas as coisas
que na verdade importam nesta vida:
poder amar alguém e ser amado,
não morrer depois dos nossos filhos.

Amalia Bautista

On Wednesday, May 21st 2014, I gave birth to my beautiful twins.

My baby girl was born first, just before 9pm, and greeted me with a full bladder of pee on my belly. I was exhausted, and incredibly happy as I held those tiny legs. I saw as she was taken for observation, held in the air by two experienced hands.

My baby boy arrived twenty minutes later. These twenty minutes, however, would change my life completely, in ways I couldn’t quite grasp at the moment. These were fateful minutes, when something very bad happened to my son. He was born alive, but barely so. I was alive – but apparently, barely so.

Daniel, my baby boy, died a few hours later, in a different hospital, in the expert hands of the medical team that accompanied him, and the caring love of his father.

In a matter of hours, we became the family of four we dreamed about for nine months, lost our son and joined the ranks of those parents who suffer the greatest loss: that of a child. I couldn’t have imagined how incredibly hard it is to feel such joy and such sorrow at the exact same time.

Almost three months have passed since that day. We have seen our girl grow by the day – it feels like she grows with every nap! We have felt love and support from friends here and abroad; from friends we have met and those we haven’t, and yet feel close.

Someone once told me that having a baby was “the best and the worst” that could happen to a person. I beg to differ: the best is to have a healthy baby, and the worst is to lose a child. There are no words to mitigate this loss, no shortcuts to the overwhelming grief.

A few weeks ago, I read the beautiful poem above by the Spaniard Amalia Bautista. It addresses the very few things that come to really matter in life: “being able to love and be loved,/ not dying after our children.”

I am the luckiest person on earth when it comes to love, as my Prince and I have found each other and work hard at being happy together, every day. “Not dying after our children”, unfortunately, has happened to us. And all I can wish for is to never have to experience it again.

I want to thank you all for the love and support you have been giving us in the past weeks. This tragedy has shown me, yet again, that this space is more than a blog: it’s you, my readers, that make it a community. I have felt your presence through emails, messages, phone calls; my family has received presents from all around the world (and how I love to receive snail mail!). I may take a long time to reply, but I appreciate every word and gesture you have sent our way.

We are doing better. We have settled into a new routine, a “new normal”. We miss our baby boy, but, at the same time, are in awe of all the things our baby girl has learned along the way, and melt with each and every one of her smiles.

Despite the tragedy, life is beautiful and we have the firm intention of living it fully.

Thank you for being there, it means the world to us.

Ana, Paulo, Alice

A guest post over on the Uppercase Magazine blog

air guest posting at Uppercase Magazine

Hi everyone!

I had a lovely birthday last weekend and a busy, busy week. One of the highlights of the last few days was seeing my guest post published over on the Uppercase Magazine’s blog. You know how much I love this magazine, so you can imagine how I feel about seeing my post, a quite intimate account on how I created new roots when living abroad, published there.

Thank you, Janine!

Before I sign off, Tara Gentile (my business teacher, mentor, role model) is teaching a Creative Live intensive workshop you can attend for free. I loved embroidering April’s Embroidery Club project while watching the live broadcast yesterday, so much fun (see below)!

Happy Valentine’s Day for you all!

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embroidering-while-watching-Tara-Gentile

April-air-embroidery-club

Olá! Boa sexta-feira!

O fim-de-semana passado foi delicioso, passado entre celebrações de aniversário (adoro fazer anos!). Esta semana tem sido muito movimentada, sendo que o ponto alto foi, sem dúvida, ver o meu artigo publicado no blogue da minha revista favorita, a Uppercase. Obrigada à Janine!

Antes de me despedir até segunda, deixo-vos o link para a aula, ao vivo, que a minha professora de negócios, a Tara Gentile, está a dar nos workshops Creative Live. É até amanhã, Sábado, e é grátis (visto ao vivo). Enquanto assistia à sessão de ontem, bordei o projecto de Abril do Clube de Bordado. Adorei!

Bom dia de São Valentim!