Everyone has their own rituals in the morning whilst waking up….but from the no breakfasters via the cereal and fruit people to the fry fanatics, many enjoy a lovely cup of coffee in the morning. My preference is a nice fluffy cappucchino but my brother for example prefers a strong espresso to give the day a kick start. So when he decided to move in with his girlfriend (yeah!!), I made these two personalized cups as their housewarming present. They were inspired by some cups I saw in Bon Marche on our Paris trip Iast September and I used a stamp set from Muji (bought that trip) to put their names on the spoons and “espresso” on the cups.
These are still leftover projects from my old pottery class (and there are still some more to follow) but a few weeks ago I found a new one! It’s just around the corner from my home, the teacher makes beautiful stuff and is not only intent on teaching me pottery but German as well! And it’s working really well, sometimes it’s a bit of a struggle but as the teacher also speaks English and French we generally work it out. I think it’s really a fabulous way to practice the language, learn a new skill and meet some new people. I’ve talked about this briefly before and wanted to emphasize the point as I had some comments about it in a previous post.
I guess my family has always had to learn languages. Before my brother and I were born, my parents moved from the Netherlands to France for my Dad’s job. Whilst he was working, my Mum was trying to learn the language, make friends and also find a job. She joined several courses and clubs, all in French and slowly, through cooking courses and flower identifying walks, learned the language and made friends. So I would definitely recommend anyone to join something like this. Many foreigners here often complain that it’s hard to meet the local Swiss people but I always think this is quite unfair as they often also don’t speak German or French. We can not expect everyone to speak English (well, or feel comfortable speaking it all the time) and therefore will have to make a bigger effort ourselves learning the local language. But once you do, you will find many lovely, funny, genuine and loyal friends.
The Crafty Shrimp 