3 Hobby Books to make your weekends more creative

Either if you work full or part time, if you are a parent with one or more children or just single, life is not easy and the working week means very often a lot of stress. As winter and the cold weather decide to stay for longer in some unhappy parts of the world, weekends can be just grey and not-eventful, without too much to do outside. Instead of staying in the front of the TV most of the time, what about learning some new skills that can save your mind for something better during the exhausting days of the week? Here there are three books that can bring a pintch of creativity into your life:

Simple Calligraphy. A Beginner's Guide to Elegant Lettering, by Judy Detrick

In the age of digital writing, hand writing is greatly neglected. I used to study calligraphy in primary school and I still do a lot of handwriting every day, but the art of elegant lettering is not so widespread as it used to be. Judy Detrick, a calligraphy teacher and professional, offers an introduction into this precious art, with the help of a couple of exercises and various advices about the best materials to use. The exercises for acquiring basic skills for Italic hand writing, are designated for specific letters - including capitals and punctuation. 

For the beginning, it requires an investment of maximum 40-50 EUR. You can practice 10 insightful minutes the day and use this new skill for creating various 'Thank you' notes or invitations for events.  

The book will be available for sale starting with 19 April.

Wonderland. A Colouring Book inspired by Alice's Adventures, by Amely Shen

I am a big supporter of colouring books for adults and I own myself a couple of them. This one is a bit special though, because besides the beautiful graphics it features a story that I love even more as I love colouring books: Alice in Wonderland, celebrating 150 years since making the world a better place. Besides the colouring patterns, it also has some little story and an invitation to quizzes. The only regret is that there are not as many patterns to keep you creative at least for a couple of months. 

The title will be released on April 5.

The Flower Workshop, by Ariella Chezar with Julie Michaels

I spent most of my childhood in a house with a wild garden and I love flowers wherever they are. I am doing once in a while flower arrangements, but not that much as I want to do and not always with a plan. This book is meant to bring inspiration for creating insightful flower projects but also brings the personal story of the author, of growing up in a creative familly in love with nature. First and foremost it has beautiful pictures, but it is also well written and gives many ideas for the beginner or advanced flower designer. The learning is based on the author's workshops all over the world that I will be very tempted to attend at least once.

The book will be released the March 1.

Disclaimer: I was offered these books via Netgalley.com, but the opinions are, as usual, my own

Flower decorations ideas for the summer table

The main thing that I love about the summer except the long days and the sun, is the possibility to admire so many flowers. It is that season of the year when one can find natural flowers, with natural smells that will always embellish the house. Also, I noticed that in the summer the flowers last longer,and for instance, the flowers bought for Shabbes can be kept for another week or even more. A couple of days ago, while on the road, I noticed some beautiful bouquets. For each of them, an interior design story was easily matched. 

I am still consider the very blue flowers as looking a bit artificial, but the flowers included in this bouquet achieved a pleasant balance of colours. It looks a bit official and would buy it for a special occasion, maybe for a holiday. 

Yellow makes me very happy and would love to have this bouquet for a birthday related occasion. Or for an anniversary. Through the combination of various kinds of flowers, including the very special rose, it brings a sense of warm and diversity. 

The combination of yellow and blue resulted in a quite cold combo in my opinion. This bouquet goes rather for any winter occasion. After a bit more thinking I realized that if placed in a predominantly white environment, it can show a friendlier face.

Do you feel the waves of joy sent by those joyous flowers? I want to have them on my Shabbes table every week.

This simple selection of flowers is more distinguished and elegant, but warm enough to send you friendly good waves. For a summer bar or bat mitzva is more than perfect.

And if none of the previous bouquets convinced you, it's hard to believe that the simple sunflowers will fail. Look at every single flowers, about the sun stories they are telling and the wonderful simplicity of the pure yellow. 

If interested to check more flower inspiration, feel free to check my Pinterest dedicated board: http://www.pinterest.com/ilanaontheroad/flowers/

A new chapter: flowers

Each week, on Friday evening, we should have beautiful flowers on our table. As in the case of the food, I try to adapt the type of flowers with the season, the discussions that we will have, the style of guests or any other occasions it may occur. 

I am the one who chose the flowers and decided about the final arrangement. The average price of the flowers in Berlin is acceptable, and with around 5 Euro I can easily find what I need. Most shops in my area - the Western side of the city - are owned by Thai people, very pleasant and ready to help when it comes to arranging a nice bouquet. The price is fixed and not open to negotiation, as it used to be the hometown of my childhood, where the inviting Roma women were inviting you to buy the most beautiful flowers I ever seen. The more you were buying the better the price.

In Germany, as everywhere else in Western Europe, the flowers are sold in cute small shops, many situated close to the subway. It looks as a good business, as people always buy flowers, even though I do not see on the street too many carrying them on their way home or to a date. 

In the past 4 weeks, the predominant flowers of the table were tulips - especially the orange and yellow ones - and some interesting roses - light pink and some traces of green, and my favourite type, the passion red ones. The last week, I found some extraordinary flowers, looking so delicate and like painted. I do not remember the name, I was thinking there are anemone, but when I googled it and saw some of the pictures there was no connection with my flowers. 

As I am right now in a middle of (another) redefinition of my career and passions - my career always used to be the result of some open passions - I decided that I should use more time to do creative flower arrangements in the next months. Hopefully, the weather will go better and better and I will be in that special mood for discoveries and learning. 

I grew up in a house with a big garden and flowers and spent a lot of time in the middle of the nature, hiking in the mountains and discovering on my own flowers and fruits, and running after butterflies. The fine school of flower design was never one of my priorities, but long time ago - before moving in Japan for a year - I wanted to get some Ikebana basics. Time is my most precious asset and I will complicate my priority list for the next weeks with some learning about flower arrangements. If I succeed, I will be able to bring smile and happiness to many people that would enjoy my ideas and only for their smiles and it is worth the effort to try. 

Till then, some pictures with the mysterious flowers of the last week.