My 2010 resolution is..

Some time ago I decided to become a professional scrapbooker. I honestly love this art more than writing and I have been freelance writing for the past five years.
So my 2010 resolution is to start my scrapbooking career! I make at least one layout a day, scrapbooking in my dream and everywhere I go, i take pictures specifically to make scrapbooks of them and lately start writing diary to capture all daily moments to have journaling for scrapbooks later.
When I was researching my options for becoming a custom scrapbook artist, I realized the importance of a well maintained blog. And here I go. I created House of Frisby as my blog when I lived overseas, to stay in touch with my husband and let him know about my everyday live. Now, House of Frisby is going to be my ultimate online scrapbooking retreat. I will post my layouts, talk about trying new techniques (i just inked the eges of a paper for the first time yesterday!) and my love for scrapbooking. And I hope you will join me too.
Happy scrapbooking in 2010!

It´s Raining Day

What can you do with a baby when the weather is not cooperating? 

A, Suffer trough the rain and take him for a walk anyways.

B, Took him to the nearest mall and let him play with other hundreds of toddlers, who are hiding there because of the weather.

C, Play costume play!

My sister came home with a new fedora and Jr. was really happy trying it on. He was smiley superstar, waiting for the camera to take pictures. Isn´t he adorable? 

Parenting means showing your child fashion choices from early childhood :)

Synagogue Pics

A Little Exotic Trip

Over the hills and far away... Ehm, okay, maybe not over the hills or exactly far, but we took a trip to an away city located 20 miles north to Bratislava. Senec (read Se-nje-s) is a small city, almost a village, with cute little shops, one little square and the best ice cream. 

My dad pretended, he is in NY, because he posed in front of gate to Chinese restaurant. My mom pretended she don´t know him. Jr. was running around and chasing birds, but he was really ammused by a little cellar window about his size. He must thought that´s a special window designed for him, because he got stuck by the window and refused to move for 15 minutes!

I tried to make some nice pics of him in front of a synagogue. We are not technically Jews, I mean, we are not Jews at all, but rumor has it my greatgrandma was Hungarian Jew, but no one from my family can confirm or refuse it. But for unknown reason I like old synagogues and fortunatelly, there is at least one in every bigger Slovak city. The buildings are usually empty, recluse and mysterious and I imagine all the people visiting the synagogue every week, the prayers silently whispered in the air, the secret looks between black-eyed Jewish girl in the women part of the building and a curly Jewish guy in the opposite part... I know in a Christian church it may be the same, but they lack the atmosphere of something hidden and special. I have been on Christian mass numerous time, but I have never been on a Jewish mass. It´s time to change!

The Time Goes By...

Bond. James Bond.

Frisby. Master of Journalism Frisby.

I am happy to announce you since this Monday I hold the Master degree in field of Journalism and Communication. After five happy years I ended my university education.

It seems like it has been few months, not years, since I first walk to my university in September 2004. I dreamed about stuyding Journalism few years before I ended my high school, I always wanted to write and become a writer, see my names on book covers... Soon as I realised that there is NO school for learning how to write I changed my mind. I would be a journalist instead. I can see my name in press more often as on a book, right?

From the beginning it was all about writing for me. TV, radio or anything else was no option for me, I don´t think I look that good to be on screen or my voice is the right for a radio. But writing, there´s a whole new world for me. I love sitting behind the computer and typing, the sound of materialising my thoughts is great. And when I can see them on paper, whoa!

I worked in a press agency, popular weekly paper, I wrote some articles for daily newspapers, for glossy women magazine, I have my own collumn in the most popular teenager magazine here. I wrote about cinema, fashion, culture, music, I had short stories published. 

It seems I may get a book deal soon, but write a book is one of my life goals. I see myself as blessed. All my dreams came true and now I have the formal university education I ever dreamed of. I have wonderful husband and cute baby, my life is like a fantasy. As the time goes by, I know one thing for sure - dream your life and you will live your dreams.

Funny Fashion Choices

Sometimes I wonder if being a celebrity consists part of losing your mind. Especially when choosing your clothes. I know that most VIP´s probably have the advantage of helping hands of a stylist, but sometimes I will rather stick with my "boring" SAHM clothes rather than the latest fashion.

The Costume Institute Gala has been some time ago, but Madonna´s hair still amuses me. I will never wear my hair like this, mostly because this is an old lady ´do. Old lady, who sweeps the floors and empties the trash cans, to be specific. Madonna may be 50, but why showing your age THIS way?
Another thing is this poor supermodel named Miranda Kerr. Have this killer legs, probably I will show them too. But flashing your skin in this stripped and ripped way? Too much...
And, finally, the winner of the gala. Media did not pay attention to Helena Christensen, because of Madonna and Rihanna, but I noticed her and was pleasantly surprised. I had to literally "read" her statement dress. It is a real statement, honoring Vogue as one of the most prominent fashion magazines in the world. Whoever made this dress, kudos! (This is smart when you have a BF or husband with name starting at "V", you can copycat it and make it yourself as a surprise for anniversary or birthday.) 
I would really like to know, how many of the celebrity outfits have been designed by stylists and how many did they do by themselves? You can always blame Rachel Zoe or someone for your failure and critic, but is it really worth it?
PS: I was complaining to Travis about no nice clothes here and that I really want to go shopping in US. He laughed and called me spoiled. But by "shopping in US" I ment Target and Ross :D. Big laughs. 

When You Will Grow Up

Not a long time ago I was thinking about my future kids professions. It all happenned when I attended a Slovak folklore birthday party for a famous 80-year old choreographer.

He is known for bringing Slovak traditional dances to life and as a "thank you" almost all dancers made an appearance with their presentation. I thought the little dancers were totally adorable and beyond cute, and I decided to "sacrifice" my daughter for the sake of traditional Slovak dance. I said sacrifice because I know few people who used to dance as kids and basically they consider it a high form of children slavery. Because parents did not respect their wish NOT to dance and forced them to be involved in an activity they hated. I really don´t want to be this type of parent, but as long as my little girl will be all cute and dancing like a ballerina, I am into the dance class.

It was somewhere in 2007 and I wanted to have three children, two boys and a girl. My daughter would be a dancer, but what about the boys? Again, the cuteness factor. I really like hockey players and cute little boys skating on ice, dreaming big and playing hard. I wanted my son to be a professional ice-hockey player. The last baby, my dream baby named Gabriel, would be a journalist. I am the only one in my family who can write, so why not pass it to my son? Also, there was a famous journalist from the 60´ies called Gavril Gryzlov, Gavril means Gabriel in Russian. It would be nice to pay him a tribute this way - name my son after him and send him to Columbia University to study journalism.

By now, I just started having my kids. Jr. is adorable and cute and he can choose what he wants to be. He loves to comb hair, clean windows, drive a car, cook and massage. If he wants to be a masseusse, as long as he is happy, I will support him. Bye-bye free ice-hockey matches, welcome free massages!

Baby and the Bunny

On Friday I invited myself over to my friend Lenka. She wrote me a message on Wednesday that we can meet anytime downtown, so I called her the next day and asked her what is she up to and when she said she will be home, I said - yeah, we can come visit you! And because it was lunchtime she suggested she will make a lunch for me and the baby and I gladly accepted.

So she prepared sushi for us, it was kinda good. Jr. was eating rice and then some carrot and then a little of soup, but he was really amazed by Lenka´s and David´s rabbit. Rabit was not amazed at all :D He was scared, running like in a komics, when you see paws on an animal moving in frenzy- that was their bunny. Lenka said that he was

fine when they had a huge party with loud music and 20 people talking and drinking, but he got really scared when he saw a baby. Jr. didn´t even try to catch him or touch him, he was just being happy and looking at the bunny.

Me and Lenka decided to take a trip to Vienna after our exams. She and David were there few weeks ago and he don´t feel like coming back so I can go!. Sooo I am happy´ cause I want to explore the Jewish Vienna and finally see the Sigmund Freud Museum. Awesome :D

(Pic Nr. 1. - Jr. and David playing with his blanket, pic Nr. 2. - Lenka presenting her sushi)

Peace

I am lazy to write. Enjoy some pics, I will think about some words:)

Frankie Said Relax, So I Did

Yesterday I needed to relax, calm down. I am preparing for my graduation exams and I am studying every time I have some time. When Jr. is asleep, I try to learn. Sometimes my mom or dad took him out for walk, so I have some more time I can spend with theories of journalism. 

My big day is in 10 days and I know about half of things I should know. I decided I deserve a little treat, so I did a scrapbook page about Jr.´s first swimming lesson. Here it is:

Materials used: Yellow, pale yellow and orange paper by Basic Color Paper from Sevt, stripped paper and flower paper by Walmart, embellishments by Lidl, whale button by Tesco, blue dots by vintage :).

Three Days In A Life Of A Baby

Three days passed and I barely got time to breathe, not to write. Previous two days I was so tired I fell asleep with the baby, waking up in the morning to feed him. But funny things happened every day, so here I go...

Tuesday: We went for a short walk to a private primary school playground, that is nearby our house. I guess this is the only place here where the grass is not covered in smoke butts, dog excrements and dirty papers. They have a nice playground and sometimes open their gates for public, so we went to try it. Jr. showed a desire to work, not play. He saw a lot full of little stones and a wooden playhouse nearby. My cousin has this exact house and it stands on a lot full of little stones. Jr. connected this two images in his little head and decided to bring the stones to the house, to make it like it should be. For more than half an hour he was carrying stones from the lot to the house five feet apart.

Wednesday: My mom was working all day and she didn´t spend almost any time with Jr. I decided to take him for a walk to the place where sho works and wait for her outside. Jr. was amazed by tennis players who were playing at a nearby court and didn´t want to play with his own HSM ball. There was a little boy about four playing tennis too and I started dreaming about Jr. playing tennis and being famous and honoring me with gifts and mentioning me in every article, how much he loves me...

Wake up, Ninka! :D Before I was pregnant I wanted to have an ice hockey player son and traditional dancer daughter. But now I realized the most important is what the baby wants and not what the parent wants. If Jr. will choose to be a hair dresser, cook, journalist, fisherman, driver, IT specialist or something else, I will support his decision.

And today he found out a new game. He loves to play with the cookware and he realized he can hide under a pot! How funny! :) We also spend most of the day by ourselves and he was a really nice company. The only thing I wish is he would let me sleep longer...

PS: Good news for scrapbooking. I have found a store from Czech Republic that shipps stuff to Slovakia. I immediatelly ordered papers and embellishments and now I need to find how to pay it into a foreign country... 

All By Myself

I was in a gym all by myself today. I know it may be not a big deal for somebody, but for me certainly is. Hanging out in public places alone was never fine with me. I refuse to eat, drink or wait in public by myself, and honestly, I don´t know why.
Imagine an intellectual heroine, probably a French girl in a black turtleneck, black glasses and heavy book in hand. She is sitting alone in a caffee and she is occupied by the book, she don´t care about the world, but the world is amazed by her grace, intelect and beauty. This French girl has a pen and paper in front of her and sometimes she scribbles her brilliant ideas. People admire her courage and smart mind.
And I admire her too. I have this image stuck in my head every time a situation like this is about to happen. But I could never pretend I am this imaginary girl. I simply don´t have nerve to go and order a lunch just for me, or drink, or peace of cake. I need to say it is not an obsession or phobia. Once I desperately wanted to eat chinese so I went and ate in an empty Chinese restaurant. Once I had to wait for my books in the library to come for two hours, so I spent them in the nearest Coffee & Co. branch with a carrot cake and sweet coffee. And today I was sweating in a gym. None of this experiences were scary or mortifying. It just don´t feel right with me.
The image of the smart French girl is still on my mind. But I think I will have to visit A LOT of public places by myself to come closer to her...

Cutting The Paper

I mentioned yesterday that I bought a new album for scrapbooks. I love the flowers and the simple and clean white pages in it. But not to be boring and plain, I bought some gift wrapping paper (I said that in Slovakia they don´t sell much scrapbooking supplies, I have to use what I can...) with black-and-white design. I measured it and cut it into 26 smaller pieces to cover the clean pages. Now I will use the black-and-white background as my base for the scrapbooks. Other colors I am going to use are red, yellow and silver and I guess the B/W will nicely complement it and put together.  I already have some embelishments ready, so let the party begin! 

  

Pain For Pleasure, Pleasure For Pain

Today is a big day, Jr. got immunized with two shots, one in left leg, another in right leg. He was sooo wadly afterwards! Fortunately he is a big brave boy and did not scream at all, just little squeaks when I was holding his legs straight. Every time when we are at the doctor´s office he is behaving very well, not scared or fussy. His love to people and attention includes people in white :)

After the shots he deserved to be treated as a little prince, so he took not one, but TWO car rides, learned how to put car keys into a keyhole and got his very own swing. My dad with help of his friend and Jr. (of course) installed the swing in our balcony. Jr. is not really happy about the swing now, because it is too high for him, but as soon as we will install new rope, he will be the happiest little munchkin on this planet. You see my son, you felt a little pain and got a lot of pleasure. Life is fair with you :)) 

Sunday @ Avion

Someone likes to go to church on Sunday, I like to go shopping.

I took Jr. to a little shopping spree today. I needed to buy an album for scrapbooking for my lovely husband (hi dear!) and some scrapbooking supplies. The album is absolutely fabulous, black linen cover with japanese style flowers, it contains 30 white removable pages and some stickers for the photos. I will use it as a scrapbooking album as the original scrap albums are not available here. It was under 5 Euro, which make the album my ultimate favourite! :)

We strolled trough the stores, I bought some (silver, dark red and yellow stripped) paper and I saw a cute ball in a store. Jr. likes to play with a ball so I let him choose the design. Spiderman? No. Cars? No. Winnie the Pooh? Oh no. He picked up a ball with High School Musical. Great taste, son!

It was hot inside and I took off Jr. shoes and socks. He felt really comfortable.  He was munching on a croissant and playing with his feet. I bought him a sunhat and pair of matching sunglasses (more in the next post) and because he was such a gooooood boy, I let him play in the fountain in the new wing of Avion for a while. Then we went to several more stores just to discover that the entire gift section at Marks and Spencer disappeared. I didn´t want to get anything else, because my perfect pair of monokini does not exist yet, so we headed home, happy and tired.

What a wonderful spree this was!

XOXO

Hello world, this is Ninka

Hi everyone!

I decided to start this blog because I have so much to tell you! Basically, my husband Travis (hi dear!) works in Alaska and I raise our son in Slovakia, Europe, so he is pretty much missing everything going on here. I love to scrapbook, I love to write and read books, I love fashion and my baby, Travis Jr. To have a baby means a wonderfull opportunity to shop for someone else than me and have lovely pics to scrap (just kidding!).

I am going to graduate in a month, but I spend most of the time with Jr. or online, I am looking for the perfect house with perfect furniture and decorations. I will write a lot about houses, colors, color combinations, kitchens, sectionals, flowers and so on. I feel kinda obsessed about house decorating right now... 

The second thing is scrapbooking. In Slovakia there is not much possibilities to buy scrap supplies so I have to stick with the basic or get it imported. I try to be creative so I will post a lot of my finished projects.

The last but not least is my everyday life with my baby. Jr. is year and two months, loves to watch people work and eat adult food. His biggest love is water and boats and he never gets bored of being outside.

So, hello world, this is me, Ninka. I enjoy my life and you should enjoy my blog.