Johanna

Who thought destemming raisins could be so satisfying? 🫐

Rhythm Food
Montalut Daily Rhythm

Annem (mother in Turkish) likes to give us clothbags full of homemade dried fruits and leaves. Once she gave us apples she harvested from her garden and dried over the fireplace–these lasted well over a year back home in Manila. @korayerimez says keeping them in breathable bags lets them last longer.

Today I took out the raisin bag and went about removing dried stems. There’s something about getting busy with our #hands, touching something that has passed through other hands as well. It’s calming and grounding, like I’m shaking hands with old #wisdom. Tradition. Storebought #raisins never have these stems.

On White Day Sunday, do something traditional, artisanal, handmade. Get rooted and touch something that’s been passed on to you with love and tenderness.🤍

I’m A Natural Girl

Everyday Life,

🎵 In between singing Material Girl 🎙

Su: Mom, what does Material Girl mean?

Me: It means you like Material things like this (paper) and this (markers) and this (scissors).

Su: Am I a Material Girl?

Me: Yes, but you also like nature, parks and trees, right? So you’re also a Natural Girl.

🎤 Su back to singing:
We are living
in a natural world
and I’m a Natural Girl. 🎶

What makes you smile from ear to ear?

Rhythm
Montalut Daily Rhythm

On our dede (grandfather)’s 83rd birthday we all went to his happy place, Ikea. When we got to the kitchen section, it was @korayerimez who was like a kid in a toy store. Koray’s the cook in our family and his eyes lit up every time he picked up a new must-have kitchen tool. Here he is smiling ear to ear next to copper pans.🤩

On Blue Day, we’re invited to do what nourishes us, mind, body and soul. Having a happy place that brings so much joy is a blessing. Imagine what life would be like if this happy place was home? 💙

Time to touch grass!

Rhythm
Montalut Daily Rhythm

25°C weather is here and today was extra busy at the neighborhood park. Looking forward to sunny spring days to touch grass more often again and tap into grounding energy.🌿

I’m an ideas 💡 person by default, airy and flying from one shiny new thing to the next. Green Day is my polar opposite: staying grounded in the concrete and practical, servicing. In my Sun years (30s) I started feeling an impulse to build a home and more recently, life as a mother, has gotten me embracing green energy more. I like predictable and steady, what parenting circles would call rhythm.

On this Green Day, may you find your bit of nature, calm and balance.💚

Our first attempt at Mrs. Fields style cookies!

Rhythm Food

Fudgy, chocolatey cookies are not easy to find here so we did the next best thing–we made it ourselves.🍪 They ended up more like Chewy Chips Ahoy (still so yummm). Koray says brown sugar in Turkey is made with beet molasses, which give a weaker flavor, so we got creative and added grape molasses.🙃

Yellow Day is about creativity, and it comes even in everyday things like adapting a cookie recipe.💛

Just in case you want to DIY Chewy Chips Ahoy, here’s the recipe (we added 1/3 cup grape molasses).

Do you See fun and joy?

Rhythm
Montalut Daily Rhythm

Pink is such a happy color. It says princess, unicorn, rainbow (even if it’s not in the rainbow!). Cherry blossoms are most wonderfully pink.🌸

💓Pink Days are days of vision and seeing, and what better way to truly See life than through fun and joy?

Rhythm: Colors of the Day

Rhythm

Daily photographs for inspiration based on the color of the day:

🤍 White Sundays – Discover Yourself

💜 Purple Mondays – Empower

❤ Red Tuesdays – Reflect

💛 Yellow Wednesdays – Create

🧡 Orange Thursdays – Connect

💚 Green Fridays – Serve others with love

💙 Blue Saturdays – Embrace Nature and Body

Making our own Dollhouse

Projects with Kids

The whole point was to do a project together. Something that excited both of us.

So summer of 2023 we started our dollhouse and months later, this still holds true.

We enjoy this bonding activity that allows us to be busy with our hands and push the imagination a little bit every time. I deliberately use recycled materials to encourage our daughter to stretch her idea about everyday things and how we can re-imagine anything. The sustainability or envrionmental lesson is a nice bonus.

There are easier projects out there for sure, and on some days I need to remind myself why we DIY anything. Here are ways to reframe when projects like this start to lean towards “chore”:

  • “It’s time-consuming.” –> It’s wonderful hours of non-agenda, non-gadget play.
  • “It’s not perfect-looking.” –> It’s handmade and spirit-filled work. The delight is in the making.
  • “We can just buy a dollhouse.” –> We strategize and design all the little details. It’s very intentional.

This is an open-ended work that will just keep getting upgrades when inspiration hits. It’s become the default art project in our home, and admittedly I do a little dance of joy every time I hear my daughter say, “Don’t throw that! I can use it for my dollhouse.”

How to DIY a Dollhouse

Project start: July 2023 – ongoing

Materials We Use:

  • For the base:
    • Egg Trays, toy boxes, pizza boxes, cake boxes, milk cartons, medicine boxes
    • Barbeque Sticks for support
    • Scratch paper / used bond paper to cover small boxes as furniture
    • Tissue for papier-mache
  • For decorating:
    • Colored Felt
    • Colorful pages from Activity books and coloring books
    • Stickers and Paint
  • White Glue

Updates:

  • 💛 What are your Works-In-Progress?💛

    💛 What are your Works-In-Progress?💛 Here’s an update on our DIY dollhouse (yes it’s still alive!). ✅️ Pool – our milk carton got a fresh coat of purple paint and tada! Outdoor pool is ready [Not in pic]: ✅️ Sofa – only a pink one will do for this little pinkie, made from juice carton…

  • 🤍What’s your big picture?🤍

    Our 5yo wanted a dollhouse, and in the spirit of doing projects to get her off gadgets, I told her we would make it.💪 Here we are halfway into it, doing some testing. I thought all along the house was for her Lego dolls about two inches high. Turns out she wanted her Barbies to…

Celebrating Women with a Collab piece with 10 artists for Women’s History Month

Portfolio,

🌟 Here’s a collab within a collab:

Co-painted with my 5yo daughter, who was so happy to be a woman celebrating herself on Women’s month 💃

🌈 The 7th update to this piece shows mothers in all shapes and forms on the rainbow sleeves of Mother Earth.

Open Edition
Price updates with every artist update
Minting til Mar 31 👇

🙏Thankful to be 1 of 10 Artists in this co-creation project for Women’s History Month:
✅ @melarif.eth
✅@amber_umber
✅@anne_zanne_silver
✅@morvixity
✅@katiesdesignstudio
✅@ixorabloom.art
✅@montalut_
⚪️@luckyst_ar
⚪️@antwomanart
⚪️@carolineharroearts

Minting is live on @manifoldxyz
https://app.manifold.xyz/c/WHM24

📆 17 days left to get yours!

#women #womenempowerment #womensupportingwomen #womenartists #womenshistorymonth #mother #motherearth #rainbow #collab