What did you miss in 2012?

Welcome back to the sorella-hood for 2013! We hope you had a wonderful time over Christmas with your family and set for another fantastic year!

As parents start to get the back-to-school preparations started, and men and women over the country groan their way back to work (dreaming of any sort of opportunity to be able to quit work and financially fund a permanent residence at the beach), Alisha & I are so excited to be reaching sorella & me‘s first birthday later this month, and can’t wait to see  where this year will take us (it’s going to be hard to top an amazing 2012!).

Aside from a overwhelming love of our sleepwear collection, a very surprising aspect of sorella & me last year was the growing love for this blog. We seemed to have naturally developed a little community of wonderful people to connect with via a couple of rambling posts each week.

If we can make you smile, raise some important questions, or perhaps help even answer some questions, then all the more important our time allocated for writing becomes.

So firstly – thanks so much for your support!

For today we thought you might like to know what our top 3 posts were for 2012 – this will give you a chance to read them again or perhaps discover them for the first time if you missed them the first time around!

In spot no. 3

“10 things to make you feel old, but also make you laugh”. I have now had another birthday since writing this post so it’s even more breathtakingly-dire!

How did a kid get a whole creek named after him? Photo credit: Sony Pictures

How did a kid get a whole creek named after him? Photo credit: Sony Pictures

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The sorella-hood’s top 10 essential items to pack in your hospital bag – for MUMS!

It’s fair to say an expectant Mary Poppins would be well prepared for her pending hospital visit, but what about the rest of us that aren’t lucky enough to have bottomless luggage?

There are many ‘What to pack for your hospital bag’ lists out there, so the difference with the sorella & me list? Well, it is compiled by our sorella-hood readers – AND their suggestions focus on Mum’s needs only! (A big thank you to all those who contributed!)

So here we go – the Top 10 essential items to pack in your hospital bag – for MUMS!

1. Comfy Sleepwear (that doubles as day-wear!) 

You have to be comfortable, but you don’t want to be in clothes that will have you diving under the covers when visitors turn up! And you’ll need lots of changes, especially items you can discretely breastfeed in that won’t make getting your breast out difficult (!!) or make you feel self-conscious about your belly. It’s no surprise our sorella mums very kindly recommend sorella & me organic sleep and loungewear. Tried and tested, they think the collection is a perfect combination of style, function and comfort.

sorella & me organic nursing nightie – http://www.sorellaandme.com.au

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The Battle of the Boob

It’s the final day of World Breastfeeding Week (1-7th August) – a really important world-wide awareness campaign on all aspects of breastfeeding.

Although I’m yet to experience the lows and highs of breastfeeding (the lowest I’m guessing being the actual lowest point the breast can get post-breastfeeding); I have had many friends go through this incredibly anatomically intricate, yet completely natural process to have a little insight into it. Plus given Alisha and I design maternity clothes to make breastfeeding comfortable and easier for a living, it’s pretty important I know what I am talking about!!

My breastfeeding summary: breastfeeding can be exhausting, difficult, sometimes impossible, and often just a big pain in the bust. It can be a stressful battle of the boob. It can be a mountain of soreness. It can be 2 watermelons of a goddamn bad time.

But it can also be incredibly rewarding, special, heart-fluttering, and is very important for the health of your baby. And it’s this last benefit, I am told, is the good that hugely outweighs all bad.

World Breastfeeding Awareness Week

image by spfoto/istockphoto

So why is World Breastfeeding Week so important? Continue reading

Australian fashion is loaded with toxic chemicals – Organic & Natural fibres are the way to go, says Choice

It’s no surprise for us here at sorella & me to read a report this week by independent consumer watchdog Choice on the toxic chemicals found in Australian clothing and the damage they are doing to our health as well as our environment.

In Choice’s report, Andreas Schimkus, a Senior Advisor from the Council of Textile and Fashion Industries of Australia (TCFA) states:

The most dangerous way for a toxin to enter the body is not through the digestive system, but through the skin

Therefore, any garment in contact with the skin can easily transfer the toxic chemicals used in its manufacture and finishing through to the individual.

Toxic Chemicals are found in garments

Image via Choice ‘Chemicals in Clothing’

Further, and perhaps even more alarming, Schimkus says:

“Products that are made in China for the Australian market could not even be sent back to China, as many of them would not meet the Chinese product safety standards but are acceptable here.”

This is terrifying!

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New designs coming soon from sorella & me maternity sleepwear

Just a brief post today because alisha & I are up to our eyeballs in fabric samples, lace, Pantone colour cards and lots of sketches! After an incredible response to our launch collection, alisha and I are really excited to be back in design phase – Yep! We are in the midst of adding a few new swanky pieces to the collection. Yay!

anna & alisha of sorella & me maternity sleepwear

We have had an incredible start to life with our new ‘baby’ – with the sleepless nights and teething problems to boot! But the smiles she brings us every single day makes all the hard work worth it! (sound familiar mummas out there??) Continue reading

Vintage finds & the stories they tell

I have already confessed my love of 1950s films to the sorella-hood (see here for a re-cap). So it probably won’t shock you that I’m a sucker for a cute antique shop – I just love looking (and sometimes laughing) at all the amazing things. I can waste some serious hours and fortunately for me, if I holler out to J1 to “Pull over!” he knows I’m serious and is as equally keen to jump out of the car and hunt for treasures.

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What does it take to build a business with your sibling?

Oh my lordy!  Seeing yourself on the cover of a magazine without expecting it is enough to give anyone a heart attack! And while it’s no cover of Vogue (and cover girls we definitely are not) we were chuffed for sorella & me to be included in Business Review Australia’s feature on siblings in business.

sorella & me maternity sleepwear Continue reading

Grace Kelly: Princess, Mother, Actress, Style icon. Could she have been any more fabulous?

I adore Grace Kelly…

Princess Grace Kelly - Boating

image via Harper’s Bazaar

I don’t know how or when it started – I can’t remember the first time I saw her but I suspect it had something to do with driving our mother crazy and her needing some quiet time.  She probably plonked my sisters and I in front of Bill Collins’ Midday Movie and perhaps that particular day it happened to be the 1956 film High Society. It would very quickly become my all-time favorite movie, and Grace Kelly, my favourite ‘pretty lady from the movies’. Continue reading

Being fair can go a long way. This Fairtrade Fortnight – ask some questions!

It’s Fair Trade Fortnight! This a great opportunity for us to understand how making more informed choices on the products we buy can have a huge impact on the lives of those less fortunate.

Fairtrade is described by the Fairtrade Association of Australia & NZ (an arm of Fairtrade International) as:

Better prices, decent working conditions, local sustainability, and fair terms of trade for farmers and workers in the developing world. By requiring companies to pay sustainable prices, Fairtrade addresses the injustices of conventional trade, which traditionally discriminates against the poorest, weakest producers. It enables them to improve their position and have more control over their lives.

Fairtrade International have developed a strict global certification process to allow consumers greater confidence when buying products that may have come from areas where working conditions and prices paid for goods can be questionable.

I have worked in India with Oxfam, and Vietnam with CARE Vietnam and I have seen first-hand how the cycle of poverty can grip communities when they are treated unfairly.  Why should we have the benefit of paying just $10 for a piece of clothing if it means a family can’t afford to eat? That doesn’t seem very fair does it?

Anna in India with Oxfam

Me with a local Health Worker visiting the Pune Slums in India

(In a simplified way) here is what can happen without ethical and sustainable supply chains: Continue reading

The day I realised I am turning into my mother

It was that moment when you heard the words come out of your mouth – and you knew just as soon as you said it: they were the words of your mother.

We joked about it in our 20’s out of a false sense of security that it was surely just a myth.  But the bubble has burst and many women are realizing that the ’joke’ about girls turning into their mothers is everything but (and you can hear the shrieks of self-realisation and terror from all corners of the country).

The metamorphosis is nothing less than horrifying, especially when you actually realise just how much you now look, sound and act like your mum*

* this does not mean we do not love every ounce of our Mums – it just seems a bit weird to now be a version of her when you thought that you couldn’t be more different, and more to the point, you vowed you would never let it happen. Furthermore, the comment “you’re so much like your mother” seems to be accompanied by an evil laugh from our husbands/partners/sisters/brothers and is extremely annoying. Continue reading