Two years ago, when we decided to move to Portugal to develop Severina Kids production here, it was a big and tough decision.
For the new people here, who don’t know me yet, I’m Alejandra, founder and creative director at Severina Kids. My husband and I are Argentinean. We’ve been living abroad for the last 19 years and our 11 year old son Mateo was born in Madrid, Spain.
Our last stop is Porto, where my son and I are based full time while my husband is coming and going working abroad. (Please, let’s not speak about this crazy 2020 and how often we were able to see each other in the flesh…)
Going back to the point, when we moved to Porto, two years ago, we barely knew anybody living there. The new school gave us a great opportunity to meet new people, and we were really lucky! We made great friends and we share amazing time together.
But I would like to make a special mention about a friendship that was born “online” and moving to Porto gave me the opportunity to turn into a “real life” friendship. I met Florence Rolando 10 years ago in 2010, when I started Severina Kids and she was running Pirouette Blog.
In 2013 we saw each other for the first time in Brussels where I felt the connection was immediate. We were in contact online since then, and lucky me, Florence and her lovely family moved to Porto, I think 7 years ago. So since I moved to Porto, we’ve been sharing precious moments together (big, big plus we live 5 minutes apart!).
I still remember her first post about my work, in which she wrote “Personally, on top of a doll, I would love Alejandra to come and draw something in my house!”. Who would tell that 10 years later I would illustrate her first book “Les ondes, la 5G et notre santé” .
Last Sunday Florence and I had a “jinx” moment when I was calling her to offer veggie snacks I cooked and she was calling me to bring me some festive foliage she collected at Sierra de Valongo :) So we were really happy treating each other with so simple yet pleasant (why not emotional) stuff.
Thank you Florence!
Here's what I’ve done with Florence's green treat:
I whish you could smell the eucalyptus...
