Hello!
I am Ksenia, mom of Theo and creator of Bali.Bebe.
Having studied to be a rocket science engineer and worked in business consulting for many years, I had nothing to do with kids clothes before my son was born.
To explain how this idea came to me, I shall go back to 2013. The year when I left the corporate path and my home in Moscow, Russia behind and bought a one-way ticket to the self-rediscovery journey. To do things that I never had enough time or bravery for, or simply didn’t know much about – mindful living, creativity, and freedom.
Rediscovering myself journey
A couple of short months later, I was on the airplane to Thailand. The first destination was a massage school. After that – all blank. Even trembling and being not sure what and why I‘m going to do next, I was blindly trusting my intuition. I tapped into numerous learning experiences from ancient healthy life science called Ayurveda, yoga and meditation teaching to painting, cooking, and even programming.
All that did not give me an Aha moment of “Yes, that’s it. That’s what I want to do!”. I kept exploring and believing that my path will find me itself as I was making an effort to find it.
I lived this way until 2017 - on the journey and transitions between countries, cultures, different jobs and projects.
Pregnancy found me in Russia. My partner gave me full choice of the place for delivering our little one, and this choice brought us to Bali, Indonesia. A magical island where was a clinic for a natural birth.
Life changer
Theo came to the planet Earth on 13th November 2017, two weeks overdue. Long waiting made his mama so tired that she simply gave up on all her expectations, relaxed and delivered the little bundle of joy in 10 hours of relatively smooth and completely natural labor.
As I was preparing myself for giving birth naturally, mostly worrying about physical pain, maternity turned out to be an unexpected part. I was sure that what comes after birth will be naturally easy. Ha-ha! So wrong.
Like many new moms, I still remember the mind shift that happened after birth. I still wanted to do 100 things at a time, then I learnt to relax and let go when I already failed in task no. 2. Taking a shower and brushing my teeth were my absolute priorities, it still didn’t happen regularly in the first few weeks, though.
Who am I besides a milk factory?
Maternity also raises very serious questions for new moms, such as “who am I besides a milk factory?”. I couldn’t leave it like that, so I needed to find my own answer, and rather sooner than later.
When Theo was around 1 year old and could already stay with a nanny for a few hours per day, I started to explore my new potential career paths. I was teaching yoga, and then I got really excited about cooking. Making amazing healthy vegetarian dishes by mixing written recipes with my ideas was a real passion of mine.
Though I was feeling great with my new hobbies, I learnt that leaving my baby, especially if he is teething or sick, was too difficult sometimes. A fixed schedule was giving me stress on top of my ultimate inspiration to pursue my talents.
I had the knowing inside (again) that there should be another way. I sat with it for a while and wrote criteria on how “another way” should look like and envisioned my perfect business as it would already be happening.
Trusting the Universe
I dreamed of independence and creativity, sharing my passion with people, yet still having the freedom and a flexible schedule, and I was sure that whatever I’ll choose to do, it will involve my little monkey Theo.
I wrote it all down, closed my notepad, let it rest while the Universe takes care of us and unravels new possibilities. The Universe didn’t take long to work its magic!
Once a friend gave me a piece of a knitted fabric as she was leaving. After putting my boy to sleep, I made the first "jumpsuit" for him as my "night meditation". It was very raw, stitched by hands, still it was liked by everyone including Theo.
I made a couple more versions, and literally every parent around was asking where did I get them. After I told that it's my creation, they were asking me to make one for them. That gave me the motivation to continue.
It has been over a year since that moment. A year of doubts, struggles, research, ups and downs, and today we are an official Indonesia-based company that features the first few collections. Our collections are still small, raw, worked out in long hours and learning processes. They are the best we can offer to our community and what we truly believe in – conscious children clothing that don't disturb our little explorers in their daily journey to the moon and back!
So here we are... A growing team creating kids resort wear in the heart of island Bali and expanding our lovely products to any place where it is sunny, hot, and humid.
My biggest gratitude goes to my guru Theo, since he is my muse and the cause that made Bali.Bebe happen.
Forever grateful for be your mama,
Ksenia