busy...

been pretty busy since i last posted preparing for some altered projects to be given away as birthday presents... SB is such a great way to make handmade present especially for people!

alphas and flower wood board at 'resting' after I applied a layer of mod podge over them... can't wait for the next stage to continue with altering... hehe

personally I find altering quite a challenge and requires lots of meticulous planning as well! ... ok, granted i've never been to any 'formal' SB classes to learn creating layouts *other than going for crops & a lesson with cousin J* or learning to alter *although i meant to do that*. so now it's my 1st foray into the world of *alter* so wish me luck! and lots of creative juices

another BKK LO

I have resisted buying a cutterpede for the longest time because

1) It is far too expensive for my pockets
2) I have been 'trained' to use the traditional cutting mat and ruler to cut paper! that is the poor kindy teacher way
3) storage space!


I started this LO approx 12am in the morning... quite an unearthly hour for me but I was quite inspired by my new cutterpede that I bought 2nd-hand from Pris. Thanx for the great deal & new mat! I surprised myself by completing the LO in around half an hour! of course it helped to have a cutterpede to do all the paper cutting.

at 12.30am in the morning, my brain's kinda dead.
i just took a few brads and placed them randomly
i also started to staple ribbons to the LOs in random and I totally love the effect it made!
something so unlike me... as I am quite anal about positioning of embellishments! hehe

TFL!
have a great weekend!

completed...

As promised a photo of the birkies that I have for a LO... took another picture from top view. I am still contemplating with picture to scrap! I am ADDICTED! as you can see the new pair of birkies (silver) is so CLEAN, I can't bear to use it!

also finally completed the altered box.. nothing fanciful with the embellishments! it is so hard to put more there without looking cluttered!

and just came back shopping from spotlight with IG... yippee I have more projects coming along! :D SB is so great for making handmade wonderfully thought out gifts for birthdays!

smiley grin

nothing beats waking up to a great msg:

Hi. Better start taking pictures now.

Cos all your kits are coming with my shipping!

It's been sent last friday. So would be there this weekend! :)

Excited???

Of course I'm excited! hehe...

*jumping up and down like a mad woman*

Thanx cousin J for the sms :D I'm camping over to your place this weekend to pounce on the poor postman the moment he arrives to get my hands on the kit!! :D

still....

... feeling under the weather :( Nursing that sore throat with lots of "nin jiom' sweets. It's so funny how at the end of the day I feel okie and think "great! I should be okie tomorrow" but no I would wake up feeling that dry throat and 'heat' from my body! Not good at all...

However, I did feel better yesterday :) After teaching, went out with Mom and Bro to do some serious damage on our pocket - custom-designed jewellery - oh darn! I love them too "think pink and white* and has been seriously dropping hints that mom shouldn't give it away. But as we made 2 sets, she said we could keep 1 set - as it is meant for future purposes! erm.. nono! idea is: I GET ONE SET AND MOM GETS THE OTHER... oh well.. as the only daughter I still get to keep my mom's jewellery right - hey! stop that the evil look!! I am not eyeing my mom's jewellery... I've been contributing to it the past years since I started to work but of course not expensive pieces! But great pieces nonetheless *wink*... ANYWAY back to the subject. I love the pieces made! so I want to keep them too! maybe it's more the matter that I dun like to share, in this case I don't like the fact that another person has the same piece of item that I have! wahaha... I AM a spoilt brat!

After that serious spot of shopping, mom and I went down to Raffles City for some 'lighter' shopping... to pick up the birkies that M kindly reserved for me! There was a crazy number of people in that shop! and Yes! I am one of those crazy people who keep buying birkies! but they are oh-so comfy! IG and I were talking and we said we should do a LO on our birkies! I have to date 5 pairs and counting... not a lot considering an ex-colleague of mine said she has 19 *i am sure i did not hear wrongly* pairs and they are all madrids! I am still SANE!!

I've not been to raffles city for a long time and my! it has changed alot - renovation and shops moving to different levels! mom and I had trouble finding the foodcourt and ended up asking a tourist where it is! erm... ironic isn't it? a local asking a tourist where the foodcourt is? haha...

************************

But today... woke up not feeling good again :(
Staying home to do a bit of cleaning, laundry and chauffeuring...

totally feels good to just be at home all by myself once in awhile doing things that I wanna do without someone bugging me from behind! keke...

and yes! I still need to finish my altered project :(

A request

A colleague saw a card that I made for a friend's wedding and requested if I could do a couple of birthday cards for her. As it was meant to be sent overseas together, I did not want to have too much embellishments on it (to add to the postage weight) . Obviously 1 is for a guy and the other a gal! Spelt the guy's name wrong... you know it's not steVEN.... it's the french way... STEPHEN! arghh had to redo the name.


Glad my colleague liked it anyways! and hope the birthday boy and gal like them too!

a change indeed

I finally decided to change the skin of my post, after finding it totally boring. Now it's bright and cheery... a bit too bright? erm....

it's almost 10pm. Thought I would hit the sack soon after reaching home from work! But obviously not! played around searching for downloadable blog skins hence what i chose. (if it's too glaring do let me know and i'll change the skin again to sometime more pleasing) .

anyway I think the sore throat that I felt was coming along is not FAKE.. it's real! but then i've been making myself go to work as my appointments are back to back and I really need to be in office to clear up and continue with some work! (I can't believe I'm saying that!). The weather is getting to me as well! arghh... hope it's going to be a better week soon!

on the scrapping front... i've been trying to do some altering and experimented with mod podge... i think i was quick successful with it after getting detailed instructions from I. However, feeling under the weather has not helped in 'sending' any mojo my way to complete the project! hope that starts to pick up soon as I really need to complete it soon... hopefully *fingers crossed*

hope everyone is feeling much better than me! and that the horrid weather is not getting to you as it is getting to me :(
Take care you all!

Photo shoot

It has been a busy weekend trying to help co-ordinate my elder brother's photo shoot... So this layout took 3 days to complete! The only lesson I learnt from it was never to do that cos I totally lost my mojo at the end and just added 1 -2 things and that was it!

so this being my end product.....
Results from the photo shoots!

Kids took a while to warm up. Big K (in the vest) was the most photogenic one of the lot! Even the photographer said so! G was in a few other shots needed a bit of coaxing to smile but totally loved the hairband and flowers she held onto. Small K needed more coaxing and seeing kor kor taking pictures he wanted to join in too!
A fun enjoyable event nonetheless! :D


oh darn... back to work tomorrow after a nice long weekend! Erm.... do i feel that sore throat/fever coming along??? :P

National Day and a bit...

It was Singapore's42nd birthday yesterday. Went for the preview last Saturday, tickets courtesy of my cousin. It was an unscheduled rehearsal so it seems that lots of things were not prepared like FIREWORKS, parachutes, MC leading... but enjoyable nonetheless when the company was good.

i love the backdrop of the flag against the skyscrappers!
Self -portrait of Kieron (elder nephew) and me! so scrap-worthy right?

Being the typical Singaporean, since I have a chance for a long weekend, why not take leave right? So today I'm on leave and brought G out for a bit of flower-girl dress shopping :D

Also, I managed to scrap a bit with my new (not so new- june) SOMO kit. :D more LOs coming up soon...

reminiscing

... about the past

my long curly hair which I cut off at the beginning of this year wanting a change, just to find out that I loved my curly, wavy hair a lot and I want it back again... so I am keeping it long again to get it permed again! ... and yes of course I am reminiscing about my age too. After the 25 yo mark, one really starts feeling the heavy responsibilities that lies on one's shoulders!

and Yippee! June SOMO kit finally arrived! Can't wait to get started :D but still anxiously waiting for July kit to arrive.... wonder when? it really is a big waiting game :(

on hind sight...

I am totally elated when I hear that my friends are married, having babies and having a great married life!

In the past couple of months, 2 friends have given birth (in sg) - I woke up last week to a msg that a friend has given birth! talk about a nice wake up call :D

& I also found a long lost friend from Perth who has also just gave birth to baby no 2! Although N's blog's in Japanese, I totally love looking at her pictures and her cute dogs that she has since I knew her in Perth! and of course her two darlings are so kawaii!

Do wonders never cease! hehe...

Well whatever it is... I am happy just playing with my nephews and niece and I can't wait for my other niece to arrive soon :D

scary thoughts

When peers around me starts to get hitched, I TRY NOT to be affected. hehe of course I'm happy for them but then the idea of marriage seldom cross my mind! I guess I'm interested in persuing other areas of 'interest' before the marriage bug hits me! There are just too many other things that I want to do 1st....

close up of the transparent swirls that i used :D

daddy dearest

one of the rare few photos of my dad actually smiling!

TFL!

Ph.D

also known as Permanent Head Damage

just came back from lunch... cheap & yummy Ayam Pengat :D

anyway that's not the story!

This man came to share the table with my colleague and me. He wore something like a uniform and had a badge on top of the left breast pocket and it read:

Dr. xxx Sim, Ph.D
Certified Trainer for
Emotional Intelligence

and there he went taking out a wet tissue to wipe his face, before proceeding to wipe the top of the hawker centre table and placing his plastic blue file on the table and took out a big pastry - looking bun to eat. Oh! he also kept trying to place his earpiece into his ear... you know like one of those *koo-ku-s*

My colleague and I looked at each other... thinking... he can't be a Dr.

I guess the whole 'experience' added a positive light note to the the start of the week...

*Grin* I'm so not going on to study Ph.D after I do my masters! *Grin*

finally....

Mom seldom calls me at work.... so when she finally did, she told me she wanted to go to the 'health & lifestyle' exhibition at Suntec on Sunday. So today being sunday, we went very early... by 11+ am we reached suntec and parking was a breeze! always a good start right? Anyway, going to such exhibition with Mom or Dad I always have to be the 'controlling' one, reminding them not to buy anything unnecessarily and walking way ahead so that they will just move on and not get 'stuck' in 1 booth, hanging on too long for the sales person to think that they are interested to buy anything!


This time, Mom's intention was to buythe uZap that I've been mentioning that I wanted to buy for a long time (for about a year??) but I've resisted buying as I wanted her to pay for it - rationale being that Mom needs it more than me! wahaha *eh! I'm not being mean but it's true!!*

she FINALLY became interested when her colleagues starting buying recently due to the promotions and when her workplace started to receive donations of some kind of machine. so at the booth today we checked out the uZap
but then... we saw the uZap KING! the newer improved version of it, that gives different vibrations according to the areas you want - tummy, butt or thigh, even the shoulders too to give some relief to aching shoulders... needless to say, we bought this.

and sadly to say... I paid for it... boohoo... but then it's her birthday soon and lucky for me, my brothers know what to do, one has already said he's going to split the cost while the other's going to pay for tonight's dinner...

The moment we bought it, uZap has come in handy! We just came home from a full dinner at JUMBO! I was joking about not worrying about overeating for we have the uZap KING! hehe i need to zap away that peking duck, fresh prawn, chilli crab, prawn meat wrap with bacon, hor fun! lol... haha :D oh!!! & gotta zap away that slice of cake from Awfully Chocolate too!

guess we made the right choice to buy the heavier-duty uZap, although the model is a male, it's better for us as now I think everyone in the family needs it! haha

*********************************************
loved the wonderful closeup photo of my darling niece with her rosy cheeks, pouty lips, wide eyes wonder and that inquisitive face! What a sweet darling who when keeps looking for this 'ku-ku' makes me feel like I'm on cloud 9... darn... that little gal sure has me round her fingers too!

sorry for the reflection on G's face, using the pretty hambly screens :D

Mummy Dearest

mentioned previously that I found some great photos at my grandparents' place. here's one of them - a picture of Ah-Ma with her 3 sons! Dad could not supply me how old he was then??? I wonder why! Using the new BG infuse range of papers which blend very well with the previous range :P

TFL!

relishing on relations

I am considered quite lucky? That for most of my life... though not long... I've had the joy to experience being taken care of by 3 of my grandparents. They brought my cousins and I out, took care of us.

My maternal grandma stayed with my brothers and I as we grew up as my parents were often overseas... now at 90+ her memory's failing and whenever we visit her, she will ask, who we are and how we got to her place? & somehow she has the fascination to know if we can drive or not ... she approves of driving though... and will always remind us to drive carefully. anyhows... taking pictures with grandma was so cute.. she kept saying it was pointless to take the photos, but because she keeps shaking, she always appeared blurry! so ended up taking so many pictures together! well.. good memories to treasure anyway!

FULL!!!!!!!

oh my! Just got back from a scrumptious dinner with Grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousin! What a spread of selection of food for steamboat! And yes you can see the pot-full of ingredients and the soup that is "oh-so delicious" hehe... even the colour is milky which gives the indication that has a full bodied flavour! A great dinner is never complete without dessert! According to my aunt, there's a pineapple plant in the garden and we ate the pineapple and it so so sweeeeeeeeeeeet!!!!!! probably the sweetest that I tasted! Yum... and I am oh still so full!!!!
heh! making anyone hungry??? look just look at the soup!!

Also managed to do a couple of layouts last night and I am totally pleased with this one! My new found love is glossy accents, JBS little birdie rubons and the transparent sheets!

I really love how the flowers and hambly screens turnout! so pretty!!
love the 3-D effect that the flowers make!
big smiles from me when I complete the LO.
it's kinda like a new level for a novice scrapper like me....

off to complete another LO... i need time to digest the food!

paitently waiting....

Still paitently waiting for SOMO kits to arrive :( With the CHA coming and all, the shipment has been delayed. According to the site, it will only start shipping on 16th July! and that will be 17th July in Singapore!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! arghhh.. why must there be this nonsensical saying that 'all goods things come later'???? I just wanna get my hands started on them to get scrapping again!!!!! arghh.... well, the only good thing that's coming out of this whole waiting game is to find out that i have PATIENCE!!!!! hehe...

I don't care! Going to start scrapping with my 'not-so-old' supplies! Erm... Which product should I use? And I have photos!!!! Truly a scrapper's nightmare to be without subjects to scrap about! Found some fab old photos at Grandma's place 2 weekends ago! hehe.. they are so vintage! I scanned them, just can't bear to use the actual ones anyway. Going again tomorrow for steamboat dinner, as my younger bro is back for the month for a short vacation, a family dinner is called for! can't wait for steamboat and can't wait to see what other goodies grandma has at home! & of course more photo opps at the dinner rite??? yippeee!!!!!! seems that I've got a couple of 'meal' events that my family has planned since younger bro is back now!

here's 1 pic of something I wanna scrap about? erm.. still contemplating about it whether I should scrap or not.. it's for a purpose that I shall keep hush hush now... ;P






Tomorrow's TVC Junkyard July event... can't wait but then I'm wondering if I should just go without cash! hehe... should really stop buying things! haha


TGIF!!!! have a good weekend everyone!

nothing much...

actually i've nothing much to say, but just felt that i've neglected my blog a bit the past week!

Feeling horrible yesterday (sunday) so i just literally slept in the whole day feeling totally lethargic and nursing my bad cough. Imagine being up in the middle of the night coughing your lungs out! It's getting better but I just hope that this bugging cough and irritable tingle in my throat will just go away!

Haven't been scrapping or sewing that much. In fact, i'm waiting anxiously for my SOMO kit to arrive! Waiting for both June and July kits. Woohoo.. I''ll be scrapping then!

hope everyone's feeling much better than I am...

Giving thanx

Am totally really grateful that I have wonderful friends. Friends that I've made recently from SB are a real GEM! A priceless friendship that have been fostered through the common love of SB and of cos the love to shop! keke... It's so cute when we keep edging each other to shop and spend money but also at the lookout for each other to remember to CONTROL the spending!


& of course friends that I've known since Secondary. It's been 13 years since we've known one another. We've all grown in our own different ways, from the type of education we went through, the experiences we have, working in different industries, experiencing one another relationships... but we stuck together, bitched about things together, lunched, shopped, travelled and just hung out together... Such wonderful friendships that I am so grateful of.

Yeps! I enjoy my work!! hehe seldom heard from someone who has quite miserable pay but I enjoy cos it's for the greater good of mankind! lol!!!!

i have to praise myself as I played with the alphas and the black ones read ASD - autism spectrum disorder... that's the kids i mainly deal with trying to help teachers include them into school ! so clever rite??? keke

been nursing a bad cough since I came back from BKK. well it started before I went but having all the yummy curry and tom yum kung didn't help of course, although i am still dreaming of the scrumptious taste... :P

Bangkok here I come again!

One can never reject a nice relaxing trips with full of great food and massages!!! hehe shopping was not too bad.. not as fantastic as I envisioned but that was because the exchange rate is a bit low at this point in time and I had SELF CONTROL!!!! hehe....

my favourite purchase! doesn't it look like the nunn design SB embellishments??

absolutely HEART it!!!

feeding a very hungry baby elephant bamboo shoots.

Saw it at Patpong (Silom Road) the red-light district in BKK

my favourite dessert from Thailand. like Ang Ku Kueh with the tau sa filling!
looks totally plastic but absolutely delicious!! yum
eh... i still can't figure out the actual name! ;)

one of the best meals I had in BKK was at Chatuchek weekend Market!
Rice with chicken green curry, deep fried chicken, mix veg and green mango salad..

all for 210 baht, which is SG$ 10!!!

I was so full by the end of the meal!!! it was just delicious..... drool ;P

planning my next trip already... haha.. anyone wanna come along???

set

oh and i played with the settings on my camera AGAIN... and I think the pictures turned out better now? esp the one with the close up of the yellow ribbon n the AC flower ribbon?? yeah!!
I'm a happy gal

Happy Father's Day

Well.. glad to announce that out of the 2 'parent's day' I managed to celebrate Father's Day today with Dad. Predictably, we went to a Japanese Restaurant at Turf City (it's a combination of his 2 fave things... Jap food n somehow Dad likes Turf City??? I think it's Giant). Food was not bad overall although veg was pretty salty... Er.. present for Dad? On it's way... :D

Happy Father's Day, Dad!


Common knowledge that we take after genes from our parents right?? (read we're kinda screwed man!!)... so I have to say the organisational part of me is from my dad! I like to make sure stuff is organised and packed exactly nicely together! An area for SB, an area for sewing, a box for all the beads for jewellery making... and today I added a box for my make up!!! kekeke... it's something that I've wanted for a long long time but I could not bear to part with the obsence amount of money for the box from Shu Umeura (my fav makeup brand) but the lady at the counter made me an offer I could not refuse.. hence... adding to my collection of limited edition stuff and to my addiction for organisation.... I have myself a new makeup box with a pretty bright pink graphic design on it.....

Price is still kinda high but I had a good offer.... hands are trembling, heart is pumping from the knowledge that I actually bought the box... you know it's kinda like a love-hate relationship now... love the box, hate the fact that I spent again!! argh...


well to cheer myself up and to stop feeling guilty, I've finally fully made use of my AB purchases...

Another album cover for my other AC album...

a yellow ribbon to break the monotony of the fabric

Maybe I should start selling custom-made album covers???
anyone interested??? let me know!


WIP for an UPtown Madison Bag

The base totally bugs me! I cannot get it right... but after several times of trying I finally made it look somewhat reasonable. Bit tired after trying so hard on the base, I've decided to hang on a while to recuperate, give myself a breather before I start to do the top stitching and time to pack for my BKK trip this Wed.

woohoo!! i'm going on a H-O-L-I-D-A-Y!!! can't wait! and there's where Dad's pressie's gonna be from, or rather from DFS. Dad's pretty happy that I'm going for a holiday. NO, not because it's GOOD RIDDANCE (aka nagging from me) but we always get alcohol from him at DFS that's he's only request... cute dad i have, no need to buy anything from holiday trips, only bring back the good stuff from DFS a bottle of red, a bottle of liquor and 3 cans of beer!

oh and my 'chelsea' bag has been going on shopping trips with me.. so far so good.. it's a sturdy bag alright! Cool!!!

Protected!

My completed album cover....

Thought the black fabric should be jazzed up with some ribbons...

I detached a lanyard given by TVC during one of their OH and sewed it onto the cover! An AC label for an AC album :D

Another 1 more cover to go!

I gritted my teeth....

and i finally used the Amy Butler fabric that I ordered previously! hehe.. although my heart broke a little.. just a little when I cut the fabric but i love how the whole bag turned out. I used those super-hard kind of interfacing for the bag and now it can 'stand' by itself. Oh and i used the black/white striped bag as the lining. Now this bag is super-strong.. *fingers crossed*


Matching light brown fabric for the binding. : D it was so darn hard to sew it on as the fabrics all became thick even after trimming off the excess interfacing n fabric!

Mom exclaimed after I showed her the completed bag! The fabric is nice (refering to the AB fabric) but the binding stitching is bad (as the different thickness of the bag caused tension on the stitching, but overall it's still a presentable bag that I can carry around :D

Off to next project.. so many which one?? And what to sew for Sew Much Fun??

Oh! and I wanna thank M for giving me the lovely kit that I used to do for JT's birthday card :D Big Thanks n Kisses going your way!

gifts from the heart

Since I'm 'into' scrapbooking what better gift can i possibly give my dear friends than a 1 of a kind SB LO done especially for them.


This is a card I made for a dear friend in Australia... hehe I mentioned making it in a previous post but i couldn't post it until I'm very sure that she has received it :) so here it is! I'm glad that she loves it ... It becomes 'scary' when your inner circle of friends, those that you know for many years start to get hitched! Anyway, the 'guinea pig' of my lot from secondary school had her ROM end of may and here is her belated ROM pressie! Another SB made with exceptional love! just for her ...


glad that she likes it too.

One-o- a-kind handmade

The weekend's over so quickly! it was great to just hang out with friends, esp the ones that you have not seen for months due to the great distance that is between us! Always great to catch up with one another and to know what one another is up too!

Maad was another great event! Cousin J did not managed to sell much but there was lots of interested people who appreciated SB and took her card for future reference for SB customisation? The interesting stuff that people sold were all handmade and really inspired us to want to set up a stall in future selling the bags that we sew.

And yes! i am very proud of myself that I did not buy anything from MAAD although i was really tempted by this necklace sold by Cousin J's stallmate, V. it was simply gorgeous.. but i CONTROLled! rather i can thinking - contemplating - and seriously evaulating if i will wear the necklace often enough to warrant me to buy it. It's an equvilent thing if i spent that amount on the necklace.. i could have bought at least 15 pieces of pattern paper, 5 7G 97% stickers, or another AB fabric.. well you get the idea!! hehe... well i am still thinking cos the necklace really is simply stunning, nothin outlandish, understated and of cos one-of-a-kind (which i am a sucker for)..

oh! and the pretty fabric wrapped journals, handmade i must add, by the other stallmate, D were just fabulous!!! Bright and pretty colours, it's really great for people who wanna write stuff or draw stuff to keep for memories! I think my X'mas shopping list is extending cos all these handmade stuff are so pretty that you just want to buy and give away!!

Of course, i sewed a bag too! it's the AB chelsea look-alike bag, with the handles. The method to sew the handles have been buffling Cousin J so I experimented it out. I have to say it's not easy cos it require more hand, handiwork and precision, but it was all worth it! See!!!

What's next? I've got pics so i'm going to SB soon!! yeah yeah!

erm.. no monday blues today!! hehe.. must have been the wonderful weekend and the holiday that's coming up! woohoo...

it's on the way!!!

Yeah! I just had an email from Kim telling me that my waitlist for SOMO kit is here! That means I am going to be receiving a kit for the next three months starting June! Can't wait. It is a bit pricy cos of the shipping all the way from States - for people who knows me I've started to be more 'conservative' with my money and I am trying to CONTROL *to the little ounces of my ability* my spending!

But when I see the kit every month, I just told myself I have to have it!!! even for the stamps it's so worth it!! So can't wait for my kit to arrive!! Woohoo...

Enjoy ur weekend! It's packed for me..
1) teaching
2) catching up with friend who's in town
3) seminar at NUH
4) MAAD event!!! - go if you can!!

even though i'm not feeling too good n my whole body's, I guess i've to get better to attend to my packed weekend!