Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Project Hairclip - DIY Felt Cover for Snap Clip

Ok, came back and felt inspired (or rather stressed) enough to do a quick felt cover for a snap clip and I documented it! Ya, I feel like a pro now, even though my handiworks probably beg to differ!



Materials


Felt
1 Snap clip
thread and needle
+ 1 marker and a pair of scissors


Method



1. I started off by cutting 2 pieces of felt slight bigger than the clip. Mark an area about 3 mm away from the clip on the felt.






2. Trim the excess.





3. Place the clip on the felt and mark with 2 dots where the back prong begins.






4. Make a small snap about 3mm below the marking and slide the back prong through.






5. Centre the clip and snap tight.






6. Place the other piece of felt on top and using buttonhole stitches to stitch it together.







The final product!




Hope you will have as much fun as me making these!

Monday, April 21, 2008

Glam Chick!

My model happily displaying my handiworks!













Saturday, April 19, 2008

Addicted ...

to making hair clips that is ...

I made 2 on Friday, when I came home at 10pm. Attacked my feather boa and it's now "recycled" to 2 hairclips instead. My gal wore one of the creations out this morning to Macdonalds at King Albert Park and I didn't really care if they thought I was a crazy mother to make my gal wear feathers in her hair early in the morning!

I wasn't quite pleased with the 2 designs. Something's lacking and my materials are not up to par either.

This afternoon I made another one and I just completed another during dinner. It's not too bad, but after this two, I'll move to another type of "bows" to try. Still had yet to get my proper materials, and of course it doesn't look pro, but I am actually enjoying myself. I hadn't enjoyed art & craft for a loonngg time, and I did remember the last "craze" was during my A levels and I was knitting sweater for the stuff toys. I guess the work stress had been slowly but steadily building up and this latest addiction is probably just an outlet to vent. I guess my hubby should be happy since I am not venting any frustrations on him.

Note to self: get a proper candle and matches.

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Hit by the flu bug

Thought my gal looked a little off in the previous 2 posts? You bet.

Monday - fever hovering about 38. Brought her to see PD, undetermined so brought some standby medication home.

Tuesday - seem better. So far so good.

Wednesday - sniffles and a slight cough

Thursday - SNIFFLES and COUGH - in CAPS because it was really BAD

Friday - the above plus she's going off her food and looked really listless.

Saturday - Saw the PD again, gave additional medication to deal with her symptoms. Still off food.

Sunday - She's still sick and so is the helper.

Monday - The helper has a really BAD cold. We did some of the housework so she could rest early with baby. I stayed up late to finish some work and wanted to carry Vanessa to my room so the helper could get some rest. The cheeky monkey woke up and refused to sleep till 3am, when the helper took over.

Today - A bit wonky so I took the morning off. Woke up early to cook porridge for baby and ourselves and played with Vanessa so that the helper could nap a little. After their naps, it's my turn! Napped for less than an hour and it's lunch, sent them off to my mum's place and then back to work.

Tired? I am ... but I need to destress. I'll read one of my favourite Terry Pratchett books I think.

Product of Lurve 2

I made 2 more hairclips and my process is getting a bit more organised. I may put up the steps if I have the time to document the process.


The designs were so because I was experimenting with the different types of "bows" there were. Not entirely satisfied, but not displeased enough to chuck it away. Maybe I can enhance it at a later date if the inspiration hits me.

Presenting the model ...



Here's a closeup ...


The 2 designs ...

Blink and you might miss the Bling

My sweetheart, playing on the sofa outside the PD's office...



Oh wait, did you think you saw something?

Hmmm, not quite sure what it is?

This is a closeup to help you to confirm that your eyes are not playing any tricks on you ...


Ya! Bring on the BLING ... that cost $2 ;P it's a pair of magnetic earrings, so I didn't get her ears pierced either!

Only with adult supervision please, the magnetic bits are small and can be swallowed easily by babies or toddlers.

Sunday, April 13, 2008

Enhancements ...


This is the enhanced version of the hair clip. Note the "amateur" bow at the bottom, that's the best I could do! And I overdid on the "clothes peg" pressure to hold the parts together while drying, the roses got a bit spoilt, hence the faux pearls to "enhance" the look.


Sigh, disaster in the kitchen, disaster in the living room (my area for my crafts).


Thursday, April 10, 2008

Product of LURVE

You know, sometimes, there are only so much to compete (not that I am interested in that) to show how much you love your kid.


Some do it by the amount of luxury goods they lavish on their kids, some do it by buying tons of clothes and stuff for their kids ... I can't afford to keep up with the Jones man!


So this poor mummy, can only afford to lavish love by


1) making porridge for her (well sometimes I am too tired to make for her, and besides the oldies are more than eager to show off their culinary skills)


2) making hair clips to adorn my girl. Yes you heard it right, me making hair clips!


Just a very simple one, it cost me less than a dollar but the satisfaction to see her gleefully wearing the clip is more than enough to melt a glacier. Yes, it's my first attempt and I'm not sure if it will be my last too!


Here's the model!




Sunday, April 06, 2008

My latest cake creation

These are the cakes from all the students in the class. Guess which one is mine?








Are you sure?













Do you want to guess again?










OK, this is mine. Not too bad I think =)






*strut*

The French Chick!


Oh the scandals!



I wonder what will Vanessa do if she sees these pics (let say I show it at her 21st birthday)?


Princess Vanessa's First Birthday!






Happy 1st Birthday Sweetheart!

Busy Busy Busy!

Ok, last week we had:

1) Vanessa's birthday party - had about 40 plus guests and it was way more relax than the first month celebrations! It was quite fun, and as usual I was tired out after it! Pics will follow in the next few posts!

2) Was sick on the day before and day after the birthday party - Friday I had my mega cramps and came down with food poisoning in the same evening! Sunday the cramps came back *sigh* So was on MC for 2 days.

3) Lots of work to catch up on, since I had a full day "wellness" seminar to attend on wednesday. So Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, busy busy busy.

4) Thursday was Vanessa's actual birthday, so I took an hour off, grab the helper, baby and my ma-jie (took me 45 mins to drive back to my mum's place in the HEAVY rain, which would normally take me 20 mins) and then took me almost another 45 mins to reach Thomson Plaza in the now even HEAVIER RAIN with almost-flooded roads and spoilt traffic lights. By the time we had dinner, it was like 7.30pm. My sister and hubby arrived later, at 8.30pm, no thanks to the rain, traffic jams and spoilt traffic lights. The other 2 kids had fun, eating their fav jap food. Vanessa, needless to say, enjoyed her Chawamushi and Udon. Me? I just enjoyed the fried tofu they had - it was yummy!

5) Friday wanted to take some time off, but discovered to my horror I missed out 1 email so I spent the entire afternoon rushing for the deadline, but only managed to complete one major portion of it. The remaining smaller sections I had the deadlines kindly extended till Monday *phew*

6) Rushed to Phoon Huat after work and guess what, THEY CLOSED EARLY. They put their closing time as 7pm, but I arrived at 6:45pm and the shop was DARK and LOCKED. According to the other tenants, they have the tendancy to close as early as 6.30pm. I'm going to write to their management and COMPLAIN! Rushed to Bengawan Solo and their butter cake were way TOO SMALL. So went home to bake the cake for my class on Saturday. Realised to my horror, I forgot to get sour cream and I was out of butter. In my desperation, I rummaged through my cupboard and managed to find a instant cake mix box, but it was expired in 2006. *sigh* Anyway I managed to dig out 1/2 block of butter and 3/4 block of butter to be combined for use. I also had to try a new recipe since the other recipe calls for sour cream and I don't have a ready substitute. In the end, it wasn't bad, I quite like the cake! Thankfully this time, I had the maid to help me sift the icing sugar, but this time, it's still only twice. I used my smaller kenwood mixer and boy, was it a mistake. It couldn't quite cope with the load of icing sugar, so it was really a lor of scrapping and adding water to make sure it gets properly "mixed". As for the cake board and box I couldn't get from Phoon Huat, I decided to sleep on it and get it first thing in the morning, since it's already 1.30am when my cake was done.

7) Gosh, Phoon Huat opens only at 10am! *sigh* I had to do with a makesift cake board then, and my pizza baking tray came in handy - just wrap it with alum foil! Did the crumbing first and then cooked breakfast for our usual Saturday "Breakfast by the Pool". Came back and and completed icing the cake - it wasn't perfect but I decided I wasn't going to kill myself over it since I have the roses to pipe! I managed to pipe 2 decent ones before I was repeatedly throwing the subsequent attempts back into the icing tub - NO GO! Gave up and then went for class. See the creations and mine in the next few posts!

8) Did my overdue marketing today and rushed home as it was my helper's offday. She kindly stayed back a little to help me to squash the items into the fridge and then took off. Vanessa was sleeping, so I prepared most of the dinner's dishes and by 10:30am, I sit down, took my breakfast and then a nice long shower. Baby was awake then, but she was following the hubby, so it was good.

I'm kinda glad it's over, but I'm wondering what next week holds for me!