Janet Chan from the NEEDLESNCRAFTS group organised a Moo swap with "Summer" as the theme. However, they are 1" by 3", which is slimmer and longer than the regular 1 1/8" x 2 3/4" Moo.  I had a harder time filling them up, but I did managed to send in 6 finally.  3 are tatted summer flowers - goldenrod, lupines and paintbrush, and sunflower.  I included an extra ATC for Janet too.

The other 3 are die-cut flip flops on textured background I created with DecoArt Paper Perfect.  I can't think of any better way to create the look of sand with whatever I have at home.  To make them look like the beach, I ended up attaching a couple of the tiniest shells I had picked and kept all these years.         

I used foam for the pair of flip flops I kept for myself, it looks really like the real thing, but I'm afraid they won't stand up to the strain of overseas posting, so the others are cut from cardstock.        

I seldom cook and least to say bake, but can't resist trying out the new oven DH bought.  Ended up baking scones with Kristine, and over 2 rounds in an afternoon, we made 93 cranberry/raisin scones topped with chocolate chips.  Relatively fuss-free and simple enough for 2 baking idiots, who kept reading the recipe and the instruction manual for the oven!  Love the scones just as they turned out.       

I have been playing with my month-old Samsung Galaxy S4 phone, or rather Kristine is playing.  We found an app to create collage pictures, and it's pretty fast and easy to use!  So here's the scones baking ...

and our weekend outing to Sentosa playing the luge and taking the skyride.      
Kristine did an impressive charcoal drawing in class, scoring 95 out of 100.  Looks like her drawing skill is better than mine!

 I mentioned a couple of activities I joined at the libraries a couple of months ago.  One was a Chinese Couplets Writing workshop (对联工作坊) conducted by 胡建弟 held on 2 Feb 2013 in the then newly opened Library@Chinatown (唐城坊图书馆).  The talk on how to compose couplets was most interesting, though some parts about certain Chinese dialects were beyond me. Wish they teach this couplets in school!  One thing struck me particularly - the common phase we use and hear for birthday greeting "福如东海，寿比南山“ is actually incomplete and meaningless just based on these 8 words!  The complete and meaningful couplet should be "福如东海常流水，寿比南山不老松“.  

 At the end of the talk, each of us were supposed to apply what we have learnt to compose a couplet based on our Chinese name.   My Chinese grades in school was ok though not fantastic, but since leaving school for donkey's years, my writing skill in Chinese has been left to rust.   I almost gave up when most of the other audience were done and I was still rooted to my seat and cracking my brain hard.  I had a lucky break and managed to come up with something eventually. When I was given a pass without any need for alteration, I was so happy that I almost jumped up with joy!!  So, here's the couplet I composed and written out on the spot by an invited calligrapher 王白安.  I took my own small brush there, and requested for a special small piece - A4-size rather than the usual big pieces.

 ‘Lantern Riddles’ workshop (灯谜工作坊), held on 23 Feb 2013 afternoon, was another event I attended in the same library.  Do you know there is a difference between 灯谜, 字谜 and 谜语？ Now I know.  The speaker 新加坡灯谜协会公关邱建忠 went through all the techniques to crack lantern riddles, and we had quizzes along the way.  Fun but mind boggling.  Again, my speed was slow compared to most of the other participants, I was plain lucky to be the first to answer one question right (out of the tons of questions) and received a book prize. If you want to know more and have a go at lantern riddles, this is one book to look at.
Can you believe that on the same day (23 Feb) but earlier, I actually went for another Chinese paper cutting workshop in Yishun Library?  I was hoping to get more tips to improve my skill, but a bit disappointed with this one.  We just cut the printed motifs and I completed 3 in the 1-hr session.  I also cut the butterfly, but it was during one of the fringe activities that I happened to be there when Kristine was having her Chinese Calligraphy competition.  Looks like Chinese paper cutting is getting more popular now!