Happy Tatting Day!

Happy Tatting Day - it's 1st Apr here in Singapore now, and it's International Tatting Day! I'm not sure who started this or when, but it's sure better than celebrating the good-for-nothing April Fool's Day. Tatting uses a needle or shuttle to create lace which is a more delicate of work compared to crocheting. On this day, tatters around the world celebrate our hobby and introduce it to others. Often, we celebrate by eating chocolates and making tatted lace. Over at Ambitatterous, Isdihara is celebrating with a lovely giveaway. Want to learn tatting? Hop over to the TattingChic's blogoversary giveaway for a chance to win the book "Learn To Tat"!

Time flies! How true! 2 weeks has gone by in a flash. My office work sure gets busier by the day, but no, I haven't stopped tatting. In fact, I was tatting up quite a bit and doing them up for the up-and-coming Pameran Poskad 2010 to be held on 18 Apr -1 May 2010. There is no restriction on the medium, but my 10 pieces are all tatted laces - some tatted previously and some new ones, but all mounted on acid-free cardstocks with added embellishment for presentation. I'll show them over 2 posts.

This first piece is "Parrot Talk". I think this is one of the greatest parrot design, by Mary Parrott. My own design is a far cry from Mary's one. I tatted Mary's parrot pattern twice, one with size 10 threads, and this one with size 20 threads. Cool, right!

Next is this "Blooming In Spring" - a bookmark design by Jos van der Helm. Another one of my favourite floral designs.

Ha, owls are next in the line! "Listen To The Wisely" comprises 2 of my small owl design, and Dianna Stevens' horned owl bookmark design. HOOT!

I did 2 pieces in creative tatting, which I have not done for some time. Hope to tat more flowers for my girls' dresses and clips, but see how it goes later. Well, this is "Floral Scroll" - with embossed background done with QuiuKutz embossing dies.

And the last one for now - "Pretty In Red".

I had to miss KBCC's activity last Sat to rush these entries. Betsy taught the group to weave alphabets and patterns onto regular pens, the Friendship Pens. I didn't do these during my school days, but I did make some Friendship Bands in this form some years back. Managed to dig some up and gather them together for a shot. Not too bad, right?

Just realised I have not posted about these 2 fabric Easter ATCs I received from Ann Seidel of Germany. They are a great addition to my collection, thank you, Ann!

Mainly ATCs

Just received my paper-cutting ATCs - (top left corner going clockwise) from Florinda, Susan, "Bean Sprout #1" from Melissa, and "Wild Hyacinth Blubell" from Edie. Thank you, everyone!

These were what I did and sent.

For this month A*Live ATC session in Bishan Library, we tried perspective drawing. Long time I didn't try drawing! Got the "Kite Entangled" from Rita (middle card on the right) - love the concept and the drawing! The top 3 are from Joey, and the bottom 2 are from Kristine in exchange for my Easter fabric ATCs.

I did these "Eat with the Family" ATCs; we made our favourite dessert, tang yuan, together one afternoon, boiled them and everyone ate and enjoyed them. I don't made them very often, it is a treat every now and then, as I made them differently from those selling outside.

This is a Chinese New Year lantern my boy did for his school earlier in Feb - his concept and work, and with some input from me. Won a prize too!

Even More Tatted Names and Names on Paperclips (Motif No. 15) and Some Easter ATCs

Here are more tatted names - 2 for my OWOH giveaway winners:

Connie and Sandi's daughter, Devon.

These set of paperclips, plus my lucky clover paperclip, was for my boss who joined us briefly for half a year:

and 1 for myself:

All these names on paperclips will count as Motif No. 15 of the 25 Motif Challenge (2nd round).

I'm now tatting flowers for a break finally! Hurray!

In-between, I managed to needle-felt some bunnies, tatted some small eggs for these hand-stitched fabric Easter ATCs.
This first set is already on their way to Ann in Germany.

Finished 2 more sets subsequently - these 2 are already reserved by my girls.

and I just must keep 1 set for myself!

That's all for now!

Children's Doodling and My Birthday

My children did quite a bit of drawings this past week. These 3 were drawn by Kristine, the first 2 partly with stencils.

I like this garden one!

At the carpark on the left, outside the house in the centre piece, and in the garden on the right.
This one is a doodle by Joey while taking a break doing her school homework. They are sure lot of details in this half piece of A4 paper.

2 more colleagues quitted this month and I have been tatting names non-stop, sigh.

Last Tuesday was my birthday. I took a day off from work and had a peaceful day at home. Did a bit of tatting and watched a movie (K20) on Mio-TV.

This was the birthday card done by Joey; the 5 in the family were finger-printing with all her 5 fingers! The little tatted flowers and butterfly were tatted by her.
... and Kristine's card

My abalone set dinner with DH at Ah Yat Abalone Restaurant, with chicken shark fin soup, baked crab on the shell, cod fish and of course, the abalone:

My birthday cake ...

And my birthday-cum-Valentine's Day presents from DH -

a 0.54 caret Celestial diamond ring (upgraded from the previous 0.4 caret one)
and these titanium necklace and bracelet:
Can't wish for more!

River Hongbao 2010 and Sam Hui's CNY Concert

This Chinese New Year was sure an eventful and unforgettable one; first was of course, it coinciding with Valentine's Day, second was my boy went through the whole period down with fever, and then, my father won a pair of concert tickets. More about this later.

We didn't go out much because of my boy, but we did go down to the River Hong Bao 2010 at the Marina Bay Floating Platform. The usual things we expected, this being its 24th year since the event started in 1987, as Singapore’s annual signature event to usher in the Chinese New Year. This year, River Hongbao 2010 featured local performers and performers from Chengdu, China, the God-of-Fortune, 12 Chinese zodiac animals, but oh, these were what attracted me most!

What were these ? Here's the description of the exhibits. Amazing works!
Then, these were beautiful art dolls - shadow puppets:

My youngest girl, Kristine, was selected by her school to join a calligraphy competition held at the River Hongbao venue. A very tiring Friday afternoon, but exciting and rewarding. She was elated to won a consolation prize! (These were what she wrote with the Chinese brush, but the better piece was submitted.)

I mentioned a concert earlier, right? It was Sam Hui CNY Concert Live in Singapore on 19 Feb at the Singapore Indoor Stadium! I bought his Jun 2010 concert tickets in last Sep when ticketing starts, this Feb concert was rolled out later, I actually has been comtemplating whether to also buy the Feb ticketst. Decided not, then my father won this pair of tickets at a CNY dinner event at the Floating Platform! What luck!

Sam Hui, the Godfather of Cantopop, in his early 60s now, still sporting a guitar slung over his shoulder and drumming his catchy tunes about everyday people in everyday life. The lyrics poke fun at ordinary life and complain of struggles, and relieve stress and make people take themselves less seriously. The songs just sounded especially nice sung by him himself. His younger son also put up a superb performance singing “卖身契”，though this part with his 2 sons were the same as his last concert here in 2008. Again, his middle brother, Ricky Hui, made a special guest appearance at the concert. Apart from these, most of the songs by Sam were different from his last concert. He was so sporting that the concert over-stretched till 11 plus, and he came down stage thrice! Now, waiting for his next concert in Max Pavilion @ Singapore Expo on 26 June 2010!

I just received these goodies all the way from Sweden and have to show you first. More in the next post!

OWOH Winners, ATCs, Art Doll, Tatted Names

Thank you to everyone for participating in my OWOH giveaway. I'm elated to have a total of 214 entries!

Using the random number generator at Random.Org, I am happy to announce the winners of my 1st OWOH giveaway:

No. 202 - Sandi M of Sharing My Daze

No. 178 - Connie of Studio 64 Chicago

I will be contacting you soon!

Now to some craft photos. For Jan Artdoll ATC swap, I did these 2 Alice In Wonderland cards: the first is the poker card soldier Seizing the Gardener when the latter failed to paint the roses red as the Queen of Hearts wanted, the second is Alice Growing Big after eating a cookie. Alice can move up and down a bit by pulling a tab on the back of the card. Hope Sherry will like them.

This Queen of Hearts and the Rabbit are done by Lynette, very classic and neat! Thank you, Lynette!

Here's the artdoll mermaid I received from Sheri for the Jan 2010 exchange. It is big at almost 12 inch tall, fabric covered and hand-sewn on the edges, with lot of beads 0n the tail, hand-braided hair too. Wow! Thanks, Sheri!

Another 1 colleague (Wei Sun) quitted, I tatted up her name for her. Did Isabel's name on a paperclip too.

One World One Heart 2010

Hello, and welcome to my blog and my special announcement of the global "One World, One Heart" bloggers event! This event is created and hosted by Lisa Swifka, and a great way to get to know other bloggers from all over the world.

I am Ellen Lai, aka SingTatter, from Singapore. I have dabbled in a lot of crafts in my pastime, but tatting is my favourite so far and my forte. Don't know what is tatting ? Check out my blog for more tatted laces and the talented tatters in my blog list on the right.

This is my first time participating in this OWOH, and I must say, I'm not quite prepared. So, in order not to miss all the fun, I have decided to make the prizes for my giveaway personalised. And what can be more personal to you than your name ?

The prize will be your name to be tatted using Anna Valeire's alphabet pattern. I have here a few of the names I have tatted before. Using Gutermann Sulky Cotton 30 variegated threads, the alphabets are about 5/8" tall, and they will be glued onto a ribbon and slipped into a thick plastic sleeve (1 5/8" width, 10" length). In order to accommodate the plastic sleeve, the maximum is about 16 alphabets. If your name is 5 alphabets or less, I'll throw in a pair of large paper clips with your name tatted on them too, my own designs, like these:

But I must seek your understanding, as I can only start tatting after the event closed, please allow me 1 to 2 weeks from your confirmation to tat them and mail out. And I hope I will have your permission to post the tatted name on my blog subsequently.

This giveaway is open to bloggers everywhere and runs until 15 Feb 2010. Just leave a comment on this post and BE SURE there is a way to get back to you. You can either leave your name (to be tatted) and colours preference in the comment, or let me know only when you are the winner. I will try my best to match your preference if I have the thread colours I will draw 2 winners with the help of a random number generator.