Flowers Attract!

This is the 2nd set of fabric flower brooches I sewed for Catherine, now my ex-colleague:

And more I completed subsequently ...


Now, time for some crocheted flowers! Definitely more are starting to bloom.


[It has been really a long time I have not taken out my crochet hooks.

Luckily they dont' rust like felting needles!]

Well, all the flowers attracted this beautiful purple butterfly!

[Fabric ATC from Lisa in USA, swopped for my crocheted angel ATC. ]


I'm quite excited to be catching the theatre show, Animal Farm, this weekend with my children.
I have read the book in my secondary school days, and have since forgotten half the story, but who can forget the famous line -

“All animals are equal. But some animals are more equal than others."


A “Made in Singapore” production by the Singaporean theatre company, W!LD RICE (ok, that's my favourite theatre company) and directed by Ivan Heng (my favourite director!) , the animals are created not by fancy costumes but by the human body - innovative design combine with live and original music - well these are in the advertisement, I will judge for myself come this weekend!

OWOH Win, More Tatted Entries, and New Fabric Flowers

First of all, I received these 2 prints from Vickie for winning her One World One Heart Giveaway in Feb. I don't think she mentioned how big these teapot prints are and I wasn't sure what to expect, perhaps postcard-sized ones, so imagine my surprise when they came in a 42 by 32 cm box! Cheerful and gorgeous colours, thank you, Vickie!

Here are the other entries for the Pameran Poskad exhibition mentioned in my earlier post. The 6th one is "Heart To Heart" - these 2 hearts are what I test-tatted for Martha Ess for her book "Tat's Amore" with a good collection of her tatted heart patterns. This pattern is not a very fanciful one, but has a very lacy feel to it, especially when tatted with finer threads.

Next is "My Sweet Heart", pattern by Pam Palmer in her Tatting Treats book. This is mounted on a 3-fold card, blank inside.

Nina Libin's butterfly bookmark, loaded with Czchekoslovakia glass beads and tatted with Olympus 40 thread. This has been one of my favourite beaded bookmark piece all the while. The piece can be detached from the card to be used as a bookmark. I made the flower girl too to go with the whole theme!

Another piece with tatted butterflies - "A Gathering of Butterflies" with Rozella F Linden's celtic butterfly tatted with Flora 20 threads and Adelheid Dangela's Elise butterfly tatted with Manuela 20 thread.

Last but not least, "Just Clips' - just my paper clip designs: the Jolly Sun, butterfly, lucky 4-leaf clover, and the newest goldfish and flower bloom, which will go into hopefully my planned paperclip design book.

Two more colleagues have resigned, this didn't help in our already heavy workload :( I only managed to squeeze whatever little time I have to sew these fabric flower brooches for Sallyna to use with her headscarves. My first attempt and feeling quite pleased with them. My tatted butterfly paperclip to go with them naturally!

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!