shabby what?!?!?

Person A: what style will your future home be?
Me: shabby chic
Person A: what? shabby shit?
Me: shabby CHic
Person A: HUH? shabby Cheap? why you want it cheap??!?!
Me: shabby CHIC.. c.h.i.c.
Person A: what's shabby chic??!?


err...is there something wrong with my pronunciation?!? :P anyway, i told my friends i will post a picture of how shabby chic looks like (picture are taken from issue "realliving jan/feb2010"). See below


"distress wooden furniture with white, chalky paint, use soft pastel floral fabrics, ruffles, pleats in furnishings and oversized damask cushions and hang vintage glass chandeliers"

cornflakes cookies

finally, haw got around to doing the cornflakes cookies. she has been talking about doing and sharing it with me since more than a year back. finally, its here

tried the reciepe tonight. as usual, i am too slow for my mother. after a while of waiting for me to toodle ard with the reciepe, she decided to take over and take charge. hahah tat's her helping me to mix the butter and marshmallow :D

after mixing in the cornflakes, the toughest part has to be scooping the cornflakes into the small papercups. i had to rope in my younger brother to help continuously stir the mixture over small fire to prevent it from solidifying. after another while of waiting for me to finish up, my younger brother came to my rescue again. i am too slow for him too! ahahahahah :D well, the flakes were abit too big and its difficult to put them into the paper cups. so next time, i will crush the flakes abit before mixing.

and here's the end product!

key cozy

made lots of key cozy-es last week. here are the end products

parking coupons pouch

had been thinking of making these for ages and a couple of frens had been asking for them for ages... had been procrastinating for a long time. it could be a variety of reasons:
(1) taking measurements and doing trial & error takes time
(2) it needs interfacing in order to make it feel sturdy but i dislike interfacing cuz its not forgiving - if its not ironed on carefully and properly, air bubbles will be obvious and ugly
(3) will need to do button holes for it which is something i cant do at all (but i later took the short cut using push buttons)
(4) will need to hand stitch the bias tape around the edges which takes time again


so u see, the conclusion was its time consuming and there's no guarantee of a good end product, which is extremely fustrating for me. anyway, since my crafting bug's on, better ride the trend and do it !



here's it .. all eight of them.. but since it takes time to photograph each one of them, i have stacked them up

red packets

my future sis-in-law, audrey, is a tutor and during cny, instead of red packets filled with $, she usually gives her students some goodies packed in red packets - it can range from sweets to stationeries.

this year, she chanced upon these candies and bought 2kg worth of candies to give away. i had the pleasure of helping her pack them into small individual red packets.

getting ready to start packing !

up close picture of the candies in few variations and flavors

work-in-progress. we had to pre-pack them in small little plastic bags before putting it into the red packets.

end product !

scrunchies

i remembered a scene out of 'sex & the city' where carrie bradshaw said that no decent new-yorker girl will be caught outside with a scrunchie... those were not her exact words but something to that effect la. for those who dunno, a scrunchie's like a rubber band for the tying up long hair - its kinder to the hair since its fabric covered.

anyway, since i have caught the crafting bug, i decided to do a few matching sets, just in case i have friends who want it.

the finished products, packed and ready to given away :D

magnets

had made some pretty fabric covered magnets some time back and had them lying ard collecting dust as i was trying to figure out the best way to pack these magnets. toyed with sticking them onto paper, but that leaves behind glue residue which is unsightly, or buying pre-cut steel plates or individually wrapping etc etc. the pre-cut steel plates are the best but not feasible as i just cant find a ready source.

finally managed to luckily chance upon poker-card-sized tin boxes! perfect for the magnets! :D

and the final product ! :D (should have sewn on the lace but cheated by using hot glue instead)

so pretty :D

shopping @ belle maison zakka

i was lucky enough to chance upon belle maison at thomson plaza a few weeks back, which sells very lovely and pretty zakka, country style goodies. despite visiting and buying from the the shop four days out of the seven days it was open (it was a one-week fair), i did not get enough goodies. lucky for me, she has an online shoppe and i went on to get some more stuffs. it came hand-delivered in a pretty cake box...

a very pretty two-tiered stand

up close look ... lacy looking plates

and i had to get snowy to strike a pose. she looked awkard.. hehehe... poor girl.

shopping @ the little happy shop

have been eyeing some of shinzi katoh's stuffs for quite some time, especially his fairy tales range. finally, armed with a little 'bonus' money, i went ahead to buy some goodies for myself , which arrived prettily in mail!!! even snowy looks happy to receive it !! :D

boxes of happy things!

the cute teapot in 'snow white and seven dwarves' prints

it has a sieve too.. how totful.

and matching mugset...

the cover doubles up as a small saucer for cookies/chocolates etc.

a metal tumbler. this is prob the most useless purchase cuz its too small and not as cute. had wanted to get the 'thumbelina' / 'little mermaid' bottle but its already out of stock, so this is the next best option.

stackable lunch boxes.. which is actually absolutely useless for me but its just too cute to resist

and that's all! :D

obession with hooks

have developed an obsession with metal/wooden hooks these couple of weeks and have been adding to my small but growing stash (hopefully).

the red and pink one's a bit out of place but i got them cheap at daiso. upclose pics of the nicer ones...

this hello kitty hook's too kawaii to resist. no need to nail into the wall, just latch it onto the door frame.

my new mod toilet

finally! i've got a new toilet! forgot to take the 'before' look, but here's the and finished look

had haw to help sketch a concept. it was good to run by my amatuer tots through her cuz she pointed out some flaws of my initial concept - i wanted the wooden cupboards to flank the sink and sit on top of the tabletop (but that's a no-no cuz the tabletop's likely to be wet frequently and the water will 'soften' the wood over time) or how should the drawers be positioned etc.

anyway, once the simple concept was done, i just had to show it to our contractor to do it. that's when the headache comes in - i had to choose the sink, the tap, the material of table top, the material for drawers, dimensions for mirror cupboard etc... wah .. headache... so apart from choosing the sink and tap, i just went with the supposed 'standard or dad's preferred way for the rests of the fittings.

wanted the mosiac tiles in turqoise color but dad prefers black... and since i am easy on the color, i went ahead with his choice of color.. of black mosciac and black tabletop - he said that that allows the pretty sink to stand out

and what i love about the new toilet apart from being new now, is the fact that there's lots of built in storage space now for me to hide all the uglies from direct view.

cupboards under the sink for towels and my stash of toiletries supplies

and mirror cupboards for more storage space!

thanks haw for your suggestions! :D

belt & magnet

had these 2 'D' hooks for a long time and had been wanting to do a belt. finally got ard to doing it about a month ago. turned out.. err.. not so nice and i have trashed it since ...
then i made fabric covered magnets. they are so easy and fun to make!! here's one of the sets - japanese lucky objects.