Altered Holiday Bird

Today's the last day of year 2007, 1 more day to a brand new year ... exciting and nostalgic at the same time. I'm in a holiday mood and I've altered this little wooden Holiday Bird with stamping of snowflakes. The bird was then crackled and wings and a little ribbon were attached. Tips on altering the bird can be found here.

I love the crackle effect!

Here's wishing everyone Happy New Year ...

Materials - Pattern Paper: Sassafras Lass, Basic Grey; Stamps: Hero Arts; Ink: Tsukineko Brilliance, Tim Holtz Distress Ink Pad; Others: wooden bird, Ranger Inkssentials Crackle Accents, ribbon.

Love Is ...

... this.

Me & my baby at Christmas - perfect!

Winter Solstice Festival

This year's Winter Solstice Festival was fun. Fun, as in we had J's participation this time round when the family got together to roll the little colour flour-balls (normally in white and hot pink) which would later be cooked in sugar syrup. And this was what the little apprentice cooked up ...

Hard at work.


The finished product ... well, not exactly round balls, but i guess it's acceptable. In between making balls, we made some snowmen and mice flour-thingies too. FUN! I didn't manage to get photos of the cooked item as all got consumed before I had the chance - maybe next year then.

Altered Snowflake

I can't believe that Christmas is barely a week away. Time passes by too quickly, really. I haven't done any Christmas shopping yet and judging by my workload, it looks near impossible ... sigh! But, by some miracle, I have managed to do up this wooden snowflake which was given by a friend, so here it is...
I had painted the raw light wood with a layer of bronze acrylic paint followed by the pearl finish acrylic paint - you don't quite see the pearlescent effect in the photo (sorry, it's been rain weather these past weeks and really difficult to get better lighting for photography) but the pearlescence is 'mildly' there. Okay, after the layers of paint, goes on the swirl stamping done with the Brilliance ink, then I outlined the swirls at certain areas by hand to add a bit of detailing to the swirls and adhered the photo. Edges of the snowflake were then lightly inked with distress ink.

Next, my favourite Modge-Podge was applied to seal everything. Those little fan-like prongs in between the wood are actually of an embossed snowflake stamp that I had cut up and glued on. Finishing touches of beads and sequins were then glued on. Voila!!

Materials - Paints: Making Memories; Stamp: Autumn Leaves, Hero Arts; Pen: Zig Writer; Embossing Powder: Scrap-n-Crop; Others: wooden snowflake, sequins, beads, Modge Podge.

Altered Lunch Tin

Here's a lunch tin that I have finally finished altering. This took waaayy longer than planned due to lots of 'unforeseen circumstances' (I love how that makes it sound like such a valid reason!!) along the way. Anyway, it's finally done and I have to admit I really had a great time working on this - by far my favourite project so far in terms of enjoying the process!
Lined the tin cover edge with velvet ribbon.

I made a little tag too (on the right side of the handle) - an excuse to use my tag die-cut on my Cuttlebug.

This is what it looks like opened up.

A close-up. I adhered a pearl centre to the flower and added a little 'bling' to it. And finished it with my favourite process - Modge-Podge.

Materials - Lunch tin: Provo Craft; Pattern papers: My Mind's Eye, Basic Grey; Rick-rack: Phrase Cafe (EK Success); Flower: Prima; Others: Modge-Podge, Making Memories Pearl, various ribbons, bling.

A Whaat???

Okay. The picture you are about to see is a Caly-bird. Yup, you read it right, it's a Caly-bird. And no, it's not some kind of new bird species, but more like something J made up. She just came up to me one day and asked me, "Mummy, can you please draw me a Caly-bird?" Of course I patiently asked her what that was and what I got back was this look - this duh-helloo-where-have-you-been-living-all-this-while look. So never mind, J proceeded to describe to me in detail what a Caly-bird looked like and this is what I came up with ...

... and believe it or not, J squealed in delight when she saw my finished (err ... I think it's finished) drawing and went, "Yaay, that's Caly-bird!!" So I must have done something right. Oh well, now Caly-bird shares a space above her pillow in bed, her special treasure trove ...

I've Been Tagged ...

I've been tagged ... well, actually, I was tagged some time ago. Yeah, I'm sloppy with my blogging - always too much going on around me. I'm totally thrilled because I got tagged by Fiona Carter, DT at Maya Road and Paper Salon (and I LOVE her stuff!). Anyway, this is how it's supposed to go ...

Here are the rules:

1. Link to your tagger (see above), and also post these rules on your blog.
2. Share 7 facts about yourself (random or weird) on your blog.
3. Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs.
   Let them know they are TAGGED by leaving a comment on their blog.

... and 7 facts about me:

1. I lurve to eat - I've been told that buffets should probably put me on their list of people to ban.
2. I love the smell of rain.
3. I'm quite a neurotic mother ... hopefully this doesn't leave any permanent damage on my DD!
4. I crave for Laksa-flavoured Maggi instant noodles.
5. I'm an Arsenal supporter!!!
6. I'm a reformed shoe-aholic.
7. When I was kid, our home was like a pet shop - we had a chipmunk, hamsters, cats, rabbits, fish (4 aquariums) and a turtle. Past pets also included dogs, terrapins, snails and a squirrel.

Time to tag some people:

1. Valerie
2. Michelle
3. Irene
4. Serene
5. Mel
6. Nicole
7. Jenny

Hope you will all play along!

Happy Birthday M!

Happy birthday M .... many happy returns! This card was done on 2 pieces of hard board and joined together with ribbon. Lilac background was painted with acrylic paint. The green patch was distressed around the edges using an emery board while the monogram 'M' was inked with distress ink, as with the pattern paper. The words 'Happy Birthday' are written on a separate sheet of white paper using Sakura Glaze pen and then cut out and adhered. The card when it is closed up and tied.

Materials - Paint: Making Memories; Pattern Paper: Making Memories; Cardstock: SEI; Flowers: Prima; Buttons: Autumn Leaves; Monogram: Basic Grey; Stamp: Autumn Leaves; Ink: Tsukineko Brilliance; Pen: Sakura Glaze; Others: hard card, ribbons

So This Is What's In My Head ...

Found something fun today ...

Your Brain's Pattern

Your mind is a creative hotbed of artistic talent. You're always making pictures in your mind, especially when you're bored. You are easily inspired to think colorful, interesting thoughts. And although it may be hard to express these thoughts, it won't always be.

What Pattern Is Your Brain?

Happy Birthday V!

This is a hanging birthday card made for a friend. The 2 pieces of cardstocks are actually adhered to 2 separate transparencies (which appears almost invisible in the photos). The 2 separate cards are joined with twines.A close-up of the top card. I have torn the edges of the cardstocks and inked with distress ink. The 'frames' are inked with several colors of chalk-inks and finished up with distress ink. The 'V' monogram was also inked around the edges and rest of the name was doodled. The words 'Happy Birthday' are cut out from chipboard and painted with bronze acrylic paint.

Materials - Pattern paper: Basic Grey; Monogram: Basic Grey; Stamp: Autumn Leaves; Ink: Tsukineko Brilliance, Colorbox Fluid Chalk, Tim Holtz Distress Ink Pad; Pen: Uniball Signo, Zig; Paint: Making Memories; Others: Cuttlebug, transparency, twine, eyelets.

Happy Birthday Ah Kong

It's Dad's birthday today, and I made this altered cutting-board for him as a gift from J and N. Many happy returns Dad, we love you!

I added dimension to the body of the dragonfly and butterfly cut-outs using the Glossy Accents to get an 'epoxy' effect. Then I chalked a shadow around the title alphas and glued pearlised beads around the dragonfly and the butterfly. (Click on any of the photos for a larger image.)

Materials - Pattern paper: Scrapworks, K&Co (cut-outs); Alphabets: Basic Grey, Making Memories; Flowers: Bazzill; Button: Autumn Leaves; Adhesives: Modge-Podge, Helmar's Super-Tac, ThermOWeb 3D Zots; Chalk: Craft-T; Others: cutting-board, ribbons, beads, Schmincke Fixative, Ranger Inkssentials Glossy Accents.

Bubbles

This is my other 'baby' Bubbles. She was given to us by this really great couple and we cannot thank them enough for her as she has been giving us so much joy. And, little J has been proclaiming that Bubbles is her dog and not Mummy's!

What a poser too!

Ah Kong & Me

This layout is done with 1 cardstock and doodling only - with 5 shades of my trusty colour pencils.
Close-up of the top portion of the layout. I had added colour to the title and washed it using my new fun tool, the Tsukineko Fantastix - it functions like a brush but with easier control. Will try and post pictures of the tool later on. Also coloured the edges slightly.

Materials - Cardstock: Bazzill; Pen: Pigma Micron; Colourpencils: Faber-Castell Albrecht Durer

Succulent

This little fella had relocated to my office from Cameron Highlands a couple for years back. Unfortunately, it had a sad ending when I was away from work for several days - suffered rotting as the damp soil was unable to dry out due to a stretch of rain ... RIP.

Banner

A little bit on the banner I just put up. This beautiful antique tile was nested in an old wall surrounding a rather newly built structure in Penang - those who live here will understand why I refer to the New World Park as a 'structure'.

I really love this little piece of beauty I chanced upon during lunch out with Dad today. I must admit I'm a tad nervous about posting a photograph I'd taken but like I said I love it too much to let it sit unnoticed in some little byte-space in my laptop. Really glad I had my camera (one of the rare occasions) with me for once.

I Spy

These 3D flowers were made from the same pattern paper where I cut out each petal indivdually and inked the edges before I 'curled' them slightly using scissors and assembled them with 3D adhesive.

Materials - Cardstock: Bazzill; Pattern paper: Basic Grey; Ink: Colorbox Chalk; Pen: Sakura Gelly Roll Metallic; 3D adhesive: Therm O Web Zots 3D

Accordian Folder Album

This is a little present I made for my nephew for his 2nd birthday. I hope he likes it!

I doodled the white outline of the word with the Sakura Glaze pen (the outline actually pops up slightly, giving you the effect of embossing), then used colour pencils to add touches of colour. The faint stars at the top are done using masking with chalk ink. All stretched out - side ASide BThe star is manually cut out from cardstock and inked around the edges for better depth. I then adhered it with 3D glue dots to make it pop. The embossed word is actually done using metallic ink which the photo does not seem to show to its true effect (click on photo to get clearer view).

Materials used - Bazzill Accordian Folder; buttons: Autumn Leaves; Chipboard alphas: Heidi Swapp; Pattern paper: Scrapworks, SEI; Stamps: Doodlebug, HA Limited Edition, Hero Arts (clear), Making Memories (foam), 7 Gypsies 97% complete; Inks: Colorbox Chalk, Tsukineko Metallics & Brilliance; Stickers: Basic Grey, KI Memories; Tag: Basic Grey; Colourpencils: Faber-Castell Albrecht Durer; Decorative tape: Making Memories; Paints: Making Memories; Pens: Sakura Glaze & Metallic.

Altered Magnets

Materials - magnets; Flowers: Prima; Buttons: Autumn Leaves; Alphas - Basic Grey; Pattern Paper: Chatterbox, Heidi Grace, Modge Podge.

Mini Book

Made as a present - I hope the recipient likes it.

Materials - Album: Making Memories; Pattern Paper: Chatterbox, Sassafras Lass, Heidi Grace, Autumn Leaves, Scrapworks, SEI, Doodlebug; Cardstock: Bazzill; Buttons: SEI, Hero Arts, Autumn Leaves; Alphas: Basic Grey, KI Memories; Decor Tape: Making Memories; Brads: Scrap-n-Crop, Heidi Swapp, Making Memories; Ribbons: Scrapbooking Cove, Scrap-n-Crop, EK Success; Metal Charm: Scrap-n-Crop; Stamps: Technique Tuesday