Canvas Scrap - Siblings

I have finally done something which I think is original. Took a piece of canvas and painted it. Stuck a fave photo on it and embellished it. Will call it a canvas scrap. The whole idea came to me when I first started thinking on my house renovation. I wanted to put something on the wall that was distintively ours and hence, what could better than art on canvas by the kids and I.

Yes, I know that we are hardly artists but at least the house has our own touches that we can call distinctively ours. This will definitely be one of the wall hangings coupled with the kids' art on the wall.

Journal - Rare Moment of Peace

We had a precious rare moment for peace between the 2 kids last night. Sean was feverish, wheezing and Clarissa was fussing all over him - nebulising him in bed and making sure that he took all his medicine. Sigh... Such a welcome relief from the "Mummy, Sean said this. No - I didn't. You did. Did not, Did too...etc etc - you get the drift. Will enjoy this whilst it last. My prediction - 10 mins. LOL!!!

Journal - Eggplant Pesto Canapes

Just prepared another batch of my pesto sauce. It is combi of pine-nuts (lightly toasted), basil leaves, garlic, lots of parmesan cheese and extra virgin olive oil. Blend everything together - voila - you have a great tasting pesto sauce. I add a pinch of sea salt for added flavour.

Kids love eating the pasta tossed in the pesto sauce. Another popular recipe would be to use the Pampas shortcrust party to make eggplant pesto canapes. It is a relatively easy exercise. You can even rope the kids in to help. Cut slices of aubergine or eggplant. Cut flower or round-shaped shortcrust pastry - using shaped cookie cutters. Just spread a little pesto sauce and lay a slice of aubergine on top of it. Top it with some parmesan cheese and pop it into the oven (180 degrees) for 10 mins. Glaze the canapes with a beaten egg and pop it back into the over for another 5 - 8 mins. By then, the canapes should be done when they turn golden brown as above.

I find it a great snack and a quick thing to serve when you have unexpected guests. Very quick to do and very yummy too...

Altered Tin - {Play}

This is a tin given to me by Sharon last year, thanks Shar. Been cracking my head and finally came up with this method of altering. I stuck on tissue paper with Mod Podge to the tin. Then painted it with Jo Sonja's Acrylic Paint in Amethyst. Then I inked it with the Briiliance Ink - Victorian Violet. I added on several layers to Mod Podge after that - giving it some shine. Fimally decided to add another layer of shimmer as the colour turned out a little too dark.

For the deco - green little flowers and a smattering of chipboards from the Brenda Walton (K & Co Collection). Must say I have ink all over me after finishing this project but boy - it was very satisfying.

I will use this tin to store a collection of Clarissa's photos by Sarah. The photos all captured Clarissa in a playful mood with ribbons and she looked very happy and beautiful.

Journal - What's in the Box?

Everyone needs one in their family. It's a Sean in a Box. Comes complete with mischief, ability to make you angry, sad, anxious, and a whole other array of emotions. Who needs a Tamagotchi when you have Sean in a Box???

I have started packing for my impending renovations. It is progressing at a snail's pace as everytime I want to do something major, somone starts wheezing. Sigh... I am cursed to stay in a disintegrating and messy home.

Sean was found these 2 boxes and taped them unceremoniously together with my expensive silver tape! Sigh... Sean - you see a spaceship from the boxes, I see - What a waste of boxes!!! Just when I thought you outgrew Buzz Lightyear - guess not.

Mini album - Sean at 5 years old

Beth, my American friend who now resides in Atlanta introduced me to Sarah Grasset. These photos of Sean were taken by Sarah when he turned 5 years old in 2005. What a photo shoot! It was difficult to pick which photo are my fave, they all were. If you need pics to be taken, please contact Sarah at the link I have provided.

Sharon taught me to make this accordion album, thanks very much. This is a very easy and useful album to learn. I used the following for the album:

1) Chatterbox and Bazzill Papers

2) Making Memories Boy Stickers

3) Some brads from Momoyo

I have made pockets in between the pages and put pull out pages and tabs onto them. I intend to journal my thoughts about him as the years go by.

Children for Children Charity Concert

As some of you may already know, the kids were involved in a charity concert on the 18th November last year. This concert was the brainchild of their piano teacher, Samantha Hooi. Was held at the Equatorial Hotel - kudos to them for a flawless execution of the lunch. More kudos for Sam as she worked extra extra hard for all the kids to perform and for the show to flow well in spite of so numerous hiccups. After many late nights and stress, the show was on great! Well done Sam!

Both kids were emcees of the show and both performed duets with their respective partners. Clarissa played "Can you feel the love tonight?" with Arianne and Sean played the "Heart and Soul" song with his old pal Gaetan. There were a total of 4 children emcees along with the very professional Karen Bahrin. The show managed to raise RM20,000 for the Aids Foundation which proved to make all the hard work worthwhile. I am proud to say that both kids carried off the task beautifully and without a hitch!!! I must be the proudest mummy that day!

Journal - Yukie and Sabby's Visit

Yippee, just received an email from Yukie, my good friend from Japan. She and her daughter Sabby will be visiting from Tokyo on the 1st Aug for 2 weeks! That is great news for both Clarissa and me as we enjoy their company very much. It will soon be Sabby and Sasha's birthday soon. Will ask Clarissa to make birthday cards for both of them.

Mini album - Energy

Sean has always been a very energetic boy in spite of being so skinny. I have asked Sarah to capture that him in motion in a photography shoot and to my delight, it was a set of photos that showed his energy exploding through the photos. I have not downloaded all the photos as it would take too long to do it, just my favourite ones.

Jimmy Choo Launch

I had the pleasure of attending the Jimmy Choo launch last night courtesy of Monica. Monica's hubby, Ashwin is an integral part of the Valliram Group that has brought this very high end brand to us Malaysians. To you all Jimmy Choo fans who are reading this blog - please visit the Jimmy Choo boutique at KLCC.

I have never seen so many beautiful people, bags and shoes in one place! The launch was hosted at the Diamond Ballroom in the Mandarin Hotel. Moet champagne, red wine and a whole load of beautiful finger food were served. The models at the fashion show were fab, very leggy and managed to make me look like DUMPLING... Note to self - must exercise more - getting too plump... Yesh, right ---- Like that's gonna happen - the exercising part LOL....

We went home relatively early around 10ish. We all left with a pretty gift bag with a beautiful lilac shoe horn. Can't bear using it!!! Thanks Monica, had a great time. Mayling - if you are reading this, I saw Karen. Karen is now attached to Coach which is part of the very vast empire of the Valliram Group.

Journals - Drats, it's a school day!

Yup, you did not read wrongly... But it's a saturday, how can it be a school day? Well, this is a normal thing schools do in Malaysia. We often get all these week long holidays predominantly during Chinese New Year and Hari Raya (This is the Muslim New Year - similar to Hanukkah and Xmas). In order to "replace" what has been not taught by having such long holidays, the kids are expected to be back at school on saturdays.

The argument goes both ways - To have or not to have the long holidays. We, Malaysians do uphold more of our traditions as we have more time to celebrate them. The "Balik Kampung" phenomenon (Most working Malaysians work in big cities and visits hometown where the old folks resides) is very common and has stressed our North South Highway to the max during such holidays and traffic jams are notorious.

However, the older folks back home love the visits and hence, it may all be worth it!

Thanks Friends

I have received good responses from my blogs. But then I was very clever, only telling my good friends about my blog - what would one expect? My good friends will definitely say that it is good. Ha Ha - that is my cunning scheme of things. Great way to flatter myself!!! Yippee! But a BIG Thank you for actually reading the blog. If you need any creative solution, you know who to call now....

This is not intended solely to be a scrapbooking blog. It is to inform my dear friends overseas mainly in London, Canada, Australia, Japan, Singapore and not forgetting the Malaysian ones too, yes, you gals know who you all are on what I am doing both visually and in writing. Yes, I know - I still need some more practice with the photography - will try to get a better camera soon.

Well - too long-winded again. Talk soon and big thank you again........

Layout - Groovy Girl

This is Clarissa's first layout with minimal help. I just taught her how to use the Making Memories Circle Cutter and she was happy using it. Definitely am recommending this cutter and thumbs up for ease of use. She used my foam stamps from Pebbles Inc and the words below were all from my Technique Tuesdays Clear Stamps.

Clarissa was playing around on my bed and I just took the camera and took these shots. She prides herself as a very groovy chick and thinks that she is very precious, 100% girl, Funny, a Princess, Sweet, a Diva, Cute, Curios and Adorable. Phew!!! That is why I been trying to tell everyone. There are many facets to her personality. Beware!!!

Layouts - Blossom and Girlish

One of the first layouts that the kids tried. Simple techniques - stamping in plain black kids ink using Fancy Pants Clear Stamps. Firstly, they stamped flowers and cut them out. Stuck them on the page in combi of normal glue and double-sided foam tape. This created a collection of flowers of some being popped up and other adhering flat on the page.

Then, both chose their own titles and stamped it out using Making Memories foam stamp. Clarissa used black inked stamp pad and Sean used the Acrylic Paint Dabbers by Ranger. Finishing touches were the sewing and the flourishes which completed the page.

Clarissa's photo was taken in Disney Sea in Tokyo, Japan in Sept 2004 and Sean's photo came from the collection of photos taken by Sarah in May, 2005.

Layouts - Creepy Crawlies

Both the kids wanted to scrap 2 weeks ago. Hence, I found these photographs which I took of them last year. Being city kids, they rarely has the opportunity to observe and savour nature. This rare moment in time was definitely precious. They yelled in disbelief when they found a worm on a lettuce leaf. The way they were screaming for me - one would have thought a bomb had gone off!!!

I designed the layout for them (ahem, control freak mother MAJOR!!!) and they settled to finishing the layout in 2 nights. We used the Making Memories alphabet foam stamps for the title creepy crawlie. I then pierced holes with my trusty piercer from MM tool box for the kids to follow the criss-cross stitches. Gave both needles and thread from DMC and away they were sewed into the night. Both finished before bedtime which is 9 p.m. around here.

I noticed that both the worm and lettuce were green which made it hard to see. Hence, I decided to pierce a circle around the worm to draw attention to it. I remembered that the worm was crawling everywhere when I was taking the pics (presumably to get away from the neurotic mother who was blinding it with a flash and kids who could not stop shouting!!!). Hence, I used the eyelets to mimic the worm and pierced running stitches to depict it crawling away from us.

Both kids were very proud of their first layout. As Sean aptly said, "This is one of the best layout I have ever done."

Layout - Fish Wish

Malaysia is a tropical country. It is hot and humid with a smattering of thunderstorms mostly in the afternoons. Hence, swimming is definitely a fave amongst kids here. Sean loves his swimming very much and often envisions himself as a fish. This was very common when he watched the show "Finding Nemo". Who wouldn't want to be Nemo????

This set of photographs were taken by another photographer friend of mine called Sarah Grasset. She has taken awesome photos of my kids. Thanks a lot Sarah for all the beautiful photos.

I chanced upon this poem and I knew I had to use it for his swimming layout. As the pic ain't great, I will type the poem out for anyone who wants to use it:

If I were a fish

If I could have a single wish

I'd dearly wish to be a fish

Swimming in the deep blue sea

But if I were a fish, I think

I'd have chocolate milk to drink

None of my favourite songs to sing

No playing on a tyre swing

I couldn't hug my family

And I know that they will surely miss me!

So though a fish's life sounds cool

I'd stick to swimming in the pool.

The page is basic as I wanted the photos to be the main feature. I always loved simple designs when the photos themselves are nice in order not to overwhelm the layout. I stamped the title and embossed with clear embossing powder in vellum, attached the title with brads. Then printed the poem in vellum and again attached it with brads. The only "fancy" thing I did was to bead a fish to complement the page.

Layout - 1st Glimpse of the Great Wall

Trip to Beijing - End May, 2007. Beijing was what I envisioned it to be and more. Lots of things to see and digest. This is the first pics that I took as we were nearing the Badaling Great Wall of China. Badaling is the most touristy and visited part of the Great Wall.We had a toilet stop at the base of the wall.

I used very simple techiques to scrap this layout. Oriental paper and a few pieces of jade. Did a simple running stitch for parts of the title - mainly the words 1st Glimpse of the and used Sizzix for the rest.

Layout - Making Waves

Sean - my youngest is a terror by the pool. He will definitely make my poor old heart jump when he does his cannonballs in the pool in the most violent ways! This is a photo taken by Simone, my German friend cum photographer in residence at the moment on the 26th August, 2006.

This layout was scraplifted from a magazine. Sorry too lazy to dig up which mag, but yes, I do admit the scraplifting part. All i did was to cut small squares and ink the sides of each square. Then, the rest was adhering it to the a base cardstock. I used the Bazzill cardstock of course.

The sunshine chipboard with beads was bought quite sometime ago from Singapore and the chipboard lettering is from Thickers which I bought over the internet.

Clarissa did a similar layout employing the same techniques. However, the pics were 4R instead of 3Rs and she ran out of space. She ended up with too little space for the chipboard lettering. We used the Basic Grey Dasher letter stickers instead. Still looks good to me... But as the proud mummy - I may be biased. Ha ha ha!!!

Layout - Beach Bum

We went vacationing in the Gold Coast in Oct 2005. Was one of the bewst vacations ever as we took our time just chilling out by the beach which my hubby enjoyed the most. Think the kids bonded more with him then as mummy is not keen on beaches. This is my favourite photos taken as the pic depicts their closeness. Wish I have more of this type of photos.

I have used the Little Davis chipboard for the title. Then I went unconventional to using a housing brochure sent to me by Mirvac from Perth. I loved the sunset pic, the "beachside" title and the sandy beach pics. I am not a slave to the term acid-free. I am not bothered as I have retained copies of all the pics digitally and we can always reprint if need be.

To create a "watery" look in the beachside title, I used the 3d lacquer to enhance the title. But alas, my camera is not able to pick that up. Will def buy a better resolution camera when I have the chance.

The rest journaling came from stickers that I picked up over the years and the little starfish was from Jolee's.

Decoupage Box - Facets of You

Clarissa, my eldest is first and foremost is a girly gal. But there are many facets towards her character. Hence, the name of the box. She may not know it but I do love her to bits and I do find her perplexing and worry about her the most.

This is a mini-album in a box. The box is made by both my japanese scrapping buddies, Michiko and Yukie. Thanks very much for my box. All I did with my box was just to cut coordinating pieces of patterned paper, inked the sides and stuck them on with decoupage glue.

Embellishments were kept simple as I wanted to feature the decoupage technique. I have used small little brads from some good friends of mine, Hoei Lee and Saw Lan who runs MOMOYO. MOMOYO is a wholesaler that is currently starting to import more scrapbooking stickers, brads and etc. Please be on the look out for them as there arev plans to be more prominent in the scrapbooking scene. At current, Momoyo products are being sold at Craft Haven,they have a shop in Sri Petaling Carrefour and they also run a stall at the Mont Kiara market on sundays.

Mini-album - Bunch of Friendship sayings

I have recently bought the Flower foam stamps from Making Memories. Agonised on how to use them till I saw something over one of the blogs - pls don't ask which - my brain is not designed to retain information. But whoever's blog it is, thanks for the inspiration.

Just stamped the flowers out in Bazzill monochromatic yellow papers. Added some friendship sayings with my recently purchased stamps from MSE (My Sentiments Exactly). Loved the combi. If I must say so I do love details on my scrapbooking and if there is a distinct style that I employ - it would be beads. Here, I painstakingly stuck beads again in yellow (which the photo may not show clearly) ansd it really made the mini-album look elegant. In addition, I added 3-d lacquer to some of the flowers enhancing selected ones.

Note to self - need to buy new camera as this old one that I have - is not "powerful" enough for my blog. Pics are not clear.

Mini-album - Xmas 2005

Finally..... My first album to be posted! I managed to scrap the pics that we took during Xmas 2005! Yes, I am that behind in my scrapbooking. Made this 9 x 9 album by using chipboards, basic grey paper (the dasher series, some chipboard letters from both the basic grey undressed series and Heidi Swapp for the Xmas words. Just employed simple scrapbooking techniques of matting and letterings are from the Basic Grey Dasher collection.

Janine - if you are reading this - kids fave presents were the books you sent. Sean loved his Horrid Henry very much. Thanks.....

Morning Blues

It's 6.28a.m. Gosh, I such a blur blob - took me 20 mins to sign up. Finally I can start posting again before I go for my walk at KLCC park. I am currently trying to load the photos onto my brand-new laptop and will be ready soon for posting all my work. Yippee..... Well - there are around 800 photos so this could take a while.

Sean is sick today, yes, yet again. He is wheezing and I think I will keep him home. He is awake and thinks that creating your own blog is really cool. Guess I will "torture" him by sending him to the chinese acupunturist for treatment. The combi of acupuncture and cupping was extremely effective for Clarissa, my other one. Clarissa was on combivent, singular, phensydyl and aerius for her wheezing. A 2 hour session of massage, acupunture and cupping did miracles - she was better and I took her off the meds. I have to. Will load the photos when I return after my morning walk.

Hello

Hi!!! I have finally started my own blog, thanks to the encouragement from Sharon. If you are a scrapper from Malaysia and am looking for supplies - please visit Scrappingville at the Bangsar Shopping Centre on the 2nd floor. Sharon is the proud owner of Scrappingville.

I am first and foremost a scrappingbooking-queen-wannabe.... Ahem, but not getting there though - I must stress. I have been scrapbooking since 1994. Most of my layout are of course of my kids (like most mothers) and I love making mini-albums as they are so easy to decorate. Yes, lah( lah - is a malaysian slang which we, Malaysians tend to attach to every word), one has to admit - a 12 x 12 layout ain't easy when the mind ain't working, hey....

Will try to load my layouts as soon as possible. But the technically-challenged me, hmmm. maybe give me a week to figure everything out? Till then, my fello scrapping bloggers, adios and have a great day!!!!