Sweet Like You

My selected challenges for today :

By Papercraft Star

 Papercraft Star - Challenge #33

Cute Card Thursday - Shiny Happy Card 
Creative Craft World - Use A Square

This is my take :

Paper: Pink Card, Cream Card, Green Card,The Spring Stack (DCWV)

Ink: Old Paper (Distress)

Accessories: 3mm Baby Blue Gemstones (Anita's), Red Foam Button

Tools: Fine Line Drawing Pen (Letraset), Damask Embossing Folder (Craft Too), Netting Texture Plate (Fiskars), Multi Frame (Nellie's), Small Round Corner Punch(Siesta)

New To Stamping Art

Been slowly (as slowly as I can resist) collecting all the craft essentials to make any type of cards I want to as and when. Crafting is so fun but it can the tools can be pretty costly. So, sometimes it is really cool whenever I stumble upon a great deal. One of the best deals I got myself was this...

 

...rubber stamp set of 75, a mix of sentiments and images. It's classic stuff with may images for birthday, flowers, Christmas and etc. And boy, these wooden blocks are heavy! Guess how much I got this stamp set  for? £19.90. Can you believe it? So, when I saw it, I thought it would be my 1st batch for stamp collection. 

After I gotten these stamps, I thought perhaps these images would need colours to bring them to life. That's when I realized how much more I would need to invest in these stuff that works hand in hand. Did some reseach online and saw that there are two main brands that many crafters are using to colour their stamp images - Promarker & Copic.  Since I am trying my best to get budget quality stuff, I went for Promarker. And these are the colours I have at the moment.

With these new markers, I went online to check out the tutorials of how others use them. These markers are great stuff. I never did realize that other than designers (Interior, Graphic, Fashion, Architecture, Product, Animation & etc), crafters use them too. I used to have several of these markers when I was studying Interior Design. I had about 15 of those. We used them for perspective sketches and to create some effects on our presentation boards. However, the colour rendering with markers was not the kind of technique I favoured. Suffice it to say, I cannot recall the brand of the markers I had! After the completion of the ID course, my markers were hidden in some nook to collect dust and spiders. When one cousin began to pursue architecture, I gladly gave all the markers to her.

So, it's kinda quaint that I am recollecting these markers once again. But this time, they are treated as my prized possessions ;)

Other than collecting more essential colours from Promarker and maybe Copic too, I am also hoping to go into the art of heat embossing. Would love to begin making cards with nice embossed stamped images/sentiments. But oh well, I guess I will have to pace myself for these craft investment, lest I be broke.

Oh Baby Baby!~

Ooh, ideas streaming in... but somehow the execution of my card designs is limited to the few craft materials I have now. I guess I will have to make do till next month. Hobbycraft fair is just next month!

Meantime, here's yet another card:

 

Paper: Polka Dots from Retro (Paper Pizazz), Cream Card, Yellow Paper, Pink & Green Pearlescent Paper

Accessories: 1cm Yellow Flower Grosgrain Ribbon,Scrap White Cloth, Staple (pose as safety pin), Glitter Glue, 
Faber Castell Ecco Pigment Pen

Tools: Whimsy Texture Plate (Fiskars),  Multi Frame MFD020 (Nellie's)

 

Entering this for card challenges at :

Annabelle Stamps - Say It With Polka Dots

Scrapbook Sisters - Baby Baby

Scallops Or Me?

I am all excited about some new craft essentials that I finally received a few hours ago. Will blog again later about the new stuff I got.

Just completed another card with scallops element using my new toys ;)

Ink : Old Paper (Distress) 

Paper: Retro by Paper Pizazz, Pink Card, Cream Card, Pink & Brown Foam

Accessories: 1.5cm Gold Metallic Grosgrain Ribbon, 0.5cm Cream Ribbon (Sopp), Dark Green Brads

Tools: Multi Frames MFD020 (Nellie's) ,Threading Water Border Punch (Fiskars)

Entering this for 4 card challenges at

Waltzingmouse Sketch - Challenge #34

Our Creative Corner - Cut It Out

Skipping Stone Design - Sketch Challenge #64
Bunny Zoe's Crafts - Flowers Everywhere

Call Me Princess!

I know in Christianity, fellow believers are considered the sons & daughters to the King of kings. So that make me a princess... a royalty. But I never knew my family name described me as one too!

This evening, as I was collecting a parcel (my craft stuff!) from my apartment's concierge, the african staff was looking at me eye wide and asked if OYE is my name. I told him yeah and I know it's a popular name for Africans. Oye is my family name... actually a spelling mistake to Ooi. The mistake dated back to my great grandfather's time, and that variation of family name has been passed down ever since. 

To my pleasant surprise, the staff told me Oye in African means 'crown' and it symbolizes that I am a royalty or something. Woah, what a fun discovery! I went on to google to find out more. Found two interesting results :

An African gave a description to Oye as  'a title of a higher being' while in Spanish it is an interjection that means 'listen'.

Now I am wondering how exactly do they pronounce that name in African. As for me and my Chinese family, we have been keeping it to the pronunciation of Ooi whenever we introduced ourselves with the family.  

Oh by the way, Ooi/Oye is a variation for the Chinese family name, 黃, meaning 'yellow'. Some of the Chinese family names though translated differently for English, they are the same in the Chinese character. People from the different provinces of China (depending where our ancestors originated from) speak different dialects, resulting that the same family name sounding different. Therefore, those with Chinese family names like Huang, Hwang, Ong, Wong, Wang, Ung, Ooi, Wee and etc may be from once-upon-a-time the very same family tree.  Hmmm... I wonder if you understood what I meant. Here's how Wikipedia explains it :

"Transliteration of Chinese family names (see List of common Chinese surnames) into foreign languages poses a number of problems. Chinese surnames are shared by people speaking a number of dialects and languages which often have different pronunciations of their surnames. The Chinese diaspora into all parts of the world resulted in the Romanization of the surnames based on different languages. As a result, it is common for the same surname to be transliterated differently. In certain dialects, different surnames could be homonyms so it is common for family names to appear ambiguous when transliterated."

 According to Wikipedia, 黃 is currently ranked  7th among the most common Chinese family names.

Ah, we learn something new everyday. Okay, now back to my card making. I can't wait to get my hands on the craft stuff I received today. Stay tune for my next card ;) 

Turned Purple

Paper: Purple Velvet & Metallic Silver On Turquoise Damask Paper from Paperchase, Lilac Card, Cream Card.

Accessories: 1.5cm Silver Metallic Grosgrain Ribbon, Blue Brads

Tools: Swiss Dots Embossing Folder(Provo Craft)

It's purple this time. Am not too sure if I should continue making cards with no particular sentiment to it or does cards with words always sell better? Hmm.

Whenever I use purple papers, my friend, Wean will come to mind. She loves all things purple and she collects purple stationeries. She sometimes even hunt for papers of a certain purple hue. She would have loved it if she came for my wedding because purple was the theme colour. Ah memories...

Thoughts and memories stream in when I am making cards. They can either be distractions or inspirations but nevertheless these thoughts accompany me through the whole card making process.

I discovered that the current card challenge from Card Pattern is similar to this one design I just made, so I am submitting this as an entry ;)

Jocelyn Collection & Hobbycrafts Fair at Birmingham

I have been eager on checking the mail for some parcels the past week. So looking forward to the craft papers and tools I am collecting this month. Need to get some of these stuff as I have been feeling stuck with the very limited choices for making cards. 

The other day I saw this paper pack collection and instantly I fell in love with it... erm, maybe because I am also a tiny weeny bit bias. Take a look at it.

It's called Sei's Jocelyn Collection!^_^ Named after me! Ahaks! Yes, indeed it's gonna be included into MY very own crafting collection. 

Oh, by the way, I stumbled upon this craft fair coming up by end of March. Hobbycraft is organizing a craft fair at NEC, Birmingham. It got me all excited, so without much thought I got myself the fair ticket. This Hobbycrafts ticket also entitles me free entry to Sewing for Pleasure and Fashion, Embroidery & Stitch at the same venue, at the same time. I can already imagine that I would go crazy and would spend the whole day there till they kick me out! Immediately, I made plans with my mister to meet up with a friend in Redding and to spend the weekend there too. 

This Valentine's Day isn't Ours...

14th February is Valentine's Day. But ever since my hubby and I started going out, we have been celebrating our Valentines on 17th instead because 17 is our special number. 

We actually prefer celebrating it on our own Valentine's date to avoid the crowd and the overbooked venues everywhere on earth! I figured that it probably won't be such a romantic thing to have so many people out there and have every Valentine's item price marked up. On 17th, it's more quite... items are not necessarily more expensive and more venues are available for us.

By the way, today is also my hubby's stepfather's birthday ;) It's Birthday + Valentines. Last year, Chinese New Year Day was on the 14th, so it was Birthday + Valentines + CNY! It's good for people who loves crowd and parties but I think this birthday 'boy' loves a smaller group and would usually like more intimate time with several guests. 

Anyway, here's a shout out to all my friends, blog followers and crafters,

♥ Happy Valentine's Day! ♥ 

.

 

Engineering A Hearty Piece

Yay! I made cards again today. I feel satisfied every time after I have a design executed. Having felt that for a long time.

I used to always feel this way when I was doing Interior Design assignments back in those days. The making of ID model isn't the hardest part but the preliminary stage of getting an interesting concept is! I usually would I labour more on getting the concept which encompasses many many  many factors. Though ID is gets my attention and I appreciate it, I never did land myself in an ID firm. Decided that while I have an interest on ID, I don't have the passion for it to put through the sleepless nights working in that industry.

Oh well, back to the cards I made today. Although concept still applies to cards, it's a lot less complicated than ID. It's even easier when the card challenge presents a sketch, colour scheme and requirement - 1/3 of the designing process done! 

It's Valentine's Day on Monday. Everyone and everywhere displaying lovey dovey stuff. So it's no brainer the cards made for challenges would be to that theme.

Stamps: Sentiment (May Hughes)

Paper: Retro by Paper Pizazz, Grey Pearlescent Card, Red Card, Red&Black Velvet Damask

Ink: Red (Caroles Crafts)

Accessories: 1.5cm Gold Metallic Grosgrain Ribbon, 0.5cm Navy Ribbon (Sopp), Pink Brown Felt Flower, Brown Button, Tiny Pink Brads

Tools: Filigree Texture Plate (Fiskars)

Oh, I totally dig the velvety damask design paper!

This is now an entry to these challenges :

Penny's Paper-Crafty Challenge - Challenge #46, Heart A Flutter

Daring Cardmarkers - Reeling In The Ribbon

Stamping For The Weekend - St Valentine's Day

Skipping Stones - Sketch #63

By the way, It's my mum's birthday today. Having her birthday on Valentine's eve resulted my dad giving her an easy 2-in-1 gifts for years. But of course, sometimes my mum would remind my dad that there should be two gifts ;)  It's past midnight here in London but just the perfect time to call my mum as it is about 9.30am now back home. Hope she will received my card soon.

In Mood For Pink

Trying my best to keep my card making engine going. *Choo-choo*

Just got to know another friend in London loves to make cards too. Yay. Been hoping to have friends who crafts in London. Hope to befriend some crafters on Bloggers. Just so many of you bloggers out there that are so talented with your crafting.

Background paper from the paper pad given by Gjin ;)

Stamps: May Hughes

Paper: Retro by Paper Pizazz, Pink & Grape Pearlescent Card, Cream Card

Ink: Black (Caroles Crafts), Metallic Gold Pen

Promarkers used : G258, G339, O739, M137, M727, R727, Y828

Accessories: 1.5cm Silver Ribbon, 0.5cm Maroon Ribbon (Sopp), Pink Miniature Flowers

Tools: Swiss Dots Embossing Folder(Provo Craft), Filigree Texture Plate (Fiskars),  Sizzix Big Shot Express 

I have decided that joining card challlenges will spur me on to make cards more consistently through the week. This shall be my second time entering a card for card challenges These are the ones I sent to for this round :

Sew Many Challenges - Challenge #43 Valentines 

Polka Doodle - Week 6 Challenge - 'That's Amore!'

Stamp Something - Something for your Valentine CHALLENGE

Gradually improving my card making skill... I hope!

Would love a blog candy!

Well, I am sorry if you clicked on my blog thinking I am giving away one. Not yet but I guess I will consider giving away blog candies one day. It's just so fun!

Just as I was surfing for more card challenge to join, I came across Amanda's blog, Crafty Creations and she is giving away a superb candy - the We R Memory Keepers' Sew Easy Paper piercing and stitching kit!!! This is one of the most expensive craft candy I have seen online. 

Well, don't think I have anything to lose, so I entered myself for the candy. By end of February, we will see if I will be blessed with this Sew Easy Kit this way... or to get one myself one day if I don't end up buying a small sewing machine. ;) 

I am trying my luck for other candies too. So I went on surfing for more of 'em. Seen several but only interested in some kind of candies - sweet and healthy! Hahaha!~ Ehem. 

So the second one I saw and wanted is from Bows & Berries Digital Stamp Shop. They are giving away a mixed of blings, embossing folders, clear stamps, paper pad and etc. Yummy ;)

The 3rd candy I saw is from Annie@Ambriel Blog in conjunction with her Blogger-versary. I like the ribbons and I want to have some gems to be added to my craft stash. And I discovered a delightful thing - Annie came from my hometown! What a small world. Good to know more crafters from home. 

These people inspire me to have my bloggerversary candy too. But when shall it be? I started blogging since last year but I was not so regular. Hmmm, I guess everyone will know the date of my bloggerversary when I finally have my very own 1st blog candy giveaway too.

My 1st Card Challenge Entry

I was feeling a bit restless towards the evening because I did not make any cards today. So I went on to Waltzingmouse Sketch's blog and see if I should join their current card challenge. I decided today (although it's past midnight) will be the day I sent my 1st challenge submission. Here it goes...

Waltzingmouse Sketch's Challenge #33 is this :

And my card design entry is this :

My first card challenge entry

Stamps: May Hughes

Paper: Turquoise, Green, Beige, Playful Paisleys (Paisley & Petals)

Ink: Gold & Orange Pigment (Caroles Crafts)

Accessories: 5mm Ribbon (Sopp), Blue Button (GCS), Brown & Yellow Felt Flower (made with unknown brand)

Tools: Swiss Dots Embossing Folder(Provo Craft), Ornamental Die Cut (Ellison), Sizzix Big Shot Express 

Well, I don't expect myself to win anything but I guess blogs like Waltzingmouse Sketch Challenge stirs crafters like me to make cards especially on days when we are less motivated. I would say everyone who joins any challenge is a winner because you made something - an achievement! ;)

Cherish The Love

Valentines?

I am liking square cards. Probably I got too used to A-size cards. I will be making more of these 6"x6" cards.

Made the felt flowers and embossed dots onto a pearlescent card. 

Oh, I have to admit the photos could be better. Currently my photos are taken with the Samsung  PL150 (or TL210 as it’s known in the USA). It's a fairly good camera with a front LCD for people who likes a bit of cam whoring like myself : p The problem is perhaps the poor lighting. Whenever there's a bit more money I could spend, I would end up spending on crafts materials. I guess someday soon I would need to hold my horses and send my DSLR for repair. The Nikon DSLR camera I have can't shoot anymore... it just wouldn't focus and wouldn't function at all. I wonder how much will it cost to fix the problem and I am hoping the camera clinic that I send to will do a decent job with a reasonable price without having my any other Nikon parts stolen/exchanged.

More Chinese New Year Cards

CNY card production time!

It's has to be red, it's festive but it's not too conventional (I hope).  I guess I will be able to experiment on more oriental designs next year (or earlier) once I  acquire more craft materials and tools for my crafting obsession.

Finally used my new glue gun sticking these flowers.

Not so red...

This is my 2nd fav after the this one.

Chinese New Year Eve in London

Me & my Mister ; )

It's was the eve of Chinese New Year on 2nd February 2011. On the CNY eves, the chinese would gather with their family members and have a feast. But this year, we are far away from our home land, we celebrated with our 'adopted family' (close friends) by having a nice dinner at the Chinatown. 

None other than the London Chinatown

Another view of the Chinatown

We had yummy dishes with the Salted Egg Prawns and 'Nin Koh' (CNY cake) being the highlight for me. Another thing that made my day was that I walked past a restaurant and saw a lion dance was about to begin. In just less than 10seconds, they started their performance. Ooh, I was so excited. It was a short routine but I was very pleased. It was a happy night with good company. Missing home and missing some nostalgic CNY goodies. 

My first Lion Dance of the year

With the ever-so-bubbly friend

As to get into the CNY mood, I have decided to wear this same red coat from the eve till this Sunday (2nd - 6th Feb). Just for fun.

Me & my red coat