it's the season

As always by this time the malls all over town are ready with their Christmas deco. This one at KLCC looked so yummy View from the 3rd floor, reminded me of lollipops, smarties and M & Ms

High up above the roof from the 3rd floor, looking like dreamcatchers

I am having a 4 days week at work for 3 weeks this December beginning last week till Christmas and it got nothing to do with clearing off my leave days nor the firm is cutting down on work time, just lucky me that it coincided with the state public holidays that falls on every Friday for 3 weeks at a stretch. That extra day gave me some time to watch New Moon, with a under 18 in tow, all I can watch are movies for under 18 and I did a bit of shopping .

Trying to avoid the weekend crowd which we thought will be heavy, we made it to the cineplex early, very early on the first Friday I was off. That gave us time to do breakfast at the food court one floor down from the Cineplex . Waffle seems to be every one's favourite that morning and my must have cuppa kopitiam styled nescafe.
After the movie, we had our lunch at Madam Kwan's, this is what was left of my nasi lemak by the time I remembered to snap a picture of it Sago Gula Melaka for dessert

CLARIS year end Mini Concert
Diane's impromptu year end mini concert at her music center last Saturday, thou this mini concert was already planned for, but the girls were initially not involved, until that very Saturday when they attended class as usual, the girls was called to take part and were given only 2 hours to practice "Merry Christmas To You"
Very serious looking and in full concentration during their performance, LOL, they were awesome, they pulled it thru together all five girls. Made their teacher, Miss Chew very proud as they sort of made history that evening, LOL Congrads, girls ! happy faces after the performance, missing one girl, these foursome are like leeches, meeting only once a week and they made havoc blowing whistle at the other performers and cheering them from the back seats.

Stashing news

Fabrics Sand Color Solid Cotton, Tea & Jam by Quilt Gate, Lotta Latte & Bistro by Deb Strain for Moda from Nagoya, I loved their Christmas print too which I did not get any..kinda regretted now
Velvet ribbons in several meters, red bells and a roll of red ribbon

Christmas Ornament and some finishing including shameful errors Two running stag, the smaller one had some wrongly calculated stitches, I didn't frog, since in my humble opinion it did not in anyway cripple the design entirely and I choose to leave it. Christmas tree design freebie by Aliolka
Another Aliolka freebie design, I was too engrossed with finishing for the first time with the silk poms-poms (that is what the label on the poms-poms says) that I somehow made some calculation error and it did not occur to me until its all done where I can no longer make good.
Blessings to you freebie by The Sampler Girl on 32 ct Linen with Berry Swirl by Carrie's creation and there's error here too, I won't tell whereNorwegian Reindeer design by Lynda D.Baldauf of Scandinavian Stitches, JCS Christmas Ornament, one that I had a frog for companionship. DMC 75 variegated 32ct Sand Belfast linen.

I have mailed a couple of packages and am still awaiting news of its arrival. Hopefully all will arrive safely.

Thank you for visiting everyone, I appreciate it a lot for leaving me your kind comments

Have a good week ahead till I see you next.

My Santa's wish list

A heartfelt wish for linen, floss and time to stitch is my HOE Christmas Ornament Exchange from Mary Jo Hays. Thank you so much, Mary, I do loved Homespun Elegance designs. Design : Homespun Elegance, Chart name : Santa, Please Bring Me

Great Surprise !!!

A Christmas ornament from Mylene came as a pleasant surprise. If you have received from Mylene before, you know her finishing is just simply superb. Thank you so much, Mylene from the bottom of my heart. I managed to stitch this, Running Stag, JCS Ornament Mag 2004 (if I am not wrong with the year) not one but two. Its like a habit now, I seem to be stitching two of everything. Finishing hopefully this weekend, no idea what it will be yet. This weekend is also a movie weekend, the kids choice.

Two exchange packages went away on Monday. That was a great relieved.

Thank you for coming by, I am glad many of you who visited last, like the jar tutorial and thank you for letting me know, very sweet of everyone who does, least I know my effort didn't go in vain :)

Dear Nima, if you are reading this, just want to let you know that somehow I couln't leave my comments in your blog, been trying since your trip home. I can't detect what went wrong.

Enjoy a wonderful weekend everyone, till I see you next.

Jar Pincushion Tutorial

A while back when I posted my first jar, Tracey inquired if there was any tutorial, I wasn't sure as I did mine the way I thought how it should looked and through trial and error. I also mentioned that I will try to put one up, so here it is, Tracey this is for you. Sorry I took so long to put this up.

Supplies : A jar (mine fits jar cap size 5.5 cm Diameter Approximate)
Glue any kind that is stong enough to hold the fabirc cushion to the cap, I use the glue gun
Fabric 12cm x 12cm Approximate (depending on your cap size)
Thread, needle and a bit of polyfiber for filling
1) Make a cirlce on the wrong side of the fabric, for my cap size, I measured size 7.5cm diameter
across
2) Draw another larger circle around the first circle measured at 9.5cm diameter across giving the first circle a 1cm allowance all round which will be the seams
1) Fold the 1cm seam allowance inward, pressed and sew loose running stitch all round
Complete a circle and pull the thread to form garthers on the fabric

Stuffed a generous amount of polyfiber fillings into the fabric and plumed it up

pull the gathers closed tightly, make sure your threads is strong enough for this and

stitch over the gathers to securely sealed it.
The cushion is now done

Heat up the glue gun, and squeeze enough glue to hold the pincushion in place.
In my case, I fill the inner cirlce of the cap with glue

and place the pincushion over it, position it in the center.

Note : a bigger size pincushion may fit the cap, but take note that the opening of the jar may not fit the pincushion into it . So it is wise to determine the size of your jar and cap by doing a test run after the cushion is done before you glue to the cap.

Pressed firmly and hold for a little while. A heavy object like a book may give it some weight

It dries pretty fast

Taaa...da.....done!

Final touch, dressed up the outer jar with ribbons or laces if you wish Enjoy !

Christmas already ?

It sure did for me when the mailman came by yesterday and my package came out looking like that.
Praire Schooler - Round 4 from Becky K. I thought the name was familiar and indeed it was, Becky was my Halloween partner from HOE's Halloween exchange and she had stitched me a beautiful quaker pumpkin then. This round with All Year Long PS, she stitched me, Santa Welcome a Christmas ornie, I loved it, the fabric on 28ct Opalescent gave it a shimmering effect...most beautiful. Too bad the camera couldn't capture that.

Thank you Becky!

Now, my exchange piece is still with me, thou completed weeks ago, I just didn't made it to the PO, and I have tons of unforgivable excuses which I am too shameful to go into the details . I have given myself an ultimatum to mail by Monday or if I can find a PO that opens on Sunday..its Sunday then !! and because of the same reasons too I didn't stitch much, except completed what I had started some three weeks back or so.

Santa's Buddies - 2009 JCS Mag

BD from last year's, in 2 different count and 2 different fabric
Evenweave 28ct and Belfast Linen 32ct

Finishing done last nite, I had one stitched with some one's initial, no revealing yet until ....the finishing on the 32ct linen didn't look too good especially on the curve. Its my first sock finishing.Diane's Chocolate Chip Cookies, last Sunday, I let her messed up my kitchen and my oven. There was some Chocolate Chips leftover, apparently the chips was not quite enough as you can see, every pieces had about four chips, five the most...LOL . One tray was a bit too brown but still it was Diane's good first effort. This Chinese New Year, she's gonna make more..lol

The year end long school holidays took effect on Friday which means that my daily schedule will be a bit off from my usual routine until school re-opens in the first week of 2010. Diane will be sitting for her final major medium school equivalent examination, the PMR which will determine if she will get into science stream the following year. Seriously, I preferred when there is school. Then, the seasons this time of the year, raining like everyday and sometimes like all day long, most mornings, gloomy skies greeted me and looks like rain will stay for another while.

This weekend is another 3 days weekend for me starting tomorrow, "Selamat Adil Adha" to all my muslim readers and Happy Weekend to all. Thank you for visiting.

Sunday Brunch Meet

Had a little meet up with three great ladies during the weekend over a delicious Japanese buffet spread. Everyone was camera shy, so you only see the chopsticks going for the fried soft shell crab minus one, who is holding the camera. This is especially for Jess, who is in down under and couldn't join us......this time ;P

The meet was considered short, about 3 hours of non-stop yakking and eating, as Margaret put it, devoured with gusto in between showing off books, charts, stitching in progress, recent purchases and recent finishes including my Mary and a tiny itsy bitsy....... gossips...LOL Shhhh........actually can't remember what it was about...LOL, THE FOOD, thanks to June and for the photos and I confessed, stole from the group's album.

Chicken Sukiyaki

Edamame and pickles

Fried Oysters Tempura
Beef with Garlic

Teppenyaki and Salmon

Desserts - Doriyaki, Mickey Mouse shape, specially made for June instead of that normal looking round shaped Doriyaki and that's not all, there were plateful of yummies that didn't got snap, LOL .

It was a great get-together, a great stress relieved for me too..LOL and June, thanks so much for the treat, the food so yummy at the so famous Kampachi. It was great to meet everyone, more upclose and personal. Thou, we did wrote earlier that this is a ' no gifts' meet, the lunch itself was a treat from June, Margaret brought stamped fabric pieces for us to pick, shown are my selection. She also gave lots of cut ribbons in various colors. Barbara gave the fabric trim card with her sweet coffee dyed ric-rac. (You can check-out the trim card tutorial by Alma here ) and here's my simple gift for everyone, store bought.Its a brooch that I bought from my trip to Hatyai in October, was a bit concerned that I might not have time to stitch something for everyone for the meet, so I had to make sure that I gave some thoughts for the ladies where possible. The brooch is in the shape of a Loy Krathong's vessel, a Thai water festival offering that was supposed to bring great blessings.

My Giveaway arrived

Am very glad that my package to Cindy who won my giveaway arrived safely and I can now revealed. I did mentioned that besides the jar pincushion, there will be some surprises for the winner, so here's the contents that went away and seriously, Cindy's photos looked a lot better and she made it so much more interesting. Thanks! Cindy.

Am so thrilled that Cindy like everything that I put in for her :D

Another piece of exciting news !!!

This just came out of the oven!! that was yesterday, but still hot at the time of being photograph, my foursome Christmas Theme RR with NNC is home. My theme Winter cottage and looked what the ladies, Anna, Janet, Margaret had stitched for me .

Excuse me for the folds, the mail man just flew the envelope into my driveway. Can't blame him, the days has been gloomy and we had many days of rain. Yesterday was no exception. Thank you so much ladies for the wonderful houses. For the first time, my RR came home within its time frame.

Thank you for visiting and for your lovely comments, have a great weekend.

Japanese Charity Fair

Two Sundays ago. Thanks to Eling who got me the tickets and had to apologize for being late as I had to wait for Diane to finish her lesson on that Sunday morning. While Diane's just completed her schools final exams on Friday, her additional classes for her piano lessons started that Sunday, and we were only told of it on Saturday. It was something that we knew it was coming but never thought it would be on a Sunday. It had always been on weekdays. Her first part of the Yamaha Grade 5 exams falls on November 23.

Back to the fair, like last year, it also houses several local charity organizations. Here are some pictures from the fair. Interesting bags, tea cosy, pot holders, patchwork and quilts Playful cats, no details of the chart or the fabric but looks like evenweave 32 ct or 40ct.
Toilet Roll paper holder and letter holder with cross stitched design mostly on aida fabrics and some stuffed animalsPainted Fridge magnets

Bags, tote, book covers,coasters, purse

Fabric made strawberry potpourri and crocheted jar covers

Crocheted dish cloth and more jar covers

Interesting Japanese craft

My haul while Diane played the Ennchi game of fishing balloons out from a pool of water and she got 2 out of the maximum 3 trials and she refused to be photograph!

Thanks for coming, appreciate your comments and have a great week ahead. I will try to catch up with my blog round soonest.

Another non-stitching week goes by

seven tenders to work on

reports

tender clarification

reports

summary clarification

interviews

reports

more reports

all in a week, by the time I get home I became a couch potato!

Am so looking forward to this weekend, have a good wonderful stitching weekend everyone

Thanks for visiting.

Two Festivals and One Parade

I'll begin my 1st November posting by recap some happenings in October that I had not posted. Firstly, Mid-Autumn Festival or the Moon Cake Festival falls on October 3rd and the beauty of this festival to me are the moon cake boxes.I have been collecting the boxes intended for finishing that somehow never got around to doing it. Every year, new box design appeared on the market to lure buyer and you'll get a gift bag to hold them; the whole package is often given as a gift to family and friends . We usually stay at home and savor the moon cakes with Chinese tea but this year it coincide with MIL's birthday and so the family had 4 tables of family and friends at the restaurant

The 2nd Festival for the month in October falls on the 17th is Diwali festival

A Hindu festival that marks the victory of good over evil, and uplifting of spiritual darkness. Symbolically it marks the homecoming of goodwill and faith after an absence, as suggested by the Ramayana.

October 18 marks the begining of the 9 Emperor Gods Festival where devotees normally observed 3 or 9 days of vegetarian. Such festivity normally ends with a parade on the eve of the ninth day, but in Hatyai, Thailand, the parade was held on the eve of the 6th day . Was here last year for the festivity with my MIL, this time I was with Jamis.

The parade, a carnival-like atmosphere pervades the street. Participants in the festival dressed all in white which has come to be translated as abstinence from eating meat, poultry, seafood, and dairy products.

The purpose of this festival, in its simplest terms, is to provide a venue for the annual renewal of cosmic power which rejuvenates human life and allows human conflicts to be resolved.

A bit on crafting for the week that was, the only stitching done is my square for Margaret W's Christmas RR. Wasn't feeling well for the entire week due to a mild sore throat that gave me a mild fever and a cough that followed thereafter. The medication that the doctor prescribed made me drowsy and very sleepy. My Santa design is Project #23159, a freebie from Michaels and I am the last to stitch. On October 30th, Mom had an appointment with her Ophthalmologists, to kill the time while waiting for her at the hospital, I took with me some threads and a tape measure and crocheted this in the waiting room. The second one with arcylic yarns .

The mailman brought me a wonderful mail yesterday. I was RAK by Tracey, from my wishlist. Tracey, thank you so much from the bottom of my heart, the chart arrived with the button intact, thanks for the extra care taken, I appreciate it alot. It gave me something to smile this morning at work after days of sniffing and coughing.

Thank you for visiting, have a happy weekend everyone.