A little diversion.

I have some fabrics in my storage which were supposed to be made into dresses for Azzahra sometime ago...hmmm...that was like two years ago. And did I tell you I bought a used sewing machine last year for this never started project. I don't see this going to materialize anyhow since Azzahra has enter the age of four, she is already showing her taste of fashion. Mostly she picks on pants and tees nowadays and her explanation is 'comfy'. Oh well, I couldn't agree more.

So where do the fabrics go? Certainly, I'm not going to waste them as cotton materials are pretty costly. It can even reach up to $16 per meter!!

Here's what I did with them. Rolled them up and made into fabric flowers, add some ornaments and wallaaa....they are as sweet as sugar!! The fabric bows (not sure what to call them) can be worn on its own as a hair clip or attached to a headband. Check below. Cool rite...

Green + Pink + White = Sweet!!

Top position

Side position...sweet as sugar!!

Finally they arrived!

Since I got the inspiration back, I'm eager to get new ribbons. My stock do need replenishing as with what I have right now is quite limited plus I badly need new colours and designs to get myself motivated. I'm also thinking of doing ribbon woven headband so more headband it is.

As I said earlier, Brunei have limited grosgrain ribbons otherwise I would love shopping in my own country. So logged onto online shopping and as expected I was drowning in the sea of gorgeous ribbons. This is a dangerous moment for a ribbon lover armed with a Credit Card. My wise spending strategy is DO NOT buy immediately, browse thoroughly first and try to picture the colour combination. If it looks good in the head then only they go into the cart.

Checkout?? Nope, I don't rush into that yet. Usually the stuff will be in the cart for at least a week. Within that time span, the imaginations continue to grow and the cart will experience two things, either getting weight reduce or being dump with more ribbons. Also, the mind need to do serious thinking on the money spent.

Clicked checkout on March 21 and somehow I confidently expect that they will reach me within 2 to 3 weeks time. Boy, was I wrong! Goodbye April, Hello May and ribbons are still away. Hey, that rhymes!

I planned to check with the post office to see if the stuff arrives but never get to actually do it. Work life is getting busier I guess. On May 4, as I returned from work, there on the coffee table lay a brown box. YAY, they finally reached Brunei!!

Have a peek : )


My long awaited babies.

Gorgeous ribbons.

I'm backkkk =)

Hi all,

It's been ages not updating this blog. I've been pretty busy myself that I hardly have the time to master my hobbies i.e. making hair bows and knitting.

A few weeks back, I sneaked into my craft room with the intention of organising the area and guess what, I started playing with ribbons again. Blamed it on the bright, colourful and beautiful ribbons.

OK so the glue gun get heated again, scissors and lighter are back to work and stray of ribbons all over the place. It was an enjoyable evening though and here are the results of my late night sleep.

Three butterflies hair clip!!

Cute Felt Clippies

I like to call these as '3Ds clippies' as the characters - butterfly, bumble bee, whale and space shuttle seem to be alive. Cutting and sewing the details are quite intricate as their shapes are very small and I'm using free style cutting. No template whatsoever.


Managed to get Azzahra to wear one of them. She's into the butterfly design.

Wearable Cupcake

I've started this project far back in October 2009. My first attempt took almost two months of remaking...remaking...and remaking. I experienced difficulties in making the nubble, the small bulb hanging on the side of the frosting part. The yarn got tangled, twisted, knitted the wrong direction.....so on and so forth. Almost brought me to the verge of giving up but the cuteness of the hat gave me the motivation to keep on trying and oh Azzahra...as well.

The first one has a brown base and red frosting. It was overly done as I was practising with the knit, again....I lost track which ended up with an extended cupcake hat. Suitable for elongated alien head.

This is my second attempt and it is perrrrrfect. Certainly will make more of this and will add some creativity and add more decorations on the frosting. Will post them if they're ready.


An adorable cupcake with purple frosting topped with a cherry pom-pom.

Since my supermodel Azzahra is not always available...*wink..., I got Mr. Self-upright Beany Doll to model for me.

Party of Monsters

Sorry for the long silence....Am still doing bows, clippies, knitting and woven headband if you're wondering what I'm up to but at a slower pace. Will give updates if time allows. Pretty busy these days with 2010 workloads.

Here are my new creations......monsters......edible and non-edible ones. The monsters' sculptured ribbons are intended for hair clippies. The clips are not yet attached even up to now. Will try to make time this weekend and complete the set.

Monsters coming out from their furry world.

The clippies give me the inspiration to bake monster cookies. Aren't they cute... Both cookies and clippies won Azzahra's heart.

My Bows Debut

I''m so excited that my clippies will be making their selling debut today. They are available at UPSY DAISY BOUTIQUE. You can see the link to the shop's blog on my side bar. My anticipation is high at the moment as I'm not sure how's customer respond will be. I'm starting with Ladybug and Bumblebee. Here's the shoot of the two bugs on my flower bunch.

They're both are sure photogenic and friendly bugs.

My bows will also make their appearance once they are ready for sale.

YO-YO Hair Clip

I'm trying my hand on another kind of hair accessory using fabrics instead of the usual ribbons. Using a pink fabric with gorgeous princess motif print, I made a YO-YO hair clip. Some may call it Rosette hair clip. I add a felt love cut-out in the middle to match with the prints and also to hide the gathered hole where the fabric bind around.


Somehow...I feel it's not complete just to have the clip so I came up with a matching night pants. Believe it, the pants was done by hand as I have no sewing machine ...yet.....

Loop de Loop

Here's another style where a loopy bow surround the big bow with spikes. The loops give funky look to the bow.

Gone...?

It's been quite a while for not updating this blog. Well.. I've picked up a new hobby - KNITTING, and that very much explained my MIA.

Knitting is really interesting yet quite tough. Need extreme patience. As a beginner, here is my first attempt of making a knit hat. It's a Tomato hat... ha..ha..ha. Seriously, it is called a Tomato hat.

This took me almost 4 weeks to complete with lots and lots of 'frogging' going on. Frogging is the knitting term used when you rip out a whole project and start over. Imagine that...

I'm not quite satisfied yet with this one as the stem was not nicely made. Towards the end, I lost track of my knit patterns and to 'frogging' it again was not what I had in mind. Problem is, I don't have one important tool i.e. the Double-pointed needle (DPN). So, I just knit all the way using my circular knit needle and try to make out the stem. Gonna look for the DPN now....

To me, knitting is really rewarding. We get to see our fruit of labour and have a sense of accomplishment. Well.. almost with my Tomato hat. Thumbs up for a beginner, I guessed.

Top View

Side Views

Simply Sweet

These itty-bitty clips are super deliciously sweet looking.




Paired them up with the ribbon sculptured clippies to have the 'Va..Va..Voom' effect.

Mouse Ear Clippie

An adorable hair bow clip that has a mouse shape attached to the center adorned with a small bow and rhinestone. Isn't it cute.....

Am I Bugging You?

I managed to get a ladybird clip landed on my Azzahra’s head while she was busy with her tricycle. It didn’t take her long to realize something was going on as mommy was busy with the camera ha..ha..

Taken numerous candid shots and luckily got a good one before the ladybug got thrown up in the air.

Headband

I find that ribbon woven headband is a truly unique headband. You can play with the design according to what ribbon colour or print you like. The best part is that you can stick any hair bow with a clippie attachment into the ribbon to make it interchangeable.


This is my first take. The headband is 1” wide. A four color combination of light blue, aqua, white and yellow.

This is what I meant by interchangeable. Sorry, the bows don’t really match with the headband as I’m using them to show how they can be interchangeable.


Simply clip the clippie to any of the woven ribbon (theyr'e not glued).




Other advantages, you can place the bow anywhere either on the left, right or in the middle. Wish I can show these worn on a girl. Yeeeepppppp....Azzahra is no help at all.

Experiment with different colours or printed ribbons and you can have matching hair accessory with outfit.

I’m proud to have completed the headband and would definitely create more in future. Azzahra is excited too. She worn the headband for few seconds and gave compliments on how beautiful the headband was on her. I was scrambling to look for the camera and ends up with this photo.

Anyway, it’s a sign of a good start. BTW, the headband matched with her tees.

Boutique Bows

It’s fascinating to see beautiful boutique bow. I’m not talking about the mass produced ones but the handmade one-of-a-kind style. I like to browse the internet in search for boutique bows and they never failed to give me the oohs and aahs everytime. Most of them are however big sized at 5".

I don’t really fancy big bow. They looked kind of heavy on a child head. Medium and small sized bow suits me well and are just nice for the head. This is strictly my personal opinion only. I may try out doing the big bow one day or much probably on request (if any) *wink*

My first boutique bow with spikes, measured at 4".

My second boutique bow with spikes, measured at 4".

I really love having spikes on bows. They make quite a fashion. What do you think?

Here comes Hello Kitty……….. or not.

Hello Kitty was going to have a show during the school break. Leaflets about it were distributed at my son's school and he was so excited that he told us he was 'INVITED' thinking the leaflet was an Invitation Card. That was amusing.... Cut story short, we booked tickets for a 4pm show on June, 19 which is on a Friday, a convenient time for us from KB.

Arriving at the venue (ICC), it was strange enough that we were able to park near the building and it was quiet for a show to go on. Only when we enter, we knew the show is canceled due to some shipping problem in Singapore and the play costumes were stranded, as we’ve been told. The organizer staff told us that the news of the cancellation was in the paper (Brunei Times) and on air (Kristal FM) on Thursday June, 18. Such a short notice and we failed to know about it.

It was sooooooo frustrating and surely was visible on my son’s face. He kept on asking why the show was canceled so we make up by bringing him to play at the Mall’s game arcade.

As on my part, I was pretty mad too as I’ve been staying up most of the night to complete my Hello Kitty hair clip for my daughter to wear to the show (though she probably will not be wearing it).

Well…..looking at the bright side, I’m able to make one new hair clippie. Look at the heavy eyelashes…hmmmm…Hello Kitty with mascara version LOL.

More Hair Clippies

I really like making ribbon sculptured hair clippie. Here are some more.

Butterfly clippie

Ice cream cone clippie

Love clippie

Aren't they all cute.

Playing with Ribbons

I really love ribbons. they are so strikingly beautiful and delicious looking. Grosgrain type is the best.

Anyone knows where can I find good grosgrain ribbon in Brunei. I've checked most of the craft and gifts shop and they are mostly stocked up with satin or organza ribbons. Not much on grosgrain.

Turn to online shopping and find several overseas suppliers. The cost is not so much on the ribbons but more on the shipment to Brunei.

My very first ribbon clippie - would you like to have a watermelon.....

My First Clippie

Hair Clippie is my favourite. They are cute and can make one get hooked over making them. I do for sure....my only constraint is finding times to make more. But once I started, I usually aim to complete at least one project.

I started with felt and find it quite difficult to cut smooth edges, much more if the design is in small sizes. Really need good sharp scissors. Have thought of using the shaped paper cutter but not sure if it works with felt. Will try it out someday and let you all know. Anyone out there would like to give me ideas.

Try out a simple one and turn to be too fit for the clip. I realized the need to give extra space allowance for the clip pocket cause once we sew the felt, bear in mind that we're going to put a hair clip inside and the bulk of the clip will stretch the felt. We can always trim the excess afterward. Nonetheless we cannot make the clip pocket too wide otherwise the clippies will look sloppy.

Here is my heart clippie (second attempt actually). I can't find my very first one as it looks so bad that I don't bother to keep it. Will post if I find it.

Third attempt - Tree clippie

Noticed that they are not in proportion. The trunk is big for the leaves, looks like an unhealthy tree to me LOL.

Fourth attempt - Flower clippie

Yummy, sweet colour.