My England Is Not So Powderful

Writer/Rabbit pouch owner

Remember the rabbit zip pouches I made? Sylvia Toh snagged the red rabbit version. If you're from Singapore, you'll know her as Paik Choo, the author of Eh, Goondu! and Lagi Goondu! If you're not familiar with Sylvia, she's really the guru of Singlish. Singaporeans are not native English speakers. With English, Malay, Chinese and dialects thrown together, it's no surprise Singlish evolved. My favourite Singlish expression is of course "England is not so powderful". England really means English while Powderful is a deliberate mispronunciation of powerful. You use this expression when you want to make fun of someone's poor command of spoken English.

Recently Sylvia had her 2 books reprinted as The Complete Eh, Goondu! (goondu means moron).

 I got an autographed copy.

 

I made 5 more rabbit zip pouches for keeping red packets.

Deep purple

Lucky red

Peachy

Pinky

Maroon

gimme sexy, gimme dots

I like making my mini zip handbags and for this one, I used yuwa linen cotton polka dots. The only part I dislike about making this bag is the handles. They are narrow and hard to turn inside out.

Today is Friday and for me Friday couldn't come soon enough. I got really tired of waking up at 5:45am and I could feel my body slowly breaking down. Today in particular, I felt really old. Firstly, I felt so cold thru'out the morning I had to wear a sweater even when I'm home. For crying out loud, Singapore is just 1º22´ north of the equator! Then while still wrapped in my sweater, I went to lie down for ONE minute. Who was I kidding? I woke up 2.5 hours later! In my defence, I did not take a nap. The nap took me.

8th & 9th January 2011
MAAD
red dot Traffic
28 Maxwell Road
Singapore 069120
11am to 7pm both days

I have zip pouches coming out of my ears

Today is the first day of school. Everything went smoothly in the morning. I woke up when the alarm rang at 5:45am. The kids managed to get out of bed, wash up and get dressed. No voices were raised. Most importantly, it didn't rain. Since it was the first day of school and for my girl, the school didn't just re-located - it went from double session to single session, I expected hiccups. Nothing major happened. My girl was dismissed much later then expected due to it being first day. So she arrived home at 2pm. I was a little worried. Hopefully the school gets its act together soon! For my son, it went pretty ok except he wasn't assigned his locker. So I had to call the locker company. Oh well, first day.

It's 6pm as I write this and I'm already exhausted. I can't imagine doing this for the next 2 months. After the long, long school holidays, I had forgotten that my kids nap a lot after school. Suddenly it gets very quiet and sure enough, the 2 of them are lying flat wherever they are, fast asleep. As for me, I'm resisting any napping because I'm worried it'll spoil my sleep tonight.

Initially I had planned on "turning over a new leaf" as my girl puts it and start jogging on Monday. Unfortunately I had to go to my ENT doc to get my EN checked out. You remember all those times my eyelids, face swelled up and my nose had sneezing fits and all that smoke I inhaled? Well, they came back and bit my ass. Because I ended up with a persistent stuffed nose and ears. A stuffed ear for me is of course bad news as I already can't hear very well. Anyhoo, my ENT doc has put me on some meds which should take care of my sensitivity. You know, I wasn't borned with a sensitive nose. I was fine, really until I moved to the westesn part of Singapore when I got married. So you could say my marriage screwed up my nose. You see, me hubs lived in the west near a heavy industrial area and the air is horrifically polluted. Every day I could smell this godawful smell but strangely, the people I lived with couldn't smell anything! Me hubs explained recently in a column why he smelled nothing here.

So today I should have gone jogging but I was so sleepy! I shall try again tomorrow.

While the kids were at school, I sewed up a storm. I was really just trying to stay awake.

zip pouches coming out of my ears

You don't have to count. I made TEN!

toy story aliens

alexander henry apples & pears

rilakkuma

retta warehine

blue/white nautical

serendipity

samurai

Okay, I'm usually not into traditional Japanese fabric but I bought this one for a strange reason. I was looking for fabric with faces/figures and this one caught my eye. Actually the black colourway was the one I wanted. Unfortunately it was all out. The shop owner told me a Japanese restaurant owner had bought the entire stock to make into outfits for the crew. I was so intrigued by the story that I had to buy the red colourway. I don't know what I was thinking. I had this weird idea that I would make some bags with this fabric and maybe by some coincidence the bag owner would dine in the EXACT same Japanese restaurant and when the waitress is taking her order, she would look up and go, "eh....?". I'm funny, right?

flying pigs

kokka purple patchwork

blue momo

It's 4 days to January MAAD and I can't help but feel much apprehension. With MAAD being held on a different weekend from the norm, would enough people show up? Oh, the perils of being a seller. See ya.

8th & 9th January 2011
MAAD
red dot Traffic
28 Maxwell Road
Singapore 069120
11am to 7pm both days

The Return Of The Rabbits

So how did you start the New Year? I ended the year really well with a package in the mail.

These were in the package.

It was my winning from Bec Clarke Creations. This was part of the Sew Mama Sew giveaways which I'm sure many of you entered for. I'm so lucky. (easy now, no bragging) Other than the 2 MoMo charm packs, the package included 3 surprises : a print fabric with vintage-like floral and 2 scotch tapes. The scotch tapes are no ordinary scotch tapes. They have pretty images on them! I can't bear to use them.

So how did I spend my New Year? Would you believe I was sewing? If you're not Chinese, you may not know this. The Year Of The Rabbit is coming soon. Let me explain if this is new to you. The calendar you use is the Gregorian calendar. Well, we use that too for our daily lives. But we also use the Chinese calendar for festivals. So the first day of the Chinese New Year is 3rd February 2011. And that is the first day of the Year of the Rabbit which will run right up to January 22 2012. Right now, it is still the Year of the Tiger.

4-in-1 calendar

This is my calendar. It is a special calendar which the Members of Parliament in my constituency print and give out for free every year. It has the Gregorian, Chinese, Islamic and Tamil calendar all in one calendar. Amazing, isn't it? If you zoom in, you will see what I mean.

Well, so I had this idea to make rabbit zip pouches for women to put their red packets during Chinese New Year. What do you think? I made the pouches a little longer than my normal zip pouches because I noticed that some red packets are really long.

SGD18 each (lucky number)

So I was sewing these rabbit zip pouches when I stayed up to mark the New Year. My plan is to make a total of 8. (lucky number)

fabric in waiting

It seems I'm in a zip pouch mood. Look at all the fabric I cut up, just waiting to be sewn up. I've completed 2 so far. They are for my kids. My son wanted something "as plain as can be". What???

Camouflage is plain, right?

I find it impossible to make a solid green zip pouch without any details. So I went for camouflage. My son did not scream when he saw it so it meant he liked it. Besides, it looked man-man.

For my girl, it was easy. She had asked me to save this fabric for her some time ago.

I started the year with a brand new wallet. I knew my rip curl wallet was dying when it started shedding.

While I searched for a new wallet, I used my son's old super cool spiderman wallet.

The problem with the spidey wallet? Not enough compartments. I'm not a regular-size wallet person. I like my wallets long. The weird reason? I don't like my notes folded! I like my money nice and flat. Me hubs surprised me with a new wallet. It came with a $50 note. How nice! Actually I told him to put money in the wallet because when I was younger, I once received a wallet for a birthday present and it came with money. I was told you can't give someone an empty wallet. I like this custom or superstition!

This is my new wallet. Hope it lasts a few years.

So many compartments for my discount cards.

This is for the cheque book but I'm not in the habit of carrying my cheque book out. So I'm using it to keep my receipts.

And of course a big coins compartment.

The next MAAD will be held this coming weekend on 8th & 9th January. It was postponed due to it falling on New Year's Day. Once again I'll be selling my wares and despite the drastically falling sales at MAAD month after month after month, I will make an effort to make a few more new bags. Without hope, there is nothing. See you.

8th & 9th January 2011
MAAD
red dot Traffic
28 Maxwell Road
Singapore 069120
11am to 7pm both days