Day 001

Akemashite omedetou gozaimasu!
Manigong Bagong Taon!
Happy New Year!

Welcome to circa 2008!

Panda + Neko Meeting

I briefly mentioned my meeting with my bestfriend in my previous post and here's the photoblog of that meeting.

Photos courtesy of Kathy-chan.

Bubble Juice, SM Megamall

Neko and I met in SM Megamall so I can treat her in Bubble Juice. It's my turn to treat her and I wanted to try Bubble Juice, as usual mine is coffee flavored. We also had Beef Curry Korokke and Tamago Maki.

Dream Yarns, Glorietta

Visited their shop to check if they still have the dyelot for the yarn I am currently using for my C3 project, no such luck. But Neko and I were so fascinated with the knitted scarf they had on display. That's me with my new hair and modeling the scarf for Neko. The piece of paper I'm holding in the photo was their flyer for the tutorials they're offering. I am going to enroll for a knitting class next payday, woohoo!

Yamazaki, Little Tokyo

Our last stop will be Yamazaki for dinner. We're actually planning of eating Okinomiyaki for dinner but the restaurant is closed for the night so we tried the Onigiri in Yamazaki. The rice balls we're so delicious and it has Salmon inside. Neko had Squid Tempura and I had Korokke for the second time. I just loved Korokke, blame me hahaha! I'll definitely go back for their Onigiri, it's just amazing.

Magazines + Fabric

Yesterday was so fun! I met Kathy-chan, a friend from my previous employment and we ate from one Japanese restaurant to another. But before that, I received my gift to myself, a Moleskine (mol-a-skeen-a) Red Limited Edition Twin Set of Weekly Diary + Notebook! I am loving my new planner plus the red color of the set matches my favorite Nike bag.

And again I was blessed with a couple of Japanese craft books from my Santa and was lucky enough to get a hold of Adorn Summer and Spring 2007 and Crochet Today! July/August 2007 in Booksale. I was so glad because I love the patterns I've seen in Ravelry in that particular Crochet Today! release. Really looking forward in making those projects as soon as I received the lovely yarns I ordered online.

I must say that my lady luck is working overtime because finally this girl has found a local store selling Japanese fabrics! Woohoo! I only bought a yard because really, I felt foolish enough for buying fabric for a future project when I still haven't found the perfect sewing machine yet.

Short term goal: To find the perfect yet compact sewing machine before January 2008 ends.

Where was I?

Kris and I treated his family to a trip to co-co-cold Tagaytay City to celebrate Christmas and the birthday of his father which is also December 25th. A two-hour drive was cut into only an hour, less traffic of course. As expected, the Picnic Grove was packed and we had a hard time looking for a cottage with a decent view.

We ate a lot, roamed the Eco-trail. Hang-out near the slope. Took silly pictures. Laughed a lot. Ate a lot. Ate Mushroomburgers. Bought souvenirs. Visited a family friend in the city near Tagaytay. Took a lot of fruits home then slept in the van on our way home.

Taal Volcano

Despite the fact that there's a slight drizzle and the cold weather in the park, we made the most of our stay there and spent a lot of time enjoying the view and filling our lungs with fresh air.

How was your Christmas?

Personal Update...

Curious as to what happened to my two years worth of long hair?

Well, it's been murdered and has been resurrected with me nagging on the background.

Click here for more details: Dear Hair...

Photos are up in my Multiply site, that is if you're interested to know if I look like my Father, my brother or my niece, hahaha!

Meri Kurisumasu Minna-san!

Enjoy the rest of the year and be safe!

Quick Update

It's been so long since I last made an update and now I am making one in a hurry. Anyway, how have you been doing fine folks?

A lot of new things happened before the year end. I've got a new job! It happened so fast and now I'm already in my first vacation in the company. A friend referred me to a huge company, they called me on a Monday, had a schedule for exams and interview on a Wednesday, signed a contract on that same day and attended a New Hire Orientation on a Thursday. So fast I'm still grasping the fact that I am now employed after seven months. But I'm loving it. The people I'm working with during training were so helpful and it was so fun! I'm excited + nervous for the actual work.

Oh, did I say that I received my first pay? Yes, I did! And as soon as I had cash on hand, I went to Dream Yarns in Glorietta and bought three skeins of Lion Brand Cotton-Ease in Teal. I would have bought more if they have more Teal colors, though it looks gray + brown to me.

For now, training is on vacation and it will resume on the 26th of December. Hopefully I'll get to finish my new project with these yarns before the year ends. I'm on my second skein now and I still need to make a special order for these same colors. Really, really looking forward to that.

Lastly, my brother and his family are back home to spend Christmas here in Manila. They're still not used to the way Singaporeans celebrate Christmas. Well, we Filipinos give our all on this wonderful season and we celebrate Christmas longer than anybody else and I think no one can beat that. Three more days before the big day, we'll be off to Tagaytay to spend our Holidays there eating seafoods and enjoying the fresh air. I'm so excited I can't think straight, haha!

Wish me luck, I'm on my way to the salon and will have my two years worth of long hair chop off, well not really, maybe six inches short or even shorter. We'll see.

Enjoy your weekends!

Fan Bookmark

It's done! My first ever bookmark! And yet I am saying goodbye (already?!?) to this lovely bookmark and already on it's way to California together with the Christmas card.

I saw this first in Mimi's blog months ago, the pattern that was shared by one generous Crochetville member named cupcake. She's a very talented mom from Australia and just by looking at those colorful bookmarks made me want to create one myself, and I finally did it. Just in case, this pattern was a total hit in C'ville that I think, almost everyone in the forum made this and now making it's own noise in Ravelry. But if you're not a member of these two wonderful groups, you can go ahead and visit the creator's blog and say thank you after you've made one. I just did it myself.

Pattern: Fan Bookmark by Crochetroo

Well, if you can't crochet but would like to see and have her wonderful creations, go visit her Etsy shop and you might want to add one or two of the items that she have there.

For this project, I used Monaco Cotton Thread Ombre size 8 and 1.75mm steel hook. Most of the bookmarks (like this) are actually required to block with fabric stiffener but we don't have that locally. So I asked my ever dependable crochet buddy Mimi for suggestions and she said that it would work using a mixture of water and glue but the lazy me didn't do that but I found a cheaper alternative. The technique that we all used when we were kids when we found this wonderful flower and want to preserve it, yes, that's it! I lay it flat between the pages of a hard book then add another hard book on top of it, let is sit for a whole day and viola. It's flat and the texture is still soft and nice to touch.

It's guaranteed super easy and fast plus the result is really really amazing. Just look at it for yourself. I think I'll make more using the new threads that I recently purchased.

Please look forward to it.

Past and the Future

An FO, hear ye, hear ye!

I have been working on this starghan for two months now and it's finished! I am so proud of myself! My eagerness to finish this cutie is because of the fact that another friend of mine just gave birth to a baby girl and soon to be my third inaanak (godchild) for the year. What I am excited about is the other gift that I'm going to make for her. If my eagerness permit me to make a set of hat, mittens and booties then I would gladly do so. The baby has been through a lot while she's inside her mother's womb so this is really good news that she's healthy, alive and kickin', yeah!

Notice the two new cotton threads that I bought, they look so yummy. Unfortunately, the brown one (lower left) isn't really nice to work with, it's so tough and I just learned that it has been discontinued. Gosh! Christmas is fast zooming in and I have been slacking of with my projects, bad Gene. If only I could find some sort of motivation or inspiration. Anyway, the Christmas Tree is up and all I need is to write Santa for my wishlist, yoohoo, Santa!

My Christmas (Short-term) Wishlists are 1) all the yummy and soft yarns in the world; 2) different types of hook that can work with the lovely yarns I wished in #1; 3) pattern books with wonderful wearables; 4) Super yummy, all organic lip balm; and 5) very effective skin moisturizer.

These are the things that I so wanted ASAP and yet so out of reach. One good way to cheer me up is look at the wonderful Japanese craft books that I just had and daydream on the projects while sipping my coffee.

I am such a Queen of Unfinished Business.

A Special Treat

I feel blessed for having a partner like KC. I have always been a brat and lazy when it comes to finishing his scarf but he loved me nevertheless and asked someone a huge favor just so he can make me happy and for me to stop annoying him. I felt so ecstatic when he gave me a plastic bag filled with magazines. Not just magazines but Japanese craft magazines! Whoa!


You can't imagine my delight when I look into the bag. I jumped, laughed like crazy and hang on his neck and my grin is so wide I think I was lucky that my jaws didn't lock.

And look at that! I have Cotton Friend Summer Edition 2007! This is too much! Too much! Too many wonderful things going on and I so wanted to have a sewing machine right at this very moment so I can start working on the projects!

Oh my gosh, I can't sleep. I think I'll sleep with my magazines tonight.

Zen Scarf for Her

This is the partner of the first Zen Scarf that I made for KC.

I used two strands of cotton thread held together and a 4 mm. Inox hook so the result is a bit wider than the brown one.