Shanghai 2013 ~ Day 1 & Day 2

Finally, i can post about my holidays. I've been busy choosing and editing the photos (hehe...sounds like a pro but i'm not :p ) So here it goes...

Day 1 (20.03.13) KL ~ Hangzhou

Our flight to Hangzhou International Airport  is at 8am, so i had to wake my girls up at 4.30am as the cab is picking us up at 5am. We arrived at LCCT around 6am and waited for the rest of the group (relatives - it's sorts of a family thingy)

Little Jay in her 'blur blur' state

Getting on board

Big Ray fell asleep as soon as she found her seat, even before the plane take flight!Can you imagine how tired she was having to wake up so early in the morning - she slept throughout our flight to Hangzhou ( 5 hours plus). We had to wake her up when the plane is about to land so that she could see the landing process.

I am so SLEEPY zzZZZ

Little Jay checking the weather

Arriving at the Hangzhou International Airport

Hangzhou International Airport

Shortly after arriving, we found our Tour Guide cum Driver (a Mr. Li aka Li Sifu) and started our journey to Haining. On the way, i saw these cute little red trucks that resembles the tuk-tuk in Thailand.

Our first stop is the Temple of Seagod . Guess what? This is the first time i went to a tourist spot and there is no one else except us. They must be closing early or perhaps the locals rather stay at home than 'chilling out' in the cold weather. Yup, the weather is much colder than i expected and luckily i've brought extra shirts and pants for my gals. Below are some photos of the temple.

 

Little Jay having her tea time

Next, we visit to a 'Prime Minister's House & Street'. (I'm not to sure who either hehehe..)

The huge difference of traveling with and without your kids is your focus will be on them rather than the tour guide (who explains the history and stuffs) and the scenic spots. While our Li Sifu was explaining things, Mommybie is busy catching up with Big Ray & Little Jay and taking photographs of them.

A sedan chair - olden days mode of transport

A stage in the Prime Minister house used for entertaining important guest

Below are some snapshots taken at the Prime Minister House Street.

Sisterly Fun

Big Ray getting bored waiting for the aunties shopping

Call me when you are ready ok?

Later, we were brought to the hotel and have our dinner there. Being our first day there, we were all still excited and thought perhaps we could go for a walk nearby after our dinner - just to see around, and my mom asked one of the waitress if there is any place around that is still open (that's because while on the way to the hotel we saw many shops closing and it's only 6pm!) Well, the waitress kindly replied " Madam, the weather is not good (too cold), better to stay indoor" . So, that's the end of our Day 1.



Day 2 (21.03.13) Haining ~ Suzhou

Good Morning Haining ! I woke up an hour early before our morning call at 6.30am. Why? Because i have to get myself ready first before waking up the 2 little gals. You'll have plenty of work to do - boiling water to make their milks, packing milk powders & water for later feeds, changing diapers, waking them up and getting them to dressed up is no easy task ( also getting them to poo poo before leaving the hotel :p)

Haining International Leather City

The first stop for the day is Haining International Leather City. Well, the entire area is huge consisting of a few blocks of buildings selling winter jackets, shoes, bags, luggage, wallets etc.
Anyway, we only visit a small section of the building as it is way too cold outside. The first thing that caught our attention are LEATHER GLOVES!! We were liked bees attracted to flowers and each bought a pair to protect our freezing fingers.

Wuzhen East Gate Water Village

Next, we went to the Wuzhen Water Village, one of China's ancient water town. It is a very nice place to visit with its charming architectural and unique culture. The whole town seem so peaceful and relaxing with the river sandwiched in between rows of traditional houses and stone bridges. Also, one can find lots of exhibitions on the old ways of life here such as the flower printed blue fabric, winery, traditional beds and etc. I personally think the people here did a great job preserving their culture.

Big Ray & Grandma

Big Ray at a kitchen display

Do you know what are these? Beds from the olden days!

 

And here we have a collections of olden days clothes, different styles and cutting.

A display on traditional Chinese wedding and customs

Oh...the sweet smells of Chinese wine, you could smell it even before you enter the doorway.

Pots of wine placed at the winery

The place where the wines go through the distillation & cooling process

Here comes the purified wines

And this was the most beautiful part of all ( for me). These pretty flower printed blue fabric all hanging down from the poles - don't you think it looks like a scene taken from those TVB dramas?
(hehehe..guess i'm watching too much dramas).

Little Jay is having the most fun here.

Samples of the flower printed blue fabric with different designs

A template (paper board) used to print the fabric

Flower printed blue fabric was said to have appeared since the Qing dynasty. Back then, people used wood blocks carved with reversed design to print the patterns on the fabric. While after the Song dynasty, people started to used paper board (picture above) to print the fabric.

Tools used to make the wood blocks for dyeing the fabric

Scenery from the Wuzhen Water Village

These ladies are preparing to weave a cloth the traditional way

Another beautiful scenery from the water village

Next, we will be heading to Suzhou.

Mommybie and gals having a snack time in the bus

Our first stop at Suzhou is the Flirting Garden (Former Residence of Tang BoFu - the scholar with 9 wives). But in real life according to our tour guide Xiao Shen, (we got a tour guide in Suzhou!)  he only have 2 wives and his life wasn't as glamorous as portrayed in movies and dramas.

Entrance to the Flirting Gardens

I forgot the Chinese name of this tree but it is loosely translate as Dragon Claw. Don't you think it looks like one? This tree is planted by noble people in the olden days. If you see it in someone's house, you'll know that the owner is some one respected, with certain rank or wealthy.

These flowers are flirtingly beautiful

At night, we went to the Suzhou Bird's Nest Stadium . Unfortunately i did not manage to take any photos here. It actually does look a bit like the Bird Nest Stadium in Beijing.

From there, we goes to the Harmony Times Square. The main attraction here is of course the 500meter long LCD screen above the walkway.

The LCD screen above the walkway

The LCD screen when not lighten up

Shanghai 2013 - Day 3 & Day 4
Shanghai 2013 - Day 5 & Day 6
Shanghai 2013 - Day 7 & Day 8

Holidays Stuffs ^^

Hi Hi gals!
Just been back from a holiday...and a tiring one!
So this post will be a quick update on a few items that was done before the holiday.
Well, i should have post this earlier but really didn't have the time and Big Ray was down with fever just a few days before our flight (oh gosh! that just got me panicking!!!)
Fortunately, she got well a day before our flight... =)

Okie, so here goes the list...


Fabric Belt

Make these fabric belt for Big Ray & Little Jay so that their jeans would stay put hehehe...
I would prefer toddlers to wear something with elastic and require no belts (easier for mommy to change their diaper) but since the weather is a bit cold i decided to let them have a few pair of jeans around.



Passport Holder

This is the first ever passport holder that i make with 4 slots and a little zipper pocket to keep some money & coins. All these while i've never use a passport holder but since i'm travelling with my 2 gals along, i'll need this to keep our passport together. I really loved the fabric and the out come of this holder but Silly Me, i miscalculate the seam allowances and MY PASSPORT COULD NOT FIT IN! Can you imagine how i felt then? ... =(

After spending the whole day with my mood turned to cloudy, i took out my stash of fabric and look for some materials to do a new one. And this time, i'll make sure i get the right measurement. And so this was it, my passport holder.

It was a combination of yellow & grey colour.  I think this was lovely too and the most important thing is - it fits the Passport. ^^ (I did not iron it beforehand hehe... so it looks so wrinkly)




Luggage Tag

Tadaa... aren't these luggage tags cute? I saw lots of fabric luggage tags tutorials on the web but i wanted something cute and bright so i ended up with these. I used felt for all of them except for the red matryoshka doll which i added a fabric as the dress ( it's pretty easy, just wrap a piece of fabric around the felt with fabric glue and sew them together). The transparent slot is actually book wrapper -  i bought the thicker plastic type from Popular Bookstore. Big Ray loves the Hello Kitty one. I actually put some poly fiber fill in the hello kitty one but the result is not as good as the flats one because the slots behind seems like 'puff up' if you notice from the picture below.

No-Knit Scarf

This was actually from a tutorial i found from Martha Stewart Crafts website. If you are interested, you can find the tutorial here. As i don't know how to knit, this was the next best thing to do. I think i can handle knots much better than knitting and i love the outcome of it ^^ .

I bought a ball of yarn from Daiso. Well, i did not follow the exact measurement because i don't have enough yarn so i basically divide them accordingly. Lucky me, it suits a toddler just nice.

And for the process of tying the knots, i hung up the yarn instead of laying them down which i find easier. (hehe... those hangers are  really old stuffs)  The first few knots got me thinking if i'm doing the right thing but trust your instinct, you'll get the hang of it after a while.




Thermometer Pouch

I always carry a thermometer whenever my gals are going for balik kampung or any trips which required more than 1 day. The original pouch was spoilt - the zipper came off  so i cut the pieces up and make one my own.

Notice the zipper part which was torn? It actually have me cracking up my head a bit sewing this pouch because of the curves and again i did not allocate enough seam allowances. Thus the pouch was a bit out of shape i guess...but fortunately, the thermometer still managed to squeeze in! Whew!

That's the front view in the picture above and the inside lining (picture below). I think i'll do this again sometime in the future - and to get the right measurement.

Well, that's all for this post. Next , i'll be posting about our holiday trip to China. See ya ! ^^

little zipper pouch

I haven't try sewing a zipper before and thought that it would be tough and troublesome. But i would like to try it someday, so i did some homework and go through a few tutorials and try this little zipper pouch. I'm so glad that it turn out well and the zipper wasn't so hard to sew after all. The purple colour felt pouch was for my elder daughter to play with. She loves to play with Daddy's wallet and Mommy's purse nowadays so i thought I'll get her one. She's happy with it =)

Below is one i tried sewing using scrap fabrics and i love it! I'm keeping this for myself and will be making more pouches. They are so handy and i have lots of things to keep with them.

CNY Blooms

My previous post was about flowers... and so was this one! I've decided to make a bouquet of little flowers using the ideas I saw on Facebook sometime ago.

 

Aren't they sweet? It is simple to make as well.

First of all, gather the materials. I searched around my house and found these:

1. Felt according to your colour choices

2. Cotton Twine

3. Steel Pin with Pearl

4. Plastic Container

5. A ball of fiber stuffing - i found a softball that fits perfectly :)

6. Matching threads, Sewing needle, Craft Glue (picture not shown)

To make the "vase" wrap the cotton twine around the plastic container using craft glue. Do Not leave the container up while wrapping. You don't want the cotton twine to come off at the bottom as you press them down firmly during the wrapping process. It may feels messy at first but don't worry, you'll get the hang of it after a few rounds. Below is the picture of how i did mine.

As for the flowers, i did mine using a 20 cents coin as my template. Each flower will need 4 frilly circles and 1 plain circle. To get the frilly circle, just draw some frills around the circle  and cut accordingly. Then take the first frilly circle and fold them in half and half again. Place them on the plain circle and sew a few stitches. Repeat with the other 3 frilly circles. Add a few more stitches to secure it and knot it underneath. Voila, you'll get a cute little flower. 

Next,push a pin through the middle of the flower and you are ready to arrange your flower on the fiber stuffing. I added 2 leaves (just to inject some green into it) which is very simple too. Cut a larger and a slightly smaller leaves and sew them to the back of your flower. Or you can pin it like your flower too. Hope the pictures helps.

Well, that's just about it. Pretty easy right except the cutting part..hehehe

Anyhow, I'm happy with the results. Maybe I'll do some other flowers next time. For the time being, this will seat  nicely in my living room. Happy Chinese New Year everyone!