Hats Off to the Grad! It’s Party Time!

27 Sep 09

Jared was very excited about his birthday. He had been talking about his birthday since the beginning of the year. This year, he wanted a birthday party rather than the usual 20 minutes birthday celebration in school.

Hubby and I discussed and thought of a few celebration options ... have a big party at Club House, food catering at home with tent and clown, kids party in baking school, small gathering at home with close friends, party with Krista school mates and teachers, etc.

Finally, we decided on a birthday party at home with Jared's classmates and teachers from Krista. We were thinking since this is the last year that Jared will be in pre-school and most of his classmates will not be in the same class or school as him. We would also like to show appreciation to those teachers in Krista who have nurtured him over the last 4 years.

Since we did not know Jared's classmates and their parents, we need to give proper invitation with details of the party. I searched on the Internet for card making software and didn't like any of them. After a few days of searching, Hubby goggle search and emailed this Printable Birthday Invitation link to me.

While deciding on the design and wordings on the invitation card, lots of idea came to my mind. I scribbled the birthday invitation wordings along these lines ... Jared and his classmates will be graduating from pre-school, they will move into primary school, its a graduation, its a farewell, its also a celebration of Jared's Birthday, etc.

Jared likes Pokemon and I chose those characters for the invitation cards and mix them with some graduation and cupcake pictures.

Finally, this is what I printed on the invitation card:

"As we bid farewell to Pre-School years, let’s celebrate the beginning of Primary School Years. Jared will be turning 6 and we would like you to join in the Birthday Celebration too!"

I also thought of the activities for the day. Nowadays, it is a trend for kids to have parties in baking school where kids will make pizza, decorate cookies or cupcakes and get to take them home in a nice gift pack. I did make some enquiries and noticed that its quite pricey to have such party in baking school.

I decided to have my own version of cupcake decorating session for kids and printed this on Jared's birthday invitation card itself "Please RSVP to decorate your own cupcake to bring home". I knew this would create some excitement in the kids. I included Hubby and my handphone numbers for the parents to RSVP.

I printed 20 invitation cards, fold them and asked Jared to write his guests name on the invitation and envelopes.

I bought these colourful envelopes from Popular Bookstore.

We did not receive many RSVP phone calls or sms from parents of Jared's classmates. Unlike inviting our own friends where we could just email or sms to them to chase for confirmation. We did not have the parents contact numbers. I got worry as we need to know the number of people attending the party for food preparation purpose.

Few days before the party, I decided to print RSVP reply slip, wrote the classmates names, tick Yes or No and asked for contact number in case of emergency. It was a clever idea as most of the reply slip came back the following day. Malaysians are real lazy and love convenience though it means inconvenience for others :( I've forgotten to ask if any of the kids were allergy to any food. In future, I will include this RSVP reply slip in the invitation card itself.

It was a mix respond. Some of the classmates couldn't make it as it was still Hari Raya celebration, some asked if they could bring their siblings along which we welcomed very much, some came with their mother, etc.

I shall share more details on the preparation of the party, especially the busy day just before the party.

Digital SLR and My Best Friend's Hubby's Birthday

Christina is a sweet lady and she always is. Her hubby, Yuan Hui's birthday was in Oct 08. She invited us to her house for dinner. This time round, Christina cooked dinner for all of us ... 3 families!

Recently, Yuan Hui is into photography. During our Kuantan trip, he was toying with his SLR digital camera and took quite a number of good shots. Hubby suggested to get him a book on SLR photography.

Hubby browsed through photography books in Popular Book shop in 1 Utama and bought this book "Mastering Your Digital SLR ... How To Get The Most Out Of Your Digital Camera".

Hope Yuan Hui would like this book and find good tips on digital SLR.

I made this card cum book mark to go along with the gift.

I used 2 different pattern papers for the front and back of the card. I printed one black and white photo and another colour photo of Yuan Hui (taken in Kuantan while he was concentrating in photo shooting with his SLR camera) and glued it to the card. The tab on top of the card is to be used as a book mark.

Birthday boy shooting the cup cakes made by his beloved wife, Christina and chocolate cake brought by his best friend.

Christina lighting up the candles on the cakes.



Lovely cakes from lovely wife ... the best birthday gift!

Hubby teased me that I didn't cook and invite close friends over for dinner on his birthday, as Christina did for her hubby. Christina, you've set such a high standard for wives to meet.

Teddy Bear and Table Cards

Thurs, 16 Oct 08

My colleague from the Marketing Department, Wendy had a big launch event. She asked me to make table cards for the event. There were 6 teddy bears and 6 bowls of spices on 6 cocktail tables.

Based on the colour of the teddy bear and bowls, I made these 6 table cards.

This is the first card that I made. The card matches the colour of the spices.

So is this card. Wendy likes this card the most. She likes it being simple and elegant.

This card matches the colour of the bowl.

So is this card. It matches this pink bowl.


These 2 cards match the colour of the teddy bear's cardigan and I missed out the photos of the cards with the teddy bears.

I received compliments from my colleagues on the cards. I was glad that I could contribute in a small way to the Company big launch event.

Gift ideas for children birthday

I’ve never like to give snacks and tit bits as party pack, especially nowadays with so many products affected by the toxic chemical, melamine. We are not sure which products are safe to be consumed and which are not.

Hubby and I went to Becon and bought Faber Castell and Stabilo stationery sets. Each set comprises of 12 2B pencils, rubber and sharpener in a clear case. To personalise the party pack, I made name tag for each of Jared’s classmates and his teacher using animal die cut and rubber stamp (refer to my earlier post on Craft Puncher and Die Cuts).

I asked Jared to write his classmates’ names on each of the cards and we inserted the name tags into the pencil cases.

I hope the children will not be disappointed that there are no snacks or tit bits but serious writing tools.

Children, hope you'll like this gift!

Craft Puncher and Die Cuts

I bought this corner puncher yesterday from Memories, 1 Utama at RM34.80. Corner puncher makes a great different to our craft. I've been thinking of getting one for a long time as RM30+ for a puncher seems to be expensive. I used to cut the corner myself using scissors. However, the effect is very different. You cant get a round, smooth, balance corner.

Can you see the different between the 2 cards above? The card on the left is without corner punch, wheres I've punched the 4 corners of the right card with the corner puncher.

I bought this Sizzix Sidekick die cut starter kit (at RM225, after 10% member discount) in Apr 08. It came with 2 die cuts ie a flower and "Happy Birthday" embossed plate. I chose this Sizzix die cutting machine as it also work with other brands ie Cuttlebug dies.

Check out Sizzix website http://www.sizzix.com/ to find out more about die cut machines, ideas on die cuts, etc.

Jared loves to play with this machine. I gave him some papers and let him explored with it.

Together with the starter kit, I bought this Yarn alphabets dies at RM220.50. It came with both the uppercase and lower case. Prior to this, I've been buying lots of alphabets cards for journaling. At the end of the day, I used up lots of the vowels alphabets but not the others. So, these dies are good solution to it.

I loved this Cuttlebug Zoo Animals dies (RM88) and bought it cause I'll be making lots of cards for Jared and friends' kids.

Look at these cards. Aren't they lovely? Using die cuts do take up lots of time and effort, however, I just love the 3D effect of it. It is also so versatile. I can mix and match with lots of paper colour and pattern.

And this was the other stamps that I bought on the same day at RM86.40 after the 10% member discount.

And finally, this is the Frog and Lily Pad rubber stamp that I bought. It is a woodblock set of 14 cute frog and fun message stamps, including a thought balloon.

I realised I have lots of dies and rubber stamps on animals. At that moment, I had the idea of making "Animal" cards, tag, etc for Jared and kids.

Jared and I worked on the above cards. I let him stamp the animals on papers and colour them.

After trying both dies and rubber stamps, there are pros and cons of both. For dies, we need to choose a few colour papers and work with the die cut machine, match them and glue them on papers. The effect is excellent.

As for rubber stamps, after stamping on papers, we need to colour the stamp and scissor cut the design. However, the effect is not as good as using die cut.

Scrapbook and cardmaking are an expensive hobby. Many times, I'll try to stay away from the shops but somehow, I ended up in the shops for a few hours and spent money that I thought its too much to spent on stamps and papers, promised myself that I'll not spend anymore on it and at the end, buying more things that I believe is the last thing to buy.

But look at the results! Aren't they cute?

Hayley and her "Kiasu Mom"

My good friend from dancing school time, Amy has started blogging as well. She has recently given birth to a baby girl, Hayley and created a blog http://kiasumom.blogspot.com/ about her girl and life as a new mom.

Amy worked as a part time dancer and always appear on Astro shows (as dancer to singing competition, Beauty pageant, etc). Otherwise, she is the regional manager with a MNC + Hayley's mom.

I made this card for Amy and her baby, Hayley, along with a pink dress as a gift for her full moon.

A few days ago, I received a surprise email from Amy. She sent me an email together with this photo of Hayley in the pink dress. How time flies. Hayley is 7 months old now.

I am glad that Amy and Hayley like the gift, appreciated it and took the trouble to email me the photos.

Thank you, Amy. Keep up the good work as a new mom.

Cheese Cakes and Cards

I baked marble cheese cake on Thurs, 28 Aug. Its a working day and only started baking after my dinner at ~9pm . It is for 7th uncle's 60th birthday celebration on Friday.

I obtained the recipe from "Bake with Yen" book. Its a much simpler recipe and method compared to other baking books. The recipe is enough to make one big and 2 small trays. During my first attempt, I only bake a big cake and ended up the with a cheese cake that was very high, unlike the usual low height cheese cake. Honestly, it is much easier to consume a cheesecake as long there is not too much of it.

While waiting for the cakes to cool down, I decided to make cards to give along with the cakes.

This is the card I made for Jo. I tried using the paper trimmer that Hubby bought for me for my birthday. The "J" is from a chip board. I cut and paste pattern paper to it. The 3 layers flowers represent "O".

This is the card that I made for Jared's pre-school, Krista. The school celebrated Merdeka Day on Fri, 29 Aug and all the students wore national costume to school. The alphabets "TQ" is from die cut.

By the time the cakes were water-bath baked for 2 hours and cool before I could chill them overnight in the fridge, its already past 2am and went to sleep past 4am, to finish up the cards.

These are the 2 small cake that were given to Jo and Krista teachers. Jo sms me in the afternoon and said "Wow.. Your cheese cake is so yummy! Even my son loves it. We almost finish it already. You really have to teach me how to bake it".