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Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Summer

Hi there,

Summer is here but today it was raining almost all day..not fun. I woke up early to enter my cake into the Marin County Fair competition because I needed my sister to drive me there. I made a Knitting basket for the competition inspired by the tutorial by cake journal. I weaved a basket instead of using the basket weave embosser and I added a pair of scissors. Here are the pictures, my kids really want me to win...
We will be going to the fair this weekend and my kids are really looking forward to it, they love going to the Fair because they can play all the rides all day.



Last Sunday, my youngest son, Seamus really wanted to sell Lemonade at the Stern Grove Festival.  I helped him make fresh homemade Lemonade and get all the stuff ready on his wagon. Then we walked to the Grove. It was so crowded down there and we were very lucky to have a lot of customers that day. He was so happy. He was shy at the beginning, but he tried to be polite and ask the people there if they wanted to buy his Lemonade. He said he will do it again next week. So proud of him .

My son with his Lemonade wagon.

The crowd at Stern Grove Festival











Sunday, June 5, 2011

Friendship

Hi,
 It’s June already, we haven’t  seen a lot of sun. Still more rain to come according to the weather  forecast.  We have been busy the last couple weeks, we are going to sell the house and  move to a new place where my husband job take us to.  We have open houses  two times a week, and we have to keep the house clean all the time. I hope this will be over soon.
I want to talk about  “Friendship”.  I was born and raised in Jakarta, Indonesia. I had a lot of friends there and I love making new friends. My parent always said it’s easy to make enemies but hard to make friends. It’s true, since I moved here in San Francisco after we got married in 1997, it was hard for me to make friends in here.  Maybe because I didn’t grow up here.  I have tried and tried, and it seems like I have no luck finding a true friend. Anyway,  I am lucky that my friends back in Jakarta still care about me and we still keep in touch on a daily basis. I have  group chats with my friends from High School and college on my blackberry messenger. They keep updating me about everything going on in Jakarta.  Sometimes, a lot of jokes will crack me up and make me so happy. I have a lot of friends who cares for me and love me very much. It was not easy to find a good and loyal friend, and I am so thankful  that my friends always there for me. Some people said when you leave apart  then your friendship will grow apart  too..., I’m glad that hasn't happened to me.
However, sometimes there are friends who take advantage of your friendship. They only come to you when they need you and only think about themselves. I’m so glad I don’t have a friend like that. We always care for each other. So, if you really love your friend and care about them, show them that you love them, if you never meet them for a long time, send her a note, say Hi, or pick up the phone and call them, maybe they need you.

Anyway, I want to share with you a cake that I made for one of my clients. Her daughter graduated from middle school. Here is the cake :


Since next week is the last day of school, I was thinking about making something for the teachers, and I saw this project at : acreativemomma.blogspot.com, Crayon Monograms. Look what I made for Mrs. Conti and Mrs. Chiarani. I hope they will like it.

One for  Mrs. Conti and the other one for Mrs. Chiarani

Enjoy your Sunday...

Friday, May 6, 2011

Happy Mother's day...

Hi. there,

It's May already and we will be celebrating Mother's day this Sunday. I am from Indonesia and my husband is from America. He was born and raised in San Francisco. His family is Irish American, and that's why all my kids have an Irish names. In Indonesia, mother's day is in December 22, and usually during that time all the moms will have a day off while the Dads take over all the moms duties. Nice huh?...

I made couple of totes (revisable tote) for charity. I really want to help the kids in Indonesia who got effected by the Mount Merapi eruption, and I don't know how to get donation besides selling these tote. I'm so happy that I have a good response and also by using this bag I will be helping in saving in our environment. Here are the pictures of the bags, the blue one is the favorite, I have to make it over and over, because people love the blue bag.



I promised my daughter that I would make her a Doll quilt for her American Girl doll, and when I went to Borders, I saw this magazine called 101 Projects Patchwork Quilts . It is a very good magazine, with a lot of good stuff to make, you should grab one. So, I made this Doll Quilt and a small pillow to go with the quilt. I think it is very cute...


the back


Happy Mother's day everyone....

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

DS Quilt Collection

I have been reading from other bloggers about Denyse Schmidt fabric that is out and available at JoAnns. I love Jo Anns store, it's like a candy shop to me. I can stay there for hours looking for fabrics, books, , and other art and craft items. I decided to go there and check it out. They have almost all the collections, but I only have a couple for now. It was $. 9.99/yard and if you have a coupon you can get 50% off for one yard of fabric, not bad at all. If you want your own DS Quilts Collection, go to Little Bluebell, she is having a giveaway for all 21 prints (fat quarters). Hurry, head to her blog and leave a comment.

Some of DS Quilt Collections
I would like to say thank you to my friend Anabella from Life's Rich Pattern, she nominated me for the Stylish Blogger Award . I'm so honored and very flattered that she did that for me. I love her blog because she encouraged me to finish my first quilt. Look at me now...I'm about to finish my third quilt.
Here are the pictures of my third quilt that I'm still working on it, I have to make more blocks..and this quilt is for my daughter. She is very excited and can't wait to see the end result.







Thursday, March 24, 2011

My second quilt, finally!...


Finally, my second quilt is finished. I'm quiet happy with the result, and I think turn out pretty good. Now, I've gained confidence and want to try different shapes such as triangles or hexagons. I will start with my sherbet pips, and still looking for pattern that I like and color combination as well. 
So, here is the pictures...



the back of the quilt

I added some hand stitches at the border

Sunday, March 20, 2011

Cakes and quilt

I got a call from a woman who wanted to order a cake for her friend's baby shower. She was an easy customer, she let me decide what to do with the cake and she handed the invitation to me. On the invitation there was a pea pod baby, so I was thinking of doing a pea pod theme with some ideas from a pink cake box too.  And here is the cake... I love this cake, the baby turned out very cute and I wanted it to be perfect, so I made it flawless...I'm happy with the result.



The butterfly cupcakes were for my son's teacher's birthday. He told me that his classmate planned a surprise birthday party for their teacher, so they decided to surprise her with red velvet cupcake and the colorful butterflies.

When I was browsing for a tote pattern at Etsy, I found a very cute pattern from Ali Foster Pattern. So I bought the pattern and used the fabrics that I bought from Joan. Here is the tote... What do you think ?
Ali has some patterns on sale, and the instructions and pictures are very clear.  I had hoped I could share the pattern with you, but I have to respect her policy...
I'm thinking of selling it to find money for Kids in Java who were the victims of the Mount Merapi Erruption last October.

I made a mistake on the handle but I will fix it on the next one..Promise!

And finally my sherbet pips are here... I bought it on ebay, so cheap! I won the bid for 2 charm packs for $. 14.25...Yay.. I will make another quilt after I'm done with my second quilt. I know....I know... I kept talking about finishing my second quilt. I will finish it before Wednesday.
My Sherbet Pips...

O another note, please donate to the Red Cross and help the people in Japan.. my prayers go to all the people in Japan who were effected by the Tsunami. 

Friday, March 11, 2011

I'm back...

I have a cake order, a Christian Louboutin Shoe and I'm having a hard time with the shoe because of the wet weather in San Francisco. It took a long time for the shoe to dry, and it made me nervous. Finally, the shoe dried along with the other accessories too, and here are the pictures of the cake. I hope the woman who ordered the cake likes it.




The next cake is a surprise birthday cake for my youngest son's teacher. The kids plan to surprise their lovely teacher without asking the parents. They just assigned me to make red velvet cupcakes with butterflies. I'm thinking of make another cake for her after I saw the cake from Natasha. I asked her if I can use her design and she said yes..yay...!

I put my first quilt picture on my facebook and I was so surprised with the comments...everyone loved my quilt
I'm so excited and I can't wait to finish my second quilt. By the way, did you know that Sherbet Pips fabrics are out already ? I just bought one from ebay, and I can't wait to make a quilt out of it.

Have you ever won a giveaway ? I  have finally won one...a Duchess Necklace from Lia Sophia.  When I received the email about it, I was so happy ... I got a chance to choose the jewelry that I wanted from the collections, so I chose the Duchess Necklace, I think it's beautiful. I will take a picture when I get the necklace.

Have a nice weekend everyone... 








Thursday, March 3, 2011

My first finished quilt

Hi there,
I have been busy trying to finish my first quilt. I found Joy Lily, a very nice woman who is teaching a quilting class at South San Francisco. I love all the women in that class, they have been very helpful and very sweet especially to me, a beginner. I brought my quilt that I learned to make from you tube and other blogs, and she showed me how to finished it.  Since I didn't feel comfortable using the machine quilt for my first quilt, I decided to hand stitch it. Here is the picture of my finished quilt.



the backing, love the red and white.

Hand stitches


Now, I have to finish my second quilt. For my second quilt, I will try to machine quilt it. I have to learn how to do machine quilting. Maybe the simple machine quilting such as "stitch in the ditch" . My daughter already gave me an order: she wants me to make a quilt for her American Girl doll. I have to go to Jo-An again to find a fabric for her doll.

This week will be a busy week for me, I have a cake order too, and I have to share my time between quilting and making a cake. The woman who ordered the cake in the shape of a Christian Louboutin Shoe. She ordered a cake for her friend's birthday. I guess her friend loves Christian Louboutin Shoe. Right now, the weather in San Francisco is very wet and it took a long time for the shoe to dry. I will share the picture of the cake when it is ready.


Saturday, February 19, 2011

Bakerella book signing

When Bakerella aka Angie the author of the Cake Pops was here  last October 2010, I was in Indonesia visiting my mother, so I missed the book signing. I was so upset and I thought I would never have a chance to meet her in person again. Fortunately, last week she posted in her blog saying that she would be coming to San Francisco again for another book signing... Yay...I would not miss her this time.
I was hoping the weather would be nice with no rain, however, the rain came and it was cold and windy. We went to the Chronicle Book Store at Union Street. It was a nice, cute, and small book store. The line wasn't too long when we were there, and I stayed a only quick moment in line.
My daughter, Hannah came with me and she brought her a gift, a friendship bracelet that she made the night before.

Angie was very sweet and she answered all my questions about the cake pops. She also gave tips about selling them to fundraisers. What a fun day. Here are the pictures from the book signing.


A cute pose of Hannah and Angie.


Angie with the bracelet from Hannah



And this is my book

Friday, February 18, 2011

More progress

I was so happy that finally I made the progress. After I followed the tutorial from Crazy Mom Quilt on how to baste the quilt, here is the result.

 I'm not sure if I will do the quilt with the machine since I'm not familiar with it. I decided to do it by hand until I felt comfortable to do it with the machine. I would like to thank Annabella and Claudia who is encouraged me to keep trying...Thank you ladies!.


Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Here is my unfinished quilt!

As I promised before, I have finally finished my top quilt. I'm not quiet completely finished yet, I still have to finish putting it together. I'm still not sure on how to do the machine quilt and put the batting. I looked around and kept browsing until I finally found these two blogs  called  Sew Inspired and Crazy Mom Quilt. They both have basic tutorials that teach how to baste the quilt for beginners like me. I will try to follow their tutorial, and I will show you again how it looks.
Here is the picture of Dresden Plate from that I learn from the Missouri Star Quilt.

And the second picture is just a square pattern. The fabric is Kate Spain Fandango. I bought these charm packs from ebay, and they are great for a beginner to practice matching the squares together.



I have ordered more fabric from ebay from the Kate Spain collection for the back of the quilt. As soon as I receive the fabric, I will follow the instructions of Crazy Mom Quilt on how to baste the quilt.

Do you know Bakerella ? She will come again to San Francisco for another book signing.I missed the first book signing because I went to Indonesia to visit my mother. I'm so glad that she has decided to come back and have another book signing.. If you are in San Francisco on February 19, don't miss it. She will be in San Francisco  at the Chronicle Books Store at Union Street .

Friday, February 11, 2011

My new toy

My husband bought me a sewing machine about 10 years ago, right after I had my daughter. When he bought it, it included a course on how to use the sewing machine. However, every time I came to the store with the baby in the basinet, I didn't have a chance to learn anything because my daughter always cried. So, I decided to take the course later.. after my baby was a little bit older and guess what!, until now, the sewing machine has still been inside the box. So, I decided to do something with it... First, find manual and try to figure out how to use the sewing machine. Lucky for me, I made it worked, but I still to had to go through the manual for other applications
I'm so glad that it finally worked because I want to do so many things with this machine. I have been looking for a place to learn quilting around San Francisco especially for beginners. I need someone who can guide me from start to finish. However, I had no luck, so I googled it and found a lots of blogs that can help you learn how to quilt. I had to keep searching until I found the answer, and most of the results were very useful.
This is the picture of my sewing machine.

my new toy and the manual


 If you have the same machine and want to share with me on how to use it, please feel free to email me
You can learn from youtube as well. A woman named Jenny from the Missouri Star Quilt Company gave a free tutorial that was very useful and very clear. I'm so glad that I found her.
My first quilt is the Dresden Plate Quilt, I will show you when it's ready. Right now, It's still in progress..I will post the pictures tomorrow.





Tuesday, January 25, 2011

First post in 2011

Happy New Year everyone, May this New Year bring many opportunities your way to explore every joy in life and may your resolutions for the days ahead stay firm, turning all your dreams into reality and all your efforts into great achievements.

It has been a while since my last post. I have been busy here and there.... I want to talk about a book I just ordered from amazon. I haven't gotten the book yet but I saw it at the library. That's why I decided to buy it. I got a good deal from Living Social Deal.I bought a $10.00 amazon gift card, but it was worth $ 20.00. It was such a great deal.
Ok, back to the book, if you want to learn to bake anything from scratch, you should buy this book. The title is : Rose's Heavenly Cakes.

Rose's Heavenly Cakes


If you are looking for a good book to read, I have a recommendation. My sister in law gave me this book : Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese. She said it was a good book. If you see the review from amazon.com, you will see hundreds of good comments about this book. I will let you know about it when I'm done with this book

Cutting for Stone

Last weekend, I baked a cake for a little boy who loves Pirates. Her mother brought me plates and cups that  were going to used at the party, so I tried to incorporate the theme onto the cake. I painted the bottom tier to look like the map of a pirate and the second tier was red and white with a Pirate flag hanging on the tier. On top of the cake was the Treasure Chest with coins coming out the chest. I hope he liked the cake... Happy Birthday Emiliano...
Here are the pictures of the cakes :





 
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