Adorable room, no?

New Finds

I was doing some research today for K's birthday and gosh but kids birthday parties are ridiculous! I just discovered a whole new brand of blogs, dedicated purely to themed parties. I admit I was well-trained by my parents in exuberant kid's parties that took weeks to plan and execute, involved tons of food and hired entertainers (yes, I know, I know) but I am so psyched to plan a grassy backyard that can be used for exactly these soirees. What will we do if we don't actually have a child? Well, maybe my cousins will lend me their first-born *evil grin* to princess up or we'll adopt a party-hungry third-world baby. (Wanted: adoptive child, must like birthday cakes, bubble baths, wooden oak floors and staircases, rides in Jeep and somewhat smothering granparents)

I'm also pysched to discover that thanks to the glories of the internet, one can now outsource a lot of the cutie-fying, great Etsy websites like NickJR.com, Chickabug, W Hostess, Sweet and Saucy Supply and B.Nute that make and coordinate all manner of food toppers, gingham bunting and vintage print invitations. What we really need though, is a Walmart or Costco for cartons of sidewalk chalk, bubble blowers and cheap fabric.

Check out Sarah's Party Perfect, Imprintables, SmallChangeBigChanges blog for parties replete with favours, goodie bags, car race tracks, decorations, garden set-ups, costumes, basically, if you think you're OCD, this is a great cure to know that you're really not that far gone.

Here are some really cute ones, Tank Engines, Max the Superhero and Pirates and Princesses. I love the mix of theme And colour.

E's wedding flowers: Dreaming in coral

This was my last wedding assignment in September, for my cousin E. She'd graciously accepted my offer to help with her flowers and entrusted me with her coral and cream theme. E. is a really sweet, good soul and I wanted to reflect that in the design, using soft, petally flowers like peonies, which she had requested, tulips, carnations, eustomias and the tips of temperate flowers like foxgloves. Coincidentally, it also matched her tiered, gauzy ballgown skirt- she looked like a tall, graceful swan on her wedding day!


This picture is more accurate to the colour of the flowers. E. had sent me a brief months and months in advance of her wedding, specifying colours like coral, pale pinks, beige, creams and gold. One of my best memories of her wedding is the night before, her younger sisters picked away at flowers while E. hopped on and off the phone, then later on, eating dinner and laughing together. Her mom said it reminded her of when we were both just children and made her feel like crying with happiness and sadness at the same time. One thing I realize about doing flowers the night before- I was so happy with how her bouquet was a tight, round and perfectly symmetrical posy. Alas, by the next morning, the blooms had grown even larger and this pushed out the shape of my nice posy into a slightly messier, though probably more natural bouquet!


E. specified that her bouquet was to be more coral but the bridesmaids, who she'd dressed in long chiffon coral dresses, were to have bouquets that were more cream-white. With the leftover corals, beiges and whites, as well as some pale coral, small calla lilies, we made boutennieres for all the men and ushers. I hadn't seen the bridesmaid dresses till the day itself but coincidentally, the coral tulips and roses were exactly the same shade.


When we went to pick out flowers, there were some very Kate Spade-ish parrot tulips in striped green and white, which she also liked and authorised for inclusion if they were available (which they weren't on the day itself) so the bouquet could actually have been really punchy, with rose reds and those tulip green and whites. Instead, I kept to the original, softer, more feminine colour scheme the whole way through and added some dusty miller and translucent red juniper berries to soften out the tight bunches of flowers. The flowers would also have gone well with green succulents.


At the last minute, I saw stalks of these curly-wurly ferns (I'm not sure what they are called but I know they are tropical) and added those for some dimension. Those were really the only "hard" element in the bouquet, which I think was very different to flowers that I've made in the past. This had less leaves, was distinctly less wild and less dark (didn't have the blood-dark hydrangeas, large and black-berries of past work- despite the dark-looking photograph here, which I think was partly because of the shadow tint). The berries were all tiny and many flowers were small, with none really dominating.


Generally, this was more summery, polished and wrapped with the braided tan leather ribbon and white lace, was very suited I think, to E's personality. I also think that I'd been looking at so many coral inspirations lately that I was very into large David Austen roses, whirly soft eustomias, ripe juicy peaches, taupe velvet ribbons- you get the idea, not a burning fall or wintry spring anywhere in sight. She married my new cousin YW and is moving to be with him in Australia, where I just know she's going to be the world's best wife and mother. Congratulations!

*All photo credit to Eng Hong of 39East Photography

A New House

Some photos of the near-finished apartment. Let's start with my favourite. This is the room where we knocked out a wall and replaced it with glass. We also re-positioned all the doors of the rooms to face the stairwell, to let in more light and make the apartment more communal. Now light floods through the stairwell and from the masterbedroom, you can see the double-barelled volume of the apartment, which is why the two walls are purposely left raw. That and I was rather inspired by the apartment in Woody Allen's Matchpoint and Twilight.


The stairs and the second-storey landing have tempered glass panes, which turn the stairs from an imposition into a distinct architectural feature. And very child unfriendly, as I later realized.




This is the living room, with the flush-panelled cupboards (lots of storage) and the faux-hollow block wall. The ceiling surface-mounted lights were laminated in the same laminate as the cabinetry and kitchen island to preserve the ceiling height, which is now, still about 3 meters. Thanks to the drop in the floor, it's got a great sense of height, which I think would get even better with low sofas and a large coffee table. The photos don't really show the length of the living room- the funny thing is, all the contractors tried to convince me that it could be a living and dining room (it is about the size of conjoined living and dining rooms of most other apartments), why is a large living room such a bad thing?




The sliding doors out to the balcony and open-concept kitchen. We carved out of the kitchen space to form a helper's room on the first floor and it helps to open up the space for a large, seperated dining area.




The masterbathroom, matching sinks, nuetral wall tiles and the bedroom- a great view overlooking the low-lying Queen Astrid area! One of the other rooms has a great view as well, possibly better than the master, while the third bedroom is a bit shafted with a sliding door to a tiny balcony but much less of a view.

Friday I'm in love

I guess there's a rainbow paddlepop kid in all of us after all

Still waiting, after all these years

Almost time for a new weekly update, although there isn't much to report on the visual front, the piping and aircon ducting are still going on and tiling is almost complete and the wardrobes are in. Although there is still work to be done, it really makes big difference. Part of me can't wait to see the place done up and the elements that I can't wait to see are the choice of tiles, the floors, the glass railings on the stairs, the wood grain in the living room.

However, we've come to the part of the renovation where the pace moves very, s-l-o-w-l-y. Everything else however, moves very quickly. We put the place up for sale, partly on a lark, thinking that no one would really pay what we wanted for it. Well, you can guess the rest of the story. Someone did come along. Funny how a big risk, a new purchase, an old estate, a load of renovations, an untenanted situation, changes from a big risk of having overpaid, to a small risk with yet the exact same fundamentals.

So the long story short is that, we are selling. It is a good price and they seem nice people. We'll find somewhere else to live and start over; we could definitely use the financial boost. In the meantime, we still have to finish the renovation. I guess they are getting a good deal, a brilliant location, a brilliant view, a brilliant if I do say so myself, renovation, delivered to them at a price for which yes, I suppose they've paid for much of that. The downsides? Well, the same, odd shapes, odd walls, no facilities, one car parking.

How do you synthesize four people into what was essentially two people's view of a home? Well, that, I have yet to answer. Can it be done? We'll find out. I wander around the place and it no longer feels like home and there are days I can't really care if it is finished or not. I do want to see it finished but it's become more like I pay for their way. And when their way is the washing machine and dryer in the storeroom or no unfinished grey brick walls or dark wood finishings, it's strange, boring and somehow feels angrily out of sync.

What will I do about the new couch I bought? When will my lamps find a home? Where will we go next? Where should we go next? I stayed awhile to watch the sunset off the beautiful unblocked tree top balcony view that is no longer ours and watched the twinkling lights come on one by one in the neighbourhood and tried not to feel sad. I think I succeeded. We're young, we have each other and we can now own most things we'd want. If we had kids, they could go to college anywhere they choose. That's not so bad, right?