Pierce.

I've been meaning to post it since September last year after I arrived from my two-week Eurotrippin' and not until today I had the sudden motivation to revive my blog again - I'm getting some creative juices!

There was this simple dress I got for roughly S$8 in BKK and I wanted to make things rather different. My style, Miss Foo will say when she sees this. Everyone knows I like drape drape, so here's just one way to do things your own way and be different, and all you need is:

the basic dress with only 1 pin

 

• 1 Long dress, preferably with a pattern so draped and scrunch looks visible compared to solid black
• 10-15 pins, big ones like those nappy for babies (since I used them for this) and normal ones, big ones better to keep the weight.

It's not so easy, I had to pin and pierce it while I wear it because laying them on the bed and scrunching it in will not look the same. I tried it on and off, and best way is to keep it ON.
Sorry for the bad image, it was really late at night and I was rushing off or I'll look horrendous on Day 5.

 This was scrunched and held perfectly with trial and error. Make sure your pins really are strong and won't fall off halfway. My dress material was polyester cotton jersey and polyester made it ultra heavy. So those babies huge ones actually did help through the inside.

TA - DA, you now look different.

See the rest of my trip's looks of 10 days worth!

the KTCHN corner.

Here's the place where all my cooking dilemmas and taste journey to develop where life forces the girl inside me to do something to feed my rumbling tummy at a student's budget price! But taste of course, absolutely matters, a French would comment.

About two months back when I don't feel like going out to eat I was wanting clear chewy noodles, and so I've got a big whole pack, which could last forever just for me! It is a lot.

Soup was standard where I mixed it in, and this time is something without recipe!

Ingredients A:

Clear Chinese/Korean noodles

Carrots (I always try to add this vegetable to nourish my eyes!)

Crab sticks

Ingredients B:

Tofu (I love the shrimp flavored tofu)
Ready-to-eat Fishcakes (or any kind)

Chopped garlic

Spices: Fish sauce, tom yum paste, pepper, salt, butter (in a change of oil)

OK, make sure you've got a rice cooker which saves your life and uses minimal electricity (better than gas) for steaming ingredients A till cooked. How do you know it's cooked? Of course when the noodles has gone transparent and you felt like eh, it dissolved into water?!




See the noodles are invisible in the rice pot... and the being cooked ingredients B.

On the cooking stove, for ingredients B since I only had Teflon pans which is OK, anything goes, melt the butter as oil, add in the garlic which adds the wonderful aroma and the whole house would think you're born to be chef till it's bit burnt brown, then slide in the tofu, pre-cut. Add the spices as desired, the whole ratio of tom yum paste now.

So you'll get a brown fried coated tofu in the end, make sure both sides are cooked, then turn off, waiting for the noodles to be cooked along together.




Dry A out of water, then finally mix together with tofu in the pan! Add spices to your like again. If it looks cooked then it should be done - turn off the stove!


And here's a measly look-like meal however the taste was surprisingly more than adequate! :)

Adding chilli powder before I removed it, immediately after I slurrrped it up and it was good, and thus there isn't any final food impression image. =P

 • • • •

Recent health conscious leads me to get fresh vegetables and lots of free time this week (no class drrrt drrrt) and cook like my mom, always a portion of greenery just plainly cooked.

Easy, simple, a change from fried brown things!

Spices and prepare: chopped garlic, fish sauce, chicken stock/concentrate, butter
Vegetable: anything green and doesn't have natural taste (e.g. spinach has another way of cooking and it has its own taste beforehand) like chaysim, watercress...


How to do:
Melt a bit of butter and garlic as usual till it has the aroma.
Add  the rinsed out vegetables, then spray over the spices as needed. Chicken stock needs only a bit.
Wait till the vegetables' leaves crinkle, meaning cooked!

You could see the fishballs and garlic on one side and freshly cleaned and added into the pan on the other side, the vegetables.
Pour accordingly
Prepare rice in bowl, so when the vegetables are cooked add on top of the rice with the bit sauce left (fish sauce, chicken stock) so the rice would also have taste.

Done! Healthy simple meal! Ones in the mixed vegetable rice stalls (esp. Singaporeans) are full of oil.

Last Christmas...

I went back home early to Jakarta, and immediately wanted to rush back to dear super chill little house in Padalarang. There's also KBS World stuck to my TV so my butt stays still in the couch for pre-ordered shows. Whoo!

A little warning beforehand, it'll be image heavy, long post with outbursts and unnecessary tidbits. Didn't say I warned ya'll ;)

I have these holiday crafty plans to do in preparation for the trip to Japan, hopefully to do power dressing Japanese style and be like one! So here were were the inspiration and the results hence...

The pictures are seriously huge in resolution so as soon as you click it more details can be seen. So click away and enjoy!

•Full on embellishments, inspired by and courtesy of Miu Miu Fall 2009 lookbook. However actually Doo.Ri had first made embellished stockings•

 ++ the We Love Tights colorful stockings previously image posted ++

***

And the beautiful results...!

***

The processes are long-hard driven takes time but worth it for the fun and trials.

The DIY socks and hand covers were plain white polyester, a stocking kind of feel, and with basic tie-dye method of using rubber bands and all...

I had used blue, pink, and yellow for the dyes. Adding a spoonful of salt so the color would last longer to each mix, I first boiled the water with the color then dipped the socks area color desired.

Cooling it off with plain water, to check if the color would fade away and to re-dip into the color mix if so.

With the rubber band effect, here's one of the monochrome color product which is stunningly pretty!

***

        The grey embellished (in Indonesian, payet) tights are originally boring grey makes me look fat tights from Topshop (sale by the way since early summer) was painstakingly sewed by hand one by one... Scurrilous not to fret, my sewing skills and patience have dramatically increase (partly because it is the holiday and deadlines were not demanded (but definitely before 17th of Dec.) and it made me wonder again is Design or Communication the one I want...

(topshop sparklies)

         The two vests were out of a want to make my own extra clothing; I daily wear T-shirts and having a vest with patterns just add extra color. The vests were made out of Japanese fabrics which are absolutely appealing and totemo kawaii prints, one flowers mixed with hearts and the other has postage stamps pattern with a soft color, such prints are rare!

         My grandmother the used to be dressmaker teacher was my pattern drafter and maker. She taught me the basics, jotted down in a notebook, I did once on my own with some confusion and still do not know out of my head, however unnecessary because all I did was cut and sew parts together, the final side, since my grandma sews coarsely so I only let her do the inner parts until the vest looks tangible by shape. Pugnacious was the little drama, "Aaaah why did you sew so rough, ma! Let me do it unpick, unpick!" and I finished the sewing whilst watching KBS or Sleepless in Seattle and You've Got Mail a number of times.

 

       My auntie's old pair of black jeans are also heaven-sent. She gave it to me the previous summer and I wore them for formal slacks but now, thanks to the trend of making yourself looking like a beggar, I sacrificed my cheese grater and cutter to rip it off!! Plus studs on the side and added zipper on each side, so it's easier to wear them as the holes always stops my toes from wearing.

And gave holes to my vest as well. Now it looks ultra hip - swell!

 

 •the completed look

wearing pink Ouval tee, People of Asia vest, DIY ripped studded jeans•

I wanted to do some decorations like this Zara handmade detailed bag which costs your whole wallet life just for a small sling bag. Yes it's handmade so that is why I want to make. The body isn't hard, the details of how to sew to hide the stitches is what I question.

A few days before saying bye-bye to Indonesia to go to Tokyo, I stayed in Jakarta to prepare and pack my luggage, making a list on outfit mix plans which I keep loosing the papers and changing the items of the mix for 3-4 papers. Tsk tsk tsk. And my mom's wardrobe is actually full of things that are now in trend; things that she has for over a decade (so fashion IS going backwards...)...

AAAAANNND I FOUND TREASURES.

Yes they're now MiNE officially, my treasures I 'window shopping' at to my mom's wardrobe. I found a white blazer with navy blue polka-dot patterns for the inner collar, and if my mom recalls it, it's from Japan. Plus, my auntie's old black pair of supertightonthetummy jeans and look what I've did above, no cost. And I saw what Jejung wore in this editorial, the feel is the same!

Datte sa, if you want to see my journey in Kyushu of day one wearing the blazer, move onto this post!

I also grabbed a black suit blazer which is very useful for presentations, and old metal belts which I forgot to bring it back here. My mom also sneak peeked a Chanel-something she has but my dad hated it so she never wore it from the first time she wore, which was probably almost two decades!

 Awesomenesssssssssssss I can't wait I hope my body copes if I would decide I'll go to Bali and I'll finally meet my dear dear items I will love!

***

More speciarrr online shopping for graphic tees which I finally have gotten aroundwas buying these limited, non-conformist with high quality controls and all...

Did I tell you I'm a package junkie as well, packaging is everything for me, so the saying goes of "the cover of the book" is a tad important, it's the emphasis, golden ratio for me. If the outside doesn't excites me, how can we know the inside would be a journey to embark on? The feeling of wanting to rip off the plastic and carefully using paper knife so the package won't tear to see the inside... nothing beats that!

 

It's none other than The Balletcats!

             Now the question is, what to do with these tees. My hands are itchy but I don't want to cut them out... especially the soft cotton and the teeny extrude level of the print (handmade, how neat can that be) and the blue and red color is just nice (or, alright, let's put last week's lesson into practice! Nice is just too general. It should be more like exceptional, jaw-dropping...) But yes, these kinds of things that excites you from the start should be the things that are penchant, always looking forward to get it out from your closet after a hiatus cycle and love it even more.