Spoon Necklace - sealed stamp

Sorry for MIA forever... Or maybe you're used to my absence? (it happen.. many times already.. and I am deeply sorry for my absencessss..)

I have never work full time before. It's crazy that my colleaguess who start work from 930 and ends at 2300... and show up at 930 sharp the next day.. How on earth could you do that? To stuck in that office for over 12 hours? Luckily I am still a newbies in the offices, not much work. But I was grantee by my supervisor that my workload will be increased by 60% next month. God bless me..

Ok, that is my reason for absences.. I am figuring out how to manage my time to blog/ craft / write letter/ make envies.. It's getting better. I am here finally, at Tuesday's night.

See that cute little thing up there? Yup, my latest craft, spoon necklace.

I love the stamp from England. Hong Kong was a British Colony until 1997. I kind of miss the colonial era. This 97 cents stamp from England touch my heart. I cut it from the envelope, stick it in the spoon. Seal it with Epoxy resin. Now, the memory is alive, stay with me, forever.

Simple to make your own!

1.Saw the spoon handle in half.

2.Bend it backward with force.
(I asked my dad to do the first two steps. Thank You Dad! )

3. decorate your spoon.
(Tips, Cover your pic/stamp/drawing with mod podge or PVA glue. So that it won't bleed when you pour in Epoxy resin.)

4. Pour in the mix of Epoxy resin. Patiently wait for 24 hours. Yup, it take a day. It's worth it!
(Tips, you can wait for one or two hours and put in some beads / buttons. So that the beads won't sink in the bottom. It give the spoon a little texture. )

5. Voila, Wear with pride!

September - Mail Incoming

Can you believe the summer is over? We are actually in September! And this is the best month I ever had in the entire year! I got a lot job interviews (meanwhile I am still waiting for "You're Hire!" phone call.. waiting suck. but chances are coming! ) and I got a lot of lovely mail ! Thank you for sending me lovely post. I have to share with you, no matter how far you live!

Kid come first. Ok, I don't remember when and why I mail the panda postcard to a kid. (Ok, I don't really keep track of my outgoing postcards..that's why I say"I don't remember" ) I bet he/she is very young, judging from the handwriting. I love the hand-draw heart and Polar Bear and Penguin!

From Mail incoming Sept

Darja! This postcard make my day. Not only because I like the white flower from Japan, but also Darja remembered me while she was traveling in Japan! Very Very sweet of you! If you are interested in learning Chinese, ask Darja. She writes perfect grammatical correct and colloquial Chinese. Oh, I forgot to tell you, she is a German girl !



Cutest Stamp Ever!


PostMuse send me a postcard first via sendsomething.net. And our correspondence start by exchanging postards, not letter. Simple and plain. I am a caffeine-holic. Post Muse take my caffeine addiction to a higher level. Now, not only I am addicted the drinkable caffeine, but also the readable one!



Calvin and Hobbs Stamp!!!!



Postcrossing - Postcard from Russia.



Four postcards from postcrossing arrived my mailbox last week. But this one worth mentioning is because .. I really love stamps from Russia. They are very colonial and elegant.



New Pen Pal - Melisse.


Melisse is from New York. She found me through indiefixx penpal project. (speaking of pen pal project.. I have no clue how to work on the new system.. Any tips? ) The first letter that she sent me accompanied with a letter-press Hello card from WeHeartPaper! I really want to learn how to make letter pressing. It's not very popular in Hong Kong, not to mention doing letter press in small scale. But, hey, I am gonna visit U.S. someday and found out how it's made! (Or I will simply buy tons of letter pressed card instead.. :p)



Sara from Oh, my darling project. This is a very lovely project. You will have a group of pen pal. And you will keep exchanging correspondence within your group. I haven't write to any one in the group yet. But I am going to ! Thanks Sara for this card!



Sofia. The first Pen Pal I encounter this year through indiefixx. I feel like I am at the beach right now when I open the mail and find the sand and seashell from Sweden accompanied with vintage beach postcards! Oh I love summer~!



Nature themed stamps from Sweden



Last But not least, Fabulous Felicity! Very cute hand made stickers and a very Japanese booklet! Look how she turn a paper bag into a environmentally friendly envelope.

I love BIG 5 on the envies! Addressing me as Five or 5 will make my day and put a smile on the postman's face!



Thank You for the package!


You do not need a fancy or expensive paper to write a letter. Write on the inside of paper bag and put the letter into envies made from magazine! It cost you nothing, except the very inexpensive postal stamps.

Happy writing!

Love,
Ms. Five

Hurtfully hilarious.

Not a big fan of 3D / 4D animation.
I enjoy simple cartoon, like those early 2D Disney cartoon.

I like this one. Simple, hilarious, and hurtful. Poor Daddy!

If you like simple cartoons too, check out this blog!

Happy Wednesday!

Make it up to you'all

Zillion Sorry I MIA for so long! Excuse... Erh.. I got no excuse except I am super lazy. Ooops.. truth is ugly. Sorry again.

A best friend of mine, who happen to love letter writing also, draw me some letter paper~! They are cute and awesome~!

Just have a quick look here.





No wonder we are best friend. Candy Ma, I call her Miss ma, is a teacher in primary school and not surprisingly, she teaches Visual Art! She is much craft-ier than I do. From Binding books to sewing fabric Cupcake, nothing scare her. Crazily in love with teaching, kids, and the traditional language of all time - Chinese (she professionally studies Chinese, i.e., she analyze text. Scary! ). Obviously, drawing is one of the things that she fond of.

One day, she mail me a letter set she draw. I cannot help but sharing with you all! With her generous permission, I am now sharing SIX letter paper she designed for you!

Yup, it's six. Including the above three letters, there are still three other designs, Go Download it here! You'll know how talented she is!

Print it out and start writing ! =)

Speaking of which, writing letter, it has been a long time since my last mail post. I have got tons of Great mail, I am going to share with you soon. I promise, here.

The blog writing mood is Back!

Quote from Sherlock

If it's the rubbish that keep cheer me up and stay alive - I don't mind being ordinary. Do you mind?

Quote from Sherlock, Season 1, Episode 3 - The Great Game.

I love detective novel and TV show. Really, I do.

Make my own Journal

Have I ever told you that my family name in Chinese, Ng, means FIVE? If I directly translate my last name into English, I will be addressed as "Ms. Five".
It's cool, isn't it? So I put this salutation on the cover of my newly made journal, do you like it?

This is a very easy to make journal, paper, glue, and card stock (or photo). Thank for the video tutorial here, make my night funnier.

If you look closely to the crown, he is holding a banner with Chinese writing on it. 香港 means Hong Kong. The banner was a matchbox cover. Before encountering this matchbox, I had no idea that Hong Kong had a history of making matches!

Friend of mine, a rich one, subscribe to Nat Geo for three years and never read any of them. She, gave all here precious Nat Geo Mag to me. Ok, No, I don't think I will read them all. Nat Geo actually is a great source for collage! The image is InCreDiBle~! I like Hamming Bird, A Lot!

Original From..
Crown found here.
Match Box found here.
Hamming bird from Nat Geo Mag

Great Find today: Delightful Jazz just for you~!

Have a funny happy week~!

View from my window

From the view of my apartment. I live in the 16th floor.





The green part of the photo is the park my dog always go to. (98% of park in Hong Kong said No Dog. Including this one. ) A little space that make me believe, I am breathing, though difficultly. It said, hey messy you, I am so green and breathing, how can you be suffocating? Put yourself together~!!!!

A little park, give me a chance to live longer and happier.

Just across the road, Still filled with residential skyscrapers.

Ride with me .. to the Near Space

Cautions: You might experience faint, nausea, uncomfortable during the ride to the near space. Hold tight to the BALLOON ~!



Magnificent views isn't it? Time to tell you the truth, which you can check out Here, the serious article about this great ride.=)

I have heard that Thursday is the grumpiest weekday of all week (Surprisingly, not Monday..), so may this video remind you, the world, is really insanely beautiful and amazing.

Happy Thursday~!

This is where I live

Maybe you would be interested to know where I live, the city of buildings, Hong Kong.

Here it is.





I can barely breathe. Totally suffocating!!

The city for buildings, but not human. Someday, the buildings will turn into living robot and kill all the human. I mean it.

photoshop workbook

I just start penpaling at the end of last year. The first Pen Pal, Sofia, found me from the Pen Pal Project by indiefixx. And She is E-N-G-A-G-E-D!

So I decide to make her something special. Something that she could write on. Photoshop is very very new to me and thanks to the free tutorial by Pugly Pixel I have acquire some skills that sufficient for me to make the following stationery! Ok, I declare that I am now photoshop-holic. Any dose that could cure my disease?





The marriage register I found via The Graphic Fairy blog and the sillohette by the Vintage Moth. Two great blogs that has tons of vintage and contemporary Clip Art. I think this may serve as a register list or a piece of paper that with the Love Vow on it! I printed it out on a heavy weight paper and going to send them to Sweden!




(Click to Enlarge. Welcome to print it out and write all over it! Happy Writing! )

The Prugly Pixel not only has the sweetest and useful of tutorial, but also a lot of lovely image to download! I got the lined paper just from the Prugly Pixel freebie package! And I merge it into the wallpaper offered by the Graphic Fairy. Oh, don't you just want to write on that ? Yup, I am going to write on this paper I just made and send them over to Sweden!

Happy Travelling!

Postally yours,
Vicky

P.S. Here are some great blogs that offer tons of clip art image

1. Agence Eureka. Very Very resourceful blog. Easily to spends hours and hours just surfing it.
2. BiliOdyssey. Explicitly vintage-like clip art.
   
3. Arachneas Attic. Vintage images totally on public domain, totally FREE to use!!
   
4. Vintage Printable. The name said it all.
   

The kindest person on earth

From Postcard from the postcard project

From Postcard from the postcard project

From Postcard from the postcard project

From Postcard from the postcard project

Aren't they gorgeous? I truly believe it's always a blessing to have the ability to give. Elizabeth is absolutely blessed. She run an amazing and generous project on her blog call The Postcard Project. Just drop her a line and the kindest postcard will arrive in your mail-box. Not a swap, Not commercial activities, just pure kindness to send you a postcard. To make your day.

It's Elizabeth who inspire me of the Envie adoption project. Of course, my silly project have nothing that could compare to hers. Not only you could pick your theme of postcard, Elizabeth even decorate the postcard beautifully. Drawing of the Japanese style animated girl is her strength. Do check out how delicate and beautiful they are!!

In April this year, I send her an email and suggesting we could do a trade. She send me one, and I send her one. Three months later, today, I open my mail box and Voila, the second postcard from Elizabeth! I never expected the second one to come around! The 20's Empire State postcard from the U.S., I just Love Love Love it!

I do believe, truly believe, Love is all around!

Things you must do to make me happy

A very funny and sweet list I got from wordfilled envie swap from swap-bot. My partner send me this check list, "Things you must do to make me happy" is hilarious!

Here it is. Free for you to download!

How to use it? Whenever you have a fight with your love one, filled out this envies and present to him/her. Force him/her to do things that could cheer you up~!

Tip: Always tick "From Now On" and "Or else", it's more effective this way. XDXD

Wish you guys all the best and a lovely day!

Thank you for adopting (and featuring) !

The Evnie Adoption Programme is going so well!! Thank You for participating AND mentioning about this small silly programme in your blog! The envies has already went to the U.S., Canada, Germany, England and even Africa!!!!! Woo.. They are around the globe! Oh, Yay~!

Huge Thanks to first two bloggers who adopt the envies even before I work out the little details! Faiza is the friendliest blogger I ever know who brave enough to drop me a line and interested in my silly programme. The geneous blogger Zoe, even send me a postcard in return!



This was the "logo" for the first batch of envies I send out. Look how hilarious they are~!.. haha

The programme bring me so many surprises! Ana's blog is always with positive energy. Her blog always bright up my day and remind me how great the nature has to offer us. She is kind enough to suggest that we should have a envies swap. I love the catoon envies she send me~! yAy.



It's the programme that brought me one more penpal from Germany! Tanuki wrote me email and tell me that she know how to read and write Chinese. I am so so so Surprised! Because she really write like a native Chinese! And here we are, penpaling started!

Maria blogged about this little programme on her blog even before I send here any envies! Our world is filled with kind and lovely people. You are all gorgeous! Internet, what a great invention!

Thank you every who adopted the envies! And Zillion Thanks to everyone that mention about this silly programme on their blog! You guys are geneours and Amamzing !

Trifle thing about my father

I want to post about my mail. Unfortunately, my dear card reader is dead. My laptop computer with implanted card reader also unable to read my memory card from my camera.

I don't want anyone to think that I am dead or something. So I decided to post something.

My dad is very smart in a cunning way. So here is a little story about me and him happened this afternoon.




Just something I made is generous and amazing blog that provide tons of tutorial from web design to jewelery making. The latest post is about how to make penny pendant. And I REALLY want to make it.

So, I ask my dad,

Can you drill a tiny little hole in this 50 cent coin?

He answers,

No. It need special equipment. What are you drilling it for?

I want to make a pendant. And I see people doing it in the U.S.

If it turn into a pedant, it must be ugly. And Don't break my drill. Don't even try to do that when I'm not at home.

And 5 second later,

He came to me silently, and handed me a Japanese 50 Yen coin - With a huge hole in the middle.



I said, it saves a lot of trouble. Except I want a gold one.

Fill in the blank Friday

Woo, the topic for the a Fill In The Blank Friday is FOOD! Couldn't help but answer all the questions right away! May be I haven't tell you, I am crazy about food. I don't cook very well. But I know very well where you can buy the best organic vegetable or where you can buy the most traditional Shanghai food. I even have very good relationship with those little store owners who sell those ingredients. Food! Here are my answers !



1.If I could choose my last meal it would be Beijing Style Dumpling noodles made in the little restaurant around my neighborhood in accompany with Iced cold Soy Milk. Follow with a bar of Godiva Dark Chocolate. Ok, they are not perfect match. It's a bit fusion. That is exactly the reason why I want it to be my last meal. Last meal would be a combination of all the food I like.. so here they are.

2. My favorite person to share a meal with is my younger sister. She is the only person on earth I could mock and laugh at during meal without being piss off. It's not about the food after all. It's the joy of sharing. She is perfect for that.

3. The best meal I've ever had was a bowl of Chinese soup - Parseley with perserved egg fish soup cooked by my grandpa. When I was in England for a month, the first thing I wanted to eat when I arrived Hong Kong was this soup. Hot, Yum and I missed the smell. I rush to my grandpa home for this soup. This remind me my life worth living.

4. The one food that makes me feel instantly better when I'm having a bad day is a bar of Dark Toblerone Chocolate. (Ok, any brand of Dark Chocolate would do. I just very fond of Toblerone recently.) No explanation require I guess. Girls born to be kidnapped by chocolate. (The photo at left: I filled the already emptied Toblerone box with Candies and mail it to my friend! The box arrived to her mail box safe and sound! Thanks postman! )

5. My absolute specialty in the kitchen is Instant noodles? Does that count? If you are asking for real cooking and real food, Spaghetti with pesto sauce plus a fried egg. I only cook when I am alone. And this dish is easy to cook plus I can share some plain spaghetti with my dog LEO and he always love it.

6. The city that has the best food is Hong Kong. Please allow me to explain. It's just because I live here for 20+ years. I never spent that much time in anywhere on earth for that long. The weird thing is that Hong Kong has all sort of dishes and restaurant coming from around the world but I can't think of one presentable dishes that can represent Hong Kong. (Dim Sum does not count, coz it is from Canton, Not solely Hong Kong)

and my favorite restaurant there is 巧興, the little restaurant I mentioned in Q1. Lovely couple from Beijing cooking the best dumpling noodles in Hong Kong. The important thing is the shop is just 5 minutes walk away! Convience and cheap! (A bowl of lovely dumpling noodles is less than 5 bucks!)

7. My favorite healthy snack is Golden Kiwi.I like the gel-ed hair style. My sis call it the bad boy because of the "hair style" it has. We call the regular green one the good boy.

8. In my opinion the nationality which has the best food is Chinese. HUGE variety. Super diverse. Go to China and the dishes will drive you crazy.

9. If I could learn to cook anything in the world (and be really good at it!) I'd choose spaghetti. Simple, fast, and comforting.

10. The most outrageous dessert I've ever had was Pile of Chesscakesssss. My friend and I went to ALL YOU CAN EAT Cheescake Buffet. We eat at least 15 piece of cheescake. I skip the breakfast, lunch and dinner the next day. NEVER TRY IT AGAIN! Got Cheesecake phobia for two months!

Christmas came to me

For the best viewing experience in reading this blog post, may I present you my beloved Hong Kong artist Jacky Cheung singing "Everyday is Christmas"? The song share the same theme of this blog post. Trust me, this will be the first and best Christmas song you ever listen this year. (Of coz.. It's only June.. It's a little bit early for Christmas. But Christmas just came to me! )




Did I tell you I pick up reading again? Bookmark is the best companion during reading. So I decided to make my own.

When I was wandering in the craft store, I found the lovely reindeer charm. When I bought it, I had no idea what was purpose for me to buy it. The reindeer is so cute and I had to bring it home.

In the evening, I decided to make something. So, I pull out the bookmark I bought and the reindeer. But that is quite dull if my bookmark just has one reindeer. So sad and lonely. I looked over my crafting materials (translation: A pile of stuff ranging from scrape paper to ribbon, from scrape fabric to plastic bottles. ) and found the ribbons I brought last Christmas in the thrift store.

Voila, Christmas came to me just like that!

I may be naive
　But I do believe
　That reindeer fly on Christmas Eve :)

Happy Holiday~!

I could draw?

What do you think? Do you think I could draw judging from these two inchies? Swap-bot had a inchies for beginner swap. Anything that welcomed either Beginner or Newbies always draw my attention and tempted to join. These inchies above are all for this swap.

My friend who knew me since I was 6, we went to primary and secondary school together, asked do you remember that you hated Art class when you was in primary school? Why are you picking all that art and craft stuff lately?

I have no idea why I picked art and craft up, despite the fact that I am still suck at it. At least I have fun. And, hey no one is judging, right?

Exactly! When I was in school, teachers was judging. Maybe this is the reason why I hated Art class. My works are not here for you to grade, it's for me to have fun. It's the process that I enjoy. But after all, I need an excuse to pick up drawing, so I enter swap.


OK, I know, this is too much pick going on. An ATC for Newbies from swap-bot which I signed up. This is my second ATC. Now, you have more evident to tell me, do you think I can draw? Or I am still suck? Would you smile when you get this ATC from your mail box? Tell me the truth. But, no matter what you told me, I will keep on making. Hahaha. (Ok, I am just trying to make conversation here. )

Envelope Adoption Programme (Yah, Free Envies!)

June 20th UPDATE: Sorry that I made a typpo mistake on my email address in this post for the past few weeks. Many thanks to Ana for correcting me. So if you send me an email and got no response, please do send it again at write2five[at]gmail[dot]com. A million sorry.

Introduction: Envie Adoption Programme is specially designed for anyone who want some free envies made from Hong Kong magazine pages.

Aim: The graphic and design in Hong Kong magazine is too pretty to toss away. In order to give them a second chance to live, I will turn them into envelopes. And send them to the kind people around the world. The aim of this programme is let the magazine envies to see the world. Also, they deserve a chance to be seen!

Quality of the envie: They are magazine pages after all. Soft and fragile. A piece of unwanted flyers/A4-size papar is sticked inside the magazine envie in order to support and strengthen the magazine envie. They are strong. They can travel long distance.

Graphic/Design of the envies: Mostly drawings or pictures from local artist. But sometime there will be photos of delicious dishes or travel destination. No, never, no advertisement.

Size: Around 3.5' X 5'. It depends on the size of the magazine pages.

How to Join? Send me email at write2five[at]gmail[dot]com with your postal address and please state "Envie Adoption Programme" in the subject line. Through the delicate care of the postman in Hong Kong and your area, 5 envies will arrive in your mail box. As simple as that.

Deadline? No. No deadline yet. It will run forever, I guess. Given the circumstance that this is not a popular blog and I am guessing there won't be a lot of requests. So, I am guessing this will last forever. =p

Repeat customer is welcome.

Spreading the words are more than welcome, by putting the button on your blog would be a nice idea~! Just copy and paste the following code and the Envie Adoption Programme button will be appear in your blog. Yayay

<a href="http://showonfire.blogspot.com/2010/06/yah-free-envies.html"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4Adjd73ULOmRoC4sQCQgrleR4HiLYEyxS3a5dzlye3Qi_dF8gxsiEfN_Yc3E9MzGWTE3RmCltYoicEYZoVFhxlRShvyJQl7f1JcY_62IGPr2ZbnqKRfGf8r45mk0ET9ldB0IcdaSy0MQ/s144/circles_orange.jpg" /><alt="=" 0" /><a>

HappY Envelopes. Open for adoption.

As you can see, I made tons of envelopes from magazine pages. All those pictures in magazine are so pretty. They deserve a chance to see the world and be seen by the world! So here they are!




I made some small envie (4' X 5.5') for the swapbot handmade envies swap. Two partner, five envie for each. Of course I need a bigger envie to put them all in. So, yummy summer treat envie with other pretty one inside!



Don't you just love masking tape? It doesn't block the whole image of the envie. It put on some mysterious feeling to the envie. The color of the envie is being revealed in a subtle way. Oh, that is for handmade envies swap.



There is one artist/food-stylist/cook I really like. He is Mr.Au Yueng. So I made a series of envies by his magazine column. I hope he doesn't mind. (You know, those copyright issue is super scary! You have no idea when you crossed the line.. sigh)




Kaytd89 from Swap-bot came up with an amazing idea. I have made seven small envies each of those contain a notecard with either silly or witty quotes or graphic or poem that hopefully will put a smile on the receivers' face when the receiver is not having a good day. I have fun making all those small envies. That is just so kind and cheerful that something is there to encourage you when bad day happens.

It just because I made tons of envelopes. And they are all from Hong Kong magazine pages. And they are all pretty (in my prespective.. ). I guess they deserve a chance to meet people around the world.

So Adoption?
If you are kind enough to give them a chance to see the world, then write me a email at write2five[at]gmail[dot]com with the subject line "Adopting envies". Put your mailing address in the content. Through the delicate care by the postman in Hong Kong and also in your destinated area, 10 small envies will arrive in your mail box, hopefully safe and sound.

They're waiting for you!