verypurpleperson

making other stuff
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Christmas platypuses

Since moving to Tokyo, Sidra has been exposed to Christmas things and activities from friends and school, so it’s only natural that he wants to have Christmas too at home. Last year, I bought him a (very) small Christmas tree that he can decorate at home with those blinking lights and all. He was very happy about it. This year, my husband and I are planning to give him Christmas presents too because he has been asking for them. Actually we don’ usually celebrate Christmas or any other days. The things celebrated in our home are only birthdays and anniversaries. […]

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giveaway
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Birthday giveaway winners!

Thank you to the 105 wonderful people who have participated in my birthday giveaway! The giveaway has closed and now it’s time to announce the winners! I used the Random Integer Generator from Random.org to pick 4 lucky numbers, and here they are! Congratulations  to carmencitaB, MeikeVanessa, Barbara, and Laurwyn! I will send email to each winner for shipping details. Thank you again to all who has participated and shared wonderful stories and opinion. I enjoyed reading all of them! So many interesting and lovely stories ^_^

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life, making other stuff
25 Comments

Little things

I joined a small cooking class in the neighborhood and they had a Christmas potluck party yesterday. I always got nervous whenever I have to meet people, and this time I had to make something edible for them! The fact that my skill in the kitchen is not something to be proud of didn’t help either. So I spent the whole week getting nervous about it. I ended up making sweet Indonesian (Javanese) dessert called ‘Jenang Grendul’, it is one of my favorite food when I was a kid. This dessert is some kind of sweet porridge with little balls made […]

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giveaway, life
109 Comments

Birthday giveaway! – CLOSED

Thank you so much for all the sweet messages on my birthday post! I’m sorry if I couldn’t reply to all, but I read all the messages and they brought a warm feeling to my heart. Sidra was not feeling well and he didn’t go to school, while my husband was working at home, so all of us just stay at home today. But there were so many messages and best wishes from everybody from all over the world! Internet is wonderful and scary at the same time, isn’t it? Anyway, it’s now time for a birthday giveaway! I love […]

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life
53 Comments

As time goes by

I’m 39 years old today! … Some people has said that I look a little bit younger than my actual age. In fact, the reaction people made when I told them my age made me felt like I’ve just confessed a big lie. Of course I didn’t lie, I just didn’t see any opportunity nor reason to talk about my age. But yeah, I was born in 1971 and the eighties happened in my teenage years. My first perfume was Electric Youth by Debbie Gibson, I bought it in a supermarket near my high school in 1989. When I was a […]

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kidswear
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Recycled pants

My husband has a couple of pants and jeans who are no longer wearable due to some rips on obvious places. After being worn and washed so many times, the fabric has became soft and comfortable to the touch, unlike stiff brand new denim. I thought they would make good pants for Sidra, after all with his rapid growth, he’s always in continuous need of new pants. I turned to my precious Pattern Drafting vol. II to find a pants pattern. This 1970 book has a small section on kidswear on the back. I drafted a basic straight pants pattern and then […]

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making other stuff
29 Comments

Bye bye Baon-chan

Have you ever heard of a wonderful project called Softies for Mirabel? The Mirabel Foundation is based in Melbourne, providing help to children who have been orphaned or abandoned due to their parents drug addiction. Once a year, they collect handmade softies for the children so they can have a friend to snuggle down with. Before they were donated, the softies will be displayed for a week in the window of Meet me at Mike’s store. You can click the link above to read more about this wonderful project. I have told Sidra several times that I was going to make something for […]

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life
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Here she goes again with the wriggling pet

Sorry if you don’t like our cute pet! It’s time to change the soil again for our Colombian Hercules larva. Today was such a shiny day, it was nice because the larva wouldn’t get exposed too long to the cold autumn weather. We keep the larva in a big plastic case filled with special soil that contains food for the larva. It would then eat the soil until the case is about half-full or less, and then we change the soil with new one. It’s the 4th soil change already, the last one was about 4 months ago. The larva hasn’t grow […]

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womenswear
62 Comments

Grey jacket

Another pattern from Pattern Drafting vol. II, this is from page 134 and it is called The Onepiece-Coat Ensemble (it is spelled that way!). I only made the coat and made several changes to it. It was shortened into a jacket since I only had one meter of the fabric, and three buttons are used instead of one. As my autumn dress, I didn’t draft the pattern, but cheated by scanning the page and enlarging it by 1000%. Cheating is the way to go! The jacket has a pair of neck darts on each side and I love the fact that a […]

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womenswear
30 Comments

Autumn dress

This is one of my favorite pattern book, Pattern Drafting vol. II, it was bought several years ago in a secondhand bookstore in Indonesia for only $1! The book was published by Kamakura-Shobo Publishing in 1970, it shows how to make a basic bodice pattern and how to use it to draft patterns for blouses, dresses, coats, skirts, and pants. There are also small sections for maternity and kid’s garments. The drafting techniques used in the book is from Japan, but the book is in English. The last section in the book shows several sewing techniques for pockets, collars, zippers, and […]

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