Easy Father's Day Gift DIY Tutorial

This year marks the first Father's Day for my husband. I thought to commemorate this special privilege by personalising a cup for him.
A little bit cheesy maybe, but what's better to have something encouraging greet you every morning when you need a cuppa.

So here's a tutorial for you too.

Materials needed for a personalised mug:

- A plain cup (I got mine from Muji)
- Marabu ceramic paints (they have a ceramic marker line too if you're not so comfortable with a paintbrush)
- Pencil + Eraser (optional)
- Paintbrushes
- Alcohol wipes
- Oven




Steps:

1. Have a design in mind
2. Wash and dry your mug
3. Wipe the surface area you intend to have design on with an alcohol pad
4. With your pencil roughly sketch in your design. Or if you're daring, just go straight for it with your paint. You can always wipe off whatever is unwanted/redo with alcohol wipes



5. Leave design to dry for at least 4 hours
6. Place designed mug into cold oven
7. Heat oven to 170℃ and let it bake for 30 minutes
8. Let mug cool in the oven

You now have a cup of your very own design that's wash proof (dishwasher safe too) and a much appreciated dad!

{Side note: You might be curious as to why I wrote #0 and not #1. That's because Jian's a coder and in geek speak, 0 always comes before one. You'll get it if you're a programmer.}

Dip Dye Chair Legs

If you have been following me on Instagram, you'd have known that I'd picked up this awesome stool from the trash area underneath my void deck.

I can't believe someone would toss it out. Mainly because I've been thinking about getting one just like this.
Of course though, I can see why someone would. The legs have started to rot.

I didn't think it was that big a deal and thought it'll be a relatively easy fixer-upper. Already I knew in mind what I could do with it — dip dye its legs.
I've decided to document the process and make a simple DIY tutorial.

First things first. Materials you'll need aside from your beat up stool:

Masking tape, or painter's tape + spray paint colour of your choice.

Tape off areas where you don't want the paint to go on. Make sure you get nice straight lines where the legs are. This ensures you get a neat finish.
Everywhere else doesn't really matter so long as you've sealed it off proper.

On hindsight, we should have sanded down the areas where we'd wanted spray painted too. This would have allowed our paint to grip on the wood better.

Take your spraying outdoors. You don't want to be breathing in any fumes. 

Set up your spraying area with some tarp (or newspapers) to prevent the ruining of any walls or floors.

This was what we did. We'd created a setup at our corridor.

Not necessary, but we'd placed a board down from the stool's legs as a further surety we don't get paint on any bits we didn't want either.

Follow your can's instructions and paint as many coats needed. 

Leave your stool to dry and peel off the tape after.

 

Yay, you've just given your furniture new life! This stool is going into the corner of our studio as a plant stand. I think it looks super cute, like it has socks on. 

All we need to do now is to decide on a plant.

DIY: Jazzed up terra cotta pots

A month odd has gone into propagating my pineapple tops. Only one has sprouted roots. 

The other has grown a few new baby leaves, but no roots. I thought maybe it's time to have it potted.

I'd purchased a couple of terra cotta pots a while back.
On a whim, I'd decided to spruce it up this afternoon.

So here's a simple DIY on how you can make one of your own too:

First, have a pot ready.

Plot up a design and stick tape onto areas where you don't want paint to go on.

Next, in a well-ventilated area, spray paint your pot. 

I don't have a picture of that process, but I reckon is straight forward enough. 

Once dried, you can start peeling off your tape to reveal your design.

Easy peasy and so pretty.

Leatherrr Panther

Hiya guys! 

I've gotten into leather making these days! It's ridiculously fun. 

To me, it's like a combination of doing metal work and fabric due to the tools involved. 

I'm hoping to explore more into this. 

Till then, here are some instagram piccies and videos:

   

Metagalatica, Void of this Age

Been a pretty hectic month of April. Since picking up a new full-time job, I've never been busier.

Did fall rather ill in the week, dizzy spells and leaky nostrils, but all that's behind me and now I'm better.

Worked on a few more things this week:

Cosmic Space Shoes for women 

Cosmic Space Shoes for men 

In fulfilling the request for more male-oriented products -
We'll be having galaxy shirts now!

Etsy soon.

In His Time

The weekend was hectic, yet thoroughly enjoyable. Definitely, one of the best weekends I've had :)

Saturday - Jeff and Phillane's wedding! 

They had gone through so much in the 11 months of planning, and to see it finally happening, it's all too wonderful and I'm so glad for them. 

The new Siaws on the block!

I've been looking forward to this day since November of last year!
So excited I bought my outfit and thought of the gifts to make them months and months before (haha)!

Sewn and painted these pillowcases a while back, and finally, now that the wedding is past, I can post them here!

 Jian painted a couple of cups for them as well

Hope they'll like them!

But, I won't deny it. The best part about attending the wedding was the chance where Jian and I could dress up! Might be a bit embarrassing to say, but we don't really get the opportunity to dress this fancy.

(Silly papi, looking all smug with half his lids closed)

It was a beautiful God-centered wedding, and I'm so honoured to be a part of it.

We wish you both bliss and happiness. May God continue to bless your marriage and may you place your trust in Him always. He will carry you through :)

::

::

Sunday, it was church, choir practice then a short nap before heading out to dinner with my Sunday School class. A nice time spent sharing and giving thanks, before Jian and I had to leave haphazardly to catch the last of The Lion King!

I'm so glad I've finally managed to persuade Jian to go catch it with me. It was so much more than I expected! The set, the props, the colours, the dancers! Everything was so alive! I have no words to describe the experience, except for fantastical!

It being the last show, the entire crew got up on stage after to say their thanks and goodbyes. You could feel a tinge of sadness for them having to leave after being here in Singapore for 8 months.

Jian: "Woah! Next time, for any musicals, we'll catch the last show! Then we'll always get an extra special bit to it!"

A terrific night, besides the fact that I had to deal with a pounding headache which pounced on me out of nowhere + kept walking into a rough estimate of some probably mid-30 year old caucasian wearing the same dress as I at the musical + walking about all over town after the show in the attempt of finding a cab but failing to + missing the last bus that went home from the esplanade, then catching another that went to Thomson instead, to make a what seemed like awful situation better, buying home some "tofu sweets", what one of Jian's Aussie mates call it (A.K.A tau huey), home.

More Cosmic Space Shoes

Hi there!

I made another one of these intergalactic travel space shoes.

This time, for Paul :)