New Hand Painted Shoe Designs

I know, I know, I lied.


I said I'd not be spending time (at least not now till Oct after the PSLE) coming up with new designs for our Dare-to-wear Hand Painted Shoes but I simply could not stay away.



In a moment of inspiration (and thus the duh name, 'Inspiration'), I came up with this black and white pair.




It looks simple because it's monotone but there are many tiny details included which took me hours to complete. It's more the passion that drives us, not the money (money? what money!).
We do realise it's sometimes 'pai-tarng' (hard to profit) doing such designs and most times, we make enough back to just keep the business sustainable. But it's ok, we've been in business several years now and it's always fun to be able to interact with new people. We definitely miss doing flea market sales!

Go to our website to view more shoes:

http://www.cartoonlagoon.com.sg/

The 'Princess' pair I came up with upon an appreciative customer's request for her little girl. Enjoy. I know I should be spending nights concentrating on my kids' schoolwork but I just can't stay away from the drawing and the painting. Therapeutic. Sometimes, I just need to escape into my own world.

Anyhow, I intend to come up with more Black and White designs.
Must have been all those Twilight books I'd been reading! (This crazy 41 year old went running around several bookstores hunting down the last of the series because the supplier had 'run out of stock', only to find a new shipment arriving in the neighbourhood Popular Bk Store a few days after this crazy 41 year old found her copy at Borders Parkway Parade. Going to Borders meant this crazy 41 year old also bought another 4 novels she really didn't need. At this point, maybe I should give a big hug to my hubs for driving me here and there on the wild book chase. Also, I should mention that I'd like to thwack the head of that young Popular Bk Store asst who had told me, 'Mam, supplier no more stock all over Singapore. Or how about you put your name on the waiting list lah. But book come you still must wait becos got many people put before you, they get first').

Wrinkles

I remember the time when I was pregnant with my first kid (including gestation period, that would make it about 16 yrs back) and watching the first appearances of TV Media ads (you know those where the sales people goad you into calling in).

There was this lady who looked to be in her 40s or 50s (or who knows, perhaps 60s) and she was all made up and decked out in her leopard print, skintight outfit with her hair permed and stacked real high. She was a Racquel Welch lookalike and was promoting something on TV but it was the way she smiled that caught my attention.

Her smile did not reach her eyes.
It looked as though she had had a face lift and she could only smile below her nose. I could not fault her glittering white teeth nor her immaculate Farrah Fawcett smile but she definitely lacked warmth.

I think of that picture of 'perfection' and compare it to me. Me, the one who has always smiled from eye to eye, cheek to cheek and now, wrinkle to wrinkle! Sigh. Now, it's crow's feet and eyebags galore. They've come to repay me for 41 years of smiling and laughing like there's no tomorrow.

I've never cared how I looked, grinning ridiculously, in pictures. Not until now anyway. It's always been important to me to keep smiling and laughing. Suddenly, since age 40, my eyebags, which have always been apparent since young, have grown so much in size, they can now hold my NTUC grocery shopping! (ok, lame attempt at joking while discussing this very dire matter).

I think of that lady in her leopard outfit smiling without letting her wrinkles show and realise that the use of BOTOX was not prevalent during her time but it is now. No one's going to care. No one's going to gossip. I won't rule out ever going that direction but I doubt I'll ever do it because I can't see myself wasting all that dough just to rub out my wrinkles when I can better spend it on my family or just do it the photoshop way. So a cheaper alternative for me, is to start learning to smile that leopard lady's way ~ that is, I'll grin, smile, laugh all I want, as long as it remains below my nose. (sigh, looks like this is going to be a steep learning curve)

Family Shots - Botanic Gardens

Been a long time since we visited the Botanic Gardens. Kids insisted we should go there to fool around with our camera. Managed to squeeze in a visit for a couple of hours last Saturday afternoon (family outings are hard to come by nowadays given that the kids have school or church activities even on the weekends).

(pic above ~ camera set on self-timer by John......from left, John, Tessa, doggy Sparkles, Fiona & Mike)

These shots were taken by John. Now that most humans no longer have to waste money buying rolls and rolls of film and take into account the cost of every shot taken with a digital camera, we freely encourage our kids to play around with our cameras in the hope that this will improve their eye for picture composition. It'll help them in their art classes maybe.

Uh-huh, Tess insisted on bringing Sparkles so she got to look after Sparkles nearly all the time. Anyway, Sparkles sticks to Tess like glue, pining for her if she doesn't see her for too long. It's always tough on Sparkles when we go away on holiday. She just lies next to the front door, pining for Tessa's return for every night that Tess is away.

(that colourful doggy carrier slung from my handbag ~ we bought it for a song in Bangkok.)

Was pleasantly surprised to see what a nice backdrop the waterfall turned out to be.

Review of New Year (2009) Resolutions

So term 1 of the school year has come and gone. Some of our kids would already have completed their quarterly review of their school grades and goals. Some of us working people have already had our reviews. I thought it's time to have a look at those personal resolutions I had made for year 2009:

In Dec 2008, I wrote that the following would be my personal new year resolutions:

1) To be a better servant of God
2) To be a better wife
3) To be a better mother
4) To help my son with his Chinese
5) To improve my own Chinese
6) To come up with more shoe designs (Yes, I know you are waiting for that!)

No. 7 is invisible but it was related ideally to some kind of needle movement on my weighing scale (in the correct direction of course).

With nearly 4 months gone, I took a look at the above:

1) To be a better servant of God
I'm not sure if I have become a better servant of God but I have been consciously trying. I am a Catholic and I have learnt over the years that it is always easier to feel holier than thou, good and harmonious whilst you are attending mass but terribly difficult to keep up the faith in every day life. That is what I mean to have self-consciousness and awareness in this area. I do know I spent the days before Easter in church praying, trying to knock some sense into my human self but on Easter night itself, whilst lining up behind a young lady at a roadside POSB ATM, I wanted really to give her a good wake up call for carrying out no less than 10 transactions with both her POSB cards whilst people queued up behind her. Then when I finally asked her if she was going to take much longer and she replied loudly (without turning back to look at me), "YES!" I really lost my temper at her arrogance, told her loudly to take her time and stomped off to my waiting car. Lady, I know you were at the ATM first but it wouldn't have hurt you to have a thought for the people behind you who may have just wished to make a quick withdrawal.
Yes, that was me on Easter, mind you. I have a long way to go as a Christian but I know I am only human and I shouldn't give up hope on myself yet because God won't.

2) To be a better wife
Oops! My hubby is too humble to say it out loud but I probably bully him no end with stuff like

"Could you get me a glass of water, please?"
"Could you please check if all the doors are locked?"
"Could you go check the letter box for letters, please?"
"I have no company for lunch today, wanna eat with me?"
"Did you remember to pay that bill?"
"Can you go get my car from the multi-storey carpark?"

Uh-huh..... I believe in my guy taking care of me, babe. Aiyah, I also take care of him in other ways what, like when he needs to scratch an area on his back which he can't reach! So, fair lah.

3) To be a better mother
I am not a fantastic mum and it's always a continuous learning journey which I hope I can travel for many, many years to come. I'm sure they'll miss me if I'm gone so I think yeah, I have made an effort this year to be there more for them. I yell less at them and I am firmer in other areas too. I've been referred to as a 'cool' mum. Ok, guess that'll do for now.

4) To help my son with his Chinese
Not much progress there. I know MM LKY means well in encouraging the parents to speak Mandarin with the kids to improve their ability in this language but really, he probably isn't aware of 'how good' our standard of Chinese is.
I was recently told by someone that it is so shameful that a Chinese cannot speak Chinese. She went on to say that we cannot survive if we cannot learn Chinese well. I was a bit put off actually. This was coming from someone who could hardly string a complete sentence in English.
What is 'cannot survive'?
Hello, think BIG. I mean BIG. In trying to conquer the world (or rather China), do not end up being narrow minded.
Firstly, I am very Chinese even if my Chinese sucks. Secondly, I know China is the new economic power house but really, it'd make more sense for them to learn to speak English to the rest of the world. These China Chinese who flock to Singapore shores to work, do you see them speaking English proficiently? Thirdly, are you telling me we all have to be so kiasu and ensure we speak Chinese if we are to survive in the future? To survive means what? To find a job related to China, I gather. So what happens to the many, many other jobs unrelated to China? Are we becoming a single nation on this good Earth? (roll eyes)

Those are NOT the right reasons to encourage me or my kids to improve our Chinese.
It makes me even sicker to hear all this. Get off my backs, I tell you. Enough already, enough already. Blame my boring, unmotivated Chinese school teachers if you must. But I am sick of getting the flak for my weakness in my so called Mother Tongue. MAKE THE LANGUAGE interesting for goodness sake and throw away grading for bananas like myself. If you keep pegging the MT grade to entrance to JCs or Polys or Uni, then there will be no light at the end of this forsaken Chinese tunnel.

5) To improve my own Chinese
Ditto to the above

6) To come up with more shoe designs (Yes, I know you are waiting for that!)
I decided that in keeping up with resolution no. 3 which is to be a better mother, my concentration is on my son's PSLE this year. He is weak in several subjects and I have to do my part in helping him cross this hurdle as best as I can. That is why I have not participated in any Flea Markets recently. His PSLE finishes in October and then maybe I can get on with it.

The good news is we have still seen a steady string of orders coming in to Cartoon Lagoon for our Dare-to-wear Hand Painted shoes, mostly through email and the phone. Thank you to our loyal supporters! We are still in business, lah. We just had to re-prioritise and spend more time with the kids as opposed to spending a whole weekend hanging out at a Flea Market. Come October, things should be different.

So, that's the end of my short list of new year resolutions for 2009. I do not even need to mention invisible no. 7 because the weighing scale needle has not moved. Neither to the left nor to the right. Sigh. I guess I should be happy that it hasn't headed upwards yet.

I realised that I forgot to mention trying to improve my son's Math grades. It's funny, I haven't even spent much time on his Chinese. I've spent more time on this Math. To me, his ability in Math is going to be much more important than his Chinese grades. As his mother, I need to believe that and I need to show him I stand by him.

Overally, my first 'quarterly review' does show that I have been trying to stay on track. Still trying...well, 4 months down and 8 more to go anyway.

Twilight series ~ tongue-in-cheek review from Singapore

Writing this, I’m sure to incur the wrath of ‘Twilight’ series author Stephenie Meyer’s loyal fans. First off, I’d like to state that I do like the books. I like them so much that I’ve ignored my son’s homework for the past week. They are addictive.

My 15 yr old daughter snorted at me when I made her buy ‘Eclipse’, the third book in this 4-parter. She said the second book (New Moon) had become a drag and she'd found it utterly boring and nonsensical (ok, watch out, now, she’s incurred the wrath of the loyal supporters!). Why do I keep mentioning these supporters? Because if you bother to do a simple search on Google or Yahoo, you’ll find gazillions of people very much in love with Edward Cullen, Bella Swan and Jacob Black!

Ok, let me backtrack. For the ignorant or uninitiated, the Twilight series is made up of 4 books (Twilight, New Moon, Eclipse and Breaking Dawn) about teenage vampires and werewolves. The plot goes from something to nothing and the characters are so weak and lame that you actually very nearly believe that we have vampires and werewolves living amongst us in our HDB estates. Yep. Ironic. It all started with the author having a vampire dream. Uh-huh. It’s such simple writing that Stephenie Meyer’s laughing all the way to a bank (even if it’s a bank on the verge of collapse). I’m intent on finishing the series. I guess that makes her a good writer after all.

Let me state for a fact that I’ve devoured enough romance novels in my lifetime to be quite a romance novel expert. I can junk a book within the first 3 pages. It has to be good writing to make me carry on. I had shelves and shelves of second hand germs sitting in my home till I had to throw them out to make way for my kids' stuff. Second hand because my romance novel appetite grew too big to be sustained purely through new purchases and I ended up being a great patron of second hand bookstores. I could finish a Mills and Boons in a couple of hours. There was a time in my life when I thought only a Mills and Boons guy would do. People who are familiar with what I mean would understand the emotions which the following words invoke :

“His dark steely eyes stared intently at her. He grasped her with one swift stroke and pulled her tightly towards her, blatantly ignoring her gasps as his arousal became apparent.”

(Hey, I just came up with that so it’s copyrighted. Hands off!)

I grew up on that. Many of us did. Well, the image of a typical Mills and Boons guy has sorta become distorted over the years as I’ve grown older and my expectations of a guy, well……I’ve grown kinder.

Anyhow, there are basic ingredients to a good romance and Stephenie Meyer’s smart. She’s good with descriptive writing and when I read, I am totally immersed and transported to the dense forest, dark clouds looming above, light rain falling endlessly on the huge dense canopy. I imagine I’m Bella and Edward’s come to stare grippingly into my eyes. His being cold to the touch does nothing to douse out my desires.

However, Stephenie (if I may be so bold as to call her that) really needs to brush up on better characterization. What the heck does Bella have that I don’t??? I still can’t tell after 2 books. In a good romance novel, the female protagonist’s allure is immediately made known at the beginning so you know why the guy’s after her after all. Having said that, the Twilight series is still a worldwide phenomenon that isn’t going away.

Oh by the way, my kids love the Harry Potter books. I tried several times but just couldn’t make it past page 3. That pretty sums up something doesn’t it? I’m a sucker for love. Make that a blood sucker. Slurrppp!

N.B: I won a gold diamond pendant in a Mills and Boons contest eons ago (First Prize) ~ so don't go doubting my prowess in romance novels! Hah!

MCYS Funeral TV Commercial

I can't believe it. I teared last night. While watching a TV commercial. While watching a Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports (MCYS) Family commercial that is! What the heck?! Really seow ku-ku already.

Sigh. Fortunately I have a medical appointment later this afternoon at KK Hospital. Really must ask the doc if the hormones she'd prescribed for my PCOS of which I've been on for the last 3 months, is causing unusual emotional upheaval. I mean, tearing over a TV Advertisement, hor! MCYS must give me a token for even mentioning this.

So the ad goes like this. It's a funeral eulogy and the wife of the apparent deceased stands in front of her audience and explains that she's not about to sing the usual praises. Instead, she mentions (to the utmost horror of the old fogeys listening) about his snoring and farting issues which she's had to put up with all these years. Unless you were born on Mars, you understand that in the end, the things she used to think were issues with her hubby end up being what she would be missing most about her late husband.

I watched it for the first time last night with my son and hubby (munching on green peas and fried ikan bilis). It wasn't your usual short ad and we were asking if we'd stumbled upon one of those always interesting short films. The 'wife' (short haired lady in a sari) was so convincing and her thoughts so poignant and thought provoking that at the end of the ad, I tried not to give any indication that I was on an emotional roller coaster ride.

But of course my 12 yr old son had to know me better. He got up from sitting by my feet to peer into my eyes.
'Mum!' He continued to stare into my eyes. 'Are you CRYING???'
He goes on to shake his dad's legs, 'Mum is crying. Oh my goodness, Mum is crying after watching this!'

Thanks, kiddo. When you grow 'older', you'll understand where I'm coming from. Your dad and I have been through enough as a married couple to totally understand what that ad is saying. Your dad snores REAL loud and I, well, I have an abundance of flatulence. Not that my flatulence is dispensed the way his snores are every night. But it's enough for him and the kids to call it the atomic bomb (and that is with me behind closed bathroom doors ok?) So let's see, the ad's not trying to say all happily married couples snore and fart but you get the drift. There was once, as a younger married couple, we'd have been irritated to death by each other's quirks and fancies but we seem to have ridden out the storm now. We have well....grown older and I'm happy. I still sometimes flip myself over to sleep on the opposite end of the bed where hubby sleeps (my head at his feet) because his snoring keeps me awake but I've come to accept and love the fact that his snoring is an indication to me that his heart continues to beat in the same room as mine, at least.


Watch the ad online:
http://app.mcys.gov.sg/web/home_main.asp

Why I would drive traffic to MCYS' website, I dunno. Blame it on the hormones or maybe something called love.