Crafting Days: I heart U card

I wanted to try something different for handmade cards this time around and I had seen some cards on Pinterest that used embroidery thread as accents. The idea was very simple but the process did take some time since I hand punched all of the holes needed for the pattern.

First I printed out a heart and added the letters. I made sure the sizing was fine when compared to the card and taped it down onto the back of a magazine. Using a sewing pin, I poked holes along the outlines as evenly as I could.

After all of the holes were done, I used needle and thread and sewed randomly through the holes, while making sure that the letters were recognizable.

10k+ Views!!!!

In the middle of the night last night, I have reached another goal with this blog. Ten thousand views since I started it earlier this year!!

Thank you to all of those who regularly visit my blog and read through my randomness that I spew out. This is the first time I have been writing in a blog consistently and I don't plan on stopping!!

My original intentions with this blog are still being done so I am glad that I didn't stray too far from that. I have found that I am consistently writing about the following topics and I want to continue them because this blog is a reflection of me!

Travel: I like travelling and I will continue to write about it as much as I can. With a full time job, it's hard to go places but it can be done =)

Food: I haven't done many recipes since I don't have the time to try to expand my cooking skills, but I do have some fun posts for Halloween and Christmas planned!

Crafts: One of the newer topics that I started about 2months ago. I was reluctant at first to add my DIY/Crafting posts but I haven't received any negative feedback so far and it's working so I'll keep doing it!

Photography: I haven't done a lot of posts on photography since it does take time so hopefully I can do more of that for the next 10k views =)

Once again, thank you everyone. Couldn't have done it without my readers and my friends.

Throwback Thursday: Batu Caves, Malaysia

Located about 8 miles north of the Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and named after the Batu river that flows past the hill. This cave is one of the most popular Hindu shrines outside of India and I got a chance to walk up those stairs two years ago.

The staircase is 272 steps, which sounds like a small number but when climbing up it does seem like a lot. We took several pit stops along the way which helped but if you are fit, you can definitely walk up in one shot.

The worlds tallest statue of Murugan, a Hindu deity, is located right outside of the caves. It stands at 140 ft tall is painted gold that was brought in from Thailand. It is one of the top tourist locations in Malaysia and one of the must sees on a travel list. Just don't feed the monkeys!

Wo Hop: Chinatown, NYC

Located in Chinatown, it is probably one of the places that a lot of my friends go to in the middle of the night for some good drunken fun food. I don't come here often since I don't like going to Chinatown but I met an old coworker there for dinner one day and my stomach was super happy by the end of the night.

We got there around 6pm, before the dinner rush, and we were promptly seated in the second room. The waiter took our order and we seriously got our food within 20 mins of sitting down. With just the two of us, we ordered everything pictured here including two bowls of white rice. We didn't finish everything, but we definitely did finish the snails!

Crafting Days!: Stamp Catalog

So I don't have that many stamps but I am starting to a get a bit worried that I would buy the same ones on my weekly trips (shh don't tell my husband) to Michaels. After being on Pinterest for such a long time, I have seen a lot of people who catalog their stamps so that they can see what they have and to make it easier for them to choose the right one.

I figured since that I don't have that many right now, it would be a smart idea to start now before I bought more and go out of hand (shhh don't tell my husband ;)). With the amount of stamps I have, it still took me a 3-4 hours to sort, stamp, and clean all of them.

In the end, I ended up with 10 pages and I even scanned them in and uploaded it to Google Drive so that I can access them on the go! Now I don't have to worry about buying the same stamps now!

Throwback Thursday: Baltimore, Maryland

Two years ago, a group of our friends took a trip down to Maryland for Labor Day weekend for some good food. We ended walking around Baltimore and we found a random guy selling oysters for $1 each. 

We took the chance with just six oysters but once we saw how juicy and meaty these oysters were, we came back around after an hour and ordered a dozen of them! Look at how amazing they are! Seriously, whenever I think of oysters I think back to this picture and day in Baltimore and all I can do is drool.

Healthy and Creamy Tuna and Avocado Salad

Wow, I haven't done a recipe in a LONG time but here goes!

I have been on a healthy kick lately and while working from, I have access to a lot of food in the fridge but I am never sure what to eat. For several weeks, I have been eating tuna with just pepper and lemon juice and I wanted to try something new. I looked online for some healthy varieties of tuna salad and found several that included avocado.

Luckily for me, my mother in law bought a bunch of avocados from the supermarket and all I needed was a ripe one! Out of the three I looked at, one was perfect so I cut it in half and used it for my salad.

Ingredients:

• 1 can of tuna in water
• 1/2 a small chopped onion
• 1/4 teaspoon of garlic powder
• 3 table spoons of plain greek yogurt
• 3 tablespoons of avocado (i just used a half of a medium sized one)
• pinch of black pepper
• 2 teaspoons of mustard (dijon or yellow)

Mix all ingredients and VOILA! Healthy, creamy tuna and avocado salad!!

Crafting Days: Custom Toms!

One day at a friends house, I was web surfing through Etsy looking for random things to buy and I came across a woman who painted custom Toms. I saw that she sold one that were of Disney's Stitch and thought, "I CAN DO THAT MYSELF!". So here we are, with a little tutorial/step by step of how I did it!

Materials:

• A pair of Toms. I chose white so that I wouldn't have to worry about painting
• Paint
• Pencil
• Sealant/finishing spray

Steps:

1. Open the box of Toms!

2. Draw your design using pencil.

3. PAINT!!!!!!

4. Seal it, yea... seal it good. (make sure you do it outside haha) I did get a bit dizzy from the spray, just FYI.

5. Wait to dry and then wear them!

Kollaboration NY 2014 small recap with photos - Winner: Sung Lee

Sung and I after he won!

The Kollaboration NY showcase was 2 weeks ago, TWO WEEKS! Time flies doesn't it? If you haven't heard by now, Sung Lee had won and is in the running for Kollaboration Star in November. Voting is still happening today and tomorrow and I hope everyone has been voting every single day!

Here is a little recap of the showcase via photos! Don't worry if you missed this years showcase, there will be another next year!!

Our guest judges from left to right: Ashok Kondabolu, Ted Fu, Ellie Lee, Melodee Morita

Special performance by I love Dance!

Our funny hosts for the night from left to right. Becky Yamamoto and Adira Amram

Ivan Polanco

Lionel 'MusicalBasics' Yu

Sung Lee 

Grace Shay

Red Oak Lane

Yut and the Hot Four

Izzy Man

Awkwafina

Throwback Thursday: Sept 11th, 2001 NYC

This week's Throwback won't be revolved around one of my trips or food. I wanted to do a post on Sept 11th, 2001 because I don't want others and myself to ever forget what happened that day. It has been 13 years but I can still remember it clearly.

It was gym class when students were asked if their parents worked at the World Trade Center and I remember 2 of them walked out. We were all wondering what happened but continued on until the next class. It was physics where our teacher had told us exactly what happened. We all sat there listening to him explain that planes had crashed into both of the buildings and there were people stuck at the top with no way out. At my next class, ceramics, we were able to see the smoke coming from the building and we were listening to the radio as the first tower fell. After that, my teacher had closed the blinds.

We should always commemorate all of the people who have lost their lives and those were affected that day.

The tribute in light, that started in 2008, is running tonight so if you are in NYC, the best spot to take a look would be Brooklyn Bridge Park at night.

(pictures for this post were taken on Sept 11th, 2013)

Crafting days: Buttons galore

On August 30th, Kollaboration NY had it's showcase (my post about it will be up later) and in preparation, I made 200 buttons that were used that day. They were placed in our VIP ticket holders swag bags as well as used to promote our brand at our booth. 

The buttons didn't take too long to make. With some help I was able to make all of them within 2hours. Luckily I have the Cameo otherwise cutting the 200 graphics would have taken forever! Oh, by the way.. I have a button maker ;)