A Homemaker’s Diary

I have been bitten by the crochet bug these days…except for the few days of my down time since I got high fever and terrible sore throat after nursing dear son back to health.

This one was crocheted using DMC Babylon No. 10, which is slightly thicker than the normal thread you will use for sewing. Tell you it was such a challenge, harder than the normal thicker yarn.

Last weekend I spent some more money buying materials in Daiso – embroidery floss, felt, hair clip and even needles. Hey, you got to have needles with bigger eye so that those yarn can pass through..heh!

I have tried sewing buttons on top of all the 5 petals flowers that pass my standard..now it’s time to turn them into embellishment on cards. I have also found easy instructions to crochet butterflies and heart, would make perfect decoration on cards, tags or bookmark.

I have been spending many hours of waking time after son sleep at night, browsing through Ravelry – a community site, an organizational tool, and a yarn & pattern database for knitters and crocheters. Some of them are kind enough to share their patterns, or at least quote where they get the pattern. I mostly check out the flowers they make. I have no intention to crochet anything else like sweaters, hat or whatnot.

Well, that’s basically what I have been doing during the time I am not updating this blog, for those who wonder..heh!

Gosh! It’s been a while since I last updated this blog. Many things happened in the month of July. We went on a vacation, dear son has been sick, bla bla..and July seems to be a month we got money coming in, payment from project, income tax refund, NCD refund from the old car, Hubby got some money from his company..Alhamdulillah!

As the Hari Raya is approaching, amazingly I have no strong feeling to spend on anything, no new baju kurung raya as I won’t be wearing baju kurung as often as I could, kuih raya pon rasa macam malas nak beli (boleh tak gitu?)

The point is those kind of preparation (tempah baju, kuih raya, balang kuih, langsir raya etc) is meaningless as it is not practical. We will only wear baju kurung/baju melayu for say like 1-2 hours, and on the morning of Hari Raya, we will be eating ketupat, rendang, and whatever heavy dish like nasi, lontong and whatnot. So those kuih raya will be like penghias balang je..

Well, that’s what I feel for now la..in years to come once the son is older, if he wishes nak baju raya 3-4 pasang ke, nak kuih raya 4-5 jenis ke, I’m sure I would be happy to indulge in the spirit of Hari Raya for him..err Hubby, what say you if we go to Aquaria on the second day of Raya like last year..we make it our yearly visit..haha!

The picture above was taken while we walked to taman orkid last month. We didn’t go to Taman Bunga Raya as it was scorching hot and I was tired after walking in the bird park.

It’s funny to realize that eventhough this red hisbiscus is our bunga kebangsaan, I have been searching high and low but couldn’t find one at the recent Floria or local nursery.

They only sell the Hawaiian type, bunga raya berlapis as they called it, but not this single layer, 5 petals, humble bunga raya merah..huhu!

SIL said we should just pluck one ranting from the park, Hubby agreed as he said taman bunga raya is using duit rakyat to operate, means the money he pays to income tax every month. I disagree because I don’t want to grow pokok bunga haram in my garden..sigh!

Hopefully I will be able to find one to plant in the spirit of Independence Day this year.

Lately I have been catching up on few new things which I’ve never tried before – crafts that I am able to do with less material and less concentration. I have dabbled with tatting, and for the past few days with crochet.

Fortunately on certain days, our dear son is able to play on his own most of the time, provided I am around him. Thus I can’t do things like scrapbooking or card making since such crafts I have to use a lot of materials and have to pay more attention to details to complete those layouts.

With crochet or tatting, what I need is just a ball of yarn, a crochet needle or tatting shuttle and a small scissors. Of course the step by step I have to memorize because every time I on the PC to watch the video, it will distract my son from whatever he is doing and he will start whining and making fuss..huhu!

This is the picture of the first flower I made after learning the crochet technique on Youtube. I used the yarn I bought in Daiso for RM5 which initially meant for tatting. You won’t believe how expensive a ball of yarn could be. I was shocked to see some could be as expensive as RM70 per ball..huh!

To date I have made about 8 flowers like in the picture (of course with each newer one, I made remarkable improvement), but still for me are far from perfect. I still need to practise a lot..heh!

I intend to use all the crochet flowers I made as embellishment on my scrapbooking layout and cards later.

“Dreams can often become challenging, but challenges are what we live for..”

There are many times that I feel that I am losing myself, I don’t know who I am anymore apart from being a wife and a mom. I don’t really have friends, in the sense that friends you can call, go out to lunch/dinner with, you know that kind of camaraderie which I used to enjoy during my working day and pre baby years.

And when I found a contest in one of the craft blogs I stumbled upon early this month, I thought this is something I could do to nurture my soul, to feed the artistic passion inside me. At least this kind of thing I can do at home, no need to go out, after all I already have the materials. So each available moment everyday since then, I did my research, browsed through the stack of card making and scrapbooking magazines, pondering the piles of online picture, thinking what kind of layout I want to submit for the contest.

Yet this morning when I woke up, I realized I might not have time to complete the layout. The dateline is today, 15th July. The son has been extra clingy these days, and I have been swamped with house chores. I thought, there goes my dream of entering the contest, I have a pathetic life, I can’t even do something for myself at home, something that might take 2-3 hours the most on my own. I cried.

It’s just a craft contest, I know..but it breaks my heart to come to term that I have to fight and struggle so hard to find some precious and peaceful time for myself, to do something solely and selfishly for my own sake. I vowed not to check out any of the craft blogs after this, I packed all the craft magazines and books on the bed, put them away with the intention that once they are out of my sight, it will be out of my mind. But it’s bugging me..

Hubby came home, ate something, took shower and ready to babysit. But no, the son who woke up from his nap was not happy to be neglected, he cried and cried. I tried to work out the layout while letting him play in the craft room. I couldn’t concentrate and got pissed off with some blunders I made. You can’t really be creative when there’s a crying toddler hovering around..sigh!

At 9pm, Hubby went out with our son to the nearest Mac Donald. I told myself I should finish this by 10pm, giving myself one hour of solid mind. I managed to complete both layout and card by 10:30pm, snapped the picture and then they came home at 11pm..with Hubby bringing home a pack of nasi goreng ayam for me, the starving wife!

Well, I did it! I am an enthusiastic person nevertheless. It is such a humble feeling to realize that even with strong enthusiasm I wouldn’t be able to follow my dreams if there’s no support from Hubby and son.

I am so, so very grateful for you both!