A Homemaker’s Diary

Often time people who came to learn decoupage told me that they are interested to learn about folk art or decorative painting. I told them that they need to find a personal teacher as it is not something you can learn in an hour or two. It takes a lot of practice in order to have the perfect stroke.

Of course not everyone has the time and resources to attend such class. I have 2 craft books that are related to folk art or decorative painting for sale. Each of them cost RM35. I have checked with MPH, and they don’t have the stock for such books, but the retail price is RM99.90.

The first book is by Priscilla Hauser – Book of Roses. I have 3 more in stock.

Inside you will learn about what kind of brushes, paints you might need to start decorative painting. There are patterns that you can photocopy and enlarge to suit the size of your painting medium.

This is some of the step by step techniques you will learn from this book. What you need is perseverance to get a perfect stroke.

Another one is by Donna Dewberry. She is a housewife, a mother of 7 children and a self-taught artist, who picked up different painting tips where she could and learned by observations. I used to follow her video online. I even bought some of the materials from ebay. Since not everyone is accessible to Internet all day long, having her book is another great way to learn her famous one stroke painting technique.

This is one of her books : Donna Dewberry’s Quick & Easy Murals. I have 4 more in stock.

There are 300 step by step pictures for you to follow.

You will learn how to paint rose, vine, leaves, hydrangea, blue bird and bird bath just to name a few.

So if you are interested to learn from those books, feel free to leave comment or email me to buy any of them. I will try to get back as soon as possible. The postage charge and handling per book via Poslaju for West Malaysia is RM8, and for Sabah and Sarawak is around RM11.

I have been having tough days since last week. If you have followed my blog for some times, you will know that my son and I have unusual sleeping time. Usually we will sleep from 4-5am onwards. So by the time it is 8-9am (the peak time when normal people go to school or work) we will be in our bed sleeping soundly..do you think we are somehow related to vampires..haha!

Anyway since last week, my next 2 door neighbor has started massive renovation work on their house which I believe has been abandoned since the last 2 years. So the contractor they hire has started working since 8am till 5pm and on Saturday too (as it is allowed by the gated neighborhood handbook). Imagine the noise of drilling and more drilling, knocking the wall and more knocking every now and then that both of us have to endure in our sleepless sleep. Just as I thought the contractor has stop working, there will be some knock, knock here and annoying drilling there.

If only Malaysian’s house are built like these modular homes Massachusetts. Check out how the owner get his second story house addition completed just in a day.

Since the land in city like Selangor and KL is really precious and expensive, I doubt that we can have such spacious home to equip the sunroom which I could use as my craft studio. But hey, give this cranky, sleep deprived mom a chance to dream. After all I don’t know how long the renovation next door will continue, Hubby said he saw piles of sands and more bags of cements in front of the house..huhu!

I have been thinking whether to have my son birthday party this year or not..sigh! The thing is he doesn’t have any real friends of his own since he never go to day care or play school yet. If I were to hold his birthday party, it will be my friends’ kids who will be attending.

I have this idea of doing a birthday party once he has entered play school or preschool which will be in like 2 years time. What do you think? Should I do a birthday party this year or we just do something special in family like what we have done for the last 2 years?

For the last few years since we moved here, our neighbors have done birthday parties for their kids in such an elaborate way, some with party goodies in bags, banners on the wall with theme like under the sea, party princess and Cars..huhu! Yes, you read me, I am pressured, not easy being a mom in this neighborhood..huhu!

Maybe in years to come once I am ready to organize a proper birthday party, I should order all these vinyl banners to make up for the lack of enthusiasm to celebrate my son’s birthday in his toddlerhood..haha! Or else, I could save it for his university convocation or wedding.

We managed to go to the Big bad Wolf sale on Tuesday and look what I got myself this time..huhu!

After browsing almost all the aisles and checked out the boxes people left under the table, I managed to grab many interesting titles. Oh, Hubby got the Shopaholic Ties The Knot to complete the series..(err except we still couldn’t find Mini Shopaholic anywhere!)

I bought Philippa Gregory’s The Other Queen. I never read any of her books. She wrote The Other Boleyn Girl which has been turned into motion picture. I think if I don’t really like her writing style, I’m going to sell the book…haha!

There were also many parenting books by Dr William Sears. Since I am way passed the tough phase of parenting infant, I only bought The Successful Child. Oh, I also found another book by Michael Gurian – A Fine Young Man to complete the boys series.

Since my son is not into eating rice and more into pasta, I decided to buy the Italian recipes book. Hopefully I would be able to try a recipe or two soon.

Hubby went to the second day of Big Bad Wolf sale on Saturday. I gave him a few book titles in case he could find them at the sale.

Hubby knew I like Lisa See’s books and he remembered what other titles of her work that I already have at home. On Friday when we went to the sale, I couldn’t find all the complete set of the Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella. Now I have almost all except for Shopaholic Ties The Knot..hehe..(will look for that tonight :))

I am so happy that Hubby found Malcolm Gladwell – What The Dog Saw. I have been eyeing that book for some times and have been hoping to get it at RM8 at the BBW sale. It doesn’t matter if the jacket cover of the hardcover is not in good condition, for me the content is more important.

As requested by my online friend Yin, these are the craft books I bought. For RM10 (on average) per book I would say it was worth all my effort of browsing at the Craft isle for 2 hours..heh! Thanks to Hubby too for taking care of our son while I took my own sweet time thinking which craft books might help in my future biz venture.

We are going again tonight and I will share more pictures if we buy anything worth reading.