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Friday, December 19, 2008

Christmas Spirit



Today is Youngman's last day of the school year and he will be in year 2 next Feb. The School Report has been sent home and Youngman was cool on all key learning areas. The teacher's report said that he set a good example for his peers. He has already opened some of his Christmas presents and now he can just be himself and play with his Legos and make up his own storys.

The P&C put on a little drinks party after school, after a few snacks and beer, I am officially on Christmas vacation and off line......

We are heading down Melbourne . Mr. Silvermonk bought some carbon credits to plant trees so that we can all fly down this year to spend sometimes with friends and relatives.

We wish you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

cheers
chimin

Ps: we will be back in Sydney for the New Year Eve firework!

Monday, December 15, 2008

Carols in Victoria Park 08


Carol in Victoria Park 08, originally uploaded by silvermonk.

We've been to the Carol in the park for a few years now. It was organized by the St. Barnabas church The Park is a beautiful place with the city as the back drop.

We were having a very enjoyable time with children playing tips ( chase ) and the magnificient fire works to finish the night! We raised enough money on the night for the Habitat for Humanity to build a house in India.



We also seen the biggest full moon slowly creeping up behind the stage......

Well, after a hectic week of working on the bench, ( which end up drilling a hole in my thumb....)
I am glad that we had a relaxing and peaceful night out in the park.

We will be in the City tomorrow to choose some big Lego toys for the Youngman. He's been a real good boy this year apart from watching too much TV.


Saturday, December 06, 2008

Best Ever........



The Finders Keepers Market was the best market i've ever participated in.
Lots of cool stalls, 10 minutes walk from our place, all the neighbours were there and every single one of the young and old handmade groovy people from Sydney were all there, even a lady from Chicago was there and got a present from my stall for her daughter, I was busy..... very very busy and tired and happy!

The organizers should be congratulated on putting such a wonderful and successful market!

The best part of it was seeing all these people with a beer or wine in hand while relaxing, browsing and supporting handmade!

See more of the photos of the night!

Thursday, December 04, 2008

The Market!




Dear friends,

The finders keepers market is on........
If you are planning a night out, this is the place to be.

There will be clothing, accessories, jewellery, art, homewares, lighting, stationery and more......
And of course, there will be music and food!

It is held inside the foyer of the contemporary arts space "CarriageWorks".

I am having a stall there as well, so come and say hello.

Finders Keepers will be running:
Friday 5th December 6pm – 10pm
Saturday 6th December 12pm – 10pm

click here for direction.

Monday, December 01, 2008

100 Sales!



My jewellery shop on Etsy reach a little milestone today! A small step in terms of statistic, but a big step in my adventures into the Cyber space.

The 100th sale is my Cross embedded with love, how wonderful is that!!!!!

A big thank you to all my customers.
Your support is much appreciated.

cheers
and more to come!

Friday, November 28, 2008

Christmas Sparkle!





Just want to pop in and say Hello!
I've been a bit busy with the Christmas orders and making lots of jewellery for my up coming Finders Keepers market.
You can click on the side bar for more info.

Also thank you my fellow Aussies greenOlive and Pominoz for putting my fine silver earrings in their treasuries.

We are going to the Star War opening on Wednesday.

cheers and have a nice weekend!

Monday, November 17, 2008

BUY HANDMADE THIS CHRISTMAS!



Couldn't believed it, its only six weeks to Christmas!

I am in love with kraft paper at the moment and redesign my new earring tag and Christmas packaging.

FREE SHIPPING worldwide until Christmas in my Etsy shop .

If you would like to purchase from my website, Just enter FREESH15 upon check out to get 15% discount on your purchase. (Not to be used with other discount code!)

Sunday, November 16, 2008

Old Darlington school





The Old charming Darlington School is all fixed up with new beautiful roof and new surrounding landscape.

It quickly becomes our favourite walk after dinner, the only thing missing in this picture is a dog........I wish we live in a house with a backyard.

There has been a lot of opposition noise about the expansion of the University. I personally don't mind that at all.

Thursday, November 13, 2008

DaWanda World 2009



Yes, I am going to give away all this beautiful jewellery......

A group of online sellers from DaWanda organise a new promo called "DaWanda World 2009" /"Happy New DaWanda Year 2009".

"The idea is to bring together a variety of shops from all over the world representing Dawanda in this "Dawanda World 2009" promo campaign.

Each shop participating in the campaign will send 10-15 items, which will be put into the bags and can then be bought from a few nominated shops on Dawada .

The sale will start on January 1st 2009 and the money from the sale will be donated to an organization which is still to be nominated."

Tuesday, November 11, 2008

Creative advertising




Don't you love this?!

The council has been putting heavy fines on people putting poster on the post......
( you could see the lamp post next to it is all clean!)

So someone come up with this great idea and i think they will get away with the fine.

The cool thing about it is the bicycle is chained onto the (legal) new bicycle stand, how appropriate!

Friday, October 31, 2008

Stretch your brain

( Anna~my sister in law sent me some interesting emails every now and then. This is one of those i want to share with you!)

This is not a test - just a phenomenon. All readings are explained.

Read out loud the text inside the triangle below



More than likely you said, 'A bird in the bush,'! and. .......
if this IS what YOU said, then you failed to see
that the word THE is repeated twice!
Sorry, look again.

Next, let's play with some words.
What do you see here?


In black you can read the word GOOD, in white the word EVIL (inside each black letter is a white letter)

What do you see here?

This one is quite tricky!
The word TEACH reflects as LEARN.

ALZHEIMERS' EYE TEST
Count every 'F' in the following text:

FINISHED FILES ARE THE RESULT
OF YEARS OF SCIENTIFIC STUDY
COMBINED WITH THE EXPERIENCE OF YEARS...
(SEE BELOW)

HOW MANY ?
WRONG, THERE ARE6-- no joke.
READ IT AGAIN !
Really, go Back and Try to find the 6 F's before you scroll down.

The brain cannot process 'OF'.

Incredible or what? Go back and look again!!
Anyone who counts all 6 'F's' on the first go is a genius.
Three is normal, four is quite rare.

*****************
More Brain Stuff .

From Cambridge University .

"Olny srmat poelpe can raed tihs.
I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm.Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Amzanig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt! if you can raed tihs psas it on !!"

The last test is quite interesting because Gabriel is in the mist of learning to read, write and spell!
And there is this big debate of "Whole Language learning" and " Phonics learning".

What is amazing is that Gabriel ( he is almost finish year 1 ) can read the above paragraph without any problem.

What I've learnt from Gabriel's learning experience is that, some kids are very good with whole word learning and they learn to read (out loud ) in no time, and that is just part of the story ( of learning to read and write). To complete the picture ( to write and spell), you need phonics and grammar.

At first, Gabriel's reading progress very slowly, he's a bit reluctance to say the word out loud ( to read ) if he did not know how to. Now that he learns the phonics his reading and spelling skills just take off........

I am no expert in all this and i probably need Mr. Silvermonk to check the grammar, but i am sure you know what i meant ( hopefully most of the time?!)

I find this quite useful.

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Up dates .........



~The" Explorations '08 " is over and I am very happy to report that the displayed piece "Spiral Dream Necklace" has gone to a good home. Good news is they are still available in my shop.

~ Watch out for this month's (November) newsletter with big discount code for the Christmas season!

~I am in the process of adding new designs to my shop in conjunction with the newsletter.

~If you see something on my Blog or Flickr that you like and is not currently listed in my shop, just let me know and we can sort something out!

Sunday, October 26, 2008

Sculpture by the sea 2008





"Sculpture by the sea" is held every year along the coast between Bronte and Bondi Beach. The event marks the arrival of spring and the farewell to the unwilling winter. ( This is especially true this year, the weather has been exceptionally cold last week!)

This year the " Harmony with the breeze" by Kozo Nishino really caught our imagination......

Its delicate titanium wings flag gently and rhythmicly in the wind. It's so elegant and poetic and beautiful. I can just sit there all day and contemplate.
It has to be my all time favourite!!!!!!

If you want to see more of the sculptures in the walk, I found a set on flickr, just clicked here

More Sculpture by the sea photos post on Flickr

Friday, October 24, 2008

Sir Ken Robinson: Do schools kill creativity?



Every parent with a young child in school would enjoy this video!

What Sir Ken Robinson said in the video truly rings a bell.

...................

The sun is shinning again after a few days of rainy and cold weather.
We are heading for the beach and the "sculpture by the sea".

Have a nice weekend, my friends!


Sunday, October 19, 2008

International Organ Day







Yesterday was the International Organ Day. More than 250 concerts was held around the world to showcase the King of the instrument! We were there in the Great Hall of Sydney Uni.(I was graduated in the same Hall 9 years ago) for the " Introducing the pipe Organ" to the kids! I've always love the majestic sound of the Organ and really enjoyed it! Youngman even had a play on the Organ .......

The Quardrangle of Sydney Uni. is such a beautiful place. They have one of the only two Carillons ( the largest by itself weighting over 4 tonnes) in Australia. We are very lucky to hear and then see the 54 Bells in action!

See more of the phots here

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Songlines Castle Ring




I love my Songlines Ring and wear it quite a lot. The only problem is that the ring band is slightly too wide for my finger. I decided to do something about it. I held it in my hand yesterday and they started to grow on me and evolved into something of its own.
Within minutes I started to cut out 3 strips of silver from the rims and soldered them onto the open side of the ring........and there you go, looks just like a castle.

Mr. Silvermonk said Castle Ring sounds a bit too Colonial.

I thought, Wow, from Songline to Castle, that sounds very much like the Australian ( natural/cultural) landscape........




Honestly, I just really like the sculptural feel of the newly reincarnated ring.

I feel blessed!!

Saturday, October 11, 2008

Casper the friendly ghost.......



Well, I thought the Ring looks like ET, but Mr. Silvermonk said it looks like "Casper the friendly ghost". I like the fact that ghost and friendly go together, at least in this case!

I have been in a bit of La La Land and made a few unusual rings lately and this is one of them! They just came out of my hands and took me by surprise........

I will be in Kirribilli Market tomorrow, come and have a chat if you are around the area.

cheers and have a nice weekend!

Monday, October 06, 2008

Jill Bolte Taylor: My stroke of insight



Very inspiring!

I hope you enjoy!

Want to know more, click here.

Friday, October 03, 2008

Nicholson Museum Collections



Don't you love these earthy ceramics! They are as old and as modern as you can get. What i mean is they are very old and at the same time have a very modern feel and look about them ( i do not have the date and where its from on my finger tips, i was too busy to take photos and just literally blew away with their beauty and simplicity!).

Its all part of the Nicholson Museum Collections at the Sydney University. We drove pass the Museum several times a day on the way to youngman's school everyday........ and we never visited the place!!!!! Or more precisely, we did not even know its there!

All i really want to say is they are so beautiful and simple............
Worth a visit if you are in Sydney next time and their school holidays programme is excellent and it's free!!!!!!


See more photos here

Thursday, October 02, 2008

Sydney Children's Festival



It's the much needed school holidays again.........

We normally go to the Power House museum, but this time the Sydney Children's Festival just literally around the corner from our place and its all happening in the Carriageworks !

We went to see the Jungle Fever and really enjoyed it!
There are lots of other free events and activities happening in the main foyer as well.

We might pop back in again next week..........

Talk about Carriageworks, they are planning a market on the site and you know how much i love having a stall in the market.
I've already put my hands up and hopefully they will get it all organise and in time for the X'mas season!

Did I just mention the word X'mas, I am not joking, the big department store in the city ( Myer) already have their decorations out.....

OK! OK! That's enough for today!