Lazy Earthlings: October 2013

Thursday, 24 October 2013

DIY Clipboard Display Wall

There is never enough storage for my yarn.

I present to you our play and work room with the Clipboard Display Wall. One side of it at least, we are not quite done with the other side of the room. Recently J put up the clipboards display that we saw on Pinterest. I love sticking stuff on the wall but it damages the paint work over time so this is a great idea for me who loves to switch displays frequently.

Command Medium Picture Hanging Strip for each clipboard
Read more at http://web.stagram.com/p/567123617893922151_789940#x0QiBKWUaMKSS26y.99

3M Command Medium Picture Hanging Strip for each clipboard
Read more at http://web.stagram.com/p/567123617893922151_789940#AOuDGrXBepu6t63S.99

Domo kun made it up on the clipboard hehe and a tribute to Pinterest! Another picture of this wall.

We had been thinking what should we do with this piece of huge wall. There are tons of stuff we can do with it. Perhaps something non that permanent that we can change the displays on and off with whatever we like. Pinterest is where I browse for inspiration daily. Even if I only had 10 mins in a day or before I sleep, I would get in there and look around. Then I found the clipboard display ideas and showed it to J. It is perfect!

Removable velcro hanging strips by 3M Command.
J measuring meticulously for the spacing of the clipboards ^^

We used one 3M Command Medium Picture Hanging Strip for each clipboard and secure the bottom of the clipboard with a little bit of white tack as the wind is pretty strong at our place when the windows are open.

This clipboard display idea is perfect if you have kids who love to draw! (Here I'm the kid LOL) You can always update the board with their latest drawings and with the help of the 3M hanging strips it shouldn't cause a lot of damage to your wall. But still beware of paint chipping if too much force is applied when removing the clipboard. This is an inexpensive project and you can also decorate the clipboards with beautiful masking tapes or wrapping paper. :)

Looking for the "perfect" for us wasn't easy. The stationary shop that we went to only had 8 of this particular design and being the picky sort, we can't settle on any other types of clipboard anymore. So for now we settled on 8 boards first. My plan was to have 12 boards or even 14 boards so that they are much closer together. It is not too bad to have 8 boards after all though, it is not that cluttered. ^^

INSPIRATIONS:

Love how neat it is in the left picture.
Great idea to have a elastic band around the clipboard to secure the picture from flying if it's windy and also include smaller pictures at the bottom part of the board in the middle picture.
Nice mixture of colors with the wall!

Wednesday, 23 October 2013

The Play & Work Space

Our Play Room

I thought I'd post about this space first and slowly move out to the other parts of our home. :) This is where we game, relax, get inspired, create, craft, DIY, sew, crochet, work, stressed out, relax again, photography yada yada :D

Can I say that I love our desks? A bit shameless haha.. The structure is constructed with the typical storage rack system that we Singaporeans (Most) are familiar with if you have a household shelter aka storeroom in your home. This idea is not be new but we are glad that we managed to get this idea done up. It suits the style and our needs and the length, width and height are very customizable. ^^

A quick initial fail sketch (lol) of our table for the storage rack boss.

We need a storage rack for our household shelter as well and I kept all these dusty leaflets that were left on our door when the BTO is completed in a plastic bag and went through them one by one, calling to ask if they take custom design for the table structure. Most of them declined the request for they only have standard sized racks, claiming that customize racks are very troublesome. At least we found one that is willing to customize to our needs. Hooray!

Before engaging the storage rack service, we ordered 2 pieces of 2 x 7ft white laminated plywood top from a factory. Upon confirming our table top, we immediately booked the time slot for the storage rack and table structure.

There are a lot of ready made sizes table top but ours are longer than usual so we had to have it custom made.

Worked together with the storage rack builders to determine where the legs of the table should be so that it will not obstruct our sitting arrangement. They kept reminding us not to lean on the table top where there is no support (like the middle part of the table along the window) and we understand their concern and will definitely take note. :) They are very friendly and easy to work with.

The completed look after the installation with our dining chair. :D Oh... look how empty and spacious the room is in this picture. Hahaha XD

At first we thought will 14ft of desk space too much for us? At least we get to have our own computer space but after settling down and using the room for half a year we feel that it just right, and with a Mac in the middle it is no longer that spacious anymore LOL

We are still working on this room, in need of storage units for the never ending craft materials, yarns, model building tools, cameras and many more stuff. XD

Aren't these metal cabinets beautiful? I think they suit our place a lot! But that might make our 5x5 Expedit a little out of place. O.o KIV KIV!

Sunday, 20 October 2013

Mika Cheesecake

We bought a cheesecake from Mika yesterday in City Square. It is really light, not too big also, my brother, sister-in-law and us finished it after dinner. :D Sunday treat~

Industrial Style Food Mall in Johor Bahru Malaysia

One thing nice about living in the northern part of Singapore is that we can just take a bus to the custom and poof! We are in Malaysia, Johor Bahru! We enjoy the food there and the exchange rate to be honest. Although things are getting a little more expensive over the years but it is still a nice short afternoon getaway.

Our main purpose today was to buy monthly contact lenses for J. :D The last time when we came to City Square was during June/July before our wedding, we came to City Square to look for my wedding shoes but the mall was having a major facelift so we didn't really enjoy the shopping much. After a year we are back and although there are some parts of the mall that is still under construction, most of the shops are back and they seemed to have added a new wing.

Ever since our home renovation which we were very hands on. Not that we mixed the cement and lay the tiles but in the design wise, we had been paying a lot of attention to shop interiors and I must say there are some really nice Industrial/raw styles out there. They may be too much for a home but they are really inspiring. Like the newly open JEM in Singapore, a lot of shops adapt industrial shelves, displays and so does restaurants/food court. Super yummy!

Alright, let's move to the photo above. It's the Dapurkita Food Mall in City Square! I was blown away with the style and little details they uses in the food mall. :DDDDDDDDDDDDDD

Firstly, there are a lot of quotes on the cement screed walls within the food mall. Every where I turn there are different quotes.

Eat like your life depends on it. LOL Inspiring no? Gotta love the tables, chairs and benches. <3 The natural lighting there was awesome, food photography will be a breeze. :D Thought we didn't eat at these food mall because we had KFC before we discover this place.

Eat well travel often and Love can wait hunger can't. Hehe :D

We used subway tiles for our kitchen backsplash but they are much bigger. We wanted to use these 3x6inch tiles but our contractor/ID couldn't find them and our own resource was limited since we are first time home owners and we don't work in related field. So we settled on the bigger subway tiles, not that they are not ideal, I still love my kitchen's backsplash but I wonder how it would look like with these smaller tiles. :)

The brilliant signboard in the food mall. Alphabets cut out of metal sheets and lights installed within. They are really raw and beauty in my eyes. I don't really know if photography is allowed there but I quickly snapped some pics with my phone just for the record.

Although I really like industrial style but our home style only consist of bits and pieces of industrial essences because I have love for other styles as well. I don't really know how to describe my home style of I guess it is our style. XD I hope to show some photos of our home soon. We are still lacking some parts of the home to be properly photographed. Lol Even though we live here but there are only so much energy and time to do proper shooting. ("proper" means I have to clean up my work space and maybe dust the place a little LOL)

Apart from the eye candy in the food mall, we did a little shopping in the Popular bookstore where we found out that it is generally a tad cheaper than Singapore (stationary wise. I don't know about books) and Our Popular membership applies in Malaysia too, so besides being cheaper we still enjoy 10% discount for non nett items.

I grabbed some Sharpies and the PLUS Repositionable Glue Tape and a Malaysia Home and Decor magazine, just to see what they write about in Malaysia version and I like what I read inside. Magazine is Nett priced.

Overall it's fun and my feet hurts! Heading to bed now! Will write more soon.

Good night,
E

Saturday, 19 October 2013

Cross Granny Squares Table Cloth For Ikea PS 2012 Coffee Table

We were really happy that Ikea PS series came just in time when we were furnishing our home about starting of this year, since our home has a touch of industrial theme, metal furniture is a big welcome to our shopping list!

IKEA PS 2012 Coffee Table White

Half year has gone by and we thought maybe it's time we cover the surface of the table since the remote controls slide on it day in day out. As I was wondering what we should cover it with, the Cross Blanket by Pia Wallen came across my mind.

via Story North

This is my first time making multiple granny squares and combining them into a bigger piece. At first I thought I could make some black and white squares to form the cross but the design is too big for the a small piece and I'm a little too lazy to combine tiny squares together. In the end I created this Cross pattern in the middle of the granny square and I am really glad it came out right.

I used a total of 45 squares for the table cloth and some more rows to fill up the sides. The fitting were done as I crochet so there were a lot of undo-ing and redo-ing which was kind of texting near the end. It was so near yet so far. I also learnt my lesson to block the squares before I combine them as I had some trouble blocking the whole piece after combining them. It's all good now though. :)

I'm on the way to make an inverted version. Perhaps next time I will attempt a blanket or I might want to buy the Pia Wallen's Blanket! It is in my wishlist!

Wednesday, 2 October 2013

A little too early?

Hohoho~ A nice mug box from last year's Christmas, I should have punched some eyelets in it a long time ago to hold my yarns. I am glad I kept the box, I am trying hard not to hoard stuff so that it won't clutter up at home. I'm still at my table cloth project, 30 plus more granny squares more to go!