Superman Wall Hanger/Rainbow Slats

Some time ago I made this and gave it away as a prize...it's a wooden door'mat' made of scrapwood . You can read about that here...
 

Someone wanted a similar one, but in bright, actual rainbow colours...(her 8 year old son is currently into rainbows :) 

And another one to hang on the wall, with a Superman logo! (and there's that feeling that I'm using an eyeliner on 92 ... 46...  92 ladies...again)

This is before lacquering....

Lacquer, add some S hooks to hang stuff from...

Here it is, placed on a cupboard (I have nowhere to hang it to 'model')....I think it can be used right up to teen years :)

As all of it was made of scrapwood, the size of each rack couldn't be standard.  It ranged from 30inches to 36inches wide (currently I'm making a third one).

Hope someone's daughter will want one with a unicorn!  Imagine how fun it would be hanging stuff from its glittery horn! :)) 

Clearly I am such an amateur.  What should have taken two days to make (including drying time), ended up taking 5 days, for these two racks, because:

1.  I forgot that the thickness of the boards were not the same and used the same-length nails and hammered away.  And then found, horror of horrors, the nails sticking out the back, in a row.  Sigh.  Remove.  Use shorter nails.
2.  The lacquer I used turned the original purple of the rainbow to brown.  Sanded it again, re-painted, re-lacquered.
3.  I started to get a backache around the third day because I was doing all the work on the ground - not a good idea.
4.  The Superman logo did not stand out as much as I wanted it to until I added the plywood backing at the back, outlining the shape of the logo.  Draw outline, cut out of plywood, hammer at the back, mix paint again, paint into the grooves to complete the logo.  In short, more work.
5. I tried mixing all my leftover paint and by doing that, the paint somehow wouldn't spread evenly and I had to paint and re-paint several colours several times.

Somebody shoot me.

But yah.  I love how they turned out anyway.  It looks much better in these pictures, though.  Hahahahahahahahha!

Further notes to self:
1.  When are you ever going to learn to put on gloves so your thumb and finger prints don't disappear altogether from sanding all the itsy bitsy grooves?  Your thumbprint is important!  It's your identity!  Ain't nobody gonna know who you are if you are mysteriously found lying dead in a....

oh.  I guess there's always your DNA.

2.  Re-use the same tee-shirts for messy work since you don't like to wear an apron.  Otherwise you ruin a perfectly good tee.  Sigh.

What do you think? (about the hanger and the doormat, not the tee)

The Day after Mother's Day

I am sure I have told my three children already (now 24, 21 and 16 years old), but it doesn't hurt to have it down on paper (is this paper?) before it all starts to go...my memory that is.

What a joy it was to have all three of you. None of you was an accident, a mistake, or a regret.

Joni - how your Daddy wanted a girl for a first child! And there you were, all 8pounds 6 ounces of you. As red as a lobster you were.



No....that doesn't look like you...hmmmm.. See why I have to put all this down on record somewhere as my memory starts to go?


Actually, you were all red and crumpled up like the lasagna we had last night.


And how you turned our world upside down! How any first-born turns an adult's world upside down! Joni, at probably a couple of months old.
We actually do not have a good close-up photo of newborn Joni.

As I was nursing you, I remember being overwhelmed with the idea that this little bundle of a living thing was totally dependent on me to give it sustenance. That was scary! And I remember waking up several times in the middle of the night just to check if you were still breathing.


I remember how two weeks short of your three year old birthday, you won 2nd prize in a kids' singing competition in church.

One of the three judges nearly fell off his seat, all teary-eyed, flushed and holding on to his tummy for dear life cos he was tickled pink as you sang:

In the house and out of doors
Washing shoes and scrubbing floors
Cleaning, ironing, brewing tea
Sometimes making cha-pa-ti !

I do it all for Jesus
I do it all for Jesus
I do it all for Jesus
He did so much for me!


And two and a half years after you were born, came Darren - oh my! It's a boy!

How perfect! I know I tease that I wondered if you were really mine, what with all the horror baby-exchange stories that we'd heard happening in hospitals. But those eyes that you inherited from your Chinese grandma....it does make one unsure.



Darren, a couple of days old


How Joni was thrilled to bits when we brought you home from the hospital. She sang "One little Indian bo-o-oy, one little Indian boy!" (to the tune of Ten Little Indian Boys) all the way home!


Joni, with her precious little brother (see that protective hand there?)


And how innovative she was to open up the wardrobe drawers so she could climb up each drawer using it as a step so she could get a clean diaper for you.

Joni and Darren (see that protective hand there?)



Joni and Darren (see that protec......ok, ok, you get the picture)


How you loved/love to eat, young man. Feeding you was no problem at all as you'd wildly flail your arms about for me to feed you faster and you'd be done with your porridge within five minutes.

And six years after Darren,

SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEAL!
oops. wrong pictures.


Tammy!





A cutie pie girl! The easiest baby of all, in terms of caring for. My alarm-clock baby who'd wake up on the dot for feeds and no in-between stirrings. At least that's what I remember.

How Joni and Darren wanted to feed you from the first day you got home. "Just a little bit of bread, Mommy, can, just a beeeeeet?" And you were carefully transferred from one to the other cos they couldn't have enough of you!



Yeah, Mother's Day is a good day to reminisce. A great day to ponder, observe, be in awe.



Has it been a joy all the way? Nope. It has been many nights crying in the darkness, too.

At one ladies' gathering, as the speaker, I shared how sometimes you make me so frustrated I'd harboured thoughts (not seriously, of course) of selling you off to the glass-bottle recycling man on his bicycle.

And that started an avalanche! The other ladies started to tell of how sometimes they'd had similar horrible thoughts, too. And how relieved they were to hear they were not alone.
Let's just say I didn't feel so bad after that either (especially when one mother said her thoughts had had been to flush her kid down the toilet! ummmm...not very maternal thoughts, huh?)

Have you grown up to be the best kids? No. But I'm not exactly the best mother, either.
Do you sometimes hurt me with your words and actions? Yes. But I do that to you, too.
But forgiveness has to reign. And unconditional love. And longsuffering. See that protective hand there? Yep, that's what it's about. Kids always teach us.



Little Joni:


Aunty Wei Ling: Joanna, your baby brother is so cute! I'll take him home, ok?

Joni, to Mum, indignantly: Mummy, put Darren back into your stomach lah!


Joni, helping to wipe the windows..

Mum, did God make DIRT?


(Joni, fashion guru. Even way back then)

Joni: Mummy, you shouldn't wear that brown dress with the squares, you know.

Me: Why?

Joni: Because that one is only for old ladies - like Granny.


(Dad, giving Joni a bath)

Joni: Oooo...so cold lah, Daddy.

Dad: Yes, it's chilly today.

Joni: But chilli is hot!

Dad: No, chilly is cold.

Joni: No, chilli is hot!



Little Darren


Darren, concentrating hard while 'changing ' chords on guitar:

Darren (to himself): C!

Fingers move, then: C1! (meantime, Mum's starting to wonder if there's such a chord)



A little later: C2! (now Mum's sure there isn't)

Then looks around and exclaims:

No wonder! Mummmmmmmm....where's the pickle?* *pick




Darren: Mum, ants are very hardworking, right?

Mum: Yes, they are.

Darren: Then why do we kill them?




Darren: Mum, Lionel doesn't know the name of the thing where the dead person is put into, you
know. He said 'box'.

Mum: Oh, (do enlighten me) what is it then?

Darren: I told him it's a *cafe. *coffin


So, with failing memory and before I go to my "cafe", I have found my purpose to plod on, despite great difficulty, heartache, discouragement and frustrations, to continue slogging...oops. I mean blogging.


Signing off











oops. wrong picture again. can't be me.
(cos we didn't have baby potties back then)

and I'm sure it's not one of my kids.
(cos their potty was blue)

From India to China

February 1st, 2010


So there we were in this little town in the south of India (see blogpost dated January 6th Shooting Stars). When told leather goods were cheap in India, we got excited. Except that there were very few shops there selling leather anything, ok?

My Hero finally found a leather belt which he (actually, I) felt he should get. Cuz all he has are three belts in three different colours. black, blacker, blackest. How boring, boringer, boringest is that? You will read more about our colourful differences in a later post (all together now........ oooooooooooo, can't wait!)

Anyway, Hero likes shopping for himself like I like shopping for curtains, y'know?
So he (actually, I) find him a belt. great. looked so good. smelt good, too. Yes, I smell belts to determine if they're really leather. Heard of wine-tasters? They smell the wine first, too. No....I din't taste the leatherlah. honestly, can't believe you guys would even think that.

The logo was nice!


Of course, donno whether the camels were symbolic of India or that it meant it was made of camel hide.

(as you can tell, this photo was taken by me, shadow and all. din't I tell ya I ain't no camerawoman)















quite impressive, right? the card, not the photo-taking.
















And I loved that there were no mistakes in the wording. YES! Nowhere did I feel the need to underline a word and write spelling! across it.






highest space quality



















hey, wait a minute....refined stying? sighhhhhhhh
spelling!

















Yes, a simple, brown, leather belt.





And I was done with Hero and could totally focus on teendaughter's and my bangle-scrutiny.








When we got back to Malaysia, I was re-checking the price of the belt. Turned the tags around and found...
























SHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESH!
Can anyone tell me what a China-made belt was doing in a tiny town in India?



Not that I have anything against made-in-China things, y'know....
Like teendaughter said, "Look around our house, Mum, probably half of what we have is made in China whattttttt. so what's the big deal?"

Huh? Really ah? Now a comment like that would surely make me do a Sherlock Holmes, ok? Do we really own that many China-made things? Do you? Unfortunately, most of what we own had already lost their labels. But I love every one of these, which I think are made in China.


dinner plates - these, definitely made in China




















see?













my sequin shoes which has the word
JinQishi inside















my fit-the-pieces-together wooden house
(which I painted white). so cute! I wanna put a
light bulb in it so it can be lit up in the dark but I
donno how.













my fountain! love it! see what happens when you tell people just what you want for your birthday? you get what you want!











super comfy walking shoes probably to be used
for taichi which is beyond my understanding
(taichi, not super comfy)
















and I LOVE this Red Indian couple! When I saw them at the shop, I'm a-tellin ya, they were just calling out to me - smoke signals and all.. reeeeally! They just looked so Pocahontas-ish.












and the lady's face is so forlorn,
like their love just wasn't meant to be, y'know?
awwwwwwwww.....I mean, look at her!

GEEZ, I'm getting corny.

Anyway I just had to buy them. That is so un-me. I hardly EVER buy anything on a whim.

But I just couldn't leave them there, could I? (there were about 6 other pairs just like them but just ignore that fact cuz that wouldn't make for an interesting story, would it?)

And that's about it! Those are my made-in-China-I-think goodies. So far, none have broken, spoilt, faded, split, chipped, cracked, ... And every one of 'em is treasured, ok?

Now, as far as made-in-Malaysia products are concerned....ummmmmm...there are some really hopeless things out there.






Like this...















But we're not going there.


BUT, just like made-in-China stuff, there are some precious made-in-Malaysia products, too.







Name: Joanna Lynne (wants to be called Joni)
Delivered: 21st December 1985




















Name: Darren Ashley
Delivered: 12th July 1988












Joni and Darren























Name: Tamara Jayne (wants to be called Tammy)
Delivered: 8th April 1994
















Tammy and Joni





















So far, none have broken, spoilt, faded, split, chipped, cracked ...












And every one of 'em is treasured, ok?