Friday, February 26, 2016

Leather Necessary Clutch Wallet


You know when you have all the tools out, you might as well make the most of it before you start cleaning up and put them back in their proper storage. After Danial’s back quiver, and my mystery braid key fobs, I decided to dive into making my leather version of NCW to replace my old fabric NCW. I had to make a new one because I broke the turnlock of my old purse. 


Since I have the pattern, I printed a new set of pattern and adjusted them to take away the seam allowance. Working with leather, I don’t need the seam allowance. In the original pattern, the flap was done separately. For my leather version, I glued the flap to the body pattern and use it as a template to cut out the whole external piece of the NCW.


I used a 2mm vegetan leather and stained it light brown. My wool douber has felted after only a few uses and it gave the streaking effect on the leather. I like it. It looks like wood grain. Before anything else, I have to fix the turn lock.


I used a mix of leather for the interior of the purse. A nice soft lamb skin for the side gusset and card pockets (I didn’t trim it to reduce bulk, I should have). The other pockets were from scrap leather that I bought from Yee Button. All the pieces were painstakingly hand-stitched. The most difficult part was to stitch the sides for the divider and zipper pocket. After I stitched one side, I realised I could have just used rivets instead. Duh!

I love the look of my new leather NCW and have changed my purse. I wanted to attached some D rings so I can hook my strap and wear the purse as a cross body. 


Monday, February 22, 2016

Mystery Braid Key Fob


After making Danial’s back quiver, I used some leftover scraps to learn how to make the mystery braid bracelet. I’ve several pins about how to do the mystery braid and you can check out my pinterest on leather craft here


For my reference purpose. I cut these straps 0.75” width by 9.5” length. I’ve discovered that the length would be adjusted as we weave the mystery braid by 1” leaving the total finished length of 8.5”. I cut three strands about 0.25” width and stop 1” from the ends  

I’ve also cut longer strips of 13” and 12” long and instead of having it as a bracelet, I turned it into a key fob. 


And for practise, I made several and stained them light brown. I’m selling them too. Drop me an email if you want to order them at rozirahman@gmail.com.


 A few days later, Azrai got me a set of metal stamps and I tested the stamps on the bracelet I made earlier. Cool huh?


Saturday, February 20, 2016

DIY Leather Back Quiver


Last Saturday, Azrai called the handyman to fix things around the house. I wasn’t in the mood for creative experiment but Danial asked if we can work on his leather quiver, I didn’t have the hearts to turn him down. So I took my leather stuff outside on our patio and cut out the basic shapes for the quiver. I’ve been pinning some back quiver pictures in my pinterest. One in particular showed how to mould the quiver with a pvc tube. I got hubster to go get a 3 inch pvc tube from the local hardware shop. I dampen the leather and wrap it around the tube and held it together with wooden pegs (using whatever I have around me). Thinking that it needed time to mould to the shape so I told Danial it won’t be ready that day. 

While putting the quiver aside, I thought I’d stain the other parts. The staining process was rather quick so I ended up staining the body too. Might as well so it can dry while taking shape. We left the leather to dry while I took the kids for their KUMON Recognition Day that day.


When we got home, the handy man was done with his work. So, it’s our time to make some mess. I glued and knocked in the belt with rivets to the body of the quiver; then punched holes to fix the rivets to join the seam. I knocked in a few rivets before cutting the excess leather. Seen here, Danial helping me with setting in the rivets before I knock them in. He’s super excited but patient enough to help me get his quiver done. He’s confident that we could finish the quiver the same day.


I gave Danial the task to burnish the edge of the quiver. 


 Fixed the buckle and got Azrai to make the holes for the buckle to fit Danial.


 And there you have it. Danial’s very own leather back quiver. He was so happy that we finished it in time for him to wear for his archery class the next day.




Friday, February 12, 2016

Kids craft: Rock Painting


I am keeping Arwen at home today because the doctor gave her an extra day of medical leave. It suits me fine because I can make sure she takes her antibiotics on time. She has a swollen lymph node below her left ear just behind the jaw that I'm concern about. 

She wanted to do some rock painting so I decided to indulge her. She made quite a few to give to her friends at school.



Since I've taken out all the colours and brushes, I might as well join in the fun. Here are some sets that I've made. I'm thinking of selling them as pattern weights for RM12 per set. Would anybody be interested?

Strawberries, A set of 4 for RM12

Design/Create/Craft/Make set @ RM12

Doa/Iman/Sabar/Usaha set @ RM12

Positive words set @ RM12

Golden hearts set @ RM12

I've been using only glossy Mod Podge to finish the rocks before but find them slightly tacky and I cannot stack them up in yhe boc for storage nor can I wrap them loosely with newspaper. The tackiness would cause the paint to chip or paper to stick to it (when I wrap them with newspaper).

This time, I sprayed a coat of clear lacquer over the rocks. It feels less tacky. I've put them away in a basket and layered them with fabric placemat. i hope the paint doesn't chip.

Leave me a comment if you are interested in my painted rock sets.


Wednesday, February 10, 2016

Freebie: 2016 Cuti-cuti Malaysia Sticker Set



Before having a planner, my blog posts have always been erratic and sporadic. That’s because I’ve never put much thought into my blog posts. As I browse through Pinterest, I came across tracker page for blog posts and how people plan their blogs. Wow! It was mind-blowing to me.

Since the existence of Facebook and Instagram, I’ve had this struggle to keep my blog current. And come new year, I would make the same resolution to activate my blog again. I would blog for the first couple of months and then, my blog would go on sleep mode.

This year, while renewing the same resolution of keeping my blog current; I’ve set up a mind-maping page in my Bujo to plan out my blog posts. It’s a beta-version of my blog tracker and I’m still tweaking it to make it work for me. At least for the next 3 months, I have blog titles to blog about.

OK, now come to the subject at hand. I’ve actually plan to have a giveaway this February in celebration of:
  1. my 14th Anniversary
  2. my Mother In-law’s 84th birthday
  3. the Lunar New Year
  4. All of the above 
I’ve been thinking of what thing I can give as the giveaway prize. As I was drafting my blog post about my Planner Zen, I got an idea of doing something better; give a Freebie instead. It has to be planner related and something that I can share away easily. So, here it is, the 2016 Cuti-cuti Malaysia Sticker Set. I made this using the images I found on Google and  put them together. Here are the files:
 If you do not have a printer or a Silhouette machine, fret not, I print and cut them for a fee of RM5.00 (price is not inclusive of postage). Leave a comment down below if you want me to print and cut for you.

This Freebie is intended for PERSONAL USE ONLY. Please do not sell them. This Freebie is valid throughout February and shall end by 29 February 2016. 


Tuesday, February 9, 2016

My Journey Towards Planner Zen

Mandala doodle in my bullet journal
 I started keeping a diary when I was 16. I was staying at a girls’ hostel and attended school at Sekolah Menengah King George V, Seremban. A rather aloof person, I was having a difficult time making friends and poured my sorrows in my diary. Fortunately, I adapted to hostel life and have more friends and can now say that the best time of my teenage life was at the hostel. Here’s to Malay Girls Hostel, Seremban!

Fast forward to my working life; keeping a planner helped me keep track of my projects, sales and what have you. My first employer and one that is worth mentioning is Royal Selangor Pewter put strong emphasis on human resource development and I even took a course on how to effectively use a planner.

Image from Google
Then, I went into paperless organizer. I had a PalmOne Zire31 and I was scheduling my appointments with it when I was active as a Unit Trust Adviser. I felt strongly about using less paper and being environmental friendly so to a certain point, it did serve a purpose.

Then I started a family and let go of a lot of things; focusing on my babies and keeping the house. I managed to start a small online enterprise with my handmade and never give it much thought of organizing things the best way possible. It’s more of doing things as you go. Nothing really works well for me nor was I searching for the perfect planner to help me organize stuff.

Looking back, I wonder how did I manage? Seriously... Well, I didn’t or at least I didn’t manage it well enough. The dawn of realizing I need a planner came when I stumbled upon Angela Trinidad’s Passion Planner KickStart site sometime end 2014. I was so impressed on how she breaks down the planner to make it goal oriented. Something that I feel seriously lacking in my life after I settled down with kids. She had a free version and I made my own Passion Planner on A5 paper and bind them together with my comb binder.
My DIY A5 Passion Planner 
I’m beginning to discover ‘Planner Zen’. I like the Weekly Spread, the Week’s Focus, the Good Things That Happened column and the blank space for my brain dump. It brought me back to my first love of pen and paper. Somehow, paperless planner wasn’t cutting it for for me. There is magic when you put pen to paper!
I DIYed some trackers and used cute memo stickers bought at Daiso

I was quite content with the Passion Planner and somewhere in 2015, I discovered local planner groups on instagram @myplannerbabes and @planneraddictmalaysia. I was amazed with what they are doing with their planners. They don’t look anything like the planners I was using before. They have colours, washi tapes, stickers, beautiful hand-writing, stamps and so much more. I started to get the creative itch to do the same with my planner. But A5 size is not a size to do much decoration; what more to have it functional too. So I went hunting for a new planner. From these groups I found out that some had more than one planner. I wasn’t sure I can manage more than 1 planner but I won’t know unless I try.

Mambi Happy Planner 2015-2016

I was in luck because Scrap n Crop brought in the Mambi Happy Planner which starts July 2015 to December 2016. I got my Happy Planner somewhere in September (if I’m not mistaken) and started to hoard clear stamps, washi tapes, stickers and made my own stickers and what have you. From limited space in my A5 Passion Planner, I have so much space in the Happy Planner. Have I achieved Planner Zen? I thought I had. But it was short lived. The planner is so “pretty” that I was too careful filling it in. It takes time, planning and in short too much work for me. It’s not helping me much in organizing my life but it’s adding to the long list of things to do for me. No, it defeats the purpose of me having a planner.


My somewhat humble decorated pages of the Happy Planner

So I started dabbling in other systems. I made my own Passport Size Faux-MTN and diy-ed the inserts. I thought organizing the different areas of my life with different inserts but having it together in the Dori would work but again, short lived. It was still too much work for me to juggle between the inserts. I’ve made more Fauxdori and dubbed them Zidori and gave and sold them online. 



By end November, I’ve decided to let go of my Happy Planner so it can spread it’s happiness to a deserving Planner. I did sell it off and my quest for a planner went back to square one. At the same time, I’ve been searching Pinterest to get ideas on how to use a planner more effectively. I then stumbled upon Bullet Journaling and the simplicity of it all captured my attention. I watched the video and searched some more. I later found boho.berry and tinyrayofsunshine. They are bullet journal junkies and I love them to bits. I follow them on Instagram and their blogs. They expanded the basic concept of bullet journal and made it SO interesting so I decided to give it a try.


So I went to get a notebook. I feel that A5 is the best size for me. It’s small enough to keep in my handbag and yet functional enough to hold a lot of things. I wanted a dotted page and I found a notebook at Borders; Giornale by Unicorn. It’s only RM20.05 which is a lot more easy on the wallet than a Moleskine. I dived right into in and started my Bullet Journal journey in December 2015. Here are some sneak peak of the pages in my Bullet Journal, Bujo for short:

Index page

Future Log

Monthly Spread

Some of the trackers I’ve incorporated
I love the fact that it slowly grows on me. It’s like falling in love all over again with pen and paper. It wasn’t an immediate Planner Zen but it was a journey of discoveries. This is the kind of love that grows as you nurture it. Totally different from my Happy Planner episode which now I can call an infatuation. The more I discover what Bujo can do, the higher the Planner Zen grows. I am in a happy place as far as my planner is concern. I achieve Zen without needing to fill the pages with washi tapes or cute stickers. My doodles although not so pretty and the quotes I hand-lettered was giving me satisfaction beyond the more professionally done commercial planners.



And the zen didn’t just stop there as a planner zen. In my blog of handmade and diy stuff, it finds its place here as everything in the bullet journal is made by me. As a disclaimer, in no part of this post am I saying that any particular planner system is inferior to bullet journaling. They might be the best for some planners, they are just not the right ones for me. 

With that, I leave you for the time being. In next post, I’ll be sharing more things on my Bujo and show you how it is helping me organize my life. In the meanwhile, do check out the links I’ve shared in this post if you are interested to learn more about bullet journalling. Who knows, it might lead you to Planner Zen as it has lead me :)

p/s: Wishing everyone a “Happy Lunar New Year!”



Wednesday, February 3, 2016

3 Reasons Why You Want To Learn To Make Your Own Telekung



I am following Azrai around today so that he can send me to check some leather afterwards. So, to make the most of my time, I'm blogging on the go on my mobile.

3 reasons why you want to learn to make your own telekung:

1. Custom to fit : I have my share of ill-fitting telekung and sometimes they don't come cheap. It's frustrating when you've paid a lot of money only to have it ill-fitting. In my class, I'll be sharing tips to to measure and custom fit the telekung.

2. A useful skill : as muslimah, especially in Malaysia, and in Asia generally, we still put on telekung (prayer robe) to pray. Once you've learned the skill, not only you can make one for your own use, but you can make one for your mom, sisters, daughters and friends. You can make and give it as birthday present, anniversary present and even wedding present and it will be greatly treasured and appreciated.

3: Potential source of income : you can not only make and give the telekung as gidt, but you can sell them too. There is always a market for good quality telekung . On top of that, I am not just talking about financial gains but the potential reward (pahala) you gain by making them, having someone wear them for prayers, ماشاءالله 

Having said that, I would like to make a quick announcement; the next telekung class will be held on 20 February 2016. Above is my poster published in my Facebook page and Instagram account.

The space is limited to 6 pax so first come first served. Book your place now!


Nuffnang