Saturday, April 25, 2015

ROCK & ROLL GIRL DIGITAL STAMP & RONETTES

New digital stamp titled 'Sixties Rock n Roll', you might already have guessed she was inspired by the beautiful Ronettes, my favourite girl group from the 60s! This illustration was made quite some time back (last year). I will post a coloured example soon!

She is 8 inches 300dpi in jpeg format, available as an instant download in my Etsy shop: https://www.etsy.com/listing/230803771/
The W-I-P sketch.

Meanwhile enjoy some beautiful photos of the trio:

My favourite Ronette songs are: 'Be my Baby' (of course), 'I Can Hear Music' (first heard it from the Beach Boys), 'You Baby' (first heard it from The Lovin' Spoonful) & 'Do I love you'. The 2nd and 3rd songs were my faves from the Beach Boys and Lovin' Spoonful before I got into Ronettes.

Previously I only knew 'Be My Baby' and their Christmas songs. No surprise why I like the girls so much, it's the type of tune I'm into... giving Phil Spector the credit for that!

'Be my Baby':


The Big TNT Show - 'Be my Baby' and 'Shout'

Wednesday, April 22, 2015

LEMON SHORTBREAD AT SWEET PEA RUBBER STAMPS

Just received these unmounted Lemon Shortbread rubber stamps from Sweet Pea Stamps, thanks Lynette! The images are 4 inches height. As you can see, the lines are precise - sorry no stamped examples - I want to keep them clean for now!

These make fine samples for introducing people unfamiliar with scrapbooking or stamping. Their main question is: 'how do they get the lines cut so clean and detailed?'!

The rubber stamps are available here: http://www.sweetpeastamps.com/lemon-shortbread/ A selection of my digi stamps are also available at Sweet Pea so don't forget to check that out under Digi Stamp Artists if you'd like to combine your purchases!

Sunday, April 19, 2015

CAT BURGLAR GIRL DIGI STAMP

Cat Burglar Girl digital stamp - you may call her Catwoman, though my creation has no relation to the DC character but well, she looks quite like her! There are only so many ways to draw a cat girl... and cat ears are cute! She is wearing a diamond necklace, two bracelets and a ring. If you like another cat girl digi, there is "Cat Girl with Mouse" here.

I coloured the artwork with markers, pastels and coloured pencils, with background done in Photoshop. Of course, you can also make this a daytime picture, and add gloves and a mask if you please.
This digi is available as an instant download in my Etsy shop: https://www.etsy.com/listing/230083045/

Friday, April 17, 2015

A VISIT TO TAN TOCK SENG'S GRAVE

Decided to take a quick exploration of the Tan Tock Seng grave site at Outram Road because I passed by it the other day. I've never knew of its existence since Tiong Bahru isn't part of my vicinity and the site piqued my interest because one of the graves was pretty large and facing the road. Spotted it while crossing the overhead bridge towards the bus-stop opposite Tan Boon Liat building (Tan Boon Liat is the great-grandson of Tan Tock Seng).

Tan Tock Seng (1798-1850) was a merchant and philanthropist in Singapore, and became of the wealthiest settlers here. He was made Justice of the Peace and also contributed funds to the building of Tan Tock Seng hospital.

Here is a board introducing the site. You can read it by using the 'View Image' on right-click to view it in 1000pixels.

There is a sign that warned 'STATE LAND NO TRESPASSING'. National Heritage Board says you can follow the trail.
This is the grave of Tan Tock Seng's daughter-in-law Chua Seah Neo, and granddaughter-in-law Wuing Neo. It is more elaborate than Tan Tock Seng's grave. It is dated 1882 and looks pretty spruced up and scrubbed clean, apart from the fallen leaves.

This circle appears to be for collecting water when it rains, possibly for fengshui. There is a larger one in the center in the photo above.
There is a shrine for a mountain deity. I'm not too sure about the customs of it but guessing because the family plot is situated on a hill. The stone guardians are interesting, can't tell what the one on the right is, maybe it is a hybrid chinese chimera (qilin or pixiu?) but it has hooves.
There is a path going towards Tan Tock Seng's grave towards the right, located on a hill running along the main road.
Down a slanted stone stairs.
 Here is Tan Tock Seng's grave, they cleaned it up pretty well. Seems like someone was here not too long ago too. It is much smaller and simpler than the other grave, his remains were originally not buried here but re-interred later.

See it is just above the bus-stop! Beyond that stone lion there is another mountain deity shrine. After that, it is a dead end.
It was getting dark and the mozzies were probably hungry so I left after snapping a few shots.

Wednesday, April 15, 2015

LUPIN, KIWI AND MORRIS CAT

Introducing Lupin, our semi-new black kitty. It arrived at my boyfriend's house porch out of the blue one day a few months back - this is in California by the way. They say a cat chooses its owner - this is absolutely right.

This kitten was feral and following an orange cat with his other kitten siblings earlier and the gang stopped by the house at a water puddle. We don't know how Morris (what we call the orange cat) is related to them, but after a week one of the black kittens returned and permanently stayed, with Fuman who readily accepted it. Don't know what happened to the rest of his siblings but we know one sadly got killed on the road.

The photo above is Lupin with Fuman in the background.

Lupin is very skittish and refuses to let any human touch him/her or get close, although it meows very loudly and does the slow blinks. This is a problem since if it is coming 6 months old we need to neuter it, we still can't tell what gender it is! Lupin's name is from the 1960s-80s manga/anime Lupin the Third (ルパン三世 Rupan Sansei). We have a Lucy dog, a Luna black kitty (died, Lupin looks just like her) so now we continue the Lu-name.

Initially Lupin hissed at Kiwi cat at the door. Understandably it can't see in and smells all sorts of strangers, but Kiwi can see out lol. It doesn't do it anymore once it figured out Kiwi was just another cat.

This is Kiwi, Fuman and Lupin taken about a week or two before Fuman died.

 
Next is Kiwi, she has been with us for maybe 5 - 6 years. Kiwi used to be an outdoor porch cat and absolutely refused to go indoors for years, scrambling out the door whenever she was curious enough to peek in (she never fully came in anyhow). One day she decided to relocate indoors two years ago and stayed put, and if you put her outdoors she freaks out and dashes back indoors... sigh cats.... Nowadays she gets occasional sunshine under monitor. She watches her cat tv out the screen door and the dogs on top of the couch. 
Kiwi came over from the neighbor's across the street, also out of the blue. Just came to the porch, laid there, refusing to leave. We used to see her brother lounging out on the pavement but have not seen him for a few years now - hopefully he got kept indoors too.

Enjoying life as an indoor cat. When she wants to play, she rubs against your leg and sits down with her back facing you, waiting for you to jiggle her toys in her face lol. She is a bit violent when playing with them.

Kiwi is a very clean cat, she grooms herself over and over so her fur is very soft. However she sheds like crazy, whenever I go to the US, I get pretty bad nasal allergies from her dander. Her moustache is fish-shaped and uncannily resembles her favourite kibble! She is also gentle and patient (to humans at least, never bites or scratches) and a good rat catcher. She likes to troll one of the very timid female chihuahuas (Dotty) by staring down at the end of the corridor and blocking her way. Lucy dog has no problems and walks past looking at them wondering what's going on.

She has gained a lot of weight since I left last year. Partly due to losing a staff who would play with her whenever she demanded it - acrobats at least twice a day lol...  Now she only has bf left and no more acrobats. She is spayed but got so big everyone wondered if she was pregnant! She managed to lose some weight after she decided she wanted to play again, for a few months she wouldn't play and only ate, slept and groomed all day long. The funny thing is she has short stubby legs so her tummy looks like it touches the grass now!

There is a new cat on the porch since 3 weeks ago, the orange cat Morris we mentioned earlier. He actually dropped by for a few minutes the same day Fuman died. I've heard that a new cat immediately takes the place of another cat's territory once the latter's gone, but his pace was too quick! I can only deduce he was hungry, or his rival was gone, or both.

Anyway, this was the then unnamed ginger cat that arrived the day Fuman died.

Coming closer, and sniffing around. Bf did not feed him then because we don't know if he was someone else's pet or curious.

You might have figured out why we call him Morris.

Lookit that face - like a sad lion. How can you not feed him lol. He was very hungry by the way, and probably homeless. This was when he didn't want to leave.

Morris is very vocal with a scraggly mew and is sort of friendly with humans. Voracious appetite and keeps stealing little Lupin's portion! He looks pretty roughed up from fighting and his ear has some injuries.

Reunited with a member of the original gang, and got along for a short time. 2 weeks ago Morris started chasing and biting Lupin so we are going to see the situation if Morris should stay or go. There are also 3 other tabby cats fighting on the roof that day.


Video of the cats, mostly Morris.

Edit: We know now Lupin is female. I typed this post some time back and only just published it, unfortunately our 'kitten' Lupin is not a kitten but a very small-sized mature cat and she had her first litter of 3 kittens 2 days back!! We don't know what to do but to leave them in Lupin's selected hiding place (under the house) for now - can't get close to her without her freaking out lol.

Wednesday, April 8, 2015

VINTAGE FAIR - JOURNEY EAST @ OUTRAM

Just a quick cross promotion for this mini vintage event held at Journey East Furniture showroom on 11th and 12th April 2015! I am bringing lots of cool jewellery so vintage lovers in Singapore, do drop by this weekend if you are looking for bargains in a homey relaxing atmosphere! Cash payment only, more info at lemonkitscharms.com
Preparing the jewellery.

Dates:
11th April (Sat): 11.00am - 6.00pm
12th April (Sun): 11.30am - 6.00pm

Address:

Journey East Furniture
315 Outram Road #03-02, Tan Boon Liat Building
Singapore 169074

Directions:
-From Outram MRT
Take overhead bridge to opposite Outram MRT at Outram Road entrance, take bus 970 or 75.
Drop two stops at Blk 2B (behind Tan Boon Liat Building)
Cross Zion Road at traffic light and walk around to Outram Road to front entrance.

-From Tiong Bahru MRT
Take bus 5, 16, 33, 163, 195, 851
Drop one stop at Blk 1.
Walk along Tiong Bahru Road, past Zion Road, to Outram Road & turn left to front entrance.

Monday, April 6, 2015

WALKING THE DOG DIGI STAMP

New digital stamp release called 'Walking the Dog'! I had fun drawing this illustration. Above is an example of it coloured, printed with my inkjet printer and I added a simple background. I coloured the artwork with markers, pastels and coloured pencils. This is the proper way to walk a dog lol.

On a side note, a few days ago I saw a lady being impatient and tense with her dog. Maybe she thought plain walking the dog was sufficient enough and didn't want to deal with waiting for it to explore its senses. She was yanking and dragging the poor thing without letting it sniff around, pee or poop. It was as if she was dragging a cart with broken wheels.... sad I know!

So here's a happier picture for doggie lovers!

The digital stamp is 8 inches height, 300dpi format jpg. You can easily custom the background to any season you like. Available in my Etsy shop: https://www.etsy.com/listing/228241912/

Friday, April 3, 2015

CAT GIRL & MOUSE DIGITAL STAMP

New digital stamp "Cat Girl and Mouse", if you are a cat lover, this may be perfect for your crafts! I wanted her to be mod-styled and a bit nonchalant. May do a cat-burglar type next! I am currently working on a doggie digi. The above artwork is an example of it printed on inkjet then coloured with markers and pastels, with background added in Photoshop.


She is 7 inches height in 300dpi format, available as an instant download in my Etsy shop: https://www.etsy.com/listing/227896646/