Looking back......

I am not at all productive this week, spent so much time re-decorating another room, so maybe it is a  good time for....

Looking back

New York City - August 2012

There is so much of New York to take in, even I lived there for 8 years and went back to visit again and again,  I still can never tired of this wonderful city......

on this trip, hubby and I totally want to be tourist again, took the New York Water Taxi from South Street Seaport and went to the Williamsburg Flea by the East River.

got a gorgeous sight of the Brooklyn bridge on the ferry

and saw Frank Gehry's building from a distance, and the Freedom Tower was still under construction at that time

Williamsburg Flea is part of Brooklyn Flea

Dough - I heard they are good

I had these instead, fatty pork belly just looks good to me

old stuff, nice stuff

it is lucky that I always travel light and have no space for these stuff

other wise, will burn a big hole in my hubby's pocket

did get a box of these for 5 bucks though

we took a 45 minutes walk to Green point, where my favorite bakery is

Ovenly has the best sea salt chocolate cookies, yum!!!! If you are in Brooklyn, do stop by, they do sell these yummies at Joe's coffee in Manhattan

the park near Ovenly, great view of the Manhattan skyline

on the same trip, I also met up with Lauren, where I treated her at Alice Tea Cup on the upper west side for her birthday meal

Look! Lauren came with a plan too, we are going thrifting in the city together

and here are some of the goodies I brought home from NYC

a really really cool cookbook from the 60s, with real pink pages

ok, I gotta go, lots to do today, have a great Labor Day weekends my friend in the USA and for my friends overseas, have a fun one too!

From this to this....

If you remember not so long ago, I told you I was busy playing with paint? Not with paper though, I was re-decorating Clare's room.

Here's what the room looks like 3 years ago when we first moved in

The girls get to pick what they want in their room, Clare is a big fan of THE WHO and THE BEATLES, so you can see lots of colors of Great Britain there in her room.

and then when they moved to college, they leave me junk

My husband and I have different opinion when come to this issue, he doesn't like me "nagging" at them asking them to clean their own room, he said the room is theirs, if they want to live in junk, let them be, just close the door and don't see it.

My cleaning lady did tidy up the place a little bit after Clare left

but I still decided to do a make over, my husband thinks that we have way too many white walls in our house, literally every room is white when we bought this place, since it was newly painted, we didn't do anything.

2 days of hard work.....

really really hard work....

I got ache and pain all over after that

but.....

Tada.....

how do you like this room now?

wall decal from Kmart 12.99

birdcage from Michaels 3.99 X 2, used 40% coupon, final price 4.78 for 2

I bought this mirror from the thrift store for 1.50, it was in a cheesy golded color, so I painted it white to go with this room

this little shelf is also from the thrift store - 1.50, now you know why I love to go thrifting? all you need is just a little white paint and you can do magic with old junky stuff you bought from the thrift store

I hand-stitched this with the left-overs from the cushion cover

oh by the way, the cushion was hand-stitched too, I did it in the car while we drove to Sedona early in the summer 

this dresser was from Ikea when we lived in New York, I thought the color doesn't go with this room

so I did do a bit of research, learning how to paint on laminate furniture

tidy up the shelf, and that's about it

Clare loves the room, she has been back twice after I re-decorated and the room and the room maintained neat and clean since....

I am linking up with

WOW US WEDNESDAY #133

City Crafter Challenge Blog Week 174 ~ Cottage Roses and Gingham

This week at City Crafter Challenge Blog

The beautiful inspiration photo picked by Charlene

via

It is lovely Charlene, and so YOU! I love it, and had fun making my project too, thanks!

 Cottage Roses and Gingham

who doesn't like that?

this is another page to filled up my 2013 year book

remember? I told you before, I always have the intention to do a small album that highlight the important events in each year, but by end of the year, my memory gives in and I always had problem getting the dates right, so in 2013, I decided to "scrap as it goes", try to mark down the event and scrap as soon as possible and not wait till year end.

My brother-in-law Dan and his wife visited us back in February, we took them to the Bellagio Botanical Garden.

I pick out the roses and gingham paper right before I start this page, but as the layers piled up, I noticed my gingham patterned paper almost all cover up, whew....... so I took a really really close up to show you that I DID USED gingham, LOL!

you can see a tiny bit more of the gingham paper right next to the green leaf here too

I did have lots of fun though....

Come join us this at

City Crafter Challenge Blog

Our special guest star Sue Lelli and the CCCB designers have more to show you, hop right over now!