A Fun Class

On Saturday it was such a blessing and so much fun to take a class from Taylor from Taylored Expressions.

I used to take classes with her once a month when she lived in SoCal.  Now when she is visiting she often teaches a class at Pages From The Heart.  I always look forward to taking her class because she always comes up with such fun and creative cards.  Saturday was no different of course.  Here are a few pictures from the class

and of my friend Roberta and I with two of the four cards that we made.

I surprised Taylor with a special treat from Disneyland.

I look forward to the next time when Taylor is in town so I can take another class from her.  Until then, I will continue having fun using the fun products that I have purchased from her over the years.  When you have a chance check out her online store at Taylored Expressions to check out her fun products.  I promise you won't be disappointed.  :)

Fun Goodies From My Annual Stampin Up Catalog Party

Happy Wednesday!  I hope that all of you are having  a good week so far.  Mine has been a busy and very productive one.  Because I've been so busy I have not had any energy to craft.  Hopefully by the end of the week I will have some time to do some crafting.  Today I would like to share some pictures from my annual Stampin Up catalog party.  Each year I feel very blessed to get to earn lots and lots of free products and be able to purchase products for 50% off.  This year was no different.  I was able to receive a little more than $210 of free products of my choice and 4 items for 50% off.  I was super excited when all the orders arrived.  When the UPS guy brought the boxes to my door I happened to peak out the window.  He used a dolly to bring these boxes to my door. 

Here is all the fun products that I earned.

I can't wait to get to play with everything when I have some time off from work.  As a big mahalo to my friends that placed an order I made a little some thing for them.  For the three friends that ordered the most I gave them some Martha Steward twine.

All my other friends received a package of twine.

It was lots of fun making toppers for each of the gifts.  Along with their gifts each friend also received 2-3 cards  from the friend that are placed the order with.  Each year I ask her to send me some cards to give to my friends to give them some ideas.  Here is the stash of awesome cards that she sent to me this year.

It's always so hard for me to not end up keeping all the cards for myself.  LOL!    Before I end I want to share some pictures of ono food that my family and I enjoyed last weekend.  On Saturday we had dinner at Back Home in Lahaina. My hubby ordered HI fried chicken, teri chicken, and BBQ beef and I ordered the luau platter which includes a choice of rice (I ordered bacon fried rice.), kalua pork, roasted port,  rice noodle soup, and lomi lomi.

My order comes with an onolicious piece of haupia (coconut) cheese cake. (It's in a take out box because we were too full to eat another bite.)

Afterwards we dropped by of our favorite bakeries- 85 Degrees.  We picked up some green tea rolls and a taro smoothie with boba.

On Sunday we spent a total of  11 hours at Disneyland and California Adventure and ate dinner at Flo's Diner at California Adventure.  They have the best pulled pork sandwich

and roasted chicken.

For dessert we ordered a chocolate moose pie.  It looks rich, but it's very light.

(We don't usually order dessert when we go out to dinner unless we are enjoying a meal at an amusement park or at one of favorite restaurants.) With all the ono food that I ate last weekend I think it's time to go on a diet.  Thanks for stopping by to see what I have to share.  Have a blessed rest of the week!

A Hello Kitty Tea Party and Visiting a HK Exhibit

On Saturday my good friend Esther and I attended a Hello Kitty themed tea party in Honor of Girls' Day.  The tea party was at Chado Tea in Little Tokyo.  Prior to going to the tea party, I had the hardest time finding an outfit to wear.  I looked in several stores and could not find a Hello Kitty outfit to wear that would be appropriate for a tea party.  Finally I went to Walmart and found some HK material.  Prior to leaving work on Thursday I asked a friend if she would be willing to help me make scarf if I dropped off some material at her house that evening.  Here is my friend Sandy and I after she made the scarf.

Can you believe that she made the scarf within 30 minutes?  What a pro.  Thanks to her I was stylin for the tea party. :)  Esther and I had lots of fun at the tea party.

Check out all the cute food.

The sandwiches had special shape, but we could not figure out what it was.  The smoked salmon was shaped like HK's head.

The teas were pretty good too.  They served HK tea.  The best one was the cinnamon tea.

Best of all we got to take a picture with Hello Kitty

and got some fun party favors (We got a bag of mochi and a HK bag with a HK folder, note pad, band aids and kleenex.)

After our tea party we went to the HK exhibit at the National Japanese Museum next door.

Although it was third time visiting the exhibit I still had lots of fun.  I actually noticed some new things that I did not notice the first two times.  Here is a picture of some of my favorite displays.

At the museum bookstore I previous purchased the HK products that they have there the first two times that I visited.  This time around I purchased a cute book bag

and a cosmetic bag.  Aren't they cute!

Before I end this post I wanted to share with you the RAK that Esther and I gave to each other.  I gave a some green tea with a HK chain for her phone.

This is what she surprised me with.   (Please excuse the pencil in the picture.  I put it underneath the cup to keep it from rolling.)

Thanks for stopping by and for sticking around for such a long post!

In Honor of Chinese New Year

In honor of Chinese New Year I try to make some thing crafty for family and friends each year.  This year I decide to make a magnet/decoration

to attach on packages of rice crackers (For the package of rice crackers I decided to add an extra
 

stripe of paper so that it's a little more stable.  I put a message on the back of it from my family as well as the magnets.)

take out boxes with fortune cookies inside,

and toppers of key chains.

I purchased the Year of the Ram stamp from a Japanese bookstore.  As soon as I saw the stamp I had to purchase it even though it was more pricey than what I would usually pay for a stamp.  It was more on the pricey side since it's imported from Japan.   I just love all the detail on the stamp. I also made gave these notepads on to my Sunday School students (I put each of them in a red envelope.)

and made two of these Mickey toppers for friends.

Before I end this post I wanted to share a picture of my hubby and I in our Chinese outfits.

We wear them annual to church for our porridge brunch.  Check out these two big pots of porridge that an "uncle" made.

Each of us bring condiments to share. It's always lots of fun enjoying porridge together as a church family. I hope that you enjoyed what I shared today.  Don't you think holidays are always a lot more fun when you can put a crafty touch to them?  Thanks for dropping by!