Monday, July 29, 2013

How Bigib scarf or jewelry can jazz up your simple black dress

I have this little black dress, which is one of my favorites. It's simple and yet comfortable.


I love this because it's easy to wear for going to work, church or even party. I decided to wear it to one of my meetings. As usual, I was rushing, not sure what to wear, so I grab my little black dress. It looks so plain.

 I was deciding between wearing my dress with a jewelry or scarf. Since this is the first interview and I want to show a more classic style, I decided to wear a red / black batik silk scarf. Plus if the room is too col, I can always use the scarf help warm myself a bit. .

I think both looks good. I'd wear the silver jewelry and the matching earrings for a party.
What do you think?

Monday, July 22, 2013

Giant bubble wands summer fun

What makes this girl so excited? The first big, giant, humongous bubbles she's ever seen !!!
Yes, it is Summer and of course my kids started to say "I'm bored".
I decided to try to make giant bubble wands.

It's made of two dowels, eye hooks, string, washers.
 First, you have to drill both dowels and twist the eye hooks tight
Add washers/nuts on the string.  I use cotton/poly 20 lbs string at Home Depot. Even my youngest can help make the wand.
 Then tie both ends and it's ready to go. I searched home made bubble recipes and I tested a couple. I also tested a store bought bubble. We found out all of them are good
It's simple project to do that I think will last all summer fun. Wouldn't you agree?

Monday, July 15, 2013

Silk handmade scarves by Diah at Bigib

Bigib is now teaming up with Mardiah Faraz. Diah,  is her old friend at college whom she met in her last trip to Asia. Diah has been making hand made scarves in the past 10 years. So when I told her I make jewelry, we decided to team up. We both graduated from architecture school so we have similar "wave length" in design.

 This is one of our favorite items. It's  "lines and circles" them hand made silk scarf. The size is 90"x40", which is long enough to make infinity scarf.
Or may be a double knot scarf?
And we can pair this to "lines and circles" hand made earrings


So, what do you think about same theme scarf and earrings? To learn more about this, please visit bigib.etsy.com

Monday, July 8, 2013

Batik, a resist painting method to color fabric

I was inspired with a handmade scarf my dear friend of mine, Diah, made. I decided when I get a chance, I'd like to learn about fabric, especially resist dying or Batik.

So when I was in Indonesia, I went to Indonesian textile museum in Jakarta and took a class about batik.

It's started with a design. We have a piece of 100% cotton fabric and some designs we can choose from their collections. Then, using a light table, we traced the design on to the fabric. Then using "malam" (was) and canting, we traced the design on the fabric. The tricky part is to get used to holding the canting the right way. You are suppose to hold it at an angle. If it's too steep, the hot wax can spill off and got your hand. If its too steep the opposite way, you'll get "blob" instead of a nice design.

Yes, I've made some blobs and also spill hot was on to my hand. After several tries, I think I got a hang of it. Now it's just making sure that the canting will follow your design nice and smoothly.

Here is the picture of my first piece. I think it is pretty good for a first timer. We made a small bandana.. or may be a small handkerchief. And when I'm happy with it, I take it to the coloring station where Pak Warso is waiting for me with his elbow length gloves.



They have 4 huge container filled with color. I chose blue. He then dipped the piece in a special agent, then color then he rinse it with water and for the final touch, he boiled the piece to remove the wax.


And here is my first and final masterpiece. I should have signed my name but I forgot. We spent about 3 hours to finish up a project. I think it is addicting because I felt I'm ready for my second project. 

What do you think?

Wednesday, July 3, 2013

Sepa Island trip at Pulau Seribu Thousand Island Indonesia


We went to Sepa Island, part of Thousand Island in Indonesia. It's located in North of Jakarta. There are several tour operators located in Jalan Lodan near Marina Ancol.
We learned we could make a reservation and put a 50%  down payment to secure our spot. or we could also come on the day with no guarantee spot.
We choose the later ones. Originally, we wanted to go to Pulau Kotok. Since we have no spots for that, we decided to go to Sepa Island




The cost is about $80/ person, including trip and lunch. The boat would leave Marina at 8 and would arrive at about 9:30 am. The boat will pick us up at 2 pm. 
We plan to swim around, do snorkeling around the island to see coral reef. 

When we arrived at the island, there are some options to ride a boat for extra charges. About $20 to rent a boat to get to an atoll island and $30 to rent snorkeling equipment.
We only have swimming goggles... we decided to give a try. Geared with swimming goggle, swimming shoes (highly recommended as there are coral and sea urchins), we swam around the beach. I was hoping to find colorful corals but all looks brown, grey or black. I'm not sure if that's how it's suppose to be but it looks very unattractive to me. Besides, there are floating plastic bottle, plastic glasses that ruin the nature. 

There are some "naughty" fish that keeps nibbling on our legs. The lunch is just OK. A local food presented pretty decent. There are tents to helps protects from the heat. Perhaps, the best local findings is a "Biawak"(small Komodo dragon) that was walking around "freely". They ran away when they saw us.

Is it worth $80/person for the trip? I thought it was just OK. I do wish they have a better beach.