Cute Obentou! かわいいお弁当

Another post that has nothing to do with stitching...sorry guys... This one is about a workshop I went to with a friend of mine this weekend. It was so much fun!

We went to a Japanese shop called Roppongi (www.roppongi.nl, one of my favourite shops - maybe even my favourite shop - in Amsterdam) to participate in a workshop cute obento. Obento is a Japanese style lunch box, usually with cute characters made of rice and vegetables.

This is the Japanese style lunch box we were going to make, this was the example our teacher made before the workshop started. Our teacher - or better, sensei - is called Noriko. Noriko-sensei's cute lunch box looks so cute and so pretty!

We all got a cutting board, a knife, a picture of Hello Kitty and ingredients - of course.

We had to take some sushi rice, wrap it in plastic and make a ball. Here I'm trying to make a Hello Kitty shape from my round rice ball.

And hurrah! I've made Hello Kitty's head! We used unboiled beans for her eyes.

I'm not going to go through all the stept of the workshop - I think that would be quite boring - so here you see what my finished bento box looks like. It's got a rice ball in it, carrots, broccoli, tomato, ham, corn, sausage, omelette and a bit of seaweed in it. I have to say, that I'm quite happy with the way my cute obento turned out!

Enjoy! Or, 'itadakimaaaaaaasu!' (いただきま〜す！) in Japanese. The woman who owns the shop gave us both a can of Dragon Ball Z soft drink, because there was a misunderstanding about the starting time of the workshop. The obento and the softdrink were very nice! I really enjoyed making it and eating and drinking it!

My friend and me in the shop, after finish making our obento. It was very nice, thank you very much for teaching us, Noriko-san!

My obento

My friend's obento

Cupcakes

Last Saturday, mum and I went to a Cupcake workshop in a very posh little village in Holland. The teacher already prepared some cupcakes so we could be inspired by them. I have to tell you, I don't really like fondant, so I didn't want to make a cupcake with lots and lots of fondant on it. I stuck to little roses.

Although I do quite like this little turtle. 

First we had to cover the cupcakes with butter cream, to make the layer of fondant stick to the cupcake.

Then we had to roll out whatever colour fondant we wanted, cut out little circles and stick them onto the butter cream covered cupcakes.

These are my cupcakes. The posh girl next to me asked her friend why I only made roses and only used pearls. Still can't figure out why she didn't just ask me why I only made roses and only used pearls. 

Mum made these cupcakes. I think they look very cute and dainty! And they go well with mine. I think mum's look like bridal cupcakes.

We were done quite quickly, because we only made roses. When we were done we put them in boxes and went home. We didn't eat any...for some reason, having that super sweet fondant in your hands all the time makes you want to eat savoury things instead of sweet things. I have no idea what they tasted like.

I probably won't make fondant covered cupcakes ever again...I don't like it... I'd like to make a chocolate cake though, with chocolate frosting and red marzipan roses. (And maybe a few pearls).

Bon appétit!

Pretty Little London Update I

Good morning, everyone!

It's a nice sunny day over here and way too hot to stitch (but that doesn't stop me)!

Since I've got till Christmas to finish this piece, I'm taking my time. I don't want to stitch it quickly and get CTS and make lots of mistakes. I want to enjoy stitching this.

Here is a little update on Pretty Little London. I haven't been stitching a lot with Animal Crossing: New Leaf in my hands and A Clash of Kings by my side, but this is what I've done so far.

The Big Ben is nearly done and I've done a bit of Tower Bridge. I'm actually really enjoying stitching this piece. 

About Animal Crossing: New Leaf...

It is absolutely awesome! It's the best one since the GameCube version. Have you played the GameCube version? You were greeted by this cute cat called Rover on the train and based on the answers you give, your face is chosen. 

(Rover in the GameCube version of Animal Crossing)

In the other Animal Crossing games you get picked up by a different character and I kind of missed Rover - he's so cute - but in Animal Crossing: New Leaf he made his second appearance! Hurrah!

(Rover in Animal Crossing: New Leaf)

Now you're mayor of the village you live in, so there's lots of work to do - lots more than in the other versions. The other versions were basically paying off your mortgage and befriending animals, but here you have to get 100% approval from the villagers before you can start your real mayoral tasks. After you get a 100% approval rate, you can build loads of things in your village. And of course, also in this game, you have to pay off your mortgage and befriend the animals that live in your village. It might not sound like an awesome game, but it really is. Even if you have to do everyday stuff you normally don't like in real life, you'll probably like it in this game. This game is like a vacation, you can escape reality and enjoy a forest life with weird Japanese aspects and cute animals.

Animal Crossing: New Leaf

Okay, like the title suggests, this is not a post about stitching, this is a post about a great great great Japanese video game. Ben and I have been waiting for aaaaaaaaaages for this game to come out. In Japan they have been enjoying this game since the 8th of November, 2012! Oh, how we envied the Japanese...but now...only a couple more days to go...and we can finally FINALLY play Animal Crossing: New Leaf.

So I keep telling myself: keep calm and wait for Animal Crossing: New Leaf. 

I stumbled upon this lovely little picture on the internet (I don't know who stitched this, but it's awesome). Would love to stitch this, but I don't have an iPhone and I'm not sure any of the people I know would want a childish iPhone cover like this. 

Anyone else desperately waiting for this game? 

Another New Start

Hello!
Again, sorry for not stitching and posting for so long... I've been very busy and didn't have a lot of inspiration.

I remember starting a small Adventure Time piece - in March - that I never finished, because I made a mistake and didn't want to take it all out and start over again. Sorry for that. I'm sure I'll try it again when I'm done with my new piece.

This (above) is another piece I finished and mangled about two weeks ago. I wanted to make a nice biscornu for a friend of my mum's, who loves to sew and loves sea creatures. A biscornu with sea horses seemed suitable, so I started stitching. I was very happy with the result, but when I stitched the two pieces of cloth together...it started fraying. I should have thought of this before... As you can see, I left very little excess cloth. Ah well...I'll make her another one some time...

I stumbled upon a blog (www.littleloveliesbyallison.com) and I saw a nice pattern by Satsumastreet, so I clicked on the link and was linked through to Satsumastreet's Etsy shop (http://nl.etsy.com/shop/SatsumaStreet). I bought a very cute pattern called Pretty Little London. Yesterday I decided to make a start. This one has to be done by Christmas, it's for B's grandmother.

So far, I've only done the little raincloud and the sun, so nothing spectacular. I was counting the little holes to see where I had to start, but my dad was talking to me so I was listening to him as well...which made me start on the wrong spot... I had to start over again, that's why I only did this little bit of Pretty Little London, I wasn't really in the mood for much else - since I'm reading a really exciting book.

I'll be working on this one for a while though, so stay tuned for updates! (This time I'll try to stitch as much as I can, so this doesn't turn into a boring blog with no new posts).

P.S. I have a blog about Japan as well, but unfortunately it doesn't work at the moment...I don't know why...

New Start

Sorry for not writing/stitching for so long!

Here is a picture of my new start, I started this evening. Can you guess what it's going to be?

Sorry for the poor quality of the picture and my rather childish pyjamas...

Japan Blog

Hello everyone!

Yesterday I finally started writing on my blog about Japan, so if you would like to read it, here is the link!

http://www.emmainghibliland.nl

Hope you enjoy reading about my trip to Japan and enjoy looking at the pictures I made.

Love,
Emma

Manga Drawing

Can't remember when I drew this, but I found this again when I was cleaning out my room. Now I'm in the mood for drawing!