Move Out to Instagram

Dear Bloggers,

I moved out to Instagram...
since there's just few times to write, and the internet connection in my new dorm is really really bad. But I still make projects, and add new post of my other hobbies. We still can share anything about the projects. So follow my IG: projectsofrena. See you there ^^


Regards,
Rena

My First Amigurumi

Yesss! This is my first amigurumi project. At the beginning, i was hesitate how this project would be. Will it finish like the pattern I've chosen??? Hahaha, but old quote always remind me to finish a project, "you'll never know the result unless you start to do it." So here it is, me, with the free pattern from Ravelry.com. When I decided to start the amigurumi project, I bought yarns in a yarn store at Depok. I chose caramel brown because last day before, a beagle pattern attracted me.

At home I already had the black yarn, but it was so hard to find white acrilyc wool. I brought the yarn to my dormitory, then when I tried to start the beagle, I found the pattern was a lil bit hard for me...since it uses multicolor, and i dont know how to change the yarn color. What I did was looking for other, simpler pattern, easy and one color pattern to learn how to make amigurumi (Amigurumi is stuffed animal you make using crochet or knitting technique). AND... I found thi adorable bear pattern, looks like rilakkuma indeed. (Rilakkuma is Japanese bear character). Click here to get the free pattern.

And what I did next was just crochetting... ^^, I will post the picture of my amigurumi bear.

 1. First of all, it will look like a small dome

2. If you pin the safety eyes, it will look like giant choc chip #droll

3. Then if you follow the pattern above, you'll get the limbs, just like this:

4. Dont worry, you almost there. Now, pin them up before you saw it

5. Sew it... and VOILAH!!!

ah, dont forget to add ears yellow felt, and embroidery nose. I Really love the bear, it's tiny and cute :3. Hint: I'm gonna make another amigurumi project. Guess what it would be? I will use soft wool for next project. Can't wait to see the result. Cya in next post >.<

DIY Potpourri - Dried roses

Have you ever heard potpourri? I dont think potpourri famous Indonesia, hahaha because it's quite rare to find potpourri in my friends' house. Well Popourri (read as popori) is natural fragrance made of dried natural materials such as dried leaves, flowers, fruits. Me, knew potpourri because I browse at Pinterest. SO many interesting posts of potpourri there.

Beside that, i have my favorite flower. Well, basicly I do love flowers. But my favorite one is ROSE. I plant some kind of rose. The yellow-small roses: its flowers are small and it blooms every month. Since it often bloom, i have an idea to keep it, although the roses already dried.

Beside this yellow rose, I also have red one. The red rose is big type flower. But it blooms once or two in 2-3 month.

So I started to collect my flowers. Both yellow rose and red rose could stand 2 weeks on its tree. But at the end of two weeks, flowers usually get withered and before it withered, I pick it up and hang it with sewing yarn. By hanging the flowers, you could make your flowers dry perfectly. So after I have collected for several months, I put it in jar, and then painted the top of jar. And this is what I made:

The red rose give unique color, since dried rose rose will change to dark purple rose. Basicly, when i open the top of jar, the smell is soooo good, warm and relaxing. To make it nicer, I add some dried rose leaves, and CINNAMONS! I always love cinnamon's smell!. So, what you need to make it just dried flowers (any kind of flowers indeed) and dried natural stuffs, put it in a jar or bowl, you also can add essential fragrance if you want. Good worth to try! So lovely!

Friendship Shawl Ala Rena

SOOO after long break of crochetting, I was confused to start again.. either learn to learn amigurumi or make more shawl? While I was confused, I browsed at online local yarn store. And there, i found that bulky yarns had interesting colors. They were so colorful. And the store added notes that buky yarn's texture is soft, thick, and big ply. The bulky has attracted me since I browsed that day. So I finally decided to order it. Before I ordered it, i browsed for the pattern. What should I make with those yarns. And I found this pattern: Friendship Shawl. The pattern available free in Ravelry. Yeah you can find many good and unique pattern in Ravelry for free, and share your project there too! And this was how I did start it:

Looked so nice at the beginning rite? This pattern is easy to understand, and one of quick projects too. After about 2 or 3 days, I finished it like this:

My shawl length is about 1.6 metres and it is really nice. Warm, soft, and thick but light enough (since I used bulky yarn). My office colleague asked me, "Does it really make you warm? So many holes in you shawl!" But, guaranteed! It is so warm. I spent 3 balls of yarn to finish this. And the rest of yarn? I made 2 small wallets to my lovely friends in my last office. They are so kind yet funny too. They helped me a lot when i worked there. So, before i quitted my job, I wondered, what should I give to 'em???. And this things were the answer. I hope they like it tho! ^^

Used bulky yarn and double crochet! Very quick project indeed, about 2 hours. Hihihi. I would like to make more things with bulky yarn. Really love it!

Rainy Day Dinner Menu

Rainy Day Dinner Menu

So, A few days ago, still worked at the old office...

As usual, I and my colleagues looked for lunch near our office. The sun really really showed his power to us. I mean, damn! It was truely hot that day. But, tho the sun was so hot and sexy, and i had gut feeling that rain would come down as the evening come too (becase rain fell down after hot day too, day before).  So after having lunch, we continued our work, our office room felt hot too. It seemed like the air conditioner didn’t work because the weather outside was extremely HOOOT! (Me and my friends thought like that). And then what happened next was my gut feeling came true. About 3 and 4 pm, sky became so dark and the thunder rumbled loudly too...and after the signs, rain fell down, just down hard, as hard as it wanted...

4.30 pm. the bell rang means it’s time to go home now, but what shoud I do if the rain fall so hard like that day. So, I just could wait.Maybe about 45 minutes later, slowly, rain stopped and I decided to go home. I stopped public motorcylcle (Ojek) to take me home. Me, myself, convinced that I could reach home safe and everything would be alright. On the way home, I found that there was flood in Taman Duta residence. Oh no, my motorcycle should turn around or take other route to take home. Fortunately, we could pass this flood, that was so relieved.

As long as i sat on motorcycle i had already thought about food, food, and food, since my belly was so hungry. Warm food... ah.. could be very warm, warm my belly, warm my body, warm soul too. But mom went outside to visit my aunt’s mom who passed away that day... so it’s me had to provide meal for myself tho... okay, I stopped the motorscycle and bought an instant corn soup powder, imagined that the corn soup would be soooo warmmmm.

Nah, what came next was so unpredicable! After buying instant corn soup, I continued my way back home. The rain was really really hard indeed, and flood didn’t only happen at Taman Duta, but also in Pondok Duta (near my residence) and my motorcycle driver didn’t want to continue taking me home. And you know what, I had to walk, by my foot, walked through the water, the flood, heavy footstep because you walk in water it would be hard to walk. So hungry, cold, chill, shivered but had to keep walkin.

Huffft, finally i was getting home and i didn’t enter house soon. I went to smal stall near my house to buy some stuffs to be cooked. I picked an eggplant, ginger-milk powder, and sausages. After I reached home, i mopped floor because the roof was leak and finally I started cooking.

I checked refrigerator and only found this: lettuce, mayonnaise, egg, onions, bellpepper, and half portion yesterday- cooked-rice. And i started it. I made tempura first: Chopped the onions and eggplant, mixed the flour, water, and seasonings. Put in chopped onions and eggplants in mixed flour, wrap them with flour powder, and just fried it till it done.

After tempura, I worked for the soup. Pretty easy! Just chopped sausages into small pieces, boiled some water, added the instant corn soup powder and sausages and stirred it well. Done! As I served it, I didn’t forget to serve it with lettuce and mayonnaise, also the hot ginger-milk. And I ate a lot till belly was so full! Happy with what I’ve done... I still had to face the realita: wash the cooking and dinner utensils hahaha. 

PROJECT YANG TERTUNDA-TUNDA – sebuah catatan reflektif

#EDISI JALAN-JALAN

#FAMILY TIME

PROJECT YANG TERTUNDA-TUNDA – sebuah catatan reflektif

Minggu, 11 Mei 2014

Puncak, Jawa Barat. Kita semua, atau mungkin, hampir semua dari kita, pasti pernah jalan ke kawasan wisata Puncak, Jawa Barat. Yup! Puncak yang itu, yang banyak kebon teh, banyak tukang bubur Cianjur ato nasi timbel lesehan, puncak yang katanya uda ga sedingin dulu lagi. Yah, tapi jangan salah, kalau dikunjungi sama orang-orang tersayang, tempat wisata ini tetep bisa jadi istimewa.

Kayak hari ini ni: rencana jalan-jalan ke Puncak sama Papa-Mama (Pap-Mam) untuk sekedar makan bubur ato makan jagung bakar udah ada sejak aku masih kuliahan, jomblo, punya pacar, sampe sekarang jomblo lagi tapi belom pernah kesampean. Alesannya simpel: sibuk, ngiringin orgen di gereja, males, udah kesiangan jalan, macet, harpitnas, ogah ah, dsb, dsb. Nah Nah, ceritanya hari ini, tanpa disengaja, aku sm mama uda  ke gereja hari Sabtunya, papa ke gereja Minggu pagi. Tugas wedding udah beres, tinggal nyelesein partitur temen. Singkat cerita, papaku iseng ngajak jalan ke Puncak, cari makan siang (padahal uda jam 11an, udah agk kesiangan sih mau jalan jauh2) tp aku yg nyetir mobil krn papa capek katanya. Hmm okelah, kami jadi jalan. Setidaknya, rencana yg sebenernya pending bertahun-tahun ini akhirnya bakal kesampean ni. Sampe di sana, ya kami makan siang, makan jagung bakar dan pastinya foto-foto. Walaupun sederhana, this made me so happy.

Dari event ini, aku jadi kepikiran hal ini: berharga sekali ya waktu yang bisa kita nikmati bersama keluarga kita, alias family time. Berharga sekali waktu yang bisa dinikmati sama para rangers (sebutan utk sahabat2 semasa kuliah yang makin ke sini makin syusaaaah ketemu #eits curhat).

 Apakah di antara teman-teman ada yang punya pengalaman yang tidak menyenangkan dengan keluarga?  Atau sahabat? Atau pacar? Atau tetangga? Berapa banyak waktu yang habis bersama mereka yang diisi dengan kekesalanmu karena mereka mungkin pernah menyakitimu padahal quality time dengan mereka sangat premium dan sulit didapat? Sharingku dgn beberapa sahabat-sahabatku di gereja tentang pertanyaan tersebut menghasilkan kesimpulan sederhana bahwa semua orang punya pengalaman yang tidak menyenangkan dengan anggota keluarganya atau dengan orang-orang terdekatnya. Let’s say:  berantem sama kakak/adek, berantem sama ortu, diusir dari geng, diselingkuhin pacar, ditusuk sahabat sendiri pake pisau terus ditabur garem di atas lukanya... perih bgt (haha ini istilah dr temenku), rebutan warisan, rebutan arisan, kabur/diusir dari rumah, orangtuanya berantem, dan pengalaman-pengalaman nggak enak lainnya. Aku pun punya pengalaman-pengalaman semacam itu. Lalu pertanyaan selanjutnya, benarkah bahwa orang-orang yang berpotensial membuatmu sakit hati adalah justru orang-orang terdekatmu sendiri? Lantas kalau mereka membuatmu sakit hati, apa yang kamu lakukan? Menjauhi mereka? Menghindar? Melawan?

Aku sih mungkin pernah mencoba semuanya ya, ya intinya menjauhi hal-hal yang tidak menyenangkan itu lah...  mencoba melawan ya pernah juga, tapi tidak berhasil,dan sebisa mungkin membuat diri sendiri nyaman. Tapi kok setelah mencoba meng-counter semua stimulus negatif itu, aku justru merasa ngga nyaman dengan diriku sendiri. Rasanya makin sakit karena ngerasa gagal dan ngga bisa mengubah apa pun dari orang-orang itu.

Dan proses pun berjalan... aku masih ingat nasehat seorang pastor mengenai hal itu, “kita tidak bisa menampik bahwahal-hal buruk dan tidak menyenangkan selalu ada di dunia ini, tapi, cobalah untuk berkompromi dengan hal-hal itu. Tidak perlu menyetujui sesuatu yang salah, tapi kita perlu sadar bahwa hal buruk itu selalu ada dan kita tidak bisa mengubahnya. Dari pada kita mengutuki kegelapan, lebih baik kita menyalakan lilin dalam kegelapan itu. Apa maksudnya? Maklumilah bahwa di dunia ini akan selalu ada yang baik dan yang buruk. Jika kita tidak bisa mengubah dunia, bagaimana kalau kita mulai dari diri sendiri dahulu”.

Okei, selain itu, di sebuah gathering (lupa gathering apa), ada disampaikan ayat berikut, “Karena itu, Aku berkata kepadamu: apa saja yang kamu minta dan doakan, percayalah bahwa kamu telah menerimanya, maka hal itu akan diberikan kepadamu. Dan jika kamu berdiri untuk berdoa, ampunilah dahulu sekiranya barang sesuatu dalam hatimu terhadap seseorang, supaya Bapamu yang di sorga mengampuni kesalahan-kesalahanmu. Tetapi jika kamu tidak mengampuni, maka Bapamu yang di sorga juga tidak akan mengampuni kesalahanmu.” – Markus 11:24-26.

Memang, susah sekali memaafkan, atau menerima hal jelek yang dilakukan orang kepada kira. Susah. Dan mungkin ada pula yang sudah memaafkan, tapi orang itu tidak juga berubah. Menerima? Owh itu paling susah juga. Melupakan? Tidak akan pernah kita bisa melupakan kalau kita belum bisa menerima dan memaafkan. Jadi? Susah, semua itu proses (like we all know, that everything is about proccess), dan patut kita usahakan. Toh orang-orang terdekat itu lah yang juga menyiramimu dengan banyak kesenangan, kasih, tempat dimana kita bisa berhuwe-huwe (Contoh: “Ncom...HUWEEEE ..  XD), minta saran dan bantuan, dan sebagainya. Jadi, jgn pernah gengsi untuk bilang Mom, Dad, guys, dear, girls, Love ya! ^^ #they are so precious, of course!

Next Project will be...ARUGURUMI vs. SHAWL?


Wah, akhirnya niat tulis-tulis lagi di blog hahaha. Kalo ngga salah pos terakhir aku ya tetep di bulan Januari aja. Hahahaha agak kurang konsisten ya dalam menulis dan ngepos-ngepos.. yah.. tp gimana ya.. memang aku tidak sedang dalam project apa-apa. Setelah lulus kuliah, aku jadi sibuk cari-cari pekerjaan dan dapet pekerjaan yang 'a lil bit shocking for me'. Kerjaanku sih, sebagai MT marketing, ngga sibuk-sibuk banget, tp cukup bikin stres dan rasanya kalo ada waktu luang, aku santai-santai aja. Baru ni di bulan April akhir aku sempet lagi merajut, dan kali ini aku bikin tempat pensil -pakai sisa benang yang ada di rumah. Tempat pensil pun belum benar2 selesai!!! Masih belum difuring dan dikasi resleting... T.T.

Nah nah nah, karena udah lama bgt belum ngerajut-ngerajut lagi, kemaren sempet kepikiran untuk belajar tentang amigurumi. Apakah Anda tahu tentang amigurumi? Amigurumi itu dari bahasa Jepang. Ami means crochetted or knitted dan gurumi itu artinya boneka. Jadi, secara terminologi, amigurumi itu ya boneka yang dibuat dengan cara dirajut. Kalau mau tahu amigurumi lebih dalam, teman2 bisa cek disini Amigurumi. Banyak sekali web-web yang menyediakan pola gratisan (GRATIS!!!) dari amigurumi ini seperti, salah satunya: http://greatamigurumi.blogspot.com/, dan cukup mudah menemukan pola gratisan ini. Aku punya satu pola boneka kucing. Yang paling menarik dan bikin ngiler adalah biasanya amigurumi ini kawaii item, alias cute, lucu-lucu banget desainnya.

Sayangnya karena pola ini kebanyakan dari Jepang sono, maka polanya banyak tersaji dalam bentuk diagram-diagram rajut. Aku belum sempat belajar amigurumi karena aku agak bingung membaca polanya. Aku sempat minta tolong diajarin baca pola tersebut sama Mba Oty, empunya toko sekaligus kursus merajut Rajutan Mama di bilangan Depok. Toko Mba Oty ini ada di Detos dan cukup lengkap dan menarik. Informasi selengkapnya tentang toko Mba Oty ini bisa dilihat langsung di webnya : http://rajutanmama.com/, tapi sayangnya aku belum sempat ke sana lagi untuk belajar bikin amigurumi-nya

# break sebentar ngurusin kerjaan...

lanjut...

Nah, belum sempet aku ke tokonya Mba Oty, ada temenku yang ngasi link toko benang online. Pas aku liat-liat ternyata toko benang ini keliatannya cukup bonafit juga. Jadi aku pesan bbrp gelos benang warna-warni (benang sembur). Suka banget sama warnanya.. walaupun barangnya belum sampai ke tanganku. Rencananya benang-benang itu aku mau bikin shawl. Do you know what is shawl? Shawl  tu ya... kaya scarf gitu tapi lebih lebar, hampir mirip pashmina juga. Semoga proses pengerjaannya nanti lancar ya... hahaha, silakan ditunggu jadinya kaya apa tu shawl


HAPPY WEEKEND ALL