DIY Resin Kits To Make Your Own Resin Accessories! (Review)

 I super love resin accessories because they look classy and always pretty and feminine. In fact, I've been thinking of signing up for resin art classes where I can try my hand at resin as well as create something uniquely mine. So, when Happy Hands Can approached me to review their DIY resin kits, I jumped at it immediately! It turned out really, really fun and interesting!

Currently, they offer several different DIY resin kits - You can choose to make your own earrings, necklaces, keychains or a mixture of them! For me, since I wear earrings most often, I opted for the earrings kit which gave me 4 pairs of uniquely designed earrings that cannot be found anywhere else! 

The kit comes complete with detailed step-by-step instructions as well as all the items you require in making your own DIY accessories. I love how meticulous the team is - they included cotton buds, small plastic cups, toothpicks etc to make the whole process smooth and very easy. The most exciting part was probably using the UV light torch, which solidifies our creations! Don't worry if you are hopeless at art because Happy Hands Can makes this whole project very easy to follow. Even my kids had fun doing them on their own!

(Image from Happy Hands Can website)

Different colorings were provided and all I needed to do was to squeeze out some liquid resin into the plastic cups and mix in my desired colors.

Tiny dried flowers were also included to beautify my earring creations! Love these!

Following the clear instructions, I got started on making my earrings and just enjoyed the whole process of creation and designing. It was so therapeutic! :D 

For this pair, I went for a mixture of pink and blue hues. So pretty already, isn't it? 

Hardening the resin takes just two minutes with this UV light torch.

Once the base is hardened, it's really up to you how you want to place the dried flowers and other decorations. No right or wrong - Just your unique art pieces!

Once all the resin have hardened, fasten the earring hooks and we are all set! Really simple and easy, isn't it? And we end up with 4 different pairs of earrings to don with different outfits!

The end result was so satisfying - I loved every minute of it! I think these DIY resin kits from Happy Hands Can are great as gifts for your crafty friends this upcoming Christmas season, or you can even host an Art & Craft party of five with your friends using these kits! They are also easy and simple enough for kids to try, so get some for your kids to do this school holidays as well - I guarantee you that they will be so pleased with their creations! Hop over to check them out now! =)

Canon HD FotoJournal (Review)

I can’t remember exactly when my passion for photography began, but what kept the passion going over the last many years was because of the immense amount of satisfaction I get when I saw the photos I captured. They may not be perfect shots (in fact more than 50% of the shots I took were embarrassing!), but they told the stories and experiences I had. The invention of digital cameras was ingenious, and because of that, even amateur photographers can just snap without a second thought because they know they can sift through thousands of photos afterwards and keep only those that turned out good. But on the flipside of things, it also meant that we have lost the joy of holding hardcopy photographs in our hands. Now, we admire our photographs on the screens of our phones and laptops. Still good, but it is just different from hardcopies.

Because of that, many of my friends would print out their favorite photographs or even print them into photobooks to commemorate special occasions or memorable family travels. I had not done so myself personally until I was approached with an opportunity to review Canon HD FotoJournals. Now that I’ve tried it and seen the final products for myself, I don’t think I can stop anymore. =P

I made two Canon HD FotoJournals and I couldn’t decide which I liked better. The rectangular journal (Landscape 8” x 12”, 20 pages, S$75.00) is a documentation of our experiences at Telunas Resort a couple of years back, where we were immersed in the beauty of Nature and surrounded by sea, sand, skies and fishes everyday. The square journal (10”x 10”, 20 pages, S$125.00) is a collection of the husband’s photographs taken on his film camera. Every single shot told a unique story of its own and so beautiful. One thing is for sure though – I absolutely LOVE how the FotoJournals turned out!

The wonderful part about creating your personal FotoJournals is that you get to customize, beautify and decorate every page according to your likes. Don’t worry if you are not a creative person because there are preset templates and layouts within the program to help you along. The program is user-friendly and very easy to follow. This program I am talking about is the FotoHub program, which you will be instructed to download after you’ve purchased your FotoJournal from http://shop.canon.com.sg/photobooks. Just follow the instructions accordingly, upload the photographs that you have selected to be in the FotoJournal and you are good to start designing.

Even though the number of pages is fixed (Depending on which option you purchased), you can have as many photographs included as you like. When you see the inside pages of my FotoJournals, you will know what I mean.

There are many ways to personalize the journals – You can choose the type of layout, background color, background designs/wallpapers, insert captions, treat your photographs with filters and even simple editing in brightness, contrast, sharpness, etc. One great feature I’ve discovered is that the program will prompt you if the photograph you have selected is not high-resolution enough for the printout to look perfect. You then have the choice whether to still go ahead or choose another photograph. Once the photographs are accepted, you can be assured that the printout will look great.

To give you a better understanding of the various features in the program and see the different design possibilities, let me show you my FotoJournals. I am biased but I think they look perfect. =P

As you can see on this page, I didn’t opt for full-page image so that I can add in a wallpaper and insert a caption. Tip: The program uses installed fonts on your laptop/computer, so before you get started, make sure you’ve downloaded fancy fonts that you would like to use in your journals.

This page is similar to the one above, except that I aligned the photograph to one side and gave it a flowery wallpaper to match the colors of the image.

This is one of my all-time favorite shots of Joey and I gave it a Sepia treatment and filled it up to full page because I felt there was no need for more frills or captions.

I did the same with the following because the photographs told stories on their own, without a need to say more. Less is more sometimes, isn’t it?

I did a slightly different layout with these 2 consecutive pages which were the center page of the whole journal, with a series of photographs taken on the beach. One of the most common mistakes that people make when creating their journals is that they try to put in only photographs of people because subconsciously, it feels more worth it. But if you do it like I did - Add in some shots of the little details such as the hermit crab we caught and the insects on Jayne’s hand, for example, it makes the whole journal come alive. Just my personal opinion. :)

For the back cover of the journal, I chose this photograph taken on the husband’s iphone and made it black & white to signify that the trip was a wonderful memory to all of us. Thankfully, the photograph was sharp enough to be used, even though it was not taken on a professional camera. That border & background is a preset option in the program that I chose. I thought it matched perfectly. =)

For the second journal, we wanted to create a different feel altogether. I had this fancy idea of making it into a really professional-looking photojournal. We were really happy at how it turned out eventually – I think we achieved our goal!

Here, you see the back cover (1st photo) & the front cover (2nd photo) because I wanted to show you the concept that we used. The front cover’s title probably does not make much sense on its own but when you read it from the back cover, it says, “Back To Basics”, which was what we wanted to convey – Film photography is about getting back to the basics because you have to use the right aperture, ISO and settings in order to capture the photograph the way you envision it to be. This journal is a collection of the husband’s vision through his film camera.

Since the focus of this journal is mainly on the photographs, we used white background on every page without any wallpapers or fancy colors. The captions were all thought of by the husband as he recalled the thoughts in his mind when he took the shots. I thought that was so meaningful and provided a rare peek into the mind of a film photographer.

The layout used was simple and neat, so as not to distract the viewers from the beauty of the photographs. That is exactly what a professional photojournal should look like, and the program helped to achieve that flawlessly.

It was a wonderful experience creating my FotoJournals with Canon, and the satisfaction & joy of holding a beautifully printed copy of our photographs in our hands is unexplanable. The final products are extremely high-quality and very professional-looking, and after I’ve submitted my final draft of the photojournals, I received notification (SMS & Email) after 5 working days that the albums were ready for collection (You can choose which outlet to collect your albums from after you’ve completed the design work). They certainly didn’t disappoint. In fact, they way exceeded my initial expectations! They are unique, only-one-in-the-world and most certainly an encouragement for us to continue this passion for photography.

If you have tons of photographs stored in your computer, why don’t you consider printing them out using Canon HD FotoJournals? It would open up a whole new world of possibilities for you, I promise. It’s addictive!

Thank you, Canon, for this review opportunity!

Disclosure: The J Babies was provided with two complimentary FotoJournals for purpose of review, and no other compensation was received. All photographs used and opinions expressed in this post are solely mine.

Christmas Gingerbread House Decorating Workshop at Shangri-La Hotel

Media Invite

The kids recently attended one of the most fun Christmas-themed workshops they’ve ever attended so far – The Gingerbread House Decorating Workshop organized by Shangri-La Hotel! This is their centerpiece for Christmas, by the way. So lovely!

The workshop was one of the best for several reasons –It was held in one of the hotel’s ballrooms, luxuriously and beautifully decorated in the Christmas theme, with the ingredients for the workshop displayed nicely at one end of the room.

 

There are many helpful staff going around assisting the kids and helping them to complete the whole project, and parents can just focus on taking photographs and helping out a little here and there without feeling stressed out.

Plus, there was a sumptuous dessert spread of cakes, candies, chocolates, tarts and sandwiches prepared for the participants and their parents, which got everyone really excited as well. At the end of the workshop, the kids got to bring home not just their masterpieces of gingerbread houses, they also got to bring home their cute mini chef’s toques and aprons!

All excited to start!!

A completed Gingerbread House was on display at every table for reference, and it was hard to imagine that we would be able to replicate something as pretty as that. I did a feeble attempt several years ago, to assemble a DIY Gingerbread House kit and failed so miserably that I seriously wasn’t harboring much hope.

Thankfully, the staff were all experts and before we knew it, the house’s assembled and the kids started having fun decorating their gingerbread houses! Phew.

There were so many different types of colorful candies, chocolates, gummies and marshmallows for the kids to use to decorate their gingerbread houses. The kids couldn’t resist popping some into their mouths along the way, I’m sure!

 

It was great seeing the kids’ creativity at work. Some kids covered their entire house with M&Ms! Others squeezed a lot of icing onto the roof and said that the snowstorm was really heavy and covered the entire house. Everyone’s houses looked different and unique, and that was really the fun part!

 

This was Jayne’s final product! So lovely and Christmassy, don’t you think? :) She was of course, very pleased with it.

   

Joey, on the other hand, preferred having more ‘snow’ on her house, and she even had Santa on the roof, about to climb in through the chimney, created by using a marshmallow!

The best part was that all the kids really enjoyed themselves and we made friends with all the staff who were helping the kids get their houses done.

The Gingerbread House Decorating Workshop was organized by Shangri-La Hotel for the first time last year and due to overwhelming responses and great feedback, the hotel decided to run it again this year. There are still workshops happening on some dates this month, so please quickly grab your seats before they run out and you’ve got to wait till next year! Details here.

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Now, if you are planning to bring your kids to Shangri-La Hotel for the workshop, why not plan a family meal there as well? The Line is an amazing restaurant with  superb buffet spread, and this Christmas season might just be the perfect reason for you to head down for a gastronomical experience. There were so many different stations and I didn’t manage to try everything, but those that I did, it all tasted fabulous. My favorite was the roasted meats – So good and satisfying! Words cannot describe how delicious the food were, so here are photos of what you can expect at the buffet.

            

OK I hope I made my point. You’ve got to try this buffet!

Thank you, Shangri-La Hotel for your invite. As always, we had such a great time at your hotel! =)

Disclosure: The J Babies was invited for a meal at The Line and to attend the Gingerbread House Decorating Workshop for review purposes. All photographs and opinions expressed in this post are solely mine. No other financial compensation was received.