CaraOnSugar

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I love the beach. And this is entirely my parents' doing. For as long as I can remember, our week-ends and vacations were spent visiting the shores in various parts of the Philippines.

When my parents prospered, they acquired an ocean front property in Anilao, a coastal destination at the southeast tip of Batangas. I spent a lot of summers learning how to snorkel by the rocky coast, and once I was used to it I could stay in the water until sunset, or when my parents began to worry. We also sailed to the nearby Sombrero Island, which had a beautiful white sand beach. The coral reef was breathtaking, but I was careful not to stray too far from the shore with the sharks dwelling nearby.

Besides being in the waters and listening to the waves, birds, and the wind, I have become very fond of collecting items, such as shells, corals, stones, and other gifts the beach had to offer. The trinkets I amassed were stored in a secret place in the beach house.

Through the years, as I got older and had acquired other interests, our family visits to Anilao were fewer and farther in between . I took it for granted that I had time to one day retrieve my treasures. Unfortunately, that day never came as news of my summer mecca was recently sold. My collection was lost.

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I love browsing at Ornamentea, which I consider to be a  perfect one-stop destination for any jewelry crafts. It offers beautiful, but very easy to make, tutorials that you can follow and embellish according to your personal taste. You can even do print outs to share or keep for future use!

I am also a regular reader of their 'Shiny Little Things' blog, where more video DIY projects, freebie contests, and inspiring creations are shared.

For supplies, you can look no further because Ornamentea offers this too! From beads, rings, pins, and other jewelry parts, they have it all!

The only caveat is not being able to avail of their personalized lessons, so for those who live in Raleigh, North Carolina you are definitely in luck! Ornamentea offers weekly classes and various craft clubs you can easily participate in. Fortunately, they share much on their website, and stopping by there makes me feel like I am in their store!

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Title: Handmade Chic: Fashionable Projects That Look High-End, Not Homespun (ARC copy*)

Author: Laura Bennett

Release Date: November 8, 2011

About the Book:

In Handmade Chic, Laura shares simple strategies for creating 40 small luxuries and high-fashion accessories, from a smart leather iPad portfolio to a feather-embellished evening bag. With sections organized in skill-building order and based on type of accessory-small leather goods, agendas and notepads, electronics, bags and wallets, and evening items-Laura offers patterns, easy-to-follow diagrams, and detailed instructions for fabricating each glamorous project, whether it involves sewing from scratch or embellishing a prepurchased garment. While showcasing her own creative designs, she provides readers with the basic techniques and encouragement they need to come up with variations and create their own signature pieces.

Packed with Laura's signature flair and finesse, vibrant four-color photos, step-by-step drawings, and a complete list of suggestions on where to purchase materials, Handmade Chic is an accessible guide to at-home crafting that is elegant enough for the most modern, fashion-savvy of women.

Laura Bennett was a finalist on the TV series Project Runway. She has designed a line of clothing for QVC and appears regularly on CBS's The Early Show presenting craft segments. She lives in New York City.

Book Review:

Project Runway is one of my favorite shows with Season Three in particular because I was enamored by the smart, sassy, and witty redheaded New Yorker and Mom of six boys (one in the oven at the time of the show) who ended up placing second runner-up. She is Laura Bennett and she is simply remarkable. Here is a woman who is oozing with elegance and finesse, whose designs are classy and impeccable, and then quite unexpectedly, she tackles a feat of raising that many kids in the busiest city in the world.

So when an opportunity came to review an ARC copy* of her book, 'Handmade Chic: Fashionable Items that look High-End, Not Homespun', it was insane to pass up! The read was delightful because the book was really well-written, thoughtful, and engaging. The projects she teaches you is a far cry from the average country-style quilt-making or basic pattern dress-making books you typically see displayed in a crafts store. They are absolutely 100% chic, the type of assortment many would think you paid hundreds of dollars for when in truth it only cost you thirty bucks to make!

Now if you think that sounds enticing, here comes the best part -  this Do It Yourself publication is EASY! Absolutely simple to follow with no complicated technical skills required apart from basic stitching and sewing. And if you were previously hesitant to use the sewing machine, the pretty items you could create will encourage you to learn!

This book comes out in November, which gives you plenty of time to create urbane holiday gifts for family and friends. I am just glad I was able to get a head start!

*Disclosure: This book review is based on an Advance Reader Copy (ARC) courtesy of the publisher. Please note that ARC copies may not reflect the final edition and changes could be made prior to publication.

Here's a sample video of Laura Bennett creating a chic notebook case. This project is found in her book!:

Here are Chic DYI Projects You Can Learn to Create:

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I am O.C. I make no apologies about that.

On the other hand, I can also be very sentimental.

Quite a conundrum, don't you think?

The test on which side of my personality would prevail finally came on the day I had to pack our stuff to move to a new home. I was tasked to take out sizable items from our garage depot. And although I could have easily chosen to transport them to our new house since they are organized into clear plastic bins, I decided that I have two choices, either donate usable things to charity or discard as much as I can. If they have been in storage for quite sometime, then they won't be missed.

However, in the middle of my sorting, I found out that four of the containers housed memorabilia of my daughter's school work, from preschool to fifth grade. I had kept most, if not all, of her art work, homework, book reports, and science fair projects. They were, to say the least, a capacious lot.

The O.C. part of me tempted me to just close my eyes and empty the bins into our recycling can. But the sentimental side, the one who insisted to keep them all in the first place, kept playing the 'guilt' card, "if you throw them away you will never ever see them again." Oh my! What was I going to do?

Fortunately we are in a digital age, where things can either be scanned or photographed. Although it is not the same as feeling as touching the actual item, digitizing these things makes for a good compromise. I can stick to my hard rules of clearing up the clutter, and still keep my kid's school memories.

To make sure they do not stay littered in my computer's hard drive, I decided to compile them all into a hard bound book! Because this project is enormous and extremely important, there is no other book publisher I would use other than Blurb.com. They have made it extremely easy for anyone to create a beautifully crafted book. Their intuitive Booksmart software has a multitude number of creative templates and fonts. Though I am a book designer, I encourage everyone to try creating their own book. Hire me for the complicated ones (for which I can use Adobe Indesign)!

So if you happen to be an O.C. and sentimal, it turns out you do not have to choose which one dominates in the face of scrambled mementos! Just grab your digital camera, take some pictures, and design them all into a book! I certainly did, and the result is a 360 page keepsake, aptly titled, "First to Fifth: The Elementary School Years of Ashley Victoria".

Here is a preview:

I have created a book based on the photographs of my Digital Diary (Blog Entry: http://cara.onsugar.com/17947772) entitled Playing with the Light. I would like to dedicate this work to my Parents, my husband Ken, my daughter Ashley, and my cat YumYum.

However, I will give two special acknowledgements to two professional photographers whom I chose to single out of the many I admire because I am truly blessed to know them personally and have their work as a source of inspiration:

My Uncle Edmund, the proficient photographer in our clan, who has a varied range from street, nature, wedding, and creative photography. The gallery of his work can be viewed at: http://www.esubijano.com/.

And to Nino Nucum, who I was fortunate to work with in a news program for ABS-CBN Global. He has all the technical accolades, but his sense of humor and easy going character made all the tapings we did extremely fun! His company is called PXL Photography with his portfolio being shown at http://pxlphoto.com/.

As for my book 'Playing With The Light: Photographs of a Neophyte', here is a preview:

One of my earlier book designs is the home of a friend whom I consider a sister. She always had the interest and uncanny ability to put things together. Interior design is her hobby, but when I ventured into her home, I could not help but try to convince her to do this creative endeavor professionally!

Armed with a simple canon camera, I took shots of her personal abode that both she and her husband built together. I was amazed to see pieces of familiar trinkets, gathered through our travels as fashion models in our previous careers, thoughtfully placed throughout the house.  I always wondered what she would do with the memorabilia and art pieces she collected. Now I have my answer.

I hope you enjoy a preview....

Casa Mendoza is a look into a beautiful filipina home in La Vista, Quezon City, Philippines. Inside Casa Mendoza the readers will find a blend of Moroccan and Asian furnishings, and sporadic placement of antiques, souvenirs, and prints.

The exterior setting, particularly the pool and gardens, is also a masterpiece with the design of the gazebo, the eternity pool,  the rocks that formed a waterfall, and the landscaping that house exotic birds. It also amusing to find a couple of Peacocks, a Chicken, and Rooster traipsing through the gardens.

My home-based design studio, Boo Publication, does business on a cloud. One of the advantages of marketing into the virtual world is being able to meet clients overseas. One of my first book design collaborations was with Vanessa Dualib, a photographer and author of one of the most creative and funniest art work I have ever seen!

Vanessa is from Brazil. And it was so uncanny that she contacted me through my website and asked if I can send her some layout samples because she is considering a book designer to work on her latest project called 'Playing With Food'. Needless to say I got the job and I was quite enthused! With Playing With Food, I was able to show my ability to create compelling layouts, use of color and fonts, and to translate and edit the anecdotal writings that go with the photographs.

This book eventually became a contender in the Blurb Book Design Competition. It did not win, nevertheless I was so proud to accomplish the design of this book and have it in my work portfolio! I invite you to do a preview. Please note that most of the two page spread may appear mis-aligned. However, this was intentionally created to account for the bleeding on the middle insert of the book when it is printed. I hope you enjoy it!

About the Book:

“Don’t Stare at Your Food or It Might Stare Back at You!”

Author Vanessa Dualib loves photos, loves food, and hardly takes life too seriously. Thus, her book is a true reflection of her passions in life. It is meant for anyone who, for a reason or another, might not be having a good day, a good year, or even a good life. Thus, Vanessa hopes that when you view these pages something would have made you laugh or smile. If so, then her mission is accomplished.

Customer Feedback:

“I only have praises to express how satisfied I was with Boo Publication's services. Cara patiently and efficiently designed and created a true book with my ideas and photos. Cara is a dedicated, friendly and absolutely talented book designer that not only managed to meet my expectations but actually to surpass and truly surprise me with the final result. Her attention and dedication to the smallest details of something she knew meant a lot to me is something I will always remember and be thankful for. Once again, thank you, Cara. For everything. And I most certainly recommend Cara and BOO Publication to everyone!”….by Vanessa Dualib

Here's a preview of this book:

Last Christmas I decided to make fancy ornaments made of baroque pearls, beads, glittered faux flowers, leaves and twigs, and give them out as our family’s holiday gift to our relatives and friends. I was surprised how much I enjoyed designing and putting them together into these quaint ceramic ornament bisques.

Though my ornaments were fairly simple, the mixture of yellow, turquoise, green, and orange pearls made them sparkle and appear to be truly unique. I had a chance to photograph each one before I wrapped them into these 3x3 Holiday boxes that I bought from the craft store. I had hoped that the recipient would remember our family whenever they use the ornament for their Christmas tree.

This short but very enjoyable experience prompted me to experiment with my remaining materials and venture into creating fancy-looking business card holders. Apart from using the same technique when I created the ornaments, I also tried to experiment with polyester resin to create swirls of color. Then end result was quite satisfactory. I thought they turned out to be really chic-looking accessories and truly one-of-a-kind.

Among the lot, I chose my favorite and wrapped it in an Asian designed jewel pouch. I later presented this as my congratulatory gift to my youngest sister who began her first job as a staffer in Mega Magazine, a prominent fashion publication in Asia. I wanted the card holder to be one of her staple items whenever she attended networking events. I also thought it would make nifty credit card holder for occasions where she would prefer to leave the bulky wallet at home.

If you are keen on arts and crafts then this ornaments and business card holder project would be fun to do!  You can utilize various materials, such as jewelry pieces you no longer use, buttons, feathers, sea shells, and many more. Hope you find bliss and solace in these creative tasks the same way I did.

Adobe Photoshop is indubitably my favorite tool when it comes to photo editing and crafting photo art. I have trusted this software through the years and it has never let me down.

However, from time to time, with my Photoshop loyalties intact, I experiment with other photo editing software such as Corel Paintshop Pro, Google’s Picassa, Serif PhotoPlus, the recently popular Picknik, among others. Some are free to try for 30 days and some are free to download (who could resist that??!!!).

They are all cool, simple to use, and a lot of fun. However, among the recent ones I have tried is an online image editor that has been creating noise in the online creative community called SUMO Paint. Without a doubt, it slides into second place among my favorites! And here are the reasons why:

1. It’s FREE!

2. No download necessary. Just click on this link http://www.sumopaint.com/app/ and paint, edit, or create away!

3. You get an online canvas that serves as your display gallery.

4. Very EASY to USE and so kid-friendly!!! I opened an account for Ashley and she’s painting away and having a blast! And printing the artwork is a cinch! They are perfect for self-made gifts, framed art, or greeting cards.

5. Simple and Organized. Even though this is a web application, there are NO ads to distract you from your work! And registration is fast, with just your name and email address.

So give it a try! Make an art of your photographs or just simply paint from scratch.