Jones the Grocer @ Mandarin Gallery

**  All photos here were taken with my new iPhone 5 :)

I had been to Mandarin Gallery twice for Art Jamming at Artestiq but this was the first time that I came here for food.  The occasion this time was to celebrate one of our buddies' belated birthday at Jones the Grocer, which is located at a quiet cosy corner on the 4th level of Mandarin Gallery.

The colour theme for the restaurant was "Blue and White".

I ordered a pot of forest-berries tea.  Most of their white cups were quite badly stained.

A good location for a laid-back afternoon.  I like the fact that the whole place is rather spacious and the tables are not too close to one another.  This gives us more freedom to engage in our conversation without worrying that the people seated adjacent to our tables can hear our small talks.

At 3pm on a weekend, the choice of food was rather limited.  The breakfast, lunch and ala-carte menu was not available at this timing and we could only choose from the brunch menu and bakeries.  The birthday mummy and I both ordered the Jones' Club sandwiches and we were quite happy with the food.  The only disappointment was that they ran out of avocado and replaced it with tomato.

Time flies.... the next time when we meet will be to celebrate my birthday!!  Looking forward to our next gathering!!  :) :)

My 2nd Painting session at Arteastiq (Mandarin Gallery)

I had my 2nd painting session at Arteastiq yesterday and I am seriously proud of the canvas artwork that I had painted!  For my first session, I chose a colourful artwork and I couldn't really complete the painting within the stipulated 3-hour session.  You can read about it HERE.  This time round, I did a bit of my own research at home first instead of picking a design from their design books.  I saved the picture that I wanted to paint in my thumbdrive and asked the staff to help me print out the file.

 My friend, Lijuan and her masterpiece.

 Mine!!!!  Can you feel my excitement?  Going to hang it up in my living room, with hubby's approval.

 Me and my finished canvas artwork.

 This time, I finished my painting half an hour before the session ended.  After that, I went around kpo-ing to see what other people were painting.

 Our artist friend here tried to combine the cat and dog picture into one.  However, she didn't manage to complete the painting as she got too many different colours to mix.    

 This couple was doing painting on canvas bag.

Social Painting at Arteastiq (Mandarin Gallery)

I was supposed to meet my friend, Lijuan at 4.45pm for an early dinner at 313 before we went for the painting session which will start at 6pm. We bought the deal from Groupon at $88 for 2 painting sessions.  However, I was late and reach 313 around 5.15pm. Thus, I told my friend to find a dinner venue first before I joined her. When I reached 313 somerset, it seemed that almost every restaurant had a long queue even it was still quite early. Lijuan messaged me that she found a seat at the Old Malaya Cafe which was at B3 of the building.  There was no queue here and in fact, there were still quite a number of empty seats.  Since we were rushing for time, we quickly settled here and ordered our food.

At Arteastiq.....

Painting materials were all provided for us, including unlimited use of acrylic paint.

We could flip through their reference books and photocopy (in colour) the one that we wanted to paint. I chose this colourful painting.....

So I started to outline the drawing.... on my own.  Although there was an instructor there, but I felt she was not very helpful.  She only talked to me twice.  First, she "taught" me how to put the paint on the palette and mix a bit of water to the paint.  Second time, she told me I was too slow, need to paint faster a bit.  Very helpful huh?

 My friend's painting of an owl.

My product after the 3-hour session.  Frankly speaking, I felt that 3 hours were not quite enough for me to do a decent painting, especially this one with so many colours.

They will help you to pack your canvas painting in this cardboard carrier.

I still have a second session to go.  That will be a new canvas and new painting.  Hmmm... what should I draw next?