NYE Resolution Post

Cliche, I know, but I just wanted to make a list of resolutions for 2011, that I can hopefully start working on right away!

o Start doing regular cardio and lifting again once I get back to school
o Make the most out of the spring semester
o Get a job/internship/some summer plan that does not involve my current job, because I think I've outgrown it
o Learn to cook more diverse foods
o Learn to do my makeup better

We'll see how it goes, eh? My NYE is going to be a busy one, just about to head off to noraebang / karaoke with friends, and then a party that will be mostly confetti, silly string, balloons, and a 'party canon'.

What are you doing to kick off 2011?

Holiday Food Post!

Just some quick snaps, since I was out of town for the holiday, we had our official Christmas Dinner last night. Doesn't that look good? Luckily I can't take credit for it (because I would wreck it... I'm really bad at cooking meat :|)



Me just being really derpy. In the first pic, it looks so small right? That thing is the size of my head = w=;;;; And it was very tasty.

Stay warm / cool / safe, everyone!

Belated Holiday and Sacred Night

Opening your day: teaser pic of Lief's new work "Sacred Night" aka "Shut up and take my money" Glad I passed on regimental stripes so I can get this when it comes out, yes yes.

I hope everyone who celebrates Christmas had a good time, and everyone who doesn't also had a good time. Good times all around! The high point of my holiday was the Doctor Who Christmas Special which was amazing, and I am a huge nerd. I was also in Atlantic City to see my relatives on actual Christmas, which was interesting because neither my sister and I could gamble and/or drink so we just kind of sat at the pool and chilled out. Which was pretty nice, all in all.

New years is just around the corner! Got any fun new years plans / traditions?

Omlette and toast

Weirdly I have less time to blog while I'm on break than not. Weird, huh? And since my taobao order got delayed 2 weeks (one week ago) (wtf, R-series), I will technically be following my "no more lolita until 2011" deal I made with myself back in Sept/Oct. where I spent a little too much. Moving onwards...

Pictured is breakfast last sunday- spinach (with onions, mushroom, and cheese) omlette and toast. Spinach and goatcheese is actually my favorite kind of omlette~ It's nice to be at my parent's place, because we have a gas range <3 Which is amazing and so much easier to cook with than on the electric range in my apartment (;_;)

Leftovers (not food, I promise)

A couple odds and ends fashion (I use this term loosely) related items. Here is my converted bow that originally went at the neck of my St. Claire OP. Using the pin backing, I slipped it on a plain black headband I have. No this is not omfgcreative, but I just wanted to mention I cannot bring myself to actually pin it on the dress itself. It leaves holes!! I dunno, I never liked how big the holes were left by using those kind of pins. I'm now considering getting a strong magnet backing, but I heard even those run the risk of having the object fall off. In the meantime, cute matching headbow! (I have no outfit shot of when I wore the whole deal to my Ballroom Club's holiday party, w/e)



And here are my new winter slippers! I finally switched from my summer slippers, after picking these up at Target. I think they are really really cute, and they are hella warm to boot.

How do you keep your feet warm in the winter? Slippers? Socks? Keep shoes on at all costs?

First Snow!

Just wanted to show a snap of our first serious snowfall. All the kids got out of school 2 hours early, and I got out of work 1 hour early! Snap taken at my work, which is a small home office where I do data entry / management. So yeah, after a very precarious 1.5 mile drive back (thankfully I live super close to the office), I shoveled out our driveway for my mom who isn't back yet, and then settled in for an afternoon of snow watching.

I've always seen snow, every winter, for my entire life. I wonder what it would be like not to have snow any time of the year. True, it is pretty inconvenient, but its so pretty! But a bitch to drive in, that's for sure.

Do you get snow where you live?

Chesnut Curls Wig Review

I ordered a "Chestnut Curls Long Wig" from Ramen Stand shop on livejournal. It operates on a rolling group order, meaning that when the quota fills up, they make an order for the wig. I got mine a couple weeks ago, but it was mailed to my parent's home so I only got it today when I got back for the winter holiday.


Here's the color under natural (albeit it was overcast) light. It's a much darker color than I anticipated, just about a shade lighter than my hair right now. However, this turned out to be a good thing because I had the sinking realization that I would probably look really bad in a light brown, given my skin tone (;_;)


Here's what it looks like worn. Crappy mirror/phone combo, but you get the idea. The curls are less full than the picture (which I also expected, because that picture is an ad for Gabalnara, which this wig is not) but the fibers were soft and I don't think I'll have to do a lot of work trimming the swept bangs.

I really wanted a long curly wig because I don't think I could curl my natural hair on a regular basis, especially if it ever grew out that long, OR deal with it if it was permed. That's really the true convenience of wigs, and now I'm more tempted than ever to give my real hair the chop. Maybe after I collect a few more wigs, haha.

Price: 4.5/5 - I paid 33USD+shipping, which for a new kanekalon wig is not bad. The quality is better than ebay, and the price difference is about even.
Quality: 4/5 - I'm please with the overall quality of the wig, soft fibers, not a shiny mess, holds the curl, and for the price, not a bad deal
Accuracy: 1/5 I decided that this would be better as a separate category. The stock picture is really not the wig at all. I went with it because I assumed that the picture would be "something like the wig", based on the fact that the picture was from gabalnara. And while it is indeed "something like the wig" (long, curly), it is NOT the same thing, and people who thought they were getting the stock picture would be sorely disappointed.
Communication: 4/5 - very quick communication, except for the fact it was sent to the address attached to my paypal, when I had previously sent an email asking it to be sent to my apartment. No harm done, but it would have been nice if that request were remembered.
Overall: Maybe a few months down the road I'll get another one from this shop, if they have any cute short styles. In the meantime, I'll keep contemplating what to do with my own hair, lol. Also, I'm not even sure when I'll wear this, but maybe on the first day of classes next semester?

Lolitas and fashionable people, do you own any wigs? Do you wear them often? Or rarely?

Holiday Cookies

The other day my friend Ellen and I got together to make holiday cookies, except the only shape cutters we had were the ones I used for my bento stuff. We did have holly sprinkles, so with a little creativity and patience we made some interesting looking cookies, haha.



They were a simple rolled sugar cookie mix, except they resemble shortbread because I didn't roll them out thin enough. Hopefully, over the break I can make and decorate cookies proper. It's so much fun (but very, very time consuming). Yay! I have my genetics final tomorrow and I'm going to die.

Raspberry Dark Chocolate Ginger snaps

Pretty simple way to make some awesome tasting cookies. One package of gluten free ginger snaps and melted ghiradelli dark chocolate chips and a teaspoon of raspberry extract, mixed and coated well and stuck in the freezer for a couple hours. Warm to room temperature, or enjoy chilled! Bittersweet, fruity, gingery, and crunchy.

On that note, just wanted to remind everyone that I visit all commenters and leave clicks+comments and follow back followers, just to show my appreciation. Plus, y'all have interesting blogs!

Confession: I'm not southern, but I really like the word "y'all"

Hope you guys had a good Monday!

Give Away Mention Page

Giveaway Mentions! (Is anyone else horribly unlucky and has never won one of these, like me?)

http://www.finding-tokyo.com/2010/11/new-year-giveaway/

http://universal-doll.com/2010/11/mitsus-favorite-things-giveaway/

http://momo1982.blogspot.com/2010/11/my-first-giveaway.html

(W)International Lolita Day 2010

Celebrated my first winter ILD by dressing up~ Rundown:
Skirt: Baby
Blouse: Yolanda
Socks: Innocent World
Hairpiece: Handmade by someone else

Pretty basic, I love this skirt to death and really should wear it out more. For lack of company as well as an excess of finals coming up, I went by myself to my favorite bakery/cafe/lunch place, Hot Cakes, and got a quiche and early grey and studied for my Japanese final this Monday. It was quite nice. Also, this morning before I got dolled up I cleaned the whole apartment with my housemates. Our floor was getting really grody, so it was definitely much needed. In addition I abhor showing a messy room in pictures, so I knew I had to clean up ;D



Make up shot. Make up is really the bane of my existence. I have to practice contouring more (getting a good brush would be a nice start) and I'm cursed with hidden monolids... meaning that most of the time, eyemake up just kind of disappears when I have my eyes open, hence the closed eye shot. I'm not big on falsies and I didn't even put on mascara because I find with my uncurlable eyelashes (this list of grievances is getting really long) the mascara just ends up on my face and its generally unpleasant.

But I tried! And I'll get better, in time. In the meantime, does anyone have any links for people with really asian eyes (ie me?) It's been killing me, but I won't resort to eyelid tape/glue/surgery.

Lolitas, what did you do (if anything) for ILD?

Innocent World Beatrice Reserve

New up on IW's reserve page is the "Beatrice" series... That sound, kind of like a dull thud, was my jaw hitting the floor. It's like a gothic print with a classic color scheme, and I'm absolutely dying over it. There's a skirt, JSK, and long JSK version of it.



There's a second, nerdier impetus for how much I want this dress, stemming from the name perhaps. From the Beatrice archetype in history, including Dante's Inferno, to stranger, modern incarnations of the name, like The Golden Witch Beatrice, it's a name that I admire and adore.

Also check out how GORGEOUS these socks are. I'm generally a proponent of solid color socks or tights, but these are just too pretty.

Since I said I'd hold off on Lolita for the rest of the year (and failed miserably, see incoming winter JSKs from R-series) I'll wait until the pieces show up in the store itself, probably mid January. Hopefully, I will be working again too that month so I don't feel as bad.

But please, don't let it sell out on reserve! D: Lolitas, want to weigh in on how popular this series might be?

Damn you Innocent World, holding my heart (and wallet) in your clutches.

Winner Announcement!

As it is now technically Friday, I thought I'd announce the winner of my first giveaway.

According to my friend, Random Number Generator, 8 is the winning number, which corresponds to HSP, congratulations! I hope to have another giveaway when I hit my next milestone, 200! Thanks to everyone who participated.

TGIF.

Baby x AatP x Kuragehime

OMG
Dying a little bit right now. Baby and AatP is doing a collab with Kuragehime, currently on reserve: heeeere(how did I miss this??)

100 Follower Giveaway!

Pretty self explanatory! I just wanted to do a small giveaway to show my appreciation for everyone out there reading this blog of bits and bobs. So, the rules:

1. 1 point for leaving a comment with an email address to contact you if you're the winner
2. 1 point for leaving a link to a post on your blog with a link to this giveaway
3. Deadline is 12.2 11:59 PM. The winner will be announced on friday.

* a 'point' is just having a chance, so more points, more chances. Pretty standard set up.

The prize- These adorable letter sets. The kitty one has a ton of stickers and a variety of stationary. I bought them at the Kinokuniya Bookstore in Manhatten over Thanksgiving break!




Have fun~!

Flawless and the Machine

Music post! Music post, because I'm exhausted from driving back from West Virginia (but it was mostly downhill, no police, and a nice day) and was rewarded by my deluxe 2 disc edition of "Between Two Lungs" by Florence and the Machine, who coincidentally were on SNL last night. Seriously, she is one of my favorite vocalists, I love everything on this album. It also came with post cards because I preordered!



I put them up decoratively. I really, really like the style of her music, someone once describe it as "Benedictine monks falling down an elevator shaft" but it's much more beautiful too. Her lyrics are also very twisted and dark, but still shining and moving at the same time.

It's so inspirational too, for me. I find myself thinking back to her songs or just listening to them when I write, do work, walk around, etc.

Exceedingly Interesting

So I've had a very interesting past 36 hours or so. I spent about 26 hours of it in the hospital, completing a PCOS research study. Basically they drew a lot of blood and nothing is wrong with me. They did feed me exceedingly well, which I appreciated. And took quick snaps of. No one really expects hospital food to be really good, huh? Well, I didn't have any special dietary restrictions (besides my allergies) so I think it was a bit out of the norm.



T-T What wasn't cool was forgetting my cosmetic bag at the hospital and having to go back there this morning to fetch it, derp.

Maybe after my second admission, I'll do a write up about the study itself. It's pretty interesting, but that just might be because I'm a bio major.

Mini Burger Patties

When its my turn to cook, I usually make one of two things: korean food, or mini meatball patties. Usually meatball night is sunday night, like today. And the recipe always comes out a little different depending whats on hand. Usually it's a pretty standard mix conceptually:

1) Something to act as bread crumbs. Because Julian is allergic to gluten, its usually crushed rice chex or rice crackers
2) Meat base- at least one part ground beef, I've used ground chicken, turkey, and pork before.
3) Vegetable mix: I sautee chopped onions, and add spring onion if I have it on hand
4) Misc: salt, pepper, a couple eggs for moisture.

I form them into mini patties and just pan fry them. I've gotten a positive response every time. I also prepare a DIY A1 sauce: ketchup, Worcestershire sauce, a dash of soy sauce mixed together.

So, how much work did I get done?

[x] Draft of Lit paper (4/5 pages)
[x] Draft of Story for CW (7/10 pages)
[x] All my japanese homework (just studying left to do)
[ ] read chapter 11 of genetics and do wednesday's homework (Ffffff)

~3/4 isn't bad. That's like 75% of projected goals.

I have had much less productive weekends than this one. Hope everyone has a good coming week

Siren's Call

My resident cook (talented housemate) is gone this weekend, so I had to bear the culinary torch. The result? Savory Duk Buk Ki, korean street fare, essentially. Stir fry of soft rice cake (Duk) and oyster mushrooms, onions, carrots, and green onions with a sesame oil / soy sauce / sugar base. Oh and beef. I'm pretty glad the beef turned out well because it was a pot roast cut I had to butcher some extra. But everyone enjoyed it, so I consider it a success! ... One of the very few I've had this week.

I had a pretty rough week between a lot of personal and school issues. And I get to close my friday with a campus wide siren test that has been going on since 9am. Intermittently the sirens would go off and then stop, with a recorded voice repeating "This was test of the blah blah alarm system". While I appreciate my school's attention to safety, its given me this huge headache.

I'm determined to have a really productive weekend. Here's what I'd like to get done by 11:59 Sunday night. I'll update it then to see where I got.

[ ] Draft of Lit paper (5 pages)
[ ] Draft of Story for CW (10 pages)
[ ] All my japanese homework (???)
[ ] read chapter 11 of genetics and do wednesday's homework

... that's just an academic to do list, I have a pile of stuff to do around the apartment. Plus my resident chef is away this weekend so the boys will have to suffer my cooking. That will be an interesting post, I bet.

Coming up next

Teenage girl spotted running down to bus stop with toast in her mouth, news at 11.

For almost my entire life I managed to eat breakfast before I left the house. All the times I've seen some character run late, go out the door with bread clamped between their teeth, I thought, "Hey if they just got up earlier they would be able to eat at home. Plus you get crumbs all over yourself" and happily tucked in to breakfast.

Well, today with 3 minutes till the bus arrived and my breakfast sitting on a plate, I bit the bullet (or bread...) and rushed out, probably looking like a complete fool. But at least I got breakfast, right?

It gets better- bus pulls up, I've got a quarter bit of bread left, sit down feeling pleased, if not a little self conscious and I heard the dreaded words-

'We've got 6 minutes here'

...

MLIAAA (my life is average/anime/awesome)

Bonus Round



I posted these to my tumblr the other day for funsies, I was just messing around with my hair and stuff. I love that over head braid style, and now my real hair is -finally- long enough to pull it off. The dress is Mary Magdalene (I swear, if I could marry a brand I'd be down on one knee as we speak) and the tights are 'sweater tights' from target... it's getting chilly guys and none of my housemates apparently need heat.

Not What It Looks Like

Sweet sticky rice + Fresh ripe mango + Coconut milk topping=♥ I usually get this for dessert every time I go to a thai place (that has it, obviously). I tried making it for myself this time, and while it did not turn out as good, I got the general idea.

Sorry I post so much about food guys. Looking at my tags and stuff, it's about half lolita/clothing and food/baking. It's just so much fun to take pictures of both, so I hope you don't mind.

Midnight Snack

Studying always makes me hungry. Pancake from box mix is usually the quick and easy fix, plus extra nutella. Seriously, it's one of the greatest condiments known to man (second to peanut butter).

Also, sort of messing around with food photography/pornography, some photoshop was involved... but doesn't it look appetizing?
What's your favorite condiment?

Off Brand Wishlist

It's getting cold and so longer JSK styles are appealing to me more. Especially these gorgeous pieces from the taobao shop R-Series. As they cost about 700 RMB, which is about 110 USD, they aren't cheap. Largely what I've found in buying offbrand lolita, especially from taobao, is that you get what you pay for, but up to a certain threshold (the threshold being the total price versus it's quality) and then past that threshold would be paying essentially for a brand name. Take the SS AP shoes for example. Cheaper tea parties probably have worse quality than the more expensive replicas that are essentially the same AP shoes. But the real AP shoes are obviously way more expensive. I find the same rule applies to a lot of offbrand dresses and blouses.



So I'm far from put off by the price tag. After all, 110USD (before shipping, SS fees) is a little less than half the price for a brand (non print) JSK.


This new floral one went up recently I believe (since I've been stalking their store all month) and I'm really digging both colorways. But I might go for the yellow in the end because I already have too much red tones in my wardrobe, haha.

Not to mention once December rolls around the the holidays start, a lot of shopping services get really tied up and there are delays everywhere. If I need something custom made, I don't want to get my winter style items in early March (though I don't think it's that extreme... probably).

What should I doooooo

tl;dr dresses, man. Dresses.

Another day, another market

Went to the farmer's market, now it opens at 8 instead of 6 and runs till 2. I still got up at the same time to go anyway. I went with a pretty laid back classic coord, between the knit tights, bloomers, petti, skirt, and coat, I stayed very warm.

My hat! I love it so much.


My main haul was bread, a loaf of farmhouse milk bread and french bread (which I froze for later this week) and a new jar of jam. It's "strawberry chocolate mint" and... that's exactly what it tastes like. Amazing. They also had strawberry and thai basil jam.



I also finally caved and got a ring from that jewelry table I adore. Only 5$ and the color matched Mary Magdalene's "Raspberry" colorway so perfectly. I really love wearing rings.

So that's how I spent my last 19$, go me~

OTL now, back to studying....

Feels good man

I don't really like the extreme cold, but I like winter because I can dress up like this (ie, layers of knits, dark colors, sweaters galore). I stocked up on some knit tights over the summer in preparation, haha. However, in the summer I only wear light colors, but now with my darker colors I have to do separate loads of laundry, which at my apartment complex doubles the cost each week. Alas.

Today I spent 3 hours after classes ended today just cleaning: bathrooms, vacuuming, laundry, cleaning every surface of my room, organizing. It's because when I have a big exam and I'm stressed (like now) I need to procrastinate, and when my google reader feed is empty the only thing left to do is CLEAN like a maniac, haha. But my organized environment is a lot more conducive to studying, I think, so everyone wins!

What do you do to procrastinate (maybe in chronological order?), before you actually get down to work?

Stick it

Today's needle count: 2, which is 2 more than any normal given day really. It was just coincidence I went in for my second blood draw this morning, and then got my flu shot after class. Yayyy no flu (hopefully). I know for some people they actually get sick after getting the vaccine, but since that's never happened to me, it can't hurt. I'm also not freaked out by needles. Some people are, my sister bawls, but I'm pretty meh about it. But I'm not ecstatic over having to get poked either.

How do you feel about needles (getting stuck with one)?

Feels bad man

Pic unrelated, I just love Mary Magdalene dresses and everyone else should too.

Today I go into target and remember I have a 10$ gift card and then hunt futilely through my bag for it and realize it's not where it should be. Then I go home and look for it (after getting my plastic mat anyway) and it's nowhere to be found! What a tragedy right?

What's an item you've lost, but never noticed until you needed it?

I'm still hoping in vain that some day it'll come back to me. But I might have just lost it at the drug store when I dropped my card case once and EVERYTHING spilled out and aughhhh

Happy hump day.

Cute Animal Objects

In the spirit of winterizing my room, I picked up a humidifier because it gets really dry :( It's also shaped like a super cute frog. Also I think the high today was 46F... the lowest of the season, yay! There's hope for snow yet.

As just an add on for a lolita related topic, I almost or never wear a petticoat with my lolita skirts when I wear them for classes or school, out of practicality. A lot of the seats in the auditorium or classroom are pretty small and increasing my volume will just get in the way of me and other people. While its an acceptable excuse, I still feel kind of ehhh. I love getting wear out of my skirts, but the poof man. The poof.

Last week of Dahlias

The dahlia seller at the farmer's market is done for the year, so this is my last dahlia for the next months. Sorry the picture is absolute crap ;-; I picked it because the colors (and the shape) reminded me of Estelle from Tales of Vesperia- the game I recently finished playing and had a lot of fun with XD Yay for nerdy inspirations

Halloween 2010

There's our pumpkin, carved by my housemate Julian. It's the red dragon tile in mahjong. Yes, that is really nerdy and seemingly random. But's not! Because we recently started the Riichi Mahjong Club of UVA so it's a little subtle promotion ;D

Okay it is pretty random. But very cool looking, no?

Farmer's Market Outing

Today was my outing with my friend to the city farmer's market. Opens from 6am to noon, though starting next week it'll be 8am to 2pm. They have so much excellent fresh produce as you can see.

Click the jump for more pictures :D

Book Post: 下妻物語 or Kamikaze Girls by Novala Takemoto

So, after I signed up for a free year of Amazon Prime with my student email (I also sent a FutureMe email in one year to remind me to cancel it before I have to start paying) I've been getting a lot of (relatively) inexpensive things because hey. Free fast shipping. I've seen the movie and read the book, but that was both ages ago. I don't even remember where I read it the first time. Light novels are something I purchase more frequently than manga, if only in a misguided attempt to tell publishers "hey translate more light novels please". Alas, if only.

If you have read KG, then you know it's a fun story. I like the differences between the book and the movie, and in the end I think I prefer the book (I always do). How about you guys?

Light novel vs. Movie? Totally didn't mess that up, haha

And if you haven't read or seen the movie, it's a fun, quirky watch and a good, quick read. Sometimes when I'm just feeling blah or down I'll watch it on youtube and generally even just listening to it perks me up. I love Anna Tsuchiya ♥