Day: May 24, 2010

Meetup Report: Bittersweet Treats

Meetup Report: Bittersweet Treats

by alice ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

I tried to keep myself occupied this weekend; it keeps me from moping around while my husband is out of town. My family kidnapped him and took him on a vacation I couldn’t join them on due to my work schedule. I am hoping that once he gets back we can have a few non-disappearing-husband weekends together. It seems like his busy schedule is always taking him off to some other place with one side of my family or the other!

Sir Mortimer
My shark is always ready for a meetup…although his wardrobe needs some sprucing up.

So I met with Miss Lindsey and Miss ElleJay for lunch at one of my favourite places–Bittersweet! ♥ It’s a charming little bakery & café near my home. They sell delicious pastries and fancy desserts, and they serve breakfast and lunch at marble-topped tables in the sunlight from large windows. There isn’t a lot of seating and you can’t make reservations, but it isn’t counter service and the atmosphere inside is really great! If only we could make reservations I’d host a meetup there. It’s very popular, though, so we had to loiter a bit to find a table.

We had lunch and macarons~ I really enjoy the macarons there. Although they’re not Ultimate Perfect Unquestionable Macarons, they’re always good and don’t taste frozen. Frozen-tasting macarons are my least favourite, no matter what the flavor is supposed to be. I also had a piece of mushroom quiche. _ It was so delicious…they make a lovely quiche that isn’t overcooked and dry, but creamy and soft. ElleJay and Lindsey both brought a few of their ball-jointed dolls, so there were a lot of stares at the oddly-dressed table of girls with interesting dolls! I intended to bring my Claire but totally lost my nerve.

After we had finished eating we clearly weren’t ready to part ways, so we headed over to my house. We sat around on the carpeting (a staple of visits to Alice’s tiny house, as I have only kitchen chairs), drank tea, and talked about dolls~ It’s always a lot of fun to spend time with people that share the same hobbies, and thankfully we’re all pretty mild–no worries of hurt feelings or drama~

Flutter-Flutter
Lindsey brought these adorable magnetic wings that we had to try on every doll. On mine they make me think of a Cardcaptor Sakura battle costume!

It was really enjoyable to sit around in the sunlight from the window, sipping tea and taking pictures of dolls. It’s only in that span of brightest-sunlight hours that my apartment isn’t too dim for pictures, and since I wasn’t at the office during that time–as is usually the case–we were able to utilize it. The wig my doll usually wears has this awesome habit of looking ridiculously adorable on any other doll, so it was passed around a bit to show off its amazing technique.

Lindsey, who sells really awesome doll clothing as Studio404 on Etsy, has been working with me to branch out to other sizes. Since I have a doll that’s considered to have fairly standard proportions for a 1/4-scale doll, she’s been measuring, drafting, and testing clothing ideas. It’s a lot of fun! ♥ I’m bribing her with tasty desserts and the allure of an Usamomo plush bunny–the ultimate in Alice currency.

This time she brought little bloomers for both my doll and ElleJay’s doll~ They’re so cute! Her doll was wearing the prototype, a faintly-striped beige pair, ElleJay’s doll’s are a deep purple dupioni silk, and the ones I received for my doll are white polka-dotted pink flannel! (Perfect for my general tastes.) They fit perfectly–now she just needs a cute top and they’d look like pyjamas.

Strength in Numbers
The pile-‘o-dolls-and-bunnies! We couldn’t help wanting to pile all the dolls on Lindsey’s largest doll, as she doesn’t necessarily look like the type who would WANT attention from so many “kids.”

We also took some pictures outside my building, to take advantage of the sunlight and nice weather while it lasts! Around here, you can never be sure what tomorrow will bring, after all~ The areas along the pathways and courtyard by where I live are always nicely taken care of, too–that’s why I’m always ready to take pictures there! It’s not a lush meadow or enchanted forest, but still better than a parking lot in my opinion!

Pearls and Bows
ElleJay looking super cute with her red dress and fluffy hair~

I insisted that everyone take pictures with Monsieur Lait, which really doesn’t need much insisting. Usakumya are so soft and perfect for snuggling; no-one ever resists! He gets a lot of attention, and I get the feeling that it’s a-okay with the bunny bear.

Hey There, Bear
Lindsey and bear. I get the feeling that she knows that he knows that he’s cute…
Usakumya Cuddles
ElleJay and Monsieur Lait are adorable together. It’s pretty obvious in this picture how enormous he is!
Big Bunny Ear
Usa-usa-uuuuuusakumya~ ♥

When it was finally time for the tea and fun to end, I walked them back to their respective places of departure~ It turns out that another local lolita, who haven’t yet had the chance to meet, spotted me while she was at work. I got home to a “who was that” post on our local community; it was very entertaining to see that most of my friends immediately knew that it must be me based on the description of pink + pigtails. That is an accurate condensed description!

Beautiful Butterfly
While she was taking pictures, a butterfly landed on ElleJay’s hair~ It made me wish I had been the one holding the camera so I could have taken a picture of it.

It was a really lovely time, and I can’t wait to do it again~ ♥

Daily Life: A “Momoko” Moment

Daily Life: A “Momoko” Moment

by alice ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

In most ways, I’m not much like Momoko of Kamikaze Girls (original title Shimotsuma Monogatari)–and I think that’s a good thing. Her personality isn’t exactly the best–she’s rude, selfish, untruthful, and conceited. She isn’t even in denial–she readily admits that beneath her beautiful clothes her soul is rotten. Despite my disapproval of her personality and actions, the way she lives is very intriguing, if unattainable. I’m sure I wouldn’t really want to lie around all day reading about embroidery and eating sugar-coated cereal for dinner, but sometimes when work or class is exhausting me I daydream about how relaxing it would be once in a while.

The scene from the film where she shows her sugary and insubstantial boxed lunch~

I particularly think of the food she’s always eating–always sweets, never anything else. I like sweets very much myself, but I keep it balanced with lots of vegetables and grains~ That wasn’t the case for her. I always wondered if she secretly ate other food, but she seemed the sort who would rather get scurvy than do something she disagreed with, so perhaps she just took really effective vitamins.

Since my husband isn’t here I haven’t really felt like cooking dinner. I don’t eat very much and I’m not very hungry, and it seems like a waste to make something if I don’t particularly care either way–and then I might hope those ingredients are still here for a future meal. (As if I’ll never get to a grocery store again–it’s completely irrational.) I did make a cheese soufflé the other day, but this evening I didn’t want to eat it again after having some for lunch already. I remembered that we had some strawberries that absolutely must be eaten or else, and thus my dinner was decided: tea and strawberries & cream.

An Alice Dinner
The evening meal of champions very silly girls who absolutely know better. A honey & butter sandwich was made later and not pictured.

It was just one of those silly things that brightened my mood a bit. My husband hasn’t been gone for very long, and I’m sure he’s having a wonderful trip. I kept myself busy over the weekend so that I wouldn’t miss him too much, but I miss him just as much regardless of how many other things I’m doing to keep myself occupied. Sometimes doing something that you know isn’t necessarily the “right” thing to do, but is absolutely-completely-undeniably the “fun” thing do–the fun thing is the better choice. (And one non-nutritious meal is harmless. If I made a habit of this I’m sure I’d be quite sick!)

I’m also getting acquainted with my beautiful-wonderful-amazing new computer. ♥

My computer is rather old, and it’s been giving me trouble for quite a while. So much, in fact, that before I graduated from university my father told me that he would get me a new computer as a graduation present. (Yay!) And then I graduated, and heard nothing of the computer for months. When it was finally brought up again, the new computer was suddenly surrounded with red tape and more delays. It had gotten to the point where I thought I’d have to start saving up for the new computer myself–especially because my former computer has been continuously making suicide attempts. I haven’t actually been able to use it in over a month, but I thankfully my tiny pink netbook has been pulling me through! Tiny pink netbook is really not a permanent replacement, however: he runs Linux and has an itty-bitty screen.

My Baby ♥CANDY♥
Mallow and the computer. Both are cute, but Mallow’s still cuter. I think he can take solace in that. He hasn’t been forgotten even though Monsieur Lait has been prominently featured as of late.

The best part about my new computer is that it’s new. The second-best part of my new computer is that it’s PINK~ ♥ I love every centimeter of it’s textured pink Windows 7-running self. ♥ It has well over ten times as much hard disc space, much more RAM, doesn’t do crazy things for no reason… And it’s pink. Did I mention it’s pink? It’s pink.

My brother and father argued over the computer, apparently. I told my brother that I wanted a pink computer that wasn’t just junk, since whatever I get will have to be my internet-and-other-stuff terminal for a long time. I am not very swayed by new technology, preferring instead to buy frills and tea. My brother declared that this was the best pink computer in the given price range, and then my father looked up every review he could find and brought up whatever negative points others had found, for my brother to rebut them. I really appreciate both of their hard work! ♥

My father very seriously told me I should immediately tape my business card to the bottom of my laptop, so that I don’t pick up someone else’s when we go through the security checkpoint in the airport. Somehow, I don’t think that will be a problem.