New dress ★~(◡﹏◕✿)

 My sister and I went shopping the other day and I wanted to go to Nordstrom bc I heard they stock Roxy sometimes. Mine didn’t end up having any, but look what I found instead! 

Isn’t it so absolutely perfect? It’s from Billabong and I even caught the sale since it’s the end of the summer season! 

★~(◡﹏◕✿) I got to wear it to lunch today!! 

Also, I’m getting my nails done tomorrow and idk what to get. Do you have any ideas?? Maybe I’ll just do something simple I’d I don’t know… I broke one on Friday and got a last minute appointment tomorrow. I always love going though and it was only a few days earlier than I was planning. Maybe something like this? 

daily outfit 9/21 + new nails and make

 Hello! Today I just ran a few errands and in the afternoon I'm going to acupuncture and playing Pathfinder (like Dungeons and dragons, if you aren't familiar) 

Today's outfit! Taking advantage of the summer weather while it's still around. I wore my Ugg sandals as per usual. 

I had to go to the store to get my mom a birthday present! 

She said she was looking for beach themed decor, so I got her 2 of these seahorses (✿ ♥‿♥)

Look how cute this is! I almost bought it, but really I know I wouldn't use it often and don't have space for more displays xD 

After that I wanted to drop by Ulta to get a few things. I was talking with Kieli and she inspired me to keep trying old school looks. Sometimes I get discouraged since I feel like I'm not cute enough anymore, but she always encourages me to keep trying ●‿●

I decided to try a brown liquid liner instead of black since I don't tan anymore and I felt like maybe the color was why I didn't like wearing eyeliner right now. I also got this facewash I used to use since my acne is coming back. I only use this in my acne prone areas on my nose and chin/mouth area because the rosacea on my cheeks would get too irritated by it. I used to use it about once a week and it did a really good job of making the pores on my nose smoother. So far my acne has mostly been surface spots and not the awful deep ones I used to get, but we'll see how that progresses the longer I'm off of the medication. 

This is the nail set I got done last week!! I love the palm trees. The checkout person at the store commented on it and said she was already on to fall colors, and I said I wear tropical things all year xD I really don't wanna give up palm trees and hibiscuses just because it's not summer. 

This is the make I did when I got back. I feel like it's missing something, but I don't know what. I used to like tanning so I'd feel really gal but it kinda ended up giving me body image issues so I stopped since I didn't wanna ruin gal for myself. 

Also, does anyone know how to make your hair stay voluminous all day? I sprayed something on it earlier and it looked exactly how I envisioned, but it sank after a couple hours. Teasing doesn't really seem to stick in my hair either. Right now I use a cream, oil, and sometimes a gel in my hair. Then in the morning I will put sea salt spray or sometimes a sea salt mousse and it looks good but I just want the little extra volume especially in the root area.  I have to be careful and make sure I use a cream when it's wet or else it will go into a giant knot if I just use a gel or mousse with nothing else.

Gotta run now for my appointment!! Catch you later 

★~(◡﹏◕✿)

jfashion meet at the japanese store!

 A few weeks ago my jfashion community met up at a local japanese import store! I decided to wear the ma*rs outfit that I bought at the store in Japan. 

Everything is from Ma*rs except the black skirt I wore under the OP because it was obscenely short without it xD I got that in the basement of 109, not sure what brand it was. 

Here's what I bought at the store!! 

Marie kitty hair oil from &honey. I really like it. It has a floral scent that admittedly kinda smells weird with my other products, but it's fine on its own. My hair is fine, dense, wavy/curly, and not porous, so this oil is great because it is very liquidy and light. 

Two blind boxes! The kirby one was called Pop City, I want to go back to get more of them because they were so cute. 

My friend Kat and I unintentionally matched in Jirai (✿◠‿◠) Also look at my Memetchi ita bag!! I wanted to show it off for the photo. 

Here's all of us together! We walked around a pretty small store so we took up most of it hahah. After the store we went to get macarons and bubble tea which I completely blanked on getting a photo of. I've really enjoyed going to these meetups and I'm excited for some that are coming up this fall! The next one is a "match your (stuffed animal) companion", so Melody Jr and I are going to have matching gal outfits... the details are a surprise, but here's a sneak peek. 

Also, I got Memetchi on my tamagotchi idL! Isn't she so cute? 

Daily Outfit 9/16

 I wanted to post today's outfit! I got this shirt off of depop recently. I wore my Ugg platform sandals with this too. I was also really excited to wear my new Alba bangle bracelet (✿ ♥‿♥) I wore it to work so I just wore a cardigan with it. My make isn't super exciting, but I need to post about it soon bc I like it anyways hahaha.

These are the sandals I wear :) I bought them because they were comfortable for my bad feet/toe. They are Ugg goldenstar sandals.  

I also got my nails done this weekend but I keep forgetting to take a good photo while it's still light outside o(╥﹏╥)o I wore a cute outfit then too but I wanted to post it when I post the nail photo. 

Beach Vibes finds (✿◠‿◠)

 I'm posting so often now, are you overwhelmed yet? xD 

Okay so after my last post (literally less than 24 hours ago, sorry my brain is going too fast but I'm telling myself no one is judging me for it, but these types of ideas are bouncing around my brain often anyways) and doing some more thinking and reflecting, I ended up doing some online window shopping. I used to read blog posts like this where people would post what they saw online and link them, and I always liked reading those so I wanted to do that too. I wish people would still do stuff like that!! 

I'm kinda always back and forth between wanting to be trendy and genuinely enjoying some trends and wanting to be only 90's tropical. Then I realized there's nothing stopping me from just kinda blending the two except myself and thinking that trendy stuff = looking boring or average. After all, aren't all of the models in the magazines I love also trying to be trendy, just at a different time? Most of the reason that I'm viewing their outfits as really unique is that I'm viewing it 10 or 20+ years from when the photos were taken. Even a style like Jirai that I view as very unique has hundreds of girls wearing it running around 109 all looking similar. I think in giving up my mental block about looking unique, I will connect with what I like on a deeper level and just look at items without worrying if they belong to whatever category. 

Since I actually went through my clothes recently and was somewhat shocked to discover that I really don't have a lot of fall clothes, I decided to go looking at Roxy since they sometimes have some really good hidden treasures. A few years ago I got a bikini and boardshort set and tshirt all with this amazing huge hibiscus graphic. I feel like the store is like 80% kinda meh and then 20% really cool stuff. I was happy to discover that this store still even exists because several months ago they had what looked like a closing sale, and a message saying something about their company being sold and gift card not working etc. I always assume nowadays that when a store is sold, it's sold to one of those places that will close it right away. BUT to my surprise it still exists and has some really cute stuff. I've been better about spending money recently, so I think I might treat myself. I'm definitely not getting everything I'm posting but it's fun to dream xD 

Lost Paradise dress, $88

OMG look at the hibiscus designs on this dress. I know it's not at ALL fall appropriate but I really can't help myself for my love of hibiscus designs like this. 

Patchwork 90's top, $40

I really like the design on this as well but I'm on the fence since what I really need is lighter long sleeves for when it's a bit colder. 

Leia Sweater, on sale $56 

 I really like the hibiscuses on this one as well, but my size is sold out and I'd have to size up, which I'm not sure would look great considering this is already a wide cut. 

This one I'm less sure about especially for the price. 

Morning Hike Crewneck, $35

I really like the color of this, even if it is a bit oversized for my tastes. 

Hippie Love sweater sale $49 

I can't decide with this one either. I think the longer I look at it the more I think it looks too hippie with those strings lol. I was drawn in by the pattern. 

midnight avenue pants $54 

I love the pattern on these pants, but I think that the short cut may look a bit awkward on me. They actually have several really cute colorful pants, but all of them are definitely designed for summer temperatures, and it's going to get cold quickly here so I don't think they're a good investment right now, since I'm trying to not get too off track. 

Chips and guacamole bag 

Look how cute this bag is!! I love bags that have that woven texture to them. Roxy actually has a TON of them right now. 

straw tote, $60 

I have a straw tote I used to carry everywhere, but it's a but unstable, so I'm considering replacing it with this one since it has an actual lining inside. I wish I could carry something like this to work, it makes me happy thinking about it, but I have a pretty hefty macbook and I think it might ruin something like this ●︿●

They do make this laptop backpack though which is a pretty cool design with the checks. I'm not 100% sold on it and idk why. Sometimes I worry I'll look too like earthy/hippie with their clothes but maybe with my styling it won't come across that way since I'm always wearing sparkly makeup and have big hair. 

That's all for tonight!! I'm gonna sleep on it and decide what to buy tomorrow so I don't impulse buy anything and regret it. 

Surf Style inspo (✿◠‿◠)

I've been into surf style from around 1998-2001 lately! My brain is so scattered from looking at magazines for too long. I wanted to write a post to try to collect my thoughts. I took some photos of a few magazines I have to try to help myself with fall inspo. They're mostly from the wrong seasons, I don't care, I'm gonna make them into fall appropriate clothes xD 

I've pretty much accepted that if I wanna look like this I'm going to have to do a considerable amount of DIY. I tried looking for pieces like this, even the same cuts but solid colors, both on US and Japanese secondhand sites and they just don't seem to exist or maybe I don't know how to properly search for them. I overwhelmed myself by searching so much, and I ended up just feeling really discouraged. 

●︿● I have so many ideas in my head but none of them actually exist in real life for me to buy.

I've actually found it difficult to even find just plain tshirts that are cut the way I want which is driving me insane. I recently got an Alba top that is just a plain tshirt with a big embroidered hibiscus, so my plan was to make something sort of inspired by that since embroidery should be no problem for me. 

ughhh, sometimes you just wanna give up because it's so frustrating. I feel like I look too average day to day. I need clothes for fall, and I don't wanna settle for boring clothes, but I feel like what else can I do?? This is the style that is calling to me at the moment and I never wanna look any way but tropical, so this is now my daily frustration. I think I would even settle for modern clothes that I could use as a base for DIY, but they are all in colors I don't want like brown, beige, black, or washed out colors. 

As for what I can actually do about this, once I track down some decent tshirts I know I can make those. I also want to embroider some flowers onto jeans, same with a denim jacket I bought a while ago. I realized that I always used to save photos of outfits with skirts, but really I very rarely wear them. I just feel more comfortable in pants/shorts/capris. That makes things a bit more complicated since skirts are the one thing I feel like is more easily accessible. I actually own at least 3 plaid skirts that work well, but since the only place I really go day to day is work, they're much too short to be practical. Accessories I either already have or very easily have access to the supplies I need to make them. Sweaters I can't do much about without becoming an expert knitter, so I will have to settle for whatever solid color turtlenecks I can find. 

Whew, okay. I don't think my brain feels any better (⊙︿⊙✿) I might have made myself more confused, but at least I have something written down. I really want to persist in my enjoyment of this style, I don't want this overwhelmed and frustrated feeling to make me give up. I just have to find a way to make it work. All of the ideas are swirling around in my head ~(⊕⌢⊕)~  I have such a clear sense of the feeling I want my outfits to give, and it's really frustrating to not be able to express that. The pictures don't really even express my feeling exactly, because I'm not trying to literally copy this style, it's a source of inspiration that has given me ideas for how I want my own stuff to look. It feels very personal to me, like a combination of things I have liked since I was first able to pick out my own clothes as a child.  

Here are my inspo photos. I really want to use these more for the general feeling of the outfits, I don't want to copy any of them. I really like tropical prints and the little details like embroidery that are on a lot of these clothes. The prints from this era have a really nice hand drawn look to them that I feel we've mostly lost with clothes today. I'm not sure I captured it well with these photos, but this surfer girl style has a really natural (like nature that can be wild and colorful, not like clean girl minimal) and comfortable kind of feeling to it. It feels very fitting for me. I like that there are sometimes accessories that look like they might have been handmade or hand painted because they aren't totally perfect. I have a magazine from 2004 that I actually like a lot less because all of the models look much more "glamorous" and don't have this sort of "real person" aesthetic I guess? Like they all have really shiny curled hair and perfect nails, very crisp makeup... and the clothes have started to lose a little of that sort of natural/wild feeling. I like that the models in these older magazines are still very stylish but aren't "perfect" looking. I guess this is also the reason I'm drawn to old school gal as well. There's something that feels very "home-y" about it? I can't think of another way to describe it. It's like being warm and comfortable in your home where you belong. 

I thought this was an good example of interesting pants.. I'm not sure I'll ever be able to find something like that though. 

The embroidery on her dress is what drew me in. 

I really like the flower print on that navy blue skirt. 

I think the embroidery on the flatlay clothes is really inspiring! 

I have a loom for making jewelry like this, makes me want to break it out again! 

I've been really into denim with interesting details like her skirt has here. 

These floral patterns are interesting. This is what I meant about the patterns being hand drawn, not crisp digital art like we mostly see now. If I ever figure out how to properly digitize my paintings, I might use spoonflower to make some floral fabric.  

WHY don't they make sweaters like this anymore am I gonna have to learn to knit too?! 

I really like those black pants with the floral print. The cuts on their sweaters are a bit unusual for this era, at least in the magazines I have. 

This is the only one from a seasonally appropriate magazine LOL. I liked her top a lot. Leopard print feels findable, at least? 

(O∆O) we've reached the end. that was a lot longer than I planned. Thanks for reading, if you did actually make it to the end! Please leave me a comment with advice if you can think of any (◕‿◕✿) I like hearing from you! 

Japan Trip Day 1!

I went to Japan earlier this summer at the end of June/beginning of July! (✿ ♥‿♥) My husband had the honor of his art being displayed in the national art museum there as part of an international ink painting exhibition. We decided to go during this specific week so that we could make the awards dinner! 

I'm going to share the photos of the first day with you! I don't think all of the posts will be this long but I took a ton of photos on the first day because that's when we visited the museum that had my husband's art displayed (▰˘◡˘▰) 

It was over a day of travel time to Japan from where we are in the US, so the actual "first" day was pretty much just us going to donki and going to bed since it was already around 6 pm. Our longest plane ride was about 13 hours ●‿● I was super super nervous about it since the longest plane ride I was on before that was... like ONE hour, plus I'd never left the country before. My one saving grace was that I knew Sam and 109 were waiting for me on the other side xD. And that Sam speaks Japanese and wouldn't let anything bad happen to us. I was pleasantly surprised that the plane didn't make me sick at all, and it was really just like being on a long car trip as long as i didn't too deeply consider that I was so high up in the air over an ocean (O∆O) 

This is probably not what you care about, but I was sort of amused by how large some of the airports were, and when we went through texas I was counting cowboy hats. I think I counted 9. hahaha. I had to calm myself somehow before getting on that insane flight. I feel bulletproof now, I can travel pretty much anywhere I want to go and it's way less time on a plane than that. 

The first full day we woke up early and decided to wander around Shibuya where we were staying. We actually stayed super close to 109 so ofc I was constantly taking photos of it. I think I almost cried the first time I saw it hahaha. I couldn't believe it was really real and I was actually seeing it in front of me. My dad got to see 109 a few years before me because he visited Tokyo on a work trip, which was absolutely NOT fair (◡︿◡✿)  He sent me photos and asked if this was "my mall". So seeing it in real life was like a religious experience, I got to make the gal pilgrimage. I still can't believe I got to see it and shop there and everything. I actually thought that the entire thing was the cylinder, I was a little shocked when I found out it has a rectangle part xD I just thought it was a really wide circular building LOL. 

As usual if you wanna see a better photo you can click on them!! 

Our hotel had a mini donki inside xD

the shibuya mega don hahaha I bought about 10000 pairs of lashes here immediately after checking into the hotel and we kept going back to wander and buy drinks. The availability of alcohol in Japan shocked me since it's kind of taboo in the US? I don't know about where you live, but it seems the alcohol laws in the US are quite strict compared to other places. In my state it has to even be in it's own special state owned store, so seeing it in this random stuff store just out and about was so interesting. 

Also it had this enormous screen outside with some kpop boy group we kept calling the lobotomy boys because they had such vacant stares xD 

I was very enamored with Shibuya, Japanese cities are so much different than where I'm from :0 I was honestly really entertained just walking around and not even going inside anywhere. One thing I noticed was that holy cow this city has ads. Every spare space has an ad and a lot of them are also playing music? I wasn't really bothered by it, it was more just fascinating to me since it's not something I've ever seen before. And it was true what I heard about Japan... it's so clean. Even for being the partying area, we walked past bars where someone had lined up the empty beer cans/bottles. It was such an interesting experience for me since I love cities and had never been to another country before. It was all so overwhelming but peaceful. 

A bit later we met up with our friend Sam in Roppongi to see the art museum (✿◠‿◠)  We hadn't seen her in such a long time so we were really looking forward to spending time with her on this trip! 

I had to really narrow down the pictures I'm putting on this post because i took SO many at the art museum. 

The two above are my husband's paintings (this pic is better if u click to make it bigger) ≧◡≦ I'm so proud of him! He also carved the large stamp on the dragon painting. It's still amazing to think that his art was displayed in a museum in another country... especially the country where this art form is from. And to think we just randomly met our painting teacher at an art festival at home because she liked my nails! It really was fate. 

Below are some more photos from the gallery!

These were some of the paintings that I really enjoyed.  There must have been over a hundred, from all over the world! It was beautiful to see how people from different places used the ink painting style to portray their native animals, plants, and landscapes. The point of the exhibit was to encourage people all around the world to love and participate in ink painting since the art is declining in popularity in Japan and the ink painting society wants to save it for future generations. It was also amazing to be able to see ink paintings in real life, because museums in the US don't tend to have them. 

Then we got lunch at this random little restaurant in what is I guess normally a bar? It sounded like they were renting it out during the day. I had beef and it was really good, and I'm always craving miso soup. I'm kinda hungry thinking about it... I haven't eaten very well since returning. 

Okay so this next part is kinda foggy lol. I am wearing the same outfit, so this must've been the same day xD Anyways we're just gonna pretend it is even if I'm wrong. 

We ended up going to Kabukicho and we got to go to the Ma*rs store ≧◡≦

 okay look how funny this photo is. You may have to click to make it larger. Sam accidentally took the photo so that we are in some weird spotlight, and it looks like we are photoshopped in. 

I'm fairly certain this was also the day where some random (definitely tourist) white guy pulled out a camera and took a photo of me??? I don't understand because I don't even look that interesting especially not to another tourist? And I'm 100% sure it was a photo of me too. It was so bizarre lol. Hope you got a glamour shot. xD 

Ma*rs was so cute!! I ended up buying an outfit here. I don't normally wear Jirai like on a daily basis, but I do enjoy it from time to time and Ma*rs/Princess Melody is my favorite brand so I was very excited to splurge here. I didn't take a photo on this day but I did wear it later in Harajuku! I felt very trendy ʕ·ᴥ·ʔ

At some point during this day we also went to a wine bar, so japanese I know xD. We all had summer sangrias that were super good and Sam was very excited to see bread again like we have at home. 

I look bizarre here but we ended the day by eating taco bell because we thought it was funny xD I think they also sold alcohol here?! Japan was certainly a party ﾍ(￣▽￣*)ﾉ

See you soon for more!! These posts will probably get interrupted by your regularly scheduled Rae posting, but look out for them sometime soon! We were there 2 weeks so I gotta consolidate.