30 Day Photo Challenge - Days 6 and 7, Breakfast and Beauty

I'm sorry I've been absent. Things were going swimmingly well, and then I got a big burst of anxiety that set me back from doing fun blogger posts. But I'm here now, with more photos! Let's get the boring one out of the way first: breakfast. I don't eat very much for breakfast, but during winter months I drink tea and eat a bowl of oatmeal. Below is a picture I took from my desk of my meager summer breakfast.

[Day 6: My breakfast on a typical workday includes a banana and a cup of either Vietnamese coffee or a green tea latte. On this day, it was a green tea latte.]

And now the fun photo! I love beauty products. You might have noticed I just decided to continue morphing all my photos in Instagram, but for this one I feel like talking about my makeup, so I'm going to do a more extensive post with "regular" photos.

[Day 7: Contents of my makeup bag]

[My makeup! The makeup bag is peaking out from the right on that first photo.]

I tend to go for jewel tones, particularly deep purples and blues, paired with brown. You'll see that I buy a lot of stila, MAC, and benefit, but I'm now venturing out with my first Laura Mercier product. I by no means wear all of this on one day, but probably going out I'll throw it all on. Without further adieu, the makeup of a light-skinned, dark-haired Asian girl:

FACE

Laura Mercier silk creme foundation in cashew beige (This one is new in my bag. I shopped around because I wanted something creamy, and this one has been so nice. Doesn't flake, good coverage, and matches my skin tone really well)

MAC powder blush in CUBIC

MAC  mineralize in Medium

Make Up Forever High Definition Concealer

EYES

Ole Henriksen total truth eye cream (super soothing)

stila backstage eye shadow palette (a very pretty jewel-toned palette that goes well with light skin and dark hair): chiffon, flamingo, pacific, luster, poetic, coal

stila smudge stick waterproof eye liner (my fave eyeliner, I have three colors: stingray, lionfish, peacock)

benefit brow zings

Takako eyelashes

Fairy Drops mascara 

Acuvue Oasys contacts (lasek one day please)

LIPS (these aren't pictured, but I love dark, red lipstick)

benefit Wild Card

MAC Viva Glam A30 (LOVE this, a great lip color that makes my lips look 1920s glam)

Korres Cherry Gloss

NAILS

essie nail polish: it's genius, clambake, rock candy, mint candy apple 

Do you have a product you can't live without?

Mo+Chewie Go To Comic-Con

 [Make me a buddy here!]

*Roaaaaaaaar* Hello. I'm Chewbacca. You might remember me from a little 'ol movie series called Star Wars. Mo made me from following this template on StarWars.com so that I could go to Comic-Con. I think she did a pretty good job, but someone still confused me for A DOG. Um, no. I'm not a dog. Wookiee, thankyouverymuch.

[We made it!]

I guess a lot of other people wanted to go to Comic-Con too, because it was very hard for Mo to walk around! She had to raise her hand a lot so that I could see over everyone's heads.

But even though there were so many people, we got to meet lots of cute characters just like me. This is edamame, its ears moved up and down! We were instructed not to lean on it because edamames are delicate.

[Edamame from Mameshiba]

And then we met these ugly dolls. They are called Ox and Ice-Bat.

 [Ugly Dolls]

After we took some photos, we saw some talented artists that we admire like Gene Yang, James Kochalka, Andy Runton, and Craig Thompson. Look at what Andy drew for us!

[A sketch from Andy Runton for Mo and her boy]

We also saw some panels, including one about a new Jim Henson graphic novel, and another about one of our favorite subjects--children's books! Here I am listening intently to the panelists.

[Interesting. I wonder when the Q&A session will start? Too bad my arms don't move, otherwise I would ask a question!]

After a really long day I was TIRED and hot. All this fur is really stifling. So we left the con satisfied and exhausted, but our last adventure of the day was at Yogurtland! My friend Hello Kitty was there. She's on a commemorative spoon, along with my other friend ChocoCat. Mo really wanted the other spoon so the boy took one when the person at the register wasn't looking. Don't tell Yogurtland, I don't want to go to wookiee jail.

[My favorite flavor is strawberry.]

I hope you've enjoyed my recap of Comic-Con 2011! Mo says next year I might have an ewok friend if I'm lucky. 

[See you next year!]

30 Day Photo Challenge - Days 4 and 5, Clouds and Books

 

[I cheated, these are not clouds from Day 4. This is a photo I took on the road in New Mexico, but can I help it that San Diego has been cloudless lately?]

 [Our travel books. Sort of. I think some of these are my sister's -- sorry!]

30 Day Photo Challenge - Day 3, Hands

The boy will occasionally grab my hands and observe them. He tells me he loves how perfect they are, and that makes me smile.

I took a photo of his hands today while he was sleeping. (I promise I'm not creepy.)

 [The boy's hands during a nap.]

He has a habit of peeling his cuticles (totally gross) and his palms get sweaty, but I still like holding his hand all the same.

Hope everyone had a lovely weekend and that Monday goes by FAST. We had an exhausting but fun day at Comic-Con (more on that to come!) but finished off Sunday night with a big bowl of Japanese curry and lounging on the couch.

Are you fascinated by a part of your S.O.?

30 Day Photo Challenge - Day 2, Favorite Shoes

[Day 2]

Ok. Favorite shoes? That's a little broad if you ask me. I have shoes I wear almost everyday, shoes that are super comfortable for walking, shoes that I like to wear to weddings. I went with the shoes that I was stalking for a long time. These are the "amethyst" shoes in black from Seychelles. They are not only super cute on but also comfy. Y'know, for a reasonable amount of time, you wouldn't go rock climbing in these hunnies.

Seychelles is one of my favorite shoe brands, along with Poetic Licence, and now TOMS for comfier uses. If I had the $$$ Kate Spade would be added to that list, but I only had the chance to buy one pair for my wedding. Le sigh.

What are your favorites?

[To see the full 30 day list, click here.]

30 Day Photo Challenge - Day 1, Self Portrait

Thanks to Amelie Obscura for introducing me to the 30 Day Photo Challenge. I'm going to try and see if I can make it through all thirty! The list is above if you'd like to join me. :)

Since I was snap happy today, I decided just to go ahead with Day 1, which is a self portrait. I shot this with my iPhone and then put the lomo filter on it via Instagram. I don't generally like close-up shots of myself because *fun fact about Mo!* one of my eyes is larger than the other. Close-ups magnify this. It's SUPER obvious in baby photos, but my eyes slowly evened out the older I got. I've made peace with them, they are, after all, sisters--not twins.

[Day 1]

Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend! xoxo

Adventures in Wall Decals

I finally purchased this wall decal from Blik and Doodlers Anonymous and it came this week! I mustered up the energy to put it on our wall. The boy acted as quality control.

Here is the before with the pieces pinned up with tape to give me an idea of what it would look like:

And here is the after!:

 

[A view from our hallway, with kitty standing guard]

We used a transfer method. (You can watch this step-by-step on the blik website if you are considering using wall decals.) Kinda nerve-wracking at first (I was scared that I would rip the graphic, especially at the tips of the buildings) but I'm really glad I didn't and that it came out nicely! Overall, a rather easy way to spruce up a wall without painting. Plus, for all you renters out there, this decal is removable just by peeling. 

Huzzah!

It All Ended This Weekend

"It" being the Harry Potter films, don't worry blog friends! I still have a ring on my finger. ;)
Did you see Harry Potter 7.2/DH 2? Wasn't it satisfying and captivating? Way back when I was in high school, I still remember being at my friend's house and seeing the first book on his kitchen table. I had never heard of it and casually read the back cover, probably before doing something very high school, like speeding through the hills in my hatchback while eating gummy bears. Who knew that more than a decade later, I would be at the movie theater playing cards on a nasty a*% theater floor (not much else to do while waiting for a movie) for this very book? 

Anyway, we had a great time! I did my best to look Harry Potter-esque and painted a deathly hallows symbol on a white tee. I had that cardigan (hard to see, there's a little lion coat of arms on it) in my wardrobe from a J. Crew sale, and the scarf is leftover from my days in Bay Area weather.  

In other weekend news, I bought some pretty yellow tulips which brightened up my apartment.

And, I got a surprise in the mail from our wonderful wedding photographer, Jessamyn Harris. As a gift for our one year anniversary, she had our wedding portrait turned into an encaustic painting made by Wax and Pixels. It's mounted on a piece of sustainable wood. I've already hung it in a special place and think it's quite lovely.

Back to work . . . last week I had a nightmare about work on Sunday night, so let's hope I have sweet dreams of macarons and cupcakes. Like this one I ate.

Hope everyone had a fab weekend and that you had sweet dreams last night!

New Mexico Mini Book

Another mini book post! This one was much easier to make because we were only there for three days. After making the Japan book, editing these pictures and threading all the pieces together was a piece of cupcake. I used brown note cards from Paper Source, green divine twine, and stickers by Lotta Jansdotter.

Here are the different sections for each town we visited:

I'm in love with these Lotta Jansdotter stickers I used for each section. My sister bought me a book of them, available from Chronicle Books. I still have a bunch of them left, and so far have used them for gifts, labeling boxes at home, and now these little books.

 [Lotta Jansdotter Labels & Stickers]

I'm also now tempted to get the dutch door press labels and stickers and the small object labels and stickers so that I can cute-i-fy anything in my crafting path. Who needs boring white labels anyway?

Colorful New Office Space

[My new office area during a momentary lapse of cleanliness.]

One of my favorite parts of our new apartment is that there are two bedrooms, so not only do I have one bedroom for me to dump all of my stuff, now I have two! This weekend, I tidied up my area and hung up my bulletin board and new wall file. I purchased them a few months ago from The Container Store. They are both part of the Brocade collection and definitely pretty up my space!

[This kitty cat on wood is from the wonderful Night Owl Paper Goods.]

Once upon a time, I didn't even have a desk area and would set my dingy computer on my lap sitting on my bed. At the time I was also taking design classes, so I had to use the computers at the lab because I couldn't afford Adobe Creative Suite, and on top of that I didn't own a scanner or printer. My art supplies stayed in my backpack, and any reading I had was just scattered around me. Having all this room, I feel so grown up...despite the fact that I have a poodle lamp and still post up images of kitty cats. 

I love having this as my space. The other half is the boy's space--there's a framed and autographed photo of Levar Burton, a molecular structure model set, an empty beer bottle, and a gigantic filing cabinet.

 [You thought I was joking about Levar Burton, didn't you?]

That's right. I married a Troy.

How about you, do you have your own space you love at home? Any Levar Burton fans out there?

Honeymoon Mini Book

[A mini scrapbook I made of our honeymoon trip to Japan]

I was on a scrapbooking frenzy this weekend! After finishing our guest book, I tackled a mini scrapbook (4 x 6) of our honeymoon. It has my favorite photos, dressed up with stickers, labels, and any maps, tickets, or cards that I saved from the trip. The letters on the front and the blue pom poms are from Martha Stewart Crafts. I couldn't find the link to the alphabet I used, but there are some other alphabet stickers from Martha Stewart on the web.

Here are some pages from the book. You'll notice that most of them consist of either food or cute animals, because if you're new to the blog, that's just how I roll.

 

I'm planning to do one for our last trip to New Mexico, one for my bridal shower, and then, well, more exciting things have to happen to me so I can make another book. :)

How do you like to remember your travels and big events?

Our Collaborative Wedding Guest Book

I FINALLY got around to making our wedding guest book! Well, let me clarify, more like finally got around to compiling and creating covers for my wedding guest book. Our guests luckily created all of the content, and I had the pleasure of putting it altogether and getting weepy over their messages and photos! 

{The guest book, like most things in our wedding, prompted a lot of debate and discussion. You can read all about the other options we considered here.}

I'm really happy about how it turned out. Here it is, the completed book, each page made by a guest at our wedding: 

I designed the cover to mirror our invitations. You can see our invitations here. 

And here are some of the pages designed by our guests: 

Our collaborative mini book was very easy to organize. You can make one too!

I planned to have two types of paper to the wedding, pink scalloped note cards and plain white note cards left over from when I was studying for the GRE. (Glad those came in handy later in life!) The cards are about the same size at 4 x 6. Prior to the wedding, I punched three holes in one notecard that I used as my template. And then I gave the boy the hole puncher and had him punch holes in the notecards. :) 

Next, I gathered stickers, special scissors, pens, colored pencils, and anything else I thought people would like to decorate their page.

We used the Polaroid camera so people could add photos to their pages (bring lots of film!), and because Polaroid cameras are retro fun. I bought photo corners so they didn't have to tape the polaroids and so I could take them off the page if needed. 

Our kind cousin took people's photos, and then put all the completed cards in a box. 

You can see the whole set-up here:

 

 [Set-up photos from Jessamyn Harris and Sheri Tennison Berg for Jessamyn Harris Photography]

Finally, to put the whole book together, I used 2" binder rings and a Crop-A-Dile to punch holes through the thicker cardboard I used for the cover.  This mini book was inspired from one of my favorite blogs for inspiration, enJOY it.

If you had a wedding, what was your "guest book"?