April Favourites

Somehow April just flew by and we are already nearly a week into May. Time just goes so quickly nowadays, it's hard to keep up with what month it is. I know it's a little bit late, but here are my favourites for the month of April!

Gaming
Still playing Animal Crossing Pocket Camp and there was a fun event last month which was a fishing tourney. I managed to collect all the items and this tourney wasn't as hard as the Nintendo themed one. Loved the school uniform items you could collect and here's a cute picture of my workmate and I in the game wearing the uniforms. Don't we look adorable?

Actually been playing a little bit of Style Boutique last week because I thought of doing another One Item Challenge. This time it will be an item from Brooke Bridge and no idea when I'll post it as I haven't had the time to create all the outfits just yet.

Music
I have a massive amount of haul posts to put up on here of my recent additions to my collection. I posted a review of CD Japan the other day so check that out if you haven't seen it already. I was quite impressed with the site and will definitely be using it again. Here are the two CD's I got from there and I'm super excited for Dream Ami's new single which I've been listening to like crazy.

At the moment I'm reorganising my music collection which is a massive project. The idea behind this is that I'm having a huge pain trying to sync things between all these tech devices we have nowadays. Plus my new car doesn't have a CD player so I can't play my CD's in it anymore. A few years ago, I had an issue with my computer and it busted up my iTunes making the files all weird. Like I still have all my old stuff, just not the original files and everything is just one single file. So I decided the other day to refresh my whole collection and start from scratch. I want to make sure everything has a physical file now and a back-up in case I ever lose anything. Plus it will help me discover old tracks that I love and forgot about. Speaking of which, I've been listening to some old stuff recently from my collection so I'll post some in this months music favourites section.

Beauty
So the Lipsmacker Kiss Natural lipbalms that I loved are now out of stock where I live sadly. Luckily I still have some left to use up. I did however manage to melt one of them in a hilarious stupid fashion. I couldn't find my lipbalm at work and wondered where on earth I had lost it. Turns out it fell out of my backpack when it was unzipped in my car. So the lipbalm had been sitting on the seat the entire day and melted into the pill shape of the container. Like you can still use it, it just looks really silly now.

March Favourites

How on earth did we get to the end of March so quick? I was filling in some forms the other day and asked someone for the date which was the 28th. We were both shocked at how it was the 28th of the month already! Anyway here is my monthly favourites for March!

Gaming
Haven't played my 3DS for a while as I've kinda been burnt out on Style Boutique recently and not as passionate about playing it. Maybe a break will help and I'll get back into the game again. I'm just so let down by the post-main story line content as I literally cannot work at my boutique anymore as the only customers I ever get are the side story girls like Molly. Doesn't matter how far ahead I go int he game or how many times I complete their story lines, they are the only ones that ever appear. So frustrating and it has really put me off the game.

My workmate got me into Animal Crossing Pocket Camp recently and I've been playing it here and there. It's so adorable and the graphics are stunning. I don't take it too seriously and only really fulfil requests and catch stuff. The current event with growing flowers for Katie is quite cute and I've been enjoying that.

Music
Big month music wise as I have two packages on the way and received one order from Zenmarket this month. I'm waiting for Dream Ami's new Japanese single Good Goodbye and E-girls Celebration from CDJapan. This will be my first time trying out the site and I got a poster with the Dream Ami single so I'm excited to see it when it arrives. Also on the way should be Hong Jin Young's new album, MOMOLAND's 2nd Mini Album Freeze and myB's DdoDdo single. Waiting for the later one to come into stock on YesAsia so hopefully it ships soon. I did get some exciting releases from Zenmarket which I must post about. I finally completed my Japanese CLC collection which is great as it's something I've wanted for years.

Song wise I've been listening to quite a few tracks. MOMOLAND released a new song both in Korean and Japanese in recent weeks. Personally I hated the Korean one and much prefer the Japanese one. I held off getting the new Korean mini album for now and will just get one of the Japanese versions. I wasn't too interested in the other tracks on the mini album so I decided to buy Freeze instead which I was missing from my collection.

February Favourites

Going to give myself a gold star as I spelt February correctly in the title on the first try! Seriously, I struggle to spell February every year when it rolls around. Anyway this month went so quick! I still feel like it's December though because it's just been so busy and I don't realise how quick the days are going. It's still pretty hot here, we're having a sudden heatwave. Normally I don't mind the heat but after the last heatwave in January when it was nearly 50 degrees, I'm a bit over it. Plus it's quite hot at my work then it's hot at night so you can't sleep then everyone is tired for work the next day. The endless circle! 

Gaming
Amazingly I didn't play much video games this month. A bit of Style Boutique here and there to update my Shopdo but I don't recall playing it much. All the posts on the blog this month were a back log of images I had from the game. I did however make some new outfits on teh Design Centre which I need to post on here. Here's a sneak peak at one of them!

Music
Big month music wise. I got a large order from Japan but it's not quite ready yet to post on here as some of the CD's absolutely reeked of cigarette smoke when I got them. So I've been using some techniques to make them smell better and I think there working so far. I did get some albums and singles in good condition or brand new. Picked up CLC's Japanese releases from Tower Records which I'm super happy about. I brought the two I didn't get from Tower Records second hand the other day so I'm excited to receive those soon. Here's some of the songs I've been listening to this month!

November Favourites

Didn't November just start? I feel like it went super quick and can't believe it's December this weekend. And soon it will be 2019! How on earth did that happen? Anyway here are this months favourites!

Gaming
As I posted about last week, I found a copy of New Style Boutique at EB Games recently and have been playing a bit of it lately. It's quite fun and exciting to go back to older features in the series. Plus I can finally use glam/flirty fashion when it's actually in the game. I need to work out how to get pictures of my console to post on here.

In Styling Star news, I reached 3000 likes on my Shopdo! Hooray! I'm so excited to reach this milestone and went crazy giving every one on the recent tab of Shopdo lots of likes to celebrate. I'd like to thank everyone who visited my Shopdo who reads my blog or just stumbled across it online. I shall continue with the weekly updates, still on Monday currently just late in the day as my work schedule changed.

Music
Earlier this week I posted about my recent haul from YesAsia which I was excited about receiving. The Dream Ami one has the most gorgeous design and apperantly she is recording a new song so that will be another one for the collection hopefully. E-girls also brought out a new song this week which is pretty awesome as I love 80's sounding songs. I prefer this release over Perfect World mainly because I'm all about their dance pop songs rather than slower stuff. I do wish however the song was just a standard physical release instead of these MUSIC CARD ones. They are always a pain to track down and find. Hopefully we'll see some Happiness, Flower and SYY releases next year instead of just straight E-girls releases all year.

Other than that, I've just been listening to bits and pieces K-Pop wise. I've been super into Pristin recently which is kinda sad since the group is currently in limbo with whats going on with them. Looking at picking up their physical albums next year as I only have them digitally currently.

Toys
After like a billion years of searching, I finally found the Barbie Fashionista doll I had been after. When the doll was released, I could not find her at any toy or department stores in my state so I thought she just wasn't available. Months later I came across her randomly in Big W and was rather surprised to see her and some other dolls from the same release on the shelf. And added bonus as she was on sale!

October Favourites

My favourite month of the year has ended sadly. October is my favourite month for various reasons, one being that the weather finally warms up. However October here wasn't actually that warm, only two or three days above 30. Halloween was great, we ended up having quite a few trick or treaters! Mainly young children in super adorable costumes. I brought a bag of Milky Ways to give out because who doesn't love Milky Ways. I had a few left, maybe I'll go eat them after this post. Anyway, here are my top things for October!

Gaming
Finally collected all the Halloween & Nightmare Before Christmas items in Disney Magical World. Had to reset the game a few times to get the skeleton counter as the request didn't want to spawn. I also managed to finally get the last items to craft the remaining outfit items I was missing. So now I'm only missing some fall and winter specific items and less than 10 cards. The card thing is frustrating as I cannot get the last Daisy card! I got Minnie's somehow the other day and Daisy just keeps giving the same ones and not the Super Rare. Sigh, maybe this month I'll get it from her. I hate random chance in games, makes everything take so much longer.

Music
No new CD's this month but I'm planning on getting Dream Ami and MOMOLAND's new releases next month. Just still trying to decide which versions of BAAM from MOMOLAND to get, leaning towards Type A because I adore the bumblebee style outfits the girls wear on it.

Thinking about getting this version of BAAM.

This month I've actually been listening to some non K-Pop and J-Pop music. Shocking isn't it. I was going through my MP3 player at the gym and decided to listen to some of the older albums in my collection. Many years ago, I was a hardcore fan of this Australian rock band called The Living End. I used to collect all their releases and track down rare promo discs from the band. I've been listening to some of their older stuff recently and thinking about picking up their recent release as well. Here's their most well-known song Prisoner Of Society which was a staple for all the summer music festivals when the band was on the line-up.

Beauty
Managed to track down another flavour of the Kiss Therapy lip balms from Lipsmacker. This time it was the Grapefruit one which is my new favourite. It smells like Passionfruit soft drink (or Pasito as the Kirks brand is called) which is my favourite soft drink besides Raspberry and Vanilla Coke. So strawberry is the only flavour I'm missing now but I'm guessing it's just your standard strawberry scent. Not a huge fan of strawberry lip balms as they are a bit boring and overpowering sometimes.

Stationary
So my friend and I were in one of the Japanese stores in town a few weeks ago and I came across the best sticker set ever. I was so excited when I saw this Maru the Shiba themed stickers. Omg they are just so adorable! The tennis racket one is my favourite. They also had round shaped stickers with similar images of Maru.

During the same trip to town, I found this Winnie the Pooh stamp set from Daiso. It is similar to another stamp set I had brought previously from there and is a decent stamp. You need to be precise with the pressure to get a good print with it and to be careful not the bleed the ink through certain typse of paper. I'm going to blog about my stamp collection in November so keep an eye out for that!

Simplicity 2054 Pattern Review

A little while ago, I made a new dress using this lovely Cynthia Rowley pattern from Simplicity. The pattern was super simple to make and turned out nicely. I thought it was finally time to post a review of the pattern which is 2054 from Simplicity.

Pattern Description
The pattern is described as a knit dress and cowl collar. The pattern has three variations of the dress: View is a long sleeved dress with an optional cowl collar, View B is a three quarter sleeve dress and View C has sleeves with a slit in the elbow part. The dress has no lining and requires no zippers.

Sizing
The sizing of the pattern is 4 to 22 and comes in two packets (6-14 and 14 to 22). I made the size 10 of the View A pattern without the cowl collar. The dress fits quite nicely and is ideal for autumn or winter weather (with a warm top underneath). The arms are a good length for me as I have quite long arms.

Instructions
I'd rank this pattern as a beginner level pattern and would be a good project for anyone wanting to learn how to sew with knits or learn more about sewing sleeves in. The instructions are easy to follow and the dress didn't take longer than a weekend to make. The pattern only has a few pieces which is great. Some patterns have so many and it's nice to sew something with less than five pieces for once.

June Favourites

June was such a busy month and I've been insanely busy lately, so this month's favourites are a bit late. Managed to get a variety of posts up on Marzipan Wonderland this month which I'm proud of. I'm going to be pretty busy for the next few weeks so posts might be spaced apart. I do have some exciting challenges for New Style Boutique 3 to post so look out for those! Now onto the favourites!

Gaming
Besides playing New Style Boutique 3 and Animal Crossing on the 3DS, I've been really into this game on Steam lately called Voodoo Garden. It's a clicker style game where you create a garden filled with different flora and animals. I got it ages ago during a sale but only really got into playing it this month. It's similar to Plantera which I've played previously and enjoyed.

Screenshot of my garden in Voodoo Garden

Music
Earlier this month, I was lucky enough to find KARA's debut Korean album in a second hand book shop. I was absolutely thrilled to see it and it was only $1.50! I didn't have this one for my collection yet and I just changed the case over to a new one to make it look all nice.

Been listening to a few songs this month. I've really been into SudannaYuzuYully スダンナユズユリー this month who are a sub-unit of E-girls. The group has one of my favourite E-girls members Yurino in it so it's nice to see her singing and rapping instead of just performing.

MOMOLAND released a new song which is just as good as BBoom BBoom. Their new title is called Baam and has a similar sound to their previous track. But I don't mind as it's still fun to listen to and has a dance which reminds me of T-ARA's Lovey Dovey. I have purchased their new mini album which should arrive in a few weeks along with two other exciting titles.

Simplicity 8418 Review

Haven't done a sewing post for a little while and I wanted to get one up before the end of the month. In previous Monthly Favourites posts, I mentioned I had made a jacket using a pattern from Simplicity so that's the focus of this review. This review will be about the Simplicity pattern 8418.

Pattern Description
The pattern is described on the packet as a lined bomber jacket with fabric and trim variations. The pattern has two styles of jackets: View A is a jacket in one tone and View B is a jacket with contrasting sleeves and appliques. The neck, sleeves and bottom band are made of ribbing or stretchable knit fabric. The jacket has lining on the interior and I have seen some people on the internet make the jacket reversible instead of lining. It also has pockets which is always a plus!!

Sizing
The sizing of the pattern is 4 to 22 and comes in two packets (4-12 and 14 to 22). I made the size 10 of the View A pattern which was a good fit for me. Doesn't look super fitted but the arms are long enough for me and the bottom band isn't too tight.

Instructions
There is no skill level marked on this pattern like some Simplicity ones are and I would have to rate it as intermediate skilled as there are some tricky techniques. You could make it as a beginner if you had worked with commercial patterns before and understood the steps. I found some steps difficult to follow and the instructions weren't detailed enough. Step 18 is where I got stuck as you need to anchor the lower band seams together but when I had attached the lower band to the jacket in Step 14, I had pressed down the seam. So when you get to doing Step 18, the fabric wants to go upwards and a different direction from the way it currently is. The problem I was having was that the fabric was bunching in the front corner part and flipping over. The fabric I was using was quite thick and heavy so I guess if you used lighter fabric, you could easily press this down (however there is quite a few layers here). 

May Favourites & Blog Update

The last day of May brings the end of Autumn and soon the beginning of winter. However it's been freezing cold here recently so it could've been winter already. Nicer weather the past few days, so hopefully it stays that way for a little while. Anyway, time for my monthly favourites! I've also written a little update on the blog at the end of this post about my plans for future posts.

Gaming
Goes without saying, been playing New Style Boutique 3: Styling Star of course! Managed to get a few new customers in my boutique recently and I've seen the chased the story line girls off for a while thankfully. Besides Style Boutique, I'm still grinding away at Disney Magical World trying to craft all the items. I'm stuck at the moment trying to obtain rare items like the Rainbow Clover and Fairy Diamond Bubbles to make some items. Other than that, I collected all the Easter set and just waiting for other holidays later this year to get more items for the 100% collection. I took this funny photo from the game that I thought was amusing as it wasn't Easter in the game anymore. Easter started in-game after Easter had occurred in the real world. Excuse the camera photo as you cannot move photos from the game off the 3DS as they aren't stored on the SD Card.

It's not Easter anymore!

Besides 3DS games, I'm looking forward to a game on Steam called House Flipper. It was released recently, but I'm waiting till it comes on sale during one of the many Steam sales to pick it up. I find it quite fascinating and interesting as the game lets you basically remodelled a house and decorate the interior. Sounds right up my alley!

Music
Got a bunch of new singles and albums this month which I've posted about before so I've been listening to them. Besides those, I've really been into E-girls latest release Showtime. Haven't got the new album just yet as I'm saving up to get the top version, but I've been streaming the album on Spotify. No stand out faves just yet, but Showtime is definitely on that list. 

Another song I've been into this month was (G)Idle's debut song Latata. Loved it from the first listen! Looking forward to seeing what their future releases are like and I need to make time to listen to their debut album as I've seen people raving about it.

There's a few more new tracks that came out this month that I haven't had a chance to listen to yet like AOA's new release Bingle Bangle. Really need to work on getting some new music on my MP3 so I can listen to them at the gym and in the car.

Television
This month I've been super invested in watching Produce 101 China. I'm so obsessed with this show and personally I prefer this version over the Korean one (season 1). I find the China one is a bit more positive and less drama. My fave girl so far is Gao Qiuzi because of her upbeat personality and hilarious antics. Plus she's actually quite talented in singing and dancing. I'm actually quite fond of all the girls on a show so it's hard to narrow down my top faves. Yamy and Sunhee are pretty cool and I've become more interested in Meiqi who is from WJSN. I'll definitely need to look her past performances up! I've linked the theme song MV below and be sure to look up the episodes (they are subbed too) if you are interested in watching this amazing show.

Simplicity Pattern 1419 Review

Thought it was time for me to finally make a post about sewing. Besides playing video games, I like to sew in my spare time. I haven't had to buy new clothes in ages because I'm always sewing new items to wear! So for my first sewing post, I thought I'd write a review of one of my favourite sewing patterns. The pattern is Simplicity 1419 and was part of the Lisette line.

Pattern Description
This pattern features two dresses and a jacket. The dresses can be made either with or without short sleeves and the dress features an optional peter pan collar. The dress pattern has a keyhole front and a pleated skirt. It is slightly fitted and features darts in the bodice. The skirt part of the dress features pockets which is amazing!! A 22" or 55 cm invisible zipper is required for this pattern. The jacket is a gathered peplum bolero style with three-quarter sleeves. I have only made the dress in this pattern and are yet to try making the jacket.

Sizing
The sizing of the pattern is 6 to 24 and I made the size 10 pattern. I find the size 10 is closer to a size 8 for me and is quite small around the waist.

Instructions
The steps are quite easy to follow to make the dress and the pattern would be suitable for a beginner to intermediate sewer. The first time I made the dress, I got a bit stuck with the neck facing part with the elastic loop and button. I ended up just skipping this step for reasons I will explain next.

December Favourites

2018 is coming to a close and that means it's time for my December favourites!

Gaming
I've been playing a variety of games this month. Style Boutique 3 was one of them as if you could've of guessed. I unlocked a lot of amiibo items this month and will get around to posting them on my other blog soon. I'm sad that fashion shows are not in this game as I'm missing the challenge of finding perfect outfits.

Besides Style Boutique 2, I've been doing my town up in Animal Crossing New Leaf the past few days so I could update my dream address. Luckily none of my villagers moved out whilst I wasn't playing. I would've been upset if Frita moved out as she's my favourite. Been grinding away on Disney Magical World again. I hate how it's impossible to get certain items in that game and how furniture costs stupid amounts to build. 
 

Ah! I'm stuck!

Now for games that are not on the 3DS. Steam is currently having a sale and you know what that means? Yes, buying lots of games and never getting around to playing them haha. A friend sent me Goat Simulator and a Nancy Drew game which I'm looking forward to playing. I got a whole bunch of other games during the sale as well: the Nancy Drew Collectors Pack, Space Channel 5: Part 2, Voodoo Garden, Find This and Castaway Paradise. I love Castaway Paradise as it's super cute and similar to Animal Crossing. I don't get why Steam never recommended it to me earlier, it's totally the type of game I play! It has some amusing quests, one villager made me sort out his debt and then burying letters from the tax man. Such a crazy game.

Castaway Paradise has some interesting quests.

Music
This month, I received E-girls Lesson 1 album in the mail and it is amazing. I've been listening to it frequently and Ready Go is one of my new favourites. I got the Taiwan Limited Edition that comes with the CD, DVD and Photobook. And I love the fact it came with the plastic sleeve! It's always great when albums come with one as it helps protect the album when in storage.

Another E-girls album for the collection.

I've actually been listening to an album that's not J-Pop or K-Pop related this month. Omg! I know, I think it's crazy. I've actually gotten back into a band called the Kaiser Chiefs. I used to be a hardcore fan back when they first came on the scene with their album Employment. I remember hanging out with my friend years ago waiting to buy their second album Yours Truly Angry Mob. We each got the Limited Edition version but I could never work out what was so limited about it. It was literally the same as the normal one. Their second album is the one I've been listening to a lot recently and it's an excellent album. 

Art 
For Christmas I got a copy of the Everyday Watercolour book from Jenna Rainey. It looks amazing and very informative. I'm excited to start it in the next few weeks. One of my resolutions for next year is to be more creative and I've got a few instructional art books to work through which should be exciting!

Sewing
Picked up a few new sewing patterns recently and looking forward to making some of them early next year. Most of these were Christmas presents but I picked out the patterns I was after as I wanted useful ones I would actually wear. I got the matching accessories pattern for the dress pattern. I've made my own EGL style dress before from scratch, so it will be nice to try making one based off an actual pattern.