Guess Where I Shopped Today?

 

(UGH why are my pictures so grainy?????)
But yes. The Bay Downtown :) Check out their new White Space on the 2nd floor. I'm kinda quite impressed.

Spacious fitting rooms.
My typical OTD (outfit of the day). Black... black... black...

 Hey look, I'm suddenly 30 yrs old+!

 Don't I look like some Japanese ajumma who works at a department store selling fragrances?? lol

From Halston Heritage. Trying out the one-shoulder look (again). This looked really weird in person, but pretty decent in a picture. Pictures are deceiving.

Update soon! I gotta sleep!!

Published.

This 4men- Baby Baby song is nice to listen to when you want to sleep. Apparently 2 of their members quit and joined the group Someday lol. Nice voices.

Waiting for my dad to get ready to leave to drive me to work this morning. For once, I was ready before he was!

Loving these cheap A+F super skinnies (possibly jeggings) I bought in the States last week. They're so perfectly stretchy - I feel that (if I were flexible enough) I could do the splits no problem! Also love the colour of my silk green scarf I picked up at a vintage store yesterday for $5. So Fall-like to me. Wearing this white blouse I decided I needed in Korea for the first time with just jeans... or actually for the first time ever... mainly because I didn't have the right nude bra.. but thanks to La Vie En Rose, now I sort of do! Good enough, I say.

Weird washed out colouring - the light was partially blocked by this full-length HEMNES Ikea mirror I thought would suit my room (but didn't really, so it's now leaning against the hallway railings for everyone to use.. because we don't have a full-length mirror in my house surprisingly).
Thinking of dying my hair a medium ash brown next. Bangs have grown so much. I need a trim badly. Hair so flat and fried... wow 3 posts today.

Yesterday, All My Troubles Seemed So Far Away

Dammit. I obviously forgot. Bad idea to get that Spanish Latte so late. I went to bed at 2AM and now I'm fully awake at 7:15AM (I woke up a couple times in between, too). So yea. Busy day yesterday and since I brought along a digi, I have a few pictures to share for once~

Sooo convocation was early in the morning. My grandparents, parents, and brother came. My grandparents got me a pretty and girly bouquet, a graduation bear from the bookstore (that my mom helped me name "Geo" for Geography), and a necklace my 2nd cousin made (she sells her handmade jewelry as one of her many jobs and really ran around to find the right quality pieces for it). The whole thing was 2 hours long (zzz) and we all walked across the pond and down the stairs of the AQ while the whole group of bagpipe players (SFU tradition) blew air into their instruments EEEEEERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR which left 10 minutes to take a few quick snaps before we rushed off to the Milestones near my house and then to the office. 

(I got a BA in the Faculty of Environment, btw.. Geography major). There was this one graduate who had a 4.24 GPA.  He did a joint major in (something along the lines of) molecular biology and biochemistry and minored n psychology! He has 36 A+ (not a single A-!). CRAZY.

Oh, I picked up 2 Anna Sui polishes and was pretty excited to use them. I saw someone swatch the peach colour, but I was taking a chance with the purple and I was so disappointed when I painted my nails! (Oh yea, btw, I totally did not fulfill anything in the challenge yesterday... I wore mascara, straightened my hair, and painted my nails.. bad... I know :( I'll make up for it Tuesday). 

Super adorable packaging and the polish has a nice rose fragrance, which was a nice surprise. I was hoping the purple would be a dupe of the YSL one I wasn't fast enough to get earlier on in the Spring. The Anna Sui purple (208, for reference), was totally NOT anything close!!! It was darker, way ugly, and had this blue under-shimmer that made my nails look like I stole my little cousin's DISNEY nail polish! It looks cheap and the shade is more than awful. It's hard to see just how terrible it is in the picture... but I guess you can imagine. (Yes.. I'm a nail drama queen.. I think it's because the polish was $15 which is pretty expensive, but I swear, this is my extent of my drama....... hehe).

Met up with M and Yena downtown to do some shopping after and M brought me 2 rolls of chamchi (tuna) kimbap from Port Coq. because that store has the closest thing to the best chamchi kimbap rolls like the ones we had in Korea. That was dinner, thanks! Bought a huge fluffy hot metallic pink and black (so not me haha) powder brush from Sephora I will test out. It was very pricey so I hope its price will reflect its performance... also got a basic form-hugging tank dress from True Value Vintage for only $19! Deal of the day. I think that's all I bought. 

I tried on my first one-shoulder dress at TVV. It feels weird putting it on! It's like when I first tried on my mom's 3/4 length sleeve shirts back in elementary school - it felt soooo weird.. as if material was missing.  It looked really bad on in person (pictures are a bit deceiving and it was way too small at the hips) but I really like the look of [most] one-shoulder dresses. I like this general shape because one side is a "long" sleeve. I see so many sleeveless versions out there, but not many one-sleeve.  One-shoulder is the new strapless!

Quick snap of my simple outfit of the day before I left Urban Outfitter's change room.. (I tried on some really cute pieces but the debit card machine was broken). Club Monaco sun dress, cropped 3/4 sleeve cardigan from Korea, UO Sabina Convertible leather bag, cheapie elastic + metal belt from Korea, and the only shoes that fit me from Vince in Malaysia (and the only heel I can walk all day in) that I noticed after was a replica of a Nine West heel.

After, hung out w/ the Kgroup... (lol I don't think I've ever made a name for them) at Jerry's apartment. We were originally supposed to go sing, but I kind of like just hanging out 'cause I haven't seen them for a long while. It was in celebration of Jerry's birthday. 

Bern has all the better pictures... we tried to surprise him by lighting his candles in the bathroom and then coming out. Guh.. now that I look at this picture, it looks really really unappetizing! LOL

Jin is leaving to return back to Korea on Monday~ InJae is leaving mid July~ Jerry is leaving mid Aug. Sad!

Oh yea, the boys created Korean names for me and Bern. I like them. They went through the effort to make it as close as possible to our Chinese names (but really, only our last names were very accurate).

Bern = IM BO-MI (Bomi is a very popular Korean name, I knew 4 Bomi's in Korea. It suits Bern 'cause her nickname is "Bunny" and if you say Bomi in a certain way, it sounds like Bunny! or maybe you can even hear "Bher-ni[ce]" lol so I think it really really suits Bern!).

Me = OH SO-NA (Very unique apparently - only 1 other person has this (full) name in Korea lol - you can check online! The "So" is close to my middle character of my Chinese name "little".. and the "na" resembles "Natasha". It's funny how easy it is to write (and say) my name in so many languages)

Anyway, thanks to M for letting me borrow her camera. Good day, especially since it warmed up! I shall get my Canon S90 within the next month if I find time (and someone) to go down and pick it up from the States with me. :)

On & On

Goodbye SFU. Please let me pass my courses this term!


Bought my maxi dress from French Connection the other day! The dress is too long to take a picture of using the webcam 'cause there's no self-timer, but I found the picture online. I think it looks better on a person than in the picture.. not as hip-concentrated.  I'm the first one in Vancouver to get their grubby hands on it...

I like the weight of the material and the subtle geometric pattern!

Also bought Lush's Brazen Honey fresh face mask. I'm thinking this could be my favourite one so far (I've tried 3 I think), but the smell isn't that great. Quite tolerable, though. 

I'm still trying to recuperate from the sleep I've been so deprived of last week. I should be good by Wednesday morning!

To Seattle

States trip yesterday w/ M and N! It was fun - M picked me up at 6:15AMish and then we picked N up and drove down! 3 min wait at the border - much less than we expected, so we got to Nordstrom Rack near Westfield Southcentre a half an hour earlier. Wasn't expecting to find anything there, but I ended up walking out of the store with a pair of basic black, ankle-length skinny Jbrand jeans (pretty much what I needed) and Bumble & Bumble hair thickening spray I couldn't find in Vancouver.  

Look at what the spray rang in as on my receipt! loll bum-thickening

We had lunch at the Cheesecake Factory (yay)

After, we headed to Westfield Southcenter's Forever 21 and spent a couple hours in that massive store. I got a light-wash cropped jean jacket with 3/4 sleeves and a cute yellow and white striped zip-up. Huzpaz for nautical! I like the yellow. It's not the fresh, creamy and happy yellow as it looks below, it's more like a Pier Imports yellow if you know what I mean.. sort of has a greenish tinge to it and more.. muddyyet it's still bright and pops.

Also ended up picking up a pair of brown T-strap flip flops from Gilly Hicks (I've concluded that GH sales associates aren't very bright...) and a Sephora Professional #45 Mineral Powder Brush (new to their line). It's around 6.5-7 inches long.

The brush is soft - I'm curious how it I'll hold up after I wash it.

We stopped briefly at Alderwood Mall to look at Forever 21's accessories store where M got a temporary wallet and then we headed back North. Started to rain a bit on the way back.  We had to wait less than 5 minutes to cross the border and didn't have to pay duty even though we all exceeded the limit by 3-4 times! Wooooot

I still have my shopping tolerance (meaning I can shop for over 9 hours and I still won't get tired) - and this was the first time I didn't nap for one bit in the car on the way down or up

What's In My School Bag...

Red Longchamp Le Pliage in Large. Love this thing - it's so lightweight and goes with 82% of my outfits and is perfectly casual for school. Fits everything - it's the black hole! On top of all that above, I could fit a thick sweatshirt, umbrella, gloves, AND a pair of flats. Has been done before and it didn't look overstuffed! I literally dump everything in and out.. it has taken quite a beating.. but still looks new. Got it at Seoul's Lotte Duty Free for a good price. Also got the little black matching coin purse not shown.
. SFU clipboard folder with this week's readings and a bunch of lined paper. 2 Korean crayon-highlighters (so coool), 2 pens (I'm a pen girl)
. Pink planner from the dollar store in Korea.. a fill-in-the-date one. Has pictures of traveling (mainly Tokyo) inside that's why I like it.
. Pink Sushigirl keychain from my Auntie Sandy
. Pong Pong Happy Panda pass holder (I use it for my bus pass.. still has all Korea passes in it)
. The best bobby pins from Daiso (a Japanese dollar store)
. LG Shine Candybar cell w/ Tohoshinki 4th Live Tour 2009 charm
. Cenix S-300 8GB w/ Bose In-Ear headphones (really good headphones)
. Capitalism text (1 of 2) for contemporary capitalism course..
. Cheapie $10 F21 black patent zippered wallet with 15 cents (yes.. poor student) and stuffed with a lot of things... like even paint chips lol
. Neutrogena Lip Moisturizer (quite a good one compared to Blistex, Softlips, Nivea..)
. NARS Lip Gloss in Chihuahua
. phantom camera is there. yea. you just can't see it.
. oh and I ran out of the Wrigley's 5 gum in Cobalt.

Agnes B Cosmetic Case (from Japan):
. Crabtree & Evelyn Gardener's Hand Therapy Cream (mmm)
. Anna Sui lookalike comb
. this free pack of wipes for buying a 350ml milk carton @ a convenience store. So odd...
. Sparkly gold swirl compact
. Red knit coffee cup sleeve M got me for Xmas haha - for those coffee runs! Allows me to be somewhat eco-friendly + saves my poor fingers from the heat of my venti Tazo tea.
. Some Scotch tape (w/out dispenser)... you never know
. 2 gum/mints from Japan


I always find it interesting to browse sites like this and this to see what's inside other people's bags. I mainly look to see if there's anything nice in them, to make up imaginary thoughts about what sort of person I think they are (minimalist, book-lover, designer-obsessed, super girly girl, really social, trendy, an artist, environment-friendly, sale-lover, someone who likes to show off, teacher by day and something totally different at night..., makeup lover, cat-lover... etc.) though I know that it's not totally representative of them 'cause that's just their bag for that day. I don't carry makeup around to do touch-ups throughout the day during school, but that doesn't make me not a girly girl 'cause I know to a lot of ppl, I am the girliest girl they know. My school bag is practical... eh eh eh?
Anyway, the main thing I get from these sites is that I'm still lusting a black Balenciaga with gold hardware, a Prada calf-skin (my goal for Italy), and a Miu Miu bag... and that I love zippered wallets 'cause you can throw a bunch of things in without worrying it will fall out (like loose change and buttons)!.. and that I think it looks ridiculous carrying around full-sized bottles of perfume (though I guess the scent does change if you put it in another bottle..).



3 more days until the move! Grarararrar. Goodbye "Vancouver Special" Asian carpet! Goodbye hill! Goodbye sunlights and roof deck that provided us with the unique 360 view of the city, a cooler house during the summers (funny, we have like 5 fans in the basement storage of our new house 'cause we think it's going to be hotter w/out roofdeck), and non-mosquito-bitten sleepovers! Goodbye small kitchen! Goodbye cool marble on fireplace (nice to sit on in the summer)! Goodbye backyard where I held a few birthday parties, chased around my pet bunny, and buried all my hammies and Kimchi the bunny! Goodbye unfinished room! haha man I just realized my room has gone through quite a few transformations! I was 2 when we moved into this house. I remember I first had colourful alphabet wallpaper (with the letter Z, for example, and a picture of a Zebra next to it)... and then when my brother grew out of this small baby room, he took over my room and I got the room next to it which was my dad's office/weight room which I turned into a Mickey Mouse room! I wasn't all into Mickey.. I liked Winnie the Pooh more, but I remember picking wallpaper from Revy (yea, before Rona) or Home Depot and that was the only acceptable one.. and then after, my mom found a matching duvet in the exact same pattern! And I had a couple of Mickey tees and even Mickey short-alls! And then I had a yellow phase when I loved wearing a lot of yellow so I painted my room Winnie the Pooh yellow (again, unintentional - I didn't realize it was WtP yellow until my uncle pointed it out). It was bright and rich - but happy! I had a bit of a yellow and red theme going on. Didn't really plan the red theme (haha), but I happened to get this red framed mirror set from IKEA for a "pop" of colour, everything else happened to be red.  My mom got me red bed sheets and sewed a simple red cloth over my headboard. It wasn't until around four years ago that I grew to like more classic, traditional, and more mature decor. Nad came over and we spent the whole day (or was it 2?) painting my room an ivory-ish colour and I had tons of plans to make it the ultimate room for me with what I had and some DIY projects and some good, flea market finds. Unfortunately, I never got around to it because I had busy summers and traveled around and, well, those are just excuses. I never made the time to do it I guess.. and my room has been a huge mish-mashed mess ever since.
So after I graduate, I will have more time to focus on my so-called 4th attempt at decorating a room (so I hope)! Btw, I didn't realize how long I've been designing. I used to put "designing" as my hobbies back in high school haha. While I was cleaning, I found pictures of a bunch of modern penthouse layout plans and blueprint types that I printed out back in Gr. 8. I had "fixed" the plans to suit my wants and then traced the layout, organized where the furniture, plants, lights, and details would be.. and then I would draw 2D versions as of what that side of the room would look like if you were facing it. Not bad. Then I remember my favourite class ever: drafting and design in Gr 12! I think it was a tie between Mr. Bae's English class where he would spend every class practicing his lines on us (he was a comedian on the side and told really really good stories.. and believable scary stories, too!!). Anyway for drafting, besides a couple of mini projects in the beginning such as recreating objects using the CAD program in 3D and drafting.. using angles and such, I got to design my own house and create a blueprint on CAD. CAD was so cool 'cause you could build a scaled house blue-print style and you could choose from a ton of options - even the style of column you wanted! There was a function where you could make it 3D and actually "tour" what you built! That is my dream come true. I loved that class so much, I was sad whenever it ended because it was too short so I worked on it at home though it wasn't homework. haha it was like playing Sims - I always thought the best part of that game was designing the house and would spend hours and hours designing it, picking the colour hardwood on the floor by its durability, choosing the cabinets.. and then I would make my characters play on fast foward just so they could make enough money so I could afford another fireplace or a fancy bouquet in the foyer that the maid would water lol. My house for Drafting & Design turned out exactly as I had imagined it to - it had a raised kitchen, tons of recessed lighting, a round solarium/breakfast room, four grand french doors leading out to the meadow-like garden, ensuite bathrooms for every bedroom (it was a 2 floor, 4bdrm, 4 and a half bath house), a skylight for every bathroom on the 2nd floor, a walk-out half-circle patio from the 2nd floor, a super luxurious walk in closet for the master bedroom, and huge windows overall. I happily achieved my first (and only) perfect grade in a course.

So yea I wanted to become an architect for a few years there (but then I learned of how much math was involved....). I remember I even took an architecture class at Eric Hamber in the summer of Gr 7 or 8.. but I recall I wasn't too impressed because we had to make our structures out of ugly brown cardboard and then paint it using generic dollar store colours. I always took some summer class/course all throughout elementary school and maybe for first year of high school because my parents had to work during the day and I guess, at the same time, they thought my brother and I needed some stimulation/learning thing. They used to be fun things like pottery, sewing, painting, drawing, there was always a sports camp I loved.. used to take basketball camp up at SFU (that was kinda brutal - they had a lot of excellent players) and Science Alive at SFU and UBC for a few years.. and then my parents made me take classes like creative writing, speech-making... wow I guess I just realized how many classes I've taken.. and that was just for summer. Just in general, throughout my childhood, I did all the swimming levels, did synchronized swimming for a term (hated it so much but it helped me get super good at treading water w/out hands 'cause we had to do it for 8 min at the beginning of every class), joined Gators (a swim club) in high school that was outside of school, life guarding course, did figure skating for a number of years during the middle of elementary school for Canskate, Brownies and Girl Scouts for 3 or 4 years, rhythmic gymnastics for a year or two (they were short, seasonal terms.. we just tumbled, balanced on the beams with help, and jumped on trampolines and things.. I was quite young), baseball for quite a few years (I really enjoyed that), art classes in random years (indifferent), piano lessons (completed gr. 8), theory (completed Rudiments 2), Dr. Chin (I think that's his name...) math where we would practice math contests every Thursday (disliked this a LOT even though I did it with Nad and we wrote notes to our friend Cass pretty much all class.. at least that's all I could remember.. oh and notes to each other, too haha), I was in Brain Child for math until Gr. 3ish (zzzz the routine of going in with my plastic folder with star-patterns, I can still remember the smell of that place, doing that computer quiz that quizzed you on what you just learned the week before and singing along with the simple tune that played when you got the answer right, then completing the math questions (I was terrible at problem solving), going to the dudes who looked like they were in their early 20's in the front to have them mark it, and then working on my homework until my parents came to pick me up. I liked the prizes, though)... and oh yea, Chinese (Cantonese) school until Kindergarten when I told the teacher I wouldn't be going anymore 'cause I didn't enjoy it (though I did pretty OK at 95.4% - not bad for a preschooler who disliked it! I remember drinking grape juice during class, the distinct smell of a high school, and those red-and-black-striped pencils that had horrible erasers at the ends.. oh and my favourite character was "little" 'cause it was part of my Chinese name and "mouth" 'cause it looked like a mouth. I thought the character for "flower" looked pretty, too) and it's funny and interesting 'cause the characters I learned then are the characters I know now - the super super basic. Shows how much you retain when you're young! I guess my grandma showed me some more, after. When I would go to my g'rents house, she would take out allll her Chinese calligraphy brushes and paper and ink and stones and her and she would show me how to hold the brush properly and we'd do easy characters like for "hand" or "mountain" and then I'd repeat after her how to say it.

That's like, half my childhood story right there. Lessons, classes, courses. I'm glad I took them - I feel more... well-rounded if you will. I guess it was part of the process for finding things I liked and didn't like and what I excelled at. My brother got the better end of the deal, though. When I quit, he got to quit at the same time, too even though he's 3 years younger. See, I can't even remember if he went to Chinese school! And you'd think from all the lessons, I'd excel at drawing or math lol...


Gosh, I yap a lot when I'm tired but don't feel like going to bed, don't I? GOODNIGHT

Burberry Prorsum SS10/RTW

Credit to style.com

I just realized I previewed around half of the Spring 2010 rtw collections on style.com back in late October! hah.. I want every piece of clothing from this collection.

Oh so btw, I bought this trench from H&M last week. I instantly fell in like with it because it was different! It's a classic colour and material, but it had some excess material detailing which made it fairly heavy (and warm.. not exactly a Spring trench). They only had 3 left in varying sizes, but after trying this one on, I decided I will return it unless I can exchange for a size down. I really like it.. my mom doesn't really, and my dad says that it's a lot of material lol. This trench is different because it looks totally funny if I wear it just buttoned, double-breasted-style. I need to literally wrap it around me and then belt it. Yea it stays put fine.. I like it that way 'cause it looks like a dress.  Sorry for such crappy pictures.. like I said, my camera broke and I had to use my mom's (super super super old) 3.2mp Canon that produces pink-toned or streaked pictures...

You can also wear it open and all bow-like in the back (if I could see what I was doing) for a different look. I actually like how fold-y it is when I do it.

Wedding Soiree 2010

Had a great time yesterday at the Wedding Soiree! It was actually at the same hotel I went to for my New Year’s Eve celebration – at the Marriott Pinnacle on West Hastings. One of my ex Posh co-workers invited me and a couple of her friends were volunteering. Basically, it was an event where we could wander from the various vendors who set up booths to promote their wedding services and we were served a 3-course dinner, watched a bridal fashion show, participated in some games, and tried to win door prizes. Every guest was given a goodie bag full of bridal magazines, candy, and discounts to a ton of salons and retail boutiques in Vancouver.

One of the vendors was Lavish Design Group who designs events and specializes in luxury chair covers & decor rentals.  In the main hall, there were around 30 tables and each table was designed with a different theme. My table, I thought, was very pretty. The theme was Cherry Blossoms and the centrepiece was fairly tall and substantial with cherry blossoms and fresh Phalenopsises somewhat draping over a glass bubbled vase. We all got cute, little Cherry Blossom candle favours to take home, too.

 The menu – everything was good! The salad, as you can see in the picture of the table layout above, was presented like a cloth napkin in a napkin holder – the cucumber wrapped around wild greens and was drizzled with the Balsamic Vinaigrette. Very filling.

Other booths included a travel one for honeymoon destinations, makeup and eyelash application from Wink Beauty Lounge (they’re located in Gastown now), this “kitty card” which claims to be my ticket to exclusive discounts & VIP treatment at Vancouver’s most indulgent salons, spas, boutiques, & bistros (just think of it as your new sugar daddy, it says), cold laser microdermabrasion, and oh a MAGICIAN was there! Magic is even more amaazing and unbelievable when you’re up close and participating O_O. I would have never thought of having a magician at my wedding, but he was so funny and entertaining and drew in quite a crowd. At one point, he asked me to pick a colour, I said “pink”, and other ppl said “yellow”, “green”, and “blue”.. so in a “normal” deck, the backs of the cards eventually all turned all into our chosen colours and ended up being all Ace of Spades on the other side! And there was another one where he had these sponge bunnies and got members of the audience to squeeze two adult bunnies in their hand.. and when they opened them, a ton of baby bunnies came out ’cause bunnies are good at multiplying fast! lol

Anyway, there were also cookie favour vendors and cakes:

 Our favourite was hands down the photobooth vendor.  There were 2, actually, in competition with each other.

Butter Media printed one picture (4 mini pics in 1) for each guest who was in the picture but they only had solid backgrounds and PhotoboothVancouver only gave one per group, but had a more unique damask background. We enjoyed Butter Media’s more because they accommodated our wants and needs by letting us take as many as we wanted and still printed out one of each of us! Truth be told, they aren’t that flattering as you can see (for me), but they’re a ball to have at your wedding. They’re $300/hour, which starts when the event starts, and your guests are able to take an unlimited amount of photos and are allowed to take one home each as their wedding favour. Plus, the bride and groom gets a DVD with all the photos taken in that booth at the end of the night (hehe good for blackmail lol)

The fashion show was fun – they showcased a handful of bridal gowns which were pretty – the models were gorgeous. They had some bridesmaid dresses that are versatile enough to be worn as a party dress or as a guest to another wedding. One of the vendors was SVS Choreography group that designs the dance the bridal party performs to “rock your reception”! haha it was great, actually!

 Just a couple pics from the fashion show that turned out a bit.. I thought the 2nd picture's dress was a cute summer dress.

 The girls

 Cupcakes make me happy and these were really yaaammy…

My dress. Bought it over 1.5 years ago at Forever 21 and just cut the tags off today. My hair is covering it, but the “track” detail around the neck continues as actual straps to halfway down my back – my favourite detail about the dress.

I dropped my camera after taking this picture and now it’s broken (in an un-fixable way). Time for a new one!