Lolita 52 Challenge: Not really

Hello everyone~! So today's Lolita 52 Challenge topic is Lolitafying things in my everyday life, buuuuuut I generally am more into Fairy Kei than Lolita in general anymore (though I still do love Sweet Lolita and have several OPs and JSKs), so instead I'll be talking about how I cutify things in my everyday life to fit my very specific pastel aesthetic~

#1: Spray Paint
 Soooo, I'm kinda lazy when it comes to painting furniture, but I like to thrift or otherwise rescue unwanted furniture while still having furniture that matches. So to fix that, I spray paint all of my furniture. I did paint a few pieces with regular furniture paint, but I had no idea what I was doing and ran out of paint extremely quickly compared to what I was lead to believe I would need and the particular paint I chose ended up scraping off waaaay too easily (Having a kitty using them as leaping pads didn't help either). So, rather than waste my time and money on painting things that weren't going to stay painted, I decided to just buy a ton of spray paint in various pastel colors and do that instead. And I do have to say, I think all of my shelves and other furniture that I painted this way turned out super cute and way more durable than the ones I tried to paint properly. Plus it's a lot easier for me to decide to change the colors on furniture or frames if all I have to do is lay some newspaper on my porch, put on a mask, and give it several coats over the course of an anime episode or some YouTube videos than all the work that goes into proper painting. (I literally bought and painted a cute little corner cupboard and shelf thing in a few hours one afternoon along with a couple other items earlier in the day. The only time I can't finish a project in an evening or a day is if I run out of the color of paint I need and am too lazy or broke at the moment to get more.)

#2: Stickers!
 So, I have a handful of stickers laying around that I'd never really found a use for, then I realized I could use them to make plain looking, single color items look waaaay cuter and more intricate! Plus it's less expensive than trying to get and attach wooden shapes to make it look like the piece has intricate craftsmanship rather than being rectangles of presswood nailed together. I especially like puffy stickers since they can give an item even more depth than just flat stickers.

#3: Cute and colorful thumbtacks
 So, like many people, I like to get prints and other art and apply them to my walls, so I use cute heart shaped thumbtacks as well as typical ones with colorful plastic heads to pin my artwork up. In addition to the pictures on my walls, I also have a cork board that I keep cute packaging, business cards, tags, and the like on using a fun mix of the thumbtacks I have!

#4: Collages~
 Like with my cork board, I like to turn things into little framed collages to put into spray painted frames. I posted a few pictures of meh ones I'd made previously in another post, but I have one with Pusheen blind box pieces (and another one planned), several with business cards and cute notes from sellers, and some other ones with cute packaging I didn't want to throw away.

#5: Lotsa lil' trinkets
 So one of the the main ways I cutify my apartment is with lots and lots of cute little things (and some bigger cuties). I have plushies invading every room (minus my bathroom because I don't have a place to put them) displayed on shelves, in my display cabinet and TV center, and on my couch. I have anime figures displayed in my living room and bedroom as well as some very nice quality weapon replicas of Sora's keyblade and Link's Hylian shield and Master Sword that a friend gave me. (I also have a little shine to my best girl from Love Live!, Eli Ayase, in my living room.) I have re-ment figures and some little outfits, that fit my Licca doll perfectly and also look super cute on my drawing mannequin, displayed in my kitchen and display cabinet. And I have a pretty phone styled to look like an antique rotary phone that I recently repainted to be pastel along with lots of other miscellaneous trinkets displayed around my apartment on any flat shelf-like surface that is relatively safe from my little kitty cat (who thinks everything is a toy).

#6: Display that merch!
 In a previous post where I talked about how I decorated my room at the time, I mentioned that I like to display my hair accessories on the wall. My collection has since grown a good deal, so instead of the one ribbon hanger thing I now have several, two of which I've made rather recently to hold all of the cute hair accessories and pins that'll fit on them. In addition to those, I have several decorative wall pegs meant for holding clothing or hats that I display my headbows and hair poms and such on so they're all easy to see and add to a coordinate. All of those are in my bedroom, and in addition to those I have a little coat rack and shelf with pegs on it that I display my favorite purses and my BTSSB parasol on for easy access and bragging rights along with some of my Pusheen items.

How do you like to decorate your room or apartment/house to fit with a Lolita aesthetic or your personal aesthetic? Let me know in the comments~

Check out my Insta: @animelolitacouture

Lolita 52 Challenge: How I Accessorize

Hello everyone! Today I'm back with another Lolita 52 challenge topic: How I accessorize. This has changed a little bit as I've gotten more accessories of different types and it also varies depending on the event and my energy. I'll also be covering how I accessorize with Fairy Kei, my main style outside of Lolita.


 So with both Lolita and Fairy Kei I generally have some type of hair bow, a necklace or two, some bracelets, and rings or earrings if I remember them. For Lolita hair accessories, I usually wear a bow or two in a coordinating color or a large matching bow on the back of my head for more toned down looks. For one of my recent coordinates that I wore at a convention, I used the second detachable bow from my JSK as a headbow by slipping it onto a headband and added a giant resin star clip on one side and three smaller pink and purple bow clips on the other side. Generally my hair accessories for Fairy Kei are a bow or two that go with my outfit or the giant resin star clip and some bows. For necklaces, I generally do a choker and a longer necklace for Fairy Kei and just a longer necklace for Lolita coordinates. Generally my longer necklaces have a large statement pendant, like a big plastic heart or plastic lettering saying "mahou shoujo." For bracelets I generally use my wrist cuffs and pastel arm kandi or pearl bracelets, but I will occasionally wear a simple metal bracelet or a half pearl, half charm bracelet. For the most part though, I put on as many bracelets as possible! Rings and earrings are typically forgotten when I do everyday cords, but I generally wear two to four rings on each hand and a pair of pastel earrings when I do remember them. I'm trying to get better at changing my earrings to match my outfit so I'm not just wearing the simple fake pearl earrings I generally wear day to day since my job doesn't allow flashy earrings. I'm also looking at different ways to display my rings and my smaller hair clips so I'm more likely to actually wear them instead of forgetting they're in a small jewelry storage box. Other than jewelry and hair accessories, I'll occasionally put a decorative pin of some sort on my outfits as well, and that's pretty much the extent of my accessorizing.


 What sort of accessories do you guys wear? Let me know in the comments below!


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A Random Update Had Appeared...

...You use read. It's super effective!

Hello everyone! Pokemon references aside, I have some exciting news for you all! I just started my own Storenvy shop to sell some of my past and current creations on! Feel free to head on over to check it out and maybe buy something if anything there suits your fancy. I'll be adding some other items as time goes on, so be sure to check it out occasionaly or stalk it!

https://animelolitacouture.storenvy.com/

I'm also on Facebook: www.facebook.com/CelesteChoCho

And Twitter: @animlolicouture

Product Reviews: Violle Ville

Hello everyone! So recently I was given the opportunity to review some items from the online store Violle Ville (she can be found on Storenvy or Etsy). I'm going to be going through the whole process, from buying to recieving. Enjoy!

Storefront
 After receiving the offer, I went to check out what all was available for sale in Violle ville's shop. She has a wide variety of items for sale from bags, accessories, plushies, and phone cases. Having just gotten a phone case and having a bit of a spending limit, I decided to purchase some accessories. While the storefront was a little difficult to browse due to Storenvy's annoying feature of showing everything that's out of stock, I had a little trouble finding some items I liked the look of that were still in stock. I eventually settled on the Mini plate of sweets necklace in blue, Hearts and Bows necklace in pink, Marshmallow necklace, and a Mini Alpaca plush.

Shipping
 Shipping was from Israel and took 17 days, about two and a half weeks, to get to me after ordering. Everything shipped out the day after I ordered them and arrived well withing the 2-4 week span predicted for shipping on her website.

Receiving and Packaging
 When the package arrived in the mail, I had to sign for it as it was registered mail. I was a bit worried when I saw the package as it was a fairly weak material and already had a rather large tear in it. Everything inside was alright though as the alpaca plush was in a plastic bag and all of the necklaces were in a little jewelry box wrapped up in bubble wrap with a business card on top.

Front of the package

Back of the package

Detail of the tear (appologies for bluriness)

What was inside!

Products
 So the first and most obvious item in the package was the alpaca plush I'd ordered: an Arupakuso! He's very cute, soft, and cudly. I love his little smile, and he's the perfect hugging size!

Ain't he a little cutie?

Also inside the packaging was the little gift box with bubble wrap and a business card around it. Upon opening the bubble wrap around the gift box, I saw that it was a very cute, dark blue box with a little ribbon and bow detail on it.

Violle ville's business card taped securely to the bubble wrap

Underneath all that bubble wrap!

 Upon opening ther box, I saw that all of the necklaces I'd ordered were safely in there as well as a couple extras included as free gifts! I got a Pastel Purple Heart necklace and a cute little fruit Tart necklace.

Inside the box

All the necklaces lined up!

Hearts and Bows necklace

Mini Plate of Sweets, blue necklace

Marshmallow necklace

Tart necklace

Pastel Purple Heart necklace

All of the necklaces were very cute! The chains and clasps are all good quality and didn't look to be in need of fixing with my pliers. All of the pieces are well made and don't look like they'll be coming apart anytime soon with proper care. I was very happy to see that the parts of the pendants were all glued firmly together as well as to the bails (the loop backings), so I'm not worried about the pieces falling apart. I wore the Heats and Bows and Mini Plate of Sweets necklace together the following day and had no problems with them falling apart, breaking, tangling themselves on my hair, or having the annoying grey marks from the coating coming off like with a lot of inexpensive jewelry nowadays.

Final Thoughts
 I'm super happy with my order from Violle ville! Other than the torn package, everything was great from her comunication to the final products! I would definitely consider ordering from her again in the future and would reccomend Violle ville to anyone looking for some super cute accessories, clothes, or plushies. I'm looking forward to wearing these cute necklaces all the time with Fairy Kei, Decora, and maybe even Sweet Lolita coords!

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