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

Japanese Tableware

A few years back a friend and I were at a Cost Plus World market shopping for some gifts for Christmas when we came across a set of Japanese tableware for two. Since we both had yet to buy a Christmas present for each other, we decided to split the cost of the set and each keep half of it. Since my friend liked the red set the best, I got the black set of the tableware. Both sets came with a plate, a dipping bowl, a rice bowl, a spoon like the ones at Chinese restaurants, a mat, and a set of chopsticks with a holder. All of the pieces have the same characters on them, which I unfortunately can't read at this point since I'm not any good at reading Japanese calligraphy.

The full set

My Pocelain Doll Collection

Over the years my love for porcelain dolls hasn't faded. As a child, they were a beautiful, delicate thing that I rarely was allowed to play with since I wasn't especially gentle as a child. I've always been enraptured by how elegant they are and have always wished that I could dress as elegantly as them. Currently my collection consists of three dolls, two of which I was given as a child and the third I got a few years back as I was visiting my grandparents.

My Porcelain Dolls

The first doll I got was given to me when I was very small by a family member. My parents wished to keep her in good condition until I was old enough to appreciate her, so she was kept in our attic for quite a few years. She is very cute and has blond hair just like me, and I love her frilly white dress. My favorite part about this doll is that you can wind her up and have her play a little tune that she sways to. I've always loved listening to the tune she plays, so it's a fortunate that I haven't broken her sound box by winding her up too much!

The second porcelain doll I got was a gift from one of my teachers at church. It was so long ago that I don't really remember why she gave me the doll, but I think it might have been because of my hair color. Ever since I was little I've let my hair grow out and all of the older ladies at church always complemented me on my hair. So I believe this doll was given to me since her hair appeared similar to mine, which has red and strawberry tones in it as well blond. I've always loved the dress on this doll as it is very cute and delicate. The fabric on her dress has a silk-like texture to it and she has an adorable pair of bloomers on as well.

My most recent addition to my porcelain doll collection is a pretty mermaid who's hair matches mine. I got her as a gift from my grandparents when I visited them several years back. I chose her because she was the most similar in appearance to me out of all of the other mermaids that were at the store. Ever since I was a little girl I've loved mermaids as well as swimming, so my parents used to call me a little mermaid, so in a way this doll lives out my dream of becoming a mermaid. I love that there are little bits of underwater foliage as well as a little fish shaped bead on the cushion she sits on as well as her shell necklace and her tiara.

All pictures were taken by me unless otherwise noted. Check me out on Twitter.

DIY Clay Decodens

Recently I've been getting interested in Decoden, cute little items such as kitty faces and cupcakes or other food or kawaii related items. Since these items tend to be rather expensive and a little difficult to find, I decided to try making my own with some colored clay I had. I started by making cherries, then moved on to cookies and macaroons as well as frosting and whipped cream. The cherries turned out alright, but my favorite items are the frosted star cookie I made and the macaroons. For all of the cookies I mixed some pale yellow clay with a bit of brown clay to get a color similar to other decoden cookies I've seen. For the frosting I mixed small pieces of colored clay and some white liquid clay together until the solid clay was mostly broken up, then drizzled it on the cookie. I attempted the same thing to make frosting, just adding more solid clay, but it didn't turn out especially well. This could be because I was using a oven bake clay instead of a self hardening clay like most home made decoden are made out of. It's also possible I didn't add enough solid clay to make a good mixture since I was getting rather tired of breaking up and mixing the clay. Anyways, here's a picture of the decoden I made minus the whipped cream which was added afterwords.

The larger macaroon is in half still because I put whipped cream in the middle after the initial baking. Sorry for the low image quality; I'll try to get better pictures of the items up later. All images were taken by me unless otherwise noted. Check me out on Twitter.

Japanese Dolls and Geishas

Here's another one of my collections, this time featuring my items with traditionally garbed Japanese women. I have a statue, a doll, and a note pad in this collection (see below).

The statue features a lady wearing a kimono doing a traditional Japanese art: Ikebana or flower arranging. I like how delicate this statue is and how it mostly uses soft colors that all blend nicely together.

The next item is the doll. I believe that this doll is a highly simplified version of the Hinamatsuri, Japanese girl's day, Ohime-sama doll as it is in a similar style to other Hinamatsuri dolls and has a tiny fan, like the full sized versions of Ohime-sama have. I love how simple and small this doll is while still being very elegant and detailed.

The last item in this collection is the note pad. It's a very pretty note pad with a geisha featured on the front. The paper inside has a nice delicate pattern using different shades of purple. The outside has lot of metallic gold accents, making it very difficult to get a good image of the cover.

All images are by me unless otherwise noted. Check me out on Twitter.

Metallic Nail Art Tutorial

Please be warned that this post has quite a few images in it. If you have a slow internet connection I suggest you stop the page loading once you can see the text, then load the pictures individually as you come to them.

Time for another  tutorial, this time for nails. This look was inspired by Michelle Phan's Metallic Knight makeup tutorial. Let's get started!

What you'll need:
A sparkly nail polish as well as a base and top coat
Metallic tape in silver or a silver metallic pen (You can find the metallic tape at a crafts store and the pen at an office supply store)
Rhinestones (Tiny ones work best)

First off, you'll want to start with clean nails without any rough edges. I filed my nails so that they're rounded, but you can also do this with squared off nails. You can also use fake nails as this would make application of the decorations a bit easier. Start by applying a base coat on your nails. This helps the polish last longer.

Now apply a sparkly colored nail polish, one coat if it's more opaque or two to three if it's a more translucent polish like mine. I used a jade colored polish here, but you could also use any other jewel tone. I recommend against using a gold or silver polish as this will make the stripes we will be putting on next not show up as well.

Now start cutting off pieces of the metallic tape that are a bit longer than your nail at the angle you wish to place the stripes at. Cut these pieces into thin strips (see image below) and then cut them to fit comfortably on your nail. I found that cutting the ends at angles made the strips fit better on my nails. Be careful while you cut out the strips. The tape had a tendency to slip off of its backing on one side of the scissors while I was cutting mine.

 Arrange the strips of metallic tape and rhinestones on your nails in a striped pattern. Make sure to leave the backings on the tape until you know how you want them to look (see top image below). To attach the metallic tape, just remove the backing and press onto the nails. It helps if you have a layer of polish on that's not quite dry yet so the tape will stick a bit better. Put a dot of polish anywhere you want to put a rhinestone and apply them with a pair of tweezers or with your fingers if you want (see bottom image below). Push the rhinestones into the positions you want them in if you haven't placed them quite right.

Arranging the metallic strips

Adding rhinestones

 Keep repeating this pattern for all of your nails. I decided to only do every other nail with the tape on it and I only did rhinestones on two nails per hand. Mix things up and do a different arrangement on each nail, but it looks best if you keep the metallic tape strips in the same general pattern with the stripes running in the same direction (see image below).

All the stripes run in the same direction.

Make sure to cover everything with a clear topcoat to help it stay on better once you're done. Here's the finished result!

I mentioned above that you can also use a metallic pen in place of the tape, so here's an image with the finished nails using a metallic pen. The metallic pen isn't quite the same effect as the metallic tape, but it still looks nice. If you have a nail art brush you could also use a silver nail polish to paint on the stripes.

I hope you enjoy trying out this tutorial! Michelle Phan's tutorials can be found on YouTube. All images are by me unless otherwise noted. Check me out on Twitter.