A Mondrian Look Back

It's four days before school, and I feel like I have to 'fess up: my Summer wasn't as exciting as I cut it out to be. Heheheh. The above outfit was something I wore yesterday (owing thanks to my Tita who just came from the States for the top).

Let's recap: all I've done these past three months is go out with friends, sometimes attend some events, eat out with the family, get glasses, practice driving, and sit on my butt almost every day drawing, watching movies, and catching up on Hannibal.

I'm a little frustrated about being "too lazy" to update the blog - my sister laughed at me once, telling me it takes dedication to run a blog every day. And even though I never planned on updating every day I still feel - no, know that I'm missing out on updating, writing, working as much as I should.

Looking back, I can conclude that I can't be half-assed to make my own adventures sometimes; and if I do, I don't even have the initiative to blog about them.

This isn't supposed to be as emo a post as it sounds, haha. 

Here's to hoping that the time I actually have piles of work on my desk to be done, more friends around me, and a new home to fit into for the next four years, I will be able to update this blog and have more adventures worthy of documentation. I know I'm crossing my fingers, but I'm not hoping too much. Hihi.

No Gas

Guess who went to her first day of driving school today?

(Continuing the OOTD entries I started here, except time won't let me take pictures of all of my outfits every day if I watercolored them. Oh well. Thanks to Stumpy Brush for contributing to 90% how good this one turned out! Haha.)

Fortunately, with a couple more days of going out planned in the coming days, I'll be able to document my OOTDs more often! :)

Cosmic Love {D.I.M. Galaxy Canvas Shoes}

So there's this new thing I'm trying called Did It Myself. Since I'm terrible at formulating Do-It-Yourself type tutorials, here's a chronicling of things that I - proudly! - was able to do myself!

***

If there's one thing I'm grateful for the hipster community for, it's turning space into a trend.

Quoting the inimitable Hank Green.

Seriously, how could you not like these? Or space in general?

Quite unabashedly, I love galaxy prints simply because they're so pretty (...I get really guilty when I like something just because it's pretty).

Once upon a time I bought these Vans canvas shoes. I thought they were pretty cool back then; besides, they fit me (they're a Men's 11). I have a hard time finding shoes that fit me around here (which is why I treasure the nice shoes I actually have). Now I think they're really ugly; besides, I was never able to wear them with anything that really matched. I've always wanted to do something to them. So when I saw Lorra Angbue-Te's post on D.I.Y. Glitter Shoes I finally decided to get off my butt and do it.

Habis and Interests

What is the definition of habi? In the Bisaya-English dictionary, "habi" is "the act of weaving/weave/interlacing". - Bisaya to English Translation 

Please forgive my punny ways.

Anyway. I told you guys last post that we were going for a tribal print for my Grad Ball dress and I would have bought it yesterday. That's only partly true. Tita Mila told us to look for a store called Balikbayan near Glorietta, and we did find it, except they didn't exactly carry any indigenous prints there except for a couple of table runners and pillow cases. Hehe. But it was really nice seeing the so-called "dream weavers" (T'nalak/Tinalak) in the flesh cloth.

Today we went to Kamuning to look for fabric. But this morning my Grandma brought out some fabrics she bought in Greenhills ten years ago (so she says) that she believes were sourced from, like, Malaysia.

I trust her on that. This lowly Instagrammed picture gives it no justice, by the way. It's gorgeous in all its gold-mixed glory, but it wasn't what I was looking for.

Instead, when we hitched a taxi ride to Kamuning, we found this:

It was from a shop on the inside of the market and it cost 250 per yard (woohoo!). The people at the store estimated that we needed about six yards all in all. Imagine, the table runner (still laughing) in Balikbayan cost like, 700 bucks for about four to five feet.

It's really pretty. I was aiming for something more intricate, but this looks more Ibaloi than anything and I'm content. There was an alternative pattern for 150 a yard, and it was half as thick. I asked the lady at the store where she sourced them from and she said they came from Baguio. I trust her on that, hehe.

I want to apologize for having taken an entire post to nerd out about cloth, but let me just this once. Anyway, I bet my family will make fun of me for being dressed in a huge-ass table runner, but a lot of people are planning on skipping Grad Ball/Senior's Night because it's being held at school. I've always wanted to go on a fashionalistic (fashion + nationalism) route and this is probably one of the few chances I'll do so. If anyone asks why I wore Igorot print to a Grad Ball themed "Winter Wonderland", well... Baguio is believed to be the coldest place in the Philippines, right? My dress is gonna be the bomb, yo.

Go Do

I finally got to use the Muji binder my friend Trisha gave me for my birthday!

I really didn't expect the paper to receive watercolors so well. The pages looked so thin and I was scared the water would eat it all up. To my relief, there was only a little crumpling and the paints worked like a dream. (Trisha, if you're reading this, you da best. :D Hihi)

I painted these yesterday, and took the advantage of borrowing my Tita's camera to document them today.

I had indeed tried drawing other things on this prior, but the perfectionist side of me took over and I tore both pages (yes, two :'() out and started anew. I thought my first Outfit of the Day entries (inspired by fashion bloggers everywhere and Flominowa especially) would be appropriate for that new start. :)

I actually have the chance to dress up now since it's Christmas Break. And yes, these are mostly accurate, starting from the bottom which I wore to the school Christmas Party. :)

Yeees, making up for my lack of bravery to own a Lookbook, and the resources to take pictures of my outfits everyday. Woohoo!

Cookie Couture

I've always wanted to start a fashion/cooking/photography/art blog, but I have neither the time nor resources to maintain any (except perhaps the last category). I've finally had the chance to start this blog move with a post that falls under all of those categories.

My Tita gave me "fashionista" themed cookie cutters as well as edible markers for Christmas, and I couldn't wait to use them - so that's what I did today. Hihi. Also borrowed my other Tita's DSLR just for the occasion, because I'm so obsessed with posterity like that.

Primadonna girl, would you do anything for me? Buy a big diamond ring for me? Bake a batch of cookies for me?

Although they didn't really come out as I expected them to be once I started decorating, as the glaze was really runny (LOL what did I expect...) and it took a long time to set. The last time I made this was when I first got the book, when I was less than ten years old for that birthday.

Inside joke with my schoolmates. Heh.

I've eaten so many of the rejects, and now I'm rather full. I may not be planning on giving any of these away (I haven't deemed them worthy of being seen by other people haha) but they sure are good. ;)

I'm afraid I don't have a Christmas post all on its own. Truth be told I'm one of the people who haven't been feeling Christmas very much this year. :( However, I'm still so grateful for all the things I received and just being able to spend time with the family after such a busy, fast year. 2012 went by like a breeze.

Belated Merry Christmas, and an advanced Happy New Year! :)