a strawberry

This outfit's theme was strawberry!  Or at least I think of strawberries when I see it?  I was wearing a strawberry hat part of the day too, but I didn't draw it.  I guess this could be watermelon-colours too, but the little flowers on the top make me think of strawberry blossoms.  So there.

I had these knit flowers lying around for a project I haven't got around to finishing (...) and when I was trying to figure out what to do with my hair, I realized they would look really cute pulling my braids back! (yes, hair is still in braids, mostly.)  So I pinned 'em in, and one of them had long enough yarn-tails that I could actually braid the ends with my hair to get a colourful braid mixed in with the plain ones.

(another post I can't fit all the tags in.  arg.)

fruits-y

There are these books that exist, Fruits and Fresh Fruits, and they are fat photo-collections of Japanese street fashion from around the late 90s or so.  Perhaps you know of them too?  They're awesome.  Some of those kids are way more adventurous than me!!  I love looking at the pictures :D  This particular outfit is one I put together after the cover of Fresh Fruits (sitting around my room) caught my eye.

Now to see if I can fit everything I'm wearing in the tags field... (nope.)

sugar happy

Some good friends of mine frequently mention sweet foods and it always makes me hungry, because I love sweets (but I love my veggies too, mum!).  On this occasion they were talking about chocolate truffle cake and I don't even know what that is exactly (apparently you can make it without flour, which means it's probably ridiculously rich and wonderful) but oh, how I wanted some.  Having no means to obtain it, I was forced to be creative and find something else that is sweet and yummy and also easy to make—and I happened upon a recipe for dorayaki!  They're like little pancakes folded in half, traditionally with sweet red bean filling.  (I later tried them with chocolate chips, banana, coconut shavings and other fillings, but I think the red bean is best (but chocobanana is still reeeeeally good)).  Yummy yum.  The only problem is that the recipe makes about 6-7, and if no one is around to share them with I might just eat them all in one sitting (and I can't cut the recipe in half, because it calls for one egg and what would I do with the other half of the egg?)

tigerlionduckdrummer

shirt - In Vain (Kohl's)
skirt - Old Navy

It's been a while, but here's another friend-fashion post!
Kids are awesome, aren't they?  I was over at this boy's house when he decided to dress up and started roaring through the house. He's so funny.

The duck mask fits him better than it fits me... (she says, from experience.)

my stripes!

Everything's striped!  The blue shirt has a ribbed texture.  Somehow stripes feel like they're extra warm... maybe it's just all the layering.

Those armwarmers were originally knit for my brother, but he rarely wears them, so I took 'em back (temporarily).  They're ribbed, so nice and stretchy, and extra long.  Cozy~

update-update

Some new-old posts for you today.  They're a  bunch of 2009 outfits from round one of my daily journal.  Here!  1, 2, 3, 4, 5!  Or you can click on 2009 in the sidebar; there may be a few others I posted a while ago but didn't mention.

soft and sparkling

sweater - So
scarf - handmade
skirt - Ann Taylor

I got a new skirt!  A couple, in fact.  Not that I needed them, but when we had our monthly get-together with the extended family, my awesome cousins had an impromptu mini clothing-exchange, and I got to join in (though I didn't have anything to offer)!

I'll have to be careful not to let this skirt get covered in Finny's fur.

Still got braids!!

more snow

dress - Old Navy

And theeeen all my spring-ful hopes and dreams were dashed by another snowfall! What a shock.  By the way, sundresses are totally okay to wear in winter.  With winter boots.  Yes.

flower showers

button-up - H&M
lace shirt - Forever21
skirt - self-made
tights - SockDreams

This must be some kind of self-torture.  For this outfit I intentionally wore only things with a flower print (excepting the blue star-print shirt and the legwarmers).  I was in a springy mood... (only wishfully, of course!)

swishyswish

sleeveless top - It's Our Time (Kohl's?)

I put my hair in a bunch of tiny little braids a couple days before this.  They were fun to have but kind of a pain to draw.  You'll be seeing them for a while though...

I'm gonna be a little inconsistent with the brand captions, because I'm lazy and by now I think most of my clothes have been listed at least once with the brand or I've forgotten where they came from (like my socks and tights).

random posing

Slowly, slowly catching up... (and then falling behind again, and then catching up again!)

This might be a little out of place, but as I'm posting this (11 March), my mind is filled with the news from Japan and the devastating earthquake and tsunami they've been hit with.  Please keep them (as well as all those along the Pacific coasts) in your thoughts and prayers!!

curry day!

shirts - Mudd, Wet Seal, So
jeans - from YesStyle
socks - Tabbisocks (SockDreams)

stuff and things

a happy valentine

skirt - from YesStyle
socks - Sock It To Me (SockDreams)
earrings - Kohl's, Icing

almost-vday

sweater - Takeout
both skirts - Wet Seal

Almost Valentine's Day!!  I get really excited about this holiday every year. I can only blame all those happy childhood memories of Valentine's Day parties in elementary school.  Maybe it's my love for sweets.  Or my love for pink, for lace and frills and hearts. In any case, I love it.

laundry day

flower earrings - Forever21
sweater - Mudd
skirt - friend-made

I went to my parents' to do my laundry.  Woohoo, adulthood!!  I also made them dinner since it was busybusy Valentine weekend for my mum (she does floral design) and helped my dad do the grocery shopping.  All in all, a productive weekend!

phones and me

sweaters - from Kohl's
skirt - Old Navy
boots - from Target
pig phone charm - some Sanrio-ish store in Chicago

On this particular Friday in February, T-mobile had some deal for free smart phone upgrades going on.  Since my family has a cell plan with them, various of us decided to go check it out.  My current phone was... oh, 4-5 years old, so I thought, maybe I'd find something worth upgrading to.

However, I'm one of those odd ducks who uses her cellphone for phone calls, as a substitute alarm clock, and occasionally for the calculator feature.  I don't text, I don't tweet, I don't browse the internet, I don't even (necessarily need to, though it might be nice to) take pictures with it...  and most importantly, I like cute.  This is problematic, because new phones are not particularly attractive to me.  Sure, they're slick and shiny and new, but they're not cute.  They're just big ol' boring ol' screens.  It's hard to find a new model a cute size, a pretty colour, and (the key point) possessing the little phone-charm-holder-slot.

So of course I found nothing I liked.  But there was a happy outcome even so!  I ended up getting my mum's old phone (she upgraded to a fancy new thing), an identical model to mine phone minus the scratch on the outer screen that always made me sad when I looked at it.  It's cute and a nice colour and my adorable round piggy-charm matches it perfectly!!  I couldn't be happier!

extra layers

turquoise sweater - American Eagle
red sweater - Takeout
jeans - l.e.i
tights - from Younkers

A simple, warm double-sweater outfit.  (man, this is genius.  I need to find more warm-but-thin sweaters to layer...)  Plus knit tights under my jeans.  Mmm, cozy~

contemplating pattern

striped shirt - Old Navy
both skirts - YesStyle

Stripes, plaid, and argyle all at once?  Of course!  And layered long skirts for extra warmth.

no more!

button-up and pants - Old Navy
sweater - American Eagle

This was my official Sick-of-Winter pout.  And possibly also an "I don't care what I wear" day.  Meh.  Come on, spring!!!!

for tiz

jacket - So... (Kohl's)
star tshirt - Arizona (JCPenny)
shorts - l.e.i (Younkers)
leggings - Say What?

This outfit, hmm.  My inspiration was a '90s scifi shoujo manga I'd read the day before.  Does it show?  Maybe not the argyle socks so much.  Anyway, the manga was Jyu-Oh-Sei, and it was really fantastic.  Great characters, lovely art, story that kept me hooked.  Check it out if you're interested!!  As for me, now I'm craving more shoujo scifi...

paisley headache

dress - Derek Heart | tshirt - Mossimo | socks - SouSou | earrings - Forever21

Look!  I'm doing soooo good at updating regularly, huh?  Huh?  Praise me!  Well, but I'm still two and a half weeks behind.  Anyway!  This update has more updates attached!  I scanned the dress pattern and finished off some other drawings with it.  It's a brown-paisley-dress-extravaganza!

I had a headache when I drew this.  I think it was from drinking soda.  My body isn't used to all those chemicals and high fructose corn syrup!  Danger, danger!!

sorta split complements

cami - American Eagle
tshirt - Mossimo (Target)
scarf - self-knit
skirt - Weathervane
tights - JC Penny
shoes - Apple Bottom
earrings - Forever21

Colour-theory outfit day!  This is split complementary (which is when you take two complements, say red and green, and then choose the colours directly adjacent on the colour wheel to one of them—so  redviolet, redorange, and green), mostly, although the cami might go a little too far into purple.  But theory is just theory; what matters is that it looks good, right?

So that's today's art/colour lesson.  As someone who could spend hours organizing giant Crayola boxes of crayons into perfect rainbow order and still has memories of the day she learned the colour wheel in an elementary school art class, I love this topic and its practical application (or was that already obvious?).  I hope you enjoyed it too!!

beginner's luck

sweater - American Eagle
top - L8ter (Younkers)
pants - YesStyle
socks - Sockdreams

I have fantastic beginner's luck.  Have I mentioned this before?  Especially with board games, it seems.  Maybe I'm just so quiet and unassuming that no one notices me until it's too late and I've taken over the world.  So this is my "Never you mind about little ol' me while I build a ridiculous train empire, and spell words like quinoa and tunicate (+50pts) in your Scrabble game" face.  (okay, so it wasn't my first time playing Scrabble, but it'd been a while, and most of my memories of the game are of putting down words like "did" and "far" and adding an "s.")

the old navy

EVERYTHING - Old Navy
(I feel kinda like one of the Jusco people
in Kamikaze Girls, writing that...)

Sweater-sweater day the second!  The outfit's theme is Old Navy, because everything came from there.  I started coordinating the outfit with the sweaters, was amused that they were both Old Navy, and decided to see if I could make an entire outfit of Old Navy clothes.  The socks were the only tricky part—I used to have a lot of their socks some years ago, but they almost all got worn out except for this and one other pair of thick-fuzzy socks.  Also, I realized I have a ton of Old Navy skirts—like, eight of them.  I guess that's fitting since the skirt that started my obsession came from there...  But still, I hardly ever shop there anymore, so it's weird to realize I've got so much of their stuff in my closet and dresser.

snowpocalypse day

skirt - Wet Seal
jeans - American Eagle
socks - Sockdreams
scarf and armwarmers - knit 'em myself!
earrings - Icing (I think)

It's been a while, since I got so behind in posting, but do you remember the Snowpocalypse of a few weeks ago?  Yeah, I'm trying to shut it out of my memory too (especially because we've had beautiful SUN the past couple days). This drawing was from the day all the snow hit our fair state—at least 13 inches, I recall hearing.  I stayed holed up inside and only looked out the window with contempt.  This is another good-and-bad thing about freelancing.  I never have to go out in the gross weather to get to work... but I don't get snowdays either.  But I'm not complaining.

double knit

dark purple sweater - American Eagle
light purple sweater - So...
skirt - Old Navy

Now we reach my "Take that, winter!" phase in which I wear as many layers as I can pile on.  This is not the last time you'll see me wearing two sweaters (plus other assorted shirts).  Mmm, warmth...

Stupid ol' winter.

falling rainbow

yellow t - My Favorite Tee (Younkers)
green t - Old Navy
skirt - from YesStyle
green socks - Sockdreams

Sometimes I have days where I feel I need to wear Every Colour (oops, sorry orange).  And then nothing happens all day, so I draw myself upside down to make it at least a little exciting.  Tada!

winter warm

sweater dress - Energie (JC Penny)
tights - Express
boots - from Meijer in the kids' section

booksale bliss

This is our Lys after a used book sale at the library.  Only, she actually couldn't have held all her new books in her arms like this—reality was a huge, heeeaaavy paper bag with tons of great stuff inside!  One of my favourites was an edition of Beauty and the Beast with an unassuming cover of green-leafy design (it had lost its slipcover).  The illustrations inside (by Hilary Knight) are just lovely!!  I also got a Cinderella book by the same illustrator, but I didn't realize it until I got home.  Here's a link to the Beauty and the Beast book—you can zoom in on the cover and get an idea of its prettiness.

In other news, I love children's books.  And I need a new bookshelf for them.

improv neapolitan

earrings - WAR Chest
sweater - Aéropostale
lace shirt - f21
skirt - Fresh Brewed (Younkers)
brown shoe - Airwalk

We had an improv event thingy at my church!  I was expecting that this would be an improv troupe(?) performing, with some audience participation here and there, but it ended up being the two improv-people giving prompts and all of us were the performers.  Eek!! They got me to participate in one skit (though I did not actually pose dramatically like this).  I got to play the part of a third grader visiting the Grand Canyon!

The outfit theme—can you guess it?  It's neapolitan ice cream!  Or neapolitan candy.  Ooh, I remember in elementary school we did a unit on Space and Astronauts and stuff, and I got to taste some freeze-dried(?) neapolitan ice cream(???).  It was pretty radical to me, and that's still the first thing that comes to mind when I think "neapolitan."  I wonder if they sell that stuff somewhere...

bus adventure

hat and yellow sweater - Target
turquoise sweater - American Eagle
pants - Wet Seal
boots - Little Laundry

This... is when... I had to... run... after a... bus—through the snow, but I couldn't catch it, and the next one didn't come for another hour, so I had to walk all the way to the other bus stop I needed to get to (instead of transferring from the bus I was chasing) so I could visit my friend at college.  I learned two things: one is that I am not used to running and ran out of breath pathetically quickly and spent the rest of the walk feeling like I was gonna die, and two is that it's not that far to the other bus stop, only a brisk half-hour walk or so.  I do like living downtown.  It's a good city, my city.

Also, that pain in my guts that makes me feel like death isn't something I enjoy, but as it gradually subsides I realize what a great feeling it is to not have pain, and I can be thankful.  So it's a good experience overall, I think!

rebellious hair

sweater and shirt - Old Navy
capris - UnionBay
socks - Sock It To Me (SockDreams)
shoes - Apple Bottoms

Why do you look worried, lys?  I wonder...  Maybe because I wasn't happy with my hair.  It's going through a phase, you see.  Rebellious and all that.  One day it'll grow up and learn to be more responsible...

the cat came back

shirt - Arizona (JC Penny)
skirt - YesStyle
tights - Gap

And the very next day... I got back to work with a new lettering project!  A Korean comic about a traveling cat!  I got really excited working on it because it's visually gorgeous—whimsical watercolour-ish illustrations with an amazing range of colours.  There was a night-sky scene that was so beautiful, I couldn't help wanting to replicate it a little with this outfit.

work casualty

skirt - YesStyle | socks - Sockdreams | lace shirt - f21 | cami - American Eagle

Aftermath!!!  After staying up I-dare-not-say-how-late (ahem, 6:30am) finishing a project, this is how I spent the rest of the day.  I don't know what to say except that I was really happy to finally have a deadline again, after many months of being sort-of-working-on-things-but-not-able-to-finish-them, and so got a bit carried away making sure I absolutely met my deadline without fail.  Aaah.  It's such a great feeling to finish things.

Anyway, I'm going to point to this incident as the reason I got a li'l behind with updating here.  It'll probably happen again whenever my next big deadline comes along, so be aware.  But I'll always come back, you know!!

lys-de-lys

jacket - So (Kohl's)
skirt - YesStyle
tights - JC Penny
socks - Sockdreams
red earrings - f21

Fleur-de-lys socks!  That is all.

(I forgot to finish a part of this drawing too.  Darn it...)

sailor scavenger

dress - Bodyline
tights - f21
shoes - American Eagle (Payless)

Noooooo I forgot to colour the tail of the bow in the back of the dress!  Oh well, moving on.

This day I spent mostly in pajamas, working on work.  Then around, I dunno, 4 or 5pm I decided I should get dressed because we were going to my parents' for dinner.  And after spending all day feeling like a bum in pjs, I needed a drastic change!  So I dressed up in frills.  Man, tons of frills, as I realized while drawing the outfit later.  I still had time to get work done, so I loaded up the convenient heart-pockets on the dress with dried pineapple and pecans and set back to work.  (yes, my eating habits tend toward scavenging most days.)

I've had a slightly odd fascination with sailor outfits for a while now.  My cousin and I have an ongoing joke about dressing our future-someday children in snappy little Victorianesque sailor suits.  Ooh, the precious-ness!  Until such time as I have a child to dress up, I guess I have to make do with dressing up myself.  Therefore, this dress is awesome :D

awesome sandwiches

shirt - Aéropostale
cami - Express
skirt - Wet Seal
tights - Forever21
earrings/necklace - friend-made!

Foodie pose number two!  This was actually a day full of great food, with a Salad Extravaganza dinner at my friend's place and all kinds of yummy toppings for our mounds of green leaves.  For lunch I went out with my mum to a local place that serves amazing, awesome food (Marie Catrib's, for my fellow locals) and you know what I got?  I got an awesome sandwich!  (with gluten free bread!  Marie, I love you!!)  My mum got a different awesome sandwich, and then we traded half.  And then I ate both my half-sandwiches, because they were both so delicious I couldn't bear to save one or the other for later.  *contented sigh at the memory*

curry noodles

lace shirt - Nicole Miller
yellow shirt - Mudd
sweater dress - Wet Seal
skirt - Fire (Kohl's)
tights - Forever21
socks - Sockdreams

This is part one of a food-pose series!  Lys Making Curry-Noodle-Stuff!  I love noodles but have been afflicted with various food allergies and intolerances and generally try to avoid wheat/gluten and dairy.  Which are in, like, everything.  So how happy I was to discover rice noodles at my local Asian grocery store (and they're soooo cheap too)!  For a while I only used them in specific recipes like pad thai, but since moving out and living with my brother I find myself doing more "improv" cooking for my dinners.  One of my recent favourite things to make is this curry-pad-thai-ish dish with chicken, zucchini, spinach, onions and garlic and a sauce made of curry powder, yogurt (the one dairy food I allow myself), soy or almond milk and some peanut butter.  Sometimes I toss in dried coconut and usually a bit of cayenne pepper or something to spice it up.  Chicken-zucchini-spinach with rice noodles and spaghetti sauce is also very good.  Oh food, I love you.

not warm

sweater - So
pin - came w/ jacket from Weathervane
skirt - Old Navy
socks - American Eagle

Sometimes sweaters aren't very warm.  Aaaaand... I can't think of anything else to say about this one.  The end!

chase the cat!!!!!!

green shirt - Old Navy
skirt - American Eagle (secondhand)
socks - Sockdreams
tights - JCPenny

My cat and I have this game we play in the evenings, anytime from around 6pm to midnight.  It's called "Chase the cat out of my room and halfway down the stairs, then go sit down and wait for him to come tearing into my room and crashing into the mirror or plant stand, then chase him again."  He seems to enjoy it, so I try to be accommodating, but sometimes he wants to play this game when I'm in work mode and it's very distracting.  The best part for me is the way his eyes get huge and black and ferocious-looking.  Such a cat!

options

shirt - Arizona (JCPenny)
green skirt - A. Byer
pink skirt - Wet Seal
socks - Sockdreams
barrette - dollar store

This is my dilemma.  I got lazy for a few days and didn't write down what I wore alongside the drawing, and then when I went back I had to figure it out based on the drawing and my memory.  It's usually not a problem because I've trained my brain to remember frivolous details like that, but when I got to this drawing I could not for the life of me remember what pair of tights I'd worn.  So I made three different versions—the yellow tights as you see here, the same outfit with pink tights, and with blue tights.  Now for your assignment: please write a five-paragraph essay and explain which you like best, OR which you think Lys was most likely to have actually worn, and why.

falling through winter

sweater - The Great American Sweater Co.
skirt - friend-made!
socks - American Eagle?

I don't wear this sweater more than maybe once a year or so... I wonder why?  In any case, it was perfect with this new skirt!  Nice muted colours, my favourite for winter.

mudd day

shoes - Old Navy
sweater, fluttery top, pants - Mudd (Kohl's)
tshirt - So (Kohl's)

golden bubbles

tshirts - Mossimo (Target) and My Favorite Tee (Younkers)
cami - Energie (Kohl's?)
skirt - Old Navy
tights - Gap
earrings/necklace - handmade by friend

where does it go?

top - In Vain (Kohl's)
lace shirt - ? (YesStyle)
grey shirt - Target
skirt - StringBean (secondhand)
tights - Express and Forever21

I would be grateful if you could forgive the slightly odd proportions in this drawing.  Lately I keep starting my drawings too close to the bottom of the page, but I hate cutting off the feet, so I just did my best to make it fit. And it looks a little weird.  Sorry. Hopefully the lace pattern on the tights is enough to distract you!!  Isn't it cool looking?

Oh, there was some "concept" I had in mind when I drew the pose... what was it?  Oh yeah, right, I was looking back trying to figure out where my day went. It went to doing work, that's where! But sometimes I get so wrapped up in a project that I forget about everything else and before I know it, it's 3am and I'm still working. Those are fun times.




By the way, I know I skipped a couple days' posts, but they'll be up... soon.  Probably after the weekend, because right now I'm in Deadline Mode and anything I do that's not work or eating or sleeping makes me feel guilty and anxious.

twirling roses

dress - Bodyline
tights - Forever21
shoes - Rocket Dog (Younkers)

Fluffy dress fluffy dress!!  This was another  recent purchase (along with the blue print dress a few days back).  It is my favourite ever—it's got such a nice full skirt and a cute rose print!  I think if I did this colour combo again I'd switch it around, with dark tights and a brighter top.

what to do with you

skirt - Target (kids section)
sweater - American Eagle
polo - Aéropostale (second-hand)

thanks, friend!

skirt - handmade by friend
tights - Gap
blouse - Old Navy
sweater - Aéropostale

self conscious sweaterdress

blouse, tights- H&M
sweaterdress - WetSeal
earrings - Forever21
sweater - TakeOut (Kohl's)
shoes - Vigoss (JCPenny)

So I was like, totally happy with this outfit when I put it together.  But then my mum saw me at church wearing it and was like, "Are you sure about that?" and I spent the rest of the day all self-conscious and distressed.  Sweater dresses are a little tricky to pull off, I guess.  But I liiiike them!

But I still like the colour and texture combinations.  I had like four shades of off-white going on there.

grumpy chocolate day

blue shirt - ? (Younkers)
cami - Express
brown shirt - Wet Seal
capris - UnionBay (Kohl's)
tights - Forever21
legwarmers - Target?

So I was a little grumpy this day.  I addressed this problem by eating some chocolate (but I promise I only broke off one square... or maybe two) and reading manga that made me cry and knitting.  I am making these and right now they look like this!  Awesome, huh?  Hopefully they'll be awesome.  I need to get around to finishing them though.  Go lys go!!