International Lolita Fashion Photobook

Yesterday a new e-Book got released by Ai Akizuki, which contains 200 pictures from Lolitas around the world. Several months ago, Ai asked on her Facebook page to send in some pictures for a book, and I also sent one which is used in the book. It is even used on the cover!

You can buy the book on Amazon for 4,61€ , it is a Kindle book but you don't need a Kindle, you can also download an App for your computer or mobile phone and read it there.

I bought the book, but I'm a little disappointed, since the pictures are quite small and you can't zoom in (it's nearly as pixelated as the preview...). Also they weirdly cut some pictures to have them all in the same size. And I think they didn't made any selection of pictures, they just put every picture they got into that book (I mean most pictures are good, but some are lacking quality).
Sorry, I sound a little critical, but those were just my first thoughts after flipping through the book. After all it's still a cute book, it contains some great outfits and the layout is nice. It's divided by continent and country, and it's always surprizing how many Lolitas live in countries you don't hear much about (like Israel, Colombia, South Africa).

Here is the page with my picture:

Thank you for reading,
Miuko~ <3

365 LLC - Favourite Lolita places

I barely do meet-ups in my hometown (Cologne), because most of my friends live closer to Düsseldorf and it just have better shops and cafés. But I will tell you my favourite places in both cities.

Le PomPom (Cologne)
This is a very cute cupcake café, I mainly go there because the interior is beautiful and the owner likes Lolita and is always happy to see us :)

Nordpark (Düsseldorf)
It's a park with many photo opportunities! It also has a japanese garden.

Südpark (Düsseldorf)
Another park with photo opportunities.

Relax (Düsseldorf)
It's a café and restaurant, not really pretty, but it has authentic japanese food, I always order Cream Soda and Curry there.

Takagi (Düsseldorf)
It's a japanese book store and I always go there to but the newest Kera or Bible, or to just brose through the magazines and cute stationary they have.

There are places in Cologne and Düsseldorf which might be much more awesome, but those are the places I mostly visit when I wear Lolita.

Thank you for reading,
Miuko~ <3

365 LLC - Wardrobe Goals

My goal for the next months is to invest in blouses and cardigans, and not in dresses, because I really don't have many of them and I could make so much more out of my closet if I would have more matching items. Also I want to invest in shoes and head accessories, because of the same problem. But I will only buy items if I have spare money which I don't need / want to spend for Japan.

New year, new plans - and 365 Day Lolita Challenge

Dear readers!

I hope you had a nice start in the new year! I'm really excited for this year - I will turn 25 years old, and I really think I should celebrate this special birthday. Also I plan to go to Japan - maybe not so much for shopping but definitely travelling around the country. And I know what I will do for the rest of my life - I can start an apprenticeship in September where I will study some law stuff to be able to work in the city government (sorry if it sounds weird I'm not sure about the correct english words xD). Well I'm not that interested good in law stuff but after the apprenticeship I can work in a normal office job and this is all I ever wanted (well all realistic jobs I ever wanted xD). I secretly hope to find another dream job before september but I'm pretty sure it's not going to happen.

So yeah I'm currently in a quite happy mood, I'm very motivated to do stuff (for example writing job applications, loosing weight, learning japanese), but I know it won't last forever - but I try not to think about my bad days, I will just look forward to new happy and successful days.

So that's about my private life, now on to my Lolita life. I look forward to the Putumayo Tea Party and to the Under the Sea Tea Party. I already started to plan my outfits and to craft a new headdress for UtS. But I can't really decide what to craft - I don't want to make an OTT headdress that looks too far away from Lolita, but I also don't want to wear a simple headbow... I spend the whole december making that headdress and I already threw away several versions because I didn't liked any of them ^^''''. As for Paris in July, I don't know if I will attend the events this year, I plan to go to Japan earlier so I will just look if I have enough money after the trip xD. For Paris I can't book early anyway because AP usually announces the Tea Party only 4 weeks in advance, so no rush needed xD.

As for my blog, I want to post more this year and what is better than a new Lolita challenge? And especially one that you can do eeevery day! I will participate in the #365LolitaLifestyleChallenge, which is created by Lace a la Mode, and you can find the instructions *here*. However I will only do the challenges I really like, and I think that not every challenge will include writing blog post, so you certainly won't see a new post every day.

That's it right now, I'm also looking forward to many new blog post of you (a.k.a. of all the blogs I follow), so have a nice weekend and...

...Thank you for reading,
Miuko~ <3

My Lolita Year 2015

I found this questionnaire on egl and thought it will be fun to answer. I changed the questions a little bit, feel free to copy them from egl or from here.

Questions:

1. Favorite look

2. Favorite purchase

3. Least favorite purchase

4. An item you wished you purchased but didn’t

5. Favorite release

6. Trends you liked and didn’t like from 2015

7. Favorite event

8. Favorite picture

9. Achieved Lolita-milestones

10. Fashion goals from 2015 and did you achieved them

11. Fashion goals for 2016

1. Favorite look

Honestly this year I didn't had many special outftits, because of laziness, too small dresses, too hot weather and no meet-ups with photo-opportunities. But I think my favourite outfit is the one from Japan Day:

2. Favorite purchase

Definitly my Castle Mirage dress from Angelic Pretty. I never thought that I will ever buy a dress in lavender, but this shade of lavender is darker than AP usually uses, so I fell in love with the color.

3. Least favorite purchase

My whole Taobao order. Some items were quite nice, but I paid way too much money for them in relation to their quality. I would say from the order, the traditional hair piece is the least favourite, because it doesn't really fit to any of my stuff, even if it is beautiful (why did I bought it in violet again instead of pink???).

4. An item you wished you purchased but didn’t

I wished I had bought one of the Kimono-inspired dresses from Metamorphose. I missed the release of the Daydreaming Goldfish and I didn't liked Dozing Cat at first, but now I love it. Sadly, Metamorphose also became a target of the scalpers this year, so it is nearly impossible to get those dresses for a reasonable price 2nd hand. 

5. Favorite release

Of course Mirage Castle and Goldfish are one of my favourite releases, but I think the best dress released was the Pompadour dress from Angelic Pretty. The dress is so beautiful, but I also love that it is inspired by an original painting.

6. Trends you liked and didn’t like from 2015

Well it's not really a trend fashion-wise, but I like that some Lolitas want to revive the Lifestyle aspect of Lolita. I'm happy that egl is somewhat active again, however I'm disappointed by the mods of egl, who still don't care about the website, so I barely check egl anymore. But I enjoy the general vibe in the community and wish to contribute more to it too.

Fashion-wise, I actually can not remember any new trend that started this year?! Or I guess there was no trend that I really liked or really disliked.

7. Favorite event

Can't really choose one event because all moments I spend with my friends and lovely Lolitas are special, but my trip to Paris was definitly a highlight!

8. Favorite picture

While flipping through my pictures from this year to find my favourite one, I had to realize that I barely took any pictures this year D-: I really have to change this!!! So I don't have really pretty pictures from a special photoshoot... but I chosed this picture as my favourite one, because I find it so awesome that I have worn the same dress in the same color like Maki ^_^

9. Achieved Lolita-milestones

- anniversairy: wearing Lolita for 5 years

- bought my first Pullip

- first post on Daily Lolita

- first order from Taobao

- started to collect Bibles and Keras (I already bought some issues in the years before, but this year I started to buy every new issue)
- found two wishlist items (crown headdress & bow bag from Btssb)

10. Fashion goals from 2015 and did you achieved them

I didn't made any goals last year, but if my goal was "buy tons of dresses", I guess I achieved it xD

11. Fashion goals for 2016

- buy more blouses (I barely own any Lolita blouses, it's horrible)

- buy a big Lolita bag (I own several Lolita bags, but they are all so small)

- don't buy anything that doesn't fit you 100%

- don't buy random things just because they are cheap
- don't buy crafting supplies / an item if you don't have a specific project / outfit in mind

Thank you for reading,
Miuko~ <3

Halloween Tea Party

This year I was invited to a Halloween Tea Party at a friend's house. Her living room looks like the Alice in Wonderland Café in Japan, I should have taken pictures of the room, it's just amazing!

My friends put a lot of effort into preparing really tasty and awesome-looking food and drinks, and decorating everything very spooky.

Of course I have to share the pictures with you, all of them are made by Jungblut Fotographie :-)

We also took outfit pictures, but unfortunately my outfit isn't very scary because I had to work in the morning and therefore no time to prepare.

Later, we also played "Cards against humanity". The game is quite funny, but I didn't understood many cards of it, because I either didn't knew the english word or I'm just not nerdy enough, so I didn't knew many of the references or persons in this game.

Thank you for reading,
Miuko~ <3

Christmas time with my doll

A few weeks ago I bought my first Pullip doll! I wanted one for YEARS, and finally I was ready to spend some money for them. They are quite expensive, and the quality of the clothes is not what you would expect for that price, but none the less I am very happy with my doll and I can't stop looking at her beautiful face (ﾉ^o^)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

I bought the Favourite Ribbon doll a.k.a. Misako Aoki. It even came with a nurse costume as Misako is also a nurse. And the best thing is, I even bought the Favourite Ribbon JSK for myself, so I can twin with my doll *\(♥o♥)/* I always dreamt of having a doll and wearing the same outfit myself. But I have to wait until March when the rerelease arrives.

Yesterday I decorated my christmas tree and my doll is also part of the decoration (^o^)* So I used the opportunity and took some pictures!

Thank you for reading,
Miuko~ <3