Outfit: Pastel Batty Girl

Hello again lovelies!

Another outfit post for you!

I think Mondays are pretty good days for postings, right?  I prep 'em on the weekend, then post 'em Monday morning!

Hopefully Monday postings will make your day a little brighter. ^^

Anyway, this outfit was inspired by all of the pastel spooky pixels I've seen on tumblr lately.  I love spooky-cute stuff!

Let's go!

Details from the top down:

Skull Ribbon Clips: Target

Sailor Moon Earrings: hobbit.town Jewelry

Jacket: Pinkly Ever After

Seifuku Top: Bodyline

Bow Ring: Love Culture

Shorts: Savers

Bat Tights: Holley Tea Time

Shoes: Bodyline

First off, I'd like to apologize for the lighting.  I have plenty of space in this area of my apartment to take full body outfit shots, but the lighting is definitely not the best.  I'm playing around with my tripod in different areas of my humble abode to make sure I get the best lighting possible, so don't be alarmed if the location for these shots changes in the next few posts!

So for this coordinate, I wanted to look like one of the bats on my tights.  A bit silly, but lots of fun!  The bat itself is lavender, so my lavender seifuku top worked perfectly!  The fact that it's also white fits in with the melty moons, eyeballs, bones, and such on my tights.  The pink jacket fits with the background of the tights, so I had a good color balance on top and bottom.  There was a bit of black in the outlines of the designs on the tights, so I paired everything with my favorite black high waist shorts.  The dark color and cut of the shorts also created a nice body shape and contrast to the light colors in my outfit.  For shoes, I went with my Bodyline ribbon shoes.  These are one of my favorite pairs of shoes because they're so comfortable.  Seriously, they're my most comfortable pair of stylish shoes that I own.  I think I'll have to get them in black as well. xD

As far as accessories go, I just wanted to use things that fit in with the color scheme of the outfit, so the pink bow ring and my pink and purple sailor moon earrings did the job.  The entire outfit itself is pretty loud, so I didn't want to pile on the jewelry.  

To top it all off, I tried to style my hair to look like bat wings.  I tied it up in twin tails and teased it to give it more shape.  Unfortunately, a big rainstorm hit after class that day, so by the time I took these photos, my hair had fallen considerably.  But all was not lost, as I had my super cute skull ribbons in!  I bought them in the dollar section at Target during the Halloween season, but I haven't worn them much in the past couple of years since they didn't seem to go with anything in my closet.  I was digging through my hair accessory bin (yes, bin) right before I had to run out the door, and at the bottom I saw these and knew they would work wonders with this coordinate.  

The many layers in this outfit kept me warm on a chilly Autumn day, and I was a little drop of color in the otherwise gray, gloomy day.  I had great fun sporting this look around campus, and the receptionist at the Student Service Center said I looked like a pink, fuzzy bunny!  Not exactly what I was going for, but pink fuzzy bunnies are super cute so it's still an awesome compliment!

I hope you enjoyed this post, and I'll have plenty more outfit posts to show you in the coming weeks!

If you like what you read, please consider following me here on Google or on Bloglovin!  I definitely appreciate your support.

Thank you so much for reading, and I'll see you next time!

xoxo

Martha

Outfit: First Day Of School!

Hello lovelies!

I'm back with another outfit post!  Now that I'm all settled into my apartment in Illinois, you'll be seeing photos taken in a different environment.  The lighting in this apartment is slightly orange in some places, so I'll do my best to keep it as bright as possible!

On Monday I started my final year in University, so it was my last first day of school!

Crazy, huh?

It's strange to think about.  Once I finish up and graduate, I'll have been in school for 17 years of my life.  It's going to be quite a change going from school and joining the workforce, but I have until May to get as much as I can out of my last year of school, and I'm ready to learn a lot and then bust out of the gates, guns blazing!

Anyway, all the sentimental stuff aside, I knew I wanted to wear at least part of my seifuku on Monday since it's a school uniform, and I thought it would be a nice way to start the year.  Unfortunately, it was incredibly hot that day, and that seifuku is all synthetic so it doesn't breathe.  I couldn't wear the entire uniform, but I did wear the top!

Without further ado, let's get on to the photos, shall we?

Details from the top down:

Hello Kitty Headband: Target

Rose Hair Clips: H&M

Sailor Moon Earrings: hobbit.town Jewelry

Seifuku Top: Bodyline

Starfish Ring: Chicago Toy Fair

High Waist Shorts: Savers

I'm sorry for these photos being mirror shots, but I took these before I went out the door for my 8am class!  It's not bad at all really if you get some sleep and a nice cup of tea or coffee after you wake up.

Anyway, I thought this outfit was nice and simple, but still a lot of fun and kind of quirky.  If you've been reading for a while, you'll probably recognize the Hello Kitty headband that I got in the dollar section of Target.  I almost didn't wear it, but I didn't think the rose clips were quite enough on their own.  Speaking of the rose clips, aren't they darling?  I haven't worn them too often, and the last time I did was when I put my hair up while wearing my Ko-Furisode Kimono over a year ago, so I'm glad I found another way to coordinate them!  

The seifuku top from Bodyline should also be familiar if you've been reading my blog for a while, since it's a versatile piece that I like to pair with various things.  I think it's perfect to wear with high waist shorts since it has a short length, and shows just a peek of tummy.  The shorts are another DIY project.  I bought some high waist jeans from Savers for a few bucks, measured and cut off the legs, rolled them up, and voila!  Cheap, cute, high waist shorts!  I like the dark wash of these shorts, and I think it gives a nice balance with all of the pastel colors (read: PINK) in the rest of the outfit.  

The last main pieces of this coordinate are my favorite hobbit.town Jewelry Sailor Moon earrings, and my starfish ring!  The Sailor Moon earrings have been in most of my coordinates since I bought them in June.  If you'd like to read about them and the awesome shop they came from, check out my review here!

The starfish ring was a gift from a friend's mother when we took an adventure to the Chicago Toy Fair a couple years back.  It was unexpected and so kind!  Thank you so much Mama L!  She bought her daughter (my friend Micki) a panda ring, and the pink starfish for me since black is Micki's favorite color and pink is mine.  I'm not even sure if Micki still has her ring, but I like to put this with casual coordinates because it's fun and a nice conversation starter.

In the spirit of keeping it simple, that's it for my back to school outfit!

I hope you enjoyed this post and keep on the lookout for more outfit posts and fun stuff ahead!

The next post will be my August favorites in a few days, and I have a lot of awesome recommendations for y'all!

Thank you so much for reading, and I'll see you next time!

xoxo

Martha

Review: Bodyline Purple Seifuku

Hey people!

Today I'm back with another review, and it's SEIFUKU TIME!

For those of you who don't know what a Seifuku is, a Seifuku is an abbreviation for "Seira Fuku" or "Sailor Uniform" in Japanese.  Seifukus are what Japanese girls wear to school as their uniforms.  In the past few years, Seifukus have taken off not only as required wear for school, but as a fashion trend!  They not only come in the tradition patterns and colors, but they can come in bright colors with tons of different accessories.

I already have a pink Seifuku, but I decided to get another since I love them so much.  This time, it's purple!  I ordered my Seifuku from Bodyline, and it cost me $22.  There was a free shipping thing going on around the time I bought it, and it's always best to buy from Bodyline when those things happen, or else you'll be paying $10-$20 for shipping, at least to the US where I'm from.

Onto the pictures!

It came in one of those plastic mailing sleeves, and this is how it looked when I unfolded it.  It was on a hanger and in a plastic garment bag.  The hanger was broken, but there was no damage to the garment itself.

Here we have a close up of the ribbon--tag still attached--no loose threads or anything.  It's in good shape!  Its length is adjustable to however you'd like to wear it.

And the skirt!  It's wrinkled from being folded up in its parcel, but the pleats are very well intact and held together neatly by the white thread at the bottom.  When you receive your Seifuku, you have to gently pull out the thread with a pair of scissors, and then your skirt will be properly flippy!

I got my pink Seifuku around three years ago I think, so they've added a few updates to them, one being these hanger loops on the skirt!  Convenient for when you don't have one of those skirt hangers with clips, you can just hang it on a normal hanger!

Another update is the design of the white stripes on the back of the top.  The lines on my pink Seifuku are just normal and straight, while these have a little loop at the corner.  Not a huge difference, but I think it's a cute little touch.

I've posted photos of myself in full Seifuku, but let me show you an example of how I coordinated it with something else!

Seifuku Top:  Bodyline

Shorts:  Target

Kandi Bracelet:  From a friendly raver :D

Here I used the top of the Seifuku as a crop top, then put on my favorite pair of pink shorts with it, and just a simple kandi bracelet for a little jewelry.  I think the outfit in itself makes a statement enough, so it doesn't need too many accessories.

Seifukus are very versatile in that you can mix and match the top or bottom with multiple different pieces to make a super cute outfit!  Not many people notice that the individual piece came from a school uniform design anyway, especially if your Seifuku is in a bright color like this one!

This product is well made, has great color, and has some nice little updates from its previous version, so I'll give the Seifuku a 5/5 stars!

I was a little disappointed with the broken hanger in the packaging, but since the garment itself had no damage, and I have plenty of hangers, I decided not to take any points off.  

Do you like Seifuku fashion?  Do you have a Seifuku?  Where do you like to purchase yours?  Let me know in the comments!

I hope you enjoyed the review, and I'll see y'all in my next post!

xoxo

Martha

Outfit: Academy Girl

Hey there honey bears!

It's been a while!  Life has been pretty crazy with a whole bunch of rehearsals, performances, and HOMEWORK!  And while the homework won't stop since exams are coming up, I've done my last ensemble performances of the year!  YAY!

So!  I have another outfit post for you!  This one was inspired by school fashion in anime, particularly those fancy Academies and boarding schools you see in Shoujo titles.

Let's go!

Note:  I apologize for the streaky mirror...I tried cleaning it with a Mr. Clean magic eraser but WOW it didn't work.  Back to good old Windex!

Details:

Turtleneck:  Thrift Shop (Originally Ralph Lauren)

Skirt:  Bodyline

Necklace:  Charming Charlie's

The goal for this outfit was to be simple, stylish, and cute!  I personally like the cream turtleneck paired with the skirt.  The color combination is one of my favorites, yet the clean cut style of both pieces reflects that academy type look I was going for.

Usually when I put together an outfit based off of anime style, I add a whole bunch of accessories and make up to play up the animation factor, but since students of these institutions are supposed to be clean cut, I decided to go with a pendant necklace and minimal make up.  I like that the pendant necklace is simple, but it's still big enough to be seen from a distance and has great sparkle!

I wore this outfit on the last day of choir tour a couple of weeks ago, and it was still very comfortable to wear on the long bus ride back to campus.  Fashion and comfort together is always A+!  

I hope you enjoyed this outfit, and look forward to new posts!  I received a bunch of new items in the mail, so I have some shop reviews coming your way very soon!

What's your favorite anime Academy?  Would you wear their uniform?  Let me know in the comment section!

Thanks so much for reading, and I'll see you in my next post!

xoxo

Martha

Anime Review: Is the Order a Rabbit?

Hey there honey bears!

Sorry for the long wait, but I'm back with another post!

I started watching a new anime recently called ご注文はうさぎですか? (Gochūmon wa Usagi Desu ka?) or "Is the Order a Rabbit?"

Let me tell you right now, it's flippin' adorable!!

Here's the plot synopsis from Anime News Network:

"High school freshman Cocoa Hoto got lost and bumped into a coffee shop called "Rabbit House" while looking for a boarding house for the upcoming semester of her new school. Luckily, Rabbit House is the boarding house she's looking for, and to return the favor Cocoa starts working at the coffee shop alongside quiet and cool Chino, strong and athletic Rize, plus Chiya and Syaro from Japanese-styled coffee shop Amausaan, as well as the shop mascot rabbit Tippy, who sometimes doesn't quite act like a rabbit...."

Usually I feel that the plot synopsis leaves something out, but this one pretty much hits the nail on the head.  "Is the Order a Rabbit?" is a slice of life style anime centered around middle and high school girls (read: Lolis) who work part time in a cafe.  With slice of life anime, the plot is very simple and isn't as fast paced as other anime genres, but what matters most is not the plot.  It's the characters.  Let's meet them, shall we?

Here we have miss Cocoa (pronounced koh-koh-ah), and she's the main character in this story.  She's got a few of your main character traits of course:  overly excitable, gets along well with everyone, loves pretty much everything, etc.  She has a habit of getting lost frequently, and her special skill is doing math in her head.  She's a hard worker and gets used to the cafe atmosphere quickly.  She thinks of Chino as a little sister and cares for her very much, and also has an obsession with rabbits.  Anything cute and fluffy really.

Next is Chino!  Chino's father owns Rabbit House, the cafe she, Cocoa, and Rize work in.  Chino has a great knowledge of coffee, and she is constantly seen with the cafe's mascot, Tippy, perched on top of her head.  Chino is the youngest of the group, the only one in middle school, and she is a bit shy.  She gets overwhelmed when first meeting Cocoa, but slowly warms up to her and even calls her "Onee-chan" once (but never does it again because Cocoa flips out).  Chino loves animals and cute things, but doesn't react as loudly as Cocoa does.  You can tell she likes something when a blush forms on her cheeks.

The third character we meet is Rize (pronounced Lee-zeh), and she's about the same age as Cocoa.  Her father was a soldier so she keeps up a tough image, carrying a gun around with her, and all of her accessories are in some form of camo.  When she gets put in charge of teaching Cocoa how to work in the cafe, she takes the job very seriously and has Cocoa call her "Sir" during training.  Despite her tough exterior, Rize loves cute things.  She constantly has inner monologues about the other characters and how cute they are, but is quick to hide it so the others won't notice.  She's an interesting character because she flips between the military training she's learned and wanting to be a normal high school girl.

The fourth character we meet is Chiya.  She's in Cocoa's class in school, and her family runs another coffee shop in town that specializes in traditional Japanese sweets.  Her shop also has a mascot, and he's a black rabbit named Anko (pictured here).  She's soft-spoken and kind, but she gets very excitable when she talks about making sweets.  You can see a twinkle in her eye and she becomes a lot more animated whenever she's thinking about it.  A fun quirk of hers is that she doesn't just call the sweets by what they are, but comes up with creative names for them that she thinks are poetic and represent the ingredients...although that sometimes can make it hard for the customer to order since they don't know what all is in the dish. XD

The last of the main characters is Syaro.  There are only two episodes of this anime released, and we haven't met Syaro yet.  I have a hunch that she may work at Chiya's family's coffee shop, or her family may have one of her own.  I'm looking forward to meeting her!

Out of all of the characters, I have to say my favorite is Chiya.  I can definitely relate to her in the creative process, and she has a passion for what she does that gets me excited about it!  Also she's so CUTE.

I just love her bright green eyes.  They match her uniform!

I'm excited for this anime to continue forward, and this is one of the only anime that I have watched while it's currently airing in Japan.  I usually wait until the whole series has finished broadcasting and watch it all in a few sittings...but the previews for this one were too cute to resist!

The Slice of Life genre took me a while to warm up to, but I do enjoy a good fluffy, cute show to make me smile and keep me relaxed when I need it.  Not to mention all of the cafe settings in this show give me ideas for the maid cafe.

Once Syano makes an official appearance, I'll write another post about how the anime is progressing.  I'm so excited!

Have some more cute pictures:

Too much cuteness and moe I'm gonna diiiie...

I hope you liked this post, and I'll scope out some more cute anime to review for y'all!  

What genres of anime do you watch?

If you've seen this one, what do you think so far?  Do you like it?

Let me know in the comments, I'd love to hear your opinions!

See you in my next post!

xoxo

Martha

Maid Cafe Adventures: All-Con 2014

Hey there honey bears!

As promised, here's the skinny on all things ALL-CON!

Well, all things MAID at All-Con.

As some of you know, my maid cafe dance group, the Kira Kira Maids, performs at All-Con Dallas every year, and this year was All-Con's 10th anniversary!  It was very exciting to be back again this year for our fourth All-Con!  At this four day convention, we had three concerts and had a merch table full of lovely decoden stuff!

Maid Kaya reporting for duty!  Ready to seize the day in PINK!

Before the first concert on Thursday, we got to the hotel, checked in, and set up our merch table!

These lovely deco goodies were all made by maid Ponnchi!  She's so incredibly talented, and we had some good sales during the convention!  There's an online shop in the works, so stay tuned!

The concert on Thursday was at 2, so after set up, the ladies performing in the show did some rehearsing, then ran onstage!

Credit for this photo goes to Daniel Brennan.

We even had our magical girl wands with us!  I always have a lot of fun singing and dancing with the maids, and this time I felt supercharged!  Each concert was better than the last, and I must say we ended our shows at the con with a bang on Saturday night!  If you'd like to see a little of what our show was like, check out this concert digest I put together for the maids' YouTube Channel!

After the show on Thursday, we stayed at the merch table for a while then went out for dinner...after that we pretty much crashed since it was a very busy day and a long drive up to Dallas!

Saturday we didn't have a concert until 9pm, so I ran around to do some networking and go to a few panels after my shift at the table.  But first--

I found Scooby Doo and Daphne!  I see a lot of Mystery Inc. cosplayers, but rarely Scooby!  He was too cute!  And as you can see, I wore my seifuku during the day!  It's super comfy, and Hazel wore her seifuku with me.

TIME FOR SEIFUKU SELFIES!

I will probably snag more seifukus in the future...I have an addiction since I wear it all the time!

But what's that on my bow?

                                       

A KIRA KIRA ENTERTAINMENT BUTTON!

Featuring the Kira Kira Maids on the front!!

For their 10th anniversary, All-Con made buttons of the convention themes over the years, along with various acts and vendors who have come to the con over the years--and the maids were picked to be one of them!  I didn't even know this until Todd (the wonderful con chair) came over and handed me one.  He told me that there were 200 of these babies circulating around the con for trading and collecting!!!  I was seriously speechless, and so grateful!

I had so much fun going to panels and making new friends that I didn't get too much shopping done (which is probably a good thing for my wallet), but I did pick up a few things!  Here's what I bought:

So this lovely little brooch was made by the folks at Punk'dWorks!  They make jewelry out of clock gears!  It's all got a steampunk theme, but this caught my eye because of the pastel cameo...of a skeleton lady!  Cool, huh?  I've always admired steampunk from afar but I didn't think I could pull it off.  Starting in small doses with pieces like this is good, and I've already worn this a few times since buying it!  

The man at the booth was nice (and very stylish in his Steampunk garb), although he did make some stereotypical comments about girls which made Natsume and I roll our eyes...but that's why Kira Kira Entertainment and the maids go to cons!  To educate and promote cute and feminine culture!  If I see him again, I'll be sure to have a chat with him.  I'd also like to meet his wife next time around, as she does the actual piecing together of the jewelry while he finds and gathers up all of the clock gears.  

My next purchase was this manhwa!  I thought it was a manga at first, but by looking closer I saw that it was drawn and written in Korea, therefore it is classified as a manhwa!  I fell in love with the art style on the cover, and that was the only reason I bought it really.  It's just so beautiful!  Look at those big, sparkly eyes!  And luckily, it was half off!  ...so I bought the first four volumes.  XD  I finished reading the first volume, and it's super interesting!  I'll do a review of it in my next post!

The last piece at All-Con was actually bought for me by Natsume!  She's such a sweetheart, and a good friend of mine as well as a maid in the group.  She knew I loved rose quartz, and so she found a booth selling necklaces made with various crystals and bought me one with rose quartz in it!  It's tied on a simple black cord, and I'm actually wearing it right now!  It's good for those simple days, and it gives off good energy!  I'll make sure to include it in an outfit post in the future. 

A huge highlight from this All-Con, and one of the most important for me, was making new friends and reconnecting with old ones!  The ladies of the Disney Princess panel came to two of our shows and rocked out with us, and we had a lot of fun at their panel too!  We had a whole bunch of shenanigans later Saturday night with them, but y'all wouldn't want to read about those, right? ;)  But here's a photo of us at dinner before things got too crazy:

As you can see (kind of), I'm wearing my Pinkly Ever After dress!  Maid Rose has on a red maid uniform, Maid Hazel is in pink sweet lolita, Butler Akakiba in casual wear with a fedora, and Rosebud the Maid as Sailor Jupiter!  You can also see Artemis (she was Ursula in the Disney panel!) but she had her back to the camera...I don't think she likes cameras much. x3

I hope this post was enjoyable, and hopefully those of y'all in the area can come to All-Con next year!  It's the maids' favorite con of the year, and we'd love to see you there!

If you want to see more photos of our concerts, you can go to our Facebook Page!

Thanks for reading, and see you next time!

xoxo

Maid Kaya ;)