Crop top and Hem skirt by sbeautyqueen featuring vintage tops

Calypso St Barth vintage top
$295 - calypsostbarth.com

Motel sweetheart neckline top
£22 - houseoffraser.co.uk

Lightweight skirt
$25 - romwe.com

Fairy tale nail ;)

   I always loved experimenting on nails using all the nail polishes lying around. I started growing long nails since I was like 13 years old!, and that too on both hands!! While I did'nt have access to all these magazines and DIY tutorials, my mom's beautiful hands with long nails were my inspiration. She has such beautiful, young-looking hands <3....

Well, my art may not do justice to its name, but let me share with you my work :D

Ok, first I wore my nail color base coat. I have dark color separation where the nails starts to grow out. It shows when I am wearing a light polish. Hence, I wore a pale rose polish at the bottom, slowly blending it to the color of the base coat at the middle of the nail. I hope you can notice the color change.

Then I applied a coat of light gold colored polish with glitter, trying to retain the color of base coat near the cuticle and applying a little thicker towards the bottom. So far it has a nude look with glitter and a gradient of rose to orange from top to bottom.

Fairytale nails

To add more drama, lol, i lined the bottom with pink and applied some blue glitter on the bear pink area near the cuticle....  Do you like it?

These are the colors I used...

What is today's google doodle?

My day started merrily as the google doodle of origami greeted me on the home page of my browser. However I wondered what was special today? world origami day?? No, it was on Nov 11. A a quick googling taught me- today is the birth(and death) anniversary of renown origami maker Akira Yoshizawa. He is known as "grandmaster of origami" and "father of modern origami".

Akira Yoshizawa (14 March 1911 – 14 March 2005) has folded about 50,000 models, according his estimation in 1989, he is also author of 18 origami books!! He is the inventor of the “Wet Origami” technique, paper is moistened to give higher flexibility in making the models.

Akira Yoshizawa with his self portrait

In 1983, Japanese emperor Hirohito named him to the Order of the Rising Sun, one of highest honors that can be given to a Japanese citizen. The Yoshizawa-Randlett system of notations is a standardized way of diagramming the steps involved in folding a particular origami model.

 

12 Japanese zodiac signs folded by Akira Yoshizawa

The butterfly origami on the google doodle must have caught everyone's attention today. This origami butterfly is one of the simple yet great designs by Yoshizawa. If anyone who has never tried their hands at origami feel an interest in this art, get a piece of paper lying around and make a Yoshizawa butterfly today... Here is a super easy video tutorial by origami expert Rob. For the experienced hands, here is a pdf.

Well. I made a couple of them myself today :)

I love folding paper since childhood, origami became my hobby since I moved to Japan. Now gifts/decoration... for anyone/any occasion means origami for me...

Above are few of my best folded ones. I made all of these referring guides online. The bat and jack-o-lantern where decorations made for Halloween. The white spring that you see is an exceptionally difficult model to make and I am very proud of it!! Last waltz and ring box were gifts for my sweet heart. Rest are a penguin, swan, lotus, xmas star, flower and cranes. I usually watch tutorials on youtube rather than diagrams and my favourite origami channels are Rob, Happypuppytruffles, Jonakashima, Tadashimori etc.

I hope those who read this post develop a taste for paper folding and make origami their hobby. Hey, paper folding is said to relieve stress!! And if you have an unfulfilled wish, legend has it that folding 1000 paper cranes will get your wish granted...

Update:
Time Lapse of the google origami doodle:

Shinee 4th mini album: SHERLOCK

UPDATE(March19): Shinee's sherlock is finally out... Shawols please listen to the one minute version of all tracks for free on mel0n so that Shinee stays top on album ratings(You don't need to buy anything or register, just click on the names of the songs and it will play.)!! Click below!!

http://www.melon.com/cds/album/web/albumdetailmain_list.htm?albumId=2093546&MAIN=2PM

or

http://www.melon.com/cds/eventpop/web/shineeComebackEvent.htm?MAIN=BODYBANNER 


The much awaited fourth mini-album of our shining Shinee "Sherlock" is scheduled to release on March 21.....

It is heard that the album has seven songs, all belonging to different genres. The songs will be available online from March 19th on Korean music sites like Mel0n as well as international distribution sites like iTunes. SME describes "Sherlock" as a hybrid remix of two independent songs "Clue" and "Note".

 

Teaser picture of individual members for the new album have been released over the past week. To the delight of Shawols, Shinee appeared shirtless in most of the teaser pics. The first teaser pic to be released was our flaming charisma MinHo's.

 

MinHo looked charismatic as always in his "French Boy" look. The following day teaser picture of maknae TaeMin was released.

Although I couldn't grasp the concept of Taeminnie's dress (don't know its name either) shirtless maknae looks all grown up in the long hair. TaeMin fans who love his long hair would love this pic for sure! 

Following Taemin, Leader dubu Onew's teaser pic was released. I am basically Onew biased, hence I was looking forward to see Onew's new look.

 

Dubu fans who expected to see shirtless Onew might have been disappointed, hehe.. Onew looked warm and adorable as usual. The lying-on-a-pillow pic is my favorite.

Apparently, Mr and Mrs Jong fashionably reserved their pics to the last(yup, I am a JongKey shipper!)....

  Lockets must have been anticipating Almighty Key's new stunning hair-do. Key who never disappoints his fans appeared with GREEN hair on the teaser.

  Also noticeable are designs on his lips and ears... Are they pierced? I hope not! Key is also seen with brown hair in a pic, I wonder what colour his hair would be in the album.

Atlast, but not the least, our blingbling Jonghyun's teaser pic was released. Jonghyun's new hairstyle looks super cool on him.

Fans wondered whose leg were beside Jong when the above picture was released. Many suggested it would be Key's. However, when the group teaser pic was released, it became clear that the owner of the legs was none other than MinHo...

I came across a photoshopped pic of Jongkey in the poster of  2011 hit movie "Sherlock Homes: A game of shadows" and found it amusing :)

So the count down has begun!  I became Shawol on listening to Lucifer and I hope Sherlock will be my new favourite K-Pop song..

Shinee...Fighting!!

Solving 3x3 Rubik's cube.

I had been trying to solve Rubik's cube 3x3x3 since I was in my teens, only to throw it away frustrated after hours of struggling with it. And my Cube was lying forgotten and catching dust until recently when I found an online video tutorial which described the techniques to solve the cube. It involved 7 steps of lengthy algorithms which had to be memorized. Given my weak memory, I wouldn't put an effort to even hear it once, but somehow I survived the tutorial and memorized the algorithms too, well... almost....

Now I can solve it in about 4 minutes and I have my aspirations really high when I say that my aim is to bring it down to the World Record of 3x3x3... ie 00:05.66!!! Hmm, may be not... Now, I am using a beginner level algorithm and an ordinary cube, neither of which are cut out for speed cubing... Following the advice of veterans in speedcubing, my intention is to try to solve the cube with in about 1.30 minutes. By that time I should be ready to learn the Fridrich algorithm which is more suited for speedcubing.

score form online Rubik's timer

I am planning to write a very simple beginner's guide for solving the cube for dummies like myself and put it here... to rescue all those unfortunate Rubik's cubes sleeping in the darkest corners.... lol...

Trip to Hakone

Hakone is a town in Ashigarashimo District in Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan. It is known for it hot spring onsens, art museums and view of mount Fuji. Hakone is located in the mountainous far west of the prefecture, hence it is snow-clad even in February. The main motive of my trip is just to see snowfall!

You can read more about Hakone here, and if you are planing to visit, here is a guide.

I stayed at Fuji Hakone guest house. It is a Japanese style Inn and the stay was more delighting than words can tell. I got down at the nearest bus stop Senkyoro-Mae. The clear sky and snowy ground made my heart jump... lol.

Guest house was one minute walk away from the bus stop. The hosts spoke English and welcomed the guests warmly. 

 

The living room had piano, guitar, computer, toys for kids, TV, oven, hot kettle, origami papers, traditional Japanese show-case dolls etc. The rooms were Japanese style, floored with tatami mats. They were named Fuji, Sakura, Kabuki, Hakone etc.

All though there wasn't an attached toilet, it was very nearby the rooms. There were both indoor and outdoor onsens, which you can use private for 30 minutes. Having a hot sping bath viewing the clear blue sky is a must-have-experience if you are in Japan. The indoor onsen was also exciting as the window allows us to view a space closed by bamboo walls, where ground is snow-clad and you get to view the sky too... Yes, I love clear blue sky.

There weren't too many restaurants near-by. I guess the population density as such is low in Hakone. Regardless there were many tourst attractions nearby. There is Hakone Jinja Shrine on the south shore of the lake Ashi. Hakone open air museum is a must-go. Museum of Petit prince was one minute away. Grass lands were about a 15 min away by walk. A 24 hour Lawson seemed to be the only shop opened after 8.00pm. After check-out, I headed to Lake Ashi by bus, for boating and Hakone ropeway.

My trip ended with chilling memories of making snow angels, evening walk in snow fall and onsen baths.

Will it snow.....?

This is technically speaking my first winter off the tropics... but still I couldn't see snow fall. It's already mid-Feb... will I have to wait for next year?? :'(

Morning sun

I got up earlier than usual one day and was watching the sunrise. Nothing gives more energy than rising sun on a clear sky :)