Today, Liz and I went to Joanns for potentially the last time ever- and we honored it the best way we knew how:


BY DRESSING UP IN COSPLAY, OF COURSE!!!! We had a leisurely afternoon of watching dumb shit on Youtube and then got into cosplay to make our pilgrimage ;w; I've written some here before and plenty of people have said it better, but Joanns closing is going to leave such a void in the crafting world that it's hard for me to put into words. Maybe I'll write a poem about it; maybe I'll just ramble on here in the middle of the night at some point. But we wanted to give a sendoff to the store that enabled us to start cosplaying in the first place, and I think we did well.


everyone ignore the stain on my shirt and focus on how cute we look~

( we took more pics while we were there and still, somehow, I feel like it'll never be enough )

And then every fucking mall was already closed & it was raining, so we didn't really have anywhere to muck about in cosplay? So we ended up getting bubble tea XD


I put the boys back in their bear nuis + bows, because I wanted them to go to Joanns in something I made~
Speaking of nuis...my cat kigu nuis from the Chinese enstars store finally shipped. They were supposed to ship around the 19th and didn't, and then I saw other people online sharing theirs, so I started to worry D: I even made sure to order from the official taobao, so it was like...what has gone wrong??? Thankfully, Superbuy reached out and they arrived at the warehouse safe and sound! :D They'll be here in a couple weeks, according to the shipping I got, and the package will also include a Kohaku orb plush to go with the Madara one I have. Very excited for all these things~~~

and then the tariffs will murder me when the next set of nui preorders arrive sobs

ALSO!!!!!!! Liz managed to get the VPN + foreign purchasing working for the newest enstars stage play, so tonight we're gonna watch Desperate Checkmate :D The streaming service for this one was way trickier to deal with than the one the last Dramatica used, and tbh I wish they were all as simple as the one the MDZS stage play used XD

OKAY. The image hosting software still isn't working properly, but at least it's being worked on by the support team. And I can still upload things through my FTP client and the in browser control panel, it's just the convenience of the specific image hosting that's lacking- for now.

Cool things I did this week: more hand-sewing projects! I made a big bow for Lumos and matching-ish ones for my Judal & Hakuryuu nuis! :D


SHE LOOKS SO PRECIOUS the bow is soooooo cute on her + it has a bell and it makes such a good sound, I keep dying from how cute she is ;w;

( more pictures of Lumos + the bow itself )

making bows for my Madara and Kohaku nuis definitely inspired me, and I'm sooooo excited to have some for these little shits, too ♥
Besides that...it's mostly been playing enstars, stressing about my website, and watching Liz fucking crush it at Queen's Blood in FFVII: Rebirth XD I've played some more of the OG, too, but...idk I haven't been feeling great so I've been sleeping a lot. I would really love if this could stop happening ;w;

BUT!!!! I wan to make more cute things!!!!! I have a bunch of YouTube videos open on how to make rosettes for pins/ita bags, and I wanna use that knowledge to make things for my nuis. The Kohaku & Madara ones that I usually carry around are a unique size for nuis - basically only the company that makes them makes outfits/accessories for them - so I also wanna make them some more clothes. I just gotta keep inspiring myself!!

Also I promised myself I was done buying Chinese enstars merch because of the tariffs - even though I love most of it, hence why I've got a bunch I preordered - but they just teased the new collection of merch and it's REALLY FUCKING CUTE!!!!!!!! Everyone has fox ears and fluffy kimonos for most of it, and then they're making fox nuis of all the characters.

AS IF THE KITTY CAT KIGU NUIS I ORDERED AREN'T CUTE ENOUGH!!!!!!!!!!!!! It's killing me XD I guess I'll have to see how all the tariffs shake out/how feasible buying from a reseller in Japan or else is, but damn if I don't want basically that whole collection ;w; Life is hard!!!

Oh, right...on Madara's birthday I did a single scout on his birthday box because I didn't have much else to spare, and this fucker gave me a third copy of his demon 5* XD


I'm not even mad, just surprised!!!!!
.....and then in ENG I did multiple 10 scouts and got NOTHING OF HIS. I did get some 5* cards, just not his. Which like. Okay. I'm glad to have them, but I'm also kinda desperately hoping to max out his first feature scout and get the secret color...maybe someday.

Lemme finish this off with a great pic I took the other night: Double Face in their pristine unicorn kigus...on an old pay phone.


I love putting them dumb places~

I got rained on and I'm super sore + achy, but I had tons of fun today!!!! The Mt Vernon Flower Mart is back and we were in the market for more plants (aka, more peppers, since those were what we had the most success with last year), so Pat and I planned on meeting Liz there after they got off work. Pat ended up inviting Elio, since we hadn't seen him in awhile, and by chance he'd been planning on going today, too!!!

HOWEVER. I thought I was meeting Pat and Elio at the light rail stop by Pat's work, but Pat thought I was meeting them at the flower mart...so they left without me XD It's cool, I can handle taking the train alone...it was just really silly since they just left like RIGHT before I got there.

This meant I got off the light rail just as Liz was getting off work, so we walked over together~ We got maybe 30 seconds into our walk before we were like "hey, is it drizzling?" followed up by a torrential downpour. At least the nuis were safely in a waterproof ita bag!

Eventually, the rain cleared up and we made it the last block and a half to the flower market!!! AND!!!!!!!!!!!!!


we got to see a truly stunning rainbow ♥
I managed to whip up little bows for their ears this afternoon, just in time for the festival~~~~~~~ I was honestly really excited to go this year, not just because it's a fun tradition we've fallen into, but also because it was this time last year that Liz and I had truly fallen for Kohaku & Madara in a like... "oh, oh, this is gon' be an important one" ship feels kinda way. We walked around talking about Madara's love of impulse performances at street festivals and just...idk it was really nice ;w; I love them (kohamada and Liz).

So!!!! Returning this year with my decked out kohamada nuis...very special to me ♥

After that, we got the ever-important lemon sticks - since Elio had never had one! - and walked around, picking out plants. Honestly, the rain cut some of the heat, leaving the weather basically perfect for an evening at a street festival :D

( further images from the festival!!! )

While we were eating dinner - still at the flower market, but slightly fancier street food because it's in a sorta bougie area - someone came up and complimented the dress I was wearing, and then we ended up chatting a ton. They just moved into the area from out in the suburbs and seem similarly nerdy, so hopefully we've managed to make another local friend!!!

I'm in sooooo much pain from all the walking around, but overall today was good *w* I'm also too tired to figure out how to end this properly, sooooo bye? XD

I changed my laptop wallpaper today, because I got lost on pixiv + I wanted something summery~


art by 芦 ♥
Love how the only major change since the last time I posted my laptop bg is that I've added more versions of enstars to it XD I have good taste, I swear! Also finally remembered to include a shortcut to the control panel for mewdragon's online reader...since it's a weird url that I can never remember :T

Other than that, I've been fussy about the new enstars UI but not for major reasons, just more that I have muscle memory and only one of the versions I play has changed. I still play in ENG + CN and they won't be getting the UI change for yearssssss so I'm just struggling. And it's partially glitchy from being a massive change, so I have to be patient...something I'm bad at XD

I usually try to make the maximum amount of icons for challenges/contests I enter, but I'm still feeling burnt out ;w; I managed to pull together the minimum 5 for monthlyinspo, but most of them I'd made earlier in the month...bluh. I'm not happy with most of what I made, either.

BAD CREATIVITY BRAIN SUUUUUUUUUUUCKS!!!!!

I did get the 5* from Sena's event today, at least!!! I don't even like him that much, but 1) the song slaps, 2) the aesthetic slaps, and 3) I'm trying to get as many copies of Leo's 4* from it as possible, which means I'm potentially getting two copies of the 5* XD


Senaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa~~~~~~ real talk tho I've been looking forward to this event for over a year; Or the Beautiful Golden Drop is hands down my favorite Knights song *w*
okay back to the jp event~ I'm not gonna get Hokuto from sitting on my ass ;D

I FINISHED KOHAKU'S BIG BOW TOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So clearly it was time to take the nuis on an ~adventure~
Also, Pat and I had avoided going to the new Ebisu yesterday and could not pull that off again XD We wanted to see the (relatively) new Japanese store!!!

....but first we went to Chili's for dinner. It had a wait and I was really hungry and I had to work very hard not to throw a tantrum in the Chili's entryway, because I'm the strongest. It ended up being fine and the food was good and I survived waiting XD I was feeling particularly whiny and difficult earlier, which suuuuucked.

BUT EBISU WAS REALLY GOOD!!!! It has its own parking lot in Towson, which is a big plus! Also if this place had been there when I was in college, I would have been even more broke than I already was XD Pat I both kept marveling at how much it would have destroyed our finances back then, lmao.

Honestly, I was having a bad pain day so didn't stay as long as I would have liked...which was maybe a good thing? XD They had a lot of tasty looking snacks that I don't usually see at H Mart or Lotte Market, so I will definitely be going back to peruse more of those.

And then we came home and farted around for awhile, but tbh we had originally gone out for bubble tea - cuz a lot of bubble tea places are super cute for optimal nui photoshoot options - and then we didn't end up going. And I started working on this entry at like 9:45 pm, at which point I got disappointed that we never got bubble tea...

NEVER FEAR, GONG CHA IS HERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! One of their locations is open until 11 pm on the weekends, so we went back out~ However, they were out of boba...and a lot of other things.....but whatever, we had a nice time AND I got cute pictures ♥


they look so cute in the ita bag now!!!!!!!

( even more pics from the nui adventure! )

Anyway! I'm now very satisfied and exhausted. The JP enstars server is down for 24 hours of maintenance to roll out the new UI, so I'm sad it's and nervous about what it'll be like ;w; But the merge game has hit the ENG server + my favorite Knights event is happening, so it's not all bad.

ALSO I MAXED MY FIRST EVER GACHA CARD IN ENSTARS BY HAVING TWO COPIES OF REI'S FIRST FEATURE SCOUT COME HOME WITHIN 3 SCOUTS OF EACH OTHER??????


I was expecting it to be one of the multiple cards I have 4 copies of but nope!!!! Rei pulled ahead XD

( just more enstars squeeing and shit in here )

aaaaand I think I'm gonna play for FFVII~ baibai!

After buying all the ribbon and shit a few weeks ago, I finally finished one of the projects I bought it for!!!!!! I made a big cute bow for my Madara nui!!!!!!!!!!!!!


lookit him and his big dumb bow he's so cuuuuuuuuuute
It was very frustrating at times, because I'm actually terrible at making bows- this has been a problem since I was trying to make lolita outfits in my late teens and apparently I still struggle with them ;w; BUT I DID IT!!!! I conquered my fears and pushed through to make something adorable ♥

ALSO LIZ GOT ME A GIFT!!!!!!!!!


adorable kohamada pins!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

They're so sweet *w* They're also playing the horrendous card game mini game that's part of FFVII Rebirth, because we needed more mini games????(We didn't) But it hits in the right part of their autism brain, so they've been having fun.

First thing: Lumos is doing better!!! She's been eating more regularly today and we got her some new antibiotics...which she does not like, but she didn't throw them up. So I'm counting that as a win ♥

Now, let's catch up on the rest of my life, since the last few days with Lumos kinda drove everything else out of mind. I finished playing Crisis Core a couple nights ago and basically cried like a baby. Every fucking time I'm like "maybe this time it'll be different" even though I know it won't be. The nature of a prologue like this is to let the tragedy loom in the distance while every bit of the game fills you with such hope that you can't help but get swept up in it. But that's just it- Zack has to die so Cloud can become the protagonist, and it's so damn good ;w;

Seriously...I have only hazy memories of playing the original on the PSP back in high school. I mostly remember GACKT Genesis pulling a whole bunch of anime bullshit at the end, so I somehow forgot the incredible bit of plot integrating into the UI in the final fight. Holy shit it was good. That's the sort of thing that I love about video games; when the menus suddenly become key plot elements I lose it!!!! :D

Anyway, I now desperately wanna pick up the next part of the FFVII remake (despite not really liking the first one), but I don't wanna shell out $50 for it especially with how much everything with Lumos just cost sobs so...I'm replaying the original XD tbh I wanted the next part so I could finally get out of fucking Midgar and I didn't wanna replay the original because, well, Midgar. But I had a save file on the PS3 that's right before the final couple boss fights in Midgar, so I called that close enough and started playing it this evening.

AND I DISCOVERED SOMETHING:


YOU CAN CHANGE THE COLOR OF THE MENUS??????????????????
Literally I first played FFVII in 2004 and I somehow never realized this until today. Okay. I'm stupid XD This picture doesn't quite capture how pretty my color gradient is, but the PS3 doesn't natively take screencaps and I didn't feel running it through the capture card. Maybe another day~

In enstars news: I got both 5* cards from the jp tour last night!!!! I actually have enough whistles and event bonus that I can probably nab a second copy of each pretty easily, because apparently that's just what I do with year end tours in jp?? XD Whatever, I'm not complaining...I'm delighted to have more Rei and Tori cards.

Aaaaand a couple doujins + a small piece of merch came in the mail! Probably the next package from our jp shopping service will be the exciting one - new outfits for the nuis!! - but this one was still good :D

( more pics + enstars screencaps )

Anyway, I started a new community this week as well, because what good is stress if you don't turn it into making sparkle graphics? XD I'd been hoping for a freebie community to pop up on a DW because I didn't feel like I should be the one running it...for some deranged reason???? I ran a bunch of freebie communities on GJ back in the day, idk why I thought I wasn't qualified??? But talking with thewizardofoz about it the other day pushed me to ignore my nerves and just go for it!

SO!!! Now vogliaa exists, which is the name of one I ran on GJ. I held onto a bunch of old icons I used to use to post there + I managed to lift the profile from the wayback machine, so I had something to start with. The banners and layout coding are all brand new, tho the layout coding comes from someone who was very big during 00s-era of freebies/requestables. I think it looks very nostalgic and colorful and nice ♥

Everyone has been so nice about it so far btw ;w; I've gotten some really kind comments and it just reminds me of how much I love making icons, honestly. I know that it's a bit rose-tinted, but making requestables on GJ was such a formative part of my life...I know I wouldn't be who I am today if not for the community and friends I made there.

ALSO THE TEMPERATURE JUMPED TODAY FOR NO FUCKING REASON BLUH

uhhhhhhhhhhhh my brain is mush because I've been in the enstars mines all day (playing the jp tour) but I have many thoughts about the whole two (2) chapters of story I read XD I usually read the whole thing at once, but I couldn't help but jump ahead to the bit that's Crazy:B + Madara because...okay, because I'm a simple man, I'm always hoping for kohamada crumbs.


the boys were also here for Kohaku + Madara interactions, clearly
AND IT FUCKING DELIVERED!!!!!!! Yeah, it was only two chapters, but they had a ton of back and forth, cute snarky bits, etc etc etc ;w; Rinne now has a nickname for Madara - Mikeneko-chan - and it's so fucking cute!!! I'm so glad someone finally called him a calico cat in text, it's important to me *w* And then Niki said that Kohaku and Madara looked like cats together, which was so fucking precious. Like. Yes, please compare my faves to kitty cats, my day is made.

ALSO!!!!!!! Rinne told Madara that he has to prove his worth before he can have Kohaku back - which for the record isn't even why Madara was there, he just showed up and that was the first thing Rinne said to him XD - and it very much had the vibe of "you broke my friend's heart and I'm not gonna let you do it again" so like. VERY GOOD SHIP CRUMBS FOR MEEEEEEEE. This was followed by Kohaku being like "I can do whatever I want" which, again, gay????? SO GOOD.

HiMERU very clearly did not like that Madara was there and wanted him to leave. Which make sense with how dismissive he was of Double Face during Ephemeral Festival, but I like that Rinne was not and instead acknowledged that Madara is an important part of Kohaku's life...he's just a shit who needs to make up for wronging Kohaku.

gaaaaaaaaaaaaay ♥

And another thing!!!!! It opened with Madara pondering on Nice Arneb Thunder and thinking that him + everything regarding 4piece and his quick acceptance into ES is really sketchy. Which is 1) accurate and 2) hahahaaa I fucking called it, I just knew Madara wouldn't trust this dude!!!!!!!! I said this during the first 4piece tour last year and tbh Madara is one of (the only????) character who hasn't been immediately taken in by Nice's cult of personality charisma. Kohaku also seemed concerned about him after Madara showed up to question Rinne about his past, so like......there's still time for my crack theory to win!!!!! Double Face could still take Nice Arneb Thunder out!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

sorry not sorry I'm just having a nice time uwu


I ground through the tour quite quickly so I could get Madara's 4* ♥
Honestly, the tour setlist has been really solid so far!!! I just finished up stop 10 and it's been less than 24 hours, which is a lot faster than I've played any recent tours tbh. idk I'm just having a nice time? It's nice to enjoy things ;w;

I mean also Madara is in the event so there's a lot of MaM and Double Face songs, so I am delighted by that ;D

( more enstars-related screencaps in here )

Oh, right. I do have one complaint about the event. Two complaints, I guess? But they're related, so I'll complain about them together. There's no event song and no MV outfits ;w; I know that tours don't usually have either of those, but the year end tours usually do. I guess because it's the prologue to the next chunk of main story it doesn't? BUT I'M STILL FUSSY.

Just another reason to be mad at Nice Arneb Thunder XD

Liz thinks that the outfits are gonna be the 10th anniversary MV outfits that everyone gets, which, like...okay. That's nice and all, but I wanted year end tour outfits ;w;

AT LEAST I HAVE ALTERED AND MY FOUR COPIES OF TSUMUGI


and here's a Lumos for sticking around for this whole longass post!

TODAY WAS SUCH A FUCKING EXPEDITION AND I REALLY WISH IT HADN'T BEEN!!!!!

lays on the ground

The day started with our laundry machine being full of ants, which is fucking great and also I have a whole paranoia thing about my food getting infested/tainted by ants so like. Now they're somewhere else in my home, and that's terrible!

And of fucking course Liz and I had been planning on catching up on laundry today, so we were like...okay. Cool. We can go to a laundromat, do a shit ton, and call it good (for now). But nope!!! It's never that easy!!!!!!!! On the way to the laundromat, literally less than 5 minutes from the house, we got a flat tire in a chunk of road with nowhere to pull over.

COOL COOL COOL

We made it to a gas station, took a bunch of laundry out of the car - you know, because we were on the way to the laundromat, so of course the whole trunk + back of car was full - and Liz got to work trying to put on the spare tire. But the jack for Pat's car is like super fucking finicky, so it was just not working right.

HOWEVER!!! WE WERE SAVED!!!!!!!!!! A friendly bisexual man helped us change the tire while his girlfriend and boyfriend took turns slapping his ass.....because apparently I was in the start of someone else's porno XD Liz paid him back by buying him a pack of cigarettes and a gatorade, and honestly it was just a very nice interaction. City living is great, y'all.

After that, we finally managed to get "lunch" which was...late enough to be dinner......whatever, it was very good!!! And then...laundry daaaaay~~~~


you know I had to bring the boys!!!!
The laundromat had a lounge on the second floor with free wifi, but 1) the chairs were the most uncomfortable things ever and 2) once we really got into the swing of it, there wasn't much time to "relax" or wait. It took awhile, but now we have tons of clean clothes!!!! Our laundry never runs right in the winter due to the plumbing being shit when it's cold, so we were very behind...

And then we rewarded ourselves with bubble tea :D


oshikatsu life ♥
Final step: getting a replacement tire. The initial plan had been to swing by a 24 hour tire place and get a used one for relatively cheap, but that only sorta worked. Pat's car takes a very odd tire size, so they didn't have any used ones D: But this was a process, since they had to look through a ton of tires...only to be met with failure D:

However, all hope was not lost!!!!! They did have a new tire, for a much better price than tires for his care usually run. All in all, it could have been worse, but it still felt like one thing after a-fucking-nother. I swear, I couldn't catch a break today.

Now I just want wanna curl up and either play enstars or crisis core...I'm beat! So I'll leave you with a picture of a tower of tires~

I last minute entered an icon contest (over at your_favourites) because...idk, I saw it on my friends page and felt inspired???? I managed to make 4 new Kohaku icons in between playing various enstars events ;D

......right after I finally made a new icon post @ killiansicons like 3 days ago XD

Also, I made an icon of my nuis because I'm worth it- and they're so fucking cute *w* I take them everywhere with me these days and I love them and it makes me so happy.

What doesn't make me happy: how fucking much my nose hurts from this god damn cold. I'm stuffed up and dripping mucus at the same time!!!! I'm exhausted but I STILLLLLL don't know if I'll be able to sleep, even though it's 2 in the fuckin morning!!!!!!!!

lays on the floor

plz just let death take me

Okay, okay, back to the grind (CN server's "we're sorry ur not gettin the pjsk collab" tour) ♥