HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS?

Here I am, taking a break from one of my many impulsive, spur of the moment decisions. Two days ago, I decided to paint the cabinets in the kitchen at home. The idea sounded good in my head, till I realised that painting the entire kitchen cabinet would mean that I'd have to sit in the kitchen for days. And I am nowhere near being done. zzz

So here I am (taking a 5-30 minutes break), enjoying my Chips More and a cup of over sweetened hot Milo, and I'm gonna blab about my new home back in Dublin!
I never got to blog about it so here we go. We settled into the loveliest lemon yellow coloured house, a couple kilometres away from campus. It is nothing less than perfect and it took a lot of work. Without going into the uninteresting tale of how I finally got the place, let's just go into the fun-ish stuff. We set a price on each room so it'd be fair, so I chose the (furniture-less) living room! Its on the ground floor and next to the kitchen plus I'll have my very own patio!

Not that I'm gonna step outside admiring the 'greenery' every second of the day but there's something about a huge sliding door in the room, (meaning more natural lighting heh heh) that makes the room a major plus for me. Since the landlord decided to pay for the furniture in the room, I decided to get a little creative. But we had a budget, so...cheap but creative....creative-ish.
Naturally, we went to IKEA to get all the stuff and being cheap asians, we decided to assemble the furniture ourselves, instead of well,  paying 35 euros for people to do it.

All in all, Sarah, and I assembled a bed, chest for clothes, and a study table. *Cue the 'I don't need a man' & 'Single ladies' related quotes* -but umm some man power would've saved us some time tho but I'm stickin to my point. hashtag denial So here's when it's all finally done! The kitchen, to me, is the best part of the house (well its the best part of any house but you get what I mean). Absolutely inlove with the white cabinets and wooden table tops. Excuse the mess, this picture here was taken on our first night in the house. My sweet pumpkin mouse of a housemate, Tia baked us a butter cake and some chocolate chip cookies as part of our mini 'housewarming'.  Well that's all for now! Can't believe I'm missing the house already. Something's clearly very wrong here. Night xx

HAPPY DAYS

It was a pleasant Thursday. More than pleasant really, the weather was tolerable,the food was great, and the company was perfect. Its been six days since I've been home (WOOT) and the jet lag hit me like a big yellow school bus (excuse the irrelevant Mean Girls reference). A day out with my main girl was exactly what I needed. Being abroad for 9 months, we've seen so many new urban-esque, cool cafés with really nice food presentation through social medias that are, well, Instagram-able, VSCOCAM-mable, Pinterest-able, etc etc. Naturally, we wanted to try them out for ourselves and so we did.
Today, we went to the Antipodean Café on Jalan Telawi, Bangsar. I'm pretty sure this one has been around for quite some time, but we just wanted to try out something new to us, at least. 

Dessert afterwards was also unbelievably deadly, especially the deep dark chocolate and gula melaka ice cream from the Artisan Café. I could feel the calories making its way happily to my thighs, but what the heck.

Zati and I, happy faces happy days (Y)

QUEEN OF TARTS

Beautiful day today! Its so sunny and perfect and a lot less windy! (major plus especially when you're living in Ireland). But of course, being the lazy bum that I always am, I decided to stay in with my toast and marmite, and my new favourite flamingo socks, and just..blog.

So yesterday was massive cheat day. Well not exactly for 'jaga badan' diet, but rather for 'jaga muka'.   Ever since my transition to Dublin, I've been having the absolute worst breakouts and it has really taken its toll on me. I mean, I've never had bad breakouts in my life, not even during my teenage years. Of course there were the usual 'that time of the month' kind of breakouts then, but now its just.. depressing. So Nadia and I came up with a set of rules we'll have to abide to for a month in hopes of seeing at least some form of improvement. They're basically the Dos and Don'ts for acne prone skin, from basics such as 8 glasses of water per day right up to changing pillow cases every week. Whoever breaks any of the rules 3 times, will owe the other a lipstick. Well, guys, its only been a couple of weeks and.. well.. we both owe each other a lipstick.

Back to my cheat day, one of the rules was to not take any fried foods and chocolates (of any form. sad I know). I went out for lunch with Fasiha yesterday and we had this popiah-like dish but with crab meat instead of 'taugeh'. So she calls it the Irish Popiah. It was sooooooo good!


Then we watched Need for Speed (3D)! Not a bad movie, honestly. But I wouldn't choose it over the Fast and Furious franchise. obviously
The both of us were still feeling so hungry, so we went to the famous Queen of Tarts café on Dame Street to have some cakes! And it was heavenly..
 

They even had chocolate scones!! I obviously wasn't supposed to have any, but for future reference, who knows, when it may be a matter of life and death. haha! Till then, xx

THE QUEEN

From listening to Destiny Child's Charlies Angels on those 90s mix CDs my parents played in the car, to singing along to their song on Disney Channel's Proud Family, to giggling to her Naughty Girl music video when I was 10, to our very own Beyoncé Night in college and now, finally to an actual concert where I got to see with my very own eyes, this amazing, flawless woman herself. And I kid you not, she was literally flawless. From her beautifully tanned smooth skin to her unbelievably long toned legs. It was a dream come true and I just could not believe I was actually. there.

The show opened with Run the World (Girls) and we shrieked like seagulls and I legit cried. The stage lights, Beyoncé's video montages throughout the show (with baby Blue Ivy too!), the unbelievably amazing dancers (personal favourite being Les Twins from France hehe), and the fact that all the musicians were ladies, just made the show even more out of this world than it already is with her alone. Seriously, I still hyperventilate from time to time just thinking about it. Major fangirl. Guilty. Sorry not sorry.

OH and one of my favourite moments of the show would have to be towards the end of it when suddenly the whole arena blacked out. And we could see nothing but this really (annoying at first) but strong beam of light shining towards the audience. And there she was, singing Dolly Parton's I will Always Love You. We could only see the silhouette of her body and let me tell you this, she sounded perfect. It was absolutely amazing, breathtaking, unbelievable.
Bless the show, bless the Queen B. Seriously, thank you for being a big part of my life growing up and I'm pretty sure till I grow old. I'll be singing Flawless in my death bed fo sho x)

XO

LAZY FRIDAY

A rather frequently asked question. What do you do in your spare time? Asked in IELTS testing, job interviews, orientation week in school,and even when you're getting to know a stranger on the internet. And through my 2 minutes of research and study, I have concluded the ever repetitive answers:
1. Surfing the internet
2. Read my favourite novels
3. Watch TV
4. Keep up with the Kardashians
5. Catch up with my favourite TV Shows
6. Play an instrument
7. Draw

 Its somewhat an annoying and depressing question to me. It sets the benchmark real high because looking at others, you are expected (by yourself) to actually have an activity to do when you have a few hours to spare. 
I don't know about you, having to find something to do is tiring for me. What if you'd rather sit in your room, and daydream and look at old photos for an hour or so. Or what if you just wanna drive around and waste time instead of picking up a book to read?

Well friends, here are some ideas I think would enlighten you. Ideas to me that are fun, yet beneficial (in some ways).

Make a Playlist
Compile all your favorite tunes, and name it lazy friday!
Burn fm 
Playlist
8tracks
Grooveshark
Jampri

Make an Outfit Plan
An idea I found from Claradevi's Lucedale. Its a really refreshing post you should definitely read. Definitely makes it easier for people who take hours to decide on what to wear (exhibit A, yours truly).When you basically have outfit plans in mind, its useful for future no-idea-what-to-wear you. :) Here's my take on Outfit Planning!

Spring Cleaning!

Well, this one's pretty standard. But the good thing is, you're sure to find the things you never knew you had (and still love) or, the things you'd want to donate or sell! Either way, you're doing good to yourself by being a wee bit more organised and PLUS, make room for new stuff too! *wink wink*

Bake Raya Cookies
I actually made my first batch of Raya cookies last night. They're dark chocolate cookies with white chocolate chips. Unfortunately, they were too moist, not cookie-material :( Oh well, I'm gonna attempt a 2nd batch tonight. Wish me luck!


So that's all for now. Have an awesome Ramadhan!

YOU ARE MY SUNSHINE

So I told my mom that my last post was about Phuket and that I'm still eighteen 'on my blog'.
"Malas is clearly an understatement for your case, girl"

Well, since I practically have nothing on my plate at the moment, I vow to at least attempt to be a little less lazy with updating my blog. This time I'm serious. My blogshop will be edited to neaten things up, and I shall prove to myself (atleast) that malas is infact NOT an understatement for me. For those sweet sugar honey pumpkin pies who asked on whether, Ill be continuing the blog, yes I will. But quite frankly, Ill need time to source for better materials to sell in order to branch out instead of sticking to preloved clothes. Don't get me wrong, that was my intention at first, but the online clothing market is getting ultra competitive, so I'll need to do a lil better than simply sellling preloved sun dresses and tops to at least be noticed. Especially when online shoppers are resorting to Instagram instead of Blogger.

Without going into my hormonal rage against shopping on instagram, i mentioned having an empty plate earlier.By empty plates, I mean no more A Levels (yes, I graduated!), no more chemistry tests to study for on weekends for now, at least, and no more fixed regimes! I am beyond ecstatic about finally finishing my studies in KYUEM, however the morning of graduation, prom, and our last End of Semester Dinner, were all bittersweet moments. Let me just state here that an attempt to stay awake through General Studies would be relatively easier than trying to hold in my tears through the last week in college. To all my friends and those dearest to me, blood may be thicker than water, but friendship is thicker than both. And in 15 years' time or so, if I dont get wedding invitation cards from any of y'all, I'll be there. In black.

No bunch of people in the world would be able to replace the friends i made in KY. They're just the right mixture of beauty and intelligence, the funniest and goofiest group of people, and the greatest of friends who'd tie you to a light pole and bash you with buckets of rotten food (and nestum). Let me tell you, it takes work to actually preserve rotten food. The will power to withstand the smell for days even weeks,can only be found in true friendship k.

I love you guys more than life itself and I am eternally grateful to Allah for giving me the chance to have known all of you, even in this short yet biggest phase of my life. Alhamdulillah.



To Nadia, Alysha, Amal, Sarah, Zati, Fatin, Anusha, Syazana, Syaza, Syifa, Aira, Mel, Diyana, Nani, Dee, Kaveetha, Karish, Sonia, Aqie, Anis, Pana, Fa in, Sherry, Azam, Kanda, Olan, Tariq, Ariff, Zak, Hakim, Iman, Aidil, Ah Chong, Bob, Julian, Hatim, Farhan, Izmal, this one's for you.