Playing Ichiban Kuji with Japan Award: Plushies Galore!

Hello & Happy Sunday, guys! Apologies that my post is super late and that I randomly took a week off, but last week was filled with hard work in the garden, mostly lots of clearing and loading old junk into a skip. I was too exhausted to function afterwards and it took me a good few days to recover, but most of the pesky garden stuff is out of the way for now. I also had more clearing of stuff inside to do, since we finally had the opportunity to throw things out with hiring the skip. Woo! Adulting sucks... :D I have also come down with a cold, which isn't helping! Currently, my concentration levels are almost non-existent. Oh well, nevermind. At least a post is here now! 

It's been too long since I last blogged about one of my favourite YouTube channels, Japan Award. This fantastic channel is dedicated to Japanese nerd life: ichiban kuji, arcade games & toys! Some of the things that make my kawaii little heart super happy :) 

I've shared all about playing kuji through Japan Award before; click here if you'd like to read my previous posts ♥ However, it's been quite a while since then and I've played lots! A few of my friends have told me they'd be interested in reading all about the adorable plushies I have gathered, and so being the ever-eager-to-please person I am... I'm delivering, haha. Enjoy!

I usually start off my Japan Award posts by giving an introduction to the fabulous game that is ichiban kuji, so I guess that's what I should do now! Ichiban kuji, mostly referred to as simply kuji, is Japanese for 'number one lottery'. It's an activity that involves buying tickets to win prizes :) Something that I absolutely adore about kuji is that you always win, so it's not like those ticketed fairground games you guys might remember playing during your childhood, where most of the time, you walk away after spending far too much money trying to pull a ticket ending in a 0 or a 5, with no prize to show for it! 

As I said, each and every ichiban kuji ticket coincides with a prize, all of which are usually brilliant because they are themed, and you wouldn't be playing that particular lottery if you weren't interested in the fandom/theme itself anyway!  The aim of the game is to pull one of the top prizes, which are typically A, B & C. There are fewer of these tickets up for grabs, and obviously more of the lower letters, i.e. F prize. Most people I know actually want to win some of the lower prizes, and so you can play the game however it suits you. For example, I am a huge fan of charms/keychains. These are usually in E, F or G categories and often come in blind box form. If you've been reading my blog for a while now, you'll know that I LOVE blind boxes!! 

Anyway, most of the time, A prizes, and even sometimes B & C, are big plushies that are exclusive to the kuji and thus are highly sought after. I see a lot of them ending up on eBay being sold for ridiculously high prizes >.< ugh. It's really not fair when you are normally looking at only £7-£15 per ticket. It really does feel epic to win a massive limited edition plush for like £8, one that would easily cost you £30+ from kawaii supplies in the UK!

I hope I explained that well enough :) I tend to go off on a tangent when I'm excited! I still can't believe I won these plushies though!! Despite having pretty much ran out of space to store and/or display them, I couldn't be happier to have them in my collection! The quality is always superb, as well. But, it's about time you guys saw them for yourselves.... 

LOOK! It's everyone's favourite round pink boy, Kirby! This is the first A prize I ever won, so I had to show him off first. He was a part of the Banpresto KIRBY STYLE Relax ichiban kuji. Almost all kujis are hosted by the company Banpresto, which you might of heard of already if you're a fan of anime figures. I won him back in November 2018, but didn't receive him until early 2019 as Japan Award always lets me start a box that I can fill with kawaii goodies over time, until it's full and ready to be shipped. It's amazing :) 

I was over the moon when I won this adorable guy! Because throughout my life, I'd never seemed to have much luck when it came to winning prizes and whatnot. Since then, the magic of Kirby seems to have unlocked my winning streak! And thus, I've got a bunch of top prizes to show you all. 

I love the texture of this huge Kirby plushie; it makes him so fuzzy to snuggle! The design is so sweet. I mean, look at those rosy cheeks!! I've always loved Kirby's big feet/shoes, so naturally that's one of the best features for me. They are usually bright red, but I really like the more muted salmon shade that they've chosen for the design of this plush. I like the overall colour scheme in general, as I'm used to Kirby being super bright pink. It's a nice change to see him in pastel. 

His vibrant blue eyes are precious. They are very 'puppy eyes', wouldn't you agree? And his hat is lovely, especially with the pom-pom on top. Are you a fan of round pink boy? What do you think of this plush? 

It's Tokage!!! My favourite Sumikko Gurashi character ever! Oh my gosh, I am soooo delighted that I have a plushie of him now. And how amazing that it's so big and squishy and special!! *imagine squealing here*. Tokage is the word for lizard in Japanese and if you didn't know already, lizards (and reptiles in general) are my favourite - herpetology is my jam :)

The story behind this character is too cute: 'Tokage is actually the last of the dinosaurs. It pretends to be a lizard to avoid being caught'. Awww! I can't help but love him the most out of all the other Sumikko Gurashi characters. I very much love the sky blue colour of this character, and it matches so well with the green 'clover' crown. Green is my all-time favourite colour, and blue sky follows that, so the colour scheme is perfect for me! 

This particular kuji was called 'I Met Brother Neko'. Neko is another character in the franchise by San-x. The A Prize was a plush of Neko himself and as you can see, B prize was the lovely Tokage. I played this kuji back in February 2019. Japan Award actually bought out an entire set of ichiban kuji because it was in very popular demand with viewers. He did a live stream on YouTube, pulling our names at random and getting his adorable daughter, Vivi-chan, to open tickets for us ♥ It was super fun to watch! 

My name was pulled last in the draw, which is fantastic!! This is because all ichiban kujis have a 'last prize', meaning there's a special prize just for the person who purchases the last remaining ticket available. You get two prizes for the price of one! It's such a lovely gesture for Banpresto and the other companies involved to offer this, because kuji is amazing so people would play regardless of this, which makes the last prize like a huge thankyou for your patronage gift, and I won it! Eeeee!!

And so, I got another massive, huggable plushie, this time of Shirokuma, a polar bear who dislikes the cold weather, haha! Isn't she the sweetest? I absolutely adore the flower crown she's holding. It's so bright and eye-catching, since it stands out against Shirokuma's white 'fur'. Her little pastel pink ears are super cute, too! Do you prefer this plush or the Tokage one? 

Now it's Eevee's turn :) I won the adorable plushie, that you can see in the first photo on today's post, playing the kuji 'Eievui & Melodies'. Eievui is the Japanese name for the Pokemon Eevee. This was such a gorgeous kuji for a Pokemon fan like me! Vaporeon happens to be my favourite Pokemon so I couldn't have been more thrilled when I saw that the kuji was themed on Eevee and all of its eeveelutions. I was delighted at the prospect of winning some Vaporeon goodies! 

And I did just that! I got a blind box charm of Vaporeon, plus a towel featuring it, along with lots of other wonderful prizes! It was an spectacular kuji and I still cannot get over the fact that I actually won the B prize. Let's take a closer look at it! 

If you hadn't guessed from the name, this kuji was music-themed. All of the keychain charms, for example, featured each Eeveelution with a different instrument. Vaporeon had a harp, and I also won an Eevee & Umbreon. Umbreon was standing on a keyboard and Eevee had a background of music notes. I actually won a duplicate Vaporeon, but luckily, I had a friend who also played and she wanted to trade her duplicate Leafeon charm for my Vaporeon. Leafeon is my second favourite of the Eeveelutions, and he came alongside a violin. How pretty they are all! If you guys are interested in seeing my charms, let me know and I can share a photo over on my instagram. 

Anyway, the B prize features a sleeping Eevee on a piano. What's not to love about this design!? I've always wanted one of the sleepy Eeveelution plushies that are sold at the Pokemon Centre stores, and now I have one... and it's so much more cool because mine's also a cushion. The cushion is made of a smooth, satin-like material which isn't something I'd enjoy resting my head against, but it's lovely for displaying nonetheless. The Eevee plush itself is very soft, and I kind of wish that he was detachable. But I'm still happy with winning him. The A Prize was an Eevee plush dressed in a bow-tie, fashioned to look like a orchestral composer! Super cute :) 

I also have a couple of smaller plushies to show you all. I won them playing two of the Sanrio ichiban kujis, 'Sanrio Characters All Stars' and 'Sanrio White Winter'. When it comes to Sanrio kujis, the prizes are categorised using numbers VS letters, and instead of having various colour and style options available for specific prizes, such as E prize being a towel, where the winner will get one of four different designs, with Sanrio kujis, each individual variation will be lettered. That was tough to explain in a sentence... I hope it made sense :D This means that there ends up being 50+ prizes available and it can get confusing. 

One of the tickets that Japan Award pulled for me whilst playing the Sanrio Characters All Stars kuji was a 5, which won me a plush puppet of Pochacco. It's really sweet and I used to love these kinds of puppet plushies when I was a kid. However, Pochacco is one of my least favourite Sanrio characters and I would have preferred to win one of the other puppets available: Cinnamoroll, Hello Kitty or Keroppi. I'll probably end up giving this prize to my niece when she's a little older, so it's still an awesome win :) Who's your favourite Sanrio character, by the way? Mine are Pompompurin, Corocorokuririn and Kiki of the Little Twin Stars. 

Speaking of Kiki! This is him; the blue-haired boy twin from the Little Twin Stars franchise. He has a sister called Lala who has pink hair, and they are the loveliest pair of pastel buddies ever! I have never seen something Little Twin Stars themed that I didn't love! These cuties have a story behind them, that they were born on a star inside a dream cloud and that they travelled to Earth so that they could learn to be the shiniest, greatest stars they could be. Cannot get more adorable than that, right? I love stars and anything starry-patterned, so along with the pastel colours, I think that's what drew me to these characters as a teenager. 

You can imagine how happy I was when I discovered I had won Prize 2, of which you could get either Kiki or Lala, and thankfully I got Kiki! The quality of this plush is so fantastic. The fabric used is so smooth and the attention to detail on his outfit is marvellous. I love the ribbon bow with pom-poms under his chin. And the star on his back, of course! 

The final plushie that I'm including in today's post wasn't one that I won playing kuji. But as I mentioned before, Japan Award also shares videos featuring the wonder that is Japanese arcades. They look incredible & the prizes you can win there compare to nowhere else in the world! Before the corona virus came along, Japan Award would often visit arcades to pick up certain toys for his customers and share videos over on Instagram stories. I spotted the most adorable Amuse plush ever whilst watching Japan Award's stories and I had a mighty need!! 

I collect Amuse plushies and I have several now. Each time I go to Comic Con, I can't come home without something by Amuse, as they make the most fabulous plushies ever! I once blogged about my collection, which has grown quite a bit since then but click here if you would like to have a look at some of my other Amuse plushies :) I asked Japan Award to try to win me a super cute pink hippo plush!! I've only ever seen probably two hippopotamus plushies in my life until seeing this one, and none of them were nearly as precious as this one! It reminds me of a Moomin!! 

If you also loved the show The Moomins growing up, you will understand how much this resembles one and I couldn't not get it because it's massive and so soft and perfect and squidgy and he is now the best plush in my entire Amuse collection (sorry Alpacasso's!). I don't remember how much Japan Award won it for now because so much has happened in my life since then, but it was a fantastic price for such an amazing plush and nowhere near the price you'd be looking at for a Japanese plush of this size here. My photo doesn't really show how big it is either, but its head hangs off the top of my square unit! I am very impressed with this plush and his name is Smushy-Smush, if you guys wanted to know :D 

The labels for Japanese products are like no other! They are always so cute and colourful and enticing for a kawaii lover like myself! I am super thankful that I stumbled upon Japan Award's channel in my suggestions one day. They're so brilliant and I am very happy that I'm now able to get so much gorgeous Japanese merchandise :) Thankyou for always being so lovely to talk to and for searching for things I want; you're awesome, Japan Award!! Definitely go and give their channel a follow, and don't forget to check out their instagram, too. I can't recommend them enough! 

I really hope you guys enjoyed reading all about my ichiban kuji haul/entire collection of plushies won via Japan Award. I had a lot of fun writing all about them and showing you guys the cuteness overload! I guess that's a positive to me not blogging as often this year... you get to see a load of cute things all at once :) Please let me know if you'd like to see similar posts in the future, because they are my favourite to do. I hope you've all had a great weekend, and wishing you a fantastic week to come. It will be my birthday week!! 

Thankyou for reading!

♥

Have you ever played ichiban kuji? Or purchased some of the prizes online afterwards?

Do you have a favourite Japanese franchise/character? 

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Custom Animal Crossing Portrait by Aries Arts

Hi guys! I hope each of your days' have been as awesome as you are ♥ The weather has been glorious (albeit far too humid) here in my corner of Lancashire, so I did some butterfly photography, a spot of reading in the shade, and nice weather meant garden work... so that was not so fun, haha! But it will be worth it when everything is done! Anyhow, you're not here to read me ramble on about the maintenance of my garden... you are here because you're one of my fabulous regular readers, or because you stumbled upon something Animal Crossing related and just had to click it! Either way, I hope you enjoy reading my post :) 

Back in mid-August, I entered a giveaway hosted by Aries Arts over on instagram, who had the loveliest pieces posted on their account! It was such a delightful surprise when I discovered I'd actually won!! Elizabeth, the artist behind Aries Arts, very kindly offered the choice of any one item from her store, as the giveaway was held in celebration for the opening of her Etsy, which you should all go and check out! There's something for everybody- nature, fantasy, cats and of course, a touch of nerdiness. 

Today's post is going to be one for gamers and those of you who are fellow lovers of all things kawaii, because after a struggle (seriously, there is so much pretty art on Aries Arts Etsy store, that it was a challenge to select just one thing!),  I opted for my very own Animal Crossing villager commission. It was so wonderful of Elizabeth to include this in the prize options, too. And I am super excited to show you all what she created for me!

Before that though, I wanted to show you guys this super sweet personalised note from Elizabeth. You're very kind! How pretty is that logo artwork, as well!? Not only does it feature a cat (which makes anything better, in my opinion), but check out those funky star earrings! The vibrancy of the colours is amazing and seeing this when I first opened my package made me even more excited to get a look at my prize! JUST LOOK AT IT...

Wow!! I honestly don't know how to describe how much I adore Elizabeth's creation! It's so stunning, right!!? Everything is perfect and I am over the moon with it. Thankyou so much Elizabeth for bringing to life exactly what I wanted and then some. You're super talented! 

So, when designing this beautiful commission, Elizabeth asked me to send over a photo of my Animal Crossing villager for a reference. However, unfortunately T_T, I am yet to play the latest game, New Horizons, as I don't own a Nintendo Switch. Some day! I have been a fan of the franchise since my teens though, from the days when Animal Crossing: Wild World was my favourite game to play on my Nintendo DS Lite. When I saw how amazing the character building was on the new game, it made me super jealous that I couldn't be playing along and putting together my dream AC persona. BUT, my wish has finally been granted and I've been able to create myself in AC villager form, with the help of Aries Art. She's a lot cuter than I am in real life, but let's pretend I look like that. Okay? :D 

As Elizabeth didn't have a visual reference to work off, she asked me questions about what I specifically had in mind. The clothing, the hair, the background, any additional items or detailing I wanted, were all covered. I also sent a couple of photos of some Animal Crossing hairstyles that resembled my own, but the rest she designed herself. And oh my gosh, what a purrrfect job she has done! (I can't help myself XD).

I asked for a black and white gingham dress with puffy sleeves, a sky blue background and some flowers. I was then asked what my favourite kinds were and after I'd answered with sweet peas and bluebells, Elizabeth opted for the sweet peas which I'm so happy about! I see a lot of artwork featuring bluebells, but barely any at all when it comes to sweet peas. Elizabeth's are so gorgeous, especially due to the ombre colouration on the petals. What a brilliant touch! The same goes for the colour of my characters hair, just so pretty! 

Another detail that I absolutely adore are my snakebites/lip piercings! Don't you think they look so adorable??! This wasn't something I asked for until last minute as I wasn't sure if they would look nice on an AC style face. I'm really glad now that I asked; Elizabeth was so sweet and offered to have a go and delete them if I didn't like how my character looked with them. But I adored them on my villager, so it was the best decision! What do you think about this feature?

I very much adore the cat ears that Elizabeth added for me. They are so cute!! Wouldn't you agree? As well as the dress! I wanted something very cottage-core-esque, whilst still emulating my alternative fashion sense. With the pretty dress Elizabeth designed, she's the cutest little sweet-pea lovin' goth girl in town... (or island). The sky blue background makes her stand out even more, which I really like!

I decided to go for a hairstyle that wouldn't distract away from the rest of the villager, if that makes sense. I mostly wear my hair down or in a high ponytail, and it's very long. I just didn't think these styles would suit... I was 'worried' they would take over the entire look. So, I decided to get a style as close to the hairstyle I had throughout my high school years and some of college :) I was known as Sarah with the plait, the plait that my friends couldn't seem to resist spinning around above my head like a helicopter, or using as a moustache. Fun times :D But these are all fond memories from a time that was pretty damn dark for me, with regards to my mental health, so it's nice to highlight the good stuff and each time I look at my new AC commission, I can reminisce. 

Overall, I am very impressed with the artwork that Elizabeth painted for me. The colours are beautiful, the paper has a lovely textured feel to it (the artwork is printed onto 312gsm Smooth Fine Art Production Paper), that reminds me of fancy cards in those little celebratory gift shops. Is that very specific or can you picture what I mean? Haha! Obviously, the icing on top of the cake is the outstanding attention to detail that has gone into the villager herself! There's nothing that I don't love or would change, which is fantastic! 

I'm sure you are all eager to get one of the custom Animal Crossing portraits for yourselves, or buy your loved ones their own for Christmas, etc., and so I thought I would let you know the prices and such. You can get a digital character commission for just £12.99, a physical print that will be mailed out to you for £14.99 (this option is only available to UK buyers, at the moment, as is the next...), and for just £24.99, you can get both. It's free shipping, too! What an amazing price!!

Before I finish up today's post, I just wanted to say a massive thankyou to Elizabeth for, first of all, hosting this excellent giveaway and also for creating something so wonderful for me! You were very easy to talk to, which is a big deal for someone who struggles with social anxiety disorder like myself. I really appreciate how lovely you were and how accommodating you were, too, making all the  little changes here and there that I asked for. You're super awesome!! 

Don't forget to go support Aries Arts by giving them a follow over on their instagram, as well as their facebook page. We need to show as much support as possible to small businesses and independent artists right now! If you want to buy yourself something from Elizabeth's Etsy store, I found a discount code for 10% off when you get two items or more. Use 10FOR2 at checkout :) So, that was my giveaway prize from the marvellous Aries Arts! I couldn't be happier with it, and I have really enjoyed telling you guys all about it. Wishing you an awesome week ahead! 

Thankyou for reading! 

♥

Are you a fan of Animal Crossing?

What's your favourite thing about your character/villager?  

Also, which is the best kind of fruit tree? 

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My Favourite Video Games As A Kid

Hello Everyone! Today has been a slow albeit lovely day in the end for me :) I don't know if you guys care/are fellow nature lovers, but I had my first ever encounter with a Silver Y (Autographa gamma) moth, a daytime species that I've always wanted to see! It visited my buddleia bush, with its last remaining blossom, and even landed on my hands!! It made my day, if not my entire summer! I might sound like a dork for getting all excited over a moth, but... well, my long-term readers will know by now that I am one :D Anyway, what was the highlight of your day?

Did you know that it's National Video Game Day? So in celebration, I thought why not do a themed post? I recently stumbled upon a load of my old PlayStation games and so I decided today's post would be dedicated to my favourite games as a kid. Enjoy! 

I was always a PlayStation kid. It was my very first console and as such, it holds a special place in my heart. I must have been around seven or eight years old, when Santa Claus delivered me a PS1 for Christmas; it was one of the tiny models, if anyone remembers those? Along with my uncle's old TV. Gosh, that thing had seen better days (an understatement)! I actually had to bang it sometimes to get the screen to stop filling up with black lines- oh growing up 'poor' in the 90's- what fun times! But much appreciated nonetheless, as I felt so grown up having my own TV and console in my bedroom and had to pretty much be pried off it at bedtime, haha! My love for PlayStation has stuck with me, and after owning an Xbox 360 in college, I very much decided PlayStation's were the better consoles- sorry not sorry, Xbox fans! I'd love to hear which of the two you all prefer :)

But, what were my favourite games? 

Klonoa 2: Lunatea's Veil

Whenever I mention this wonderful game, no-one seems to have played it! Have you?? It was so good! I first met little Klonoa, the Dream Traveller who looks like a lop-eared bunny, on a demo. It featured the original 1997 game- Klonoa: Door to Phantomile, and I just fell in love with it! I grew up playing a lot of games in their demo versions, as my parents couldn't afford to buy me new games all the time. As an adult, I understand that and I am so thankful they saved up to get me my PS1 and PS2 consoles, however for little me, it sucked that I never got to play past the first few levels of games! I pestered my mom for the full Klonoa game so often, and being the most amazing mom that she was, she searched for it everywhere she could but didn't manage to get it. What she did come across though was the sequel for PlayStation 2, and thus, when I was around 10 I was reunited with Klonoa and his fantastical adventures! 

I have been a fan of Japanese animation for as long as I can remember. I've always been drawn to it, so it's no wonder that as soon as I set eyes on Klonoa, I adored it! It was produced/created by Namco and the sequel was released by Sony throughout Europe and the US in 2001. The graphics, the storyline, the gameplay, the soundtrack- everything, is so beautiful! I am so glad that I still have my original copy :) 

Tomba! 

Again, as a child, I only ever played the demo version of this 1998 game. It was first released in Japan by Whoopee Camp (another Japanese game, of course!) and then a year later by Sony. In the game, you play as a caveman-esque little boy with spiky pink hair. I was immediately wowed by this feature as it reminded me of the iconic Saiyan hairstyle from Dragon Ball Z, my one true love at that time in my life :D Tomba is on a mission to find a precious bracelet that is stolen from his grandfather by the antagonists of the story, the 'Evil Koma Pigs'. Tomba must venture through a world that has been taken over by these pigs, who have used their powers to destroy the land, wreck havoc and set obstacles in the way of the hero's journey! 

I loved the mix of prehistoric scenes and creatures from Tomba's homeland, and the fantasy-based elements of the rest of the quest. There's also these adorable little leaf butterflies in the game that I wished were real, AND a puppy you've got to rescue!! What's not to love!? I didn't get to play this game properly until I was at university, when my flatmate let me buy it on his PS3 and oh my god, it was a delight to relive the nostalgia and then some! I'm hoping to come across the game for a reasonable price some day. 

Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped 

This is one of the first games I remember asking for as a Christmas present. I played it a little at a friend's house when I was eight and I had to have it. I'm not gonna lie, it was the medieval level and the frogs that sold me... I mean, huge frogs though!? And I've forever been a history-obsessed human, so I was over the moon with this element of the game! Crash Bandicoot is one of those classics that is so well-known that I don't really need to describe it, but just in case... Crash is a bandicoot, obviously, that escaped from an evil doctors laboratory after an disastrous experiment and then fights, along with his friends, to stop Dr Neo Cortex from taking over the world. In Crash Bandicoot 3, the Dr teams up with Uka Uka, a vengeful spirit, to hunt for some magical crystals that are hidden throughout time and space. Crash must stop them from completing their evil mission. It's seriously such an engaging game, full of action and the different levels are so creative. Everyone should play at least one of the Crash Bandicoot's in their lifetime! Who has a favourite in the series? I loved Wrath of Cortex for PS2, as well.

Sonic Heroes 

Twelve year old me was very eager to get her hands on this game. I grew up listening to one of my brothers always going on about Sonic the Hedgehog, which he was a big fan as a kid in the 80's. I had already decided Knuckles the echidna was the best character years before I ever played a Sonic game! And he still is to this day :) Anyone who's ever played Sonic Heroes will know much of an awesome game it was. That theme song is catchy af! (And now it's going to be in my head for days, oops!). 

Sonic and his buddies aim to defeat Doctor Eggman as always; this time, by collecting the 'chaos emeralds' before he does. I don't know what else to say about this Sega game, other than it was heaps of fun to play, very action-packed, and the storyline was great. I know there's a lot of people that didn't rate the game, but I love it, so yeah :D 

Puchi Carat

Okay, so this might seem like a very random choice to my gamer readers, because there were so many other brilliant games in the 90's and early 2000's, but I fell in love with this game for the characters and storyline alone. It is a Japanese arcade game produced by Taito in '97, and was one that my mom found whilst out shopping and surprised me with ♥ Those graphics are just wonderful... so much detail has been put into a very simplistic arcade game! I was a fan of anime from around six years old, so I couldn't not adore the characters of this game. I had just started to have an interest in crystals and birthstones, things surrounding magic and the like, and the characters were based after just that! There's one for every month, designed to represent that birthstone. To this day, I have memorised those gems thanks to Puchi Carat! 

Paz, the villain of the game, the character for November's birthstone Topaz, made me think of Kagato, the bad guy in the anime series, Tenchi Muyo! Another thing that I was obsessed with at that age :) I even named my pet Mongolian Gerbils, Ryoko and Sapphire, after my favourite Tenchi Muyo! character and my childhood best friend's favourite character from my Puchi Carat game. Once a nerd, always a nerd, right? 

Anyway, the quest of the game is to try and help the characters collect the 12 gems, so they can have their wishes granted or something like that. You battle against other characters via the arcade game, which is a basic retro classic that I can't remember the original name of now. Nevermind! Its a game that is weirdly relaxing to play even though it gets more challenging as the game progresses. It certainly helps with concentration skills! This is a long shot, but did any of you guys ever play this game? 

Well, those were my all-time favourite games when I was growing up, but here's a few honourable mentions. Disney's Tarzan was up there, and was so close to making the list! The movie is one of my favourites, and through the gameplay, you unlock little video clips from it. You get to listen to the gorgeous soundtrack by Phil Collins, and it's just excellent to be able to pretend you are living in the jungle and swinging from vine-to-vine. Not so much running from those terrifying baboons! Some of my go-to games when I wanted to wind down or when I was having a particularly unmotivated day, were Tony Hawk's Pro Skater & Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (which had an ace selection of music on their car radio channels!). I couldn't end this post without also including Rayman, which is a marvellous game, and Spyro, which I unfortunately only ever had demos of. Regardless, I thought that little dragon was so cute, more so Sparx the dragonfly :), and I enjoyed harassing those frog characters, haha!  I better stop typing now or we'll be here all night! 

Thankyou for reading! 

♥

What were your favourite games when you were a kid?

Did you grow up on demos like I did? 

Do you remember the first game you got?

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I'm Obsessed with Colouring Books

Hey lovelies! I hope you're all having a marvellous start to the week :) Do you have any nice plans? I'd love to hear all about them! Today's post, as you've probably gathered from the title, is all about colouring books, and my current favourites that I've been using throughout these times with Miss 'Rona (I watched a lot of YouTube so this name for the virus has stuck!). I was inspired to do this post thanks to National Colouring Book Day, which is on the 2nd August, however as some of you guys will know, that month is a very triggering time for me, and so this post is a month late. But who cares!? My blog, my rules :D And I hope you'll all enjoy reading it just as much now as you would then! 

I have forever been a fan of colouring books, since being a small kid. Of course, most children are, but my love for them never went away. Thus I'm almost twenty-eight years old and still derive joy from colouring in. Who can relate? You can probably imagine my delight several years ago when the market for adult colouring book was booming. I mean, there's always been books available to colour in, but it was wonderful to have ones catered to grown-up's (even if, like me, you don't always feel like one!) in practically every store! 

As a result of the popularity of these adult versions of colouring books, which I believe were and continue to be so well loved because many grown up's feel childish for enjoying colouring, or for doing anything that is bright and happy and has an air of whimsical fun to it, apparently... And these books being sold specifically for them made it feel more socially acceptable. If you're someone who feels this way about anything, I want you to know that it's okay to enjoy things! 

My bedroom looks like a child's room with literal children's wallpaper and plushies everywhere you look, but life is too short and often miserable, or stressful or filled with boring adulting stuff, to not appreciate or partake in something that makes your heart happy, or your inner child. But there's really no such thing! Your childhood experiences, your interests from back then, your likes and dislikes, makes up a lot of who you became as a person, and it's fantastic when you let yourself embrace those things. So, you like colouring? Own that! I don't care what people think of my interests. If I want a giant fluffy alpaca plushie in a sailor's hat for my birthday, then that's what I want! And there ain't no-one who can make me feel bad about it :D

Apologies, guys; I seem to have gone off on a tangent! But the original point I was trying to make was that adult colouring books make so many of my fellow grown humans feel better about enjoying colouring, and if that encourages more people to do it then I'm all for it! Plus, its led to the creation of tonnes of really cool themed colouring books. There's seriously a book for everything and anything you can imagine- wanna colour in some serial killers? You can do that! How about trains? Yep, there's a book for that! And my favourites that have come out of this hype are sweary books :) Keep reading if you like these, too. 

Two of the colouring books I'll be talking about were very kindly purchased for me by my brilliant friends off of my Amazon wishlist! THANKYOU, GUYS!! And the other is one I picked up myself. I'd love to know which is your favourite! 

Look how adorable this witchy colouring book is!! It was the first that I received of the three I'm including in today's post, so I thought I would talk about it first :) I popped this lovely item onto my wishlist because a) I'm a big fan of all things witchcraft-related & b) because the illustrations are done in an anime style! As a lover of Japanese anime, this feature was probably the main reason I was drawn to this particular colouring book. And I was delighted to discover, upon flicking through the book when it arrived, that the company (Fritzen Publishing) have various themed colouring books designed in this style. There's a partition in the middle of the colouring book that lists other colouring books from Jade Summer, and also has two sample pages from other books. I now have a mighty need to start another collection! Can I ever be stopped!? 

One of my favourite things about this colouring book is how many different designs they are inside and how varied they are. There's 26 in total, and each of them is unique, featuring a witch or two doing completely different things. They are all such gorgeous illustrations, too!! I am just in love with the artwork! I want to put them up all over my wallpaper walls, to be honest :D 

I almost didn't want to start colouring them in because I thought my messy colouring would ruin them. Luckily for me, you get a double of every single picture!! When the book arrived, I was impressed by how thick it was, but I soon realised that there are the first set of illustrations, then the promo stuff I mentioned in the centre, followed by another set of the illustrations. I have both positive and negative opinions about this! It would have been amazing to have 52 unique designs to colouring in. But if I don't like my finished page, I can always do better on the extra sheet. Also, it would be ideal for parents with two children because you can cut out an identical page for both of them and not have to deal with them fighting over specific pages! I think it would be cute for couples to do together as well, because you can compare afterwards to see which colours you chose for certain parts of the illustration, etc.

How pretty is the first page of the Cute Witches colouring book!? It's the same design as on the cover and although my colouring in abilities don't do it justice, you can still see just how marvellous it is! The designs are very spacious, which is great for me who as I mentioned before is messy when it comes to colouring. I really do struggle to keep in the lines. Good old dyspraxia! 

Here's an example of one of the pages I've yet to colour in and as you can see, it's very different to the design of the first page. I'm delighted with the detail that has gone into the design of each illustration!! Another feature that I really like about this colouring book is how each illustration has its own page. You can see in my photo above that the backs of each page are just black in colour, which is superb as it means whatever you are using to colour with won't bleed through onto another design. This was always something that irritated me when I was a child, especially when I was trying to colour with felt-tip pens. I've not tried those in this colouring book yet though! 

You can find Cute Witches: An Adult Colouring Book for yourself here. It's available for only £4.99 which is amazing, considering the fact that it has 52 pages! The paper used is pretty good quality as well. I was a little surprised about this with the book only costing a fiver! All-in-all, I am super happy and I will definitely be getting more of Jade Summer's books in the future. Colouring in this book has not only been something to fill the time, but the designs have got my imagination going! I've found myself creating little tales and scenarios in my mind for the witch characters in the particular scene I'm working on. It's wonderful! A huge thanks to the lovely Estelle for getting this colouring book for me. She's a blogger, too, so definitely check out her blog as well as her YouTube channel :) 

I was certainly spoilt by my wonderful friends!! This colouring book was another that I added to my wishlist because if you've been reading my blog for a while now, you'll know that I love all things related to Japan: the language, the art, the history and culture, everything is fascinating! The design on the front of this book is so beautiful! And even though its available for only £1 more than the other book, the overall quality is better, including the cover which has a finish/texture to it that makes it seem like it would cost even more. 

I am a lover of surprises and so I was very much looking forward to find out what Japanese things would be featured inside this colouring book, and I was not disappointed. It looks as though lots of different artists were commissioned to put this colouring book together, as the style of the artwork differs from page-to-page. I like some more than others, but it keeps colouring in this book an interesting experience! 

As with the Cute Witches colouring book, the first page matches the design on the cover, so I've decided to show you a random page within the Japanese Colouring Book. I'm quite happy with the finished look of this page :) There are lots of beautiful scenes like this in the colouring book, so if nature and architecture are your thing, you'll enjoy it! It's relaxing to sit in the garden on a sunny day, colouring in outdoorsy scenes like the one above, whilst listening to the sounds of nature. 

This book has 32 illustrations in it, and no repeated designs, so it's a lot thinner than the other colouring book. And again, each is on its own individual page so you don't have to worry about the colours going through to 'ruin' another design. The blank backs of the pages in this book are white, which I prefer to the black. However, the paper feels a lot better quality in this book so I can understand why the Jade Summer book has backs that would hide most of the colours that might bleed through. 

Would it even be a Japanese themed book without at least one koi carp?? Spoiler: this books got many! I am lovin' the range in these colouring books though. It's been nice to turn to something new each time I open a page to start colouring. With the designs being so different in style, some are more intricate and have smaller sections to colour in, and this makes them more difficult, at least for someone like me. This is a feature of the book that I like because I can work on the tougher pages when I'm feeling in the mood for a challenge. Doing colouring that requires a lot of concentration makes me feel very focused, and I am often quite productive for the rest of the day after I have finished working on a page like that. 

The book is produced by a business called Creative Coloring Co, and you can purchase it on Amazon here. The final pages of the book have a few sample sheets from other books, and this is something I prefer. The samples being at the back I mean VS being in the middle, like with the first colouring book I mentioned. Thankyou so much to another fellow blogger friend of mine, Natalee, for surprising me with this colouring book from my wishlist :) Make sure to have a read of her blog, too! 

The final book that I wanted to show off to you all is the sweary one! It's made by Sugar & Sloth, a shop run by a fabulous artist called Anita, who makes the most adorable products! Just look at the cover of this colouring book and tell me that it doesn't immediately make you think 'AWW'! I am a subscriber of Sugar & Sloth's Tiny Party Club and receive monthly goodie boxes (they are so much fun!). And so I follow Anita's social media accounts, where I got to see the process of this spectacular adult colouring book coming to life! I even voted in the polls to determine whether the cover should be yellow or blue. I voted blue so I was so glad that it was the winner! I pre-ordered a 'Love Yourself, You Stupid Bitch' colouring book as soon as I could :) 

COLOURS GALORE!! I love love love the design of the inside of the cover! It's so eye-catching and vibrant and aesthetically-pleasing. What's not to love? There are so many adorable creatures on there, and it's excellent to be greeted by cuteness overload as soon as you open your colouring book! 

One of my favourite things about Sugar & Sloth's artwork are the bold outlines and how chunky the characters are! And this translates into the perfect colouring book style for me :) The design and the cute yet simplistic style of the illustrations mean that there's a large surface area to colour in, and that's why I can colour with less risk of going outside the lines, haha! 

I'm a huge fan of Anita's creations and the major reason for that is the contrast between the sweet little chubby animals and the captions that accompany them! As a adult who is fond of cursing as a form of expression, but who also likes to fill her life with all the kawaii things, this really appeals to 'both sides' of me. I am super happy to have a book full of them now, as each and every one of the illustrations in this colouring book makes me smile when I look at it! The book is titled as a self-care colouring book and its already doing a spectular job before I even get started with the actual filling-in of colour! 

The designs in The Sweary Self-Care Colouring book are very relatable for me. Anita, like myself, has anxiety and so a lot of her wording speaks to me on a personal level. It's kind of cathartic to see words that could pretty much have come from your own brain on paper in cutesy form. I don't know how to explain my feelings, but I hope that made some sort of sense, haha! 

This fantastical product is £12, which it is definitely worth considering how beautifully designed it is and the illustrations are printed onto super thick paper that feels closer to card. It's very unlikely that colours are going to bleed through that thickness, but I've not tested it with felts yet :D There are 36 illustrations to colour and they are very varied in design, so you won't get bored colouring in this book! The only element that I would change is that the pages are printed back-to-back. Because of the thickness of the paper used, I would love to display these around my room, but this means I won't get to see the illustrations that are on the backside of the paper and as the designs are all so nice, there are lots of pages where I would love to display both sides, but I'll obviously have to chose between the two! It will be challenge to decide, but this isn't something that has an impact on what the book is for? It's still wonderful to colour in! 

Thankyou Anita for putting together such an epic book filled with hilarious swear words, like cockwomble!!, and lots of lovely phrases of encouragement. Both help to brighten my day whenever I open up a random page :) You can get yourself one over on the Sugar & Sloth website. Go support an independent, small business during these trying times!

It may sound silly, but colouring really has been a big help for me over the last few months. I've found that on days when my mental health is bad and I can't find the motivation to complete the tasks written on my to-do-list, such as trying to blog or doing photography, I can open up a colouring book and get lost for a while. I can fight away the intrusive thoughts that pop up to tell me how much of a bad person I am for being unproductive! And this is because there is something so satisfying about finishing colouring in an illustration. You can admire your work and think 'I did that!', even though all you did was colour in someone else's artwork. It still feels like the artwork is partly your own creation, as you've bought it to life with colour :) I don't know about you guys, but it always makes me feel that little mood boost that comes with accomplishment. It's the little things, as they say! 

So colouring for me as been a form of self care, and I am so grateful to my friends for helping me more than they know (or at least, knew before reading it here!). I really hope that this has been an interesting read, despite the fact that my mind is all over the place today and I can't seem to stay focused on one topic at a time! Maybe I should go do some colouring?

Thankyou for reading!

♥

Are you a fan of colouring in?

If so, what's the best colouring book that you own? 

I'd love recommendations!

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PokoPins Haul | Review

Hello guys! It's almost the end of the first week of September and gosh, where did the last five days go!? I hope you all had a fantastic start to the month, and that your weekends are just as fantastic. If not, *big hugs*. Today, I have some gorgeous, super adorable things to show you and help brighten your day, hopefully! If you follow me over on Instagram, then the topic of this post has been long awaited for you. So, enjoy! And if this is your first time stumbling upon my little corner of the internet, welcome :) 

Back in May, I received my pin I'd purchased from PokoPins, and I posted 'unboxing' videos on my IG story where I discussed my initial thoughts. And you guys loved watching! I promised to blog all about it, but then something amazing happened :) The artist behind PokoPins watched my videos and loved them, too!! As a thankyou, Beth very kindly offered to send me a free pin with my next purchase from her store. How lovely is that!?! When I made my first order at the beginning of May, it was such a challenge to choose just one pin, but I had a budget to stick to. I planned to get myself another as soon as payday rolled around, so this gesture from Beth was so wonderful!! When payday finally arrived, I headed over to the PokoPins website and popped another of their stunning enamel pins into my shopping cart. Then I got to chose another!! 

Before I show off the latest additions to my ever-growing pin collection to you guys, I just wanted to say a huge thankyou to Beth!! It was so very kind of you! ♥. And now... let's look at these beauties! 

So, the very first pin that I got from the PokoPins Ghibli Beast Dangle Pin Collection was Moro. I HAD to have it as soon as I laid eyes on it, as I hardly ever see fanart/merch of this character. If you didn't already know, Moro is a character from the Studio Ghibli movie Princess Mononoke (1997), which is my absolute favourite movie by this phenomenal Japanese animation company! There are several reasons why I love it above all of their other brilliant movies, but the main one is the legendary/mythological creatures. Moro is one such creature; she's an ancient wolf god and she's epic. It's so fantastic that PokoPins included her in this collection, and even more so that she's been made cutesy! I love kawaii Moro, the cutest god of the wolves there ever was :D 

And just look at those charms! As a nature nerd, I fell in love with the pin after seeing those tiny leaves (as well as the bed of leaves Moro is sitting on), and I love that Beth incorporated Mononoke's mask into the design. It's so eye-catching and just makes the pin stand out even more. Of course, the gorgeous gold plating/outline helps. I've said this so many times, but I used to always prefer silver or darker plated metals when it came to pin badges, but I've been sold on the gold! The way it shines when it catches the sun on a nice day, almost illuminating the design. It's kind of magical! Wouldn't you agree? 

The second pin I purchased was of The Baron, who is a character from both Whisper of the Heart (1995) and The Cat Returns (2002). This dashing little feline gentleman who's full name is actually Baron Humbert von Gikkingen (what a name!) is a statue living in an antique shop, who comes to life at night-time. As soon as I discovered this fabulous character, I instantly adored him :) I have been a fan of anthropomorphic (humanised) cats since I was a small child, and the 1998 movie production of Cats the Musical is to blame. I was obsessed as a kid, still am now to be honest, and The Baron reminds me of a mashup of several characters from T.S. Elliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats. This book was the inspiration behind the world famous musical. 

I am super happy that I now own some artwork of The Baron; the pin design of this character by PokoPins is the best I've seen so far! And he's even more dapper in person; you could say he's purrrfect... I'll never tire of using that pun. Please don't hate me :D

How adorable are his little top-hat and bow tie!? He looks like he means business, especially with his stern facial expression. The gold-plating matches fabulously with The Baron's ginger coat, and I really like how subtle the touches of red and blue are to his outfit. The sparkles dotted about are so pretty as well, and his ears!! They are so pointy! His dangle charms are of Toto the crow, another enchanted statue from The Cat Returns. And it's super cool that Beth has chosen him for the charms, as he's a very underrepresented character when it comes to fanart. This is actually the only time I have seen him!

This incredibly sweet pin is the one Beth very kindly gifted* to me (this was not in exchange for a review or anything, just as a thankyou for my videos, which I appreciate so much! I have anxiety disorder and videos are tough for me to make, so it's a lovely reward!). Ponyo on a Cliff by the Sea is a 2008 Studio Ghibli movie, with a storyline that somewhat mirrors popular mermaid-to-human fantasies but with a twist. The star of the show is actually a goldfish who longs to be a human. She's magically transformed into one when her friendship with a little boy called Sosuke blossoms. It is such a cute and heart-warming tale, and Ponyo is a sweetheart. She is so captivated by the human world (instantly sings *Ariel, listen to me! The human world is a mess*. Uh oh, the Disney fan in me is trying to come out!), and it's such a joy to experience the journey of her first time on land alongside her. If you've seen the movie, the scene with the ramen!! If not, get it watched immediately! Heads up, if you're in the UK, it is on Netflix :) 

This pin though!! It's so bright and colourful and attention-grabbing. It's also quite bigger than the other two pins, so that makes it further stand out. I can't wait to wear it! It is marvellous that the design is of Ponyo jumping/running on top of the waves, and that her hair is flowering with the current. So adorable :) Her little happy facial expression makes me melt from the cuteness overload each time I look at it! 

The charms are super precious! The green bucket is the one that Sosuke carries his new friend around in. The boat is his toy that he's playing with in the ocean when he meets Ponyo for the first time. And the egg & pork is from that ramen scene I mentioned, so you can imagine how delighted I was when I saw this feature of the pin!! 

Guys, I need more of these Ghibli Beast Dangle pins in my life! There's so many others available; including: No Face, a soot sprite surrounded by konpeito candy, Totoro, Calcifer, the Catbus, Haku as a dragon, Jiji and Howl in his bird form. They're all stunning and their charms are so well thought out! I'd really love to buy the Haku pin next (because he's the greatest dragon ever!) but he's sold out T_T. Fingers crossed that he is backed in stock next time I visit the shop. 

All three of the pins I've talked about today are 'grade B'. If you are not familiar with this term, it refers to pins that a bit cheaper because they have the tiniest imperfections. However, as you can see, mine are all beautiful and it's really hard to notice the minuscule 'blemishes'. I have always been kind of weary about ordering grade B's, but I'm not anymore! I'm over the moon with the overall quality of the pins I received from PokoPins. Oh, by the way, the grade B pins are £10 and the standard ones are £12 each. When I placed both of my orders, there was a 10% discount offered so I only paid £9 per pin. And if you're a fellow Brit, the P&P was such a great price at £1.15! Worldwide shipping is also available, though.

Each of the pins is double-backed with two pink backs/clutches/clasps- I don't know what the heck these things are called XD But yeah, I'm very glad they are double-backed because the likelihood of them being accidentally knocked off my clothing by clumsy me is very slim, haha! One of my concerns when I first spotted these pins was that the o-rings, connecting the charms to the main body of the pin, would be flimsy and leave me worrying I'd loose a charm when I was out and about. But they seem very sturdy; i'm impressed, but only time will tell! I've not been able to persuade myself to wear them yet because they are too lovely. I have a problem. So many pins never worn... who's the same!? At least I have ita bags ordered I'm waiting for to pop my favourites in. I'm looking forward to being able to display them, without the risk of wearing them. Honestly, I have lost pins before because I've forgotten I'm wearing them and as a consequence have haphazardly took my backpack on and off whilst shopping. Oops! 

Finally, I just want to mention how smooth the enamel is. The surface of the pins have a great finish! If you have a friend or family member who's a lover of all things Ghibli, you should totally put one of these awesome pin badges away for them for Christmas, or treat yo'self. You know you want to :) 

Well, I hope you all enjoyed reading about these superb enamel pins. Which is your favourite and why? Please check out Beth's shop and give her a follow on instagram. Her artwork is soooo cute and always cheers me up whenever I'm scrolling on IG and spot her posts! Now, I'm gonna go watch The Cat Returns :D Have a nice evening, lovelies!

Thankyou for reading!

♥

Are you a pin collector?

What's your favourite Studio Ghibli character and/or movie? 

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