A look back...

This years Hyper Japan event is going to be held at an earlier time of July 22nd-24th, I had been hoping to win some tickets from their Friday "like" post (I only end up winning a bar of wasabi flavoured kitkat...lol hooray for novelty snacks!) but yesterday it was announced that Kanon Wakeshima would be appearing at this years HJ event, here. ^_^ I just had to book my tickets there and then! Now I cannot wait heehee. I will be going to the Friday event as I work on weekends but hopefully if I have time I can pop down on the Saturday.

 Last year, I hardly knew anything about lolita fashion. I mean I was more of an admirer, I never thought that I would actually wear any of the outfits but ever since HJ I've started buying a few pieces and actively wearing them. I look back at the HJ photos of myself from last year (which are still on the website >_<) and start scrutinizing my  outfit, "the skirts too short", "blouse ribbon is too shiny" or "the petticoats showing" *gasp!* but I think I've come a long way from that in quite a short space of time. The only problem is where I would hand make all my clothes and accessories, it seems now I'm more inclined to buy from brands and stick to a single style/theme/brand and not experiment as much which is quite sad since I really enjoy making things. Where as before I would be quite economical, spending about £10 to make a skirt, I probably wouldn't hesitate to by a brand one for £100+ if it was a print I liked.

Which moves me swiftly to my next topic of when a love of lolita fashion becomes an obsession. Now I have my fair share of "dream prints" and over the past couple of months I have been very lucky to find two of these prints in the mbok auction site for reasonable prices. I guess the prints I wanted were not that highly sort after but there is one print that's making the rounds on the auction sites right now going for lets say...quite astronomical prices. That is of course the Angelic Pretty's Sugary Carnival special set.

Now let me just say that I'm not really a fan of sweet lolita but as of late the madness of SC has infected me ever so slightly and even I have be in awe of this dress! I think it was up for sale on the AP english site yesterday and sold out within seconds (causing many people to have to be refunded because lack of supply), now this dress has a sale price of 27,090Y which is quite expensive in itself but since it's a limited edition colour the demand was very high. The lucky few who managed to get one have either found their ultimate dream dress or great way to make some serious money! Cue SC special set auction madness! As of today I found a couple of special sets up for sale on mbok,  the highest price I've seen is a bid of 43,000Y with 2 days left to bid. I'm no economist but even I can say that's a great return! A profit of about £120, nearly $200 so far. I will be curious to see the end price of this auction, I'd estimate it to get into the early 50's before it's over.

Innocent World Lucky Pack

 After nearly 2 weeks of my LP arriving in the UK, I have finally received it (thanks customs >_>). A lot of people have already posted their LP's on egl and so far only 3 different varieties have been seen in the jsk pack. The print that has cropped up most is the Classical Chair with matching cape in the pink/blue and black colourway, then after that the Little Lady print was quite popular. This made me a little nervous as I wasn't very keen on either print (although I do like the jsk+cape combo). A few people also got plain colour jumperskirts, mostly those who ordered the black LP.

Thankfully when I opened my pack I was overjoyed to see I received the plain black jsk which I had been hoping for, a bolero (which I wasn't too keen on since I wanted a black blouse..in fact it's the main reason I wanted to get the LP), and a black headbow instead of socks.

The jsk is beautiful quality, I couldn't find a single fault or loose thread unlike my Baby jsk which has loose threads everywhere and untidy buttonholes. The lining has a soft/silky feeling and it fits really well. The only thing I'm not really happy about is the neckline, it's a bit too high up and not very flattering. Also it's the long length version, which comes down a bit below my knees. I really love this length so I think any future IW jsk's I order will definitely be long length ones.

The straps have a popper button to attach them to one another and can be detached at the back, I'm not entirely sure what the purpose is for these detachable straps???

I was really hoping for a black blouse but got a bolero instead, it has 3/4 length sleeves and nice lace detail around the collar. I'm not sure of the material but it feels like acrylic which is surprising considering how nice the jsk material is.

The headbow is a simple back one with not much detail, it's really cute and not so overbearing. I'm glad I received this instead of the socks since I really don't wear knee socks.

All in all I'm quite happy with my lucky pack, I'm glad I chose to buy one since the jsk alone is about 25,000Y and I bought the whole pack for 15,750Y (+ customs charges of course >_<) so it's quite a good deal and 5% did go to the earthquake relief appeal. I probably wouldn't be getting another one though, unless it is an outlet lucky pack (I remember seeing some really great items there). It was really easy to order one and they sent a nice little thank you note with the pack, very sweet  of them ^_^ so I look forward to any future luck pack buying ;-)