Author: TwinkieChan

I repeat: I am probably the sloppiest, laziest, lamest nail-painter ever, but I enjoy it so much!!! I did these nails really super quick for Manda’s MFA graduation last week. I have been craving a black polish for a while, but then lightened it up by alternating it with a creamy white. I am always overzealous with the polka dots, which kind of ruins everything, but oh well, they are fun!! Then I decided to break up the dots with some random faces painted on with a tooth pick.I think this mani says: I am a complex woman. I am a play in contrasts. I am darkness. I am light. I am life. I am death. I am happiness. I am sadness. I am deep.JUST KIDDING. I’m just random.

Cardboard has so many uses!!! I have used this piece of cardboard for at least 2 years. I don’t want to be wasteful! I started using it to pour out my GemTac, which is what I use to adhere small beads to my crochet work (I think it looks better than sewing for my ice cream scoop hair pieces).  I also used to use another piece of cardboard exclusively for hot glue, but then I invested a whole $5 into a reusable hot glue gun pad, which is way awesome (hm, it looks like it’s $7 now, so maybe visit your craft store to see if it’s cheaper?). But I still use my trusty cardboard glue board for other adhesives. Check it out! Gross, yeah? I mean, artistic!!!

I used to do these round-ups briefly, but I stopped for 2 reasons: 1) my shopaholic tendencies go in cycles 2) I started feeling pressure to do them regularly, and I hate pressure! Plus, I think that’s what Pinterest is for now, but it’s actually really hard for me to get into Pinterest. I’m pretty slow to adopt a new social-media-related thing, because I find them each so time-consuming! So, I’m bringing back Fun Stuff Round Up here on the blog! My shopaholism is full tilt right now! Here’s some fun stuff I’ve round up! Real Gumball Candy Dangle Earrings by EatWithYourEyes on Etsy. I srsly need a pair of these but I can’t decide which color! Pug Print Skater Dress from ASOS Everything by The WhitePepper from ASOS Mushroom House backpack from ModCloth. Are you dying yet? This is so adorables! Neon Pink Clear Back Pack from American Apparel. This just speaks to the 90s girl in me! Stickers Dress, Lazy Oaf x Nasty Gal. Lazy Oaf’s collab with Nasty Gal is so super cute! I don’t think I could actually wear a lot of it (no crop tops or bodycon for me!) but it’s just so fun to look at! Cute things by Sara M Lyons! I bought some nail decals from her, but I lost them!! I need to do a deep clean of the craft room to find them!

I’ve been trying to think of a fun title for yarn-related posts. “Yarn Appreciation Post” came from @bunnycartoon on Twitter, and I liked it because of the acronym: YAP. YAP, yapping about yarn. YAP Time it is! So, I’ve been working on some new secret Yummy You! collab projects, and I’m always really picky about my colors and their exact shades and saturations. This is going to sound lame, but I am very aware of the … connotation of color … what feelings a certain shade evokes and what I think it SAYS to me. I wanted to share some of my thoughts on yarn color with you, even though it will be kinda messed up because (a) it can be hard to shoot/edit the colors exactly the way I see them, and (b) all our monitors will interpret them differently, stupid monitors! But at least you can get a taste for what goes on in my head and also check out some of the brands I use most. Links to where you can purchase yarn are at the bottom of the whole post. Please remember, this is NOT comprehensive. I also use other colors/brands, but these are what I grabbed first from my stash. I also try to stick with using yarns that are fairly inexpensive and accessible to all of us (I can’t have the materials cost alone of a scarf be $50+), and I personally prefer acrylics because (a) a good acrylic is soft, and I am very sensitive to animal fibers being itchy, even some merinos, (b) many plant fibers don’t have the right feel for my projects, like cotton often feeling stiff, or bamboo often feeling too floppy. I also like a huge color range in a worsted weight on the heavy side, so you can see how I can get really picky about things! Okay, on with the color!

Sooooo Christmas of 2011, I decided to buy a cookie press and make some spritz cookies. I was like, “OMG THIS IS SO FUN! I WILL USE MY COOKIE PRESS EVERYDAY! EVERY EVERY DAY!!!” I never used it ever again. But tonight. Oh, tonight. I resurrected the cookie press and finally attempted to make some home made CHEESE CRACKERS!!!! AWWW YEAH CHEESE YEAH! I love Cheezits so much, that I literally make myself sick. My buddy Pickle once asked me, “What do you like most? The Cheez? Or the Its?” WHO CAN CHOOSE!? Needless to say, this was like my most humongous kitchen debacle. My cheese crackers look like cat chow and they smell like Bibi’s feet. Let’s go on this journey together. I used the recipe from the Wilton website, Wilton being the maker of my cookie press. I know I should have done a little more research, but …. say it all together…. IDGAF! Actually, I do, but I’m also lazy. Here are your ingredients: 1 pound sharp cheddar or aged swiss finely shredded 1/2 cup unsalted butter softened 2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce Dash hot red pepper sauce 1 1/2 cups flour 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon paprika I am a very serious chef, and I only use VERY SERIOUSLY SHARP CHEDDAR. As should you. I wanted to get yellow cheddar because cheddar is supposed to be yellow in my book. But Hairy is a food snob and insisted on white cheddar. Plus, he got all cheesenerdy with some dude at Andronico’s, and they were like, “Good sir, you must select a cheese from Vermont.” “Right-o, good sir, I shall!”   1. I attacked the aerobic portion of the recipe first: grating 1 lb of cheese. I gave up after .5 lb, which ended up being the best decision of the whole night. You may think this was due to laziness, but the real reason was my plate was overflowing with cheese, and I didn’t think I had enough large bowls for mixing everything together. SO MUCH CHEESE. So I cut the whole recipe in half. 2. Preheat oven to 375°F. In a medium bowl, cream the cheese, butter, Worcestershire sauce and hot red pepper sauce until smooth. So, what exactly does it mean to cream something, because I attempted to do this, but it was basically like trying to turn the cheese powder from your pizza delivery into a liquid. Like, it’s not gonna happen! It was like 80 million parts cheese to 1 part worcester sauce and butter. I already knew this was a terrible, terrible sign. “Cream” was not what I had. I had superstiff cheeze playdough. 3. In separate bowl, toss flour and seasonings with fork. Gradually add to cheese mixture. I added my cheese playdough by small chunks. What appeared in my mixing bowl was first like a pile of pebbles and then later like a bucket of sand. Great dough, right!? 4. Mix until dough holds together and shape into small logs. Sand is just […]

Last Saturday, Manda and had a girl date at Maker Faire.  We tried to plan wisely and both ride the train from our respective towns to meet in the middle in San Mateo. Parking and traffic can be a big, hour-long hurdle when Maker Faire is in town, but our efforts to ride the train went out the window when we both realized we would miss our trains! We ended up parking at a nearby shopping mall and walking 20 minutes to the faire, which I think worked out just fine! Espesh cuz we grabbed Chocolate Creme Frapps at the mall for our walk! Here’s a fun mosaic UFO that I think we should all have in our back yards. I didn’t really end up taking many photos that day, but there’s neat stuff all over the place, like a man riding a mechanical horse bicycle thing, a man driving a fur-covered articulated blinky luck dragon, stuff shooting out fire, kids building all sorts of stuff, a guy  dancing in a super happy robot costume, some dude banging on bucket drums, kids playing around in cardboard Minecraft outfits, and lots and lots of carnival food! Garlic fries were our #1 priority. GBFF! GARLIC BREATH FRIENDS FOREVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ALSO, cheesy popcorn!!! CHEEEEZ FINGERZ!!!!! Then we hit up the Bazaar Bizarre to check out all the crafty peeps. I ended up really loving the brooches by Bottle of Clouds. They are laser cut wood and then hand-painted. I wanted so many of them! I may re-visit her Etsy shop when it re-opens. She was also super duper sweet! I really just love being a relaxed shopper at craft fairs, instead of being a vendor. I always feel too guilty to break away from my booth for too long in order to have a look around, so I truly appreciate just having a stroll and appreciating everyone’s creativity! If there is a wooden or cardboard cut-out of something, I really super have to take a photo with it.   OH yeah, it was really super sunny that day, if you couldn’t tell, and Manda was really worried that her nose would fry. We are going to invent some kind of nose guard for sun glasses. Here’s the prototype. My Accessory-of-Note for the day were my super cute bunnycookie pins by TinyTangerines! Later that evening, we met up with our dudes and watched Star Trek: Into Darkness! Despite anything I might read on the internet about it, I enjoyed it! Two thumbs up! Two thumbs way up for the whole day!  

I have a new pattern in available in my Etsy shop. It’s for a “Pancake Lovey!” I had no idea what a lovey was, until someone asked me to make one a year or two ago (I didn’t end up doing it). I guess it’s like a doll/security-blanket hybrid, usually characterized by some kind of head stuck to some kind of blanky. This Pancake Lovey has a happy, sleepy butter pat buddy sewn to a security pancake! I don’t really want to make/sell baby items, and I probably won’t write very many baby-related patterns, but I designed this particular morsel because my brother and sister-in-law’s first baby, Ender, was born on May 16! He came out really cute, and not at all wrinkly or alien-looking. Manda and I got to see him after he was just about a day old. Pretty crazy! You might be wondering why I made a PANCAKE for them.  Recall the baby shower and how I mentioned my brother loving pancakes. Also, my sister-in-law decorates a lot using beige/neutrals. So, I figured, even if the baby never ends up using the Pancake Lovey, it could still sort of maybe fit into the neutral color scheme of their home. Incidentally, I didn’t get a chance to bring them the lovey on the day we visited them in the hospital, because I washed it but didn’t have time to dry it because Hairy’s air-dry-only laundry was taking a million cycles! But the baby won’t be able to actually use it for a while anyway, so I guess it’s all good! Here’s a picture of Ender for you baby-lovin’ folk out there!  

Today, Hairy found a new place to walk the doggies in a town nearby called Montara. The trail is along a hill that overlooks the ocean and follows Highway 1.   It was really pretty there, but also SUPER BRIGHT. So I couldn’t really see the photos I was taking with the iPhone, since the screen just appeared black to me!   Afterward, we got a sandwich at this place called Gherkin’s Sandwich Shop, and they put little gherkins in your sammy instead of pickle slices, and they were really crispy and crunchy! We passed by a Peruvian restaurant called La Costanera which looks like a fun place to check out in the future. We also saw a neat BBQ shack and a place to get coffee and donuts inside an old train car. It’s funny all the little spots you can discover so close to your own city! P.S. After I wrote this entry, Hairy started swearing in the shower and then came out and said he had found a tick in his side. Then we all freaked out, and I checked myself and the pups but didn’t find any more. The place we hiked had a small woodland area that transitioned into a more open area with wild flowers and grasses. We stayed on the dirt trail and didn’t wander into the grassy parts, but you never know what’s dangling on a flower or blade of grass! Wear light clothing, tuck everything into everything else (like pants into socks) and check you and your furbabies immediately after a hike!

Thanks so much for filling out my survey, guys! It was really interesting to read the responses. Over 80% of you know how to knit/crochet. That’s a lot! My favorite part has been reading how you guys describe your personal style. I know it can be a tricky question, and a lot of us shy away from putting ourselves in little boxes, but I think it’s a fun exercise! I would say mine is “The Girls Section at Target.” Comfy, casual, colorful, but with girlie frills like ruffles, bows, and cute collars. Here are some of my favorites from the survey. I love how unexpected some of them were! The personal style question reminded me of this test someone gave me back in college, and I started giving it to all my friends. This will probably look familiar to many of you, and there were probably many variations on it. 1. What’s your favorite color? State three adjectives you’d use to describe this color. 2. What’s your favorite animal? State three adjectives you’d use to describe this animal. 3. State three adjectives you’d use to describe a large body of water. 4. State three adjectives you’d use to describe an empty, white room. There may have been a fifth question in there, but I can’t remember it now! Okay, take a second to write some answers down if you want to play along. . . . . .

 I HAVE to tell you guys about my current girlcrush, Brit Marling. One night on cable, I happened upon her 2011 movie “Another Earth,” which she co-wrote and starred in. Here’s a blurb from the Fox Searchlight site: “In ANOTHER EARTH, Rhoda Williams (Brit Marling), a bright young woman accepted into MIT’s astrophysics program, aspires to explore the cosmos. A brilliant composer, John Burroughs (William Mapother), has just reached the pinnacle of his profession and is about to have a second child.”On the eve of the discovery of a duplicate Earth, tragedy strikes and the lives of these strangers become irrevocably intertwined.” It sounds kinda science-fictiony, but it feels like a quiet, elegant, emotional indie movie. She is one of those people who I find oddly mesmerizing. Like, feed me the Kool-Aid cuz I will drink it! The sci-fi-ish angle gives the movie a sense of fantasy or magical-realism to me. When the movie ended, I was like, “MORE? NOW WHAT? I NEED MORE!” There may be elements that remind you of Lars von Triers’ “Melancholia,” but I found “Another Earth” much more hopeful and sweet, although also with its own sadness. When I looked her up on IMDB, I loved her even more. She is an Econ major from Georgetown U., but turned down a job at Goldman Sachs to become an artist. Here’s her quote from IMDB about why she started to write movies: “[on why she decided to become a screenwriter in relation to her being an actress] How terrifying to surrender your life to being chosen all the time. Having to be chosen and re-chosen. Writing so that I can act became a way of having not more control over my future but not having to wait for permission. You can choose yourself. Hmm, who should play this part? I nominate me!” “I think I’ll never stop writing now because I’m wondering why there aren’t more representatives of women that are like the women we know. Where’s the film with the women who are complicated and strong and beautiful and sexy and interesting and of all body types? You don’t get to see enough of them. So there’s something important in attempting to write them for myself and for the insanely talented women out there.” The fact that I just found her mesmerizing led me to watch another film from 2011 that she co-wrote and starred in, “The Sound of My Voice.” In this film, she actually portrays  a cult leader, and it’s about two film-makers who try to infiltrate and find the truth about her and her strange claims. Much like “Another Earth,” I loved the ending of the movie, and it leaves you with another odd sense of hope and wonder. She has been in other movies I haven’t seen yet, but her new one, “The East,” is coming out this year and also stars Ellen Page, Alexander Skarsgard (I didn’t know him, but I guess he’s in True Blood), and Patricia Clarkson. One […]

I hate to ever really ask you guys for anything, but I was wondering if you could help me out by filling out this superquick survey. It’s only 6 questions and includes things like:   (p.s. that multiple choice option is dedicated to Manda, and, no, she CAN’T get mad at me, because she doesn’t read my blog… and what you don’t know, won’t enrage you.) Why did I make a stupid survey? Well, the big reason is that I take meetings from time to time for various business opportunities (actually I’m doing that today at 2pm!), and sometimes in meetings, I’ll get asked, “Who is your audience/market/readership?” And like, I’ll have an IDEA of who I THINK is reading, or who I think I am crafting/writing for, but to be honest, I don’t really know, and I kinda make it up based on who leaves comments for me, whether I happen to have time to click on your website/blog if you have one, or if I’ve met you in person or we’re friends. SOOOOO, by filling out this VERY BRIEF survey, you can help me to start forming a basic picture of who all of you guys are.  This will also hopefully help me bring you more of what you want. I mean, you might just be here for a rare blog photo of Bibi (there’s lots on Instagram!), and if Bibi is what everyone is really after, then I need to re-strategize and send Bibi to Hollywood or something! I’m also exploring the idea of adding sponsorship space on my side bar to promote your awesome businesses, so it would be neat for all of us to get an idea of …who we all are :). Thank you! I didn’t want to make the survey long and boring, so if you want to chime in about anything else, feel free to sound off here!

Thanks to everyone who participated in my first “Free for 48 hrs” crochet pattern party! I may not always do 48 hrs, but I’ll try to always throw some kind of “party” with a window of time when you can grab a new pattern for free. Now, the crochet pattern for the Cupcake Coffee Cup Cozy is available in my Etsy shop. BONUS!!! At the back of the pattern PDF, I included the cup-shaped paper insert that I sometimes use to package my cozies. It’s really perfect for gift-giving because it explains what the gift is and also includes washing instructions. A new thing I noticed while adding the pattern to the shop: Etsy seems to now be offering the link to customers directly to download the pattern, so let me know how that goes! This is really cool for sellers, because before, we either had to manually email all the patterns, or pay for an app to do it for us. Etsy really stepped it up!

  I played around with a new header for my pattern PDFs. I don’t know if I’ll use it. It makes my cover page a bit busy because I also include a big photo of the project. I intended for the title of the pattern to go under the banner. I’ll keep playing around with it and see if it sticks around! It was a fun break, though, from crocheting! I planned out my items for Renegade in July. Lots of new stuff for the carnival theme! I hope it turns out! Hehe.

I like reality shows. I like Betsey Johnson. I’m somewhat familiar with the ups and downs of her business. I’m definitely tuning into this!! XOX Betsey Johnson premiers tonight T 8pm on the Style Network (which is Channel 235 for me on DirecTV)! I think it’s kinda neat it premiers on Mother’s Day, cuz it looks like her daughter Lulu will also be on the show!  

Happy Mother’s Day! Happy Sunday! Happy Run Your Errands Day! EDIT May 14, 2013: Thank you so much for participating in my first “Free-for-48-hrs” crochet pattern party! I’ll do another one really soon! This pattern is now available in my Etsy shop. I’ve decided to try this thing. I was going to post a new pattern in my Etsy shop, but FIRST, I’m gonna post it here for free. For 48 hrs. Commence Crochet!!! (p.s. if you find any booboos or confusing spots, please let me know!) Small print time! This crochet pattern is intended for personal use. Please do not distribute or sell this pattern, or sell finished items made from this pattern without my permission. Thank you!  

Mother’s Day is only a few days away, but you still have time to DIY something special! When I needed some emergency help in proof-reading my Asparagus Pen Cozy pattern, Kim came to the rescue and then also suggested that the pattern could be used to create lavender flowers. I loved this idea, since my mom loves lavender, so I decided to make a crochet lavender bouquet for her… of pen cozies! (Dad, don’t tell Mom!) What You’ll Need: my Asparagus Pen Cozy crochet pattern that I wrote for Michaels.com that you can now find at this link on my blog. In the pattern, I refer to working a Leaf, but they left out the part where I explained how to work a leaf! Regardless, for my lavender flowers, I changed the leaf a tiny bit. To work a lavender leaf: Ch 3, sk 1st ch, 1 sc, 1 sl st. Done! I also worked a shorter green stem and a longer purple top than for the asparagus spear. H hook small amount of worsted weight yarn in Green small amount of worsted weight yarn in Purple regular ball point pens optional: small terra cotta flower pot (the green one I used is biodegradable) dried beans or pebbles to fill the flower pot The particular yarns I used were just from my stash. I picked 2 shades of Purple. KnitPicks Brava Worsted in Grass, Deborah Norville Everyday Worsted in Orchid, Plymouth Encore Worsted in 1606 Purple Bell. I dabbled in mixing 2 purples in one pen. One has 2 leaves in one color alternating with 2 leaves in another color. The other is mostly Orchid with a few leaves in Purple Bell here and there. Do you guys have any fun plans with your moms? We are going out for a family dinner on Saturday night!

Check out crazycute artist/designer Cherie Buttonss in our 5-character “Hello Kitty by Twinkie Chan” scarf! Amazing right? Love her! You may also be familiar with her as MINT SODA on Tumblr. Don’t forget, you can pick up your own “Hello Kitty by Twinkie Chan” scarf here!  If you want to watch Miss Buttonss in action, check out her introductory YouTube video and channel!

I’m so delighted to be part of Cat Morley’s “Crafter to the Stars” series! She is one of the dynamic duo behind Cut Out + Keep, one of the super awesomest DIY sites/forums. She selects someone to create a craft project for and then shares the tutorial with you. Pretty cool! Cat sent me a magnetic paper doll necklace! Of myself! It’s much more fun to dress my magnetic self than my real self, plus my magnetic closet is WAY cleaner! Click on this link to read a little interview with me with more photos and also to get the tutorial from Cat’s blog. Also, CO+K was also recently featured in a video by Google. It’s pretty rad. You can meet Cat and Tom! They’re the real stars!

Inspired by the next Michaels.com crochet pattern I’m working on … I decided to use rainbow sherbet colors for my nails. I also decided to try using washi tape for the first time to create stripes and hearts. I really do not have great skills or patience with nail art, but I think it’s fun anyway, so sorry if it looks totally sloppy! To create stripes, all I did was paint the base of my nail orange, and then I trimmed some washi tape to the width I wanted my center stripe. After placing the tape on your dried, p0lished nail, you can then paint the other two colors on the side. I found that taking the tape up right after polishing was better than waiting for it to dry even a little.  Washi tape is great because it is not as sticky as Scotch tape, and is less likely to ruin your base color. To create the heart, I took a piece of washi tape and folded it in half. I then cut out a very small half heart, carefully opened it back up, and stuck it on my nail to use as a template. I wasn’t very good at cutting out the shapes, but they turned out ok! I learned this trick from The Dainty Squid, and she learned it from Danny Brito. Here are the polishes  I used:

I know these magnet sets may look familiar to those of you have been following along for a while, but this is the first time we have had them available in our shop! Each set – Cupcakes or Sushi – comes with 4 super strong magnets, depicting photos of my crochet foods! (I think this is my favorite set of purikura with Manda!) Also, for the month of May, we are including a mystery pack of 5 free 1″ buttons in every order! We just got our pins in, and we were like, “Do we really want to list 20 separate different buttons on the site?” Not so much! Maybe later! So we’re giving them away right now! You’re welcome! 🙂 xoxo  

Ok, this is not super over the top, but it is way more accessorizing than my usual. I have never really worn cat/mouse/bunny ears before, and while I think it is a really fun look, I’m not sure it would be my go-to? Maybe with less other stuff! This is kind of a fake WIWT. It’s more of a “What I Tried On Today To See What It Looks Like and to Play with Some of My Stuff.” I am getting old and cellulite-y, and bare legs really aren’t on the agenda for me, but I can pretend in a photo! This floral collar is pretty amazing. The flowers are made of PAPER. YUK Clothing is a new brand by my buddy Kate in the UK. I’m not sure if it’s still secret or not, but I know who is designing some YUK tshirts, and it’s gonna be amazing. Can’t wait to see more! I put my YUK brooch on a purse by Spank! These sparkly ears came in my goodiebag from Blogcademy LA a few weeks ago. I need to blog separately about that! Okay, let’s talk about the shoes. Sorry they are chopped off in so many of my photos. I can never master how to properly take an outfit photo inside a room with limited space.  I need to lower the camera so there’s less room above my head and more room under my feets! Anyway! The shoes are Hello Kitty flats, and they are the first thing I ever bought off Fab.com after my brother showed them to me. I love them! Dress: Miracle Eye, Collar: Locketship, Ears: c/o Crown & Glory, Brooch: c/o Yuk Clothing, Purse: Spank!, Shoes: Sanrio (and on sale!)  

Yay! Another new free crochet pattern is up now at Michaels.com: Chiffon Cake with Fruit Topping – A Tissue Box Cozy! Just in time for Mother’s Day! Edit, June 4, 2014: Please find the pattern here on my blog. Michaels.com is currently re-vamping their pattern/project section, and the above Michaels.com link is disabled for now. Here’s the intro I wrote for the pattern: When I crochet gifts for my mom, I like to make cute things that she can use around the house. One of the first projects I ever made for her was a cake-themed tissue box cozy. So, this month, I had my mom in mind when I designed this crocheted chiffon cake with colorful strawberry, blueberry and kiwi topping. I remember eating delicious cakes just like it when I was little. I hope you have fun creating this yummy piece of my childhood memories. Consider making one as a gift to sweeten a special someone’s Mother’s Day! You are gonna have so much fun making the frosting border for this!!! It’s a variation on the “piped frosting shells” stitch I include in my Sugar On Top mini booklet but much BIGGER and PUFFIER! I hope to see pictures of all of your cake projects soon! I have another fun Mother’s Day present idea for you using a pattern of mine that’s already available and also inspired by my own mom and what I would make for her. More on that soon!    

On our last day in Melbourne, I had the extreme delight of meeting magical blogger Violet LeBeaux. I can’t remember how I came across her blog for the first time, but I instantly fell in lurve with her cute, girlie style, and her commitment to creating DIY tutorials for maximizing the cuteness and prettiness of life on a budget. To be honest, I’m pretty sure I totally fangirled over her on Twitter, and the rest is history. Apparently we both got the memo that it was White Cardigan Day. And p.s. she made her dress!! Here are some examples of her tutorials: how to sew cute overall shorts,  poufy curly up-do hairstyle, how to make cardigan clips. I tried to take a few outfit snaps in the hotel before our meet-up, but the light was really dark in our room.   Afterward, Hairy and I wandered about Melbourne a bit more and ended up in the library, upon Bei’s recommendation. But it was Sunday and filled with students doing actual studying, and we felt kinda bad just poking around! There was a gallery filled with portraits and busts of random old guys, so I thought it would be another fun opportunity for an iPhone outfit snap! That night, we walked down to by the river and ate dinner at Guiseppe Arnaldo & Sons trattoria inside the Crowne Hotel, and everything was super duper yummy! Especially the chocolate pot de creme for dessert!  

We rented a car in Melbourne today and drove out to Phillip Island to visit the Koala Conservation Centre. There was another park nearby where I think you could get closer to the koalas and pet them and stuff, but we decided to check them out in their natural environment, minding their own business, doing koala things. It was kind of like a game of Where’s Koaldo, craning our necks up at the trees, spotting little fuzzy dumplings napping on branches. My photos are terrible since they are from my iPhone. We’ll have much better photos and video from the other camera, but for now, you get a teaser! There’s a story about these two. One is a mama and one is the baby. The baby is old enough to be independent, but is still learning about how to be his own koala and have his own house, so apparently, these are some difficult teenaged koala times.  You kinda just walked around amongst the trees, and all of a sudden, there’s a koala or two or four. It was really neat! Most of them were napping and swaying in the wind (it was super windy). We found one koala who looked somewhat more active and was kinda looking at us. Then she started dropping some poos, which was really exciting for me, cuz it was like, NATURE!!! SO NATURAL!! And THEN, she PEED!!!!! And then she pooped some more! And then she scratched her rump a few times. And then she tucked in for a nap. It was amazing. (I’m just going to assume now she was a ladykoala because I read that they don’t keep as many boys in the center to avoid fighting.) And then there’s the random take-a-picture-of-my-outfit-in-the-koala-park outfit shots that you always need to have, even if your outfit is not that exciting. I travel in comfort! We have one more day in Melbourne, then we’re flying back to NZ for one night and heading home!