I haven't done much so far, but i did have a chance to go to Seattle with Sarah and Nelly for two days. Very short amount of time, but we made the most out of it. I loved Downtown Seattle, it's on a completely different level compared to Downtown Portland *disgusted face*. The four hour ride to Seattle felt like the longest four hours of my life. There were no more seats on the greyhound so the three of us ended up sitting next to strangers. I sat next to this sketchy looking man, but we all made it safely to Seattle. The trip back was very nice because the greyhound was empty and we basically had the vehicle to ourselves. Hope i'll have a chance to stay for a much longer visit some day :)
And moving on to pictures from our trip...
Street art!! I love the artistic aspects of Seattle, seems like there were art works everywhere we went.
Behind (?) the Pike Place Market is the gigantic wall full of gum (aka Gum Wall). This wall didn't have as much as the other one. Next time I go to Seattle I'll be sure to bring some bubblegum!! I thought the second picture would be more interesting if it had a person and that kid happened to be standing in my view finder...
Pike Place Market! I've been there around two times from my previous visits to Seattle (which was ages ago). It hasn't changed a bit, still full of awesomness! We bought giant korean wraps for dinner and it was delicious (been obsessed with korean food for awhile). Wish I had taken a picture before I ate it, guess I was too hungry.
Sucker for vintage posters.
Giant gummy bear made out of gummy bears!!!!
Inside of the Westin hotel we stayed at. Nelly got a room with two beds for an amazing deal. It's also at a perfect location, all of our planned destinations were near by.
View from the hotel room. Morning/afternoon.
Night view.
These were included in the fridge (with the exception of the korean wraps and fruits). Everything was ridiculously expensive in that fridge, costed $5 for a small pack of m&ms and other candy bars. The whiskey and alcohol cost an arm and a leg. (obviously we didn't eat/drink anything they provided in the fridge) Call me a country bumpkin, but I was surprised to see all the alcoholic drinks in there so I took a picture haha
Took the monorail (rail-based transportation system). Felt like I was taking a flying max haha. We need one of these in Portland.
Monorail about to go through the Science-fiction Museum. Unfortunately we didn't have a chance to visit the inside. The building itself was a work of art (super shiny and colorful), I've never seen anything like it.
Some sculptures near the Space Needle (thats not me in the picture btw). We took turns trying to climb (or lifting each other up) onto that circular sculpture/space on the bottom right...which took a lot of effort, some scratches, and sprains -_-.
Space Needle!! Got some bad/embarassing memories from this. I was going broke by the time we decided to visit the Space Needle so I decided to save some money by buying a kids ticket (thinking I could pull it off). Apparently, I failed at looking like a 12 year old. The ticket lady let me off after giving me a glare and a FEW, "I don't believe you're 12." Ok, I learned my lesson and will never attempt to be a 12 year old again but this also means they need to lower their admission prices!!
Views from above the Space Needle. Pretty cool...although im not sure if it was worth the money. Im not too interested in looking at morning views.
I bravely walked up close to this seagull and snapped a picture before it could attack me. Puhaha *proud*
Went to the Seattle Aquarium. Admission was, once again, expensive but pretty worth it. They had some cool tank designs and I had a chance to touch some sea creatures.
Fishes/tank on the ceiling.
After visiting Seattle I've decided that I will have jelly fishes as my pet some day. Screw fishes.
Okay, I swear this fish looked adorable when I saw it at the aquarium. But when I looked at this picture I was like, "EW WTF." Guess its not photogenic at all. In reality, it just looks like a cute smiling fishy =D
Nemo and Dory!! (although Dory is blurred in the picture)
Im not that interested in fishes but I sorta like the contrast in this picture although its a bit out of focus.
I want this sign....
Seattle at night. We walked to the Seattle Waterfront from our hotel. Pretty view...it was nice to just sit there and chat while staring out at the view.
We went to several more places and took a ton of pictures but I didn't take out my camera much.
"Back at home..."
My sister and I made the perfect cheesecake for Father's Day. Took a picture before it deflated. It was supposed to be a mousse cheesecake but we made the mousse separately and decided to spread it on when we eat it since the pan was too small.
Excuse my terrible food photography skills...
I made and ate a lot of these sandwiches in the beginning of the month. It's my own version of a subway sandwich...I called it the 'joyway sub' haha. Its basically bacon, cheese, egg, tomatoes, peanut sauce, and sauted onions.
Been cooking a lot these days, especially after my dad went back to Hong Kong. I feel guilty about lazing around at home all day so cooking is sort of a way to be more productive and also a way to help out my mom so she won't have to be in the kitchen all day.
Starbucks drinks are always so photogenic haha
I bought the chicken in the background from Daiso in Seattle for $1.50. WE NEED A DAISO IN PORTLAND. LIKE NOW.
My aunt bought me this giant stationary holder and it fits all my art supplies perfectly (except my paint bottles and tubes which are all in a separate shelve). It's shaped like a hexagon and can be spun around.
Missing Link on Hawthorne was moving so I stopped by to purchase some designer toys while I still had the chance to. Not that many sales but I did spend A LOT there...mainly the toys that I know will up in value. Haven't had the chance to take pictures of my purchases yet. Here is a metallic qee keychain my sister bought me for $5.
I was running out of ideas for my extra credit art work so I decided to paint my giraffe munny.
Another progress picture of my final art piece. I managed to finish it on time...but forgot to take a picture of the final product...if im not feeling lazy, I will photograph it for my next entry. The colors are EXTREMELY off but I couldn't fix it on photoshop :( its more of a blue-green and a neon pinkish orange.
A terrible picture of one of my most recent paintings. I took this in the middle of the night so the lighting is bad and the colors look all funky. I added a red push button (which i bought off ebay) on his nose ...have some bad pictures of the final product so I will probably be retaking them when I have a chance to.
Toys & Toy Story 3!!
Not a toy but a SUPER AWESOME mustache -chart porcelain coffee cup!! I saw this in Seattle but I was too broke and thought I could probably find it online for a cheaper price...unfortunately, I was wrong :( I must get my hands on this coffee cup.
Finally had the chance to watch Toy Story 3. It was beyond amazing!! Topping my list of favorite animations. The short film, Day & Night was amazing as well. The ending of Toy Story 3 was very touching...I watched this with two other friends and we could definitely relate to Andy since we're all going our separate ways for college. Most of us grew up watching Toy Story and now watching Toy Story 3 as 18 year olds...it felt like we also grew up with Andy and the toys. It's kind of hard to explain in words but there was definitely a strong connection. The humor was great and the entire movie was full of fun, creativity, and excitement. I wish I was also a part of the production, creating and designing all those toys seemed like it would be ridiculously fun. I especially loved how they used a ton of vintage toys, toys that I grew up with and actually owned when I was younger. Pixar definitely never disappoints!
I had plenty of favorite characters (peas in a pod, dolly, etc.) but this one was just ADORABLE. I see a ton of these toys around (I think my nephew has a few) but none of them look as adorable as they do in Toy Story. I took this screen cap on youtube, they should have official pictures for every single toy in the movie.
And speaking of Disney...here are a few awesome Disney-related toys and designer toys.
Stay real Astro Mouse and Spongebob Mouse designed by Stayreal. These will be released at the Taipei toy festival this month. I seriously hope they will release these even after the toy festival.
Pinocchio designed by Kaws. I personally dislike Pinocchio...but I wouldn't mind owning one of these.
'Up' Bearbricks and Kubricks!!
Jallisa showed me these cute Disney pook-a-looz. Still need to stop by the Disney store soon.
PJ Berri Plush... there's just something about it that makes me smile.
Bet you've never seen the 'real' inside of a Hello Kitty.
Hello Kitty anatomy by Jason Freeny. It would be awesome if they made a toy out of this (maybe I'll make my own out of clay and wires puhahah)
(don't ask me why i decided to gave them a weird accent)
How scary can these things get?? I saw them for the first time on TV several years ago and luckily I was in my teens otherwise I think I would've peed myself. No doubt they would've became a reoccurring nightmare that may haunt me for years to come (I were a kid).
(not my photo)
This To-fu design feels very nostalgic. I think I had a lot of these types of toys when I was a kid, they were quite popular back in the days in HK and Japan. Looking at it makes me think of the good old days.
Jesus christ, this entry took me ages and is probably one of my longest blog entries x_x I feel a bit brain-dead now.
Anyway, I've finally decided to leave my xanga even though I've been using it for around 6 years and all my precious (maybe) memories are there, but I guess its time to move on and start a new. Still working on the layout background (I wish blogspot would let me use my own background pictures -_-) ...the banner is a collage of some pictures I've taken/blogged in the past. It took me ages to think of a name for my blogspot and I decided to go with joirobo because it sort of matches my current interests. So many designer related toys are named something 'robot' so whenever I see the word robot, I think of designer toys. I used 'joi' instead of 'joy' (first 3 letters of my name) because joyrobo looks funny...joirobo flows better. It's sort of a simple casual screen name so I will stick with this for now. :) until next time!
