Back to Black

Oops! Yet another two-month gap... But honestly, I've been both busy and boring; there has been very little to post about. Actually, I'm still busy and boring - a week left to finish my BA thesis and three more exams this week, one of them tomorrow, I'm avoiding it by updating my blog - so here you go: a photo spam of the last two months.

We took my little brother to Linnanmäki amusement park to see the light show in October. We had a great time and Miko is really starting to like Aleksi. :D ♥

Then some random outings:

My outfit for my friend's housewarming party... that ended with me patting said friend on the back while she, for the first time in her life, realized that alcohol can do funny things to you when you least expect it. :__D


On October 28th we rooted through the damn city to find a Halloween party but failed spectacularly. We did have a great time at DTM, though - with guys hitting on my bf and him being all confused and jelly and thinking they were after me, which was pretty hilarious and adorable. XD



Then, almost before I knew it, I suddenly realized that I had actually managed to hold on to him for six whole months (seven now!), and had to celebrate it by drawing something on the subject.

Even more amazing is that, after six months of this, his brains haven't melted completely. :D At least he still speaks in relatively coherent sentences, which is more than I can say about myself...


Also, since last year's Halloween party was such a success, Milla and I went ahead and threw one this year as well, this time at my parents' place!

We had punch, "blood", "ectoplasm", "poison" and "maggots", and for food we had zombie hands (pizza), spider cookies, bloody muffins and something blue and moldy. Everything was edible though most of it didn't look like it! (And, in the spirit of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, even we were edible, but you'll probably be happy to hear that we decided to refrain from cannibalism this year!)


True to our recently passed six-month point, we looked like a domestic violence poster. But it wasn't the idea XD I was a zombie (and for once actually got to put the bags under my eyes to use, lol) and Aleksi was... something bloody, idek.



The house was full of zombies, vampires, murderers and strange creatures - we even had the Terminator, two strange animals that are probably now extinct, and Conan Barbarian. And one poor avec wearing a suit... either Emma didn't tell him it was a Halloween party, or he was dressed up as a collector. Hmm.


And then it was my birthday! I actually managed to stay awake during lectures that day (yay!), and after them we went to see the new Tintin movie - I loved Tintin as a kid, used to read them aloud to my little brother loooong after he'd learned to read himself :3 I actually loved the movie! The one thing that bothered me were the English names, since the Finnish comics I read as a kid used the original names, except of course in the case of Tintin (Fin. Tintti) himself. :D


Boring lectures have not only enhanced my natural talent for falling asleep anywhere, anytime, but also boosted my interest in drawing - since it's the only way to stay awake sometimes! As I said, I got hooked on Supernatural over the summer, so I draw SPN a lot.


But that doesn't mean that I neglect other topics, either! Have an extremely pretty-boy-ish Snufkin (Nuuskamuikkunen) from Moomin. :D I'm actually ridiculously proud of that one, even though I kind of half-assed the coloring and particularly the shading.



And then I decided that since I missed the black and white hairdo, the pink was refusing to stay in my hair, and anyway I had half a bottle of black dye still lying around in my closet, I'd go back to black - though with the process of removing all that black last spring still clear in my memory, I decided to go for a few black stripes instead of dyeing half of my head black.

So here you go: Cruella de Ville, vol. 2!


I'll try to see if I can actually get back to posting after I've submitted my BA thesis, but honestly I'm so behind on everything because of school that I'm not sure if I'll manage...

Also sorry for not having had the time to stalk you guys properly, but do let me hear from you! Miss you all! ♥

Come What May

Hi bellas! ♥ Here's my week in a nutshell.

♠ Cut my hair. The ends were a horrible mess and kept falling off anyway every time I brushed or straightened my hair, so I figured that what the heck, I'll try something different, and sat down in front of a mirror and started snapping away... with nail scissors. Yeah, did it myself. Pretty damn proud of it, too, considering my previous attempts at cutting my own hair have been................. less than flattering. XD

The change is pretty radical, especially since I haven't really posted any pictures of my hair without extensions or wigs, but... what do you guys think? :3


♠ Last Sunday marked five (5!!) months that I've actually managed to stay in a relationship, which is pretty fucking HUGE by my standards. :o For that, I tried to do my new hair nicely (not very expertly, I admit, but damn, it's so much better than the last time I cut my hair short 'cause back then I couldn't work a freaking flatiron XD), dressed up, and had Aleksi moping and brooding because he'd come to meet me right after work and hadn't had the chance to freshen up. I thought he looked good. D:

What did we do, then? Well, Aleksi, the sweetest boyfriend on earth, told me I could pick the movie AND the place we'd go to eat before it. And I, the most romantic girlfriend on earth, picked The Rise of the Planet of the Apes (instead of Friends With Benefits, which was also an option), and Mc-fucking-Donald's.

... Seriously, sometimes I wonder what's wrong with me. XD

But then there was this amazing moment when Aleksi pointed out the difference between our dates five months ago (no food, just tea, or latte with soy milk, chocolate uneaten) and our five-month anniversary (Big freaking Bacon burgers and fries - admittedly, with diet coke, but still). I was like, wow, and went all silent and stunned for a moment, and he was like, "I'm so proud of you.", and I grinned like crazy and thought about how proud I was of the both of us. Because if that wasn't us kicking some major eating disorder-ass, I don't know what is.


♠ My left shoulder has been acting up lately, and on Tuesday it just totally exploded. (Not literally. Thank God.) I left in the middle of my Spanish class, in so much pain that I nearly cried, and went home, downed several different pills and went to sleep at 10 am. Obviously I couldn't meet up with Aleksi like I had planned, so what does he do? He turns up at my door, bearing food and candy and wine (that we had to leave for later because of my meds) and flowers and a freaking teddy bear and then proceeds to mother-hen over me for the rest of the night. ;____; I'm sure it's entirely because of him that I was back in action the day after. ♥

Teddy and the flowers. He said he'd specifically asked for something pink and something that's hard to kill because his confidence in my ability to take care of flowers is overwhelming like that. XD I thought it was adorable.


♠ It's been all fall-y! *w* I love fall when it's beautiful like this, and even if it's rainy and cold it's okay if I get to stay indoors, burn candles and drink tea. The weather has been horrible for the past two days, but Wednesday was gorgeous. ♥






♠ Nursed back to health by my kick-ass bf, I was able to join my uni friends at Limeksen Appro - that is, a major bar crawling event. Had a wonderful time, remembered to drink water and soda at reasonable intervals, and didn't detect even a shade of a hangover the day after - pretty much perfect, if you ask me. ♥



It was also the first time I showed up with my short hair in front of all my friends. I was freaking nervous about it, but the response was overwhelmingly positive and left me feeling all giddy and warm! :3 This time, I managed to do some styling, too.


I guess that's about it (so far). I'm ridiculously behind on my school work due to my shoulder and other stuff, but I'm confident that I can handle whatever the world throws at me. This year, I'm not facing it alone, after all. :3

Hear Me Now

Hi guys! A lot has happened since my last post - again. My life is a total mess, but luckily I've had my wonderful bf and friends supporting me, and don't feel all that down at the moment.

Firstly, remember how I talked about the pedagogical studies last time? Well, after an extremely confusing first week, it turns out I can't take them this year because something about me seems to block all information before it gets to me, and I hadn't signed up for several courses, couldn't fit into the groups, and, even if I could, I actually still lacked an English course I had no idea was needed for them. Funny thing is I was supposed to take it as a summer exam but decided to skip it, thinking it wasn't that important. :_D

That meant I couldn't start my pedagogicals until next fall, which meant I was suddenly 60 credits short of my Bachelor's degree. So, after a few days of frantic running around, useless flailing, moping, bitching and drowning my sorrows in soda, I managed to cover my ass and scrape together two short minors instead of one long - though this means I'll be taking courses like "National Parks in the United States". Fascinating. I'm still hoping this one includes a trip to the US to see them personally... Still lacking some credits, but since I'm greedy and like to take random courses on ancient Greek literature and so on, I don't think that will be a problem.




That sorted out, it was time for Tracon VI - my very first full-blown convention, featuring my very first attempt at cosplay.



I was Mello from Death Note, and considering my nonexistent sewing skills (and just as nonexistent sewing machine!) and experience, I'm pretty happy with the result. Instead of the light pink burn scar Mello actually has in the anime/manga, I decided to go with the just-burned look, and ended up looking like the Terminator - but hey, at least I had a great time. :D

(photo taken by Uideo)

I was kind of tricked into this by Saara, who cosplayed L wonderfully, and our party also included Suvi, cosplaying Mikami, so I felt safe with two others from the same series. :D I gotta say, I never thought I'd cosplay anyone - just didn't think it would be my thing - but it was great, and I'm pretty much hooked, because for one weekend I was someone else, and got to forget about my own life for a moment. Not that I'd necessarily swap my messed-up life with Mello's - I like my face NOT burnt, after all XD - but it felt good to take a break from everything and live in this Tracon bubble for a while.


The best part was that people I'd never met acted like they knew me because they knew my character, and I was incredibly flattered by how many wanted to take a picture or hug me or whatever. In fact, I was deeply flattered that people recognized me as Mello at all! And of course, even if it hadn't been for my two companions, there were plenty of DN characters around. :D


Of course, we couldn't be in character all the time... but who cares, we had fun. :_D


Took our roles very seriously, too. (The biggest problem about being Mello? I don't really eat chocolate. Used to be allergic to milk, so I couldn't - and I still don't care much for it. As Mello, I had to munch on chocolate all the time, so by the end of the weekend I was positive I never wanted to see chocolate in my life again... does that make me a complete failure as a woman? XD)






While I ordered the wig for the cosplay - my first wig, too - I decided to order another one, just to give it a try. It was cheap and plastic, but I figured I wouldn't lose much, anyways. :D

It turned out pretty okay, and fooled at least some people - in fact, Aleksi walked right past me because he didn't recognize me. :___D ♥ Still, it's very plastic and gets tangled easily, so it probably won't be good for too many times. I'm still contemplating on buying a better one, but I'm a little unsure how I feel about wearing a wig... Sure, it makes life easier but it feels so much like cheating. :D Plus it makes your own hair look awful!

Like this! It looked cute enough back then, but so messy now! Well, I still like the pearls.

On Saturday, I went out to my friend's housewarming party, and was torn between dressing casual (like I knew my friends would) and getting all dolled up (like I wanted to). I decided on something in between - unfortunately, I was in a hurry, as always, and didn't have the time to take a photo of my outfit. Suffice to say it was pink and black and pretty casual, which I tried to tone up with the hairdo above.


I'm trying to get back to dressing up for school, because it makes going to school so much more fun, even if sometimes it's just tiresome. I really liked this outfit. :3 We went to see Cowboys & Aliens that night with Aleksi, and it was hilarious because come on, Harrison Ford and Daniel Craig fighting aliens? Man, I loved it.



Random photo of my breakfast on Monday, because I like to brag about my awesome boyfriend. Is there a better way to start a week than coffee, chicken salad and orange juice, curled up on the couch and watching some early morning cartoons with your bf? Didn't think so.

Unfortunately, my week went sour pretty soon after it. My eye decided to spontaneously go kaboom again - that is, the skin around it got all swollen and huge for no apparent reason, and I looked like I'd been mugged. Or like Quasimodo, lol :D I was heading to see a doctor anyway because shoulder has been bothering me, and thankfully he gave me three days of sick leave for my shoulder - at least I don't have to show myself to anyone like this. I feel like I'm bailing on my responsibilities by staying home when there's so much to do, but on the other hand, my shoulder's still being a bitch and making concentrating on anything kinda hard... The pain radiates from there to my back, my head, and down to my fingertips, though luckily it's not that bad all the time. I got some stronger med from the doctor, so I hope they'll kick in after a while, because both my studies and work include a lot of sitting in front of a desk... :3





Staying home for three days and looking at this through my window makes me kind of melancholic. It looks lovely right now, with the green and gold and red and with the scent of the rain in the air, but it won't be long before that red tree there sheds its leaves and everything will go ugly and gray. Considering what last year's fall depression did to me, I'm terrified of going back to that, and I wish it could stay like this, or that we could just skip straight to the snow... The time when nature's all naked and black and dead is the worst for me, even if it's my birthday then. I'm trying to keep the depression away by drinking lots of tea in candle light and taking the time to just relax and think of absolutely nothing important every day, even if it's only for a moment.






I feel like it's time for change again, and so I changed the layout of my livejournal yesterday, and came across this picture as I did it. I took it in May 2010, in California, back when I was slim but healthy and things were good - just before the downhill started. I think it's a lovely photo, and sometimes I just close my eyes and imagine I'm there again. ♥

Speaking of change, I feel like changing the layout of this blog as well - maybe the name, too. However, I'm totally incompetent with layouts and so on, so I'd definitely welcome any suggestions and/or help.

Also, I've been wondering if you guys are still reading this (I know some of you are, and I absolutely love you for it, though I seem to have a knack for forgetting to reply to you!) and if you are, what kind of things would you like to read about? Would you be interested in a Question&Answer post? Would you like to hear more about my life and the more or less funny things that happen to me, or are you just hoping for more photos? (I'm sorry I've been so out of style lately...) Would you like it if I posted more often with shorter entries, or do you prefer these long and picture-heavy ones? Let me know what you think!

Sincerely yours,
Henna x

Just Desserts Spelled Backwards

Still alive and kicking! Yet another school year has started, now with pedagogical studies as my minor, and of course I had to go and start it with a bang: FOUR DAMN HOURS LATE. That's pretty epic, even for me. :_D Though it wasn't really my fault - the information hadn't reached me, so I came for the first lecture at 1 pm and found out that they had started with info and stuff at 9 am... I rolled around in self-loathing and generally felt like the biggest failure on earth for a short while, then I got hungry and had to sit through a five-hour lecture with a growling stomach, and then it started to rain.

But, then I got back home, ate, drank some tea and took my sweet time reading the newspaper (that no one in our shared flat seems to have ordered, but I'm not passing on a free newspaper, lol XD), and I realized, yet again, that


and that if I'm gonna freak out that this point, there's no way I'll ever make it through this semester alive, and anyway it's not like I can't get the info from somewhere else. :3 The great thing is that I'm finally feeling motivated about becoming a teacher, again! I've been on the verge of tears about my future for the last six months, so I pretty much wanted to scream hallelujah and dance on the table when at some point of the long-ass lecture I realized I was imagining a happy, stable life as a high school teacher and smiling about it. ;___; God does it feel good to not be so damn afraid of the future for a chance!


Needing something new for the start of the semester, I cut my bangs. The side-swept style was showing a bit too much of my roots, lol XD





While I'm happy to be back at school and having something concrete to work on, it also means that summer vacation is over! ;_____; It wasn't wonderful and at times it was far, far from fun, but for the rest of my life I'll remember it as the summer of recovery, made possible by the support of my friends, irl and online alike. And it's not like it was all bad! There was the Summer Sounds Festival:




And the On the Beach Party with Rihanna, of which I have no other photos but my outfit. As you can see, the Finnish weather, lovely as ever, decided that the best weather for a beach party was rainy and cold... but when has that ever stopped us from partying, right? :D ♥



The end of the summer also marked the beginning of a new era for many, and I don't even know how many of my co-workers and uni friends disappeared from my life to work or study elsewhere. It feels like August has been an endless string of farewells, but at least they decided to leave the building with a bang, and threw some wonderful parties! At one of them, Aleksi got us two of these volcanoes. That stuff was frigging strong!






So anyways! I'm going to be freakishly busy with my pedagogical studies, Bachelor's thesis, two language courses, work, boyfriend, social life and I don't even know what else, but I'll try to keep updating every now and then - and get back to checking on your blogs, too! I'm sorry for neglecting everyone for so long ;___; I don't think I replied to your comments on my last entry, either - I'm so sorry, I feel like the lowest worm on earth. -__- I swear I'll get better at that!

Oh, and I went and promised to do my very first cosplay at Tracon next weekend... so expect some photos of that, next time! If everything works out as planned, that is. XD