Fancy Lolita Tea Time - AnnVita Tea Room

It's been quite time since I've blogged, my last post being in 2013, but I think it's time that I come back to this in order to record the things that happen in my life. So many things have changed in the past 3 years, so let's get blogging!

I find with lolita, you have ups and downs. You are passionate for the hobby and then after you're satisfied with your wardrobe, you decide take a break. I took a break and when I came back to it earlier this year, I saw many things I had missed in the past few years. I never stopped loving lolita fashion, but with other things happening in my life, I just didn't have a chance to wear it very often and lolita took a back seat.

My friend, Whitefrosty, kept suggesting that I organize some meet ups so that we could wear our outfits. Dust off the frills and be fancy! 

It was also a coincidence that one of my other friends, Hiroko, was interested in lolita...but had no lolita items, so I told her to come over and have fun with my wardrobe. I said, "Pick whatever print interests you and I'll dress you up!" 

 ~~~

Previous AnnVita visit with my friend.

My brunch!

I organized a meet up at AnnVita Tea Room since I knew they had a lovely ambience and had some very nice drink selections and offered two types of afternoon tea sets. It was also around the time of Whitefrosty and Keiko's birthdays, so I figured it would be fun to celebrate in lolita.

I had previously came here on casual dates with my girl friends and with Whitefrosty before. I'll try to find some pictures of the tea room. It's quite lovely. One side has lots of natural light that streams in, which can be harsh on your eyes depending on the time of day and the amount of sunlight, and there is another side near the entrance that is a bit more secluded. For our meet, we were seated behind the entrance wall partition, which provided a bit more privacy for our group.

Scones!

When we arrived, they were serving brunch! I was really surprised...(and hungry). So the few of us who were there early decided to order some food while the rest of the group arrived.

I ordered the classic breakfast set for brunch and it was a generous portion and the price was quite reasonable. (I believe it was around $10-12?) I find with AnnVita, their tea and drink list is quite expensive, but the amount you are served is quite deceiving. The cheapest drink you can order is $11.99 if I recall. It looks like a little amount, but 4-5 cups later, you're bursting! On this occasion, I ordered the rose milk tea. It has lovely hints of rose and a creamy texture to it. It was served with a cute dessert...that none of us could figure out what flavour it was. Guava-mango?

Their afternoon tea sets are around $40 per person. One is the Victorian tea set and the other is the Jane Austen tea set. A few of us ordered the tea sets to try, but since I had brunch, I opted for an order of scones instead, they're small, but so filling!

Rose Milk Tea

Victoria Tea Set

If you're looking for a place to spend a comfortable afternoon at, AnnVita is a lovely choice. They take reservations and the staff are very friendly. They do not rush you or give you a time limit on your seating. I do prefer their teas and the a la carte menu for scones or biscuits. The tables are small so you have to be careful when moving your plates or pots around while in lolita.

At this meet, I wore a coordinate featuring Metamorphose's Happy Ending Story.

This is a first of a small series of group meet ups for tea time and wearing lolita.

Let's be fancy!

Until next time <3

~~~

All photos were taken by Archangeli.

 ~~~

Bonus:

 Welcome to the dark frilly side Hiroko... ;)

Volks Sumika Times ft. Sora

Volks' Sumika Times blog accepts owner pictures of their Volks dolls and my sister has submitted quite a few of her Dollfie Dreams that have popped up on the blog before. Sora has made a cameo appearance before when I gave him to my sister to bring to the LA Volks showroom to find a new wig for him. 

They updated this awhile back in November and I'm just getting to blogging it now, but better late than never! Sora got his big feature on the blog during his trip to London. My sister was kind enough to bring him along on one of her business trips and snap shots of him with some iconic buildings and architecture around the city! She was the one who sent in all the pictures to Volks to have him showcased.

Sora, a Volks YoSD Kakeru

You can check out his feature here on this page to see the other pictures and commentary. (^__^;)

After Sora appeared on the blog, I brought him to a doll meet the week after and some of the attendees recognized him because of his showcase! I thought that was amusing~!
Sora, you're getting lots of love!

♥

Happy Holidays everyone!

Macaron Journey - Part 2 (featuring Nadège)

Although my I lost most of my files when my computer hard drive decided to stop working, I still had pictures on my camera to upload, so thankfully, this is the next part of the Macaron Journey!

My friends and I celebrated a birthday last month, and Keiko and I decided to get some macarons for the mini-party (and it was also a temporary....gift since we had not found anything suitable yet.) These macarons are from Nadège, a cute cafe and patisserie on Queen St. W. I've passed there many times to get some supplies but I would forget to pop in to try their macarons. My sister has tried them before, and said some flavors were too sweet or lacking. So it's time to try them out!

I think their packaging is very sophisticated, no?

Keiko and I decided to get the 12 piece set. It was very interesting watching the lady pick and choose which macarons to put into the box. We asked for one of every flavor (they only have 10), and the remaining two to be chocolate and pistachio. None of the macarons were the same size...some where very large or small in comparison. And you couldn't fit all 12 into the box because of the size difference. That is why we have one sitting out by itself. Lonely macaron :(

The pistachio macaron! Nadege's macarons aren't as creative as On's, and this is probably the most decorated they have. But it's not always about how they look, it's more about the taste!

Don't they look yummy! From my recollection, they have these flavors:

-Chocolate

-Raspberry

-Mojito

-Pistachio

-Vanilla

-Orange Chocolate

-Cappucino

-Rose

-Cassis

-Salted Caramel

In order for us to try most of all the flavors, I was dividing them up in halves or quarters. This one is the Mojito. I personally wouldn't recommend it, as it tasted like fresh tooth paste. It had a very strong mint flavor to it.

Keiko also bought some Pecan Milk Chocolate Nougatine at Nadege to share. I don't normally eat chocolate anything, but I decided to try a bit of it, because the others were saying how good it was. It had great texture, but I'll leave it to the chocolate lovers to eat it while I deal with the macarons :)

I thought the nougatine looked a bit like beef jerky, it has to be the way it photographs. Bossu brought out some of his homemade green tea short bread cookies. They were very good...wish I knew how to bake! So here are some of the general opinions of some of their flavors. 

I thought the Vanilla was not very good. The texture was gritty and very sweet. I only had a quarter of it...and I don't want to know how sweet a whole piece would have been. Laduree is still #1 when it comes to Vanilla.

Cappuccino was very interesting. It had a very strong coffee flavor and between the 4 of us who shared it, we really liked it. 

Rose, unfortunately, did not fare so well among us. It tasted like liquid hand soap, something from Bath & Body works, it was quite awful. :(
Cassis was recommended. However, Bossu ate it all, so I can't comment on the taste. ^__^"

Orange chocolate was another flavor I didn't personally taste, however it apparently was sweet with a strong chocolate flavor. The orange taste was similar to orange jell-o. 

Overall, I don't think I'd buy macarons from Nadege again unless it was for specific flavors. Some of the flavors were just too over powering and too sweet. I do think Cappuccino is worth going back for...but the other ones are a bit too mediocre. I think the desserts they offer there would be a better option rather than their macarons. 

This is a little extra!

This is the other item I bought that day. I actually really like their marshmallows. Lemon flavor is the best! They're a bit pricey...so I only indulge in them one in a blue moon.

The Macaron Journey blog series will feature other macarons we've tried around the world. Please stay tuned for more and my comments about them! ♥

My computer has blown up...

(Image shamelessly stolen from google images...LOL)

Not quite like the image above...but my computer has definitely blown up.

Don't know what happened, but I just couldn't get it to work properly and it kept saying my hard drive had an internal error...

So the result is that I've lost all my pictures, music, movie, whatever was on my computer is now floating in hard drive cyberspace or just gone forever. I have a feeling it's the latter :(

My dad is helping me re-install Windows 7 onto my computer..since Vista had so many problems with it to begin with...so maybe this is for the better?

I'm a bit annoyed about loosing all my pictures though...all the travel pictures and stuff, gone just like that! :(

I had some pictures lined up to post for another Macaron Journey update and a new face up I did for my friend's doll. I don't have the before pictures of her doll's face up since they're all gone...but I suppose the after ones are ok. The macaron ones are still on my camera, oddly enough. LOL

Gonna be a few days before I get my computer in decent condition...all my programs have to be re-installed, how frustrating!!

Another random question to ask not really relating to this post, but how does everyone feel about the new interface blogger has gone to? I don't really like it...I prefer the old one better for some reason. I think it's to stale or...well, maybe I'm just not use to it..

Until next time! More updates with food and doll stuff! :)

Guu Sakabar!

My sister and I went to Guu Sakabar last week since I had gone the week before with Alice and she wanted to go try it out after I was saying it was great :D

Let's start with the pictures and review!

It was a hot day so we ordered some drinks. I didn't feel like alcohol, so we both got Ramune. A partial donation to Japanese relief is donated from Ramune purchases, which I thought was very nice. The labels on the Ramune are customized for Guu! Guu is Guuud!

My sister's Kinoko Cheese Bimbimbap. It's got mushrooms and cheese in it. The just tried a bit of the rice, and it just tasted like really good seaweed..LOL I don't like mushrooms, so this dish was all hers.

My Okonomiyaki! I feel like it's not as good as Okonomi house's okonomiyaki, as it's not as flavorful. It's very thick compared to Okonomi House (The pancake part of it), but the yakisoba noodles underneath are Amazing. They taste so good...on nom nom. (I've been told this is more like the okonomiyaki in Japan though...LOL...can I say I just like the noodles then? XD)

 Ootoro Freak! I only had a little piece of the sushi at the top, but my sister Really liked it. It's a bit pricey, but the fish is very fresh and she was in tuna heaven for a bit. Best way to eat it is from the sushi side then progress to the right (or left) of it. It apparently gets tastier as you go :)

My Takoyaki Gratin! I don't usually like cheese too much, but this is...a great combination. I love takoyaki, but this is SO good! It's a shame that this location of Guu doesn't offer normal takoyaki like the Izakaya location, but this works just as well :) Best to eat this if you also have someone else with you who like takoyaki. It's very filling...and if you eat it by yourself, you're pretty much done the meal. LOL! (I ate it all by myself the time I went with Alice...I had a major food baby).

Sister decided to order the Gindara. Miso-marinated black cod with some yuzu miso sauce. It was so tasty and cooked perfectly. It melted inside your mouth! It's also a bit pricey...but it's definitely worth it.

The last time I went, I got Goma Zukushi, and it was an overload on sesame! It's ok if you share it with someone, but I had to eat it all by myself, and my stomach was about to burst. So, this time I asked just for the sesame ice cream. I love Guu's sesame ice cream! The waitress was really cute about it and went back and forth asking if I could just get the ice cream and how much it would be. 

My sister ordered the almond tofu, and it was very good! I had a small bit though..she didn't share, like I wouldn't share much of my sesame ice cream..LOL

The nice thing about this Guu location is that if you go on a weekday, you can wander in around 7pm and there are still seats available. The seats in the semi-traditional area are usually taken up since it's a bit of a novelty, but when we left around 7:30, there were plenty of seats in the non-traditional area. I still like going in a bit early to eat, because the less people means that it's not as noisy. 

The semi-traditional area isn't suited for large parties though, the most they can accomodate is 5-6 without it getting awkward and uncomfortable. Getting the 3 person seat in the corner also isn't fun either :(
The service is great, the waiters, waitresses and the cooks all welcome you when you come in and leave, It's a bit of a shock if you're not used to it, but I think it adds to the fun of Guu. They are helpful if you ask for recommendations and describe the drinks and food pretty well to you if you don't know what they are.

Guu is still pricey for the wallet though, so I definitely could not go all the time...especially if you like their expensive foods! However, I think it's fun if you have more people go because you can order and try many different things.

Go get Guu'd! ♥

Reviving this blog

This might take awhile, since I have to get acquainted again with this blog and it's format...
and I have to get rid of this setting, not cute. LOL

Edit: changed background to this green grass and blue sky thing...LOL I'll make it look nicer later...still trying to fiddle with the settings.

Edit2: Still fiddling with things... trying to get it to my liking..