December Recap

Tuesday, 27 December 2016Saturday, 31 December 2016 StarrLeave a comment

There were a few goings-ons that happened this month but I haven’t talked to you about them yet so here we go! I’m still unsure of how to handle events where I don’t have much to say or show about them, so for now I’ll do these catch-all posts. Let me know if you’d really prefer I do mini-recaps about events like this.

I kicked off December by attending my first National Tree Lighting, which was also the Obama family’s last as the First Family. It was really exciting getting to see the Obamas at their last tree lighting, and it was also great to see the celebrities who turned up as well! Eva Longoria was the host, Bailee Madison was there to speak about a cause she cares about, we were able to hear musical artists like Kelly Clarkson, Chance the Rapper, Marc Anthony, The Lumineers, James Taylor, Garth Brooks, and more. It was freezing by the time we left, but I got to hear President Obama crack some jokes and sing “Jingle Bells’ so it was a pretty jolly time!

Eva Longoria with the National Tree in the background

The president joined by all of the evening’s performers (I got no good photos of Kelly Clarkson, I’m so sorry)

The evening after that was my birthday party, which was so much fun and I still am in disbelief that I pulled it off.

I started becoming really fixated on the idea of serving bubble tea at my party, because I wanted a beverage I loved that went well with cake. I got several without the bubbles, knowing that some people still weren’t quite used to them.

I was supposed to attend Yelp Northern Virginia’s holiday party, but I actually got a scary flat tire that I knew would be funny in hindsight as soon as I calmed down. Maybe I’ll tell you about it one of these days…

The following day was my company winter event / holiday party. I’ve been working with my current company since March and I am really happy here. I love the work culture and my coworkers. Meeting the partners who manage the firm and their spouses was great, the food was delicious, and I had a lot of fun with my team.

A few days later, I attended Ben’s company holiday party. I might be a bad luck charm, as this was the first year he didn’t win something at the raffle, and I wasn’t feeling 100% great that evening, but I enjoyed seeing him have fun with his coworkers. (I also discovered that one of his coworkers was one of my classmates back in college! Neither of us are doing psychology work now and, instead, both of us are in tech. Funny how life works like that, huh?) Holiday parties galore!

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A day later, I found myself back at the Kennedy Center singing along to holiday music as sung by Santino Fontana and Laura Osnes, accompanied by the National Symphony Orchestra for an NSO Pops event. They were great and I was really thrilled we had such huge Broadway stars crooning these holiday songs to us. (I nearly cried when they sang “Love is an Open Door”, which is in no way a holiday song but maybe my favorite song on the overplayed Frozen soundtrack.)

That weekend, I worked the Yelp Maryland ‘Burbs holiday party, where I single-handedly ran the 60-person White Elephant, and then headed to a friend’s house for a belated Friendsgiving-type celebration. It was a very chill time and I got to play with doggies!

It’s a little odd to mention this here but my company has a monthly, all-hands meeting for the entire firm and this month was the best one I’ve ever been to. I found out one of my new coworker’s husband is very close childhood friends with Wang Leehom, and in learning that I also learned that I was the only other Asian female in the room, which is why I was the only person who reacted audibly to learning that little fun fact! (Cue embarrassment at having gasped out loud in front of my whole company…)

On the day of my birthday, I woke up for a 7AM dance party at my first Daybreaker DC event and I kind of loved it so much! That evening, I attended a little Friendsmas celebration, where my friends surprised me with an ice cream cake (those chocolate crunchies!!!) and I just had such a lovely time. There were 3 separate gift exchanges, spiced apple cider, hand-written cards, and a photobooth. My friends know how to throw a party!

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As of now, I am in China celebrating the end of this year and the beginning of 2017 with my extended family, whom I haven’t seen in a few years. December is one of those months that always gets wild because it’s the end of the year but also the biggest holiday season of the year. I hope that your month was full of positive excitement as we all gear up for 2017!

How did you wrap up the year?
Are you ready for 2017? On the one hand, I feel very ready but on the other… wow, how is it already 2017 so soon??

Galactic Starr Party

Tuesday, 13 December 2016Friday, 23 December 2016 Starr3 Comments

You may have noticed that I love dressing up for a themed party. I even made a resolution to throw my own themed party, and I started trying to figure out Pinterest to scour for ideas for theme that seemed too obvious not to do.

Screen Shot 2016-12-10 at 9.42.08 PM.png — Look who learned to use Pinterest!

So for my upcoming 25th birthday, I decided to throw a galactic star(r) party! And finally put my previously-useless skill of finding star things to good use! It did seem a bit self-indulgent to have a star party but spoiler alert: I am a little sick of stars now, so we will all be seeing just a bit fewer of them in my life.

15288716_10208217173686915_1849215700508141158_o — Time to focus on our little blue dot for a bit

An initial challenge was picking the date. Because I have a December birthday so close to the holidays, my party would have to compete with holiday parties and festivities all over the place. I also tried to take into consideration that two of my friends who were key in helping me pull the party together may need to help another friend with his birthday party. I picked the first weekend of December to try to play it as safe as possible with regards to conflict.

Once I had the date, it was just a matter of slowly accumulating things I wanted to have at the party. As a girl named Starr, I have seen and been shown a lot of starry, space-themed, galactic things. Little by little, I started collecting pieces that I wanted to showcase.

15271809_10208217173006898_7297886139030749750_o — Planetary glasses – ThinkGeek | Star string lights – Target | Star-shaped cookies – Trader Joe’s | Photo credit: Meghan Vu

Make no mistake: even though I love logistics, this was stressful to plan. I was really unsure of how much food to get, because I wasn’t planning on serving enough to be dinner, but I didn’t want people to be hungry. I wasn’t serving alcohol because I don’t drink, but I haven’t been to a dry adult party… ever…?

Menu: Veggie spring rolls, Taiwanese popcorn chicken (thanks Irene at Jumbo Jumbo!) Chicken McNuggets (40 for $8.99 the best deal!!!), veggie trays (for nutrition!), Martinelli’s sparkling apple cider, assortment of fancy sparkling juices and sodas, assortment of my favorite chips. Also some people brought booze and I may have been one of them.

I got 2 cakes in case there wasn’t enough. (Spoiler alert: I had way too much cake. Not only did we not touch the 2nd cake, we got through way less than half of the first one. Maybe the biggest mistake of the entire party was ordering that second cake.) A big part of my decoration initially was candy, so then I got to worrying about how many sweets I had. (A lot. It was a lot of sweets.)

I got my first-ever salon manicure in preparation for this, and that was a strange ordeal because the nail tech really wanted to fulfill a vision of different colors with different glitters on all my nails! I was only able to put my foot down so much but I think it still turned out lovely, despite the orange (gr…) and pink glitter bits. She was so convinced that it was a cute polish and she wasn’t wrong. I just wanted… only silver glitter. I lost that battle but I won the war.

This beautiful dark teal with blue sparkles that is barely showing through in the photo is CND Midnight Swim, with a more colorful glitter than I planned for…

I also spent the days leading up the party in a mad panic trying to get the finishing touches and getting express shipping for things that I almost forgot about. Oops. I originally planned to get my hair blown out so I’d have one less unruly thing to worry about, but things don’t always work out the way you plan. There was also the incident where Ben and I spent over an hour searching for an item I could’ve sworn was on the dining table only to later discover it still in the mailbox.

15271806_10208217173966922_8613924118374158607_o — I became fixated on the idea of serving bubble tea at my party, because I wanted a beverage I loved that went well with cake. I got several without the bubbles, knowing that some people still weren’t quite used to them. Photo: Meghan

What really came through for the aesthetic of the party was the lights. As nice as the little pieces of decor I had looked, with how large the room was, what really pulled the entire thing together was the 30 strands of fairy lights that I was able to borrow.

Another key show-stopper was my stunning galaxy mirror cake.

The making of the above photo involved holding the box for the Trader Joe’s star-shaped cookies and flashing a cell phone flash light through it over the cake.

A thousand thank yous to Lavande Patisserie and their pastry chef, Chef Andrew for making my dream cake. My friends wanted to do a grand reveal of the cake to me, and I was blown away. It looked even better than I expected!!!

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img_5402-cesm — With colored-flame candles! Photos: Meghan

My only regret is that I ordered 2 cakes out of fear that there wouldn’t be enough. As it turns out, people were pretty full and couldn’t even eat 1/3 of the first cake. So… we brought back a LOT of cake…

IMG_5424 CESm.jpg — A silly photo of me anxiously trying to slice the cake… and finding the mirror glaze was not so easy to cut! The little crown on my head was gifted to me a few minutes prior to the cake, I did not show up at my birthday party wearing a crown… Photo: Meghan

Oh yeah, and I wore ThinkGeek’s incredible twinkling lights skirt! It was a lot of work to string the lights through it, but I think the result was well worth it.

I am also eternally grateful to my friends who helped me put together the party. Annie, who is a party professional, was invaluable to me, as was Tim, who put together the amazing photobooth.

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I wish I had taken more photos of the event, because there were so many starry details that I put together for it. Different lights, different decals, there was an origami lucky star station. The games, the gifts, the wonderful themed outfits my friends wore.

I will have to just cherish all of that in my memory, and I hope my friends will, too.

I’m so grateful that I was able to pull this party off. The best feeling was looking around at all the friends that I’ve made. I have been reflecting a lot on what kind of friendships I have and what kind of friend I am over the past few years, so I am always amazed and appreciative of the friends who choose to spend their time with me.

Thank you to all of my friends who joined me to celebrate stars and space! I had a stellar time and hope you did, too.

Halloween 2016

Tuesday, 1 November 2016Friday, 23 December 2016 Starr2 Comments

Ahhh Halloween, one of my favorite holidays of the year. It is the coming of my favorite seasons and the best way to get everyone to participate in one of my favorite all-time activities:

Themed outfits. And yes, a costume is very much a themed outfit!

I saw some really awesome costumes this year, including the ones that terrified me. (And I had forgotten that Halloween is sometimes a scary holiday… silly me…) As a millennial, I definitely appreciate all the pop culture costumes that pop up, even if it means seeing a lot of Harley Quinns and Ken Bones.

For me, I came at Halloween wearing not one, not two, but three costumes over the course of three days. I usually spend all year preparing one costume to wear for everything, but this year, circumstances were different and I wound up having 3 different costumes to wear.

ON FRIDAY and Saturday, I went out in the costume I purchased back in June, so excited I was to be in possession of it. I actually purchased this last year as well, but the post office returned it to the sender instead of giving it to me… and then I never got it. June seems very early to be thinking about Halloween, but the seller actually stopped selling costumes a short while later so I’m really happy I acted as early as I did because I was finally able to realize my dreams of becoming…

YES, after nearly two decades of desperately wanting to be Sailor Mars, the Pretty Guardian of Flame and Passion, I was finally able to achieve this dream.

Putting this cosplay together was an ordeal. The costume itself was custom-fitted (because my measurements fall across a lot of different sizes), came from a seller on Etsy, and included the dress, the choker, the headpiece (and an alternative material headpiece), and the gloves. Honestly, the seller was great and I was just happy to have received it at all this year! The shoes were one of the hardest things for me to find, actually, because I have been searching high and low for plain red pumps but all I have been seeing over the past 2 years were super pointy red shoes or sky-high stilettos with a thick-thick platform or red shoes with random patterns or designs on them. I knew this was the year my dream would finally come together when I found these at a Payless – classic shape, patent leather finish, the right shade of red, a reasonable heel height. I even got the earrings and earring adapters for my unpierced ears. I also bought a wig for this costume, as I was expecting my hair to be a much brighter shade of red, but I ditched the wig at the last minute because I couldn’t get it on right when I was rushing. This year, I also forced myself to learn to apply false lashes for that cartoonish, wide-eyed look.

A lot of folks called it a “Sailor Moon” costume, but I could tell the costume excited other people. I honestly can’t wait to take this costume out for other occasions because there is no way I retire it after Halloween, not a chance!

ON SUNDAY, I attended a local Instagram meetup in partnership with IGDC and Visit Washington DC where we were asked to come in costume. Thinking about good photo opportunities for the amazing Instagrammers, I brought out my outfit that I originally purchased with RennFest in mind.

For her dramatic red cloak – another item I have been coveting for years now – I went with Little Red Riding Hood. This has been such a great purchase for a costume-in-a-bag I got on Amazon, especially given that the last time I bought a costume-in-a-bag was… in the 4th grade? (It was a ninja!) Instead of keeping my hood up, I went with this beautiful red butterfly hairpiece from an Etsy artisan in the Ukraine, and I got the basket separately to go with the basket hanky that came with my costume. (It came in handy for holding little things like my phone and glasses, but I did still need a larger bag for other things like my wallet and an umbrella, since it was going to rain.) It was actually over 80°F on Sunday, so I thought the flow-y cloak would help keep me cool but I think the long skirt and the long cloak wound up still keeping me glistening on that hot day. If you check out the photos I’m tagged in on Instagram, you can see some of the really lovely shots that the talented photographers captured of Red in action.

ON MONDAY, I went to work with a plan set in motion by my team several weeks in advance. We all came to work wearing…

Adult onesies! This was so much fun to plan, and our excitement to wear them got the rest of the teams in our office wearing costumes in a big costume contest! (The managerial team won for a great Wizard of Oz group costume.)

I stuck out with my Espeon kigurumi onesie, since it was bright purple and not an animal like the rest of my coworkers. But I have been wanting to own an Espeon onesie for, again, years and years, and I finally had a legitimate reason to purchase and own one! When I first tried it on, I could hardly contain how giddy I was. (Ben said he has never seen me more delighted!) It was a lot of fun to wear to work, although I was scared that I got the date wrong when I walked onto the metro wearing this and… no one else was wearing a costume? Not a pumpkin shirt or tie in sight! You cannot imagine how scared I was arriving at my office wondering if it wasn’t actually Halloween… But walking out to lunch with my coworkers in their onesies made it all worthwhile. (I also managed to make it all day without using the bathroom, knowing how difficult that would be…) Also, as it went back to being cold, it was nice to have such a warm and cozy costume for once!

This Halloween, I not only got to be 3 different characters, but I fulfilled 3 different goals that I’ve had for such a long time:

Be Sailor Mars
Own a long, hooded, red cloak
Get an Espeon onesie

These are fairly specific goals, and I did not imagine that I’d be checking them all off in one Halloweekend.

What did you do for Halloween?
Did you see any good costumes? One of the most creative costumes I saw was actually terrifying, but it was a pairs costume, with one man on stilts “controlling” a zombie man below him. The zombie on the strings would lean with gravity towards people, and both men had really scary/disturbing makeup and facial expressions. Super creative and really creepy! I seriously LOVE how creative costumes get. I bought all of mine but it is cool to see the costumes that people make.

I hope you all had a happy Halloween. Can you believe it’s November now? Two months of 2016 left!

P.S. Is anyone doing NaNoWriMo? I don’t know if I am…
P.P.S. Ghosts of Halloweens past: 2014 and 2013

Hogwarts Spirit Week 2016

Friday, 28 October 2016Friday, 23 December 2016 Starr2 Comments

Last year, Halloween fell on a Saturday, so we observed it during the workweek on Friday. I wanted the week leading up to Halloween to feel a little more special, so I dressed in business-casual outfits with color palettes inspired by each of the Hogwarts houses on each day: Gryffindor on Monday, Hufflepuff on Tuesday, Slytherin on Wednesday, and Ravenclaw on Thursday.

I had so much fun doing this little thing last year (and wearing very different colors every day) that I decided to do it again this year! With Halloween coming up on Monday, and only 4 houses, well… I had to get a little creative with Friday.

Happy Hogwarts Spirit Week 2016!

14560012_10210945978709119_4355665424127142262_o — *Where dwell the grave at heart…*

I always like to kick off the week with Gryffindor because I tend to enjoy doing Hogwarts Spirit Week in ROYGBIV order. (Such is how I usually organize the colors in my life!) Red is also one of my favorite colors to wear, so it’s more a matter of where not to wear red, as I could very easily cover my entire body in scarlet and crimson hues.

14753441_10210955954638511_7216924739581360385_o — *True and unafraid of toil…*

I never understood why Hufflepuff got so much flack as the leftovers house, or the weird house, or the lame house. It is one of the most admirable houses to me, because its students are literally known for kindness and being hardworking. Helga Hufflepuff accepted the students who were rejected by the other 3 Hogwarts founders and taught them everything she could. I only wish I could be as kind and hardworking to consider myself a Hufflepuff!

14604873_10210963475466527_6721418867607105350_n — *Those of great ambition…*

I’ll be honest, when Pottermore’s Sorting Hat sorted me into Slytherin several years ago, I was a little indignant about it. Me? Bookish me, an evil Slytherin and not a nerdy Ravenclaw? But as I read more about my designated house, I realized how true it was, that I placed the pursuit of power above the pursuit of knowledge, aka I have always been very ambitious. Since finding myself in the emerald-loving house (I only wear green on St. Patrick’s Day and Slytherin Spirit day though…), I remain upset with JK Rowling’s depiction of Slytherins in the canon. It would have made for a richer story to have students whose ambition did not lead them down the dark path opposite the heroes of her story and to have them use their cunning and determination for a different cause over, say, loyalty to their friends and family whose ambition led them down a different path.

14717103_10210974521582673_67154198328860637_n — *Wit before measure…*

The house that I identified so much with but did not ultimately get placed in: Ravenclaw. I realized that I may not be a prototypical Ravenclaw upon realizing that they are the Einstein types who don’t do their homework because they were busy studying extra material. (I’m a little too rules-loving to dedicate myself to knowledge this much!) That being said, it is my sister house. Ravenclaw and Slytherin are the pair that go together, and those who believe in hybrid houses may accept that this is the second house of which I am a blend of traits.

So there are only 4 houses at Hogwarts, but with Friday still being fair game this year…

Oops.
Ended Hogwarts Spirit Week with a Death Eater look, because after all the color I wore this week , it was time to return to an all-black before Halloween. My decision to end the week as a Death Eater launched some interested conversations, including whether or not Dementors are evil. (Do they choose to suck the joy and happiness out of people? Or is that literally the only thing they are capable of doing outside of floating around? Are they even sentient? How much of a “choice” did they have in joining Voldemort and guarding Azkaban? Is something that is borne of evil inherently evil itself?)

I had a lot of fun with Hogwarts Spirit Week this year, and even got one of my coworkers to join me. (No one else in the office noticed until Slytherin day:

“Oh, Sara is wearing green today, too! You two match!”
“Welp. It’s not a coincidence!”
“Wait, wat”

I’ve got a busy busy busy Halloween weekend planned and will be going to work in a group costume with my coworkers. I have already gotten a chance to work a Yelp Halloween event as…

A DOUGHNUT! Oh man, doughnuts are one of my favorite foods of all time, so this was kind of a dream come true. I’ll also be at more Northern Virginia events if you are an active NoVa Yelper, as I moved from Maryland over a year ago and it doesn’t actually make sense for me to try to fight traffic to work Maryland events all the time!

What are your Halloween weekend plans?
Are you wearing a costume?
Are you going to wear a costume to work/class on Monday? I’m kind of super pumped about our team costume for work. It’s going to be very embarrassing to wear on the metro (our subway), so I think that’s a sign that it’s a good one! Hint: It was very easy for me to put together and it is not a costume I will get cold in easily, which is a JOY as a girl who likes to cosplay for Halloween!

October Weekend Recap

Tuesday, 18 October 2016Friday, 23 December 2016 Starr6 Comments

Brushing aside what I have said in the past about slowing down, I stayed busy again this weekend. Despite that, I didn’t feel like my schedule was jam-packed. The activities I did were really relaxing, and I was able to feel very present in the moments that I was enjoying. This is kind of an ideal way to experience these memories – not rushing through them but savoring them.

RENNFEST // I finally had my first-ever Maryland Renaissance Festival visit on Saturday! While my initial impression of the RennFest was that it was for super nerds, I later came to realize that I am a super nerd and these are my people. The best decision I made was attending in costume, because I felt too cool for school with my red cloak billowing behind me and the butterflies in my hair made me feel like a little fall fae. Also, the weather was so perfect that I often found myself just standing there, breathing in the crisp air, feeling the wind in my cloak and my butterflies, soaking it all in.

14681726_10210843671991515_8660344608930406168_n — Do not put your faith in a cape and a hood,
They will not protect you the way that they should…

It was actually the 40th anniversary of the Maryland RennFest! We didn’t eat as much as I thought we would! Just a turkey leg (fun to wield but actually really annoying to eat because it’s tough and tendon-y) and a berry tart. We got to see Danger Committee (a comedic stunts show that makes you laugh and gasp and was featured on America’s Got Talent), Puke and Snot (some of finest and fastest wordplay I have ever heard, from an act that has been around for over 40 years!), and a great jousting match. Did you know the state sport of Maryland is jousting? Some folks think it was modernized to be lacrosse, but lacrosse is only the state team sport. Jousting remains the official state sport.

14721561_10210869284551813_996283266363362416_n — Commemorative 40th anniversary tankard: “Let Merriment Abound!”

We chose this past Saturday specifically to see a gathering of Game of Thrones cosplayers, but there were so many people at RennFest (they sold out shortly after we arrived!) that we weren’t able to find them among the masses. We did see several cosplayers on their own: Daenerys, Sansa, Melisandre, Joffrey, Robert, Cersei… it would’ve been nice to have seen all of them together though. (Especially when Cu Dubh played the show theme song for them!) I still had a really lovely time with my friends and look forward to coming back many more times in the coming years.

Steampunk!Don and FallFae!Starr enjoying turkey legs

A bee sting is 3/4 hard cider, 1/4 mead, and 100% not consumed by Starr

FLEET WEEK // Maryland Fleet Week ended yesterday with US and Canadian Navy ships leaving Baltimore’s harbor. My family went out on Sunday to have a peek at the newest naval destroyer, the USS Zumwalt, which was actually commissioned in Baltimore on Saturday. It looks very different from the other ships and is claimed to be the most technologically advanced surface combatant in the world. While we couldn’t get a closer look, we did get a chance to quickly tour the deck of the USS Letye Gulf.

2016-10-16-14-34-43 — See how different the USS Zumwalt looks?

2016-10-16-15-00-50 — Super different design, super different tech and strategy

While an air show roared overhead. Yep, while we waited in line to board, we got to see the Blue Angels do their stuff (deafeningly) above us.

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We wrapped the evening with a seafood dinner. Successful visit back home with my brother, and still very relaxing to boot!

ROCKET LAUNCH // NASA launched an Antares rocket from the Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia last night! I didn’t know about this until yesterday morning, so I went to the Marine Corps Memorial to watch the launch with a coworkers in the evening. This was the first launch of an Antares rocket since 2014, with a failed launch, so it was very exciting for everyone. The livestream on NASAtv proved to be a little bit delayed because before we even saw liftoff on the video, we could already see the light from the rocket shooting up into the sky. While it’s not as ~cool~ as watching the footage of the explosive force that sends the rocket into the atmosphere, it was still pretty phenomenal to watch a manmade rocket go up… up… and away. The fact that we were still able to see it as it reached 180,000 ft altitude was a testament to just how bright and explosive the rocket must have been. I’ve never seen a rocket launch in person before, so this was really surreal to experience!

Also, is anyone watching Westworld? I didn’t love this week’s episode, but I think I like the show. I am a little bit in love with James Marsden’s face, so that doesn’t hurt at all. Plus, science fiction has been one of my favorite genres of everything since I learned to read.

Okay, I really am going to take it a little easier from here on out… until Halloween, of course!

East Coast friends, were any of you able to spot the rocket launch? It looked like a little red star for us a few miles away, but with its speed, you would’ve noticed a bright point in the sky going up, up, up, and then disappearing into the atmosphere.

Have you seen an air show before? I never thought about how much my dad probably enjoys them but we’ve seen the Blue Angels a few times over the past few years (Fort McHenry is a popular spot for them because of its historical significance) and I have a very early memory of seeing an air show with him… probably the Blue Angels!

Would something like the Renaissance Festival be your type of thing? You know I looooove dressing up, but I also really liked the historical aspect of the festival and just the… festival aspect! The shows were top-notch, the crafts were beautifully-made, and the people were all there to have a great time together.

P.S. Get hyped for peak costume season with me by looking back at an old Halloween Costume Reveal. Also, can you believe that disastrous Craig Robinson show I watched was 2 years ago?