Monday, March 31, 2014

XIXILI celebrates 10th year with Bra Art Visual Display with Message of Women Empowerment

Monday, March 31, 2014

2014’s March has been quite an interesting month for me; it was all events & projects for me. At work, I had the chance to work an art exhibition featuring my favourite video game Assassin’s Creed, followed by I’m FINished with Fins pledge project.

Then on 20th March 2014, I had the chance to go out as The Artsy Craftsy blogger to attend XIXILI 10th Anniversary soft launch event at One Utama, Damansara. As a creative lifestyle blogger, I have to be selective at the type of events to cover because my blog is a niche blog. But with XIXILI’s event, I had to make it an exception! No, not because it’s a lingerie brand, which I must say, offers the most comfortable range ever.

I had to make it an exception because the event featured an Installation Art, made with Bras by one of Malaysia’s most renowned female visual artists, LouiseLow. Louise Low’s artsy craftsy bra installation art is being displayed at each of XIXILI’s window display in shopping malls: One Utama, Queens Bay Mall and MidValley Megamall.
Louise Low's Bra Art at One Utama

Louise Low's Bra Art at MidValley Megamall

Louise Low's Bra Art at Queens Bay Mall



For some of you who happened to follow the Bra Shark project (promoting violence against women) last year, you might know that this is the same talented artist that was responsible for the crafty masterpiece.
Some of Louise Low's work that was displayed for guests to look-see


I missed my chance though, collecting & donating unwanted bras last year for Louise, but finally got to meet her in person this year; an inspiring artistic woman, which is at par with XIXILI’s women empowerment theme.
with Artist, Louise Low



Before the fashion show, XIXILI organized a mini-game/lucky draw for its guests. At the entrance we were all given a sticker with a famous female figure and an inspiring quote; mine was first female pilot Amelia Earhart. 

The Message of Women Empowerment


Basically we had to look for our matching sticker, pair up with that person and register our names for the lucky draw. XIXILI and Louise Low were giving away limited edition gifts. 

Participants registering and winning the lucky draw gifts!
I was walking around trying to look for someone with a similar sticker for me, unfortunately, I only met that person after the registration was over. However, I didn't go home empty handed; I received my own goodie bag and took home XIXILI/Louise Low cotton tote bag.
Goodie bags that was given away. Love the items!
The lucky draw session was followed by the launching of the ceremony; a signing session by Louise Low and her speech.

I also got to witness XIXILI’s collection showcased some of its beautiful light hue range made with soft silky fabric. By the looks of its designs, you can actually tell that XIXILI offers technology-focused product, making sure that its female customers feel comfortable and confident when they wear it.
The fashion show
Models showcasing XIXILI's state-of-the-art lingerie-wear
The event ended short but sweet; I stayed on to browse through their products, and because we were all given 20% discount, I decided to make my FIRST XIXILI purchase. I was impressed with their product and the assistance that I was given to help me look for the right size and suitable pattern to match my body structure. That is how intricate XIXILI is.

I think I was even much more impressed at the fact that XIXILI positioned its brand to empower women to remind us that we are all beautiful regardless of our size, we are still goddesses.

Media has very much influenced us women, for centuries, we judge ourselves based on society’s requirements. Today, more and more young women are affected by this idea that being thin or being slim is the concept of beautiful. Being beautiful cannot be defined by how colourful your make up is, or the less-fabric in your attire, or how tall you are. Being beautiful means we embrace the inner woman in us, to know that we are naturally creative, talented, intelligent and vibrant in our own unique way. 
However, when we track back the root cause of this false perception on size does matter, it is us human beings that are responsible for this damage and it is time we initiate some damage-control.

Well then, I would like to thank XIXILI for their initiative; it is nice to see popular brands out there to take that step to make a world a better place. And thumbs up to Louise Low for channeling her entire creative insight to empower women everywhere.


Thursday, March 20, 2014

Featured in: Better Blogger Network Member Spotlight

Thursday, March 20, 2014

It is very interesting to see how things can easily turn out, especially the things that you have been wishing for and trying your best to manifest it for it to happen. I have always wanted to be featured in the Better Blogger Network's member spotlight. And this only came about when I got to know about this website last year. Even being a blogger for 5 years now, sometimes I get that feeling too, as if the grass is always greener on the other side. I tend to forget that I don't have to wish or hope, because I can have it all too; I don't have to wonder how it feels like to have your work featured and promoted by others. After all, anything that has happened to the other person can easily happen to us too. I guess, what happened was that I kept telling myself that good things come to those believe in it; believe that you deserve it, after all everyone deserves to have good things happening to them, am I right or not?

Anyways, it was a pleasant surprise to have Better Blogger Network contact me recently to inform me that I was going to be featured. It was also nice of them, to check with me, if I want to update my blogging advice, since I totally forgotten what I wrote last year when I submitted.

I was featured on the 18th March 2014.

I am happy to be featured, not because of publicity, but because here's another opportunity to get my cause out there. To share with the rest of the blogging community, all over the world, that I share the same movement as them in the name of creativity.

In case you can't read my blogging advice, here's what I submitted:
My life took a turn about 5 years ago, when I decided to fade out all negativity about me not being able to be creative. I decided to take a stand and start pursuing my interest by engaging myself in things I enjoy doing such as painting, crafting, blogging, etc. Then I realized that the more I engage myself in my hobbies, my life started to balance out on its on and no longer feel life is without a purpose. Each time I create or write, I reflect, and eventually I started to see that my existence in this world was equally important as everybody else's, because I was sharing a lot of light & love about creativity through my blog. From then on, I never look back on inspiring myself and others, especially women worldwide, to develop self-love through art & creativity. Do what you love, and everything else in your life will unravel!

Each time I am featured, I give thanks to the support from each of my readers; May you jump, dance and laugh on the green grass on the other side.

Thursday, March 13, 2014

Listen: Little Black Submarines, The Black Keys

Thursday, March 13, 2014
Okay, I admit, I watched Twilight a couple of many times and I happened to collect the soundtrack. But as cliche the movie can be, I happened to like the movie's playlist. That's how I came across The Black Keys; the bluesy indie rock band from Ohio. One of the first songs that I listened to was 'Chop & Change', a song with a sexy and sultry feel to it. Here's another song of theirs that I came across- 'Little Black Submarines'. 
Enjoy!

Thursday, March 6, 2014

I am Celebrating the Woman in Me, join me.

Thursday, March 6, 2014

Today, my usual routine at work was I clicked open my Google browser. I do this everyday at work, because this is the first thing in the morning that helps me warm up before I spend my entire day writing.

The first thing I saw was the little colourful clip featured by Google (I like Google's little surprises) in conjunction of International Women's Day 2014. The short video showed women from all over the world. Although I had my speakers turned off, but looking at the scene after scene of women of different culture, ages and race from all over the world gave me goosebumps of excitement and a smile on my face.

I smiled because I am a woman. And I am happy to know that I am born a woman.


When we were young teenage girls, we had to learn how to face society's challenges; we were told about being cautious about sexual predators, looking prim and proper or dressing well, behaving like how a girl should behave, having your first period, your first pimple, staying away from boys, not allowing to go out after 7, and so on and so forth.

We were told all of these things, yes out of good intentions by our parents. But being born a female, it sounded more as if we are caretakers of something that didn't belong to ours. We weren't told to embrace ourselves. There is a distance between ourselves and our female bodies. Do you get the picture?

Eventually as I got older, I started to realized that the culture that was passed down from generations after generations and later on the "idea" turned negative underneath the layers of beliefs and misconceptions of lack of reasoning and understanding. The message that was ritually passed down to us taught us to 'fear' more than to be 'brave' instead.

I also noticed that as girls, we weren't nurtured to appreciate our bodies or giving thanks that we were born a woman and embracing the female within. We weren't taught to be brave young women, because the "idea" told us focused on the danger much more than focusing on ourselves. Hence, probably the reason why women experience self-esteem issues or self-development issues, which will lead to relationship issues.

Anyways, after watching the "silent" clip, it reminded me once more about how blessed I am to be born a Woman. 

However, today shouldn't be the only day we commemorate our birth as females. It should be everyday that we celebrate the goddess within us. 

In case you are wondering, how do we celebrate being a woman everyday? It is simple, see here:

~ As a woman, you possess natural powers, you are naturally intuitive. Use your insight and feel it in your heart to guide yourself in your daily on-goings

~ As a woman, you are intelligent. Use your wittiness and quick thinking to handle life's challenges. No problems are non solvable. All problems are doors to a new found glory.

~ As a woman, you are naturally creative. Being a multi-tasker is a myth, but being natural creators such as cooking, gardening, painting, crafting, writing, even putting on make up! anything! You don't have to be an expert to create something, you are creative.

~ As a woman, you have empathy and emotions. You know when to do or what to do. You know how to feel and when to hold back. Being a softie is a myth.

~ As a woman, you are a natural creator; you create Life, Love and Food while you carry a divine soul or seed in you, and grow it when you are ready.

~ As a woman, you are a brave warrior. You can endure storms of adversity to showers of blessings. Youcan withstand life's most difficult obstacles and yet still can stay strong enough to experience the joy of our courage.

~ As a woman, you are a natural lover; whether it is romantic love or compassionate love, you are natural at giving maternal-kind of love and affections to your loved ones, whether as wife, sister, daughter, friend, girl friend, etc.

~ As a woman, you are a natural guardian. When you become parents you can take on the role of a mother and a father.

~ As a woman, you are natural at partnerships. When you are paired with your husband, as a wife, you make a good team-mate; as one unit, you make a great team! Hence the saying, behind every successful man, there's an intelligent woman behind them. So be a partner/team-mate with your husbands or boyfriends; don't ever think you are lower or higher. You are both equal existence on this earth.

~ As a woman, you are naturally beautiful. Don't be afraid if it doesn't look like those cover models on the magazine or your favourite celeb. If you want to beautify yourself, do it with the idea of bringing out the YOU. You don't have to be like anyone else, you are perfect and unique in your own way.

and the list goes on...
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Once, I didn't know how to appreciate that I am born a woman. I used to think that it was such a curse because it was challenging to be a girl while you face society's challenges, especially with no role model or good examples to guide me as I was growing up. As a teenager, physical appearance was always a challenge, and as I was turning into a young adult, I developed a terrible low self-esteem which lasted me until after graduation. Little did I know that I was just basically kicking myself in the (metaphoric) nuts!

When I turned 20, I finally learned how to be and what it means to be a woman. Believe it or not, I learned all about it when I started going steady with my boyfriend. The challenges that we faced as a couple helped me learned how to understand my role as a woman and how to release the baggage and the stereotypical vicious cycle of this world.

I have natural dark circles, tanned, dry skin, heavy side on the weight, and bad teeth by the way; people point it out all the time. Years ago, when people commented about my weight, I would be depress about it and had trouble eating because I was reminded about the things they said to me. I used to be self conscious eating in front of my relatives because my weight would turn into a topic. I used to hide myself from cameras during photo taking sessions, because I don't want my bad teeth or dark circles to show. Instead of being proud of my differences, I hide myself; basically I was embarrassed to be Me.

So it wasn't until a couple years back, when I was 25, that I started to question my existence. After much self-discovery, I finally understood that my appreciation of myself as a woman matters; it is a simple Self-Love formula. As soon as I was awakened with that realization, the comparison stopped. The hatred for my existence as a female (weaker gender) stopped! My low self-esteem stopped. And yes I still do get ticked off when people point it out, but I no longer think I am ugly, or wish that I was skinny, because after all, this is me, and there is only one-me in this world. I just learned how to stay strong and cope with comments.

I am one of a kind, and so are you.
Go ahead, celebrate the goddess in you.

Here's something to inspire you; shared by a cousin of mine to nurture her beautiful teenage daughters. =)


Tuesday, March 4, 2014

Style: Wooden Sunglasses Eco-Friendly Fashion

Tuesday, March 4, 2014

Do you like sunglasses? I do.

I remember my first sunglasses; I was 7 years old and I think I was quite ahead of my time because I used to have a pair that looks like today’s hipster retro sunnies or the ones that Bruno Mars wears. It was two tones, purple and pink and it was favourite sunglasses of all. 

Sunglasses are always in trend. Currently, there are various designs that are popular, you see it coming back again, now with the round-rim style a.k.a ‘Lennon’ glasses so popular everywhere, including the ‘biker chic" looking sunglasses too.


What if I told you that next in trend would be the Wood Sunglasses; a fashion statement targeted to be the hottest. Not only it is to be the next fashion trend, the wooden sunglasses promotes sustainability; allowing us to stay in style while appreciating our environment.

I personally think that the Wood Sunglasses are unique. I was awed by the idea of it, and I find it amazing that it was different from the other sunglasses in the market. Not that I dislike the other designs, it is just that, almost everything is of plastic-ky look. More and more sunglasses designs are looking too common and similar.

On the other hand, the natural colour and earthly design of the Wood Sunglasses keeps it fashionable for the everyday-busy-girl on-the-go, yet classy enough to match with different types of outfits for any occasion.



Outfit:
Denim vest: unknown
Pink top: unknown
Floral Skirt: H&M Malaysia
Black top: Forever 21 Malaysia
Tribal drawstring pants: Forever 21
Blazer: H&M Malaysia
Leopard top: unknown
Black skirt: Somerset Bay Malaysia

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The Wood Sunglasses design range by EUPHORIC is produced with environmental-friendly materials. Every pair is made sure to have perfect finishing, ensuring long lasting effect. As I am speaking from experience here, I was actually amazed and impressed by the Wood Sunglasses' good quality.

I like the fact that even though it aims to promote sustainability, however you can still see that there is an effort to keep its uniqueness while keeping in trend with today's fashion style.

The Wood Sunglasses is non prescription sunglasses; however, if you are worried that it makes your eyes uncomfortable, worry-not because surprisingly, for a non prescription sunglasses, it doesn't give you any discomfort or dizzy feeling. Euphoric's Wood Sunglasses range may be fashion-focused, but right from the lens to the finishing material, it is also of good quality. The uniqueness of the sunglasses allows the user to be a happy & fashionably satisfied customer!

In almost each of my style post, I often stress about having an essential-focused wardrobe rather than a wardrobe filled with clothes, shoes and accessories that easily go out of style. But with EUPHORIC Raven sunwear range, the wood sunglasses collection will easily fit into your wardrobe. You no longer need to have a sunglasses specifically for each outfit of the day. Whether you are travelling, touring, on the beach, out for the weekends or just out for a simple Sunday brunch, the Wood Sunglasses is designed for your everyday use.

Check out EUPHORIC, an online creative lifestyle store that caters for urbanites and individuals to express their creative-selves. Offering a wide range of creative functional and fun designs products aim to jazz up your life!

Follow EUPHORIC on Facebook 

How to Heal Yourself from a Breakup (chocolates, tears and love-dovey movies)

Break up is hard to do. Being the breakee is even harder because you go through this assorted emotions that throws you all over the place when you wake up, when you go to work, and when you go to sleep at night. You walk around aimlessly and because you are used to how things are, suddenly you are forced to change your lifestyle, your plans, your routines; now you just don't know what to do, and eventually even that makes it harder for you and wail like a child.

Sounds familiar?

I am sure being the breaker is also harder, to make that sort of decision. If not now hard, eventually in the long run, it comes back again that gnawing feeling.

I am not going through a break up, in case you are wondering. Justin and I have been together for more than 7 years and basically, after going through our fair share of insane roller coaster rides, we are now inseparable through good times and bad times.

I am only writing this because I came to know recently a dear friend is going through a downswing. And I feel compelled about her situation and eagerly want to help her with what I know and what has worked for me.

First things first, when it comes to healing from a break up, I don't believe in rebound, I don't believe in escapism and going out drinking until you puke your brains out and I certainly don't believe in avoiding or ignoring the mourning period.

I talk as though it is about getting over death or something...

I think it kinda is except Love doesn't die. It just evolves. And that is something very important for us girls (or guy, whoever the breakee or breaker is) to understand. It is NOT possible for Love to die. It grows, it changes, it evolves.

When I experienced my own downswing in my relationship, I was very young, very naive and only recognized the pain instead of gain. I couldn't see the good in anything and that made it harder for me to heal myself. After several hurtful moments, eventually I grew and by the time I was in another round of turmoil, I decided to heal. It was then I realized that I never believed in giving myself a chance to heal, no matter what the situation was. Once I decided to heal, it was as if my body and soul starter to cooperate and I just knew what to do, no matter how painful each day was. When the healing phase was over, my relationship also healed; although I never forgot the journey I went through to get to where I was. So looking back, I realized that it was as if I was following a guidebook on what I needed to do each day to help me get by. I think my soul was my guidebook because of the decision I made to heal, and my body just listened and followed through.

So when my dear friend came to me to break the news, I saw myself in her: not of the same situation but as a woman to another young woman; I feel her. My methods in healing are pretty simple, though it might not appeal to some because there is always a sense of laziness to move your ass when you are feeling as if the whole world has crumbled on you. But after going experiencing all kinds of life's obstacles (though I have not face the most challenging one yet), I matured and started to realize that problems are not the end of the world. Any problems are solvable, unless you are at gun point about to be shot to dead.

I don't know if any of you who are reading this might be going through a break up coincidentally, or just broke up or just moved on; or perhaps you have a friend, sibling or a relative that is facing the same thing. But no matter how long or short a relationship maybe, there are always ways to get yourself together and start living life. That's the most important step to take, start living life. So here are some VERY BASIC pointers to start living again:

1. Yes it is hard. If its less than a year relationship, give yourself 3 days to mourn, 4 at the most. If it is more than a year, give yourself 2-3 weeks to mourn. Mourn as if someone just died. Cry as much as you want. Be alone and do some thinking, you deserve your own space.

2. Done with your mourning? Now it is time to get up, get out of your pajamas. Sit down