This post is a day late because we just got back last night (after almost 24 hours of travel!) from our vacation. But now, I want to wish my dad a happy Father’s Day!

This post is to thank the man that taught me you can pretty much do anything yourself. He never hires anyone to do anything (besides plumbing, he hates plumbing haha)! The deck you see in the background? I remember him renting a jackhammer and using concrete to build the foundation himself.

He’s re-tiled the roof, put wood floors in our entire house, lampworks (glass-bead making with a propane torch), and so much more. He’s shown me that with patience and a will, you can learn to do anything you can imagine.

So thanks dad, for not only teaching me I can do anything, but also for helping me whenever I need it. Love you!

DIY family for LIFE ♥

Guess what??

I GRADUATED! ! !

As of last Sunday, I officially have a BFA in New Media from the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign. It;s been a long journey - there were two points where I seriously considered dropping out. I still haven’t wrapped my head around it yet.

Here’s a photo of Mike and I just after the ceremony. It’s so weird that we’re in the same major; there were only 8 New Media undergrads total in our year!

This is everyone in New Media minus Eric.. I’m going to miss having classes with them all. <3

My family and I celebrated at the reception afterwards~

And took some photos with my closest friends. Ahh I’m feeling more and more nostalgic by the day! :o

Now I’m just packing things up, moving, cleaning and organizing. But after that, I get to blog full time again (so many posts planned, including an outfit post for graduation~). Can’t wait! c;

I wasn’t able to dig this photo up in time yesterday, but I finally found it hidden in the depths of my hard drive’s backup folders. These were the Pokemon Yellow days.

Happy belated Sibling Day Scott! Whether fighting or not, I always have and I always will love you. ;p  ♥

Now I’m feeling all nostalgic for the simpler days, haha~

Easter isn’t really been a big holiday for my family, but every year we always get together to have a nice, homemade dinner. :] Since it was just last week that I drove to and from home for Spring Break, everyone decided to drive down and bring Easter to my apartment this year!

Let me explain the above gif first, haha. My entire life my dad has used a tripod and self timer to take our family photos, which means he usually runs to and from the camera at least a few times.

Yesterday, however, we realized that I had a remote control for the camera at my apartment and my dad decided to use that instead. We didn’t realize until it was too late that he would enjoy using the remote so much that he took 7 photos in a row (look at his face, see how happy he looks! ;p )..

I really liked the photo above even though Mike and I aren’t looking at the camera, so I’m still going to post it~~

And here are Scott and Christine (my brother and his fiance) with the dinner we all made. :]

Toast ended up getting a lot of attention, as you can tell from all the photos haha.

Toast thinks that meowing will make us put him down, but here’s a secret he doesn’t know; one of the best parts of picking him up is that he meows. ;p

I had a great time yesterday and am really glad my family drove all the way to visit. It might sound cliche, but my favorite part about holidays is spending time with the people I love. ♥

Hope you all had a lovely holiday too!

I love my mom so much!~ Thanks to her, I’ve never in my life had to wear a store-bought costume! ♥

She made me the Sailor Moon costume on the left in 1997, and because she began teaching me how to sew when I was so young, I made the Sailor Saturn on the right in 2007. c;

Dressing up in costumes is just about the best thing ever.

This book by Klutz is how I started coloring my hair. :] Did anyone else ever have Klutz books? They were just about the coolest things ever.

Originally I actually wasn’t allowed to color my hair, even temporarily. Growing up I could tell that my dad looked down on those kids in their 20s who had colored hair, piercings or tattoos. I think he used to consider them as “punks” that were just looking for unneccesary attention. (But he’s changed his opinion over the years. I’ve seen him tell his coworkers with pride that his daughter has “rainbow” hair. ;p )

My mom got me this book from Michaels in 2004, either 7th or 8th grade. If I remember correctly, it took a little convincing to get my dad to let me put the temporary color in my hair. Here are some pages from inside:

After that I was hooked. I remember having different colors every day for awhile in 8th grade. When the dyes that came with the book ran low I started using colored mascara. And then I got some hair mascaras in Taiwan that came in 2-3 oz jars.

In 2009, 5 years after I got that book, I finally bleached and dyed one strip of hair with the help of my mom’s friend. And it went from there until finally now, in 2012, all of my hair is bleached and dyed. (Here’s a semi-timeline of my hair stages if anyone is interested..)

Lot’s of reminiscing, haha.. I just found the book in our basement today and wanted to share with everyone. Coloring my hair just makes me so happy~