Dim Sum Diaries


I'm back on the blogging wagon again!! June has a crapload of new releases in terms of books, so I thought I'd highlight some of the ones I am keen on. First up is The Eaves of Heaven: A Life in Three Wars by the awesome Andrew X. Pham. This time round he tells his father's story and if its anything like Catfish and Mandala, it should be really really good.




Another one I have enjoyed recently is Lonely Werewolf Girl by Martin Millar. If you like Neil Gaiman, this one is for you. It's all about werewolves in London with THE royal werewolf family in disarray as some of his kids scramble to seize power, some of his other werewolf issue could care less, they have their own lives to lead in London (fabu rich or just scraping by) but they all get entangled anyways and its a great read. Millar also has a killer sense of humor.

Anyways, off to bbq soon w/ my parents, I hope everyone has a great Memorial Days Weekend holiday!
Yes, I'm still here. Things have changed quite a bit at chez Mir, dear readers. Daughter is now 10 and I am now learning...navigating? how to effectively parent a pre-teen, with all of the scary bits of being a parent of a pre-teen, almost teen (3 more years till 13 oh gawd). Overall, I think me and the Hub are doing okay at it (have had to redye hair blonde as I seem to have more white hairs then before now). Then Dad had to have surgery and I had to stay a few days with my parents to make sure they were ok. The surgery went great and Dad is now at home recovering, but I think I might have slightly been stressed (PMS didn't help either). Good things and bad things came from this...

THE GOOD NEWS

I discovered Etsy, which is a selling site for handcrafted goods and vintage items. It sort of a cross between amazon.com and ebay, but selling crafted stuff. I'm so addicted to that site because you can spend endless hours exploring the neat things that people come up with. Its seriously the new crack. Its even better then WOW PVP.

THE BAD NEWS

The bad news is that stress made me temporarily an insane shopoholic and...yes...utter disaster...I ended up buying 10 new purses from Etsy. I've also turned more girly in my taste. First I saw this bag and omg its so cute! I could use a new tote as a purse and its so stylish! Then I discovered a whole shitload of indie pursemakers who also flogged their wares quite effectively to me. Then there was this purse (why are you turning so girly, Hubby wondered) for going out, then there was this shoulderbag which would be great for every day use. Then I really liked this one, but it had already sold, so I am having the nice lady custom make one for me. In the process, discovered a bunch of different new concepts, such as indie clothing industry, upcycled (taking a used item and refashioning it into something nicer), etc etc etc. Recycling and trying to use less resources is in. Also a new trend, using cloth/canvas bags by bringing your own from home to carry your groceries home as opposed to using the plastic ones provided by the market. This made good sense to me, so I got these two market tote bags to use for shopping. The idea of having someone from a far away country craft something for me and being able to use it is quite an exotic idea. So all that was from Finland, and I couldn't neglect the Netherlands, of course, so I had to also get this bag and this stylish tote bag.

Yes, I know, I'm crazy. I don't usually binge shop like this, but with the added stress and everything, what can I say. One of my favorite sites is Leaves of Glass, an indie jewelery designer whose vintage glass jewelery is like THE BEST. For example:



Her grenade bracelet is so pretty and its very stylish, I really dig it.

Will write more soon, I promise.