What 2015 means to me

Hi everyone. 

It's now around 2 hours before new year, and I'm sitting here in front of the screen trying to share about what I have actually learned in 2015 and what 2015 means to me.

Truth be told, new years have always been so ordinary to me. I always think that it's just another day, nothing much, nothing special. But this year, I can't deny, it's really hard for me to let go of 2015. 

2015 is the year when I ACTUALLY discover myself, about what I want, and what I really need in life. I used to think that growing older just brings more sorrow, because it's time for me to see the world, the harsh world. I used to shut myself down, blocked myself from seeing the "real" world, and I spent almost everyday wondering if I was lost. 

Then I opened myself up.

I started to realize that this world indeed could be as bad as hell, full of fake people, ignorant people, or in contrary, it could be as great as heaven, with many faces to meet, many things to learn. It's all about perspective, and it depends on us which side we want to see it from. 

Truth is, growing up isn't always about seeing things from the "hidden" sides, or "negative" sides. Instead, growing up means you should see things from BOTH sides, and realize that there are always 2 sides of coins and judging from one side won't be wise enough to live an adult life. 

I finally understand, that sometimes we have to let go of things or people, so that we can grow and learn from our mistakes. I finally understand that IT'S OKAY to make mistakes, IT'S OKAY to be imperfect. Because those imperfections are what make me, me. I finally realized that I've been living my whole life trying to please someone else subconciously, trying to lift myself up to people's standards, until I lost myself. I used to blame myself just because people said I wasn't good enough. I used to focus on what people thought about me and I remember sitting at the corner of the room wondering what I did wrong, why people left, why I made mistakes, why things happened that way, why why and why. And it got me nowhere. Things didn't get better. 

And then I slowly learned to forgive myself (it took me 3 years to undestand this). I forgive myself for being imperfect, for making mistakes, and I tell myself that no one, seriously, no one could bring me down or judge me because of a single mistake I did in the past. I've finally come out from my darkest moments and decided to allow myself to see everything from the whole different perspective. I grew stronger, I found myself, I am happy, and I am grateful.

2015 has taught me that this life is actually wonderful (maybe to some people I might sound ignorant or naive when I write this), I was the one who blocked myself from seeing its value because I focused too much on all the negative sides. I tend to blame people for not understanding my circumstances, my thoughts, and my behavior. But truth is, we can never expect everyone else to walk like we do, talk like we do, and think like we do. People are different, we are all different indeed. And when I accept this, my life changes. I become happier by accepting and understanding why they think differently, and for me, it is interesting and full of wonders. I went to places, I met new people, I talked to strangers, I came out from my comfort zone, I saw the world little by little, I learned new things, and the more I learn, the more I realize how small I am in this world, how much I don't know, and that's OKAY. I don't need to feel worthless about myself, because as human beings, it's become our nature to learn, and as long as I keep on learning, I won't feel sorry for myself. These things finally led me to my biggest accomplishment in 2015 which is : start LIVING instead of just existing. And I'm grateful.

I've finally let go of my past completely, and I'm thankful for that. I've put down all the burdens which have haunted me for years, they're only lessons to me now, they could no longer harm me, and I'm finally free spiritually and mentally.  

The road is still long ahead I know, and I don't say it will be easy. I'm just starting my journey, a whole new journey. A journey of gratitude, a journey to learn to be better, and I'm looking forward to it. This is my personal adventure, my personal homework, and now I'm finally ready. 2015, thank you for all the memories and lessons, you're my best teacher, and 2016, here I come <3

"You have to let go of the past,so that the better future can come to its place."

I want to live my life to the absolute fullest

To open my eyes to be all I can be

To travel roads not taken, to meet faces unknown

To feel the wind, to touch the stars

I promise to discover myself

To stand tall with greatness

To chase down and catch every dream

LIFE IS AN ADVENTURE

Let's call on the interested 
The wide-eyed, the hopeful
The princesses and the princes
The believer

Let's summon the generals, 
The queens, the kings,
And the knights that ride the adventurous trails

Let's call on the leaders
The lover, the big ones, the small ones
The been-there's, the done-that's
The discoverers, the conductor
The scientist, the CEOs

Let's call on the skywalkers
The movers, the shakers

Let's call on the curious
And bring on the hope.

LIFE STARTS HERE

and after all these years, I finally understand what meanings these commercials actually hold. <3

Merry Christmas

Sharing my current favourite Christmas Song from TTS <3

 May you have a wonderful Christmas. XX.

DIY cute jar tutorial

Hi everyone, welcome back to my blog!

So I'm finally back with another tutorial to share with you guys. This is a recycling tutorial I can say. I believe that most of us sometimes buy candies, jams, or any other foods in the jars, and instead of throwing the jars away, we can always reuse them to keep another foods or we can even recycle by decorating and transforming them into cute jars to keep anything we want. So if you like to do DIY or recycling projects, then this tutorial is definitely for you. <3

Several years ago, I had transformed some candy jars into these, and since I am a planner, I like to keep everything related to planning, such as clips, pens and cute stuff in the jar. So you can actually decide yourself what things that you're gonna keep, and what words you wanna write on it. 

So for this project, I'm gonna use this Mozzarella Cheese jar. I remember I bought this just because I loved the jar very much hahaha. So finally I can use it now. However, if you use this jar as well, or any other food jars with a strong smell, you have to wash it so many times to get rid of the smell, I mean really really lots of time. I find it so hard to get rid of it, I even sprayed some air freshener inside, geez. 

I use erasers on top of my jars. Yes, while people collect branded shoes or bags, I collect... erasers. Oh come on, I just can't stand it alright. Whenever I see cute erasers at the stores I would definitely buy them hahaha. So instead of using them on papers, I use them as decorations. Well, you can always use whatever you want to decorate, but in this tutorial, I'm gonna use these. 

These are other materials needed for the project. You can always be creative by adding whatever materials you have/want in decorating your jars. 

So let's start <3

You can first start off by colour coordinating the stuff that you're gonna use. For me, I will go with turquoise, pastelic blue and white.

Next, measure the ribbon around your jar and cut off the ribbon.

Pick a pen and write down whatever you want on the ribbon. I'm using a gel ink pen so I need to put aside and let it dry for a few moments.

While waiting, let's move on to the cover. Pick out your favourite ribbon and start gluing it on top of your cover.

Next, arrange your favourite erasers / any decorative items on top of your cover, and glue them down.

Now, take out your pearls, stick them wherever you want, and have fun with it! :D

This is optional, but if you have jeweled stickers, you can add them on top of your items to make it look shinier and cuter.

And now you're done with the cover. Let's move on to the jar.

After it has dried, place the ribbon on top of your jar and glue it down. 

As you can see I ruin one of the words and should clean it since I'm so lazy to rewrite it hahaha. Next, take out your decorative ribbon and place it wherever you want to make it less plain.

Instead of using the same ribbon, you can colour coordinate the upper part with another ribbon to make it look sweeter.

To cover up my mistake, I use the decorative flowers I have in my storage and add pearls on top of them to make them pop <3

Place another ribbon around the jar and tie up a ribbon. I purposely don't do it separately to add more "DIY" feeling to my jar. But you can stick the below part of the ribbon to make sure it doesn't move.

Place the cover on the jar and YOU ARE DONE!!! <3 

You can always customize your own style of jar and pack it as a gift for someone you love. Since it's handmade and one of a kind, this kind of jars will be much more meaningful than any other jars you could buy from the stores. 

So if you see this tutorial and happen to make the same jars or if you make another creation of your jars, or if you have another ideas on how to make cute jars, then you can always share them with me by tagging me on instagram : @flolaviniaa or leave a comment below, I would be so happy and honored. :D

Alright then, thanks for reading and see you guys <3

DIY extra storage in your planner

Hi everyone!

2016 is around the corner, what have you planned for a new year? As for me, I've been planning a lot for my 2016 planner. I have been a planner for more or less 9 years now, and so far I only use 1 kind of planner each year. But for 2016, I'm planning to have both planner and bullet journal to keep myself organized. This is because the planner I'm gonna use doesn't provide any extra pages for me to jot down my other essential sections, so I've decided to use bullet journal in addition to keep myself on track on what to plan and stuffs.

The planner that I'm gonna use is peekmybook 2016 in pastel mint colour which I totally love (left). I bought this planner at ART SEE (IG : @art.see), they sell cute stuffs for planners, and if you're a planner addict like me, make sure to check them out. <3 As for the bullet journal (right), I bought it from DAISO SG. I know it's not a proper bullet journal, but it's okay since it's quite emergency.

As you can see here, they don't have any extra spaces in front or at the back to put my stickers, money or paperclips like my previous planner. And the only way is to add them myself. I always keep stickers and paperclips which I always use inside my planner so whenever I don't bring my planning essentials pouch with me, I don't need to worry since they are already inside my planner. And I always put emergency money inside my planner in case I forget to bring my wallet, so for me, those extra spaces are super important.

Finally I come with an idea to use my old envelopes which I thought I no longer need as an extra storage. We never know when we will need all those abandoned stuffs right hahaha. So, yeah, this post is gonna be a super simple tutorial of how to add them inside, especially if you have the same problem with me.

For this simple project, you only need 3 stuffs :
- Journals/planners you wanna use
- Envelopes
- Hole puncher

Let's start with my bullet journal. Since it uses rings to bind, you need to start of by marking down where the holes are going to be. You can use the rings as the guide.

Then just simply punch them with the hole puncher, and remember to slit through the middle part of the holes, since the rings are fixed and can't be opened.

Then use your finger to plug the envelope into the rings and voila, you are done! Now you have your extra storage to keep your emergency money or stickers. Remember to seal the cover by using washitapes to prevent the content from falling out.

And what's best from this is people won't even realize that you have an envelope inside, but this is only possible if you don't put too much money since it will be so bulky.

Next, for a planner which is binded this way, you can just simply stick the envelope and put in your most used stickers.

So that's all for the tutorial. I know it's super simple, but I really hope it will be useful for you. Okay then, see you on my next post <3.

New blog is born!

Hi everyone!

I'm finally back on blogging. I was kinda sad because I could no longer log into my old blogspot account, and I should leave all of my memories there. I had been blogging since February 2010 and you can imagine how many posts I should leave behind and start all over again. *sob* But now I feel a lot better after putting a pastelic theme here. My previous blog was left abandoned since August 2013 because of hectic schedules and stuff, and I've been missing my blogging life so much. Through blogging I could pour whatever I feel into writings and it really helps me a lot, and I really hope that this blog can inspire you all as well. Okay, enough of the craps. See you on the next posts <3