H a i r ♡ c a r e - Tips and tricks on how to dye and keep your dyed hair healthy!

I don't know about the title here, my brain somehow thought it kind of rhymed. Let's forget about it.

Hello, this is a surprise post I did not plan to write, but I felt like it, so I'm squeezing it in here.

Haircare! Hair colors! Dye! 

Stop it, Saga.

If your hair is already dyed and you have no interest in what I have to say about how to get a good result, if you just want to know how to keep your color and hair vibrant and what to do to keep it strong and healthy, scroll down past the images to point 6. (I won't judge you, just a little bit).

There are a lot of things to think about with dyed hair. How to make it last and not wash out straight away, how to keep it strong, fighting damage and other horrors, etc. Especially with "extreme" colors - i.e. unnatural colors, such as pink and blue. Being a hairfreak I've faced every horror there is to face, believe me. 

First time I dyed my hair in an "extreme" color I was tiny and obsessed with An Cafe. I also didn't know what a straightening iron was, nor did I know what eyeliner was, and I used to draw the Nyappy-thing on my cheek, so I don't think I need to even say how not pretty it looked. The hair was the worst part though. Standard emo-haircut, short in the back and long in the front, straight bangs, ear-like sideparts. Dirty blonde in the back, red bangs, pink side-hair-ear-thingies. 

I still feel the need to run and scream "NO" just thinking about it. 

Luckily I moved out of that phase, and from that first glorious hairstyle it escalated way too quickly. To sum it up; ice blonde, white, white with red and black bangs, dirty blonde with brown parts, dark brown with red parts, all black, black with orange bangs, black with a purple part by the neck and purple bangs, after that I don't even know, blonde again, blue for like an hour, black again, red and black, light brown, lighter brown, blonde, blonde with brown and blue parts, baby pink, white, grey, grey with black bangs and pigtails (actually my favorite hairstyle ever), white, dark brown, orange, brown and pink, and bam, seaweed hair. It's been green once before but that was an accident and it was horrible and people gave me disgusted looks.

My hair has been close to death so, so many times. 

But you know with experience comes some sort of wisdom, and I do know quite a bit about taking care of hair - dyed hair in particular - by now. My hair is not dead, after all. 

Time to share what I know with y'all! 

(Hey, that did rhyme)

Along with grey x black, probably my two favorite colors (so far).

1. Products for dyeing (vibrant, clear colors, like my white hair, or the bottom part of my seaweed hair):

Bleach;

- I usually bleach my hair with Schwarzkopf's strongest bleach, L101. 

- Any other bleach from any other brand, works just as well, just know that the stronger the better. 

- Look for the number of shades the bleach will lighten your hair. As many as possible, I think there are dyes that lightens up to 11 shades.

Dye;

There aren't a lot of permanent extreme colors out there, except for maybe red. So going with a creamy dye, that works almost as conditioner, is the best thing to do. It's also less damaging on the hair (actually, from what I've experienced, it actually feels like my hair gets stronger when I use my beloved Directions hairdye). It's not very toxic in any way either, I usually don't even wear gloves when dyeing my hair. I live with the weird colored hands instead.

- Directions is the brand I use most of the time. There's also Stargazer, Manic Panic, and probably some other brands as well. I do think these three are the biggest, however. 

- You can usually find these in more "alternative" clothing stores. 

- If you don't have any nearby you, use Google, or just search on eBay. 

- "Directions hairdye purple" ← it's that easy. 

1:2. Products for dyeing (a more washed out tone, like the top half of my seaweed hair):

I actually went straight from light-dark brown with dirty pink ends to seaweed without bleaching in between. Keep in mind though that my hair have been bleached many times in the past, so it was and is pretty damaged. That's why the color still stuck to the hair so well. 

The hair must always be a little bit damaged if you want a good result. So;

Bleach; 

- Simply use a weaker bleach.

- The hair must still be a lighter shade of brown. Extreme colors will not have any effect on black hair, or really dark hair. 

2. Basic things to think about before bleaching and/or applying an extreme color: 

Which result you want;

- I repeat: in most cases, your hair must be bleached for the dye to have any effect at all. Like I said, extreme colors will not work on black hair. Your scalp will suck up the color though, just for the record.

- I repeat x 2: if your hair isn't too dark and has been damaged or been bleached before, you might not need to bleach your hair again. That is, if you're going for a more "dirty" shade (unless of course your hair is close to white).

- Think of it as applying a transparent layer of color onto your hair. Darker hair, darker shade.

Hair quality (please don't kill your hair);

- Simple thing you can do to check if your hair is fit for fight, pull on the ends when it's wet. If it's kind of elastic and rubbery, don't do anything to that poor sucker. Hair treatment (scroll down a little dear friend), now. 

3. Bleaching:

- Depending on how dark your hair is, you might need to bleach it more than once. Bleaching is probably one of the most damaging things you can do to your hair. 

- If you have to bleach it more than once, wait at least two weeks between each attack. Because of reasons I will write right down below. 

Let me quickly explain what the bleach actually does to your hair. It will "open up" the texture of the hair, and suck out as much color as it can during that "opening" (here's where the number of shades plays a part). Once the bleach has done it's job and you've washed it out, the hair will still be "open" for a while. Which means, that it will be a little tired an unwilling to let go of more color. So even though you might get rid of some more dark tones if you bleach it for the second time on the same day as the first time, the result will be so much better if you wait until the hair is "closed" again. And, it will be less damaging. 

When you get roots;

- Just bleach the roots, then apply the dye over the bleached part to "fill in the gap", so to speak. Simple as that.

4. Dyeing and how to create colors:

I've already mentioned hairdye sticks better to damaged hair. This is why it'll be most effective on hair that has been bleached recently, preferably on the same day. It'll suck the dye right up. Unless, again, you're going for a darker shade. Remember what I said about that transparent layer of color that you apply over your current shade? Good. 

There's also some other things to know about the colors and shades;

- If you want a color that doesn't exist, you can mix already existing dyes to create new colors. Blue and red becomes purple, that kind of thing. That way you can pretty much control every little detail about the color. 

- If you want  a lighter shade than the colors that exist, simply mix a dark shade of the color with white dye. Or, if you don't want to buy white dye (that might give it a more purplish shade), mix it with some conditioner before applying it. 

- According to Mashyumaro, it's perfectly safe to mix colors from different brands. Like mixing a purple shade of Directions with a pink shade of Manic Panic, for example.

How do you do it Saga-senpai?

- I cannot believe I just wrote that, I am sincerely sorry. 

- The easiest way is of course to simply follow the instructions that comes with the hairdye you choose. 

- That said, given that dyes don't do much damage to the hair, you can leave it in for as long as you want. The longer the better, I'd say. I usually make a whole day of it and leave it in for like 5 hours.

If you choose to do what I do and just leave the dye in for as long as you feel like; there is no exact number to go after. So don't worry about it! 

5. Two-tones:

If you look at my seaweed hair, the top half is darker;

- The top half was light brown, the bottom half was dirty baby pink. 

- The top half was dyed with a Directions Atlantic blue and Turquoise-mashup, not mixed with conditioner. 

- The bottom half was dyed with Turquoise and a little bit of conditioner.

If you're going for an half and half-style, like this one (ruthlessly directing you to the already mentioned Mashyumaro, because she is a hair goddess), then I'm afraid practice makes perfect. But it's all about dividing your hair into parts and applying the different dyes carefully where they're supposed to be. Be careful if you have a dark part in an otherwise light lump of hair; when you wash it out it might bleed onto the light part.

Try to wash out separately, one part at a time. Same when you refill the color, which is what I will talk about on the next step.

6. Keeping the color vibrant:

Now here's the fun part. Keeping extreme colors vibrant can be a real bitch, pardon my French. 

Basics; 

- The more damaged your hair is, the slower the color will fade, I'm afraid. 

- Some colors fade more quickly, while other colors - such as red, for example - is a nightmare to wash or bleach away. 

Heads up: I had to bleach my hair five times to get rid of my red Stargazer experiment. It was still very, very light pink. 

What you can do;

- To start off simple, re-dye as soon as you don't like what you see. This might not have to be so often, if you...

- Each time you wash your hair, grab a cup or a bowl and mix some hairdye into your conditioner. Use it like you would use conditioner normally, but maybe leave it in for an extra minute or so. This will keep the color fresh between each "bigger" refill. 

White and grey hair; 

White and grey are the trickiest colors to maintain. Silver shampoo, white and grey dyes, bleaching and bleaching, you have to work it. Writing this separately to just put emphasis on the fact that these two are bitches, sometimes. 

7. Health, dammit, don't forget to keep your hair healthy:

The hair is, to keep it simple, a mess of nutrients and other things that is left over when your body has taken what it needs. Correct me if I'm wrong, but that's what I've learned, both by experience and from working briefly at a salon and going to school. 

This is why you lose hair when you don't eat properly - your body will give all the good things to the rest of the body, and will refuse to waste nutrients on the hair. I know this from experience and it is not fun in any way. 

Keep yourself healthy; 

- Eat food rich in vitamins. We're talking veggies and fruit, people. 

- Eat food rich in protein. Like eggs. And avocado (I'm allergic so I'm going to leave that one for you).

- Drink plenty of water. And by that I mean p l e n t y. 

- Don't drink too much tea and coffee (I'm afraid I'm not doing this, but it's a tip).

- Learn what's good and bad, which I will talk about right away.

Enemies / things to be careful with:

Silicone - If there is silicone in a bottle of shampoo, no. Bad shampoo.

Shampoo - Don't wash your hair so often. Wait as long as you can, wait until it really needs it. Every time you wash your hair, the shampoo does damage to it. So obviously this is a simple way to keep your hair a little happier. 

Styling - Teasing, for example. Something that the hair doesn't like. I'm not saying you shouldn't, I'm just saying maybe you shouldn't do it if your hair is falling off.

Styling products - Hairspray in particular, makes the hair dry and sad. When you go out to stock up on supplies, go somewhere where there's staff that can help you pick out products that are better for the hair than other products. 

Styling tools - Straightening irons, curling irons, blow-dryers, etc, you may use them, but keep in mind that they are not your friends. Heat dries out the hair. If possible, at least avoid to blow-dry your hair. And when you do use these things, you might want to consider using some sort of heat protecting product. There are sprays and mousses, for example. 

Friends: 

Keratine - Look for products with keratine. Like shampoo and conditioner. The hair is part keratine and therefore loves keratine, so giving it some extra to munch on is always a good idea. 

Simple things - Oils, conditioners, good food, nutrients I've mentioned, hair masks, etc. You can buy hair masks where you can get shampoo, or if you want the real deal, at your hairdresser.

8. Some do-it-yourself hair remedies

In general, just rubbing oil into your hair, wrapping it up in plastic or just a towel, leaving it in for as long as you want and washing it out with water, is a good thing to do. 

If you know what's good for the hair, you can pretty much whip up simple hair masks with what you have at home. Oils, mayonnaise, eggs, even beer, soy, avocado, and so on. There are tons and tons of recipes online that you can try out. Me and Alex tried one out though, so I'll use it as an example. 

I don't have the exact measurements, but it's not that important either. So here goes:

Egg

Mayonnaise

Olive oil

Beer 

Soy sauce 

Measure and mix the ingredients so the result is not too thin and not too thick. Divide it evenly and rub it in all over your head (not the face, just the hair, but you get that). Use a good amount, don't be shy. Wrap it in plastic foil and wrap a towel around it - the heat will help it absorb the goodies. Leave it in for at least 15 minutes, or longer if you want to. Maybe don't sleep with it, but otherwise there's no set time when you need to take it out unless you want to die. 

Done! 

9. Summary

1. Bleach and dye until you're happy with the result

2. Keep the color fresh with the tricks I mentioned

3. Bleach roots and / or re-dye completely when you feel like it's needed

4. Eat properly, dammit

5. Don't wash your hair so often

6. Avoid enemies, welcome friends

7. Use hair-remedies and masks once a week or every other week, as often as you want

(maybe not every day, though)

10. END

This was meant to be a short post, but I suppose I had more to say than I thought. I'm sorry. Or not sorry, depending on how helpful or not-helpful you found this long rant. 

Of course I do really hope someone found this helpful in some way! 

And as usual I hope someone made it to the end of this mountain of text. If so, thank you very much for reading and thank you for not throwing your computer out the window with a loud roar of frustration. I love you very much dear person who I can't possibly see through my screen. 

Have a great life until next time, 

Chu chu ♡(  ᵕ̤ɜ)ᵕ̤ૢᴗᵕ̤ૢ )♡

Dear my future

I've been in a Mawaru Penguindrum-mode lately, hence the title (ending song).
That said, hello. Just thought I would do this real quick since I tend to be rather quiet between posts:

❀ Upcoming posts ❀

- NärCon 2013

I was very bitter when writing this draft. But the pictures are nice. 

- Faded dipdye / ombre hair tutorial

- Triple circle lens review

- Recent "please let me look like this" fashionistas

Those are the drafts I've been playing with so far! I will probably think of more random things and throw them in here. I at least have the ambition to become more active with tutorials and things, even if I am getting back to studying soon (I'm sorry for being so terribly inactive when you've made the choice to follow this crap I write). 

Now I've had the worst of days so I will get back to watching Quack Pack and dying slowly. Here's an outfit from today though, just because it looks like a post has more of a documenting-diary-blog-purpose when it has a picture: 

I stole Nanako's vest and even made the effort to put my hair up. 

I was quite happy with my makeup too actually ♪ Then I ended up crying everything away, sigh. 

Everything except for the hairclips and necklace (Kreepsville) is offbrand.

I hope your day was much, much better than mine, and that your tomorrow will be as well.

Much love and positive thoughts from me to you ♡

REVIEW ♥ Gold and black skull necklace + Clothingloves.net

Hello ladybugs!

You guys remember a few posts back when clothing online store Clothingloves asked me to help them out and write a little about them and their products? Either way, here's part two, because I finally own something from their jewelry selection! 

You can get the necklace for 9.98$ right → here!

I wore it today when my parents visited and took me to lunch. Didn't want to go all out with makeup and clothes, but I think the necklace and glasses made the super casual look more "fun", if that's the correct word.

I love this necklace for my more boyish and messier street outfits. Wearing a lot of black and white, I usually wear something small or big with a pastel color to break it all off. I don't even own any other gold pieces, I only have silver necklaces and whatnot, but gold works very well too, apparently! Matches my brown wig nicely if I may say so myself, haha ♪

I wore it with this ↓ outfit too, so I'll post a picture of that as well, even though you can't see the necklace as clearly there.

I picked this necklace both because I got curious to find out how gold would fit into my outfits, both because skulls are always nice, and because I wanted to try out their site before getting my hands on something else. 

I've been emailing a lot with the staff, they've always responded quickly, and they're nice and helpful. So good customer service! And the shipping was fast as well. Didn't take long for the necklace to arrive at my door. 

Having been obsessed with expensive Japanese brands that have killed me with toll fees and slow shipping, I have hardly even looked at online stores with wholesale clothing before. Positively surprised. Brands are always nice, but I've already said that expensively branded clothes aren't automatically better than cheaper clothes. You might even love those cheaper clothes more. And they might even look better than branded clothes. My favorite pieces right now aren't brand clothes, actually.

So the sum of the cardamom (Swedish expressions are wonderful), 

happy to have discovered a site like this! 

Apart from wholesale clothing, both for women and men, jewelry and other accessories, Clothingloves also have things like cheap wedding dresses, if you're older than me and looking for one to help you tie the knot in a fancy way. And they have other cheap fancier dresses as well.

Their banner is here to the right, so click it and visit! 

Or just click right here, works too → Clothingloves.net.

If you're wondering something don't hesitate to ask, and I'll try my best to answer! 

Otherwise I hope this review was in any way helpful, especially if you discovered Clothingloves as a new site to shop from. 

'Til next time, 

be sure to behave and have a nice July ( •ॢ◡-ॢ)-♡

Style & shopping crash course ☆ PART ONE → finding bargains in unexpected places.

Good evening fellow adventurers.

Since this is my first post in this future short series (?) of posts, maybe I should do a little introduction. For starters, let me just tell you how silly I always feel when I write something like this. In what way? Well, I get paranoid and think that you'll start to see me as a stupid old owl who thinks she knows everything when really she's just annoying and talks way too much.

I hope that's not the case.

Thing is, I think a lot. And when I think I start to write. It's like a compulsive need, I can't help it. And sitting on my ass writing all day just turns me into a ball of "oh my god what the hell am I doing with my life"-angst, so I might as well share what I write! Especially when I do think it might be of use for someone else. I don't know.

Anyway. Lately I've been thinking about how difficult and complicated everything felt when I first started out with street fashion. I sound like that owl now, but it's true. I was so caught up on only buying the right brands, panicking about not finding enough stores to buy clothes from. I even felt ashamed when I wore something offbrand, like a shirt from H&M, or whatever.

Man was I stupid.

Sure, brands are fantastic. I would still commit murder if someone gave me a truckload of BOY LONDON in return (not really, but you get the point). But now I'm sitting here wondering why I tried so hard and worried so much, when I can probably even find something to wear at IKEA.

I came to think of this a while ago, and the result is this (and future, since I came to think of a lot of other things, and thought it'd be fun to make a series of it) post. Topic?

..
PART ONE → FINDING BARGAINS IN UNEXPECTED PLACES
A little something about great shopping in places that might even make you uncomfortable.

..
1. Never underestimate a shop just because it looks unappetising. 

Just because it looks like one of those chique boutiques for 40+ ladies, it doesn't mean you can't find anything in there. Let me be pedagogical and state an example from my own life! More specifically, this mother's day.

Mum and I celebrated with a mother-daughter shopping and dinner-day. It being mother's day, I let her decide where, when and what to shop for. Took some serious mental strength. My dear mother has a thing for the most boring shops in the history of mankind, and she always has to try on a billion different things, and on top of that she always wants to spend at least an hour looking at flowers, which is not a dance on roses, I hate flowers. Or, well, I don't hate them, they're just pretty but not very exciting at all and they make time go by so slowly it feels like the clock is moving backwards. So I wasn't thrilled. But hey, mother's day. What to do.

Anyhow. Apart from visiting the damn flower stores, we walked around the whole Skanstull area here
in Stockholm, and went into this shop called Cayenne.

Cayenne, an old enemy of mine.

My mum has been dragging me there since I was little, and just looking at it you can see why it's not such a happy encounter for a person like me. All the clothes are beige, white, frilly in a bad way, and most of the time trying way too hard to be hip and trendy, in a 40+ kind of way. From the look of it, at least.

You see, that's the lesson I'm trying to teach here!
From the look of it.

Because when I walked around with my judgemental attitude, trying to make time go by faster by poking the clothes on the hangers and shelves, I realized there were actually a lot of things I could imagine wearing in there. And by that I mean a lot!

Some of you may have noticed that I like crosses, and I found quite a few nice pieces with crosses and other lovable details, for example, studs, trashy hems and ripped fabrics. Sweaters and shorts and whatnot.

I fell completely in love with this dress that I found.

I don't know about you, but I think it's a little tumblr hipster-ish - a trend people seem to hate on quite a lot, but I actually love it, and I stand for it. Even though my friends tease me quite a bit for it from time to time (with love, I hope). The material is super soft and airy, perfect for summer, it's comfy, and just overall a very nice dress. I felt so bad when my mum ended up surprising me and bought it for me. It was mother's day after all, I had to make her dinner and act like a nervous butler for a few days to make up for it. But hat's not the point here, stop it Saga.

The point is that this dress comes from a 40+ looking store, that I've feared my entire life.
It might look a little boring, but with the right accessories (scroll down to the end of this post to see what I mean) it looks good, if I'm allowed to say so. I love it a lot (thank you mum).

The more you know, huh.

2. Treat unappetising stores like a science project. 

Now, when exploring new territory, keep in mind that you probably won't find a goldmine very often. Sad as it may be. You might only find one usable piece of clothing in one of those stores you visit.

But if it's a really good piece of clothing, that you end up using all the time, isn't it still worth it?

It might be a pair of shorts, perfect fit-jeans of a perfect color that you can modify and make more fun, undies, a hat, even just a pair of socks. Anything is something!

I can still promise that at least in 95% of all stores, you can find that something you completely fall in love with.

So try it out, go in there and investigate properly before you give up. It doesn't have to be something with a lot of details and prints and street-y looking, simple things work too. Remember that you'll probably want to mix the clothes with a lot of details with something that has less details, so they don't eat each other up. And, you can also modify things. Add studs, rips, simple things that look great. It might save you some money as well, since it's often way cheaper to, for example, rip your own jeans than to buy an already trashed pair.

You pay more for broken pants. What's the logic in that?

What I mean by "treat it like a science project" is that you should go into a store with an hypothesis of what you might find, and let the store prove you wrong or right. You can, after all, only imagine what you might find, until you actually investigate properly.

3. Think and play outside the box. 

Now, the dress I found. It looks a little plain and a little boring. But that's the other thing;
Every single thing you buy can't automatically be magical as soon as you put it on. You have to play around a little with it, I think. I love boring clothes, because you can add so much to them, without it looking crazy.

So I did this;

Blouse: Beyond Retro. 

Skeleton-necklace: Kreepsville. 

Clock-necklace: ...grandma. 

Bag: Taobao.

Thinking about wearing this with transparent bat-print tattoo-tights, white platforms, and my dark blonde curly wig in two mini buns and the rest let down (kind of Sailor Moon-style?), and bone hairclips. I don't know, what do you think? (　ﾟдﾟ)''

According to me this dress kind of says everything I want to say. It comes from a boring store, it looks kind of boring on it's own - that doesn't mean you have to match it with boring things. There's always something you can do to make something more fun. You just have to... throw in a little bit of everything until you're happy with what you see, I guess. 

Keep an open mind, that's what I'm saying. 

And that concludes part one, I suppose.

Like I briefly mentioned, I have a few more posts coming up in this newborn little crash course! Speaking of which, I didn't know what else to call it, it's really just a series of posts with me sharing my thoughts. But crash course will have to do! Whatever. 

I'm thinking about an DIY post, I have some more "knowledge" about finding clothes in the wrong places, and using clothes, and how to look for things online, inspiration... I have a lot in mind!

Do you guys have any other suggestions of things you're wondering, and things I might be able to talk a little about? Questions, topics, etc? 

I'd love some suggestions!

Now it's time for sleep though. I've been adding some things to my room, so my bed is really screaming after me. It's so cozy I feel like crying. So I'll just say good night right here.

I hope this was in any way a nice read for someone. If not, at least I'll have this to remind myself to take it easy next time I panic over expensive brands way out of my reach.

Have a nice Thursday tomorrow everybody!
Lots of love ( •ॢ◡-ॢ)-♡

P.S. Added a tiny picture of my pimped bed and Suzuki-san posing on it. Couldn't resist, haha.

Midsummer weekend 2013.

Midsummer is another great tradition over here.
Midsommar. Oh Midsommar.

When you're a child it's all fun and play. You eat good food, decorate a huge pole with flowers and birch branches (Sweden. Birch branches apparently are very important to us), play with the other kids, sing the "små grodorna" = "little frogs" and dance around the pole, family and music and friends.

Then when you grow older you'll eventually find out that that pole is supposed to represent a huge penis and it's not so much fun anymore.

Midsummer is a fertility celebration.
To this day most kids are, apparently, conceived on the glorious Midsummer nights.

I don't dance around that freaking pole anymore, believe me.
I spent a part of my Midsummer weekend like this:

Alex is always looking for a reason to pull down/up his shirt and he has great abs so it's cool though still, come on dude.

Started off innocently and then it just sort of went downhill after dinner.
Look at mah glorious hair and them fabulous glasses.

Love these guys so much.

That would be all. I just really wanted to throw these pictures out there and forget about the penis-pole.
Goodnight lovelies! (⊙ヮ⊙)

Taking the student

Good day my poor neglected blog. 

Yes, emphasis on neglected up there. For some reason I haven't checked in for a while and oops, 16 unpublished and unanswered comments (sorry Chriss, Anid and Josephine, and all the bots that have been spamming me telling me to visit their lovely sites, such as "busty blondes posing" or "nose job"). 

I'm here now, shh, don't cry dear blog. All is fine. 

I promise I love you just as much as I love my tumblr. 

Now. I suppose it might be a good idea to explain the rather suspicious title of this post. 

What the hell does "taking the student" mean? 

Let me start by saying that "taking the student" is a both traditional and a rather barbaric Swedish celebration, that goes on for a couple of weeks, once a year. Let me continue by saying that despite it being a somewhat barbaric thing, it has nothing to do with hunting nor capturing students, it has nothing to do with picking students up and carrying them away, making them your property, and it doesn't have anything to do with things you might do to the student of your choice in the bedroom of your choice, either. And let me finish - bear with me on this, I'm trying to be educational - by saying that "taking the student" is Swenglish and shouldn't make sense at all unless you speak both Swedish and English. 

"Studenten" = "the student" = also a word for "the graduation"

"Ta studenten" = "take the student" = "take the graduation" = you get it. To graduate. To be more specific, finishing high school, usually at the glorious age of eighteen. 

"Hey, I took the student this June!" 

"Congratulations on the unemployment!" 

Something like that. Swenglish is beautiful and I love wordplays so nope, not sorry.

Now, how do I even start though? I've literally rewritten this post from this sentence and forward a billion times so I obviously am a little lost here. Past years, as I've grown up, this whole graduating Sweden-style has just been something rather terrifying. I've basically known that it's best to avoid going outside as much as possible during these weeks in the beginning of June, and that's partly because all I've seen of it are drunken teenagers screaming on top of huge trucks while pumping music way too loudly, all over town, you literally can't avoid them, and then of course I've been to my cousins's student receptions and seen them come home drunk after riding those trucks, covered in booze from head to toe, and it goes on and on. You can see why I labelled this as "barbaric."

I was supposed to graduate this year too, but as you may know, I took a year off because of reasons. That hasn't stopped my fellow 1994 comrades from graduating, though, and since me and my best friend are basically siamese twins, whether he likes it or not, it's kind of like I've been taking the student through him taking the student. Though I must say, the more closer information I've gathered from this whole thing, the more relief I've felt about the fact that my student will probably look a bit different.

Let me make another one of those convenient lists;

1. It all starts with the class fighting over what the theme of the "studentskiva" (= directly translated, "graduation record", but it means "graduation party" or "graduation ball").
   
   
2. The next step is to decide which students should do what - like finding a place to hold the studentskiva, finding a "studentflak" (= the trucks I was talking about) to rent, DJ, catering for the dinner before the studentskiva, and so on.
   
   
3. A lot of fighting there as well, before everything is settled.
   
   
4. The students presents the results of their completed assignments. Here, the insane costs are revealed. And when I say insane I mean it. All together, it can add up to like 80 000 SEK. According to Alex (I just texted him and asked). Good thing is this cost will - hopefully - be paid through the students selling tickets to the studentskiva to their friends and family. Though they have to sell quite a few tickets to save their asses from having to pay up themselves.
   
   
5. The theme of the studentskiva is decided. Some more fighting here, I presume.
   
   
6. Time for some other yummy costs! Like the "studenthatt" you pretty much have to wear, whether you like it or not. The studenthatt, or "studentmössa", is a hat. You might have guessed that since the Swedish word is pretty much identical. So what's up with this hat? It's a special snowflake hat and it's expensive. You order it custom made, and you can choose colors, shape, and if you want to have something written on it or not. Every letter cost 50 SEK, fun, right?
   
   The studentmössa can cost up to 3000 SEK. I am not kidding. You can get a goddamn laptop for that.
   
   
7. Once everything is settled and ready, it starts for real.
   
   
8. The students call everyone they know, including their distant aunt that might go by the name Agda, to sell tickets.
   
   
9. Chaos and panic.
   
   
10. Finally, the studentskiva. My old classmates first had dinner with their parents, with speeches and the oh so important ceremony of handing out titles to all the students. Alex was voted "the sunrise of the class" which fits him oh so well, considering he's as least pretending to be nice to people's faces before going away with a not so nice look on his face. He's very bitter. One of the reasons we're friends.
    .
11. The studentskiva goes on with the skiva itself, once the parents have left the building. ES10B - my old class - had their skiva at a place called Wokhouse. The theme was "in the wrong time" (the themes are usually super boring, like "oops how did I get here?" or "from the seventies") and I dressed up like a cow-human from a future where the human race is dying and forced to breed with animals. Basically an excuse to just wear my kigurumi.
    .
12. People get drunk and dance. I didn't. Alcohol is expensive over here, no way I'm paying for that shit unless I'm out with friends, far away from a skiva.
    
    
13. The studentskiva is followed by a few weeks of some more chaos as the students in charge of arranging and collecting the money to pay for the skiva and the flak (again, what we call the truck-things). Poor Christian almost ended up paying for the whole thing himself since some idiots hadn't even sold one ticket and were refusing to hand in the money "because they couldn't help it that they hadn't sold more tickets, because they didn't have as many friends and weren't as popular as some of the others."
    
    Did anyone say bullshit? Yes? No? Okay, good.
    
    
14. And so, the student is completed with the "utspring" (= "run out"?). 

Yes, I've written a lot now, but I'm just really fascinated by all this. 

Can't help it. My wordvomiting can't be tamed. 

ES10B and Alex graduated June 7th. 

Not a lot of friends usually join the families of the students to watch the utspring, but since I was supposed to be in that utspring myself with ES10B, and since Alex is Alex, I was determined and excited as I armed myself with wig, sunglasses and camera and hopped on the metro that took me to S:T Eriks Gymnasium. 

Around here it hit me how chaotic the student really is.

As I've already said, I've just grown up glaring at this from a safe distance, and I might have been at a few afterparties with my cousins, but before this day I'd never been at a utspring and hadn't seen how huge the crowds are outside the schools. At first it wasn't so bad, snapped the first picture shortly after arriving, then Alex's mum hunted me down and while we stood and waited for the event to start, the huge parking lot and street quickly filled up with people and soon we were pretty much attached to the fence behind us like band-aids.

The traditional elements were all there, like the signs the parents carry with their own student's baby pictures printed on them (Swedish parents are often cruel and print naked pictures on the "studentskyltar" = "student signs"), the yellow and blue balloons and ribbons, as well as the green birch branches everywhere.

That alone was quite a lot to take in with two pairs of eyes, and then some students added fire crackers and smoke-thingys to the picture, while a couple of other students started banging drums and started dancing, screaming and singing arabic songs, of all things. And then some sort of national anthem started playing, but there was something wrong with the speakers, so it played for like three seconds, then stopped, then started over again.

And somewhere in the middle I remembered how much I hate crowds and just had a panicked little party for one.

Anyway, all utsprings are the same; the graduating classes all wear white clothes (they don't have to, but they do it anyway) and run out of the school while screaming, then meet their family and get bombarded with ugly toys and mini champagne-bottles tied onto necklaces made by yellow and blue ribbons, before they join their classmates to decorate their "studentflak"-truck (the ones I mentioned and have scared me all my childhood, that is). It's often quite fun to see, since the schools usually have big main entrances that the students just flood out from while screaming, all happy and drunk after the mandatory champagne breakfast.

S:T Eriks is a crappy school in many ways, though, one of them being the shape and location of the school. So no big happy utspring for S:T Eriks's students.

They ran out from the nurse's office onto a frikkin' 10m long balcony.
Not very impressive.

And they forgot that Alex's class were supposed to run out with the other esthetic-majors, drama, music, musical (again, S:T Eriks is a special school), etc, so they randomly ran out at the end without even being announced. Even more not impressive.

I was basically like a proud mama when Alex joined us down on the ground despite that disappointment, so it's a pretty fabulous memory, okay. I mean look at him so cute in his mössa and with his skylt just, yes.

Ugh.

I think I managed to keep my poker face though I was just ready to go "wäääähh" and roll around on the ground. Don't judge me, end exams have apparently been murderous and I've been a nervous wreck worrying about my graduating friends - especially Alex.

And, adding to that pile of embarrassing emotions, as happy as I was, and still am, for all my graduating friends, I must admit it stings a little knowing that I might not get to experience this. Not that I won't graduate, but most likely I will be taking courses from home and not be part of a class. Which means that if I were to be a part of an utspring I'd be running by myself and that would be way more sad than to just skip it and go ahead and graduate.

Feeling better about it just writing that.
As long as I graduate I'm just happy to be a part of my bro's student. Oh the cheesiness.

How about those studentflaks then?

Well here they are and the pictures are crappy, because that yellow thing is the tiniest studentflak I've ever seen, it's ridiculous. But it's the only close picture I managed to snap, so it'll have to do!

Imagine that but as big as the trucks on the first picture, and not tiny and not ridiculous.
There you go, that's what they look like.

They're covered in sheets with pretty things like penises, flowers, names and lovely phrases like "fuck you, we're coming to take your jobs." And of course more birch branches, Swedish flags, and blue and yellow ribbons.

ES10B's truck said "best class, worst attendance" - which is very true. 2000 students and those 30 were like 50% of the year's documented student absence. I think there was a penis on there too, not quite sure. Very mature choice of decorations, I must say.

These monsters drive around town for around 4 hours after the actual utspring, one class per truck, and those 4 hours are spent drowning each other in beer. Literally. The trucks are prepped with at least a hundred cans that the students throw, spray, and pour over each other, while dancing, screaming, singing, and killing all the civilians with the loud, horrible music they're pumping from always present the speakers at the back and front of the trucks. My friend Jözz, who graduated last year, told me that her studentflak didn't have any drainage for the beer spilled on the floor, so the truck actually filled up with beer and gave her feet a light frostbite.

Birch branches, war wounds and booze y'all,
Sweden in a nutshell.

That is basically it.

There is of course the "studentmottagning" (= "student reception"). Home of student x + family of student x + buffet table + cake + presents for student x and maybe an emotional speech. But not much to talk about there. The food was delicious on all the mottagningar I attended this year though.

My fingers are getting sore now and I suspect if ANYONE bothered to read this, your eyes most be sore too. So let's end this post with the outfit I wore to Alex's utspring, to squeeze in some fashion in this entry.

Cap: BOY LONDON. 

Shirt: SUPER LOVERS. 

Necklace: Homemade. 

Jeans: Help I don't remember. 

Shoes: Taobao. 

There we go! Just one final greeting to my bro and then I'm happy;
Congratulations bro, I love you to hell and back (no hetero).

Oh, speaking of nothing... I know I already wrote this when I replied to previous comments, but thank you for the kind reminder to slap myself take care of my foot. I actually had a similar thing to what started the last episode happening today. I cleaned the crap out of it. 

(And Chriss I suggest you do the same next time you get blood poisoning, seriously woman!). 

Over and out my lovely readers,
especially those who bothered to read this entry, if you exist ♡(  ᵕ̤ɜ)ᵕ̤ૢᴗᵕ̤ૢ )♡

The tale of the foot

So the thing is,

Someone actually e-mailed me and asked me what the hell happened to my foot. 

I've mentioned it a few times (and tweeted about it many, many times, because I'm... me), but this nice little e-mail reminded me that I never actually got to the point. Thank you for reminding me. Don't worry, it's neither a long nor yucky story, it's also a very nice example of how I work as a person. 

= how I don't work, in other words. 

Let me break it down for you; 

1. I stepped on something, a small piece of glass I suspect, since a couple of days before I'd been carrying a mattress from my room to the livingroom and I literally walked into a mirror and knocked it over, which of course means that it broke. Big time. It pretty much exploded when it hit the floor (I'm clumsy).
   
   
2. After a weird, high-pitched noise and a sting of pain, I looked at my foot, could see something but it didn't look like a big deal. So I didn't do anything about it and just kept walking.
   
   
3. Why the hell didn't I do anything about it?!
   
   
4. I honestly don't know (I'm both clumsy and I make questionable choices in life).
   
   
5. A few weeks went by and it seemed like everything was okay. I didn't think about my foot since it didn't give me a reason to think about it, so to speak, until one fine day (it was probably raining, but it sounds nice to say "one fine day"), it started to hurt. I finally looked at it, and there it was. A black dot right where I'd stepped on the thing that was probably a piece of glass. About the size of a pea.
   
   
6. I still did nothing.
   
   
7. I spent the night at Emilia's house with her and Jözz. For some reason I mentioned "the black thing on my heel" and showed it to them. They were not amused. They told me that I should have it checked immediately, then pointed out that I should have 24-hour surveillance, because I hurt myself so often.
   
   
8. I didn't listen to them and I still did nothing. Of course I didn't.
   
   
9. A few days before we went to Amsterdam, me and my mother were cleaning the livingroom, when I stepped on the cord to the vacuum cleaner, and the pain made me scream. My foot was really hurting by then. I was kind of limping already. Mum was about as amused as Jözz and Emilia were. She immediately called the doctor and we went to the hospital the morning after.
   
   
10. I got an ultrasound on my foot, and they did some other things. I have literally had ultrasounds done on every part of my body now.
    
    
11. They couldn't find anything, said it was probably a mild inflammation. I was sent home with some pills and a follow up-appointment scheduled a week later. We went to Amsterdam. I was limping big time. Around here I finally started to realize that I probably should have been more careful.
    
    
12. Like I wrote in my previous post, when meeting up with Dana and Naomi in Amsterdam, I ended up walking for five hours straight. I was really, really limping by then. Putting pressure on that foot was no option, and it hadn't been an option for at least a week, so my other fot and leg was quite... worn out. By the end of the day I could barely walk at all. And...
    
    
13. ...when I got back to the apartment, there was a blister the size of a cookie under my foot, where the black dot had been. Not pleasant.
    
    
14. Understandingly, I spent most of the Saturday in the apartment eating those huge delicious puddings I found at the supermarket, hopped on one leg all the way home to Sweden on Sunday, got home, 40 minutes later we were on our way to the emergency room after my dad had looked at my foot and squeaked "BLOOD POISONING?!", and the day after that I got sent back to the hospital (it wasn't blood poisoning, fortunately).
    
    
15. They did some yummy things at the hospital but I'll spare you the details. You're welcome. It got better once the surgeon worked his magic, at least. Now after a few weeks of penicillin and limping I can actually walk again. And my foot lived happily ever after.
    

The end. 

Glorious, huh? I guess this also sums up the end of my Amsterdam trip! So no need for a post on the last two days. A bunch of family stuff and apple pies. Foot. Airport. More foot. You know the deal. 

And so, what have we learned?
I honestly don't even know. I should just buy some bubble wrap and make a suit out of it. 

Yep.
What to... say now... 

Well, for starters I'm kind of brainwashed from working at the bakery, and working extra as a kitchen slave at my friend's family graduation party all weekend. And on top of that, all week I've been watching way too much Pretty Little Liars, so I don't have much to spit out. Actually watching Pretty Little Liars right now. Mona is back from the asylum and it's pretty tense in school, she found a cow's brain in her locker. Okay. I love this show, but my brain is like a damp, dirty towel. Like a really, really damp towel.

Towel's don't think that much so you can see why this is a problem.

Since fashion is my passion I'll just throw in some pictures from Saturday, with some closet add-ons. 

"Ponies forever" tee from Taobao and dotted skirt from H&M ♪ 

Oh and here's my rubbery face as well. Charming.

No I don't know what happened there either.

Goodnight friends, I hope you had a nice day and that you're less tired than I am.

Rabu rabu (づ￣ ³￣)づ ♡