Looking back: Aug '25, Week 4

The week went by in a blur. Most of my time was spent cleaning and organizing my home in preparation of a housewarming gathering on Saturday. I suppose I made good progress since the number of loose items in the closet has decreased as they found their rightful place. I am hopeful that I'll be truly settled in by the end of this week! 🥹

✨ Gaming -- Tried Spirit City's new DLC (All Aboard) and started a new Don't Starve Together game with my usual gaming friends

My Spirit City view today ⭐️ Hello Whalody! 🐋🖤

I love Spirit City so much. I've been enjoying the vibes from the latest All Aboard DLC and Lofi Girl music library update. Now the game has both Lofi Girl and Homework Radio playlists! 🥹

What do I like about Spirit City besides the vibes? Nothing says "It was a good day" more than a long list of checked off tasks! ✨ I enjoy ticking tasks off a list, so I find myself looking forward to checking boxes on the habit tracker every day. ✅ What makes it better is that the task list is always visually pleasing in Spirit City. 🥹💜

Looking forward to busting more tasks after I'm done with this one (writing my weekly updates)! I even have "Have Coffee" as a task because a day without coffee is a sad day. 🤣

Started a new game of Don't Starve Together with the friends I usually play it with. Now I'm back to worrying that I'm a liability and am not pulling my own weight because I am not fully self-reliant. 🙃 But I'm trying my best to improve my Wormwood play as much as I can, so I'm hopeful that we will get to see (and survive) the latest Hostile Takeover update. 🤔

Roasted Potatoes!!! 💯🥔

✨ Music Projects -- Recorded some vocals for a cover, and received a request to collab.

I need to start on a project I've planned for September soon, so I found time to test recording vocals in my new home. Yuraia said that my vocals have opened up, but 2 years of trying to not be loud because of poor sound isolation at my previous home has turned into a habit that I need to kick. Guess I'll need to come back to this song cover another day when I'm feeling more confident, and after more practice.

Over the weekend, a friend I've kept in touch with occasionally reached out to ask if I'd like to cover a song together. 🥺 I was so happy to be remembered and invited to sing. Lately I've been seriously doubting my ability to sing at all, feeling like I either have bad technique or my vocal quality has really been irreversibly damaged by a month-long throat infection years ago. I listen to my previous covers often because I keep praying that I'll finally grasp what my singing voice sounds like, and be able to find a genre I enjoy that I can lean more into. I tried asking for help to find direction before, but I always find myself lacking. Why do I not sound like anyone else? Is it because I just don't have a nice singing voice, or am I using my voice wrongly?

But this friend thought of me. She even presented 3 song choices and shared duet covers of them, so she probably seriously gave this collaboration some thought didn't ask me on a whim. No matter how she feels about my singing in particular, it felt nice to be asked to rise to the occasion - it's like as if they were saying, "I believe you can do it!"

Now, whether I can is a different matter, but I am hopeful that if we go through with this project, that I would have taken another step in the right direction. 🥺

✨ The Housewarming

First! Some photo updates of my living space!

Spot the Ari. ❄️🐰 Also, majority of these prints are mine... I need to stop. 💸💸💸

The snack corner!

My partner and I had several friends over to enjoy some home-cooked food and board games. We played Veiled Fate 3 times, and with each game I got further and further from winning. 🤣 Oh well! To be fair, I was trying less and less to win as time went by, so that might have contributed to it.

We checked out Utsu-P's latest song (Giant Hornet) together, and tuned in to Mogra's 16th Anniversary Party Day 4! \o/ I once described my taste in music as mind-numbing/ cranium-beating/ drunk-people-music, so the moment the music from Mogra came on, I completely lost my mind and couldn't focus on anything else. "Good luck to whoever is my secret teammate," I said as we played a round of Veiled Fate where everyone had a secret teammate they didn't know of that they needed to work with to win. 🤣

It was nice to hang out with friends who I normally only chat and hang out with over Discord. Deep down I felt like they were there mostly there to hang out with my partner (because I... don't... socialize very much...), but I hope that they enjoyed my company nevertheless. 🥺 Sometimes I wonder... Do people look at me, or do they see me?

Anyway! It was a pleasant day, and an even better evening! 🌙

✨ Random interesting thing -- Ari showcased the anniversary gift I gave her 🥹

When she appeared on stream with the clips and pin/ sticker that I drew, I was so touched and quickly took a screenshot. 🥹🥹🥹💖💖💖

A few weeks ago, I drew some Mimi, Mogu, and Yuri inspired accessories with the idea that they could be used with Ari's 2.0 Live2D model. I wasn't sure if I was overstepping boundaries or imposing on her, but in the off-chance that my hunch was right, having something that reminded her of us would give her encouragement/ feel less alone whenever she goes live.

I saw snippets of Ari's model when it was done (before her anniversary), so I referenced them to try to match the line weight and color tones. I wasn't sure how it would turn out, but thought that even if she doesn't ever use the illustrations, that at least I would have conveyed my well wishes. I wasn't expecting her to really use them on stream... and for her to look so adorable with them on. 🥹🥹🥹💜💜💜

She deserves all the love in the world. 🥺💜

Also I hope I didn't come across as imposing to her or her viewers... 😭😭😭 I wish I was a "cooler"/ "more impressive" acquaintance for her to associate herself with...

~💜~

Hopes for this week

♪ Start on a new music project 🤔 Shall I show my WIP?

☆ Finish putting up prints! (Lol it's a task on my Spirit City, as you can see in the screenshot)

☆ Finish organizing my closet (holds home maintenance tools and my craft materials...)

☆ Play Don't Starve Together? :D

☆ Gale of Waterdeep (BG3) is still waiting for me...

Thank you for reading! 🌙🐰