Hey guys! I'm super excited to tell you guys that I have bought a new phone. It's the not-so-new model, LG G2. It's fairly new, only around a year old but the LG G3 is about to (or maybe it already has) come out. So let's begin this with telling you guys why I opted for the G2 over other smart phones. I have heard some news about the G3 coming out but I thought that it'd be too expensive and out of my budget since it's new and has pretty much just came out. Even though I have to admit, I didn't even set a real budget, I kinda just looked for a phone that I liked and thought was fair priced. I bought the LG G2 over the new Samsung galaxy, an iPhone and other smart phones because I really like the look of the LG G2. I love how there are no buttons which means that the size of the screen would be the entire phone size pretty much. It's a 5 inch phone which is HUGE! So after a week of thinking whether buying a phone is important/worth it or not, I ended up buying it. It was somewhat difficult finding a good, trustworthy store that had it for cheap. The store that I ended up buying from is einfo.co.nz (Expert Infotech). I also looked at Parallel Imported and Trade Me listings but I was kind of worried to buy such an expensive thing from a Trade Me listing since I can't be for sure that the seller is trustworthy. I mean, I know there's a 95% chance that the seller is trustworthy but I still opted for a proper store.

The main reasons that I bought this phone is because of it's large screen size (it's 5 inches), its great camera (13 MP) and also the back power/volume buttons. I think that the power button placed at the back is such a unique idea and I love how the volume buttons at the back allow you to snap pictures. Haha this seems like the ideal phone for selfies. ;)

I've used this phone for over a month now so  However, there are more pros than cons in my opinion.
Pros:
*Great resolution and amazing screen size. I know this isn't the only phone with a large screen and great resolution but it's still awesome!
*The knock on function where you just need to double tap to go to the lock screen. I actually love this function because it's probably me being paranoid, but I always feel like I'm squashing and ruining a button (like lock/home button) when I press it too frequently. With the knock on function, I have only pushed the proper lock button a few times.
*Playing games are so much more fun with the huge screen.
*Fair amount of case/covers to choose from. I bought my case from etsy.

Cons:
*The home button is right below the space button when texting/typing. This makes it super easy for me to accidently go home instead of pressing space while texting. This isn't too bad since once you click back into the messages, you can go back to what you were writing. So this isn't a major con.
*I've cracked the screen already.. I have not dropped this phone yet so something hard and sharp must've been put against the screen to cause it to crack. :'( The crack happened a week or two after I had the phone.

So that pretty much sums up my thoughts on the phone.

Love,
Elaine

Hi guys, I guess my new years resolution of blogging more often (like once every 2 weeks or so) has failed miserably.. I just can't find anything too special and glamorous to blog about. However, there should hopefully be some interesting stuff happening. Anyways, last night, my dad, sister and I went to this Japanese buffet called Haru no Yume. It has a range of food but mainly sushi and sashimi. Time just flew by when we were there. We ended up staying for almost an hour and a half.

Firstly, let's talk about the decor and overall "feel" of the place. They have very pretty fairy lights which is the main theme in this restaurant. Or shall I say light source? Because the ceiling has no lights! They only have fairy lights and some long dangily light bulbs. (Not sure what the specific name for these are because I'm no light expert.) I actually don't even know how the restaurant felt so well lit but in reality, I was pretty dim now that I think about it and look back at the photos. Speaking of lighting though, each table also gets a lighted candle to set a nice, calming atmosphere. They also had some nice decor which consists of giant Japanese style umbrella. They also had some empty sake bottles on this divider wall that they have.

Secondly, ze food! Here's just some of the food that we ate:

This is Yvonne's plate and first thing she pigged out on was sushi and raw fish like salmon, tuna and king fish (I think?) because she wasn't able to eat them while pregnant.

More food

Sashimi plate that they bring over.

Beef that they light the bottom of the "stove" thing for you and the beef will begin to cook.

ICE CREAM. These are just like your typical soft serves. They have a machine for it where you just pour out yourself and I also added this fried thing on to substitute fries :3

I have one major highlight from the entire evening and that is that we originally thought that the beef (in the 2nd and 4th picture) was eaten as beef tataki (pretty much raw beef). But like after grabbing our first plate of food (including the beef), one of the waitress' told us that we're supposed to cook them! haha So embarrassing but hilarious because we were honestly so excited to eat beef tataki since it would have been my first time and also my dads. Even though the plates of raw beef (along with other food that were on the stove type display) were placed with the food that you just grab yourselves, it was misleading and caused us to think we just ate it as it is. This is actually bad and dangerous because not everyone would know that the food had to be taken by a waiter first and then served to the table. They should at least have a sign up. :P

The one downside to my experience is the fact that the website that they have, gives out wrong contact information. There was a cell phone number that they specifically said was where you text to make your booking so I texted that number. I didn't get any replies to the text so I guessed either that they don't reply to confirm bookings (which is weird) or that they didn't receive it. So I texted them again during the day that we were going (yesterday midday). I didn't receive any reply so I looked on their website to see what their shop's number is so I can directly call to confirm/make a booking. BUT every time we tried calling, it went to a voice message saying that they're busy. We tried at least 5 times as well and at different times! We called about every 30 minutes until we gave up. Even though no one ever confirmed our booking, we still went because we doubted that the restaurant will be fully booked with no spare tables anyways. And if it was full, we would've just went to another restaurant. When we arrived, they said that there was no booking made by us and it took them about 2 minutes to think and decide whether we'd get a table or not. I'm seriously dissapointed in the fact that the number to text to make a booking is incorrect because it is on their website and I'm sure lot's of other people have fallen for this too. But what I'm not sad about is the fact that we tried to call them so many times and they were too busy to pick up the phone even once.

Overall, I would go back to this restaurant but I don't want to be the one booking the table! haha Too much of a hassle.


Love,
Elaine

Hey! So recently, I've been looking at dogs online but not because I'm getting one anytime soon. I've only started looking on Trade Me because my friend's sister is getting a dog so now I'm looking too. There's so many cute puppies available but I really want to adopt a dog from SPCA now because they need more help than those puppies who have great homes already. (Even when they're not sold to another family, their current home would be nice.) I have to be honest, when I was younger, I never thought I'd want to adopt a dog from SPCA and other organisations like that because I always imagine the dogs being kept up in small tiny cages while at the facility. I always thought that they will have mental problems because they had a bad upbringing and be scarred for life from the reason as to why they had to go to a facility. Now that I'm older, I know more information about organisations and all that. I really can't wait until I move out so I can get my own dog (which will be from SPCA or other organisations like this). I just went on the SPCA website and they now posts up photos of the animals at the shelter and have some information about them. One main thing that I realized is that the majority of the animals are quite young! Like most of the dogs there are 3 months which means that most of the puppies are just able to leave their mothers. And I always thought that the dogs in shelters were big, scruffy and looks tough but there are some adorable dogs on there! They're not the small breeds like toy poodle, shih tzu's, Maltese, etc but these puppies are still adorable. I don't even know where I'm going with this blog post. Just mainly spreading awareness to other people that you shouldn't be so close minded like my younger self when I thought all dogs up for adoption have a terrible background.

Have you adopted a dog from an animal shelter before?

Love,
Elaine