👋 Hello everyone, and happy new year!
I love end-of-year lists of favorite books, movies, foods, cosmetics, and whatnot and so forth. Here are a few of my 2023 faves!
Favorite iOS Games
Please send me your favorite phone and tablet games! I’ll try pretty much anything.
BTS Island: In the SEOM. I play this little game every day. It’s based on cute little BTS characters, but it’s also just a really fun match 3 game.
Japanese Rural Life Adventure. This cozy game is relaxing and cute and can be done at your own pace. Nobody dies, you get to have a pet cat AND dog AND chicken (I named mine Gochu, Kimbap, and Kimchi), and you can just spend all day fishing or catching bugs if you want.
Paint By Number Coloring Game. This is my keep-my-hands-busy-while-I-think game.
NY Times Games. I do the Crossword, Connections, and Wordle every day!
Luna Story 1, 2 and 3. I love nonograms - they’re kind of hard to explain, but they’re like graphic crosswords, little logic puzzles that turn into cute pixel pictures when you finish. Justin says these look like homework. 🤓
Honorable Mentions: Krispee Street, Scavenger Hunt, Patterned, Illustrated, stitch.
Favorite Amazon Purchases
Let me preface this by saying I buy a LOT of crap on Amazon (my usual face cream, laundry detergent, etc.). But these are a few of my faves that are new to me this year.
Wide leg cargo pants. All the gals in Seoul were wearing wide-leg pants, often a bit short; there were no skinny jeans to be found. I found these and now have them in two colors. They’re super comfy, and I think they’re cute and lovely and suit my style really well!
Redken Bonding Treatment. I dye my hair a lot, which means it gets brittle and dry and sad. But when I use this (Maybe once every week or two? Before shampoo/conditioner), my hair is insanely soft and smooth and lovely. It’s magic.
Herbacil Pineapple Tea. I love adding a bag of this when I’m brewing green tea, herbal tea, or whatnot. It’s so delicious!
Shark Rocket vacuum. I guess I’ve had dumb vacuums my whole adult life, because this one makes vacuuming SO easy.
Noshinku Pocket Hand Sanitizer. These fit in your pocket, they smell amazing, and they’re refillable!
Favorite Books
Goodreads says I read 42 books this year. Here are a few:
Books that were super fun to read
Station Eleven. “First we only want to be seen, but once we’re seen, that’s not enough anymore. After that, we want to be remembered.”
Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries. “One doesn’t need magic if one knows enough stories.”
The Graveyard Book. “If you dare nothing, then when the day is over, nothing is all you will have gained.”
Fourth Wing. “Lies are comforting. Truth is painful.”
Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow. “But it is worth noting that to be good at something is not quite the same as loving it.”
Books I’m still thinking about
Think Again. “We listen to views that make us feel good, instead of ideas that make us think hard.”
I Who Have Never Known Men. “Perhaps you never have time when are you alive? You only acquire it by watching it go by in others.”
Demon Copperhead. “The wonder is that you could start life with nothing, end with nothing, and lose so much in between.”
Dry. “As far as authority is concerned, calm people quietly dying is a lot easier to deal with than angry people fighting for their lives.”
Cookbooks I’m currently inspired by
I Dream of Dinner (so You Don’t Have To). Bookmarked: Olive Oil-Braised Chickpeas, Lemon Black Pepper Shells, Smacked Vegetables with Feta & Dill
The Complete Plant-Based Cookbook. Bookmarked: Thai Coconut Soup with Tofu, Sweet Potato Noodles with Shiitakes, Spinach, and Eggs, Cauliflower Biryani
The Everlasting Meal Cookbook: Leftovers A-Z. No bookmarks - it’s super easy to search through based on whatever leftovers you have!
Random screen grabs lately
Inspiring words, flat dumplings to look for at H-Mart:
Podcast to listen to, book to read, autumn thoughts, Min Yoongi:
Things that made me laugh:
That’s it! Thank you for reading—hit reply and tell me what you’re up to.
--Crystal