Mail Week: 25 + 26

Hey, Sorry for the late updates, but my life is super busy at the moment. I just learned, that the place I work at will close down soon, and I need a new job. My brother just graduated from school, so we went to his party and everything, and then at work an idiot with a baseball bat decided to smash around a bit (no body got hurt, nothing got stolen, and as he was drunk, he barely hit anything - still it was shocking!)

The mail strike is still going on. Last week I still received mail every second day, but this week I didn't receive ANYTHING :(
I WANT MAIL!!!!

 I know that some of my penpals are worried because I didn't receive their mail yet, but as the mailman won't work, there is no chance for me to receive anything...
I'll start crying soon!

But here comes my happy mail from week 25:

4 letters, 3postcards and 1 swap received :3

I'll begin with the goodies I was still owing to Yuki.
4 Dolls and a 3 A5 sheet / 5 pages long letter.

From Ji-Won, Korea I received a 1 A5 sheet / page long letter + awesome beauty products :3

I haven't replied yet, but I will as soon as I get some nice things for her!

From Jennifer, China I received a 3 A5 sheet / pages long letter:

My reply was a 2 A5 sheet / 4 pages long letter:

From Lily, Finland I received a 5 A5 sheets / 9 pages long letter + stamps + postcards + teas, and all of this in the most awesome packaging ever:

My reply 5 A5 sheets / 9 pages written + stamps + tea + photos

From Shermane, Singapore I received 2 A5 sheets / pages written

My reply was a 2 A5 sheets / 3 pages written + photos.

Now to the postcards:

The first was a swap on IG

Then from Astrid, Germany I received this:

And a postcrossing direct swap:

And last but not least the swap, I really wanted this stamp for my collection, and she also added a postcard and an add card:

Well, this was all for the week, I hope you enjoyed it, and I hope I'll get mail again next week >.<

Lisa~

P.S. I'll update my other blog in the next few hours too :D

Book Review 19: Fantastic Beasts & Where To Find Them by J.K.Rowling

Actually, I am reading "The Scorch Trials" at the moment, but a couple of days ago I received this book, and as it's really short, I thought I'd read it in between.

Fantastic Beasts & Where To Find Them (Hogwarts Library) by J.K.Rowling

Things to know:

• I read the original English version
• It was published July 2009
• It has 123 pages
• Set in the World of Harry Potter and is supposed to a replica of the school book Ron and Harry shared
• I read this on 15th June 2015
• This is one of 3 books of the Hogwarts Library published for Muggles 

As mentioned above, this book is supposed to be a replica of the school book shared by Ron and Harry. The foreword was written by Dumbledore and the Introduction by Newt Scamander. 

This book gives a short definition of the term "beast" and a brief history how this definition came into existing.
The largest part of it is an A-Z of magical beasts and where they live. 

~~~~~~~~~~

To start with, I want to be honest and say, this book will only be enjoyed by people who really love the Harry Potter World. It reminded my of "The Shadowhunter's Codex", though of course the Hogwarts Library was published before. But both of them are supposed to be school books used by the heroes of the series, with some notes in the margins.
Fantastic Beasts is way shorter than the Codex though, which is great, as it wasn't overfilled with information. On the other side, I would have wished for more sketches of the beasts and a cover which looks nice and old. Those points clearly go to the Codex!
(BTW you can find my review of "The Shadowhunter's Codex" on the right under "January)
Also I would have wished for a few more notes written by Harry and co. Most of them were non-sense. And I have the feeling some "beasts" where missing, the Giants for example. Others, which played a bigger role in HP had only tiny descriptions, e.g. the  Thestral.
Maybe just a bit more detail, would have made it way more interesting!

On the plus side, this is a charity book (at least the UK version is), it's a good cause, so if you want to buy it anyways, get a new UK version on Amazon or something like that :D

I'd say this book is best read after you finished the whole Harry Potter series, but this isn't a must. The notes written by Harry and Ron aren't spoilers, but they do mention what happened throughout books 1 to 6.

I hope this was a little help. If you have any questions, just ask :)

Lisa~

Mail Week : 24

So, another mail week has passed. Full of strikes (which still haven't ended), thus I only got mail every other day... But still, I received 6 letters and 5 postcards :3

I'll start with the letter / parcel I was still owing Hiroko from Japan. 

1 A4 sheet / 2 pages written

PLUS
souvenirs from Amsterdam, drawings, free goods from Dokomi, my penpal sheets and some goods from Yves Rocher she asked for!

My first received letter this week was from Elle, Netherlands

 2 A5 sheets / 4 pages written

My reply:

 2 A5 sheets / 4 pages written

From Rikke, Denmark:
1 A4 sheet / 2 pages written + some small presents

 

 My reply:
2 A5 sheets / 4 pages written, plus a postcard and photo of Amsterdam.

From Eleonore, Sweden

2 A5 sheets / 4 pages written

My reply:

2 A5 sheets / 4 pages written

 

From Tina, Slovenia

1 A4 sheet / 2 pages written

 

My reply:
2 A5 sheets / 4 pages written, plus photo

 

From Wahnnetta, UK

2 A5 sheets / 4 pages written

 

My reply :

2 A5 sheets / 4 pages written + photo

Also I received a big parcel from Yuki, Japan

including a 2 A5 sheet /  pages long letter
PLUS

2 makeup sets, a kitchen tool, jewellery and she has written into my travelling notebook :3
Also she used awesome Moomin stamps!

And here come the great postcards:

First Anne from Finland:

And as we are PC penpals, this is my reply:

 

Then from an IG swap:

 And these Lily sent to me, after I gave them to her to write to me :3

And the stamps / cancellation used

 

This is all for this week, please also check out my fashion blog.

Lisa~

Book Review 18: Sweep in Peace by Ilona Andrews

For all of you who don't know, the Innkeeper Chronicles are a free online fiction by Ilona Andrews, regularly updated on their blog. Later this will be published as a book as well, but on 7th June the last Chapter was added. YEAY!!! 

As I read this as it was written (more or less), I am sorry if I forget anything, but here you go:

Sweep in Peace (Innkeeper Chronicles #2) by Ilona Andrews

Things to know:

• I read the original English version
• I read it whilst it was written (last chapter June 2015)
• I don't know how many pages this has as I read it online, sorry
• It is set in Texas, USA
• I started: End 2014? some chapters were already up at that point and ended it: 7th June
• Book 2 of the Series

Sean has left for an adventure, and Dina is in her Inn, with only one guest as always. She worries about her magical Inn, as it needs guests to survive. Not only because of finances, but because the magic of the Inn is stronger with people in it.
Then George, an Arbiter appears who asks Dina to host a peace treaty discussion at her Inn, which no body else would host.
Dina has to agree to save her home, but this is were the mess starts, as having three different parties at her Inn, who'd like to kill each other means a lot of stress...

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I love Ilona Andrews, their books made me read again when I was 16. I hated reading so much beforehand! (And if you wonder why I am writing "their", it's because a wife and husband duo is behind this name).

The way this was published online for free made me take my time to complete the story. Usually I start a book, and when I like it, I read it in one or two days and I am finished. Here I couldn't do that. Even though I loved the story, I couldn't read more, as the authors were still in the writing process. It made me think about the story more, but also it gave me a tiny insight of the work authors do. This is a great Idea the two of them had!

I love how the characters develop in this story, and how you only get information slowly. Thus the tension also only builds up slowly.

There is nearly no romance in this book, which made me a little sad, but I guess this will be picked up in the next book.

Honestly, if you like fantasy go check out their page:  http://demo.ilona-andrews.com

This is all for now,

Lisa~

Amsterdam Trip 4th - 6th June 2015

I went to Amsterdam with University for 3 days. It is such a great city, I really want to live there one day, I felt so at home :3

On 4th June we all met 9 am and wanted to drive to Amsterdam. It's a 2 1/2 to 3 hour bus drive. BUT because someone overslept, we only left past 10 am. Then we went into a traffic Jam and and and... we planned to be there at noon, but only arrived at our hostel around 2.30pm -.-
We stayed in the Stay Okay Hostel next to the Vondelpark. A really great location, as the museumsplein is also really near. The food there was good too (for a hostel) I pre-ordered veggie food and there were no problems. I know others ordered gluten free and lactose free food which was also no problem :) The food was also really healthy.

 I can't tell you a lot about prices, as most of it was sponsored. We only payed 99€ for 2 nights, 2x each breakfast, lunch package and dinner, 2 museum entries, a boat tour, cinema ticket and transportation. REALLY CHEAP!

So, let's carry on with day one.

After we finally arrived we left our luggage in our rooms (4-beds). Sorry I took photos of practically everything except for the hostel and rooms xD

Then we made a student-for-student tour which we had to prepare first.
We walked to the main sights which were awesome. 

 After Dinner we went to the Eye Bioscoop (cinema) to watch a crime-comedy.

The cinema also has a museum inside and is located here:
IJpromenade 1 

(IJ is pronounced eye, get the joke?)
you can also find information here:

eyefilm.nl

Here are some pictures of day 1:

Rijksmuseum

Flowermarket

CHEEEESE!!!

In front the Eye Bioscoop

After only a little bit of sleep, we had to wake up early to eat and then meet as a group 9.30 am. We split into smaller groups and went to museums we could choose from.

 For day one I chose the Stedelijk Museum. It shows modern art (e.g Lichtenstein) and it also has a wonderful Matisse exhibition at the moment called "The Oasis of Matisse). This exhibition is there from March 27th to August 16th. If you  are interested in art, and in the area anyway, you should really go there! It's an awesome exhibition!

You can find the museum on the museumplein, it is opened everyday from 10am to 6 pm and on Thursdays until 10pm.

The Usual prices are: Adults 15€, Students 7,50€ and under 18 year olds are free.

Due to the Matisse exhibition everything is a bit more expensive at the moment though:

Adults  20€, and Students 10€

After the Museum Visit we had a bit of free time and met again around 2.30pm for a boat tour which started 3pm. Loved it, a must do in Amsterdam!

After Dinner we had a free evening, but as soon as we were free a bad storm came. 3 seconds outside and we were as wet as if we jumped into the water, so most of us stayed at the Hostel bar xD

Here some pics from day 2:

At the Museumsplein

Entry to Stedelijk

On the last day we had to wake up really early because check out was 9am -.-
After that we were able to leave our luggage and again we split up to go to different museums. This time I went to the Rijksmuseum, which is a must see in Amsterdam in my opinion!

It somehow reminded me of the Louvre in Paris by the way xD
The Rijksmuseum is opened every day from 9am to 5 pm.

Adults pay 17,50€ and under 18s can go for free.

After that we were free until 5 pm YEAY.
I had about 4-5 hours of free time which I spent shopping, eating and sightseeing.
As I was really busy looking for stuff and writing postcards, I didn't take a lot of photos xD
Here is one, plus the Starbucks Cups I bought <3

Well, I arrived home just before 10pm, and had to wake up the next morning early as I had to work starting 5.30am xD

It was a fantastic trip, I loved it.
I didn't want to leave at all xD

Lisa~