WELP.

 I don't even know if I messed something up, but I was basically trying to adjust my blog's layout and it ended up screwing the ENTIRE PAGE UP.

That's how I also ended up losing the pretty banner I had painstakingly created just for this blog (for some reason, it just shrunk and I couldn't adjust it back to its original size), hence why now, you're probably seeing an ugly text title with a small "WILL PUT NEW TITLE SHORTLY" below it.

I was forced to choose a new theme and everything because for some reason, many of the themes (including the one I originally had) tiled the background and it just looked awful.

Yeah, so, it'll be like this for a while. Whatever.

Arietta's Wardrobe ♥︎

I might have wanted to make this post because I wanted to get rid of several bookmarks I've been hoarding in my Chrome browser...

For the uninitiated, Arietta Cadenza is my "Beauty and the Beast" fan character (also partly a self-insert/Disneysona)! She is the only child/daughter of Maestro Cadenza and Madame du Garderobe from the 2017 live-action remake of the Disney film. While she technically doesn't exist in the original 1991 animated film (as her father is also a 2017-exclusive character), I also imagine she'd be the daughter of Forte from the 1997 midquel "The Enchanted Christmas" if she was animated in 2D.
However, because Cadenza and Garderobe are currently my only true and honest comfort characters™️, I'm more attached to the idea of Arietta being their child instead of Forte's.

Anyway, let's discuss what Arietta would wear!

From what I discovered through googling, there is some debate as to where the Disney adaptions of "Beauty and the Beast" take place. Some people think the animated versions take place either during the 18th or 19th centuries, while the 2017 live-action version is clearly influenced by the 18th century. I also personally think it's based in the 18th century, as the original story itself was written in 1740. Therefore, I've opted to choose wardrobe pieces that are influenced by those worn during at least the mid-18th century.

For reference, these are the fashion pieces worn by Arietta's parents:

the outfit worn by Arietta's mother, Madame du Garderobe, at the beginning of the film

the outfit worn by Arietta's father, Maestro Cadenza, at the beginning of the film (I could've sworn there was a version of his outfit where the costume was displayed on a mannequin similar to Garderobe's outfit above, but upon clicking the link, I found it was broken)

a bust/headshot of Arietta's mother. Isn't she gorgeous? 💖

a bust/headshot of Arietta's father. Isn't he adorable? 💕

Arietta's parents side by side!

Arietta's parents in their outfits that appear for like a brief ten seconds at the end of the film (gotta gush here a bit: why don't we see more of these fits?? These two are so adorable and THEY DESERVE MORE SCREEN TIME-) 

Okay, okay, I'm done gushing about Arietta's parents, I swear...

Onto Arietta's own outfits! 
I found many of these dresses on a site called "Antique Lilac" - the dev makes these very gorgeous and intricate ball-jointed dolls with exquisite outfits! To me, quite a few of them kind of have that blend between historical and fantasy - perfect for the Disney universe!

The dress below was one of the first pieces I discovered from the Antique Lilac website. I think I may have originally found it on Pinterest, but it paved the way to a new source I could use as inspiration for my characters' outfits!
I always imagined Arietta would wear cool colors like violet/indigo at the beginning of BaTB (Beauty and the Beast), and knowing the workers at Prince Adam's court wear very intricate outfits, I knew this dress was perfect for the court violinist!
Even the hairstyle on this doll is perfect for Arietta! Since she is a biracial child, I always imagined she'd have curly-ish hair like this.

The following dress seems like something that Arietta would wear as a younger child. I love the bright, cutesy colors!

Moving even more backward in time, I could see the dress below being worn by a baby Arietta! I think it's more Victorian in design, but considering that one anachronistic dress worn by Belle in the live-action BaTB, this probably wouldn't be out of left field to include anyway in the film.

The outfit below could probably be worn by a child Arietta when she'd just go out to run errands in her home village. Green happens to be one of her favorite colors!

My other OC Kristin would definitely approve of the next outfit, knowing her love of the color pink! This dress would probably be worn by Arietta at the end of the film.

The curious case of Rose Dawson, my OC

 This is my OC, Rosalind "Rose" Ursel DeWitt Bukater-Dawson:

(click the image to go to the original picrew!)

Oh wait, you say, that name sounds familiar.
Well yeah, that's basically the name of this character:

So, you continue, why do you consider this already existing character your own??

Let me explain.

First of all, I do acknowledge my own Rose is not entirely original. In fact, she takes heavy inspiration from her source material. I basically just took the original character, put her in our current world (so it's effectively a modern AU - or "Alternate Universe"), and gave her a whole new backstory and personality that better fits the new world she's in.

I don't know how or even why I got personally invested in the original character in the first place, maybe it could just be chalked up to finding a "comfort character". 
But whatever the case, little Maddy saw the 1997 film "Titanic" for the first time in theaters back in 2012 (I remember that because 2012 marked the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic, they re-released the original movie in like, 3D or something idk).
At that moment, I was hooked.

perhaps because it also kick-started my crush on leonardo dicaprio who's hotter than the sun itself

I had a friend at the time (who I'm still friends with to this day) and I introduced them to this film and its

✨ beautiful one true pairing that are totally star-crossed couple goals~ ✨

And because we were really into the cutesy romantic couples in Disney and My Little Pony, what better thing to do than live-action role-play as Rose and her partner, Jack, themselves?
What started as imagined scenarios where Jack didn't die like he did in the movie (oop, spoiler) turned into fully-fledged character and even story revamps, many of which contradicted the original time period when the film took place (the Edwardian Era? I mean, the exact year - 1912 - is certain). Both Jack and Rose were turned into a prince and princess, were given their own magical powers, and dressed/behaved in ways they couldn't theoretically get away with given the time period (unless they were, like, time travelers from the future, or something).

As my friend and I grew up, we gradually realized that our versions of Jack and Rose were utterly overpowered and made no sense at all. We even "deep-dived" into the original film occasionally, and while we continue to hold it in pretty high regard, there were some parts of the plot that we kind of-sort of didn't really like (I won't go too in depth into what the exact gripes were in this post out of personal preference).
Today, our AU Jack and Rose are still together, happily married and the parents of two children. We find it a lot easier now to tweak their personalities and storylines now that they live in our current age.
Again, leave it to the two being comfort characters as the reason why we're somehow so attached to these characters. I don't know if there's a strong Titanic "fandom" out there, but this film, to this this day, is probably the only piece of media we have been so emotionally invested in. By this point, we have revamped Jack and Rose so much that they could potentially just stand on their own as actual original characters different from their source material.

If anything in this post still makes little sense to you, then, I don't know, just chalk this up as a "AU where Titanic characters live in the modern age with a little bit of magic involved", I guess. Honestly, this post is just here as some kind of explanation that I'll be able to link to people out there who are wondering whether my own characters are related to those of the same name from the original movie.
If, even after all of this, you still have an issue with this AU, then just block me by this point, I don't know. Or I'll block you. Cringe culture is toxic. I'm not planning to monetize or do anything serious with this AU, anyway - it's all just for fun and it isn't hurting anyone. 💕

My Animal Jam masterpieces!

 As a follow-up to my previous post describing my experience having a membership on Animal Jam (a game I used to play religiously when I was younger) for the first time, I have decided to make a kind of "master list" of all the masterpieces I created on the game!

If you're not familiar with what masterpieces are on AJ, they're basically just little decorations you can create through their built-in art program (equivalent to MS Paint).
Confession, I never really used said art program before my membership trial, mostly because you could only really make masterpieces if you were a member (nonmembers were only able to make them if they had "Masterpiece Tokens", which are kind of hard to come by if I'm not mistaken). 

By the way, I should mention that you're going to notice these masterpieces seem to have been created by two different users: "xxTheLivelyOnexx" and "princesskittykins"; these are both me! The former is my main account and the latter is my side one. I redeemed the membership trial a week or so later on my side account just for the sole purpose of creating more art to display in my main account's den. ^^;

I only made one actual masterpiece back in the day (probably around 2017-2019????? I don't know, as far as I know, there's no actual way to see when you created a masterpiece on AJ unless you actually wrote it down in the art program lol) and it's this one:

It's my OC, Lily! (she's not a princess anymore, and plus, her whole look is outdated)

Here she is again, this time made during my membership trial:

Yup, a clear improvement! ✨

The rest of the masterpieces below were created during my membership trial.

This one was created as a sort of "greeting" for people who visited my den.

A creative (?) subvert on the "not like the other girls" trope featuring Stacy Willow and her sisters.

Stacy's sister Becky (on the right) and Lily's rival/frenemy Mariangela (on the left) share these common traits: they both like to wear their hair in ponytails and revel in the limelight of popularity!

My Beauty and the Beast OC/main Disneysona, Arietta Cadenza. The violin kind of sucks, but whatever...

Both of these feature my OC, Elisabeth "Lissie"!

It's cut off in the bottom left on the first image, but the outfit she's wearing is inspired by artwork by VIVINOS, a Korean animator I like.

The second image features Lissie as she appears normally (left) and as a Dungeons and Dragons character (right).

Lissie's mother, Rose! (also the inspiration for some of the animals that I created)

Mother and daughter doing their looks for their day in a mirror!
I know the "mirror" obviously sucks, but I'd argue Lissie's hands are also quite awful...

I like to call this one a "subtle contribution for pride month".

You see, not only does AJ impose a strict chat filter that prevents you from saying any pride-related words ("gay", "lesbian", bisexual, etc. - while I am aware that at the end of the day, this is a kids' game and anything remotely "sexual"-related is going to be banned. This extends to masterpieces as well, though some players have kind of gotten around this, mostly by drawing pronouns and pride flags in the background. After all, if you can't say you're gay, why not show it instead in the form of a flag?

With all this in mind, I chose to draw my OC, Caelus, who was originally modeled after the rainbow goddess, Iris! Yes, she indeed does have rainbow hair, and she loves everyone who lives below her sky kingdom. ♥︎

Speaking of rainbows, here's my take on the wannabe scene queen my younger self really wanted to be!!!

Little Maddy thought jet black hair and green eyes was like, the perfect combo (you can see how this translated into my awful self insert, Charlotte Li), and she was obsessed with all things cutesy and rainbow. She also really wanted to wear arm warmers, for some reason.
Maybe because a lot of the avatars on the games I played back in the day dressed like scene kids/emos...

I mentioned Charlotte, so here she is! Of course, she gets rainbows as well because uWu sO kAwAii!!!!11!!!

Oh boy, have I got a story behind this one.

First of all, these are my characters (l-r:), Crystal, Emiko, and Vesta. They're actually princesses and revamps of some old Super Mario characters that were basically just recolors of already existing characters, haha. 
Originally, I created a masterpiece featuring Emiko and her older adoptive sister, Maiko. It was basically just a cute shot of the two hugging with their names added next to them. For whatever reason, AJ denied it! 
Unfortunately, the game does have a habit of flagging quite a bit of harmless masterpieces as containing "inappropriate content"; I don't know if that's the fault of an automatic moderator or an actual human moderator who decided to be a piece of trash.
I was determined to make a piece featuring my Mario characters, however, so I just put Emiko alongside two different characters, all in fairly neutral poses, and just had her say something. Sadly, her older sister had to go, but it was worth the approval of the AJ moderators! ^^;

Last but not least, here are my Ancient Egyptian characters, Princesses Berenice Hotep and Ra-nefer-u!

You can view all these masterpieces at my den - they're all displayed with my main account, xxTheLivelyOnexx (NOT MY SIDE ACCOUNT!) You'll also find a few masterpieces that were bought from other people because I thought they looked cool! 
My den should be open for everyone to visit (not just friends), so you can just look up my name and come visit!

My experience with a membership on Animal Jam

 So last month (May), Animal Jam, a virtual world that I've probably been playing for a decade now, promoted a free membership code (which lasted 2 weeks)! I don't know how often they release membership codes, but I might have seen a post on Reddit and Twitter where AJ promoted a similar 2-week membership code in 2020. So I suppose it's quite rare!!!

This was my FIRST time having a membership on Animal Jam! And you know, it's actually a lot more... enjoyable than just being a non-member??? I mean, no wonder I rarely play this game...

Anyway, I decided to create a post featuring my highlights during my two weeks of membership! Yeah, not OC-related, buuuuuuuuuut...
This is my blog, come on. I post by my rules!

First up, here are all the animals I had during my membership!

When I used to be more into the game a few years ago, I had a habit of naming my animals "DJ [insert last name]". I think it all started when I had a bunny named "DJ Kawaiipaws" and I liked how catchy, cute, and cool it sounded, haha.

I always wanted an otter as my main animal! Almost everyone in the game plays as an arctic wolf, and - don't get me wrong - while I do think they look cool, some of the other animals are kind of underrated. Otters are one of them. I mean, look how adorable they are! They're so cute in real life, too!!!!

The rainbow raccoon, DJ Perfectpride (come on, I just had to pick that name, it just fit), actually showed up in the diamond shop during my membership in celebration of pride month! Apparently, it's been around since 2020.

The falcon and fox named "Rosy Fieryflower" are meant to be "cosplays" of my OC, Rose.

Lastly, the wolf, DJ Grandgem, is wearing an outfit (well, sans the flowers on the tail) that my younger self chose back when I was more into the game. I even picked the same fur colors and a similar name my younger self liked! I usually cycled between the names "Baroness Grandgem" and "Queen Grandgem".

Here are the pets I made during my membership!... well, just the ones with the golden locks. ^^;

I believe I named the black and brown dog "Sugarpaw" and colored it to look like my own pet dog.

I also love my gecko's rainbow mohawk and bandana combo.

Some screenshots of my den! Definitely an upgrade from my basic, one-room non-member den.

I believe it's Cosmo's Den, and I decorated it to look like a mix of a grotto/greenhouse/garden! I kinda have a thing for this aesthetic, haha.
I even had a decently-sized plushie room/stash!

Peep my friend photobombing (or "photo booming", as I said in order to get around AJ's strict chat filter) my screenshots - yes, the other raccoon and the wolf are owned by the same friend, lmao.

Last but not least, my jammer wall! Yeah, that one thing you can't even access unless you're a member!!!

I made my first post on it (the top one with the otter) the day I redeemed my membership code, then I made the next two posts when I attended the "Bunnies Only" party. The last post was made a day or so before my membership expired.

I'm not even exaggerating, the game has a HUGE lag issue, for some reason. And it's not just me experiencing it, my friend (the same one mentioned previously with the two animals) also mentioned going through a laggy game. It was especially bad for us when we both played the "Forgotten Desert" adventure (it didn't matter whether it was just us two or we played with two other random players). Neither of us remembered the game being this laggy before it was transferred to a downloadable program after the end of Flash!

With all this being said, I will NEVER be playing Animal Jam again... well, at least I won't be playing for a VERY long time. I've already deleted the AJ app from my computer and I don't plan on reinstalling it unless there's a significant update (like another free membership promo). 
I know we all have our preferences, but AJ just isn't worth it for me anymore. The game has declined in popularity since around 2015 (according to Google Trends when I looked it up a while back) and pretty much the majority of players nowadays only care about trading and rares. It kind of sucks, honestly, I miss when the game was more focused on animals and conservation and all that (especially when it was originally backed by National Geographic - this was how I discovered AJ in the first place!!!), and I even miss all the roleplays people used to do, as cringeworthy as they were (like those adoption roleplays in the Pillow Room, and random people starting little scenarios in their dens and all that).

But I guess that's how all childhood games/MMOs decline (and dare I say eventually die off).