The Hello Kitty Cafe in Santa Clara recently opened! It's located in the Westfield Valley Fair Mall. This is a very busy mall (unlike most others) and it's considered a high tier mall, I suppose, due to it's many luxury stores. ngl I love pink LV bags (but alas, I never want to actually spend that much. Lolita is more fun).

I found out reservations were open and was lucky enough to snag one on the second day of opening!

There's actually 2 portions to the cafe. The Bow Room hosts Afternoon Tea in the afternoon (hurhur) and dessert pairings in the evening. This portion of the cafe requires reservations.

The counter of the cafe has snacks, drinks, and merchandise for purchase. You cannot make a reservation here. The line can be extremely long for this!

Just a note, parking was extremely difficult. Even getting off the freeway to approach the mall was taking very long! I wanted to arrive like ~30 minutes early to browse other shops in the mall, but I ended up only arriving on time!

I got a reservation for the dessert pairing. It seems to be a little bit easier to get this reservation and it's also less expensive. The Afternoon Tea looks fun, but for ~$70, I wasn't sure I wanted to gamble since character cafes aren't typically known for their stellar food..

Here's how the cafe looks from the outside! This was around 6pm on a Saturday (second day of opening). As you can see, it is a little busy! There was maybe 20 people in line?

I spoke to a staff member holding a sign and he directed me to the Bow Room ^^

I didn't get a good picture of the inside as I didn't want to take a picture of all the patrons and make them uncomfortable (idk, maybe that's too respectful of people)

This is maybe 1/4th of the Bow Room, it's actually kind of small? I think there might be another section. Perhaps only this section is open for the dessert pairing.

Here's how the place setting looks! It's so cuteeee~ (I kinda took home the napkin and stuff for junk journaling later!)

While I was waiting for my friends, the staff were kind enough to move the carts so that I could get a good picture. They offered to do this and take my picture. I am really grateful they were so nice!

I wore Angelic Pretty's Promenade de Paris! I thought the bows on it kinda reminded me of Hello Kitty's hair bow and also, it's sweet and cute!

Here's what my friends and I ordered! There's a strawberry tiramisu, matcha tiramisu, and the strawberry tart. The apple pie with ice cream was sold out. The staff told me the strawberry tiramisu was the most popular item. There was also no alcohol that day. (damn missed opportunity of getting drunk at hello kitty cafe ><) On the top right, there's also cream that was provided. It tasted like yummy marshmallows. I almost skipped it because I thought my tiramisu already had enough cream, but the marshmallow taste was delicious!

Overall, the food was not bad. It's definitely not fancy like Japanese character cafes. But I think simple is fine too! Having very attractive looking, but not tasty food is my less preferred vibe.

The staff sprinkled powder over a stencil to make the cute outline~ My Hello Kitty looks like she has cute freckles!

I forgot to get a picture, but we all ordered strawberry sodas. All the other drinks were warm and it was quite hot in the cafe.

They didn't rush us at all (despite being one of the last reservations of the day), but eventually we got the bill. After paying the bill, they gifted us this cute keychain! It seems to be special for the grand opening of the cafe.

My friends and I wrapped up the night sticker pictures! This brings back memories to high school... I really missed doing that.

Scarlett came, but a new friend named Ashley came too! I met her from Bumble BFF. And although we haven't been friends for very long, I'm amazed at how considerate and thoughtful she is ;_; Navigating single life has been hard for me.. but she is like my cheerleader and advocate T_T I appreciate that so much. I still need to work on my own self esteem, but having a cheerleader makes me feel grateful. ilu.

It was a really fun evening. I'm thankful for how things are moving in my life.

Thanks for reading!

▶︎•၊၊||၊|။|||||။၊|။• New Jeans - ETA

I really despise modern Kpop, but gonna admit New Jeans' songs are pretty fun. My heart is still with Jpop idols because of how silly and how much more sincere it feels. Not a fan of the manufactured, completely rehearsed Kpop look.

I guess this is gonna be one of those "be real" entries.. I've been reluctant to share what I have been going through, but...

I wanted to talk more about important people in my life... My last post included how much Scarlett meant to me. Yet somehow I never managed to express that to her. Only to all my other friends!

****Dream Sheep - I've known him forever. Like almost as long as I've been on the internet (ᵕ—ᴗ—) Uh I might have been really young then.. like 15 (ᵕ—ᴗ—) ... that was like early 2000's (you can do the math (×_×))

He has been there for me during my most tough times. He's watched me grow. In my college days, I had crippling anxiety and he was there. I was scared to go out. Like even order food at a restaurant. Even to go to class. In more recent times, I was dealing with divorce and navigating a lot of complicated feelings. If you read my blog, you know I have been honest with my head space. He helped me get through a lot of these hard feelings. And being single has been difficult too. My low self esteem says no one could ever want me.

I feel incredibly grateful.. we don't talk super often. But he considers me a good friend and that makes me so happy ;_; I feel the same <3 It's like no matter how long time passes, our connection remains strong.

He is one of first people that made me feel "seen". Like he understands my suffering without effort. and he tries to soothe it ;_; It used to be so hard for me to express my desires to others. I didn't want to cause issues and create a hassle. I just wanted to minimize myself so others were happy.. Unfortunately this has caused some friendships to end due to misunderstandings. But Dream Sheep sees me (╥﹏╥)

****Jelly Honey - JH is a new person in my life. Never in my life have I felt so "seen." We operate on different wavelengths, but he really is curious and asks the right questions to understand my and soothe my suffering ;_;

He sees my flaws and accepts them as they are and only wants to get closer to me. Spending time with him makes me so happy. Even just talking is fine. Being around him makes me think, "wow, is this how life is supposed to feel like?" I never have to minimize myself for him. He wants just the real me, even if it's flawed.

I hope it's not weird I talk so much about my suffering. I do know I have a lot to be grateful for. I try to remain positive on this blog.. but I really wanted these people to know how much I care <3

I realize now how much I lost my sense of self. I try to state my needs now, but I'm not experienced at it and this has also caused lost friendships >_<

That was a very verbose post, sorry! Here is a preview of an upcoming post ^^

Thanks for reading!

♫⋆｡♪ ₊˚♬ ﾟ. Morning Musume - Genki+ ♫⋆｡♪ ₊˚♬ ﾟ.