My Week In Outfits #3 + My Birthday!

Hello everyone! Today I turn 23 years old. I celebrated last night by being a birthday lion and hanging out with my besties, including, of course, Katie from Buddle and Squeak! However, most of my week doesn't consist of me wearing onesies (in the daytime. As soon as I get home from uni, it's straight into the snuggly lion onesie for me). I really liked all my outfits last week, so I filmed them all and made a little video with them! Enjoy :) Let me know which days outfits were your favourites! Bloglovin' | Youtube | Facebook | Twitter |  Instagram | Chictopia | Lookbook | Tumblr

Three Year Blog Birthday! // The Journey So Far

Three years ago today I sat down at a computer, made myself a blogspot account, then roped my boyfriend into taking pictures of me in my new Asos dress. I then proceeded to make a fairly amateur first post, the formatting of which now makes me cringe. And all I got for my efforts was a single seedy comment. But slowly my blog began to blossom - I became obsessed with online shopping, was introduced to the world of lookbook and chictopia (which helped people to find my blog in the first place), and started posting outfits once a week. Inspired by other bloggers and the then very-popular galaxy look, I tried out my very first DIY. Very shortly after beginning to blog, however, I was diagnosed with a very scary and life-threatening illness, which was to become a very large part of my life - certainly not a defining feature of who I am, but still something that I continue to battle every day. This space then became so much more than a fashion blog to me - it became my place to escape. Some days all that I was able to do was to throw on a pretty outfit, take some photos, and then be utterly exhausted. But it gave me something to do, some sort of purpose, rather than lie around in bed feeling defeated and sorry for myself. At first, you wouldn't have been able to tell I was sick (such is both the blessing and the curse of having an invisible illness), but slowly the medications that I was taking took their toll - my weight shot up, my face ballooned and my hair began to thin. So I dyed my hair and hid my face, terrified that people would discover that I "wasn't normal", but determined to keep blogging no matter what happened. Dressing up and doing DIYs became a sort of therapy for me. I got my first ever sewing machine, and started making my own clothes - the above picture shows the very first circle skirt that I ever attempted! While the hem was completely uneven and I had to wear it with a belt for it to stay up, I was beyond excited that it was possible for me to make my own clothes. For valentines day in 2012, I wrote my first DIY tutorial. Companies took notice of me, and decided that they wanted to start sending me clothes for free, which was basically the most exciting thing in the world right then. Super enthusiastic, I signed up with about 20 companies - then realised that was way too much work/pressure, so I stepped back a little and became a bit more selective. I discovered wigs... Started actually working with aforementioned websites like chictopia on style campaigns... And at the end of 2012, I started blogging about science! I wrote for the Scientific American, was a guest on one of my favourite science podcasts and met a whole community of scientists and science-lovers who also adored vintage and loved to craft! I met up with one of my favourite bloggers, Ashley of Candy Kawaii Lover in Japan, proving just how much of the world blogging had opened up for me. Ashley showed me around Kobe, and we became good friends - meeting up a second time when she visited Australia! In 2013, I moved out of home, and was asked to be in a magazine. Shortly before the release date, I was asked if I would actually like to be on the COVER of the magazine itself! And so this happened: I started thinking more carefully about my impact on the world and my fashion choices, and how the two were intertwined. Just under a year ago, I decided that I was no longer going to support/buy from companies that were possibly manufacturing their clothing in sweatshops. I had a complete overhaul of how I viewed fashion, but also aimed to prove that I could still maintain the same style solely through thrifting, DIY and shopping more ethically. I started writing for Birdee Magazine at the end of last year, and this year I branched out into the world of video blogging and started my own youtube channel, on which I have just hit the milestone of 10,000 subscribers. This is both awesome and mind-boggling - as my "film studio" consists of me sitting in a very awkward spot where the light is just right in the middle of my kitchen. But the best part about my three years of blogging? You guys. (Awww) Seriously though, it is! I will never be able to thank you all enough the love and support and lovely comments and "fan-art" and emails that have made me cry - to know that I have touched the lives of so many people in such a positive way is the greatest feeling of all. And in return, you guys have made such a positive impact on me! So that's three years of The Pineneedle Collective (Happy Birthday, blog!) and I am very much looking forward to what the next three years has in store! All of the love in the world, Bloglovin' | Youtube | Facebook | Twitter |  Instagram | Chictopia | Lookbook | Tumblr

My Surprise Birthday Treasure Hunt

It was my birthday on the weekend, and Luci had been hinting all week that something *surprising* was going happen (he kinda had to tell me this out of necessity to stop me organizing anything myself! He knows me and my control-freak ways well.) However, he did hide the surprise well enough that I had no idea that I was going to spend the morning trekking around Sydney on a treasure hunt! Because I was so excited (and anxious) about my surprise, I managed to only get 6 hours of sleep. At around 10:30am on the morning of my birthday, after staring at the clock and buzzing with nervous energy for about 4 hours straight, Luci handed me a cryptic envelope: Clue #1! I tore it open - and found a letter inside. Can you solve the riddle? After staring at it for a moment, I realised that I had to go to my favourite pay-by-the-kilo thrift shop! After a momentary bit of disappointment that the "surprise" wasn't that I got to eat all the food that Luci had gotten up early to make (delicious food Luci told me me I wasn't allowed to look at/nibble at), I grabbed a banana to keep me going and headed off to catch the bus. The excitement kicked in after about 5 minutes and by the time I got to the thrift shop I was running purely on adrenalin. I totally felt like a contestant in the Amazing Race (a TV show I watched religiously when I was little). Katie was waiting for me at the thrift store, keeping up the pretense that we had accidentally bumped into each other, and that she had forgotten that it was my birthday... for about 1 minute. Katie told me that I should probably go and talk to the owner of the op-shop, but didn't tell me why! The owner ended up coming over to me, and asked, "Are you Anni?", then she handed me my next clue! (We're up to clue number #2 for those of you playing at home!) Me at the op shop, pulling my "are you serious right now?" face. (I had also been told to dress in gingham, and it was at this point that I realised why!) After decoding clue #2, we jumped on another bus to find clue number #3! Blurry selfie because I was shaking so much from excitement, haha The second clue got us to visit a mysterious milkbar in the inner-west, the centre of many an urban-legend. This milkbar is run by an extremely old dude who people affectionately call "Dr Death". Olympia milkbar is notorious for not having changed since the 1960s (all the old chocolate boxes - now empty - and posters still remain), including the prices (apparently you can get a milkshake for $2.20) and for never having the lights on inside, not even at night.  My friend Leila was waiting here with clue #3! We were all feeling brave, so we went inside the milkbar (not technically part of the treasure hunt) and had some milkshakes in the dark.  Funnily enough, we were charged $4.50 for milkshakes - I think the owner wanted to see if he could get away with it, or maybe we looked rich - anyway, we just paid him the $4.50 because we felt bad for him - "Dr Death" is a pretty apt description of this guy's appearance (he looks about 100 years old and like he hasn't seen the sunlight in 50 years). After this slight detour, I opened up clue number #3. It told me to visit "the prettiest building at Hogwarts" - pretty obvious to me, we headed off to Sydney University! Here we found the person with clue #4 - Luci! I gave him the biggest hug - I think he was fairly relieved that his treasure hunt had worked out thus far. We all had a little break (I'd been running around the place for about 2 hours at this point). Unfortunately all that Katie had in her picnic basket was a ukelele and a bunch of raw eggs (??) so we couldn't really stop to have a picnic, but we did at least get to take some cute pictures! Me, Leila and Luci! Clue #4, handed to me by Luci, was the sweetest little riddle, opening with: "return to the place we share together". So, we all headed back home. Awaiting me there were all my best friends, who jumped out and yelled *surprise!* at me while blasting Pharell William's Happy and - probably most importantly - FOOD! Hey, this is pretty okay for a poor student budget! Traditional Australian dessert, the pavlova, brought over by my friend Bonnie. Some of my gorgeous friends... this photo cracks me up so much - I feel like we should have our own Degrassi-style sitcom. Loads of lovely hugs - I love my friends so much ;__; Another surprise was having my parents visit me and give me a dress maker's mannequin!! Such an awesomely cool gift; it's going to help me so much with my sewing! Me and my mumma - somehow we both managed to wear all red and be matching! This was the first birthday since turning 18 that I haven't been desperately afraid of getting a year older. I had such a nice day that I was just like "bring on 22!" by the end of it. And as a final, amazing surprise, Luci played me two songs that he recorded just for me, with him singing and playing guitar - they're very so special and beautiful, I cried tears of joy for about half an hour straight, listening to them on repeat. Have any of you guys ever planned/been the recipient an awesome surprise? I'd love to hear your stories! I hope that you're all having the BEST day! Bloglovin' | Youtube | Facebook | Twitter |  Instagram | Chictopia | Lookbook | Tumblr