Polkadots for a Gift Swap Meet

On Sunday November 10th, the annual Gift Swap Meet took place! For this meet, every Lolita who signs up receives an email with the name of another attending Lolita and some information about her, after which you buy presents for her suiting her style. So you give something and you get something! I had really wanted to go to the meet last year, but unfortunately I couldn’t go. So when this year’s meeting got announced, I jumped at the chance! I was very lucky, because I was one of the last ones who got in! Soon I received an email with the girl’s name I got assigned, but I didn’t know her at all! It took me a while to come up with a present, but eventually I bought a cute double layered candy jar (that I decorated with lace stickers) and cute bow earrings. I filled the jar with marshmallows and put the earrings on top. I was quite proud of the result! :3
I really wanted to wear one of the dresses I hadn’t worn yet to the meet and pretty early on I decided to wear my French Doll dress, the black polkadotted dress I had won at the Angelic Pretty Tea Party in Paris! Initially I had decided to wear the dress with a simple, black bolero, but about a week before the meet I went shopping with my mom and I found the perfect polkadotted chiffon blouse! It fit the dress so well, it’s like they were made for each other! I finished the coord with simple black tights, red shoes and some French-themed accessories. I did my hair Misako style, from her cute book. ^^ I asked my mom to take some pictures of me outside for a change, which resulted into some (or rather, too many~) really nice shots! I really liked my outfit, I hope you do as well! ♥

● French Polkadots ●
My outfit rundown:
Beret: Primark
Blouse: H&M
Jsk: Angelic Pretty’s French Doll
Tights: offbrand
Shoes: Bodyline
Necklaces: Claire’s and Bijou Brigitte
Bracelets: Claire’s and offbrand
Ring: Claire’s

In case you were wondering: the umbrella is offbrand (bought in Japan) and the jacket is from Primark. ^^
Since my mom had to go somewhere that day, she offered to drive me to the Fly Away Fashion shop, where the meet was being held. I arrived very early, so there were no one there, except for Danchelle (who organized the meet) and her boyfriend. So I helped a bit by setting up the food and the chairs.

Food, glorious food~!
I put my gift next to Danchelle’s beautiful gift (a gorgeously wrapped box with a giant gold glittery bow on it) and she took an instant picture of me. We were soon joined by Katie (the owner of Fly Away Fashion) and we talked for a while. Soon we were joined by more people and I picked out a nice spot from where I could take pictures.
When everyone was seated, the game began! The first person took her present for the girl she was paired with and after that girl unwrapped her present, she’d give her present to her girl. There were also two boyfriends present and they had a (very amazing) gift for each other! It was a lot of fun to watch others give and unwrap their presents! Some people had bought something, others had made something. So many amazing presents! I wish I could describe them all, but that would be too much work (and I don’t remember everything either, haha).

There were many different Lolitas and many different presents! ^^
Now I will tell you about my present! It turned out that Danchelle’s gift was for me! I was so surprised, I never saw it coming!

My beautiful gift!
Picture by Danchelle
After I took the big gold bow off, I was covered in glitter! *_* The box contained: a cute paper bunny from Angelic Pretty’s print ‘Fancy Paper Doll’, a really sweet letter, Etude House ‘Sliced Cake Puffs’, Etude House ‘Sweet Recipe’ lip balm, four nail polish bottles in the shape of ice cream cones in the colours light green, yellow and two shades of pink and a super cute donut bracelet! I was so happy! ;_; ♥ I didn’t know how to thank Danchelle! The gifts were so perfect and wonderful!
After about half the girls got their presents, we had a little break for food and pictures. I took my tripod down the stairs and set it up outside. I tried to take pictures of everyone who wanted. Here are some of them!

Clockwise from the top left: Nina and Amy, Cat, Tamara, Kim and her boyfriend,
Kimmy, Stacey and Kimberley, Iris and her boyfriend and Dieuwke.
Choosing pictures was quite hard, so I decided to make two collages (even though they still don’t feature all the pretty people)!

Clockwise from the top left: Josine, Ella, Kathleen, Alice and Roos,
Joze, Anne, Katie
and Manon.
Don’t you think everyone looked pretty? *_*
After the pictures we continued our gift swapping. It was so much fun! Around 5 pm everyone had received their present and it was time to go. I thanked Danchelle for the wonderful meet and gifts and then I walked to the station with Cat, Tamara and Dieuwke. It had been a wonderful day, filled with fun (and presents :3)!