Toys for the Gabby’s Dollhouse Movie are on shelf already! (This was at Target but it’s also at Walmart & other stores www.walmart.com/ip/GABBY-HOU... )

ICYMI here’s the trailer for the Gabby’s Dollhouse movie coming out this Sept. 26 starring Kristen Wiig and yup that’s Gloria Estefan, too! Tell all your favorite preschoolers! youtu.be/S-GFCPEWqe4?...

Cat’s out of the bag! A Meowgical Dollhouse I designed, with animated LCD windows, 7 buttons, music, elevator detection, and a spiral slide comes out this fall for the #gabbysdollhouse movie. It interacts via RF with the new Pandy Plush & Roleplay Cat ears. www.hollywoodreporter.com/lifestyle/sh...

Happy Lunar Year! I made a #gabbysdollhouse drawing of DJ Catnip, Cakey, and the Cupcake Cousins to symbolize my recent trip to Asia for the holiday aka the Spring Festival in Asia. www.instagram.com/share/BAEzJX...

I had a hearty fantuan here (rice tightly wrapped around breakfast ingredients like a burrito with no tortilla) but I overdid it getting the gua bao (like a steamed bread taco). Soy milk comes with a yo tiao (fried cruller dough stick) to dip in it. No tables but there is a small park nearby w seats

I didn’t try it but Domino’s has some crazy offerings in Taiwan! They got pizzas w a cheese dip built into the center! I mean, maybe I would try one out of morbid curiosity on a future trip lol

If you are in Taiwan during Lunar New Year and want to send postcards, go to Lai Hao gift shops (in Ximen and Yong Kang) because they also sell postage stamps which you will need when the post office is closed for the holiday.

Back in LA and my car battery is dead of course. Otherwise generally considering myself really lucky that my water & power is fine and the LA fires are finally contained! Will post more about TW but this sums up my trip for now & why I need to switch to salads & smoothies for the next month or three

I wandered more into Ximending & found a tiny shop that sells custom ink stamps with really cute Sanrio character handles, so I got one with my Chinese name and they made it so fast! In an alley behind Uniqlo near some tattoo parlors. Here’s how it turned out:

Happy Lunar New Year from Taipei! Gong Xi Fa Cai! (Hope you get rich!) Wishing you all good health and happiness. Here are cute Lion dancers I saw from inside Ximen Red House

The coffee donut from Mister Donut tasted weird so I had to redeem it today with a double berry one. Also picked up a Pon de Lion and French Cruller lamb toy. Taking a bite in Ximen in front of a cute goddess display.

So lucky to find postage stamps sold at Lai Hao gift shop because the post office is closed during the holiday. Figuring out who gets which postcard now.

Quick stop in fun Yongkang, may need to head back to shop & eat more but I need to check if I even have space left in my luggage 😅 I love Lai Hao & Jumeng gift shops for their stylish, fun, & cute gifts. Also there is a corner shop that has the best freeze dried fruit and yummy yogurt samples.

Here are some figures of monsters that are hidden in snack packages? Found in a toy store at Eslite Spectrum Xindian mall, where I also found more Gabby Dollhouse toys & got my nails done. Then I went to Taipei 101 & had a Mister Donut.

I read somewhere that it’s bad luck to buy books during Lunar New Year (which sounds oddly fascist to me lol) but I went back to Eslite to browse their fun gift section. I didn’t buy these but you can pretend I did. (I did get some cute Frixion pens & Snoopy tape, though.)

Wooderful Life has enchanting shops around Taipei, where you can customize mechanical wooden musical wind-up toys. They sell a few other token crafts too, so I bought a Chip ‘n’ Dale punch embroidery kit.

Here’s my ice cream burrito getting rolled up

I got a zongzi (sticky rice dumpling), guava juice, a jumbo spicy fried chicken fillet, and of course the ice cream burrito! Not pictured: strawberries wrapped in red bean/ taro and mochi that I’m saving for later. #ningxianightmarket

Ningxia Night Market was overwhelming; I felt like I had to pick 3-4 things at most. I browsed a kids’ game section at the front for a break. A couple food booths were closed and others had ridiculous lines already. Even the oyster omelet place nearby had a crazy queue. Some booths I skipped:

I just had a cherimoya for lunch and then headed to the Ningxia Night Market… where there were just too many people and queues, oh noooo

So… is it time to get a trainer and level up Sarah-Connor style now? (I gotta burn off the 50lbs I gained in Asia anyway) Gahhhhh!

Was this robot Chinese dance show related to Deepseek or is it just another horrifying tech company?

Trying to comprehend this game show (which seems like some innocent knockoff of Squid Games) in my Taipei hotel just reminds me how poor my Chinese is 😩 –never mind my Diamond levels on Duolingo

A cab driver told me that the biggest Toys “R” Us in Taiwan is near my hotel, which is open despite the holiday. Nice to see the Cakey oven & Kitty Camera almost sold out & the Carlita (which I designed) so prominently on the shelves! A-meowzing!

This is the longest I’ve ever stayed in hotels and it’s going to be a harsh adjustment back to normal life in my cluttered & likely smoky LA apartment. 😅 Even w. various world events and disasters, I feel immensely lucky. Thinking about my friends back in LA. Gonna find some PPE to bring back home.

I suppose this is the Taiwanese version of Dick Clark’s Rockin’ Eve. Excuse my sleepy Chinglish commentary 😅 I should look this band up to learn their lyrics & practice some Chinese!

A bunch of us (in Taipei) scratching off the Lunar New Year lotto tickets. I didn’t know the scratch-off material could be in more colors than silver! (Also I’m slow because I’m holding a puppy with my other hand)

Here’s the salesperson at the Coach Play shop applying my name in gold leaf to my free custom tag Chifeng store for Lunar New Year. What a fun job!

Just realized that I can share videos. Here’s a fun fortune-telling Year of the Snake gift I wanted to buy from a Taipei 7-11, but I realized I wouldn’t be able to bring this back to the US because it seems to include seeds.

Spent Lunar NYE over dessert w my cousin & her friends who treated me to a Year of the Snake lotto ticket, whiskey, & cuddles with their little doggies. Cousins sent me home w a cherimoya (fruit), gold bunny, and a bag of sweet snack puffs

Spending Lunar New Year with cousins in Taipei for the first time so of course they’re feeding me too much delicious home-cooked food, like a Taiwanese Thanksgiving!

I gotta say I miss the fun of picking stickers and songs to go with my shared posts! Is @bsky.app gonna help add these features when Flashes kicks in?

I didn’t pack a red outfit to wear for Lunar New Year so I decided to treat myself to a vintage 1973 Coach bag with a custom gold-leaf print tag. 新年快樂,恭喜發財!

Coach Play Chifeng shop had a special guava foam coffee! Also decided to get their Oolong-pistachio soft-serve ice cream to go. I had to get it in their Jasmine cone-which is even molded with the Coach logo. So yummy. Amazing branding experience. Kudos to the designers!

I found the specialty Coach Play Chifeng store, and their snake year merchandise is on point! The whole shop is so cute and there’s even a really tasty café. Upstairs you can find more merchandise and a studio, where you can customize your own bag! 新年快樂！

I even love the relief detail on the manhole covers in Taiwan that reminds you that these sewers lead to the fish and the trees. I picked up a few silly fortune decorations at the convenience store and they gave me a bunch of coupons that I’ll have to give to my cousin.

Browsing Poya for facial cleansers & makeup in Taipei makes me feel like I’m the tannest person in town. Fascinating to see so many types of contact lenses in the beauty aisles. Even the contact lens packaging is cute.

Taipei 7-11s are so full of frivolous delights to browse. Surprisingly I didn’t buy anything!

Taipei consistently has elevator buttons at lower levels for better accessibility. So nice to see wheel-chaired folks navigate around town.

"Even the employees came out to record the show on their phones," said the frontman for Knuckleadz, the Whittier street punk band that performed inside McDonald's on Slauson and Central Avenues. By @theglutster.bsky.social lataco.com/punk-band-pl...

I saw an indoor farm in the Taiwanese subway station, on the way to a vegetarian dinner

I also found a Pui Pui Molcar craft book. ICYMI on Netflix, it’s a Japanese stop-motion animated series about hamster -shaped cars and the passengers inside them. Totally adorable and bizarre. I hope the Japanese also make a Gabby’s Dollhouse craft book someday!

Hey @monstromo.bsky.social & @zimmercorn.bsky.social look what I found at Taipei Eslite’s 24-hr bookstore among a surprisingly big selection of tarot cards!

Taiwan beer, a squat Coke, & squid snacks waiting for me in my hotel room. Cab driver said he went to college in Scotland & told me the biggest Toys R Us in Taiwan is nearby.

Other funny finds in Ximending, Taipei. I bought a “get rich lucky happy” purse for the Lunar New Year aka #CNY

Found a Sanrio-themed 7-11 in Taipei. Should I attempt one of these #gachapon prizes? Idk what the buried brown muscle men are!!! 👀

Which of these claw machine prizes should I try to grab after I do my laundry

Who are these “Beauties” promoting Coco treats? Are they a dance squad? Seen in Ximending, Taipei

Cute pop art from Huashan Cultural Park on my trip to Taiwan