For me, the home is a place to show your personality, and I love filling it with things that inspire me every day like a great piece of art. Lately I’ve been inspired by Curate Snack bars and the unique ways they bring together ingredients to create something delicious.

So today, I’m making my own version of a woven wall hanging by curating unexpected materials into something amazing! I’ll show you how to turn paper into a piece of art simply by applying a few simple techniques and combining a ton of fun colors together. See the video below for a full how-to!

// CREDITS //
Creative Direction: Joy Cho
Video: Jenner Brown
Music: “It's Beautiful“ by Sofia
Production and Styling: Julia Wester
Production Asst: Jessica Hong
Graphics: Angie Stalker

*This post is in collaboration with Curate Snacks. All words are my own.

Sometimes it's hard to blog about cute things and pretty pictures when the real world going on around us isn't so perfect. No matter how hard we try, we can't always make real life look like that perfect social media life that we wish it was.

I really try to keep this space (and all of my social media outlets) positive and uplifting. When bad things, sad things, negative things happen in the world, it is not my gut instinct to publicly share my feelings about them. Maybe it's the conservative Asian part of me not to show pain outwardly...I internalize, I process, I think, I get upset...in private. So it took me a day or so to be able to even write anything about the world as of lately.

I don't know what it's like to be African American.

I don't know what it's like to be Caucasian.

I don't know what it's like to be gay or bisexual or transgender.

But I do know what it's like to have someone you love taken away from you unexpectedly. I know how it feels to be treated unfairly based on my skin color. I do know that pain is pain and lost lives are still lives no matter what color or gender or sexual preference. Whether it's in the hands of someone who was meant to protect us or someone who just felt like walking into a public space and taking lives that day, losing someone—whether you knew them or not, whether you loved them or not—hurts. 

It's okay not to know what to say or do. Because I myself am speechless. I don't know what the answer is to this past month, this past year, past decade, past hundreds of years of injustice, sadness, and loss.

I'll just leave you with this video below by that I came across by Brene Brown via Wit & Delight...

Thanks for listening.

What started as a blog series, Dressing the Babe, has now evolved into me putting together fun outfit suggestions for your minis. I'll still post real life outfits of me and my kids when I can, but since putting together kid's outfits is one of my favorite guilty pleasures, I've been sharing lots of outfit flats over on Instagram under #OhJoyDressingTheBabe. Our Creative Producer and Stylist, Julia, hand paints and hand cuts the backgrounds for all them which super cute and a fun thing to see come to life. So watch for them over there where all sources are tagged (just tap for tags on Instagram!)

P.S. I have gotten requests for boy outfits, so I am trying to do more non-girl ones, too ;) 

Sources: Outfit 1 - Raincoat by Nobodinoz, onesie by Oeuf, sneakers by Zara; Outfit 2 - Noe & Zoe top, Childhoods pants, Pons sandals, hair clips by Meri Meri from Lux Tots; Outfit 3 - Target dress (past season), Boden sunglasses, Pitchoun bow, Ouistitine bunny from Bitte, Zuzii shoes; Outfit 4 - romper by Izzy & Ferd, shoes by Toms, vest from Target (past season), bow by June & January.

{Photos by Casey Brodley and Mary Costa, outfit styling by Joy Cho, flat styling by Julia Wester.}