snow to sunshine

Hey there chickadees, I hope you're making it through this crazy winter weather.  And the last, y'know, six months or so before that.  Sometimes that's just the way it goes.

I was lucky enough to escape the NYC and Jersey snow for a few days last week with a little jaunt down to Florida.

 

Bare legs!  In February!  (And yes, I really am that pale.  Let's call it 'luminous,' shall we?  Although I'm sure I blinded a few people who caught the blinding glare off my legs.  I'm a walking geriatric opthamology accident.)

 

 

The walk to the beach through the mangroves is just as lovely as the beach itself.

  

 

 

 

I'm holding onto the sunshine from this wonderful vacation to get me through the rest of the winter.

♥

rainy beach day

Happy Friday!

I went to the beach a few weekends ago.  I like rainy days at the shore-- the beach is quiet and empty and everything seems a little soft around the edges.

        

Have a wonderful weekend!

♥

brigantine

Just a few vacation snaps.

♥

jaunty seagull out for a stroll

my auntie Fern, the beach babe

seashells-- I'm  smitten with the deep teal color on the upper left one

Hope you all had a great week!
♥

much love, monday...sort of.

Hi everyone!  Much Love, Monday is postponed this week because I'm at the beach!  I took the above photo while I was packing some of my seashore essentials.  I'm about halfway through 'I Drink For a Reason' by David Cross, and I'm really enjoying it.  I never liked Arrested Development, but Cross's absurdist essays are irreverent and fun while still remaining thought-provoking.  The other book I want to read this week is 'Consider the Lobster' by David Foster Wallace, but I'm saving that until after my family has our annual crab night.  I don't want any crustacean-induced guilt.

My other beach essentials that aren't pictured here include a cover-up dress, an oversized button-down shirt, a sheer cotton scarf, and a bottle of SPF 50.  My skin color hovers somewhere between porcelain and paper, but I refuse to get sunburned.

I hope you're having a fantastic week!
♥

over the river and through the woods

...to grandmother's house we go!

I'm spending a lot of time at my grandmother's house over winter break, because she's having some health issues and she usually lives alone.  

Her house is absolutely adorable.

the kitchen is decorated in red and yellow

coffee for Nanny and my mom, tea for me

my mom surprised me with my very favorite lemon soda for New Year's Eve!

pretty mirrors in the hallway

aren't these cute?  I love the pink ruffly edge.

Nanny's cats

One of my favorite things about being at my grandmother's house is spending time with her cats (I am officially out of the cat-lady closet.  Whatevah.  Love me, love my love of cats.)  Their real names are Bucky (the big guy) and Cocoa (the little guy), but lately we've taken to referring to them as "The Chaplain" and "The Sergeant-At-Arms," respectively.  Which makes it very funny to talk about them-- for instance, "The Sergeant-at-Arms is enjoying some kibbles" or "The Chaplain and the Sergeant-at-Arms have retreated to their love nest."  

Teehee.

hey!  hey!  enter the giveaway for some goodies from my etsy shop!  it only takes a minute.

♥

procrastination station

Y'know what I should be doing right now?

Packing to go home tomorrow.

Y'know what I'm actually doing?

Pretty much everything else.  Seriously.  I just darned my socks. 

Alright, so random life updates until I get back in the groove of blogging and can come up with actual paragraphs!

(No, really.  I think this is the result of being on twitter way too much, I'm thinking in 140 characters or less.)

♥ Remember my end-of-semester Anthropologie bonanza?  And how I said I was going to feel silly when the Braided Toggle Sweatercoat went on sale after I paid the semi-ridiculous full price for it?  I wasn't predicting it would go on sale within five days, as did the Mushroom Picking Chemise. So I got an amazing price adjustment even though I was on RA duty and couldn't come into the store because their customer service is awesome.  And now it's sold out!  So instead of feeling dumb, I feel preeeeeetty smart. Yesssss.


♥ I've become slightly obsessed with the blog Eighteenth Century Sluts.  It's so bizarre and hilarious.  Just to give you a taste of what it's like, here are three of my favorite recent posts.

Haaaa.  I've got the giggles even posting these.

♥ I have been making stuff in lieu of packing!  Now in the etsy shop:  two cards and two notebooks.  I have a zillion more cards that will get put up in the next few days, but I'm excited about them.  I'm so pleased with how everything is looking!

I'm especially in love with this notebook...

♥

Alriiiiiight, I guess I should go shove stuff in suitcases.  I'm planning on having one suitcase and one garment bag for clothing, and one suitcase of craft supplies.  That's normal, right?

♥

tonight I did something I never do.

I took a bubble bath.  For two hours.

It was my first day of vacationing at the beach, and the tub in the bathroom attached to my room is spectacular, very deep and white with a big silver faucet.  It was heavenly.  The water was just the right temperature, and the bubbles were almond-scented and light.  And who doesn't feel quietly glamorous lounging under mounds of foam, hair in a bun, with the water loosing wispy curls at the nape of the neck?  It feels like being in 1960s photograph.

I haven't felt really, truly happy very much since losing my dad.  Mostly I feel like I'm wandering around in a haze, not really aware of my surroundings, floating along in the hopes that someone's going to shake me awake and tell me that of course everyone's okay, I was just having a bad dream.  But tonight, alternately reading one of my favorite magazines (thank you so much, Taryn! ♥♥♥) and blowing loose suds at my exposed knees, the heartbreak wasn't nearly gone, but I did at least feel closer to being aware of the present.

♥

take me out to the ball game ♥

My mom and I spent the afternoon at a vintage baseball double-header.  It was so much fun!

Basically, vintage-style baseball teams play wearing the uniforms and following the rules of a time in the history of baseball-- 1864 and 1898, in this case, and since the rules were different during those two eras, the first game was played in the earlier style and the second in the latter.

It was pretty intense!  In the first game none of the players wore gloves, and the smack! of the ball hitting their palms was audible even from across the field.

...Plus their uniforms were way cute, although difficult to run in, I'd imagine, since there were no knit fabrics involved (hey, I'm a fashion student, these are the things I notice).  And I won the 50/50 raffle and was presented with sixteen dollars-- goin' to Vegas for sure!

There was lemonade, and sunshine, and cracker jacks, and it was a really fantastic afternoon.

♥

cat of leisure

I really do have the cutest cat in the whole world.

ohhhh, she's so adorable.

and posts like this one are why I have just so many boyfriends.  ha.

♥

etsy shop giveaway!  until 11:30 tonight! whee!

happy sunday things

♥ I get to see my mom today, and I got to talk to my dad last night.  yay!



♥ this lovely photo-- doesn't it look like the prettiest place to curl up with a book?

♥ wearing my sing sweetly dress from anthropologie yesterday

♥ Marissa's 30-day Disney Challenge

♥  knitting with one of the prettiest yarns I've ever seen

♥ you can still enter my etsy shop giveaway until Wednesday night! ♥

have a lovely sunday!

 

midsummer eve

Robert Edward Hughes, "Midsummer Eve"

summer nights at home always remind me of this painting

etsy shop giveaway!  exciting! you should enter it!

♥

fill-in-the-blank friday ♥

via the little things we do

1.   I love my grandmother because she lives life on her own terms.  She's the sweetest lady, but she stands up for her family and what she believes in and doesn't take nonsense from anyone.

2.  A time that mama knew best was: actually, my mom and I agree on most big things... I'm sure there have been times when we disagreed and she was right in the end, but none come to mind right now.

3.  My first kiss went a little like this: aw... it was sweet and a tiny bit awkward.  very cute.

4.  My celebrity crush is: Edward Norton, particularly in The Illusionist.  He just seems very articulate and thoughtful, plus he's involved with a lot of ecological and humanitarian causes.

5.  My splurge of choice is: Anthropologie dresses!  Obviously.  A lot of the dresses there have the nipped-waist-and-full-skirt silhouette that I love, and they always have the cutest prints.  I'm actually experiencing a little bit of withdrawal at the moment, because I've been in the routine of going to my favorite Anthropologie (the one at Chelsea Market in Manhattan) every two weeks or so.

6.  My biggest accomplishment is: my 4.0 GPA this semester, wheeeee! And learning to balance schoolwork with occasionally leaving my dorm room.

7.  My dance jam of choice is: oh boy..I couldn't decide between these two.

etsy shop giveaway!  enter it! 

♥

flower child

It's sunny and beautiful and cool here today... The wet weather has made for really lush flowers.

♥Don't forget to enter the giveaway for a gift certificate to my etsy shop ♥

aw, yay!

Denise, over at A Room To Write, gave me the stylish blogger award!  Thank you, Denise!  From what I gather, after receiving this award we're supposed to post seven random facts about ourselves.  So here are mine!

1. I don't drink coffee.  I don't even like coffee-flavored things.  Since I drink mostly decaf tea, too, and avoid soda, this means that a little bit of caffeine makes me verrrrrrry energetic (by which I mean that my voice goes into excited-chipmunk range and I can knit at lightning speed.)

2. I use the escalators at my school to practice running down stairs like a Disney princess.  I couldn't find any videos or gifs of it, but they all make their various dramatic exits very gracefully down the stairs, so it looks like they're gliding rather than running.  Someday I will perfect it, too.

3. My google reader page currently has 536 unread posts from all the blogs that I read (there are over 100).  I really need to catch up.

4. Certain books stay interesting no matter how many times I read them.  I'm currently re-reading The Thief Lord by Cornelia Funke.  (Yes, I know that's a kids' book.  I still love it.)

5.  I am really big on routines.  This doesn't mean that I can't be coaxed into doing unexpected things, but I am generally happiest when I've planned out a schedule for my day and have a few days notice if it needs to be changed.

6.  I am so happy to be home.  Even with how weird things are right now, there is nothing more comforting than going back to the place where I grew up.

7.  I'm so thankful for my friends and family who have been so incredibly supportive, helpful, and warm lately.  I don't understand how I got this lucky, but thank you so, so, so much.

And now for passing the award on!  Recipients are supposed to pass the award on to 5 bloggers whose style they admire.  So here's who I chose!

Abby at An American Girl Doll

Claire at Clearly Brightly

Cassy at Living A Girl's Adventure Tale

Katherine at Thrifted Things

Rachel Elizabeth at We Are All Magpies

Have a great Memorial Day Weekend, everyone!

♥

wildflowers

I came home today.  ♥

It's so lovely to be home.

...except that we have a tornado watch until 10 p.m. tonight.  Natural disaster stuff makes me intensely uncomfortable.  And I'm by myself.  Eeeeeeek!  So please excuse any excessive blogging tonight, I need to distract myself from being completely terrified a little nervous.

♥

yay summer!

♥

Things I'm excited about:

• hearing crickets when I'm falling asleep


• cuddling my cat


• seeing the stars


• how it gets really, really dark at night at home


• seeing my family!


• spending next weekend with Marissa


• sun-warm raspberries


• trees


• maybe getting a tattoo of a button if the scar on my ankle fades enough/if I have a sudden burst of bravery


• walking and walking without any specific destination

♥