RIP Farley Granger

An Emotional Rant... Or As Emotional As I Get...

I wish I wasn't so weak.  I wish that when confronted, I didn't break out into tears.  I don't always cry though... My responses aren't consistent, so I can't rely on whether I'm going to cry or stand my ground.  Most of all, I wish that I wasn't in situations that ended in fights.  What is the point of fighting anyways?  Especially when the situation has basically been resolved?  If everyone is already moving in different directions, who benefits from rehashing things that did (or did not) happen?  I also wish people didn't assume that they know everything about you, when they don't.  No one can possibly know everything about another person unless they are family or actually friends, and even that isn't a rule.
It's days like these that I wish I was a Hermit... Or that I consider becoming a Hermit.  I think I could actually be a pretty good Cat lady... Without the Cats..  I'd have Fish.. Or Parrots.  Or maybe a garden... I'd be a good crazy old lady yelling at youngster's to get off of her begonias.

Ok, I'm sorry for the rant.  I have a lot of crazy things going on in my life right now (some good, some bad) and I like to type my thoughts.  It's my second best form of stress relief.  The first is shopping.  Obviously, I don't have any money to be shopping with so you, dear readers, get to be subjected to emotional blog posts.  Yay for you!
Seriously, thank you for reading this.  It really means a lot to me.  I'm really not an emotional person (I know you probably don't believe me, but it's true.) It means a lot to me to know that someone knows what I'm going through... Even if I don't know them.

I'll bid you adieu with a picture of a really cool skirt.

xo
Madeline

RIP Elizabeth Taylor

Little Women was one of my favorites when I was a kid.  When I grew up I wanted to have blonde hair and purple eyes, just like Elizabeth (at the time I didn't know she was really a brunette with blue eyes.) 
For a few nights, I tried sleeping with a clothespin on my nose, too.  It hurt a lot, so that didn't last long.   Any time we had biscuits or something similiar I would do the, "One for you and one for you.. And one for me!" thing... I wanted to be Amy March when I was a little girl...  When I got older and developed a mad crush on Peter Lawford, I realized how smart I had been as a little girl, because *spoiler alert!* Amy got Laurie. 
Maybe that's one of the reasons I became involved with Theatre, identifying with the very dramatic March sister...

It's so weird to think that she's not here anymore. 
Rest in peace, Elizabeth.  You will be missed.

Do you believe in truth, freedom, beauty and love? Then you are a true bohemian.

I don't know if you know this about me, but I hate recommending books to people.  Which is weird since I want to own a bookstore someday, but it's true.  Recommending music + movies is hard enough, but (in my opinion) the types of books a person reads says more about them then the other two.  Anyone can be conned into watching a stupid movie or listening to silly music because it's on the radio, but with books you don't really have an excuse for reading a book that is deemed "silly" or "bad".
So with that being said, I am about to recommend a book.

Anna and The French Kiss.  I know, the title sounds cheesy.  At least I thought so when I first heard about the book.  Even more so when I found out it was a YA Novel, But I was so wrong.  Now, if you don't like Paris, cute boys, happiness or humor, you won't like this book.  But, if you do like those things (or at least some of them) you will most likely love this book.
I'm also really bad at summarizing books (I tend to get really rambly, as you've most likely noticed since you are reading my blog.) so I'm going to copy and paste the Synopsis from Borders.

"Anna is looking forward to her senior year in Atlanta, where she has a great job, a loyal best friend, and a crush on the verge of becoming more. Which is why she is less than thrilled about being shipped off to boarding school in Paris - until she meets Etienne St. Clair: perfect, Parisian (and English and American, which makes for a swoon-worthy accent), and utterly irresistible. The only problem is that he's taken, and Anna might be, too, if anything comes of her almost-relationship back home.

As winter melts into spring, will a year of romantic near - misses end with the French kiss Anna - and readers - have long awaited?"

Honestly, none of the synopsizes I found could really do the book justice (in my opinion.)  It's just so sweet and funny and it's like your watching a movie in the best way possible.  All the locations and characters seem very real, everyone's not perfect all the time but they also aren't not perfect all the time... If that makes sense.  Anyways, I didn't actually start writing this post about Anna... I want to talk about Lola.

"Lola and The Boy Next Door" is the next book to be published by Stephanie Perkins and it is a companion novel to Anna.  I. Am. So. Freaking. Excited.  It comes out in September (currently listed as the 29th) and I am almost literally counting the days until.  From what I've been reading on Stephanie's blog about Lola (p.s. her blog is awesome!  You should read it.) I think (if it's possible) I might love her more then Anna.

"For budding costume designer Lola Nolan, the more outrageous the outfit—more sparkly, more fun, more wild—the better. But even though Lola’s style is outrageous, she’s a devoted daughter and friend with some big plans for the future. And everything is pretty perfect (right down to her hot rocker boyfriend) until the dreaded Bell twins move back into the house next door.
When the family returns and Cricket—a gifted inventor and engineer—steps out from his twin sister’s shadow and back into Lola’s life, she must finally reconcile a lifetime of feelings for the boy next door."

Lola is a budding costume designer, I love costumes. Lola likes sparkly clothes, I LOVE sparkly clothes!  Yes.  Excited really isn't a strong enough word.   This is a photo collage Stephanie made of things to do with Lola's book

  I love everything in these pictures!  So, go read "Anna" then come back here and you can wait with me until
"Lola" comes out.  Then we can wait for "Isla and The Happily Ever After" which comes out next year.  Aren't you excited?

P.S. Yes.  The title is a Moulin Rouge quote.  I'm a nerd for musicals.

A Short Story About Mushrooms...

My Sister made me dinner last night.  I always find it hard to eat the tiny little Fantasia (as I call them) mushrooms.  I know that if/when I turn on Tchaikovsky, they won't start dancing... But it still have hope (after all these years).
Again, the mushrooms failed me... No dancing.  So I ate them.  They were delicious.
The End.

NOLA Pictures!

Hmm... Where did we take this one again?

Yay!  Vacation pictures!  We went to Sucre and it was FANTASTIC!!  The decor was adorable and the macarons were yummy!   I'm still getting used to my camera, so please excuse the odd focus in some of the pictures...  We actually took a bunch of really cute pictures on my Instax Mini, but my Sister still has them so I haven't been able to scan them (a.k.a. take reeeaaallllyy zoomed in pictures of them.)  Hopefully I'll have those soon, too.

The Pink (strawberry) macarons had glitter on them!  Glitter! 

The only Vacation picture I have edited so far...

Amanda really took to my instax..  I want her to get a Hello Kitty one!

I don't know why I look so sneaky...

I hope everyone had a Happy St. Patrick's Day! 
Xo
Madeline

Happy St. Patrick's Day!!

Excuses and Ellie

Ok, pictures from my trip are coming, I promise.  It may be another week or so... Work has been kind of crazy lately.  Anywho, here is a lovely cover by Ellie Goulding instead!  Yay!

Some pictures...

Hello!  I survived the Wisdom extraction!  Woohoo!
I apologize for not posting anything the past week, but I've been wiped out.  Anyways, I have been taking some pictures... Do you want to see them? Yay!  Here you go

The quilt is one my Great-Grandmother gave to my Mom in the 70's.  I love it.  The colors are extremely faded (photoshop is awesome) and it is just the cushiest quilt.
I'm in New Orleans right now.  Tomorrow we're doing a photoshoot for my friend's band.  I'll post some pictures of my New Orleans excursion in a few days.
Until then,
xo
Madeline