• books,  summer,  Top Ten Tuesday

    Top Ten Tuesday: beach reads!

    Top Ten TuesdayIt’s been quite a while since I’ve linked up for Top Ten Tuesday! This week we’re talking about our favorite beach reads. I’m not a big beach person—we don’t have a lot in the traditional sense where I live—but I am all about lying in the hammock in my backyard with a good book and a tall glass of iced tea!

    I don’t really stick to any particular genre or style of book when picking out beach reads. They just have to be so compelling you can’t put them down, and they should be something that’s not too serious—no nonfiction exposes or tear-jerking fiction. Also, they should preferably be in paperback. Hardcovers are too heavy for casual summer lounging!

    So, here are ten books I plan to tote out to the hammock this summer, and quite possible devour in a single gulp. I’m sure there are many, many more to be found in the depths of my TBR list but these are just some of the more recent, off-the-top-of-my-head titles.

    TTT: beach reads edition!

    The Three, by Sarah Lotz // Dark Matter, by Blake Crouch // Tell the Wolves I’m Home, by Carol Rifka Brunt // And I Darken, by Kiersten White // We Could Be Beautiful, by Swan Huntley // The Sister, by Louise Jensen // This is a Book, by Demetri Martin // The Hanged Man, by P.N. Elrod // Norwegian by Night, by Derek B. Miller // Let’s Pretend This Never Happened, by Jenny Lawson

    I’ve linked here to the Goodreads pages for these books so you can look up the blurbs and add them to your own TBR lists! If you have any other beach reads you think I might like, be sure to leave me a comment and let me know!

  • summer,  Ten on Tuesday

    Ten on Tuesday: first tattoo!

    1. So last time I linked up, I said that I dreamed about adopting a baby raccoon for a pet. Now this week I dreamed about getting a whole litter of kittens–eight in all. If only!

    2. By the way, June is Adopt a Shelter Cat month. So, if you needed a good reason… :)

    3. One of my besties and I finally went to see Divergent on Sunday, and it was awesome. Just as good as the book, I think. Now I want to see it again!

    4. Is it weird that I spent much of the movie being jealous of Shailene Woodley’s hair? Like, seriously, what is she even doing to have such an awesome mane?!

    5. Oh, and THIS happened yesterday.

    It means “fortune favors the bold” in Latin.

    6. Now that I’ve got one tattoo down, I’m trying to decide what to do next!

    7. I can’t wait to go shopping for some crop tops and whatnot to show off my ribs now. But I need to tone up my abs a little first. Which can mean only one thing: it’s time to hit Pinterest for some workouts! Let me know if you’ve Pinned any fave exercises lately.

    8. We had our first official big thunderstorm of the season last night. I don’t know why but that always feels like a must-have before you can say it’s really summer.

    9. Two and a half weeks until vacation!

    10. I didn’t care so much for this song when it first hit the radio, and then I saw the Clueless-inspired music video and kind of changed my mind.

  • fashion,  spring,  style,  summer

    Random Thursday: Spring Apparel

     
    I don’t know that the hell is going on with Blogger today, but it let me upload all of one photo before it pooped out. This would be annoying but admittedly not such a big deal if I hadn’t spent an hour taking and editing photos today to show off my spring wardrobe. Grrrrrrr…I wound up switching into Internet Explorer to upload the rest of the photos to the post, saving it, then switching back to Mozilla to finish writing it up. Apparently I’m not the only one having this problem, and I hope Google fixes it soon!

    Anyway, let’s get into the clothes! Hands-down, my favorite thing to wear when the weather warms up is a maxi dress. The print dress on the left is one of my favorite pieces of clothing ever (like EVAH).

    Maxi dresses rock for so many reasons:

    • They don’t require a lot of effort.
    • They keep you cool on super-hot days, but if you go in a chilly restaurant or movie theater you don’t have a ton of skin exposed and freezing.
    • They look great on everyone. I don’t care what height or weight you are, you can rock a maxi dress.
    • You can skip shaving your legs for a day. (Lazy girl here.)

    I wear lots of floral print skirts and dresses in the warmer months. If I’m going casual I add sneakers and a moto jacket, or I might wear boots. Spring in the northwest isn’t always warm and dry enough for sandals, so I have lots and lots of cute boots and sneakers on hand to wear with my skirts and dresses!

    Spring also means that it’s warm enough to dress up and show some skin after a winter of being bundled under layers and layers of clothing. I like to wear lots of light, bright colors and the highest heels and wedges I can find!

    Lots of people seem to think it’s odd that I wear such high heels. I’m 5’8″ but I still wear five or six inch heels if they’re at all comfortable enough to walk in. Is that weird? I’ve been informed that those shoes are for “short people”. I say, if you’ve got it, flaunt it!

    When I want to go more casual, I usually just grab shorts or skinnies, a t-shirt, and my Chucks. These sneakers go with EVERYTHING in my closet and are probably my favorite pair of shoes, period. I really want to buy more pairs in different colors this summer. It’s important to carry a light jacket or hoodie with me because you don’t know when it will get chilly or start raining–the Northwest is not known for steady weather patterns.

    When I’m really feeling lazy, I revert to my natural all-black uniform, but with a t-shirt and these gauchos that I made in high school. It’s like wearing pajamas, but for some reason it looks better. You can also see on the right how I wear my hair when I’m feeling lazy: in a loose twist. Simple and easy.

    I can’t let you leave without a peek at my favorite spring shoes. As I said, spring means the end of ice and rain so I get to break out my favorite heels. I also love wearing ankle boots (lower left corner). When I want to wear something flat I have a ton of sneakers, sandals and ballet flats to choose from. The studded gladiators, cheetah print flats and my Chucks are always my favorites!

    Oh, and scarves. I wear lots of different scarves year-round but these four are my favorite for spring: turquoise, pink, and two floral prints.

    So what are your favorite pieces of clothing for spring? If you linked up for Random Thursday let me know so I can see your spring fashion show!