adorable illusion

Is weather.com seriously telling me that tomorrow is going to be a snow day? Really? How is that possible? Some horrible April Fool's joke? That is not fair in the least bit. They're saying we won't have school tomorrow — say what? Guys, it's April. April showers bring May flowers. Rain. Not snow. No snow allowed.

tee: delia*s. // tights and shorts: unknown // shoes: (yup those shoes again) Target // plaid shirt: Abercrombie & Fitch // kitten: angry

^^^ so much more inspiring and less stalker-ish than Chictopia... sorry Chictopia...^^^

It just isn't fair. 10-15 inches of snow is just not fair.

Trying to force the weather into spring with neon yellow nails and the reclaiming of my "summer bracelet" collection — I wear them literally all summer, since long sleeves are gone.

The weather disagreed.

You might have noticed my crazy black eyeshadow... I didn't wear that to school, I was playing around with something amazing and it just kind of got layered on there. Because Sweet Pea and Fay sent me nine shadows, three lip glosses, and a tinted lip balm so I could model/photograph them and they could use the photos. I was psyched, it seriously made my day. My mother quickly claimed the tinted balm.

My eyes in the photos are a shade called "Chupacabra". How awesome is that? My eyelids are now Mexican goat-sucking vampire monsters. My life is complete.

And guess what? They're one of NINE (possibly ten!) sponsors for this weekend's giveaway! Because yes, it has been decided that this weekend will be the big old 500-Followers giveaway — are you excited yet? I am! Altogether they're donating about $300 worth of prizes! Surely that's worth an entry, lovely friends.

listening to: Heart of Glass - Blondie

(that's where the title comes from btw)

question: how lucky am I?

Answer #1: Very lucky. Very lucky indeed to have all you wonderful people following. Because yes, 'tis true that yesterday we hit the big 5-0-0. Reaction? (Taken with my webcam during a study hall in school, so badddd quality but epic excitedness.)

^^^kinda hurts your head after a while, doesn't it?^^^

Shout-out to my #500 follower, live brathovde. I'm still getting the prizes for the party together, so give me a week or so and we'll have us a good old giveaway.


Answer #2: Unlucky to the max. I've been getting theses awful headaches — so bad I had to miss class and go to sleep in the nurses's office yesterday — so I went to the doctor yesterday thinking it was migraines or something... Nope, looks like it's a virus that only causes really bad headaches. He told me no physical activity until it goes away, but my gym teacher *ahem* told me I have to make up all the classes I miss. Unfun, especially since next week is the final week before the play's opening night. Gahhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Answer #3: I am totally lucky that I was awarded Best Photographer in the I Heart Design 2011 awards. Thank you to everyone who voted for me, I never could have done it without you!

Answer #4: I have a mixed bag of luck because it is beautiful and warm (the fifties! ohmygoodness the fifties!)... but I was stuck in school until sunset and only got to enjoy a few moments of it. Sigh.

listening to: Lose Yourself  by Eminem

rain snow rain.

That's what's been happening all day. Rain, snow, rain, snow. The weatherman calls it a "wintery mix". I call it depressing. "Wintery mix" is a far too elegant name, it sounds like dinner party food. This is definitely not a dinner party. The ground is covered with slush — I had to wear boots out to the bus stop today and change into my heels once I got to school. Any evening gown would be history after thirty seconds in this weather. The atmosphere is one of general blah.

So, of course, one must try to make her day a little happier and ignore the fact that it's sleeting outside.

I did this yesterday by making a little vlog. Now, I don't think vlogging is really my thing, but I mentioned a few music videos and such so I thought it would be appropriate. It's only four and a half minutes, I tried to keep it short.

I tried to do this yesterday but YouTube hates me and didn't upload my video. Pout. So I had to do it again today.

Oh, and that really exciting white thing I mentioned yesterday Saturday? That gets revealed in the video. Eeeeek.

PS: the video was taken with the webcam of my incredibly exciting white thing, that's why I only show you the box.

^^^ can you guys see that? ^^^

if you can't try the one below. 

the quality is lower but all I see is a black brick for the one above. 

wouldn't want that showing up on y'all's screen.

(please note above failed attempt at being Southern. 

o readers from the South, please correct me.

teach me how to say "y'all" and I'll teach you how to say "ayuh."

Kidding. I don't say ayuh. Just being a stereotypical Mainah.)

Links mentioned:

the new MacBook

Ke$ha's Blow music video

Emma (1996 movie)

MollyThePirate

xoxo, lovelies, and I hope you survive the week.

I don't know if I will.

Eh. I have key lime pie. I'll make it through.

Hopefully.

PS: We're steadily approaching 500 followers! Wow. What kind of party do you guys want to have?

Synonyms for Weekend

For me, the weekend is Friday afternoon through Sunday night. That gives me two days and three nights to do something awesome before it's time to take the plunge back into school-world.

weekend = shopping trip
Friday afternoon
My friend Anne was having a bad week and I think that nothing cheers a girl up more than a little shopping trip. So my mother graciously dropped us off at the mall and we just had fun wandering around, eating pretzels, not really buying anything. Though I did buy a pair of big hoops and a little shrug from Forever 21... those will pop up later in fashion posts, I'm sure.

weekend = good music
Friday night
It came to my attention that my dad's band, Space Versus Speed (who I believe I have mentioned before) was playing at Port City Music Hall for their CD release party. Of course, I wanted to go. So my dad asked the manager of the club if his fourteen-year-old daughter was allowed — kind of a strange request — and I got in. I did get two black Xs on my hands; no drinks for Olivia.
The deal was that my job was to take photos. Now, all the other times I've seen my dad play, he's been pretty far away, and a telephoto lens was a good idea. So of course I brought my telephoto. And of course I SHOULD have brought my wide-angle. But I managed.
PS: All these photos are unedited (except for cropping and watermark). The first one amazes me... smoke + lights turned out great.

that's my daddy :)

Spose was there for one of the songs. Not quite sure what to think of him. Rap isn't really my thing.

But oh, what a good excuse to get dressed up!

please ignore the awfulness of this phone photo.

weekend = inspiration
Saturday morning
I am now in love with houzz.com. It is seriously the best thing since sliced bread, if you're a design-geek like me.

weekend = relaxation

Saturday afternoon

Complete with facial steam and volcanic mud mask that makes me look like the Thing from the Black Lagoon.

weekend = key lime pie
Saturday night
The best dessert in the world, if you ask me. And oh-so-easy to make! It didn't take me 45 minutes to make a delicious pie that was gone in less than 24 hours. I added a little something extra when I made the crust: a healthy dose of allspice. It gives it a very unique — and yummy — flavor, a nice offset to the acidity and sugar of the filling.

weekend = cleaning spree
Sunday morning
Sunday is my cleaning day. Clean room, clean mind.

weekend = new music

Sunday midday

Recently discovered a song called "Jar of Hearts" by Christina Perri and I like it. The chords of her voice are slightly dissonant, which is interesting. Her vocals feel very raw.

Also loving Sara Bareilles — if you like Regina Spektor (*heart*) then you'll like her. And Natasha Bedingfield is pretty awesome too.

weekend = X-Files

Friday night - Sunday night

We're making it tradition. Every weekend night we watch X-Files. Yep. That trippy, paranoid, incredibly awesome TV show from the nineties. We're watching every episode of every season, in order. We're almost through Season 8... Season 9 is the last one... I don't know what we'll do once it's over!

weekend = being in denial

Sunday night

My Google chat status... sigh.

I'm Having a Mustache Day Today

Yesterday I remarked to a friend: "My only regret in life is that I'll never have a mustache."

Maybe that's not completely true, but I do dearly love mustaches.

Totally ordering these when I get married.

Not actually on guys. To be honest it weirds me out when they're real.

But fake mustaches?

{via}

Fake mustaches make me happy.

I *need* one of these.

Someday I'm going to draw a mustache on my face and sit out in Central Park for the day, just smiling at random strangers. This is legit on my bucket list.

By the way, Etsy has a stunning array of mustache-related goods. I made a whole treasury about it.

As soon as I get a little extra cash, this will become my new favorite shirt.

Wishing for a million dollars to spend at Etsy right now... anyway. I'm having a mustache day today.

Saturday is Spa Day

If you remember from my New Year's Aspirations post, one of my aspirations was thus:

I wish I had better skin
but instead of getting stressed about it
(which only makes it worse)
I'll be chill and not worry
+ take steps to help my skin stay clean.

So I've decided that Saturdays are to become Spa Days. Below is my new Saturday regimen:

Morning

• 30 minutes of athletic/energizing yoga (makes you work)
• 15 minutes of facial steaming followed by a peel-off mask
• exfoliate with a face brush
• manicure & pedicure

Evening

• nice long bath (with bubbles)
• 10 minutes of stretching/relaxing yoga (winds you down)

Somewhere in there I'm going to try to get to the Y for a little exercise and clean my room.

At the time of writing this post (10:30) I've just tried my first facial steaming and I love it. Basically the steam opens up your pores and lets the toxins and gunk that may be clogging or darkening them just slide right out. It's a sauna for your face and it only takes 15 minutes.

How to Do a Facial Steaming

You will need...
- a large bowl (big enough for your face to fit into but not much bigger)
- a bath towel (not a hand towel)
- Kosher salt
- boiling water
- straw
- (optional) lavender essential oil and/or calendula essential oil

Directions...
1. Start boiling your water. Put about 2-3 tablespoons of salt into your bowl and a few drops of essential oil (if you're using it).
2. When the water is boiling pour it over the salt and oil mixture in the bowl.
3. Quickly transfer it to the table/floor where you'll be sitting for your steam. (Make sure it's comfortable!)
4. Drape the towel over your head so no steam can escape. You will probably want to use your straw to breathe, it gets pretty muggy.
5. Keep your face 2-4 inches away from the water at all times.
6. After 10-20 minutes (not too long or you could dry out your skin) remove the towel and go wash your face with cold water.
7. You might want to follow this with a clay mask, since your pores are all opened up. At least moisturize.


Stay Safe...
- Don't do this more than once a week, it can dry out your skin. And dry skin can actually lead to acne.
- The water is obviously very hot, so keep your skin out of it.
- The steam can cause issues for people with severe athsma, etc. Also, if you have really really bad acne, this may make you break out more.
- For everyone: this treatment opens up your pores and brings the toxins to the surface. After doing this you might actually break out a little more than usual. Don't worry, it will clear up quickly. But do this in advance of a big event.

I really love doing this sort of thing... and using a mask afterwards is a bonus. I'm about to go out and buy a peel-off or clay mask from the drugstore (I haven't decided which yet) but here are three masks you can make at home with the contents of your fridge that I've tried and really like. They all use yogurt and honey as a base; make sure you're using plain, unsweetened yogurt, preferably full-fat (Greek yogurt is supposed to be wonderful as well) and pure honey.

Three At-Home Masks

{via}

Moisturizing 

• 2 tablespoons yogurt

• 1 tablespoon honey

• 1-2 tablespoons cooked and cooled oatmeal

Mix all this together in a small bowl. Apply to face and let dry for 10-20 minutes. Wash off with warm water.

Nourishing

• 1/2 ripe banana

• 1 tablespoon honey

• 2 tablespoons yogurt

Mash banana and mix with yogurt and honey. Apply to face and let dry for 10-20 minutes, wash off with cool water.

Anti-Acne

• 1 tablespoon yogurt

• 1 tablespoon honey

• Fresh lime juice

Mix the yogurt and honey; add a dash of lime juice (approximately 1/4 of a teaspoon, more or less). Apply to face and let dry for 10-20 minutes. Wash off with warm water.

Have fun, girls! It's nice to pamper yourself once in a while.

By the way, if you have any good spa@home recipes, I urge you to share them in a comment. I'd love to try them out and post them!

sally&olivia

Today was a day of laughter and silliness. Today was a day of songs stuck in heads and lifting big bags of chicken feed. Today was a day of many outfit swaps and excessive idiocy on skis. Today was a day spent with a friend.

Some of you may know Sally from her blog Treble Clef — if you haven't seen it already, check it out, it's awesome. Anyway, we live fairly far apart so we don't see each other too often. When we do? Well... this is the result...



A   f e w   w a y   t o o   m a n y   n o t e s :
One, the black squares everywhere... they bother me to no end. I think it's iMovie's fault, and I'm hoping to switch to a different program ASAP.
Two, the song is called Send Me On My Way by the band Rusted Root. I love it.
Three, if you can't see who's who, I'm always wearing a teal hat (I change outfits a few times... yes in the course of about three hours...) and Sally's either bareheaded or wearing my white beret. I made her put it on. I think she is in dire need of a beret... look how cute she is, so French-looking.
Four, the parts where we fail at skiing? I'm actually pretty good at cross-country. I just haven't done it in a year, I'm out of practice. Sally, meanwhile is a downhiller. She was like, "see, I won't fail, I'm good at skiing!" And yet, a foot into her decent, she smacked her rear end. You can't hear it, but I go into a certain amount of hyena-laughter. Well, you know what they say: the proud have the farthest to fall.
Five, when I attack Sally at exactly three minutes, it's because she threw a snowball at me. I don't attack unless provoked. Mostly.
Six, though all these clips seem randomly smushed together, I assure you that a good deal of time was spent placing them just right. Example: the last scenes out the car (our ride from her house to mine) are closure going with the last few bars of the song. See?


And I finally tried my hand at some legit digi-scrapping. I dunno... it takes a lot of time. I prefer blog design.

ridiculously corny little saying, yes. see? olivia fails at digiscrapping. this is turning into a post full of fails.

I also have a very epic picture I'd like to share with you... this isn't from today but it's quite hilarious. Don't ask me why Sally's making that face. We both look like creepers. Sigh.

ayup.

PS... I won't be installing the new HorseFeathers look until tomorrow, but there's a sneak peek on Robin Blogs. UNFORTUNATELY a few other choice people decided it was a great idea to do the exact same design. So if you see one? You know what happened.

Blizzard

I was psyched to try out my new camcorder. After a few technical difficulties, I now bring to you...

THE BLIZZARD.

Beware: Many Captain Obvious moments above. Such as "snow is cold." Sigh.

Also, no chickens were harmed in the making of this video. :)

I really despise iMovie '06. Really. It's a bad program. I apologize for the editing quality of this video.

Note to self: improve home video skills. Eep.

It happened last night. Howling wind, lots of snow (though not the 18" predicted... sigh). There's something very thrilling about the first big winter storm. It reminds you what it feels like to be alive. (I know, that's very trite. But it's true!)

Random Fact About Olivia #7823: She likes to earn her stuff. I love the little camcorder and it's totally awesome and useful (thanks Santa *ahem*mom&dad*ahem*), but it feels more special to use my camera that I saved for and bought with my own hard cash. My parents always taught me that if I wanted something I had to save for it and earn it. I used to resent that they didn't fork over the big bucks like my friends' parents, but now I'm starting to see their point. It's much more satisfying to earn it yourself. Weird life lesson realized in the middle of a blizzard.

Today I made my mom suit up in her boots and coat and frog-marched her outside for a photoshoot. (Okay, maybe I didn't frog-march her. But I peer-pressured her.)
Teaser: These pics represent the new look coming to HorseFeathers on January 1. *insert evil laughter here*

This is quite possibly the best photo of me ever taken. The white in my hair is SNOW, by the
way. Not that weird flakey stuff they make shampoo for... what is that called again?

Vintage camera fun

I look so serious... Hmm. But my eyes look kind of wolfish... just thought I'd post some wolfiness.
Wow, I really need some coffee. That made little to no sense. I'm sorry.

Can I justify this extreme oddness/comment on pop culture by saying it was very windy?

I've updated the About Me page, by the way. Should you care to check it out.

For some reason all the backyard birds seem to love coming to the feeder in the driving snow. Crazy birds. But I'm not complaining, it gave me a pretty backdrop and rather nice photos. I especially love the cardinal. Noticing a color scheme here? White on red on brown-black on grey. Favorite color scheme ever.

I now leave you, o readers, for I must go eat my dinner. Have a lovely night... er... evening... er... whatever it is when you read this.

Moving Forward + Christmas

First off, Merry {late} Christmas! I hope you all enjoyed yourselves as much as I did. My mom and I attended our church's candlelight service on Friday, full of carols, lessons, and (of course) candles. There's something so intimate and spiritual about candlelight services... love it. And I was blessed on Christmas morning to unwrap many lovely gifts, including one of those adorable flip-style camcorders. Expect some epic videos soon.


On Thursday night we attended an annual Christmas party. It's hosted by some good friends of the family and there are about four or five girls my age (we chill out together upstairs, and it's weird because we only see each other once a year yet we know each other so well). And guess who was there? Jane Spencer. Her family has been friends with mine for a long time. Jane won a Pulitzer Prize and is now the managing editor in the popular news-site the Daily Beast. My mom started talking to her about journalism because about a year ago I decided what I wanted to go to college for: photojournalism, with minor degrees in writing and acting.

Well, Jane had some amazingly terrific news.

She said that right now, the journalists most in demand are good in both regular writing journalism, photojournalism, and video-journalism.

Can you imagine my euphoria? I consider myself skilled in all three of those things! It's almost too good to be true... but it is true, and that makes me so happy. You have no idea. And now with my new camcorder I can practice my video-making.

Jane also cleared up a question I had about college. I had been wondering a) what type of college to go to and b) what kind of degree to shoot for. Now I have no doubts what I want to do.

I'm the sort of person who has altogether too many hobbies. To be told that I can combine all those (plus my love of travel!) in one job? That is a true gift.

Journalism isn't exactly the highest-paying job, nor does it require the lowest effort. But it makes me happy. And aren't people always saying you should do what makes you happy?



Okay, done with that little burst of happiness. Christmas photo time... I'm afraid I didn't get very many photos. I woke up and forgot it was Christmas until I opened Google. I know, I know. I'm terrible. I forgot Christmas. Eep.

Christmas dinner... hello dad

Willa loves presents...

My very first attempt at a lattice pie (before and after baking)

Our family also got a TV and Blu-Ray player. Now we can watch old X-Files on Netflix on some screen other than my mom's laptop. (Weird family obsession, don't ask.)

PS... we're supposed to get a mega-blizzard tonight, so it's very likely I won't have power tomorrow. I've temporarily turned off comment moderation; I trust you all to be respectful and polite. Thanks. :)

ALSO: Don't forget to enter the art contest! Only 5 days left, and if you're not one of the 28 (just 28?!) who has entered you'll want to hurry up.