Mipsy.

HELLO FRIENDS!!!
I'm done with finals, which means.... I'm officially back! I have accumulated a list of post ideas and I'm thinking I'll be posting three times a week but you'll never know exactly what days cause sometimes I feel like posting on weekends or whatever, and sometimes I don't want to. You know how it is. I have news to tell you. I got a second job! I'm excited because that means I'm one step closer to New York and I'm also excited because I went earlier and they're such great people. I'm going to be the early morning nanny for another lovely family, by the way. Also, I'm still doing the Tone It Up Bikini Series and it's going fantastic. It just feels good to eat clean, even though I occasionally wish I could eat cake or something. You know how I love sweets. Whatever. It's been great. I like the recipes. I love that I get to to cook all the time, and I love that I've started losing weight again, and quickly. In other news, I'm now one of the co-leaders in another Girl Scouts troop and I know that's a little bit crazy of me, but I feel like if I have the time I should do as much as I can to help. It's something I'm passionate about. And finally, I plan on starting on my fashion school application portfolio next week or the week after so that's also exciting!

Onto Mipsy, or Meredith Grey, or just Mere.

I was so excited to finish this painting. A while ago, I painted the background and then I just sort of left the canvas sitting there for a month until I remembered that I needed to finish it because this is actually an end of semester project I needed to present in front of the class. So, with that in mind, I started painting the cat a couple days ago, and then I finished it yesterday. It must have taken me a total of eight or nine hours. I'm getting faster at painting. It's still just as relaxing though, especially with good music in the background. I'm actually intending this work to be a part of a series of four pieces, two of which are already done, counting this one.

I'm not sure if you guys remember the painting on the left. It's one I made in September of Taylor's other cat, the younger one, Olivia, or Dibbles. I'd like to have another Olivia and another Meredith so that I can put those two under these and then it can cover a whole wall, hypothetically speaking. I don't actually hang my own art up. I would feel a bit weird about that, not that it is, I just don't know why. Anyway, it's been so fun making these. By the way, it's acrylic on a 6"x8" canvas. I used my tiniest brushes mostly an 18/0 spotter and liner, but I also used my 0 and 1.

Thanks for reading! Have a lovely week!

Term Papers + Happenings

I swear I think about updating you guys at least a couple times every day, and I always say tomorrow will be the day I'm back on, but then things happen, as you know. For one, on Sunday I was thinking I had only two papers left to write for the semester, only to later discover that I had five more in total. To make matters, worse I procrastinated with one paper because it's the longest and most daunting one, so instead I wound up spending all day today writing it. I'm not even done yet. I'm down to two more pages, which is a huge accomplishment considering the length requirements. I also discovered I'm more productive when I don't sit down. See, I have a good friend who keeps her laptop not on a desk, but rather on top of a tall dresser, so that then she always has to stand when she uses it, because it's better that way. I didn't want to believe her, but it is. I know now. The downside is now I'm exhausted, because it's literally been all day.

But in all honesty, it has been such a busy week. I only have one true final exam, and then just tedious papers, so if I'm not on it's because of that. And also partially because I have a job again. I'm a sweet little girl's nanny. It's been lovely and crazy, but mostly lovely. I also got a new volunteer position at the hospital again and third of all, I've been insanely busy planning things for the Girl Scouts. I should tell you guys more about that. I mean I care about it enough that it should be a part of this blog, but then I also don't want to bore everyone if you guys don't really care. But why does that even matter. The point is, being a Girl Scouts leader is as time consuming as everyone said it would be last summer, but it's so fantastic and hilarious and worthwhile. I'd do anything for those girls. Anyway, so I just wanted to stop by and say hi and let you know that I'll probably stay on this weird sort of hiatus until halfway through next week. And then I'll be back to at least three posts a week.

Have a lovely rest of the week!

picture credit goes to Roma.

we'll just go til the road ends

 "just hold tight to my hand, there's no need for any big plans, we'll just go til the road ends." - Holley Maher

I'm inconsistent, I knooow. I tend to have legitimate excuses though, or at least I try. You know. If you wanted to know where I've been the last four days, I was holed up in my room blaring indie love songs and making art, obsessively. I mean it all started on Saturday night, when I was sitting downstairs listening to music, loudly, and thinking, mostly about the lyrics in said music. I came across the line, "I don't wanna talk about it, I just wanna hold your hand" by Rhodes, in the song Your Soul. It just sounded so nonchalant and intense at the same time, which is the nice thing about the subtleties of loving someone. I'm not in love with anyone right now. In fact, I don't think I've ever quite been in love with anyone, but I do know that I've loved people before, so intensely. It's something comfortable and beautiful and also terrifying, but at the end of the day that's not love, that's something crazy, but it's not quite it. I don't think it's supposed to be terrifying. Whatever. I'm nineteen. I'm not supposed to be in love. I'm fine. That was all besides the point.

Can I tell you something funny? I don't know much about Taylor's life. I know a lot about her career, but even that I don't know completely. I know what her sense of humor is like, I know her cats' nicknames, I know who she has dated, I know she likes wearing outfits that consist only of black clothes sometimes, I know what she would say in most situations, but I don't know much else... and I didn't realize that until last year when this one weirdly plausible article was put out that nobody really talked about. It doesn't even matter though. Okay, so on a more related note, I know she's dating Calvin Harris. That's the sort of thing you can't hide if you're famous. I know he said he wanted to see her in 2012. I know they connected at the Brits Awards two months ago. I know they were first seen together hand-in-hand on a stroll by a lake. But I don't know what exactly is going through her mind, or what she thinks of it all. I mean, I can't just assume she's so in love cause I know it's not like that sometimes. I just don't know. God, I hope so. She's a more rational person now, though. We all are when we grow up and get hurt a little.

Anyway, the whole point is that I drew this very lovey dovey pictures of her and Calvin holding hands and it all sort of just came together, like things tend to do. There's a candid of them holding hands and I drew it and I was going to stop there and quickly write that Rhodes quote on the bottom, but then I was like WHY STOP THERE WHEN THERE ARE HUNDREDS OF SONGS WITH NICE LYRICS and then I stayed up til 2:30am googling and searching and listening to songs until my eyes hurt and my fingers were tired of typing and I felt like an insane person. And then I changed the whole composition of it. The lyrics went on the side instead, and in faux calligraphy but with pencil. And then I was like, why should the hands be freely floating? They need a frame, enter the floral border. It was going to be watercolor, but then I decided to opt for watered down acrylic because it's more pigmented and I love acrylic. My sister walked in halfway through and was all like, "you should make something like this for a real couple you know, so they can hang it up on their wall" and I'm like, "is it that lovey dovey?" I'm not crazy, I swear. I actually love it for it's cutesy nature. And it did take me three days, so it better be worthy of being hung up on a wall, even though it does in fact reside in my sketchbook. Isn't that dumb? I spent three days on a sketchbook piece. What is wrong with me.

But anyway, my friends thought it was cute, and I feel proud of it, so whatever. Let's let it be cutesy. Let's all just gush over the fact that at least someone's in love, somewhere. Which reminds me, one of these days I'm going to post the playlist I listened to when I was working on this. It's my favorite right now.

Have a flawless Wednesday!

Friday Thoughts

HEY!! so I'm actually in a bit of a hurry right now, cause I'm going to Salt Lake City with Sarah and Clarice and I totally lost track of time looking at articles earlier. And I know, I know it was supposed to be Thursday Thoughts and not Friday, and I totally had plans to do this last night. But 1) I forgot Grey's was on last night so I watched that and then 2) I got caught up fangirling last night. So that was intense. This weekend I have a Girl Scouts meeting and it's Easter so that should be lovely! Anyway, here are your links for the week:

   - Magic is all around us, if we just pay attention.
   - On flaky friends. I'm a three strikes kind of person, but maybe I should try some of the more rational options haha
   - I dare you to look at this gorgeous wreath and tell me you wouldn't want it.
   - This is literally me.
   - Tone It Up is starting their annual bikini series and I want to participate this year, so I probably will.
   - Ariveting article about competition between girls, a problem caused by our internalized misogyny.
   - Honestly, I feel like this is so accurate.
   - These two are heart-eyes emoji.

Have a beautiful Easter weekend!

p.s. the picture is by Chelsea Francis.