I'm alive!

I know you probably all think I'm dead (or maybe, if you are like any normal person, you have an insanely busy schedule as well and haven't noticed my absence, yet), but I am here! And I've been reading your blogs regardless of whether I leave a comment! It's Hell week which essentially just means chemistry exam week so all my hours are spent doing chemistry problem flash cards. Fun, right? Almost as fun as getting trapped indoors for three days due to the snow and your flight being cancelled home. Almost as fun as making your dad come get you in a blizzard and drive you home. Almost as fun as getting told your final paper for Media Arts was due a week earlier than the syllabus said. Um, hello? There's a reason you write a syllabus: so you know when things are due. Not so you plan the weekend you write said paper around when other classes say their long term papers, tests, and midterms are for it to be due a week previous. It was a giant FML :). But, oh well, what can you do but do it?

Here's what I've been up to the past two weeks! I don't have an outfit for you, or at least, I don't have the pictures edited and ready for you, so I figured I'd do a life post which I know won't rake in as many comments or page views, but I know there are some of you who will genuinely appreciate life pictures. At least, I hope! Hehe.

After tenth grade, my dad vetoed sleepovers. With the exception of my neighbor who I call my nister because she really isn't just a friend, she's family. And even those were scarce and saved for long breaks and Christmas sleepovers. My high school career was definitely deprived! Haha. Coming to college, I literally dreamed of making close enough friends that I could have slumber parties with and genuinely giggle and laugh at everything the way you can only do at 2am. Well? SUCCESS! I officially have three best friends in college. And we had a five day long sleepover in which we pulled their mattresses off their beds and down the hallway to our rooms after cleaning them for hours so their beds would have room. And with the addition of my new television, we laid the mattress in front of them and the four of us squeezed together in one bed and watched movies. That's it. Movies and laughing and food. And due to the snow, we skipped two days of classes and laid in bed all day. I definitely missed out in high school.

The four of us best friends! My three best friends! Jenny (roommate), Maggie (twin), Katie (soulmate)

 The fab four + Kaleb and our neighbors Amanda and Erica.

 The new giant television! 34 inches of bliss!

 SPOTLESS ROOM!

Moving the beds

 Sleepover setup!

So, I hope you thought of me when Taylor's new album came out. And when seeing the thousands of press articles and tv ads and ect you saw of Taylor. I found her in starbucks and target! I went to the midnight release at target! This is me and my friend MAGGIE. We are so much alike. I'll be frankly honest, I thought she was really super nice the first time we met and the first time we all hung out, but she was so much like me I was almost annoyed with it, you know? Like who wants to be friends with yourself? But, I've gotten used to it, and I adore her now. We both loveee Urban and have the same camera and have little sisters and have the same sweaters and love Taylor and that's just some of it!

Maggie, Maggie. Taylor, Taylor. Same sweater, same sweater!

We got our first snow about three weeks ago. We were freaking out about the first snow...but as it turns out, there was a ton to follow (thus, being snowed in!) Nonetheless, it's worth showing our "excitement" pictures from the first snowfall.

 and it turned into a barren tundra of 40mph winds and blizzard conditions. And -25 degree weather.

experiencing -25 degrees for the first time. Don't be fooled. I am not warm in the slightest. I needed about five thousand more layers.

 blizzard!

 outside my window!

 My boy-story-exchanger and life-talk buddy Katie!

 My roommate and I! We are best friendssss! I couldn't have been more lucky. We are roommate soulmates. It's perfect!

 While snowed in...I didn't shower...for two days!

Neighbors!

 My Taylor shirt!

I got my haircut...again!

 Front of the chictopia page! EEEEEP!

Some of you have asked about my photography/photoshop class. It's a combination of photoshop and photography which has been amazing! My latest project was to combine the lesson about fashion photography (EEP) and the lesson about magazine covers. I really wish I could have spent more than the hour that I did doing it, but I didn't have time. It still was fun though!

 So I blogged about our "6 month" but I never showed you guys what Niklaas sent me! He sent 10 index cards of cute things and this was one of them. It's the one I hung up. It made me smile! Our "7 month" is tomorrow though, so this is pretty old news. Still exciting, I think though!

Well I'll be back SOON! I promise!
Wish me luck in chemistry! EEEP
Love,
Maggie

Selective Potential

So anyone who has a blog without a doubt follows the lovely Tieka. All you have to say is Tieka and everyone knows who you're talking about- and everyone could agree that she is the sweetest, most down to earth girl with a kickass style who should be walking the runway:). I first found Tieka last November and I remember thinking how absurd and crazy it was that she had 500 followers. And look at her now!!! Tieka was truly who inspired me to start a blog- and not just because I loved her clothes. I loved the way she got excited about little things like I do and how she was in love with her life- it's so infectious. Until Tieka, I was an awkward dresser who hated getting dressed in the morning but loved buying clothes. I always had the clothes obsession in me, but it never showed. Tieka inspired me to be bold and dress how I wanted. I started picking up on the way she styled different things and it wasn't long before I took the inspiration she gave me and ran with it. I guess you could say the result is this blog- which has never been about showing the world how well I think I dress, it's always been about learning and challenging myself to put my best foot forward every single day and to be confident about what I'm wearing and who I am. Clothes don't make a person, but the person in them makes the clothes. I've grown so much and the past year that I've been stalking style blogs have been the best and most transforming of my life- I'm just so happy and in love with everything!

Corniness aside (I'm sorry I had to spill that on you all), I was so so so excited when I saw this dress on Modcloth before I saw that it was Tieka's namesake dress. I ordered it and fell in love. One year ago, I didn't have a pair of tights in my closet and now I have over twenty five. One year ago, I wouldn't dare wear a dress in public or to school, and now I wear them almost every single day. I would have never, ever dared to wear this dress let alone take a picture of myself wearing it.

I knew styling this dress I wanted to do something more than just stick with the black and white palette. It needed life! I threw on my mom's red blazer to add just a smidge of color and a pair of patterned tights to really make the dress stand alone, and I like the result. Unfortunately, the dress was way, way too big on me (I had to pin it just to get these pictures) and I gave it to the lovely Jasmine, but if I could get my hands on a size small, I would be the happiest girl in the world.

Thank you, Tieka! No dress could come close to as amazing you are, but this one comes close.

Love,
Maggie

erase me

Alright. I have a confession. I might, maybe, could be falling in love with Kid Cudi. It all started when my friend put Erase Me on a CD for me and it started playing on rotation. Then, the kid in the dorm directly above ours with a mild obsession for rap and hip hop started his now daily routine of blasting music at precisely 3:35 PM every day, always beginning with that song. Seriously! Every single day at 3:35, you can bet that song will be played followed by other Top 40 rap-hip-hoppy songs. So now I have to listen to this song and now I kind of love it. And have delved into his other works. Oh, my.

Have you noticed anything...different around here? Ah! Yes! A new layout perhaps? :) It still has a ways to go but it's getting there!

I'm thoroughly, thoroughly exhausted right now and it's not because I was doing something exciting last night, like seeing Harry Potter. I've seen every premiere since the first movie, and, no, I didn't go to this one. Ahhh! I have to be awake at 7:30AM for lab on Fridays so I opted out and coincidentally, the homework Gods threw a paper at me to finish last night too. I definitely wasn't in the mood after five hours of sleep (as opposed to my regular ten) to wake up this morning and dissect grasshoppers and worms either. I would gladly dissect a pig, cow, cat, or anything over a worm. I have a phobia of them.I nearly puked. Woot. What a great start tot he day. I will be seeing Harry Potter SOON though. I have a thing for Ron Weasley. Shhhh, don't tell anyone!

(Niklaas' favorite of the day)

I think the yellow coat fits him better. It's so large on me! Tehe.

These pictures are yet another one of our photoshoots I have had stacked up here for a while and I'm sooo excited to post these-finally! They turned out so pretty! It's funny because whenever I come home to visit, I dream of sleeping in my own bed and waking up peacefully in it all wrapped up in my home-scented blankies...but that never seems to happen. I always wake up disturbed by my awful alarm to get a few precious extra hours with Niklaas or my family and I always fall asleep on the couch in the living room after a full day and being completely exhausted. When it used to be a chore to wake up early to get a pictures like these, we were already awake! Yay!

You've all seen my yellow coat and let me tell you, as the temperature drops in Missoula, it is definitely proving itself to be more than just cute. It is so warm. And, following the dressing routine, I am indeed wearing a cardigan, dress, tights, and boots. Ooops :). I got this dress in the summer as part of my fall stocking up extravaganza and it's lovely. Chiffon is so cozy! And it's floral. Floral equals me. I really hope you're not ever going to be sick of these boots because I plan on wearing them constantly. Like this.

I'm growing into this short hair thing. However, I saw a picture in Seventeen yesterday of a girl with a long braid and a bow at the end of it and my heart jumped out of my chest. I so badly want to do that! Oh well. I'm wearing the lovely bike necklace again! I got these white tights from target and while I was nervous about white tights, I couldn't be more happy. They're delightful!

Well. I'm off to shower. And go to class. Tonight we are having a SLUMBER PARTY in our dorm room. My roommate and I are very close friends with two other girls on our hall and we have sort of turned into the next Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants quad. They are bringing their mattresses into our room and we're going to stay up until the wee hours in the morning giggling. I love them. The four of us are going to live in an apartment next year, too, which excites me to no end. Yay! It's a high school dream come true!

Have a good Friday! Tell me how Harry Potter was ;)
Love,
Maggie

P.S. None of these pictures are even slightly edited!