21

 

What is up guys? I am officially 21 now, and I had a really nice birthday weekend with my family and Travis.

I had to work in the morning on my actual B-Day, but I woke up to a little pile of presents on the dining room table. My loot included: a sewing machine, jelly shoes, a RADICAL necklace (from Travis), and prints from some of my fave artists.

These photos turned out a lot grainier than I wanted, but I really loved this outfit, and it was about to rain so we were rushing under the storm clouds!

We went to Goodwill, where I got this dress (I hemmed it with the new sewing machine) and to the mall where I treated myself to some fancy lipstick and new bras. On Saturday we went out to eat at one of those Japanese places where they cook the food in front of you and it all tastes delicious, and then my family surprised me by taking me to get Mindy Kahling's book that I've been wanting to read for so long!

Oh and of course I bought my first alcoholic beverage. Travis came with me to the ABC store where I got a bottle of vodka. I offered up my ID to the guy at the counter freely, and he threw in a tiny bottle of something pink with the label "Kinky" for my birthday. So that was creepy. My mom made us all peach fizzes! (Limeade + peaches + vodka in a blender) YUM.

As you can see, Trav is back from Italy and I am just pleased as punch to have him.

dress: Goodwill

shoes: ASOS

radical necklace <3: I'm your present

On Travis

shirt: Target

pants: Zara

shoes: American Eagle

Anyway, thanks for all the birthday wishes on my last post, u guyz rule.

It's My Party

You guys I am so excited to complain at you today!

First of all, today is my birthday! (No that is not what I am complaining about) but it means that the phrase "It's my party and I'll cry if I want to" rings true. Now, keep in mind that I am writing this post on the 18th, so that's not entirely fair. I'm planning on going out to eat with my family, maybe making a cake, and opening lots of presents! Since it's my 21st, I'm going to go out drinking (PARTAY) next weekend with the bros.

Okay so now I will complain.

You may remember I wore this dress 2 months ago. It's from American Apparel, and I mentioned that it was too small for me. Well, I returned it. And the dress that came back to me was a size Large, but that was about the only thing right about it. It was in the wrong color, had a thread loose, and still had the anti-theft sensor on it! You know, those things you can't remove? I was peeved, obvi. AmApp charges $70 for their dresses (mine was on sale and my Mom pitched in), and this is the kinda customer service I get? It gets worse. I sent them an angry message, and got NO reply for 2 weeks. Then the tracking info on my package disappeared. I sent a second message, and they replied to this one to say "Yeah we don't know where your package is," but at least I got the apology I wanted. They eventually found it and the lady who helped me got me the right dress and sent it. So here it is.

It's just such an expensive store, and one that I'm supposed to feel good about purchasing from (all American made, hello!), but they really handled the whole thing poorly. I don't know if I'll be shopping there again.

At least it is a really pretty dress and the whole ordeal is over with. Look how over it I am:

Next order of business:

Today a girl emailed me asking me to lower my prices on custom portraits. She had bought one at $15 before I increased the price to $25, and was asking for a discount code. Maybe she didn't intend to be rude, but man. I was deeply offended by this! She was basically saying to me, "I don't think your art is worth what you are charging." Which, I mean, that's fine, you don't gotta like my art, but it's the difference between not liking someone's outfit and going up and telling someone they dress ugly.

I realize most people don't do art, and art is valued weirdly, but to get my point, think about this: If I spend 2 hours on a portrait for $15, that's $7.50 an hour. That is like, minimum wage, and I'm not even including supplies! Like, gurl, you are equating my art that I work really hard on with bagging groceries at Bi Lo. It was just Dis. Re. Spect.

BTW this dress needs to be taken in lol. I am between a medium and a large there, apparently.

Okay I am really glad I got all that off my chest. Now I am totes ready to go have a beautiful birthday, full of Japanese food and cupcakes.

I'll leave you with this: Today I went to get my license renewed. The only reason I didn't mail it in was because of the way dated picture... I was 15 and in the worst of my awkward teenager days. So here is the new one, guys.

It's like they try to make you look unattractive.

Boston, Part 2

Here are the rest of the pictures from my journey to Boston.

A bridge in Maryland?

There was some town in NJ we got sidetracked into that had all these huge sculptures. Pretty cool place for us to get lost!

An outfit I wore at the con! A cool thing about the nerdy folks there was that they dressed how the fuck they wanted. While maybe it wasn't how I'd dress, it was neat to see people dressing weirdly and not caring what anyone thought. Can you say 75 year old lady with bright blue hair?

Floral tights didn't even phase those guys.

We drove through NYC and I saw the skyline! It was really amazing. I texted my Mom that I was driving through Brooklyn and she said, and I quote, "where is broklyn?"

I basically wore these over my normal glasses the whole way.

Another driving outfit.

Some cool earrings I got at UO! (We don't have one of those in SC)

Offbrand gummy bears! We were so broke from all the tolls, we ate grocery store food the rest of the trip.

 

On a shopping excursion. U no I wanted these so bad.

Peace the heck out!

Boston, Part 1

Here are my photos from my trip to Boston!

I'm glad to be back at home, of course. I was in Boston for Readercon, a scifi convention. It was interesting to hear all the talks, but sitting in a room listening to intellectual panelists ALL day long isn't my cup of tea. I left to go shopping a couple of times, and I got some cool stuff at the (huge) mall!

We drove through some seriously beautiful country. I love driving (maybe not for 12 hours straight) but I didn't get as many good shots as I'd have liked. 

I pulled over on the side of the interstate in VA to get some pictures of the Shenandoah Valley, and about 3 minutes later a cop pulls up behind me! He comes up to my window, and when I tell him what I was doing he puts on his most condescending voice and says, "You pulled over on the side of the road. To take a picture." He actually ticketed me, too! I don't know guys, that's not illegal in SC, and I really feel like he should have been nicer to me. I've got no record and I was obvi from out of state. It's not like I was up to no good! Worst part of the story: I didn't even get my pictures. Let that be a lesson to you guys!! Wait and pull over at an exit.

We stayed the night in DC where we have some family and friends. I lived in the area until I was 6, did you know that?

My travel outfit...

And Dad's.

Driving was like, 60% of our trip. And of that 60%, 100% was traffic jams.

I have some more pictures from the trip scheduled for you soon!

Art Lately

Some art I've done lately:

A commission for a girl's Mom who is a realtor

 A portrait for Marie of Lemon Drop Vintage!

You can email me for commissions at ohavalanche@gmail.com, buy one from my etsy, and keep up with my art on tumblr!