love stories: laura & radley

Are you ready? I don't think you are... because today is probably going to be everybody's favorite day on beauty and the feast because it's definitely mine! One of my favorite bloggers... ever... is here to share part of her love story which just happens to be my absolute favorite love story... ever... and part of the reason I started this little series to begin with.  I've been following her blog for years and never even kind of dreamed that I'd ever have the privilege of hosting her on my little blog. Meet Laura from Little Things and Curiosities and get ready for some beautiful words and heart melting story-telling about the guy who captured her heart (and let's be honest... all of ours' too) and how she just knew he was the one.

photo courtesy of cooper carras

You just know. That's what people always say about finding their other half — about knowing once and for all that they've met The One. You just know. And I understand what those people mean, because at some point in a relationship, you stop waiting for everything to become clear, to turn black and white. At some point, your questions are either answered or feel irrelevant or maybe you just stopped asking them because you decided that the gray area was sort of the point. The gray area, you realized, is everything.

I just know — and yet, there was also this one moment. This one sweet and simple, fleeting moment in which I realized Radley was It.

His face was scruffy and tanned that morning, slightly burnt, his days back then filled with bayside runs and sandy beach football and long, sunny motorcycle rides. He wore khaki cargo shorts and a green tee, the one I loved because it brought out the golden-green shade of his eyes.

It was early in the morning, a Sunday, and we were carrying hot coffees as we walked along the edge of Mission Bay. I wore cutoff denim shorts and a hooded sweatshirt and my hair was frizzy from the wind.

"The sky is cerulean," I said. "Cerulean. That's my favorite crayon."

And the way he looked at me — his head tilted sideways, eyebrows raised, a half-smirk — well, everything felt sure. He knew, and I knew, and the sky was the color of the brightest blue crayon.

{You can read about the beginning of their love story here.}

24 candles

This weekend, I celebrated my 24th birthday... most definitely the best birthday I've ever had. My friends, as usual went above and beyond with thoughtfulness and I felt so special and loved... it was just perfect. We started Saturday morning with lunch and drinks at Toronado [a friend who couldn't make it called and covered a ton of food for us as a surprise... so incredibly sweet], then moved on to some other bars and eventually home. A full 12 hours of fiesta. Woof. Yesterday, Amanda woke me up with donut holes and I opened presents. Blog Inc., Frye boots, washi tape, nail polish, recipe book, wunder unders, a clutch and an alliegator pinata [handmade by this gal] were some highlights... I am seriously blessed.

yours truly... 24 years old... beer + brat

cards, homemade alliegator pinata, favorite friends

birthday millslagle sandwich... double decker edition

blowing out the candles

It was a lovely weekend, indeed! 

space jam

photo (left) courtesy of design*sponge

After reading Bekuh's tips for finding inspiration, I got inspired and discovered a mechanism of my own. Lately, I just haven't been able to get enough of design blogs. Perhaps it's the grown up in me yearning to decorate a space of my own or maybe it's that fall is coming and I'm even more drawn to brick than usual. Thanks to design*sponge, I've rounded up some of my favorite spaces that will someday influence my own [semi] permanent abode.

one + two

three + four

PS: Thanks for sticking with me through my rant yesterday. As usual, I felt way better after writing it all out. Lots of goodies coming to ya this week... including my birthday this Sunday! Woo hoo! Happy Tuesday!

vows

photo courtesy of thisrusticlife via therusticarchives

As you may remember, I dubbed 2012 "the year of the Allie," meaning that I would take care of myself and my needs and really enjoy and live my life and thus far, I think I've done a pretty good job: trying new exercise classes, getting my hair done without caring about what other people think, concentrating on this blog, volunteering, trying new foods, camping, quitting my job... and so on. But another thing I've really made a conscious effort to do is to put myself out there in the dating world. Though I complain about being perpetually single, I don't do much about it. I will admit that I have romantic and probably unrealistic expectations for dating. I want to be fought for and I want to feel loved and of course, love in return.

Through this newfound and semi-forced confidence, I've met some cool people. Some I've hoped would turn into a romance but mostly, the encounters have just been friendly, which is wonderful. New friends are always fun and I enjoy learning about people and their life paths.

But anyways, that's not what this post is about. In one of my bold moments, I gave my number to a guy, we'll call him Bob. Bob and I texted for a while and then it kind of fizzled. When I bumped into him at his place of work a month or so later, we starting chatting again. Things were looking up until one of his co-workers informed me that Bob is, in fact, married. In typical "the year of the Allie" fashion, I called him out and he responded, "but things are bad and I'm on the fence."

Dear "Bob," it just doesn't matter how bad things are.

I'm no expert, but he vowed to love this woman and to be true to her and if things aren't going as planned, bailing and texting a random girl (me) just doesn't seem like the right thing to do. This small and seemingly insignificant encounter kind of shattered my hopes. Bob and I never hung out or went on a date; just casual get-to-know-you text messaging. But putting myself in his wife's shoes just broke my heart. Of course this is an extreme example but I think that we see this type of carelessness in everyday life as well.

One of the reasons I started my love stories series was to foster my vow to take care of myself because love is definitely the number one thing I get down about. I feel like all I hear about is failed relationships and cheating husbands/wives and it makes me sad. Keeping the faith and vowing to yourself to not settle is a constant struggle. And besides romantic relationships, it tears me apart when I witness people being downright rude and terrible to complete strangers... in my opinion, no one deserves it. You don't know what battle that person is fighting and you don't know if their day was, gasp, worse than yours.

I think what scares me the most is that cheating on your significant other, getting frustrated too easily with your loved ones and being a complete jerk to a perfect stranger is becoming the norm and even worse, widely accepted. But it doesn't have to be that way.

photo courtesy of meggielynne

I don't know what the goal of this post is but I just wanted to say: treat people how you want to be treated. Whether they're your best friend, your significant other or the barista at the coffee shop who might be going a little slower than usual, be kind. It's as simple as that. If we could all just adhere to that, I think we would be a lot better off.

inspiration... where you at?

image courtesy of the shiny squirrel via isle of view

I think I've officially hit a wall. Nothing has inspired me lately and I don't know what to do about it. Usually, I can take a walk around the block or peruse the blogosphere and I'll snap back immediately but nothing is doing it for me this week! Silly because things in my life are, for once, going according to plan. I couldn't be more excited to start my job [I got my business cards already... cue the squeals!] and I have some very fun happenings to look forward to in the coming weeks: my college roommate is coming to visit, Lori's housewarming party, my birthday, my first day at my new job, the wedding... so many things! Trust me, I'm very grateful... anddddd I've been out pretending like I'm still in college to celebrate all of these wonderful things in my near future [which has been, by the way, pretty dang fun].

So why have these positive events resulted in neglecting my blog, which is one of the most important things in my life? I'll tell you why... balance! It's something I write about FAR too often but it's my biggest life struggle. All of my attempts to get things in order, balance-wise, end with me being completely neurotic and driving myself crazy. Oy. I think I need an adventure. In the contraption above [how cute is that!?]

Where do you go for inspiration? What pulls you out of a writing rut? How do you balance your life?