Family Photos

 

Bet you thought I meant my human family, lol. NO. THIS is my family. Dogs. If it makes you feel any better, we took these after we took human family photos over Christmas. Notice I’m not wearing a sweater because Texas decided it would just kinda gloss over winter this year and head right into what it thinks is “spring.” Which, I mean, is fine I guess if you don’t own 62 sweaters and velvet leggings you want to show the world.

This was pre haircut in February and it was having a DAY. I could NOT get that turn out to tame and it was flat and weird and ugh. Even with short hair I still have issues.

You wouldn’t believe how difficult it was to get these girls to hold still for a minute while we took some photos. They were too excited to not be in a fence and wanted to get loose and play with my family. Crazies.

I’m wearing: jeans-American Eagle, booties-Shoe Carnival, shirt-stolen from Shelby, velvet kimono-local boutique

HAWT FIRE. My mom is adorable.

 

Anyway, happy finally Friday! I’m going to the enormous Round Top sale with friends for a girls’ weekend. I AM SO EXCITED. Sometimes I look back on my life and say, “God, no wonder I was depressed. I had no friends!” And then I think about all the cool stuff I get to do and the people I get to love in a healthy way and just get the warm fuzzies. Life is cool and hard and weird! That should be the tagline of this blog.

Did you see my collab post with Infinity Jars? Check it out!

 

Love you!

xx

 

My First Rap Show

Last Christmas, Rudy was going to get she and her boyfriend concert tickets. It was between a Lil’ Wayne show in Bossier City or a Future and Ty Dolla $ign show here in Dallas. I (cleverly) tricked her into telling me which one she personally would rather go to so I could get those tickets. So, being the perfect oldest sister that I am, bought all three of us tickets to see Future and Ty Dolla $ign last month.

 

He did not disappoint.

If you’re like me and have no idea who Future or Ty Dolla $ign is, Future has done such classics as Jumpman with Drake, Where Ya Atand Big Rings also with Drake. Also, Future is REAL cute.

Ty Dolla $ign has done…well, you can look them up. Fyi? They’re real explicit. *cough* *cough*

ANYWAY. If you have a chance to go to a rap concert, just GO. Being crowded by hundreds of other people and being forced to jump or be crushed is THE GREATEST THING EVER. Pro Tip: Get there early and get towards the front. It’s less fun if you can’t even see the stage. Also, maybe know more than two songs so you can actively participate.

Also? Be sure at the end of the show there’s a confetti cannon.

 

Actually, anywhere you go make sure there’s a confetti cannon.

 

10/10 would recommend a rap concert. Especially with your best friends/sisters. 0/10 would recommend waiting over an hour to get out of the parking lot because they’ve got the back alley blocked off for the artists. But at least we got to see them get on their tour bus.

If you come to Dallas and go to one, hmu. I’m good company! Swear. Plus you can stay in my house. My couch is a great sleep couch. 🙂

 

xx

Sister Crop Top Day

Approximately 1,000,000 years ago I bought this crop top at Target and thought, “omg how cute a striped crop top can’t wait for summer.” And then 1,000,000 years later give or take a few days I saw it in my closet. Unworn. Mocking me every time I slid past it to get to a different shirt. One that was, how should I say, uncropped.

It just so happened that on that day, my two sisters were in town and each had brought their own crop top. CROP TOP FATE. With that and the fact that weekends are the only time I can wear such a thing (offices really frown upon midriffs. Who knew?) I popped the sucker on.

Oh yeah, I got my nose pierced. Did you know that?

 

I won’t lie to you. When we walked into Gold Rush Cafe I felt insanely over dressed and like I was trying too hard. But when you stop thinking like that and instead think like I’m the best dressed in the room your perspective shifts and you really stop caring about the person that might stare at you for a couple seconds. (SPOILER ALERT: No one did! Dallas rules.)

Turns out nobody really gives a crap if two inches of your cute belly shows. And why should they? They’re not the ones that are you. You are you. And before I get too Dr. Suess on you, just wear a crop top, k? They’re cute and cool and actually super flattering with the right bottoms. Can’t wait to pop out a couple others I’ve got for this hot weather.

 

xx

PS! Have you seen this article on Buzzfeed about a girl that wears a crop top for seven days and documents people’s reactions? It’s eye-opening.

My First Christmas

Christmas!

I’ve had a lot of firsts in the last seven months: my first apartment, my first real night alone, paying my first electricity bill, first time melting an extension cord into the socket. Lots of stuff. But this Christmas was mine. I had complete control over the entire holiday. I could make my own traditions, decorate however I wanted, watch and listen to Christmas music all day long.

I normally get pretty melancholy around Christmas. Not because of the holiday itself, but because of the weather. It’s always dreary and cloudy and it’s hard to feel festive when you come home to an empty apartment every night. But I made it work. I figured out ways to be cheerful! I made myself listen to Christmas music on the way to and from work, I decorated my tree, I made Christmas cookies for my neighbors, I even bought myself an ornament to document my first Christmas (a gold ‘M’. Fitting, as I have been recently called ‘basic’. A term I wholeheartedly disagree with.) I began my own traditions.

And that’s really what it’s about, right? We spend the majority of our early years Christmasing with our families and adopting their traditions. But what happens when we move out? When we have our own families? We have to make our own! I’m already thinking about things I can do this Christmas. (Too soon?)

Treei like foodThanks, Urban OutfittersPepperLove!

Christmases have kind of notoriously been hard for me. Lot of breakups tend to happen around this holiday for me. Just me? No one else? Cool. No matter who you are, if you’re lonely or not, just surround yourself with people. Shine those twinkle lights all night until you run your electricity bill through the roof. Make your neighbors cookies and then get anxiety knocking on their doors in the dark and then when the one neighbor you’ve deemed ‘Hot Neighbor’ doesn’t answer his door when you knock, make yourself crazy wondering why you heard his floor creak then leave the cookies outside his door. (This is so incredibly incriminating.)

 

Happy Christmas in March, folks.

 

 

xx

Where I Decide To Retire

Day Two: Roatan, Honduras. Sigh. This place. Ugh. The beach. The food. The water. The palms. The jungle. If I ever get married this beach or the mountains is where I’ll do it.

Processed with VSCOcam with c1 preset Processed with VSCOcam with b2 preset Processed with VSCOcam with c2 preset Processed with VSCOcam with h6 preset Processed with VSCOcam with k3 preset Processed with VSCOcam with k3 preset Processed with VSCOcam with k1 preset Processed with VSCOcam with c1 preset

This is the best we’ve ever looked.

Processed with VSCOcam with k3 preset Processed with VSCOcam with a6 preset

Processed with VSCOcam with e3 preset Processed with VSCOcam with k2 preset Processed with VSCOcam with c1 preset Processed with VSCOcam with a1 preset Processed with VSCOcam with a2 preset Processed with VSCOcam with c1 preset Processed with VSCOcam with c1 preset Processed with VSCOcam with c2 preset

That sunset. Man. Those mountains. Who wants to go in on a vacation home with me? I can offer you chocolate and $13.

 

The Beginning

Oh haaaaaiiiii! Did you miss me? Don’t say no. It’ll crush me.

So if you follow me on Instagram (why aren’t you following me on Instagram? @melodyrich, k?) you’ve seen all the cruise spam I’ve been spraying. So how about some more of it here? I mean, this blog is me and I went on a cruise. Ergo, my blog went on a cruise.

Processed with VSCOcam with f3 presetProcessed with VSCOcam with c1 presetProcessed with VSCOcam with e1 preset

I mean, it was freezing the day we boarded. Ya girl decided to wear a gauzy swim cover up and the thinnest denim shirt on the planet.

Processed with VSCOcam with b4 presetProcessed with VSCOcam with a6 preset Processed with VSCOcam with k1 presetProcessed with VSCOcam with e4 preset

Day one we sailed to Cozumel, Mexico. We spent all day lying in the sun getting burned. This is the exact moment I earned the splotchiest sunburn I’ve ever had. I mean, my skin is still marked. It’s bad, y’all. But napping in the sun with a margarita next to your sisters is pretty neat.

Processed with VSCOcam with a5 preset Processed with VSCOcam with a4 preset

Day two we woke up to the clearest water I’ve ever seen. Well, technically we woke up to the sights and sounds of that Carnival ship off our balcony. But that ship was in the clearest water I’ve ever seen. So, that’s something.

We disembarked and got on a small boat and headed to Isla de Pasion. (Add a tilde over that ‘o’ in Pasion, for me will ya?)  We passed a yacht from Australia, a rusted sunken ship, and came upon this…

 

Processed with VSCOcam with e3 presetProcessed with VSCOcam with a1 presetProcessed with VSCOcam with a6 presetProcessed with VSCOcam with k1 presetProcessed with VSCOcam with e3 presetProcessed with VSCOcam with t2 preset

This is where they filmed your favorite Corona commercial. And this is where I fell in love with sand. Free margs and rum and guacamole? SIGN.ME.UP.

 

Let’s go back.