this week's clicks.

get your week off to a colorful start...

SWOON.

Allen Tsai via Style Me Pretty

• Erica's colorful bohemian twist on Christmas home decor.
• From Elli, a Vermont wedding with lovely, rich colors.
• Creative bridal editorial inspired by southern colleges.
• A cozy Christmas lifestyle shoot from Style Me Pretty.

SMILE.

• Desktops: Every Tuesday, Flipsnack, May Designs.
• YOU GUYS IT'S STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI WEEK!
• From Apt Therapy, landfill-proof holiday cards.
• Adorable paper house DIY from Lia (I'd add glitter).

FLASHBACK.

• 2015: My wellness wish list, fall in Instagram, favorite holiday traditions, and a glam woodland Christmas wreath.
• 2014: Roanoke's Festival of Trees, rounded up ideas for a wedding inspired by Beauty and the Beast, and my blog loves.
• 2013: My all-time favorite Christmas movies and songs, a historical fiction book review, my favorite no-bake cookie recipe, and my December in Instagram.
• 2012: Easy holiday party ideas, advice for letting go of perfect and enjoying the holiday season, and 7 winter date ideas.
• 2011:  a paint chip mosaic, poinsettia wreath, no-sew tree skirt, and how I decorated our tree.

drowned in moonlight.

I've written quite a bit on this blog about how much Star Wars means to me. It's a link to my dad in that it's something he loved and shared with me. It's one of my inspirations as a writer and creator. I don't think I can even put into words why it was so important for me at the age of ten to see a princess with a blaster taking charge and not taking any crap, but also being vulnerable and loving her friends fiercely. As an adult, learning that Carrie had bipolar disorder and was very open about it was so important to me in a world where mental illness still carries a stigma. As a woman, I loved how blunt she was about the fact that she had aged like a real human being and didn't give two hoots what anyone thought about how she looked. Finding out that the world lost Carrie Fisher yesterday was crushing. I'm thankful that we have her body of work as an actress and a writer. I wish I could have been wherever the people who loved her were yesterday, hearing the stories that the rest of us were never privy to. I'm thankful that she got to share so much of hers with the world.

Leia Organa by kittrose on DeviantArt

this week's clicks.

get your week off to a colorful start...
LISTEN.

• The New Basement Tapes, consisting of  Marcus Mumford, My Morning Jacket's Jim James, Elvis Costello, Dawes' Taylor Goldsmith, and the Carolina Chocolate Drops' Rhiannon Giddens, works with song lyrics penned by Bob Dylan in 1967 to create magic. Despite the weird video (kind of reminds me of Gorillaz), I love this song. Hope this supergroup gets back together soon.

SWOON.

Henry + Mac Photo Co.

• Lovely ethical wedding gowns by Celia Grace via Bridal Musings.
• A romantic and festive greenhouse wedding from Henry + Mac.
• From SMP, a glam Chinese-American wedding with confetti!
• I love this perfect fall kitchen from Shades of Blue Interiors.

SMILE.

• October calendars from Dawn Nicole and Minding My Nest.
• I'm obsessed with these painterly fall dishes from Wal-Mart.
• Geek girls: 'Tis the season for BB8 pumpkins and costumes.
• Lots of other fun, colorful Halloween ideas on my Pinterest.

FLASHBACK.

• 2015: Ideas for playing tourist in your hometown.
• 2014: my October favorites and the last Sunday Social.
• 2013: casual high school reunion outfit ideas.
• 2012: gold and camel wardrobe ideas and the #Septemberstories IG challenge.
• 2011: our cocktail hour, outdoor wedding party portraits, and couple portraits.

this week's clicks: all we need is a roof and a warm place...

get your week off to a colorful start...
LISTEN.

• The sun has finally come out in southwest Virginia, so I'm filling my playlist with upbeat, springy music perfect for warm days, like Little Brutes' "Make Our Own Way."

SWOON.

Kate Haus Photography via Style Me Pretty

• Seriously in love with this colorful South Carolina wedding.
• Obsessed with this little Venice, California canal cottage.
• Lia Griffith's picture-perfect papercut just married banner.
• This tee from The Tomkat Studio is the cutest gift for brides!

SMILE.

• Intrigued by mineral sunscreen spray now that spring's here.
• Watched this interesting Gloria Vanderbilt doc this weekend.
• Book Riot rounds up the best of the new Star Wars universe.
• Beth shares Bible verses to stand on when times are tough.

FLASHBACK.

• 2015: remixed closet staples, seating ideas for spring celebrations, April favorites.
• 2014: a Sunday Social about pet peeves and the best [Mean Girls themed] link-up ever.
• 2013: inspiration for my eternal favorite spring trend: mixed prints.
• 2012: backyard wedding inspiration and ideas for a Cinco de Mayo celebration.

#5FandomFriday - Make-Up Friday - Geeky Clothing and Accessories I Need

5 Fandom Friday is a weekly prompt challenge hosted by The Nerdy Girlie and Super Space Chick. This week, our prompt is "favorite stores to get geeky wears/wares." My answers to that question were very boring... um, Barnes and Noble? Campus bookstores? Instead, I'm revisiting an early prompt I missed - Geeky Clothing Items I Need Want In My Life.

1. Uhura's earrings - In the new Star Trek movies, Nyota Uhura (Zoe Saldana) accessorizes her Starfleet uniform with Alexis Bittar earrings that look suitably futuristic. I've been obsessed with these for a while now - such a subtle bit of geekery!

2. Sunnydale tee - Another subtle way to participate in fandom - anyone who's a Buffy fan would instantly recognize and appreciate this Sunnydale tee from Redbubble, anyone else will just think it's a high school they've never heard of.

3. Marauder's Map shoes - I'm not sure if I've ever shopped at Hot Topic, and I totally missed the point when it shifted from being a Goth kid store to a haven for geeks! These Harry Potter Marauder's Map sneakers are amazing.

4. Empire Strikes Back tank - Junk Food has a great collection of Star Wars tees, and this tank is so retro and cool. I would wear it to the gym, around town, and probably even try wearing it with a cardigan to school.

5. Raven Boys tee - Emgrav is a Society6 designer who creates quirky art based on Maggie Stiefvater's Raven Cycle books, and this tee is my favorite - each of the sketches represents something significant from the story, and it somehow manages to be creepy and cute at the same time (just like Blue Sargent's life).

What geeky items are on your wish list? What are the

geekiest things in your closet or jewelry box right now?

#5FandomFriday: Favorite Fictional Foods

5 Fandom Friday is a weekly prompt challenge hosted by The Nerdy Girlie and Super Space Chick. This week, I'm rounding up fictional foods I would love to try!

1. Butterbeer from Harry Potter

J.K. Rowling is so, so good at writing about food that reading the dining hall scenes at Hogwarts always made me need to take a kitchen break. Of all the magical things the characters enjoy, the one that seems to inspire the purest elation is butterbeer. I know that Universal Studios serves their own version of the treat, and some people think Starbucks' new butterscotch creations are the closest we Muggles may get to the real thing.

2. November cakes from The Scorpio Races by Maggie Steifvater

One of the many reasons Maggie is my favorite YA author: when she decided to invent a special roll that the denizens of her fictional Celtic island, Thisby, bake to celebrate the annual super-deadly water horse race, she felt like she actually had to bake them , and took it upon herself to create a recipe. That is some next-level universe building right there.

3. Rey's bread from Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Science fiction foods get me every time, especially for their usually instant nature - I was also kind of obsessed with all of the different dehydrated meals Tally had in Scott Westerfeld's Uglies series. In The Force Awakens, Rey's bread was a practical effect accomplished with a balloon, but the folks at Star Wars have come up with a recipe that apparently comes close to instant bread and has an appropriately unappetizing shade of green.

4. Abby's Caf-Pows from NCIS

Sure, a Caf-Pow is just the NCIS universe's version of a Big Gulp from 7-11, but it is also the magical fuel that helps Abby Sciuto solve crimes! Imagine how much I would get done in a day with Caf-Pow running through my veins!

5. Coffee of Doom's specials from Questionable Content

I've been reading this webcomic since college - it's cute and I like the characters - and one of the best running gags Jeph Jacques includes are really strange specials on the chalkboard at the coffee shop. A recent strip featured Earl Grey tea that made Bubbles (who is an AI and can only smell tea) see a unicorn. Totally normal in QC-land.

#5FandomFriday: Make-Up Friday - 5 Gateway Fandoms

5 Fandom Friday is a weekly prompt challenge hosted by The Nerdy Girlie and Super Space Chick. I got really excited when I saw this week's #5FandomFriday topic - Make-Up Friday! I decided to do the first-ever #5FF prompt, "Gateway Fandoms that Made Me Who I Am Today." Let's do this!

Fairies - The first oddbeat thing I can remember being obsessed with is fairies; when I was a kid I had a set of books that were hand-me-downs from my cousin and the one for beginning readers had a whole section of poems about fairies and pixies and such. Two of my favorite movies were Thumbelina and Fern Gully and my favorite book was Lynne Reid Banks' The Fairy Rebel. My best friend and I made up an elaborate game for our classmates around the premise that there were fairies living in the woods beside our school playground and a series of tasks had to be completed to save them - basically, at the age of eight I was already a fantasy writer in training. Unfortunately, our ongoing story came to an end when we came back to school one Monday and the tree where the fairies lived had been struck by lightning overnight.

Titanic - It sounds strange to call a tragic historical disaster a fandom, but hear me out! In December 1997, my friend's parents dropped us off at a G-rated move so they could see Titanic. After about 15 minutes of Flubber or something, my friend and I were in the back row of Titanic feeling like the baddest 12-year-old chicks in town. We were found out when her parents found us sobbing as the credits rolled. I became obsessed not only with Leonardo Di Caprio (you'll always be my first love, Leo), but with the ship, its wreckage, and explorer Robert Ballard. I was so psyched to find out my sister-in-law shares my love of all things Titanic - we went to see the movie together when it was released in 3D, and she and I forced our family to endure the Titanic Museum Exhibition on our vacation to Tennessee.

Arthurian Legend/Medieval Everything - My mom can attest that medieval lore was one of my first fandoms; when I was three and four all I wanted to draw was castles. When I was in eighth grade, two things led to my medieval obsession: the TV movie Merlin and Brian Jacques' Redwall books (I can thank my local librarian for that literary gateway drug). In the early days of AOL, I stumbled upon a chat-based RPG about a castle, and started writing stories a character named Duchess Isabella (my name from Spanish class, super creative obviously) who was basically a Mary Sue version of Morgan Le Fay who used dark magic to save unicorns and such. I'm sure our stories were horrible, but I had found a community of people who loved the thing I loved, and 5 years later I'd be studying Edmund Spenser and Geoffery Chaucer in college. My trip to Ireland to study literature was a dream come true because I got to see actual medieval things, real ruins of castles and The Book of Kells, and I'm still obsessed with all things medieval.

Star Wars - I resisted Star Wars - when I was a kiddo, my dad kept trying to convince me to watch the trilogy via his battered set of VHS tapes and I refused every time because it was a "boy movie" (there were no horses, so he couldn't trick me into watching it the way he did his favorite Westerns). When I saw some of the cool guys in my class playing with Star Wars action figures, one of which was shaped like AN ADORABLE BEAR, I was like, okay, Dad, let's do this thing. The next three weekends held probably three of the most significant Friday nights of my life! With the release of The Phantom Menace in 1999, my gang of online medieval writing geeks realized we all loved Star Wars and AOL created a spin-off universe for us to play in. I created a science fiction character that I still love and write about. This year, watching The Force Awakens, I couldn't help but feel like my dad was there with me.

Harry Potter - The fandom that is closest to my heart. My first year of college, I made one of my best friends in the whole world through our mutual love of Harry Potter. Not only is it practically my religion, HP has made being a geek cool. This week, when one of my coworkers recommended a book to me and another teacher said, "Is there a wand in it?" I am definitely the resident genre fiction expert on the eighth grade English hallway and I love nurturing my baby geeks by putting Harry Potter, Redwall, Ender's Game, and comic books into their hands.

What were your first fandoms and obsessions?

lately in entertainment.

lately in entertainment - winter 2016

books.

The Mermaid's Sister - This book was charming in a way that reminded me of being read to as a child, and if the main character was a squirrel living in a dollhouse or the main character had a pet alligator I didn't question those things. It's a whimsical fantasy set in America in the 1800's (I think) and very different from the action-packed, dark paranormal romances that are so popular right now - it reminded me of Alice Hoffman's writing. The main character, innocent sixteen-year-old Clara, was dropped at her Auntie's mountain cottage by a stork, or so Auntie says. Her beautiful sister Maren, according to the stories Auntie tells, arrived in a seashell. Auntie just so happens to be a hedge witch with a pet wyvern. Though the family keeps to themselves to avoid freaking out the locals, they eagerly await visits from Scarff, an old trader with a wagon full of wonderful things, and his adopted son O'Neill, suddenly grown-up and handsome. Their cozy, offbeat lives are interrupted when Maren starts to become a mermaid - first, scales appear on her skin, then her legs begin to fuse into fins, and finally, she begins to shrink. Worried that she will die without the sea, Clara and O'Neill set out with Maren in a washtub. Along the way, they become tangled up with a traveling circus sideshow, its owners intent on keeping Maren as a star attraction, and Clara and O'Neill must outwit their captors. All the while, Clara struggles with her newfound feelings for O'Neill and her anxiety that she herself will someday become a stork and fly away.

Winter - I'd been waiting anxiously for the last book in the Lunar Chronicles series - Marissa Meyer had left us with so many cliffhangers in the third book, Cress, and added layers to the story in the prequel, Fairest. I've loved the way she weaves together the little details from each of the classic fairy tales - even the ones I'd forgotten since childhood - in a science fiction setting. I can't say much about the plot of Winter without giving away spoilers for the rest of the series. At the end of Cress, one character had been taken prisoner, another blinded, and Cinder had just added kidnapping to her list of crimes. This book's new character, Princess Winter, is Meyer's space-opera version of Snow White. She is beautiful, kind, scarred, and quite possibly insane - a side effect of her constant effort to suppress her inherited Lunar gift, mind control. Together, the characters must work to lead an uprising and defeat their common enemy, the evil Lunar Queen Levana. This book was filled with action, crazy plans that almost always went awry, Meyer's cheeky, Whedonesque humor, and enough romance to keep every ship afloat (Cress and Thorne 4EVA, y'all). There were a few times when I thought the book was almost over and then got surprised by how many pages were left (824 total)! I have loved this series, I'm very excited that it's been optioned for film, and I can't wait to see what Marissa Meyer does next.

Throne of Glass - I didn't fall into a funk after reading Winter because I quickly found a new YA series to obsess over, and I've been recommending it to all my fellow adult YA and fantasy lovers! I'd read about the Throne of Glass series on a few blogs and had actually had the first book sitting on my Kindle for a while, but hadn't been able to get into it. I finally pushed myself to get past the first few chapters, and I'm so glad I did! Here's the story: the main character, Celaena Sardothien, has been serving a brutal sentence in a salt mine when she is summoned by the captain of the king's guard and taken to the royal court. Formerly the most infamous assassin in the kingdom, Calaena has been chosen by the prince to compete in a contest the king is holding to choose a new Champion. By accepting, Calaena agrees to serve the king whose armies destroyed her people's homeland and way of life by outlawing magic - in exchange for her eventual freedom. Though she's been hardened by her years as a killer and abuse in the mines, Calaena begins to open up to Crown Prince Dorian, the captain of the guard who becomes her trainer and coach, and the mysterious foreign princess who has come to stay at court despite the tenuous balance between her country's freedom and the king's goal of complete domination.She also discovers that while magic may be illegal, it definitely isn't extinct. As

her opponents begin to fall victim to mysterious murders, Celaena and her newfound allies have to act quickly to investigate what evil is at work within the glass castle. I feel like Stefon from SNL when I tell people about Throne of Glass - "This series has everything: action, a sassy and intelligent heroine, PUPPIES, a playboy prince, romance, a brooding warrior, SHOPPING, fancy dress balls, swords, a library, magic, ghosts, and a secret passage!" 

movies.

Mockingjay Part 2 - My coworker Shannon and I stuck with our tradition of going to see the Hunger Games movies together after school. The movie does a great job of capturing the truly post-apocalyptic feel of the novel as Katniss, Gale, Peeta and their team make their way through the devastated Capitol to find and kill President Snow. The special and practical effects were great - one of the quirkiest characters from the book, Tigress, came to life perfectly on screen, and the Capitol's monsters were like something from a horror movie. Even though I knew the ending, the movie was full of suspense and included all of my favorite moments from the book.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens - I'm planning on seeing The Force Awakens again in IMAX, and I want to write a more detailed review/analysis after that. As a Star Wars fan since childhood, I was on the edge of my seat from the moment the Lucasfilm logo appeared on the screen, and got chillbumps when the yellow text finished scrolling and the camera dropped through space. A lot of critics have debated whether The Force Awakens is too similar to A New Hope in plot and pacing, but I thought the resonance made the story powerful, and I look forward to seeing Rey, Finn, and Poe continue their journey as the new heroes of the Star Wars universe.

Trainwreck - Finally got to see this total gem of a comedy. LeBron James cracked me up in every scene that he was in, and I was surprised by how actually sweet and real the relationship between Amy Schumer and Bill Hader was - I expected a raunchy comedy, but this one really did have a heart. Plus, no one told me John Cena played Amy's original boyfriend - you guys are all jerks.

Winter's Tale - This one had been lingering on our DVR for a while - I'd thought the trailers looked cool, but hadn't really been in the mood for Colin Farrell riding a pegasus through Victorian-era New York. I'm a sucker for the Victorian era and for magic, so I was quickly drawn in to the story of Farrell's character, a foundling on the run from a gang run by an actual demon played by Russel Crowe, falling in love with a spunky, privileged rich girl (think Rose from Titanic) who is dying of consumption after he tries to rob her house. The story takes a lot of strange turns, some of them kind of delightful (Will Smith plays Lucifer in a Jimi Hendrix t-shirt) and some of them just plain weird (Farrell's character's true love's father finally accepts him because he kept their house's boiler from exploding). While Winter's Tale has many gorgeous scenes and Farrell and Crowe play their characters well, the worldbuilding didn't seem quite solid enough for me to get on board.  I think I want to read the book this one is based on to see if it fills in the obvious gaps in the movie's plot.

What are you loving lately? Leave your recommendations in the comments!

this week's clicks: i'll place the moon within your heart...

get your week off to a colorful start...
LISTEN.

• Something I've realized this week is that everyone has their own version of David Bowie - those who grew up in the 70's will always see him as Ziggy Stardust or the Thin White Duke, but to us 80's kids, he is first and foremost Jareth the Goblin King from Labyrinth. Grace Potter shared her lovely tribute to Bowie on YouTube this week.

SWOON.

Emily March Photography via Ruffled

• A gorgeous shoot inspired by French Impressionism at Ruffled.
• A sweet, classic Southern Wedding in a little white chapel.
• At Sunday Chapter, the world's most colorful destinations.
• Sean Parker's crazy celeb-filled LOTR wedding at Vanity Fair.

SMILE.

• Tech desktops: Moo's Musing, This Nifty Earth, Sarah Hearts.
• Recut Star Wars original trilogy trailers will give you the feels.
• Did you know about tattoo paper? So many possibilities!
• The ladies at Oh Happy Day made a unicorn pinata. Want.

FLASHBACK.

• Two years ago, Sunday Social was about Top 3's.  I rounded up my favorite cranberry-hued wardrobe updates (spoiler alert: this color will never go out of style), collected inspiration for an elegant black, white, and blush celebration, put together ideas for a living room makeover, and recapped my January in Instagram.
• Three years ago, I shone the spotlight on a few of my favorite Instagrammers, rounded up inspiration for a red amaryllis wedding, and listed my entertainment favorites from the month.

year in review - favorite posts of 2015

Along with the most popular posts of the year, I always like to shine a little spotlight on my personal favorites. Here are the posts I enjoyed creating and writing, the ones I enjoyed re-reading the most, and the posts that were most meaningful to me in 2015.

Inner Bookworm: My TBR List - I'm a sucker for surveys that encourage me to reflect on my reading preferences and behaviors - which is no surprise, since I'm constantly asking my students to journal about their goals and progress. I practice what I preach, y'all. I wrote a little here about how I use Interactive Notebooks at school, and I completely changed the way I use those this past semester, so I'll probably write a post about them on my classroom blog soon.

A Letter to My Younger Self - This was a really great topic from The Circle link-up. I decided to write to myself as a first-year college student. I'd also like to write to my middle/high school self and add the advice, participate in P.E. class and learn how sports work.

Style: My Second Stitch Fix - Not my most successful Fix, but it did include my favorite dress, which I refer to as my "Fleetwood Mac dress" because it was perfect concert attire.

If I Could... - Totally ripped off the idea from Micah, Holly, Erin, and Katie, but this post ended up being more personal and insightful than I imagined.

16 Weird Ways to Celebrate Star Wars Day - Once in a while I come up with a really oddball idea for a blog post. I still love this post. It truly was the year of Star Wars.

Retro Summer Style: Aquamarine and Gingham - One of Pantone's colors for summer, a major pattern trend, and a TV show/book that were right up my alley all came together to inspire one of my all-time favorite style boards. Nicole called it "daintiest little inspo board" and I think that comment was right on target - I found myself adding little '60s touches to my outfits throughout late summer and fall. I need this kind of inspiration more often.

Travelogue: Charleston, South Carolina - We had an absolutely lovely, though short vacation to Charleston this summer, and I was so happy to finally be in the city I'd read and dreamed about. It was every bit as beautiful as I'd imagined. We're so lucky to have so many amazing places within driving distance, and I'm hoping we'll have the time and budget for even more travel in 2016. I think the biggest lesson I learned from Charleston was that vacations don't have to be long or obsessively planned - exploring random streets and following friends' recommendations or random Yelp reviews can be just as memorable as a scheduled tour or complicated reservation.

Midsummer According to Instagram - I participated in several Instagram style challenges this summer, primarily to keep myself from defaulting to pajamas every day (#teacherproblems). I did not expect so many compliments from real-life friends who genuinely liked seeing my outfits every day and thought they were creative - one friend even asked if I was buying new things just for the challenges (I wasn't!).

#ROANOKESTRONG - This post was very meaningful for me to write, and I wish I hadn't had to write it. My community experienced tragedy this year that I will never forget, and for a while I wasn't sure we'd ever be able to return to normal life. Seeing Alison Parker and Adam Ward's family and friends out and about, experiencing and enjoying life after such an excruciating loss, has been really inspiring. 

#5FandomFriday: Favorite Fictional Teachers - My topic suggestion got picked for October, and I knew exactly who my list would include.

Halloween Recap: Our Adventures as Cap and Peggy - This was my favorite Halloween ever. Peggy Carter is my favorite Marvel character, I love history, and I love dressing up. It was perfect, and I have the best husband in the world.

Holiday Craft: DIY World Map Ornaments - I'm so happy with how these turned out, and really hoping some other crafty folks will use this idea! When my mom came over for Christmas Eve, I asked her if she liked my new DIY ornaments, and she looked at our tree and said, "I don't see any handmade ornaments." Crafting win!

Bloggers, what were your favorite posts from 2015? 

Share your links in the comments!

my december in instagram with #5FFPhoto

I love Instagram - more than anything, it's the fastest way to document day-to-day life as it's happening - perfect for days that are too busy for journaling or blogging and adventures so spontaneous they don't get written on a calendar. This fall, I'd slacked off a little on my Instagramming, so I decided I needed a photo-a-day challenge to get me back on track. December photo-a-days are my favorite anyway (I'd participated in Fat Mum Slim's in the past), so when I saw that The Nerdie Girlie and Super Space Chick had created a #5FandomFriday photo challenge, #5FFPhoto, with a combination of festive and geeky prompts, I was all in. Since I started on December 15th, my photos were originally posted out of order, and I took two or three a day to get caught up. Here are Days 1-29 in order of the challenge prompts!

I hope you all had a warm, cozy, and joyful holiday 

season. Best wishes to you for a Happy 2016!