From where I stand/sit...

So much green!
School just looked so beautiful today. I had to stop and take pictures.

And I call this my favorite path. It leads to the mansion where I've had at least one class every semester. 

I needed to finish reading a couple short stories before class started later in the day, so I took a seat in an empty, dark room near the window where the sun was coming in, giving me just enough light to read without straining my eyes. I could hear the water making bubbly noises from the fountains two floors below and snapped a couple more pictures. The view from the third floor of the mansion's backyard is just so lovely. I could live here, I swear.

I hope you each find simple beauty in the places you see every day. 
Have a terrific Tuesday! 

♥ this dress...♥

Oh, this Dahlia dress is one of my absolute favorite little numbers in my closet. I've worn it to school, weddings, the grocery store...it's perfect for any event, no matter how extravagant or low-key. I love that it can be worn causally (as shown here) or sans the tights & oxfords, replacing them with high wedges and a chunky necklace. I don't really remix it too much since the dress is lovely enough to stand alone. 

Trying out a new pose, but it just looks like I'm popping a squat.

~*~Details~*~

oversized peter pan collar + gold buttons + doilies + sheer sleeves + bow belt 

twirly + blooper photos

Dress: Dahlia via ModCloth (old)//Belt, oxfords: ModCloth//Tights: Target//Earrings: F21

Sending you all happy-happy-joy-joy vibes! I'm having a nice Sunday watching all my shows: Mob Wives, Tough Love and Real Housewives of New Jersey. 
I hope you all have a great start to your weeks tomorrow. <3

bird IS the word

Not gonna lie, I went back n' forth for a hot minute trying to settle on a title for this post. I slept on it and decided I'd go with the first thing that flowed off my finger tips when I logged into Blogger again. (Yeah, I didn't realize I took post titles that serious either.) And so here we have "b-b-b-bird bird bird, b-b-bird is the word". These were my other cheesy choices:
~ "If you're a bird I'm a bird" (because I love The Notebook)
~ "Say I'm a bird" (same as above^)
~ "Birds of a feather..." (because it was just too easy)
~ "Fly high, free bird" (because "Free Bird" rules...and I'm a free bird, obvs)
Welp, at least I have options the next time I wear this demanding top. 

Blouse: F21//Shoes, belt: Ruche//Jeans: American Eagle//Headband: Target

Coat: Oasis//Bag: Thrifted//Mini: Vegas, baby

I really do think that in my other life I was a bird. I've always considered myself a wandering, unpredictable free spirit...a tumbleweed, planting bits of me (seeds) in every place I call home for a while. But I take away bits of past places with me, too - like the friendships, experiences and perception of the world from that temporary space. 
Picking up and making new homes has always been hard as far as saying goodbye, but I live for the excitement that comes with the feeling of brand new, like being the "new kid in town", exploring new territory, and simply starting over. It's a blend of the most raw emotions for me: I'm anxious, inspired, depressed, scared, rejuvenated, all at once with relocating. It's thrilling, but sometimes I wish that I could be happy in one place so I could spare myself the pain of more goodbyes. I wonder if I'll ever find a place that I want to settle down "forever"...just the thought of that immediately negates any possibility in my mind. But maybe that's just because, for the time being, I'm not ready to commit to a nest.  
Do I have any fellow free birds or tumble weeds out there? If so, maybe we should all get matching tattoos or something. ;) 
Have a lovely weekend, friends. 

Friendly visits: Stephanie part dos

This day was spent walking up and down and all around New York City, one of my favorite pastimes. 
As soon as we got into the city we went straight for lunch at John's Pizzeria. Mikey and I agree that out of all the pizza places we've tried, John's is the best hands down. 

 Checking out the ice rink in Central Park

 Sittin' on boulders in Central Park. It's one of the best places in NY to sit and take it all in. 

Headed to Times Square...

Steph also got to see her dad and grandma who live in NY. They were so hospitable. 

 And then I took her to our main stomping ground in New Jersey: Clash Bar

Thanks for stopping by, Steph. I know I snapped at you a couple times, but that's because you really are like my other little sister (you also take way too long to get ready and I'm impatient! lol), and I love you. Plus we're both feisty and capable of handling the others sass; it's one of my favorite things about our friendship - brutal honesty and absolute protectiveness. I love looking back on how our bond began and thinking about how much closer we can possibly get in future years. I know you're a friend for life and that's one of the pieces that makes my heart a whole. 

I think I'll end this with a warm, appropriate quote:

"I count myself in nothing else so happy, as in a soul remembering my good friends." -- Shakespeare

Love,

Roni

Bullying

I just read my friend Jen's post about a recent situation that involves TEACHERS bullying students. My nerves are going crazy right now and I'm beyond pissed after watching this video and reading the articles. I hate reading bad news, but there is some hope in this one: hope that the teachers involved will lose their jobs and that from now on NO teacher who creates an environment of verbal abuse and negative space will subject more innocent children to it. 

Read the story and watch the video here. Sign the petition for the legislation to change. 

Thank you in advance for caring about this. This isn't even my kid, but it doesn't matter. No kid, no person, deserves to be humiliated and belittled by another human being, especially not by an adult that parents trust to assist in molding and teaching their child(ren). This is ridiculous and from the bottom of my heart I wish that bullying in all cases would cease to exist. It's absolutely disgusting. 

Friendly visits: Stephanie

Last month one of my best girlfriends -from Vegas- visited me for a few days. It was a short but super sweet stay. Here are some photos from our four days of fun. (Sorry I'm just getting to this, Steph. You know I love you.)

Our first stop when she got to Jersey was Park West Diner. The best! Also, my darling Steph has always acted like my second little sister. The bratty little sister that says, "I'm wearing your clothes all weekend. Dress me b*tch." So, top to bottom, Steph is in my stuff in every photo, fyi :)

Except for the bag she's carrying - it's hers. She got it in Africa and it's amazingly unique!

You might recall the many times I've bragged about my beautiful school, so naturally I wanted to take Steph to see the pretty landscaping. We had a fun photo shoot this day. 

Darn, this had the potential to be a panty shot ;)

This was the first time I had worn my junk food dress, so it seemed fitting to buy us some cookies from fellow students raising money. 

Cookie monsters :D

It's always so nice having people that have known me for years stop by to visit me in a place where I'm starting from scratch [in building new friendships]. It's sort of like a relief in ways because everything is beyond natural...it's familiar and feels like home...to me, friends feel like home. I hope that makes sense. 

Tomorrow I'll do a part 2 with our photos from a day in New York since this is already picture overload.

Thanks for visiting my bloggy-blog. 

Love,

Roni

P.s. If you click on my "Fairleigh" label below, you can see other posts that contain more random pictures around my campus. Just throwing it out there, if you care. :)

shoes worn from top to bottom: Swedish Hasbeens loafers, Jeffrey Campbell Daisy D, Swedish Hasbeens Mimmi

Colorado Cafe...

Sucks. 
I'm a Texas gal, and at heart, country music is my ish. I don't necessarily know how to line dance or two step (I like to do my own thing on the floor), but I still have so much fun cutting a rug in country clubs. Therefore, I was really looking forward to visiting one of the only country clubs in Jersey this past weekend. Oh, what a let down. Not only is Colorado Cafe nowhere near as humungous as my Gilley's-esque honky tonk, Cowboys Dancehall, in San Antonio, but you're not even allowed on the dance floor if you're not a profesh line/two-step dancer! I watched a girl get tapped on the shoulder and asked to get off the floor (she was also doing her own thing) and it was her bachelorette party! What a crock. As we were leaving I sarcastically asked the dude at the front door if they had a "freestyle" night where anyone could dance and he said, "Yeah, Fridays, but that's not a country night." I just rolled my eyes. We basically paid $10 a person to watch other people dance. Sure we got to hang out with a couple friends, but I had my heart set on dancing for the entire week leading up to this. A good portion of the night I stood on the sidelines, with the other shunned freestylers, miserably sipping beer after beer, wishing I too could spend hours taking line dancing lessons every week and show off in front of poor noobs like me... Colorado Cafe, "you ain't sh*t".
Now that I got my rant out the way, here's what I wore that night. I realized I looked too much like Pebbles from The Flintstones so later in the night I pulled out my bobby-bow pin and used it as part of the collar. Also, the good Lord didn't bless me with "the girls" to fill out the top of this dress so...yeah. Then again, they wouldn't have fit anyway. After 3, maybe 4, beers I was about to pop.

First, Mikey snapped some shots of me in a true bloggers dilemma: finding a bag to match my outfit. Or in my case, picking one that didn't really match, but in true Roni-form, "it matches if you say it does". 

Dress: ModCloth (old)//Belt: F21//Shoes: Poetic Licence//Bag: ? Old

Happy Monday, friends! I hope it was a great start to your week! And thanks for reading through one of my few venting sessions. I'm entitled to a few, right? :)

Love,

Roni

Indecent exposure (well, sort of)

Back in February I stumbled upon an adorable blog called Dolls Are United, run by a sweet girl named Amy, along with every-now-and-then posts from her "Resident Bloggers". Immediately, I found myself attracted to the blog and naturally started clicking around, when I saw that Amy is a fashion designer who has a line called Mod Dolly. Needless to say, I purchased two lovely dresses from Mod Dolly as soon as I got paid, and I'd been eagerly waiting to don the dresses -without having to winterize them too much- ever since. Today was hot, but breezy, so I went with the striped one first, only adding tights and my own belt (it came with a black one). 

How gnarly is this brass knuckle skull clutch?! It's like the Alexander McQueen one, but affordable.

And of course, a blooper:

Dress: Mod Dolly//Tights: ModCloth//Shoes: Lulu's//Clutch: gifted from my s-i-l

This is definitely not the dress for a windy day. You can see that it's not terribly short, it just flares up easily since it's a lightweight summer dress. Anywho, I had a Marilyn Monroe moment this afternoon...well, it wasn't even a Marilyn moment since my dress actually came above my goodies as I walked to my car at Best Buy. I froze, laughed, and sped out of there. These opaque tights were my saving grace. Nevertheless, I love this panty-flashing frock and can't wait to remix the crap out of it! 

Now, get into some shenanigans this weekend and enjoy yourselves.

Love,

Roni

After Midnight Wishlist: my fave UK sites

From Oasis

From Dorothy Perkins

From ASOS

The two items that I need STAT are the blouse from Oasis and of course, this Cath Kidston handbag from ASOS. However, not this week...or anytime soon probably. Last week I took advantage of a drunken Mikey (not like that) and asked him if I could splurge on some ASOS stuff, and as I expected he smiled a sweet, whiskey smile and said, "If it makes you happy, baby", so I entered our debit info in like a mad woman. I'm terrible, I know. But in my defense, aside from thrifting the two times, I haven't shopped-shopped in a hot minute. Well, a hot minute in Roni-time. Which is still a long time. (Trice, we're twins on this "shop-shop" lingo.)

What pretty things are you hankering for?