#32.

A nice, sunny day walking around a beautiful city!

I had a delightful time checking out some cool photography in a neat gallery, finding cute and delicious places to eat, and reading in a wonderfully lively park (where I spotted the biggest dog I have ever seen!). :)

Loved the color of this door and the door knocker!

You HEARD all the birds before you figured out they were coming from all the birdhouses on the side of this building!

Mural! So cool!

My dinner date was amused by my hair and how it just curled right there, haha.

#31.

Men who fall in love with women and write songs about them. Specifically, my Wesley. This is called "Funny Faces."

How time flies, the clocks must be telling us lies
What else can legitimize hours passing us by?
Dancing in mirrors, covering our ears
We laugh almost as if we’ve known each other for years

Record player, tell her later
She’s riding the escalator through my head
On top of the ball, I’m beginning to fall
Falling so in like with her

*When she smiles it makes you melt, I’m melting
I’m melting through ice for her
She’s determined that it won’t be a love song
So it must be a like song, ....A like you a lot song

I think we’re going places, I knew it as we sat
Making funny faces
Feel my heart skip, as she traces my lip
Her eyes rise to mine, in the darkness they shine
Goofy smiles to silly laughs, Eskimo kisses in the photographs
She knows how I feel, I feel that it’s real
The doctor confirms my hearts doing cartwheels
Try to speak but instead, nonverbally it’s said
As our color turns red from the funny faces, funny faces

Called her a buddy, we’d try to study
Instead we’d stay up late talking past two
The fortune cookie, words just took me
But it told me what I already knew

Makes you think that you don’t know anything
She makes you forget the world
And makes you believe you could do everything
She’s that kind of girl

She’s determined that it won’t be a love song
It might be a like song, A like you a lot song
She’s a skeptic and hates anything cheesy, it makes her uneasy
We’re better off calling it out
But then she knows, He’s already figured it out

#30.

A beautiful friend's company and laughs on a sunny (and comically windy) day!

#29.

"Life is like photography, you need the negatives to develop."

My romance with photography has been a long, flirtacious journey. Mostly, I have chosen to stay in front of the lens because it seemed easier to control what I knew as my body than to work the bells and whistles of a really great camera. For the last 4 months I have picked up film photography.

And I have absolutely fallen head over heels. Hook, line, and sinker. I'm a goner. So some of these are what I like to call my "sacrificial photos"; photos that didn't turn out quite like I wanted them to or the exposure is a tad off or I moved too much....you get the gist. But there's something significant about sacrificial photos. Or at least something special that I like. Maybe it's that I would like to revisit the shot and try again. Or maybe it's the beauty in the breakdown. The delicate elegance in the mistakes. I'm sure this is just the first of many posts about photography to come!

Lately, I have been considering taking a cue from my friend Erin and starting my own photography project like her "365 project." Erin took one photo everyday and uploaded them onto a blog. At the end of each week, she critiqued herself. It was amazing to see how Erin grew not just in terms of her skills in photography, but also as a person. I really enjoyed following along and she definitely inspired me from Day 1. Her blog is titled The Finished Film so check it out!

#28--Part II.

A friend of mine re-enacting the scene from Tangled in the last blog post!

#28.

Tangled.

And in general, Disney movies all together! If you haven't seen it, it's worth buying on DVD. And Mandy Moore's voice is actually less airy and nasally so I was impressed!

#27.

CHOCOLATE.

By the house I grew up in, one of my favorite places to go is called the Chocolate Cafe. Amazing artwork, as every cafe should have. Amazing atmostphere, as every cafe should have. And cozy, relaxing places to sit while you are eating or drinking or using the free wifi :)

In the last month or so, I was visiting a new city and quite literally turned a corner to see this:

I didn't even have to say "we're going in." I was with Wesley at the time and he just started walking toward it. After nearly 2 years of dating, he knows me well! Or, I've trained him well ;)

Chocolate cafe Aztec Milkshake:

• aztec chocolate shake
  chocolate ice cream, aztec spices, whipped cream, chocolate shavings

Chocolate Bar Ice Cream Sundae:

Just so you can get a sense of the proportions. That's what I'm talkin' about!

#26.

My friend Steve.

He says things like:

"We all know it's the little things in life; but three seem to rise above the rest. A good red. A dark chocolate. And a slow kiss. And when you find the one whose every kiss feels like it did at the first, you know you have arrived and life can begin."

"How is it that chocolate is so paradoxical? It is calming, yet exciting. It is sensual, yet soothing. It is erotic, yet perfect for a bad day. It can be tantalizingly sweet, and also sharply bitter. It is predictable, yet mysterious. And you know what? the more I think about it, the more I come to the conclusion that chocolate and woman are one."  (And if you read this blog, you know how I feel about chocolate!!)

From a song he wrote for his girlfriend: "Her lips are sweet like southern tea and her kiss smooth as chocolate wine. With each taste it feels like the first time every time."

Very thankful for him in my life! This weekend him and his girlfriend double-dated with Wesley and I. A lovely rainy evening of mexican food for dinner and tango dancing! One of the best date nights in my book.

And tell me this picture isn't a visual representation of the words above....Like you would expect a man that speaks words above to look any less romantic than this!

#25.

Getting caught in the rain.

One morning this week I was really on the ball. I got up on time and didn't hit the snooze button AT ALL. I was really happy with the way I did my make-up. I had time to straighten my lion's mane to make it soft and silky...and I took pride in how well it resembled an Herbal Essences commercial. I had enough time to fully wake-up before I had to fully function at working brain capacity!

I left for a lunch break and stood in shock. Definitely did not check the weather this morning. If I had, it would have been flashing "Warning! Severe Flood Watch in effect from 10am-6pm." Guess who left their umbrella behind that morning. As soon as I had a moment to be frustrated and mad that my cute outfit, make-up, and hair would be ruined, I laughed out loud! What a diva thing to think! I tossed my head back, stuck my fist at the sky, and said "You can't ruin my day! Watch me enjoy this!" I skipped merrily on my way with a childish smile on my face :) And then purchased bright yellow polka-dotted rainboots online as soon as I got home.

(Note: slight dramatization on the story for effect. But I really did have a joyful moment!)

#24.

My job/My place.

I just resigned from my job this past Friday. I will miss my job a lot but I am confident that I made the right decision! With this decision, I will be moving to a new place hopefully by May. The place I live now is like no other though and I got very nostalgic late Sunday night. I started experimenting with my camera and took a couple shots of different things to remember. I called my handsome man (who has asked to be called Wesley on this blog....he did not want to reveal his true name and rather likes the character from The Princess Bride) and told him how much I am going to miss this place, especially my bedroom. His response was: "Elly. It's a room." I tried to explain it and he just wasn't getting it. It's ok - hakuna matata. I have incredible memories here and that's all I need!
To help explain my feelings, you know that scene from Father of the Bride: Part II after George has sold the house and his son and daughter grab a few last minute momentos? Annie grabs a few leaves from the tree in the backyard where they all carved their initials. George's son comes out of the house with his glass doorknob in hand. Well......I took a picture of one of the doorknobs in my place. When I did, I realized I have turned into a Banks. A comically sentimental person holding on to silly momentos! I'm ok with that.

#23.

'Alicia'.

So I spent a week 2 weeks ago in Nicaragua working with a school in Managua.The kids I got to love on the whole time had a tough time saying 'Elly' so I began introducing myself with my full name, 'Ellyse'. Only the lady behind the glass at my bank calls me Ellyse. I don't have anything against my name. 'Elly' just works for whatever reason so it's how I introduce myself. But in Nicaragua, about mid-week I realized that the kids still didn't have it right. I had a couple (just incredibly adorable) notes passed to me, addressed "To Alicia". They sorta got it, hahaha. Everytime I heard my new name, I couldn't help but absolutely enjoy it. I love the fact that I will always associate such an amazing experience with the name Alicia. I love that Alicia will always trigger snapshots in my memory of so many smiling faces. I love that I hear Alicia accompanied with the feelings of receiving so many abrazos y besos (hugs and kisses) from so many small children the minute I walked through the gate of the school.

This is a picture of a child who I fell in love with nearly effortlessly....after of course, I almost had a bloody nose on him within the first 20 mins of meeting him the first day! Despite how freaky that probably was, he still clung to me the moment he saw me each day and never went far away! He is one beautiful little man.

 

 

 

#22.

"Men always want to be a woman's first love. Women have a more subtle instinct: what they like to be is a man's last romance." -Oscar Wilde

Love this quote. Love this man. Love his work. It always brightens my day!

I think the man looks particularly dashing in this picture :)