RVA Fashion Week

I have over 1000 photos to go through but hopefully I will be sharing some soon.
Until then, here are a few instagrams from last night's finale show! 

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The last one is from the Can Can show, but I thought I'd go ahead and include it.
Off to edit pictures!



Runway Show at Can Can


Unfortunately I missed the first show of RVA Fashion Week at Short Pump mall but I was able to make it to  the second one at Can Can!
It was packed and they put on a great show.
The clothing that was featured came from various Richmond stores and was put together so beautifully. 
(My personal favorite is the neon orange blazer and the pink and blue dress...)
Here are a few photos of the event!

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 Check out more photos here!

P.s. Did you see my bag? 

Haircut

I got a haircut!

It's a little bit (read: a lot a bit) shorter than I had asked for, but after the initial shock,
(and after waking up on the first morning thinking for a split second I had gone bald)
I like it.

Though I do have days of missing my long hair.
Good thing my hair grows fast.
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Day 15


It's my last day here in Liverpool.

My stars am I ever going to miss this place.
I've been telling everyone that I feel like 2 weeks is the time frame in which a place finally starts to feel like home. You've been there long enough to become familiar with it and you've started various routines that you become used to. So, needless to say, this place feels like home to me already.
The people, the atmosphere, the activities, the routines.
I love it all.
I am ready to get home though.
I do miss it a lot.
Mostly the people.
And to be honest, living out of a suitcase has gotten old at this point. It'd be nice to have more of a variety of clothing to choose from when getting dressed in the morning, as silly as that sounds.
But I digress.

Today we packed a picnic lunch and went to Sefton Park.
It was a really relaxed and chill afternoon. We mostly just laid in the grass, eating, talking, sketching, reading, people watching, listening to music and throwing dandelions at each other (don't ask).
It was yet another gorgeous day.
I really have been lucky with the weather while I've been here. It's been so nice and sunny most of the time.

We headed home for dinner when the sun started going down and our jackets were no longer enough to keep us warm.
After dinner I put off packing for a few hours (I really hate packing) and watched hilarious youtube videos with Adam instead.
Then finally I got on with it since it was either pack or leave everything behind (and I'd spent too much money on yarn to do that).
I actually finished in an hour flat. I was quite proud of myself.
It looked like I wasn't going to make it there for awhile though, with all the extra books, yarn and sweaters I'd bought... (the fact that I had to carry two jackets onto the plane is besides the point).
After everything was all squared away we went to The Richmond Tavern one last time.
It was kind of sad, knowing I wouldn't be back there for a very long time. But it was nice to end the night with a place I'd frequented often on this trip and grown to love.


My last day wasn't anything super adventurous or extra special, but it was perfect nonetheless.
Just spending some good quality time with my old friends, and some new ones, and not being in any hurry to do anything or go anywhere, but just to relax and enjoy one another's company.


I went to bed not quite believing that I was going home in the morning.
I've had such a wonderful time on this trip.
I wish I was able to better express all of my thoughts and feelings about it.
I've experienced so many countless new and wonderful things.
Created memories that I will enjoy looking back on years from now and made some friends which I hope will last equally as long.
I know I've only seen a small portion of what this side of the world has to offer, but I loved every minute of it and I can't wait to come back and explore some more.
It was worth all the time and money spent and every minute of sleep lost.

Liverpool, it's been lovely.
Thank you for being so good to me and making me feel so at home. I love you dearly and all that comes with you and I look forward to visiting you again some day.

Until then, cheers!



Day 14



Second to last day here in England.

I can't quite believe my time here is almost over! It's been amazing to say the least.
Today we all slept in, recovering from our exhausting adventures in London.
It was nice to sleep in a bed that wasn't one foot from the ceiling!
After taking our time with eating breakfast (drinking tea) and getting dressed we headed into town to see the two cathedrals that are here in Liverpool. They were one of the few things left on my list I had yet to see!

The first was the Catholic cathedral.
Like I said in my previous post about the cathedral we visited in London, the peace and reference you feel walking into such a place is such a calming and wonderful feeling.
The stain glass center of the church was so amazingly gorgeous. From every angle in the room you could look up and see a different color scheme and varying rainbow shades of glass.
Also around the cathedral were art pieces with varying depictions of the crucifixion that were very moving. They weren't very pretty or very nice to look at in the sense that they were kinda scary and gory feeling. However that's how it really was when it happened. It wasn't all gentile and beautiful as a lot of sculptures and pictures make it out to be.

The second was the Anglican cathedral.
I found that this cathedral was much more beautiful in the architecture and also just in the older feel of it. Both cathedrals were completed at the same time, though the Anglican was started earlier.
Despite its beauty, there was more of a touristy feel in it because of the gift shop and there were more people wandering around which made it noisier.
However, because of it's size, there were rooms and corridors that were more peaceful and had less traffic which was nice.
Another cool thing about it was that every brick used in building it is a different size, to represent the body of Christ and how we are all different as well, no two of us the same.
I really loved that.
We were also able (for a price of £5) to go up on the top of the cathedral and overlook the city.
Lucky for us, it was a rare and beautiful day.
It was really a great experience and totally worth the money spent to see it.

After that we wandered around L1 a little bit. We stopped by Primark again (I mean, how could I not?) perused their Urban Outfitters (so pretty) and finally ended up at the tiny little Krispy Kreme kiosk where we bought a dozen donuts and proceeded to lie in the sun stuffing our faces with them.
(Good news, they taste the same as they do back home)
Which made this girl a very happy one indeed.

Went home to a dinner of Porcupine Meatballs followed by cake pops for dessert (I've finally tried one! So yummy. Now just to make some myself...).
And then after contemplating packing, and deciding against it, we went back out to a few pubs (The Richmond Tavern included of course) and had a great second-to-last night out on the town.

I am most definitely going to miss this place.

Day 13


Day 2 in London.

Woke up and had a little breakfast, provided by the hostel (I avoided the massive tub of weirdly smelling peanut butter), and then hit the road to see as much of the rest of London as we could before catching our bus that evening.

The weather was so much nicer than it was the previous day, not a cloud in the sky.
We passed by Ben again, and I took a few more photos of him since it was prettier out and the sun was shining.
It seemed that we always passed him right when he was chiming. It was a really neat thing to hear actually.

We continued walking around the parliament building until we came upon Westminster Abbey.
It was so beautiful.
We sat around on the back side of it on some benches for a bit to rest, (I'm telling you, walking so much is tiring) and I walked around and took pictures with my various cameras (I only brought 3! Which was really good considering).
We headed to the front after a bit and when we noticed that the price to get in was £16 we decided to just stay there.
We were poor college students back packing after all!
Not to mention the line was an hour wait so we quickly nixed that idea.
Instead we wandered down the road a little into similarly named: Westminster Cathedral.
That was gorgeous.
I really wish we had some cathedrals or older churches here in Richmond. The peace and reverence you feel walking into one of them is so humbling. It'd be nice to be able to go and sit and just journal or spend some quiet time just sitting and thinking in one.

After that we had to go to the bus station to sort out some mess with our open ended tickets, and that took way longer than it needed to, but finally when it was over we stopped for some lunch at The Shakespeare.
I had a simple mustard and ham sandwich. Lesson learned: When the menu reads "mustard and ham sandwich" that's exactly what it means. Nothing else.
It was pretty good though. I'd been missing mustard (is that a weird thing to miss?)
And the chips were good as always.

After lunch we headed back (passing by Ben again. Adam threatened to promptly leave anyone who dared take another picture of him. I took one anyways) towards the Thames, (which I learned is pronounced "Temz". Again, thanks Jenn!) and started a nice walk along the opposite side.
We passed by The London Eye, which we had seen yesterday, but not this up close. It was bigger than it looked from across the river that's for sure. If it hadn't cost so much it might've been neat to go up in it. But again, our money wasn't endless and neither was our time.
We passed a lot of people in various costumes (never seen such a sketchy looking Mickey and Minnie in my life) and street performers and such. It was all pretty touristy and we didn't linger very long.
We came across a really neat skate park though, that had layers and layers of various spray painted murals and pictures on the pillars and walls, it was really cool.
There were also several tables of books under one bridge that were fun to go through (see above).

Our main goal in walking along the river was to see The London Tower Bridge. However as we kept walking and walking we realized we were running out of time before our bus had to leave and we weren't going to make it.
So we had to settle with walking across London Bridge and seeing it from there.
We were still pretty far away but we at least got to see it.
We stopped for a few minutes to take a few photos and rest and then we had to head back.
The journey back was... let's just say unpleasant.
Walking 4 miles at a fast walk, with feet and backs that already hurt, was not fun to say the least.
I won't go into detail, but we almost missed our bus so it was pretty stressful!
Thankfully we made it though and I had never been so happy to sit down.
Which quickly changed when my seat mate on the bus decided to talk on his phone for the next 5 hours... But oh well.

We made it back around midnight and it was really good to be home.
We calculated the next morning how much we walked over the two days and it was about 15 miles.
London, you were fun to visit.
Thanks for some good memories, some good food and good times with some good friends.
Cheers!



Day 12


The morning was met with preparation to catch our bus to London!
It was about a five and a half hour bus ride from Liverpool which wasn't too bad.
True to it's reputation, London was rainy all day, but we had a lot of fun being tourists and sight seeing nonetheless. 

Our first stop was Buckingham Palace. In all honesty it was a bit anticlimactic in my opinion. 
(Am I allowed to say that? Don't tell the Queen...)
But that probably had to do with the fact that watching Mary Kate and Ashley movies while growing up had led me to believe that the guards would be outside the gates and not several yards behind them, in tiny little boxes, looking like little itty bitty toy soldiers.
Oh well.
On that note, I wonder how one becomes a guard of the Queens? Also, is it a voluntary choice? 
I mean what little boy thinks to himself: "I want to be a Queens guard when I grow up and stand still for hours on end!"
I mean I'm just wondering...

After that we walked through St. James Park which was really beautiful. 
It was a shame it was raining because I would have liked to have stayed and enjoyed it a little bit, but it was too gross out. So we stopped at Pret A Manger for a quick lunch and headed off to The National Gallery. 
I love art museums. 
There's just something about seeing pieces of art, created years and years ago, still enjoyed and looked at today by so many people who come from all over the world to see it. It's the coolest thing. And the variations of art and different interpretations of things is so huge and varied that there's always something for everyone's taste. 
I just love it.
By far the coolest painting to see was Van Gogh's Sunflower painting. 
I have to admit I kind of freaked out a little bit when I saw it!
I had no idea it was there and it took me completely by surprise. 
I've always loved this painting, and Van Gogh's works in general. Especially after seeing a documentary of his life a few years ago at the Imax.
Despite the "no picture taking" rule, I snapped a photo of the painting with my phone.
What?
Everyone else was doing it...

We headed to the British Museum after that. But by that time I think we were kinda done with museums and ready to find our hostel and get some dinner so we breezed through it pretty quickly. 
The Roman statues were pretty neat though.
Sadly I don't really remember much else.
Oh! Except for the Rosetta Stone.
That was really cool to see.
Or, what we could see of it, through the masses of people.
I think that was the other thing too, I was just really done with being pushed past, pushed by and pushing through crowds of people. It's really tiring after awhile.

We left and headed for our hostel and on the way saw none other than Big Ben!
Now that was cool to see.
He was so regal and majestic looking (can I call it a he? Is that ok? His name is Ben after all...)
It was definitely a highlight of the day. 
Other than the Van Gogh paintings, Ben was my favorite thing to see. 
See his picture? Isn't he handsome?

We took our time (not intentionally...) finding the area where the hostel was located, but once we did we started looking for a place to eat and found The Grand Union.
It was the neatest place. A really fun atmosphere with old pictures and paintings hanging on the walls and a random mish mash of tables, chairs and mirrors as well as several chandeliers hanging all over the place.   
The food was delicious too. I had pretty much a whole pizza to myself. It had arugula on it but they called it "rocket" which was interesting (yet another British word for something). 
It was really an awesome place though, I definitely would go again if I had the chance. The people were really nice and chill and we sat and hung out and played cards (of course) and rested after having walked our feet off.
We headed to the hostel, happy and full.

I'd never stayed in a youth hostel before, so I don't have anything to compare it to, but I thought The Steam Engine was pretty decent. 
I have to admit I was a bit nervous about it, sleeping in a room with a bunch of strangers isn't really on the top of my to do list in life, but it ended up being fine (though I will say I was supremely happy to get back to a clean bathroom once we got back to Liverpool).
I thought I would have trouble falling asleep but I was out like a light.
Walking does that to me...

All in all it was a good first day in London.