Hello, everyone! Well, I survived my first full week back at school. So. Glad. It's. Over. Let's see, one week, that's five days, so.....175 days left? I really shouldn't already be counting down the days already this is pathetic. Anyways, I thought that now that I'm actually semi-busy doing things, it would be nice to write weekly wrap-up posts sometimes to kind of give you all a bit of a peek into my life and anything interesting that I've been up to!

Made Me Smile:

Thank you so much to everyone who commented on my post about dance auditions- I got in!!!! I'm super excited for this, it's going to be a great opportunity. :) :) :)

I'm taking a really cool writing class this year, and I'm also super excited about that. I love to write, and I think that it's going to be really fun. 

I got a new pair of ankle boots at TJ Maxx! My mom actually was the one to find them, but they didn't fit her, they fit me. New shoes always make me happy! :) I've actually acquired several new pairs of shoes recently, I'll have to do a fall shoes post soon! 

Ugh:

Geometry. Geometry Geometry GEOMETRYYYYYYY. Math has never been my strong point, and geometry is absolutely brutal. It's kind of sad when I'm actually missing Algebra.

Apparantly Hallmark is going to be playing holiday movies non-stop starting October 31st. I AM NOT READY FOR THE HOLIDAY SEASON YET.

I seem to be even more eyeliner-challenged than usual lately. Messing up liquid eyeliner is LITERALLY one of the most annoying things on earth. Am I right?

Loving:

My planner!! Call me OCD, but I really like laying out my entire day in front of me to see everything that I have to get done.

Hallmark Channel! I know that I was just freaking out about holiday movies coming soon, but I'm falling extremely in love with Hallmark movies. We watched one last night called I Want To Marry Ryan Banks and it was so good!

Pinning:

^This pin is literally a master list of amazing Naked palette tutorials. It's incredible!

Oh. My. Gosh. I was laughing so hard when I found this. People of tumblr, I love you....

Can we please appreciate these shoes??

I need this outfit.

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How was your week?

~Lately~

Soooo, I had a fabulous back-to-school post all planned out. I had taken the photos, and I had everything planned out in my mind.

Then my computer broke.

That's right, my lovely laptop that basically held my entire life on it, has broken. Yay. And until it's fixed or we get a new laptop, I can't upload pictures from my camera to this blog.

Isn't life fun?

So unfortunately, that's why I don't have a back-to-school post to share today. I'm going to try to figure a way around it (maybe use my phone to take pictures? It's an iPhone 4, so it's not the absolute best quality, but it's better than nothing.), but for now I won't be able to do certain blog posts that I was planning on sharing. For now, I'll be using a different laptop, but I won't have any pictures from my camera to share. Sorry about that!

Since that post didn't work out, and I didn't really have a good backup plan, here's a bit of my life lately. Hopefully this post doesn't bore you to death! (Sorry, my life isn't the most fascinating...) I found these prompts on Pinterest, and I thought I'd give them a try.

~Lately~

Reading- The Hangman's Curse by Frank Peretti. I just finished it this afternoon- it was really good! I've also been catching up on lots of different blogs because I haven't had time this week- oops!

Watching- my free time drift away! xD Let's see, as far as watching things on television, I'm kind of growing obsessed with Hallmark movies...I told my mom the other day that I just want to quit school and watch Hallmark movies and eat chocolate and blog all day. Because that would be a super productive way to live.

Trying- to figure out how to manage my time better. Newsflash- I'm not very good at that. My schedule may say that I'm doing homework but I'm probably getting distracted by soundtracks. 

Cooking- absolutely nothing. But I really want to start making more scones and muffins for breakfasts because I really don't like breakfast food otherwise. (Scoooooooooonesssss!!!!! They're my weakness. My mom made some for me the other day and I kind of died of happiness.)

Eating- too much food in general. Thank the Lord for metabolism. 

Drinking- waterrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. It's pretty much all that I drink. Except for frozen lemonade. Frozen lemonades are my happy place. 

Calling- .......nobody. *hides face* I'm really bad about actually calling people. I need to get better at that....

Texting- a friend about the most random things possible. Killer trees were a topic of conversation. 

Pinning- too many things in general. Lately I've been obsessed with writing prompts and fall outfits. My fall wardrobe seriously needs some sprucing up.....

Crafting- a photo wall! I'm really excited for it. I'm covering the wall above my bed with black and white photos. I literally love it so much.

Doing- too many things and not enough all at the same time. 

Going- to different school-related things, and shopping. I got a super cute pair of shoes the other day, which was definitely a high point!

Loving- Ed Sheeran music, frozen lemonades, the song Chasing Cars, reading, and seeing my super awesome friends again. 

Hating- Geometry. With a fiery passion. 

Discovering- that schoolwork goes by much faster when you're listening to Les Miserables. 

Enjoying- this novel-writing class that I'm taking. Gah I'm such a writing nerd.

Thinking- about what I should use for an audition piece, and also about how I'm going to survive first semester.

Feeling- really excited about a bunch of different things and ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh I just get excited really easily.

Hoping- that you're actually still reading this and not bored to death by my rambling.

Listening- to music practically 24/7 because I'm learning that I don't function well without it. 

Celebrating- the fact that it's almost Friday!!!!! :D

Smelling- my different EOS and wishing that watermelon-scented things wouldn't be going away soon.

Thanking- my mom for being awesome and bringing me a frozen lemonade:):):):):)

Considering- taking ballet classes at a real studio again. Maybe.......

Starting- to clean my closet. Trust me, it's far overdue....

Finishing- this blog post!!!!! Yes, it's finally over. You're welcome.

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Sorry that I didn't have better material today. I'll work on some different things that are hopefully more entertaining! :) 

What have you been up to lately?

Summer Photo Challenge- Week 12!!!

GUYS.

IT'S WEEK TWELVE.

NO.

NOT OKAY.

*sigh* Well, this is it. My last week of summer photos. Right now, I'm probably doing school of some sort. (I pre-scheduled this to go out.) Is anyone like, super excited for school to start? If you are, congratulations on being such a positive human being!! ......I'm not a positive human being.

Monday:

I didn't really get any good pictures today, but I really like this ring so I started photographing it. xD I found out some big news today- I'm getting my braces off! Woo-hoo!!! 

Tuesday:

Today was a yoga day. I have a really important dance audition on Monday (which is actually when this post will go out- pray for me!!!), and yoga always helps me to get more flexible. Y'all know that I'm desperate to get into this thing if I'm working out voluntarily. Exercise + me don't mix.

Wednesday:

Oh my goodness. So, I found this journal at Barnes and Noble today, and I kind of totally need it. ^^ Like, this is my life, guys.

Thursday:

"I want to get super healthy and have abs and lose weight," I say as I thoughtfully chew on my pizza roll. (Which was really easy to make- it wasn't frozen! That makes it healthier, right? Right?)

Friday:

Saturday:

Excuse me as I lie here and ponder life's mysteries...

Sunday:

I'm so sad that this is my last SPC photo!! But I hope that you all have a fabulous year! xoxo

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Thank you to everybody who's stuck around for this crazy, rambling summer! 

.....It's only what, 180 days until the next one? We can do this!!!!

.....Agh. I can't do this. 

Snap out of it, Grace Anne!

Okay. I'm going to be positive!

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I hope that you all have an absolutely wonderful school year!! :)   

~Summer 2015~

Late nights

Books

Harry Potter obsession

Too much Pinterest

Slushies

Photography
Remembering how much I actually love piano

Blogging, of course!!

Lunches and dinners with my awesome grandparents

Texting crazy people
 Parties

Attempting eyeliner

Sleeping in

Re-reading all of my copies of Teen Vogue

Seeing old friends

Time at the lake
Chocolate, chocolate, chocolate!

Shopping
Writing
Boy Meets World 
Pajama days
Wondering how my room possibly gets this messy 

Broadway soundtracks
Messy buns

Falling even more deeply into my obsessive love of words

 Sunshine

Watching tons of Murder, She Wrote

 No stress

Sleepovers with friends

Theatre camps
Taylor Swift
The Princess Diaries (again)
Obsessing over cats
Dreading the start of school
Procrastination
Planning my future novels
Lemonade
 Sandals, shorts, and t-shirts
Happiness


~Summer 2015~

  

July Favorites!

 Did anyone else feel like July was kind of a weird month? Like, in a way it seemed to be really fast, but at the same time I think back to the beginning of the month, to the Fourth of July, and it seems like it was ages ago. Time is kind of a weird thing. It's so slow, but at the same time it's so fast. Right now, I just wish that things would slow down. Everything seems to be moving super fast. We're already three weeks into August, school is about to start...it's so weird.

I'm sorry that this favorites post is kind of late! Between party prep, the actual party, test prep class, life in general, and all of the other posts that I've had to work on, I haven't had time to get this out yet. (Agh and it's almost September...I'll accept my bad blogger award now.) But hey, I guess it's better late than never!!

Let's get into the favorites!!!

Beauty:

This flat iron spray. Oh. My. Word. I'm pretty sure that I posted a bit about it at the beginning of July when I bought it, but I had to include it in this favorites post, too. This spray is an absolute life saver. It keeps my hair straighter, cuts down on frizz, helps keep my hair from going crazy with all of the humidity, AND it smells good. What more can you ask for??

I've been super obsessed with my Naked 3 palette!! It's so beautifullllllllll! Love ya, S ;)

This shadow has been one of my go-to makeup items for July. I've worn it almost every day, unless I was using my Naked palette. It's just so shimmery and pretty, I adore it. I really need to go back to Target and look at these again....

Music:

 I seriously love this album so much. Oh my gosh, the music is just so incredible. GO LISTEN TO IT. Noooooooow. 

Especially during the beginning of the month, I really enjoyed this album. I'll admit, it's kind of bubblegum-pop, but I actually like it.

As you all could probably tell from my Photo A Day challenge, I listened to this album a TON during July. It was kind of a month of throwback T-Swift music!

Randomness:

This one is super random, but I seriously love the musical It Shoulda Been You. Oh my goodness, it's so funny! I wish that I could have actually seen it live, but it closed. I'll have to stick to longing over photos on Instagram, I guess! If you want to see a taste of it, Google "It Shoulda Been You Today show". So. Funny!!!! (Granted, the fact that I first saw this first thing in the morning before an early rehearsal might have something to do with the fact that I couldn't stop laughing, but that's totally irrelevant.)

I didn't have a picture for this favorite, but four words- Butter Pecan Ice Cream. For some reason in July, I was reallllllllllllllly in love with it! So yeah. That's slightly random. ^But that's why it's under randomness, I guess!

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If you haven't yet had a chance, I would really appreciate it if you checked out my last post and answered a couple of my questions in the comments. :)

What were some of your favorites during July??

 

I Want YOUR Opinion!!!

  Hello, lovely people!!!! 

So, I just celebrated my one-year blogaversary last week, (so crazy!!!), and with the thought that I've been blogging for a year now, I'd really like to improve this blog. That's where YOU come in! 

I have a couple of questions that I'd absolutely love for you to answer in the comments, as well as leave any additional feedback. :) Have some constructive criticism? Fire away! I love it! So, if you have a minute or two to answer these questions, that would help a ton, and it would mean a lot. :)

1. What is your honest opinion on my writing style? Is there something that I could do to make it better? 

2. What is your opinion on my blog design? (I know that it needs serious help....I'm currently trying to figure out how on earth to go about doing that. Any advice/tips/help would be awesome!!!!)

3. What kind of posts do you like to see? Is there a kind of post that I should do more often, or a type of post that you really don't like? 

4. Is there a kind of post that I never do, but you think would improve my blog?

5. Just generically, what else am I doing wrong/do I need to be doing? 

If y'all wouldn't mind answering these questions, it would really help me. :) Please, be totally honest about it. If you think something is horrible, just tell me!!!! I really want to know. Also, if you have any blogging advice, I would really appreciate it. I'd love to make this blog better in any way that I can. 

Thank you so much for all of your help! You guys are amazing. :)

Book Sale Haul!!!!

Hello, lovely people of bloggerland!!! How are you all doing? 

On Saturday, I spent the morning at this really big used book sale. It's so incredible- you wouldn't believe the size of this sale. They have an insane amount of books, I've literally gotten lost there before. (I may be somewhat directionally challenged...)

Book sales are one of the only occasions on which I will willingly get up early. Mornings + me do not mix. Ever. But I tend to make an exception for gigantic book sales. I always want cheap books!! This sale is held every year, and I've probably gone at least four times. It's so much fun!

Anyways, I thought that I'd show you some of the books that I was most excited to pick up! 

Trust No One: Trust No One is one of the few 39 Clues books that I didn't own, so when I found it for $1, I absolutely HAD to pick it up! Now I'm only missing three- Nowhere To Run, Breakaway, and Countdown. I was super happy to find this!

The Hunger Games: I've been wanting to read this book for a while now, and I finally picked up a copy at the sale for around $3.00. I'm excited to read it- it's honestly pretty pathetic that I'm just now getting around to it, considering how much that I read. I mean, how long have these books been insanely popular? Yet I'm just now getting to them. Oh well. I feel like "better late than never" seems to be my motto lately...

The Hangman's Curse: This book is by Frank Peretti, and while I've never read one of his books before, my mom has told me that he's a really great author. I haven't started it yet, but from what I can tell it looks really cool. The book description looks kind of creepy- this may be a book to read in broad daylight!!

13 Gifts: 13 Gifts is one of the books in the Willow Falls series by Wendy Mass, which is one of my favorite series. I don't own any of the other books in the series, but since I found this one I absolutely had to grab it. I need to do a post on the Willow Falls series soon, but for right now I'll just say that I definitely recommend them!

Prescription For Murder: I may or may not have a *teensy* obsession with the show Murder, She Wrote, and the fact that there are Murder, She Wrote books as well makes things even better! The murders are absolutely fascinating, and the books are really funny as well. (Also, if you're familiar with these characters- apparently there's a lot of Jessica/Seth in this book. I'm so excited!!! I totally ship them...) I can't wait to read this one!!

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets: You all know about my major obsession with Harry Potter, but I didn't actually own any of the books- until now!! (Can we just have a moment of appreciation for libraries? They're amazing!) Anyways, I'm thrilled to have gotten this one, especially for only $2. It was so crazy though- they were completely sold out of Harry Potter books after ten minutes. I didn't even find this with the Harry Potter books, my mom found it somewhere completely random. Hey, at least I got one!!!

Every Soul A Star: I've been raving about this book a lot lately, I know. Sorry about that! I originally picked it up at the library, and since I loved it so much, I decided to actually buy a copy at the sale. It was two or three dollars, which I thought to be well worth it. I'll be reading this book over and over again!

Nightmare Academy: This is another Peretti book, and it looks just as cool as The Hangman's Curse. I'm really excited to read this- I need to start before school starts shoving me underneath the waves of stress until I'm drowning.

Book sales are seriously the best. I was a bit disappointed because I didn't find some of the books that I was hoping to (If you've ever recommended a book to me on here, it was probably on my list!), but I'm happy with what I did get!

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Do you love book sales as much as I do?

Do you have any good book recommendations?

Summer Photo Challenge- Week 11!!!

Week 11...weird. I think that I've decided that next week's post is going to be the last of my Summer Photo Challenge. I start school again a week from today, so doing my last SPC post then seems appropriate. *dramatic sniff* I feel like since it's the last week of summer, I should be doing wonderful, summery things. But as I type this, I'm sitting on my couch in a nearly-dark room, as it pours down rain outside. Ah, irony.


Monday:

Okay, I'm probably just really weird. But the non-sparkly side of this actually is a pretty bronzer! I know..I'm weird...

Tuesday:

*considers painting nails* *remembers how tedious it is* *takes pictures of nail polish instead*

Wednesday:

Frozen lemonade + shopping = happy blonde!

Thursday:

 I finally finished Every Soul a Star by Wendy Mass. Oh my goodness, that book was phenomenal. I'm absolutely in love.

Friday:

I'm in love with this planner! I got it at Target for $12 and it's really awesome:):) Although with planners come school....aghhhhhhh....

Saturday:

I really like how my eye makeup turned out today! I have no idea how this happened, especially because I literally spent five minutes on it before I went to the book sale. But hey, I'm not complaining!!!

Sunday:

He was watching YouTube videos with me xD

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How was your week?

Summer Days// Lemonade, Glasses, and Books, Oh My!

I learned several things yesterday.

1. Standardized testing prep classes are boring.
2. They are especially awful if they are solely math based.
3. Especially when you are not aware that the class is only math.
4. Math classes in the summer should be illegal.
5. This is made even worse when you have a really good book at home calling your name.

That definitely wasn't the most fun part of my day. I had testing prep class four days this week (ALTHOUGH IT'S OVER NOW!!! HALLELUJAH!!!!!), and the fact that I'm currently in the middle of Every Soul a Star by Wendy Mass really didn't help. It is SUCH a good book so far, that I definitely didn't enjoy spending my time working math problems. Oh well. Now it's over, and life is fabulous again!!!!

BUT, things looked up after class, when it was time to do some shopping! First off, a moment of appreciation for Burger King frozen lemonades. They. Are. Amazing. I never actually eat at Burger King, but their slushies and frozen lemonades are to die for, especially when it's hot outside. A quick story about how we discovered the amazingness of these things- this past spring, my sister was in a musical, and I did the tech crew. Problem was, the fog machines somehow managed to make the entire cast and crew come down with sore throats/allergies/laryngitis etc. That was most certainly not fun. So we were desperately trying to figure out something that would help get rid of the sore throats, when we thought, "Hey! Slushies!" Thus, we tried Burger King's slushies, and learned of their fabulousness. So that was a perk to the situation!

After getting our drinks, we stopped by a used bookstore and this picture was my attempt at being artsy. Bookstores are so much fun though. I picked up a copy of Theodore Boone: The Fugitive by John Grisham for only $4, and the book looked brand new!!! I was very happy with that. :)

I need to get a pair of glasses- right now I wear contacts, but I don't have any glasses that I like, so I kind of end up going around my house blind when I don't want to wear contacts. So we did a bit of shopping for those as well. I kind of liked these, although they were a bit large. What do you think?

Anyways, that was my day yesterday! I'm trying to enjoy this last little bit of summer before school starts back again. Got to make the most of the time that I do have left!! The fact that school is about to start feels so weird. I'm really not looking forward to getting back into the busy schedule of classes, rehearsals, tests, and homework. Having so much free time to read, and blog, and just to take things at a slower pace has been so nice. I'll have to work on a couple of back-to-school posts- would y'all be interested in that?

Hope you're all having a great day!!

                                                      

It's My Blogaversary!!!!!!!

Wow- exactly one year ago today, I started this blog. That's so crazy! I still remember setting it up, trying to figure everything out. It's so funny to look back at my first blog posts- oh my gosh! They were pretty awful. I spent so much time, trying to figure out how to write good posts, how to make my blog look nice, etc. Let's face it both of those areas still need work but oh well. xD

Blogging has been so much fun though. Usually I have problems sticking with a project once I start it, but somehow I haven't had that problem when it comes to blogging. Granted, every now and then I'll go a bit too long without posting, but overall it's something that I've stuck with pretty consistently over the past year. 

When I first started blogging, I honestly didn't expect anyone to read it. Nevertheless, I would sit at my computer watching the stats charts for ages, hoping to get a view. Most of the time, I'm pretty sure that I accidentally self-generated those views........

But it's still kind of crazy to me that people actually read this little blog of mine. It's so much fun creating the content, but I never really expected anyone to actually enjoy reading it! I'm not going to lie, getting comments is one of the most fun things ever, because I love when people actually respond to something that I write! It's so much fun talking to you all in the comments and getting feedback and thoughts from you. I love it!!

In this last year, I've somehow managed to accumulate 8,046 pageviews and 27 followers, and I just wanted to say to you all- THANK YOU!!!! Thank you so much for reading my crazy, insane ramblings and for following this blog. It means so much that you all actually read it, so thank you, thank you, thank you!!!!!!! Thank you so much to everyone who's commented, you all have been so sweet and encouraging, and you make all the not-so-fun parts of blogging totally worth it.

I'm really excited for this next year of blogging. I'm hoping to continue posting, maybe even a bit more than I already do! I also just want to improve this site in any way that I possibly can, because I feel like there are so many things that I could do to make it better. I'm horrible with computers, so I'm not exactly sure how that will go, but hey- I'm going to try! I'm going to have some posts coming out soon asking for some feedback from you all about how I can improve this site in the next year, so please stay tuned for those!

Here's to another fabulous year! :)

Summer Photo Challenge- Week 10!!!

Week 10. 

Wow. 

I'm debating on how long I should keep doing these SPC posts. I think that I'll do them until I have to start school, since that's when summer will end for me. Or I could do them through the end of August. What do you all think?

Maybe sometimes throughout the year, I'll try to do a week full of photos and share them on here. Would anyone be interested in seeing that? I'm a little nervous about blogging during school this year, to be honest. I'm going to have a lot  going on, but I'm definitely not going to abandon this. I love it too much!!!

Anyways, here's a glimpse at my week-

Monday:

 This eyeliner is all things wonderful and happy in the world.

Tuesday:

I was out running some errands on Tuesday, and we stopped by Kohls. We had a coupon we needed to use, and look what I got! And the best part? It was only $3! The shirt was on sale, and we had a $10 off of $10 coupon, so we were able to get it really cheap. I shall wear this with nerdy pride!!! For some reason I actually got this in a large even though I usually wear smalls in everything- these shirts run small. Just a FYI!!

Wednesday:

 I may have possibly been working on this until 10:30 p.m...... I'm telling y'all, art is a struggle. And I was still kind of annoyed by how it turned out- the letters in "after" were kind of slanted. Oh well. That's as good as it gets!!!!

Thursday:

 I was literally in love with the centerpiece for the party. Not that you could tell by my tons of photos of it in the party post. We took a bunch of old books from around the house, and then cut the rose from the backyard. I just think that this was absolutely gorgeous.

Friday:

 guYS. I'm freaking out. Look at this shirt that my friend gave me!! Ahhhh! (She's kind of insanely awesome.)  I have a major obsession with ballet shirts, I've pinned tons of them on Pinterest. It's an obsession. But I haven't actually owned one before now. AHH!!! I love it I love it I love it. Did I mention that I love it?

Saturday:

A Wrinkle In Time will forever be one of my favorites. :)

Sunday:

My cat is looking at this beanbag like it holds all of life's secrets.

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How was your week?

My Murder Mystery Party!!!! + How To Throw Your Own!

That's right- I had a murder mystery party!

And oh my goodness, it was so much fun! It was a night filled with bribery, blackmail, and murder- but also good friends, crazy costumes, and a ton of laughter! I would throw another murder mystery party in a heartbeat, and I definitely recommend it for any of you!! It worked really well for my group of friends, because we're all theatre kids and we love dressing up, getting in character, things like that. Even if you're not into theatre though, it's honestly just a fun thing to do in general. Go! Go, throw a murder mystery party! Well, read this post first. Maybe comment. But then go and throw that party!!!

Basically, the idea originated from my older cousin, who mentioned something about a murder mystery party that his friend had thrown. My mom and I were immediately hooked on the idea, and started looking online to figure out how to throw the party. We ended up purchasing the Happily Never After package on nightofmystery.com. (This isn't a sponsored post, fyi- I just loved the party!) On the website, you can choose what kind of party you want, with different categories such as "Teen", "Clean", etc. You also get to choose the party size. We chose the all-girls Happily Never After party in Teen, Clean, for 8-12 people. One thing that I would recommend is trying to have as many people at your party as is possible for your package. Originally, we thought that only eight people would be able to attend, but it works so much better with all twelve people. 

Once you purchase the package, it's immediately downloaded to your computer, and you have all of the information you need! The package gives you a list of characters to assign, information on each of the characters, and tells you exactly how to do everything. 

The first things that you want to do is to cast your party. This can get a little tricky if you want to participate in the mystery, because you don't want to know who the murderer is! Basically what we did is my mom had all of the information regarding the victim/murderer, and all of the character details. She then gave me a character list with a couple sentences of description about each character, and I cast from that. I had no idea what I was doing, I just cast it based on personality, appearance, etc. That was fun, but pretty stressful- I was kind of terrified that I was going to cast myself as the murderer/victim. I decided to play Goldilocks, and as for whether I did anything- you'll have to pick up a package yourself to decide! I don't want to spoil it for anyone who decides to throw their own party.

The next day, we went thrift store shopping to find costumes. I really wanted to find a yellow and white gingham dress, but that was impossible. I ended up finding this blue and white gingham at a Goodwill, and I'm so happy that I found it. It's so cute, and I felt like it really fit the character.

Isn't it great?

Next up was planning the food and decorations. I have several friends who are gluten free, so we tried to plan food that everyone would be able to enjoy. We decided on a taco salad bar, which was delicious- Mexican food is my weakness! (Along with Italian. And chocolate. And ice cream. And basically anything involving sugar or salt or fat. I'm so glad that dance keeps me skinny) Then for desserts, we did marshmallows dipped in chocolate and had some assorted candies. 

They're beautifullllllllllllllllll!

Up nest on our to-do list was decorating. Of course, I immediately headed to Pinterest! Pinterest is seriously the best whenever you need to plan something! The only issue is actually staying on task, and not drifting off and getting distracted by that perfect hairstyle or adorable cat. Not that I did that or anything.  Since the party was fairy-tale themed, I decided to make the decorations really pretty and magical-looking. Lots of sparkles and silver and pink. I'm such a girly girl- I loved it! I also threw in lots of little Disney and fairy-tale themed things for fun. I'm such a Disney nerd......Anyways, here's some of the decorations!!

This was our table setting- I LOVE THIS CENTERPIECE SO MUCH. OH MY GOSH. 

I was just running around with my camera taking tons of pictures of the centerpiece because I love it so much. Of course, I got the idea for it on Pinterest. But it just looks so pretty. I was like, crawling underneath a rose bush in the backyard trying to get these rose petals. It had better look good after that. 

This was how we decorated the mantlepiece. Simple, but pretty. Oh my gosh, the sign. That. Sign. I spent ages trying to get that thing right. I am not an artist, that's for sure...

My sister made this sign- she's the artist in the family. I love the tiny apples in the corners!! Also, don't you love the little Rapunzel and Flynn in the corner? That was the touch of my other sister. 

Frog kissing station!!!! I think that several of my friends really wished that it would work.....

This was the sign I made for the front door! A bit of foreshadowing of what is to come..

We also had a magic mirror, and a Wanted poster wall, but I really don't have good pictures of those. 

Once everyone arrived, we took a bunch of pictures and then began! Everyone was handed an envelope containing a name tag, a list of objectives to complete, and some fake money. The victim also learned at that time that they would be the one to die. Once everyone had read their objective list, it was time to mingle and swap information! The plotting and bribing began as alliances were quickly made, as well as enemies. The fake money was used to bribe and blackmail, as everyone tried to learn as much information as possible. It was hilarious to threaten each other in character, to have the opportunity to "insult" each other. I may have possibly gotten into a slap-fight with one of my friends, which was pretty funny. 

After the initial objectives were completed, it was time for dinner! We did the taco salad bar, and everyone kind of forgot to stay in character as we all began to talk and laugh. Almost everyone at the party already knew each other, so it was easy to get a bit crazy!

Once everyone was through eating, the lights went out. When they were turned back on, one of our friends was lying on the floor- the murder had occurred! It was time for the second set of objectives. 

We each received another envelope with more objectives, and this time the murderer learned her own identity. It was time for more plotting, alliance-building, and information-gaining. Everyone was doing as much as possible to try to solve the murder. A friend and I teamed up and blackmailed my little sister for $4,000- that was really fun!!!! There's nothing like blackmailing your younger siblings;)

When all of the objectives had then been completed, evidence was laid out on the table to give us some more clues as to the murderer's identity. The evidence was scrutinized, people took each other aside and talked a bit more, and then it was time for the moment of truth. 

Each girl was given a piece of paper on which to write the identity of the murderer, as well as to vote for who they thought was the best dressed and who they thought was the best actress. Then, the solution was read out loud. We learned the identity of the murderer, as well as why they did it. It was really funny!!! Especially once we learned who it was, that kind of made it even funnier. 

It was a fabulous night, and I can't wait to have another murder mystery party!!!! I'm already trying to figure out a good excuse to have another one! Halloween, perhaps? ;)

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Would you be interested in having a murder mystery party?