Birthday girl!

The big day is finally here! Well, technically, I turn 21 in one hour! It's life changing, I know. One of the best things about birthdays is you can wear any ridiculous outfit and it's totally excusable because it's your birthday (21st birthdays especially)! Now I'm not one to look any sort of ridiculous except ridiculously good BUT I think I've picked out a pretty good outfit for my 21st. Keep in mind, I will be celebrating at home, in a small town, so while this look would be quite tame/nothing special for downtown Minneapolis, I can guarantee I will be the most overdressed person anywhere tomorrow night. And there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. Because it's my birthday :)

Haha I tried my best to get exactly what I'm wearing in the Polyvore set, starting with my most favorite Juicy Couture silk dress. The picture does not do this lovely dress justice, there is so much detailing on the bodice that you can't see and the skirt is a little more flouncy. Anyway, I'm pairing it with this great black and white chevron blazer, which I couldn't find on Polyvore so this is a similar style just imagine it's chevron. I'll definitely be wearing my platform black heels, a simple necklace, pearl earrings, and some sort of large, cocktail ring. I'm all about the statement jewelry so most of my outfits include either a statement necklace or a statement ring, never both. I usually keep my earrings pretty simple! I included the clutch because I thought it was cute and looked good with the outfit. I will welcome this birthday with much more excitement than my last birthday - I was pretty upset that I was halfway to 40. I can't wait to celebrate with my family tomorrow night and all of my sorority sisters and friends at school once we're back from break! In the end, it's just another day but an important day nonetheless. Cheers to a new year and a new beginning!  

xoxo,

rFe

Flats on flats on flats

Hey lovies! I hope everyone's enjoying their weekend, I've been waiting for what seems like forever for it to finally get here! I'm still extremely stressed and busy with school, my sorority, tennis, and working (not to mention trying to keep up with friends and family!) I feel like I literally never have a free moment and it's still soo overwhelming dealing with everything right now. If anyone has any good tips for relieving stress, that's not time consuming, I would love to get some advice! On a brighter note, one AMAZING thing I did this week was attend an impromptu afternoon concert held by Hunter Hayes! He was in town with Carrie Underwood and did a pre-show performance at a local bar/restaurant. A couple friends and I heard about it on the radio the morning of and decided to skip class and take a little adventure! It was great because it was at noon on a Thursday so it was a very exclusive and private show. I absolutely adore him so seeing him in that intimate of a setting was the best experience ever!

I just love him so much 

Another reason I've been looking forward to this weekend is because my mom, grandma, and aunt came into town yesterday! We spent the day shopping which was exactly what I needed to get my mind off this crazy week. I made some great purchases but I think my favorite was my new Cole Haan ballet flats (dying with excitement inside) from Nordstrom Rack! I've been wanting a nice pair of flats forever and I'm so happy I found a quality pair and got the best deal on them :) I feel like it's the perfect weather for flats right now because it's still a smidge too warm to wear boots, my feet and legs get way too hot! I'm a little obsessed with flats right now which is funny because I used to hate them - I thought they made my feet look big...haha but now I definitely appreciate them and their classiness so much more! Here are some more amazing flats that I'm lusting over, if only I had unlimited funds to buy them! Oh well, it makes getting a really nice part that much more special. The middle, shimmery ones are the ones I bought today :)

Tory Burch flat heels, $290 / Sam Edelman animal print ballet flat / Vera Wang ballet flat shoes / Kate Spade wedge heel shoes / Cole Haan grey ballet flat / Kate Spade ballet shoes flat

Let me know what you think and enjoy this beautiful weekend!

xoxo,

rFe

Sac City

Hey loves! I honestly cannot believe it's the end of July already. Seriously though, in a little more than 2 weeks I'm headed back to school. Can't say I'm not beyond excited! These past couple days have been both great and a little heart breaking at the same time. This past Thursday my family and I headed out to California to help move my brother into his very first apartment, as he is attending Sacramento City College this fall. He will be playing on their baseball team which is one of the best baseball programs in the nation. I couldn't be more proud of him and I know Sac City will be a great stepping stone for an even brighter baseball career. I'm hoping he makes it to the bigs so he can set me up with a teammate, who wouldn't want to be a MLB wife?! Haha our trip consisted of a long and painful trip to IKEA, an even more painful day of assembling all the furniture, as well as a day trip to San Francisco! We had a great time at Fisherman's Wharf in San Fran checking out the shops and walking around the boardwalk. There were a few too many birds and an obnoxious amount of people there for my liking but it seemed like something you had to do if you were in the area! Below are some pictures I took that day. Now, it's back to reality and the working world for a couple more weeks!

Do I have any west coast followers?! Or anyone else sending a sibling away for college?

xoxo,

rFe

Sunday Social - Vacations

Happy Sunday loves! Today I'll be linking up with Ashley at Ashley's Carnival Ride and Neely at A Complete Waste of Make Up for Sunday Social, this week's theme is vacations! I absolutely love to travel and have been fortunate enough to have gone quite a few places in my day :) I hope I can continue to travel in the future as much as I have the past 20 years. Let's get to the questions...
1. What is the best trip you've ever been on? I can't pick just one, I have two! Both very different. My first favorite was a family vacation to Hawaii. I believe I was a junior in high school and I loved every second of that trip. Getting to Hawaii was not the most fun however, (we flew from Green Bay to Minneapolis to L.A. to Honolulu to Maui) and they lost our luggage for a day in the process! No worries though, we got to buy new swimsuits and our hotel was very accommodating as well. We spent 5 days in Maui and 3 days in Honolulu. Maui was definitely my favorite, it was unbelievably gorgeous. I would go back there in a heartbeat! A couple fun things we did in Hawaii was take surfing lessons, go on a helicopter ride, and we went to a luau :)

My other favorite vacation was also when I was a junior in high school. I had been dying to go to New York City and my grandpa used to fly there for work every week. So we picked a weekend in October and my grandparents, mother, and I went there for a long weekend. It was great because my grandpa was going there for work anyway so we just went along to shop and got all the perks of flying with him...After arriving in New York we were picked up by A LIMO which drove us through downtown Manhattan to our hotel. It was so amazing and our hotel was beautiful! We spent the next couple days shopping and we were supposed to go see Wicked but unfortunately that's when the play writers were on strike so the show was cancelled :( I definitely want to do a trip to New York again soon!

2. What is your best idea for a girl's weekend trip? If everyone could afford it, I think New York would be a great place to go with some girlfriends for the weekend. The shopping, the shows, and the nightlife would be a blast. I've also done Chicago weekend trips (pictured below) which are always a good time as well!

3. What is your best idea for a couple's trip? Hmm...there's a small area in Wisconsin called Door County which is made up of tiny little towns that could be a good place for couples. It's right on the water so there's tons of beaches and the cutest beach houses you'll ever see. I go up there with my mom a lot because they have some good shopping. It'd be nice to stay in a bed and breakfast there and explore for a couple days!

 4. What is the best vacation on the cheap? I'd say weekend trips to Chicago are relatively cheap if you do it the right way. I have friends that live near there so we always stay at their houses so there's no need to pay for a hotel. Then all you have to pay for is a train ticket to take you downtown as well as meals and such.

5. What is the place you most want to visit? Europe for sure! I plan on studying abroad either Spring semester or doing a summer term in Europe. Right now I'm thinking I would go to Italy and I'd like to travel to Spain, France, England, and Greece while I'm there!

6. What are your travel necessities? Well I've already gone over some of those in my Travel Essentials post and I'm working on the second part of that right now so stay tuned and you'll find out :)

That's all I have for today! Thanks for reading!

xoxo,

rFe


 

Graduation day

Today my younger brother, Ben, graduated from high school! He'll be attending Sacramento City Community College for the next two years to pursue a (hopefully) bright future in baseball. I've already made him promise to hook me up with a MLB hottie if he makes it to the pros haha :) I can't believe he's heading off to college and I'm already half way done with it...scary stuff. It was a great afternoon though, the ceremony was only about an hour and a half so that wasn't too bad. Luckily, it was gorgeous outside too so we got to take some nice family photos.

Ben and I 

He's actually a lot taller than me (8 inches to be exact) - I'm never past his shoulders but I wore heels today :)

The empty nesters and their college kids 

Wise words from Disney - love my family more than anything

Happy Sunday :)

xoxo,

rFe