sorority halloween.

Looking at Halloween through the eyes of an adult is an interesting experience.  One of my favorite things to refer to when I think about this strange shift in... let's just say STYLE, is "Mean Girls."

1: she missed it

2: she gets it

Basically, if you haven't seen it... "YOU CAN'T SIT WITH US!"

But if you truly have no idea what I am talking about I will break it down for you... Picture number 1, with the lovely Cady Heron, dressed as an "ex-wife," is representing our childhood.  We aim to be scary, or cute or actually something other than a scandalous bunny. We aim to be masked & show off our hiding skills that we had been practicing all year during hide-and-go-seek.  We aim for candy & lots of it.

Picture number 2 is the epitome of a high school or college student.  We basically follow the (usually innocent) dogma, "less is more!"  & in the words of Cady Heron, "In the regular world, Halloween is when children dress up in costumes and beg for candy. In Girl World, Halloween is the one night a year when a girl can dress like a total slut and no other girls can say anything about it."

But is it really one day a year that we can dress a little scandalous?

Not in Sorority World! In this world it is acceptable every time we hear the word... SOCIAL.  It is always "social"ly acceptable to be scandalous & looking good.  In a way, every night is Halloween if you want it to be & if you don't move the bookmark on your agenda.

So you're gunna ask... does that make Halloween less fun every year if you dress up on the other 364 days of the year?

& the answer is... no, because it's just one more night that dressing up is 100% acceptable, & this night is even better because there is no theme & you can be as creative as you want! No restrictions & the sky is the limit! Express yourself in any dandy or scandy way you feel!

Personally, I'm still in it for the candy... I mean who doesn't love a good Twix Bar or Reese's Cup after a long night?  If only it were still socially acceptable to knock on strangers' doors wearing a costume & get candy as a 21-year-old... can I be 5 again??? I just want to wear my fairy wings & pink sneakers & count the "good candy" & trade off the "bad candy" in peace.  Ya dig?

Disclaimer: this is the only picture of me

Morals of this blog post...

1. Halloween is really really soon, so pick a costume... probably something scandalous (i.e. the classic "Risky Business" attire or the "I'm a mouse... duh" of the genius, Karen Smith)

2. Go to a college social & wear... probably something scandalous (i.e. "trash bash" or "Predator vs. Prey")

3. When you see it every day it becomes the norm... probably something scandalous (i.e. skinny mini high-waisted jorts & a bandeau)

4. Go watch "Mean Girls.." probably something scandalous (i.e. holes in your shirt with a purple bra & army pants & flip flops)

Anyway... HAPPY HALLOWEEN from a kid stuck in a 21-year-old's body!

~ciao~

charleston.

If you know me, than you know I am not too crazy.  I follow most the rules, I am always on time, I like food, I like photos, I enjoy sports, I like people, I like camp, I like my parents, I like wine nights, I like adventures, I like being outside in the day time & I don't like leaving my apartment after dark.  If you know me at all... I think that pretty much sums me up. 

 
This weekend I almost got to do all my favorite things:
-I followed most rules.
-I made it Charleston at almost exactly 5pm... even though Chloe was with me ;)
-I ATE LOTS OF FOOD!
-I took 7576537 photos & probably annoyed Chloe because I was her personal paparazzi all weekend.
-I watched some (weak) football.
-I spent some time with some new & some old.
-I didn't get camp, but I felt close by.
-I didn't get to see my parents, but I know I walked along the same streets they did from this summer.
-No wine, but something a bit different.
-I had an adventure in the best of places.
-& I spent time outside exploring with my mains.

However, this weekend I even explored my "leaving the apartment after dark" side & ventured into the streets of Charleston for my friend's 22nd birthday (am I really celebrating 22nd birthdays right now? How did I get this old?)!  But yeah, we braved the streets of Charleston! & this homebody had fun! 

Besides the quaint charm the city offers in the day time, the city has some great places to visit with friends at night! The bars are all so classy & cute compared to the clusters found in Gainesville.  As much as I love my second home here in "Gainesvegas" or my personal (more accurate) favorite, "Rainesville," Charleston was just perfect.  The homes were southern with their colorful shutters & side decks to catch the summer breeze off the Ashley River.  The trees were lined down the cobblestone roads, which the horse & carriages bounded along, the people had a pleasant air about them, & the weather was 73563557343 times better than anything you'll find in Florida.

Anyway... I just had the best time wandering with some good friends this weekend.  

I loved road tripinnnn' with my bestie, Chloe. 

I loved seeing Emily & meeting all her fantastic friends.  

I loved spending time with her parents & taking the carriage ride through the city.  

I LOVED the food, going out & my Moscow Mule.  

I loved seeing the beach & feeling like the protagonist of a Nicholas Sparks original. 

I loved (& always do) shopping & taking in the culture.  

    

I loved it all! Thank you so much Emily, Madison, Alli, Emily's parents & anyone else who made this weekend so awesome!

Ciao!

haunted.

13 years ago today, I was sitting in Mr. Carswell's 3rd grade classroom at St. Michael's Independent School with not a worry in my mind.  I can still remember the words he said, as he told us there was something we needed to talk to our parents about when we got home...

I specifically remember walking up the front steps to my house after a friend dropped me off because my mom had jury duty, & seeing the tears streaking down my mom's face as she talked on the phone at the front door.  It didn't take long for me to understand why & see the smoke billowing out of the Twin Towers on the television & start crying too.

I'm not sure I completely understood what was happening, but I saw my mom crying, so the tears were instinctive & almost automatic for me.  For hours we stared at the screen in sobbing silence, listening to Enya's haunting lyrics, watching the bravest of firemen risk their lives in the toppling buildings & seeing fear-stricken faces of the people searching for their loved ones.

There were moments in my life when I felt scared... scared that the monster in my closet would conquer the pillow blockade while I slept, that snakes in my nightmares were actually slithering in my bed, & that each little noise I heard at night was a real a robber in my house, but at this moment, on September 11, 2001, in broad daylight, I was terrified.

It's scary that there are events in our lives that can haunt you for the rest of your life & that you will never forget.  For our grandparents & some of our parents, it was the "duck & cover" tactics, where they would hide under their desks for fear of nuclear attack with the Soviets in the 1940s and 50s.  When the siren went off, everyone would jump under their desks & just wait in deafening silence for the end of the world.  Then there was the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963, which our parents will never forget because of Jackie Kennedy's memorable pink dress & JFK Jr. saluting his father's casket at the funeral procession. In 1986, our older siblings probably remember watching the Challenger Space Shuttle take off with Christa McAuliffe, the first teacher in space, in it & seeing it explode in mid air.  I'm sure our parents can still hear the sound of millions of Americans gasping in unison.  In 2001, the haunting of my generation took place & I know it will be something that resonates strongly with me for the rest of my life.   

I was an ignorant 8 year-old, who believed that nothing bad could truly happen, but the attacks on 9/11 really changed something for me.  I saw innocent people murdered, I learned the words jihad & terrorist, I saw hearts break on national television, & saw how something could affect an entire country.  It was not a personal attack, but an attack on our country & one of the most incredible things I watched through the eyes of a child, was the way our country banded together & supported complete strangers.  Paired with being one of the worst days for our young country, it was also one of the most selfless. 

As I write this short post, I get chills across my entire body.  I don't think a feeling like this will ever go away nor do I have anything to compare it to.

I changed a little that day.  Not only did I gain empathy for human-kind, but a piece of me was lost in the World Trade Center rubble as well... the piece that will always be there because every year on this day, I can still feel it tugging at my heart.

I was not personally affected by September 11th.  No one in my family lost his or her life, no extended family members or family friends were there that day, but my heart goes out to everyone who lost someone.  You are all in my thoughts today.   

I will never never never ever forget.   

bahama mamas.

Usually during Spring Break I hit the slopes in Colorado with my family, which is always super fun, but as promised, I come back pale & with dry skin, while everyone else is perfectly bronzed & sun kissed.  Not this year ladies & gentlemen... I decided to switch up my tactics a little bit & fall under the spell of the "college spring break."  A vacation to me has always been the opposite of that typical "paradise."  The snow is my happy place, but sometimes you just gotta bite the bullet & cruise with the rest of them.  So I jumped into Spring Break 2014 with a cruise to the Bahamas to become a "Bahama Mama!" 

So my roommates & I set out on an adventure to Miami to set sail on the Norwegian Sky for 4 glorious days with crystal clear oceans, white sand beaches, tropical drinks, & relaxing.  It's like that song... "I like sipping piña coladas... & getting caught in the Bahamas with 368357247254 other college students... blah blah blah... & getting caught in the rain." Those are the lyrics, right?  Well, if not all those things happened anyway.

Well anyway, this week was quite the experience.  Compared to my casual family Spring Breaks, this crazy cruise ship was crawling with college kids drowning the pain of failed midterms in $9 drinks at the bars.  I am not lying when I say the ship had about 90% college students & 10% families.  & boy did I feel bad for that minority group.  The American families were aware of the college cruise phenomenon enough to steer clear of the ships, but the foreign families just looked shell-shocked at all times.  I don't know what they were saying, but the facial expressions said it all.  It's like they have never seen American students fighting over college football while double fisting a beer in one hand & long island ice tea in the other.  Seriously though... 

On our first port of call was an island owned by the cruise line called Great Stirrup Cay, where we took a tender to the island & snorkeled in the water.  There was a ship wreck in the water for us to look at & we took sweet underwater pics with my Gopro.  The only thing that is rough about the Gopro is that you can't view any of the pictures you've taken so it is legitimate torture waiting to see what you captured.  Especially on a cruise since I didn't carry my laptop with me!  But when you do it's comparable to "The Hangover," except with laughs, because of the attractive angles taken with the fish eye lens.  Kerry understands...

So after spending the entire day in the sun & swimming & barely finishing A SINGLE piña colada (really I drank about half & Rebecca jumped in to save me from Spring Break embarrassment), we returned to the tender.  I know... I am pretty crazy.  

Anyway, it was one of the last tender's back to the ship so we got some of the rowdiest leftovers.  At this moment we learned that the 3 main colleges aboard the Norwegian Sky were UCF, FAU, & then the smallest third, UF (Go Gator), which is important because "Drunkie 1," an FAU Owl in the flesh, was stirring up some real fights with his negativity on this past Gator football season.  I forgot how well those Owls did... oh wait. They didn't...  The best part of this encounter was when "Drunkie 2," a UF Gator gal, pushed "Drunkie 1" to the ground & the boat roared with claps.  & this was just day 1. 

Señor Frogs.

I literally don't know how they do it... they drink all day, they drink all night, & I am the one taking naps & falling asleep before the 11:30 pm dance party on Deck 11.  Are they robots?

On day 2 we traveled to Nassau, where we walked around the city for a bit.  We walked up & down the main drag before making the trek to Fat Tuesday right on the beach.  I was all about drinking the Bellini flavored slushee that tasted like smiles & laying out with my favorite roommates.  

By this time, the college students have been drinking for almost 3 days straight.  Still standing, slightly comprehensive, no recollection.  I think I may have been doing Spring Break all wrong... that's okay though because I still had a blast. No rAgrets (not even just one letter?).  If you don't understand, watch "We are the Millers," than you might laugh. Maybe. 

Day 3 on Grand Bahama Island, our last port of call, was a great wrap up of the vacation.  We tanned on that windy day, climbed some trees, played with babies, got flashed, had blue tongues, & danced like no one was watching.  You may or may not have caught the "got flashed" portion of that sentence... everything I say is true.  For real.

Overall the week was a blast!  I am so glad that I succumbed to the cliché college adventure & that I have some great side kicks to keep me going.  A big shout out to my parents for funding my strides, Caitlin's & Michaela's parents for their driving generosity, & for Kerry's family for the welcoming stays! I hope everyone had a fun & safe #sb2014.   

        

-Ciao

21 resolutions.

21st birthday dinner at Rocco's Tacos!

In the words of Ferris Bueller, "life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."  I'd say Ferris was pretty right... per usual.  Because just yesterday, I turned 21 after only a few blinks of the eyes.

All around the house I see pictures covering the walls of us 3 kids in the days I don't remember: pictures of me running around in a diaper & a little blue hat, days when dressing up in a hula skirt with a coconut bra was completely acceptable, the pictures of vacations that are somewhere in my heart, the day Daniel held me wearing his "I'm the big brother" shirt & Scott next to him in the "I'm the middle child" shirt when I first came home from the hospital, pictures of me torturing our cat in a stroller (if you catch my drift), ones of the 3 of us cheesing for a photographer, & countless other forgotten, but not lost memories of my wonderful childhood.

I must say it was a pretty great childhood.  I was pretty lucky to end up where I did; in a loving home with 2 great parents & 2 older brothers, who sort of liked having me around... I guess.  I was the baby... clearly most loved, most adorable, & definitely most favorite &, the truth is, it is still true today!  2013 was pretty great for me, but I am willing to accept this 2014 business...

So, as I sit on the cusp of 2014, with an astounding amount of new-found wisdom with another, more mature year on my belt, I think it is only appropriate to make 21 resolutions in honor of my short 21 years.

2014 RESOLUTIONS:
1. Run a half marathon.
2. Learn to make a new favorite meal.
3. Make straight A's!
4. Figure out my life? (possible?!?)
5. Volunteer more around Gainesville.
6. Become the first female president. (casual)
7. Get out & meet new people!
8. Speak Italian for an entire day.
9. Run at least 3 times a week        
10. Lose 8 pounds.
11. Successfully control my portion sizes at meal times.
12. Find the cure for cancer. (winner)
13. Talk to my relatives more often.
14. Clean out my closet. (I am a hoarder... the truth comes out & the first step is admitting to my problem.  I am Rachele & I am obsessed with clothes)
15. Learn to like tomatoes. (Why must they be in everything?!?)
16. Plan a spring break adventure with friends.
17. Make my bed every day. (EVERY day)
18. Read at least 10 books for pleasure.
19. Continue writing in my blog.
20. Embrace the future.
21. LIVE IN THE MOMENT!

Ciao & have a safe & fun night!
HAPPY NEW YEAR! Welcome 2014!

birthday bex.

This is a story of a Floridian meeting a Bristolian & how they became family.

I am going to start off this post with a big HAPPY 22nd BIRTHDAY to my socially awesome, happy & smiley, traveling obsessed, & friendliest friend, Bex!  I hope you have a great birthday with lots of family, friends, fun, & favorites!  Wish I could be there to celebrate it with you!  You deserve the best day ever!

Well... I will start the story now.  In 2009 my "real" family & I went on a cruise to Scandinavia (I know... casual), anyway, if you have ever been on a Royal Caribbean Cruise before than you'd know that there is a section on the ship for a club of teenagers called "fuel," where I found myself a lot.  I didn't know many people, & for 2 whole weeks I was forced to be social & meet new people.  Going on a European cruise truly helps you meet people from all over the world: Canada, South America, & mostly... you guessed it, Europe!  I really enjoyed getting to know everyone & I liked them all a lot, but you know how it ends... "blah blah blah, I hope to see you again someday/let's get together another time" (embrace), & you walk off thinking, I will NEVER see those people again!  Usually you're right, but sometimes you're not......

Our only picture together from the cruise... rough, but reality 2009

6 months goes by & thoughts about the cruise have waned, leaving me a normal kid once again until one day I got a facebook message from my friend Bex from the cruise explaining her huge plans to visit the United States over the summer & wondering if she could stay a few nights here along the way.  I asked my mom & surprisingly she complied, but as the dates began to get closer & closer, she became more worried that Bex could be a mass serial killer planning a heist along the East Coast.  The truth is... she never actually thought Bex would make the journey over here.  But once again... Bex proved us wrong & she flew into Orlando with a new doo, a bright red pack, knee highs with converses, more color than anyone around, flailing her arms, & with no serial killing on the mind!  She was here & she was awesome!

I have to admit... I was a little worried myself since I had never hung out with her unless there were 475464 other people there too.  I couldn't help, but wonder... would we get along?
        

2010: Bristolian attacks Florida with enthusiasm

Well... the answer is, yes we did & so did she & my parents, & she & my friends, & she & my pets, & she & EVERYONE!  You can't not like this girl.  & that is how she became my Bristolian sister & my mom became her "American mum."  We kayaked, mini-golfed & had batting practice, wind surfed, ate Hershey bars & Butterfingers, swam, tanned, & everything that is apparently "American" & needed to be crossed off the bucket list.  Most importantly... Bex taught us a few things.  The chicken is the most dangerous animal in Europe.  OKAY!  Stop picturing giant, evil, human devouring chickens with huge claws & menacing snarls... we were talking about salmonella, duhhh.  & no... that is NOT what I pictured when I heard this bizarre remark!  Well...     

Did I mention a week later she met us again in New York for a short time?  Well she did.  You can't help but admire someone with the guts & personality to fly half way across the world to meet up & backpack with people you just barely know.  More than admiration... wonder.
 

Me, American Mum, Bristolian Sister taking on the Big Apple

So the summer passed & Bex & I stayed in touch reasonably well planning our next summer's adventures.  It was my turn to check out her digs & since I know "knew" someone in England, I could travel alone.  Again... you don't think that plans would solidify, but they did & I traveled to Bristol in 2011 to visit Bex & her home.

2011: Bath

We went EVERYWHERE! It was awesome to travel around England with Bex & her mum, meet her friends, & learn the hip lingo.  We went to Bath, where I coined the rather (I thought) impressive phrase "Bex, Bath, & Beyond," we saw Stonehenge & thought about alien intervention, saw the city where my family is supposedly from, & went to see the double feature of Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows Part 2.  Yep.  It was a good time.  Again... most importantly, Bex doesn't lie. Chickens really are dangerous!!  Who would have guessed? 1-0 Bex.

That vacation ended with Bex & I closer than ever.  We made a deal we would plan on seeing each other every year at least once for as long as we could keep it up.  In a way, we are pen-pals because we keep in contact: sometimes through letters, mostly through facebook, & annually in person.  It is hard to stay in contact with people sometimes, but that is what is so amazing about having a friend like Bex... she makes the world seem small.

And that's when she decided to study abroad in Mississippi (pronounced Missipee) & became a Southerner.  Did they play quidditch in the South?  Well... Bex did.  Bex did it all & became a true Southern Miss Golden Eagle.  "To the Top!"  She just never slows down!

And luckily... since she was so close, it was easy to plan a vacation over Christmas Break to Colorado.  & Bex came too!  Wouldn't want to have it any other way.  It's funny... because my brother Scott also met us out there & he had never actually met Bex before, but said, "It feels like I already have."  That's just the way Bex is.  You just feel like you know her even when you don't. 

2012: Snowmass, Colorado

After just barely making it in 2012, Bex made a trip down to Gainesville in 2013 on her way down to the Quidditch World Cup in Orlando.  We even wore matching shirts & toured our way around campus taking pictures as Gators.

2013

So far... 5 years... 5 visits... 0 murders... 10990394754 memories.

As I told you up front: this is a story about how Bex became family & I'd like to make one last shout out to her for being one amazing person!  Thanks for being such a great friend/sister all these years & Happy Birthday!

Love,
Rachele

happy fourth.

Happy Fourth of July!
_________________________________________________________________________________________

With all your:

Parades,

Smiles, 

  

Flags,

  

Veterans,

  

Fun,

Food,

  

& Family

Have a wonderful evening :)
Peace & Ciaos