and what a night it was♥

So here we are, as promised, sharing with you the photos and memories from Rachel's sister Hannah's 18th birthday party which happened last Friday! It was such a brilliant evening. A friend made the heavenly cake with a mousse-like frosting and chocolate curls, and the lovely decourating of the house was done by Rachel and her mum.

So many kids came, about 40 or so in all, and it was so tight in the house and so loud with talking and laughter! After playing a wild group game called Midnight Madness we cut the cake. 

It was so tight in the kitchen and dining room you could hardly move! It was so much fun. We had delicious snacks and the fantastic homemade Chex Mix that's so delicious! Some of these pictures may make you reminisce of our New Year's Eve party post, which was an absolutely amazing party and basically the same people came to that as well. 

The cake was distributed among the guests along with some delicious ice cream and goodness was it heavenly! The cake was so moist and perfectly chocolate, the icing like a heavenly mousse, and the chocolate curls just literally melting in your mouth!

We could not resist taking a picture of all the shoes! They were in such a jambled pile and there was so many of them! Parties at Rachel's house are just the best, we always have the best time with all the kids that come. 

We had to get everyone to rally round for a group picture, which was quite a loud and hilarious event, it was hard to get everyone looking good but in the end a couple good ones came out!

You can spot Rachel in the bottom left hand corner with the pink top and blonde hair and as for Erika she is up one and over one to the right with the dark hair and bangs.

And then came the dancing! And golly what a grand time it was. All of our close friends are so much fun and we all know how to have a brilliant time. 

[Note us right in the top right hand corner]

And I will admit we're pretty hilarious and cool dancers too! 

It was so much fun! We listened to some Passion Pit and just generally groovy stuff! Aaron, Rachel's brother, made a great playlist for his iTouch. 

[Again, note us in the top right hand corner {Erika, dark hair and bangs, and Rachel long blonde hair} both laughing at Rachel's quite humorous brother and friend!]

Rachel's mum was kind enough to take some photos-which is greatly appreciated! Because without them, we wouldn't have such lovely mementos from the grand and fun party.

The night was just generally brilliant and we love to see how wonderful of friends we've got. 

The whole night through we hung out with each other and had such a grand time talking with each other brilliant friends, laughing, and dancing!

We can't wait to host another party! Hopefully we can do one soon. We plan to do a few with this great bunch of our friends come this Spring and Summer. 

We're off to watch the sophisticated and glamorous Oscars at Erika's house! So excited. The Oscars are such fun. We would love to become an actor and work so hard in a film and be able to attend the lovely and fantastic Oscars, taking so much time to pick our glamorous dresses to wear. 

The Red Carpet's airing right now! Everyone looks gorgeous. We're going to make smoothies and popcorn and sit back and enjoy the evening. 

Happy Sunday, dearest loves!

xoxoxo,

-Erika&Rachel

love, love, love

 Hello, sweet darlings. Thought we should do a quick post for you to enjoy this weekend. Tonight is my (Rachel) sister's big 18th birthday party and Erika and I are so excited! It'll be so much fun and so many people are coming. We can't wait to party down and dance to Vampire Weekend and Passion Pit♥ 

I am currently loving this hair tutorial that the lovely Joanna posted from A CUP OF JO. I was so happy to find it because, like everyone else, I was swooning over J.Crew's gorgeous Spring lookbook and loved the girls hair in the photos. I actually wore my hair like this (using the tutorial) yesterday and today! :) 

The lovely Carrie from Wish Wish Wish was lucky and blessed enough to be able to visit Italy last weekend. I completely fell in love with the photos she posted. It makes my heart swell and want to visit Italy, walk the beautiful old streets, feed the birds, and eat gelato wearing breezy tops and pink vintage shorts. 

Also, Carrie's boyfriend posted this gorgeous video of their trip to Milan and I am in love with it! The song choice is perfect. Erika and I cannot wait to travel beautiful and wonderful Europe (just the name makes my heart swell!) together♥

The weather today is beautiful here in the midwest. The sky is as blue as a robin's egg, the sun is shining brilliantly, the wind is blowing, and I can actually see some grass and fields now that most of the snow has melted. It is beautiful...however, it is supposed to get cold again next week but I can enjoy the birdsong and look forward to Spring's coming next month, right? Right. :)

Also, I must share with you my happiest discovery. I'd seen the photo on the top right of this collage before on WeHeartIt and thought it was precious and saved it. 

Well then last night I found more pictures from this on Tumblr blogs and I knew it had to be a commercial because people were saying things like, "She looks gorgeous in this commercial" so by then I was desperate to find this commercial because I loved the photos so much. 

And then today was the day: I got on my Tumblr blog and found that someone else had reblogged this photo and said "Miss Dior Cherie!" and I knew, that HAD to be the commercial it was for. So, I looked it up on YouTube and found it. 

And goodness, was I ever happy! I am completely in love with the video. The girl is absolutely adorable, the sunniness and cheeriness of the video shines, and it's in Paris♥ I am in love! I hope you enjoy this beautiful video as much as I do. :) 

And now, I must share with you my current model love, and the one so many people are talking about, the gorgeous Sasha Pivovarova (even her name is beautiful!). I love her heart shaped face, adorable smile, and big blue eyes. I was so happy to have discovered her last month. She is definitely, by far, my current favourite model♥

I leave you with sweet thoughts of a bright and sunny house in Cornwall, walking through breathtaking and wonderful Central Park in the Summer, and roaming the streets of Italy♥

Can't wait to share the photos we take tonight with you all! Happy weekend wishes to you, sweets♥

xoxoxo,

-Erika&Rachel

"In December, drinking horchata."

Hello, my lovelies. I hope your weekend was wonderful! Erika and I had a lovely one. On Saturday I (Rachel) spent the night at Erika's house and we ate fruit roll-ups, salads, and talked until two in the morning about all things brilliant! It was such fun. We love being cousins!

Yesterday was Valentine's Day and it was quite lovely. 

 I know Erika was passing out Valentine's at her school to some people in her class and as for me, when my sister got home from work at Starbucks she brought back some beautiful flowers for our mum and a wonderful bag of Dove dark chocolate squares for me--heavenly! So that was sweet♥ 

And the evening was spent hanging out with my family and my brother's girlfriend, sharing my chocolates, and watching Lost (we are currently watching it for the first time. Oh my lands, it is fantastic!). 

I've lately found so many beautiful and inspirational photos and places online. I think it's because late at night, especially weekends, you're online, looking at your favourite blogs, and then poof! You've found a lovely website or photo. I find most pictures from We Heart It (Erika and I could be on there for hours...and somehow though we start out looking up something like 'pastry' we end up looking at 'harry potter'...♥), and also lately I have been finding them on Tumblr blogs that I follow. 

Speaking of Tumblr, Erika and I have been wanting to officially share with you our own personal Tumblr's. Though they have been on here for a while (see sidebar) we wanted to officially announce it. We use them to post lovely photos we find (which happens ALL the time) instead of spamming up this more dainty, if you will, blog with four posts a day posting a picture. 

So, here they are:

Erika's personal Tumblr-

A Ship Named Percival

And my (Rachel) personal Tumblr-

Tottenham Court Road

We do hope you enjoy! They are such fun to have. :)

And also, I've found a few lovely little links that I would love to share with you all. I got my first J. Crew catalogue in the mail at the beginning of the month (can't wait to get more!) and just got another one, The Hollywood Issue (which is amazing!) and discovered this beautiful gown. I would absolutely use it as my wedding dress! I love the taffeta and the gorgeous and unique ruffles at the bodice. Someday I'll have to plan my own wedding I hope and I can't wait. I just love looking at wedding gowns and especially wedding blogs! 

Currently I am absolutely loving the Etsy shop, Clever Nettle. I just love some of the stuff she has there! Especially this Autumn skirt, this Weasley-ish sweater, and this adorable skirt perfect for Spring or Summer!

Erika and I are loving this Butterfly globe (we love globes and telescopes and maps!), I am loving this seventeen-year-old amazing photographer Mike Bailey Gates, this brilliant photostream on Flickr, and, of course, like everyone else, the Mulberry Alexa. Also, Mulberry's Spring/Summer campaign is gorgeous! Be sure to watch the show videos and the party video.

This Friday is my sister's 18th birthday and we're hosting a big party. About twenty to thirty kids are coming and it's going to be super fun. Erika and I are really excited and can't wait to take pictures throughout the night, and if they're any good we'll share them with you all! We are sure that we'll be dancing the night away. :) 

This little collage is to share with you a few photos I took yesterday. Aren't the flowers just lovely? Oh and the chocolate was so yummy! And the day was beautiful! It was just a generally lovely Valentine's Day♥ What did you all do for this sweet holiday? 

And now, before I close I must say something very, very exciting to Erika and I which is that, as of today, it is 150 days until Deathly Hallows part 2 is released!! AH! 

We are oh so excited and can't believe it's coming so fast. Harry Potter is the best♥ We've both talked, several times, about how sad it's going to be when that movie ends--because then it's all over! But we know and trust the amazing filmmakers that it is going to be an incredibly amazing and wonderful end to this amazing, and best ever, film series! We were so excited that Harry Potter won the BAFTA of Outstanding Contribution to Cinema. :) This video made us smile. We love them all! 

♥

I'm off to work on a watercolour painting and finish a letter to my dear great aunt who has cancer. Please be praying for her! 

Have a lovely week, darlings. Thanks so much for the wonderful comments on our last post!

xoxoxo,

-Erika&Rachel 

[Written by Rachel]

"The Yule Ball is first and foremost....a dance!"

Welcome February!  So glad you have come, but please don't stay too long because I am longing for cool spring days followed by warm summer ones.  

Winter is beautiful and I (Erika) appreciate its beauty more than ever before, but for some reason I'm not content with these sparkling winter days. I am impatient I suppose, and to be honest I have been savoring every day left before summer comes, I don't want time to pass too fast. I still have things I want to do, but still I long for summer and I can't help wanting it to come quicker!

We recently had a blizzard where we live, and it was a beautiful sight to behold.  We got nearly two feet and even more snow where the drifts are.  The morning after the blizzard was as bright and sunny as could be, and the world looked beautiful covered in a blanket of sparkling dust!  Therefore, I know that February wants us to enjoy winter, and is trying to make it more lovely for us.  I recently have been very inspired, as Rachel said in the previous post, but for me its not just fashion, although that's a bit of it, it's oh so many things!  I have many ideas as does Rachel, of creative things to do and ways to spend our time!

Several weeks ago we got together and decided it was high time to build a tent out of blankets like we used to do when we were little kids.  This tent however, was big enough to fit three people, without fear of it falling over.  It started out quite small, but as we were building, it grew! To make this night even better we watched our favourite Harry Potter film The Goblet of Fire!  

"Hogwarts, Hogwarts Hoggy warty Hogwarts, teach us something please.  Whether we be old and bald or young with scabby knees. Our heads could do with filling with some interesting stuff, for now they're bare and full of air, dead flies, and bits of fluff!"

   

It really is the best film, even with all the other ones being so great, it is the best! The script is fantastic, the acting is brilliant, the humor is also brilliant, we love the boarding school feel brought into it, and somehow we could watch it over and over again without ever getting tired of it! It is just such a great film, and the book is fantastic as well. 

-"What's this rubbish?"-
-"What's this rubbish, he says."
-"This here is the secret to our success!"-
-"I solemnly swear that I am up to no good!"-
-"Messrs. Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs are proud to present the Marauder's Map."-

-"We owe them so much."-

Our tent was a little magical safe haven, all aglow with warm light and pillows and blankets tossed cosily about.  We had dreamed about things such as this late at night, but now all was coming true.   

We dreamt of roaming the corridors of Hogwarts late at night, our wand tip ignited in light, and the Marauder's Map in hand.  Going through secret passage ways unknown to Filch and his cat Mrs. Norris and traveling to Hogsmeade. 

-"The house of Godric Gryffindor has commanded the respect of the wizarding world for nearly ten centuries. I will not have you, in one night, besmirching that name by behaving like a babbling, bumbling, band of baboons!"

-"Try saying that five times fast. Babbling, bumbling, band of baboons."-

-"Babbling, bumbling band of baboons."

"In light of the recent events, the bonds of friendship made this year will be more important than ever. Remember that, and Cedric Diggory will not have died in vain. You remember that, and we'll celebrate a boy who was kind, and honest, and brave, and true. Right to the very end." 

I  hope this post finds you all well and now for some wonderful links!

Aren't these shoes absoluetly wonderful!? 1 and 2  Just imagine wearing these on a rainy day along with a jacket that has many pockets all over it and inside of those pockets are all sorts of magical objects such as, brass telescopes and compasses.

~

This picture is so beautiful!!  I love the little bottles with memories contained in them!

~

These pencils are so beautiful and I love the idea of this sketchbook.  Also, arent these bandaids adorable!?

~

Here are some lovely reads!  Visit the lovely Carrie's blog if you haven't been yet.  It is so beautiful and always inspiring!  Please read Anne of Green Gables!  I just finished reading it and it is the most lovely story. I purchased the other seven books in the Anne series because I loved it so much!

~

I have been loving the wonderful Honey Trees and hope to purchase their ep.  Here is a fantasic video of theirs.   Be sure to not only listen to it, but watch as well because it is very beautiful!

Best Wishes,

Erika&Rachel

XXXX