cassandra mortmain

Today the wind was frosty, more leaves followed their friends in colors of red, orange, and yellow. I love seeing all the different shades beginning to appear when I ride the bus each morning and watch the sun's rising. Really autumn has barely begun, but today was one of its stronger bursts of beauty. I loved walking around outside for only a few minutes and feeling my nose turn red as the cold wind blew through my hair.

This outfit was so cozy and perfect for a day like today. It made me feel like Cassandra Mortmain from I Capture the Castle, which definitely added to my rather dreamy mood. (I Capture the Castle, by Dodie Smith, is, by the way, a really wonderful book. I highly recommend it!) I wore this shirt of my dad's as a dress here, and I talked about layering sweaters over it, but little did I think that the opportunity to do so would be just a week later!

Here's to fall and feeling like you jumped out of your favorite book,
xo,
Maria Elyse

dress: dad's shirt
sweater: old navy, maybe?
tights: target
loafers: vintage

"when we grow-up..."

Something I've learned from blogging: stick a doggy or kitty in your outfit photos and they are instantly 10x cuter.  For those of you don't know, this is my dog Sam (aka Sammy). I'm totally biased towards him in the fact that he's the cutest dog in the world. He's getting pretty old, so I've been spoiling him lately...I've been giving him lots of doggy treats, letting him take naps on my bed, and cuddling him. I mean how can you not look at his cute little face and just melt a little inside? ♥

He was being super funny when I was taking these pics on our walk; he kept smelling/seeing animals and then he'd go into his alert stance, haha. Some deer ran across the road and he totally freaked out and wanted to run after them. He's a pretty small dog, so it makes me laugh when he has his little spurts of thinking he has extreme dominance over everything, haha.

I felt really 60's in this outfit, like something out of some of my mom's old family photos from that time period. The cropped jeans and loafers were definitely a bit Mary Tyler Moore-esque. :)

My oldest sister Hope left for college today. She's been packing and getting ready to go all week, and it feels sort of surreal now that she's actually gone 4 hours away at school. We were up late last night talking about it all for a few hours, and she said one thing to me that I'm not ever going to forget: "Don't ever not need me."  Anyway, she left this morning with dad and mom, who are dropping her off, but I don't think that it's all quite sunk-in yet, you know? She's always been here for me, whenever I needed to talk, get advice, or just hang out...and it's not going to be like that anymore. Of course we can email, text, have phone dates, but I don't think it'll be quite the same at all. It seems like not too long ago we were little kids and talking about our plans, dreams, and "what we wanna be when we grow up". Now she is grown up and at college...it gets me feeling all nostalgic. It's kind of hard to believe that this day has come already! I am super pumped for her in this new chapter of her life though, and I can't wait to hear all about her experiences and how things are going. I know she'll do great, but I sure am going to miss her. I love you, sistah! ♥

xo

Maria Elyse

cardigan: vintage, from my mom

blouse: vintage, for sale in my shop

jeans: target

loafers: vintage

brooch: gifted

bow: h&m