Hey guys, sorry I've been M.I.A. for a few weeks! I've been really busy and I went on a cruise! But don't worry, there will soon be many blog posts to make up for my absence! Anyway, I recently just recorded one of my first covers and I wanted to share it with all of you. It was a really informative and educational experience. I really got to see/hear my voice in a new way and hopefully I will be on the road to progress. Hope you take a listen and like it! It will be on sound cloud soon...once I actually figure out how to use sound cloud, lol. Enjoy my loves!

    Before I start this article, I'm just going to take you back to my life a little before this time last year. In the month  of April in 2015, I was in a fashion show at my school. The girls were all split up into groups and were assigned specific stores to pick out their outfit in. I was very excited for this, because I was always kind of a fashionista and now I was getting the opportunity to show everyone. So I went with my mom to the store and grabbed a whole bunch of outfits (with way too much confidence) that I loved. I went in the dressing room and from dress to dress my disappointment was rapidly growing. Things were just not fitting and if they were fitting, they made look like a baked potato trying to fit into an extra small ziplock baggy. I still remember how terrible it felt to look at myself in the mirror. In that moment, I knew that I could not keep feeling like this any more. In the dressing room I may or may not have had a meltdown where I screamed and cursed. (Just normal things like "I WILL NOT LOOK LIKE A LARGE WHALE ANYMORE"). This right here was my breaking point, and sometimes I wish it had come earlier.
     I'll have you know I did leave the store with an outfit to wear, thanks to a very kind sales girl who found me a coachella-esque outfit that actually looked like it fit. Most importantly, it actually made me feel pretty. I wish I could go back and thank her.
     Anyway, this event led to me eating super healthy and working out about three times a day. By eating healthy, I mean not letting myself have a chip, a processed snack, ice cream or any dessert, pasta and finally pizza. I let myself have it on June 27th, because it was my last day of 8th grade and that's what everyone got at lunch. (I wasn't going to remember my last lunch as me being the only one having an apple and a protein shake). After that, I never had pizza once. Pizza was the hardest thing to give up because it's the food I ate on the go and at parties. 
      Since then I have lost a little bit more than 40 pounds. I stopped looking for this magic way to shed the weight without putting in the effort, and I got to work. When you stop wishing and start working, great things can happen. Other people seem to talk about losing weight as if it was this easy thing, and that discouraged me. I would plank for two minutes straight and have to look at my fat rolls hanging down and in my head I would picture this tall skinny girl staying in shape by doing a downward dog. This was anything BUT easy. I thought "I must be doing this wrong", but I wasn't and all those twigs were lying their flat asses off. No matter what everyone tells you, its not easy and it was not meant to be. If it was easy, we would all be apart of Taylor Swifts squad. 
     I go back and forth between a 3 pound difference in my weight. Some days I go to a really fancy restaurant and say "Screw it, I'll work it off tomorrow" and other days I am extremely conscious of what I eat in ratio to how much I work out. Even though I am trying to stay in shape, I am still only human. Something I never do though is go to sleep feeling upset at myself. It does not matter what hour of the night it is, if I eat a really unhealthy dinner, I will feel guilty and either make myself run around my house for 15 minutes or do a short ab workout. At least then I will feel like there isn't a lump of ice cream sitting in my stomach when I go to bed.
        Another thing that actually helped, is I said no to a gym membership. I knew I would make excuses of why I couldn't get there or why I didn't try my hardest (I am slowly getting over my hatred of working out in front of people), and ultimately just waste my moms money. Although, months after losing the majority of my weight I joined kickboxing, because it forces me to sweat (and I love it).
       During this school year, I only lost about 8 pounds because when you get in the healthy zone, it becomes harder to lose the stubborn leftover weight. (Also, working out became harder since I have 3 hours in total of commuting each day). That just means I have to work harder for what I want, and I'm okay with that. 
       All and all, I am very proud of my 13 year old self for getting out of a vey deep hole all by herself. I wish I could have done it earlier, but everything happens for a reason. I can definitely say that I did not realize how unhappy I was back then until now (which is a good thing). Maybe next year I will be saying the same thing about today.

    I'm someone who sets goals and makes list's for myself so that I don't procrastinate. I believe that there are always things to get better at and new things to experience. I enforce this belief in the summer months, because all through out the school year I always say to myself "If I didn't have school I would do this blah blah blah". (I don't always say the 'blah blah blah' part). Now that I'm on vacation though, I have zero excuses not to get the things I want to get done. Some things on my summer bucket list are a little personal, so I'll just share a few.
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• Continue to keep a journal and add photographs to it. I have actually kept up with this goal. Looking back on my old journals always makes me smile, and adding photos or ticket stubs makes reading about the memories a more vivid experience.
• Cook my own dinner at least 5 times during the summer. Okay, this is not as easy as it sounds (for me at least). Reason 1: With a busy family with all different taste buds, it's much easier to eat on the go. Reason 2: The summer comes with so many BBQ's & parties. I'll update you on how this goal goes!
• Watch the sunrise on the beach. I've wanted to do this forever, but I just never could get myself up early enough. Not this summer.
• Work on my craft. Craft as in singing, acting, and my song writing. This is the time in my life where I have time, can control my schedule, and not worry about money or having the responsibilities of a job. There is no better time than now to focus on what I love.
• Consistently workout. By workout, I mean my average toning workouts but also including running and kickboxing into my days. It was hard for me to get to kickboxing during the year due to school, but now there's no excuse. I've also been starting my mornings with a run with my sister, and I've felt it give me more energy through out  the day. Running with your built-in best friend is also very therapeutic. 
• Visit a new place...and go on an adventure while I'm there. 
• GET OFF MY PHONE AND ENJOY LIFE. I've been doing okay with this one: I usually don't charge it when I leave the house or I just completely shut it off. The thing literally makes me feel like a robot.

These are just some of my little goals, and I would love to see what yours are. Together we can all improve and become kinder and livelier people.💛

     I can't even tell you how nervous I was thinking about all my closest school friends and their expectations of where I live. 99% of the kids I invited hadn't ever been to Staten Island, but made the hike anyway. Staten Island is definitely not my favorite place in the world and I hate it sometimes, but it is nice to come home to quiet after being in the city all day. Anyway, my friends got there and immediately got in the pool. My sister said she could hear everyone on the trampoline laughing from upstairs. Everyone took advantage of the beautiful sunny day and just loved the pool and trampoline. I always forget that my normal isn't what everyone else's is. For example, in the beginning of the year I was obsessed with my friends apartments and how cool it was that they had the city waiting outside their door, but they didn't understand my infatuation because they had been used to that life for so long. I go to a very diverse school with kids who come from all boroughs and all different walks of life and I always found it fascinating learning about everyones different lifestyles. Even though I'm only about 17 miles from Manhattan, S.I. is still an hour and a half away, so I was so grateful when so many of my friends showed up. When they came to my neighborhood, I think it was some what of a bonding experience, because it was the first time my friends had actually gotten to see the area I come home to everyday. They also got to see the cats I come home to everyday! Key to fun party: have small cats. There were literally crowds of 14 year olds in my little den playing with my cats. It was so cute. At one point in the party, people were picnicking on my lawn which was a great idea that never even occurred to me! (Why hadn't I ever did that?). It was pretty fun (and the sunniest part of the yard). By the time 6 o'clock came, people had to start going home because they didn't want to travel in the dark. (The commute back to the city is an hour and a half and for some people even longer). In the end, I feel like the party was a success. I was so glad that this party was just focused on having fun and that there was no average high-schooler drama. This was kind of a practice run for my birthday party in August, so I planning on stepping up my game and buying extra seven-layer dip😉.

   So I know I said I would post #OOTW's, but it started to get a little boring after a while, so I decided to do a collection of outfits from this season.

*THIS PHOTO WAS A JOKE BTW*
My favorite jeans outfit (is that even a thing?) from: 
Jeans-Abercrombie 
​Shirt-Rad. (it says "I WOKE UP LIKE THIS")

My favorite sporty(ish) outfit from:
Shirt: Pacsun (it says "Plants are friends")
Shorts: Nike

My favorite top from: ????? (I think I got it at a boutique by the beach).

Last but not least, my favorite skirt outfit: 
Top-???
Necklace- Francesca's Collections
Skirt- Abecrombie

And there you guy! I can vouch that all of these outfits were comfortable and show my personality. Let me know which ones are your favorite!

   There have been quite a lot of big changes this year. New school, new work load and new classes. Also, instead of going to a school that was five minutes away from my house, I went to one that was an hour and a half commute away. In September, I was worried that everything would be too much for me but I knew that if I wanted it enough (and I did) that I would make it work. So I did. What I didn't realize was how much more effort I had to put into my studies than middle school. This whole year I struggled to keep up my grades up (with getting home so late and having other obligations) and was always studying. Halfway through the year though, I learned how to manage and now I can gladly say I passes (more than passed) both of my regents. This year has taught me that I have to work even harder for the things I want and to focus on them. Some of my friends didn't understand that even when I was home on a Friday or Saturday night, sometimes I just wanted to relax and other times I had to study and catch up on my school work from the prior week. This year has had many ups and downs but through out everything, Ihave stayed inspired. Inspired to create, to work hard, and to be better than I was yesterday. I have learned to not say "I don't have time" because the truth is that I have the time and I chose how to spend it. When I tell people some of the things I do everyday when I come home or show them how much I study, they say "How do you have the time?". And I tell them that if I really care about it, I will make time for it. Instead of saying "I don't have time for this", replace it with "It's not a priority" and you will see a great change in what you do. This school year has changed what I prioritize and most importantly, has been another piece of the puzzle that is, well, myself. 
Let's see what sophomore year has to bring. 
I can't wait.

    The second part to my full on Brooklyn experience, was meeting up with my friend Charlotte in DUMBO. It was a beautiful day so we got food and walked a lot. I really loved exploring this area, because it's different than the other areas of Brooklyn I've been in. We decided to make chocolate truffle's, with this recipe Charlotte found on Pinterest. Before we started, we made a stop at the supermarket in which I ran to in size 9 flats (I'm a 6). Not easy, but very funny. Anyway, we first put all of the ingredients except for the cocoa powder and the chocolate chips in a skillet and mixed it up until it was close to boiling. Then when it was down, we put it over chocolate chips and mixed. (IT TASTED SO GOOD). We poured it in a small pan (covered in wax paper so it wouldn't stick)

Waiting about 15 minutes in the freezer, (apposed to a half hour in the refrigerator), we rolled! (It was so messy).

And viola! Our last step was rolling in cocoa powder, and we were done! They were good, but I think we used a tad bit too much expresso powder.

Thank you to Charlotte for showing me around DUMBO  on this gorgeous day! I took so many photos, but here are my favorites:

     My friend Chloe who lives in Park Slope, Brooklyn invited me for a sleepover. At first I thought, 'Oh dear, how am I going to do this?'. I'm the worst with sleepovers: I get irritable and annoyed with everybody around me when I start to get tired, and I also hear one creek in the floorboards and I immediately assume that the house is haunted. Now, I was going to a sleepover where I couldn't easily call my mom and come home/convince that a ghost wouldn't follow me home. After some thought though, I decided to do it and I am so happy I did. First off, Chloe brought me to the Cat Cafe, which is basically a little store with couches and toys with cats all around who are up for adoption (there is a cafe next door where all the proceeds go to the adoption organization). I love cats with a legit burning passion, so this was heaven (although it was a little overwhelming for me, I must say). If you like cats, seriously pay a visit. I'm pretty positive I'm volunteering there this summer.

   After that we got dinner, did Broadway karaoke (What could be better?), and watched Sherlock while eating fro-yo. Btw, I am now obssessed with that show, it's just so good.
Also, shoutout to Chloe's little sister, Lucy. for not being the annoying litter sister thatI used to be! And of course, thank to Chloe showing me around her neighborhood!💛

     This Wednesday, I had my first musicale on Wednesday. For anyone that doesn't know, a musicale is not the same thing as a musical. Anyway, I am currently in mixed elementary chorus where we have been diligently working on our pieces we've been given. Some of them were quite hard (*cough* Laetatus Sum) and some of them got us all dancing (Dubula and Shout Glory). In the beginning of the year, I wasn't excited at all about being in a chorus. It just seemed so pointless to me. Little did I know that it would teach me new repertoire, how to work well with other singers, and it forced me to practice my sight reading. The most important thing it has done, is that it created a community. I am so thankful for the oppurtunities that this school has brought me, especially chorus. At first I didn't think we did very good after the performance, (even though we had so much energy from being on stage, I couldn't possibly feel upset), but after watching the video's, I thought we sounded pretty good. The support we got from the other choruses and the whole audience really put a smile on my face. Girls chorus cheered for us like no tomorrow and gave us standing ovations. (Which means a lot, considering they're set was fricken awesome. Definitely try to find a video of it). The musicale was so much fun and a great introduction to the LaGuardia stage. 
​If anyone wants to see the set, here are some videos my mom took.