OH MY GOSH! THIS YEAR! This year has been by FAR my favorite, and I know I say that every year, but that's the best part! That just means that my years keep getting better and better, which of course only means you already KNOW how excited I'm getting for 2019! BUT today instead of looking ahead to the new year, we are going to take a little trip down memory lane on how fabulous this past year has been!! Let's go!
In January I started the year off right, with celebration! My birthday is obviously the same day every year... soooo... this will never change, but it is ALWAYS a good time! This year I turned 20, which made me, a REAL adult, and let me tell you, adulting? HARD! Check out my birthday vlog below!
At this point I'm in the thick of things at SCAD in Savannah, working hard and hardly working at the same time. Who ever said multitasking wasn't a talent?! The highlight of this month though for SURE was my trip to Atlanta to see Lana Del Rey (+murals)! This trip was both a disaster and an amazing time, Lana and good avocado toast making it amazing, and literally everything else making it a disaster... That's what happens when you book the sketchiest hotel in the world, get a HORRIBLE speeding ticket, and get claustrophobic and have a little stress attack at the concert. Disasters make memories though, right? Right!
March started out with my first ever trip to DISNEY! It was absolutely AMAZING! We went to celebrate John's birthday. I ate lots of Mickey shaped things, cried at the most incredible fireworks, and had the BEST time! I went when I was really little, but remember NOTHING, so I really treated this as my first time and loved every since second. Check out my vlog!
But March doesn't stop there, towards the end of the month I packed my just barely under 50 pound bags (which ended up getting lost for the first WEEK) and headed to HONG KONG! Where I studied abroad for my spring quarter at SCAD. It was a dream. It honestly doesn't even seem real. I made a second home there and want to go back everyday. Hong Kong, wow, no words for your wonders, no words. BUT! Lots of video ;)
In April, Michele (my bff from Hong Kong) and I took our first trip from Hong Kong to Taiwan!! It was a BLAST! Let me tell you, the food!?!? SO GOOD! Best food I've ever had honestly. We stayed in the weirdest all Hello Kitty themed Airbnb, had one very regrettable meal, and fought off unexpected tourist crowds, but had the best time ever. Wouldn't change it for the world, we had so much fun.
Here I am standing at the top of Taipei 101, one of the worlds tallest buildings with the worlds fastest elevator! Very nice views, however fast elevators up to 100+ floors just means insanely painful ear popping, you can't win them all I guess haha!!
Although my time in Hong Kong came to an end in the beginning of June, lots more was yet to come! The biggest thing in my opinion was my mega rebrand!! All Those Little Things became Olive Barrett after a brief shut down when my domain host said, "hey ya know what, we don't host blogs in Hong Kong, sorry!" *deletes blog* it was really tough! But luckily, in June, once I was back stateside, I brought her back and was better than ever!! Hello Olive Barrett :-)
In addition to that, I spent the week on Hilton Head Island with my best friends! We don't ever get to see each other during the year anymore, and hardly even during the summer, so this was an opportunity that couldn't be missed! We had so much fun!!
(literally everything in this post is me having so much fun, but of course it is, these are the highlights baby, go with it!!!)
(literally everything in this post is me having so much fun, but of course it is, these are the highlights baby, go with it!!!)
Also I had pink hair for like... one HOT second.
That week I got stung by a jellyfish and wanted to die, here I am pouring vinegar on it, because supposedly that helps? I pretended like it did.
In July I headed up north where I shot my first ever wedding!!!
It was SO beautiful, everyone had such a great time, and in my opinion... the photos turned out great, but maybe I'm just biased...
While up there, Matt and I snuck in a trip to New York where we went to Coney Island and ate LOTS of gooooood pasta. A fun weekend with good company :-)
Every August my family heads down to Nags Head, North Carolina for our annual beach trip. This year Ally came which was TOTALLY fun. The week consisted of messing around with the drone, ABBA dance parties, tipsy card games, breaking vegetarianism for crab cakes, and hunting for shooting stars, oh, and the.best.water.park.ever.
Sadly we found out that the owners of the house we rent every year sold the house, which means next year will probably be a little bit different. Here to hoping the best!
September rolled around marking the end of summer, and the start of my junior year. It's mind boggling to me that I'm a junior in college already. What's even weirder? Next year when I'm writing this I'll be a SENIOR! Time flies like no other!
This was my busiest quarter yet. I took on a larger corse load than allowed, and pulled many an all nighter. I briefly had and internship, and did lots of photoshoots. To say I spread myself too thin would be an understatemennnnttttt hahahahaha :'-)
I finally moved off campus into an apartment!! And these are my roommates! From right to left, there I am (obviously), Kate, who studies fibers, Ana, who studies industrial design and accessory design, and Annie, who studies illustration. So John, the same guy from Disney, he is our real roommate, but he was studying in Lacoste this quarter so Annie was the subletter. She was the ideal subletter, a literal dream. Thank you Annie for being the actual best!!!
Randomly, for about a week and a half in October, we got a dog! Her name was Bassy, she was a pitbull mix one year old puppy and was WILD! We loved her with all our hearts, but it was just wayyy too much to handle. Like I said earlier, busiest quarter ever... It was a foster program so she just went back to the previous fosters (who was more than happy to take her) but hopefully she gets her forever home soon :-)
We also threw our first party!!! It was a Halloween party and totally fun! Everyone dressed up and the turn out was actually GREAT! And everyone left for the bars around 1am so there was nooooo commitment. It was perfect.
I didn't have any time really to make any YouTube videos this quarter, so here's the one I made that basically summed everything up.
I didn't have any time really to make any YouTube videos this quarter, so here's the one I made that basically summed everything up.
The quarter ended in early-mid November and I headed home for winter break. The first thing on my list was my good blogger friend, Stephanie's wedding!! This was my first ever solo wedding. One where I'm neither related nor working, just there as a regular guest! Stephanie was an absolutely beautiful bride, and so was everything else to match! Congrats to the new couple <3
Since I had been home for a while, I was ready to shake things up, so natually, I headed to New York!! A group of my friends from SCAD went and we had heeeaaaaps of fun! Christmas in New York is not only cold... but SO lovely.
You can see my NYC montage in this video below :-)
And since I couldn't stay away..... Just this weekend for New Years Eve, Ally and I are in NEW YORK CITY!! AGAIN! So far we are having the best time. I can't wait to celebrate tonight with some shuffleboard and fireworks. We are staying with Ally's sister in Brooklyn and are remaining as far away from Manhattan today as possible. The crowds have already been so crazy, don't even want to imagine what it's like today on New Years Eve!!
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Overall, this year has been incredible, truly incredible. I am grateful, satisfied and full to the brim with joy for what has happened and what is yet to come. Thank you to everyone who made this year as wonderful as it was. I owe it to you!
Here's to memories, and cheers to making new ones... startiiinnnngggggggggg, now.
xo, O
These are some random stats from my year... Don't know how I'm beige, but I thought I'd leave it in there bc it's pretty funny...