Tag: american eagle

August 17, 2018 – Club Hes (OOTD #349)

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Up next in Meilin’s collection of glamorous photo shoot locations: the thirteenth floor of Notre Dame’s Hesburgh Library!

Now that my parents are gone and they’ve stranded me in the middle of a Northern Indiana cornfield (gotta love South Bend), my photo locations are more limited. Gone are the days of going to downtown everyday for lunch — even though I only got to do it for two days while my parents were here helping me to move in, I’m going to miss it.

I’ve not quite gotten into the habit of asking my friends to take pictures for me, and besides, a lot of them haven’t moved in yet or otherwise are busy with Welcome Weekend activities or band camp. Since I was on my own, I figured I’d go off to the library and do some work and take some pictures.

I have a mixed relationship with the library. I have some fond memories of going my first semester last year and finding some much-needed solitude and quiet in the upper floors, but I also have some downright miserable memories of feeling isolated and alone late at night. One of the weirdest things is taking a desk somewhere in the upper floors where you can’t see a window, and then emerging in the evening to find that the sun has gone down and everyone’s gone to bed. Time kind of stops from floors seven and up.

Very rarely do I ever get the entire floor of the library to myself. Typically, if I’m in Hesburgh Library — also known as Club Hes — and I’m by myself, it means that it’s some inhumanely late hour of the night, and I may or may not only be there so late because I accidentally took a nap at my desk at some point. But since very few people had moved in yet, and because even those who have had no reason to be studying in the library, I got a coveted window seat all to myself.

So naturally, I put it to good use — as a perfect location for some well-lit selfies.

I think I got some actual work done as well, but it was mostly just photography. That’s work too, right? Sort-of?

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at home in Kentucky. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Top: thrifted

Pants: American Eagle

Scarf: American Eagle

August 11, 2018 – Danville Days (OOTD #343)

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Actually, I guess it was more of a Danville night — I was only around town for dinner.

For those of you who don’t know, Danville’s a small-ish town in Central Kentucky, about an hour south from Lexington, my home. I’ve been a few times, and every time I go, I’m thoroughly impressed by how quiet it is. Take “quiet” with whatever connotation you’d personally like to assign to it: for me though, I find it a bit boring.

In fairness, I went on a Saturday night, and Danville’s not really a Saturday night kind of a place — maybe more of a Sunday morning place, after everyone’s gone to church. We walked around around 7pm, and it was pretty much dead downtown. Perhaps if I’d been there at 11am the next morning, I would have actually gotten to see the little bakeries and coffee shops in operation.

I did get to go into a Goodwill, though, which was a good idea in that I found a cute jacket and a sweater. It’s not really jacket/sweater season but…that never stopped me.

I had dinner with my friend, Amanda’s family, and after that, we drove back to Lexington. On the way back though, we made a brief stop at a little church we saw on the roadside.

There really wasn’t a good reason why we decided to stop at the church: we just thought it looked cute. I know, a little one-room white church in an empty field is hardly a rare sight in Kentucky, but I feel like I never actually stop and look at them, for as many as I pass on the road. It was locked up (and possibly abandoned? Looked pretty dusty in there), but I still got a nice photo or two of it with the sunset in the background. Just feature my work on my own inspirational “Old Kentucky Home” poster, already.

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at home in Kentucky. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Top: Free People

Jeans: American Eagle (thrifted)

July 28, 2018 – High on High Bridge (OOTD #337)

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Look at me, back at it with the Kentucky adventures!

Today’s blog sees Amanda and me in another small Kentucky town, wandering around and trying to find something to do. We had had plans with another friend, but he canceled on us last second, and we had to go figure out what we would do without him. We had already gotten dressed and made ourselves look cute, so we had to actually go out.

We’d had some friends post some pictures at this park called High Bridge in Kentucky, so we decided to pop over there and give it a go. This is what we found.

The daredevil in me wanted to go out and climb onto the bridge and try to get cute pictures, but the practical human being in me who still fears death held me back. When I go, I want to go with flying colors, and I feel like “died while trying to get a good picture for the ‘Gram” would not look good on my death certificate.

Having exhausted the photography opportunities at High Bridge, we decided to drive back to Lexington — but not before happening upon another photography opportunity.

Honestly, I can’t even remember what prompted us to stop in this field. I think it was something about a sign that indicated there was a historical site somewhere down the gravel road. At any rate, we never made it far enough to find whatever historical site there was — we did find this field though, and this pretty sunset.

I’m a sucker for a good field, I don’t know — there’s just something alluring about a big open space under the sky. It’s the most stereotypically Kentucky sight out there, but I like it nonetheless. I complain about Kentucky a lot, but I think I complain about Indiana more. I’ll miss Lexington when I’m back in South Bend.

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at home in Kentucky. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Top: H&M

Jacket: Thrifted

Jeans: American Eagle (thrifted)

July 15, 2018 – Dans le jardin des rêves (OOTD #331)

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I sure hope that French is correct.

Welp, the conference is now over, and I’m on my own in Kathmandu. Or rather, not entirely on my own — I’m with another Notre Dame student who had attended the conference — but we’re relatively alone.

I did London by myself last summer, which was no problem at all. It’s London, it’s not terribly different from the US, and in some ways, it’s even easier to navigate. The Underground is truly a marvel. Kathmandu, on the other hand, is nothing like the US, and quite impossible to navigate.

There are practically no street names. There are no addresses. There are no signs, or traffic lights, or subway systems. You can go on TripAdvisor and look up the biggest tourist attractions, and then ask a taxi to take you there, but it’s not a very good city for independent exploration — you may never be able to make it make back to your hotel!

Anyway, after a long, stiflingly hot taxi ride from Dhulikhel to Kathmandu, dropping off people at the airport and at their various hotels on the way, Allie (the other ND student with me) and I went to our BnB.

Allow me, really quickly, to say, that if you’re in Kathmandu and looking for a relatively inexpensive BnB within walking distance of the tourist district Thamel, Cocina Mitho Chha is an excellent choice. As a social enterprise, it uses its funds to maximize improvements in the social sphere — in this case, by educating underprivileged young people in hospitality skills that will allow them to get jobs in the hotel industry. The food was great, the service was great, its mission is admirable — overall, a lovely experience.

After getting settled in, we decided to go check out something called the Garden of Dreams, which was about a twenty minute walk away from our BnB. That’s where these photos are from. It was a really beautiful, and quiet spot, a nice respite from the chaos of Kathmandu.

Otherwise, we allowed ourselves to have a pretty relaxing day, not rushing around and not pushing ourselves. We did some shopping, had dinner at a bar where they showed the World Cup, and basically just tried to recover, mentally and physically, from the intensity of the conference we’d just spent the last two weeks devoting ourselves to. Or rather, we tried to relax, as much as we could, in an insane and hectic city like Kathmandu.

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my trip to Nepal. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Top: Forever21

Pants: American Eagle

July 8, 2018 – Getting Edgy (OOTD #325)

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I bet my mother about had a heart attack when she saw these photos.

As much as I generally don’t mind heights and don’t mind climbing to the top of slightly sketchy perches, I would not have actually done so if it were actually as dangerous as these photos make it look. While my friends did once tell me I was probably the most likely person they knew to die while trying to get a selfie, I do actually care somewhat for my physical wellbeing.

So rest assured, I’m actually safer here than I look — there’s a ledge not far below the rock I’m sitting atop, and then the cliff below. It was still pretty scary looking down though.

So why am sitting on a rock in the mountains, seemingly perched on the edge of the Kathmandu Valley? Believe it or not, I did not actually climb all the way up here just for a rock and some pretty views — it was actually a temple to the Hindu goddess Kali that I had in mind.

One of the very first excursions I went on while in Nepal was to the “1000 steps temple,” which I never actually ended up reaching on account of the sun going down and our legs getting tired. Instead, about 250 steps up, we stopped to see to pay a visit to the giant gold Buddha, and then, satisfied with what we had seen, turned around and went back.

This time, we decided to go the rest of the way and finally see what was at the top of those 1000 steps. It was literally about 45 minutes of climbing, but finally, the steps ended and we were greeted with the infamous 1000 steps temple.

And you know what? It was pretty lame. I’ve seen plenty of religious structures so far while I’ve been in Nepal — mosques, stupas, temples, shrines — and pretty much all of them have been exciting experiences for me in one way or another, either because of the architecture of the buildings themselves or the beauty of the rituals performed there.

The Kali temple, however, was no architectural marvel, and there were few people there to actually observe doing anything. In fact, I think the only people we saw there were tourists.

In fairness, we were unable to visit part of the actual structure due to damage that had been caused by a bad earthquake a few years back, so perhaps that would

If the temple itself was relatively uninteresting, the views we saw there at the top of that mountain were the exact opposite. Nepal, and in particular, the Kathmandu Valley, is full of spectacular mountain views. I’m actually surprised I’m not tired of them by now with how often I see them. The sight of the cloudy hills never gets old, though.

June 17, 2018 – Blonder Now (OOTD #304)

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I did it guys! I’m blonde again!

If you’ve been following my hair color adventures, you’ll know that I very recently got a haircut. While I loved the new cut, the color needed a little work still in order to get it to the point that I wanted, so I had to go back to get it touched up.

It took a few days to get booked at the salon again, but I finally did, a little over a week after I first got it done, and let me say — I am very happy with the results!

I’ve been blonde before (see example A and example B), so I guess this isn’t the most radical change I’ve ever done, but I’m nonetheless very excited to be blonde again. It’ll take a little getting used to, especially with figuring out the best wash cycle so as not to dry it out badly, but now that I have nearly 2 years of blondness under my belt, I’m hoping it’ll turn out better this time (read: won’t wind up with my hair getting so damaged that I have to chop it all off)

If you’ve ever done a drastic hair change, you’ll know that sometimes, it can be a little off-putting to see your reflection for the first few times, especially if you’re not expecting it.

Nothing like a few fleeting moments of dissociation to go with a new hairdo, right?

You’ll notice that, once again, it is summer and I am clearly dressed for fall weather. I really tried to just let myself go with the white sundress, but I can’t help it — I love layering, and I love having my arms covered, even in warmer months. I don’t really get it, since I’m happy to leave my legs bare, but for some reason, I’m just a big fan of long sleeves.

Was a turtleneck and a jacket a little excessive? Maybe. But does layering those two pieces along with my sundress make the whole outfit a lot more interesting than if I had just done the plain white dress? You betcha.

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at Notre Dame! Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Jacket: thrifted

Dress: American Eagle

May 19, 2018 – Rooftop Adventures (OOTD #286)

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And I’m back at it again with the parking garage photos.

 

If you’ll remember, a few months back over my spring break, a friend and I attempted to find a particular building in downtown Lexington that had a pretty view of the city. We’d seen it several times in other people’s Instagram photos, so we knew the relative location, but try as we might, we never found it. Now that summer break’s begun, we thought we would have another shot at finding a nice rooftop for fashion photography.

And we were successful! Sort of.

This still isn’t the elusive parking garage rooftop that we saw in so many Instagram posts, but this is a different one that I believe still makes for some good photography. The big building behind us is the University of Kentucky’s library (much nicer than Notre Dame’s in my opinion, even though it doesn’t have a gigantic mural of Jesus on the side of it). It’s not quite the downtown scene we were looking for, but I still thought it was fun.

Once we were up there, I whipped out my handy dandy remote camera feature on my Apple Watch, and we were in business to take some photos of ourselves, even though there was no one there to take them for us. Amanda drove her Prius up to about two feet away from the ledge we stood on, I balanced my phone against my purse atop the roof, and we got these fun shots!

 

Don’t play on rooftops though, kids. It’s dangerous. Do as I say, not as I do.

In actuality, though, this was a much safer set up than the previous parking garage we tried. It was less a ledge and more of an entire platform, so as long as we were careful, we were perfectly fine. I wouldn’t do cartwheels, still, but I felt pretty comfortable.

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oh look, another parking garage

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Plus, there was grass below us instead of concrete, so if we tripped and fell, at least our blood would splatter across the soft grass instead of the hard concrete.

 

As cool as these shots are, I’m still not quite satisfied. I mean, it’s just a library behind us — not the downtown city scene that I saw in so many people’s photos. I guess we shall have to keep searching.

 

It’s alright though. We do have the whole rest of the summer.

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at Notre Dame! Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Jacket: Tobi

Bralette: Aerie

Pants: American Eagle

May 6, 2018 – Notre Dome (OOTD #279)

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More Dome pics!

What’s Notre Dame without the Dome, anyway? Are you even a Notre Dame student if you don’t take an obscene amount of photos in front of Main Building?

I think just about every ND student gets these same shots of their friends and them in front of the Golden Dome at some point. It’s a pretty standard shot; I’m pretty sure a month (maybe even a week) doesn’t go by where I don’t come across some Dome pictures on my feed from some friend or some friend of a friend.

For as many pretty buildings as there are on Notre Dame’s campus, you’d think people would get a little more creative with their cute friend Instagram pics — but they don’t. It’s the Dome or nothing.

I guess my friends and I are no different then — so here are my Dome pics (well, the second set). Call me generic.

I did get some fun shots inside of the math building though in front of this globe, which I
never knew existed because I never went into the math building once because I never had to take a math class (hooray for getting a 5 on AP Calculus!).

Apparently I should have gone into the math building though, because it has this super cool globe room (I have no idea what the architectural term would be for this room — like, a big open foyer with a tall ceiling but in the middle of the building? Is there a word for that?). Apparently all of my friends had seen it already (because they had classes in the math building and so they passed a lot), but like I said, I’d never seen it before.

I got excited to see something new, at any rate, which made me think — how many other cool rooms are there throughout campus that I just haven’t seen because I haven’t had a reason to go into them? I guess that’s a mystery to solve over my next three years.

In the meantime, though, it’s good to be at the end of the school year. Those unseen buildings and rooms shall have to be explored another time.

Anyway, that’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at Notre Dame! Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Shirt: Zara

Dress: American Eagle

March 27, 2018 – Vernal Yearnings (OOTD #255)

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Hey look! You can finally properly see the detail on this shirt!

I’ve worn this blouse before, but unfortunately, last time, the print wasn’t visible in the photographs. The outfit was still cute and all, but I think the line drawing detail really makes this shirt pop, so I’m glad I finally get to show it off.

I can’t wait until the spring flowers finally bloom here at Notre Dame because maybe then, I’ll actually have some colorful backgrounds to use that aren’t walls or doors or paint cabinets . Back in late summer, the flowers were truly lovely — so hopefully come spring (WHENEVER THAT FINALLY ARRIVES HERE IN THE FROZEN TUNDRA OF THE MIDWEST), they’ll be even lovelier.

I seriously can’t believe nothing has bloomed yet here. I expected to have to deal with a harsher winter than I had ever experienced in Kentucky when I moved north, but I didn’t expect tor the winter to last so stupidly long. It’s draining, honestly. I love the cold, but too much of a good thing isn’t good. I just wanna see the sun again.

I have seen a few buds here and there though, and the tulips and daffodils are beginning to sprout. Maybe the flowers are coming in the next few weeks.

Or at least, I hope they come in the next few weeks because I’ve only got a few more weeks left of school! I calculated it the other day, and I’m pretty sure I only have 3.5 more weeks of class, and 5 more weeks until the end of the semester (one week of finals and half a week of reading days making up the difference.) With the pace things have been going though, I’m afraid I’m going to be packing up to go home and there will still be snow on the ground.

Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at Notre Dame! Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Shirt: H&M

Jeans: American Eagle

March 13, 2018 — #Skooled (OOTD #244)

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As much as I resent losing sleep during spring daylight savings, I am a fan of having more hours of daylight in the evenings.

It’s particularly useful for doing photos after dinnertime. It used be, especially in January/February, that I would have to get my OOTD shots done before about 6:00pm or else it was too dark to get natural light at all. Now, I’m good until at least 7:30, which takes a lot of pressure off of me.

When I’m home, like I was in these photos, I like to make my outfits out of articles of clothing that I know I will not have with me while at school, like this coat, sweater, boots, and scarf. I feel badly when my clothes aren’t worn, and I miss the pieces I can’t bring with me to my little wardrobe in my dorm at Notre Dame.

Breaks are a time for me to capitalize on my sleep and free time so I am very appreciative of them.

Though, to be honest, I might actually prefer going to school year-round if it meant my workload was significantly lightened. I’d sacrifice a few weekends and breaks to get rid of homework. It’s been a nuisance since literally kindergarten, and it’s only gotten worse as I’ve gotten older.

I heard one of my friends talking the other day about how she enjoyed exams, how they were like puzzles for her to figure out — and I couldn’t agree less. What kind of person likes exams? Even if you know every answer, and make 100% — which probably hasn’t happened to me since middle school — what’s there to like about the actual process of sitting down and writing out answers so someone else can offer you validation?

As much as I appreciate the education I’ve received so far in my life, I still don’t think I’m really the type of person who likes school. I do alright grades-wise, but I can’t imagine becoming a teacher or a professor and remaining in this system for the rest of my life. I mean, I can’t necessarily say there’s anything better out there in the workforce, since I haven’t gotten there yet, but looking back, I think the most enjoyable moments of my life have happened separate from my education experience.

You never stop learning, of course, but I hope I do get to stop schooling at some point, haha.

Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at Notre Dame! Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Sweater: American Eagle

Boots: Target