hardly sid vicious.

i've always thought it to be the most romantic question.

and plus, it's just comforting to know that summer and tom are still friends.

their dozens of music projects are all one big huge cute overload.

and i love that they're best friends.
if i'm being honest, j. gordon levitt had me at angels in the outfield.

...

 [ happy new year! ]

from george bailey, esther smith, kevin mccallister, and the rest of the gang here in christmasland...

i spent this glorious holiday skyping my brothers in far away lands, playing with babies, sending business calls from st. nick, himself, eating european gummies via my christmas stocking, and commandeering my dad's new christmas toy: the imac...

i wish you the merriest, the merriest. 

*oh, and also.*
i re-found rollercoaster tycoon while looking for it's a wonderful life last night.
admittedly, and to my mother's dismay, i cannot stop playing.
christmas brings out the child inside of me, what can i say?

guess what.

i like sad movies, quiet boys, and red velvet cake.

the u.s. postal service has my heart, along with jimmy stewart and nineteenth century british literature.

oh.

and also,

i am twenty years old today.

...a fact i am particularly fond of.

who is taylor swift?

i've heard that she sings the songs of life.

and i don't know about you...

but i've never loved a boy named stephen,

never dreamed of crashing a wedding,

and i'm just saying... if i had taylor lautner at my fingertips, you'd better believe that i'd keep him there.

plus, i'm completely disgusted by cliches.

overall, taylor and i are not the best of friends.

however.

there is one girl who has seen me through it all.

and basically, she writes everything that my brain has thought once before.

ingrid just gets me.

maybe you should just watch this... it blew my mind.

 

[and yes. i realize that this is a cover. but it doesn't change the fact that i'm in love with it.]

sepia is for sunday.

 during christmas break,

i often find myself with her.

and usually, you can find us stalking the neighborhood.

[read: our friends' houses... even when they don't live there, colonial mansions that we envy... anywhere with kick-A christmas lights, really.]

and then, somehow, tonight we wound up on ptarmigan gate road, as we sometimes do.

[home of late night AP US history study parties, shrimp coctail nights, thumbtanic, back to school parties... you know, paco's house.]

wondering...

what on earth happened to the bus...?

oh, the beloved bus.

i love being home.

and remembering stuff like the bus.

and i love christmas break.

and pictures that mckenzie takes. even when she can't quite aim right.

like this one: 

long live the next three weeks.

[birthday countdown: 2 decades in 3 days!]

just so you know,

for you, i'd give up sour candy all together.

i started to write that i'd give up sarcasm, but then i realized that you probably think that's silly too.
the statement alone is a tad over dramatic, and completely unrealistic. don't you agree?
i'm glad we're on the same page, love.

with a sweet pea on top,
your candy girl.

p.s.
this is a face that i make for people. but only when i think they're especially cool. consider yourself ice cold, lover.

3 or 4 times a week,

this mysteriously pops up on my cell phone, begging me to call the number.

and it's the worst.

what did one roommate christmas say to the other roommate christmas?

 it said, 

"here are some presents."

...

anyway...

it was christmas up in huuuuurrrr... in the H101!

not only did we exchange cool things,

but my cool friend, lexi magically became my roommate! 

it's a christmas miracle!

[she hates when i call her lexi... bahahaha!]

in other news,

our bathroom door locks from the outside. 

so occasionally, after one gets out of the shower, two try to lock the other in the bathroom. 

it is weird. but also hysterical. and childish... but still funny.

however, tonight, we accidentally locked melodey out of her room altogether. 

and had to ask our trusty home teacher to pick the lock.

but instead, he just took the door off of its hinges.

...which... also works...

anyway. 

i'll leave you with this christmas treat:

christmas party. friday night: ugly sweaters, mom bangs, tacky mistletoe kissing.

probably, it was the best.

...but only for two reasons:

1. mips and i showed up wearing the exact same thing. completely on accident. serious!

2. we played a tri-player, two hour game of kiss kill marry.  

[with that boy there in the back. who i may or may not think is tres adorable. i don't know...]

see you suckers later!

she wore the dress, and i stayed home.

so,

last week was kind of the week from hell.

but luckily, i have the two best sisters in the entire world.

and they were kind of angels.

midway through the week, mid-break down, i called my julie-sister, and she calmed me down.

and made me miss her.

and yesterday, 

while in the middle of studying... and stressing...

a surprise visitor showed up on my doorstep! all the way from the slc!

amy-sister pulled one over on me. how she did that, i'll never know.

we had a chat on my bed,

and then she took me to get an oil change. minutes before my car almost exploded, i'm sure.

[just kidding, dad. i'm not thaaaat irresponsible.] 

my big sisters deserve the world.

they put up with their kid sister like nobody's biz. 

and i love that about them.

 

brothers are wonderful, parents, phenomenal.

but there's just something about sisters.

and mine happen to be the best ever.

[p.s. i took two finals this morning... back to back. most grueling 4 hours of my life. long live the carpel tunnel. stay in bed for the rest of the day? don't mind if i do.]

[p.PPPP.s. ... birthday countdown? 10 days. what it is.]

yet another ecard that relates to you... more than likely...

ahhhh, the curses of dead week:

campus gets absurdly quiet, the library is suddenly a place you wish you weren't spending your time,

and the neighbors want to hang out. all the time.

what a weird, weird week.

p.s. 

requiem on water.

imperial mammoth.

not only an ingenious intermingling of soft harmony,

but also made with words that roll through my mind like melted butter.

captivating words kind of weaken my knees.

"brooklyn doesn't scare us... it's spot conlan who makes us a little noi-vous..."

any jack kelly fans out there?
me. i am.
that is correct.
i regularly feed my childhood love for him.
love me some jack kelly.
...okay, christian bale.
so earlier today, i might have been super obsessed with him.
i blame it on his willingness to support a union as well as that uncanny new york accent.
and in my obsession,
i stumbled upon these...
which one of them is
A: drool worthy
and the other
B: leaves you thinking, wtf.

indulge in a little jack kelly every once in a while. it's good for the soul. i'm actually pretty sure he is part of my soul by now.

because sometimes you just need some pretzel m&ms, and a 45 minute chat with your best friend.

indeed, i did tonight. the stress was just enough to make me want to sob. but I did the smarter thing, and sat in the walmart parking lot for almost an hour, and poured out my secrets to the girl who knows me best. and do you know, she just listened. that's why she is my best friend. and the stress has diminished substantially.

i hope you have a kenzie in your life.

so what.

do you know what i miss?

those 14 days of heaven back in may.
the travel days, my favorite kind.
spending nine hours on a plane.
stepping off the jetway, and into heath-row...
the best feeling ever.
i didn't care about the state of my hair,
or the makeup on my face.

that's the best thing about the travel bug.
it satisfies you with throwing wet hair into a bun on the top of your head,
slapping on the closest pair of walking shoes,
and lets you run fearlessly around england as fast as your legs will allow.

i've never needed anything but the sky.
a sky so long, and a world so wide.
to teach me about the elgin marbles.
one that lets me brush my fingers along westminster's pews,
and reminds me that it's sometimes okay to kiss the floor.

so what if my grades are mediocre and pocket change is scarce.
i've seen the world, and i know that it's there.

[if you could excuse the awkward kardashian-fab pose that i somehow thought was okay, that would be great.]

weirdos like me.

it started here. when paulie bleeker was totally boss.

 

then, it matured here when he melted my paper heart.

[p.s. ... recognize anybody else in this picture...?

"i'm nick miller. i'm so cool, i make my cool face!"]

and then i accidentally ended up in the wrong theater.

...where i stayed for the next hour and a half. laughing like a fool.

best mistake ever...

of course, i do love me some george michael bluth.

baby fat and all...

 

and i just plain adored him when i made this connection:

from ingenious comedy to the identical jawline.

 i'm friends with michael cera.

carter, buddy?

i think you're totally boss.

keep breathing.

this post is dedicated to my dear, sweet, [wildly inappropriate], hilarious, germophobe best friend.

...also known as "skinny little white boy".

it has been one psycho year, i'll tell you that much. 

probably the hardest of my life.

it is bizarre, and increasingly surprising.

i have missed those offensive jokes, and the way he yells "ROLL OUT! i'm not stopping the car..." when he drops me off in my cul-de-sac... [that little punk...]

and i can't wait to see him again.

in just 365 days! 

so, in honor of this blessed day, i made some cupcakes and threw a bash.

and on this, the first day of december, i'd like to say...

HAPPY FIRST YEAR, ELDER DAW!

i still miss you like crazy.

see you soon!

love, court.

[p.s.]
i got an interview with the BYU CES employment office to be a counselor at EFY this summer! holla! it's like fulfilling a lifelong dream. love it!

what happens when aunt courtney comes to town?

keyboarding sessions and lipstick kiss marks on that oliver grey cheek. 

clearly, i'm the favorite aunt.

don't mess with texas.

flying standby out of texas isn't exactly easy as pie... which by the way, i've been eating a lot of.

but, while sitting in the terminal for hours at a time doesn't really float my boat, i much prefer it over school. so here i'll sit with netflix and my bag of sand watermelon drops, cleaning out my iTunes.

hey fools.

while my vacation isn't over for another 48 hours,

here are a ridiculous amount of pictures.

none of that even made sense.

but i don't really care...

the sweetest hearts: olli g, and little miss taytum tots.

 gaming. we should get a medal for our gaming, no?

...and herbas with the mountain dew. really, primo?

 there were ten pies. made from scratch. minus the pumpkin. because it is a sin in this family to pass up a costco pumpkin pie.

maizey and taggerson. the most opposite dogs on earth are also the best of friends.

some authentic texas barbecue... praises be to the pork rib gods, and hard 8 bbq.

heyyyyy, julie sister. i like your terrorist hat.

 the blueberry-eyed baby, snickers, the suffocating elf on the shelf, and a baby cousin all grown up.

that last photo collage was completely random...

i apologize?

w/e.

thanksgiving has been good to me.

reeeal good.

thanks, teJas.

love you forever.

texas bound, yo!

...the land where my name changes to kiks, aunt kiki, and squirt.

hallelujah.

i am beyond ready to spend some q.t. with my big, loud, hysterically inappropriate, and most favorite family.

i will watch the family stone tonight to prepare. it only seems appropriate.

see you kearnsies mañana!

just saying.

in the midst of scrubbing my bathroom last night (and while googling "how to snake your drain" because i'm hard core...), my sweet cousin asked me to take a break.

and then she turned me into a geisha.

it's cool. i'm pretty professional when it comes to retaliation.

have a niiiiiice friday. mine has already been filled with the most delightful of surprises: fools who don't do their homework, and teach the class that st. peter's basilica is a byzantine phenomenon. wrong on one hundred levels. i was so embarrassed for her. group projects are the worst...

loves!

i slept through my alarm.

i never do that, honest.

a little miss-higgs for your afternoon/my morning.

[hap, hap, happy thursday, ya'll.]

post script:

have you bought this yet?
i have.
get on it.

an awkward mess.

that awkward moment when your cousin and her date are in the loft watching newsies and you decide that sitting in the dark kitchen beneath them trying to listen to the movie is less creepy than joining their snuggle fest.

that awkward moment when you realize that you've just written a run-on sentence.

that awkward moment when you know spot collins is on screen without actually seeing said screen.

that awkward moment when you're more jealous that melodey is watching newsies than the fact that melodey is on a date.

that suuuuper awkward moment when said date walks into the dark kitchen unannounced and asks why you're hanging out by yourself with the lights off...

that awkward moment when all you say is, "i just wanted to be alone."

...

that awkward moment when he silently raises his eyebrows and goes back up the stairs.

crap.

i'm your person.

emily matis, you are the yang to my grey.

...

love and miss you like mad.

secret is out.

i guess you could say that i love him. 

yes, i really really do.

so much so that i googled him for like... an hour and a half.

maybe more.

i like to think that if we were neighbors, we would borrow sugar from each other.

and cuddle sometimes.

[vanderbilt heir, visited burma as a 23 year old, worked for abc and cnn, friends with ellen... the man has got it all...]

i'm a walking anderson cooper encyclopedia, yo.

and then someone made this for me.

which i might frame.

just kidding, that would be creepy.

...but probably worth it.

he looks like he's not having a good time, but he is.

i am a good time, dangit!

and do you know something?

i have a mad obsession with him.
and when he wears black wide rim glasses, i think i'd rather watch the news than do anything else at all. 

i don't know if it's the pale skin, white hair, or the fact that he is a well seasoned highly educated contributor of society,

but he gets me.

e'ry time.
google him. it will change your life.

if i kiss you where it's sore.

i'm pretty sure this research paper rescued me.

it's amazing, the clarity that comes from reading.

because at the end of the day,

my heart still belongs to my education;

i am in so much love with art history.

title love, my girl, regina.

do you know those days

where you try to rip your hair out because you think it might solve all of your problems?

but then you remember that, no, breathing will. 

so then you do that. 

and then you scream.

then, you take two more deep breaths to counteract the irrational outburst of your rage,

and pretend that louis armstrong serenades well wishes your way from heaven.

well, i'm having one of those days today. 

scratch that, week. 

i'm having one of those weeks.

my friends are just funnier than yours...

in my inbox this morning, i had seven emails from elder monson.

seven of the most hilarious emails i have ever read in my entire life.

if you don't know carter, or if you think you know carter but really don't, you're missing out.

if it's possible, i think his mission is making him funnier.

proof:

and then there are these two pictures...

which

A: help me to remember that he really is on a mission, and not just randomly existing somewhere in the cosmos...

and
B: make me wonder where baby carter went... how handsome is he, right?! he's adorable.

we're almost to the one year mark!

h.a.g.m.

[have a good monday.]

i am authentically irish and french. thanks to these beautiful people.

it's probably because i came home with cary grant's comedy collection last night. 

[8$ at hastings... 4 disks, and a shiny case. i wasn't strong enough to pass it up.]

and i can probably blame it on the fact that penny serenade is my newest favorite cary grant film.

and it is also majorly due to the fact that i'm pretty sure my soul is from 1920.

[and it could have something to do me being confined to a bed all weekend...]

...

buuuuut... i found little leaves of my family tree that i adore.

blasts from the past, if you will.

via: my sweet southern bell aunt barb.

enjoy!

 

 my grandmother, mary louise on the right. she is the classiest lady. and a sassy red head!

my grandparents in the middle, and great grandparents on either side.

john kearns is an exact copy of william kearns. and ben kearns, the third generation clone! i loooove it.

after the rescue of my grandfather's plane crash on antarctica, c.a. 1946. stranded for two weeks, surviving on peanut butter and boiled water... my family history is seriously the coolest.

the most handsome devil you ever did see.

that bow-tie, seriously? dad, you're adorable.

my gorgeous aunt barb. is this picture not stunning?!

she is such a dish!

she's my claim to fame :).

i call her aunt barb, but maybe you know her as nina from all my children. 

need a refresher?

 oh, the amnesia.

...

family history. i'm obsessed with it tonight.

you belong to me.

so i just did a super cool thing... and made this. i'm not really sure how it got posted here... it must have been the result of a few crazy buttons that i pushed. and i'd own this entire thing. if i could ever afford christian louboutins. and i of course named this particular ensemble after my favorite dean martin song.
of course, of course.

anyway, polyvore is my new favorite waste of time.