May Monthly Round-Up

Today I want to start the tradition of publishing a monthly round-up blog post at the end of each month. I’ve seen other bloggers do these weekly and monthly recap posts (especially Styled by McKenz—if you don’t follow her, you should!), and I love the journal-like vibe of them. Not to mention, I’m not the best at setting short-term goals. I always have the big ideas swirling in my head but have a much harder time breaking them down to smaller, more manageable chunks and timeframes. Hopefully these monthly posts help me do just that, as well as allow me to share what has inspired, entertained, and interested me during this past month. Here we go!

I’m not sure what categories I want to include in these round-up posts yet, so bear with me these first few months as I find a format to my liking. Naturally, outfits/fashion has to be the first category!

Fashion

I’ve been doing my best to get dressed every day (as I discussed and advocated for in this blog post), but I admit that there have been several times I just wear a t-shirt and athletic shorts all day. And let’s be real, I never get dressed on the weekends to begin with, even pre-quarantine, so that hasn’t changed. BUT when I do get dressed, it always boosts my mood and makes me excited to put together a cute outfit. The weather finally jumped from 60s overcast days to 80 and 90 degree weather in the last week and a half, so I have been living in shorts and lightweight tops. I think my favorite outfit this month had to be my black mock-neck tank and elephant print skirt (you can find the look near the end of my OOTD highlight), which will be featured in a blog post next Thursday!

Favorite Purchase

In terms of purchases, I tried to resist the temptation to spend money this past month, and I did a dang good job, if I do say so myself. The only thing I got are the insanely stylish red snakeskin sandals I’m wearing in today’s outfit. I’m not usually a huge fan of snakeskin print, but something about these shoes were just too cute to resist. Oh, and did I mention the heel is the perfect height? It’s a great shoe for summer and definitely acts as a neutral. My mom bought the same pair so we could twin, but sadly they didn’t fit her! You can buy them here.

Hair and Beauty

I don’t usually wear makeup on a good day, let alone in quarantine, unless I plan on doing a photoshoot. So in today’s post, and for my Princess Leia costume at the beginning of the month, I used this amazing brown pencil eyeliner that my second cousin gave me. Usually I’m a black liquid liner kind of gal, but I’ve really been loving the softness and boho look of a brown pencil liner instead. Seems more summer appropriate! (Coming from your certified beauty guru—that is sarcasm, in case you couldn’t tell.)

Books, Movies, and TV Shows

To be honest, I haven’t been a big reader since probably sophomore year of high school. Don’t get me wrong, I love to read, but when you read pages upon pages of textbooks and academic articles all day for class? More reading is the last thing I want to do as my break. Excuses excuses, I know. So while I haven’t done much non-academic reading this month (although, this interactive article is a fascinating read about the 2019 Australian bushfires and climate change’s role in the fires), I hope these monthly posts guilt me into making more time for reading. Oh, and since my summer will finally start in two weeks, hopefully that will allow more time for reading, too!

TV and movies, on the other hand… I watched a lot this month. My number one recommendation, by far, is Hunt for the Wilderpeople, available to stream on Hulu (and possibly other places too). I had never heard of the 2016 film before and knew nothing about it, but it was so funny and heartwarming—an absolute treasure during these times. I can’t recommend it enough!

Other things I watched were the movie Booksmart (hilarious, hit a little close to home though lol), the Netflix show “Never Have I Ever” (definitely for a young audience but I enjoyed it nonetheless), the Netflix show “Outer Banks” (think ‘steamy teen-drama version of National Treasure’), and the Amazon Prime show “Tales from the Loop” (a better version of “Black Mirror”, in my opinion).

Huh, clearly I need to do a lot less watching and a lot more, oh I don’t know, anything else. Eeek.

This Month’s Quote

I don’t usually pick a monthly quote/mantra to live by, but this past month I did, and it was the following: “Hope is not a strategy.” With all of the uncertainty and cancellations brought about by the coronavirus pandemic, I have slowly been learning to adapt and prepare for all scenarios, even when they are not the outcomes for which I am hoping. So far this practice has been serving me well, and I plan to continue hoping, while also preparing, as we enter June.

My Goals for June

I have been spending a lot of time lately contemplating my blog and in what direction I want to take it. While I’m still working on creating an actionable plan to carry out whatever changes I decide to make, I know I want to spend the month of June working diligently on growing my blog and creating the best content possible. As such, I’m going to start small! My only two goals for the month of June are to A) Grow my Instagram account from my current 794 followers to 830 followers, and B) Grow my blog following to 400 (I currently have 386 subscribers). To be honest, I have no idea if these goals are manageable (like I said—I’m bad at the small goal-making), but they seem like a good place to start. So my biggest plan of action for the month of June is to ENGAGE ENGAGE ENGAGE! I know this is my weak spot as a blogger, so I plan to dedicate more of my time this month to reading, commenting, pinning, and otherwise interacting with others’ content. What specific goals have YOU set for June?

Lastly, I saw Styled by McKenz do this and I think it’s absolutely genius. I’m going to share some of my favorite posts from May in each of the years I’ve been blogging!

This Month in 2019: Why Photoshoots Are Good for the Soul // Blogging Life: Behind the Scenes // Getting Graphic: How to Style a Graphic Tee

This Month in 2018: How to Rock a Bold Lip // New Year, Still New You? // It’s Not Me, It’s You // My First Tailoring Experience // From Proper to Party: One Dress for Day and Night

This Month in 2017: Adding Some Edge // Work Dress for the Win // Red // A Unique Party Outfit

As you may recall from this post or Instagram, my family and I made it a goal to do one fun or interesting thing each day in the month of May. It was definitely difficult, but we managed to complete our 31 days of quarantivities, even though our activities had to become virtual by the end due to some traveling of family members. While the virtual events were obviously less fun than some of the crazy in-person activities we brainstormed (I mean, what can beat the Chin and the Chinettes?), we never gave up on our fun, and the process was definitely worth the daily dose of stress relief that it provided. I know I promised a second blog post outlining the second half of our activities, but considering that most of them were online (and thus lacking of photos) I’ve decided to update the original My May Quarantivities blog post instead. Be sure to check out the updated post to see what activities we did the second half of the month!

I would be lying if I said May was a walk in the park. For obvious reasons, it has been a very stressful month and ultimately ended as such. BUT that is not to say that May didn’t still have some extremely fun, memorable moments worth celebrating. I look forward to the fresh start of June and for my summer break to finally begin!

Thanks so much for stopping by the blog today, and I hope you love this jungle-inspired outfit as much as I do. Is it poor form to mix leopard with snakeskin and elephant? I just have all the animal inspo happening today!

 

Miles of smiles,

Grace

 

Leopard Dress: JCPenney, $11 // Red Snakeskin Shoes: DSW, $25 // Brown Belt: Cabi, $76 // Black Elephant Purse: Francesca’s, $20