Almost Over

I think it's been about two months since my last post. School and work have been super demanding and take up all my time (what is this free time I hear about?), so posting regularly hasn't been much of an option. BUT, I have TWO weeks left in this semester and I honestly couldn't be happier about it. I mean, don't get me wrong I am LOVING school and I am learning so many things I thought I knew already, but boy was I incorrect. Learning about film has been the greatest thing in the world for me. I have fallen head over heels in love with film. My dad told me today that he and my mom have a bunch of unused color 35mm film at their house right now, so I know what I'll be doing this Thanksgiving weekend! We've mainly been working with black and white 120mm film this semester, so it will be nice to try 35mm again (now that I know what i'm doing with it).

Since school is almost over now I will be able to do more posting soon and I'll make sure to scan in my film to post on here as well. Have a lovely Thanksgiving, everyone!

Amour, Le Petit Oiseau XO

Nosilla Vintage

My dad is a pretty cool guy and recently he bought a beautiful piece of Greensboro history. At the end of May, he and my mom purchased a pie slice of building at 500 South Elm Street and what a beaut she is, I tell you what. They (well, us as a family) are extremely fortunate to have such an amazing tenant renting 500 right now and her name is Allison Weldon.

Allison is an all around fantastic human being. Seriously, she's one of the sweetest, most kind-hearted and hard working people I've had the pleasure of meeting. She has been an avid collector of vintage clothing, shoes, jewelry and thingamabobs (and so on and so on) for many years. She has a fantastic Etsy shop and a nice booth in another local store called Design Archives (which has been around for years, it's great go check it out) and this year FINALLY got to open up her very own store. As a partial owner in a store just up the street from her and as a friend I am SO excited to have her here in the South Side. Supporting local is so, so important to me and to our little (but growing) community in Greensboro. It makes my heart incredibly happy to see more and more stores, art galleries and cafés opening up all around us in downtown. It really is a beautiful thing.

Allison's store is small and quaint. She repainted and redid the floors and it just looks plain amazing inside! I made sure to pop-in earlier this week to snap a few pictures and check out some of her new things (bad idea. I wanted EVERYTHING, but my bank account said no for today). If you're in the area, or even passing through, make sure to stop in and check out her great shop, you won't regret it!

Amour. Le Petit Oiseau XO

*Photos taken with my iPhone 5S & edited with VSCOcam*

Blahhhhhhh

Ever have those weeks when you feel like the entire Universe is against you and everything is going to hell in a hand basket? Yeah, it's been one of those weeks for me....

Three weeks ago I started school again and after 2+ years of being out of school, lets just say it's been an adjustment. I'm attending one of the best photography programs in the country and it is kicking my butt so far. Randolph Community College is no joke. Those mutha fukas mean business and won't settled for mediocrity in the slightest. It's terrifying and exciting all at once.

This whole year we will be learning all about medium format film photography, which I am super jazzed about, but they seem to think we are little money trees and that's really annoying. I'm going from a full time 40/hrs a week job* to about 20hrs a week PLUS a 40 minute commute to school 4 days a week. Gas ain't free, y'all.... So, you could say I'm a little more than stressed out about money and my life. Because no matter how shitty it is, money rules everything around us and I hate it, hate it, HATE IT.

I'm trying my best to not break my neck keeping my chin up, but maaaaaaan it's hard some days. All those little crappy moments you have during the week just build up and up until you realize you're on empty and totally crash. It's no fun, but life keeps going even when you're down. I kind of feel a little better now that I've written down some of my anxieties. Sorry that this is a little heavy. I try it keep it light and fluffy on here, but we all have crap days and weeks.

I hope everyone else is having a great week/weekend.


Amour, Le Petit Oiseau XO







*it's actually 2 part time jobs that equal full time. that counts, right?

July 4th Weekend

Oh, America!

I spent the holiday weekend watching fireworks, playing with sparklers, eating hotdogs, ice cream & going to a baseball game with dear friends. Super American things. I hope everyone had a fantastic July 4th weekend!

Amour, Le Petit Oiseau XO

OOTD {series one}

I'm going to start doing the occasional "Outfit of the day" posts on here because it's a blog and that's apparently what they are made for, other than recipes, of course. This week I'm doing a little feature for my amazing friend Amanda of Formation Design Studio in Winston-Salem, NC. Follow her on instagram to see all her awesome creations!

Top: Alternative Apparel Modal Silk Boyfriend Tee
Skirt: StarGazer by Formation Design Studio
Shoes: Jeffery Campbell Black Suede Ankle Strap Wedges
Belt: H&M 
Necklace: Vintage


Amour, Le Petit Oiseau


*Photos taken with my canon 30D & edited with VSCOfilm. Copyright Chelsea Clayton Photography 2014*

PB&M

Today is one of my coworkers last day of work and as we send her off to her new job I figured I'd bake her something. She told me "Peanut butter! Anything with peanut butter!" And naturally I assumed peanut butter cookies would be perfect, but I didn't want them to be boring. Thank you, Naomi, for this lovely peanut butter & marshmallow fluff cookie sammie recipe!

The recipe calls for natural peanut butter and I only had deliciously horrible for you JIF. I headed to my local Whole Foods to get some freshly ground PB and their machine broke while I was using it. Awesome.... One of the employees tired to fix it for me since I only came for the PB. He felt bad that it was "taking so long" and gave me a free JAR of peanut butter for my "troubles and wait time". Now that is customer service, y'all. This recipe only called for a cup of PB, but I ended up using the whole 11oz jar. I wanted it extra peanut buttery.

I really enjoyed making these cookie sandwiches and will probably make them again and again. And the cookies are 100% gluten free and take about 20 minutes start to finish (sans marshmallow fluff), which is awesome if you need a quick cookie fix.

Enjoy!

Amour, Le Petit Oiseau XO

*photos taken with my iPhone 5S and edited with VSCOcam*

Vegan Biscuits

I am a deep lover of biscuits and am always in the lookout for a great biscuit recipe. I stumbled across this one on Pinterest and figured I'd give it try. 3 step biscuits make me happy.

Biscuit are basically my down fall. I could eat, I don't know, 1,000,000.00 at least in one sitting (yes, I'm sorta exaggerating). So, these coconut oil and coconut milk biscuit intrigued me. Much healthier than butter & buttermilk biscuits and just as tasty too!

What you'll need

2 cups Self-Rising Flour

1/4 cup coconut oil melted/room temp

3/4 coconut milk (or any (dairy free) milk of your choice)

Preheat your oven to 425

Pour oil into the flour and hand mix until it forms a crumbed texture. Add milk and stir to combine until the dough is no longer touching the sides of the bowl. Plop dough onto a floured surface and roll out to about 1/2 inch in thickness. Use a biscuit cutter or a drinking glass and cut out biscuits. Place on a slightly greased baking sheet and bake for 10 minutes.

Enjoy!

Amour, Le Petit Oiseau

 *photo taken with my iPhone 5s and edited with VSCO cam*

Weekend in Georgetown

I flew up to Washington, D.C. last weekend to see my best friend graduate from Georgetown University and had a lovely weekend of crêpes, macarons & walking my feet off.

I was lucky to fly with a BuddyPass from US Airways (THANKS SHARON!) because I'm poor (flying standby is so cheap, y'all) and my car was in the shop, so I couldn't drive. But that was a welcomed change since I normally drive 6 hours from my home in Greensboro, NC all the way to DC. Being by yourself for that long gets really boring, so I will probably only fly now. God, I'm spoiled....

Georgetown is absolutely one of the prettiest places I've ever been to. I love the New York & Savannah vibes it has without the Savannah humidity & "Hoity-Toity" aspects of NYC. Not that those are bad things, but they can be tiring.

My first stop after landing and dropping off my things was Baked + Wired, of course.

BEST. FREAKING. CUPCAKES. OF. MY. LIFE.

Seriously though, these cupcakes are amazing and worth your time and money. Don't be fooled by the line at Georgetown Cupcakes (From the TV show DC Cupcakes) or Sprinkles, Baked + Wired is number 1. First of all, these cupcakes are HUGE in the best way possible. They aren't covered with frosting like most places where it's a 3:1 frosting to cake ratio, it's actually normal and perfect. They have vegan options & gluten free too, as well as other goodies and a coffee bar. All the cupcakes have unique names and flavor combinations, so you can't get bored. I tend to get the Uniporns & Rainhos because the name is hilarious. It's just your basic funfetti cupcake with cream cheese frosting topped with more heart shaped sprinkles, but it's the best damn funfetti cupcake you'll ever have! Super moist and perfect. My mouth is watering just thinking about it it's that good! The Flapjack & Elvis Impersonator cupcakes are two that I need to try next time I'm there. The Flapjack is your standard maple brown butter cupcake with caramel frosting and candied bacon sprinkled on top. Looks heavenly. And the Elvis is a banana cupcake with peanut butter frosting with drizzled chocolate on top. You can also ordered it "porked" aka with candied bacon on top. OMG I could talk about cupcakes for forever, so I should probably move on....

We spent the day just walking around on M street & Wisconsin Ave shopping and eating and blah blah blah. It was a beautiful day for that, thank god. But after 7 hours of shopping I was about to drop dead. I am the worst at shopping. I can only handle about an hour of it before I start getting really cranky and/or hangry. Thank god for food or I wouldn't have any friends. 

The next day was El's graduation and for some ungodly reason it was at 8:40 in the morning.... I just barely got showered and ready in time to make it. Oops. But it was a beautiful day and I got to watch my best friend graduate from one of the most prestige universities in the country. I am so, so proud of her!! She graduated with a double major in English & Theatre in 4 years. She's quite impressive. Words truly cannot describe the love I have for her. She has been there for me in my best and worst times and loved me throughout it all. I am so grateful for her friendship and wouldn't have missed her graduating for anything. Friends like her are the reason I still have hope in humanity as a whole. Is that too heavy? Oh well.

It was lovely weekend and for the first time I got to actually see the monuments in DC. I walked around the mall for a couple hours by myself on Monday before my flight home. I've been to DC 6 times and this was the first time I've actually walked around our nations capital. I have a deep love for the American Flag, it's the most (and really only thing other than fireworks, but those are technically Chinese....anywho) patriotic thing about me, and being surrounded by so many flags was delightful. I was oddly giddy about it, to tell you the truth. After I had had my fill of memorials and monuments I hopped on the metro to DuPont Circle and walked into Georgetown (its not a short walk, it's about 1.1 miles or whatever). I found the greatest little French café last time I was in town and HAD to stop in for crêpes before I went home. It was a treat because I'm pretty sure I walked over 4+ miles that day and I "deserved" it. No guilt. Café Bonaparte is a lovely little place and I highly recommend stopping in if you're ever in Georgetown. I haven't had anything but crêpes, but the rest of the food looks to die for, so it must be good.

Well, anyway. Here are a crap ton of pictures from my trip. Enjoy!

Amour, Le Petit Oiseau XO

*All photos taken with my iPhone (unless stated) and edited with VSCOcam*

yummmmmmmm.

 National Cathedral

 Flowers on the grounds at Georgetown.

 my best friend, Ellison Jean Roberts. (taken with my canon 30D)

 The escalators to DuPont Circle

I love finding little slices of Paris.

Banana & Nutella Crêpes pour moi.