legalities

shirt/leggings: borrowed // polka dot shirt: thrifted // shorts: forever 21 // shoes/socks: target // scarf: ASOS
// photos taken by Bekah





It's now legal to start celebrating Christmas! There was a time in my childhood when the holiday season was the greatest season of them all. And it seems that my love of the holidays has only grown with age, because I am extremely excited for Christmas this year. Yesterday a couple of my friends and I went to Portland for the parade, and ended up spending the entire day exploring the city. I hadn't planned on doing it, but I ended up doing a lot of Christmas shopping thanks to the Little Box event put on by several local businesses. It was so much fun being able to go from store to store, looking at all the lovely handmade items, getting free food and drinks, entering tons of raffles, and getting to support local vendors. That's my kind of black friday shopping. It's so great and satisfying to not only be able to get some unique presents that I know my loved ones will love, but also to be able to support the community here in Oregon. All the companies participating in Little Boxes are filled with wonderful people. The event is still going on tomorrow, and after you visit your first "Little Box" participant, you automatically get 10% off all the other places you go to. Then there are raffle drawings at each of the places, and a grand prize drawing for all who submit their "passport" to facebook. So if you're in the Portland area today, I highly suggest you check out this wonderful little community!






I love being able to wander the streets and stores, people-watching and pretending we live in the cute little apartments and overhearing conversations and making some conversations of our own, all while drinking warm coffee and listening to people along the streets playing guitars or cellos or accordions. Portland is seriously one of the most beautiful places. I also finally got to eat my first Voodoo doughnut, and it did not disappoint! I got the Butterfingering, and the Peanut one is still sitting in the box waiting to be devoured. There's also Chinese food in the fridge from Chinatown, many photos stored on my phone from adventures in the MAX, cool store finds in my possession, and hilarious encounters saved to my memory. It was a beautiful day filled with beautiful people.




Have a wonderful day!

Merry Thanksgiving

shirt/cardigan: borrowed // skirt/tights: forever 21 // boots/rings/brooch: gift





Enter my new favorite photo-taking spot. It has beautiful paved roads lined with different species of trees with little plaques telling what type they are and a bit of the history about them. There is even a Sitka Spruce, which is the state tree of Alaska. It reminds me of home. Plus, there are no people ever on the trail, aaaand ...



The cute little deer family lives here! I've seen them around campus several times (you can see them by following the tag #thedeerfamily on instagram), but I'm fairly certain they live in this park since I've seen them there on multiple occasions. They're just so cute! I'm hoping they'll get used to me being around so that I can get a little closer to them and go all snow white and crap, but we'll see.





But anyways, I hope you guys have a really great Thanksgiving! I'm spending it in the apartment with four of my friends. We've gathered our ingredients and today we will be cooking everything. My contributions are homemade macaroni and cheese (of course) and chocolate fudge pie. We also bought cheap wine glasses and sparkling cider, so it's going to be a really fancy night. Even though I don't get to spend Thanksgiving with my family, I'm still pretty excited to eat yummy food and hang out with cool people.

jigsaw falling into place

dress/shirt: borrowed // tights: forever 21 // shoes: target





Sometimes it seems like I can never get ahead in life. Shoots don't work out, I don't get any new clients for months, the rare one I do get backs out, galleries say no, on and on the list goes. One begins to wonder, "Am I good enough? What am I doing wrong? What do I have to do better? Will I ever do anything right?"

I finally broke down a couple nights ago, feeling pretty low and stressed out. Sometimes life is just hard, you know? Things don't always go the way we plan, situations change, people disappoint you. These kinds of things aren't always fun to write about, but the bad things are just as necessary to life as the good things. Sometimes it's okay to cry. And honestly, it's really freeing once you do. It reminds me of my favorite short story, "Eleven" by Sandra Cisneros. It's a story about a girl on her eleventh birthday and is really contemplative and a different look at our age and how people grow up. When you're eleven, you're also ten, and nine, and eight, and so on and so forth. So sometimes five year old you has to come out and cry a little bit. And that's okay. It's good to let go and just cry. But then it's also good to afterwards try to improve. Everything, even the bad things in life, fall into place and provide you with ways of growing as a human being.

For me, I'm trying hard to see that failure is a good thing, and is an opportunity to hone in craft and become a better person all around.




As for my outfit, I wore this several days ago, back when it was bearable to wear short sleeves for an extended period of time. (Now though? Not so much.) I wanted to focus on color and pattern, rather than shape, as it's hard for me to wear loose fitting pieces such as this shirt. It was the perfect lazy day outfit that didn't look too lazy, so I was happy. You know those days. Where you just want to walk around in a blanket? Just wear oversized shirts and you're good to go.




Have a great day!

my week in instagram #63

Getting ready for the Sophomore black and white murder mystery party. I won $50 by correctly guessing the murderer and getting my name pulled out of a hat. // Going on a date with Matt to the Switchfoot concert. Drew threw him his guitar pick at the end of the show. // Receiving my new sketchbook in the mail. I've been drawing in it constantly. // Sketching Thom Yorke. One of my favorite drawings yet! // The best, safest, most wonderful place in the entire world--in your arms. // Building a fort in our apartment! Hilarious telestrations followed. // Finishing up a photoshoot that included glitter, a fog machine, and lots and lots of flour! So excited for the results!

You can follow the adventure on instagram @impulsings.

film friday: lift

This is the longest video I've posted for the film friday series, but I promise you it is worth the watch.

The description of the film is as follows:

"Filmmaker Marc Isaacs sets himself up in a London tower block lift. The residents come to trust him and reveal the things that matter to them creating a humorous and moving portrait of a vertical community."

It's a film kind of about a man who sits in an elevator and interviews people. But it is mostly about human life, the beauty of it, its tragedies and hardships, its happinesses. You will walk away from this film feeling really thankful and blessed to be a part of the human race.

Have a wonderful weekend.

take me out

shirt/skirt: thrifted // tights/hat: forever 21 // shoes: target // jacket: from a friend





Thanks to my drawing class, I've started to get on a huge drawing kick, which I am really happy about because I used to sketch a lot a few years ago, but then for one reason or another I quit. And now that I'm finally learning how to draw properly, I've been obsessed with sketching random things. Poor Matt is going to be swamped with drawings I give to him. Thankfully, I recently won a $50 gift card for correctly guessing the killer in a murder mystery party, so I spent the first fifth of it on a brand new sketchbook to draw everything on the planet. Then Matt will have relief.

But in all seriousness, I'm thankful that this hobby has been reincarnated.





Also, here's an outfit with never-worn-enough thrifted clothes.

Have a wonderful Wednesday!

november sun

denim shirt: ebay // lace shirt: borrowed // dress/belt: target // leggings: forever 21




Hello all! I'm blogging to you now from a coffee shop. It's cold outside and raining, but the hot chocolate beside me is yummy and warm and the guy sitting across from me is as handsome as ever. It's the end of a hectic week as usual, but we have plans to go to a concert tonight and it's going to be a relaxing two days until we start the routine over again. Life is busy and sometimes stressful, but it's good. Oh so good. Despite stressful and hard situations, I can't help but smile at the beauty of life. Even though things don't always go the way I plan them to, everything has a way of being okay in the end, and I am happy.

my week in instagram #62

This is over the span of two weeks since I forgot to post anything last Sunday.

1. Took some photobooth photos for my school. It was actually pretty easy and fun to hang out with so many students!
2. Dressed up as a zebra at the last minute for Halloween! I'm dreaming up big ideas for next year's Halloween though.
3. Late night food runs with Matt. I may be getting fat from all the fast food, but I love getting to spend time with him.
4. Took a tour of the largest photography studio on the West coast. Please let me work here!
5. Went on a photo adventure and modeled for my friend. Can't wait to see the results of it!
6. Was published in the November issue of Clubhouse Junior Magazine! I took these photos over the beginning of the summer and had to keep it a secret, but I'm really excited to finally be able to tell people about it. My mom is sending me a copy of it so I'll make a proper post when that arrives.
7. Had a little GNO and ate sushi for the first time. It's definitely an acquired taste that I have not acquired yet. But I did really enjoy the mushroom wrapped in salmon (?) with fried batter around it (or at least it was some sort of batter thing). That was delicious!

Other things that happened:

I took photos of the soccer teams for the yearbook. It was a totally new experience that I was really nervous for, but it ended up being pretty awesome! This week I'm gonna try to take our new football team's group photo ... wish little Lauren luck while she's surrounded by big football type people!

Discovered the game Plague Inc.. I finally successfully killed the entire human race with Stupidity! (That was the name of my disease, hehe.)

Played spy games and mafia with the guys on our floor again! Twas an incredibly fun evening. It is always the highlight of my week.

And yesterday I got to spend all day with Matt, just chilling out, watching youtube videos, talking with each other, and getting to do a skype AMA with his friends from his old college. Sooo much fun.

And of course I watched the latest episode of Top Model. Uuuuuugh why do they always make us wait until the next week? I'm seriously dying over here. Also the last Korra episode was spot on. The writers are seriously doing an awesome job adding more elements of the spirit world into the series, which makes me happy.


Hope you had a really super awesome week as well.

film friday: "Lighthouse Keeper" speed edit

"Lighthouse Keeper" Speed Edit from Lauren Parker on Vimeo.

final image:



Here's the latest image from my art retreat weekend, plus a speed edit video for this week's film friday. I always enjoy when photographers post these types of videos. It's interesting to see the process (or when they mess up like me and can't actually edit out pieces of clothing, haha), especially if it's different from how you do it.

Have a wonderful weekend!

I'm walking on sunshine

dress/tights: forever 21 // shirt/cardigan/shoes: thrifted // jacket: from a friend // glasses: firmoo.com




The purple hair is back! Thank goodness too. I didn't realize how much I missed it until my hair became purple again. It may be absolutely ridiculous to have purple hair, but I think it's fun and just my style, and what better time to do it in life than in college? (Though, who's to say I can't have it when I'm older?) I've worn an outfit similar to this one in the past, but I love the way the blue in the shirt sort of matches my hair, and the yellow contrasts it nicely. It's fun to see how clothes look with purple hair as opposed to brown hair. Though I am a firm believer that nearly all colors go together, some go better than others and I like awesome color combinations with purple. Yellow seems to be working pretty good here!




I also really wanted to match with my surroundings, so I found some yellow trees and took these photos. Of course, being right next to a fairly active street isn't very fun. I actually had one guy honk his horn while his buddy waved to me as they drove by. Kind of creepy, and in my shock I did nothing but wave back. The scene in my head, of Lauren with fear in her eyes just waving in front of the camera, is really funny now, but man was it weird when it happened. Oh the things we do for a good background.




Well, I hope you have a really wonderful day! Despite the title of this post, there's a ton of rain scheduled, but I'm gonna make the most of it. It's gonna be a good day.