The Harbor

Plaid blazer, Groovy's in Rockwall. Led Zeppelin tee shirt, vintage from my step dad. Jeans, imogene + willie Imogene slims. Vintage Cole Haan loafers, thrifted. Sunglasses, TJ Maxx.
     My favorite thing to do is to scamper along the rocks of a shoreline, any shoreline. Fortunately, where my parents live in Rockwall features quite an impressive manmade lake/resoirvoir and a shoreline to match. It makes for fantastic viewing of sunsets and even the Dallas skyline from 30 miles away. I feel like these pictures almost look like they were taken in the middle of nowhere, but nope. They were taken right down the road from my parents home, in front of the local movie theatre. I apologize for the copious amount of pictures here. I just really couldn't decide which ones best suited the purpose. The mood that day was so great, that it is impossible to say for me a favorite. I certainly hope you feel the same!

Let's Go

     I'm making the final arrangements for my international trip to the UK and Ireland. We're stopping in London, Liverpool, Belfast, and Dublin. It's crazy that the second day of 2014 is going to be spent flying halfway across the world on my first international trip. That being said, I've decided to forgo almost all forms of social media. I'm not bringing my computer, but I will have several outfit posts scheduled while I'm gone and will be able to check emails. You can still access my posts from Twitter and Facebook if that it how you normally follow my blog, but I won't be posting anything other than scheduled links and pictures on Instagram. If you'd like to follow my daily adventures, feel free to follow me: trippplethread. I'm excited for my big adventure!

Unseasonable

Open cardigan, Francesca's (similar available) BDG Hi Rise jeans in black, Urban Outfitters. "Alabama 12" over the knee boots, Lulu's (similar here). Bradley Hathaway tee shirt. Vintage Dooney & Bourke purse.

    A few weeks ago, the weather hadn't quite turned nasty. Although the night before I took these pictures was rainy, it was sunny and hovering around seventy the day I took these pictures. Weather goes back and forth so often in Tennessee that it doesn't really feel like winter until January. And I'm typing this from my parents' house in Texas, where it is supposed to be in the 60s all week. I'm not complaining. 

     This outfit represents where my style has been headed lately. I no longer think that in order to feel dressed up I have to be wearing well...a dress. I've felt that way for quite some time, but it's really starting to hit home. I like to think that it's my tomboy roots coming back out. A girl can only handle so many peter pan collars and floral prints until she just wants to get something dirty. I joked on a cross country trip that sometimes I just like to dress like a thirteen year old hipster boy- band tees, beanies, skinny jeans, and Converse. The zeitgeist seemed to fall this way after Cara Delevigne rose to superstar status, but I'm not complaining too much.

     The black and white preset from VSCO seemed to fit my mood for these pictures. I'll admit that I spent a lot longer than I should have playing around with my self timer remote to take some moody self portraits of myself, but I thought I'd spare you the extra selfies. Sometimes a girl just feels like she looks good....and possibly even better in black and white.

    

The Importance of Female Friends (+ road trip!)

From left to right: Me, Emma, Alysse, Betsy, and Ari

     With a lot of young women, it is tempting to dismiss being friends with other women. "Oh, I just don't get along with other girls," they'll say. I understand this tendency, being largely more comfortable with guys as well as exhibiting several personality traits that are traditionally seen as "masculine". However, I'm here to say that this sentiment is a mistake. The beautiful young women that you see in the picture above are my best friends. 

     The four of us on the right recently took a short trip to see my roommate from the last two years and one of my dearest friends, Ari. No topic is off limits with these girls, which made the sleepover that we had at Alysse's house the night before the drive to North Carolina that much more fun. Our personalities perfectly weave together to form a bond that is unshakeable and uplifting. Even if all of us could easily point out the flaws of the others, it is only because we know each other so well. Those flaws are what enable us to complete each other instead of tear each other down. And that's a beautiful thing.

     I'm the baby of the group by a few months and I love saying things to make everyone laugh. Alysse, the friend I've had the longest (8 years!), is the oldest and is almost a full year older than me. She's the mom of the group in so many ways, including her mad baking skills. Emma is the eternal sweetheart and although I've known her the shortest time, it feels like we've been friends for years. The sharp-witted and adorable Betsy always has us laughing with her perfect commentary and questions. Ari and I have known each other distantly for quite some time, but it wasn't until we decided to share a room at Maryville College that we really got to know each other. I'll never forget the nights we stayed up talking until 3 AM even if we had early classes the next day. 

      Each of these women deserve an entire blog post dedicated to how wonderful they are, but I hope that I've given you an idea of how much they mean to me. Being with them makes me feel giddy, unstoppable, fully supported and loved, and perfectly content. There really is something irreplaceable about being able to go from talking about nail polish to bodily functions in two seconds flat; that's something I couldn't do with my male friends. 

    Hopefully you can see the happy, silly, wonderful vibe of the day that we had in Asheville and Brevard. We are commemorating the trip with something extremely special before school starts and I am so excited to share the news with everyone when it happens. 

Horn of Plenty

White button up, thrifted. Imogene Slim jeans, Imogene + Willie  Vintage Dooney & Bourke purse. Plaid pocket square, J. Crew. Jeffrey Campbell Minimal lace-up heels, Free People. Wayfarer sunglasses, Ray-Ban.

     One of the many perks to living in a charming little town is the abundance of quirky coffee places, independent retailers, and of course, organic grocery stores. Considering a lot of produce is grown right here in my home state, there are wonderful, local grocers that I frequent for fresh fruit and anything else you can imagine. 

     Although I had already visited a store called The Market many times because it is walking distance from campus, I only recently paid a (long overdue) visit to another little store, Horn of Plenty. I've admired their lovely displays of flowers for some time as I drove past the store; however, I can now officially give them my seal of approval. The watermelon that I bought from them was the best watermelon I've ever eaten, no exaggeration. Not to mention the fact that the employees were kind enough to let me wander around their greenhouses and outdoor displays taking as many pictures as I wanted. I even used the store as the location for July's Shoe of the Month photo shoot for Style of Civilization.

     While it's really too hot to get as much out of my beloved Imogene + Willie jeans right now, I know that I will be living in them come fall. They are the perfect staple for an Americana driven wardrobe. Rigid denim sure is tough to break in (Which is why I wore my pair for four days straight. I might have even attempted to nap in them just to try and make them more comfortable). But I know that the break in period will be worth it when I have the best fitting, longest lasting pair of jeans in my repertoire. 

How to Use Curves to Edit Photographs in Photoshop + Free Curve: Festival

      While I usually get asked about the type of camera equipment I use and photography tips in general, I wanted to share with everyone one of the simplest ways to make your pictures really stand out. My favorite thing to play around with in Photoshop is the "Curves" feature. For those of you who don't know what curves are, this is a great article that explains their many uses way better than I ever could. However, the quick and dirty version is basically this: curves are a great way to change the color tonality of the photograph in specific highlight/shadow points and also adjust the contrast or fade of the photograph to your liking. I'm so excited to show you how to upload curve presets as well as giving you a freebie that I've used on several of my own photographs. Let's get started!
      1. This first thing you'll want to if you are downloading someone else's curve preset from the internet is follow the file sharing link they give you. I've used the hosting site MediaFire which I can personally vouch for and have used several times. Be sure to save the curve (which will be an .acv file) somewhere that is easy to access, such as your desktop or the downloads folder of your computer if you prefer. My curve is called "festival" and the link can be found here: festival.acv.
      2. When you have your photograph open in Photoshop, be sure that the Adjustments panel is visible in your window. Simply click "Adjustments" if there is no check beside it and the panel will appear.

     3. Now that the Adjustment panel is showing, locate the curves icon and give it a click as well. In Photoshop CS5, mine is always the third from the left on the top row.

    

     4. Now that the Curves adjustment tab is open, play around with it a little bit to see what you change. By using the eyedropper tool on the left of the curves panel, you can select a certain point in the picture and drag up or down to make adjustments. That's a very basic explanation of what's going on, but it can cause some fun or crazy results. I usually work with each color channel (red, green, or blue) separately to get my desired results.

     5. After playing around a bit to get comfortable, you can upload the curve preset that you downloaded earlier. There's a drop down menu icon in the top right of the curves panel. Click this and select "Load Curves Preset..."

     Your files will then pop up. I have the curve saved to my desktop, so it's the default menu that comes up. All you do is click the .acv file, click open, and then read on to the next step.

    

      6. Now the Curve preset will be in the menu of preset options that you can choose. Sometimes I use the Photoshop defaults to darken or lighten a picture or create more contrast. This Curve primarily focuses on changing the colors a bit to give the picture a rosy, pink glow in the highlights and a bit of a blue undertone in the shadows.

     7. Once you click on the Curve in the drop down list, the changes might take just a second to load, but for the most part should be fairly instantaneous. The Curve graph and layers should look like this and your picture should be edited.

     8. Sit back and admire the beautiful colors of your newly edited photograph! Here's a comparison of the picture that I used as an example with and without "festival". 

Original.

Edited with "festival".

     The curve is more subtle with warm, backlit pictures. However, if you want to use the curve on a picture that isn't backlit, it would look more like this:

Original. 

Edited with "festival". 

     I hope that this post inspires you to use the Curves feature to your full advantage when editing your beautiful pictures. I first learned about Curves from the photographer Julia Trotti who not only has stunning images, but also shares several free curves on her blog, here. Please let me know if you have any questions by commenting on this post, emailing me (aektriplethread@gmail.com), or letting me know on Twitter (@trippplethread). I can't wait to see how you use this Curves preset that is one of my personal favorites, so please don't hesitate to link your edited pictures below!