S U M M E R S C H O O L // don't ever do it.

Hello everyone!

Please allow me to re-introduce myself...

I know I have introduced myself before and 

most of you probably have learned more about my life than 

you care to know through this blog, BUT, 

over my leave of absence (due to how incredibly busy my life is)

I have changed. A LOT. 

My name is Sophia Grace. 

And unbeknownst to most humans, that name was not popular when I was born. 

(Born a hipster, always a hipster.)

I have three brothers, whom have all had a part in shaping my personality.

I have two amazing parents who love each other more than anyone I know. 

and I have Evan. 

I know... You all know a lot about Evan... 

What can I say? He's pretty great. 

Over these past five months or so I have done some pretty great things!

Annnnd some not-so-great things. 

"Great" or "Not-so-great" things first?

Let's start with the good. 

"Great" list: 

1. I graduated high school. 

2. I graduated high school without ever wearing sweat pants to school, once. 

3. I went to Disneyland. 

Happiest place on earth, right? 

4. I started college.

Yep. Summer school. 

DONT EVER DO IT. 

5. I turned 18, bought some cigars and two lottery tickets and won a total of 

$0.00. 

Happy Birthday to me! 

"Not-So-Great" list: 

1. I shattered my iPhone screen today...

2. That's about it. 

So as you can see, my summer has been pretty fantastic. 

Besides the fact I broke my perfectly good phone today. 

And I have officially decided to return to the blogosphere! 

Buuuut this time it's going to be a little different... 

This is going to be a more interactive blog! 

I will be posting recipes, diy things and basically any random crap I find interesting

alongside my normal blog posts filled with a lot of vsco-edited pictures

and a lot of the word "Evan." 

Stay tuned folks. 

xo. Soph. 

Ps. The name of the blog will hopefully be changing soon... I mean a lot of my life has changed already this summer, I think we are due for a new name, eh? 

valentines day & the oregon coast

so much for posting about my valentines day, oops.
hey! ive been busy doing important things!
by important things I mean being in love with Evan and going on road trips with Ali.
that's about it.
I DID GET A SCHOLARSHIP THOUGH.
yes, please do be proud of me.

okay okay, lemme debrief you about this whole february 14th thing.
it was a perfect day.
the night before my mother told me she wanted to take me out to breakfast in the morning
and that I HAD to be ready by 7:30, I didn't even second guess her offer.
the next morning when I walked downstairs,
Evan was standing at the bottom of the stairs with breakfast and a white mocha.
uhm so precious right? 
then I had to go to school, gross.
BUT after school we decided to be cheesy and make heart shaped valentines day sandwiches.
then we went and looked at puppies and kittens at petsmart
cause' who doesn't love puppies and kittens?!
that evening he treated me to an amazing dinner at Porters downtown.
and you guys will never guess what he got me...
a necklace from TIFFANYS.
it is beautiful.
I am seriously the luckiest girl in the entire world.

so that was about a month ago, what's new?
well I got to spend the weekend with my bestie at the 3a state basketball championships in Coos Bay.
we had amazing weather for the oregon coast. 68 degrees and sunny?!
if you live in oregon, you know it doesn't get much better than that!
our boys team ended up taking home fourth in state, they played so well!
here are some pictures from the weekend:

yay for sunshine and cute lighthouses!

I have the cutest best friend! Praise the lamb
she isnt going too far away for college!

I promise to start blogging again! xo. 

a poem for my love: ponoe

what an amazing valentines day... 

I couldn't have dreamt up anything better!

I can't wait to write about it, but that will have to wait until this weekend; 

I am so incredibly tired after letting my five year old niece sleep with me last night... 

(who knew that girl could sleep talk, kick me,  AND sleep at the same time... 

now that's multi-tasking right there!) 

Because of my lack of sleep, I need to get to bed at a decent hour tonight... 

About a week or two ago my AP English class got assigned a poetry assignment... 

We had to write a shakespearian styled sonnet within the iambic pentameter... oh jeez. 

Evan offered to help me so we sat down in Starbucks (what a surprise) and got to work. 

After about a half hour of searching the thesaurus and a lot of erasing we had five lines, 

and they were about a rabbit names Otis. It was a problem. 

So I decided to take it home and "work on it,"

little did he know, I was actually rewriting it... for him. 

Let's just say I am definitely not a refined poet, so read with caution. 

(ALTHOUGHHHH, I did get dubbed the "sonnet queen" by my english teacher 

after getting an A on the assignment, so I was pretty proud.)

Here we go: 

Ponoe

by Sophia Johnston 

My world before Evan was slow and dull.

He came and brought me happiness and joy.

He makes me smile and keeps my heart so full. 

He is my pride and joy! Oh what a boy! 

Each day with him is wonderfully bright.

 I see no end of colors and of hues.

Blues, reds, and greens; what a beautiful sight! 

I think I'll never have enough of you.

He sings and draws and plays guitar so well.

His smile, his laugh, his love for the Lord.

He is so genuine, I just can tell. 

Oh dear, I don't think I'll ever be bored.

My Ponoe, my love, oh how I love you so; 

All the way through the highs and through the lows. 

uhm hello... how do I get to call that handsome face mine?! 

happy blogging. xo. 

warning: CHEESY valentine-eve post

about how far is too far on the "cheese scale" for valentines day? 
my goal this year is to surpass the line.
I like all kinds of cheese... 
parmesan,
gouda (holy yum, probably my favorite)
swiss,
and love. 
I love cheesy love. 

I haven't always loved it... 
I used to walk through the hallways 
and almost throw up at the sight of cheesy couples... 
Don't get me wrong, I thought they were cute, 
but all that roses are red, violets are blue stuff made me question their sanity... like, really!?

warning: here comes some cheddar, people..

but now that i'm head over heels in love 
(ouch, that was really cheesy) 
I realize why all those couples acted this way! 
it is so much fun to be cheesy... 

now, obviously I can't write about everything I got Evan for Valentines Day, 
BUT I can tell you it is stuffed with cheese; 
every kind of cheese you can think of! 
(and I can't wait to tell you guys all about it, but until then, this will have to do..) 


since I had a lot of fun with the 25 days of christmas, 
I decided to do a week of Valentines,
which has been pretty exciting... 
who doesn't love little gifts and cheesy cards?! 

I have been absent from the blogosphere for the past few weeks 
due to my parents leaving me and going to Hawaii for their 
20th anniversary. (how precious) Now that they are home, I have plenty 
of events and fun outings and pictures to catch you up on... BUT due to 
me not wanting to overwhelm this post with pictures, they will have to wait! 

and I wrote a poem about Evan, which is pretty exciting... 
my artsy skills are not very strong, but I'm still pretty proud of it! 
I will share soon! 

I hope you all have an amazing Valentine's Day tomorrow! 
Happy love and happy blogging. xo. 

a birthday party, a hike, and a day in ashland

hello there! 
(okay, how cute are those three?! evan and I had these two cuties for the day and boy, it was fun! ... and crazy.)

over here in wonderful rogue valley we have gotten a 
preview of summer this week! 
it was kind of a tease, but it was so nice while it lasted. 
we enjoyed sunshine and 70 degree weather in JANUARY! 
this of course meant the convertible 24/7, hikes 
and a day in the quirky city of ashland. 

okay, you ready for a lot of pictures from our adventures in the sunshine? 

   


so evan and I went to my niece Isla's 5th birthday party: 

then this happened: 

attack of the children! ya gotta love them though.. 

I mean really, look at those faces... 

we then decided to be spontaneous and venture into Ashland for the day! 

we ate some delicious authentic tomales and tacos from Agavé... 

and then visited one of evan's favorites, Mix Sweet Shop. 

hello cute little coconut cream tarte. 

and what would a sunshine-y day be without a hike!?

bare with me... we like to take pictures of each other... a lot. 

my take of him on our hike: he is s'cute. 

his take of me during our adventures in Lithia park... (I felt as if I fit into the Ashland culture quite well that day with this crazy fun skirt!) 

anyways, overall it was an amazing week 

full of fun adventures with my love. 

tomorrow is our three month anniversary, 

which I am pretty excited about! 

annnnnd Valentines day is just around the corner! 

love is in the air people, take it in! 

happy blogging. xo. 

hi I have the most talented boyfriend ever

do you ever have those moments where you sit back and look at the big picture of things and realize how extremely blessed you are... I had several of those this week.

one being when Evan played me this song the other night before posting his video... I was just sitting in his music room listening to him sing one of my favorite songs off of OneRepublic's album, Native, and occasionally adding in a note or two (my voice has nothing in comparison to his, I just can't help but sing when I hear good music... sometime it's a problem.) and then I had a revelation. I just sat there and looked at Evan and realized how amazing he is.

I mean, I think about him a lot and how lucky I am to have him, but this is one of those moments when it just hits you like a brick wall... wow. I am so lucky.

He is seriously one of the most talented people I have ever met.

He is an amazing photographer. (go see some of his stuff at: iamevanford.vsco.co)

He is has an eye for graphic design. (he may even be making me a logo soon, yesssss.)

He is handsome.

He loves the Lord.

and the list truly does go on... BUT. I have to share one thing with you...

His voice. Holy moly guacamole. See for yourselves (you won't regret it...)

amazing, huh?

any-who, the purpose of this was simply to share some of his awesomeness with all you people... carry on. happy blogging. xo. 

t'was the season

lets pretend this was posted sometime before January 1st. 
It basically was the best two days ever. No biggie. If you know me well you know that Christmas is what I look forward to starting on December 26th every year. The caroling, cookie-making, gifting and sweet family and friends always makes for a jolly good time. Unfortunately it always seems to pass by too quickly. This year was just the same. Christmas is already over?! WHAT?! December 26th is always so depressing, but it just means it is time to start looking forward to next year's Christmas! 

Do you guys ever do the whole: "next year at this time I will be **insert some milestone... age/grade/etc.**"? Cause' I always find myself doing that... Most years, it isn't that big of a deal... BUT this year kinda freaks me out a bit. Next Christmas I will be in college. Woah. Crazy huh?! 

Anyways, back to this year's Christmas, my family celebrated our Christmas together on Christmas Eve due to conflicting schedules and such. At 1 a.m. the night before, my sisters, mom and I participated in a group text discussing what we should wear the next day and we all concluded to mix it up a bit this year... pajamas. So it was a cozy Christmas indeed. My brothers, their wives and kids showed up at 9 a.m. Christmas Eve morning along with my dearest Evan. We spent the morning having breakfast together which included my mom's amazing cinnamon rolls. We then exchanged presents duhhh. 

Evan and I ventured out into the craziness to do some last minute shopping for his family Christmas the next day. That was fun of course. I stayed up late, aka 1:30 am wrapping presents for my parents' and Evan's stockings. Thankfully my sweet boyfriend stayed up until midnight helping me. (he is the best)

enjoying cookies right next to santa... no big deal. 

our extremely creative {or not}  gingerbread house... 

Ahhh Christmas day! The glorious day had finally arrived. We all slept in and then opened our stockings together as a family... My mom and I ended up getting each other the exact same two pairs of socks from Gap, oops. Then we exchanged gifts and all that good stuff that families do on Christmas morning. Around noon I headed over to Evan's and spent the day with his family. We ate a wonderful dinner (with a turkey cooked to perfection thanks to his dad) and exchanged gifts, what's new. We also played card games and watched Tangled. Later Christmas night we met up with my parents and watched the new movie: The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. It was sooo good. Go watch it! I hope all of your Christmas' were as good as mine! 

Ps. Evan is the most thoughtful person ever. Not only did he get me new socks and dresses but he put together a box with some of my favorite things: two boxes of adorable cards, new sharpies and pens, a beautiful journal, some washi tape and a set of calligraphy pens along with a book on calligraphy! You can say I'm already hooked... I'm really digging this whole calligraphy thing.. Stay tuned. 

happy blogging. 


Ps. Ps. one of the things that I really loved about Christmas was the "25 Days of Christmas." I had the novel idea to do 25 days of Christmas for Evan while Maddy, Ali and I were sitting eating a nice brunch at the Bella Union in Jacksonville one sunny morning... And... it happened! I am proud to say I pulled it off.. 25 presents in 25 days. Now of course I couldn't afford 25 amazing presents but they were fun! It also gave me an excuse to practice my packaging skills, which I loooove doing! Soooo here are two of my favorite packages...