Co-Authors

"Things are never quite as scary when you've got a best friend."

- Calvin & Hobbes, 1990

(the grass of Hollywood Forever, before Almost Famous) 

There's over 2,752 pictures on my phone. So I need to clean that ish up!!

Every time I try to take a photo I get this message...

As I was selecting and deleting pics tonight, it made me smile to see a certain brown eyed girl smiling back at me so often.

(the Wiltern, before HAIM concert) 

A good friend knows all your stories.

A best friend helped you write them. 

I love you, Rach.

Writing (and reading!) stories with you, will forever be my favorite.

HBD to my BFF

35 Perks to Finding Your Best Friend Forever

(as told through texts and pics shared between me and mine)

1. You ALWAYS have someone to take selfies with. 

2. A Best Friend Forever is always there for you when you're feeling down.

3. You have someone to share all of life's greatest moments with.

4. Your Best Friend Forever shares your interests so you can freely do whatever you want without compromising (or apologizing!)

5. Having a Best Friend Forever means that every year, someone is extremely happy that you were born. And vice versa!

6. You don't have to look nice for your Best Friend Forever. They've seen you at your worst and still flove you more than anything. 

7. Your Best Friend Forever always guarantees you have at least one like.

8. You have someone to lay around and do nothing with (with your feet in the air!) And still have the best time of your life. 

9. A Best Friend Forever is a partner in crime. "Breakers gonna break, break, break, break...into Gates, gates, gates, gates." 

10. Your Best Friend Forever is the only person you don't have to explain your costume to. 

11. You always have someone to cheer you up...and keep you from prematurely aging! 

12. Your Best Friend Forever always knows what to get you, even without having to ask what you want. 

13. You don't even have to use words anymore, because your Best Friend Forever understands you just by looking at your face. 

14. But when you do use words, they are an intricately made up dialect of gibberish that nobody else understands.

15. Your Best Friend Forever is your automatic travel buddy. And they share your need to capture the skyline EVERYTIME you visit. 

16. You can, without fail, always make each other laugh.

17. When you have a Best Friend Forever you get to celebrate weird traditions, like Friendiversaries!

18. Your Best Friend Forever understands your Girl Crush. 

19. You always have a personal photographer on hand for those times you're fangirling so hard you can't function.

20. Your Best Friend Forever obliges you in superfluous shopping trips and doesn't even have to ask what's in your mind's eye when you stop and stare and sigh at every. single. dress.

21. Your Best Friend Forever is willing to eat with you, at ANY time. And understands that the restaurants you visit are so much more than just the food. 

22. Coincidentally - you always have an open invitation to, at ANY time, eat off each's other's plates.

23. A Best Friend Forever is someone who ALWAYS understands your literary issues with fictional characters. 

24. And your Best Friend Forever shares your need to process (at all hours of the day and night!) your thoughts and feels about plots and twists!

24. Despite how busy you two become, you and your Best Friend Forever always make the time and effort to see each other, and it's so WORTH it!

25. And you two have just as much fun staying IN as you do going OUT.

26. Speaking of which, you never have to fight over which flavor of ice cream to buy for a night in with your Best Friend Forever.

27. You always have someone who's ready to go to bat (or face punches!) for you.

28. A Best Friend Forever ignores your middle of the night, drunk, music lyric texts.

29. With a Best Friend Forever, you're finally able to fulfill that lifelong fantasy of having a twin and dressing the same. 

30. You indulge in all of your guilty pleasures together...and even occasionally suck your significant others into your uncoolness.

31. With a Best Friend Forever, you have someone who's voice is just as loud as yours at all those concerts!

32. Your Best Friend Forever hates all the same people you do, no questions asked.

33. Your Snapchats reaffirm your dual superb fashion sense.

34. A Best Friend Forever is a hand to hold for when the movie gets too scary, or the song lyrics get too sad, or the book author KILLS OFF THE HEROINE.

35. And finally...the very best perk about finding your Best Friend Forever, is that you have someone in your life that gets IT. Even when you're not sure what that means. You don't have to explain IT or worry if they'll understand IT. They just do. You have someone who makes you feel less alone in this psycho world. When you look at them, you get a burst of reassurance that you're not the only one. You might be standing on the corner of Bliss and Crazy...but your Best Friend Forever is right there with you. 

“The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars.”

― Jack Kerouac, On the Road

Happy 35th Birthday, My Rachel. May we continue to burn, burn, burn for many more years to come. All the crazy flove in my heart is yours,

times 17! ~Erin

Extraordinary

“Maybe we're all like that with our mothers. They seem ordinary until one day they're extraordinary.” 
― Lisa See, Shanghai Girls

Happiest Birthday to the most extraordinary woman I know! I love you, Mom. 

Four knots, Four Prayers, All the Love

Many of you may remember my friend Jacqui and her beautiful son Ryan. Tuesday marked 4 months since Ryan became and angel and tomorrow is his 4th birthday! Alissa and I wanted to come up with a simple way to remember Ryan and support Jacqui and her husband, Dan on this HUGE day, so we put our brains together yesterday and made these  bracelets. Red thread bracelets are common in many cultures and religions - but in nearly every one - they symbolize PROTECTION and STRENGTH. Those two words were EXACTLY what we wanted to cover our friends with as they face once of the most bittersweet days they have seen since Ryan's passing. We decided to tie the thread with FOUR KNOTS - in honor of Ryan's 4th birthday and also symbolizing 1) a prayer for Jacqui, 2) a prayer for Dan, 3) a prayer for their Family and 4) a prayer for the Community that has come together in their time of need. Mine is tied to my right wrist and I will be wearing it until it falls off. Every time I see it, I will remember to Live Loud, Live Wild, and send my love to Jacqui and Dan.

Alissa posted the simple tutorial on her blog today (it's pretty self-explanatory) If you do take a moment and make a bracelet or wear red tomorrow, be sure to share a photo with Jacqui and Dan so they know you are lifting them up. They will be spending the day immersed in all of Ryan's favorite things - Lightning McQueen, Donuts, Red, Family - they can be found on Instagram at @babyboybakery and @danno12.

Thank you for being such an incredible community!! My heart is so full when social media works for good - and I know tomorrow will be one of those painfully joyful times. To my sweet, beautiful Jacqui - all the protection, strength and LOVE I have in my soul is yours - today, tomorrow and always. xoxo

(from Jacqui's blog)

Fun.

Rachel and I went to our Happy Place on Tuesday to see Fun. at The Greek.

I could wax poetic on how this adventure made my life...because of who I was with, where we went, what we ate and drank, who we got to see, what I got to hear and feel...but I'm gonna let the pictures do the talking instead. 

Rach and I start all of our shenanigans with coffee and aliases. But this time we decided to forgo the caffeine and opted for frozen yogurt. It's easier on our bladders when combined with mid-week, afternoon LA traffic!

We made better time than we expected, so we hit up one of our favorite spots for some dinner before the show. 

(are you as obsessed with my new shoes as I am?

MollyB calls them my Justin Bieber shoes!)

After dinner we parked at a friend's house and made the trek up the hill to the theater. We thought we were being so smart...saving on parking and enjoying a short walk up a iconic, tree lined street on a beautiful night in Los Feliz. BUT HECK IT WAS HOT! By the time we got in our seats we were dripping with sweat. So we took a pic of our feet instead of our faces. (Told you I was obsessed with my shoes.)

Tegan and Sara opened.

Indie, tattooed, short haired, twin sisters who write angsty breakup songs, play the guitar and harmonize like Spring fairies whilst also rocking like the fierce, brave women they are?

Yes. I'm a little bit obsessed with them too.

(all the awesome, close up, crisp and clear pics of the concert were taken by my friend, Steve, who was in the pit with his daughter that night. So jealous. But so happy, since he so kindly shared his captures!)

(these are more indicative of our seats and my iphone camera!)

Yes. Rachel and I jumped up and down, held hands, and sang every word (sometimes to each other.) It was like a 2 for 1 concert for us, being that we love T&S as much as Fun. I think the people directly behind us were a little annoyed...but we quickly let that go.

And then Fun. came on.

In tuxedos.

And the whole place went a little nuts.

Nate

Jack

Andrew

Nate has so much energy it's ridiculous.

They all do, actually. By the end of the night there was a broken guitar and a smashed up piano and Rachel and I were still debating if Jack was really wearing shorts with tights. 

When they performed The Gambler it was so heartfelt and amazing, it made me tear up and I had to sit down and just take it all in. If you don't know this song, give it a listen. The lyrics slay me. It's about Nate's parents...

"I swear when I grow up I won't just buy you a rose

I will buy the flower shop, and you will never be lonely

For even if the sun stops waking up over the fields

I will not leave, I will not leave 'til it's our time

So just take my hand, you know that I will never leave your side"

BUT THEN...

whoa.

But then,

the first few notes of Carry On played.

And I freaked.

Like this...in my chair.

Rachel looked down at me with wide eyes that said,

"Are you going to be okay?!"

I leapt to my feet and grabbed a hold of her arm.

And sighed a good eleventy trillion times.

In between singing all the lyrics.

And staving off my chills.

It was glorious. I can't even put it into words.

But it was over too fast.

I can't even tell you what they sang next because I was trying to relive the last 4 minutes and 34 seconds of my life over and over.

When they came back on for the encore, I said to Rach,

"I think they must want to play Carry On one more time. Yes?"

But no...they closed with Some Nights.

Which was perfection.

The entire place was on their feet.

And I think you can tell by our faces we had (fun.)

I love you, Rach! I am so blessed to have you in my life.