#ell/nikki

[eurovision-facts]

Eurovision Fact #488:

Male-female duos have only ever won Eurovision twice. The first time this occurred was in 1963 with Denmark's Grethe and Jørgen Ingman who won with the song 'Dansevise.'

Next, in 2011, Azerbaijan's duo Ell/Nikki won the contest with their song 'Running Scared.'

[Sources]

Düsseldorf 2011, Eurovision.tv.

Participants of Düsseldorf 2011: Ell/Nikki, Eurovision.tv.

London 1963, Eurovision.tv.

Participants of London 1963: Grethe and Jørgen Ingman, Eurovision.tv.

[nininikki]

season one of criminal minds was soooo cunt. like gideon AND elle? on the same team?

[aria0fgold]

I found Hell in Yume Nikki!!! Yay! Yippee!!!

[alexa-play-despacito]

Queen Elle overworld

[angeliicheartt]

Hi, how are you? ^^

Can I ask who your top three favourite BNHA characters are? Out of curiosity :D

hihi!! i’m pretty good!! hbu lovie??

and my top three are probably hitoshi, jiro, and kaminari!!

[mauricedelafalaise]

• Claudia Schiffer, Vogue October 1989

by Herb Ritts

• Nikki Taylor, ELLE France 1990

by Pamela Hanson

[ridiculouspark]

Hey when the fuck did Elle get added to Dream Weaver?????? I literally gasped lol

[asterroses]

omg the hawkes r real ‼️

[amjustagirl]

Ate Nikki!!!

It's been a long time~ Did your feet have already recovered? Anyway, I hope that you enjoyed your break from Tumblr. Thank you for the existence of you and your stories. They gave me so much comfort that I can't stop rereading them. Even though we don't personally know each other, you have become a part of my life. Even if we stop using Tumblr and go on with our own lives, I can look back at this year and still smile at the waves of memories.

Thank you so much! Love you lots ate Nikki 💕 and I wish you a happy new year ☺️🎆

Love,

Elle 💙

Hihi elle!

Nah the foot's still v much broken. Healing, but broken, much to my doctor's dismay. If it doesn't heal I could be looking at surgery, which I dread but at this point there isn't much I can do!

Thank you for your sunniness! Your ask made me smile (and gods do I badly need that!) so thank you ❤️ I hope life and school are treating you well and while it's true we don't know each other irl, if you ever pass by Singapore, hit me up!

In the meantime, a happy and very belated new year!

[eurovision-facts]

Eurovision Fact #526:

Nadir Rustamli won The Voice of Azerbaijan before coming to Eurovision in 2022 with his song "Fade to Black." On the show, he was coached by Eldar Gasimov, half of the duo Ell/Nikki, who won Eurovision in 2011.

Rustamli said when he picked Gasimov as his coach he had Eurovision in mind, as he always dreamed of representing Azerbaijan.

[Source]

Participants of Turin 2022: Nadir Rustamli, Eurovision.tv.

[nikkireedsource]

Nikki Reed Wants You to Rethink the Too-Small Pair of Jeans in Your Closet

Our columnist reflects on a childhood spent creating one-of-a-kind creations with her mom.

Welcome to Take Five, my recurring beauty and nutrition column on ELLE.com culled from a lifelong passion for animals, the outdoors, and feeling good. For me, the notion of taking five—whether the number pertains to ingredients in a food or just a moment to ask your body how it's feeling—can make all the difference. Consider this your 300-second-long wellness retreat.

"Hey Mom, I have an idea. Can you come here for a second?" I yelled as I came through the front door. Everything magical that happens in our "sewing den" begins with those words, and last week was no exception. I dropped 40 yards of old fabric down on the table in front of her. She looked at me with the kind of smirk that belies the actual excitement we both know she's feeling in these moments. "This week, it's muumuus," I told her. The words "I need five minutes to make a coffee"—a futile attempt at stifling her joy—exited Mom's mouth too quickly. This is just the game we play, that we've always played, because the truth is: nothing makes the two of us happier than a sewing project.

My love for clothing started very young, and not at all in the way you're probably imagining. You see, I had a mother who was constantly sewing together a mixture of hand-me-downs and scrap fabric to make new clothes. She was also clever enough to make it a game of sorts so that I took an immediate interest in the process and remained invested. Mom never let on that being a single parent didn't afford her the luxury of back-to-school shopping sprees. I never felt I was missing out on buying new outfits at the mall, because I didn't yet know that adding in a strip of leopard print velvet down the sides of my older brother's skater pants, in an attempt to feminize them, wasn't other kids' "normal."

To me, this was just the way it was done. It was also creative and exciting to play designer. Mom made these endeavors feel like a choice—we were choosing to cut up old T-shirts to make our own custom designs. Mom used specific language like "one of a kind" and "customized," so I always felt a sense of ownership and pride when kids asked me where I got my clothes. I distinctly remember her taking me to the bead store for yet another project we would work on together. This one involved capri pants, which, in my family, was another way of saying "jeans that had gotten too short."

See, I didn't realize at the time that bellbottoms that allowed my socks to show meant I'd outgrown my jeans because Mom always made it into a game of What Can We Make Next? We bought all kinds of beads that day and settled on the idea of sewing them to the bottom of my freshly chopped-to-the-knees jeans. As a result, I became known as a trendsetter, rocking an upcycled wardrobe before "upcycling" was even a term. For much of this time, I felt like the coolest kid in the world.

Then, the mean girls caught on. After fielding a few put-downs from girls who were just as insecure as I was on their quest to find their own identity, I came up with a new plan. Since neither of us could afford flashy new outfits, my best friend Brenda and I would combine our piggy banks—filled with the little money we made from birthdays and singing door-to-door—and share custody over all of our clothes. Fortunately, we went to different schools, so we knew we could pull it off without anyone knowing. Here's how it went: One of our parents would drive us to Forever 21, we'd pick out the coolest of the cool new outfits, split the bill, and keep a detailed journal of who wore what, when, while trading pieces of our wardrobes every couple days.

For a while the plan functioned flawlessly. Mondays, I wore the red pants with the white tank top and jean jacket; Brenda wore the crop top and glittery skirt. Tuesdays, we'd swap. We discovered only one issue, but it was a major one: Brenda and I weren't the same size. All of this outfit coordination happened right as I was approaching my first and only growth spurt. I was suddenly tall for my age, something I only experienced for a short period of time. I had long, gangly legs, no boobs, and giant feet. Brenda, on the other hand, was perfectly proportionate and didn't require the constant tailoring that I did. Our plan was short-lived, and I found myself, once again, back at the sewing machine with Mom. Perhaps that's where I was meant to be.

The truth is, we all end up craving the very same things we may have loathed as a child. I see this more and more the older I get. We mirror our parents, and we long for every nuance, every tiny reminder that we are their child. I am, without a doubt, my mother's child. From my ripped jeans to the 14 holes punched in my ears; from my passion for feeding everyone to the creative explosions that result in spontaneous furniture construction in our backyard; from taking in every helpless animal that needs to be bottle-fed to seeing the merit in making my own clothing and designing my own jewelry and bags; from East to West and everything in between, I am my mother's child.

Every project we excitedly take on together is peppered with all of those reminders, and sewing is no exception. I am currently navigating a new chapter of my life in the fashion industry with my line, Freedom of Animals. I'm attempting to create a sustainable line of products constructed from recycled materials. In doing so, I can't help but smile, because I'm reminded daily of my childhood. I'm beginning to truly understand consumerism—our desire for more styles, cheaper products, and a faster turn-around with a new model. I'm learning how the fashion industry should function, and even better, how it shouldn't: Mass-producing overseas while using toxic chemicals in unethically run factories is heartbreakingly destructive to our planet and all of its inhabitants. I'm comprehending all of this information and I'm wondering if Mom had it right all along. Maybe choosing to value what we already had and turning it into something new wasn't a way to appear "with the times" but rather a notion that was indeed ahead of its time. The difference is that we didn't know then what we know now, and we have the chance— individually and collectively—to use this knowledge for good. 

Reusing, repurposing, and upcycling clothing is the future, and yet we were doing it then simply because that was our only option. So how can we get people to do that very thing, before it becomes our only actual option? Now is the time to allow our ingenuity to be born of necessity. Once we've sucked the planet dry of any and every resource available while we satisfy our need for "more, more, more," we won't be afforded the luxuries we mindlessly enjoy today. This is why I'm turning to you. Maybe we can all take a few seconds to think about what we have, what we want, and then somehow merge the two. Perhaps that pair of jeans that seems too small just needs a little bit of leopard print sewn down the sides, those old dish rags you're ready to throw away are calling for a second life as an outdoor dog bed, or that T-shirt you outgrew is begging to be cut up into headbands. Be creative, get inspired. Then send me some of your creations, and I'll send you some of mine.

Original article

[eg-writtenthoughts]

Romance Books; Are They For Me?

I can say this with confidence, I don’t read romance novels. I grew up when Nicholas Sparks dominated bookshelves and movie theaters. I felt like they were overrated and that’s followed me all the way into my twenties. Now, don’t get me wrong. I love romance in my books. That fuzzy feeling you get from a good one liner couldn’t ruin a book for me. But the book has to have more, something happening around the romance. I prefer fantasy books that have romance.

In the last six months, we got a manager at work who loves to read, especially romance. But not the cheesy ones of the early 2000s. She reads the ones that are extremely popular right now, if you know what I mean (eyes emoji). My closest coworker reads them too, but also reads fantasy too. Well, now my two favourite coworkers are reading and discussing these books. I felt a little left out eventually. So, why not give them a try?

The experiment: I’d read three sports romance books, each one of a different sport and see what I think. I definitely intended on writing this post right after I read them so I had more to say. But I didn’t. So, please enjoy this extremely vague post.

I started with Rule Breaker by Nikki Hall. A football romance, which I thought would be perfect. In the end, I thought it was a cute book and that’s about it. Fake dating tropes are always fun. My main issue is that I felt like it was rushed and all happened a little too fast. Overall I thought it was fine.

The second read was The Deal by Elle Kennedy. This one came with a recommendation from my romance loving manager and unsurprisingly, she’s right. It’s hockey based and I realized that maybe, football isn’t the sport for me fictionally. This one was much better than Rule Breaker and it had to do with pacing. I enjoyed the boy falls first trope. It wasn’t perfect for me (I do know that I’m picky, especially in this instance where I’m trying a genre for the first time). However, Garrett Graham is great and I love him. There’s more books in the series and I don’t think I’m going to read them. I just don’t see myself reading them.

Third, Dirty Curve by Meagan Brandy. Baseball. Tutor and star of the team. Without talking about spoilers, I wondered the WHOLE time. It was shocking but meh. Maybe the easy answer was the better choice for that one. I liked that Dirty Curve was significantly slower than the other two. I should’ve realized this is something I’d want since I enjoy it in my other books. Out of the three books, it was the best.

My final thoughts? If I need a quick read or am on my period and in my feels, romance books might be what I reach for. If I don’t want to carry a book or don’t have the space, I’ll be using my Kindle app which has been stocked with all these goodies. Recently, I reached for a romance book after finishing a really heavy book and it was a great palette cleanser. Maybe one day I’ll figure out what my perfect (dark) romance book is.

[aria0fgold]

Also, when Elle fronted. She decided to check out what yno was all about and she ended up liking playing yume nikki A Lot.

[alexa-play-despacito]

[angeliicheartt]

Send this to all your favourite moots and pass the pumpkin round! KEEP THE PUMPKIN TRAIN GOING 🎃🖤🎃🖤🎃🖤 🎃🖤🎃

thank u babyy 🤍🤍

[maepolzine]

Looking Back at the Books I Read in November 2023

Sharing all the books I read in November and my thoughts on them.

Another month down and one left in 2023. Where has the time gone? Before we get into all the books that I read in the last month and sharing my thoughts on them (or linking out to reviews I posted in some instances), I thought I would give a quick update of something I’ve been debating. As much as I love these posts, I’m thinking of getting rid of them in the new year. Instead, I’m thinking of…