the mushroom queen returns!

Hello, hello, dear friends! It’s been a long, long time, and I know I disappeared without any explanation. I don’t want to dwell on that too much, because the person I was two years ago is not the person I am now. I’m not even sure how many of you are still around the blogging world, and that’s okay. Time comes and goes, and things change.

If you don’t remember me, hi! I’m Chloë Mali. I’m 20 years old now, and I work as a barista at a popular coffee chain. I’ve been blogging since I was quite young- 10 or 11, if I do recall correctly.

The past few months, I’ve thought about how much I miss blogging. After all, I’ve been blogging for over eight years, and it was, at one point, a huge part of me. Now, I get burnt out so easily, and I don’t write as much as I used to, but I do still love talking about books and the other things I love.

Currently, I’m in an in between season of life. I am no longer do much writing or acting, the things I talked most about on this blog, but I am learning to be okay with the slow seasons. I’m trying to learn new hobbies and recipes and life skills as I work towards becoming a functioning adult and moving out on my own.

So… I thought I’d give blogging a try again. You’ll notice I changed the name and tagline of the blog- they fit me a lot more now than my old one does, though “a girl always dreaming” will always be close to my heart. I’m planning on sharing book reviews, my adventures as I tackle new things like making sourdough and pasta, recipes (including some pet treat ones), maybe cosplay content, the occasional article on mental health, and really just whatever strikes my fancy. I’ve long given up on a consistent posting schedule, so you’ll see me when you see me.

I’ve gone through and deleted quite a few old posts, so if the blog looks bare, that’s why. A lot of them were associated with difficult times and memories, and thus I thought it was best to do a little purge.

One last note is that I currently cannot get WordPress to open on my computer, so posting from mobile it is. 😂 Excuse any typos or rambling for the time being, hopefully the issue will be figured out soon.

I hope you all have been well the past couple of years, and if you’re new here… hello! Welcome! I’m happy to have you.

I can’t wait to get back to some fun posts. Thank you to all of you who have stuck around! 😊

Much love,

Chloë

aka the Mushroom Queen 🍄 (it’s an inside joke, but also a dearly beloved nickname that I happily and proudly claim to identify myself.)

gift guide the second ~ in which chloë once again talks about presents

WordPress is asking me to use this post to answer the question “what are your two favorite things to wear”? When did they add this feature? I’m utterly confused, and no, this post is not going to be about clothing. It is, however, going to be about objects- more specifically, gifts!

A lot of you enjoyed my gift guide last year, and quite honestly, I had forgotten about it, until I was talking with some friends about how excited I was to be getting gifts for people in various gift exchanges, and they mentioned having a hard time finding gifts for people.

Well. As you may know, my love language is gifts. I love getting people gifts. It makes me happier than almost anything, though sadly, I can’t give as many gifts as I would like because I am a broke student and my budget is extremely strict (it’s currently screaming at me for signing up for so many gift exchanges, but shhhh, we’ll ignore that XD).

In light of all this, I thought it would be super fun to compile a second gift guide- especially for those of you who may have slightly delayed on your holiday shopping. 😀

a review of six: the musical

(Before I get into this post, here’s a quick reminder that my reader survey is still open for answers, and if you fill it out and leave your email within the next week, you’ll be entered into a giveaway to win a $5 Starbucks gift card! Any and all responses help me determined the future of this blog, and I love hearing your thoughts! Click HERE to access it.)

This past week, I got the amazing opportunity to watch one of my favorite musicals- Six: The Musical. This is a show I discovered about a year ago, and I very quickly fell in love with it. So when I found out the Six U.S. Tour was coming to my state, I leapt to get tickets- and I managed to get a ticket just two days before the only show time I could make it to.

Naturally, I spammed my Instagram stories with pictures of me and my program. (Sorry to all my Instagram followers, I got a bit carried away… sorry not sorry?) But this got me to thinking… why not post an entire blog post about my experience and my thoughts? So that’s what you get today. I have no idea if this post will perform well statistics wise (actually, my last post didn’t either!) but I’m having fun with it, so why not? (Please do bear in mind that this post is a bit scrambled. I have so many thoughts and they’re all over the place! I hope you enjoy regardless.)

life lately ~ june 2022

June. My favorite month of the year, for one reason only: With June comes one glorious week at Burnt Cabin, the summer camp I’ve been attending since I was 12.

All in all, June was a decent month, and one week of the month was quite literally the best week I’ve had in my life. But let’s start at the very beginning, shall we?

the mid-year book freak-out tag

(Do you like today’s featured image? My little sister got into my Canva drafts and finished it up for me. It definitely tells you a lot about her personality. :P)

Hello, my friends, and welcome back to my little corner of the internet! I took a mostly unplanned absence for a couple of weeks, just when I thought I was getting into a consistent posting routine. I’m blaming it on camp. It’s hard to get back into normal life after the most amazing week of your entire life. But you’ll hear more about that in a different post, probably June’s life lately. Today, I’ve got another bookish post for you!

Over the years, I’ve seen many people do this tag, and since it’s that time of the year again, it’s resurfaced. It looked like a lot of fun to me, especially since I’ve been trying really hard to get back into reading this year, so I decided it was time to jump on the band-wagon and do this tag myself. 🙂 So let’s get into it!

mini monthly book reviews ~ april and May 2022 + giveaway winner!

(meant to post this on Wednesday, but the week has been hectic, full of packing for camp and running errands, so you get this today instead. Sorry for the wait!)

Hello, friends! Welcome to another installment of Mini Monthly Book Reviews, in which I ramble about the books I’ve read and am generally all too generous with my ratings. 😅😂

But before we get into today’s post, I have a quick announcement to make concerning the giveaway to celebrate 200 followers. The time has come to pick the winner! And so here I am. The winner is…

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Adelyn! Congratulations, Adelyn! I’ll be in touch about your prize. 🙂

And to the rest of you who entered, thank you! I wish I could give every single one of you a prize, but alas, I cannot. Just know that I’m grateful to have you as readers and followers of my tiny little corner of the internet. ❤

Now that the exciting part has been taken care of, let’s jump right into this post!

life lately ~ may 2022

… it’s June.

HOW DID WE GET TO JUNE SO FAST PLEASE SEND HELP

Here we are, and 2022 is half gone. Which I just cannot believe. *screams* On the other hand, I’m so glad that summer is finally here!

I feel like May was kind of a quiet month, but yet I was so busy that I barely had time to breathe. I suppose that was due to the fact that most of May consisted of work, work, more work, and finals.

summer 2022 bucket list + goals

Hello, my friends!

If you know me, you know that I adore summer. I don’t know why, because I’m not a big fan of heat and bugs and the other unpleasant aspects summer brings, but I do.

Every year I come up with an elaborate summer bucket list, and while honestly, most years I don’t even finish half on the things on it, I still enjoy making the list, and I often share it with all of you! So here’s to another year of summer fun.

Before I jump in, I just want to remind you that I’m doing a giveaway to celebrate 200 followers! If you haven’t entered, click HERE to do so. I’m extending the deadline by a few days in order to allow for more people to enter, and will probably close the form for entries on June 5th. 🙂

book talk: my top ten favorite classics