mihaljevics-blog

[mihaljevics-blog]

oh hi there, welcome to holiday, ŽOFIE MIHALJEVIC. oh wait, you’ve been here. has anyone ever told you that you look like HOLLAND RODEN? you’re FEMALE and use SHE/HER? just checking. and you’ve been here for OVER A YEAR? you’re 30 too, right? just curious. you own OLENNA’S BEAUTY BAR still? you know people say you’re BENEVOLENT AND AMBITIOUS but FICKLE AND SUSPICIOUS so i guess take that with a grain of salt. well, at least i do know you’re excited for VALENTINE’S DAY. bye now! [rhys, 21, est, she/her] 

 žofie’s pinterest board.

žofie was born in yekaterinburg, russia, the first child and only daughter to a large, poor family. three brothers came after her, and all in the middle of the economic collapse in post-soviet russia. . . it was not a very pretty upbringing. her father was killed in an industrial accident when she was six. 

after this, the mihaljevics moved to live in a flat with her aunt in moscow. in primary school, her mother worked odd jobs off and on, mostly doing hair and nails or sewing dresses for more well-off families that lived in nicer flats near the kremlin. 

 žofie was made to quit school at fifteen, when her mother was first diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. her first job was cleaning flats, she was given room and board and sent what she could home to feed her mother and her brothers, to keep the lights on, to make sure they had coats in the winter. but cleaning only yielded so much. many nights žofie laid in bed wondering how she would ever get out of this work, how she could work herself to the bone and probably never afford the nice houses she cleaned. she knew no one was coming to save her, and she realized she had to find a way to save herself. 

žofie was always talented with beauty work, like nails and hair and makeup. for fun, she did nails and colored the hair of girls who she worked with who could afford it. . . so at seventeen, she worked as a maid during the day, and had her own side hustle out of the dormitory at night. after one of the rich ladies heard how well she could do hair and nails, she built a small client base of wealthy housewives who would pay her 1500₽ for acrylics and gel, and 3100₽ for a cut and all over color. 

she became very close to the woman who introduced her to most of her clients. they would often spend her days off together drinking coffee, watching tv, having small lunches in the park while her children played. so when she asked her first customer for a raise in her hourly wages for cleaning to save for beauty school, the older woman was more than happy to oblige. the wife offered her a position to mind her children, clean the home, and do her hair and nails each week. žofie would stay in the home in their spare bedroom and they decided they would pay her a flat fee of 25000₽, which was very fair and much more than žofie could fathom. 

 žofie worked tirelessly to perfect her trade, but things halted after she graduated at nineteen, when her mother died of a seizure in her sleep. her aunt and uncle decided they would adopt the two youngest boys, her eldest brother would be going to the naval fleet after he finished secondary school. . . and much to her dismay, the rest of her family was moving to new york where her uncle’s brother had a few small businesses and was very well-off. 

žofie stayed behind in moscow for a year after the family immigrated to america, so that the eldest brother could finish school and get settled with the naval academy. in 2009, he was placed on the pyotr velikiy and stationed in the caribbean sea to work hand-in-hand with the venezuelan navy and žofie went to new york to join the rest of their family.

 after finishing her requirements for cosmetology in the us, and establishing herself in new york, žofie met her late husband ben while working in a barber shop in queens in 2015. . . they fell in love quickly. they had a whirlwind romance; met in december, moved in together in february, married the following may. ben was a trust fund child from a sleepy town in maine, called holiday. . . which he talked about endlessly. his parents had left him a contracting company, and acres of land behind a big beach house on the bay and it was his whenever he wanted. 

in january 2018, ben and žofie found out they were expecting a baby and they couldn’t be happier. the budding family moved to holiday in march 2018. ben sold a little over a ¼ of their acreage to buy žofie’s salon, olenna’s beauty.

ben died in a car crash coming home after a boys weekend with friends from high school in may 2018, right before their anniversary. 

žofie welcomed their baby girl, isobel, on september 17th 2018. now she’s trying to find her way in holiday, navigate her way through her life without ben and struggling as a single mother to isobel. 

[mihaljevics-blog]

this is a  TEST !!!  blah blah blah blah blah blah    !