#madrigal women and periods

[dragoneyes618]

Thoughts Upon Reading The Wish Novelization

I still haven't watched Wish yet, but I've read the novelization, and here's my thoughts about it. Because I am the kind of person who wonders about random background unimportant details and asks way too many questions about how things work. I've noticed that I'm not a very good companion to watch a movie with. ;)

Asha's grandfather is one hundred. She is seventeen, meaning he was eighty-three when she was born (give or take a year).

To compare, take the Madrigals from Encanto. Isabela and Dolores are 21; their grandmother is 75.

So wouldn't Sabino be kind of too old? Wouldn't it make more sense for him to be Asha's great-grandfather instead? Or did Asha's parents and/or grandparents get married late or something?

Also is Sabino her mother's father or father's father?

Never mind, it says on the wiki that he's Asha's father's father. So that answers that. Also that Asha's father's name was Tomas.

And now the wishes! Okay, so everybody gives up their wish when they turn eighteen. Why eighteen? In the medieval period in Spain the age of adulthood was not eighteen. The medieval period anywhere, really. I read that in Spain people were considered under their parents' jurisdiction until the age of twenty-three for men and twenty-five for women, unless married (which applied to both men and women). Most certainly not eighteen. Then again they weren't going to make the main characters in their twenties. But then they might as well have just had the age be sixteen or whatever.

And then you just...forget your wish? What's the point of that, then? Why would you want it to be granted? If you don't remember it anymore you have no desire for it anymore.

And the wish ceremony is only once in a lifetime, but what if your wish changes? What you wish for at eighteen is probably a lot different from what you wish for at forty.

What if by the time your wish is granted you don't want it anymore? After all, you moved on because you had no memory of wanting it!

Like that lady who wanted to create the best dresses. Why would she want to create them? Presumably that was her job. Maybe she's a seamstress from a family of seamstresses. Or something. But then her wish to create the best dresses is taken from her and she has no memory of ever wanting to make them. She has no desire or drive to at all. So she becomes something else. She does a different job. Maybe she becomes a baker or something. Then all of a sudden she's granted the ability to make the best dresses, after years and years of doing something else because she had no desire to create dresses anymore. Now what?

And there was that one wish of someone holding a baby. Presumably the wisher wished for a child. Does that mean the wisher will remain infertile until and unless Magnifico grants the wish? And how would that work anyway? Would a baby just appear out of nothing onstage?

And Sabino's wish. It seems that his wish was to create music with his lute. It would've been a lot simpler if his wish had been worded that way instead of "create something to inspire future generations." Magnifico was actually right that ideas can be dangerous. Of course, Sabino would never hurt anyone, but the people he inspires might, or the people they inspire might, and so on and so forth. For all Magnifico knows, Sabino's inspiration is a rebellion or something, instead of simply music.

And now Magnifico. A name like Magnifico is a bit on the nose, no? I assume that was not his original name. Maybe he renamed himself after gaining magic. A magnificent name for a magnificent sorcerer king! 

He was not born a magician. It says that when he was young his family was attacked and he didn't have magic then. Where did he get magic from then?

And I'd like to know a bit more about this "great loss" he suffered, wouldn't you?

He founded Rosas. Why did he pick the name Rosas then? Isn't the way these things usually work is naming the kingdom or city or whatever after some derivative of his name?

And what exactly does the king's apprentice do? Apprentice to a sorcerer, but there weren't any other sorcerer's around in Rosas, were there? What happened to the other apprentices, and if you've ever read the Wings of Fire series I'm worrying that the same thing that happened to the dragonmancer apprentices in that series happens here. (Spoiler: They died.)

And Amaya, the queen, knows exactly who Asha is. Alright so it makes sense that she'd know the name of whoever was applying to be the next apprentice. Also I thought it was so sweet that she was giving Asha advice.

But apparently she's been watching Asha and knows how she acts and feels and so on. She's the queen and Asha is a random person in Rosas. I get the feeling it's a pretty small kingdom. It must be, though, for everybody to be able to gather once a month. Probably that one town is basically the whole kingdom.

Also I wonder whatever happened with that poor guy who had the interview right before Asha.

And Magnifico seemed to trust Asha very quickly and then revealed his true motives to her also very quickly. Did he think she would agree with him but drastically misread her intentions?

You know a lot of the wishes could have been fulfilled on their own. Like Simon's wish was to be a loyal guard. He could have fulfilled that wish by.....joining up with the king's guards and training with them and becoming one of them. Obviously he's already loyal if he wants to become a guard in the first place.

And I want to know how Amaya and Magnifico met! I want to know more about them in general!

My guess is that they met and married only after Magnifico became king because she constantly calls him mi rey.

Although on the other hand maybe they were married before that and she calls him that because she's so proud that he became king.

Also you'd think Amaya would have had some questions after Asha's interview. Like "if Asha isn't being your next apprentice why did you want her to sit with me then." 

And it seems that that weird green forbidden magic changed Magnifico. He could be reasoned with, before. But afterwards he threatened Amaya. I thought he truly loved her, but he was willing to hurt her with magic. I think the magic changed him, made him worse. And once you embrace it, there's no going back....

But Amaya seems to accept evil Magnifico with surprising ease. Once she sees that apparently it's impossible to undo the magic's influence she just...accepts it. Like you'd think she'd try to talk to him or something. Like even after he's in the mirror you'd think that she'd try to talk to him and ask him what he was thinking and see if he knows of any way to undo the forbidden magic now that he can't harm anyone else. But nope.

I did think that part was kind of funny, though. She's like "Well you do love mirrors!" She's seen quite enough of him staring into mirrors and preening over how handsome he is.....

But also Asha figured out that the queen was on her side and would go against her own husband just from seeing how changed she looked after realizing what Maginifco was doing? Aren't queens, like, trained never to let their true emotions show in public?

Also random but Magnifico says he granted fourteen wishes last year but he grants wishes once a month. What are the extra wishes?

Maybe, in addition to the monthly granting, sometimes he grants an extra wish on notable occasions, like the anniversary of the kingdom’s founding and holidays and so on. Which might be why everyone expected Sabino's wish to be granted - he was surely the oldest one there, and a 100th birthday is indeed an occasion.

And also why is sixteen year old Dahlia working in the palace kitchen? Is she apprenticing to someone? Do her parents work there?

Also I think it's funny how half the kingdom has a crush on Magnifico despite him already being married. Like Amaya is literally right there.

And then the ending with Asha being a fairy godmother. Crossovers aside, I don’t care about that, and I want an answer that is not bashing the movie, please, why did they word it that way? Why did Asha's friends say she should be their fairy godmother as opposed to "You'll help us all fulfill our wishes" or "you'll grant everyone their wishes" or so on? Asha is very much a human, not a fairy at all. and it's not her magic, it's the star’s magic.

So the fact that they specify fairy godmother implies that fairy godmothers already exist in the universe of Rosas. Which is maybe a clue as to where Magnifico got his magic from.

Back to Magnifico I wondered why he didn't immediately suspect that the light was Asha.

Although I thought it was funny how everybody was cheering the light and he was like "No, it wasn't me, it's a traitor!"

Like somebody figures out his true colors, he reveals his true motives (didn't he worry she would do something or tell people?) and then literally that night somebody's meddling with magic. He didn't suspect her?

When Magnifico and his guards showed up at her house I thought he'd finally come to that conclusion. But then it turned out Simon told him.

Also how did they escape on the king's horses? They're unfamiliar to the horses and likely have less experience riding. Shouldn't the horses reject them in favor of their own riders, or at least be slower and confused? Like it should have taken them longer to get the horses to trust them and let them ride them.

And Magnifico kind of doomed himself in the end. Overnight he went from a beloved wishgranting king to one trying to destroy all of them and blot out the stars. Made it pretty easy for the population to celebrate his defeat. As opposed to what he had until then, which was the word of one random teenager against him.

Especially considering his wife was against him! That definitely convinced a lot of people. Amaya seems pretty popular.

I wonder what the everyday people were thinking. One day out of the blue there's a traitor, who seemed like a nice ordinary girl but she meddled with magic which the king says is illegal and he's the king so his word goes. Then the king starts doing creepy magic and people's wishes start being destroyed and he tries to kill Asha.

Also does Bazeema have a crush on Gabo or something? She kept popping up right next to him.

And I wonder what Asha's mother's wish was.

Also Magnico states that he doesn't even charge his people rent. But how does that even work? Every kingdom and country in history has charged taxes. You need money for a kingdom to function. Basic. How does Magnifico pay his guards, then? Pay his servants?

Maybe he uses wishes as payment. Like with his guards, maybe they have to work for X amount of years and then he grants their wishes. Plus while they’re working for him they get food and a place to live and so on. Magnifico using wishes as payment wouldn’t completely solve the money question, but it would go some way to.

Also, the fact that Magnifico didn’t charge rent, nor presumably any other form of taxes, suggests that he really really wanted people to live there, to the point of forgoing any money he could make from them, so he could have their wishes….

Also say what you will about the ending but I think it could actually make sense for Magnifico in the mirror to be the Evil Queen's mirror. So they didn't destroy this mirror, right? It stayed in the palace. It's still there for the next generation of rulers, and the next. It gets handed down throughout the centuries and eventually they forgot the story behind it; they just know that their family has a magic mirror that can tell them anything. Because he has magic and can use it to find out anything. Now Rosas is in Spain and I think Snow White is in Germany but this could work. Back in the day royal families from different countries married each other all the time to create alliances. So somebody from the royal family of Rosas married Snow White's ancestor and brought the mirror along. And the mirror was passed down through a few more generations until it came to the Evil Queen. The Evil Queen was royalty by marriage, so the mirror could have belonged to her husband. It could have already been in the palace when she came. 

Also I was thinking! Magnifico's changed green magic that turned Simon evil! Isn't that sort of like what happened to Magnifico in the first place?

And I also want to know how long ago Magnifico founded Rosas. It must be pretty recent; it's still a very small kingdom. This is probably why he's so eager for people to visit and move there.

Sabino is 100 years old; presumably he moved to Rosas in his lifetime and wasn't born there? Maybe he knows about how it was founded and so on.

Imagine being older than the kingdom you live in! Quite an accomplishment! (Most kingdoms aren't new, so....)

So Magnifico can grant literally any wish, which he uses to encourage people to live there. Okay but this is literally any wish. Maybe this is another reason why people are coming to Rosas! They want their wishes granted! Literally any wish! Never mind the wishes to fly or swim or whatever! Where are the wishes for things like endless wealth or to be king, things which people have most certainly wished for over the centuries? Where are the desperate people traveling to move to Rosas to get their wish fulfilled? Where are the wishes like "I wish my dead brother was alive" and "I wish my fatally ill wife was cured of her illness" and "I wish my son who got run over by a cart last month was completely healed?"

[zafirosreverie]

Tía Y/N (Madrigal triplets & Reader) part 2

Part 1

_____________________

"GET OUT OF MY WAY!"

"I WASN’T EVEN PART OF THIS!"

"FÉLIX, I WANT A DIVORCE!"

"JULIETA, COME BACK HERE!"

“YES JULI, COME BACK! 

“NEVER!”

“SHE DOESN’T HIT YOU THAT HARD!”

"BETTER YOU THAN ME!"

“YOU’RE THE ELDEST! YOU HAVE TO SACRIFICE FOR YOUR BABY SIBLINGS”

“I KNOW NO SIBLINGS BUT THE ONE WITH THE CHANCLA BEHIND US, YOU’RE ON YOUR OWN”

“JULIETAAAAAAAA”

Alma tried not to laugh and maintain a serious face, but it was quite difficult when her triplets, all 50 years old with their own families, ran as a soul that the devil carries to avoid what everyone is afraid of: la chancla.

She didn't really know what was happening, it had been a quiet and normal morning, with the whole family taking a day off to enjoy each other's company. She had been embroidering with Mirabel in the living room (she did it more and more often, in an attempt to fix the relationship with her younger granddaughter), when Isabela and Camilo had entered laughing out loud, with Felix and Luisa smiling behind them.

They did not even have time to ask what happened before three green, yellow and blue spots flew next to them, with a very angry Y/N yelling from upstairs.

Alma was no fool, she knew that you, her eldest daughter and the one who reminded her most of Pedro (at least in appearance), had long taken the role that corresponded to her in the life of the triplets. On the one hand, she was happy they had you, but on the other it hurt her heart and guilt consumed her for knowing that she was never really present in her children's life to the point where they had to turn to you for help.

She never knew when Bruno had told you that he didn't want to have his own family, that he was not interested in having a partner of any kind. She wasn't present when Pepa had run to you on the first day of her period, or in the long night talks about crushes when she met Félix. She didn't even know that Julieta liked women too.

Just a few months ago she had discovered that Pepa calmed down when she was caressed, that Bruno liked to play the guitar or that Julieta loved painting and that the beautiful pictures in your room were made by her. In truth, she didn't know her own children. But you did.

You had been with them on every step of the road, even when they took different paths, you had never let them be lost for a long time. A task that you later performed with the grandchildren as well. Isabela and Dolores had learned to walk with you, Luisa always looked up to you especially when she had a problem, Camilo told you the secrets that he could never tell his parents, Antonio still followed you around all day when he was feeling sad and Mirabel...for the girl you were the whole world. There was absolutely nothing that she didn't tell you.

You were the only other family member besides her grandmother who didn't have a gift, you understood what it was to grow up with magical siblings when there was nothing special in you, you understood the looks of people's judgment, murmurs and teasing. That was why you had made your special mission to make the girl protected from all that.

Little by little, you wove a warm blanket of love and humility, you taught her that she did not need to have a gift to be a light, to shine and be a source of comfort. Mirabel could be identical to Julieta in appearance, but she was definitely a coal copy of you in everything else.

It took her too long to realize it, but now Alma understood that the miracle, the magic, was not what united them, that it was only a feature that most of them shared and nothing else. The answer was you. Really, you were the angel who kept the family together.

...And that's why no one should mess with you, unless they wanted all of heaven's strength chasing them. Or that it was one of the triplets. 50 years and they had not yet learned not to make you angry? Or perhaps it was their way of getting your attention when they felt you were abandoning them for the grandchildren.

A silly thought perhaps, but children will always be children, and the age did not matter, they would always need even if it was just a hug from their mother. And you were definitely the triplets' mother, no matter how much it hurt her.

"What do you think happened?" Mirabel whispered, taking her out of her thoughts

"I don't know" Alma smiled "but it must have been bad if your mother is running too"

It was true. Of the three, Julieta was usually the one that was spared from your fury. It was no secret to anyone that she was your favorite sister/daughter/family/person, despite Pepa and Bruno's anger, who would always get offended when her sister avoided your scolding.

"What about Julieta?! She also helped with the joke!" they would said

"Maybe, but she looks cute doing it" you'd shrug "besides, who could be mad at this precious face?" You would add while taking your sister by the cheeks

Your younger siblings would cross their arms and looked at you with an annoyed pout while a black cloud hovered on the redhead, and Julieta simply let you use her cheeks as a squishy and fill her face with kisses (something she took from you and did with her niece, nephews and daughters too), while she smirked at them. 

The only times she actually got scolded was when she wasn't taking care of her own health. So either Julieta just wanted to do exercise or whatever the hell they did was really stupid and dangerous.

"YOU'RE ALL SO GROUNDED!!" You growled when you managed to get to the first floor.

You cursed Casita for siding with the triplets and letting them run while it trapped you on the second floor, but that didn't mean they were safe. Nope, there was no escape. 

"What happened, mija?" Alma asked you walking up to you

"Your mocosos share the same fried brain cell and unfortunately for them, it wasn't Julieta's turn to have It" you growled 

Your mother laughed and rolled her eyes fondly. She knew that you loved your siblings more than anything and that any insult you might have for them would never come out of the heart, just from a motherly anger, and there was something she could think that this was about. 

"Did they try to test Julieta's gift with poisoned food again?" She asked 

"They tried to test my patience" you answered "they used arsenic, mom. ARSENIC!"

Okay, that was new. Alma felt bad for thinking it, but she could have expected something that stupid and irresponsible from Pepa and Bruno, but Julieta? She knew better than that, she wasn't a silly girl who didn't know what arsenic could do. She must have been really desperate to get your attention if she let her siblings drag her into that.

"How are they even alive?" She gasped

"Félix caught them before they could even finish the empanadas and ran to tell me" you sighed "and I'm glad he did"

"Of course, I don't want to thinking what could have happened to them"

"And because now I can kill them myself" 

Alma looked at you for a moment. You were frowning and looked ready to hit whoever stood in front of you, but she was still your mother and she could see the fear in your eyes, and honestly, she felt it too. She followed your gaze to see her younger children still running and she made a note to scold them right after you.

You felt your mom's aura changing and knew she was on your side, so you smirked and took your sandal with a single move, your eyes never leaving your adorably stupid siblings.

"Who do you want me to hit?" You asked, just for fun 

Alma thought about it for a second. Julieta would definitely get the worst scolding once they were back for letting the other two convince her to do something stupid, but you both knew it hadn't been her idea. It probably wasn't even Bruno's, but there was someone who had never feared death nor god. 

"The middle one" she told you 

You nodded and focused on your victim for a moment before your chance flew directly at her. Your smirk never left your face and grew even more when Pepa fell to the ground after it hit her right in the head. Bruno and Julieta didn't even look at their fallen sister, they just ran faster to save their lives. 

"AND YOU BETTER BRING IT BACK TO ME, YOUNG LADY" You yelled at the redhead while the whole family laughed behind you. 

These three would be the end of you one day, you were sure of that. But god knew you wouldn't have them any other way. Besides, they were your cute little babies, so you guessed that gave them some points too.

[lilithism1848]

Atrocities US committed against WOMEN

In 2022, the US supreme court overturned Roe V Wade, ending a constitutional guarantee to the right to have an abortion, in place for over 50 years. In response, 26 US states are expected to ban abortion in their state. Women who become pregnant in red states, will now have to drive an increased average of over 200 miles to an abortion clinic. Protests erupted in hundreds of US cities, decrying the decision.

US police officers routinely commit sexual assault and rapes: most go unreported, but over 1200 incidents, including over 400 rapes were committed over a 9 year period from 2005-2013.

In the period following WWII, the US capitalist-controlled media, advertising, and consumer products industries propagandized and glorified the ideal of the housewife-consumer, in order to sell products, make labor space for returning soldiers, take advantage of women’s unpaid labor in the home, and to help build a new workforce and potential army to combat the soviet union. This sparked an era of regression with respect to the feminist victories of the previous 50 years, and caused psychological damage and demoralization to an uncountable number of women. Women who remained in the labor force were primarily only allowed in subordinate positions such as secretaries, cleaning women, elementary school teachers, saleswomen, waitresses, and nurses. This is chronicled in the Feminine Mystique.

In September 2020, it was revealed that ICE had performed mass hysterectomies on immigrant women in several detention centers, reminiscent of the long-standing US policy of sterilization of black and brown women.

From the 1880s onward, many US states (27 + Puerto Rico in 1956) operated a system of forced sterilization of women, rooted in white supremacy. The principle targets were the mentally ill, Native Americans, and blacks. For example, in Sunflower County Mississippi, 60% of black women living there were sterilized without their permission. An estimated 3,406 Indian women were sterilized. California eugenicists in 1933 began sending their literature overseas to german scientists and medical workers, sparking the beginnings of Nazi Eugenics. In the end, over 65,000 individuals were sterilized in 33 states, in all likelihood without the perspectives of ethnic minorities. The US enacted a system of forced sterilization in Puerto Rico since its takeover by the US in 1989: a 1965 survey of of Puerto Rican residents found that about one-third of all Puerto Rican mothers, ages 20-49, were sterilized. 148 female prisoners in two California institutions were sterilized between 2006 and 2010 in a supposedly voluntary program, but it was determined that the prisoners did not give consent to the procedures. In Madrigal vs. Quilligan, many unsuspecting women were coerced to sign paperwork to perform sterilization, while others were told that the process could be reversed. None of the women were fluent in English. 10 latina women were sterilized, and the doctor was found innocent.

US elites in the 18th and 19th centuries pushed a narrative of domestic purity, or the cult of true womanhood, for women as a way of pacifying her with a doctrine of “separate but equal”-giving her work equally as important as the man’s, but separate and different. Inside that “equality” there was the fact that the woman did not choose her mate, and once her marriage took place, her life was determined. One girl wrote in 1791: “The die is about to be cast which will probably determine the future happiness or misery of my life…. I have always anticipated the event with a degree of solemnity almost equal to that which will terminate my present existence.” Marriage enchained, and children doubled the chains. One woman, writing in 1813: “The idea of soon giving birth to my third child and the consequent duties I shall he called to discharge distresses me so I feel as if I should sink.”

In 2019, it was discovered that US Border patrol had been protecting rapes and abuse of its own members since the 1990s. In one instance, a trainee was forced to give oral sex to 5 officers, and then raped while she was unconcious. At least 35 instances of rape by officers was found.

In May, 2019, Alabama lawmakers banned abortion in the state, providing no exceptions for victims of rape or incest. Those caught performing abortions will face up to 99 years in prison. The bill is part of a larger effort to overturn Roe vs Wade, a long-standing supreme court decision affirming a woman’s right to choose. Alabaman women seeking abortions are now forced to travel across state lines, and hide everything about the procedure from friends and family, in order to avoid legal repercussions from their home state. The American Civil Liberties Union has filed a federal suit against the state.

On November 25, 2017, Yang Song died after falling from a 4th floor balcony during a targeted police raid. Her personal messages revealed that in 2016, she was raped at gunpoint by an undercover police officer, and was subsequently harrassed, threatened with deportation, and then likely murdered by the NYPD.

In the 1830s, The Lowell Mill Girls were female workers who came to work in industrial factories in Lowell, Massachusetts, during the Industrial Revolution, and who despite living in cramped boarding houses and working from 5am-7pm every day, developed a culture of defiance against the factory owners, and created reform associations, and began strikes in 1834 and 1836.

[foggyfanfic]

what do you imagine antonio grown up

Thank you for the ask! This ended up being a little long so I put it under a cut. Just a quick warning, my ideas of what Antonio is like as an adult might not be everybody's cup o' tea, that's not to say I think he grows up to be a jerk. The exact opposite. I just figure the guy is going to be the least traditional in his family due to the influence of the animals around him.

I like the common headcanon that Antonio grows up to be really tall. I figure he ends up taller than Pepa but still a little shorter than Luisa. Despite his height, Pepa still insists on calling him her baby even once he's a grandfather himself.

I once saw somebody reason that because Antonio hangs out with a carnivore, he gets pretty comfy with the circle of life. That makes a lot of sense to me, but I imagine it's his association with jaguars that makes him such a stalwart advocate for animal rights. Jaguars might eat other animals but they don't put them in tiny little boxes and forget to feed them. The circle of life is a part of nature, cruelty for cruelty's sake is not. So, Antonio goes around to the farms of Encanto and does what he can to ensure that the livestock are all being treated fairly. And considering he's followed everywhere he goes by at least one jaguar, he can do a lot.

In the same vein as him being comfy with the cycle of life and death, I imagine that Antonio learns what sex is basically the first time mating season comes around. He sees one of the birds preparing a nest, asks if this means they’re about to have babies and gets a frank lesson on that bird’s courting rituals. The bird doesn’t see any reason not to explain how new birds are made, and the talk is given so matter of factly that Antonio just thinks of it as a new science fact. One day his parents are reminiscing about when they were young and Antonio asks his Pá if he built Pepa a nest, the adults chuckle and say no, only birds do that. So Antonio asks if sex is also something only birds do. The silence is resounding and would have lasted forever if Camilo hadn’t broken out laughing. When he grows up he's the easiest adult in the family to talk to about puberty and wedding night jitters.

We know the warm color side of the family has game, Dolores had Mariano asking for marriage within one conversation, and despite having a very minor role in the movie Camilo has so many fangirls. Antonio is no exception. The little dude grows up with all the charisma of Félix and all the emotional intelligence of Mirabel, and there’s a roughly 7 year period between Camilo getting married and Dolores’ eldest coming of age where he’s the only single Madrigal of marrying age. Needless to say, he’s super popular with both men and women, but he’s also pretty content to just hang out with the animals all day. Until a girl a couple years younger than him gets caught kissing another girl by her parents. They are furious at her, and plan to force her to marry the first man they find that'll take an unwilling wife. Antonio finds her crying by the river, gets her to tell him what’s wrong, then says he’ll marry her and she can keep seeing her girlfriend. She asks multiple times if he’s sure, and doesn’t he want to fall in love, marry his soulmate? Antonio just shrugs, he’s happy as he is. So she agrees, her parents jump on the chance to marry her off to a Madrigal, and they get hitched.

This next part is the reason I put the warning up at the top, you can interpret it as Antonio and the girlfriends all wanting kids and going for the obvious solution, or you can interpret it as polyamorous Antonio. I sure as hell haven’t made up my mind which it is. But, he has two kids with his wife, then her girlfriend moves into Antonio’s room and they have two kids too. Nobody is sure what to think, but at this point the family is getting pretty big, and both women love cooking so whenever somebody asks Alma what she thinks of the situation she says “Not only can Antonio have as many wives as he wants, but if Isabela has another son, I’m sending Antonio to culinary school with a bag of engagement rings.” Nobody knows whether or not she’s joking, but it’s hard to argue with that. (Side note, I figure each generation has an average of three kids per Madrigal. So, factoring in spouses, by the time the youngest grandkid is having his third child that's roughly 36 mouths to feed. Which leads some people in the village to argue that Alma is serious and rightfully so.)

His kids are close enough in age that people sometimes forget what child came from which woman, and all of the kids call both women Mama and Mami. He’s pretty happy with his small army of offspring, he’s a pretty chill dude and after spending most of his life dealing with wild animals he takes to parenthood like a duck to water. This makes it even harder for anyone to complain about his strange situation, because all of his kids are so happy and well behaved.

He ends up with a pack of domesticated jaguars that follow him around. The one time a dangerous gang got into Encanto, Antonio sent some jaguars after them and that pretty much took care of that.

Even once his own kids are all grown “Tío Nio” can be found with a pile of children on top of him while he calmly reads a medical journal. There are more healers in the family than just Julieta by now, but none of them can completely heal disease, and pregnancy is still a complicated process for all species. So he reads up as much he can in order to help the animals of the village.

He is the best person to go to for relationship advice. There are plenty of people in the family who can tell you the most charming way to behave in a relationship, and Mirabel will tell you the most mature way to behave, but Antonio blends charm and maturity like no other. For example: at one point one of his nieces accidentally rubs salt in the wound that is her husband's bad day, she apologizes but he is still visibly upset. She doesn't know if he's still upset about his bad day, or if she hurt him more than she realized and needed to give a bigger apology, so she turns to her Tio Nio. He tells her to set up a day out they'll both enjoy, that way if she needs to apologize she'll have a whole day of meaningful gestures prepared, and if she doesn't she still gets the chance to spend time with the man she loves.

Thank you again for the ask! Hope you enjoyed some of these.

[viola-ophelia]

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#idk why some people can't get it into their heads that writing a redemption arc for a character doesn't mean that the author condones murder

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

i feel extremely seen in pepa madrigal from encanto...... like. i too am a temperamental girl with anxiety who’s not as sweet and gentle as most disney women bc i have this reputation within my family for being difficult and dramatic which i lowkey resent but don’t know if i can ever really change bc it is kinda true lol but hey at least i’m genuine and i’m doing my best... idk, i know she’s a random side character in a kid’s movie but damn 

78 notes - Posted January 18, 2022

#4

in defense of cutler beckett

it’s kind of a tradition of mine to periodically write “in defense of” essays for unpopular characters (see “in defense of celegorm” and “in defense of bunny corcoran” lol), and idk what it says about me that i frequently feel the urge to advocate in favor of characters that are deemed unlikable/ unredeemable/ unworthy of attention by their respective fandoms, but i’m rolling with it lol. anyway, today, i want to focus on lord cutler beckett from pirates of the caribbean, because the general consensus about him on tumblr these days is… pretty abysmal lol, but i think he deserves a closer look. beckett seems to be the vast majority of people’s least favorite character, and not in an ironic way like some of the characters in POTC are treated online, like oh haha yeah barbossa was kinda annoying for going all ghost zombie mode on everyone but also we love him, weird eclectic uncle vibes, woo!.... no, everyone just straight-up hates beckett. and look: i get it, i really do. beckett is a much “realer” villain than davy jones or barbossa or salazar or any of the other POTC baddies, and that makes him much easier to hate. he’s not a giant octopus or a cursed skeleton or a slimy ghost guy with mystical powers, he’s literally just some guy– and he’s an asshole of a guy, because he’s basically just a random capitalist who wants all our favorite characters swinging from the gallows because they’re getting in the way of his trading schemes. and, if you count the price of freedom as canon, he’s also a slave trader, which is pretty unambiguously terrible. but despite all that, i actually like beckett. in fact, he’s one of my favorite characters in POTC: although it’s important to note that when i say that, i’m in no way saying that i condone his actions or that i think he’s morally good. as i see it, it’s totally valid to enjoy villainous characters while also acknowledging that they’re evil/problematic/whatever and that their actions are not morally acceptable in the real world. but the realm of POTC– where people (including the “good guys,” might i add!) are murdering and backstabbing each other left and right, any and all historical accuracy has to be taken with several grains of salt, and occult magic and sea goddesses and evil fish-men casually exist– is pretty far from “the real world” if you ask me lol. but anyway, let’s get into it then, shall we! (adding a read-more bc this is LONG oop)

beckett gets a really bad rap in the POTC fandom not just because he’s a ‘problematic’ character, but because on the surface, he comes across as a very one-dimensional, and therefore boring, villain. there are certainly other not-so-morally-pure characters in POTC that don’t seem to get the same treatment beckett does… no one really seems to talk about how pintel and ragetti threatened to r*pe elizabeth in the curse of the black pearl, for example. but pintel and ragetti are goofy comedic relief fan faves, and they’re also on the “good side” (aka the side of the pirates), so they have some redeeming qualities. in contrast, beckett is unique in POTC– a franchise famous for morally complex characters– for his seeming complete lack of redemptive nuance. he’s easy to understand as a villain because he’s just one of those villains who’s bad just ‘cause he can be. and he sucks! he’s ruthless, he’s power-hungry and materialistic, he plots against the pirates simply because they’re an inconvenience to him, and he represents the unjust authority which jack sparrow and the “good guys” stand against. the law permits beckett to freely exploit people in the name of the east india company, but does not allow jack and his companions even a chance of survival if they’re caught: and he knows how unfair this is, and doesn’t care. but here’s the thing: at its core, POTC is a pirate story told by pirates. of course we’re going to root for jack, will, elizabeth, and the gang over characters like beckett and norrington… because the pirates are the ones in control of the narrative. if we want, we can choose to believe them when they show us how much beckett sucks (and to be fair, they’re largely right lol), but it’s sort of boring, i feel, to just readily absorb the story that’s made most prominently visible to us and not bother to examine other perspectives. 

so let’s talk about beckett’s motives. maybe he really is power-hungry and exploitative because he just is, and that’s all there is to him… but again, that’s what the pirates think, but it’s worth considering other possibilities too. what is beckett’s backstory, then– what, if anything, prompted him to go on his pirate-killing spree? well, in the movies, he doesn’t have one. he kinda just shows up one day and crashes will and elizabeth’s wedding as an obnoxious power flex, and from that point on, he’s just, like, there and he hates the pirates REALLY bad and wants to kill them all through any means possible, seemingly just because he can. the price of freedom, though, does give beckett a backstory. i’m not going to summarize the entire thing here, but in it, he and jack once worked together for the east india co. before eventually having a big mutual betrayal where jack wasn’t a fan of the fact that beckett was transporting some slaves, so he freed them all, which fucked beckett’s career over so beckett branded him as a pirate and then went on to become the asshole we see in the movies. but to be honest, this doesn’t really compel me all that much. it’s certainly an important moment for jack, but it explains away beckett’s motives the same vague way the movies do, aka by going “well, he’s just evil because he is/always was.”  

what was really going on with beckett to force him through such a transformation had to have been much more than jack fucking up his job one time. the price of freedom tells us that he was a sickly kid not expected to live past childhood and that he was lowkey abused by his family, so i think a desire to prove his own worth was definitely part of it. but i don’t think beckett became evil (or doomed, for that matter) when he branded jack as a pirate. there’s a point in the book (if i’m remembering correctly) where young beckett gets captured by pirates and his dad refuses to pay the bail to have him released. it doesn’t explain how he eventually managed to escape, but i can only imagine that the experience left him with some internal damage… a fear of losing control, most likely, and of being out of his element. that’s kind of a lot for a teenager to take in… not only that his family doesn’t want him and he’s gonna have to fend for himself for the rest of his life, but that the world is cruel and unforgiving to vulnerable people, and the only way for him to survive is to seize all of the power and control he can and never let it go… because, if he doesn’t become the biggest fish, then a bigger fish is going to come along and that’ll be the end of him. beckett never manages to get rid of this fear of instability and vulnerability, which– especially after jack’s betrayal– manifests itself in a hatred of and desire to dominate (perhaps an attempt to conquer or mask a secret, intense fear of?) pirates and the occult. and of course, this eventually becomes his downfall, as he freezes the second he makes a mistake in at world’s end and is so unable to move beyond the loss of the upper hand that he literally just dies. beckett’s death is exactly what he deserves, but it’s also a remarkably devastating moment granted to a character who, up until this point, we’ve been guided to unreservedly hate and root against. in the grand scheme, it represents the fall of the old order, but for beckett himself, it’s his worst nightmare coming true– it’s the loss of control he’s been fighting this whole time and not realized was sneaking up on him till it was literally staring him in the face… and that’s tragic, and we’re meant to think so! we see his fatal flaw laid bare in a way that we would normally only expect the narrative to do so for its heroes, and it’s an incredible and shocking moment, being forced to briefly see things from the other side. 

it’s hard for me to hate beckett as i watch him dying, and honestly it’s hard for me to hate him in general, because tbh i do resonate with him in some ways. obviously, his actions as a character are awful (and in particular, there’s no avoiding or diminishing the unequivocal evilness of the slave trading thing), and that’s what makes him a villain. but at the root of it all, i kinda just see a guy who’s sought to prove himself for so long that now he’s at the helm of this incredibly powerful and dangerous position that he cannot lose because he’s nothing without what he’s worked for, but even as he’s surrounded himself with people he can use as tools he has no one he can truly trust, so he projects this cold and calculating persona at all times because he has to, because it’s how he maintains control and he has to maintain control because without control he knows he’s already lost, but as tightly wound as he must be, he somehow manages not to break his composure even at the very end and goes down with his fucking ship in a moment that’s weirdly heroic… like. you don’t have to like beckett, but i do think he deserves respect. in a fandom full of wacky, fun, exciting characters, i know it’s not exactly intuitive to focus on the one decidedly un-supernatural, un-thrilling character… but in a story told by, about (and arguably for) pirates, beckett maybe rebels the most of all, by refusing, right down to his last moments, to succumb to a narrative that was never for him in the first place. and i think there’s something to be said about a character who-- villainous or not-- sticks by his principles till the end even as the very world around him bends to different rules, who doesn’t run from the law when it no longer benefits him but who acknowledges that he’s lost and owns it. 

83 notes - Posted March 21, 2022

#3

i made a quiz that’ll tell you which of jane austen’s seven heroines you are - enjoy! 

255 notes - Posted September 8, 2022

#2

things i wish i could tell every young person on the internet (alternate title: an open letter to myself at 18)

- identity labels are an option, not a requirement, and they aren’t the only thing that define you.

- you’re also always allowed to change your mind about them, and you should never feel anything but proud of yourself for doing so.

- it’ll only do you harm to view your trauma(s) and mental illness(es) like immutable personality traits. you deserve to accept that things will get better. 

- if you’re cishet, that’s okay! you don’t “have” to be queer to prove you’re not a bad or boring person.

- fiction does not equal reality, and fandom is a hobby, not a venue for activism.  “problematic” fanfiction has literally no effect on society, so don’t ever feel bad about enjoying what makes you happy! 

- try, above all else, to be kind to yourself. you deserve it. 

319 notes - Posted May 26, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

i’m not just a “villain apologist.” oh no no... when i say i like a villainous character, i not only mean that i fully support all of their evil actions and believe them to be totally justified and tremendously sexy, but also that i partake in the same evil actions irl and thoroughly enjoy it. “but you can’t like that character, they murdered someone!” yes, and? i murder at least one person a week for fun, what’s your point

369 notes - Posted April 8, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[sorryiwasasleep]

When the World’s at Stake

Dolores Madrigal is fifteen years old and she wakes up to back pains.

She’s been having them for months now, her Mamá and Tía convinced it’s just growing pains. She’s gained some weight too. “Coming into her body” like all the abuela’s say, whatever that’s supposed to mean.

It’s been happening ever since she and Marco…

She shakes away the thought.

Marco was… a lot.

And she’s not even sure how much she’d liked him in the first place before she’d broken things off.

He’d just liked her so much and made her feel good about herself.

But the back pains, they’re sharper today.

Something is… different about them.

Her madre finds her curled up in pain in the morning when she doesn’t come down to breakfast.

Her Tía gives her a special tea that’s supposed to help but, nothing happens.

If anything the pain gets worse.

Sharper.

Closer together.

She can’t do anything but whimper and wait for the pain to pass.

Dolores stays home from school and Pepa stays home from the fields to be with her.

She’s been worried for her daughter these past few months, her mood getting worse and her pains sharper.

The rest of the Madrigals go about their days.

It’s around noon that something new happens.

Pepa is downstairs getting them lunch.

After a particularly bad bout of pain, Dolores feels a gush of something in her lower half and her eyes go wide.

She feels like she peed herself.

It’s not usually how things start when she has her period, but she also normally wakes up bleeding.

Maybe this is normal?

That would explain the pains then.

Even if they’re sharper than normal.

She lifts her skirt, expecting to see her bloomers stained with blood.

Instead, it’s not red.

It worries her more.

Because she knows she didn’t just lose control of her bladder.

And if it isn’t her period either?

Then she doesn’t know what’s going on.

Pepa steps back in the room and Dolores looks at her in fear.

“Mamí…” she doesn’t understand what’s happening to her.

She tells her mother what just happened and a cloud appears and then fades as Pepa comes to the same conclusion Dolores did.

That it was just her period.

The cloud is back in full force with a crack of thunder when Dolores says she isn’t bleeding.

Dolores flinched away from the noise.

Pepa starts pacing and muttering, but Dolores can hear it perfectly.

“That sounds like…” her hands drag down her braid. “But it can’t, she wouldn’t have, she isn’t, she’s only, it can’t be!” With a controlled breath, Pepa turns back to the bed where her daughter sits.

“Dolores. I’m going to ask you something. I need you to tell the truth.” She steps closer. “I won’t be upset whatever the answer, but I need to know to know how to help you.” She perches on the edge of the bed next to her.

Her baby.

She’ll always be a little baby in Pepa’s eyes.

But she isn’t one anymore.

And Pepa needs to accept that.

She takes another leveled breath, trying to control her emotions, control her reaction, brace herself for whatever answer she’s about to get.

She thinks she knows what might be happening.

She’s read books about this.

Women who didn’t know until it literally started.

She’s blunt about it.

“Dolores, have you had sex?”

Dolores eyes go wider.

Whatever she’d been expecting her Mamí to ask, it wasn’t that.

She’s also not sure what is has to do with anything?

“I— what?” She manages to choke out.

“Dolores, please. I want to help you, and I, I might know what’s happening, but I need you to be honest? Have you?” Her madre’s face is so open. So trusting.

She feels the tears well up in her eyes.

Dolores never meant to lie.

It was just, Marco wasn’t anything to her.

She hadn’t seen the point in making their relationship anything more than it was.

A fling.

A distraction.

Practice for when someone she liked just as much as they like her came along.

She nods.

Her mothers eyes slide shut and her face scrunches like she’s pained as she exhales. She nods and Dolores hears the scratch of her braid against her dress.

“And you…” Pepa exhales again, measuring herself. She makes sure to make eye contact. “Were you hurt? Or pressured?” She has to know.

She won’t love her daughter any differently no matter the answer but she has to know if she needs to kill a man today.

Dolores shakes her head.

“No.” She sobs out the word like it hurts. Like she’s ashamed.

Pepa’s heart breaks for her little girl. She brings her in for a hug and Dolores clings on.

And it’s only going to get worse if I’m right.

Pepa rubs her back as she cries.

“Hija, I’m sorry I have to ask this, but…” she does quick maths and her cloud is back.

She doesn’t want to rain.

She can’t.

Dolores doesn’t need that right now.

She takes another controlled breath.

“Was it around your birthday?”

Dolores let’s out a pained noise and it’s the confirmation she needs.

She can’t control the thunder that cracks above them.

Fuck.

Dolores is pregnant.

Scratch that— Dolores is in labor.

Her behavior from last summer is making more sense.

She’d had a boyfriend.

Her behavior from the last few months is making sense too.

Pepa wants to slap herself (and Julieta) for not seeing it before, but they’d just assumed that since Dolores was so young, there was no way.

They hadn’t wanted to think this in any case.

Pepa counts as she inhales, pushing down her own feelings, her own worries.

She has to focus on her daughter.

She pulls back from the hug and cups Dolores’ face.

“Dolores, I think you’re having a baby.”

Dolores can’t help it.

She laughs.

Because it’s insane.

That’s insane.

I can’t be having a baby!

I can’t!

At least… I don’t think I can be.

When her madre doesn’t laugh too, Dolores gets worried.

“Mamí, you can’t be serious. I can’t be having a baby! I’m not pregnant.” She gestured with her hands a rounded stomach, something she very clearly doesn’t have.

Her mothers hand comes to rest on what stomach she does.

It scares Dolores more than anything.

“Right, but— not every pregnant woman looks like that. I’ve read this before, women going into labor never even knowing they were pregnant in the first place. It’s rare, but not unheard of.” Her mothers face is pained, but sincere. “And I think it’s happening to you.”

Dolores just shakes her head.

“No, no, no, I, no, I’m not, no—“ she cuts herself off with a yell as her back spasms return.

Contractions?

No!

No. I’m not! I can’t be!

Her madre holds her until the pain stops.

She brushes Dolores’ curls back from her face. “I have to get your Tía. She’ll be able to tell us for sure. I’ll send your Papí for her, but I need to go tell him, okay?“ Dolores nods and then her next breath out is a sob. She looks at Pepa with terror on her face.

It tears her heart.

“Mamí, what if I am?” She sounds so broken, it breaks Pepa’s heart entirely.

She brushes her hands through her daughters hair again.

“One thing at a time hija okay? I love you.”

She leaves her daughters room and stops in the hall to choke out a sob of her own.

Her baby.

Her fifteen year old.

Might be having a baby of her own.

A drizzle starts coming down and she does nothing to stop it.

When she tells Félix, his first thought was hers and he’s angry. He calms when she says Dolores wasn’t hurt. He cries when the rest of her words sink in.

Back in her room, Dolores screams.

She’s grateful her room is soundproof for her own ears, but soundproof for the world too.

Because she’s shrieking as loud as her lungs will allow as her tears flow.

Because she thinks her madre might be right.

And it scares her.

Because what the fuck is she going to do if she’s having a baby?

She’s still a baby herself.

Fuck.

Her door cracks back open fifteen minutes later.

Her madre’s face is tear stained.

Dolores pretends not to notice, even as it stabs at her heart.

Tía Julieta arrives with her Papí twenty minutes later.

Both of them are wet.

It must be raining outside her room, even as her mother is managing to do a great job to keep her personal clouds at bay.

It’s all very clinical, the checking.

Dolores hates it.

Her padres offer to leave, but Dolores won’t let them.

She can’t find out alone.

She doesn’t want to find out at all.

When Tía gives a sad nod, it’s all Dolores can do not to start screaming again.

Fuck.

The next hours are a blur of pain.

Things progress quickly from there and the next thing she knows the pain is different again.

Tía is telling her to push.

Dolores still can’t believe this is real.

That this is her life.

I can’t do this.

It’s all she can think, even as she proceeds to do it.

Before she knows it, a crying that isn’t her own is filling the air.

A small thing is being hastily wiped off and placed on her chest.

Her vision blurs as she looks at it.

‘Him.’ She notes that tía said.

The baby is small and wrinkled with ten fingers and ten toes and a head full of dark curls.

She smiles at him.

Too soon, the pains in her body are back and Tía tells her she isn’t done yet.

Her mamí takes the baby to clean him off better.

Dolores finishes with the afterbirth and then Tía helps to ladle soup into her mouth.

Dolores is exhausted.

She flops back into her pillows.

As her head rolls to the side and she looks at her parents as they coo over the baby, washing him off.

It looks so right.

He looks so right in their arms.

Lightning sparks in her head.

She knows how to fix this.

She knows how to make sure he’ll be loved the way he should be.

Cared for the way he should be, without any of the shame.

The words are leaving her mouth and she knows.

“Take him. Please.”

The words are quiet, as her words always are.

But her parents hear her anyway based on how their faces change.

She knows this is the right choice.

She knows this is the most mature thing she can do.

The best thing she can do for him.

Her son.

It’s to let him never be that.

To never let him be hers.

Mamí makes sure the baby is secure in Papí’s arms before she whirls around, the wind whipping up with her confusion.

“Dolores, what?”

Dolores rips her eyes away from the little orange blanket.

From the curls that mimic her own.

Her eyes slide shut and she feels the hot tears roll down her cheeks.

“Please. Say he’s yours.” She opens her eyes to the blurred room.

She pleads with the shape of her mother. When it’s close enough to touch, Dolores reaches out and grabs her hand.

“We didn’t know I was gonna have him, we can say you didn’t know either. That you thought it was your changes. Say he’s yours. Only we’ll know he isn’t. Please.” She’s begging now, her voice getting louder. The tears come down in earnest.

“I can’t! I can’t take care of him! I can’t, I’m too young, and he’ll be too much for my gift, and I don’t even know how to take care of myself yet and I didn’t know this was happening and I can’t. Please.” Hands come to cup her cheeks, stroking away the tears.

She leans into the touch even as she stings.

She’d just wanted to feel pretty.

She’d just wanted to feel loved.

She hadn’t expected… this.

“Dolores, look at me.” Her mothers voice is hard, but when she opens her eyes, her expression is soft.

Her thumbs rub against Dolores’ cheeks and her tears continue.

“We will do whatever you want. If you want him to be your brother, he can be your brother. If you want—“ she stops, shutting her eyes and taking a measured breath, the slowly growing cloud above her receding back. “If you want him to be your son, he is. And no matter what, we will help you.”

Dolores just lets out another wail.

She knows what she wants.

And it isn’t to be a mother right now.

But an older sister?

She can do that again.

She’d love to do that again.

She forces herself to open her eyes. To make sure her mother can see the truth in them.

“He’s your son. Please.”

Tears slide down her mothers face too.

But she nods.

“Okay.” She pulls Dolores into her arms. “He’s my son. Your brother.”

Dolores just sobs as she looks over her madre’s shoulders at him.

Her Antonio.

[immacaria]

Tea and Books Asks

@sonata-ix tagged me on this, so, of course, I have to do this!

1. What period of history do you enjoy learning about?

  (My sibling is going to be so made about my answer, oh God) Sincerely, I never really cared much about history periods? I liked to learn about their culture, mythology and such, especially the aztecs, mayas and incas. The only lessons I paid attention because I was creating stories with the aspects of their culture.

2. Who is your favourite fictional character and why?

  A hard one, let me think... I don’t know really, to be honest. Mirabel and Luiza Madrigal because I can’t help but seeing myself in both of them. Merida too, to be fair.

  Mirabel is the youngest one, but she is there for every single one of her family, she listens to them, she is the one who notices the family is broken and wants to make it better and I can relate to that.

  Luzia because she is the one who does everything the others don’t want to do, she is the strongest, she is their rock, she is the one that will catch them if they fall and I also can relate to that.

  Merida is because 1. She doesn’t want to marry and I can relate to that. 2. Despite everything, she loved her family and she loved her mother, she didn’t want to harm anyone of her family, She wanted to be free, she wanted to be herself, but she still wanted to have her family’s support and I don’t think that’s bad. Merida is who I want to be.

3. What do you order at a café?

  Cake, I love cake. Strawberry, chocolate, vanilla, I love them all, just don’t give me the lemon one. Hate that thing.

4. Libraries, botanical gardens or art galleries?

  Libraries and art galleries because if I went to the botanical gardens I would be sneezing so much and so hard I would knock myself out. Tragic, I know.

5. Do you have a favourite film soundtrack?

  I do! Like Kai, I like Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron soundtrack, but the brazilian version because Paulo Ricardo fucking rocked on that movie (The scene where they are trying to tame him and Não Toque Em Mim starts to play altered my brain chemistry forever) and the Brother Bear soundtrack as well, but the brazilian version as well (Espíritos Ancestrais is simply amazing and the one where Kenai tells everything to Koda always make me cry)

6. What does your dream home look like?

  Cozy, honestly, big enough for my two dogs and my cat and my mom and my sister to live with me. Cold but soft tiles on the ground because I like to walk barefoot around the house, a library for my sister, a garden for my mother and somewhere quiet where I could read and write in peace. Somewhere that felt like home.

7. What makes you feel better on gloomy days?

  Curl up on my bed under my favourite blanket, put my earphones on and listen to music until I’m feeling better. If I get some sleep, that’s a bonus, if not, that’s alright too.

8. What are your top three films? Books?

  Films: 1. Encanto                       

            2. Whispers of the Heart     

            3. Kiki’s Delivery Service  

  Books: 1. Women who run with wolves

2. The Cat Who Saved Books

3. Anything by Caitlin Doughty

9. Are you an organized person?

  I am, yes, but like chaotically organized

10. Do you have a favourite classic novel?

  Yes, Pride and Prejudice, just like my mother.

11. What character archetype or trope is your favourite?

  Caretaker. I love the caretaker character when they are, well, taking care of others, makes me feel complete.

12. Do you prefer baking or cooking?

   Cooking! Though I would like to try my hand on baking some time.

13. Which season do you feel more at home in?

   Summer! Because I can go to the beach and see my friends and my wrists don't hurt because of the wind

14. What is your opinion on poetry?

   I like it. There is something about displaying so much emotion in so little words (most of the time) that always gets me. The hidden meanings, the hidden feelings, it's always so interesting to see and try to comprehend.

15. Do you speak formally when texting and emailing?

  Depends on the level of intimacy I have with the person, but most of the times yes, I do.

16. How do you organize your music playlists?

   Genre, artists, mood, artist's nationality, soundtrack or not, instrumental or not, based on characters or not. I have a lot of playlists, if you couldn't tell.

17. Who is your favourite author?

   Rick Riordan, Clarissa Pinkola Estes and Caitlin Doughty.

18. Chai or hot chocolate?

   Since I never had chai, I will hot chocolate because my sibling made it to me sometimes and I like it, even though it was a bit too sweet for me lol

19.Do you prefer forests, sea shores or meadows?

   Forestes and sea shores. I like to feel surrounded and see powerful things working. When I go to forests I feel at peace, I see all those tall trees, hear all those sounds and I feel peaceful. Same thing with sea shores, I look at the sea and something inside me relax, something inside me takes a deep breath and say 'I'm home' . Unfortunately, I do not feel like that with meadows, for some reason they give me anxiety, a part of me thinks it will be attacked while standing there.

20. If your were to cultivate a fruit orchard, what would you grow?

   A lot of things! I love fruits! I would grow apples, oranges, pineapples, watermelon, grapes, acerola, cajú and a lot of other ones! Me favourite fruit is pineapple (even though I'm slightly allergic to it lol)

Oh, boy, this got long. I'm sorry 😂. I will be taking @mathomhouse-e @aquilathefighter @firemandeanbuck @the-cloudy-dreamer and all of the Dreamling nation children I can't tag right now. Love all of you 😘😘!

[aurelia11fan]

Tío Can Heal, Too

(Agustín is a great tío, y’all)

It was 11:30 at night when Dolores jerked awake from a dead sleep. Cramps were tearing through her and her eyes watered at the painful sensations that only seemed to get worse with every movement. For the millionth time in her life, she wished someone could hear her and come to her rescue. She groaned when she realized she had bled through her nightgown, but the pain was too bad in the moment and she decided against changing. She took her robe from the hook next to her bed and pulled it on, desperately hoping to get to the bathroom for some relief.

Stepping out of her room, she paused suddenly in the hallway, the glow of her door reflecting off of her face. Tilting her head down, she made out sounds from the kitchen. Tia was still awake! Julieta had a raspberry tea blend that she always brewed special for her niece, sister, and daughters hidden carefully in her pantry for only these occasions. Dolores could have cried in relief at the realization. Tia Julieta would help. She only had to get herself downstairs.

The house rattled gently in an offer.

“No, Casita. Your tiles will wake someone. I’m okay.”

The house seemed to murmur a reply. If you change your mind, let me know.

Dolores’ bare feet were quiet against the floors of the house as she made her way downstairs, cringing as more blood emerged. She hadn’t expected it so soon and was more unprepared than she normally was. Hopefully her robe would be spared until she could get her rags. Embarrassment be damned, it was only tía Juli and she’d understand. Maybe she’d have an emergency stash in her apron. Turning the corner, Dolores made her way into the bright kitchen, ready to cry into Julieta’s arms, when she suddenly froze.

“Tío?!”

Agustín was at the sink, washing the remainder of the wine glasses from dinner. He jumped slightly, but mercifully didn’t drop anything.

“Dolores? You’re still awake?”

“Where’s tía?” Dolores asked with a hint of desperation. Her voice sounded needier than she wanted. Hopefully Tío Agustín wouldn’t be offended that she had asked for Julieta instead. Another cramp was coming on and she held her abdomen in preparation. Her pain always seemed to be the worst of the family, sometimes landing her in bed for a few days.

“Oh, I finally sent her to bed,” Agustín replied with a smile even though concern lined his face as he looked at his sobrina. “She had been up since 4:30 in the morning and I insisted on finishing the dishes. So far, nothing’s broken.”

“That…that’s good,” Dolores nodded. Craning her ear, she could faintly make out hear her Tia’s deep, easy breaths as she slept. She wanted to cry. Julieta had a calmness that even Pepa didn’t have and even though the young woman loved her mother, she needed a calm and reliable mood when she felt unwell and in pain. “Okay, thanks. Uh, and…um…buenes noches, tio.”

“Hey, hold on now,” Agustín said, his brows coming together in a worried frown. He dropped the towel on the counter and walked forward to place a practiced hand on Dolores’ forehead and then her shoulder. “You came down for a reason, didn’t you? And you seemed surprised to see me instead of Juli. I know your super hearing tends to dim a bit when you don’t feel well. Are you sick, pequeño buho?”

Dolores gave a weak smile at her Tios childhood nickname for her. He had called her “little owl” due to her large, beautiful, and dark eyes before her gift ceremony and then it was cemented afterwards when he told her that owls had some of the best hearing of any bird in the world. Agustín had presented her with a stuffed owl he had sewn together for her sixth birthday, and it remained one of her most treasured possessions.

“Well…um…”

Dolores hesitated slightly, not quite knowing what to say. Agustín had always made her feel safe, but she struggled somehow to talk to him about the truth.

“Is it something I can help with?”

“Uh…”

Agustíns eyes continued to regard her face with worry until they drifted to his nieces hands clutching her lower abdomen. A look of understanding—no doubt from raising three daughters— passed over his face.

“Ahh. I see.”

Dolores didn’t have much time for embarrassment. Her eyes watered as another strong cramp came on and she whimpered and flinched. Apparently it would be one of those months where things were especially nasty. Agustín motioned towards a chair and helped her sit, gently rubbing her back. Dolores struggled not to cry. Agustín handed her a bowl, (just in case, given that Isa got nauseous on her cycle) and then reached underneath the sink and pulled out a hot water bottle that Julieta kept for her sore muscles and filled it. He handed it to his niece, who took it with a grateful smile.

“Here. And…maybe try a deep breath or two.”

“I’ll try,” Dolores responded with some amusement. People said the same to her mother during her anxiety attacks. Sometimes breathing didn’t come as easily as people assumed it did, but as the heat from the bottle spread through her, relief slowly started coming and she relaxed into her chair, praying that more blood wouldn’t come. Agustín handed her a towel (“If you need it for…you know”) and she took it. For a moment, uncle and niece sat quietly, if a bit awkwardly, together. For as much time as they spent together in the house, this was a new situation for them. Agustín started cleaning his glasses on his vest when Dolores finally spoke.

“Tía…has a tea.”

Agustín smiled at her and refit the glasses on his face . “Do you know which one?”

“Not the exact one. I think it’s one of her specialty blends. It’s pink…and she has chocolate too, somewhere.”

“Hmm,” Agustín hummed as he opened the cabinets. “Let’s take a look. The chocolate at least…I think I know where she keeps it.”

“You don’t “think you know”, tío. I know you steal tía’s chocolate,” Dolores said with a smile. The heat was helping quite a bit and she was feeling more comfortable.

Agustín laughed and turned back towards his niece. “It’s really no use lying to you is it?”

“Last month she ran out early just before Alejandra Sanchez’s birthday. I heard her check the cupboards six times and she was not happy. She muttered something about you a few times and tried to find you, but you were hiding in the library.”

“Thanks for protecting me on that one. I felt so guilty until the next batch came in. Although when it did, I didn’t feel too badly to not sample a bit more.”

“I heard that too! Right as she turned her back, too. You’re terrible, tío Gus! One of these days…”

“You’ll rat me out? You’d do that to me?” Agustín asked in mock offense, clutching his chest.

Dolores giggled, rolled her eyes, and adjusted the water bottle. “Ay, tío...”

Agustín closed the tea cabinet after searching for a few minutes with an apologetic look.

“Dolores, I’m afraid your tía lets me in the kitchen so infrequently that I don’t have a good grasp on the types of her teas. There are about six or seven pink blends here, but I’m not sure how to tell which one you need. I can, however, do you one better. How about a chocolate santafereño?”

“Oh!…” Dolores paused.

Now that did sound wonderful and Agustín’s skills at making the beverage were not a secret in the family. The drink was very popular in Bogotá, where he had been born. All the Madrigal children had begged him to make it for them at least everyday when they were younger and he would oblige and tell them stories of the modern and sophisticated city where he had lived as a young child. Dolores never tired of hearing them and now that her appetite was back, she could feel her stomach growl. However, it was late and she didn’t want her tío missing his own rest on her account, so she continues “It’s late, and you just finished so get some rest Tío Gus. I’ll be fine, really.”

“Sorry,” Agustín replied, pulling out a pot from the drawer where Julieta kept them. “I saw your eyes light up at the mention of my famously amazing hot chocolate, so I’m afraid I need to make you one. It’s in the tío rule book.”

Dolores grinned at her doofus of an uncle. “Well, if it’s in the book…sounds great.”

“You got it,” Agustín replied. He found the chocolate stash with ease, of course, and began chopping away. “I made this for your mamá on her wedding day, you know.”

“You did? When?”

“After the downpour. We were all soaked and came back her before the reception to dry off a bit. The town was quite a sight and in addition to being soaked to the skin, I figured it would help your mamá’s mood so any surviving trees that were left in town weren’t uprooted with another storm.”

“And it worked?”

“I like to think it helped, but your papa was the main source of her joy that day. I had never seen her more happy. Once the ceremony was over, everything dried up pretty fast. Your tía was soaked to the skin and her hair had come undone. When the sun came out, she left it down and it dried into the most beautiful mass of curls I’d ever seen. Your mamá was a radiant bride, but she was still the second prettiest one that day.”

Dolores smiled at the obvious loving way he spoke of Julieta. “What was your wedding like, tío?”

“Which one?”

“Huh?”

“Which of my wedding days are you asking about?”

“Wh—you’ve had more than one?”

“Well,” Agustín replied , whisking the chopped chocolate into the milk and cinnamon mixture. “The first was when I was eight and then the second was almost 20 years later. Same girl.”

Dolores’ eyes widened in delight. She knew her tío and tía had met as children, but had never known for sure how old they had been. She had always assumed they were in their early teens.

“What was the first one like?”

Her usually accident-prone tío began to ladle the chocolate concoction into a mug as he spoke. “That was a Tuesday after school. I had asked Juli if she’d marry me that morning when I passed her stand in the village square. I gave her a flower and she tucked it into her apron and said she would…I made her promise three times.” He smiled at the memory. “Your papá did the ceremony. Now careful, it’s hot.” He handed the mug to her and she began to blow to cool it off.

“Thank you so much.”

“Of course.”

“Now this story sounds kinda familiar, have I heard this before?”

“Your mamá had to water the fields on his family farm that afternoon, so we held the ceremony there. We tied two sticks together to make a cross. I told your tía that I loved her and that I was going to marry her and love her forever and she said the same thing. Then your ten year old papá pronounced us married. I didn’t have a ring, but I did have a piece of thread on me from mamá’s sewing kit and I wrapped it too tightly around Juli’s finger and it started turning blue, so we had to cut it off. The string, not her finger, obviously. I saw her the next day, she had replaced it with a flower stem. I wish I’d thought of that instead. She wore it until it fell off three days later. I made it up to her much later by giving her a proper ring. And we had it sized correctly.”

Whether from the hormones or the story, Dolores sniffed a bit from the tears in her eyes. She slowly continued sipping the hot liquid and a divine taste filled her mouth. No one made hot chocolate quite like her tío did.

“How are you feeling now?” Agustín asked. He had shamelessly taken another piece of Julieta’s chocolate and was eating it as he cleaned.

“Better,” Dolores said, smiling. “And the story made me tear up a bit. It was so sweet.”

Her tío smiled again. “Im glad. All my memories of being with your tía are sweet. Even when they weren’t.”

“Tía was lucky to marry you. Actually, we’re all lucky that she did. The whole family.”

Momentarily startled at that comment, Agustín’s eyes widened at his niece who gave him a warm smile. He hadn’t been expecting it and it warmed his heart immensely.

“Gracias, pequeño buho.”

“De nada.”

As she closed her eyes and sipped her drink, Dolores’ warm smile gave way as a faint sound reached her ears. The rustling of paper wrapping. Around a yet another piece of her tía’s special chocolate. A stolen piece.

In Agustín’s pocket.

“Tío! Honestly!”

Amid Agustín’s protests, she only shook her head and insisted that whether it was her special hearing or something else, Julieta was going to find out one of these days and he’d be in trouble. She couldn’t cover for him forever, you know. Her cramps had faded to a manageable level and the warmth from the drink, the hot water bottle, and her loving dork of a tío had soothed her. A peaceful, pain free sleep would finally come for her that night.

Maybe tía Julieta wasn’t the only one with healing powers.

☕️

@hectic-hector @enigmaticdoctorscully @lizzywrites1 @historysquib @wikluk @magicalmadrigals @wifeofbean @adoptedmadrigal

[adoptedmadrigal2]

Bruno never went into the walls, modern au.

Tia Elena saves the day this time,

@prophetic-hijinks thanks for the oc privileges I won't let you down.

Game day

"Are you and Tio bruno coming to my game tonight?" Isabela asked Elena as she braided Isabela's long hair.

"We wouldn't miss it for the world, and if it weren't for your sisters having to have surgery today you parents would be there too, and Pepa and Félix would be there if they didn't have parent teacher night at Camilo’s school and dolores is leaving for a competition in Bogota this weekend," Elena told the girl. Isabela was 13 and she knew that unless they couldn't her entire family would be at her volleyball game tonight. She hated that most if her family had to miss it, but she was happy her tia and tio, would be there.

"Do you think Mirabel’s and Luisa's surgeries will go OK?" Isabela asked.

Luisa had torn her ACL in a basketball accident, and Mirabel had to have her tonsils removed due to continual complications with infections.

"They'll be perfectly fine, I know the doctor that'll be doing mirabel's surgery, we went to high school together and from what I heard from her the surgeon fixing Lulu up, is her bestie from med school." Elena told Isabela as she packed her game day bag.

"Come on mi flor, we don't want you late to school," Elena told scooping isabela off the floor and throwing her over her shoulder.

"Ok tia," Isabela's laughs as she was sat down to grab her bags.

"Can we take the Jeep today?" Isabela asked, knowing her tia only drove her jeep for special occasions or trips to the city.

"Sure we can mija, but don't tell your tio, he'll get jealous that you got to ride in it," Elena told getting a good laugh out of isabela.

"Dolores? Are you ready to go mija?" Elena called

"Not yet, I just got my period I need a second," Dolores called from the bathroom.

"Ok," Elena said.

"Tia Elena, why haven't I got my period yet?" Isabela asked sadly.

"Well, from what your tio has told me your mamá got her period when she was about 12, so you should get it soon, but it could happen at any time, you could be fourteen when you start. It'll happen when your body is ready," Elena explained as the pair waited for Dolores.

"Ok," isabela nodded happy with her new information.

"Ok I'm good now," dolores said picking up her school bag and her suitcase, since she was going to be gone with her dance company for a weekend competition in Bogota.

The three walked outside and dolores started to head toward the van.

"Jeep today mija. Isabela wanted a ride before her game against Bogota today," Elena said

"Sweet," dolores said walking over and tossing her bags in the back.

Isabela followed suit and the pair hopped into the backseat. Elena climbed into the driver's seat, and off they went.

"Dolores, did you remember the note you need to give to the office about your dance teacher picking you up for competition?" Elena asked dolores

"Si, it's in my folder," Dolores said.

"You both have your phones?" Elena asked

"Si, tia," the pair said

"Dolores, did you grab some tampons before you left? Or do you need some pesos to buy some?" Elena asked

Dolores seemed to think for a moment,

"I need a few pesos to buy some. I had my bag packed already and didn't think about it," dolores said

"Alright mija, when we stop, I'll give you ten pesos," Elena said

"Gracias tia," dolores thanked

"No problem mija, us chicas gotta stick together," Elena said.

"Alright you two, go on, I'll see you tonight isa, good luck at competition Lola," Elena said handing back some money to dolores.

"Thanks tia, I'll see you Sunday" dolores said climbing out

"Thanks tia," Isabela said climbing out behind dolores as the pair grabbed their bags and walked into the middle school.

"C'mon isa we have to get to algebra," Dolores said as isa jogged to catch up with her as they met back up after their electives.

"I'm coming Lola," isa said.

During math, Dolores was called to the office to leave early, as expected. Leaving isa to get through the last half of math class, and survive history on her own.

Isabela hated history, not for the fact that it was boring, but her teacher, Mr Evans. He didn't like her at all, he would ridicule her clothes, give her a week of detention for whispering to Dolores to see her notes so she could copy down the bits she didn't get. And he loved Dolores, he'd compliment her clothes and hair, and wouldn't say a word if she ever whispered to isabela.

When she entered the classroom, Mr Evans asked the class as he took attendance,

"Has anyone seen Dolores today?"

"She left during math for a dance competition in Bogota this weekend," Isabela answered, Mr Evans gave her a glare but said

"Very well,"

Isabela had just about had enough of Mr Evans by the time class was almost over.

Just get out of here and meet up with Ava and Reina.

Isabela thought.

Finally the bell rang and she left the classroom as quickly as possible.

"Hey isa, what's up with you?" Reina asked as she saw the raven haired girl approaching them fast with a murderous look.

"Mr Evans is a inseguro egoista hijo de puta," isabela growled

"Bad day without Lola?" Ava asked

"Si, he not only decided that my outfit made me look fat, but he also didn't like that I was the only one in the class that knew where Lola was. And then he starts going on a whole rant about something stupid. At that point I was boiling so I didn't pay attention to him."

"Yep, he seriously needs to be fired, the first day of class he chooses his favorites and his targets, and his targets get the brunt of his frustrations with the class even if they're excellent students like you," Reina said.

"Anyway, before your blood can boil more, let's go practice some serves before tonight's game, we're up against some serious competition," Ava said.

"Spike it isa!" Ava yelled.

Isa watched as the ball came up and toward her, she jumped up and spiked it over the net, where ava who was practicing her pancakes, saved it.

"Nice one A," Isa said walking under the net to high five her friend and teammate.

"I could say the same for you Jacaranda," Ava said, since Isa had flower powers, Ava likes to call her by flower names, and honestly Isabela doesn't mind it.

"Come on girls, time to get some dinner before the game," Ava's mom called them

"Coming señora Perez" isa called.

Back at casita, Elena was getting ready with Bruno for the game. Pepa being Pepa, pestered them before having to get dressed for the parent teacher meeting later that evening.

"How was Lola this morning Elena?" Pepa asked sitting on a stool near Elena's vanity table

"She was fine, I did give her ten pesos though, she forgot to pack tampons in her dance bag and needed to get some when she got to Bogota. She started this morning before we left." Elena told

"Dios mio, she has a white costume for this competition." Pepa gasped placing her hands over her mouth.

"She told me she was gonna try to get her friend Maddie to swap costumes with her since Maddie had one of the black costumes for the dance." Elena said easing pepa's nerves,

"And even if she couldn't swap, she knows how to take care of herself so she doesn't leak," Elena said as she applied her mascara.

"You're right Lena," pepa said

"mierda," Elena breathed as she clutched her right side.

"You ok? Do you need juli?" Pepa asked, concerned.

"I'm fine, it's just a cramp, and... there's the blood," Elena cringes as she got up and scurried off to her and Bruno's shared bathroom.

"I know how you feel, I woke up covered in blood," Pepa said

Elena emerged from the bathroom in a emerald green rose and headed to her dresser to grab some clean underwear.

"Best investment ever, I swear Pepa, I'll have to pick some up for you and Juli when I go to Bogota again," Elena said

"What's so special about a pair of underwear?" Pepa asked

"They're period proof, they're called Knixwear, and for me, since sometimes I don't have time to change my tampons before they leak they've saved my butt a many a time. Plus the brand makes teen ones too, I'll have to get Dolores and isa some for their birthdays,"

"I definitely need some of those, I can't tell you how many times I've stained my underwear from a leaky tampon. How'd you find out about them? " Pepa asked

"Friend of mine, her daughter showed them to her because she found them while underwear shopping on Amazon. I looked into them and I've sworn to them ever since," Elena told as she emerged from the bathroom in just her black underwear and green bra.

"I bet the girls will appreciate them, Dolores surely will, she complains every time she gets a stain."

After forty five minutes of them talking it was nearing 6 and the game starts at 6 30.

"Come on brunito," Elena called as she stuffed a few tampons and pads into her purse.

"Coming amor," bruno said grabbing the keys to his truck.

When they got to the game, the teams were practicing before they started.

The game went back and forth in fierce competition, until they took a five minute break.

Isabela had her back turned to Elena and if Elena wasn't looking at isabela she wouldn't have noticed the red patch right under Isabela's rear, on her wite competition uniform.

Elena saw someone point the spot out on the court and isa bolted. Bruno turned to Elena after watching Isa bolt.

"Should we go check on her?" He asked

"I'll go, you stay here," Elena said

"Ok amor,"

Elena knew tossing a few pads in her bag would come in handy,

She went to the bathroom near the gym remembering isa seemed to be running that way.

"Isa, are you ok?" Elena asked as she entered, hearing quiet sniffles.

"No, I just got my first period in front of the whole school," isabela said

"Bela, it's barely noticeable," Elena said in attempt to comfort her.

"I can't play in bloody shorts tia, what am I gonna do?"

"I have a pad for you to use, and I brought your extra shorts with me since, you have a tendency to rip your shorts during a play, as your mama told me,"

"Really?" Isa asked hopeful

"Si mija, now get changed, they're getting ready to start again." Elena said

"But the other team saw the stain, what if I get teased for it?" Isabela asked second guessing going back out to play.

"Are you gonna let some comments stop you or are you gonna win this game for the mariposa volleyball team? You're unstoppable isa, I've seen you, don't let this little hurdle get in your way." Elena said as she passed isa the shorts and pad

"You're better than some girls who want to tease about something that happens to them too, embrace it, it's life. Now go show those girls what you're made of bela boo," Elena said as Isabela finally emerged with her bloodied shorts in hand.

"Thanks tia, you're the best ever!" Isa exclaimed giving her aunt a big hug.

When Elena returned to Bruno she filled him in on the goings on, and he texted julieta.

Julieta

Did isabela get hurt during her game?

No but something did happen

What happened Bruno

Isa got her first period

What?!!!

Don't worry Elena had her back, and she's currently kicking Bogota's butt.

I'm still at the hospital with mis niñas, will you take her out to celebrate after the game and ill celebrate with her over the weekend.

Course hermana, how are the girls doing?

Mirabel is sleeping, and Luisa is medically high as a kite because she's still coming off the anesthesia, but their surgeries went well, they took Mirabel first and when they wheeled her out after, I told Luisa to climb into the bed, and then after a four hour delay due to a car crash related emergency surgery, Luisa went under after mirabel’s anesthesia wore off really well, when they came to get Lu she and Mirabel were watching minions in their shared room.

Give mira a big hug for me for being such a brave niña, and when Luisa comes back to earth tell her I love her too

Ok hermano, I love you, the girls and I should be home tomorrow afternoon.

Ok

Bruno shoved his phone in his pocket as he watched isabela pancake to save the ball after a Bogota girl spiked it.

After the game Bruno and Elena took Isabela to celebrate her first period and that awesome save right at the end of the game.

"Great job mija, we need to head across town to the strip mall to get you some pads that aren't so long. And while we're there we can get you something to celebrate this huge milestone in your life," Elena told as she turned the key in the ignition hearing the truck roar to life.

"Can I get some stuff for my room?" Isabela asked

"Of course mija, what are you thinking," Elena asked

"Plants, some little shelf trinkets and maybe a new set of sheets," isa answered

When they arrived at the strip mall. They entered the large department store.

Elena explains which pads isa needs and places them in the shopping cart.

Bruno went to look at the toys nearby, wanting to buy Mirabel something for being so brave for her surgery. Elena and isabela had wandered over to the bedroom things. Picking up a couple plants as they went, they went to the bedding section choosing a nice leaf patterned bed set for isabela.

They paid for their things and left. To get some much needed sleep after Isabela's game and first period

The next morning isabela mostly stayed in her bedroom riddled with cramps she didn't even notice yesterday.

"How are you feeling Florecita?" Elena asked bringing isabela hot chocolate, with a seven year old camilo clinging to her back as she did so.

"Like I've got a cactus underneath me," isabela groaned from her position lying on her stomach. The back of her favourite pyjamas visible from under her blanket.

"I brought you some midol and hot chocolate mija, why don't you come to mine and your tio's room, we can talk and I can let you borrow my heating pad to help." Elena suggested trying to get isa out of her bedroom.

"Ok, can you get my pyjama pants from my desk por favor, I kicked them off last night, I got too hot."

Elena retrieved the Harry Potter themed pants, and turned around letting isabela pull the pants on. Isabela stepped up beside Elena when she had her pants on, and she supported her mug of cocoa.

"Camilo, can you go downstairs to breakfast with tio bruno, I hear tio bruno has made some special waffles just for you," Elena said getting the boy off her back letting him run downstairs.

"Now that it's just us, how are your first period cramps?" Elena asked as she guided isabela to her bedroom.

"My entire body hurts, and I feel like my stomach is tied in a knot." Isabela said

"Ooh, painful. I know how you feel, do you want anything to eat?" Elena asked

"Not really, Im not hungry," isabela answered

"You sound like me on my period, I lose my appetite for the first two or three days, then I eat everything on day four then by day five I'm back to normal. You may be different though," Elena said, a slight chuckle following.

"Tia? How do you know how to do all this?" Isa asked

"Do all what mija,"

"How do you know how to make me feel less weird and embarrassed about this, plus you cheer me up too, how do you do that?" Isa elaborated

"I volunteered at my old orphanage for years before I met your tio and moved here to settle down. Lots of the girls that were there trusted me the most and so I did a lot of talking to them and just picked up a few things from my experience with them," Elena explained, "have you got any more questions mija,"

"Do you have any stories from when you got your period?" Isabela asked.

Elena blushed this was gonna be a long funny and embarrassing afternoon.

When Julieta came home she was carrying mirabel, who was sleeping soundly on her shoulder. Luisa following behind on some crutches. Everyone seemed to be quiet. Camilo was watching cartoons with Bruno Agustín and Felix, Dolores was at a dance competition in Bogota, and Elena pepa and isabela were nowhere to be seen.

"I'm going to my room mama," luisa said.

"Ok amor, I'm going to find your sister and Tias" julieta told as she helped Luisa upstairs, with further assistance from their casita.

Julieta walked with Luisa so she could check Isabela's room, where she found an empty unmade bed.

She quickly laid Mirabel in the nursery on her bed before heading off to find Isabela.

She walked past pepa’s room and checked her brother's room first, where before she opened the door she heard Elena tell Isabela.

"Oh my God, I got my period at a pool once, a little piece of advice for you don't buy a white bikini, it always ends in disaster. Whether that disaster be your period, or the fact that when white gets wet, it's see through,"

A quiet knock and she could see her hermana cuñada and hija, sitting on the large bed laughing about Elena's myriad of period stories.

"Mind if I join you three?" Julieta asked announcing her presence.

"Mama!" Isabela smiled as she flung herself toward julieta, she was still small enough for julieta to pick her up with ease.

"Hola mi corazón, congratulations on your first period, how are you feeling?" Julieta asked as she sat on the bed with isabela in her lap.

"Better since tia Elena gave me the midol and told me her first period story and all of her embarrassing stories,"

"Good" julieta smiled

Hope you enjoy ❤

I hope I did Elena justice in this @prophetic-hijinks

[justanisabelakinnie]

Why I Love Isabela

It’s no secret that Isabela Madrigal is my favorite character in Encanto. I mean, duh, it’s why I made this blog. 

But the question is “Why? Why is Isabela your favorite character?” And I am here to explain why. If you follow this blog, then obviously you’re also an Isabela simp and probably have your own reasons for liking this character that probably coincide with mine. But here I am explaining my reasons. 

Frankly, it’s because I see myself in her, in more ways than one. 

I too am the oldest daughter of my family, and being the oldest daughter means you have certain expectations to uphold. You’re expected to set an example, to do as you’re told, to be the shining pillar your parents expect you to be. You’re the one with all the responsibility on your shoulders. You’re the one going out into the world first, the one your younger sisters are supposed to look up to. But you can’t live up to expectations all the time, it’s not fun to be placed on a pedestal, and eventually, that nut is going to crack. You long to act out, to be free, to have even a portion of the freedom that the baby of the family does. But you know your parents are always there, watching your every move, making sure that you are perfect. And the price to pay for not being perfect is devastating, too horrifying to even think about. And the worst part is that you’ll never live up to those expectations, you’ll never be perfect enough, you’ll never get the approval your parents forced you to think you’d seek. But you’ll also never be as free and wild as your younger sister. 

So being stuck in that place, what do you do? Well, you overcompensate, try too hard to seek your parents’ approval, the approval you know you’re never going to get, but at least let them see that you’re trying, as much as it will never be enough. “What Else Can I Do?” resonated so deeply with me for this reason. No matter what language it is in, its message rings through and sends shivers down my spine. Because it’s all about realizing that you don’t have to be this perfect porcelain figure on a pedestal, you don’t have to be tight and contained and restrict yourself to one mold chosen for you by someone else. You don’t have to seek anyone’s approval or let anybody else run your life and make you feel guilty for something they put in your head. You can simply be. Be yourself. Be free and out there. There is so much more to you than what’s beyond the surface, so many more possibilities to what you can accomplish. It’s about breaking free from other people’s expectations of you, how the same way you see your sister as free, you can be, too. “What Else Can I Do?” is about freedom. About being emotionally repressed and denying your own truth to yourself, but eventually being liberated and fully embracing who you are, in all of its messiness, warts, and confusion. A person, not a shiny trophy or a pretty doll. 

Secondly, representation matters. I’m not the first to point this out, of course, but the fact that they made the darkest-skinned of the female characters the most beautiful and feminine is so meaningful to me. I’m not an indigenous woman. I am Black. But even so, it made me so happy to see someone who is darker-skinned like me and has a similar complexion to mine be the image of graceful femininity. I’m a very girly girl, but the archetypical beauty and feminine norm has, for the longest time, been pale skin with blue eyes and long blonde hair. Something Isabela is the polar opposite of. And it’s never commented on or used as a source of irony either. She’s not beautiful in SPITE of her dark skin and hooked nose. She simply is, and her features accentuate that. Even better, she’s not used as a source of comedy for her looks, either. Colorism is a big deal in Latin-America, and in every country all over the world, sadly, so for them to do this took major ovaries. Her existence means a lot to me in this regard. 

Thirdly is how her character reclaims femininity. Despite not wanting to be in the mold of a pink flower princess who is elegant and graceful, she doesn’t discard femininity as a constraint or a bad thing. And that is so, so powerful. Too many times, femininity is treated as a cage to break off, a cumbersome article of clothing to endure wearing until you rip it off in order to find your true self. Only by rejecting that which is commonly associated with womanhood can women be free. Now how ironic, misogynistic, and hypocritical is that? But Isabela shows that femininity was never the problem. Her having to conform to a particular mold that Abuela set for her is. Femininity is powerful and expressive. It’s not a prison to be locked in. And Isabela discovers that as she learns to express her femininity how she likes, by wearing a vibrant dress with a wide array of colors as she grows beautiful and towering plants that aren’t just flowers. There are more than one mode of femininity and they are all equally valid parts of the spectrum. “What Else Can I Do?” once again, shows this. Some of the plants she mentions growing are even flowering plants! She always had the power in her all along, she just never got the means to express herself up until that moment in time! Her character sends the message of coming to terms with her own femininity, in her own way, and discovering what it really means. She can be beautiful and strong and a firecracker who’s a force to be reckoned with, she doesn’t need a man but that doesn’t mean she doesn’t still want to marry a woman eventually, and there’s nothing wrong with that. Seeing her break free while also staying true to her femininity shows how the film goes out of its way to subvert the demonization of it. Certainly a feminist feat. If only more of the fandom could understand this. 

And fourthly and lastly, her power. Flower power! The ability to grow flowers and other plants is such a beautiful and strong gift, and is much more useful than it seems. I have always been drawn to flowers and nature as a child and still am, if I had a superpower I think it would be the same power that Isabela had, or at least something similar. Her character and song also inspired a character of mine’s superpower, by the way, just wanted to throw that out there. And as you all know, I have always been drawn more to female characters, especially ones that are boldly feminine and unashamed of it! I like all female characters but I’ve always had a soft spot for the more girly ones since they’re more like me(especially when they’re Black and/or woc and Isabela fits that bill, too!), and her wardrobe and fashion color palette at the beginning of the movie is basically me and how I dress(I even have a flower crown!). I’d love to cosplay as her someday, in both dresses! And that concept art? *chef’s kiss* 

So there you go, my reasons for why I love Isabela! This was quite expansive and really hard to put into words, haha, but it has always been there, so I am more than happy to share it with you! If you have anything you’d like to add onto this, want to share your own reasons, or simply agree with this post, then please reblog! I want to hear your thoughts too! 

Thank you for coming to my Isabela TedTalk lol. 

[needs-to-stop-looking-at-valves]

I just want to say, yoy are an amazing author, especually your smuts. I love them and occasionally i read them at school because i like the risk of getting caught reading something i probably shouldnt.

Anyway, i was wondering. Since we got a julieta×agustin period smut, can we get a pepa×felix one, maybe one where felix gets back to casita after a weekend with his family, and finds pepa got her period while he was gone, and shes like overly horny, to the point shes tried touching herself and using toys on herself but nothing comes of it (love a pun) and when felix gets home she practically jumps on him and though he's wary of the mess, he lets pepa have her way because a friend of his told him it was supposed to help her period.

Thank you? Genuinely you guys taking a second to compliment me makes it worth it. I'm going home monday, so hopefully i can get through these faster. With that, let's go!

"Oh oh, and take these, I know that girl LOVES my empanadas!"

"Mami please, I can only carry so much!"

"Pfft! Like that girl won't eat it all. You know a good woman has a HEALTHY appetite! Tell her I said hi, understand?"

"Si, mami."

Félix sighed as soon as he reached the Casita. His mom had packed him with so much food, he had to have Julio help carry it all.

"She'll eat all of this?"

"You kidding? Pepa loves mami's cooking. I'm telling you once she sees it, it's gonna be all sunshine and rainbows."

"Not if it melts before we get there."

The entire Encanto had gone through quite the heatwave this weekend, and it seemed to not be letting up. Hell, him and Julio had to go shirtless these past couple of days (much to the delight of a lot of women in the Encanto) to keep their sweaty bodies from dying of heat stroke. Félix set the stuff down in the kitchen, wiping his face free of sweat.

"Thanks, bro."

"Hmhmm. See you next weekend."

After his brother left, Félix took the cake out of the ice box, and hurried up the stairs, briefly saying hi to members of the family who were just suffering in the humid heat. He knocked on Pepa's door, honestly a bit worried that she hadn't greeted him already. He tried the knob, only to lightly wince when it zapped him. The Madrigals had the ability to cut off their rooms to the world if they so choose (Luisa's knob got too heavy to turn, Isa's turned to thorns, you get the idea), and Pepa clearly didn't want company.

"Pepa? It's your husband, I'm back!"

No response. Wow she must be upset. He could talk her through it, or just use his ultimate weapon.

"Mi mamá made you chocolate cake!"

The door opened, just a crack. He pushed it further, only to be met with just a BLAST of hot, wet air. So SHE was making this heat. Despite how uncomfortable it was, he walked in, and his heart just broke. His poor wife was under the sheets, clearly trying to sleep, but was unable to. She squirmed as she looked at him, body thick in sweat and agony.

"Félix...you're home."

"Of course, I told you I was going to be back. What's wrong?"

"...you're...not wearing a shirt."

He looked down at his sweaty mess of a frame.

"Oh si. Too hot. Now do you want to talk about what's-!"

He was interrupted as she damn near leapt out of bed, and practically smashed her lips on his. Her kiss was hungry, tongue immediately invading his mouth and pushing hot moans against his tongue. He had to pull away to get air, and she seemed to hate it. Her claws dug into him desperately, and he just now noticed she was totally and completely naked. She stared at him, clearly trying to control her own breathing.

"Make love to me, Félix."

He coughed a bit at the pure bluntness of her words. God he was gonna touch himself to that sentence alone.

"All of this because Papi was away for the weekend?"

"All because Papi left when I was DYING!"

Thunder cracked as she sat up a bit, pulled a vibrator out of her pussy, and just threw it against the floor. It was soaked in blood, as were her upper thighs, and the towel on her bed. Poor Pepa was on her period.

"Oh. You're bleeding, mi bebè-"

She put her hands on his chest, looking at him like she was helpless and abandoned.

"Please! I've been trying all weekend and I can't! Stupid vibrators and dildos, they do NOTHING! I can't CUM Félix, I can't-!"

He cupped her face with his hand, and kissed her. She whined into his lips, one of her hands grip into his wrist in desperation. He pulled away, tilted her face up, and kissed at her neck.

"It'll make a mess."

"Don't care."

"You gotta do what I say."

"ANYTHING. Please, just keep...keep touching me."

That was all he needed. He pushed her on her back, commanded her to stay put, as he took off his pants and underwear. He got back on top of her, gently tapping her face with his not too hard cock.

"Get me ready for you. Suck it- hijole!"

She didn't even let him finish as she took a hold of him, decorating it furiously in kisses, before pushing the entire thing in her mouth with little to no effort. Pepa was fucking RABID for him, and watching her meet his eyes as she sucked and slobbered and gagged on him was so overwhelming, he was almost in disbelief. She was even getting his balls all covered in drool, like a good girl.

"That's it mami. You earn this fucking cock. Earn...mierda stop, stop."

He had to push her head down to keep her from sucking the life out of him. In a second, Pepa's pretty mouth had made his cock throbbing, hard, and wet in spit. HE was panting now, needing a second to keep himself from cumming too soon.

"Ejole Pepa-you want this in you so badly, don't you?"

She nodded, being a sneaky little girl and kissing the tip of his sensitive head.

"Very. I need it. I deserve it. I WANT it, and I'll scream if I don't get it NOW."

Pepa was a spoiled fucking brat. And he loved it. He grabbed her ankles, lifted her ankles above her head, and plunged himself right into her. It felt...different. the blood was thick, definitely different from normal fucking, but simultaneously SO much better. It was hot, too, absolutely consuming his cock. It was different for her too, given the way she gawked at him, absolutely frozen. Maybe putting himself fully was a bit much.

"Pepa? You okay? Do you need to-"

"Follate a tu esposa. Hard. Don't stop until I tell you to."

One thing Félix learned in his long relationship; give a woman whatever the hell she wants. He adjusted himself a bit, and started to fuck her. Well really, he RAILED her. The slapping of his skin on hers was loud, he was panting to try to cool his body, and her moans were flooding the room with so much noise, he could listen to it all night long.

"That's a pretty girl. This little pussy missed me so much. Look at you, letting me fuck you. What if I want to stuff you full of cum? What if I drain my balls right inside of you? You want that?"

He kept his face buried in her neck, kissing her freckles and tasting her ever plentiful sweat. Her nails dug into his back, clawing his skin in some attempt to get more out of him.

"Yes! Please! All of it! Fuck me till you're EMPTY! Estúpida máquina sexual!"

She was screaming bloody murder as he forced juices and blood down her ass and onto the once white sheets. Pepa's periods were always HEAVY, and it made for both the messiest, yet hottest lube they've ever had.

"Aw, my baby's poor little pussy. You're getting so loud for me. You'd fucking beg for it, won't you? For me to fuck this pussy till you can't take it?"

Her gorgeous legs were trying to wrap around him in vain, trying to do anything to keep him from leaving, as if she wasn't getting full on thick cock rammed into her. He left little nibbles along her neck and her shoulder, mumbling his love for her, all while she cried out her love for him.

"Yes yes YES! FUCK FÉLIX! I missed you! I was going to go right to that house and MAKE you fuck me!"

"Naughty naughty girl...you want to cum so bad, you'd be so rude like that. What if I wanted to fuck you in the bathroom? Make you look at yourself in the mirror while I MAKE you fucking take it?"

"Eres un monstruo, DAMELO FÉLIX!!"

She came. It was sooner than he thought, but he felt her tighten, watched as her back arched, and heard her cry out thank you, like the very good girl whe was. He let go off her thighs, and pulled out of her. She sat there, frame shaking, her little cunt excuding blood heat and lust. His turn.

"Get up. Hands and knees, doggy style. Like the bitch you are. Go on, MOVE."

She was swooning at his words, clearly liking her big, strong man that knew how to take charge of her. He gave her pussy a slap when she didn't immediately move, making her yelp in pain. She grinned as she did as he said, lightly swaying her ass a bit as if to tempt him.

"Lo siento papi~"

He held onto pretty little hips, letting his fingers caress such a lovely, lovely body. Fingers trailed up her freckled body, before digging into her little cheeks, and and shoving himself inside. He bucked into her, watching as his wife tried so desperately to keep herself upright for him as he fucked a her pussy from this new angle.

"Damn right you're sorry. When Papi says move, you move."

Spank, RIGHT against her ass, making her give off just the loudest, sluttiest moan for him.

"When Papi says give me that pussy, you give it."

Another spank. Another. Another. Another. Her ass was red at this point, but he refused to stop.

"When I say this is my pussy, this is MY pussy. Who's pussy is this?"

"Y-yours papi!! It's YOUR pussy!"

He was so close. He could feel it, and he knew sge could too, given how shevwas pushing against him. Spank, spank, spank.

"I'm g-gonna cum. You're gonna take it. You're gonna be fucking stuffed."

She nodded obediently, and after digging his fingers deep enough into her ass to make her bruise, he came. Creamy cum poured into her, causing a mess of both blood and cum to seep out of her. She trembled under him, and he spanked her again, and again.

"Cum. Now."

Surprisingly, she managed to obey, whimpering pathetically as she tightened around him, squeezing just a few more drops of cum from him. Her toes curled just right, she gasped as if she was discovering her first ever orgasm. If that wasn't the sign of a job well done. He collapsed on the messy sheets with her on top of him, and she chuckled as she stroked his chest.

"And you say I control the weather ~"

He looked out her window, and sure enough, it was pouring cold, pleasant rain. He chuckled, wrapping an arm around her as he kissed the top of her head.

"I'm talented, what can I say? I'm sorry I left baby, you should've told me."

"Oh, I couldn't tell you. I know your mami misses you, I'd hate to be selfish."

He chuckled. She was so sweet, so thoughtful.

"Aw, Pepi, mi amor...that's why mami loves you. Oh, speaking of, you still want that c-"

"Yes. And I'm not sharing."

He snorted as he reached over and handed her the whole ass cake. She put the plate on his gut, and started to help herself.

"Oh my god Pepa-"

"Stop moving! You'll drop it!"

God he loved her, so so so much.

"Sorry, sorry. You need some milk?"

"Only if you don't get out of bed...~"

He raised a brow at her.

"Pepa, how can I get the...oh. Oh you're a dirty little girl Pepita~"

She was. Especially as she laid there, eating her cake, and rubbing her sopping wet pussy against his leg.

He was in for more of a bloody good time.

[flyawaymind]

Who wants to see my Encanto headcanons? No one? Fantastic, here we go.

1) While he was hiding Bruno would leave gifts for his familia. They were mostly little notes of affection and encouragement, his handwriting disguised enough that no one would make the connection, but he didn’t miss a single birthday. He would take the time to make little gifts for everyone, small enough to go unnoticed or at least unremarked upon. Mirabel would find little scraps of pretty fabric and new needles every year that she didn’t remember buying. Isabella had a collection of flowers made from wood or wire or paper. Once, when she turned 18, she found a piece of scrap wood with a hand-painted bouquet. Pepa once found a bracelet that Bruno had made from beads he’d collected from her favorite dresses, which he fished from the garbage one by one after they had been ruined in her storms. She never wore it, as it didn’t match any of her existing outfits and was actually a little ugly, but she couldn’t bring herself to throw it away, either. It lived in her jewelry box, and she would sometimes wonder why the little beads seemed so familiar. Dolores kept everything he ever gave her, hidden in a box tucked into a special space under a floorboards under her bed that Casita made just for that purpose.

2) One of Bruno’s biggest regrets from his time in the walls, aside from the obvious, was that he hadn’t managed to save his dinner plate. He’d waited for a week for everything to calm down enough that he could sneak out at night and take it, but by the time he got to the cupboard it was gone. He thought it had been thrown out, like almost everything else related to him. Actually, Alma had saved it, storing it away in the dusty trunk where she kept Pedro’s things.

3) When the triplets were teenagers Pepa tried to learn the guitar. It was a phase that didn’t last long; she would get annoyed by her slow progress and rain on her sheet music. Bruno, though, was a natural, and after a while he worked up the courage to ask Pepa if he could keep the guitar. She agreed, saying that he had always put it to better use than she did, and it was one of the few non-essentials that he took with him into the wall, even though he couldn’t play it for risk of being discovered.

4) Speaking of the young triplets, there was a period of time when the triplets were about fourteen that Bruno’s popularity among their peers skyrocketed. He was flirted with, even asked out on a few dates by some of the more daring young women, and some of his classmates would try to hang around him. At first he had been confused, then quietly thrilled that it seemed his reputation wasn’t as bad as he had thought. Then Julieta overheard those same people talking about hanging out with him in the same breath that they would mention stealing from their parents’ liquor supply. When Bruno found out that he was just one more way to rebel, that none of them actually wanted to have him as a friend, he was crushed. After that he stopped talking to anyone who wasn’t family or who his mother didn’t make him give a prophecy to.

5) For years after her unsuccessful gift ceremony Mirabel was terrified of touching her family’s doors, afraid that she would make them disappear just like she had her own.

6) When he was younger, Bruno was terrible at keeping secrets. He’d feel it building up in the back of his throat, burning hotter and hotter until he just blurted out whatever was on his mind. He was well into his twenties before he finally got a handle on his secrets, which he learned to whisper to the rats. By then, the damage had been done. Dolores learned from him. When the secrets she learned got to be too much, she would whisper them to her stuffed animals and, later, to the walls where Bruno was hiding. He would then tell the rats, and no one found out, until Antonio got his gift. Luckily, Antonio is much better with secrets than his tío and hermana.

7) The haircare routine in the Madrigal household is INSANE. Casita has expanded its bigger-on-the-inside magics to the bathroom cabinets because there are So. Many. Products. You have every kind of hair in that house, from Agustín “One-Rinse” Madrigal to Dolores, who takes almost an hour to complete her full routine (which doesn’t happen every day, obviously). 

8) Bruno’s actual Gift is indestructible joints. The man spent 40 years climbing god knows how many steps and his knees are still good enough for wall parkour. He slept in a hammock every night for 45 years with NO back issues. Being able to see the future didn’t turn out so well so the candle gave him the world’s most durable skeletal system as compensation.

9) Alma’s greatest fear is intimacy. She is terrified of letting anyone get close to her because she doesn’t know how to handle the pain of losing them. This manifests in her taking up the role of authoritarian with her family and the Encanto as a whole. The scene at the river was the first time she’d actually hugged someone in years, instead of just patting her grandchildren gingerly on the head until they learned to keep their distance.

10) Dolores’ room isn’t soundproofed, not exactly. It’s an idyllic scene with a brook, a forest, a field of grass, and a hill right in the middle with her bed on top. It would be completely silent to anyone else who enters, but for her it would be all of her favorite sounds at the perfect volume for her to listen to and not get overwhelmed. The wind in the branches and through the tall grass, the babbling of the brook, birds chirping, windchimes, someone with a comforting voice singing just out of sight, a guitar. There’s a window that she can open to the outside of Casita, so she can listen in as she chooses. The noises from the window are just as loud as everything she hears during the day, but she can focus better through the window, only hearing specific people or things. This is how she listens to Mariano writing his poetry.

[a-big-apple]

Ok I have to go off about Luisa’s look for a minute because I’ve been watching Encanto daily (sometimes twice a day) in that honeymoon phase of wanting to see every detail and I’m quietly taking notes on her outfit so I can make it for myself and I have a lot to say about it

So it’s clear her whole look is about practicality, right, she’s sweet, she’s femme, but she has a lot of manual labor to do on the daily and her whole self-worth is riding on doing it well. So everything she’s got going on is supporting that goal! 

Her hair: gorgeous, I would pay so much money to see it down, but she can’t afford to have it in her face or in the way. So she’s got it braided on the side, which is pretty and decorative but also a braid can sometimes hold onto your little short tendrils that would pop out of a regular ponytail, and we know she has some little tendrils! 

Also, the bun! It bounces like it’s not super tight, so probably she’s not taking a ton of time in the morning to get it precise--again, it’s a practical choice, she’s working out before the coffee’s even ready. A quick bun is up off her neck, out of her face, nothing dangling that’s gonna get caught on the bottom of a church or whatever. She has a nice thick ribbon for it too, because all that hair is probably pretty heavy.

While I’m on this screenshot, her earrings: plain gold studs, pretty small! The Madrigal women overwhelmingly have dangly earrings, but once again, Luisa’s gone for something more practical that’s not going to get caught on anything. 

Also while we’re here, her bracelets! Here’s where I’m treading lightly and doing a lot of googling, because I have no particular knowledge of Colombian textile arts (so if somebody reading this does, please feel free to correct me!). Based on some searching (specifically what I found here and tried to cross-check a bit), I think these cuffs are modeled after ones woven from cane fiber, like the Zenú vueltaio hats we see here and there in the movie and which have been mentioned in some of the talk in blu-ray extras and online about Colombia-specific details. 

And each side is one bracelet, all the rings attached to each other! Another practical choice. If cane fiber hats can stand up to the elements, then so can these cuffs. They fit snugly and don’t dangle, and they don’t look fresh and new either, she’s been working with these on for a while.

Okay, back to this screenshot for a sec to talk about her top

IL OVE THAT THEY EVEN PUT IN THE SEAMS! A seam down the center back, including the collar, and seams where the sleeves attach! And look at the beautiful texture of that fabric, it looks like linen (or maybe cotton) to me, which is another great choice for hard work in a warm climate. It breathes, it’s hard wearing, and it’s white so it’s easy to bleach stains out of. Also the embroidery and ribbon on the trim around her collar really gets me, what a beautiful little textural detail, geometric shapes just like on her bracelets and her skirt along with a lil pop of color. Like all the Madrigals’ clothes, this was made specifically for her and with care, and it’s another place where she can get in a bit of decoration without it feeling too frivolous for her work.

This piece also has very subtle little buttons on the sleeves which sent me over the moon when I noticed! Given the probable time period (around 1950) and how cut off the encanto is from the rest of the world, it’s safe to assume there’s no stretch fabric and maybe no elastic at all. Luisa’s got bigass muscles, and when she’s using them they’re gonna bulge in different ways depending on what she’s doing! The button on the sleeve gives her space to open that cuff if she needs to, but also gives the sleeves a sweet, subtle amount of pouf. Again, this girl’s a femme and I love her for it.

The longer I go on the more I feel like I must seem bananas but let’s keep going. She has darts! 

Darts are these little pleats in the fabric, present in a lot of clothing intended for people with boobs and/or other curves. In this case, it’s a straightforward way to negotiate the difference in circumference between the fabric at the collar and how much she needs to fit around her chest. For a lot of folks with breasts, you need more space in the front than in the back of your shirt, and the darts create that space. Anyway, it’s a glorious detail, pretty and practical for her shape, and keeps the trimmed neck lying neat and flat against her upper chest where it won’t gape open too much when she’s bending down.

Ok, moving on! 

Her waist! Here we get a little more understated decoration in the form of embroidery and I think some lace, and gather up that extra fabric she needed for her incredible pecs into a slightly narrower waistline. I’d love her without an hourglass, but also as I’ve said a hundred times now, it delights me that she’s huge and muscular and also femme. So we’ve got a little bit of pouf again here, some room for her to move, but also an emphasis on her natural waistline. Also look how pretty the waist is in detail, I’m crazy for it:

Ok, going on. Here’s where I’m once again relying on my own experience of clothing on a bigger than average body, amateur costume making, and very basic knowledge of European and North American fashion history. I don’t know how any of that maps onto Colombian fashion history, though I’d like to find out! So that said, It seems like a brightly colored skirt and a lighter blouse is a common clothing choice for the Madrigal women and lots of background folks in the encanto, but I don’t think Luisa’s top is a blouse. She’s got a white slip on under her skirt and over the bloomers (don’t worry I’m gonna get to the bloomers I’m obsessed). 

It seems the most sensible to me for the top and the underskirt to all be one piece! A chemise, or the equivalent. More carefully crafted for daytime wear than say, Mirabel’s nightgown:

but basically the same item. MUCH simpler, when you’re hauling and bending and twisting and lifting and running flexing, to not worry about whether your shirt is still tucked in or whether your slip is getting twisted around or creeping up your ribs. Especially when you’re 19 and constantly stressed out and your body is pretty different from the other women in your family. If it’s all one piece, you just stick your bloomers on under and your skirt over and ta da, you’re dressed.

Now, the skirt! This is where the most obvious details are, her signature geometric shapes and weights embroidered on. The embroidery has a gorgeous kind of shiny texture, animation is so wild wtf--

and the skirt is long enough to cover her underskirt and bloomers but short enough to not be super in the way when she’s bending to lift things.

Also, the waist has a seam in the center back, which I’m guessing (and when I make it for myself, I will ensure) has hook and eye closures so she can get it on over her magnificent thighs and then get it snug around the waist so it’s not moving around all the time.

Also, her skirt is a really practical shape overall! It looks to me like a half circle, which gives her plenty of room to move without being so full of fabric that it gets in her way. 

A half circle skirt means that, if you cut it open along the seam and laid it flat, it would make half a circle shape! So when you close it up and put it on, it makes a silhouette like you can see above, sort of a quarter of a circle when it’s open. I would guess it’s probably also linen or cotton, and probably decently heavy so that it’s durable and doesn’t go flying around too much! The animators gave it a nice weight, it hangs really beautifully, and that makes me think it’s fairly thick.

NOW LISTEN. HER BLOOMERS.

I’m so in love. I have nothing smart to say about them, except that they’re the crucial period-appropriate item for her to be able to work without worrying about flashing people. Love the lace trim and delicate scalloped edges, love the purple ribbon, love that she gets to have another layer that’s practical and pretty at the same time, also love that they put the seam along the side of the leg??? The attention to detail is so wild!!

And while we’re here, her shoes! Espadrilles, which I only know anything about because they made it into North American fashion at some point. They likely have rope soles, nice and flexible, and canvas or some other sturdy fabric uppers, and those handy straps to keep them in place while Luisa’s running around rerouting rivers and whatever. Lightweight, partially open, nice for the warm/mild climate we see in the encanto. They’re also embroidered with her signature pattern, which is super cute to me.

At last we’ve reached the end this post with a lot of details that possibly only I care about, but at least it’ll be a good reference for me when I start actually constructing all these pieces for myself. Let’s have one more look at Luisa because she’s wonderful and deserves every good thing:

I love her so much

[biographydivider]

Can we please have a fic about Bruno being oblivious and getting thorns silence and death glares from his sobrinas due to them being on their period on Bruno not realising. When he finally realizes though he feels bad for them and decided to spend some time telling them stories of their mothers when they first got their own cycles, much to julieta and pepa's dislike

Welp - I finished my novel chapters, and a promise is a promise. It's not the situation OP asked for, but it's still period-based and I liked writing it, so I hope you enjoy.

“Mami, my tummy really, really hurts…”

“I know it does, mi vida.”

“It’s like, achey-sore.”

“I’ll make you another chocolate con queso after dinner, sweetheart – you can’t have too many or your teeth’ll fall out.”

“What’s up?” Bruno asked, as he passed the kitchen and heard his sister and oldest sobrina in conversation. Little Isabela – how was she ten already, he was holding her in her arms at her baptism just yesterday, right? – turned to him with the saddest puppydog eyes he’d ever seen.

“Tio Bruno, I’ve got my period and it’s really, really sore.”

“O-oh. I see.”

Julieta laid a hand gently on her daughter’s head. “We’ve been talking about how periods are a natural, normal thing, Tio Bruno.”

Which, you know, was true. Bruno just didn’t realise we were…there, yet. She’d be all grown up before he could turn around twice, at this rate.

“Julieta?” Mamá called, from the main hallway. “Is Isabela with you? I want her to come with me to the Guzmán’s house with me, to organise some arrangements for Mariano’s Mamá’s birthday party.” Isabela winced. Julieta squeezed her shoulder, guiding her towards the sound of her Abuela’s voice. “Mamá,” she started, “Isabela isn’t feeling too well.”

“I’ve got my period, Abuela,” Isabela added. “It’s really bad today.”

From the kitchen doorway, Bruno watched his Mamá glide down the stairs. Descending to give judgement. “Ay, mi vida,” she crooned, taking Isabela’s cheek in her hand. “You are a woman, now. All grown up.”

Julieta cleared her throat. “Oh, Mamá…”

“And, sometimes,” Isabela’s Abuela continued, in a voice so filled with kindness it made Bruno feel a little sick, “grown-up women like you have to do things that they would rather not. For the sake of their community. For the sake of the ones they care about. You don’t want to leave Mariano’s Mamá without flowers for her birthday, do you?” Isabela nodded with a hard swallow. “I know you don’t. Because you are a kind, brave young woman. So why don’t we walk down there together? You can hold my hand all the way, and squeeze it tightly if it hurts. Okay?”

Isabela looked at her Mamá. Her eyes looked wet with tears, even from the kitchen doorway. “Oh…o-okay –”

“A-a-actually, Mamá,” Bruno said, stumbling into the conversation, “I kinda needed to borrow Isabela today. We’re gonna, y’know, organise a surprise for lil’ Mirabel. To…celebrate her…learning to spell her name nice an' neat. Right, Isa?” Bruno widened his eyes at Julieta and Isabela – praying they took the hint. Julieta laid her hand back on her daughter’s head.

“That was right, Mamá. They’ve been planning it all week. You know how hard Mirabel worked on her spelling.”

“Yeah – hey, y’know what?” Bruno said, snapping his fingers, “I’ll take Isabela to the Guzmán’s tomorrow, nice and early. That okay, Isa? Then we can celebrate both…occasions.”

If there was one thing that trumped showing off to the neighbours in Alma Madrigal’s eyes, it was showing off to the neighbours twice in the same week. Mirabel learning to write and having the most perfect granddaughter in the Encanto? Fuhgeddaboudit. Bruno’s Mamá took the bait hook, line and sinker – as long as Bruno promised she’d go tomorrow.

“Hey, kiddo,” Bruno said to Isabela, once Mamá had safely been led away by Julieta. “Gimme, like, five minutes, and come knock on my door, ‘kay? Got a surprise for you.”

Isabela tugged him down to her height (a gap that was closing day by day). “I need to go to the bathrooom,” she whispered. "I need to change my pad."

“Okay. Gimme ten minutes, then. Do what you need to do, then come find your tio.”

Bruno watched her go. Then, he bolted to the kitchen, and then up to Isabela’s bedroom. Casita let him in, this once. The house knew it was extenuating circumstances.

When Isa finally made her way to her tio’s room, the entire ground level of the vision cave had been transformed. Bruno had draped one of her bedsheets – her favourite one, the purple one with the flowers on it – over two of his statues, so it made a little den. Her favourite dolls and pillows and books were in there, lying on a blanket, waiting for her to snuggle up with them. Bruno had brought down every single candle from the cave and lit them all, so the room was filled with nice smells and warm, cosy light. Isabela gasped, hands to her mouth.

“Tio it’s so pretty…!”

“Oooh, a-and, and! The best part…!”

Bruno produced a mug of chocolate con queso from behind his back; still steaming gently, warm and rich and just a little salty. “It’s not magic like your Mami’s, but it means we can sneak in one more before your medicinal…oof. H-hey, kiddo.”

Isabela had wrapped her arms around his middle, giving him as tight a hug as she could. “Thank you, Tio Bruno.”

“Anything for my baby sobrina. Now, c’mon over here and read me a story…”

[kcrabb88]

Queer Movies/Books/TV Shows for Pride Month!

Happy Pride everyone!! For your viewing/reading pleasure I have made a (non-exhaustive) list of queer media that I have enjoyed! 

Movies/Documentaries

Pride (2014): An old tried and true favorite, which meets at the intersection of queer and workers’ rights. A group of queer activists support the 1985 miners’ strike in Wales (complete with a sing-through of Bread and Roses + Power in a Union)

Portrait of a Lady on Fire: On an isolated island in Brittany at the end of the eighteenth century, a female painter is obliged to paint a wedding portrait of a young woman (or, two young lesbians fall in love by the sea, and you cry)

God’s Own Country: Young farmer Johnny Saxby numbs his daily frustrations with binge drinking and casual sex, until the arrival of a Romanian migrant worker for lambing season ignites an intense relationship that sets Johnny on a new path (Seriously this movie is GREAT and doesn’t get enough love, watch it! It’s rough but ends happily)

The Half of It:  When smart but cash-strapped teen Ellie Chu agrees to write a love letter for a jock, she doesn't expect to become his friend - or fall for his crush (as in she falls for his crush who is another girl. This movie was so good, and really friendship focused!) 

Saving Face:  A Chinese-American lesbian and her traditionalist mother are reluctant to go public with secret loves that clash against cultural expectations (this is an oldie and a goodie, with a happy ending!)

Moonlight:  A young African-American man grapples with his identity and sexuality while experiencing the everyday struggles of childhood, adolescence, and burgeoning adulthood (featuring gay men of color!)

Carol:  An aspiring photographer develops an intimate relationship with an older woman in 1950s New York (everyone’s seen this I think, but I couldn’t not have it here)

Milk: The story of Harvey Milk and his struggles as an American gay activist who fought for gay rights and became California's first openly gay elected official (the speech at the end of this made me cry. Warning, of course, for death, if you don’t know about Harvey Milk)

Pride (Hulu Documentary):  A six-part documentary series chronicling the fight for LGBTQ civil rights in America (they go by decade from the 50s-2000s, and there is a lot of great trans inclusion in this)

Paris is Burning (Documentary): A 1990s documentary about the African American and Latinx ballroom scene. Available on Youtube!

A New York Christmas Wedding:  As her Christmas Eve wedding draws near, Jennifer is visited by an angel and shown what could have been if she hadn't denied her true feelings for her childhood best friend (this movie is SO CUTE. It’s really only nominally a Christmas movie and easily watched anytime. Features an interracial sapphic couple!) 

TV Shows 

Love, Victor: Victor is a new student at Creekwood High School on his own journey of self-discovery, facing challenges at home, adjusting to a new city, and struggling with his sexual orientation (this is a spin-off of Love, Simon, and it’s very sweet and well done! Featuring a young gay man of color)

Sex Education:  A teenage boy with a sex therapist mother teams up with a high school classmate to set up an underground sex therapy clinic at school (this has multiple queer characters, including a featured young Black gay man and also in season 2 there is a side ace character!) 

Black Sails: I mean, do I even need to put a summary here? If you follow me you know that Black Sails is full of queer pirates, just queers everywhere.

Gentleman Jack:  A dramatization of the life of LGBTQ+ trailblazer, voracious learner and cryptic diarist Anne Lister, who returns to Halifax, West Yorkshire in 1832, determined to transform the fate of her faded ancestral home Shibden Hall (Period drama lesbians!!! A title sequence  that will make you gay just by watching!) 

Tales of the City (2019):  A middle-aged Mary Ann returns to San Francisco and reunites with the eccentric friends she left behind. "Tales of the City" focuses primarily on the people who live in a boardinghouse turned apartment complex owned by Anna Madrigal at 28 Barbary Lane, all of whom quickly become part of what Maupin coined a "logical family". It's no longer a secret that Mrs. Madrigal is transgender. Instead, she is haunted by something from her past that has long been too painful to share (this is based on a book series and it’s got lots of great inter-generational queer relationships!) 

The Haunting of Bly Manor:  After an au pair’s tragic death, Henry hires a young American nanny to care for his orphaned niece and nephew who reside at Bly Manor with the chef Owen, groundskeeper Jamie and housekeeper, Mrs. Grose (sweet, tender, wonderful lesbians. A bittersweet ending but this show is so so wonderful)

Sense8: A group of people around the world are suddenly linked mentally, and must find a way to survive being hunted by those who see them as a threat to the world's order (queers just EVERYWHERE in this show, of all kinds)

Books

Loveless by Alice Oseman:  Georgia has never been in love, never kissed anyone, never even had a crush – but as a fanfic-obsessed romantic she’s sure she’ll find her person one day. This wise, warm and witty story of identity and self-acceptance sees Alice Oseman on towering form as Georgia and her friends discover that true love isn’t limited to romance (don’t be turned off by this title, it’s tongue-in-cheek. This is a book about an aroace college girl discovering herself and centers the importance and power of platonic relationships! I have it on my TBR and have heard great things)

Detransition, Baby by Torrey Peters: Reese almost had it all: a loving relationship with Amy, an apartment in New York City, a job she didn't hate. She had scraped together what previous generations of trans women could only dream of: a life of mundane, bourgeois comforts. The only thing missing was a child. But then her girlfriend, Amy, detransitioned and became Ames, and everything fell apart. Now Reese is caught in a self-destructive pattern: avoiding her loneliness by sleeping with married men.Ames isn't happy either. He thought detransitioning to live as a man would make life easier, but that decision cost him his relationship with Reese—and losing her meant losing his only family. Even though their romance is over, he longs to find a way back to her. When Ames's boss and lover, Katrina, reveals that she's pregnant with his baby—and that she's not sure whether she wants to keep it—Ames wonders if this is the chance he's been waiting for. Could the three of them form some kind of unconventional family—and raise the baby together?This provocative debut is about what happens at the emotional, messy, vulnerable corners of womanhood that platitudes and good intentions can't reach. Torrey Peters brilliantly and fearlessly navigates the most dangerous taboos around gender, sex, and relationships, gifting us a thrillingly original, witty, and deeply moving novel (again, don’t be thrown off by the title, it too, is tongue-in-cheek. This book was GREAT, and written by a trans women with a queer-and especially trans--audience in mind)

A Tip for the Hangman by Allison Epstein: A gay Christopher Marlowe, at Cambridge and trying to become England’s best new playwright, finds himself wrapped up in royal espionage schemes while also falling in love (this book is by a Twitter friend of mine, and it is a wonderful historical thriller with a gay man at the center).

Creatures of Will and Temper by Molly Tanzer: a very very queer remix of The Picture of Dorian Gray (which was already quite queer), featuring amazing female characters, a gay Basil, and a much happier ending than the original. 

Red, White, and Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston: The gay prince of England and the bisexual, biracial first son of the president fall in love (think an AU of 2016 where a woman becomes president). Featuring a fantastic discovery of bisexuality, ruminations on grief, and just a truly astonishing book. One of my favorites!

One Last Stop by Casey McQuiston:  For cynical twenty-three-year-old August, moving to New York City is supposed to prove her right: that things like magic and cinematic love stories don’t exist, and the only smart way to go through life is alone. She can’t imagine how waiting tables at a 24-hour pancake diner and moving in with too many weird roommates could possibly change that. And there’s certainly no chance of her subway commute being anything more than a daily trudge through boredom and electrical failures. But then, there’s this gorgeous girl on the train (This is Casey McQuiston’s brand new novel featuring time-travel, queer women, and I absolutely cannot WAIT to read it)

The Heiress by Molly Greely: Set in the Pride and Prejudice universe, this takes on Anne de Bourg (Lady Catherine’s daughter), and makes her queer! 

Tipping the Velvet by Sarah Waters:  Nan King, an oyster girl, is captivated by the music hall phenomenon Kitty Butler, a male impersonator extraordinaire treading the boards in Canterbury. Through a friend at the box office, Nan manages to visit all her shows and finally meet her heroine. Soon after, she becomes Kitty's dresser and the two head for the bright lights of Leicester Square where they begin a glittering career as music-hall stars in an all-singing and dancing double act. At the same time, behind closed doors, they admit their attraction to each other and their affair begins (Sarah Waters is the queen of historical lesbians. All of her books are good, and they’re all gay! The Paying Guests is another great one)

(On a side note re: queer books, there are MANY, these are just ones I’ve read more recently. Also there are a lot of indie/self-published writers doing great work writing queer books, so definitely support your local indie authors!) 

[zafirosreverie]

Can we have some period preferences for the madrigal women. I feel like throwing 7 women under one roof is a recipe for chaos during that time of the month.

Here it is! I only write for Julieta, Félix and Pepa, so I only did the two Madrigal sisters. Hope you still like it.