Architect of the Stars

You can call me Starry! She/her, asexual. I'm a huge nerd (as in, I love math, science, and language). I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. Reblog (and rambles) blog is @starryarchitect-reblogs, queer mormon blog is/was @acemormon (don't use it much anymore).

[starryarchitect]

Oct 2025: I'm going to be gone for about a year and a half, so see everyone summer 2027! Not dead, just temporarily MIA. While I'm gone, be nice to people (especially yourself), give me some good hijinks to come back to and catch up on, try to learn something interesting every day or so, and my ghost best friend will be operating the blog 'till I get back. Have fun!

ao3

youtube

Also, no, I do not do commissions, but I'll take requests if people are interested

[starryarchitect]

because every King needs a cape!

[starryarchitect]

medium: digital art over crayon background

@somerunner Here's my not-so-great addition to your microfandom! Believe it or not, I've been working on this literally since I read this scene in that first book, but it took a looooong time (and isn't even good enough to justify all that time 😭). There are so many of those teal lights

[starryarchitect]

finally finished severance; here's a lil' doodle

[starryarchitect]

Been rereading The Mysterious Benedict Society and oh my gosh as a kid I totally missed what an awesome dynamic these two have. Reynie being the most patient with her and the way she so clearly admires him and trusts him (she adopts his habit of putting a hand on his chin to think, when she's lost in the library he's the one she sends the call number to, he's the one people trust to comfort her after she gets her memories back, gah) and then she develops the ability to read his mind and he understands the importance of schooling his thoughts to keep her calm and fjwjjxjwhdhehdhehe I'm insane about these two

[starryarchitect]

I have to go, May. I have to fix things.

I was going to try to draw every point in their relationship but I realized I just wanted to draw more from my favorite in the series (Once Upon the End) so it's just scenes from that book instead of all of them

[starryarchitect]

A drawing of Varian in the moon Varian series I'm working on!

[starryarchitect]

Medium: digital art with crayon background

Lyrics from "Go" by Indigo Girls, because they have so many amazing activism songs about how you're never, ever too small to make a difference, and they all fit so well for HTTYD, and I desperately need everyone else to appreciate that as much as I do

[just the crayon backgrounds on their own]

[starryarchitect]

I don't normally post much for tumblrstake, but a month or two ago, I went through the temple on my own for the first time and had an experience that I think members of the queerstake--and probably the tumblrstake in general--might find some comfort in, so I wanted to share it. Story below the cut, because I'm a bit of a long-winded writer (cw crying, mention of (but no description of) panic attack, no homophobia though). For anyone who ever feels unwelcome in the church.

(apologies to people who follow me for art, I know this is a bit out of nowhere)

It was the first time I had been through the temple alone.

Since I first received my endowment, I'd been longing to do it alone. It's wonderful with people, of course--having family, friends, or even just acquaintances nearby was always comforting and enjoyable. But I wanted to try it alone, just once. I wanted to be able to sit as long in the celestial room as I wanted. I wanted to be able to experience it without needing to put on a show or care what people saw me do. I wanted to talk to no one, wait for no one. I wanted to experience it entirely with myself.

And that summer, I finally got to. It was in an unfamiliar city, one I had been to only once before (when I visited the temple on the preceding Saturday with an acquaintance from the local YSA ward). Not only was the city and temple unfamiliar, but I myself was unfamiliar. I'd spent the summer in an alien city, with my first job ever, doing--and hating--the thing I had dreamed of doing for my entire life. I had learned a lot about myself, and lost of a lot of myself in the process, and I still didn't feel entirely comfortable in my own skin. I was reeling with questions about my future and my identity, my purpose and my character, and I was exhausted.

I did initiatory first, and I finished late enough that it was a rush to get to the endowment session.

I like to write down my thoughts after temple sessions, but I didn't get time between the initiatory and the endowment. So I slipped my little temple notebook into the pocket of my dress and sat down for the presentation. Once I got to the celestial room, I snagged a one-person armchair--not next to a tissue box, foolishly--and pulled out my notebook.

I'll admit, I didn't know if it was allowed. I'd never seen anyone write in a celestial room before. But I haven't really been through the temple that many times, and I had never heard of it being formally prohibited. And my mom had mentioned once that she saw someone writing in the celestial room before. So I wanted to give it a try.

Besides, I'm a writer. I think better with a pen in my hand. I certainly feel better with a pen in my hand--and by that I mean I feel happier, yes, but also that I feel the Spirit better. This is such a prominent effect with me that I even write my prayers out in verse. Writing in the celestial room just made sense for me--and I certainly didn't expect it to be off limits. I thought maybe most people just didn't think of it, the same way most people prayed out loud rather than putting it down on the page. So I set out to record my thoughts and feelings from both the initiatory and the endowment.

I was pulled out of my writing by a hand on my shoulder, which made me jump as it always does. Then the voice of a female temple worker in my ear: "We don't write in the celestial room."

I looked up, and she must have realized how young I was. I'm in college, and to people who don't know me I look even younger. She softened her voice and kept talking, throwing words at me about sacred spaces and ceremonies and how "other people" might not "respect the ordinances" and how I'm free to write down whatever I want in public spaces, but not in the celestial room.

Her voice was gentle, but it felt like it was cutting into me. For someone who's so willing to test unwritten rules, I really, really struggle when I get in trouble. It terrifies me. And after such a difficult summer, I wasn't in the headspace to be terrified.

But she was still talking, so I just nodded, unable to say more than "I'm sorry" over and over. Because I could feel the burning in my throat that warned of oncoming tears, and there was no way I could say anything substantial when I was about to start crying. And not the good, cleansing, calming kind of crying, not the kind brought on by the Spirit, not the kind that had visited me during the initiatory, but the kind that feels like a knife in your throat. The kind that often brings a panic attack with it.

So I just nodded and nodded, closing my notebook and mentally begging her to leave so she wouldn't see me break down.

Finally, she stopped talking and left me with my face burning as tears rolled down my cheeks. I sat there frozen, the pen and notebook clutched tightly in my hands, struggling to breathe enough to stem the flowing tears.

I was angry--angry that there was this arbitrary rule in place that made feeling the Spirit harder for people who thought and felt like me, angry that the temple didn't accommodate the way my brain and heart worked, angry that I wasn't welcome as I was in the celestial room. And I was humiliated that I was crying, humiliated that I had been chastised, and terrified that I really had done something deeply wrong and unfixable. More than anything, I was heartbroken. Heartbroken that this woman valued her rules more than my experience at the temple--because this had been one of my best visits ever, up until this point. Heartbroken that the church needlessly outlawed people with minds and hearts like mine--minds that think better with a pen in hand, hearts that feel more when I'm writing out a poem. Heartbroken that I couldn't be myself in the celestial room.

And there was something uniquely awful about being berated in the celestial room. Maybe it was because it made me feel like I wasn't just doing something that was against the rules, but rather something that was morally wrong. Maybe it was the fact that I was surrounded by other people who could see me being chided. Maybe it was simply the fact that I came here to find peace, comfort, some sense of stability in my tumultuous mind, and she was giving me the exact opposite.

I considered giving up and walking out of there. Any semblance of comfort or peace or emotional stability was gone, and I should just get out of there before I poisoned my associations with the celestial room even more than I already had. The day had been ruined, the session ruined, and I needed to leave before I ruined the temple, too.

But I was petty and determined, and more than anything, I believed, fiercely, that I was supposed to find comfort there. The temple was for me, even if my desire to write in it was a flaw or even a crime. The temple was where I was supposed to go when I needed help. The temple was there to make me feel better, not worse.

So I resolved to stay until I felt better.

For the next half hour, I sat there, as people filed in from the session, as people sat and whispered, and eventually as people trickled out. I sat there, still frozen, still clutching my notebook, but at least I was no longer crying, at least I was breathing a little easier. But I still felt underwater, still dizzy from my tears and unsteady and uneasy in my heart and soul.

So I sat there, and I waited.

Eventually, everyone left except me, some other guy (who was also writing in a little notebook, actually, but he didn't get in trouble), and one of the temple workers--a different one from the woman who'd chastised me. She made eye contact with me across the room and walked over.

I tensed, worried she was going to do the same thing as the last woman--I hadn't written anything since I received the first reprimand, but I still had the notebook and pen clutched in my hand. I get very still when I'm scared or upset, as if I'll disappear--and thus evade people's ire--if I keep from moving. So I hadn't been able to put away the notebook. I hadn't been able to move my hands at all.

But when she came over, she didn't even look at the notebook. Instead, she said with a light accent, "I don't know why, but I felt that I should give you a hug." And she reached down and gently wrapped an arm around my shoulder.

I burst into tears.

I clutched that arm, and then turned and threw my arms around her neck and clung. And I cried, even harder than I had before--but not the painful, burning, scared kind of crying. The relieved kind. She kept saying, "everything is okay?" and I couldn't tell if it was a question or a statement, but I just kept saying yes, yes, everything is okay, thank you, thank you--

I hadn't gotten a proper hug in two months. I had known I wouldn't, going into the summer, and I thought I'd be fine--

But it had been a difficult two months. It had been a difficult year. I needed a hug after all of it.

I clung to her far longer than I would have if I'd been in my right mind, but she didn't seem to mind, and it was a struggle to eventually pull away from her warmth. But eventually, I stopped clinging to her, and she went and got me tissues because I was a mess.

I was so teary that it took me a second to realize that she was saying something. "You are . . . in the right place," she was saying. "My English is bad," she apologized, and I shook my head furiously, because it was beautiful. "But I feel . . . you are in the right place." And much like before, I couldn't speak, but for a very, very different reason. All I could do was nod fiercely.

I was. It wasn't just a trite comment, a thing she knows she's supposed to say in the temple. It was something I myself had been thinking. In the right place. On the right track. It was a hard year, but--I'm here.

And I'm where I'm supposed to be.

[starryarchitect]

I was surprised by the support for my Hiccup-learns-more-languages headcanon so here's another comic about Hiccup being a language nerd

(they have an entire case for Thing That's on Fire and another for Thing That is Catching Fire)

first comic

[starryarchitect]

I am very attached to my headcanon that once he's king, Hiccup starts learning EVEN MORE languages (I picked Russian because it's the foreign language I've studied the most (I'm very bad though), and a few of the books mention the Rus . . .)

It's based on my own experience with recovering from a difficult period, especially when you feel like you've lost yourself: it helps to revisit something you know you like (and if he's fluent in Dragonese, French, and Latin, then Hiccup definitely likes learning languages), and it also helps to patiently work on learning something new. So I think Hiccup would try to pick up a few new languages after the war. And this time he can do it with library books! (who knows how he did it originally . . .)

edit: For those wondering what he's saying in Russian, he's practicing the singular and plural forms of Russian "cases," which are modifications you make to nouns in some languages to denote what part of the sentence they're acting as (i.e. direct object, indirect object, location, thing that owns something, etc.) The best way to practice cases is placing a word in a bunch of different sentences so that you're not just declining (modifying) them without context, but actually using the case in a way you might for a real conversation. In this case, he's practicing by putting the Russian word for "dragon" into the six Russian cases. 

Transcription of my TERRIBLE Cyrillic handwriting + a translation under the cut for anyone curious:

Дракон. Dragon. (nominative)

Я вижу дракона. I see a dragon. (accusative)

Я сижу на драконе. I sit on a dragon. (locative)

Дракона зовут Беззубик. The dragon is called Toothless. (dative) (I'm pretty sure this is Toothless's name in the Russian translation of the books)

Это плащ дракона. This is the dragon's coat. (genitive)

Я играю с драконом. I play with the dragon. (instrumental)

Драконы. Dragons.

Я вижу драконов. I see dragons. (accusative) 

Я сижу на дракон . . . драконах? Драконах. I sit on the dragons. (locative, with hesitation and stumbling)

Я играю с дракон . . . дракона— I play with the drago— (instrumental, incomplete—it would be драконами if Toothless hadn't interrupted him)

[starryarchitect]

me: *reading a httyd post, it's talking about "hiccup" and "toothless" and I can't tell which version it is, I like and reblog almost exclusively book posts so it really should be book httyd but the post feels off and the characters don't seem quite right so it might be the movie*

*scrolls down*

#hiccup haddock

me: yup that's a movie post

[starryarchitect]

a story about growing up

[starryarchitect]

never before have I drawn such a pathetic wet cat of a hiccup (snippet of a larger wip)

[starryarchitect]

I've been constantly rereading Separation Anxiety by @aldoodles because it's so perfect and so cutting and so beautiful and it just HAS ME BY THE TEETH IN EVERY WAY and I could not get this image out of my head, so . . . (it feels wrong to provide such an imperfect illustration for a story written by such an amazing artist (and author) but unfortunately the idea seized me and I do kinda like the vibe of the outcome so I wanted to share)

(To be clear, this isn't a scene in the story or anything, it's just a metaphorical image that got stuck in my head based on the feeling of the story. Poor boy is so trapped.)

also, absolutely awful first attempt under the cut for anyone curious

[starryarchitect]

Half Upon a Time by @james-riley-author deserves a bigger fandom. If you want a kids' series that cleverly reworks fairytales then THIS IS THE BEST ONE BY FAR

[starryarchitect]

had to cancel my order of the collection containing "When the Windwalker Changed" because I MOVED before it arrived so I drew our most beloved dragon to cope with my annoyance. I'll do something more in my usual style later probably but this was a fun experiment