My family didn't have a lot of money, and I'm grateful for that. Money is the longest route to happiness.

Ironically, when I hit adolescence, I was approached about modeling and acting all the time. And, for five years, I said, "No, I'm not interested. I want a simple life, I don't want to be in the spotlight."

When I am doing things around the house - when I'm decorating, setting up furniture, putting out a vase of flowers, lighting my candles, my mind is always thinking, "What do I need to do to make this space peaceful and restful and comfortable so that when people walk into it, aesthetically they're heightened and enlightened?"

I wasn't actually going to see the original film [Lord of the Ring], because I didn't think it was possible that a film could represent the books appropriately. So I was protesting, and I wasn't going to see them. And then my family all took a jaunt together, the entire family, to see the movies, and were like, "What, you're just going to stay home?" So I saw the movies and was thoroughly impressed that Peter Jackson managed to make my vision of the book come to life, as well as my sister's and my father's, and my aunt's and my uncle's, everyone's.

I haven't sat down and memorized the language of Elvish, and anyone who does that is crazy!

I think men don't know what they want, so the idea of not knowing what they're getting makes it a little easier on them.

I bought almost every single thing that I furnished my house with at the Salvation Army in Hawaii. All second hand. Some of them are kind of retro, and some of them you'd never know.