My summer face!

When the weather starts getting warmer and the humidity sky rockets I like to switch up my foundation/face routine.  When it gets warm I usually don't mess with all the medium/full coverage foundations and trade it up for something that feels lighter on the face.  I don't want my face melting part way through the day.  Up until last summer I would just use a powder.  Then last summer I made a discovery and have been sticking with it since.  
First I start off with a tinted moisturizer.  I have found that my favorite is from Physician's Formula.  

It's in the Organic Wear line.  I stick with light to neutral in color, because let's face it I am kind of fair skinned.  There is an SPF 15 in the moisturizer, which for me is awesome.  I get light coverage, a moisturizer and SPF protection all in one!!! 
After I put on my tinted moisturizer I follow up with probably one of my favorite Mary Kay products.  The Mineral Powder Foundation. 

The Mineral Powder Foundation works best with a flat top brush as shown in the picture above.  The powder definitely gets best coverage when it is buffed on.  The combination of the tinted moisturizer and mineral powder foundation gives pretty decent coverage and is still super light on the skin!   
Depending on how awful I feel like I look in the morning and how intense my bags are under my eyes I may or may not apply some concealer.  My two favorite are Glamofauge from Hard Candy and Concealer from Mary Kay.  

there is definitely a distinct difference int he two.  The Mary Kay is a much lighter coverage than the Glamoflauge so like I really said it's all about how I'm feeling about my imprefections every morning! 
  
After I have applied the tinted moisturize, mineral powder foundation and/or concealer I follow up with a little bit of blush to give my face a little bit of color.  


I also thought I would share with you my current favorite, summery lipsticks. 

They all 3 happen to be from ELF.  The top two is from their normal line, so they were only $1.  The bottom is from their mineral line so I believe it was $6, but I got it for 50% off.  Anyway from top to bottom: Gypsy, Seduction, and Candid Coral.  I definitely like the texture and stay of their mineral lipstick much better than their dollar line, but for a dollar I can reapply right? 


Have you ladies tried any of these products?  Is there a super awesome tinted moisturize that you like better?  I'd love to try some more out!  


What does everyone have going on this weekend? I'm looking very forward to a weekend of relaxing by the pool and getting some color on my pasty legs this weekend! 

My mini weekend haul!!!

Let me apologize for the delay in posting... It was a crazy busy weekend with the holiday and all the traveling as well as coming back to having to fill in and teach someone's lecture all week and have to prepare my own materials.  Needless to say this week has been nuts and I really just want to go home, jump in the pool, cool off, and then go sleep! 

Anyway, on my way to visit my family and friends I stopped in Cincinnati, to spend some money at Ulta and Lush.  Let's see what I got :) 

The first thing I ran towards at Lush was this cute little bath bomb.  It's called Big Blue.  The darker color flecks you see in the bath bomb is seaweed.  According to the website:

Relaxing seaweed soak: Lemon, lavender and seaweed for clear thoughts. Escape into a world of pure, uncluttered thought by dropping a Big Blue into the bath.

Swim your private ocean: Lemon and lavender oils help to clear your mind, complete with skin-softening seaweed and sea salt to help you float away in your own warm, blue ocean of inspiration.

Arame seaweed: When the seaweed soaks in the hot water, it becomes softening and soothing.

 I didn't plan on getting this little guy, but I saw it and thought it was worth trying for $4.95.  This is called sugar babe.  It is a sugar mask made of sugar (obviously) and coconut oil!  I'm excited to try it. Especially since Coconut Oil is supposed to be so good for your skin. a

The first and only other time I have been to Lush they gave me a sample of Sexy Peel to try.  I fell in love with it!  I am a big fan of citrus scented soaps and etc so of course I loved this.  when I went back I had to buy myself another one!  1/4 pound of this goodness is around $8.50.  I know that sounds expensive, or at least it did to me the first time I thought about it but let's remember all of the benefits you recieve from using handmade soaps.  You can a) pronounce all of the ingredients in the soap and b) you aren't using any harsh chemicals on your precious skin.  I think it's worth it and ever since switching from using regular store soaps to using soaps free of sulfates and parabens I have noticed a dramatic difference in my skin.  I also use a whole lot less lotion!!! 

If you ever read the bloggings over at Pretty Addictions, you probably know that Kassandra loves the scent of Karma.  I had to pick up something in that scent so she wouldn't give me hell :)  I chose to get more soap!!!

 If you remember my, "Why my hair and skin love me!!!" post I talked about how awesome this Angels on Bare Skin from Lush is.  I had to replenish my stock!  I know 0.13 lbs doesn't sound like a whole lot but you need so little of this stuff to get enough to wash your face this lasts FOREVER!!! Plus your face feels amazing!!!

Across the street from the mall that Lush is in is Ulta, I of course had to stop there!

They were having a sale on their NYX products where you bought 2 and got one free. 

These are the three items I chose.  Top to bottom: Creme Rouge in Glow, Creme Rouge in Natural, and NYX Eyeliner Pen in Extreme Coffee.  I have tried all three of these items and I love them!!!! I will do a review on this soon! 

I also decided to pick up a few other items.  Ulta carries this brand called Essence, there stuff seems to be hit or miss but I decided to try a few things.  I had left what I used as my highlight down here in TN, so I grabbed something to hopefully suffice for the weekend. Since I already have several highlights I chose to get something on the cheaper side (oops, should have splurged).

The picture kind of stinks but taking it with the flash caused an awful glare.  This is Essence soft touch blush in Fashionita (should have called it craponista). 

I also grabbed this mascara from essence to try because it was only a few bucks.  It is Black Mania-Carbon Black Volume Mascara.  This actually isn't a half bad mascara.  I assume it is supposed to be a dupe for L'Oreal Volumious Carbon Black, however it's not even remotely like it, or at least I didn't think so. 

I also grabbed this bottle of Sally Hansen nail polish for $1.19.  The color is truffle.  It's a very nude/mauve color.  I actually kind of like it on. 

I wanted to do more shopping while I was up in Ohio but as usual there is never enough time.  If only we could add more hours in the day or something. 

Has anyone tried any of these products?  What did everyone do during the holiday weekend?

It's the freakin' weekend, going to have me some fun

I realized about 5 minutes ago that it's Friday which means it's one of the days I usually blog.  Since I forgot I don't really have any thing to blog about at the time, except how awesome my weekend is going to be! 

I am getting ready to head out of Knoxville until Monday evening/Tuesday morning to go home to see my friends and family.  I am originally from North of Cincinnati, about 5.5 hours away from Knoxville.  As usual, almost every second of my weekend is planned so it's going to definitely be busy!  I promise I will have a super awesome blog for you when I get back.  I am planning on stopping in Cincinnati this afternoon to hit up Lush and Ulta.  Be excited for me :) I've been excited about it all weekend!!! Anyway have a safe and happy weekend everyone and don't forget to remember and thank those who serve our country! 

Brightens my day :)

Here is proof that all you need is love...

(Click the picture, it will direct you to the story :) )

This is such a wonderful story.  I was directed to this story by my friend, Allyn.  She's a smart girl :)

All you need is love...

"All you need is love.
All you need is love.
All you need is love, love.

Love is all you need."

This past week one of my friends, Allyn posted an interesting article on Facebook.  It was a recent Gallup study showing that for the first time a majority of Americans are actually deciding that they are okay with legalizing gay marriage.  For me this was amazing.  for those of you who don't know me I am a crazy, raging liberal.  I believe strongly in human rights and the freedom to make our own choices without others making our decisions for us.  I believe that we all were put here (not sure by who) to live our lives according to how we see fit.  At some point everyone says (regardless of political affiliation) in their life, it's time to go grow up and make decisions separate from our parents. My question to you is, why do we say that we should be able to make decisions for ourselves when the vast majority of people see it fit to make decisions for the majority of us?  Why is it that someone else is always trying to tell us how to live our lives?  Doctors tell us how to live, when to lose weight, when to sleep more (blah blah blah), people tell us who to love, who to marry, what to do with our bodies.   So where exactly do we all fit in to the let's make our own decisions?  Where is this line drawn?  What decisions are we allowed to make and what decisions is someone else supposed to make for us.  Why the hell is always someone else telling me what to do? Do you know?  I sure as hell do not!

Most of you know I live in Tennessee currently.  When I first moved down here on my red chevy cavalier was a Human Rights sticker.  It looked like the pic above.  After living here maybe two weeks I left work one day to notice my sticker was gone.  WTF?  Why would anyone ever rip off an equality sticker?  Then it dawned on me... equality and the human rights campaign to some stands for what people like to call gay rights.  They consider it a campaign to give "Gay" people special rights, when in fact it's just asking to give this group EQUAL rights. In every facet of our lives people discriminate against this group, all the organization and the group wants is the opportunity to love and choose freely like any heterosexual person gets to.  I say, as a nation we butt the hell out and let people live their lives as they see fit.  Who are we to judge?  It's no body damn business what I do in my bedroom or my home and it's no bodies damn business what a homosexual person does in their bedroom or their home.  Maybe these people should realize that the HRC really isn't about "gay rights" it's about human rights, gay or not we are still part of the same human race, and should all have the same rights.  It's about the ability for all of us to make our own damn decisions in life without everyone else trying to do it for us.

After I posted the above article, my cousin Merideth commented, "Majority of the people in the world will support Gay Marriage long before they will support them raising children! :)"

After she made this comment I decided to do some research on her comment.  Most people know adoption is not an easy process by any means, it takes patience, a good deal of money and a lot of love.  To be gay and try to have a family is even more difficult!

 According to Love and Pride, "current reliable gay adoption statistics for America, there are statistics on children in gay homes. In 1976, there were between 300,000 to 500,000 gay and lesbian biological parents. In 1990, 6 to 14 million children had at least one gay or lesbian parent. Between 8 and 10 million children were being raised in gay and lesbian households.In 1999, approximately 547,000 children in foster care in the US, 117,000 legally free for adoption. There were only qualified adoptive families available for only twenty percent of them. Ten percent of the US population is homosexual, meaning a lot of couples whose biological resources for children are reduced are currently prevented from filling in the adoption gap."

Also this website states, "even in areas that have gay adoption laws, gay couples adopting may find they face prejudices within the system. Mainstream assumptions on gay parenting have led to an attitude that gay parents are a child's last resort.Often in gay adoption, parents will get harder children because social workers leave them last on the list. It is ironic that bureaucracies that believe that lesbians and gay men are not suitable parents will place children who require the most highly skilled parenting with them.Gay families have unique strengths that help troubled children. Gay couples adopting usually accept differences, understand what it is like to be in the minority, assign different gender roles, and have the skills to be open about sexuality with children who have been sexually abused."

So now I pose a question, why does it matter the sexual orientation of the parents.  Isn't it more important that they can provide a loving home and properly take care of the children?  I thought we lived in a nation with more children to be adopted than homes for them to go to? Seems senseless to discriminate based on sexual orientation.  Last I checked gay, wasn't a virus or bacteria that we could catch, so I'm not quite sure. What harm does it cause? I'm pretty sure the only thing is it steers from what we as a society consider as the social norm to raise a family in. Take a look around everyone, there are very few families that still fit the social norm that we lived in even 10 years ago.  Being a single mother or father is much more common that it used to be. Single parent adoption or IVF is more common. 

For those of you who do not know, Merideth that I spoke of earlier is currently a gestational carrier.  Her and her family (her husband and 3 children) made the decision to do a very selfless act for a very loving couple.  Here is the shock and awe factor for some of you, it is for a Homosexual couple.  Yes, you read it... H-O-M-O-S-E-X-U-A-L!!!! That's right I am the very proud damn cousin of a wonderful woman and her family who is so selflessly blessing a couple with a child, correction children (she's pregnant with twins) :)  Congratulations to the soon to be parents!  You and your family Merideth, are fulfilling two people's dreams to be parents and providing a loving home to two very special children! 

  

The last thought I will leave with you is perhaps one of the most inspirational speeches I have heard in a long time! 

 

In a world so full of hate why is it so hard to realize that, all you need is love?

 

Accessory Whore!!

Randomly I go on accessory buying binges.  Sometimes, it's to fill the void of not buying makeup haha.  Anyway, I needed a nice little setup to hang my dangly earrings on.  They usually sit in my jewelry box and then they get all tangled up and it takes forever to find the match and then on top of that they are all tangled so I decided to make something to fix that.
Here is my solution...

In reality I need another one of these to hang up all my earrings. Haven't gotten around to making it quite yet.  Anyways this was a super cheap and easy solution to my problem.  I went to Michaels and purchased one of these mesh plastic dojobs (not sure what actual name is) for 59 cents...

Then I went to Walmart and purchased a black 8x10 picture frame for $5.  I had to cut down the plastic dojob in order to make it fit in the picture slot.  I then removed the glass and back to the picture frame and replaced it with the plastic dojob.  Put a nail in the wall, hung it up and then loaded it up with my earrings.  Super cute right?

Now on to my accessories... LOVE THEM

All of these cuties came for Forever 21 and I only paid $1.50 for each pair!  3 pairs of earrings for $4.50!!! Awesome right?

I am so in love with this ring!!! I got it a store called Meijer (it's like a Walmart/Target).  It was originally $14.99 and I paid $2 for it!!!

I am absolutely in love with this rhinestone bow ring!  This picture doesn't do nearly enough justice for it's cuteness, but it was the best of the 42 pictures I took of the ring haha!!! It was originally $18.99 at Belk and with sales I got it for $7.19!  I love it!

These have quickly become my favorite accessory!  I only paid $3 for them at Walmart!!! I love them!!! Adorable!

On a side note, I am currently in the market for some new makeup brushes.  Do you ladies have any recommendations for brushes? Don't hold out on me!! Share your knowledge!!!!

My favorite blushes!!!!

So I haven't been staying at home the past few days so again I wasn't able to take pictures, good thing for internet pictures, right???

Anyway, today I thought I would share my favorite blushes with everyone today.  I used to not wear blush and then all of a sudden I started dabbling in the blush world and have discovered that OMG I love blush!!!! So here are my favorites :)

This is Living Doll by Hard Candy.  I found it at Walmart for like 9 bucks for a HUGE container.  It's a bright barbie shimmery pink. I love it!!! It's a must have!

This is my blush for my "pinched cheek" look.  This is Peche Tendre 4 from Sephora.  It retails for $12 and is worth every penny in my opinion.  You get a lot of product and it is actually pretty long wear for a blush.  This is more of my go to blush, because let's face it bright barbie pink isn't necessarily complementary for every eye look!

My other go to blush is from Mary Kay. It's called Shy blush and is a very beautiful color.  It is a coral color with strong pink and gold undertones.  I love it's finish as it is slightly shimmery and definitely picks up color based on the light you are in.  I love this blush.  This one retails for $10.   

 

The last blush I want to talk about is actually an ELF blush.  It's called Pink Passion.  It's a bright barbie pink color.  I know you are probably thinking, what's the difference between that and the living doll blush.  Um, the shimmer duh!  This blush is just matte so it makes it a little easier to wear with all eye looks.  You can do a super shimmery eye and this won't look awkward with where sometimes the living doll can. 

There are a few other blushes I work in to the rotation that are parts of palettes so I don't actually have names for you for those.  

What are your favorite blushes????