The Perfect Lip Color

About a month ago I came across this video for J. Crew’s new fall line.

I love everything about it, the song playing in the background,  the clothes, the model’s silly-coy way with the camera, her messy up-do, and most of all her chic swipe of lip color. Watching the video you get the sense that right before she dashed out the door she pulled out her lipstick for that effortless but wondefully put together look.

Obviously this is a preview for the J.Crew fall line, so I understand that this isn’t really how it all went down. Nevertheless, I forwarded the video to my friend Caroline (who also loved her fabulous messy up-do) and we emailed back and forth about what we thought the color might be. According to Caroline, J.Crew uses a lot of Nars products on their models. A few days later I found myself at Sephora and every single Nars color was on display–except for the one that Caroline predicted she was wearing. So I wandered around until I stumbled on Laura Mercier’s Hydratint in Crimson.

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The color isn’t the same–its not nearly as orangey as the lip color on the model, but I love it. I feel like its a good transition from no lip color to full on lipstick. It gives a pop of color without feeling overly dramatic. So far everyone who has tried it has loved it too.

Nail Painting Tips and Tricks

I made a goal for myself to learn how to paint my nails really well by the end of April. So far it’s coming along quite well. I think when I slow down and just do it my nails look a million times better.

I’ve found various tips and tricks across the internet, but I’d love to hear yours!! Please spill the details so that I can look as fabulously put together as all of you. On that note, I have a friend who swears that women are prettier with chipped nail polish. Thoughts? Does it capture the I don’t give a F*** look or is it just plain tacky?

Smith’s Rosebud Salve

Sunday while we were all talking at the tasting my friend, Leanne, fished around in her giant purse and carefully extracted a small tin of lip balm. She put a small amount of the pink substance on her lips and then handed the canister over to me. Never one to turn down “goo” (as Peter refers to beauty products), I followed suit. Fast-forward to me sitting at my desk at work this morning. I had to have that lip balm. Open gmail, email Leanne.

So what was this mysterious substance that had me counting down the hours until I could drive to Sephora?  It wasn’t lip balm. It was actually Smith’s Rosebud Salve.

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The smooth finish that this leaves on my lips makes me quite happy. As I type I’m rubbing my lips together. It’s quite heavenly and the smell is amazing! If you put some on and close your eyes its as if you are standing in an English garden. Who wouldn’t want that? I will admit that after learning that this is a salve and not an official lip balm, I quickly contemplated rubbing it all over and basking in the glorious spring smell. I think that may be a sign that we need to plant more flowers

Frog Tape French Manicure

What happens when Peter goes out of town for almost a week and leaves me to my own devices? Muffins for dinner, a whole lot of silliness, and many crafting projects.

It started with me reading yet another great review about Frog Tape. “OK, Frog Tape,” I thought, “if you’re so great with your paint block technology then surely you can help give me a french manicure. “

Let me begin by telling you that I am terrible at painting my nails. Seriously, I think I’m lacking some sort of girl gene, honestly it’s quite pathetic. I started out doing all the pre-painting preparation. OK, I may have skipped the soaking and pushing back of the cuticles but I trimmed and filed my nails.

Then I applied the Frog Tape directly to my nails. When this resulted in strange looking lines, I tried to trim the tape so that it mimicked the natural curves that you have on the tips of your nails. The most important part is to make sure that your nails are completely clean and dry. During my first attempt I realized that my nails had a bit of lotion on them and the tape wouldn’t even pretend to stick.

I painted the exposed portions of my nails with two coats of white nail polish and removed the tape while the second coat was still wet. The result?

Well, Frog Tape isn’t made for nails. It did a pretty good job but I did experience some bleed though.  I followed up with a coat of clear polish. My friend, Leanne, and I decided that they look fine from far away. I just won’t draw attention to them.

What do you spend your time doing when your significant other is away? Are you a crafter like I am? Or do you stay up late watching movies that s/he would hate? I’m not going to lie–I did the latter as well.

Like Mother, Like Daughter

I hardly ever watch TV. In fact, Peter and I don’t even have cable. (This is when I usually watch my friends gasp and prepare myself to answer a bajillion question about what I do with my spare time.) But when they changed TVs so that in order to watch regular non-cable programming you needed to have cable or some special converter box, Peter and I decided to invest in a box to satisfy our house guests. For a few days, fascinated by our new channel selection, I watched more frequently. One day I came across an infomercial for Cindy Crawford’s Meaningful Beauty. I was immediately interested and then as the price stared plummeting I quickly became skeptical–until it fell so low (I’m sure you can hear it in your head, “BUT WAIT!! If you buy right now we’ll take this $150 value and give it to you for for $19.99″) that what I would be getting would actually be cheaper than buying beauty products from a grocery store. Immediately I turned off the TV, walked away, and told myself that if the deal was really that good then I wouldn’t be getting so much for free.

A few days later, I drove down to visit my mother and in her room I saw this:

I found it hysterical that my mom (who also almost never watches TV) saw the same infomercial and also thought that the product sounded like a great deal. Apparently Meaningful Beauty works on a system of automatic renewal so my mom had ordered a shipment and before she’d even made a dent in it she had another one at her doorstep. Being the kind person that she is, she gave he second set to me.

I was immediately put off by the renewal system because I hate it when companies try to get me to spend extra money, but the products themselves turned me off even more. Imagine Clinique’s Dramatically Different Moisturizing Lotion in a formula that clumps so much that you feel like you are pumping buggers into your hand. This is the best way I can describe the night cream. Most of the other products seemed no different than a simple lotion. All in all, I would not spend money on this product. This formulas used for these lotions are unimpressive and they probably rely on the renewal scheme to ensure multiple purchases.

Has anyone else tried Meaningful Beauty? Maybe you liked it more than I did.

Image courtesy of Wrinkle Cure Review.