Just For Fun

G’morning! As I sipped my coffee from my favorite cat teacup this morning, I got to thinking about matte nail polish…

It’s not my favorite thing. They look like a car with a paint job that was suddenly abandoned halfway.

But that dark purple matte from the Chanel fall collection, though? *swoon* It’s everything. I’ve been hemming and hawing about whether I should “go there,” because I promised myself after The Great Gel Nail Polish Debacle of Summer 2018 that I’d take better care of my nails, and I told myself I’d care for them and paint them every week.

To that end, I’ve been wearing two coats of whichever polish has caught my eye each week (along with a base coat and shiny top coat), but the latest polish that caught my eye just so happens to be matte.

Go figure.

Sooo, I know that matte top coats exist, but wearing one now would totally disrupt the flow of my new nail polish master plan…which calls for me to use the same base coat and shiny top coat every week for consistency…

I know, I know! Clearly, I am Karen-ing this, and it’s spiraling to the Nth degree. I should just paint my damn nails already. ?

What are your feelings about matte nail polish? Should I go there?

But first, some light reading…

• This stylish (and très expensive) line of modern furniture is the new West Elm for cats, but if I actually got one of those beds for ? Tabs…he’d ignore it and sleep in the box it came in instead!

• How a New York Times columnist outsourced help to learn how to do her makeup in five minutes. (And it really does sound like a five-minute look.)

• Ruh-roh. Certain brands are catching serious heat for digitally altering their swatch pics for “the ‘gram.”

  In case any of the big dawgs are reading this, here’s how I’ve been doing swatches for the past 11 years:

  1. Bust out your arm.
  2. Swipe some makeup on it.
  3. Take pictures.
  4. Seriously, it’s that easy!
• The beauty brand Lush is trying to encourage the development of native crops like avocado and vanilla in Guatemala to hopefully reverse some of the effects of deforestation and environmental degradation there.
• These Le Labo scents are designed to evoke your favorite ?️ cities.
• Quelle suprise! A mascara technique I’ve never seen before: This unconventional method involves keeping your eyes closed while you wiggle the brush.
• Red maple leaf is a buzzy new skin care ingredient, and it could be the next big thing for smoothing fine lines.

Even if you aren’t into Erykah Badu, you still have to watch this just for her makeup. Also, the guy playing the matte black flute! Where was that flute when I was in band?!

Still on a lasagna kick.

Change my life, why don’t you?

What’s on your agenda this weekend? I got a late start today, but I want to do a little reading — this young adult suspense novel called The Book of Essie by Meghan MacLean Weir, and no, it’s not about nail polish (because I know you were wondering, ha ha ha!). It’s about a girl, the youngest of six, who grows up in front of the camera as part of a reality TV show. She wants to leave the show, but it isn’t easy, and she has to maneuver around her parents and the show’s producers like she’s living a chess game.

I’m about halfway through, and I can’t turn the pages fast enough!

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

Yeah. It’s only a matter of time… The clock is ticking… Rihanna recently showed up on the cover of British Vogue with a set of sparse, skinny brows, and even though I read somewhere that her makeup artist didn’t pluck them off (but instead did some makeup witchery to make it look like they were removed), I’m thinking that if you see the look on Riri, it’s already way ahead of the curve of what’s happening now.

We’ll start to see them out in the wild again sooner than later — first on “fashion” folks, but then it’ll filter on down to us regular peeps. I’d give it three years…

For the record, I’m 1,000% not ready to go back to ’90s-style brows. Even when I wore them in the ’90s and early aughts — which was when this top picture was taken! (It was for an author photo for my previous life as a freelancer.) — they were a reference to ’70s brows, and in the ’70s, they were referencing the ’30s.

What’s old is always new again!

But I don’t think I’ll ever go back to the extremely skinny brow situation… I’m probably going to keep mine the way they currently are, and if I do get the urge to pluck them, because one should never say never (especially with beauty things), I’ll probably use some concealer and creative placement to temporarily scratch the itch.

Do you think ’90s skinny brows will ever come back in style? If they do, how likely are you to rock them?

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

Ah, the ’90s…also known as my oily decade! I gotta give props to the face powders that got me through the oil slick years of my teens and early 20s — Cornsilk pressed powder, Coty Airspun Loose, the Clinique Loose Powder — and of course I have major love for the dark brown lipsticks I wore back then, namely Clinique Black Honey (old school!), MAC Paramount, Revlon Toast of New York.

As for face and body stuff, I went though countless bottles of Cetaphil face wash, and soooo many bottles and tins of Nivea Body Lotion and Body Cream…

Gosh, I used to love scooping that first scoop out of that thick body cream they sold in the blue tin! I wonder if that tin is still around? I gotta check next time I go to Target.

Oh! — can’t forget the Body Shop Grapefruit Shower Gel and their old-school Body Butters (back when they were thick and dense).

And for hair products, in college I loved the Herbal Essences shampoo and conditioner from the re-branding they did in the mid-’90s, and I also used a lot of Finesse shampoo/conditioner (in the blue bottles).

Remember the tagline? “Nothing less than Finesse.” 🙂

Then, after I started working full time after college, I was all about the salon lines, and I went through my share of Biolage, Rusk, Redken, and Bumble and Bumble.

It’s funny… You’d think that with my tendency to hoard, I’d still have at least a bottle, a tube or a compact of something I used back then, but I don’t. I wish I’d kept at least a few old tubes of lipstick…

Not to use, of course, but to compare the colors with how they are today!

Anywho, what are some of your ’90s beauty faves?

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

This has been “The Summer of Taupe” for me, and I call this look “easy polish” because it’s both of those things! A bright lip is the focal point, and there’s just a little definition on my lids for balance.

As for the products I use for this, hmm… Let me bust out my makeup bag.

• NARS Brow Perfector in Komo — This is one of their new brow pencils that just launched for fall, and it’s SUPER good. Big plus: The caps for the pencil and the spoolie ends are both the same size, so you can use them interchangeably, which means I don’t end up smashing the tip of the pencil by accidentally trying to force the wrong cap on the tip.
• Chanel Le Stylo Yeux Eyeliner in Mat Taupe — Thanks to this, I can’t remember the last time I touched a black liner.
• Chanel Eyeshadow Liner Kohl in Contour Clair — I just think this chubby matte taupe eyeshadow pencil goes really well with Mat Taupe liner.
• Hourglass Caution Mascara in Ultra Black
• It Cosmetics CC+ Illumination Full Coverage Cream in Tan — [INSERT ANGEL’S SINGING!] I can’t say enough good things about this stuff. I use it instead of under-eye concealer.
• Estée Lauder Double Wear Light or Double Wear Stay-in-Place Foundation — Double Wear Light has sheer-to-medium coverage with a satin finish, and Double Wear Stay-in-Place is medium-to-full with a matte finish. Both are lightweight, long-lasting and…straight-up fantastic.
• MAC Cream Colour Base in Vintage Rose — (I’m all about that cream blush life these days.)
• Chanel Jumbo Longwear Matte Lip Crayon on 269 Impact — When I don’t wear this bright matte berry with my current go-to look, I grab one of the (many) nude lipsticks in my purse. But I like 269 Impact more than everything else right meow.

Your turn. What’s been your current go-to makeup look this summer? Are you happy with it? Do you plan to change your look for fall? Feel free to go into as much (or as little) detail as you want! 🙂

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

1. The Clinique “My Happy” perfumes

When I graduated from college and got my first “real job,” one of the very first things I treated myself to was a bottle of citrus-y Clinique Happy, a scent I adore to this day.

All I know is that every time I wear it, good things seem to happen (it’s also what I was wearing when I met El Hub!), which is partly why I’m so enamored with these six new Happy versions.

Of course you can wear them separately, or combine two or more of them together to create a layered scent, which is what I’m doing today. I did two sprays of grapefruit-y Happy Splash (the orange bottle) and two sprays of vanilla-y Cocoa & Cashmere, and the combo is bright and cozy.

The bottles are $22 each and feel like you’re getting a good deal, but they’re also still small enough to fit in your purse.

2. Practice runs

This morning I had Connor go through her new preschool morning routine so we could get in some practice before her first official day on Thursday.

I’ve learned that she seems to feel better and enjoy herself more when she has some familiarity with new places and situations ahead of time (don’t we all?). This morning she put on some school clothes, filled up her backpack, walked down the block to her school, and talked about her plans for the day.

I wish I’d done this myself more often when I was younger and was starting a new job, or anything else really, to take away the jitters.

LOL! It only took me 40-something years to figure out. (Better late than never!)

3. Bandages for different skin tones

Even though I’m more of a Hello Kitty Band-Aid girl, I have to give MAY-JAH props to these Tru-Colour Bandages. I stopped in my tracks at Target today when I saw them. They come in shades for deeper skin tones!

I wish there were more than just two colors…but it’s still so refreshing to see options.

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So…what is the Monday Poll?

Good question! It isn’t, contrary to its name, an actual poll. It’s just a list of five more or less random questions I’ve been posting on this blog every Monday morning for the past gazillion years (more than 10!). I love reading your answers, and it helps me get my week off to a great start. ?

1. Sticky gloss, or non-sticky gloss?

Homie…I don’t know.

2. Your latest makeup obsession?

So, I’m still all about finding an alternative to under-eye concealer. Last week I tried a foundation, a BB cream and a color corrector, and man — it’s been an adventure! (I’ll post a post about it later this week.)

Basically, it’s been a hoot, but everything so far has mostly just confirmed that It Cosmetics CC+ Illumination Full Coverage Cream is the freakin’ SCHTUFF as far as under-eye concealer alternatives go (I wear it in Tan, by the way). Like, as a straight-up foundation, I think it’s nonsense, because it’s waaaaay too glittery to actually do pores any good, but IT’S SO GOOD at brightening the under-eye area and as a general pick-me-up.

3. Do you like going to parties?

Sure, but these days, I gotta be honest…it really depends on who’s going and where it’s at. I’m all in for casual get-togethers at a friend’s house when 1) I can take my shoes off at the door, and 2) I don’t have to be told where the bathroom is.

But if it’s a party with a bunch of strangers I have nothing in common with and will probably never hear from again, I’ll pass. I’d rather read a book on my couch or watch The Golden Girls.

4. Finish the following sentence: “Good eyeliner application is all about…”

Accepting that YOU WILL make mistakes, but also knowing how to fix them.

Oh, and having a steady hand.

And finding a formula that works for you, which is *totally* key. I’m pretty comfortable with most of formulas, but right now I’m all about pencil liners because they usually don’t irritate my eyes.

5. I’m seldom wrong about…

’80s song lyrics. If there were a game show devoted to quoting obscure songs from the ’80s, mama would clean up!

Adventures in gluten-free lasagna

Yup, that’s *THE* gluten-free lasagna experiment, and it actually turned out A-OK. I mean, lots of melted cheese never hurts anything, but the pasta itself was pretty good. I used Barilla gluten-free pasta and it tasted just like a regular lasagna! Oh, and why do I always forget that with lasagna a little bit goes a long way? I now have a ton of it (seriously enough to feed a small army of makeup lovers), so one of the things on my to-do list today is to freeze a few slices.

Onto Monday, friend. How are ya feeling?

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

P.S. Question time! Here are they are to copy/paste with your answers in a comment. Talk to you soon.

1. Sticky gloss, or non-sticky gloss?
2. Your latest makeup obsession?
3. Do you like going to parties?
4. Finish the following sentence: “Good eyeliner application is all about…”
5. I’m seldom wrong about…