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Just For Fun

What Are Some Hair Colors You Think You Can Or Can’t Pull Off?

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Hair colors you can/can't pull off?

I really enjoy playing with my hair color — not that I consider myself very adventurous with it (well, maybe a little now that I’ve ventured into pink territory). Most of the time, I bounce back and forth around different shades of brown, black and caramel.

Those are colors I think I pull off fairly well.


Dark brownish black base with dark brown highlights, May 2010

I’ve enjoyed the pink streaks I started experimenting with earlier this year, but they take some time and effort to maintain (and, truth be told, I’d rather spend that time watching TV), so I’m leaning against doing them again…


Pink streaks, January 2012

Really bright colors give me pause, like blonde, purple, green or blue. I just can’t see myself pulling off those shades, but ya never know. Maybe someday. 🙂

How about you? What are some hair colors you think you can or can’t pull off?

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

Makeup and Beauty Blog Monday Poll, Vol. 210

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  • You might be wondering, “So what the heck is this Monday Poll thing anyway?”
    Well, it isn’t much of a poll. It’s more just a constantly evolving (devolving?), somewhat random list of questions I’ve been putting out to readers every Monday morning for the past four years. I’ve always enjoyed reading your answers in the comments, and I hope you enjoy reading mine.
  1. Mood:

    2. Just peachy.

  2. Milk, dark or white chocolate?

    3. How ’bout milk and dark, please? Milk when it comes to chocolate candies, and dark when it comes to brownies, cookies and cupcakes.

    Mmm… cupcakes.

  3. Peeta or Gale?

    4. Team Peeta all the way, ever since the first book.

  4. Have you ever rocked out to a Paula Abdul song?

    5. Three words: Forever Your Girl.

  5. Fingerless lace gloves: cute or tacky?

    6. If you’d asked me in 1988, I would have said, “cute!” I used to think they were awesome back when Madge wore ’em. Now? Not so much.

  6. The current state of your eyebrows?

    7. Long overdue for a trim and a session with my Tweezerman tweezers.

  7. Have you ever worn feather extensions in your hair?

    8. Nope, but Tabs has.

  8. Strapless dresses: yea or nay?

    9. Yea, but only if I’m wearing a gravity-defying bra.

  9. What’s the most surprising thing a stranger’s ever said to you?

    10. That I can remember? Well, it wasn’t directed at me, but maybe the time I overheard a flight attended describing me to a coworker as “the young girl sitting in the aisle seat.”

    I was 35 at the time (read: score!).

  10. Weekly goals:

    11. Just one: keep smiling. 🙂

Hey, hey, happy Monday!

Got a sec for the Monday Poll? I sure hope so.

  • To complete the Monday Poll, just copy the following list, and paste it with your answers in the comments.



1. Mood:
2. Milk, dark or white chocolate?
3. Peeta or Gale?
4. Have you ever rocked out to a Paula Abdul song?
5. Fingerless lace gloves: cute or tacky?
6. The current state of your eyebrows?
7. Have you ever worn feather extensions in your hair?
8. Strapless dresses: yea or nay?
9. What’s the most surprising thing a stranger’s ever said to you?
10. Weekly goals:

Enjoy your week! I’ll try to do the same.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

P.S. The Walking Dead last night — what did you think? Can I suggest a couple of alternate titles for the episode? How about, “I would have killed for more zombies,” or, “The moral dilemmas are killing me quicker than this zombie bite”? 🙂

Sundays with Tabs the Cat, Makeup and Beauty Blog Mascot, Vol. 181

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One of the things Tabs and I like to do together on Sundays is surf the Web for cat videos. I take care of the keyboarding (on account of my opposable thumbs), while he commanders the mouse.

I think we found a few good ones today. 🙂

Tabs likes this first one best because of its “organic nature and abstract transcendentalism.” His words.

Apocalypse Miau!

What a catnip trip, right? So weird! Did you notice that paw emerging from the lipstick tube at the 0:28 mark?

Tabs knows the cat that paw belongs to. He says she’s an up-and-coming kitty supermodel.

Aqua

Maybe it’s because I’m PMSing like crazy right now, but this animated story about a cat who wakes up in a world surrounded by water made me cry buckets. It explores themes like survival and overcoming one’s fears in such a poetic and touching way.

Okay…I’m gonna cry again.

What cats dream

I can see Tabs having dreams like this… If my dreams are weird, and they are, I can only imagine what his little kitty brain is doing when he’s asleep, and his little paws are REM twitching.

Sun-dappled tabby

I have a crush on this handsome tabby! Shh… Don’t tell Tabs. I snuck this simple, soothing video in the list when he wasn’t looking.
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The Weekly Roundup: Posts You Might Have Missed

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The Makeup and Beauty Blog Weekly Roundup

Rise and shine, morning glory! I’m off to a late start this morning… Wait — is it still morning?

I’ve just been plugging along, teasing a cat, drawing monsters, surfing the web and whatnot. Very exciting, I’m not.

What are you up to? See any good movies or go out to dinner this weekend? We wanted to catch a movie last night, but the timing didn’t work out (hate that), so we picked up some sushi from Whole Foods, brought it home and watched the 40th anniversary Godfather compilation on TV instead.

Someone — not sure if it was Coppola — re-edited the three movies together, sort of mixing and matching scenes from the different eras in the trilogy. There’s also some new director’s cut footage in it that I’d never seen before. No really significant changes to the story; mostly, the new scenes are all a few seconds long, but I think they did give the whole production a slightly different feel.

I fiercely adore the first two films and have probably seen ’em 20 times each, so I thought it was pretty cool.

Give a shout out if you’re a fellow Godfather fan. 🙂

Me? I’m Enzo… The Baker.

A few beauty posts that caught my eye…

It’s been a pretty uneventful weekend so far. Right now I’m just —

WHOA! What was that!? Did you see that thing?

It kinda looked like a toad…

And now my primer — all of a sudden the primer I was applying became all fluid-like and dripped right off my face!

Weird…

MAKEUP MONSTER: PRIMER PEST

A Makeup and Beauty Blog Makeup MonsterDESCRIPTION: Primer Pests are an invasive species of toad rapidly spreading around the globe. Believed to be a mutation created in an underground cosmetics lab, they are attracted to makeup primer. Can’t resist it, actually.
FREQUENCY: Uncommon but spreading
SPEED: Fast
ARMOR CLASS: 7 (small and quick)
SPECIAL ATTACKS: Primer Pests inhabit bogs and marshes near urban areas and suburban strip malls — anywhere with makeup counters. One swat from their toady tongue turns makeup primer into a soppy sludge.

SPECIAL DEFENSES: None
INTELLIGENCE: Low
ALIGNMENT: Neutral
SIZE: Tiny (6″ tall)

The Makeup and Beauty Blog Makeup Monsters

Makeup and Beauty Blog Weekly Roundup

The Estée Lauder Mad Men Collection Estée Lauder Mad Men Collection and a Letter to Don Draper

Chanel Las Vegas de Chanel Collection The Four-Piece Las Vegas de Chanel Collection

Estee Lauder Bronze Goddess Capri Collection An Estée Lauder Bronze Goddess Has Been Spotted in Capri

Loreal Nail Color Riche These New L’Oreal Spring Nail Colors Make It Hip to Be Riche

Make Up For Ever Pantone Fashion Color Report Make Up For Ever Pantone Fashion Color Report

MAC Too Supreme Collection MAC Too Supreme Pics and Swatches

MAC Chenman Force of Love Face of the Day Hot Pink Lips and a MAC Chenman Face of the Day

Estée Lauder Five Color Gelée Powder EyeShadow Palette in Bronze Sands Estée Lauder Five Color Gelée Powder EyeShadow Palette in Bronze Sands

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

Two Ways to Win a $50 eGift Card from Sephora!

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  • WINNER: The giveaway is closed now, and the winner is Melissa! Congratulations, Melissa! If you entered but didn’t win this time around, keep trying, and click here to enter any ongoing giveaways before you jet. 🙂

A Makeup and Beauty Blog giveaway

I don’t mind running for cupcakes.

They’re like my carrots. If you put a cupcake at the end of a stick in front of me, I’ll run after it. Every time.

So if you think about it, someone should invent something like that for treadmills, ya know? A stick that goes into the console and dangles a cupcake out in front.

I’d be hella runnin’ after that cupcake, yo.

Right now there are two of them — cupcakes — the little mini ones, one lemon and one strawberry, on the coffee table here in front of me, and they’re taunting me… I can hear their little voices in my head: “Oh, my gosh! We’re just so sweet and yummy. I hope someone eats us soon, tee-hee!”

Rise and shine, morning glory! It’s going to be a beautiful day. 🙂

I hope your weekend got off to a great start. I’m about to head to yoga class now, and then after that maybe to a cafe to order a frothy drink and just sit with my notebook for an hour.

Tabs is in charge of this morning’s giveaway until I get back. See you soon.

Win a $50 gift card from Sephora

  • One (1) Sephora eGift card containing $50 sent to the winner by email (international readers, you may opt to receive $50 sent by PayPal instead).

  • There are two ways to enter, and you can do both of them for two chances to win. First, you can enter by leaving a comment at the bottom of this post, a comment about anything at all, like, who makes your favorite cupcake? Have you ever baked cupcakes? Do you enjoy baking? What do you think of beauty products that smell like food? What’s on your makeup lemming list right now? — you get the idea.
  • Second, you can enter by following me on twitter Twitter @karenmbb and retweeting (RT) the following message:
    • Follow @karenmbb and RT to Win a $50 eGift Card from Sephora! http://bit.ly/wd83fh

  • The deadline to enter is Sunday, March 4, 2012 at 11:59PM (PT).
  • Entrants must enter using a valid email address and/or Twitter account to win.
  • A maximum of two (2) entries per person — one within the comments at the bottom of this post, and a second entry via Twitter addressed to me @karenmbb.
  • Contest is open to individuals of any country who have reached the age of majority according to their local laws (18 in the United States with these exceptions: Alabama and Nebraska, 19; Mississippi, 21).
  • Sephora eGift Certificates can only be redeemed online and are not valid in stores or available for purchase or redemption in Canada. International winners may opt to substitute the Sephora eGift card prize for $50 sent directly to their email address by PayPal instead.
  • Tabs and I (heretofore referred to as “T-Money and K-Dawg”) will select one (1) winner at random from the entries either left in the comments at the bottom of this blog post or addressed to @karenmbb on Twitter.
  • The winner will be announced here within 48 hours of the deadline.
  • Void where prohibited by law.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

  • WINNER: The giveaway is closed now, and the winner is Melissa! Congratulations, Melissa! If you entered but didn’t win this time around, keep trying, and click here to enter any ongoing giveaways before you jet. 🙂

Do You Wear Makeup to the Gym or to Exercise Classes?

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To the home gym, otherwise known as my tabby cat’s break room, I don’t, but to places with people and/or mirrors, I do. I’ll usually fill in my brows, pat a little concealer beneath my eyes, and curl my lashes.

And when I’m feeling extra ambitious, I’ll treat my lashes to a few coats of waterproof mascara and slick a gloss on my lips. 🙂

How about you? What’s your take on gym makeup? Do you or don’t you?

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

P.S.

What’s Your Most Treasured Makeup Possession?

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Your most treasured makeup possession

Yargh! I don’t think I can narrow it down to just one… It’s probably a tossup between my lucky bottle of Chanel Jade Nail Polish and the pieces I’ve held on to from the Barbie Loves MAC release back in 2007, the subjects of my very first post on Makeup and Beauty Blog.

OH! And then there’s that first tube of MAC Evolution Revolution Lipglass, since it represents one of the happiest moments of my life. 🙂


[Continue reading…]

Makeup and Beauty Blog Monday Poll, Vol. 209

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A new pair of running shoes! I wonder how far we’ll go together…

  • You might be wondering, “So what the heck is this Monday Poll thing anyway?”
    Well, it isn’t much of a poll. It’s more just a constantly evolving (devolving?), somewhat random list of questions I’ve been putting out to readers every Monday morning for the past four years. I’ve always enjoyed reading your answers in the comments, and I hope you enjoy reading mine.
  1. Mood:

    2. I’m all smiles today. 🙂 I feel like last weekend did wonders for me. I was able to catch up on some sleep and watch a few hours of brainless TV, which always improves my point of view.

  2. It’s Girl Scout Cookie season! Do you have a favorite kind?

    3. I could eat an entire box of those Lemon Coolers, which I guess are called Savannah Smiles now, in a single sitting. Yesterday I purchased two boxes from the scouts on my street and can’t wait to devour them after dinner tonight!

  3. One thing you absolutely must finish today?

    4. I put off cleaning my office all weekend long, again, which is unfortunate, because now it looks like it was hit by a tornado.

  4. What’s one lesson you wish you’d learned earlier in life?

    5. That waiting for the “perfect time” to do something could lead to a lifetime of waiting.

  5. If you were given the choice to see five years into your future, would you take it?

    6. That’s a tough one… Maybe if I knew I had the power to change whatever future I saw; otherwise, probably not. Where’s the fun in the journey if you know how things will turn out?

  6. Is there anything you wish you spent less time doing?

    7. Worrying, for one. And I could definitely spend less time, as my mom would say, “dilly-dallying in the morning.” To put it mildly, morning is not my most productive time of day.

  7. What’s one of your makeup mottos?

    8. Yes, you most certainly do need another tube of pink lip gloss.

  8. List three makeup brushes you couldn’t/wouldn’t want to live without:

    9. 1) The MAC 266 Small Angle Brush for filling in my brows, 2) the Trish McEvoy 62 Fan Brush for applying foundation and 3) the MAC 224 Tapered Brush for applying under-eye concealer.

  9. Someday I’m going to…

    10. …visit Cannes, stop getting in my own way, cook a pecan pie from scratch, get a dining room table, and lose that last five pounds.

  10. Weekly goals:

    11. To break in my new running shoes, to get my email Inbox under control (it’s pushing 6GB!), to make plans to have lunch/dinner with friends next month, and to try enjoy each and every day.

Good morning and happy Monday to ya. 🙂 How goes it this morning? So far, so good on this end of the keyboard. I just finished my first run with a new pair of running shoes, so that’s been the highlight of my Monday morning so far.

I had to retire my old pair… Poor things had worn through the soles.

Do you have a favorite kind of running shoe? I’m a Sauncony girl, myself, and have been since 1996, but when I first started wearing ’em, man! — they weren’t nearly as cute as they are today, LOL!

If you have a minute this morning, please stop by, and let me know how you’re doing in today’s Monday Poll.

  • To complete the Monday Poll, just copy the following list, and paste it with your answers in the comments.



1. Mood:
2. It’s Girl Scout Cookie season! Do you have a favorite?
3. One thing you absolutely must finish today?
4. What’s one lesson you wish you’d learned earlier in life?
5. Would you want to see five years into your future?
6. Is there anything you wish you spent less time doing?
7. What’s one of your makeup mottos?
8. Three makeup brushes you couldn’t live without:
9. Someday I’m going to…
10. Weekly goals:

Have a lovely Monday, my friend.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

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