Fall Makeup Looks

Here are a couple of looks I've done on my channel for fall. I hope you like them!

Treat Yo' Self

I recently purchased our H'Suan Wen Hua hair mask from work, mainly because I was curious and I've never done a hair mask before. Plus, I love smelling this stuff at work and I wanted my hair to smell like it.

Oh boy was I happy that I did, because not only did my hair smell like chai for two days (there is cinnamon in this mask) but it made my hair feel so soft after I washed my hair. I kept it in my hair for about an hour while I went about some business on a day that I didn't have to work early. I cherish those days.

While I did the mask, I treated myself to a face mask too, because why not? I was reaching the end of the life of my Catastrophe Cosmetic face mask and my skin was having a bit of an itchy breakout so this cooled and calmed my skin down wonderfully while my hair ate up the eggs and bananas from the H'Suan Wen Hua.

Check out my full review of Catastrophe Cosmetic, as well as the rest of the fresh face masks (as I've done all of them now).

What's your pampering routine? Have you ever done a hair mask before? I'm a recent convert, so what are some of your favorites?

FALL INSPIRATION: Embossed Sweatshirts

While I was looking on River Island the other day for those green tube pants for my Halloween costume, I stumbled upon this embossed sweatshirt, and I fell in love with it. I'd seen a couple of bloggers rocking the structured embossed sweatshirts last spring, and I wasn't sure how I felt about it, but this one spoke to me. Also it's black and I'm constantly gravitating to things that I can wear for work so that's also a plus.

I've been in love with Chelsea Boots lately, and while these ones are technically men's (although I don't know any man that would wear leopard print shoes) they're on sale and they're fabulous. 

I thought I'd make a little polyvore-esque style inspiration from the sweatshirt, just to have fun with it and see how I might style it when I'm not at work. It would also be great in the spring and summer with denim shorts or a circle skirt - endless possibilities really.

Sweatshirt: River Island // Pants: River Island // Boots: ASOS // Necklace: ASOS // Beanie: COAL

Let me know if you like these kinds of posts! If you do, I'll do more in the future. 

Halloween Costume Hunting

 Halloween is in just over a month, and I've got at least two parties that I'm planning to go to next month for the holiday (my favorite holiday, by the way) so the search for a perfect Halloween costume is in full force.

For me, costumes are a bit more difficult because I like being characters, but there are only so many characters that wear glasses. One year I decided to go as Daria, but the people I was hanging out with didn't know who Daria was, so that was a failure. La Roux was a pretty successful costume, though I only did it because I had a pixie cut at the time and it was easy to style. Last year my hair was just the right length for a Velma costume, but it wasn't that much fun. My boyfriend at the time didn't like Halloween so he didn't want to dress up as Shaggy to my Velma. 

Yesterday I struck gold. 

Have you seen this meme?

 

This is the hipster Disney Princess. 

You see where I'm going with this?

You can add glasses to any Disney Princess costume and make it a "hipster Disney Princess." However, I want to go all out and do my wardrobe as cliche dance party hipster as I can get. 

The first thing I found was the American Apparel Disco Pant. The only problems is that the green is more of a peacock teal color, and they're $85. I just can't justify spending $85 on a pair of shiny green pants. However, I did find a dupe for those pants from River Island (which are on sale!) and they're the exact color that I need.

 

 The next piece of the puzzle is a top. I have a v-neck t-shirt right now that is the right color, which would work, but I was also thinking of either of these tops.

Crop tops? How much more hipster could you get?

I'll obviously need a wig and a flounder plushie (which is easy to find because we have a Disney Store at the mall where I work). 

EDIT: I was notified by a follower on Tumblr that this shirt exists, which would almost be more perfect for the costume.

My mom has some starfish that I can fuss with to make a hair clip, and the best part is that I have a bracelet made out of a fork. Ariel brushed her hair with a fork! It's meant to be.

This was the photo that inspired me to do this, and this girl did her Hipster Little Mermaid cosplay perfectly. I just figure I'd want to wear pants instead of shorts cause it's gonna get cold. 

What are you thinking of being for Halloween? Do you wear glasses? Are you in the same boat as me in finding a costume? I thought about maybe being Where's Wanda, but again, that one wouldn't be as fun without a Waldo to match. Though a hipster Prince Eric would be kind of hilarious.

I can't get enough of these memes.

Popbasic Lost Collection

Recently I was approached via email from the co-founder of Popbasic.com Madeline Veenstra, and when she offered to send me one of her new Lost Collections, I thought "why the heck not?"

If you've never heard of Popbasic, it's a really cool web store that releases small "collections" every month or so, that all have some sort of theme. You can either buy the whole collection for a discounted price, or get individual pieces if you just like one item from the collection. Each collection is limited edition, and once they're gone, they're gone. I particularly liked the Lost Collection because of the versatility of the pieces. And they're pretty high quality as well, so you're getting your money's worth.

Funtimes in Babylon

 

I am back with another outfit. 

So soon, Abby? Yes my friend!

Lush Haircare Routine

My attitude about my hair used to be "low-maintenance to no-maintenance," but once I started trying to get the red out of my hair with multiple attempts with bleaching it, my hair hated me. I could hear it yelling at me when I blow dried it - "bitch you already fried me now you have to reheat me as well?"

We Felt The Fall

 

I am so excited for this weather, can you tell by my expression? I can't seem to get the "fierce face" down without ending up with "bitch face." I need to watch more ANTM. Teach me Tyra!

Words on Words

I've been writing my whole life, since I can remember. When I was 7, my best friend got Harriet the Spy for her birthday and from then on we carried around notebooks and wrote everything down. The last time I ran into her, which was a couple of years ago, she asks me, "You're still writing?"

"Well yeah."

It's in my blood. My mother tried to write a book when she was my age, and she's always loved writing, so I think that's where it comes from.

 Lately I haven't written as much, maybe because my creativity has taken different forms, through video, photography, what have you. But I miss the written word. I haven't read a new book since Mockingjay. Really. That was the last book I read. That's horrific. My bookworm friends would be stoning me right now if they knew that I haven't read a new book in over a year. That could be why I haven't written anything either. 

It took me buying a completely new notebook to want to sit down and write something. A completely fresh, empty, new notebook waiting to be filled. 

Last weekend I attended a show with my friend Raven. A friend of mine, Gabe Much was playing a album release/going away party at Q Cafe, and I didn't want to miss the last chance to see him before he went to Europe for 6 months for his studies. At the show, we not only saw a few amazing songwriters, but also a couple spoken word poets that blew me away. I sat there in awe of these kids' talent, and as I drove home I found myself wanting so badly to write something down. 

I want to write. Whether it be a script for a video, a short story, a poem, or just incoherent thoughts, I want to write them down. I've lived so much of my life online in the last couple of years, that there isn't a lot of what I've written down that is only mine. That could be my downfall. I haven't written anything that gets to permeate within my own self before being released to the world. All the thoughts I have just gets released instantly to Tumblr, or Twitter, or to this here blog.

I've made myself a new promise - I'm going to take the rest of this year to write for myself. It doesn't mean that I'm going to stop writing here, but I don't need to post everything. Everything I write isn't good enough to release to the world, and I need to take the time to craft something beautiful, and not just spit it right out. Songwriters don't perform songs as they write them. They take the time to polish them and make them beautiful. Having so many songwriters for friends makes me feel inadequate very often, and I want to make something that I'm happy with. I don't want to just be proud of myself, but I want my friends to be proud of me, too.

So that's what I'm going to do. This pretty little notebook will soon be filled with poems, thoughts, journalings, doodles, whatever the hell I want to put it in, because I can do what I want. It will be for my eyes. And my eyes only. And that's okay.

UK Goodies from Estée!

A few weeks ago in a video I mentioned that I was totally out of my Collection (2000) Lasting Perfection Concealer, a year and a half after getting in a swap with my good friend Leena from TheGirlSawtheComet. I loved this stuff. For just over £4 (that's just over $7 American), it's the best concealer I've ever used.

So when I mentioned that I needed some more of this miracle dark-circle eraser, my friend Estée of Essiebutton offered to get me some from Boots and send it over the ocean. Naturally, I accepted her offer.

REVIEW: Bésame Cosmetics Crimson Rouge

Is that not the prettiest packaging you've ever seen? Anything vintage-inspired - gimme somma' that.

I introduce you to Bésame Cosmetics, a beautiful 20s-esque beauty brand that's taking old school cosmetics and bringing them into the 21st century. I heard about this product in particular about a year ago from Cami Loves Kiwi, I believe. Ever since then, I've wanted to get my hands on it.

REVIEW: Portland Black Lipstick Company

 

I love me some unusual lip colors. I've own too many burgundy lipsticks to count, a lavender lipstick, and a straight up yellow-based orange one. When I heard about this company in Portland called the Portland Black Lipstick Company, my interest was instantly peaked.

So when I went to Portland last weekend for Musicfest Northwest (photos can be seen here), I wanted to try this stuff out in a store. Lo and behold, this place called Blush Beauty Bar carried the brand! Can you say great luck?

When I went to the shop, it had brands from Smashbox and Nars to this tiny independent company making crazy lipstick colors like mint green, indigo, and black. Sadly, all three of those colors weren't in stock, but I did pick up a couple that were unique, but also totally wearable for fall.

Wishful Thinking: September

Here I have this month's edition of "Wishful Thinking!" I went to Portland last weekend, and did a little bit of shopping, but it didn't fully satisfy my thirst for some retail therapy.

Out and About: Pine State Biscuits

Can we talk about how sexual the Tillamook cheddar looks on this biscuit for a second?

Okay? Are we good?

Good. 

Life Lately: Weddings and Birthdays and Music, oh my!

 

My apologies for being virtually missing in action for almost a week, and I really don't have a reason why because I only worked one day last weekend and didn't go to Bumbershoot. I have no excuse. I suck. 

But to make up for it, here are some cute photos of toddlers.