{Ten} Can't Live Without Beauty Products

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We all have our favorite beauty products that we swear by...that we wouldn't know what to do without them. I have been using some of my favorite products for over 15 years, and some as recent as a few months. I thought it would be fun to share my favorite products that I use on a daily (or nearly) daily basis.

 10 Can't Live Without Beauty Products

one. Lip Ivo Original Lip Balm. Seriously the best chap stick ever. Lip Ivo was the first chap stick I've ever used (probably around age 10) and have been using it ever since. You'll never find me without one in my purse. It's a product must. 

 two. MoroccanOil Treatment. Amazing. While most serums work as a way to just make your hair just look shiny, soft, and healthy...MoroccanOil works to repair and nourish it as well. It's a little more pricy than your average serum, but it lasts a long time because you don't need to use much!

 three. L'Oréal Paris Extra-Volume Collagen Mascara. Fortunately, I have naturally long eyelashes, so my goal is to make them look as thick as I can. L'Oréal Paris Extra-Volume Collagen Mascara has become my go-to to help thicken my lashes up. It's also is great because it's cheap and can be found nearly anywhere!

4. Natural Eye Neutral Eye Shadow Collection in Natural Eye. This is my most recent beauty product that I've added to my collection. I've been a huge MAC eyeshadow fan for years, but decided to mix it up a bit. It's great because you get nine different shades in one compact, so you can mix and match colors a lot better! Definitely a favorite addition. 

5. Bare Escentuals Mineral Makeup. I've switched up my mineral makeup a couple of times throughout the past few years and decided to finally go back to Bare Escentuals. It's a nice natural looking makeup that isn't too high in price.

6. Neutrogena Oil-Free Acne Wash Redness Soothing Gentle Scrub. Face wash...ugh...what a challenge. I used to have nearly perfect skin my whole life until the middle of college. I guess it's common for women to go through different hormonal changes, causing your skin to change as well. I've tried almost everything, and the one thing that has seemed to help is this product. If I needed to, I would spend more money on face wash, but luckily this seems to do the trick!

7. Tea Tree Oil. A miracle oil. When I was struggling with figuring out what was best to use on my face, my mom brought Tea Tree Oil to my attention. I now use it everyday. Tea Tree Oil works as a natural astringent that helps rid your face of dirt and excessive oil. For your face, use a cotton ball and use about 1/4 of Tea Tree Oil and about 3/4 water. 

8.  Anastasia Beverly Hills Perfect Brow Pencil. I just recently started using a brow pencil to help fill in the sparse areas on my brows. Anastasia Perfect Brow is a great pencil if you are wanting to achieve a very natural look.

9. Eye drops. I think I started using eye drops everyday sometime in college. And now it's turned into an addiction. I hate having the feeling of dry eyes and hate it even more to have any redness in my eyes. I don't go anywhere without having my trusty eye drops.

10. Jane Iredale Facial Blotting Paper. The best. Ever since getting problematic skin, I also was lucky (insert sarcasm) to start getting oily skin. Oil blotters have now become my new best friend. I've been using different ones for a few years now, but am now addicted to Jane Iredale (thanks to one of my dear friend's for getting them for my birthday this year!) They work unbelievably well at ridding oil from my face.

And there we have it folks! What are your beauty products that YOU can't live without?

Favorite Spring 2012 Fashion Trends

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To say I'm obsessed with fashion is an understatement. I love everything about it.s Fashion is such a fascinating way to express myself creatively. Having a sense of style has nothing to do with how much money you have. It does have everything to do with having the right "eye" for putting together essentially art on your body. Fashion has always been the single one thing that I've never been insecure about. I enjoy taking risks and looking at things a little differently. That being said, I've been reading up a lot lately on the Spring 2012 fashion trends. I always love seeing new and fun ideas that I can take and make my own. So without further ado, here are my top five favorite trends of this upcoming season. 

Favorite Spring 2012 Fashion Trends

1. Tangerine

(from left to right: Vivienne Tam,  Christian Siriano, Jenny Packham)

2. Black on Yellow

(from left to right: Oscar de la Renta, Nicole Miller, Yigal Azrouël)

3. Crop Tops

(from left to right: Oscar de la Renta, Ohne Titel, Proenza Schouler)

4. Graphic Florals

(from left to right: Prabal Gurung, Lela Rose, Altuzarra)

5. Neon

(from left to right: Nanette Lepore, Jason Wu, Ruffian)

Humor Me Friday

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Portrayals of the Utopian Social Media Life

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Every day human beings wake up and live two separate lives; the one they portray it to be and the one that is the reality. It could be as little as you responding to a co-worker "I'm good" when asked how you are doing...but in actuality you are miserable because you just got into a huge fight with your significant other. Or perhaps it's something more severe, such as a financial crisis or a death of a loved one. I believe people do it, whether subconscious or not, to always seem that they are "happy". Sometimes it's really no one else's business, and let's be honest, we don't need to be "hanging out our dirty laundry to dry". Most of the time it's easier to fit into the mold of this cookie cutter life that "everyone else" seems to be living than to explain otherwise.

With the 21st century, brought new and exciting technology of being able to connect socially with friends, family, and co-workers through social media outlets (anyone heard of Facebook or Twitter?) that allowed you to share and communicate on a much more personal level than ever before. How great to be able to share photos, updates, and life events with a mass group of people without having to put much effort into it?

Social media has become the quick and effortless way to share parts of your life that would otherwise not be shared (or at least not within a tenth of a second.) This is the part I love about social media. I'm all about instant gratification...(I AM a Generation Y baby after all) and getting information as quickly and easily as I possibly can.

With the little to no effort social media created, it has allowed the passing of information to spread, with the simple "I'm fine" answer becoming exaggerated. Not only can you portray you are "fine", you can now share with hundreds or thousands of people that you are "GREAT!". Individuals are allowed to shape their social media life in ways that has never been done before. 

We're all guilty of it in some way or another...wanting to share all the best of our lives, and leaving out the worst. It's human nature to want to portray our life in the best light while leaving out the darkness. But with social media, it's not real life. No one's life has all the ups but no downs...no one's life is random updates with only good news to share. 

Social media has began to allow people to idolize this "perfect" utopian life that just isn't real. We all wish for the utopian life, where life is perfect, and perfect is real. But I believe in the beauty of flaws and imperfections, because it is real...and real is beautiful.

My Fifty List (Week Two)

Pin It In continuing {My Fifty List}, I have five more items that I added for this week...

What would be on YOUR fifty list? :)

Wisdom Wednesday

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“Everything in life is connected somehow. You may have to dig deep to find it but its there. Everything is the same even though its different. Somehow everything connects back with your life. The faces in certain places may be different, but the situation is the same. Irony is a hidden factor that creeps around us in life, letting its presence felt only after it has left. Picture back to a year ago and the situation you were in. Look at how things are different yet somehow everything it still in someway cognate. Everything connects together to form the balance of life, to maintain structure. Change is and always will be inevitable, but everything is relative, and all the moments and times in your life will come back around again, you just might find yourself on the other side of the coin. Things are always changing, as fast as everything stays the same.”~ Anonymous 

“That is the definition of faith -- acceptance of that which we imagine to be true, that which we cannot prove.” ~ Dan Brown

“I believe the world is as we choose to view it. Simple as that. Our happiness is, in the end, up to us, and to no one else.” ~ Susan Fletcher

 "That's the thing about a human life - there's no control group, no way to ever know how any of us would have turned out if any variables had been changed." ~ Elizabeth Gilbert [Eat, Pray, Love] 

 "If i find in myself desires which nothing in this world can satisfy, the only logical explanation is that I was made from another world." ~ C.S. Lewis

Picture This Tuesday

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I've recently began to enjoy cooking more and more. I think it's my way of beginning to nest and feel more like a family. I'm in no way an excellent cook though, so sometimes the idea I have in my head doesn't always turn out the best...or the tastiest. I'm a work in progress I guess...which is true for most things in life, right?
 

For this week's Picture This Tuesday post is a photo of last night's meal..chicken, asparagus, and hash browns. It was delicious, and what Andrew called "the best chicken yet!"