Five on Friday

Today I am going to link up with Five on Friday. I thought a link up may encourage me to blog more regularly. And Mama M from Five Crooked Halos retired five question friday while I was on my blogging hiatus! Oh my goodness. I thought I would die when I saw that. But fortunately Elise, my blogging BFF, has been linking up with this one. So here it goes :) 

1. This post has made me so happy. It's 40 thoughts for a guy turning 40. But these thoughts.. they are for everyone. Well, naturally, some of them don't apply to me but I could certainly take something from all of them. It is an amazing post. I love the Ragamuffin Soul blog, by the way. You should follow Carlos Whittaker. He has some great thoughts. 


2. I'm obsessed with my new decor! I FINALLY put something on my walls, only after being here for eight months and I couldn't be happier. I will have a post about these, too, so I'm sorry in advance for that. But, woohoo!! And yes.. that is a frame around my thermostat! There's glitter cardstock behind it too. My friend Jessica did this a while ago and I've been thinking about doing it forever. So here it is! Also, the 'W' wall is NOT complete, at the biggest W is not painted. I haven't decided what I want it to look like just yet.

3. My sister in law is coming to visit next Tuesday and I'm pretty excited! We won't be doing a lot of running around but she needs the peace and quiet so I'm pretty glad to have her. She is SO sweet and I can't wait for girl time :)  


4. Gracie and I had an adventure on Thursday. To make a long story short, our property management company is ridiculous and didn't fix a bunch of stuff we mentioned on our move in checklist. One of these items was open vents on the back of our house. Well, squirrels moved in (big DUH) about 2 days ago and I have been Chevy Chase-ing them a la Funny Farm ever since. Well, one was hanging out on the screen door by where Gracie loves to law and look out the window. I let her outside twice, once to chase it down from the door and a second time to get him and his friend off our back porch. She enjoyed but... I enjoyed it a lot less. I mean.. we have squirrels living in our roof. Ugh. 

5. My husband rocks. This week, he had to buy himself some new headphones at a bazaar they have every week. He's been talking about them for a while, so I'm glad he got them. But he's just so cute... He was telling me all about them in the way that husbands do, and he mentioned that there were some pink ones that he wanted me to have. It just cracked me up. I am so blessed, having a guy who thinks about me even when he's shopping for man toys. So precious. Check out this hottie. Gah! 

Have a happy weekend my friends!

I Will Wait.

This song is beautiful. 

Listen, and carry on.

Girly Things

I am pretty sure it's clear how much I love nail polish. I've been obsessed with nude nails for at least the past two or three months.

But before I get onto the polish overload, I want to prove that more than just my nails get attention. I love lipstick! I was never a lipstick person, mostly gloss, until I found the Urban Decay Revolution Lipstick. My mom is famous for her red lipstick and as much as I love it on her, I never thought I could pull it off myself. I needed a matte but creamy lipstick with staying power if I was ever going to try it. Enter UD Anarchy in my August Ipsy bag. If you're unfamiliar, Ipsy provides deluxe samples each month for a $10 subscription. It is hit or miss mostly, but for a hit like this lipstick I am willing to endure the blah months. Anyways, I put this one while Face Timing with my McDreamy and his jaw dropped when I put it on. I was repelled by the bright Barbie-style pink but I ended up really liking it, and LOVING the formula. It is creamy. It is matte. It is hydrating (as much as a lipstick can be--when I take it off, I don't feel like I'm scrubbing rubber). And the pigment is fantastic. Unbeatable. So, Anarchy. The Sarge likes it. That's a win.

But, who can stop there?? I went on to buy a full size Anarchy and hoped to find a good red, not too orange but not too dark/blue. And then there was F Bomb. And Shame, a dark berry-brown that is really perfect for FALL! Sorry the pictures aren't better... But you get the point. I think I've bought all the lipstick I need for the next year.

The jewel of this post, though, is Butter London's The 444. The neutral color I have on is Yummy Mummy, which is a shimmery taupe color that works well on my skin tone. I'm inclined to think that it would look good on any skin tone, warm or cool. But the shimmer is The 444... I wish I could capture the shine in my cheap cell phone/iPad pictures. It's such a brilliant silvery almost champagne shimmer. I really love it, and can't wait to do my whole manicure in it for New Year's or something equally festive. In the photo below I have two coats and I would call that full coverage (we know how hard that is for a shimmer). It's like a disco ball for your fingers!

 

 

 

Here are a few different angles/lighting: 

 

And here it is in the sunshine. Well, natural light... it was overcast. And this is just one coat. 

I was able to remove it in one swipe using the nail polish removal trick found at gingerbreadmanne. Thank you Pinterest! The piece of the cotton ball in the picture was ONE swipe and my nail was clean. If you hate removing nail polish, try it this way. Seriously.

 Anyways, compare it to BL's Fairy Cake -- the lighting is a little different but you get the idea. The glitter is a bit bigger and much more brilliant than the silvery fine shimmer of Fairy Cake.

 

What do you think? Do you like glitter in your nail polish or do you avoid it all together? Would you rock The 444 as a full manicure? I personally love it, even though I was sure I left glitter nail polish in 1998 with the Backstreet Boys and Tamagotchis. I guess it's true... some girls are just born with glitter in their veins :)

Take a few minutes and give yourself some love -- pamper your hard working hands! Who cares if it will all chip off tomorrow at work. You deserve it!