Personal Style: A Family Easter Weekend

 (wearing my mom's vintage dress and some thrifted, red vintage shoes, necklace f 21. love them)

Our Easter weekend was busy and wonderful. Our church (edited to add: I discovered is a lie) had a temple outing and then headed off together for a little bbq and Easter egg hunt, followed by a slide show of everyone. A very lovely, very pleasant, somewhat stressful, very exhausting day. Our Sunday was full of reflections on Christ, chocolate, salsa and naps. I hope everyone's Easter was wonderful!

 

*Linked to: Clothed Much's Rule Breaking Monday

Homefront: Easter Mantel

 It feels like it's been a very long since since a mantel post, but really, it was only since the Valentine's mantel... I've probably changed it already about 4 times since then. But for some reason I only did the Easter mantel today... crazy late for me. I haven't posted a single Easter idea post this year. Here's last years Easter mantel, for reference sake. And though, personally, I'm less of a bright bunny rabbit, chicky Easter type gal, and more of a neutral and lovely, Lettered Cottage Spring decor girl, but I do it for the kids. They just love the holiday mantel changes, and it is growing on me as well.

I got this little big guy for $7.. he's adorable!

I think I've been so excited about seeing the Gregory Brothers/Auto Tune the News/ Schmoyoho for my birthday tonight that I haven't been thinking clearly. It's funny, the last concert I went to was on my 21st bday.

For Easter this year, we are doing a long church activity, complete with a little church field trip to our local temple and do some temple work as well. I really think it's going to be a wonderful experience and will help balance the spiritual side of Easter with the chocolate bunnies, colored eggs and jellybeans side.

 my favorite vintage bunny

 "He is not here, for He has risen, as He said." Matthew 28:6

“In our hour of deepest sorrow, we can receive profound peace from the words of the angel that first Easter morning: ‘He is not here: for he is risen.’”

“As one of His special witnesses on earth today, this glorious Easter Sunday, I declare that this is true, in His sacred name—even the name of Jesus Christ, our Savior—amen.”
—President Thomas S. Monson

Read, watch, or listen to President Monson’s April 2010 conference address “He Is Risen!”
You can also view the list of scriptures referenced in this video.

Personal Style: Clown to Beachy Waves in a Single Day

I changed about 100 times on Saturday. I had on a 'professional' outfit for a facepainting gig in the morning. Came home, changed to go to my son's soccer game. Came home, went through a billion steps to get into clown for another little party doing face painting and balloons. Came home. Got ready to go out to the movies with friends and the family. Came home. Put on my comfy work out clothes. Passed out after listening to The Gregory Brothers for like hours. (And I'm seeing them on my birthday this week... weee!)

I'm looking a little tired.

 
My hair was majorly kinky from pinning my hair up to wear under my wig. So, I decided to basically tease the junk out of it and loosely pin a small section back on one side. I suppose I could have put it in a bun or ponytail, but it feels like that's all I've been doing lately. So, for me, these beachy type waves worked in my schedule.

 

(No matter how hard I scrubbed, I couldn't get all the redness off from around my mouth. And even though cooking oil is suggested for cleaning off pro clown make-up... I just can't bring myself to do it. So, I just embraced the hot pinkness. I'm looking a bit like a crazy person here.)

Yes, this is the back of my head... I'm including it to illustrate those semi- loose knotted twists can turn into somewhat pretty kinky waves after a few hours of setting in dry hair... especially if you have embraced the asymmetrical mismatched layers like I have.

To do them, just twist your hair into sections, being careful to maintain your natural part, like I did in the photos. Twist and twist until they form little twisty balls and pin them against your head, criss crossing bobby pins help them hold. I don't even have them that tight. I had them in for about 4--5 hours, and got fairly loose kinky waves. If you do them very tight and leave them in all day, you will get a more crazy and pronounced wave.

For more classic curls, be sure you tuck the ends in and you do a snail shell like and uniform pattern while twisting. Mine are more haphazardly done, some are much smaller and tighter, while others are larger and looser than others. This helps create more movement and texture in the end wave. Now, I could go on and on about doing wet styling or classic old Hollywood glamour finger waves, or pin curls but that's a little advanced for this messy look I'm doing. You can see plenty of video tutorials online however.

Sometimes, they are cute worn alone too. If you decide to try these twists, I'd love to see how they turn out!

Personal Style: Modern Modest Pin Up

I love pin up style, so to keep it modern, modest and casual, I did it with boyfriend jeans and a skinny belt. And of course, black liquid liner, red lips and a multi leveled updo.

Vintage beaded collars like this are so glamorous. You can find them easily on etsy, ebay and antique malls for a huge price range. Mine was fairly cheap, like under $10. You can find similar styles in fur as well, they often close with a rhinestone brooch. Love 'em.

For the hair, I just made a fairly lose bun. Then, I pulled the top crown area up and out and used one bobby pin to twist a poof into place.

cardi: Target
beaded collar: vintage etsy
belt: vintage calvin klein thrifted
jeans: gap, thrifted
bracelet: wrapped vintage necklace
lipstick: Rimmel moisture renew in Red Alert 900
shoes: forgot
earrings: handmade by me, Jeweled Ambrosia

*linked to clothed much's rule breaking monday (necklace as a bracelet)
* rate this look on smashion
 

Inspired Rooms: Rachel Whiting

"Rachel Whiting is a London based freelance photographer who loves modern interior design and clean lines.Like an interior photography must be sensitive to all the elements that will appear in the final print.All the objects from a room look good, but in a print, these objects may cluster the image."-homedit

Whilst not all her interiors are so bright and colorful, they are similar in that  "her photographic work is constructed with an inherent aesthetic of simplicity, shape, color and form evident throughout all of
her images.  "

The rooms she shoots have a certain ethereal function from them. From the airy white draped windows and the bright light cascading onto the white plank floors, the full length canvases of pink leaned against unfussy walls, the classically simple, yet questionably uncluttered rooms are so quiet and yet so full of an almost bohemian character. I do believe I could get used to living in a room with such qualities.

 

Homefront: Sweet n Spicy

Cilantro, from our garden. I have gotten tired of pruning that crazy fast growing herb, and am letting it flower into a huge, lovely smelling bush. It will then reseed itself and I'll have more crazy bushes one day. My boys love bringing me freshly picked flowers (here and here), and handfuls of thyme pulled by eager little hands aren't going to hurt anything. The cilantro flowers keep the boys away form my snapdragons, so it's a win-win. Especially when being their sweet n spicy smelling blooms are placed into some of my coveted little old glass bottles. What simple thing have you cherished lately?

 

 

Personal Style: Prairie Cardi Girl

* cardi, khols/ dress, thrifted/ undershirt, thrifted/ boots, candies/belt ck thrifted/ necklace, vintage gift *

Just branching out here style wise today, I'm not sure exactly what rule I haven't broken. The oatmeal fall cardigan with a summery white dress feels like a huge no-no. The big boots with the whispy fabric feels like a no-no.The ruffled white maxi dress straps being exposed was a no-no. I had them tucked under the cardi and pulled them out b/c I thought it looked kind of cute.

4 layers being belted... huge no-no. 2 undershirts, dress, and cardigan... belted. Maybe I won't try this again, made my waist look a little thicker than I would have liked. I was planning on wearing my denim jacket, but it was too muggy of a morning for this. When I found this dress at a garage sale, it was automatically in my mind I would only wear it with the denim jacket. Still debating this. Can't wear it alone b/c the busticles area is huge... hence why it looks like a frilly v-neck under the cardi ;)

 
As for my Rule of Three, in which you use 3 add-ons to make a boring outfit pop, I suppose it would be:

1. vintage necklace (thanks mom, I love wearing this!)
2. twisted belt
3. faux fabric blue roses brooch (already attached on cardigan, but I want to make several more)

 

Linked to:  Elaine's Rule Breaking Monday clothing linky
and :          The Daybook, Awkward and Awesome (#587!)