My Cosmetology School Experience

As some of you know, and many of you do not know, I am coming to the end of my time as a cosmetology school student. I am graduating this coming Tuesday, August 3rd, and I have to say the thought is so, so sweet, I cannot wait to be done. My beauty school experience has been surprisingly influential and dare-I-say-it, life-changing. Those of you who know me personally would probably never have guessed in a million years I would end up in beauty school and not some university. I surprised even myself when I made the life-altering decision to go to beauty school.

It was funny seeing everyone's reaction when I told them I was dropping out of college, with my 4.0, and heading off to Marinello's. The majority of my family reacted the same; hesitating smiles that looked more like sneers and the same phrase, "but you're going to stay in school right?" It was slightly discouraging, seeing their less-than-pleased reactions. I mean, I was scared too! This was a complete one-eighty from my life-long plan to head off to some university and major in English Literature. Until this point I had always relied on my education, my photographic memory, and my GPA to get me through life. Deciding to veer away from the practicality of college and jump into the unknown, perhaps idealistic world, of creativity and art in the form of makeup and hair was quite the leap. But I am so proud of myself for making that venture!


What fun is practicality anyway? College degrees lead you to desk jobs at newspaper and magazine companies. That could be fun I guess, but my love for literature was the creation of it. I wanted to create stories; beautiful stories about dynamic individuals with dreams and ambitions and backgrounds. I realized the inspiration needed for my stories didn't lie on a desk, it resided in the people around me. I took up cosmetology because doing makeup and hair is something I love. It's fun for me. It's like playtime. And while I enhance the natural beauty of a client in my chair I am also encouraging the internal beauty within that unique person by giving them confidence in the way they look. And you can't imagine the stories you hear from those people in that chair. You hear the scandal, of course, but also the drive, the history, the fears, and the longings of these people. Everything that makes us the beautiful characters we are in this one huge story we all interact in.

As soon as I began school a year ago I knew I was in a place with more inspiration than I would ever need. Let me tell you something, the "beauty school" stereotype is kinda true; you meet some very interesting people in beauty school. I am not going to lie, I judged a lot of these girls when I walked through the doors of my school. I thought here I am, oh so smart, miss 4.0, and I am surrounded with all these girls who are, let's just say, much, much more wild then I have ever been.I was thrown into a place full of people I had never really been around and where I was immediately labeled the "good virgin girl." Just to brief you, we had: girls from jail, girls who loved sex more than any man (and talked openly about it), girls with babies, girls without a high school diploma (**gasp**); but you know what I learned? These girls who I used to think were scandalous and taboo turned out to be the most interesting, smart, and driven girls I have ever met. These girls have taught me more about life than anyone in my AP classes ever did.

Never did I go into beauty school either and think I would leave with a best friend who is pretty much the polar opposite of me. I like to think of us as ying and yang, black and white, good and evil. She was everything I was never looking for in a friend and yet I ended up finding everything I was ever looking for in a friend. Does that make sense? Her honesty is something I just can't get over. Its kind of like sour candy, you don't really know why you like it because it's kind of shocking and it hurts a little, but after a while you realize how good it is. If you judge this girl too quickly you will truly miss out on meeting one of the most loyal and caring girls you could ever find. And that, I think is the most worthy thing I have ever learned.

Not only did I learn the art of hairstyling and the reward it brings when you make somebody feel good about themselves, but I learned what it means to have a story. We each have our own individual, unique, beautiful stories and if you can just take a moment to hear one another you can truly find the inspiration to do whatever it may be with your own life. For me it will be to capture stories and to help anyone who sits in my styling chair to feel confident to continue writing their own stories.

I Need to Personalize This Blog

Help!

Hehe. Hey guys! First of all I would really like to thank everybody who has been reading and following my blog. Seeing that little view counter go up everyday makes me so excited! I love seeing that people are reading my writing, even if it's nothing more serious than talking about makeup or products to make your hair grow, lol.

I especially want to thank my youtube channel subscribers who have followed me over to my little blog to take a look, it means so much to me :)

Now, all that being said, I need your guys help, well, at least someone's help. The generic template of my blog has got.to.go! I am taking my blogging very seriously and I want a personalized blog design that shows it! Now, I have done some research on how to personalize your blog but it is getting me nowhere. The fact that I cannot find the photoshop program that I used to use for graphics editing anywhere doesn't hep me either.

If anyone knows any pointers to help me customize my blog design I would so appreciate the advice or recommendations, or whatever!

Thanks everyone and be looking out for some newer and more interesting blog posts coming tomorrow! Hearts!

Coconut Oil -- The Key to Growing Long, Healthy Hair

I get asked a lot what tips I can give to girls to help them grow their hair longer. Most girls have a very difficult time keeping their hair healthy enough to prevent breakage and allow their hair to become longer. There is no secret product that will suddenly make your hair growth spurt 4 inches but you will notice and feel like your hair growth is increasing by keeping your hair healthy and preventing the length of your hair from breaking off.

Most of the products we use in our hair are scientifically manufactured so that the molecules in that product are small enough to fit into our hair's cuticle and hydrate the hair shaft from the inside out. The problem with these products is that they contain many chemical ingredients that are counter-productive to our hair's health. This is why many women choose to go organic with their hair-care, as I do.

This being said, not all organic or "food" based hair products are beneficial to your hair in terms of repair. Olive oil for example is a wonderful treatment for the hair if you are looking for increased softness and shine but olive oil will not do much as far as repairing the hair. This is because the molecules in olive oil are too large to fit into the hair's cuticle which means that the benefits of olive oil simply coat the hair's surface, giving it smoothness and luminosity but it does not restore or condition the hair.

Coconut oil on the other hand is the only organic oil whose molecules are small enough to fit into the tiny holes in the hairs cuticle. This allows the moisturizing nutrients from the coconut oil to penetrate the hair and restore the hair from the inside out. In this sense, coconut oil actually works to repair your hair and actually make it healthier. Coconut oil will not make split ends magically disappear, you have to cut those off, but it will help to restore dry, brittle hair.

I have found that coconut oil is indeed the magic ingredient to healthy hair. :)

Kim Kardashian Inspired Makeup Look

Hey guys this is a look that I played around with a little while ago. I was inspired by the smokey eye that Kim Kardashian is always rocking. This is a very popular eye for client's who are wanting their makeup done for a nice occasion so I wanted to feature this particular look on my blog.

I am just wanting to showcase some of the work that I have done makeup and hairstyling wise. I hope some of you are enjoying seeing the pictures. There will be quite a lot of these types of posts on this blog but keep a look out for some reviews on some beauty products that I will be getting up in the next few days.

Photoshoots Two Weeks Ago

Our model already had a natural athletic look from being a real surfer but his hours spent in the sun and in the salt water caused his skin to be quite red and dry. My goal for his head-shots was to even out his skin-tone by color correcting the redness. I also used concealer to hide any blemishes he had.










I loved this model's natural hair texture so instead of fighting it, I enhanced the curls with some gel and pulled her hair off her face to highlight her beautiful bone structure. I contoured her cheekbones with some bronzer and blush then added mascara, eyeliner, and some brown eyeshadow to enhance her eyes.






This beauty had a small amount of redness, like her brother, from hours spent in the sun so I canceled out any redness then added a pink blush and lip color with some brown eyeliner and black mascara to compliment her blue eyes.

Photoshoot from Last Summer

This is some of the hair and makeup I did last summer when I first began cosmetology school so I could become licensed to do the work I love. I loved working with this cutey-pie. She was a doll and so much fun to work with! She had the beautiful baby perfect skin of a four year old so the trick for her was to simply emphasize her coloring so it would show up nicely in photographs. Just a little blush, some plummy pink lip color, and mascara made her features stand out beautifully.

Brighten Your Day

Hey everyone! So today I decided to upload a few pictures from a look I did actually a couple months ago. I am going to be uploading pictures from older looks just because I want to get them up onto my blog. I will be posting more recent works soon though.

This particular look was inspired by the bright pink and yellow daisies that are always pictured everywhere around spring time or the beginning of summer. I know a lot of girls are afraid to wear this much color in their routine makeup look but I really do encourage you guys to try and pull off a little bit of color during these warm seasons.

I know that pink can be a particularly difficult bright color to pull off around the eye area, oftentimes in can come off looking more like you have pinkeye than a trendy, cute eyeshadow look. The trick is to stick with very vibrant, bright, "hot" shades of pink. The darker shade of pink you go, the more red pigment there is to the color. You want pinks with more yellow pigments in them then red. Red is what makes you look like you have pinkeye. I also always suggest keeping pink colors strictly on the upper-lid area. Never line your lower lash-line with a pink shade.

For this look I blended a dark shimmery orange into my crease with a fluffy 224 brush from Mac Cosmetics to blend out the line between the pink and my skin color. The final touch to this look was to add that bright, canary yellow into the inner corners of the eyes. This yellow is what keeps the look fresh and bright. The yellow in the corners brings out the yellow underlying pigments in the bright pinks I chose, which will further help to cancel out any red pigments that can cause your eye area to look infected.

Keep your cheeks a nice, bright pink. I used Orgasm by Nars Cosmetics. And voila! You will have a beautiful bright eye look for the summer! Ask me any questions you may have and let me know if you try any bright eyeshadow looks out this summer!

Pretty Little Liars -- Am I the Only One So Obsessed?

I don't care if you think this is riCOCKulous but I have become obsessed with this series. It started out when a friend of mine from cosmetology school told me I HAD to see this new TV series on ABC Family. I had seen the adds for it all over the place: the mall, the street, the bus stops, and I have to admit that the poster looked very intriguing.

I started watching after the show had already aired 4 episodes so as soon as I watched the first one I ended up watching the next three as well. It was SO ADDICTING! In fact, I was so hooked I went and bought the first book for my Ipad. I started reading about a week ago and I am already halfway through the second book.

The books are just as entertaining as the show and I recommend that anybody who is a reader should give them a try. They are definitely a "fun" read, I mean, there isn't a ton of literary substance but you know what, I appreciate the way the author, Sara Shepard, tells the story. She is definitely a good story-teller. She can capture her audience very well. I wouldn't say she is a Stephenie Meyer but she is capable enough that I don't feel like I am losing brain cells by reading the books like I did when I attempted to read the Gossip Girl series.

I'm not going to go into a huge explanation of what the series so far is about, go watch and see!, but I will say that it has a good level of mystery and suspense to it. I really enjoy it, but I really think I enjoy any show with some murder mystery in it.

By far my favorite character in the books and the TV show is Aria. When I read books I always enjoy finding the character I can relate to and I really feel like I relate to her the most. First of all, she is an English major and secondly she is just a little bit off from the rest of the girls. She is a bit darker and more brooding. She tends to over-analyze situations but I think that isn't such a terrible quality all the time, especially if your best friend goes missing and is found dead in her own backyard 3 years later. What I also love about this character is her STYLE!


The books try to capture her eccentric style and I think the show's stylist did a fantastic job at recreating the looks! She piles on a lot of layers, wears a lot of lace leggings, and the lace-up boots she is always wearing are to die for! I am definitely inspired by her wardrobe and I think I may have found a new fashion idol by way of Aria. :P I will try putting some looks together that are inspired by her fashion and uploading them on here. Enough about my girl crush. Ill talk to you guys later.

New and Confused

I am very proud of myself for finally taking the initiative to start a blog. Perhaps this will be the outlet I can use for my creative writing. Hmmm... Anyways, I really don't know what I am doing on here seeing as this is my very first blog post ever, but I am hoping that in a bit of time I can get things sorted out. I definitely want to make my blog look a bit cuter. Maybe I can work on getting some of my old website designing skills back from the days of my youth when all I did was play on horseland.com. Hahaha. That is kind of embarrassing to admit but oh well.
So, my plans for this blog are to incorporate my love of writing with my love and knowledge in all things having to do with beauty. I want to showcase the work I have done on set with makeup and hair as well as just talk with my readers about great products and beauty tricks. These are my plans but I want this blog to really be free to be taken anywhere it pleases. I am going to be embarrassingly honest and myself in my posts. I am going to write about issues I want to write about and I won't be afraid to unleash my opinion on you all.
Well, that is enough of an introduction for now. I want to go ahead and post this so I can get a feel for how everything works. If anyone actually reads this...HAHA...cool!