Mood
Because y'all, this level of dramatics cannot be normal. It was only two weeks ago that I was bent over in a parking lot with my ex-husband scraping poop off my butt.
Could I GET A MINUTE?
I Need To Smudge My Life
Latest Posts
However Bad You Imagine Getting Kids’ Passports To Be, It Is Worse Than That
Wheeeee
I was almost shockingly well-prepared for today's mission: Getting passports for my two children in advance of our Spring Break trip to Mexico. I mean, I've been around the international-travel-with-kids rodeo a couple of times before, and I know that it is terrible. But here's a fun twist: it turns out that when you decide to both get divorced and take your child on vacation? The government goes fucking after you. (Because they don't want you to kidnap your child. I get it. But STILL.)
See, when only one parent is doing the passport-acquiring on behalf of the child, the already-considerable amount of paperwork involved multiples like rabbits and requires the involvement of people like notaries. And if you hear the words "Could you get this notarized?" and think "Oh, sure! No problem whatsoever!" I do not think you and I can be friends.
The Big Activity Book For Anxious People…Now Available For Preorder!
“Smart, sassy, and absolutely genius.”*—Caroline Leavitt, New York Times bestselling author of Is This Tomorrow
These days, anxiety is simply part of the human experience. That's unfortunate, but on the plus side, the second book in the Big Activity Book series - The Big Activity Book for Anxious People - is now available for preorder! (The first book in the series, if my 10,000 mentions over the years slipped past you, is The Big Fat Activity Book for Pregnant People, now in its SIXTH PRINTING - what?!! - and the third is in the process of being written right this very moment.)
Part journal, part coloring book, part compilation of weird coping mechanisms, and part compendium of soothing facts, The Big Activity Book for Anxious People is an outlet for anyone who wants to take a break from reality, laugh through their fears, and realize with every page that they're not alone. It's also there to help you figure out what to do when it’s 3AM and you're wide awake worrying about whether you cc’ed the right “Bob” on that email. (You did. Probably.)
8 Tattoo Trends For 2019 That I Kiiiiinda Love
Look at this sweetness!
I juuuuust got a new tattoo. I am very much not in the market for another one at this particular point in time. But that doesn't mean I can't keep bopping around on the Internet in search of a little inspiration for my next design.
Two Days In Hong Kong
The face of someone midway through a SERIOUS amount of traveling.
I never wrote about Hong Kong! I meant to, but then ended up getting all distracted by the apparently massive controversy over whether or not filter-using is an acceptable life choice, or makes you actually literally the worst kind of human being there is (I can happily argue for both sides). And then the trip fell a bit into the distance, and I moved on to analyses of semi-obscure perfume oils and slime-making.
(Read about the Indonesia portion of our trip here.)
Links & Love & Stuff
Reblonding at Chris McMillan
Supporting evidence for my ongoing insistence that you should try Giorgio Armani Luminous Silk Foundation: this photo. Spoiler: My skin does not look like this when I wake up in the morning. (I wear shade 5.5, if that's helpful.)
For those of you with elementary school-aged kids: My son just tore through the Goosebumps and Press Start series, and is moving on to the Notebook of Doom series, which came highly recommended by a friend. Any other really great early reader series recommendations would be amazing, if you have them!
I Think They Call This “Living Your Best Life”
Yup.
I didn't have tons of expectations going into this weekend, because the sum total of the the research I did when I was contacted by a publicist asking me if I wanted to go on a press trip to Palm Springs was to say "yes," and then go there.
But had I done the research, I would have a) been geeking out over the fact that this is the hotel from the Saved by the Bell wedding episode, and b) been even MORE excited, if such a thing is possible, because the JW Marriot Desert Springs Resort and Spa is a total retro-luxe fantasyland.
I Cannot Say Enough Wonderful Things About This Toothbrush
The other day, I sat down to start cobbling together a post called “8 Products I’m Still Obsessed With One Year Later.” Because here’s the thing: beauty writers (and any writers with public platforms) get asked to review lots of products. Which means that if one of these writers - me, say - is not only still using one of these products a solid year later, but has actually subscribed to a delivery service for said product, and still insists showing said product to people who come over to her house because they need to know about it…
You know it’s a good product.
Which is to say that one product that I knew from the get-go was absolutely guaranteed a spot on this list of mine is quip - the electric toothbrushes that I first wrote about last spring. I hadn’t been aware that the toothbrush industry was one that could be disrupted, as they say, but it also hadn’t occurred to me that I could have a toothbrush that can only be described as “stylish.”
Spotlight On: Riddle Perfume Oil Original Scent
I LOVE it when things like this happen.
OK, so a couple of months ago I was in Malibu with my mom, and we went into a little boutique filled with many, many things that I wanted to own but could not afford. My mom felt similarly, but nevertheless decided to try on everything in the store, so I ended up wandering around by the cash register, picking various things up and putting them back down while trying to keep my children from doing the same, and one of the things I picked up was this little rollerball perfume oil from a company I'd never heard of called "Riddle."
I couldn't put my finger on what, exactly, it smelled like, but I was instantly OBSESSED, to the point where I flagged down the woman who was standing in the corner folding $300 t-shirts to ask her about it. She had virtually no information to offer me and had seemingly never noticed it even sitting there in the shop, so I figured it was some ultra boutique-y oil made by, like, the owner's friend. It was also a little pricey ($50 for the small oil, $80 for the large), so even though I definitely thought about buying it, I managed to restrain myself and went on my (now blissfully perfume oil-ed) way.
8 Products I’m Still Obsessed With One Year Later
I wouldn't call myself a "beauty blogger," per se, but I've certainly written about beauty (treatments, techniques, procedures, products, and so on) a lot over the years, including two entire YouTube shows produced by Allure (#memories).
What this means: I've tried out a lot of products - far more, I'd guess, than your average non-blogging bear. And I've liked - even loved - a lot of them. But like any human being with non-abnormal quantities of time to spend on things like makeup and skincare, there are only so many new discoveries that I actually continue using over the long-term (and on my own dime).
