Outfit #17

Here was my outfit yesterday. I was very excited about wearing my new jacket, and loved the hint of orange it gave my look.

H&M cami

UO shorts

Thrifted jacket

Outfit #16

This is my newest hairpiece.  It's called a peineta and the flamenco dancers usually wear them.  I found this small sized one in a local thrift store. 

Lauren the Explorette

On a nice spring day my friend Lauren, future explorette, was looking very stylish.  I snapped this bubbly shot just in time.

Outfit #15

Here I decided to try something new with my hair.  I used Manic Panic hair dye in Raven.  No, it's not very dark but I was still happy with the short change. 

H&M cami

Thrifted belt

Thrifted pants

Mom's jewelry

From the window...

One thing I love to do when I'm bored in the car is take pictures looking out the window (when I'm in the passenger seat, of course).  You have to look extra hard for nice buildings and wait for that perfect angle.  Here are two pictures I took while in New York. 

Dream Toy

As a little girl, I always wanted a doll that I could operate on.  So I drew the idea in a very gory and morbid manner.  

The girl is colored with india ink and water color on Arches paper.  The organs are made from modeling paste painted with acrylics.  

The rest is cut paper.  The last layer has red india ink for blood.

Regular thread connects the organs to the doll

Lips Solved

I've noticed that a lot of people stop me in public and ask what lip color I am wearing.  Everyone is always searching for that perfect lip color, and it is very hard to find.  For each person it's different, and that's the hard time I think many women (and some men) face.  I have a specific way of wearing red, and it took me some time to find the right shade.  My secret: I wear two colors. ALWAYS.  Here's my method of application:

1. Outline the outside of my lip with a wax pencil.  DuWop has a nice one that I carry around with me.

2. I apply a lighter shade of red lipstick that's bright and vibrant.  I always use MAC's limited edition color Kanga-Rouge.  It's not sold anymore and I will cry when I run out of this color.  But the key is to find a lighter red for the base.

3.  I then apply  Lipstick Queen's lipstick color Wine- Sinner.  It's a very deep blood red.  That gives it a more toned down look that goes well with the lighter red underneath.  If you don't want to use a darker red, a deep brown could work too.

4. Optional- a little bit of gold lipgloss.  Something with a gold tint.  

Think of your lips as a canvas.  You are painting them, so you need to use light and dark colors.  This sounds like a lot of work, but it's really nothing.  Just a pencil and two tubes of lipstick.

Outfit #14

Rue 21 dress

Juicy Couture necklace

Mystery brand tights

H&M jacket

MAC lipstick in Night Violet

Doc Marten boots

Lucky Outfit #13

City Place makes for good pictures

BDG pants

Thrifted belt

Mossimo tube top

Mom's jewelry

Hair by L.A. at Peter Coppola Salon in Boca Raton

Guest Outfit: J.Marie

My sister, J. Marie, graces my blog this week for a guest outfit. She looks so adorable and vintage in front of this door.

Forever 21 pants

 Sam Edelman shoes

Outfit #12

Poise shirt

Highway Jeans leggings

American Apparel strapless bra

Shoes from a mystery store in Westwood, CA

Outfit #11

Dress from TJ Maxx

Betsey Johnson earrings

Mom's necklace

Birkenstock shoes

Eyeshadow by Tarina Tarantino in Electric Butterfly

Let's talk about Lime

I hate the taste of it.

But my goodness, don't limes look handsome in photographs?

Old Time

and

My sister has an amazing mini camera collection at her house.  These two always get me excited.  The top one was found at an antique fair and, to our surprise, works perfectly.  

A Story

She's hungry...

... And sees an adorned apple.

The little apple gets a photoshoot...

 ... And then dies.

Outfit #10

Jumpsuit by Rue 21

Marc by Marc Jacobs bag

Birkenstock shoes

Antique Show

If you didn't already know, I love everything antique.  Well, not Americana antiques from the early colonial times.  While in West Palm Beach, I went to an antique fair with my family.  There were little toys, jewels, and old things everywhere.  

In the corner of a booth I found these peep show slides.  I was so tempted to buy the whole batch, but then I remembered that I would have absolutely no place to put them.

This little guy was in the same booth as the naughty slides.

Old books are one of my favorites.  I prefer to buy vintage versions of classic books rather than new ones.  There's something much better and inspiring to hold in your hands a book from 1910 rather than 2010.  

I'm not quite sure what this horn piece is, but I saw it from across the warehouse and wanted to cart it back home with me. 

On Pastel Days....

What to listen to when you're feeling pastel and Spanish:

 Runali- Ojos de Brujo

 Corpus Christi- La Bien Querida

Nana- Ojos de Brujo

Damisela Encantadora-  Rosita Fornes

Glimpses of Cuba

On a trip to Miami, my grandparents showed me some newly found pictures from an old family friend.  They are photographs from my grandfather's younger years back when he still lived in Cuba.  None of us (my sister, mother, cousins, etc) have seen any pictures from when they were in Cuba since they came to the US with nothing but the clothes they were wearing.  I loved the pictures, but loved capturing everyone's reaction even more.

It was funny to see my grandfather in his youth.  He was a blond, blue-eyd, skinny Cuban.  People always thought he was German, and it was easy to pick him out in each photo.  All you had to look for was the light hair. 

My sister especially loved these.

Artist of my moment: Bovey Lee

My professor introduced me to the wonderful world of paper cutouts and I simply cannot get enough of them.  I've done a few projects using only paper cutouts and may I just say that I have so much respect for Bovey Lee.  She's a local artist who does her cutouts on rice paper.  The amount of detail she puts into her work is amazing.  On her site she writes the reasons why she loves doing them, and one is that she likes the feel of the super sharp blade cutting the paper- she understands my feelings exactly. 

Images are from Design Sponge. 

Bovey Lee Site