I Fell for the Pressure Sell

This is totally how I feel today:

Guy can guff like nobody's business.  He is the guffiest guff that ever guffed and I'm feeling pretty guffy myself today.  Serenity now!!!

OK, Genesis just came on my playlist and then there's this:

This reminds me that I am trying a sort of home remedy teeth whitening experiment.  I don't have much to report right now because I just started.  I was not genetically blessed in the dentitional department.  Do you have any go to teeth solutions?  My teeth are EXTRA sensitive, so I am limited in the scope of products I can use... the bad puns continue!

At any rate, I am here to report on yesterday's trip to Sephora in regard to retinols.  I happened to catch one of their skin care specialists who was in town from L.A. educating the Utah bumpkins.  First, she convinced me to try another eye cream:

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From what I gathered Sephora is really pushing this product right now.  And I can attest that it DOES illuminate around the eye (kind of like a B B cream for eyes).  It didn't give me dragon skin.  It smells good.  And it burnt the living hell out of my eyes.  I'm a super shaky gal and I cannot be trusted to use products AROUND my eyes that burn if they get IN my eyes.  Why would they make an eye cream that burns?!

So, that's out for me.  I'm keeping the La Mer.  I don't care if it contains ingredients with the suffix "cone".  I think it's amazeballs.

Then this lady tells me that I need to stay away from retinols because my skin has "clearly lost its elasticity".  Ummmmm... bitch (pardon my french... oh, puns, oh you!).   I told her that I owed it to the readers to try retinols and she finally agreed to give me some samples of Dr. Dennis Gross Skincares's Alpha Beta Daily Face Peel.  I am, however, taking her advice and waiting to try it when I have no big commitments because I work at Anthro in a couple of hours and I need to look nice.  She basically terrified me by telling me it is going to eat away my skin and any sun damage that is repaired will come back ten fold because I'll be so sensitive to the sun.  That's why I got buttloads of samples of La Mer's sunscreen, lady.

The other reason I was at Sephora was because I need a new under eye concealer.  I've been using one from Urban Decay:

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I really like this product, but I have used it up really quickly and I apply make up infrequently and very lightly.  I need a product that I don't have to replace so often.  I combine this with Benefit's Ooh La Lift, which I adore.  It is so brightening and makes my skin look dewy and fresh:

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I apply it like so:

I just dab at it with my fingers and spread upwards.  It's wizardry, I tell ya!

At the advice of Miloberry (Read her blog.  She is thorough.  She is my go to for all things make-up as I venture back into wearing it) I was headed in to buy Benefit's Erase Paste, which she swears by:

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But I ended up walking out with Korres' Concealer Correcteur:

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I haven't decided whether I'll keep it or not.  That's a lie.  I'm totally returning it AND the brush she pressure sale-ed me into buying and getting the Erase Paste I went in for.  Unless you have a must-have product... do you? 

I'll be trying out the retinols on Sunday!  I hope I don't look too much like Freddy Krueger as that isn't my intended Halloween costume.  On that note, I leave you to get into the Halloween spirit with a blog written by one of the most beautiful, wonderful, and strongest babes I have ever had the pleasure of knowing:  She really DOES walk softly.

xoxox

And we're live!

Welcome to my blog!  I'm here to shamelessly plug... well, basically anything I love, be it a recipe, a product, a service, another blog, and, above all else, my dog.  My husband might get a little love too here and there.  Let's start with the dog:

This obscenely handsome beast is a rescued Old English Bulldog with the very hefty moniker of Guy Winston Churchill Larkin-Federer Wilson.  He is as obscenely spoiled and loved as he is handsome.  You'll be seeing A LOT more of him.

This dapper young fellow is my husband.  You'll be hearing more about him, if not seeing as well... assuming he doesn't smother me in my sleep for posting this photo.  He should become a realtor just so he can use this photo as his head shot.  As it stands, he's a biostatistician... with a bright future in real estate... ha!

And here's me.  I'm a 34 year-old housewife with a part-time job at Anthropologie and a freelance editing career.  I love my little family, I love to cook, I love the Oxford comma, I love cheap champagne, and I love Phil Collins.  Seems like we've covered all the bases in this introduction of characters, so I'll move right along to a segment I'll be calling THIS WEEK FOR DINNER.  I'm totally stealing this idea from my birthday twin, Ashley, who has an amazing blog called The Pickled Bean.  It's a heartfelt story about her little family and it's well worth a read.  I won't tell you anymore because you need to read this gem for yourself.  Onward!

THIS WEEK FOR DINNER:

Monday: Sloppy joes on garlic bread with parmesan roasted cabbage.
Tuesday: I had a big health scare (I have the crappiest health in all of crapdom), so we had ramen *hangs head in shame*
Wednesday: Spinach pasta with mascarpone, lemon zest, and chives with mustard-rubbed pork chops.
Thursday: Homemade cashew pesto and provolone grilled cheese on wheat bread (that mountain of basil from the Farmer's Market pictured above was far more mountainous in person... we are swimming in pesto) with fresh tomatoes from the husband's coworkers' gardens.
Friday: I worked at Anthro all night, so it was fend for yourself.
Saturday: Crock pot chicken enchilada soup that was so much better than anticipated.
Sunday: Leftovers... normally we have dinner at my parents' house on Sundays and my mom puts together quite a feast.

Oh My General Zod!  This is, like, the perfect place for me to shamelessly plug my Pinterest account because most of the recipes I use will be there.

Finally, I have a Product of the Day, which will be another constant feature on this blog:

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Along with my crappola health, I'm allergic to nearly EVERYTHING!  At 34 I finally accepted that I needed to start taking care of my skin in order to still look 25.  I tried SOOOOOO many eye creams.  They were all natural, they had no preservatives, they came highly recommended.  I ended up looking like I had dragon skin around my eyes for weeks, which I couldn't treat with Neosporin BECAUSE I'M ALLERGIC TO IT.  And then I find the most expensive stuff in town.  I'm not allergic to it! It looks pretty, it smells good, it lasts a LONG time... it has everything going for it except the price tag.  Let me assure you, it is worth EVERY penny, but it's totally hard to get that many pennies together for eye cream, ya know?  So, that's also why I'm cooking so much lately.  My sweet husband will get me more eye cream next month with all the money we save not eating out!  And just so you know, the cream has lasted over a year.  Make like Tom and Donna and TREAT YOSELF!!!

If you made it all the way to the end, I thank you, dear reader.  Paris just isn't the same, so come again. xoxox