Mood lifters

Sometimes life gets in the way of trying to be stylish, especially after 50!
I have been happily married for almost 28 years and like I mentioned before have 3 daughters who I've raised and put through university. My youngest, Nina will be graduating from UBC Vancouver May 2014 and my twins Emily & Sarah graduated from UC Santa Cruz in 2012. Not to shabby Alma maters to have in today's world! When Nina left for school I was afforded some time without having to play mommy, a staring role I am very proud to have, but it was nice to feel like that character was going to be getting less stage time. So far that hasn't been the case and I'm having a difficult time with this new kind of mothering role. I've also neglected to mention that I'm a preschool teacher without a class. I chose to leave my teaching position to take a break and see what other things life had to offer, the same time my twins moved back home from college, BIG mistake!!! Its been 2 years since they have come home and it doesn't look like they will be trying to make it on their own anytime soon. Don't get me wrong, I love my girls and am proud of all they have accomplished but it is so very hard to find a productive rhythm. All of my usual habits have been disrupted and sometimes it makes life very very challenging!  
However I found that if you have the right sunglasses it can be an instant mood lifter!
I was feeling kinda down due to some squabbling at home (que paragraph one) so I decided to channel the beautifull and stylish acting icon Greta Garbo. She plays the Russian ballerina in the academy award winning movie "Grand Hotel", where she famously says, in a fabulously tortured Russian accent, the line "I want to be alone"

 

I wanted to be alone too! 
I threw on some grey jeans, a black T and my new black,pink&white asics, pony tailed my hair, glossed my lips with some Napoleon Perdis auto pilot lip service and covered my face with my prescription Ray Ban aviator sunglasses, and off I went! Since I wanted to be alone and was looking not very put together for my standards. I ended up at one of my favorite coffee shops off the beat and path. Thankfully it wasn't too busy when I arrived so I was able to have a booth to my self. The waitress came over immediately and greeted me with her beautiful youthful smile and took my coffee order, that's when it happened. Before she walked away this heaven sent girl says "I love your Ray Ban's, they are so chic and stylish!" It was an incredible pick me up! Of course I thanked her, as it was so unexpected considering my mood or maybe she could tell I wasn't a happy camper, either way it was perfectly timed.  I think the ultimate compliment is when your told you have great style and though she was referring to my sunglasses it was perfect! 
I have over the years collected several pairs of sunglasses, mostly Ray Ban's because they fit my face well and arent over priced. I've owned a couple of expensive "designer" pairs but they always made me feel like I was trying to hard to be fashionable. I've come to realise that my most fashionable/stylish moments come when I'm not trying at all. I think the trick to this is to surround your self with what looks good and makes you happy and never underestimate the power of great pair of sunglasses!

My Hair, My Way!

I got my hair fixed! YEAH! I don't have short hair and I haven't gone grey yet so I can go a while till my hair starts to look dull and like I gave up. I'm a natural blonde, which isn't good or bad, thought it does help when you need to get away with being kinda dumb (que the Cheshire Cat grin :)

I never really needed to dye my hair till I turned 30 after I had my 3rd daughter. I should probably share that I have 3 daughters, twins and a singleton who I absolutely adore. My twins Emily and Sarah will be 24 in May and Nina will be 22 in June.

Anyways, since the dying started I've been all shades of blonde, light, dark, skunked, solid, partially pinked and I even went brown for about a 3 weeks till my husband got all huffy and demanded I be the blonde he married.

I think the invention of hair dye is one of the greatest and as the years go by the dyes get better and better. My current fave (up above) is alternating foils with 2 colors & my natural color and then my stylist covers the rest up with dark butterscotch blonde for some fabulous "low lights". Please don't think I do this on my own as I would totally screw-it up! I have always subscribed to the "don't do this at home" mentality when it comes to things that I don't know much about, though I will say the dumb blonde occasionally comes out, lol!

But never with my real hair, that's what wigs are for!

No Make-up, Make-up!

Ok! now that I have a clean non smelly fire place I can really share. 
I have a Jambox that my husband gave me on Valentines Day, not a sexy gift but, to me it was! Listening to music while getting prepped for the day is a great way to set my mood. I was listening to to Fritz and the Tantrum a new band out there with a cool modern 70's vibe and then I changed it up with a relatively unknown band called The Pack A D, who are a couple of girls from Canada with a great kick-ass sound. Right after my shower I moisturized my face! It is probably the most important thing you can do for the care and keeping of your skin! First I use a skin rev-er upper by i.d. BareVitamins and then Olay Professional Pro X eye restoration complex and then give a final coating of the Olay Pro X anti aging lotion, which has a nice strong sfp 30! Today I decided to do my usual non make-up make-up. I polished my face with regular BareMinerals foundation in Lightly Fair, contoured with their bronzer called Warmth and finished it with BareMinerals mineral veil in illuminating. I waxed the little creases at the top of my lips and lined the top and just the bottom sides of my lips with a nude colored liner by Palladio. I never line the bottom center cause it makes the lips look fuller, then a swipe of my old stand-by since high school, Dr Pepper Lip Smackers. Next I swipe on what ever left-over light colored eye-shadow is on one of my shadow brushes and then wiggle a little dark eyeliner into my lash line. Then I blot on my tongue (yup my tongue) a very old lash brush that gets caked on mascara from use and brush my brows and lashes for a smidge of definition. That's it for now, gotta go be a good friend and bring her some whiskey to lift her spirits, literally!

Till Next time!

Love My Vanity

My favorite place to contemplate and get ideas these days is while sitting at my vanity! It's where I keep my tools for presenting my best self and a few symbolic tchotches of what I think makes me, me! This may sound vain but some of the worlds most important people will agree that taking time for your self is as important as what you give in life and to quote RuPaul "If you can't love yourself, then how the hell you gonna love anyone else". And I LOVE to make everything look as appealing as possible!

Today my vanity sat unused as I decided to do something very non chic. I cleaned out my fireplace, you know the inside where all those fire logs get burned, belch! I haven't done that in about 5 years, it was smelling a little ashy and not looking good. This is definitely a necessary habit to keep up! Now it looks good! Hopefully I'll get to use it a few more times before the perpetual spring/summer LA weather starts.

I am Wavalen! Hear me Roar!
A little dramatic? Oui! But to quote Shakespeare with a feminine twist
 "all the world's a stage, and all the women merely players" 
So far I've played child, teen, young adult, mom and currently woman over 50 but, don't let the over 50 fool you! You don't get to my place in time without without amassing a lot of knowledge about the goods in life and how to put your best foot forward. So I'm diving into the blogging world with all that I can share to hopefully make your world/stage the best and the chicest it can be.