real pre-finals attire

Because I am more productive when dressed, even if I'm sitting in my apartment all day eating any carbs in reach!

My hair and lack of organization (evident on the floor in this uncropped picture) are ABSOLUTELY REDIC:

By the way, I think whoever came up with these little girls' uniform blouses must be sort of pervy (or lack foresight) because, um, they're kind of totally see-through.

Peter Pan collar blouse: French Toast. Bralette that wasn't supposed to be visible: Forever21. Green jeans: Target.

in which i play pictionary

For the record, I think this is very obviously a camel.

So I totally went there and did floral on floral on floral and then failed to take a full picture of my monstrosity. Use your imagination :(

Floral button-down: American Rag. Floral bow tie: DIY. Floral shorts: mother's.

Incidentally, David (at whose friend's house we were playing Pictionary) was also sporting floral print. That combined with our excellent (read: questionable) communication skills are signs that we're obvz SOULMATES!

P. S. Today is his birthday. If you have a minute I think you should go flood his comments section. If you don't have a minute I'm surprised you're reading this, but I suppose you can think happy birthday thoughts at him.

...and the Oscar goes to -

Thank you to recent UC Berkeley grad and fellow student blogger Pour L'Amour for passing on these two awards:

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE!

These 144 x 144 squares of recognition come laden with the baggage of this question: If you were to attend the Blogger Academy Awards, what would you wear?

I was like, OMG! It's like prom for grown-ups! This means I'll probably be the inappropriate girl in a cocktail dress instead of a gown again, but can you argue with the exposed zipper on this dress?

Above, Moiré full skirt mini dress by McQ, $535 at net-a-porter

I thought not. I would of course also be wearing a giant ring, thematically appropriate shoes, and something dramatic on my head.

Above, Pansy Ring by Juicy Couture, $88 at Saks Fifth Avenue

Above, Satin Rose Sandal by Rene Caovilla, $1095 at Neiman Marcus

Above, forever fields natural vine crown by whichgoose, $50 on etsy

I am really, really bad at playing blogger tag, but if you answer the Academy Award-winning question, I'd totally love to see your imaginary outfits!

estrellita

My piano books never looked this good. What, is classical/baroque too serious for cute folksy illustrations? ELITISTS.

excessories

Wow, my camera hand is a lot shakier than I thought.

some things never change

Once a blogger, always a blogger.

Posting will resume in five minutes, although (most of) the next dozen (or more) posts are more than two weeks old. Hopefully they will carry me over into the week when I go to LA and don't have anything to blog about.

Anyway, I have come to terms with the fact that I AM NOT A PROLIFIC COMMENTER. (I AM NOT CHARACTERIZED BY ABUNDANT PRODUCTION.) I am terrible at "returning comments" in a timely manner and absolutely do not want to consciously grow my blog by forcing relationships of reciprocal commenting with things like "great skirt xoxo" or "luv the dress! check out mai blog 2, thx." The fact that every few months, I declare comment bankruptcy à la e-mail bankruptcy should be indicative of how useful I find comments.

Part of me tells me I should feel guilty for this, and for not caring about developing a community of readers, and for not considering SEO and being socially acceptable and, you know, hoarding comments and looking good all the time and watching what I post and not offending people, and part of me says I don't care and I don't owe anyone anything through blogging.

Maybe this makes me seem like a cold hard bitch. I kind of am, but I'm also just not someone who finds commentary on fashion or style blogs to be particularly intelligent or worth reading (have I offended anyone yet?), except when the topic isn't strictly fashion or style. I mean, do people really develop relationships with other bloggers through comments? That is so bizarre to me. Give me emails! If you want to talk, let's get personal! Tell me about your life! I don't want to go to tea and spend an hour exchanging compliments on how gorgeous and amazing our shoes and jewelry are. I want to talk shop, or talk about you, or talk about me, or talk about, you know, our lives hopes dreams aspirations interests fears loves beliefs pains all those things that make you tick!

Because you know what? The best comment I've ever received was one word long, and it wasn't "fierce," "gorgeous," "sexy," "cute," or "pretty," but this:

on a post where I threw up my insides all over the internet and felt very very vulnerable.

I guess as someone who spends her free time taking pictures of herself and planning outfits and looking at other people who take pictures of themselves in planned outfits, I shouldn't be talking about superficiality.

But anyway. This is my explanation for why I don't respond to your comments 90% of the time. I only comment when I have something to say. And as with most things, I'm thinking myself into circles and nobody is actually pressuring me to be a prolific commenter.

I appreciate my readers, in this big, vague, very pleasant sort of way, but I don't really want to appreciate "my readers." I would rather appreciate you, your unique online presence. Unless you are one of those people with foot fetishes who have been Googling things like "beat-up Keds" and arriving here because I don't really appreciate you very much. Or if you are one of the Chinese spambots selling porn or erectile dysfunction products. But for everyone else, I probably will really like you and am not doing you justice when I say "Thank you, dear 2.5 readers," but THANK YOU, DEAR 2.5 READERS, including all of you who have just unsubscribed because I am so goddamn offensive and heartless and networking-unfriendly.

Blogging feedback is wonderful and validating, but I don't think feedback should be a prerequisite for my enjoying posting pictures of myself/impossible men/impossible clothes and rattling off commentary whenever I feel like it.

Right. I think it's time for some Jake Gyllenhaal.

YEAHHH!

Long, spiral curls, inspire many celebrity hairstyles

Long wavy hairstyles will work for any occasion. Get the long wavy look by wrapping small sections of hair around a medium barrel curling iron and hold in a vertical position. Gisele, see photo left, shows us how this hairstyle is done in Hollywood.

Gisele let out her radiant waves. Layers cut through the edges gave her natural wave lovely bounce and created body and movement all over. This hairstyle is best suited to those with a natural wave or curl.

How to Style:Apply styling mousse to wet hair, then using a large radial brush, smooth the hair concentrating on the bangs and crown area. Apply small amounts of wax to the entire hair to give definition and texture throughout.

please hold

Because I'm not entirely sure I like what I'm doing with this blog right now, this post is to tell you that even though I had a backlog of posts that were queued from now into the next two weeks, I am going to pause and breathe for a minute and look at myself, and around.

dress down, part deux

Dead week attire. The dirty hair makes it extra classy. For the record, piling on accessories does not an outfit make.

Watch: Anchor Blue. Bracelet: mother's. Cardigan: don't know. T-shirt: Cal Student Store. Green jeans: Target. Flats: Palladium Freerubber.

and everything is going my way

My Saturday night two weeks ago. As usual.

Today I am thankful that most Saturday nights of my life have been spent at extended-family dinners.

My older cousin and I spent a few hours of frustration on Day of the Tentacle. I must be the only 19-year-old girl who likes old school adventure games. (Any King's Quest fans out there? Woodruff and Schnibble? Freddy Pharkas? Goblins?! Actually Goblins was insanely hard. ...Space Quest?)

My youngest cousin had these animal-shaped rubber bands. We set up a clinic for the injured ones.

Back From China!

YAY! I'm back!

I'm still in zombieland, aka jet lag central but I have a couple of good posts in the works. :)

I just joined Facebook so make sure to stop by and say hi ;)

I missed you guys!!

xoxox

corkscrew

I was trying to come up with some kind of wordplay that involved "taking my new shoes for a spin" and the cork part of Kork-Ease, but I failed and the dizziest word I came up with to attach to "cork" was "screw," since "wooden particle spiral" wasn't very appealing. I must be losing it.

Redic hair: practice and grease. Jacket: mother's, H&M. Blouse: mother's, Old Navy. Necklace: garage sale + DIY. Green jeans: Target. Shoes: Kork-Ease. Socks: mother's.

It's been a while since I've busted out the phallic necklaces, but the ice key around my neck felt appropriate with the rest of the outfit. Let's not make a pun about it being a long time coming.

How to grow out a pixie cut (for real this time)

Since my last attempt at talking about short hair was really an excuse to tell you about my life, here’s the post for real this time. Ideas for how to grow out a pixie cut, aka How to not look like a disaster while growing out a pixie cut, aka Even though my growing-out stages were as tragic as King Lear*, I did learn a few things along the way.


*For illustrative purposes, you may want to look at the slideshow of my hair progression near the bottom of How not to grow out a pixie cut.

First of all, I assume you’ve already looked at The Fashion-y Blog’s The Pixie Cut: Growing Out post. If not, you should, if only for the Hasidic Jew reference.

It’s a pretty helpful and amusing guide, but I found that getting from stage 2 to stage 3 was really tedious and especially painful (and stage 2 made me look even more like a lesbian soccer mom than ever), and I really could have used some help for stage 2.5. The general idea is exactly right, though – continuously chop off the first signs of a mullet, and grow your bangs out until you can have a normal-looking bob. But when they say first signs of a mullet, they mean it. Not "when people not-so-jokingly start agreeing with you when you joke about having a mullet." FIRST SIGNS.

Anyway, without further ado, if your hair looks like shit, (or maybe, if you got a pixie cut and then realized you don’t have the dainty fairy nose for it), or if you are in stage 2.5, I think you should consider the following obvious (or perhaps overlooked) options:

• A headband. I personally find pixies + headbands to be a bit much for my face, but your pixie-mullet might look better with a headband than without, so give it a shot. Headbands work well with greasy hair (and grease is imperative when it comes to pixies!). My argument is that you always look better with your hair pulled back, especially if your hair is dripping in grease. In fact, I find that it doesn’t matter if you look like you just worked out, or if your hair is grease-slick in the front and tragic party in the back, or if you resemble Snape in drag. The point is, if you have a headband on, it looks like you at least tried to tame the beast. I’m sure people can already tell you’re trying to grow out your hair. So try to look like you tried.
  
  You can go the Blair Waldorf route and put your headband on for aesthetic purposes only, but I find it looks too twee for me and only wear headbands when my bangs are threatening to Exxon Valdez on my forehead. But if you must, I suggest narrower headbands.
  
  This is the part where I demonstrate with before and after pictures. You know how magazines have been all in a tizzy featuring models/actresses without makeup? Or without retouching? Well you can have me without makeup or retouching RIGHT HERE:
  
  Yeah, I sort of do look like crap and I am wearing Garfield pajamas, but I promise that while you're growing your hair out, some days you will wake up clad in what feels like a pile of shit on your head and embarrassing sleep clothes instead of Brigitte Bardot hair and a negligee. Also, I know I'm well past Pixie now, but I'm guessing it works the same (I wouldn't know; I kept my mullet for too long...).
  
  TWEE wide headband:
  
  Possibly less twee narrow headband:
  
  Or you could go the Gaga route and stick crazy things in your hair. Like this butterfly headband that my apartmentmate broke while we were having a midterm dress-up party in the dorms (it's balanced precariously atop my head right now... the other half of the headband is missing):
  
  Or a huge bow, which I once wore to Disneyland where one of the princesses (!) told me she liked my bow:
  
  

• Braids. Obviously, this only applies if your hair is long enough to braid, but this is really good for growing out bangs, too. Especially French braids. Embrace the unruly parts that stick out. Pretend everything is on purpose. And for the love of all that is holy, don’t bother trying to get your hair to look perfect and flyawayless. Braid it, pin it up, and forget about it.
  
  Ordinary braids:
  
  
  French braids (do French people call them French braids?):
  The point is, braid across your scalp, from temple to temple (or ear to ear, whatever suits your face better). (On that note, wear kick-ass glasses. They distract from your hair.)

• Bobby pins. I prefer contoured bobby pins so they don’t stick off your head at weird angles. And ridiculous clips/barettes. Tons of them. At once. If you walk out of the house without at least a pound of hair accessories on your head, you’re doing it wrong.

• Add texture. For me, this meant grease and intense fights with my pillow to achieve long-lasting cowlicks. For you, it might mean something more socially acceptable, like hairspray, or dry shampoo. (Even my dry shampoo is socially unacceptable. Cocoa powder mixed with flour, what?) I’ve no experience with it, but I’m guessing hair wax would be pretty good here too.


• Alcohol. Or patience. And a really attractive picture of yourself with long hair to reference when you feel like The Uglies have eaten you alive.


• Pin curls, although you should be wary about the little uncurlable bits around the nape of your neck. Either wait for them to get long enough to curl, or cover them with a stretchy headband. Or pin them up really carefully. Or gel them up. And then (this is the really important part), after you take the curls out, BACKCOMB! I know it’s bad for your hair, but if you have limp, stick-straight hair like mine, this is totally imperative, I swear. Again, I suggest contoured bobby pins because I find straight ones to be poky and hard to sleep in. (Also, pin curls are great for extending hair washes because they kill the appearance of grease. Win-win!)
  
  
  
  Above, backcombing is the difference between kind of cute limp curls and SHE'S CRAZY curls. Choose the crazy.
  Here's a link to the video tutorial I found most helpful for learning to do pin curls. And since I had trouble finding hair setting diagrams, here's one of how I usually set it, if it helps, which I doubt, because this just kind of makes your hair generally curly, not Veronica Lake or Greta Garbo curly-with-a-style:
  

• Twist and pin, twist and pin. (See excessive bobby pin photos.) If you have really smooth hair like mine, wet it first, or get it gritty with dry shampoo. (For me and probably other cheap/broke non-blonde girls, I say again, cocoa powder mixed with flour works wonders.) Then grab a little chunk of hair, twist it, and pin it. Repeat in a fauxhawk down the center of your head. Or just all over your head. Willy nilly. Helter skelter. Higgledy piggledy. Harum scarum. (Okay I’m out of phrases.) Bang poufs (not as big as Snooki's) work pretty well, too, although I never figured out what to do with the sides of my hair. More pins? Anyway, this is the general idea, although hopefully you'll spend more time/effort making it look like an artful pouf instead of a bird nesting in yor hair. Or a poo swirl.

In general, having a lot of volume at the crown of your head will look good. Like a bust of Nefertiti, or an overlarge infant.

Omg, you guys. I took this image from a Google search and now I can't find the original source because my own page is the top result with this image. :( Please email me if the original is yours!

• Turbans. They’re kind of heavy and I never actually did it when I had a pixie, but if you like your face, turbans definitely add interest. From what I’ve tried, pashminas don’t hold very well (too much material). T-shirts do, but they’re weird and bumpy and have holes in awkward places. Giant silk scarves work pretty well (I’m talking 35” at the very least), but I think jersey would actually hold better. (Silk looks fancier, though.) (For instructions on how to tie a turban, I actually suggest the pin curl video mentioned above. The silk scarf headwrap looks pretty presentable. Otherwise, Gala Darling has a clear tutorial too (although I never got my turban to stay using her instructions).)


• Kübler-Ross. Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, Acceptance. After you’ve spent enough time convincing yourself that you don’t need to see a hairdresser (when you really do), then getting mad at the initial trigger for your pixie decision (and defriending them on FB (oh wait, is that just me?)), then promising to study harder and stop impulse shopping if only oh my God my hair would grow faster, then lying on the couch crying through five episodes of Glee and eating your way through a pint of Ben & Jerry’s (Cherry Garcia), you need to sit yourself down (with your really attractive reference picture) and accept the fact that some days, you’re just going to wake up and want to cry, so at least until you feel 100% awesome about your hair again, remember that there are parts of you equally if not more important than a body and a pretty face.


• Go to a hairdresser. Unless you went pixie in a crisis and feel the need to beat up your self-esteem in the process of crisising, a professional will probably help ease your pain. Unless you’d rather be ugly than broke. (Guilty, right here.)


• GENERAL TIPS: While you’re faithfully chopping off the mullet before it resembles a piece of roadkill masterfully incorporated into the nape of your neck, scarves can be your best friend. (Although you’ll probably get an awkward face tan like me.)And you know that time frame where your hair’s growing over your ears again? Yeah, get that hair out of the way. Pin away from your ears! Or you can risk looking like your head is shaped like a box; it’s up to you.
  Make sure your eyebrows look really good. And your glasses. And your skin. Basically your face. Now would be a really appropriate time to try redic makeup.
• AND MOST IMPORTANTLY, DO NOT EMOTIONALLY CUT YOUR HAIR. Stay away from sharp objects. And keep that hot, mermaid-haired picture of yourself in plain sight. You’re gonna need it.

I really hope this helps someone...