Get Pretty Version 4.0

A few weeks ago, it was incredibly hot outside here in Wisconsin, but I had a birthday party to go to and decided to put some makeup on for the occasion! Here's what my choice was for that hundred-degree party day!

This was after a few hours' worth of being outside and if you ask me, I think it stayed pretty well!

Product list:

Face:

Foundation: Revlon Photoready Airbrush in Vanilla

Brows: Benefit Brow Zings in Medium

Powder: Bare Minerals Matte Powder in Fairly Light

Eyes:

Primer: Bare Minerals Prime Time

Allover: Kat Von D Sugar Skull (from Memento Mori palette)

Crease: Kat Von D Peggy (from Angeles palette)

Inner: Ben Nye Lumiere Grande in Sun Yellow

Liquid Liner: elf Liquid Eyeliner in Black

Waterline Liner: Ulta Smokey Eyes in Black

Mascara: Prestige My Biggest Lashes in Black

Stuff I Love Saturdays: Puzzle Books!

This may be one of the nerdiest things that I will ever admit on this blog, but here goes - I, Liz, am absolutely, ridiculously, and completely addicted to puzzle books.

Whether they're meant to build your brain power or just pass time, I own at least one of each of the following: brain games, Sudoku, word search, crossword puzzles. They are like my kryptonite! I have had a word search book constantly for at least the last three or four years, but I changed it up and grabbed the others here and there since. They are great for nights when your significant other is watching something you could care less about on TV!

Word searches were a fun pastime when I lived with an old roommate - we would sit out on our porch, drinking and passing the book back and forth under light from a tiki torch. It was, and still is, a great memory. And I just finished that book last year! This one I'm not nearly as close to finished with.

My boss actually got me addicted to Sudoku accidentally a few months ago. He has a flip calendar with puzzles and games on the backs of some of the pages, and always hands me the Sudoku puzzles. That led me to downloading a Sudoku app on my Kindle Fire, and buying my newest puzzle book.

Brain games are great all on their own - I've always used those types of books, and logic puzzles, to fool myself into thinking that they're keeping my mind 'sharp'. Some days, my mind feels about as sharp as butter, and it has nothing to do with these books!

The next time you're perusing the sale section at Barnes and Noble or cruising through Half Price Books - definitely look out for some of these books. They're cheap entertainment that lasts as long as you let them.

I hope you enjoyed the first Stuff I Love Saturday! I'll be trying to give you more and more of a glimpse into my silly little life with them every week.

Get Pretty Reviews: Benefit Brow Zings

These days, I don't wear makeup every day - or even every other day. I do have some definite go-to products, though - and one place in which that was lacking was my brows! I have used a menagerie of different things to fill my eyebrows in over the years, but was looking for that one product that would just blow me away... and I definitely found it.

Benefit is a great makeup company. I have fallen in love with every product I've ever used! Until now, that list included SheLaq, Lemon Aid, and High Beam. I haven't tried much more, but am definitely interested in a few products. This post isn't about what I want, though, it's what I already have!

Brow Zings are a product that include two things in the compact - a wax for taming unruly eyebrow hairs, and a powder for filling, as well as two tiny brushes. Before finding this compact, I was using a Clinique eyeshadow, and I can say that one use and I was hooked.

The wax holds hairs in place wonderfully, while adding a bit of a dark tint that is only added to when you utilize the powder. A two-step process that now, only takes me a few minutes. One thing I would change, though, is those tiny brushes. I used them a couple of times, but I abandoned them for my regular brow brush. Below is photographic evidence of my first time using the product - I loved it, even then!

For someone with arched (and patchy) eyebrows like mine, a great filler product is a necessity. They make the issues surrounding plucking and waxing for years basically disappear! Thankfully, I found a great product in Brow Zings, and am planning on consulting the Benefit rack at Ulta a bit more religiously at this point!

What are your favorite go-to brow products?

What’s the big deal about Friday the 13th, anyway?

It's a series of eleven campy horror movies released between 1980 and 2003 - and yes, I am aware that they re-made the original Friday the 13th in 2009, but to me, it doesn't count. Because it was awful.

 

Getting up this morning, I, of course realized that today was Friday the 13^th, but thought to myself that I never really figured out where the issue with the day came from – so I consulted my trusty friend Wikipedia and decided to put together a fun little post for all of our information!

Friday the 13^th has been considered an unlucky day for quite some time, since at least the 19^th century. There is no written information about the superstition found before that time as of yet. There are many, many theories which are used to attempt to back it up.

Numerology

The number twelve is considered a complete number, and is reflected in several things including the twelve months of the year and twelve hours of the clock. The number thirteen was originally considered to be irregular, which skews the theory of twelve being complete. As an interesting twist, there is a Norse myth that states having thirteen people seated at a table will result in the death of one of the diners.

Unlucky Day

Since The Canterbury Tales were written in the 14^th century, Friday has been considered unlucky, especially for professionals. It is stated to be an unlucky day to undertake journeys or begin new projects. Don’t most good journeys start on a Friday? Since the 1800’s, ‘Black Friday’ has been known as a day associated with stock market crashes and other grave disasters.

Friday the 13^th also has a phobia named after it! I’ll give you absolutely nothing if you can pronounce it, but you should try anyway:

friggatriskaidekaphobia

‘Frigga’ is the name of the Norse goddess for whom “Friday” is named, and triskaidekaphobia is a fear of the number thirteen. This phobia’s name first appeared in mainstream media in 1953.

In Spanish-speaking and Italian popular culture, Tuesday the 13^th and Friday the 17^th, respectively, are considered their days of bad luck.

What does this mean for us in modern-day society? According to the Stress Management and Phobia institute in Asheville, North Carolina, 17 to 21 million people in the US are affected by a fear of Friday the 13^th, making it the most feared day and date in history.  

A lot of people use Friday the 13th as an excuse to get a tattoo - at least in my world, where 13 tattoos for $13 deals run rampant in tattoo shops everywhere.  And you know - I just might get one today myself.

Now for me, it's just another day. I just thought that perhaps you guys might have been wondering the same thing I was!

Night at the Movies: Magic Mike

For me, going to the movies is an old pastime. I remember being in high school and getting my parents to pony up $20 so I could go see Pirates of the Caribbean for the fourth time and just how exciting it was. Now, movies are overpriced and I'm not the biggest fan of going to them. In the past couple of weeks, however, I've gone to two!

courtesy Lionsgate

Two weekends ago, I got together with my best friend from high school, Laura, and we had a girls' day. That day included shopping, giant margaritas, a trip to the casino, and finally, to see Magic Mike. It looked ridiculous, so of course, I wanted to see it.

seriously, these margaritas were no joke! i had 2.

I personally didn't know the backstory of Channing Tatum's history as a former male stripper, and nor did I really care. I just thought Magic Mike would make a fun afternoon, and it definitely did.

The story followed Mike, a part time male stripper in a revue called Xquisite. His real dream was creating custom furniture, but his credit and background couldn't get him a loan. He wound up doing side work in construction and shaking his ass every night. On one of these side jobs, he met Alex Pettyfer's character, Adam, and decided to bring him along to that night's show. Of course, he didn't let him in on the fact that he thought Adam would make a great addition to the cast.

The cast was great. Matthew McConaughey played the club's manager wonderfully, while Joe Manganiello, Matt Bomer, and the other big names brought up the tail end (get it?) in a great way. Sure, there was a lot of random gratuitous male nudity, but of course it didn't matter but to be a feast to the eyes.

The storyline wasn't something I was expecting. In a way I thought that things jumped around a bit too much - from the club, to the side jobs, to drug overdoses and blossoming relationships - and then it was just over. If I could change anything, I would definitely change the ending. I've also never seen a Steven Soderbergh movie (I don't think), so I wasn't expecting such a large storyline to go along with a film that was being advertised as nothing but a bunch of gratuitous nudity. Definitely was not what I expected, but it was still a good time.

If you're looking for an excuse to hang out with an old friend, or even to get together with the girls, Magic Mike is definitely a surefire bet for a great time.