OOTD & Daily Update 03/27/15

Since I do not have classes today, Fridays are my appointment days.  I have to admit though I do normally wake up confused and wonder why there are so many people walking around campus since it feels like a Saturday morning.. and then I remember that it's not.

Today is actually kind of warm however spring is still being a tease and we are forecast to get more snow I believe tomorrow.  Today we had rain.  Since I was up nice and early on a day that I should be sleeping in, I went 110% for comfort. 

This top just understands me - thank you Brandy Melville.  I wore this today as I drank both a medium latte from Dunkin Donuts and a grande latte from Starbucks within 3 hours.

Incase you noticed, yes I did change my hair up a little and an entire blog post about it is coming up!

*Shout out to the rain for trying to make my hair curl against my will*

Jeans and the signature Bean boots round out my outfit. I love my Express jeans & they are insanely comfortable; my one recommendation is to try them on because you can probably go down a size.  The jeans do run slightly large and I could probably comfortably fit into a size smaller than I bought but I ordered mine online - they were having one of their very many sales/deals - and did not feel like exchanging them a the time because they do fit well enough I just need a belt.

Top - Brandy Melville

Jeans - Express

Socks - J.Crew

Boots - L.L. Bean

The other day, J.Crew was having a 30% off spring styles deal online and needing a little spring in my life I decided to put in a small order.  I am ordering more and more from J.Crew Factory however since there was a sale I wanted a few monogrammed pieces.  I was extremely excited when I found out I had not only one package today but four - one for each item ordered apparently!

My lucky day :)

I do have a few other items from various places so I'm going to do a small spring haul post soon rather than showing this stuff and then having an absolutely tiny post being like "oh hey look what else came too!"

Let me know in the comments below any ideas for posts!

Until next time,

Xox

Weekly Update: OOTD 03/17/15 & 03/18/15

Since a goal of mine was to blog more, I am now going to try to do outfit of the day posts and I will fill in other blog posts around them about products I love. I may do a look through some of my outfits this week type of post instead of an everyday thing so let me know below what you'd be interested in seeing! 

Today is St. Patrick's day!! I don't own much green despite being Irish so I had to work to find an outfit for today... This is not the best quality picture but you can get the idea!

 All black green everything today, or well at least I tried, even with my sock :)

Top: J.Crew

Jeans: AG jeans in Ballad 

I also treated myself this holiday, and what better way to celebrate than with booze! JK with a GREEN cupcake! You need to get you green foods in don't you?

Since the cold front never really left and warm weather has been such a tease, I needed a warm and cozy outfit to make it to my early class.  This is my flannel, no I did not steal it from any boy, it is from the mens section of LLBean, my dad has the matching one.

Top: LLBean

Jeggings: Zara

Boots: Trouve (from 4 or 5 years ago) - any black combat boot will work

Slow and Steady Wins the Race

            My fitness journey has been a long one to say the least.  I’ve learned a lot over my journey and though at times I get frustrated and feel like I haven’t been making progress, I have to focus on how far I’ve come.  One of the most important things that I have learned is to be proud – be proud of myself, be proud of my accomplishments so far and be proud of my body.  I know that I still have a long way to go both physically and mentally but I am working on seeing the positives instead of negatives in regards to my body.  I know that I will never be tinsy-tiny; I will never be model skinny; that is not the way that my body is built. I am okay with that now.  At the beginning of my journey I just wanted to be skinny, I wanted to be small and I had the completely wrong ideas about how my body would be.  Now, I want to focus more on toning up while also losing fat.

            Even though I am not currently seeing the progress that I want to, I am still around 20 lbs below my highest weight.  I went from being a size 16 to now fitting into a size 10.  I still look at myself and feel that I am big and I see all of the things that I still need to improve.  I need to remember that there was a time I would’ve been ecstatic to be a size 10. 

Here are some of my small goals to help me get to my ultimate goal:

1.     Control my eating.  I am all about everything in moderation but the key word is moderation. It is also important for me to not use food as a reward - that is not a mindset that I want to have.
2.     Establish and stick to a workout routine.  I am currently doing the Bikini Body Guide (still) and I will probably go through it again when I complete it.  I miss going to yoga and pilates and weight training so I am going to work on incorporating everything back into my routine.
3.     Find positives and things I like about my body.
4.     Focus on toning instead of the numbers on the scale.
5.   Not let thoughts about my weight and the food I am eating control my life - I want to enjoy everything during this journey.

My goals are still weight loss related but I want to learn to be happy and be confident during all of the stages at this progress.  I do not want to hate my body at any point and I no longer want to be cruel to myself.

I know that the working out that I am planning for myself seems like a lot but I have come to genuinely enjoy working out.  Working out is a major stress relief for me and I will go to the gym if I am upset or angry to get my aggression out and let the endorphins kick in.  My best advice for working out is to find something you love, it is important to start small and work your way up and to stick with it.  If you aren’t used to working out, it can or will be miserable in the beginning but if you stick with it you will notice progress – you will notice that it becomes bearable and you may even begin to enjoy it.

In the comments below let me know your goals! If you are interested in more fitness posts I have a tumblr and instagram: both blacktsskinnyjeans where I post most of my fitness related tidbits.

Oil as a Primer?

Typically face primers are to make your makeup last and people with oily skin know that oil does not help your makeup stay put. MAC’s face prep&prime oil may be the exception to the rule. I was very skeptical when I saw the oil on the MAC website but the reviews were pretty good and I figured why not give it a shot and I am so glad that I gave it a try. 

1.   It feels great on your skin when you apply it – especially with the harsh winter air/cold that strips your skin.
2.     It does help you makeup apply smoothly
3.     Also helps keeping your makeup from caking on dry patches
4.     You can mix it in with your foundation like you can mix in a lotion

After I apply my moisturizer in the morning, I put a couple of drops of the oil on my fingers and rub my hands together and then smooth and press the oil into my face. I then put my foundation on my hands (without washing the rest of the oil off) and use my fingers to apply my foundation.  Then I apply my concealer etc. aka, I finish putting on my face, which I do normally set with powder, and my makeup stays.  When I wash my face at night, I have noticed that it is washing off more foundation than it used to – I use cleansing oil and when I rinse it off my face, I wait until the water runs clear.  The water used to run clear after one splash, now it takes a couple so my makeup is definitely sticking. I also believe that it has been helping my skin.  My skin has been SO dry recently and after a week of using this, I looked in the mirror after I woke up and my first thought was that my skin looked good. The bottle is pretty small but you do not need to use a lot of the oil. I wasn't one for primers before, that was definitely one part of my routine that I would skip/was lacking in; I only used eye primers because face primers did not show much of a difference.

Have you tried the new priming oil? If so, let me know your thoughts!

Until next time, xox