tuesday day off randomness

Howdies!

So I've been super spoiled with only working 3 days a week and now that I'm working 5 days a week, I feel completely spent. Today was my day off and since it'll be my only day off (besides the weekend) before Chinese New Year, I really wanted to spend the whole day cleaning my room, car, etc. I'm not sure about you guys but I always feel like when my life is a mess, my room is usually the same way and when I clean up my room, my life also starts going more smoothly sooooo lol long story short, the last week has been pretty horrible (especially this last weekend) so that means a deep cleansing for my room.

Here's my OOTD. Just a racerback tank from Pacsun, jeggings from Forever 21, and AE long sleeve shirt.

Anyways, I started off the day by going to the post office. I ordered 2 Naked 2 palettes because I was going to give one to my friend Lauren for Christmas so I went to send one to her. I had to get them as soon as I saw that they were available on Sephora. I was actually waiting because I had my "Welcome to VIB" 10% off coupon so it ended up being a pretty good deal.

After the post office, I went to get a hair cut. I've been growing out my hair but lately, it really just feels like a bird's nest (I mean literally, some of the tangles were making my hair look like a bird's nest). So I went the Supercuts, my go-to place hahaha. I ended up purchasing a leave-in conditioner, detangler/everything else from them. I bought a small bottle since the large one was like $36. She sprayed a bit in my hair and I've had it on the whole day and it feels pretty nice. Not too heavy.

After leaving Supercuts, I went to the mall to Nordy's and Ziba. If you have a Ziba near you, don't forget about their Happy Hour special (from 2-5pm on Mondays & Tuesdays). I got my brows and upper lip done for $12. Such a steal! Anywhos, I saw Lauren's post on how Butter London's Nail Foundation is a good basecoat especially for glitter polish and I had a Nordy's giftcard so I had to try it out. I bought the set with the Hardwear top coat and the Nail Foundation basecoat for $25. They were sold separately for $18 so it was a better deal to get them in the set.

So I'm not one for patience so I messed up when I was painting my nails earlier. Here are the results:

Red polish is "Cocktail Waitress" by ULTA and stop sparkles is actually 051 "Starry Pink" by Revlon. I wanted nice red nails for Chinese New Year. So being the impatient person that I am, I was trying to paint my right hand while my left hand was drying and messed up one of my nails so I had to remove all the messed up glitter and polish on my index finger. To my surprise, it was so fricken easy to remove the glitter! I was literally shocked! I had painted my nails with Starry Pink when I had first purchased it but it seriously took my over 30 minutes and numerous cotton pads to remove the glitter. Like the rest of the polish would be gone but the glitter was still stuck on my nail. But with the nail foundation, I was able to use one cotton pad on 2 different nails (I messed up another nail while trying to soak the cotton pad... I know... lol). I used 2 coats of the top coat so lets see how long the nails will last before they start chipping.

I think it was last weekend when my friend painted my nails with the OPI Shatter nail polish and I was sooooo disappointed that it didn't even last me 3 days. It started chipping on the next day. We used basecoat and top coat. She painted them for me on Saturday night and by Tuesday, this is what they looked like:

Anyhow, that pretty much concludes my day. Back to more laundry! Hopefully my nails won't get ruined :/. Hope everyone has a great rest of the week!

P.S. You can now subscribe via Google Reader or any other "reader" type service by going to the little button all the way on the right hand side of the navigation bar and clicking the button that looks like a sideways Wifi tracker. Hope that makes it easier to read/subscribe!

Thanks for reading!

new title and blog address

Not sure if my subscribers will get this post but I've decided to change my web address to timesnewjen.blogspot.com so if you come to my blog and it's "gone" it's because of the change. Anywhos, I had a busy day off running errands and I'll post a little something later. In the process of painting my nails :). Trying out the new Butter Long Hardwear & Nail Foundation I got today (using my Nordy's gift card, Thanks Pearl!)

december: week 1 & 2

Howdies!

Just wanted to catch up on some December blogging and just wanted to give you guys a preview of some new products I'm testing out. Hopefully I'll find some good stuff :). Hope everyone had a great weekend. Mine was fantastically horrible... as in came home in tears Saturday night and worked 12 hours straight on Sunday. But what's done is done. Count it as a lesson learned. What doesn't kill you, only makes you stronger. I find that motto quite useful these days. Anywhos, on to the happenings of December...

dec. 1-5 (thursday thru monday): workin' it

dec. 3 (saturday): after work, I met up with Tanya & Jason and Tony at Disneyland just for a small get-together since they were in town. We got some drinks at ESPN Zone while we waited for a table at Rainforest Cafe. And of course, we had to get more drinks :).

dec. 6 (tuesday): went to ziba to get my eyebrows done, bought some stuff at the mall and went to kohl's for christmas presents. Then went to Disneyland with Pearl. We tried to do as many holiday things as possible and I also got to try the clam chowder bowl for the first time!

clam chowder bowl... ooozing with yummy goodness

it's a small world... on crack

dec. 7-9 (wednesday thru friday): workin' it

dec. 10 (saturday): spent the weekend in San Diego. Woke up and totally craved Chick-Fil-A so I got some of that for breakfast :). Then spent the afternoon in Julian just walking around. Julian is this little town that reminds me of Big Bear... but without the snow (well at least when I was there). It's up in the mountains and it's basically a small town with little shops... and pies lol. I'm not the biggest pie fan so I didn't buy one but there were people lined up for that stuff. We ate at this soda fountain shop called Miner's Diner. I ordered a Buffalo Burger because I don't think I've ever had one before and I wanted to try it.

I also go strawberry flavored soda. Soooo good!

Their fries were super good too! I think these were the ones that tasted like gynormous McDonald's fries (yes, I like McDonald's fries lol).

After Julian, we did some extreme couponing at Target and then joined Tony's friends at Ballast Point Brewing Company for some beers. They had these huge barrels for tables which I thought were pretty cool.

Stopped at Yardhouse for some food and then walked a couple blocks to Fumari Hookah Lounge.

That pretty much concluded my weekend in San Diego.

I guess I'll end this post here. Laundry's done :). Hope everyone has a great rest of the week!

november jewelmint purchases

For the month of November, I also made quite a few Jewelmint purchases.

I ordered the Bewitchmint Mystery Bag which was a super deal since you get 2 items for $29.99. I don't even have that many Jewelmint pieces but I was still worried that they were going to give me a duplicate. Anyways, the 2 items I ended up getting were the Morning Rain Earrings (my first earrings from Jewelmint!) and the Silver Zip Bracelet (I just realized this was my first bracelet from Jewelmint too lol... maybe they were trying to get me to branch out from my orders of only necklaces and rings :/)

Silver Zip Bracelet

My thoughts: I'm not a big fan of bangle type bracelets and I loved the zipper look of this bangle but I didn't want to purchase it because my wrists are very small and I felt like I'd be better off getting something that was more adjustable. When I first opened the package I was a little disappointed to find the Silver Zip Bracelet. There's also a Bronze Zip Bracelet and in Holly's video she had recommended the Bronze one for people that liked to wear two toned jewelry. I'm actually surprised by how well this goes with my other everyday bracelets from Express. Here's a picture of how they look together. I totally love how well they mesh! This is pretty much my go-to combo now in addition to 2 other bracelets I added from a recent jewelry haul from Forever 21. 

Morning Rain Earrings

My thoughts: I saw these earrings on Holly and they look so nice on her! But unfortunately I'm not a huge fan of the dangly things. Maybe I'm just like constantly whipping my head back and forth (...I whip my hair back and forth, I whip my hair back and forth...) but those danglies get all stuck and then they look like a broken leg bending the wrong way at the knee. It's good if you don't move your head that much. They look very navajo inspired and I like the Jewelmint detail on the back. I won't be wearing these too much since I don't wear earrings to work but they are good for going out.

sorry! i don't know where the ring is. 

So for the month of November, my Top Match was the Starburst Ring. I absolutely LOVED this ring on the site. I know it's very simple and doesn't look unique to Jewelmint but I still loved it lol. That was until I actually got it lol. So far, all the rings I've gotten from Jewelmint have been very loose on me and with this ring having such a large topper, it was very prone to becoming lopsided when worn. It looks a lot better on than in the box though. I've worn this ring a few times since I've gotten it and it is still toppling over because the ring portion is too big. I ordered a size 6 and wear this ring on my middle finger and it's still too big for me. I did get a compliment on it once so I think if you have a larger finger, I think this ring would be nice. Maybe you can try to do that "ring adjusting" thing I saw on ExtraPetite. Make sure to subscribe if you like her blog! She's one of my favorite bloggers.

Anyways, this post is super late but I never got the chance to take a picture of the Starburst ring lol and now I can't even find it :/. Hopefully these items will come back into stock if you guys like them!

Happy Thursday! It's actually my "Sunday" since I have to work tomorrow and all weekend so send me some good vibes! Have a great weekend!

new year means new opportunity

thank you for reading :)

Each new year brings the opportunity to change and be "all that you can be". Of course these changes aren't going to happen over night but I think writing them down makes goals a little more accomplishable (is that a word? lol I'm guessing it is being that there is no red squiggly under it lol). Most people will call these New Years Resolutions but I'd like to just call them my goals for the year just because I feel like there is something negative attached to "New Years Resolutions" since people usually fail at keeping their New Years Resolutions. Anyway, I've made a separate page for these goals (on the top menu bar) and I will also link it here.

In addition, I think it's also very important to reflect on goals you've accomplished not to brag but just to pat yourself on the back and reinforce the fact that you can do anything you set your mind to. So in 2011, I accomplished some things I'd like to reflect on.

One of my biggest accomplishments of 2011 was finishing school. After 4 years of undergrad, 1 year off to finish pre-requisites, 2 years of grueling grad school and 1 year of rotations, I was finally done! No more school!! I was talking to one of my preceptors and we were talking about how people always say "Oh you'll miss school when you're out in the real world" and we were both like, "No!" lol. I don't miss school because it's a 24/7 worry. When you leave the work place, you don't have to go home and do homework (unless you want to lol), you're just done. When I used to work at Forever 21 they used to tell us that everyone has baggage  but when you're at work, check your baggage at the door. Well, I've applied the same mentality except the opposite. When I'm home, I check my work baggage at the door and just enjoy my time not thinking about work. Sometimes, that's really difficult since there are days where a customer decides to use you as their personal punching bag but on most days, it works perfectly fine.

Then there was the job search that landed me my first job in the profession and my entrance into the "real world". It was such a weird feeling that working would now be my priority instead of studying. After that, the pressure was on because my job was dependent on me passing my board exams. Thankfully, I was able to pass on the first try and officially became a licensed professional on August 18th, 2011.

The first couple weeks of work were full of sleepless nights. Thoughts of, "Did I lock up properly?" and "Did I do this or that correctly?" kept me up at night but after the initial period, I was able to get the hang of things and build a little more confidence in what I do.

My final and one of the most fulfilling accomplishments of 2011 was paying off a debt in its entirety. I, unfortunately, still have debt from undergrad from UCLA and one of the loans had been in grace since I graduated. However, the grace period would expired in Jan 2012 and interest would start accruing. I decided to pay off the entire debt to avoid paying any interest. I think it was well worth not getting my Chanel bag to pay off that debt lol. I figure, if I save $500 per month for the next 9 months, I'll be able to afford my bag ;) (or I just might use it to pay off my other loans lol). I guess we'll see in a year what happened!

I hope that everyone gets a little push from this post to make 2012 the best year possible! I mean the world could be dunzo by the end of the year so enjoy! lol I hope that you guys found this post useful and will start your own goals lists!

Thanks for reading and Happy Hump Day!

november: week 4 and week 5

Going back to look at what I did this week and I realized I didn't do much lol.

Monday Nov. 21st: cleaned my closet, went to the bank, donated stuff to Goodwill and went to Michael's to return some stuff I didn't end up using for Lauren's bridal shower invitations. Here's what they ended up looking like:

Tuesday Nov. 22nd: I'm guessing I did absolutely nothing since I have nothing documented in my calendar lol. Geez, what would I do without Google Calendar?!

Wednesday Nov. 23rd: worked 1:30-10pm then drove down to San Diego

Thursday Nov. 24th: Thanksgiving Day. Since my family doesn't really celebrate many holidays, I spent the day in San Diego with Tony's family. Lots of yummy food :D. It's really too bad I don't have any pictures of the food. I was too busy being a fatty lol. Sadly, I had work the next day so I drove back up to LA after eating dinner.

Friday Nov. 25th: Black Friday. I had the opening shift on Black Friday but it wasn't too bad. It really felt like a regular day. The only down fall was that we had to cut hours since it was a holiday weekend and we were supposed to be "slow". Didn't do any Black Friday shopping except at Bath & Body Works. There wasn't really anything that I needed. Since the I had the whole weekend off, I drove down to San Diego after shopping.

Saturday Nov. 26th: Started the day with a late lunch at Boudin at the Fashion Valley Mall. I had wanted to take a look at some Chanel bags (I was looking for one as a present to myself for Christmas) so we checked out Neiman Marcus. They had a little Chanel boutique inside and so I went and looked at the different styles. I think my eyes must've popped out of their sockets though when the lady told me  that it would cost $4,300 lol. Literally O_O. I mean, with that amount I could almost pay off my whole Perkins Loan which was $6,000. I decided to go home and mull over it for awhile. No need for a $4,000 impulse buy!

After spending about 5 hours at the mall (lol) we went to get thai food with Tony's friends. The place was pretty good although some of us didn't tolerate the food too well. Hopefully it was just a one time thing. We then went to hang out at Tony's friend's apartment.

Sunday Nov. 27th:
On Sunday morning we went to have dim sum with Tony's family. During dim sum, we started talking about shopping and it turned out that his aunt and cousin were going to go to the Victoria's Secret Outlet store and apparently it's the only one on the west coast. It's right at the border, exactly at the last US exit. I couldn't pass that opportunity up lol so I went with them to see if I could scout out some good deals while Tony stayed with his uncles to watch the Charger game. They had some pretty good deals. I don't think I'll be needing any more undies for a long time. Their undies were 10 for $30 (so $3 each) and I also bought a silk robe for $12.99. They also had 5 for $20 lotions in some of the more popular scents and some new scents as well. I think it's a really good place to buy gifts for a lot of girls like if you're in a sorority and you want to get everyone some stocking stuffers (perhaps buy one of the those circle clear ornament type things and put a cute panty inside with a lotion on the side). I might be making a yearly trip here to just buy some essentials. They have A LOT of the PINK stuff and also their work out gear so if people want to stock up because of their New Years Resolutions then it might be a nice spot to stop at (if you're in Southern California haha). After shopping, it was already getting late so I decided to just stay in San Diego and go home Monday night instead.

Monday Nov. 28th:
Tony had work so I just had breakfast with his mom and we just talked a little about our upcoming trip to Hawaii for my friend's wedding. After breakfast we were just watching some stuff she had DVR-ed and one of them happened to be the Hallmark movie "Have a Little Faith" which is based on the book by Mitch Albom. I've always loved Mitch Albom books ever since Tuesdays with Morrie came out so we decided to watch that. Kind of embarrassing though 'cause I was definitely tearing up at some parts haha. Stupid overactive tear secretion gland! Or I should really say all sweat secretion glands in general lol. After we had dinner, it was time for me to drive back to LA.

Tuesday Nov. 29th:
I guess I didn't have work until Thursday lol so on Tuesday I was Judy's chauffer since she needed to go to Joann's to buy stuff for our FF Christmas Gift Exchange and she didn't have a car 'cause she got into a little fender bender. Fortunately, no one was hurt. Anyways, I guess now that Christmas is over, I can kind of share what she was making. She got some yarn and felt to make us all personalized reusable cup sleeves! Super cute. Don't know if you can see if very well but it's in this picture.

Tony got the blue sleeve with the Charger emblem? logo? lol on it (which Judy did an AMAZING job on... can we say Etsy shop?!) and I got the one with the penguin! Super cute!!

Wednesday Nov. 30th: Last Day of the Month!
Spent the day doing some holiday shopping at Target and the mall since they were having that coupon where you spend $50 and get a $10 gift card. Bought all the supplies I needed to make Lauren's famous cereal mix for my coworkers and for the FF secret santa party.

And that concludes the month of November! 

Hope everyone is having a Happy Tuesday! I've spent the entire day trying to organize my music. I guess I had my iTunes set on "automatically organize" my music and I really didn't like how they were doing it so I've been moving and renaming all my files. I really didn't realize how much music I had until now. I think I spent 2 hours just renaming and organizing my Glee music folder lol so right now that's the only thing in my iTunes lol. Anywhos, have a great evening! I'm off to get ready for a dinner date! Talk to you guys soon!

Happy New Year!

Coolest pin I found for New Years. It actually goes switches from 2011 to 2012

Happy New Year to my friends and blog readers, new and old!

Thank you for making my first year of blogging a personal success :). I finally reached 2000 hits in the month of November!! Very exciting stuff! Anyways, I took a pretty long hiatus because work has been crazy... or I should say "cray cray" lol. I've been scheduled 40 hours every week (I usually only work 3 days a week... yes... I know... it's a hard life :P lol) and plus they usually schedule me on the weekends and I'll get a day off on the weekdays (which is when I get most of my blogging done). Anywhos, I'll catch you guys up on November and December events soon. I'm still in the process of adjusting to my new iMac and transferring all my files over so it shall be super funsies!