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!

november makeup haul

So now that I have a decent discount at CVS (and because of the sales during Black Friday, etc), I've been purchasing A LOT and I mean A LOT of beauty products. My beauty products have grown exponentially in the last couple of months.

Item: Rimmel Stay Matte Pressed Powder in 001 transparent

Cost (at Target): $4.99

Promotions: 5% off if you have the Target RedCard

Thoughts: I've been using this as a setting powder for my foundation and it does the job. I haven't really tried anything else so I can't really compare it to anything. I like that it's very sheer (obviously being that the name is transparent lol) and makes it sets my makeup pretty well. I haven't had any problems with it so far. I use this pretty much everyday and it doesn't break me out. I think I want to try the MAC Studio Fix Foundation next so I can compare. For the price, I think this is a good product especially since I'm just starting out using make up. 

Item: NYC Bronzer in Sunny

Cost (at Target): $2.74

Promotions: 5% off with Target RedCard

Thoughts: This product is super beloved by one of my favorite YouTubers, Holly, so of course I had to try it. It was actually quite hard to find but I just happened to stumble upon it at Target (this is exactly why you end up spending well over $50 every time you go!). I use this for contouring and it works really well. I've stopped using this one and started using the Rimmel one that I bought/got for free at Ulta (also available at Target and other drug stores) and to me, I can't really tell the difference :/. I've been really loving the way the Rimmel one comes out though. Now that I think of it I feel like Sunny bronzer comes off quite a bit darker than the Rimmel one so maybe for people with more tan skin, sunny bronzer might be better. I'm getting pretty light these days being that I pretty much stay inside for work so I think that may be the reason why I like the Rimmel one better. 

Item: Revlon Super Lustrous Lipgloss in 130 Pink Whisper and 010 Shine City (respectively)

Cost (at CVS): $8.99 orig (I believe these are like $5.74 at Target)

Promotions: I paid $8.38 for both the lipglosses because I had ExtraBucks and my employee discount. They were also BOGO 50% off. 

Thoughts: LOVE LOVE LOVE these lipglosses!! I love the packaging because they feel really high quality. I keep both of these in my purse. I like using Shine City on top of any lipstick that I use because it really hydrates my lips. I want to reiterate that these lipglosses are super amazing and I'd highly recommend them. I usually hate all lip products unless it's like Chapstick or something because my lips are very peel-y. If I put any kind of lip product on it, there will inevitably be white clumps where my lips meet (like I'm foaming at the mouth or something) but not with these lipglosses. I find that the MAC lipglosses that I had before were super sticky and these are definitely not like that. 

Item: Maybelline Color Sensational Lip Gloss in 015 Born With It

Cost (at CVS): $7.99

Promotions: BOGO 50% off Maybelline cosmetics

Thoughts: I'll have to admit I only got this because of the name lol. "Maybe she's born with it... maybe it's Maybelline..." So fricken catchy! Anyway, this doesn't really compare to the Revlon lipglosses. This color is really nice though. It's actually really close to my natural lip color is if I was going for the "I didn't use any lip stick, just clear gloss" look, then this would be perfect. I guess this gloss is pretty good too... I think it just seems to be way less product than the Revlon one and the packaging is nicer for the Revlon one too lol. Darn.. I'm judging a book by its cover lol. 

Item: Revlon Nail Polish in Starry Pink 

Cost (at Target): $3.99

Promotions: 5% off with Target RedCard

Thoughts: Love this color and the sparkles! I had to get it when I saw it because it was the only one left and $3.99 really isn't bad at all! You definitely need a top coat for this one. The sparkles kept scratching me because I was too lazy to use a topcoat lol. 

Item: L'oreal True Match Super-Blendable Powder in Buff Beige

Cost (at CVS): $10.99 orig (with coupons and my discount, I paid $1.75 for this :))

Promotions: Spend $10 on L'oreal cosmetics and get $3 Extra Bucks.

Thoughts: Before my recent venture into liquid foundation, this was my go-to holy grail product. This product seriously does wonders. It looks extremely natural on skin and is light enough so you can just carry it in your purse for touch-ups (although this product doesn't stay on skin for very long). This product seriously makes your skin look really flawless and covers up any discoloration. My skin is super discolored because of all the acne and my freckles (they could be sun spots too... but I'll pretend they're freckles lol). Liquid foundation definitely without a doubt covers 100x better but if you don't have a lot to cover up then this is the perfect light foundation for you. 

Item: elf Blush in Tickled Pink and Mellow Mauve

Cost (at Target): $3.00 each

Promotions: 5% off with Target RedCard

Thoughts: Like seriously, I might as well have been stealing these right off the shelves! So fricken affordable!! Tickled Pink is a very light color and looks really natural. It gives you that "I pinched my cheeks" look although sometimes I feel like it's so light that you can't even tell it's there. Mellow Mauve is much darker and is almost purple-y. It's perfect for fall but I don't feel like I can use it for everyday.   

Item: Revlon Nail Polish in Facets of Fuchsia

Cost (at Target): $3.74

Promotions: 5% off with Target RedCard

Thoughts: I haven't used this one yet but I'm sure it'll be just as pretty as the Starry Pink one.   

Item: Revlon Lip Butters in 095 Creme Brulee and 035 Candy Apple

Cost (at Target): $6.39 each

Promotions: 5% off with Target RedCard

Thoughts: I'm pretty much IN LOVE with Revlon Lip Butters! They keep my lips so moisturized and the colors are very buildable. I think I might have at least 10 of these lol. Anyways, I was trying to get a neutral one for everyday and a kind of out there one. Creme brulee is definitely very neutral and I love using it for every day. Candy apple came on a lot darker than I expected. It's pretty red on me and maybe I just haven't gotten use to this much color so it looks a little weird on me. I just love the consistency of this product and I can't wait to purchase even more! I really want every single color!

Item: Revlon Super Lustrous Lipgloss in Pearl Plum

Cost (at Target): $

Promotions: 5% off with Target RedCard

Thoughts: Great color for fall and just love everything about this product!

Item: Rimmel Lasting Finish Pro Nail Polish in Steel Grey

Cost (at Ulta): $3.99

Promotions: Buy 2 Rimmel Items, get one free

Thoughts: So I just bought this because I needed to get something to get the free item and I figured Grey would be nice for fall. It didn't stay for 10 days without chipping but it was pretty darn close! It lasted longer and was in better condition than OPI polish after a week of wear and tear. 

So I haven't had much time to update recently because I've had to fill in since people have to use up their vacation hours or else they become void. So excited that the end of the year is already here! Love the holidays! Hope everyone has a great week!

completely slammed

So I'm sure everyone has heard (literally) the Santa Ana winds blowing down tons of trees all over SoCal.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2011/12/high-winds-la-mayor-surveys-damage-after-storm.html

It got so bad that some of the San Gabriel Valley has lost power including all of Temple City and some parts of Pasadena.

**edit: most of this post was removed due to some new regulations**

Hope everyone is starting their December's off on the right foot!

Love and miss you guys who are far away!!

november: week 3

Week 3 of November started off with my birthday and I realized that there were some pictures I had neglected to upload from my phone. When I got home from The Grove, my parents actually bought me a cake as well and we had a mini celebration at home.

Here are some more pictures from Disneyland (all food lol).

On Tuesday and Wednesday I didn't do much except clean. I was trying to clean out my closet and also find my winter jackets. I ended up finding a bunch of clothes to donate. A lot of really old t-shirts and sweatpants from the good 'ole UCLA days. I also had a bunch of Victoria's Secret PINK sweatpants that I never wear. Couldn't bear to give those away though lol. Those sweatpants were expensive!

Anyways, I worked on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. On Thursday after work, Judy and I went to see Breaking Dawn at the midnight showing. It was so crazy! We got there at around 10pm and there were 16 different LONG ASS LINES. I mean 16 full theaters waiting for this movie O_O. In defense of the books, they were really great (not Shakespeare or anything) but written in a way a Nicholas Sparks book grips you in its romances. It's written in such a way that makes you have hope that there is love in this world. Maybe it's just me and maybe the world has always been this way but to me it has gotten a lot more depressing these days... Well enough of that lol. I had to make Judy take a picture with this poster because we decided not to wait in the long lines and just sit in the food court instead haha. Doesn't this look so great?! lol. If only I could Photoshop it so it would look better lol.

After work on Saturday, we went to support Tony's cousin who's a DJ. She was DJ-ing at AVEC, this night club in Huntington Beach. It was interesting to be back in that environment to say the least lol. Here are some pictures.

We were supposed to get filet mignon pho at this one restaurant but I got super sick so we went home. The next day it was super rainy weather so we decided to get BCD Tofuhouse. After that we went back to Tony's cousin's house and watched a bit of Get Him to the Greek. I was super surprised by how funny it was! Still can't believe Russell Brand is the bunny in Hop lol (I digress lol). We were halfway thru when we had to make a quick stop at Disneyland to ElecTRONica to see a friend of his cousins DJ. It was pretty cool because it was raining so they had it indoors.

After ElecTRONica, we got Cheesecake Factory to-go, went back to Tony's cousin's place, and finished watching Get Him to the Greek. That pretty much ended my 3rd week of November. Since lots went on for Thanksgiving, I'll save that for a separate post. Although there won't be that many pictures.

Hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving!