Kleancolor Military Green

After falling madly in love with Kleancolor's Holo Chrome, I decided to check out the rest of their offerings.

I find I really hate swatches on websites. When I saw China Glaze's holiday collection on their website, I was all "oh, ho ho ho-hum...." but once I saw that Scrangie's swatches I had to run out any buy it.
Unfortunately, Kleancolor's website suffers the same fault: bottle pics with photoshopped highlights. I will applaud them for having clear photos with a good amount of contrast and saturation - but we all know how things don't always look the same in the bottle.

Thankfully, that whole paragraph is completely negated by Kleancolor's flickr stream.

You should be able to click this and go there. If not, there's a link on their site.

Boo yeah! It must be lovely where Kleancolor is headquartered because they have outside, sunny photos of each colour. It almost makes it worthless for any of us in the midwest to bother swatching Kleancolor until summer.

But I'm going to anyway.

I saw Military green at my LBS but wasn't sure if I wanted to buy it. After being really underwhelmed by Galaxy Girl, I just don't feel like spending money on polish I haven't yet seen (thank God for Zoya's 3 for free deal, huh?). After viewing it on Kleancolor's flickr, though, I was pretty sure I wanted it and purchased it during my last beauty supply splurge. All 15 bucks of splurge...

3 coats + Orly Matte Top

I originally put this on last night and then scuffed it all up doing the dishes. In an instant of laze, I just slapped another coat on top today. For a very military look, I added the matte top coat I happened to have closest. Orly Matte Top isn't as matte as some of my other faves. I actually can't recall if I used this after I bought it. I'd really like to deathmatch my matte coats. My LBS has Kleancolor's Madly Matte, so I'll be sure to pick that up.  I hope that it will be more matte than Orly.

Even with more of a satin look rather than flat primer, I think I got a good army green base for some fun nail art.
And I know a thing or two about a military look...

New Year

Today is Day One of 2011.

I don't try to hold any illusions that somehow, magically, the passing of one day is going to make all the difference. "Oh let's shake off the dust of 2010"... Okay, but why not shake off the dust of Thursday on Friday or shake off the dust of November in December?

I do hope, however, to get myself back on track.

As I sit now, the road has been long with many a winding turn. And somewhere along the way, I forgot the declaration I made (and was then made fun of for) on my first day of beauty school 10 years ago:

"I want to specialise in vintage styles and work on movies about the past."

Yes, all the Jerseyliscious wannabes in my class laughed and scoffed that I would have such a specific desire... But I saw my desire as no more specific than "I want to work on Oprah's show" or "I want to own my own salon".
Of course, when it came time for fingerwaves and pincurls, I got laughed at even more because I didn't get it quickly. Once someone OVER the age of 30 taught me though, I got it and now I can fingerwave like a mo-fo.

So why, when I had such a dream for myself, am I now working in small town Indiana and praying daily that someone will want something more than "just a trim". How I hate those words!
"Just a trim."
"Just a trim."
"Just a trim."
"Just a trim."
"Just a trim."
"Just a trim."
"Just a trim."
"Just a trim."
"Just a trim."
"Just a trim."
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

I have to remind myself that "just a trim" will put me right back to square one when I move again in 4 years. I know I won't be able to pay for rent in Toronto with trims, let alone the higher general costs that Americans associate with living abroad (someone from Toronto, please quash that belief!).

So as I come in to 2011, I'm feel like I've found the beginning of that trail I walked down for so long.

I am going to specialise in vintage hair.
2 nights ago, I had to cut my own hair because - after a year - I can't find anyone in this town that puts themselves out there as a vintage hairstylist. Goodness, I even got ahold of the Vintage Pattern Library which is based in Indianapolis for advice. Nobody.
So not only am I going to specialise in vintage hair, I am going to market myself as a vintage hair specialist.

Once I have such a reputation, I'm sure I can take my skills and portfolio to Toronto and not start at square one again. It will take work, but I can do work. In 2 years, I went from working at a front for Polish gangsters to teaching barbering to other stylists. It happened with work. I can do it again!

Makeup, first day of work:

Today, I had my first day at my new salon. It has been a while since I've had to care at all about what I look. Well, I mean that I care... We all care or we'd never buy a hairbrush. I just mean that I haven't "had" to get done up in the morning for quite some time.

Last night, I took my shower, tweezed my unibrow, shaved my upper lip (I just can't handle wax there) and all that business so I could sleep in a little more. I only wash my hair about twice a week because it seems to make my hair loss* worse. I also don't bother shaving my legs because I always wear trousers. Sadly, because of this, I've really gotten out of practice and it takes me almost 10 minutes to shave.
Anyway, when I woke up, I feel like I woke up pretty fresh...

Or as fresh as one can be with not enough sleep. :(

It's a little embarrassing that this is the first glimpse of yours truly, but we might as well get the glamour shots out of the way first off.

To get ready for today, the very first thing I did was iron out my hair. I love the texture of my hair first in the morning, but by midday what looks like lovely beachy waves turns into some kind of white trash lookin' hot mess. You can see also that my hair is all separated and a bit chunky looking. I sweat really bad at night and I wake up kinda goofy - but that's also what makes it curly. To counteract that greasyness, I use Bed Head Rockaholic Dirty Secret Dry Shampoo.

Next, I used Benefit Cosmetics' EyeCon eye cream because it makes undereye concealer go on smoother and That Gal primer all over my face. For "foundation", I use Hello Flawless. I dust it on with the brush all over then use the sponge on my spots. I really hate foundation. Halfway through the day, it makes me itch. All of it. I have yet to find a brand that doesn't make me want to claw my face off. Even Hello Flawless makes me want to pick at my face... Which, sadly I did halfway thru my day.

For colour, I used the new holiday Her Name Was Glowla kit. Coralista blush really looks good on everyone even though it looks like crazy 80s stuff in the box. I'm quite fair and it is so nice and glowing on me.

In fact, you can barely see Coralista in this pic!

I also used Revlon Just Bitten lipstain (the new marker type) in either Flame or Gothic - I have both - under the lipgloss in the Glowla kit and Benefit Brow Zings to cover the fact that I really don't have much of an inner 1/3 to my eyebrows.

Everything wore pretty nicely during the day. I ate some lunch at work but the stain made it so I didn't have to carry lipstick with me. Even better, I had time to iron my shirt and sit and relax for about a half hour before leaving for work.
So, of course, myspace shot!

And there it is! I'm so good lookin' for work!



* I've been having problems with alopecia for some time. Off and on through most my life, really. Over the past year, I've lost about half my hair density. It's gotten so bad that my man compares me to a shedding cat. I had enough hair to create a 1 square foot portrait of myself in a week. What can I say, I'm an art student...
Anyway, this past weekend, it was discovered that I have seriously minimal adrenal function AND my thyroid is really sucking. I have an appointment on the 22nd to see what's going on. It's likely that both glands are having some sort of dysfunction, so it could go wither way as far as fixing the problem.