Merry Christmas, Darling

Hey!

I just wanted to drop by and say that I hope you're having a very merry Christmas wherever you are. I know that this time of year can be stressful with all the different things we have to do and prepare for but I've been feeling overwhelmingly thankful for everything in my life. Like, even though sometimes it sucks and nothing seems to be going right... I have food to eat and clothes to wear and a roof over my head, a warm (or cool when it's 80 degrees outside like it is right now) place to sleep at night. I have people who care about me, even one or two that love me, and two doggies that make me laugh on a daily basis. They're little things that we take for granted.

Remember that you're blessed this Christmas and remind someone you love that you're thinking about them today.

And if you can't be with someone you love, if they're far away or you're out of touch, say a little prayer for them and that should be enough. <3

xx Anna

Bling Bling Nose Ring

Some of you may have noticed that earlier this year in September I got my nose pierced. I had been considering the piercing for quite some time, going back and forth between whether or not it would look good on me (and whether or not it would get me kicked out of my parents' house). Ultimately I decided that I didn't care and that since I wanted it, I was going to get it. It was spur of the moment decision to finally get it done so I hopped in my car 30 minutes before I was set to leave for North Carolina for the 5 Seconds of Summer concert and got it pierced all by myself.



PICKING A PIERCER - The first thing you're going to want to do when you decide you want any kind of piercing is find a place to get it pierced. Most tattoo parlors employ piercers so that's where I started looking. You will want to do plenty of research on the parlors in your area and find one that has good health ratings, keeps things sanitary, etc. I found that reading reviews was the number one easiest way to decide whether the parlor was the one for me. I decided to go to The Bellrose Tattoo in Daphne, AL. I was not necessarily anxious about getting my nose pierced but I will say that if I had been, the staff and the piercer himself would have put me at ease immediately. They were all very chill, friendly, and the prices were fair.

JEWELRY - I decided to get a mid size stud with a white crystal in it. Pretty basic but that's what I thought would be the easiest to deal with as a first piercing. I believe I was pierced with an 18g needle but I wear mostly 20g now which is smaller. I just prefer it that way. I read online that it is easier to get pierced with a stud at first and then transition to a hoop later on if that's what you want. A hoop will move more and therefore irritate the piercing, putting you at higher risk to develop infections and keloids.

PAIN - Now I had watched tons of videos on piercings and tattoos before firmly deciding that I would be ok with the pain. It was like a hard pinch, definitely unpleasant, and it hurt. But it only hurt for about half of a second before it felt like nothing. It was sore the next day but only when it was being cleaned and messed with.

AFTER CARE - I was instructed to use Dial soap on the end of q-tip to clean the piercing twice a day. However, after watching many different videos online and looking at some forums I decided that I'd rather use sterile saline solution. I had no problems doing this. Be careful not to over clean the area because that can cause keloids! Once in the morning and once in the evening should be enough. Around 2 months after my appointment, I developed a slight infection. Nothing too scary, just some tenderness around the piercing area and a little bit of discharge. I used Tea Tree oil once a day to fix this and it worked really well. The infection went away after a couple of days.

FINAL THOUGHTS - All in all, I'm so glad I got my piercing. I think it's fun and it's what I wanted and that's all that matters. Sure, you will find plenty of people who disapprove of body jewelry (but are totally ok with earrings?) and will have plenty of negative things to say about it. The pain is very little and the after care is simple. If you hate the way it looks on you, you can always take the piercing out!

EVERYONE IS A WINNER.

xx Anna

Lineart | Art Round Up #2

Hey! Long time, no see! Here are a couple of artworks I've made since my last art round up. Most of these were made for my attempt at Inktober, a social media based drawing challenge that encourages you to make one ink drawing a day in order to hone your inking skills. While I failed spectacularly at completing Inktober, a couple of drawings that I'm really fond of came out of my "valiant" efforts to succeed.

Featured above are all original character designs. I didn't use a reference for anything so you'll have to excuse some of the awkward body proportions and nonsensical weaponry. I am particularly fond of the sassy #15 guy up there. I drew it while I was annoyed and I was able to convey that pretty well in his expression. That's what's so cool about art. :)

Which one is your favorite?

xx Anna

Happy Halloween

A casual Harley Quinn, the perfect costume if you're looking for something simple and comfortable to wear in place of a full red+black body suit. I didn't actually have to buy any clothes for this look, just the wig for about $20 from Party City, which made me one happy Harley fan. You can do this yourself by mixing and matching any red and black clothes you own. You can also find a blog post on how to create this Harley Quinn inspired makeup right here. (please ignore the terrible state of my mirror)

My personal favorite of the three costumes I came up with, a femme Kaneki Ken a la Tokyo Ghoul. But you could probably get away with just doing the face paint and calling yourself a skeleton if your friends and fam get confused when you say that you're "Kaneki". I used super basic, super cheap cream face paints from Party City that cost about $3 which were convenient but did require some finagling to get right. I also used eyeshadows to set the paint and a liquid lipstick for red bits since the red cream paint ended up looking awful. The wig was also about $20 from Party City. I used reference pictures of Kaneki to paint the mask onto my face. Just be patient and take your time. :)

Lastly is the typical, last minute go to for ladies and lads everywhere... a black cat. This is the world's easiest "costume" to put together in all of history. You wear black clothes, any black clothes you feel like, and slap on a cat ear headband (mine cost about $4). I initially went for a black cat princess type thing in the first picture but ended up more comfortable in shorts and a sweater. Makeup-wise, I opted for an exaggerated cat eyeliner and a dusty rose lipstick. Easy peasy. (My brother's friendly viking costume is also available at Party City, if you're interested in that)


I hope you enjoyed these three fairly simple costumes. If you have any questions, feel free to drop me a comment. Have a happy and safe Halloween!

xx Anna

"I'm the strongest man alive!"

Rokka no Yuusha (or Rokka: Braves of the Six Flowers) was an anime that was recommended to me by a friend who knows me well enough to know what I like in an anime and that's characters, characters, characters.

When the Majin awakes from the depths of darkness, the deity of fate selects six heroes and bequeaths them with the power to save the world. Adlet, a boy who proclaims himself the strongest man in the world, has been selected among "The Heroes of the Six Flowers". However, as the heroes gather, they soon begin to suspect that someone amongst them is an imposter. (source)

Early on in the series, I was unsure as to what the actual genre of the anime was going to be. I couldn't tell if it was an adventure series, a shounen, etc. Surprisingly, it began to lean toward being a fantasy based mystery series which made the entire week I spent binge watching it an utter joy. I love shows that make you think alongside the characters, trying to figure out the solution to a problem or figuring out 'whodunnit' (it's why I liked Danganronpa so much). While the entire season was primarily focused on, "Who is the seventh, and therefore fake, brave?" and not at all on the ultimate problem of the Demon God, the intrigue of the mystery and the wonderfully diverse cast of characters  made that unimportant.

The characters in this show are the best part of this show. It's fairly difficult to ensure characters in a fantasy anime don't fall into the same overused tropes but Rokka no Yuusha manages to create interesting and colorful characters that keep you invested in the story. Not to mention the designs of these characters (pictured above) are the best I've seen in quite some time. They're just nice to look at.  They each have they're own individual powers and specialties as well which made them even more complex. Nachetania's ability in particular was something I always looked forward to seeing since her ability to use and direct blades was pretty cool looking.

There were a couple of times toward the beginning where I noticed animation errors but nothing too crazy and the CGI was a little jarring in comparison the the rest of the animation. For me, the art itself was visually pleasing enough (and the story interesting enough) to compensate for such little things.

All in all, it's been a long while since I've watched an anime that had me as hyped as Death Parade back in January and while this particular anime doesn't quite live up to the masterpiece that is Death Parade, it is certainly high on my list and I recommend that you give it a watch if you're ever looking for something enjoyable.

xx Anna

Rock Out With Your Socks Out | 5 Seconds of Summer

On September 9th 2015, a friend and I embarked on a spontaneous 11 hour journey to Raleigh, North Carolina in order to see one of our favorite bands play in their first ever headline tour. 5 Seconds of Summer played their aptly named 'Rock Out With Your Socks Out' show with the kind of energy and talent that you wouldn't necessarily expect from a band so young and made the entire travel ordeal worth every second.

Arriving at the Walnut Creek Amphitheater around 2pm, VIP lanyards in tow, the sun high in the sky beating down on us like it was trying to make a point that it was the bigger man, we stood in line for 2 more hours before being led like sheep into the venue. A stroke of good luck landed us sat directly center in front of the stage extension in the second row so when the boys trotted out for the Q&A session, it was intimate enough to feel like sitting with friends at dinner.

Questions were asked and they questions were (mostly) answered and they played Jet Black Heart and She's Kinda Hot for us. They looked understandably exhausted, this being the 63rd show of their first tour and having just had a regrettable hotel stalking experience the previous night in Charlotte, but still managed to make jokes and appear grateful for fan support. Ashton told us an amazing story about Michael dipping his balls in Ash's ice bucket after the Charlotte show, during which Michael turned a bright red and attempted to hide his face in his hands while yelling, "I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU TOLD THEM THIS STORY. I WAS IN A VULNERABLE STATE". Luke was barefoot, bare-armed, and sipping what looked like tea, casually kicking his feet to and fro against the stage. Calum remained mostly quiet but still egregiously friendly despite the obnoxious 14 year old girls screaming at him about the hole in his pants.

The show itself was such a banger. The energy was high, the lights were bright, the music was loud and rocking. 5 Seconds of Summer delivered a show that was everything I expected it to be and the talent exemplified was of musicians far beyond their individual years (Ashton Irwin, in particular, is one of the most talented drummers I've ever seen perform live). The show had enough personality to fill the entire venue and then some despite the 30-40 minute delay halfway through for the bad weather ("I wanna say thanks to the weather for being an asshole. So fuck you, sky." - Michael Clifford).

All in all, I'm really glad we decided to drop everything and splurge a little to see this show. It was worth the money spent 100 percent and if you're a fan of 5 Seconds of Summer I highly suggest you invest in going to see a show sometime in your life. They're genuinely cool guys and are supremely talented.

I Was Made For Loving You

A couple of months ago I wrote a short post about love. I asked the void, "What is love?" and felt sad and hopeless about the prospect of real love in my life. Since then, I think I've found this magical "true love" thing that everyone is always talking about and thusly have been able to form a sort of malleable, flexible definition for it.

Here's what I think about true love as of August 20th 2015:

True love is unconditional and patient. When you love someone, you love them in spite of their flaws and imperfections. Love is waking up and thanking God that you have that special person in your life. Love is being willing to communicate and compromise. Love is having respect for one another's boundaries, thoughts, feelings, and decisions. Love is being able to laugh together even if sometimes you feel sad or angry. Love is that overwhelming feeling of pride and joy when you think of them late at night or see them smile or watch them kick ass at something they work hard to do. Love is being able to trust each other wholeheartedly, leaving no room for ultra-jealous thoughts or behaviors. Love is having a best friend, a confidant, a person to rely on. Love is being willing to commit, invest, and wait if need be.

I do not believe that love is always easy. I think perfect relationships where two people agree on everything and never argue or bicker or fight don't exist. I think sometimes being fully in love with someone is one of the hardest things in the world. Life is rough and the individual experiences we all go through are hard enough on our own; sometimes getting another person on the same page, to understand, is difficult. Sometimes you fight over big things; sometimes you fight over little things. Sometimes love is inconvenient, jumping out at you when circumstances aren't aligned. Sometimes you have to wait.

And sometimes the person you're in love with, truly in love with, doesn't feel the same way.

I don't think that makes the love you feel any less true.

Below is something Ted Mosby of How I Met Your Mother said about love:

One of the greatest television speeches about love that has ever existed.

Like I said, these are just my thoughts on the subject as of today. As you probably know, people grow and evolve and change over time so maybe my definition of love will change one day. But as for right now, I think it's a pretty solid definition of love in my life.

xx Anna

H&M Fall Fashion Wishlist

Ahhhh yesssss. It's mid-August and already I can sense the impending autumn season taking it's sweet time to arrive in lower Alabama. That doesn't mean I can't dream about all the things I want to wear when the weather finally turns cool and the leaves start to fall.

Fall fashion to me is deep tonal patterns, muted color, and an abundance of accessories. Below you'll find a small sampling of some items on my wish list for Fall 2015, courtesy of H&M.

xx Anna

Actions Speak Louder Than Haircuts

A couple of years ago a male homosexual friend of a friend of mine said to me, blatantly ignorant of any idea who I actually was or of my sexual preference, "You would make a great lesbian". I was surprised by the statement, not only because of it's boldness (we'd only just met and I didn't even know his name yet) but because of it's content. I would... "make a great lesbian"? What exactly makes a great lesbian?

He went on flippantly stating that he while he was "absolutely gay" he was also attracted to me, which is why he thought I would be more than a perfect fit for the lesbian community. "You have a man's haircut and you're dressed sort of masculine so I just sort of figured..." he trailed off before showing us his driver's license featuring a much heavier version of himself, instantly changing the subject to how he had lost 100 pounds by eating a bowl of Special K a day.

While they spoke, I started to evaluate my appearance. I was wearing a pair of skinny jeans, some chucks, a graphic t-shirt and an old, khaki green hooded sweatshirt my ex-boyfriend had gifted me. I had recently asked for a pixie cut à la Anne Hathaway at the salon, so yes, my hair was non-typically short for a nineteen year old female college freshman living in South Alabama and sure, I wasn't dressed particularly feminine... but I was still unsure how my appearance would have anything to do with what gender I was or was not attracted to.

A couple of days later I debuted my new haircut to a bible study group I had been attending. I was approached in the kitchen by a smaller group of "friends" while I was chatting about my week with one of the adults in charge.

"Why would you cut your hair?" one of them said.
"Yeah, I'm not very happy about it." a boy who I had a (now regrettable) crush on said.
"I thought you were a boy when you got out of your car." another snickered.
The adult stayed surprisingly quiet, which I interpreted as her agreement with my peers, while I tripped over words and eventually squeaked out a super solid, "I don't know."

And so I grew my hair out.

It's something I sort of regret doing now that I realize why I did it. I loved my short hair. It made me feel spunky and sort of like (a much more lethargic) Selina Kyle. I liked styling it in a floppy quiff because I thought it looked edgy and also kind of like a 2013-era Louis Tomlinson. I really liked the way I looked... until I didn't anymore. The weird (and sometimes straight up rude) comments that peers and strangers thrust upon me made me hate my hair and feel more than a little uncomfortable in my skin. I became perpetually self-conscious about how I looked, always wary of how I dressed or did my makeup or the posture I had when I sat down. It was rough and I was never happy. I was anxious and angry and sad and I remember crying more than once about my "boyish" haircut as I waited impatiently for it to grow to a socially acceptable, feminine length.

It's been years since then and I can safely assure you that your haircut does not define you much in the same way your weight does not define you. These are outward appearances and shallow representations of who you are as a person. A non-typical haircut does not determine whether you are a homosexual, a heterosexual, a man, a woman, a drug dealer, a mom, etc. It's incredibly narrow minded to think that it does.

It should also be kept in mind that another person's appearance is not really any of your business. Someone's personal style is something that they feel comfortable in and being critical of their favorite shirt or their space buns is not going to make you a better person. You are not the authority on style in other people's lives. Unless they ask for your opinion on their oversized boyfriend jeans or Ugg boots or crop top, it's probably best to keep your thoughts to yourself.

Stereotypes exist for a reason but it's so important that you don't judge a person based on the way that they look. Actions speak far louder than haircuts and it's nice to be nice.

xx Anna

Whatevah you say, Mistah J!

Every now and then I get a little bored and since I've been on a major Harley Quinn kick lately (as made clear by even my last blog post) I figured what better way to cure that boredom then to use whatever makeup I have rolling around my old makeup drawer and make myself look like the newest imagining of Harley Quinn?

I didn't buy any new makeup to create this look so I used a lot of really old, really cheap makeup that I've had for years. I mixed white cream face paint with a drop or two of my regular foundation and applied it as usual. I then used a roller ball blue eyeshadow and red pigment eyeshadow to use on my eyes. I created more definition by using a matte cool brown in the crease and outer corner areas. Then I used a black eyeliner pencil to line my eyes all the way around making sure to be messier than usual. After that you just use your fingers and a brush to smear it down your cheeks. I used NARS Dragon Girl on my lips which is really a little too bright for this Harley Quinn look but since this was just for funsies I let it be.

Harley Quinn is probably my favorite comic book character of all time. I find her creation story fascinating and the current storyline in her stand-alone comic has proven Harley to be quite a fighter despite her silly, sing-song henchwoman origins. Her flaws make her relatable and her ability to make wrong decisions makes her, in my mind, an even stronger female character than the typical do-good heroine.

xx Anna

I am so excited for the new Suicide Squad movie. If you haven't seen the trailer you can check it out below:

Gotham City Sirens | Art Round Up #1

Hello there! Just wanted to make my first art post. This round up features 3 watercolor pieces I sketched in my sketchbook. I didn't initially intend to paint them which is why they were drawn on dry media paper but the washes of paint were light enough to not ruin and bleed through the paper. Though it did warp the paper a little bit but that was to be expected.

The characters featured are Harley Quinn, Poison Ivy, and Catwoman. They're typically featured as antagonists in various Batman comics as well as the aforementioned Gotham City Sirens. I wanted the pieces to be very messy since I think that the sirens would probably be a little roughed up after fighting but I did still want to capture their beauty as well. The individual pieces also feature the names of songs I think fit their personality or story. Just as a fun little addition.

All in all, I'm pretty pleased with the way these turned out. I hope you like them too! (:

xx Anna

Too Faced: Return of Sexy

Two eyeshadow looks featuring the Return of Sexy palette
featuring Stila long wear lipstick in 'Patina' and NARS velvet matte pencil in 'Dragon Girl'.

Gonna be real honest and let you know that I'm not a huge fan of this shadow palette. It originally caught my eye because of the seemingly super sparkly shadows and the inclusion of a purple hued section which I'm super in to, but the pigmentation is non-existent and the sparkle is rather dull, even with an eyeshadow primer. Don't get me wrong, it's an ok palette. It's just not as fun or flirty as I wanted it to be and at gut-wrenching, very unsexy $49 there are a lot of better options out there. A Too Faced alternative would be their Semi-Sweet Chocolate Bar palette, a much better investment than this chalky brick of a palette, but it has no purple/pink shades.

Also pictured above is Too Faced's Melted Liquified Long Wear Lipstick in the shade 'Chihuahua' (that's a mouthful). This shade on the website looks like a dusty mauve color and the packaging is even more pink, but applied to the lips this lipstick is more of a muddy, brown color which is really unfortunate. The formula is also pretty weird as it's very sticky and also separates in the container. It's possible that maybe I just got a faulty product but I probably won't be purchasing this lipstick again.

I'd like to point out that Too Faced is an awesome company and have a lot of products that I really like but I'd probably avoid these if at all possible.

xx Anna

Call Me a Narsissist

Now I don't consider myself a beauty guru by any means but I do enjoy playing around a bit with makeup. I own entirely too much of the stuff, some of which I don't even use (here's looking at you, $42 'Yves Saint Laurent Touche Éclat'; I hate you), which means I've been able to narrow down my favorite beauty brands over the years and the only brand I've been able to trust and rely on wholeheartedly is NARS cosmetics.

I have struggled with finding a solid foundation routine for years but was finally able to find solace in NARS All Day Luminous foundation in the shade 'Mont Blanc' because I'm a vampire and I hate the sun, paired with their blusher in the shade 'Super Orgasm' which I love to say in a ridiculously enthusiastic voice. The good people at NARS also recently sent me one of their Illuminating Multiple's in the shade 'St. Lucia' which I wasn't sure what to do with at first but I've discovered its good for light contouring, blushing, etc. You can do just about anything you want with that magical multiple.

Not to mention the wonderful majesty that is their lip pencils. Hands down my favorite thing to slap on my mouth for any occasion. Between the three different consistencies they have to offer in a pencil (satin, velvet matte, and velvet gloss), there are literally dozens of colors to choose from and IT. IS. GLORIOUS. I find that lip pencils are a lot easier to use than a typical lipstick and they seem to last a little bit longer and they're all so damn pretty.

Basically I feel like NARS has been consistent and concise with the quality of their products, something I feel is sometimes difficult to find in the makeup world. This makes their higher prices absolutely worth it. You deserve the splurge; trust me. Plus, the customer service end of this company goes above and beyond to make you feel special and important. 

Purchasing their products have left me so satisfied that I felt like they deserved a quick little shout out from me, the ever pleased #narsissist, to them, the ever impressive NARS cosmetics company; I <3 you.

Check out their site right HERE.

Casual Tuesday

On the way to Dragon City, a restaurant we haven't eaten at since Alec went on his adventure/internship to Panama. Andrew and I struggle to take nice pictures together.

Attempting to wrangle teenage boys into taking pictures results in something like this: grainy, blurry, unposed pictures taken in Snapchat camera.

Seth and I don't have any pictures together which is unacceptable for two best friends. After seeing these results, the reason why becomes fairly clear.

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