Karen

Dim Sum: YUM!

May 15th, 2018 by Karen 12 Comments

I get these intense cravings for dim sum every once in a while, and it’s all I can think about.

I even dream about it sometimes. Mmm… Those little soup dumplings that squirt into your mouth when you bite into them. MAN! They’re SO GOOD.

I’m not gonna do it justice, but what is dim sum? It’s like Chinese-style tapas with small appetizer plates. At most places, servers push carts around the tables with different dishes displayed on them, and you pick and choose which ones you want.

Noms, clockwise from the upper right: custard buns, fried rice, green tea dumplings, shrimp balls, shrimp and green onion dumplings and Chinese broccoli

Yum!

There are bite-sized doughy dumplings with meat or seafood mixed with a few veggies like cabbage or carrots inside them, and various steamed, fried or baked buns stuffed with BBQ, pickled or steamed meat or veggies.

It’s great because you can try a bunch of different things, and if you go with a group and everyone shares, it’s even better.

That’s what we did for Mother’s Day. We drove out to the East Bay and had a fun, delicious meal at BK’s Bistro in Fremont.

Highly recommended if you’re ever out that way. It’s not super fancy, but it’s not super expensive either, and the food is fresh, interesting, and they get it to your table fast.

connor mothers day 2018 — Someone loves fried rice!

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Chanel Les Beiges Healthy Glow Natural Eyeshadow Palette in Deep (Take One)

May 14th, 2018 by Karen 10 Comments

And now for something completely different (not), if I had a nickel for every time I watched a YouTube makeup video and thought, “Oh, I can handle that. That’s gonna be easy.” And then I tried it and was like, “What the hell just happened?” — I’d be a rich girl.

Yeesh, I’m so out of practice with eyeshadow… It is definitely a perishable skill, at least for me. It’s not like riding a bike, where you can take years off, then hop back on and be like, “Lalala! So easy! This is great!”

As you know, I’ve been wanting to do a little more with my makeup lately — not necessarily to put more makeup on, but to, ya know, do something more ambitious than one or two lid shades and some tightlining, so I’ve been watching a lot of videos, like this one by Sephora for hooded lids, which was actually VERY helpful for explaining proper placement (a.k.a “where to put the lighter and darker colors”).

If you have a hooded lid situation, definitely check it out.

Thing is…it assumes you have rudimentary blending skills down pat, which I thought I had, but I guess they were tucked away somewhere because… Well, it’s not that I’m unhappy with how this eye look turned out, but I can see a few things I could have done better.

I like it from straight on, and from the side, with my eyes open. I think it’s pretty decently blended in the crease, and I like the way the gradient is feathering, but when I look at the pics of myself with my eyes closed…WHOA.

And this could just be me being hyper-critical of myself, because I do that, but I can see that one eye is darker than the other, and they aren’t perfectly symmetrical, and I know that I do these things because I’ve made these same mistakes 1,342,521 times before.

I also know that my eyes aren’t identical. They’re naturally asymmetrical. One is slightly larger than the other, and my smaller eye is set a little deeper the the other. Also, I’m right-handed, and I tend to press harder when I’m applying shadow on my right lid than I do on my left, making that eye’s makeup look darker if I don’t pay close attention.

Basically, these are just lessons I have to re-learn from time to time… While not rocket science, makeup is definitely a perishable skill. If you don’t use it, you freakin’ lose it.

Anywho, today’s makeup gave me a chance to get to know the new Chanel Les Beiges Deep eyeshadow palette, and girl, the browns are beautiful! They are SO pretty.

Like the wide buttery golden pan at the top? No, it isn’t MAC Soba, but it is Chanel’s version. If I just stopped trying new makeup and wore this satiny mid-toned brown daily for the rest of my life, I’d be a happy camper.

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Makeup and Beauty Blog Monday Poll, Vol. 524

May 14th, 2018 by Karen 48 Comments

So…what is the Monday Poll?

Good question! It isn’t, contrary to its name, an actual poll. It’s just a list of five more or less random questions I’ve been posting on this blog every Monday morning for the past gazillion years (more than 10!). I love reading your answers, and it helps me get my week off to a great start. ?

1. What’s the weather like out your way?

Cloudy with a chance of meatballs. So, normal for this time of year. It should clear up by the afternoon.

2. List everything you’ve put on your face so far today…

No makeup yet. Just…

I’m waiting for the Anti Bac to dry before putting on moisturizer and sunscreen, as in Clarins Extra-Firming Day Cream and Shiseido Ultimate Sun Protection Lotion WetForce SPF 50+.

3. What’s one thing you’d like to accomplish over the next month?

Biggest thing? Add three new summery t-shirt designs to the store. Small thing? Clean out the guest bedroom closet, because it’s become a catch-all nightmare for photography equipment and expired LE makeup that I keep for nostalgic reasons (hello, Archie’s Girls).

4. A memory that makes you smile?

Hiking to Queen’s Bath on Kauai a few years ago with El Hub. 🙂

Wish I could teleport myself there today!

5. Shorts or skirts?

Shorts, because skirts always fit me funny…

Happy Monday

Hey, lady. Hope you had a great weekend. It’s been a quiet morning here today, and I REALLY hope it stays that way. Fingers and toes currently crossed. I hope we both have a chill week. 😉

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

P.S. I hope you feel like chiming in today! Here are the questions to copy and paste:

1. What’s the weather like out your way?
2. List everything you’ve put on your face so far today…
3. What’s one thing you’d like to accomplish over the next month?
4. A sweet memory that makes you smile?
5. Shorts or skirts?

Sundays With Tabs the Cat, Makeup and Beauty Blog Mascot, Vol. 501

May 13th, 2018 by Karen 23 Comments

Happy Mother’s Day, or, as Tabs calls it, “Employee Appreciation Day.” Today he granted me an audience with himself, which I enjoyed very much. We sat and read together and watched birds on the front steps.

*sigh* He’s not my little kitty boy anymore. 🙁 He’s a captain of industry, and he doesn’t have as much patience as he used to. Now he’s all about productivity when it comes to…pretty much everything, LOL. When we’re outside, he doesn’t like to just sit and chill quite as much as he used to. He’d rather patrol the circle or go exploring on the hill, so it’s a bit of a sacrifice for him to humor me by sitting and reading for a few minutes.

So I appreciate these moments.

I know he likes spending time with me, but he’d rather just go for a long walk.

Speaking of that, he still — STILL — even after all these years, pulls on his leash to go toward where we used to live in Mill Valley to the south. He must still remember our old home all those years ago… It’s been 10 years! But he still points and pulls us in that direction, and he’ll gaze off in the distance for a long time, like he’s thinking back.

I wish I could read his mind. Is he remembering another person he used to know back when he was an outdoor cat? Or is he wondering about other kitties? I don’t even know if he had siblings or if he remembers his mommy cat…

OK, that was sad. 🙁

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Saturday Surfing, May 12th, 2018

May 12th, 2018 by Karen 19 Comments

Morning! Got a little cheese to go with your coffee today. 🙂 LOL. Perhaps some yummy gouda with a sprinkle of fresh mozzarella?

No, seriously, that quote at the top is only partially for you. It’s also for me, because I’ve been thinking lately about making a career change/adjustment. Basically, I love Makeup and Beauty Blog, and I have no intention of ever stopping it, but I’m starting to really miss going someplace to work…

Don’t get me wrong! Tabs is a wonderful ? employer. He’s fair, generous, fluffy, and I get fantastic fringe benefits (unlimited kitty hugs and purrs), but he isn’t a big conversationalist, and I’m really starting to miss talking to, you know…people.

But change is scary, especially when you don’t know what it is you want to change yet!

Anyway, I wonder sometimes what it must be like for people who live life — not necessarily without fear — but with a strong sense of purpose and a natural inclination to focus on all of the things that could go right, instead of focusing on the things that could go wrong (which is what I tend to do). What must that be like?

Do you think about things like that? Do you lean toward thinking about the good things that could happen, or the bad? Sometimes I think there’s no possible way to predict how something will go until you take a leap.

Yes, I’m feeling extra corny today, and I haven’t had enough coffee yet, so I don’t know if anything I just said makes any sense. Haha! 🙂

Onward to this week’s stories…

Artist and MIT grad Ani Liu creates perfumes that smell like people…specifically individuals you know and love. She claims to have figured out a way to describe someone in scent FOREVER, thereby evoking memories of them with just one whiff.

So far, she’s bottled the scents of her husband, herself, her parents, a lab mate, and a chemist who helped her.

Sounds very ? sci-fi, doesn’t it?
This month marks the 75th anniversary of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, the only women’s professional baseball ⚾ league in U.S. history, which ran from 1943 to 1954. Their motto? “Play like a man, look like a lady.”

When the league started, looking feminine on the field was a big deal, and players were required to wear lipstick. The league even had a “charm school,” which was run by Helena Rubinstein, a famous beauty powerhouse at the time.
Working in nail salons may get safer if a new bill becomes law at the federal level. Last week U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., and Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, D-Nev., introduced The Environmental Justice Right to Know Act, a bill which would direct the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health to research ventilation in beauty salons and determine a healthy level of ventilation for workers. It would also require (and this is big) The National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences to report to Congress on the long-term negative health effects of chemicals in beauty products.
Somebody created nails that look like teeth, and quite frankly they’re my nightmare.
If you’re in the mood for a fun art project and have an extra bottle of nail polish lying around, try marbling a vase or a pitcher.
I gotta hand it to Jean Paul Gaultier… He seems like a classy guy! When he was asked about the similarities between his Le Classique perfume bottle and the new Kim Kardashian West KKW Body perfume, instead of throwing shade, he downplayed the whole thing by saying, “I couldn’t put my body [for a women’s perfume], so I put a different body. She did her own body, so it’s different.”
In countries outside the U.S., perfumes for babies and children are commonplace.

Have a great weekend and a wonderful Mother’s Day, OK? I hope to see you in the comments.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

What’s One Thing That Drastically Changed Your Skin for the Better?

May 11th, 2018 by Karen 33 Comments

current bare skin status — Wearing: nothing

Was it a new laundry detergent? Cutting out chocolate from your diet? Drinking more water? Wearing less makeup? Trimming your bangs? Going to bed earlier? Finding a new product? A procedure? A new dermatologist whose knowledge parted the clouds and let the sun shine through?

There are a few things that really helped me, but one immediately springs to mind: Kate Somerville Anti-Bac Clearing Lotion, which I’ve been using and loving for years. Finding it straight-up drastically changed my skin for the better. Without it, I will break out, no question.

For a little bac story (get it? haha, bad pun), I started struggling with acne at around 11 or 12 and dealt with it off and on (mostly on) for most of my life.

For years, I (thought I) tried everything — every OTC paste, pad and cream; antibiotics (which many dermatologists prescribed for acne back in the day), facials — seriously, everything. Then in college I ended up doing a round of prescription Accutane.

I don’t remember the potency, but I remember my skin (even my lips) being painfully dry while I was using it, and every pimple going crazy and coming to a head at once. It was very uncomfortable, but it worked. My skin stayed clear for several years afterward, but then in my 30s I started getting hormonal breakouts along my chin and around my mouth, and that was rough.

Again, I tried everything I could get my hands on — every new ingredient and product I could find. Good old salicylic acid products helped a little, like Clinique’s Mild Clarifying Lotion, but they didn’t clear up my skin completely.

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Do You Now (or Have You Ever) Work in a Place Where Folks Wear Lots of Makeup?

May 11th, 2018 by Karen 30 Comments

k and connor cats shirt — The official Tabs the Cat Industries LLC / Makeup and Beauty Blog company uniform — a tee shirt and black stretchy pants

Not per se, and right now I’m still thoroughly entrenched in that stretchy pants life, but I wish I had spent some time working someplace where people dressed to the nines and went all out with their hair and makeup.

Even when I worked in the city at PG&E, most of my coworkers did the bare minimum, but part of that is California style. Workplaces here are usually super casual, like business casual+casual.

I like looking “put together” and getting dressed up, though, as you can quite clearly tell by my propensity for black stretchy pants, haha… 🙂

This question occurred to me the other day as I was talking to a gal who’d recently moved from NYC to Novato, which is a BIG change, because this is a sleepy little town compared to metropolis. She described how she recently went to an orientation meeting for her new job here and was the only person wearing a suit and full makeup, and was like, “You don’t understand, everyone I knew in New York dressed up. Full makeup, everything. And there were people in that meeting wearing jeans and messy buns!”

Haha! Welcome to the Bay Area, where “Casual Friday” is every day of the week.

How about you? Have you ever worked someplace where people went all out with their hair, clothes and makeup? And related question: have you ever worked someplace where you had to wear a uniform?

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

P.S. T-G-I-F. SO not kidding either.

What Makes You Feel Awesome?

May 10th, 2018 by Karen 19 Comments

go to brownie recipe top — Baking is one of my favorite pastimes.

Me, in no particular order…

Baking. Cakes, cookies, bread, pizza dough. Mmm, pizza dough…
Having a cup of tea and doing absolutely nothing other than existing for brief moments of respite in the afternoon while the baby takes her nap (this joyous occasion usually takes place between 1-3 p.m.).
Dancing. That’s it… Just dancing and getting lost in the music.
Taking obscenely long showers without feeling like I have to hurry, so I can do ALL THE THINGS, like a hair mask, a face mask and shave my toes (hey, keepin’ it real)
A 90-minute deep-tissue massage
S-l-e-e-e-e-p
Tabs on my lap while I write
Having other people cook breakfast for me (this doesn’t happen often, but when it does it’s GLORIOUS).
Finishing a grueling workout
Feeling supported and understood here in the MBB comments 🙂
Accomplishing something that I didn’t think I’d be able to do at first
Having a clean house and knowing exactly where everything is
Finding something that was lost (especially jewelry)
Finding money in a jacket pocket, or my purse, or, better yet, randomly on the sidewalk while I’m just walking around!
Pulling up to a parking meter that still has enough time left on it for me to park and do my bid-ness
Finding parking right by the main entrance at Costco the instant I pull into the lot (this has only happened once, and it was AMAZING)
Feeling ? loved by friends and family
Exploring a new town — basically, visiting new places
Getting it ALL done and handling my sh*t

You?

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen