Hello Again...

This is a nice little tradition I've got going here. My sister volunteers at the local public library and it's about a twenty minute drive from the house and it's only an hour, so I opt to stay at the library, pack my laptop and all my wires so that I can blog with ease.

So, this blog post. I'm to mention my latest purchases. Surprisingly though, I've made some purchases this week as well. Two weeks in a row, I'm a happy happy girl.

But really, all my purchases were made yesterday. On Sunday.

Now because you don't know me, that probably doesn't mean anything. Now to someone who is familiar with my family and our habits/schedules/daily habits, knows that on Sunday we go to church in the morning. After church, we eat out (at the restaurant of our craving) and then usually we go shopping.

Yesterday after lunch we went to the Moorestown mall, in search of my sister's backpack.

Anecdote: My sister and I have been looking for a new backpack for high school but she's been inordinately difficult in searching for the perfect bag. She said several times that she doesn't want anything expensive (cough*kipling*cough) and she doesn't like any of the backpacks at Staples, Walmart or Target. So we had to venture into the commercial malls. 

Luckily we had found exactly what my sister was looking for in the second department store. Macy's.

Macy's has everything.

Anyway, After my sister had found her "dream bag," we sat down next to the entrance of one of the fitting rooms.

My legs were on fire and were bothering me so I sat down in hopes of returning their temperature back to normal. 

So while my mother was wandering in and out of the fitting room, my sister and I were sitting just outside reading fanfiction on our phones.

YES. I'm obsessed. Other people may call it obsession. I prefer to call it a lifestyle.

So in the midst of our reading. My mother was looking as some of the clothes on the racks in front of my sister and I. There was one in particular that I loved. Now I've been looking for a top similar to this for ages, I've seen other girls wear it and I desperately wanted one for myself. And because I'm on the more plus size side of things, it was a smidgen more difficult finding a similar looking top in a reasonable price range. Now it had occurred to me that I found this top in the women's section so it's a little bit above my age range, but nonetheless I thought the top was cute and I could see myself wearing it.

Now... keep in mind that I'm a little new to this whole blogger thing. So my posting abilities and wittiness are a little rough around the edges. But I'm trying. And hopefully after a while, I'll be a pro at this.

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Ok. So I'm terrible at this. Can you blame me?

I'll just explain it to you.

It's a sleeveless button-down blouse. Chambray material on the shoulders, collar and all along the buttons. And from about above the bust down to where it ends just above my but it's made up of sheer, what looks to be chiffon, or a fabric similar to chiffon. On the chiffon the majority of it is an off-white, almost creamy white color, and down the center, following the buttons down the front and down the center on the back is a medley of greens, purples, browns, oranges, blues and yellows in the form of leaves (similar to ferns) and flowers. It's really cute and I got it in a XL.

EDIT: I've figured it out. I can now upload pictures. Now I've yet to become comfortable in front of the camera, let alone post pictures on the interweb, so Google pictures will just have to suffice. 

Cute, yes? I can rock it. Don't you worry. Now, back to the original post...



Now I know that plus size girls aren't supposed to wear things that billow over them and are too big, and yes the L fit me well. But with the XL, there's a bit more room around the arm hole and and it's long enough to cover my butt, should I decide to wear it with leggings. Also, I've also decided that I might also wear a belt around the waist, if I one day decide to emphasize my waist. Which I hear is a nifty trick that plus size girls should indulge in.

About the tips of plus size women fashion. I say if you feel sexy in it and you can rock it with confidence, then go for it.

Because let's be honest, the most attractive thing a girl can wear is confidence and a smile.

That's incredible cheesy and sounds like it originates from some sort of self-help book. So we'll just stop right there.

Now after Macy's, we left the mall and went decided to go to Kohl's.

If there was every a place that I could always go and spend money, it would be Kohl's.

Usually I end up buying clothes, but shockingly enough, I bought shoes. And to be completely honest, what I ended up buying was a little bit surprising.

Backstory: if there's one trend that I cannot stand, it's the hidden wedge sneaker. Wedges, love. Sneakers, yes. But hidden wedge sneakers, I cannot stand. I know from everything I've heard and read and seen, that's it's one of the trends that people either love or hate. I'm on the hate side. I cannot stand the way they look and it's just... NO. For one they look like chunky sneakers. I hate chunky sneakers. Like Osiris, DC, Vans or any of those ridiculous sneakers I hate. On guys and girls alike. I just don't like the way they look. It looks messy and unkepmt. And... just NO. I prefer more streamline shoes. Sleek shoes that can follow the natural contours of your foot. Sneakers like Converse, Puma, Nike I love. I have a pair of each. Now, going back to my original topic, hidden sneaker heels. STOP IT. 

So. I bought a pair of ankle boots, cute black ankle boots. That have a hidden wedge.

Does that make me a hypocrite?

Survey says....... you can tell me the answer to that in the comments below.

I think they're adorable. But I've got massive calves and my ankles are pretty slim.

THANK GOD I don't have cankles. 

So I'm at a bit of a loss about how to wear them. But honestly when I saw them, and especially when I put them on, I knew I had to buy them. There was no way I was going to leave that store without a pair of these booties in my possession.

Figured it out b*tches!!!! Thank you wikihow, you are a blessed godsend.

Isn't it cute? It looks like my other flat boots, but no! It gives me like two inches of height, and my sister and I are now the same height.

I've just got to figure out how to wear them and look good wearing them.

Now, other than my beautiful, beautiful boots, I also bought underwear, but those are personal, you don't want to see that, I don't want to show anyone that (well, at least not on the internet) so we'll just say I bought a few sets and leave it at that.

That actually concludes my purchase history of the last week...

Oh, wait... I lied. I forgot. Last Thursday, my mother had a hair appointment and recently she's been loving a stylist from Ulta, so she gets her hair done there. Now this is a mutually beneficial thing we've got going on here. My mom can get her hair cut while I can browse the aisles seeing what strikes my fancy and anything in particularly I want.

I had been lusting after the Real Techniques brushes for the longest time. I hear and read that they're amazing quality and they're extremely inexpensive. I own one. The expert face brush.

Insert photo you brilliant novice.

I'm getting better at this thing.

Anyway, yes. This brush is awesome. For the moment, because I'm just now getting into face makeup (I've been wearing eyeliner since I was twelve), I've been using this for foundation, because that and concealer are the only face makeup I've been using until that point. Now I'm trying to branch out into different makeup products, because I've noticed that when i use foundation and I've perfected my skin, it looks flat. My face is all one shade, there's no dimension to my face whatsoever and I don't like that it looks flat. So I want a good quality inexpensive bronzer. I went to the Mac counter and bought a MSF Natural but I feel like the color is my exact skin tone. I mean I'm not too pissed off, I got another face powder out of the deal, so it benefits me.

But back to my purchases. While my mom was getting her hair did, I looked at the Real Technique brushes and I decided to buy powder brushes.

I actually wanted to buy the set that included the buffing brush, but it cost $17.99 and most times Ulta has a "Buy One Get One 50% Off" offer, so I'll wait until then. 

Because right now, during the summer, I'm only using concealer and powder, I wanted to get a large fluffy brush that I can use to dust powder all over to set my makeup but also keep my from adding too much and start looking cakey (admittedly I have a heavy hand when applying makeup).

So I saw two brushes that fit the bill.

The Real Techniques Powder Brush. 

And the Real Techniques Blush Brush. 

Now I know that the second brush was a blush brush is geared towards blush, but i like the shape for powder. They're both incredibly soft and I've only used the blush brush thus far and it's incredibly soft. I just want to run the brush all over my face all the time. It's that soft. 

I had also bought the Clinique Dramatically Different Moisturizing Gel because I'm an oily monster and I needed to buy a new bottle. 

Now that concludes my purchases of this week. 

That's what I call a productive week. 

Ok. That's the end of this post. 

For real. 

Til next time guys! 

- JoAnne 

Well...

Isn't this awkward? The last post I wrote went on and on about forgetting to write for about... well anything really, for about 6 months and here I am. The end of July. And haven't written anything since January.

How many months is that Joanne? 7 months? Well, I'd say you just beat your record.

Anywho. Let's get on to business.

I've decided that this blog/forum/call-it-what-you-wish will be dedicated to my hauling. Anything and everything I buy will be recorded and reviewed on here. I'm not really much of a beauty person, I'm just recently getting into it myself. And I'm not that fashion-savvy (though I wish to God I was, and am currently working towards getting better). So it's not really my place to preach about that. Also, I'm not much of a cooker, though I can hold my own when it comes to baking (if supplied with a detailed recipe equipped with play-by-play pictures.

But I for damn sure buy a lot of things (bit of a problem really). Whether it's new products/items or something I've repurchased time and time again, it will be written here.

Then I can rave about all the things I've bought in the proper places, rather than by talking and raving about them to my mirror. Not that I actually do that. That'd be weird.

But my most recent purchase was clothes. We had gone to AC, spur of the moment trip, two days ago. My mom was interested in seeing the new casino--Revel--that was recently open to the public and let me tell you. It was fabulous. I watched a few videos about the casino and there were a lot of people in the comments section talking about how the modern decor made it feel cold and uninviting.

Well I call hogwash.

It looked FABULOUS. I loved the clean lines and floor to ceiling windows, the white floors and high ceilings. When I walked into the casino/lobby/hotel floor, it looked white. It looked CLEAN. And to a OCD germaphobe, it was heaven. I loved it.

It looked expensive and fabulous. My mom and dad agreed to staying there overnight and I'm excited about that. But I worry about if there are any kids at all there. It is in AC and I know it's a casino hotel, but we've stayed at Harrahs, Borgata, Taj, no problem. But this one. I don't know. Plus when I checked  for rooms to make a reservation, the only options for occupancy were up to 3 adults. There was no option for children. Then again my sister and I get mistaken for identical twins, when we're sisters, six years apart and I'm 20. So I guess she can pass for an adult.

Interesting anecdote: It's become a joke in the family about my sister and I really being twins. If-you-can't beat-them and all that. So now we just accept it. But when we first started getting asked if we were twins, my sister would get frustrated and say that we were sisters, not twins. And when those people were prompted into guessing which one was the oldest, they would always assume I'm the youngest. At the time my sister was 12 (so by deduction I was 18) and you can imagine the frustration my sister felt. Frankly I don't see where the twin thing comes from or how they figure that I'm the youngest, but everyone thinks differently. To this day, my sister get so upset, thinking that there are people out there that think my sister is older than she really is. 

But I'm digressing. Anyway, after we checked out the hotel/casino, my dad asked if I wanted to walk the boardwalk and go to the beach. To which I swiftly denied him. I'm not much of a beach goer. I've got flabby thighs, arm fat, and a belly that just won't lay flat. So no. I do not enjoy the beach season.

Since the boardwalk/beach idea was nixed. We chose to do my favorite thing. Visit the outlet. In AC there's an outlet called Tanger Outlet and it has a nice selection of stores to shop from. And since my mother was in that shopping mood, we made some nice purchases.

First off, after dinner, we went to Old Navy. My sister is off to high school this coming fall, and because she graduated from a catholic middle school, the majority of her closet consisted of uniforms and church-appropriate clothes. She then bought several shirts, and since she needed new clothes more than me (however much it pains me to say that), I only bought a white tee.

I don't know about you, but Old Navy has the best v-neck tees. They're soft, they don't shrink and they fit my chest tautly while skimming over my belly nicely. That was my only Old Navy purchase. While I used to love their graphic tees, they just aren't my thing anymore. I much prefer I solid color tee than anything that has writing on it.

After that we happened to split up because my parents got left behind at the crosswalk and so my sister and I went to Starbucks to get our dessert and my parents went off to do something. Afterwards, when we went to find them they were in a watch store.

Now to give you a bit of a back story... My mom's recently been into finding a family watch. My parents almost every 2 years or so they get a set of matching watches. And now that my sister and I have recently started wearing watches on a daily basis, my mom is convinced that we should get four of the same watches. A family watch. So for the past few months, we're been looking at watches. And we had actually found a watch that we all agreed on. It's a watch by Skagen, a danish company, and it's a titanium wrist band and a steel and something face. It's incredibly light and sleek. I love it. But the places we've gone previously, the watch had been $100+, so we've passed on the watch those days. And since then I've been lusting after that watch. Hoping against hope that my parents wouldn't nix that particular watch and choose something else. 

So imagine my gratitude and surprise that they found the watch in AC for a significant bargain. Both for less than $50. So naturally my parents bought them, where else could we find watches for less than 50% off, there was no way we were passing those up. Hell, we were buying four watches, so it had to be discounted some. I'm really excited to own it. It's incredibly light, and when I wore it yesterday, there were honestly times when I forgot I was wearing it.

Now I'm not at home, otherwise I'd take a picture and insert it here. So no picture. Maybe in the next post. If I remember to write again before 7 months pass.

After the watches, we went walking, seeing if there were any other stores we wanted to pass through. We ended up in Banana Republic, a store that I was surprised that we walked into. It's slightly outside of our normal price range, so you can imagine my surprise. Anyway, we walked in and walking through, I didn't see anything so I was following my mother, and while she was looking at something, I saw cardigans for sale. It was nothing special, it was just a black cardigan with 3/4 sleeves but I can never find cardigans that fit me right. Usually, the arms are tight and the body fits fine or the arms are baggy while the body is tight. But this fit perfectly. I was so incredibly happy to find it.

That just about concludes my most recent set of purchases. It's a little boring, a little basic. But I needed all those things. And since classes are starting up again soon I'd like to buy new clothes for school.

Well, now that just about concludes this post.

Until next time friends,
      Joanne

Whoops

6 days into the month and I already forgot to write a post for three days. Whoops. I actually remembered that I hadn't written a post for three days yesterday, but it was late and I had to sleep because I had early mass today.

Anywho, nothing interesting happening on my front. I bought a couple things from B&BW, there was an offer I couldn't refuse (3 minis for $10: talk about a steal). Oh and in other news, we tried a new restaurant. The Rodizio Grill. It's a Brazilian restaurant, and from my understanding is served the same way. I've been to three Brazilian restaurants so far--one was really bad looking and was a horrible restaurant--and they all serve in a similar fashion. They give you this red and green wooden thing and when it's flipped on the green side, the servers all come around with the meats and other foods on skewer-looking things and offer you slices of the food. And when you flip it on the red side, they won't serve you anything: you could be finishing up what's on your plate or maybe you're trying out the salad and appetizers. It's all delicious, but my ABSOLUTE favorite is the top sirloin. It's juicy and delicious and there's this layer of fat the surrounds it that just has the crispiest and most delicious skin/top I have ever tasted. It's literally melt in your mouth. I had like 6 or 7 slices of that. It was so good. There was also a glazed grilled pineapple. Now, admittedly, I'm not a fan of pineapple, but when they served it to me, it was super juicy--once you bit into it all the juices literally flowed out of it--and it was incredibly sweet. I had to ask for another slice. There was unlimited appetizers (with the menu option we took) and there was fried bananas that were incredibly sweet, fried polenta (in the shape of fries) that we cheesy and delicious when paired with any of the meats, and some type of cheesy bread that kinds tastes like toast with melted cheese on it that's burned a little. It was all so so so so so so so so sooooooooo good.

Also with the wooden block, there's a yellow strip between the green and red and if you turn it sideways that means you're done with the meat and the main course and you're ready to eat dessert. I had the creme brulee that was infused with orange (orgasmic), my sister got some cinnamon pastry dessert with caramel creme filling and caramel icing on the side (delicious) and my mom got some ice cream dessert with mango preserves all throughout. All in all, it was an amazing lunch. They offer more at dinner, so my dad says we'll have to go back durning the dinner hours so we can sample all the food available at the restaurant. I'm already excited for our next visit.

I hope this rather lengthy post will make up for the fact that I hadn't posted anything for three days.

Toodle-loo!

Feeling Clean

Just finished doing my hair, using a new method. I think I like it. I put product in my hair once I got into my room because it just seems to look better when it's really wet (Not soaking wet, but there shouldn't be any dry areas). I put gel in first, focusing it on the hair around the top of my head then I put in mousse and focused it on the mid and end lengths of my hair. I think this might be a better method. There's A LOT less frizz than last time (when I used solely mousse). Though we'll just how to see how it looks when it's completely dry.

I'm watching Sister Act 2, but only the beginning because I seem to always miss the beginning.

I want to say more, but nothing seems to be coming to me. Ah well. This marks the end of my post today.

Toodles for now.

Good Morning

A new day. So yesterday, my family had a little New Year's get-together with my grandma and uncle and my relatives from Maryland. They came over around 1 or 2 in the afternoon and my cousins and I hung out. We talked for a while then we watched a few movies--The Amazing Spiderman and Deathly Hallows Pt. 2--and it was a right good time. And then they slept over. That didn't really phase me, I mean they slept over, cool, great, done. But they had all their stuff prepared. Towels, toiletries, extra clothes, the whole shebang. I just thought that was a little odd how incredibly prepared they are. Do they get all this stuff ready every time they come over or are we just special? Whatever it makes no difference to me. I know my sister was happy, she got to sleep in my room, something she loves to do. They just left, my dad said something about them going to Chinatown in Philly (Originally, they wanted to go to Kristiana Mall, but apparently it's not a dog-friendly place).

Anywho, in other news, my sister has school today, but my dad let her stay home today, since we had guests over yesterday, I guess it was an exception. My mom was supposed to be off but someone called the house asking my mom to do a "portable." I have no idea what that means.

I feel weird. Like I have a lot of time and nothing to do. Or like I have to do something but there isn't enough time. I hate that feeling. Makes me anxious.

Oh well. I guess I'll just "surf the web" and see what happens.

Toodlepip!

Guess What?!

I bought a new planner!!!!! Now, I realize that this may not mean the same to everyone, but a planner is what makes or breaks my school year. If I buy the wrong one, I just can't get into the habit of writing down my assignments and keeping track of my tests. Then it all goes to shit. If I don't have an active planner, then I'm fumbling and guessing with when things are due and my exam days.

The past three semester have gone without an adequate planner. Oh, I bought a planner before the semester started, but I bought it at Walmart. That was my first mistake. If I wanted an appropriate planner, I should have gone to Staples or Office Max. Damn my father's cheapness. And just like I mentioned earlier, because it wasn't the right planner, I didn't use it, and here it lays, underneath my computer desk, gathering dust. Big waste of money that was.

But fear not. I found the perfect planner at Staples. See, in high school, we were given planners and they worked out perfectly for me. There was a two-page spread for each month where there was enough room for me to write down upcoming tests, quizzes and projects over the course of the month as well as a two-page spread for one week. The planner I bought (or rather my dad bought) was exactly that! And there was an added bonus of check-mark boxes! YES. My life is ready for action. I can now take the 2013 spring semester head on.

Come at me bro spring semester.

Later.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

2013. Those Mayans had us all worried for nothing. I kinda wished the world did end, that would be interesting.

In the words of Gabriella and Troy "It's the start of something new". I hope new stuff happens this year. And I hope this is a better year for me.

I turn twenty this year...Wooo. I always feel like there are supposed to be milestones in a person's life, you know? 13, 16, 18, 21 all seem to be so important to my other friends and not to mention anything media related, but when it happens to me... Not much. And just like how those birthdays don't seem to have as much glitz and glam in my life as they do others, this year's last year's Christmas and New Years didn't hold the same excitement as they usually do. For some reason they just seemed like days to me, nothing special, and that depresses me a little. I like the excitement and the wonder, it's supposed to be my favorite time of the year, but it wasn't this year. And that makes me sad.

My sister said this perfectly in a third grade journal entry: "I wish I were happier, but that's life" (Depressing that thought, but fits my mood oh so well).

Happy New Year to all of those that celebrate and I wish you the best for this upcoming year.

Buh bye for now!