Christmas is just around the corner

Christmas is not to far away, do you have all of your shopping done ???

This year i know most of us are low on money due to the economy.
I know i have worked my a$ off but its seems like i don't have as much $ for the holidays as i usually do.

I was thinking what i could do as nice gifts and i figured out quite a few things to do at low cost and they are made with the heart.

Now i have bought a few things at the store to go with these, but i like giving people multiple gifts so here are some nice add on gifts you can make yourself !!


Homeade Kaluah for those of you who are over 21

here is how you do it

Combine water, sugar, coffee and vanilla in a large pot. Cook until sugar is dissolved. Cool. Add vodka..... voila! Just like Kahlua (or very close).

I use the cheapest vodka i can find it works fine

and then i buy at craft stores cool looking bottles , sometimes you can find some at dollar stores




for pet owners i make homemade dog biscuits

take any flavor baby food - i find that beef or chicken tend to be liked the best
take any brand baby cereal

combine baby food and cereal until they are thick enough to pat together

put on cookie sheet bake for 15 min then put in refrigerator to cool


I usually get fun Christmas gift bags at dollar store tie with pretty ribbon and you have an adorable way to include their pets in Christmas.




Made from scratch cookie kit

take all the dry ingredient to make your favorite cookies combine them all layered in a mason jar
write the recipe of how to bake on a cute tag and tie around top

decorate jar however desired.




this is my favorite and its so adorable
Hollow Storage Book

Go to thrift stores/yard sales and buy classic or favorite thick books

take exacto knife or box cutter and cut out the center of the book
glue rest of the pages together

there you have an adorable secret storage book.


another easy gift is to make recipe books
take your favorite recipes make a book out of them and bam another easy present



hope some of these ideas will help you out on gift buying



if you don't have time to make anything but want some homemade presents you could always go on www.etsy.com and order from others that have made things

solid shampoo and conditioner

So as most of you know I use mainly Redken shampoos and conditioners. Well today i found something that I will probably be using for a while.

I ordered soap from the site www.fortunecookiesoaps.com a few weeks ago and fell in love. They all smell so amazing and work so well. I decided to order some for christmas gifts for friends and family (sorry guys if you follow this i just gave it away ha-ha) anyway in this order i recieved they send a sample of the solid soap and conditioner.

Basically they look like soap but its not
the shampoo lathers better then any i have ever used before.
it is very easy to use and each bar lasts about 6-9 weeks depending on how much you wash your hair

the conditioner one was a little harder for me to figure out
i rubbed it all over my soaking wet hair in the shower and i didn't really feel anything in my hair. I was rubbing and rubbing and running it through my hair and still thought i wasn't doing it right. Well my water started getting cold so i said fine ill go ahead and just rinse what i have in here and it was amazing my hair was so silky smooth and soft, so i was using it the right way.

It gave my hair body when i was blow drying it and my curles had shine

if you have curly hair you know curls are so hard to get to shine


i am so very impressed with this company and especially these solid shampoo and conditioners




oh yes and the scents i had were in the loop and vivid - smell amazing !!!

My Review of Christmas Wreath Bath Gift

Originally submitted at Fortune Cookie Soap

You Christmas freaks will love this! It is that time of year again where every house in the world smells of pine in some form. Whether it is in the form of a real Christmas tree or that - nasty pine scented spray, but some people are into that. We, at the fortune cookie soap company can appreciate ...

Christmas Wreath Bath Gift

christmas

By Jenna from blacksburg va on 11/6/2011

 

5out of 5

Pros: Moisturizes, Gentle, Cleans Effectively, Good Value, Easy To Use, Pleasant Smell

Best Uses: Daily Use

Describe Yourself: Budget Buyer

I originally ordered this as a gift for my mother for Christmas but when it came in and i smelled it i decided i had to keep it. Not only does it work amazingly at cleaning and moisturizing but the smell is just like a Christmas tree. Its actually making me even more exited that the holidays are near the more and more i used it.

(legalese)

Holy Wigs Batman

So I have a party to go to tomorrow and it is super hero/villain themed. I chose to be Poison Ivy, so i ordered a wig about a month ago off of Ebay. It was my fault but i did not realize it was coming from Japan and have not relieved it yet. So i ran out today and bought a back up wig in case it does not arrive by tomorrow. I went to our local costume shop and the only wig they had was an orangeish red wig with bangs, but i was desperate so i took it. I have spent hours tonight trying to make this darn wig look at least half way decent. I guess this post is kind of a rant, becuase I paid thirty dollars for this thing and its the biggest piece of crap wig i have ever had. You can't even brush it without globs of hair falling out. Honestly wall-mart probably had better wigs then this and cheaper ! anyway im gonig to pray my real wig comes in tomorrow but if not wish me luck, ha-ha oh p.s. you know its bad when you walk out of the room and your boyfriend just starts laughing so hard he can't breath ha-ha I will probably be awake all night working on this wig so i better get off of here. so the score Wig- 1 Jenna-0

Shine Baby Shine

Everyone always asks me "Jenna how do you get your skin to look so glowy?" I have just a few things i use to get me to this the first thing i do/use is my clarisonic brush every night before bed the Clarisonic takes away all the excess makeup and exfoliates my skin gently at the same time. The second thing I use, but im really sad because they have stoped selling it is Benefit Cosmetics Firmology face serum. This stuff makes your face shine like a disco ball ha-ha it has an iridescence to the cream and that transfers to your skin leaving it felling firmer and looking nice and dewy. The third thing is use lots of moisturizer, i alternate between my Hope in a Jar from Philosophy and Night Cream from Frutique. The last thing is do is use a great Highlighter i first put it above my cheek bone to highlight the cheek and open up the eyes. then i put some down my nose to make my nose appear leaner i also use highlighter to highlight my brow bone. my favorite highlighter is Benefit Cosmetics High Beam I also love the highlighters in my new Smashbox Mega Pallet and that my friends is how i get my signature GLOW

Smashbox photo op pallet

So I have an new favorite this week to share with you !!!! I hope you all are as excited as i am, he-he its the exclusive Smashbox Photo Op mega pallet this thing is AMAZING AMAZING AMAZING !! So it was only available on QVC and i am so glad i snagged it while i could. it comes with so many amazing this such as :

• 56 0.044-oz Photo Op Eye Shadows
• Four 0.032-oz Brow Tech Powders
• 0.024-oz Brow Tech Wax
• Eight 0.031-oz cream eyeliners
• Two 0.298-oz blushes
• Three 0.132-oz Soft Lights
• Four 0.024-oz lip glosses

All of the shadows are so pigmented and go on so well, they are definitely the quality that you are used to if you use smashbox The two blushes are beautiful and look great on just about any skin tone the highlighters are some of the best highlighters i have ever used and the lip glosses are just like smashbox normal glosses I am very excited that if i have a makeup trial i can just bring in this one pallet and not lug around 20 different things. The cover is beautiful red shiny and seems to be very durable my only concern about this is the colors kind of get on each other because of the fall out after you use them. Obviously this is not a huge deal so i am overall very pleased with the quality of this product. Check out QVC and see if they will have any more in the near future !!

Halloween=MUA busy busy day

Hey everyone
so as you all know i am a new makeup artist

well i decided since bridal season is almost over and I won't have weddings every weekend to do, i needed to find something else to occupy my time. I started trying to teach myself how to do special effects makeup.

At first i thought yeah right this is going to be a disaster but after my first try i got so many comments on my facebook page about it looknig so real ( i thought it was awful)

I decided to practice more and more and then came Halloween

So everyone i work with saw how much fun i was having playing around on my own face and arms with the liquid latex and scar wax that they decided to help find me real clients to work on.

I was approached by a regular client of the salon to do her makeup for Halloween, and of course i said i would love to.
So saying yes to her turned into me doing her and her friend as well.
I had a blast doing them and they looked fantastic
i made one into a evil mermaid and the other into a black widow spider.

I also had tons of friends ask me to do theirs as well. Now for me all these opportunities friends or clients paying or not can all be a portfolio opportunity for me to start a special effects part soo i was not going to turn anyone down


I did a evil witch, vampiress, the joker, ninja turtle, Freddy Kruger, mermaid and black widow all in one day


so long blog post short i had the best Halloween ever and i can't wait to practice more until next year