I know this is a bit of a departure from my usual, but I have to share a secret with y'all. I am having a moment with jeans, and it's not a particularly positive one. It's a very bad season to decide that jeans are too binding and yet... I'm trying to compensate by adding pants (I also don't want to wear skirts/dresses cause tights) but as I'm sure is shocking to no one, that's also difficult. I've got a couple pairs from Meeps and recently a couple from Uniqlo (to be seen later), but it continues to be a work in progress. Especially cause it's cold and I'm cold and even in the below outfit I kind of wish I'd included a scarf. Dammit.

Really, I blame Instagram for this. When MAC released this collection in the UK they invited almost everyone I follow to this ridiculous celestial themed dinner and so when I was in Nordstrom (for a RETURN) I felt compelled to wander by the counter. And then I got sucked in cause apparently I'm getting into the whole glitter thing more as I get older and these Spellbinder Shadows are lovely. Lovelier than how they swatch even, which I guess isn't totally surprising.


"Stairs to the Stars" is a deep burgundy shadow with gold glitter. All my playing with it so far has been using my fingers, though seeing it demonstrated on the MAC website makes me think that a wet brush would also work well. It's actually inspired me to go find new/more tutorials on smokey eyes because I want to really let this shine on the lid and I fall back so much on neutrals to blow out the crease when I think this will play against reds/oranges better.

I didn't trust myself to play too much with the other colors - I have a sizeable powder eyeshadow/pigment collection already and I've proven that like highlighters this will be a problematic category for me -  but I love the formula. Super smooth and practically no fallout, which considering how much glitter is in the final result is impressive.

Ok, so where were we - crown, right? Hot glue.


Well next up after getting the shape nailed down was to investigate the jewel options. Originally I had planned for it to be a much longer search, to be stuck in Ebay and Etsy hell with maybe a long trip to Goodwill in my future. Reality? One Annual Rummage Sale later and I had everything I needed to keep going.

At the sale I found two deals - a pair of orange oval stoned earrings for $15, and a grab bag of clear glass beads for $4. I had already contemplated what my options would be if I couldn't find the right shade of teal/green, and painting glass with nail polish (not totally dissimilar to what I did for Princess Warrior Daisy) definitely worked for me. Especially for $4.



Again, installing these were a relatively simple process - I looked at my reference photos and kind of went with my gut, getting it as close as possible and creating a little "inset" shape for the jewel. I used the hot tip of the glue gun to melt a space into where I wanted it to sit, pushed the jewel into place, and circled it with even more hot glue after that. The  more difficult part here is that this is the point where I really started to clean up my lines and shapes.

When you're applying layers of hot glue, things get bulky and bumpy - fast. I first thought I could use my heat gun to warm a butter knife to shape pieces, but no go. It didn't get hot enough. And it only took about 5 secs of heat for me to realize I couldn't apply the heat gun to the crown itself. So instead, and I'm sorry in advance, I took the plastic guard off the tip and started using the gun itself. Without applying more glue I'd smooth and coax curves into being more fluid, removing extra glue as I went. I even refined the shapes of the leaf tips, because I wasn't sure how much could be fixed later in paint touch ups.

What does this mean for you? It means that I have even less of a "tutorial" to offer you, because there is no right or wrong answer. Hell, even a coworker said that she had a hot knife I could borrow in the future (I still don't know what that is). It's totally up to you to decide if your crown is looking right, which I'm bad it in general because I tend to think in terms of "right" and "wrong". Still, my final result (before painting) is one I'm happy with. It's not "perfect" but I'm satisfied and am happy to keep going towards completion.



Which brings us to the end of Part II! Next up is painting and I'm not sure how long that will take. I backed each jewel with hot glue because I wanted to see how the opacity would affect the sheen. So far so good, but I did decide to buy a white primer instead of the brown I had on hand, because I'm still concerned a dark backing would negatively affect the "glow". After the white primer is gold acrylic paint, and after that aging with brown/black, and then going in with gold Rub N' Buff for that "real" effect (I learned about this stuff from Epbot, and a couple places you can see her using it are here and here).

Not too shabby right?! Though you should have heard the cursing as I was covering the jewels in masking tape, it was not my shining moment. And looking at these HUGE PHOTOS now kinda makes me want to go remove some of the glue on the edges of the orange tones....shrug. It'll happen or it won't but at least it's not a total fail!

Don't miss out! You can find the other parts of this series below:

• Part I

So I tend not to talk about workout gear other than the fact that I buy more of it than I should, but this is an exception. I ran into the brand, Beatz Per Minute Apparel, at a fall market in Ballston, and while I was initially draw in by the colors and fun, empowering messaging, it was the story of its beginning that spoke to me most.

Beatz Per Minute was founded by a young black woman, DJ Beauty and the Beatz, and in the words of her website,

"It's a digitally based brand focused on motivating creatives and entrepreneurs to live fearlessly. Deeply influenced by hip-hop, DJ Beauty and the Beatz produced a brand that is fun, inclusive, and inspirational. Established in 2018, Beatz Per Minute Apparel absolutely loves making you feel good and pushing you into your greatness."

What's not to love there? Black Girl Magic if I ever saw it, in fun packaging that would for sure get a lot of use. I started off with the sports bra/crop top and leggings, and I think I'm freakishly excited to say they're both a little big for me in the XL. I'm ok not being strangled by my workout gear (especially because I'm primarily a yoga girl) and I think these would comfortably fit a size 14-16 woman. I just ordered assuming that the Large would be too small all over, but I'm happy to be wrong! Also, just a heads up that this is a minimal support top and it doesn't have padding. It's not see through, but the lack of nipplage in these photos should be contributed to the Nippies I'm wearing underneath.

And in case you were wondering, YES, it did take everything in me not to buy the matching sweatshirt and I still kind of regret it.