Happy Halloween!

Roasting Pumpkin Seeds

When you're carving your Halloween pumpkins, don't throw away the seeds!

Roasted pumpkin seeds have a nutty flavor and are packed with protein and fiber. Pumpkin seeds are delicious toasted and salted, but they're even better flavored with sweet and savory spices.

How to Roast Pumpkin Seeds:

1. Rinse pumpkin seeds under cold water and pick out the pulp and strings. (This is easiest just after you've removed the seeds from the pumpkin, before the pulp has dried.)

2. Place the pumpkin seeds in a single layer on an oiled baking sheet, stirring to coat. If you prefer, omit the oil and coat with non-stick cooking spray.

3. Sprinkle with salt and bake at 325 degrees F until toasted, about 25 minutes, checking and stirring after 10 minutes.

4. Let cool and store in an air-tight container.

Why Carve Pumpkins?

The story of the Jack O'Lantern comes from Irish folklore. Jack was a crafty farmer who tricked the Devil into climbing a tall tree. When the Devil reached the highest branch, Jack carved a large cross in the trunk, making it impossible for the Devil to climb down. In exchange for help getting out of the tree, the Devil promised never to tempt Jack with evil again. When Jack died, he was turned away from Heaven for his sins and turned away from Hell because of his trickery. Condemned to wander the Earth without rest, Jack carved out one of his turnips, took an ember from the devil, and used it for a lantern to light his way. He became known as "Jack of the Lantern."

*Recipe from Allrecipes

Pictures of the Kids...

Cameron and Sierra before school on our porch

Sierra and her friend Hannah in front of Hannah's house

A little vignette in our foyer. I carved the pumpkin and Cameron made the junior pumpkin on the right.

My Eyebrows

After years of using eyebrow pencil to fill in my brows, today I decided to undertake the procedure known as "permanent cosmetics." Here's a little background info on it:

Understanding the Permanent Cosmetic Process
It is important that clients are well informed of the changes that occur in the appearance of procedures immediately after the procedure is conducted and afterwards during the healing process. Often the initial intense, or fresh, appearance of the procedural area is the primary concern. Understanding why the procedural area appears somewhat darker at first and knowing that this is temporary and predictable helps deal with the process.

Although the skin tissue in various locations of the face is different, there are some commonalties that apply to all facial permanent cosmetic procedures:

Swelling
The body sends lymphatic fluids to the site to provide the body’s unique healing fluids. Histamines results in a swelling (usually only slightly) of the tissue, thus bringing the compromised skin together closer in proximity to assist closing the wound site. The degree of swelling which is normally is not easily noticeable in regard to eyebrow procedures, varies from person to person. If you do experience any noticeable swelling, this is temporary and an application of a cooling compress is recommended.

Initial Darker Appearance of the Procedural Area
All permanent cosmetic procedures will initially appear somewhat darker or “fresh” as I refer to this condition than the subsequently healed version. The following explanations will provide the reason why this is so:

To apply pigment in the upper dermis location of the skin, it is necessary to implant through the top layers of the skin, the epidermis. The epidermis layers of the skin collects and then exfoliates dead skin cells as new cells are produced. As the dead skin cells in the epidermis layer of the skin are exfoliated, tiny particles of pigment that are trapped in the epidermis are also discarded with the dead skin cells. When the total process is complete only the pigment in the dermis will remain. As a result, the density of the pigment is less and the appearance of the healed procedure naturally appears lighter. Also, these new skin cells cover the procedural area veiling the procedure and causing it to be less visible than when initially implanted.

Lips procedures produce the most dramatic pigment color changes of the three commonly performed procedures, eyebrows, eyeliners, and lip color. Due to the fact that the lips tissue characteristics do not have pores or oil glands, they are the first to expel excess pigment, normally 50% to 70% of the applied pigment within three to four days after the initial procedure was conducted. The appearance of pigment lightening in the eyebrow and eyeliner areas is less noticeable, and normally can be effectively seen in 5 to 10 days depending on the client’s age.

"Overall the total percentage of pigment exfoliation on eyebrow and eyeliner procedures is approximately 15-25% of the initially applied pigment. The skin is thicker in the eyebrow area and retains more pigment."

Once the outer barrier of the skin is compromised (broken) the body will immediately detect a wound that requires healing. As a result, body fluids are sent to cleanse the wound from the inside out. These body fluids include a small amount of blood. Blood is red when it oxidizes with air, and red is the second strongest primary color and causes the procedural area to appear darker for a few days.

The skin surrounding the procedure site has been traumatized, which produces additional circulation under the skin. This blood flow causes the surrounding skin to appear red and irritated, which affects the appearance of darkness of the procedural area. As irritation subsides, the area begins to appear lighter in color.

Although technically the healing process may sound complicated, consider that this same process is something we all go through with everyday skin compromises i.e., minor cuts and scratches, it just sounds more dramatic when put in a text format. 

My "before" eyebrows

My "just after" eyebrows (kinda scary, huh?)

Click here to see "before," "just after" and "healed" photos (not of me though). It's amazing how much the color lightens up.

Here are my own "after" photos.

* Above informational text was borrowed from facesbymargie.com (this is not who did my eyebrows).

Birthday Recap

My birthday actually started the night before when I was getting ready for bed. Jason suggested to me that the next day I should stay home and sleep in and he would take Sierra to her 8:00 a.m. (have to be there by 7:30 a.m.) soccer game. That way, we wouldn't have to wake up Cameron (he usually doesn't get up until 9:00 a.m. on weekends) and it would be a nice treat for me to stay in bed longer. I agreed it was a great idea.

I woke up at 7:00 a.m. to see Sierra off to her soccer game. Got back in bed and watched a TLC marathon of My First Home. On commercials, I gave myself a pedicure and did the night before's dinner dishes. Cameron didn't get up until 9:30 a.m. Jason and Sierra got home shortly after that (their team won 6-0). The family gathered round and gave me a wonderful card from each of them. Around noon, Sierra went to a friend's house for a sleepover. Jason and Cameron spent a better part of the day playing video games together while I indulged in computer time, t.v. time, whatever. Did I mention that Jason vacuumed the whole house (he does this all the time anyway, but it was nice to have a freshly vacuumed house on my birthday).

Around 7:00 p.m., Jason and I dropped off Cameron at my MIL's house and we went to dinner at one of my favorite restaurants Daily Grill. I had the pan fried trout (which I always have - I'll have to change it up next time) and Jason had the blackened rib-eye...yum! We shared a lovely bottle of Mirassou Pinot Noir and since it was my birthday, I got to select a dessert on the house. I've never tried key lime pie so I decided to be daring and took a piece "to go." It came with raspberry sauce, fresh blackberries and homemade whipped cream. I had some today for brunch (along with my leftover trout) and it was delicious. If someone had told me that it was like a lime-flavored cheesecake, I would have tried it years ago. I think I have a new favorite dessert now.

click on the picture below to learn more about Daily Grill

After dinner, I asked Jason to take me to Target. I know that sounds like an obscure request, but we never go shopping together and it was the only store open that late. Anyway, we wandered around holding hands looking at all kinds of stuff and I even tried on a couple pair of shoes (didn't find anything I couldn't live without though) and then headed out to pick up Cameron a few mintues before the store closed.

It was a fabulous birthday!

Today is my birthday

I turned 42. I'll blog later and let you know how my day went...so far so good!

Aromaleigh FOTD "Well-Suited Room Service"

Here's the Face of the Day I did on 10/16/08...

Eyes:

• AL shadow base all over
• well-suited on inner 1/2 of lid
• room service outer 1/2 of lid and entire crease
• khaki in crease and outer corner
• smokescreen outer corner to add depth
• moon pure hue and ice matte (50/50 blend) on brow bone
• drama queen teal liner wet on upper lash line (whatever was left on the brush after doing the uppers, I swiped under my lower lashes)
  

Rest of face:

• 2y voile
• translucent ultra resolution finishing powder
• pomegrante/candy pure rouge mix on cheeks
• gala on lips
  

Aromaleigh Makeup Challenge - Week 26

Back in April, one of the members of Aromaleigh Aficionadas (that's the name of the online forum for Aromaleigh Mineral Cosmetics) posted a fabulous idea called a Weekly Makeup Challenge. She started the challenge by selecting two Aromaleigh eyeshadow colors. Forum members then do a makeup look using those two colors (similar colors are allowed as substitutions and you can add as many additional colors as you like) and post it to the forum. The first person to post a look gets to choose the next week's challenge colors. It's a fun way to use colors you might not normally select for yourself.

We're on Week 26 and still going strong. This week's chosen colors were Burnt Roses (a rich chocolatey cherry frost with tiny deep green sparks) and Teddy Wisp (a mid-toned cocoa shade with soft smoke tones and sparks of copper and rose).

Here's what I did:

Eyes:

• AL shadow base all over
• Daphne eye lustre on lid and crease
• Teddy Wisp gothic lolita on outer 1/2 of lid
• Burnt Roses gothic lolita in crease, outer corner and lined wet on top lash line
• Sunny Disposition eye plush on brow bone
  

Face:

• Porcelaine oil-control primer powder in med/deep in t-zone
• 2y voile
• translucent ultra resolution finishing powder
• pomegrante/candy pure rouge mix on cheeks
  

Lips:

• AL lip balm, topped with Burnt Roses and then topped with a drug store pink frost lipstick

FOTD - Aromaleigh Purple Eye Plush Look

Let me start off by saying I LOVE THE AROMALEIGH EYE PLUSH COLLECTION! I feel like they were made for me and I'm having lots of fun playing with different combinations. Here's what I did today (10/14/08)...

* all products are by Aromaleigh unless otherwise noted.

Eyes:

• AL shadow base all over (using this makes a HUGE difference in how the colors show up)


• dollhouse eye plush on lid and creasebalsam satin petals frost in crease and outer corner


• petit fours eye plush on brow bone


• drama queen violet pure drama eyeliner lined wet on top lash line

Face:

• 2y voile w/ just a sprinkle of 2w glissade added in


• clear ultra resolution finishing powder


• sweetheart pure rouge on cheeks

Lips:

• tulip liner to line (but not fill in)


• pout color infusion botanical lipstick


• alexandrite pure hue on top of pout


• french cocoa bliss lip balm all over for shine

Thanks for looking. Hope you like it.

Aromaleigh Eye Plush FOTD (this is not your mama's blue eyeshadow)

Here is my latest Face of The Day (FOTD) using my samples of the new Aromaleigh Eye Plush collection. Here's what I did:

* all products are by Aromaleigh unless otherwise noted.

Eyes:

• Aromaleigh shadow base all over lid
• baby blues eye plush shadow on lid and crease
• sunny disposition eye plush shadow on brow bone (love, love, love this color!)
• isabella eye lustre shadow in crease and outer corner
• graphite pure eyes matte shadow wet lined on upper and lower lash lines
• Covergirl marathon black mascara
  

Face:

• 2y voile/2w glissade mineral foundation (50/50 mix)
• pomegranate pure rouge and twinkle perle powder on cheeks (50/50 mix)
• ultra resolution finishing powder in translucent
• tulip stay-put lip liner to line and fill in
• crush color infusion botanical lipstick on lips
  
  

I love the way this whole look turned out! I hope you do too.