Monthly Archives: May 2015

Today is a Good Day to Dye

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Fuck yeah I made a Star Trek pun.

I’ve been doing my own hair for many years. It’s been all the colors of the rainbow, spiky and silky and extensions. Black, blonde, it’s all good! I’m a short hair lifer. Cut it all off when I was 19 and never looked back!

This is Special Effects “Wildflower”, a true blue violet. It’s my favorite and might as well be my natural color, since it’s what I always come back to!

To get this look, follow my simple, lazy advice: Is your hair bleached or naturally very light? Great! Wash it! Don’t condition it. Wash it really well, though. Air dry it until it’s barely just a little moist – I find this makes it easier to get the dye through your hair. But don’t put the dye in when it’s wet or it’ll be a pain in the ass.

Put on some nitrile gloves (they don’t catch on your hair as badly as latex), fill your hands with thick, everything-staining purple paste straight out of the bottle (skip brushes, that’s just a pain), and smear that stuff into your hair like you’re doing a hair mask. Make sure it’s all saturated. And then, leave it in your hair for at least three hours. It is not damaging color, it will not harm your hair. If I have the time I will leave it in up to 8 hours.

If your hair is naturally dark, you will have to bleach your hair, first, as light as you can get it. If you aren’t confident with bleach (many people aren’t), have a stylist do it for you or a friend who is handy with hair.

The longer you leave it in, and the lighter your hair is initially, the more vibrant and long lasting your newly violet tresses will be. If you literally want he exact same, bleach your bangs/”forelocks” and dye that purple and dye the rest black. Don’t worry about trying to put the purple on just the front, just slather it over the top of the black hair too. I feel like it makes my hair shinier and makes the purple seem like it blends in.

Then, if you’re like me, avoid washing your hair like you’re literally allergic to it. For weeks. Wait, did I say that out loud? Fuck yeah I did. Don’t wash your hair, and you’ll avoid having to re-dye your hair every two weeks. And it’ll be easier to style if you’re into weirdo crazy hair from the 80s and shit.

Travelo Classic Perfume Atomizer and Chanel No. 5 Eau Premiere – a Match Made in Heaven!

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I’m a bit of a perfumista (ok, I hate that word, but it’s true).  I don’t wear some of the heavier, rich fragrances I used to wear because I get migraines these days, but this fragrance right here is amazing and always just right.  Chanel No 5 Eau Premiere is everything I always wished its big sister was – a milder, more modern, fresher version of the famous classic No. 5.  Fragrantica describes it as a woody, aldehydic, white floral that’s lighter, fresher, and more suitable for daily use than the original No 5.  I can wear this even on hot summer days, whereas I would have only reached for No. 5 during the winter, with a super light hand.  This brings me to the next part of my post!

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What you see there is an enormous 5 ounce bottle of that delicate, beautiful juice.  Nope, that’s not something I would have ever splurged on for myself; it was pretty much one of the nicest holiday presents I ever got.  But how on earth would you ever take this with you anywhere?  You wouldn’t.  Enter the Travalo!

The Travalo (bottom right) is a miniature atomizer that can be refilled over and over from any perfume that has a sprayer.  It’s basically pure genius.  The bottle is all plastic and under an ounce, so it’s airline approved.  And it’s so easy to fill!  At first glance, you’d think you take off the sprayer of the Travalo and use that, right?  Nope…look at the bottom…

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Take the sprayer nozzle off your bottle of perfume.  Locate the plastic bottom of your Travalo atomizer and the little hole there.  Line that hole up over the sprayer tip of your perfume bottle…

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…and pump-pump-pump-pump-pump!

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You can see from the plastic window that the perfume has made it into the atomizer.

I have had my Travalo for several years.  It gets tossed around in the bottom of my purse after being refilled numerous times.  Sometimes I throw it in my work desk drawer.  Never ONCE has it ever leaked!  The current model holds 65 sprays (my older model holds 50 sprays) and costs $19.99 from the Travalo website, but the older version is available from Amazon for much cheaper.  If you have huge perfume bottles you cannot take on the go with you, you need this in your life!

Thanks for another amazing recommendation, fragrance board at Makeupalley.  ❤

–Rachel

And a Hello from Kristin!

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Hi everyone!

I think Rachel did a great job summing up everything.

I’m a former technology professional, but my passion is specialty coffee, so I left the tech industry to return to work in the trenches as a professional barista. I’m very serious about it, but I’ll likely not post much about that here. Sometimes I manage to get fancy for work, but usually I’m just utilitarian — that’s why I’m into long-wearing, funky, cute stuff that I can basically throw on and forget it.

I’m a self taught voracious beauty fiend, and my specialties are hair color, eyebrows, and black eyeliner — you know, just some goth stuff. I’m a former model, a sometimes entertainer, and a full time screwball. I hang out with some rockstars, drink fancy wine, make fancy coffee, disappear into the dust for Burning Man for two weeks a year, and play a lot of video games when I’m not getting too dressed up for normal life and just not caring.

I hope you enjoy the weird and interesting take we have on beauty, from drugstore finds to expensive indulgences. So, like Rachel said, beverage up and get ready for some awesome stuff.

A Hello from Rachel :-D

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So, Kristin and I are besties from, uh…oh god…like 15 years back.  We first became friends when I lived here on the East coast and at one point, I actually lived in the same city as her out on the West coast!  When I lived in the same city as her (and even before then when I would visit) we were involved in modeling and fashion events like runway shows together.  Matter of fact, the userpic on our Facebook page is from backstage at a fashion show we were in together!  I was working as a makeup artist in retail cosmetics and doing some freelancing.  I ended up moving back to the Southeast, though she and I always remained close and we still pretty much stay in touch daily.  We have been friends pretty much forever!  About a year ago, we started blogging over on Tumblr at abadhomance.tumblr.com as just a casual thing that we could do together from what seems like a world away.  And oh my GAWD, it turned out to be super fun and addictive!  So now we’re taking it up a notch and now we’re going to be using WordPress and have even registered the associated domain, abadhomance.com — and you can add this to blog reader apps such as Bloglovin so you can easily read us on your smart phone along with all your favorite blogs (no matter what platform they are on)!  We are also going to be updating to Twitter and Facebook from this account as well as our Tumblr.  Those should all be linked from this site.  Exciting times in the kingdom!!

We hope that you will enjoy our reviews and learn a little something from our years of experimenting. Maybe I can impart a little knowledge from my years in retail hell, who knows?

A little about me:  Briefly, I’m very, very, very fair.  So is Kristin.  I am super duper porcelain and she is almost as pale as I am.  If you are looking for fair skin makeup products and advice, you have come to the right place.  I am more mature than Kristin by 11 years, so if you are looking for tips and tricks for skincare and makeup in your 40s, you’ve also come to the right place.  I’m also obsessed with sun care.  Hello!  See where I’m going with this?  This is meant to be a fashion blog as well, but I have no good place to get full length photos, but I’m working on it.  Kristin and I are both obsessed with Fluevog shoes, silver jewelry, and we’re both sorta gothy, but we both branch out of that style a lot.  I have 2 cats and she has 1, so you may get some crazy cat lady vibes while you’re here.  We are both totally obsessed with fancy coffee.  Kristin knows fancy wines and we both love whisky/bourbon.  We’re considering skype makeup chats with such libations.  🙂

Sit back, grab your favorite beverage, and enjoy our blog.  Please feel free to write us with any questions!  We will always try to answer you.

Me and Kristin, we have a bad ho-mance… 😛

Welcome!

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Please excuse our collective dust.

Rachel and I are working very hard to get this whole deal up and running — I’m currently indulging my former web designer self by building and poking and fidgeting with the site design and the layout. But it shall be up and running soon, along with our many other new ventures into social media.

Thanks for coming by!

Kristin & Rachel