Birthday Wrap Up

I took it nice and easy and even took a day off for my birthday. Which meant that I've been buried in work to catch up since I got back (it's that time of year--but honestly, it's always that time of year in PR). So instead of blogging, I've been working off cake and a week of decadence.

But here is the long overdue recap of the wonderful, awesome, super relaxing birthday that I got to share with Chef.

Nothing says party like some bubbly on the actual birthday. 

It sparkles so nicely. Champagne went well with the dinner he cooked me.
Apparently I ate that too fast to take a picture. 

The beautiful flowers he also surprised me with. 

This was not about cat CPR, but a book on screenwriting I've wanted forever. Good call by Chef. 

I managed to work in a much needed root touch up. Gotta keep red on the head.

I used my Sephora gift cards to do my annual "on my birthday" Sephora trip.

But the birthday just kept on going! I took off Friday to have some fun and we celebrated on Saturday too. That's how we roll in our household.  Below are more spoils from being spoiled (that included a two hour massage--somehow I've managed to tighten up again). I'm a lucky gal! Thanks for the birthday wishes everyone!

I Cut My Own Bangs

This is a literal title of the blog and my life. I was sick of having an extra inch of fringe hanging in front of my eyes. I couldn't stand it, so I did something about it. I watched a Youtube tutorial, read a few beauty mag posts and then went snip, snip. And you know what? It didn't turn out so bad. They look fine and even, and best of all they're out of my eyes so I can see.

The problem is that my stylist has quit styling hair. Even bigger problem: she was a fucking hair magician with the color. She's the only one whose ever colored my hair red. And now while I'm wishing her luck as a paralegal, I'm dragging my heels in finding someone else to make magic on my head. (read that as dirty as you want to)

The other problem is that I don't treat my hair so great. I wait until I can't stand it, which is about two weeks past it looking good, and then I call a stylist and have them fit me in. Now that I'm without stylist, this is a bit harder. Plus I got my aesthetician to give me the name of someone who knows all the stylists in this beauty professionals collection that I go to, but the guy won't return my calls. So I'm up shit creek without a dye job. It's sad.

Until then, at least I can see.

Is it okay to touch my hair? I'm not sure

My hair in rollers

I've already outlined how my hair is one of my biggest vanities. Despite my battle with psoriasis, I still take pride in swinging the locks from side to side as I strut, er, walk around the office. Plus I love the color. And apparently other people do too because I get complimented on it from strangers quite a bit. I wish this were my natural color, but c'est la vie.

What I don't normally get is people who randomly put their hands in my hair. I was shopping at Ulta the other weekend with Chef and a sales clerk came up to me and said "I love your hair color. Whoever did this is amazing. I'm a colorist myself. Where did you get this done?" While all of that was coming out of her mouth, her hands were going through my hair. It seemed like the sort of thing only done by stylists who are actually consulting on your hair (I was just walking through the store shopping for nail polish) or toddlers whom you've picked up. The coincidental thing about it was that she had her hair tied back and wrapped for religious reasons.

My hair after rollers

The last time someone randomly combed through my hair with their hands, I was in high school gym class (not being very active, but rather sitting on the bleachers) and they found a bald spot on the back underside of my head. This turned out to be alopecia areata and the treatment was about 30 small injections of steroids into the bald spot which hurt like hell. The dermatologist said one of the causes was stress; I was 16. From then on whenever I got a little nervous about something, my mom would hug me and say "Don't stress out. I can't afford for you to go bald again." Which undoubtedly made me stress out.

When was the last time you had a stranger run their hands through your hair?

From the Outside In

As I was looking in the mirror this morning at the splotches on my face, the good inch of roots and dead ends on my hair and my chipped nail polish on my hands and feet,  it made sense to me. How can I expect to get myself out of this funk if I am relishing it too much. I've decided to fight this from the outside in.

I've made my hair cut and color appointment (sadly I think I spotted a few gray hairs in my roots, but I'm hoping it's just powder from dry shampoo that hadn't absorbed), and am going to get a mani-pedi while I'm at it. I'm going to find a skin solution to try, as no solution is perfect, and I'm going to refill any prescriptions that I have run out of for my psoriasis.

If I look better on the outside, then I feel like it will help me feel a little better on the inside. At least that's my theory now.

My Vanity: My Hair

Post roller time

The older I get, the more I come to realize that most reasonable people hated high school. And that most people going through high school or middle school were going through some sort of serious trauma that they hid from other people. I say this because I've talked with people I've gone to high school with (or at least those who I didn't remain close with in college) and found out they were going through stuff I had no idea about. Teasing, divorce counselling, taking lunch at home. All kinds of things I was too wrapped up in myself to see. 

But thinking of all that, I also look back to see what did I do to keep my shit together. Mostly I suffered from an odd case of having no or low self-esteem but exceptionally high self-respect. Meaning my overall pictures of myself wasn't great--mostly due to my weight issues, but I knew enough to know that I was smart and that counted for a lot in my book. And when I was having my ugly days, there was one thing that my mom did for me that still makes me smile: she introduced me to the kindness of hot rollers. 

One side of my hair holds curl
better than the other.
Anyone else have that?

My mom did other things, like constant reinforcement of my intelligence and the importance of that, but sometimes a girl needs to feel pretty. And was during one of those moments in need that my mom bust out her big old set of hot rollers and went to town. She would tell me how pretty my hair was and how she was excited that she had passed that down to me. And to this day, when I'm in the need to feel pretty about myself, I wrap my hair up in those hard plastic rollers and sweat it out until I'm left with bouncy curls and happiness. Luckily, I do not have to do that every day as I did in high school (and well into college), but every now and again, it's a nice reminder. 

It was these moments that helped me realize how hard it was for my mother to lose her hair during chemo. She never intentionally let my stepdad see her without a wig or other head covering because of it. But I knew what was bothering her--her secret weapon was gone and there was no easy way to get it back. She handled most things silently but she was pretty vocal about losing her hair. I would be too.

It is my go-to vanity. And there when I needed it most. And if it ever comes to losing my hair, I'll invest in a damn good wig--that I can hot roller.

Red on the Head

It costs more than the box of Nice 'N Easy I used to color my hair with (Light Ash Blonde #102B). It takes a lot longer too. But it's worth every minute and every penny. I love the color that my stylist has (she says it takes longer than the average mix, but I don't mind waiting). I love the care that she takes in chopping my locks. It is the one consistent thing that I've done for myself since I moved here.

And it makes me feel pretty.  I'll think I'll be a red head for a while. Thanks to Chef and my friends who encouraged me to take the leap.

I Thought I Saw A Ghost

Last night I got up in the middle of the night and scared the crap out of myself. Through my blurry night eyes and mussed up hair, I looked over in the mirror and thought it was someone else. I thought it was my mom looking back at me.

I think this is a natural occurrence in most women's lives. When they look back or hear themselves and think "Man, I'm turning into my mom." But for people who have lost their moms, this can be a satisfying and scary thing.

Honestly I was thinking about it today. Why now? I have a hair color that my mother never had. and I can never remember her having hair this long. After much thought I think I've nailed it down to a few things:

• I'm now getting to be the age my mom was when I was born. I'm in my thirties which is where my mom was when we met. (And by met, I mean she popped me out of her stomach-I was a C-section baby). So it's only natural that the pictures that I've seen are mostly from after that time. The memories I have are of her from the thirties and beyond.
  
• I have bangs now. It's a simple thing, but my bangs were pushed to the side in my night time slumber-induced rearrangement. This was the way my mom wore her hair for my entire life. So that contributed to the confusion.
• It was the middle of the night and I often scare the crap out of myself so I was probably making a bigger thing of this than it really was.

So, I take a little pride in having confused myself for a while as I think my mom aged well (minus the whole cancer thing, of course) and she was always cute. Honestly, if I ended up like her in even a very small way, I would ecstatic. She was a pretty great lady.

I Need Your Vote On my Hair!

I'm going to the hair stylist tomorrow to get some updates on my hair, and am probably going to go with red as the color. What shade of red? That's a good question. I'm currently varying between a few shades and would love your input and opinion.

Vote in my poll and I MIGHT use the majority's suggestion or I might use what you say to determine if I'm disappointed something else didn't get picked. We'll see. Either way, your vote does mean SOMETHING.

Pictures of the new hair will be posted after my appointment at 1 p.m (PST) tomorrow.

End of Round One

Today was the last day of our first Wrye Family Weight Loss Challenge. Two months ago my aunts, cousins and I started off on our journey to lose weight. We track it through a weekly weigh-in and chat about it on a secret Facebook group.

We started out by setting a goal (it ended up being 10 pounds each) and then we choose a reward. If ALL of us hit our goal, then we get to partake in our reward. My reward was a nice haircut and color from a professional--not just Supercuts and a box of Nice 'N Easy like I normally do.

Good news is that we had our last weigh-in for round one this morning and we all hit our goal. The six of us lost more than 77 pounds in two months. Not too shabby, if I do say so myself. I lost a little over 11 pounds this time and that brings the total of weight I've lost since moving to LA at more than 14 pounds. Not too shabby. Especially when you consider that Chef and I still go out at least once a week for a nice dinner. I'm actually pretty happy with it so far. And at least for the moment I'm motivated for about 30 more pounds.

Now the question becomes, how am I going to get my hair cut and what color should it be? Chef is determined for me to be a redhead, but I'm not quite convinced yet. Maybe some auburn highlights, but I'm not ready to commit to full blown red. I'm also thinking it's time to get some bangs and an actual hairstyle. Hopefully by next weekend, I'll have some pictures to post.

In the mean time, if you have any hair suggestions, send them my way.