If you follow me on Twitter you may have seen me tweeting behind the scenes pics from a photo shoot for Glamour's September issue last Thursday (yes, they're already working on September shoots). I was honored to get a sneak peek at their "Best of You" feature, an annual article in partnership with Sally Hansen highlighting four inspirational and powerful women and their non-profit work. From adopting a neighborhood in Atlanta to making the elderly feel special in nursing homes, each of these women had stories to tell, with one goal in common: raising awareness. Here's what you'll find in Glamour's Sept. issue:
Each September for the past 12 years, Glamour and Sally Hansen seek out women to highlight in the next years issue. After thousands of submissions, ten finalists are chosen and Glamour readers vote on the final four.
Keela Dates, Executive Director of Reason2Smile.org
Nominated by a board member, Keela only found out about "Best of You"when she was in the top ten. Her trip to Kenya at 22 years-old as a volunteer at a school for orphaned and at-risk children inspired her to create the non-profit. Currently, the school is K-11 with 45 children living in the orphanage. In the US, Keela speaks at local schools to educate them about life in developing countries and reminds students about how grateful they should be. She hopes "Best of You" will hope to raise awareness of Reason2Smile, help her get into more schools to continue the education path and raise funds for developing countries.
Rebecca Stanley, Founder of Blueprint 58
Rebecca was nominated by one of her blog readers and I got to meet her and her husband, perhaps to of the most generous people on the planet. Inspired by the phrase, "Love thy neighbor as thy self," Rebecca and her husband Adam grew up in Atlanta and realized after working at a summer camp with children who lived just a town over that poverty was just around the corner. Fast forward a few years after mentoring children from the intercity, with children of their own, they decided to pick up and move to the intercity so they could act as the positive role model in the neighborhood. Neighborhood children visit after school for games, dinners, homework help, attend Sunday mass with them and are taught about life lessons we take for granted. They're hoping the "Best of You" feature will help to raise awareness that poverty is right in our backyards. Here's her blog where you can see photos of her children playing with the neighborhood kids.
Rachel Doyle, Founder of GlamourGals
Meeting all of these inspiring women was such a pleasure, but Rachel's optimistic personality and beauty inspired mission instantly drew me to her. I have to work with her. When her grandma passed she began volunteering at senior homes by giving the ladies makeovers and manicures. Only, her volunteering stint turned into a country wide movement when she founded GlamourGals. Now, she inspires teen women to build chapters around the country and volunteer a few times a month at a local senior home. To date, she has 68 chapters in 14 states, but hopes the September issue of Glamour will help raise awareness and get more women involved.
Carrie Severson, Founder of Severson Sisters
Carrie had her mom on the shoot with her, who was as you can imagine so incredibly proud. After being bullied when she was younger, she found internal peace in her 20's and gives credit to her creative outlets such as cooking, writing and scrap booking. Today, she's committed to teaching younger girls how deal with self esteem issues and mentors bully victims, bullies and those who are bullied.
The Tracy Reese collection for Spring/Summer 2012 is full of flowers, pastels, and ladylike skirts. The nails, hair, and makeup enhanced the clothes, giving it all a polished look.
The makeup was done by Mally Roncal, the creator of Mally Beauty. She wanted the look to be fresh and youthful (which worked great with Tracy's pretty play suits). She gave all the model's skin a satin finish, "No translucent powder!" she repeated twice. She then set the skin with Mally's Face Defender. Keeping the brows strong, Roncal went kept to a natural arch. She made the eyes very special. She described the style of eyeliner as that customized style that the coolest girl in class could pull off, but you couldn't, thin with a small kick up at the end. (Everyone nodded in agreement and nostalgia when she said that). The lids were kept naked and the lashes long and spiky. The blush, in 24/7 medium, was placed high and strong, well above the apples of the cheeks. The lips were the most interesting of the entire look. They were very glossy and in two different shades. The top lip was a color called Life is Fuchsia pink and the bottom was Be a Peach orange. The models were instructed very carefully not to roll their lips, but to marry the two colors by going "MA MA MA". Mally's advice to those wanting to try the look at home, "Just go for it!"
Getting manicures is a pain in the butt because unless I get CND Axxium (the gels) my polish always chips within two to three days. Therefore, I find myself getting a polish change and a manicure in one week because I can't stand the thought of having unkept hands. I've heard about the Sally Hansen Salon Effects Nail Strips, but was very skeptical about them until I gave them a whirl. Now, they're my latest must have.
As usual, I had my weekly manicure on Wednesday and all my polish chipped by Friday so my nails were neatly manicured and instead of opting for my weekly polish change I decided to try out the strips. The kit comes with detailed instruction (even though the process is pretty self explanatory), a mini nail file with different surfaces, wooden cuticle pusher and about 14 strips.
I opted to try the leopard print design (hey, why not?) and while applying them I was also conversing with my best girl friend on the phone. Since they're strips, you don't have to worry about concentrating too hard on messing up. I have extremely tiny nail beds, which is why I was skeptical about these strips working for everyone, but because the kit came with a few different size strips for each hand, I was able to match them up best I could to my nail beds and throw the extras that were too big out.
All in all it took about 20 minutes and I do think they can accommodate people with different nail bed sizes and nail shapes. Is my DIY mani perfect? No, I have some spaces around the edges, but they're barely noticeable. I'm anxious to see if they really last the 10 days they claim to.
Tis' the season. Let me tell you. With the holidays approaching I haven't had a chance to breathe! Normally work events slow down a bit, but this year, it seems every brand wants to have new launch events and holiday parties this season and on top of it, I have so many parties with my friends and family! I haven't been able to breathe since Thanksgiving! I'm sure you're feeling quite the same way between shopping, entertaining and party hopping. Because of all of the madness I've had to cut the corners on my primping this year and do a lot of it myself. Thank God for good DIY products. Here's what I've been doing, it can save you too!
L’Oréal Paris Root Rescue 10 Minute Root Coloring Kit , $7.99
