Haireography

                                                           my beloved top-knot :]
                                                  (with muh daddy in the background!)
                                                      picture curtesy of my lil sister.

I have naturally very thick hair. It is both a blessing and a curse: blessing because I rarely actually have to do anything, and a curse because any time I want to do my hair, I have to do battle. I have to use a literal ton of hairspray if I want a curl to hold; it takes about a thousand bobby pins to keep my hair in any kind of braid, and buns usually look like giant balls of yarn on top of my head. But! I have begun to discover different ways to actually style my hair :] So I'm implementing a new plan, I'm going to try one new hairstyle a week for the rest of the year, complete with blog posts and pictures :] This post will be for this coming week (27-3). I've loved the top-knot trend ever since it started and every time I tried it, it ended up horribly :[ I tried countless tutorials (that work for most of my friends, so I'll post the link :] ) but none of them ever worked. But one day I was taking a much needed bubble bath and my hair was getting in the way so I dunked my head under the water and just put it in a bun. Low and behold, when I got out of the bath I was stunned to see that I had a perfect top-knot. I was so excited I literally squealed, jumped up and down and then slipped and almost cracked my head open... Anyway! I went ahead and slept on the bun, woke up the next day and only needed about four bobby pins to hold everything in place. It's now my favorite hairstyle, and I probably wear it too much but that doesn't make it any less cute :] More pics of new hairstyles to come!

xxo taylor.


For those of you lucky enough not to have to go underwater to accomplish an adorable hairstyle, here are the links from thebeautydepartment.com- Lauren Conrad's blog

http://thebeautydepartment.com/hair/page/18/

for this bun, scroll down and watch the video titled "The Ballerina Bun" 

Actually! The link for this one was working, so here's the copy and pasted version :]
This is the fun bun, it's more intricate than the bun I did for this post, and I'm still trying to conquer it, but it's way fun! (hence the name)

photos: Angela Kohler + thebeautydepartment.com post designed by kristin ess

In a world where we can’t stop running late, the fun bun is probably the quickest way from A to Chic. This look comes in über-handy when you wake up late and you’re rushing out the door (or even if you have plenty of time). It’s such a high-brow/low-brow look. Meaning it can be paired with anything from jeans and a tank to a chiffon tiered dress. It’s amazing for the summer because some days when it’s really hot outside, allwe want is to get that hair off our neck + shoulders! You can leave this plain & simple with no accessories, pair it with a headband or add a little sparkle by bobby-pinning in a jeweled brooch at the base. This works with ANY hair type from curly to frizzy to pin-straight. It’s also amazing for those days when you know your hair needs to be shampooed but you JUST DON’T WANNA! Spray some dry shampoo at the roots and follow the steps below. This is a more messy alternative to the ballerina bun…

Step 1: If your hair is straight, use a 1″ curling iron to curl everything under. This will make it easier to tuck pieces into the bun. When they’re straight, they tend to pop out more. If you have wave or curl you can skip this step if you want to.

Step 2: Flip your hair over and gather everything into a ponytail on top of you head, securing it with an elastic ponytail holder.

Step 3: On the last time around with the ponytail holder, only pull the ponytail through half way.

Step 4: Take the loop you’ve created and spread it out. Don’t over think it. Just widen it and allow it to be somewhat messy.

Step 5: Take the tail end and wrap it around the ponytail base.

Step 6: Pin the end of the ponytail to the base using a couple of hair pins/bobby pins.

Step 7: Gently pull on pieces and then pin them. This will give your top-knot a slightly more messy texture.

Step 8: Spray a veil of medium hold hairspray all over. Don’t smooth down all of the fly aways, just lightly tuck the pieces that have gone rogue!

Enjoy the fun bun!

XX Kristin Ess

If you suffer from thick hair like I do, here's how I do my Bathtub Bun (TM ;] )

1. Take a relaxing bath!

2. Make sure hair is fully brushed out, completely soaked and slicked back.

3. Tilt head back, almost completely going under water, and gather hair into a rather high ponytail

4. Wrap hair around base of ponytail, flattening hair to scalp as you go, it'll help tame the voluminous beast that usually results from a top-knot attempt)

5. Wrap an elastic to secure the bun

once you get out of the bath you'll either need to blow dry it or let it dry over night (I haven't tried the blowdrying approach so i don't know how that'll affect the bun) then you can use bobby pins to secure any fly-aways, letting the bun be as messy or refined as you want.

That's my first ever hair tutorial! I hope it was instructive enough :]

Enjoy fashionistas!!

Elephant Love.

Elephants are the largest animals in the entire world. Also, in my personal opinion, the most adorable. They form deep and strong familial bonds, and show great signs of grief when a loved one is lost, especially a child. The whole herd (which is mostly females) protect the young and each other. Plus! They're super smart and have the most badass memory ever. Basically I love assigning human qualities to animals, and elephants pretty much do the work for me. Yay elephants! Also, they're just so damn cute :]

Inspiration.

No one ever tells you that as you approach the end of your Senior year, you will become closer and closer to new people. Making even more friends and getting even closer to the old ones. It's the most bitter-sweet thing I have ever experienced, but I am also extremely grateful for it. Two of the people that I've started to get closer to and some of the most amazing girls I have ever met. They are truly kind, beautiful, intelligent and hilarious girls who have begun to inspire me more than I ever thought they could. P & E have always been a part my friend group but this year, this month specifically, we have bonded over fashion, self-expression, and the stupid boys at our school. They have taught me not be ashamed of loving myself or my style. I'm not sure if they know the scope of how much they've affected me but I hope to pay them back in time :] Also, they are the only two people I've felt comfortable showing this too so if either of you are reading it, wassup girl!! ;] I hope that all of you have someone or multiple someones who inspire me the way these two girls do, and if not then be that girl for someone else.

xxo taylor

http://eandpguidetolife.tumblr.com/

Femme Fatale

A few weeks ago one of my friends showed me a post on a blog called gala darling. The post was "Radical Self-Love Bootcamp" (link will be at the end of the post). The next Monday at school I was telling one of my guy friends about it, he's gay, so he's somewhat interested in such things. As I was talking about it, he scoffed a little and looked at my skeptically. "Why on earth does anyone need a self-love bootcamp?" I tried to explain the insecurities women, especially teenage girls, face with the society we live in today; having to live up to countless standards raging from academia to physical appearance to social life, it's easy to get down on yourself. But he just couldn't get it. He said something along the lines of "If y'all just stayed in the kitchen then you wouldn't have to worry about any of that stuff." Ha ha. I understood that he was joking around but he still didn't quite understand how someone could get to the point of such depression and insecurity that they really would need something like this Self-Love Bootcamp. I then remembered another time, I was auditioning for my school's One Act Competition play. The show we were doing was The Love of the Nightingale by Timberlake Wertenbaker, which is a rewrite of the Greek tragedy about Philomele and her big sister Procne. In a nutshell, Procne marries Tereus and after five years of living far from her family, she sends Tereus to go and fetch Philomele. Well, on the boat ride back Philomele falls in love with the ship's captain while Tereus is busy falling in love with her. He tells her this and she is of course repulsed by the idea of sleeping with her brother in law, so, understandably, he rapes her! Then, in a really great monologue, she speaks about how she will tell everyone, all of his people,  about how disgusting and vile and horrid he is. So, naturally, he cuts out her tongue. The story goes on and Procne and Philomele get their revenge but overall it's a very depressing, although still extremely powerful, show. (btw, I got cast as Philomele. nbd :] )  Anyway, I was walking down the hallway with two of my friends, a guy and a girl, and I was going over my monologue for the audition that afternoon. The monologue was slightly feminist, due to the material of the show. My guy friend started complaining in the middle of my monologue, about how women today are constantly complaining about society and men when really they're a lot better off than the women who came before them blah blah blah. Now, I would definitely agree that we have more rights than our ancestors and that we are respected a bit more on the surface. But the fact that women still make something like 77 cents to a man's dollar and that rape victims are often blamed for putting themselves in that position shows that we still have a long way to go to equality. Why can't men see this? Why do they scoff when women talk about struggling to love themselves in a society that is constantly telling them they're too fat, too ugly or just not good enough? And why do they get angry when a girl gets a little bit feminist? I don't mean no-shaving, man-hating, cat-obsessed feminism, it should be about equality not squashing out the male side of our race. But just a pithy comment or two on how men are regarded as higher in many aspects of society. Maybe a lot of it is that I live in Texas, and an extremely conservative part of Texas too, but it seems to me that feminism is constantly being put down or just dismissed as being silly women trying to cause a fuss before going home to make their husbands some meatloaf. I would love your thoughts on the matter. That is, if anyone is even reading this. Is anyone out there? ...Anyone?

xxo taylor

ps. here's the link to the self-love bootcamp! :]

http://galadarling.com/article/radical-self-love-bootcamp-is-live

Virgin.

So this is my first ever blog post! I'm very excited. I decided to post wintery romantic niceties because it's getting colder and we're all looking around for that adorable boy to curl up next to during the cold winter months. I also have no idea why the forehead-to-forehead look is so completely adorable, but it makes my heart melt <3 Hope y'all find that special someone this holiday season :]

xxo-Taylor