March Ipsy GlamBag 2017

Ipsy is a $10 per month beauty bag which contains a mix of beauty, haircare, and skincare products that are mostly deluxe samples or full-size. Though it is consistently my favorite of its affordable subscription box competitors (such as Birchbox, Sephora Play!, or Allure), I have mixed feelings about my Ipsy bag this month.

My First Boxycharm

This month I tried a new-to-me beauty box, BoxyCharm, which is $21 per month for primarily full-size items. There is a waitlist, but I was only on it for about 3 weeks before getting a notification that I'd be receiving a box. For a long time (i.e. since last May), BoxyCharm didn't appeal to me. They send out a lot of indie brands, and I wasn't sure that I cared to have that many full-sized products. However, now that I'm on a bit of sample overload & have unsubscribed to everything but Julep & Ipsy AND have come to find that I like the quality of quite a few of the regular beauty box indie brands, Boxy started to make more sense for me to try.

Saturday Reading List

How I feel when I'm added to my fifth freaking Lula Roe group this month: If Another Mom Tries to Sell Me Something on Facebook, I'm Going to Lose It.

Mom was in town this weekend & we spent some time discussing how important it is to start traveling ASAP and to stop waiting for more money or more stability or more time, so this article on how it's never the right time to travel is apropos.

I Don't Need Democracy because I Have Hygge: "And yes, the fact that Planned Parenthood might be defunded is atrocious. I would donate if I could, but I just bought a $1500 zinc-top bar cart from Pottery Barn, so I’m pretty strapped for cash."

My new biggest inspiration, Julie, a "not so young" woman traveling abroad. Talk about life goals!

This post from Phoebe at Little Grey Box really spoke to me this week: This Is Why I've Decided Not to Have Children.

FabFitFun Spring 2017

I audibly squealed when I pulled into my driveway on Friday and saw my Spring FabFitFun box on my front porch. FabFitFun is a seasonal lifestyle & beauty box that arrives 4 times a year. The Fall 2016 box was my first of their seasonal boxes, and it was amazing, introducing me to the only scarf I would wear for the entire winter & to the sinfully frivolous but wonderful Spongelle body wash infused sponges. The Winter 2016 box didn't have the same *wow factor* for me that the Fall box did, but I still received items that became favorites of mine (such as, somewhat unfortunately, pricey candles from DL & Co. and, less unfortunately, the incredible mineral peel from ORG). FabFitFun  is $50 per box, or $180 if you purchase the entire year of boxes at once.

Lip Hoarder Part 2

I am slowly but surely progressing through my personal challenge to wear every lipstick I own (which is over seventy-five, by the way) without repeating them. I want to force myself to try colors outside of my comfort zone and remember why I hardly wear some shades, as well as re-discover old favorites. 

March Julep Maven

As you probably already know, I am a big fan of Julep. Initially, their "Julep Maven" subscription didn't appeal to me - I wasn't a huge nail polish wearer and $25 per month seemed a little steep. However, the 3 month sign-up makes each month $20 per month, and the ability to customize every single item has been so worthwhile for me. Plus, you can skip as many boxes as you want without having to officially unsubscribe. 

March BeautyFIX by Dermstore

If you can spare the $25 per month and are primarily interested in skincare, hair products, and beauty tools rather than makeup, I seriously cannot recommend DermStore's Beauty Fix box highly enough. Two items in this box are worth more than $25 on their own, and if you don't like them? That's fine, because all of the samples still add up to more than $25 as well!

March Book of the Month

Book of the Month is starting to become one of my favorite subscriptions. I love having new releases on my radar - it's not something I'd paid attention to before! I'd gotten so used to the books I knew I loved and to trudging through my high fantasy series that I'd stopped noticing new literature.

10 Skincare Favorites (Right Now!)

I love skincare. I love trying new moisturizers and serums and anxiously awaiting the product that will allow me to wake up to a face radiant enough to blind my peers. I receive new samples and pick up new products constantly, and am not nearly as responsible as I should be about waiting a decent amount of time to 1) see if a product really truly works on its own and 2) make sure it doesn't break me out. I get too excited and I don't have the fortitude to type out a spreadsheet of sample trial dates. That being said, this is my current official routine of tried & true products I use consistently and recommend. 

March Check-in & Small Goals

I am so glad it's March, my heart could almost burst. I'm alarmed by how quickly time flies, but for this brief moment, I'm happy about it. I have seventeen weeks of school left!!! Seventeen weeks until I have my weekends back, until I can travel, until I can focus fully on work and spend my free time doing any frivolous thing I desire.

currently reading: The Possessions by Sara Flannery Murphy

currently lusting: Affordable skincare goodies from the Ordinary

currently planning: Booking.com is my new favorite travel site to play on; I love being able to sort search results by price & review simultaneously. I also keep daydreaming about our sweet little Montreal hotel, Auberge le Pomerol. 

Now let's review my February Small Goals!

• Low-buy/No-buy of makeup and clothes | Yikes. You may already know how that went due to my post here discussing recent purchases. (Spoiler: It went terribly)
• Make time to exercise | Truth? I bombed this one big time, too. I worked out a total of zero times over the entire month. I even wasted an entire paid month of Classpass!
• Pack my lunch | One success, thank goodness! Other than my sweet parents gifting me a Postmates gift card for Valentine's Day (they know me so well), I didn't order any food delivery. I ate out here & there, but nothing over-the-top, and I was pretty responsible about packing my lunches.
• Finish a book | I accomplished this one, too! I finished Behind Her Eyes from my February Book of the Month box. It was engaging and easy to read, with dynamically written characters that I mostly cared about. SPOILER, KIND OF: I just wish it had been marketed as a supernatural thriller rather than a psychological thriller, which would've made the twists much less disappointing & more in-line with reader expectations. 

For March, I'm not entirely sure what my goals should be. I feel a little discouraged by only fulfilling half of February's, and overwhelmed by the prospect of everything that will be going on throughout the month. I think I'm going to focus on building up the habits I've already started working toward. 

• Read a chapter a night
• Practice French every morning with my coffee
• Go on a walk once a week
• Watch one video for school every day
• Wait 24 hours before making any purchase

Hopefully these aren't too lofty and can be worked into my super cramped schedule. They're also all things I really want to accomplish and habits I want to craft for the long-term.