Week 2: Seeing Red

Hello, dear reader! (I'm assuming there's only one of you - hi, mom!)

This past week the east coast was blasted with a winter storm and extremely low temperatures, so I stayed indoors mostly, apart from one ill-advised run, but I have to run now because I foolishly ambitiously signed up for a 5K. While I was staying indoors, I wound up spending a surprising amount of time watching makeup tutorials on YouTube. Those things are seriously addictive! Who knew? Clearly the millions of people who had already watched them all, but I digress.

Point is, I learned a few things that I didn't know before, so I was excited knowing that another Make an Effort Monday was on the way so I could test a new method out. When I say "new method," I mean new to me because it seems like the whole universe has been contouring their makeup for decades now, but I'm 33, and still question whether or not I know where my cheekbones are. (Seriously, am I on my cheekbones, above my cheekbones, or under my cheekbones? They're big. They're basically my whole face, so where does one draw the line??)

I digress again. Oh, reader. Your patience is amazing.

I knew what I wanted to do for makeup today, this second Make an Effort Monday, but picking an outfit was a little harder, so yesterday I posted a poll and two dresses on my Instagram stories. Thanks, readers who voted! It was a close call, but my red Sisley dress won by one vote!!

One vote difference! Further proof that every vote counts, y'all.

So today, I'm in the red Sisley dress. I got this dress recently from an online vintage retailer called Nancy the Girl, with which I am slightly obsessed. I bought a few pieces from Nancy recently, and I LOVE them all. Her shop is full of great vintage pieces in a wide range of styles and sizes, and she takes amazing care of them. Reader, I implore you to check out her site and treat yourself to a little something awesome.

It's warmer in NYC today, but still below freezing, so I paired the dress with fleece-lined opaque black tights and my slouchy high heeled black boots. Still wishing I had some black riding boots, but I haven't gotten around to finding a pair yet. Someday. I finished off with a gold bar necklace and asymmetrical thin gold earrings from H&M.

Yesterday after my wintery run, I showered and gave myself a blowout. I'm not great at it, but I'm getting better. Weird little tidbit for you - I live across the street from a salon, and I can look out the window and seeing professionals doing hair at most any time of the day, so I sometimes study blowouts in progress to get a better idea of what works and what doesn't. Anyway, doing my hair yesterday made getting ready this morning a lot faster/easier. I might have to make this Sunday hair for Mondays into a thing.

I also took some time on Sunday to make sure my nails were in good shape. The winter weather dries my hands out so quickly, so I tend to give my hands a lot of extra care during these months. I have a few favorite hand cremes that I practically swim in between December and March. I will share those with you, reader, at a later date.

Here, reader, is the finished product:

Office bathroom mirror selfies aren't the greatest, but true story - I don't have a full length mirror at home and haven't for nearly a decade. Oops!

I contoured! Can you even tell? Maybe? I don't know!

I'm two Mondays into the year. There are only 50 left! I can do this!

Did you make an effort today? Tell me about it in the comments or post on Instagram with the tag #makeaneffortmondays

Cheers!
Becca