Bye Bye Baby Bump

After baby arrives, it can take a few days, even a few weeks to settle in to your new way of mom life. When Harley was around three weeks old and we had established ourselves in to some sort of a routine, it finally hit me that my bump was gone. Although I haven't shifted the inevitable baby pouch just yet (she is eight weeks old at the moment and let's face it, it was Easter last week), it suddenly hit me that I no longer had my giant watermelon baby bump.

It's a strange feeling. You're so in love with your new arrival, and so happy hat they are here and healthy, but I can't help but miss her little kicks inside of me.

By now I'm happily getting a hold of things and everything has gently clicked in to place. I am starting to know her hungry cries from her sad cries, her happy smiles from her 'I just pooped and it's all up my back' smiles and I have finally mastered the art of doing the household jobs with one hand. Just a heads up, babies have impeccable timing. Harley has a super power of knowing exactly when to wake up just as my dinner is ready. I suppose cold dinners aren't such a bad thing as long as she is happy. 

It's all a learning curve and we are learning together every day. We'll get there one day. After all, nobody is perfect. 

A Diamond in the Rough

Some call it nesting, others call it boredom, I however use it as an excuse to get a bit messy, a bit creative and an excuse to create something unique for my little pudding on the way.

In our apartment, we have two bedrooms, the master bedroom of course and the obvious makeup turned wardrobe room. No? Just me? Don't ask me how I managed to convince my other half that I could turn the spare room into a sanctuary for my cosmetic addiction but he's the best and he politely agreed. 

When we found out we were expecting a baby in early 2016 we were over the moon. We initially weren't going to set up a nursery room for the little tot as she will be spending the first few months in our bedroom in a co-sleeper but after countless nights flicking through Pinterest I couldn't help myself. It was time to give up my makeup room, well.....at least share?

I already owned the Hemnes 6 drawer dresser from IKEA in a black/brown shade in my old room in my family home. We decided it would be perfect to store all our little ones bits and bobs but I knew I wanted to do something special to make it perfect. Here's how I accomplished this DIY Dresser Makeover.

First of all, make sure to protect any other furnishings that are in the room. We have carpet in both of our bedrooms so I made sure to have all areas covered in case of any splash or spilled paint. 

Remove the hardware from the dresser. Most doorknobs just twist out. Store these somewhere safe as we are going to get to them in a bit.

Start off with a good quality undercoat. You may need to lightly sand down your furniture before this step but I didn't feel this dresser needed it. I applied 3-4 coats of this undercoat to the dresser as the start colour was so dark. If you are using a lighter toned wood, you may not need as much. I made sure to leave each coat to dry over night as I found it would begin to lift if you went in with more product too soon. 

If you do experience any lifting of paint, do not worry. Allow it to dry overnight and go in with a very fine sand paper like the one in the picture above. This will smooth out the texture and allow for another coat to glide on over this layer. 

Once your happy that your primer is almost opaque, you can then go over with a layer or two of standard white paint. I used matte white, however most people will go with a gloss finish on furniture (I just had other matte items to match it to in the room). 

Once dry, I wanted to design the front with a geometric diamond design. I mapped out the space with a 1 inch thick roll of masking tape. I then edged this design with more masking tape so when I removed the centre strip, it would leave me with a stencil to fill in with my chosen colour. To make things even easier and to avoid making a irreversible mistake with pink paint, I marked the middle tape (where I wanted the pink to be) with a pencil saying 'pink'. 

Make sure when removing the masking tape to do so slowly as you could lift the paint underneath. Remove the masking tape marked 'pink' and fill in this shape with whatever colour you wish. As we are expecting a little girl, I went with a pale pastel pink. After filling in your chosen colour, make sure to remove the leftover masking tape before the paint dries as otherwise it will cause your design to chip.

Now back to your hardware. Make sure to do this outdoors as most spray paints are quite messy and are much stronger in smell. Hold your spray can around 30 cm away from the doorknobs so that they get an even coat of paint. Allow to dry outdoors for an hour or two and then turn and spray again to make sure the full part is coated. I chose to spray mine gold. Allow to dry over night.

Reattach your doorknobs onto each drawer once everything is fully dried. And that's it, your done. Now time to fill those drawers with the cutest baby clothes and wait for little madams arrival.

Feel free to ask me questions. 

Lots of Love

Jen x

Wardrobe Dreaming

Wardrobe goals, something every girl dreams of having when owning their own home. I spend way too much time flicking through Pinterest and screen shotting far too many inspiration pictures. Here are some of my fave pics of things I would like to do with my wardrobe/desk area. 

Love Jen x

Mini Makeover

So a little while ago, I went to trusty old IKEA with a friend of mine and I may have bought far too much than my wallet would allow. Heading inside, I couldn't help but notice a trend that us women love to go to these places and act like a kid in a candy store browsing through endless interior goodness. In the mean time, the male goers look like they are entering the gates of hell and would prefer to be getting a very invasive prostate exam than bare the aisles of IKEA's finest. 

First on my list of must haves was a clothes rail. I don't have any drawers for clothes so I have to hang everything. This being said I don't have very much room in my wardrobe. After searching through pages and pages of incredible Pinterest inspiration I came across lots of external stylist racks and knew I had to join in on that band wagon. 

At the base of the stylist rack, I have laid out some of my black footwear for all occassions and these are all placed on an IKEA faux fur sheepskin rug. This rug is so soft and now my little staffy puppy has claimed it as his bed when I'm doing my makeup. I'll forgive him though, cause he's a cutie.

One of my good friends surprised me with this deer skull as a birthday present and it is honestly now one of my most prized possessions. Anyone that knows me knows I have an unhealthy obsession with skulls. I don't know what it is but I find them fascinating. This bad boy definately needed to take his proud place on centre stage so is now the focus piece in the room.

As I have almost everything in the room white, I thought I would add some sort of pop of colour and inject some pastels with my clothes hangers. I am a little OCD when it comes to hangers and hate when they are all not the same, I have to admit I even arranged them into colour code for this picture... I know, I'm sad.

This woven lampshade is everything! When I saw it in the store, I wasn't so sure. The more I looked at it though, I knew I would regret it if I didn't bring it home. I brought it home,oped it up and fell instantly in love. At night, it's even better as it creates a textured light effect on the walls giving you the feeling of being in a giant basket .... Something to that effect anyway.

On the shelving, I of course need my skull head money boxes. I don't know if anyone else is the same, but I hate coppers and small change in my purse so these guys look after my needs and take the burden off of me. These I got in Urban Outfitters.

On my desk I have my Muji acryllic drawers for my earrings, jewellery, lipsticks and lip glosses. Here I also keep my everyday makeup brushes in a glass vase and my magnifying mirror to do all my makeup. 

Up on my Alex drawers, I have my excess brushes that don't really get used that much, a picture frame that desperately needs a photograph inside and my latest sunnie faves that I am desperately dying to wear when we get a bit of sun here in Dublin.

That's everything for my mini room makeover. 

Love Jen xx

Seven Eleven

The chaos that is my everyday makeup bag!

 

Everyone that knows me, knows that Revlon Colorstay Foundation is my holy grail of all foundations. If you love a full coverage that doesn't budge throughout the day, then give this a shot. I have quite oily skin and not many foundations stay that well for a full day around my nose area, however, this foundation doesn't move whatsoever and I don't have to worry about powdering on the hour every hour. I mix Natural Tan and Buff to achieve the colour I like. I would say that the combination to oily version is the one that I use, I have tried the dry to normal however I found it was like water. 

I love this Mac Pro Sculpting Powder in Definitive for contouring. It's the perfect cool tone to achieve that sculpted shadow under the cheekbone. A shadow on the contours of the face would naturally have a cool undertone. Many people make the mistake of using colours that are too warm however by mixing in a cooler shade you will see an instant difference in your sculpting technique.

As I don't have much tan on today, I mixed Inglot 502 and 505 HD sculpting Powder to warm up my face and blend out my contour. 

Mac Blush in Melba is the perfect peachy tone for nearly all skin tones. My kit is never without this little gem. I also love to use this to warm up colours and blend out eyeshadows.

So when doing brows we clearly need some Queen B on in the background. I am obsessed with this song at the moment. I use Mac Dipdown Eyeliner in my brows and set it in place with Essence Clear Brow Gel which is less than €3. 

I store all of my lipsticks in my Muji Acrylic Drawers facing bottoms out so I can see what colour I am selecting.

Finally a bit of sun here in Dublin even though it is still cold out. The finished look including my essential aviators.

Love Jen xx