Posts Tagged ‘twitter’

photo credit: Lil Larkie

Since I just got back from Florida, a land of sun and surf I thought I would give all you gorgeous girls the rundown on mascara. And what does mascara have to do with the sunshine state? Well ladies…first lemme explain with a great rule of thumb:

Remember W is for Wise…not just Waterproof:
So choose your mascara wisely and apply your daily coat accordingly. Why? Here’s the lowdown: the ingredients in waterproof formulations make it particularly tricky to remove at the end of a glam day. This means you’ll mostly likely be tugging, pulling, and vigorously rubbing at your eyeballs just to get this stuff off of them. Later on this can mean you lose way more of that lovely fringe than you’d like to. Instead go for non waterproof formulas. Trust me unless you’re a big cry baby there really isn’t much running and smearing going on each day.
If you must go the waterproof route use it VERY infrequently. Actually I decided to break the no-waterproof rule during this recent trip to FL. My reason being I planned on jumping into the ocean with a cute guy and would rather not have any runny peepers. Afterword, to get this clingy type of goo of my delicate little lashes I baby *oiled the crap out of them making sure to be as gentle as possible in the process (NOTE: *mineral oil is fabulous for removing stubborn makeup). Then I went back to my usual non swimming pretty routine with daily non-waterproof mascara to keep my lashes intact.

Drugstore vs. Department Store
Where to shop for the best brands is the next small challenge. I gotta confess I’m biased towards drugstores, mostly because I know it makes sense. You can stay beautifully on budget by forgoing the the cosmetics counter in purchasing this particular beauty product. Mascara is something drugstores have an awesome selection of. You should save your hard earned dollface dollars for foundation, brushes, and color at MAC, Bobbie Brown, or otherwise. Cheap is beautiful okay? Just because it’s $20 and vibrates doesn’t mean it’ll coat those lashes any more amazingly than just grabbing that $6 tube while you get groceries. My choice for last weeks vacation? Maybelline The Colossal Volum’ Express in a happy bright yellow tube.

Spidery or sweet? You choose!
To coat both top and bottom lashes or not? That is the question! I love big fluffy spidery eyes myself so I coat both. If you do too you might want to change it up by coating just the top lashes sometimes – you might find doing so can give your eyes a girlish and classically retro sort of look to your overall makeup design. This might also be a better strategy to minimize losing any lashes should you choose to be a beauty badass and go for waterproofing them for those watery events like funerals and swim dates.

Speaking of application what’s your mascara application strategy? Go ahead and answer this week’s pretty little question: Do you apply mascara to both your upper and lower lashes or just the top? Why? Leave your comment below, I’d love to hear about it.

Until next time and Happy Pretty Making!

The wonderfully whimsical Lady Umbrella is another fashionable Twitter discovery I’ve happily made this month.

This quirky little fashion company is made up of charming Irishman Rob Ryan and the shyly intriguing Elena Montes. Originally from Spain, designer Elena based the beguiling Lady Umbrella character upon arriving in Dublin’s rainy and umbrella populated streets.

These tees are truly stylish creations and the result of one of my favorite real formulas: Art + Fashion. And what’s wonderful about each t-shirt design is they bring artfulness into your everyday style! How cool is that? Turbo cool I tell you.

Okay okay, let me get a little more serious and professional here about these folks. They are another fantastic example of social media savvy. Not only did they (Rob? Elena? or perhaps new recruit Richie?) @’reply me on Twitter when I started following them they also DM’d in that this-is-a-real-human-tweeting way that I so appreciate. This always motivates brand loyalty in me and many of my stylish sisters. It is a must for start ups to reach out to their market/community and share their passion and get to know us. And because of their social media awesomeness I’m not only willing to purchase from them but also happily and enthusiastically tweet to my own network.

So which tee are you going to get? I’ve got my eye on the blue pictured above. Looks just smashing on brunettes doesn’t it?

FREE shipping my lovelies! Just to make it even more enticing!

Also after you’ve breezily perused their website go say hello to them on Twitter or Facebook – and tell them Apryl the @365daygirl sent ya ;)
I <3 graphic tees and these are delightful.

I adore the blue tee pictured above.

Their site is adorable and just as quirky & fun as their tees.

I happily signed up for their newsletter and Facebook fan page and was treated to this humbly titled video.

One of my new Twitter friends @Dinalisafraioli just introduced me to this lovely and stylish company @modcloth.

I fell instantly in love! You will too OMG! Here’s why:

Not only is their site a breeze to navigate but it gives you the same delightful pleasure of window shopping through fashionable city boulevard! What’s also the #awesomesauce about this online boutique is the innovative way their social media is managed: a quintet of lovely ladies called the “Social Butterflies” who all happily blog and tweet about the gorgeous goods they love.

They have sassy shoes that I’ve not seen anywhere else including a pair called Unicorn Princess. The dresses are to die for, including the one I’m drooling over at the top of the post. And what’s really awesome is how wonderfully affordable EVERYTHING they carry is!

Check them out!

And make sure to follow me on Twitter for more fashion goodness and tweet me your favorite fashion finds!

Keeping It REALLY real online and off :)

photo credit: Adam Foster | Codefor

Fashion, my dears is not just about wearing clothes. It’s a whole lot more.

Everyday you get dressed you are affecting how well you get stuff done in the world, what you are saying about yourself, and showing others how much of a truly interesting person you are. Let me explain:

1) The Function of The Fabric
Of course clothing first has it’s function: Swimming suits for swimming, windbreakers for keeping out the chill, and hats to keep the sun out of your face on a bright day. Since the human animal gave up most of it’s protective furriness a long time ago it needed to layer itself in the skins of the critters it hunted instead. Eons later we’re still gallivanting across the world doing a number of things in a number of climates and environments if not so much hunting. However it’s not all about covering our bits from the elements. The clothing we choose to wear day to day must not only protect us but also enhance our movements, activities, and even the roles we perform right? Ballerina’s don’t leap elegantly in jeans. Eskimo’s don’t hunt in their skivvies. Navy seals aren’t stealth in orange tulle.

Same goes for you whether you are a receptionist, stripper, or housewife. The first order of the day when you get dressed is – “will I be able to [chase after a two year old in these shoes?] [walk down to the file room in this skirt?] [grip that pole with this feather boa on?]“. Usually this is all automatic and subconscious, which brings me to the next point:

2) Communicating Your Message
Your clothing is talking about you. Are you doing a good job of putting words in it’s mouth? Or are you just letting your outfit babble on about you to everyone who lays eyes on you?

When you are a single girl and on the market you want to show some leg, a little (or a lot) of cleavage, and accentuate as much of your bodacious feminine bits as possible. You don’t dress in a suite and tie and you don’t wear a ring on your left hand. Why? Because it’s sooooo much easier to let your clothes speak for you instead of shouting out to the streets “ATTENTION MEN! I’M A HOT, SINGLE WOMAN! COME TALK TO ME!”. You also know that men are visual creatures and are looking for the female in her most feminine form.

Conversely when you return to the office the next morning your best professional bet is to tuck that man magnetizing cleavage away and lengthen that skirt for decidedly less leg. Otherwise instead of seriously discussing that business deal with you your male co-workers brains will be scrambled with sexy static as they stare at your halter top.

What you wear is going to say things about you even when you just want to stay mum and get your work done. So get the message right. Then you may ask: “What do I want my clothes to say about ME anyway?”. Well how awesome you are for a start, which leads us to the final point:

3) Expressing Yourself!
This is where you can leave the obsession to follow trends behind – You don’t have to keep up with the mad dash of who’s-wearing-what-now. Why not? Because YOU are your own person! YOU have your own style. I like to call it “signature style” since it’s how you stylishly leave your mark on the world. Sometimes people won’t remember your name, or what you said, but their vision of your style and charm will be emblazoned on their memory if you are genuinely dressing for yourself.

You get to be you and expressing that with fashion is genuinely fun and satisfying way to show the world. What this means is wearing your favorite colors, shapes, patterns, where you want and when you want in a stylish way. Cause you know your body and what makes it look great. It’s you showing off your sexy arms in tank tops while your best friend accentuates her long legs in shorts. Looking and feeling blithely fabulous in high heels when the IT shoe is ballet flats. Or vice versa! Whatever YOUR style happens to be.

So, what are you wearing today?
Why?
What does today’s outfit say about you?

Leave your fashionable comment!

Also feel free to follow me on Twitter (@365daygirl) for more fashion fun! :)

-Apryl keepin it really Real :)

Like the buttons? Aren’t they cute? And they are all in one lovely little bunch. I picked them up at buttonshut.com so go on over there and grab some for yourself. There is a lovely selection to choose from.

Btw, this is random but I just added a few words to the Urban Dictionary – you might get a kick out of the definitions. I was inspired after I UD’d my own name…turns out I’m lovely, hot, AND possibly an evil genius! Nice!

Anyway, I just spent about an hour and 1/2 modifying my page – adding shtuff, gettin rid of shtuff. I may change my theme again in the future cause this one is already startin to feel old but that will have to come at a time when…you know…I have “some”. That is “time” that isn’t already assigned for work and shit.

The modifications were to make my website more of a hub – where you can find all the goodies that involve 365daygirl. Well not all of it…they don’t make nearly enough buttons for ALL the stuff I do. But I can always add links right?

Okay, so with this page, and my web presence reasonably situated I will probably be focusing my content on more real stuff and genuinely sharing my story about why I’m doing this all in the first place. It’s been an interesting, almost sobering couple of weeks. The challenge of putting up all manner of content led me to a point of exhaustion. So now I’m trying to re-focus and re-build my energies.

In other news, I finally “get” Twitter! It isn’t the total waste of time I thought it was! lol.

Okay, back to work.

Numbers…data…numbers…letters…comments…posts…tags…spam…tweets…email…letters…numbers…Oh. My. God! There’s that fried brain feeling again :P

So I’ve been learning a ton about social media, personal branding, even tweeting! It’s fantastic! But…still a lot of work.

My flickr account has fallen by the wayside recently as I answer emails and make comments, upload my videos on youtube for 5 hours, record videos for my dragon boss and my “working projects”, and sleep.

And then today, I check my blog and lo and behold I’ve got 83 new comments! 90% of which are total gibberish. Into the trash with you! Perhaps there is a better spam filter out there but I don’t know where to find it. Recommendations?

It’s been AWESOME talking with REAL people on the web. Especially women on the web. Right here in town too! Such as Summer and Stacy and @Ghennipher and Tami. As well as getting questions about my 365daygirl adventures from real folks in interent biz.

Meanwhile the Magical Mexican and the Russian Photo Babe are still super fans and keep poking me to see if I am okay and still producing content for them to ingest ;) Love you guys!

I’m curious, how do ya’ll keep up with all this stuff? I’d love to hear your blogging/posting/tweeting/vlogging/facebooking strategies and how you keep it all in check with your real work!

-Aprylcat

No time to tweet huh? Bullshit! I mean…Sure ya do! Just set the way back to FORWARD by using a handy little tool from Socialoomph.com and send wonderfully original and unique tweets on schedule while you nap, shop, or otherwise attend to that REAL life of yours :)

And, in case you haven’t noticed you can also time your blog posts…a damn convenient option I just recently discovered.

Hey! I’m learning here!

I bet you are super web savvy. I bet you’ve got a nice little collection of web profiles and accounts. You know just what is going on with them and how they all fit together. If your online persona was a painting what would it look like? The Mona Lisa perhaps? Well, mine would probably resemble a Jackson Pollack…only with bright pink shades. I am all over the web but it’s not entirely clear who the hell I am at this point. It’s a little crazy.

Here’s the current breakdown:

Web Profiles and Pages:

• 5 (?) Gmail Accounts – um….how do I justify all these…meh…I’ll do that later!
  3 Twitter Accounts – oh Twitter…I’m trying to get into you…but it’s such a challenge being a twit!

• 2 Wordpress Websites – 365daygirl is doing well, my other “girl” blog however gets slammed with spam.
• 2 Myspace Accounts – I don’t go on MS anymore…too creepy.
• 2 Facebook Profiles – one in married name (I’m divorced) the other in super fancy new name!
• 2 Yahoo Mail Accounts – 1 is spam. the other…was an a whim.
• 2 Youtube Channels – one is personal the other is all for YOU! :)
• 1 Digg Account – I really like DIGG…I just don’t ever use it.
• 1 Flickr Account – this has gone through 3 “username” transformations…I’m so wacky.
• 1 Yelp Account – great site that hardly any one in my state uses…*sigh*
• 1 This Next Account – another great site that I need to update
• 1 Shop Style Account – it’s like playing dress up…but it takes me hours to “play” with it!

My “Friends”…Real and Virtual:

• Facebook: 137 – I have more “guy” friends than “girl” friends which bugs me a little…even though I really like boys and a few in particular :)
• Flickr:49 – a handful are real professional friends, the rest are just cool people that take photos I drool over
• Wordpress: a bunch of friends have left comments. I’ve been bookmarked by some new people, but I don’t really know how many people are reading.
• Twitter – 300 something on “catthegirlguru”, and just a handful on 365daygirl since I have done much “tweeting”.
• Youtube – like 2 friends? 3 if I count myself from the personal account. lol
• Yelp – 15 friends…most of them from out of state.

  I could go on and on with this…but I’d rather hear about your webness :)
  So, whatchoo got goin on in your web universe? Is it working for you? Or do you try not to think about it all?

  Tags: blogging, digg, email, facebook, flickr, friends, myspace, shop style, social media, this next, twitter, web 2.0, wordpress, yahoo, yahoo answers, yelp, youtube

I have a question for you web users out there: How much does your use of your devices and your web profiles to express your interesting little self COMPARE to how much you use all that to screw around?

Folks be forewarned – I am one opinionated little missy but I say this all out of LOVE: *steps onto soapbox

Ahem.
Being in this here Information Age is a real challenge. An exciting one mind you – at least depending on how you look at it. I think those of us that are thriving within it know just how to rock the social media. Everyone else may just be cluttering up the net with virtual chatter. People we love too! It’s so freakin sad sometimes! I know it bums me out when I read more about a friend’s Farmville status reports then their actual life! Let me be a little voice of sense and reason here okay? Just because you are awesome at growing pixelated vegetables doesn’t mean all your friends care to know… each and every time you get a new sprout or rutabaga spouts up from the virtual ground. Does Oprah rock at Farmville? Hell. If. I. Know! Thankfully she doesn’t share those precious little updates with her fans on her web profiles.

I know I’m gettin on my high horse here but I just find it ridiculous reading about stuff that DON’T MEAN SHIT! So instead let me tell you how you can share somethin REAL and how it’s really not all that hard.

Things to Post: Links
This is the easiest type of content to post and it can still be unique to you. So go ahead and post links to all sorts of great stuff:
*Movies
*Events
*Clothing
*Toys
*Software
*Music

Things to Post: YOU-ness
You can also share the unique and weird stuff about YOU:
*Your wacky philosophies
*Your silly adventures
*Even your wisdom
*I suggest postin little 1 to 2 line blurbs in most things and then spilling all the juicy details in a big wordy blog post. NOTE: formatting things with headers and bolded text is FANTASTIC.

Things to Post: Comment Lovin
Share the love okay? Tell your friends you are thinking about them or compliment them or somethin. Believe me they need to know and it’s just super nice and cool.
*Wall Comments
*Blog Comments
*Share a link just for them
*Refer some cool resource
*Tell them their photos are cute and you want to see more
LOVE LOVE LOVE!
SHARE SHARE SHARE!

And THROW SOME MUD ON THE WALL. Do not get all preciously perfectionist about it. Otherwise you won’t learn anything and nothing will progress into something truly valuable. Chances are you won’t say, post, or upload the most perfect thing at first. But you will learn if you practice and allow yourself to get some golden feedback :)

Take me for example. I’ve decided to put my goofy ass out there and produce content at the most basic freakin level possible with this whole project.
*I’ve uploaded the most amateur photos from my sorry ass little webcam.
*I wrote my first blog posts on the generic little wordpress template EVERYONE starts with.
*And I’ve posted my videos with the lamest lighting I have available – including the creepy blue glow of my laptop.

All with the intent to show you fabulous people what this whole journey starts out like. And I have learned every step of the way and produce better content each time! Half the time it’s from people that are just wanting to be helpful and lend their expertise:
“Can I show you how to not take Myspace photos?” -says Anomaly Boy who is a genius with Photoshop.

Let me get back to Oprah here – she’s nearly Queen of the Universe right? Her first Twitter post was all in caps and Shaq had to be the well meaning jerkface to tell her that she was SHOUTING on the web. Maybe a tad embarrassing but INSTANTLY fixable. Just by pressing a button.

So Here’s Your ACTION List:
1. Do.
2. Screw Up.
3. Learn!
4. Make something Prettier next time!

Or you could be one of those fortunate souls that produces something brilliant your first try and everyone wants more more more!

Either way it’s easy as pie :)

Okay I’ll get off my soapbox here and get back to work.