Forever 21 Haul, OOTD & Ann Taylor

For those of you who don't know, the rodeo is in town right now. We were lucky enough to have a friend score us some tickets into his company's tent for the Saturday night cook-off so we headed over to the rodeo for some good ol' country music and food.

By the time we got there, food was limited, so I had about 5 bites of sausage and a dinner roll. I thought to myself, awesome less calories.

Except a couple of hours later, I stated to feel funny. Nauseous, stomach pains etc. I tried to brush it off because it came and went. We stayed until the end of the cook-off at 11 p.m. and on the taxi ride home I was holding on for dear life praying I wouldn't pass out from the stomach pain.

Needless to say, I'm pretty sure I had some kind of food poisoning, because I ended up just feeling awful all night, but I'll spare you the details.

My husband knew what a tough night I had so he didn't complain once when I asked if we could go to Forever 21 the next morning (today) to do a little accessories shopping (I had a gift card I wanted to use.)

I ended up getting no accessories and a few clothing items, go figure. The last few times I visited Forever 21, I was left feeling quite unsatisfied. I thought a location change might help better my luck so we headed to the Forever 21located in the Pavilions downtown, which is Houston's flagship store.

Here is what I wore today:

Jeans- GAP's destroyed "always skinny"; Racerback tank- Forever 21; Sweater- White House Black Market; Necklace- Tiffany & Co "return to Tiffany" heart w/ Forever 21 key charm on it as well; Flats- Xhilaration at Target. I love the little buttons on the WHBM sweater on the front and sides. Such a cute detail.

One of my Forever 21 purchases was this cute off-white spring jacket, which I put on when I got home so I could take some pictures of it for this post:

I love cropped jackets and especially love the detailing on this one. It's lightweight and perfect for Houston's in-betweenish kind of weather right now.

I've been wanting to add a bit more navy blue to my wardrobe and this cute top fit the ticket:

It's got little hearts on it and a sweet front pocket. The back has a great cut-out too, that makes the top a little more fun and unexpected. It was $24.50 and I got a size medium.

This pretty tiered top caught my eye right away:

It's definitely a top you have to wear a strapless bra with, but that's OK with me. I love it. Perfect with jeans and a cool necklace, or tucked into a skirt with a cardigan over it for work.

It was $27.80 and I got a size medium.

When I saw the ruffle-sleeve top I bought a few weeks ago in off-white in this gorgeous pinky/peach color, I knew I had to have it. I don't oftentimes buy something in more than one color, but this top was too good to pass up:


It looks a lot brighter and peachier in real life. Love this top! My white one is a size small, but they didnt' have any left so I got this one in a medium. It was $15.80, I believe.

It's always hard for me to find a long black tank, so when I saw this super-long one for $12.00 with ruffle/netting detail at the neckline, you know I couldn't pass it up:

I like to wear longer tanks with my skinny jeans and this one is just perfect for that.

My final item, not from Forever 21 which I forgot to post a couple of weeks ago is this gorgeous soft pink blouse from Ann Taylor that I got on sale for $29.99 down from $78.00. I love the big fluffy flower-like detail at the chest area.

It is such a beautiful blouse. The pink is super soft and perfect for spring. I can't wait to wear this top!

Did you go shopping this weekend? Share your steals with me in the comments below!

xoxo,

Veronika.

Contest Winner! Congratulations & Thank You to Everyone Who Entered

Good Morning Lovely Blog Readers!



I must admit I am extremely tired today because I was up until almost 4 a.m. which is absolutely unheard of for me because I am totally an "8 hours of sleep a night or I can't function" type of girl. We had a friend visiting from Dallas and ended up going to another friend's house to hang out and play Wii, etc. I had an awesome time but now I have a massive headache (and I drank water all night, not even one drink!)



But but but...I was SO excited about announcing my contest winner this morning, that it lifted my spirits! Yay for contests!



OK, so in the spirit of full disclosure, I'll tell you how I arrived at my winner. I used random.org to generate a number. There were a total of 127 comments, and of those, the random number generated was 79. So I started to count the comments and kept losing track of which comment I was on (no doubt the headache played a part in that) and my husband was like "why don't you just count from the bottom?" and I was like "because then it will end up the wrong number." But then he explained the math to me (because math is so not my forte) and I realized that 127 minus 79 was 48, which means less counting and a happier Veronika. So I counted from the bottom, and went up 48 comments to get to my 79th comment. I skipped past any deleted comments too, since those are not valid.







So...the lucky winner is...



....









.....









...... (OK OK I'll stop now)





lauraeck17!!!!!!!



This was the lovely comment she left:



"Hi Veronika, I love following your blog for great fashion and beauty tips. I am pretty sure now that I will be purchasing a Clarisonic now :) I would love to be entered in your contest."



Yay for Laura! Thank you for being a blog follower and congratulations on winning the "Big Hair, Big Lashes" contest! I will email you right now and you can send me your address so I can ship the prizes to you!



To everyone who entered: THANK YOU!!! I hope to have many more contests in the future, so there will always be more chances to win.



I am so honored to have each and every one of you as a reader! Thank you for all that you contribute to this blog.



xoxo,



Veronika.

The Shoes with the Bow & OOTD's

The shoes have arrived. I came home to a cute white and hot pink bag/box that contained the Paris Hilton shoes I had been anticipating for the last week.

They are adorable. The bows are a little crushed from shipping, but I'll fluff them back out with foam inserts.

OK so let me say this...the left shoe is a tad bit big and the right shoe fits but is very tight. They are the same size (no mess-ups.) I don't know if my right foot is swollen or just massively larger than my left, but I can walk in them and that's what counts, right? I got a size 10, my normal size.

I do love them. Here they are (please ignore my toes, they need a pedicure)




Pretty, huh? I'm excited for when it gets a bit warmer and I can wear them. I'm going to need to get an insert for the left one, because my heel slides out a bit when I walk.

As I uploaded the shoe pics, I had some OOTD photos I had forgotten about. Here are some from this week. Not super exciting, but hey, it's what I wore.

Top- Forever 21 silk blouse w/racerback; Cardigan- Express; Skirt- Express; Pearls- Charlotte Russe; Tights- Hue @ Macy's; Shoes- Jessica Simpson.

Top- BCBG; Cardigan- Express; Pants- Express; Shoes- Aldo.

Like I said, nothing too exciting, but we can't be exciting everyday, can we?

Before I go, I'd like to thank everyone who's taken the time to write a nice comment or email to me lately. I read every email and every comment and I always appreciate you ladies sharing your thoughts with me, it really means a lot.

xoxo,

Veronika.

My Hair Through the Years: A Look Back...But Happy to be Where I Am

I thought it would be fun to post pictures of my hair color (and lengths) throughout the years. I love the color I have now, which is close to my natural, but it was also fun to try other colors. Looking back at these photos, I realize that the color I have now suits me best (IMO, at least.)

My hair in college (for the first 2 years or so) started off something like this (I had highlights, low lights and that was all my real hair, length wise)


Then came my blonde phase (I wore a lot of extensions during this phase, which explains the varying hair lengths.)






I was quite blonde! Wow. I used to have to get my roots done every 6 weeks or so, it was very high maintenance. Do blondes have more fun? Maybe. I'm not sure. The color is super hard to maintain for a natural brunette though...which kind of isn't that fun. But I digress.

After years of being a blondie, I took the plunge and decided to go darker. I was tired of the time commitment and cost of coloring my hair so often. Not to mention the damage. Oh the damage. This is how it turned out (sorry for the bad webcam pic, it's all I have on this laptop.)

Then, when it faded from that initial "going darker" it was this horrid orange color (I repeat, horrid. I shudder when I see this picture.)

(and BTW yes I am 100% aware that I pose thesamefreakingway in every single photo. I am getting better at that now. But yes, I'm aware, no need to point it out, I know. Trust me, I know.)


Then I went even darker:
I hated it this dark. I felt it didn't do anything for my features. it just washed me out and made me feel pale and gross. I went super dark right before I had my surgery because I thought "I don't want to be the bottle blonde with big boobs." (not that there is anything wrong with that, I was in a transitional period, and I just wanted to have darker hair.)

I soon realized that I wasn't happy with it that dark, even after it had faded a bit. So when I moved to Texas, I decided that I wanted to try and get it back towards my natural color. This is what it ended up like:



So that's what it was like initially when I first colored it after moving to Texas, and I've kept it pretty much the same ever since, but here are some of my most recent photos of my color:

So, after sharing all of these photos I'm feeling pretty nostalgic, hehe. Anyways, I just thought this would be a fun post to do because we all experience so much change in our apperance over the years- whether it's makeup, hair color, personal style etc. I think I've progressed a lot since college (thank goodness!)

Tell me about your hair color through the years! Did you change it a lot or stay pretty much the same since HS/college? Let me know in the comments below :)

Thanks for reading and laughing along with me at what a poser I am. Seriously. I guess that's my "good side."

xoxo,

Veronika.