last minute costumes and a halloween party

My friend Grace and I went to a Halloween Party last night and it was so much fun! We had known about the party for a really long time but neither of us decided what we were going to dress up as until a couple days before, or in my case, the day before. Of course, it was a costume party and I'm not going to lie, I don't really like dressing up. But the party was great and it was all worth it!

Grace had asked me if I could do Day of the Dead makeup for her and I happily accepted the challenge. She showed me these two pictures below and we went for it. You can see what she liked from each photo. We used waterproof black eyeliner for all the black lines, it worked like a charm! The color around Grace's eyes is many different shades of eye shadow.

My makeup was easy. Lots of eyeliner, fake eye lashes, fake freckles, circular blush and stitches coming out of my mouth. Oh and bright red lipstick of course!

My "creepy doll" costume was the easiest thing I could come up with. All you need is a dress and pigtails really. I wore polka dot tights (that you can't see here because my dress is too long) and over the knee socks with boots. And I tied little ribbons in my hair. The rest is in the makeup.

And now for some instagram photos. @ohsoprettygram by the way!

So Grace and I both wore fake eye lashes, duh. It's Halloween. That's what you do. But we had this long conversation about how you hate yourself the day after wearing them. As soon as you take the lashes off, your real eye lashes immediately seem insignificant. And for a while, you just want to wear fake eye lashes every day! So every time I wear fake eye lashes it's a bittersweet moment, because I feel like my eyes look fabulous but, I always know what lies ahead... Anyone else feel the same?

xo, Savannah

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the diy: leather strap shelf

We had seen shelves like this on Pinterest and since we had a bare wall in the dining area, we figured we needed to make this. It's super easy to make these shelves and they look so awesome! I'm sort of obsessed with them.

To make these shelves, you will need:

-2 pieces of wood (ours measure .75"x7"x30")

- 4 leather straps

- 8 screws (4 long, 4 short)

- Exacto Knife

- Ruler

- Stud Finder

- Drill

-Level

Cut each leather strap to 28 inches long with an exacto knife.

Fold each piece of leather in half and drill a hole through both sides.

If you are using this shelf for something heavier, you will want to find the studs in the wall to determine where you place your leather straps. With the pieces folded in half, screw the leather strap to the wall through the hole you drilled earlier. Use the larger screws for this. Repeat with another strap at the same level. Ours are about 2 feet apart.

Place the wood in the strap and use the level to make sure it sits right. Once you've got it in the right place, use two little screws to secure the leather strap to the wall.

Repeat again right below the top shelf and you are done!

We are using our shelf to display/house all of our cameras. Usually my digital camera also sits on this shelf but, it was being used to take these pictures.

Also, the "books" that are on this shelf are books that we have been using as our visual journals. So don't read too much into the titles, we just grabbed books that were the best size! And now we use them for art. Tomorrow is Friday! Oh happy day.

xo, Savannah

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the 5 minute updo: braided gibson tuck

 I have to say, I've missed doing hair tutorials. Mostly, I just like to come up with new ways to do my hair and then I get to share it with you! This updo is so simple. I love it because it works with my overly thick hair. It's usually a task to get all of my hair together in a small area (buns and such) but the braid holds it all together.

Here's what ya do...
1. Part your hair to the side.
2. Put your hair in a low pony using a hair tie.
3. Braid your hair below the hair tie and secure with a clear elastic.
4. Make a hole with your fingers in the center of your hair, above the hair tie.
5. Flip your braid through the hole.
6. Pull it all the way through, your hair will look twisted on the sides.
7. Roll the bottom of the braid into itself, upward, towards the top hair tie.
8. After you've rolled it all the way up, pin it in place with some bobby pins. Loosen the braid and pin the sides of the braid to your head. Just do what you need to. Hairs sticking out everywhere? Embrace the messiness or pin 'em in. Use hairspray if you'd like.
9. That's it! At this point, I twisted my bangs and pinned them back. They were nuts so pinning them back was the only thing that was going to happen with them. If you don't have bangs, word. It'll take you even less time to do this hairstyle on yourself.

Here are some other views of my hair.

And because Casey requested it...

xo, Savannah

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