Welcome to my fun (slightly erratic) word space

When I started trying my hand at blogging six years ago or so, I really struggled to fill the page. I had positioned my blog around the career I’d started carving for myself as a makeup artist, beauty therapist and massage therapist. Seems like plenty to keep a person busy with topics. I mean, how many reviews, tutorials, step-by-steps on contouring, cut-crease or winged liner have you seen? And while I live for a good makeup blog, vlog, insta or snapchat (totally lying here... I’m with the recently social-media outspoken Kardashian clan... do we really open SnapChat any more?) -- I couldn’t get my cyber pen to paper on a regular basis. 


Now, you should know something about me. When I put my mind to something, I’m incredibly disciplined and dedicated. I’m that nutter of a co-worker who can be three weeks deep into a sinus infection with two children sick at home, a husband working away in China for six weeks, and I’ll still manage to rearrange my life (and that of anyone I can bribe, guilt or beg to babysit) and make it to work; probably just by the skin of my teeth. So the notion that will power alone couldn’t get me to change the way I work and commit to taking an hour a week to sit and type my thoughts on the latest Urban Decay Naked palette, despite helpful reminders pinging at me on my phone, my watch and my both my kids’ iPads, was more than a little worrying. Like many challenges, I tried. I tried harder. I worried. I worried about trying. I worried about giving up. I tried not to worry. I worried that I was worrying and trying too much. You get it. I had completely gone down the rabbit hole self-inflicted stress. And ultimately, I dropped it like it was hot. I figured when I had something worth saying, the words would just come.


Well guess what? The words have come and it’s not because I didn’t have something say before. It’s because I had so much to say. I had too much to say and it wasn’t all about the beauty industry. And some of the things I wanted to talk about weren’t that pretty. Plenty of what I have to say is related to the Beauty and Wellness Industries that I am incredibly proud to be a part of, BUT that’s not my whole story. 


So now, as I finally sweep off my world wide welcome mat and open the doors of my mind to any of my potential virtual visitors, I would like to start with a few words of explanation. This website is a showcase of my makeup artistry. It is also where I market my beauty and massage services. It is also my sacred space for sharing my thoughts on all things mama-hood and my experiences as a card-carrying member of the smaller subset of mamas out there -- special needs mamas. And I’ll tell you a secret -- we may be a small subset but we are fierce. But I digress. That happens with me.

This is a place where my ongoing battle of the bulge may be updated occasionally. I might share my musings on great wedding venues and wonderful local businesses, because as a freelancer I have the incredible privilege to work not just with wonderful women on special days of their lives, but I also get to network with some incredible vendors and entreprenuers, as well as experience some extraordinary locations.  Equally, this is a place where I may rant about the differences between the USA and the UK, because as an American-alien in a British world sometimes you just want to declare, “I want Target, a drive through Starbucks and a box of Twinkies that won’t cost me a significant portion of my mortgage payment.” 


There may be a few other random thoughts that crop up from time to time, but I promise to scatter as much beauty throughout my blog as possible. Because really, beauty, like love, is all around us. And that’s what I’m after: love & beauty.