My Alphabet

Lately I've seen a lot of bloggers do this tag so I wanted to do my own version. 


A. Age: 25. DAAAAAAAAANG I'm a quarter of the century.

B. Bed size. American Queen, which means I can't buy cute British bed sheets :(

C. Chore you hate: Cleaning in general. I will do dishes, laundry or even clean the bathrooms all day but general cleaning leaves me at a stupor. I'm such a bad stay at home wife LOL.

D. Day: Saturday, because a lot of events happen then. 

E. Essential start to your day: A cup of coffee, or I will be a fire breathing grumpy dragon with the biggest headache ever.

F. Favourite colour: Red

G. Gold or Silver: Silver, but I generally don't wear jewelry much. 

H. Height: 165 or 5'4"... just shy of minimum height for becoming a model.

I. Instruments: Jewelry bench and everything that comes with it, pastels and paper. I really need to get back into art.

J. Job title: Domestic Engineer, Grumpy Housewife, Full Time Student, Unwillingly Unemployed, Self-Appointed Organizer of Anything... you name it and it will probably be true.

K. Kids: Mittens and Echo :) :) :)

L. Live: In the middle of nowhere with pig farms. Oh you wanted a name? Sorry, it's Lakenheath, UK.

M. Mum’s name: Nadezhda.

N. Nicknames: Lyuba, Lyubochka, Lyubashka. I can keep going since I'm Ukrainian and my name has a whole bunch of variations lol.

O. Overnight hospital stays: Not for me, but I stayed with a friend when he was in a hospital since he didn't have any family and I felt someone needed to be there for him.

P. Pet peeve: It kinda comes with the territory, but I don't like when people ask me where I'm from... I don't get it as much now since in UK people first hear my American accent and only then my Ukrainian accent. But after 10 years of literally every other person asking me how I got to US, it got a BIT old and I started saying stuff from swimming to being a mail order bride. I also don't like NON-responsible people.

Q. Quote from a movie: After I started hanging out with my future husband, I noticed that I started quoting movies a LOT, so I couldn't possibly narrow it down to just one.

R. Right or left handed: Right handed.

S. Siblings: One younger brother.

T. Time you wake up: Lately it's been around 8-8:30, but really any time whenever Echo comes over to 'advocate' for her morning num-nums.

U. Underwear: Victoria Secret Lacie thongs, or any other brand which looks similar.

V. Vegetables you dislike: Onions.

W. What makes you run late: Not giving myself enough time to put makeup on of course!

X. X-Rays you’ve had: Teeth and lower back.

Y. Yummy food you make: White Chicken Chili.

Z. Zoo: Only been to one in San Diego.

I tag anyone who wants to do this tag and who haven't done it yet. :)

~ Lyuba

I'm back! ..... I think....

Hello Ladies,

I'm sorry for my long absence. I could give you a million excuses, but let's just say I got burned out on everything in general, especially on kimono and people and that made me want to stay as far away from blogging as possible. You can read my rant on my other blog if you're interested.

But now I'm back, although in the next few weeks I will be starting school back up again and I will not post as often as I would like to. Yes, I finally decided to give in and get an online degree even if I HATE ONLINE CLASSES WITH PASSION. But it's either that, or no degree and I don't want my lots years of school going to waste. So I will get me a degree! Double major actually. And I'll be taking Japanese history and Women in Visual Art class, two areas that I'm interested in, so I'm a little excited. Hope the classes will actually be fun, even if they are online.

Tomorrow I will be back with 50 followers giveaway and a blog sale. I realized that I have a lot of stuff that are unused and unloved, and instead of staying in my drawers and taking up space they should go to someone who will give them some love.

~ Lyuba

Lack of updates....

I'm sorry about the lack of updates. I've been very busy with kimono stuff for past few weeks, and them my computer got a malware that I'm not able to remove myself. In fact, I think I somehow managed to screw up system restore again. System restore and me just don't mix. :(

Until I figure out my laptop I won't be posting anything :( I hope I'll be back soon!

~ Lyuba

Meet My Kitties: Mittens and Echo

Hello Everyone,

I'm feeling a bit down today for no apparent reason, enough to not want to do anything makeup related :( I've been trying to edit photos for couple of posts for a few days now to no apparent progress too. So in order to cheer myself up, I will talk about something that makes me very happy, aka my kitties. :)

Echo & Mittens, 3 and 4 mo old

 
Be warned, the post is very IMAGE HEAVY :) 

How I Choose Which Blogs to Follow

Hello Ladies,

I've been thinking about this for past couple of weeks, namely about how I choose which blogs to follow.  I usually make a point to check out the blogs that other people follow, but I do not always end up liking what I see.

The information below is what I look for in a blog, what I enjoy reading about and by no means is intended to offend anyone.

Shamelessly using my lovely readers as an example ;P 

When I come across the blog I might possibly like, I read it, and read it, and read it. The "older posts" button becomes my friend for a while, and when I get tired of reading I either click or don't click the "follow" button. Here is what I look for:

Overall look/design
Obviously this is the first thing I look at because I like to read the content, instead of getting distracted by the design, or my personal pet peeve... the ADs! And I'm not talking about little banners off to the side, that just sit there and don't interfere with the content, no I'm talking about those 90%-off-day-in-London ads smack in the middle of the blog. I don't know if they show up by themselves, or some bloggers sell space for  those ads but I find them extremely annoying. And distracting. Or blog clutter, when excessive features are used. There is one blog that always shows up when I google any new US drugstore products, it's great to read an occasional review but I will NOT follow it because it's pretty much has everything I listed above (I don't remember what's the name of it, so can't point to it nor do I really want to). Overall I like a somewhat minimalistic design in blogs, but not always. For everyone it is going to be different, but as long as I can read the blog and not get distracted I am happy. 

Jump breaks
I could have put this one under the overall design, but I hate jump breaks so much that I feel they deserve their own  category. I feel that the use of jump breaks sometimes is ok, I use them myself for exceptionally long posts with lots of pictures. But several times I came across blogs that use jump breaks in every single one of their posts. Did I mention that I like to read pages after pages of blog before I follow it? Then imagine my frustration when I have to open up every single post to read it! Or open it in a different tab so I can read it. Then press the back button so I can go back to the blog. And more often than not I accidentally close the tab instead of hitting the back button because I'm so used to having lots of tabs. So when I see an excessive use of jump breaks, I do not even bother with reading the blog. I'm gone probably never to come back again.

Content
Easily the most important part of the blog, although I will not follow the blog regardless of the content if items above do not appeal to me. It is also probably the most personal and different thing for anyone out there. What I like to see and read in blogs is not going to be the same for everyone. I like reading reviews and tutorials, I also love to see FOTD/EOTD posts. I stay away from blogs primarily about nail polishes, because I can't relate to those much (I have gel nails, so I don't use nail polish a lot). I don't like blogs that only post about upcoming products but never actually review any of them. Or ones that have bad photos.

Shall we talk about photos now? Very briefly of course, because there are volumes written about good photos. It is essential to have good photos in a beauty blogger world, something I struggle with myself. So if the photos are terrible (come on, crop tool IS your friend you know) most of the time, I usually don't want to look at them... or the blog. 

I also don't like V-blog, I much prefer photos because I can't make myself sit still through the video. But that's again a personal preference. 

Proper use of punctuation, grammar and capital letters is also a must. I've seen couple of blogs that look like they are written by someone who never even heard about above things. Come on, start your sentences with a capital letter! Is it too much to ask? Maybe I am not the one talk, considering that English is not my first language but maybe I am. Because I still put an effort into what I write, sometimes more than native speakers.

These might not seem like a lot of requirements, but I feel they are very important (at least to me).

So what do you think? Am I being too picky or too demanding? Do you have anything YOU look for in the blog that I didn't mention?

~ Lyuba

Fancy reading some of my beauty 'sins'?

Hello Ladies,

I really should be going to bed now as I have to wake up super early tomorrow to go to London for our monthly Kimono de Jack meet up, but I am not tired!! I guess that's the payoff for having a late night job.

Meanwhile, check out Modesty Brosn Friday Confessions where I confess to all my beauty 'sins". Well maybe not all, as I could go and go with those, but some of them. I promise it will be a fun read! You might even get appalled at the atrocity of some (or all) of them. 

~ Lyuba

A little about me...

So I finally did it. I created a beauty blog so I can document my British makeup adventures. See, I'm an Ukrainian-American living in UK, and since everything here is new and exotic to me, I love exploring new stuff that I can't get back in US. Makeup is pretty high up there on my list of "new and exotic". I love how I can go to a drugstore and try regular, drugstore brands makeup before I buy it. Back in US (at least where I lived, can't speak for big cities like NYC or LA, etc...) the only makeup you could try is the fancy expensive stuff. As a result, I bought a lot of drugstore brands that simply did not work for me. Can you see that I'm in a makeup heaven now?

I really did not start getting into makeup until I moved here, and even then it didn't happen right away. I blame my lack of friends and excess of free time that finally pushed me to the DARK side. And then few month ago I started reading other beauty blogs and it all went downhill from there. Suddenly my makeup collection expended in what seemed as overnight, but I also became more aware of what's was available out there.

I still consider myself a novice in the beauty department, and this blog will document my journey as I learn about everything that makeup has to offer. :)