Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas one and all! I hope everyone had a lovely holiday full of family and cheer! I know I certainly did! They day started off rather rough with having to wait for my brother to finish a video game before we could go to my grandmothers for presents. He finally emerged from his hole in the basement and we were off! I feel extremely blessed for the lovely gifts I received and also that everyone was able to be with us and in good health (hangovers aside ofcourse!) I think the highlight of the presents though was watching my brother and cousin open their gifts to find every kind of Duck Dynasty object my grandmother could find! I think my favorite though was when my uncle asked them if they even watched the show, to which both of them replied, "No". I can't say I have ever seen him with a more horrified expression! The day ended with a both beautiful and delicious meal of prime rib and twice baked potatoes prepared by my mom! It was so delicious and so nice to have everyone around at one table. But now, another year is over and the wait for Santa begins yet again! Hopefully, it will be as good as this year, but I have the feeling it will be even better!

What's you're favorite holiday tradition? 

Merry Christmas,

Xoxo Pink Prepster <3

Matte Nails

So the other day I bought OPI Matte Top Coat nail polish. I have always loved Matte everything, so I was really excited to find out I could use any of my nail polishes (I have a lot!) and make any of them Matte. So with Christmas coming up I decided to paint my nails a nice Matte Red!

The Red is OPI "Big Red Apple". I wanted a really bright red because I knew the Matte would dull the color a bit!
So after using a base coat, I put on two coats of the red nail polish.

As you can see the nails are rather shiny, which is something I usually love about OPI! Even without a top coat they always look shiny and you can't see brush marks even with only one coat. So once the nails were dry (and you want to make sure they're really dry because otherwise you get the color all over the top coat's brush and then it gets into the polish and it's really never very good!)

Ok so ignore all the imperfections.. I'm not a professional and EVERY mistake shows up when you use red... but this is what they look like with the Matte. The picture doesn't quite do it justice because there is a bit of glare but you can definitely see a difference. The thing with the Matte polish is that when you initially put it on it just looks like another top coat. It isn't until after it drys that you can see the dullness of a Matte. You do have to be careful though because you can see how thick the polish is once it dries, so make sure you have an even coat of Matte polish. 

Overall, I'm really glad I bought this polish. I paid $9.00 for each bottle of nail polish because my favorite store went and raised the price (but I always have coupons so it's never quite that much.) I like that I can use it with any other color and really any other polish, it doesn't have to be OPI, I just happened to have a lot of OPI! It dries fairly quickly and definitely faster than a traditional top coat. The final texture of my nails now is very soft but they still have that same sturdy hardness that I've come to love from OPI top coats. If you want Matte nails, I would highly recommend it!

What is you're favorite type of Matte? Lips? Nails? Tell me!

Xoxo

Pink Prepster <3

How to Take a Final Exam

So, it's that time of year. Finals Week. That time of year when every student is camped out in the library, and you're probably study more than you've ever studied before. But, luckily, despite the possible mental breakdowns, Final Exams are really not that bad! As long as you put in the effort, you will do great! 

So, you've studied you're heart out, and you've practically memorized the entire text book! You are ready to take the exam and finally be done! So here are my best tips for what to do once the studying is done and the only thing that stands between you and winter break is the Exam(s). 

1. Get a Good Night Sleep! I really can't stress this enough. Although there may not seem like enough time in a day and an all-nighter seems like the only solution, it's not. You're brain just doesn't work when you don't get sleep. If you don't believe me, believe science! What happens when you pull an all-nighter

2. Have a Bag Packed. The morning of the exam you're probably freaking out. I know I do! I find myself asking a million times, "What am I forgetting?". So pack a bag the night before! That way you're not worried about being late and you have one less thing to worry about, and let's be honest, you have enough to worry about!

So here it is. I keep everything in my Lonchamp bag because it is always the perfect size. I also bring a water bottle for during the Exam. Obviously, I also have my Vera Bradley pencil case which holds all of my pencils and pens. I also keep a large eraser in there too, for when I have to erase a large chunk of words and the pencil eraser just doesn't cut it. I also bring my Finals Binder, for more on that click here. That little green ball is my Eos Lip Balm, I bring it with me everywhere. The dry winter air really can dry out your skin and lips and no one wants chapped lips! Now the real question I'm sure you're all asking is what are those little yellow and pink things between the pencil case and binder. Well that brings me to my next point....

3. Wear Earplugs!! This is my proudest trick for taking a final. I had never thought of it until this year, and I'm very upset I haven't done it before! My biggest pet peeve is when people sniffle during tests. I understand that it's cold out and that people are sick, but I can't help it! And, when you're in a large lecture hall with 50+ people, it is even worse! Between coughing, sniffling, and people fidgeting in their seats, the test room is hardly silent. All the noise can get very distracting, but that's the beauty of earplugs! I got these earplugs in a whole box at Christmas Tree Shop for very cheap! They block noise up to 32 decibels, so all that noise is GONE! It's like you're in your own little world to focus on nothing but that information you studied. I always make sure to check with the professor when I walk into the Exam because I don't want them to think they are headphones or anything else that might look like cheating. You would be surprised at what they have seen people do to cheat. But, I've never had a problem with a professor being ok with it.

So try these out! I hope they help! If you have any tips for when you enter the exam room, comment below; I'd love to hear about them!

Xoxo
Pink Prepster <3

Organize Me: Finals Week

It's that time of the year! Winter break is right around the corner, which means I get spend a whole month at home with family and friends celebrating the holidays and New Years. This also means that it's time for the dreaded Finals Week! But in all honesty I'm not that worried. That sounds terrible but it's because I'm ready! I know what I need to do and I have everything I need to do it. I want everyone to feel this way about their Finals because the more confident you are about what you know, the better you will do! I promise! So here it is!

1. Make a Finals Binder!
This is my holy grail of Finals week! It has everything I could ever need for Finals. It keeps me organized and it keeps everything in one place.

 This is the front of my binder. It has my exam schedule on it and what I am being tested on for each exam. I also decided to put a fun quote on the front to make me laugh while I am stressed and studying. I also chose to add glitter cause theres nothing that glitter can't improve!!

This is the inside of the binder. It has a section for each exam. In each section I keep all of my study guides for each test. I don't want to keep everything in here because I want to be able to take it everywhere and if it's too heavy I won't want to. The lined paper on the front is for me to make study guides and take notes on things as I need to. I also only want to focus on what I need to know for finals so I don't get distracted by anything else (God forbid I study something I don't need to!).

Things I do want in each section:

• Study Guide for each chapter that highlights the key points of each chapter in my own words so I understand them
• Old quizzes on the chapter to review the kind of problems the teacher will ask
• Powerpoints from previous chapters

2. Make Study Guides

Making study guides is a great way to study. The act of writing out the notes and copying them is a way to remember things. On the study guide you want:

• The key points from the chapter
• These are usually the things that the teacher talks about most during class. 
• Your own words
• you want everything written in a  way you understand it. You do not want to simply copy the notes from the power point. 
• Examples
• This is also really important for math problems because you want to see what you need to do for different types of problems
• You can also use examples for explaining different concepts. You can make these up on your own or you can use ones your teacher uses in class whatever works for you!

3. Find a Good Place to Study

You want a place where you can focus. Somewhere that doesn't have a lot of distractions and somewhere you're not going to fall asleep! The library is always great but its usually very full during Finals Week. Most classrooms will be open during finals week and those will usually be very empty and very quiet. Find somewhere you like and you're not going to mind going to. So somewhere across campus might not be the best idea if it means you will never go there.

These are just some of my best tips for Finals Week. But, when it comes to studying, you need to know how you learn best. So Good Luck! 

May the curve be ever in your favor!

xoxo

Picture Frame Calendar

So today, I was feeling rather crafty and ofcourse I got the idea from Pinterest! So I decided to make myself a new calendar for my room!
I started with a 11x14 inch picture frame. You can use any size you want, I chose this size because it didn't seem too small nor too large. I also bought two sheets of sparkly paper for a border as well as a 11x8inch piece of sparkly white paper. I bought everything from Michaels.

 I used the smaller white piece of paper for the place to write everything and the sparkly pink paper (which is fantastic by the way!!) as the background. I wrote on the white paper to make the boxes and areas for dates and I wrote the name of the month above on the pink border. The white paper was placed in front of the pink paper so it could be seen and the pages of pink were cut to size to fit in the frame behind the paper. Then I used an Expo marker to write the dates and the month. Anything else you choose to write is up to you!

Personally I chose to write different assignments and big things that are happening that week. (obviously I don't have everything yet because it would be a lot more full!)

If I were to do it again:

• I would make sure to have 5 rows for weeks or not write the days of the week on the actual paper
• I would make the entire thing the calendar and not have the boarder so the boxes would be bigger to write it (but I wanted that pink paper!)

Other than that I am extremely happy with the way it turned out!

What's your favorite craft? Comment below! I'd love to know!

<3

Mason Candle Jar

This week I decided to buy some candles for Christmas time for my dorm (No, I'm not allowed to have candles in my room but don't tell my RA!) But I also wanted something to put the candle in to keep it safe and protected, so I decorated a Mason Jar!
I started with

• a plain clear Mason Jar
• Paper Star cut-outs
• Modge-podge
• Silver Glitter
• A candle of you're choice (optional) 

So what I did was I printed and cut out pictures of small stars. They are easy to get if you use the shapes on Microsoft Word. Then I glued the Stars to the Mason Jar with the mode-podge to the outside of the jar. Once the stars were all on. I covered the outside of the jar in modge-podge, including over the stars. Then I poured the silver glitter all over the outside of the jar. Then I let everything set for a few minutes, and I used tweezers to pull off the stars. With the star windows open, I placed the candle inside of the jar and lit the candle. I think it came out pretty well!

Xoxo,

Pink Prepster

Beach Day!

I had the best day today with two of my best friends! After a failed attempt to go to Six Flags.... We decided to go spend the day at the beach instead! We drove an hour up to Glouster on the North Shore and went to Wingaersheek Beach. It was gorgeous! It was very crowded because it was such a nice day, but we found this little cove on the other side of some large rocks and it was like our own little beach!

The water was rather cold so I wasn't too keen on going in, but my friend convinced me to dive in after one simple statement.

"The salt water will make your hair blonder!"

As someone with naturally dirty blonde hair, I am always looking for ways to naturally give it that highlighted lighter look. I have tried everything from highlights at a salon (Too Expensive!) from a full head dye out of a box (I will never do that again!) Apparently when you go swimming in salt water the salt stays in your hair and it causes the sun to lighten your hair. I bet theres more science to that, but all I needed to know was my hair was getting blonder by the second! I think I believe it too! I have always noticed my hair being lighter after trips to the cape. 

Do you try to lighten your hair? How do you do it?

Pink Prepster <3

Hello All!

Hello All!
This is my first post as the Pink Prepster. I am about to become a freshman at the University of Mary Washington in Fredericksburg Virginia! To say I am excited is an absolute understatement! I have about 15 days to movie in, and from now on I will be posting about my planning for move in and my new college life! I am originally from Boston Ma and have been at a private school since the sixth grade. Over the past seven years, I have discovered just what it means to be a prep, and I am excited to fully embrace it as I start college! So stay tuned! This is going to be fun!

Pink Prepster <3