Happy (almost) Halloween! In honor of my favorite holiday, this week’s Friday Five is centered around Halloweeny things.
1. Halloween Nail Stickers by Kiss: I found these at the drugstore and obviously had to buy them. I painted my nails with two coats of a way-too-old Sally Hansen black nail polish and then stuck these fun little guys on before applying a top coat. My DIY mani isn’t the most professional looking, but I still think my nails turned out pretty cute.
1. Kaldi’s Coffee: this is a popular coffee shop in St. Louis, and my mom had this bag of Cafe Kaldi grounds (a blend of African and Latin American beans) at home when I visited last month. I made coffee using these beans a couple times while I was there, and then my mom told me I could bring them back to NY with me because she rarely makes coffee at home. So I’ve been having this stuff every morning—I’m currently drinking it as I type—and it is delicious!
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I recently treated myself to some goodies from Sephora: the Bite Beauty Discovery Set ($55, valued at $110). If I’m being completely honest, part of the reason I ordered this set when I did was because Sephora also sent me a code for a free Ole Henrisksen VIB Deluxe Sample Set with a $35 purchase—a set very similar to “The Whole Truth” set that they sell for $46. So I got some extra bang for my buck. 🙂
1. Black Flamingo: My husband and I did a long-overdue date night last Friday and went to dinner at this new vegetarian/vegan taco joint in Williamsburg. And holy hell, were we impressed with the food!! My husband is a meat eater but he was totally into everything he ordered, as was I. I got three tacos: The Banh Mi, The Bibimbap, and The Seasonal (not pictured below—I was too excited to take photos of my food). YUM! I highly recommend this place for tacos (and cocktails too).
1. The Salt Lick in Driftwood, Texas: I visited my sister and nieces in the Austin area last weekend for my elder niece’s ninth birthday, and we went out to dinner to celebrate on Sunday night. We’d been to the Salt Lick before and I specifically requested that we go again while I was in town. I don’t even like meat, but their veggie sides are so good and their BBQ sauces are seriously to die for: so mustard-y and tangy…MMMM!
I was so excited to come home from errands and work yesterday to find my latest Stitch Fix sitting at the front door! This was Fix #10 for me—I can’t believe how many I’ve gotten already. I’ve been wearing the sleeveless plaid button down from my last fix a whole bunch lately—in fact, I wore it yesterday—and I couldn’t wait to tear into the box and see what the stylist picked out for me this time.
Can you believe we’re already a week into October?! I certainly cannot. I’m well into my 31 Days of Horror Challenge and I’m happy to report it’s going swimmingly, even with my four-day trip to Texas. When I arrived home from the airport on Tuesday, my October Birchbox was waiting for me at the front door, so that was a nice little welcome home after a long, somewhat stressful day of travel.
For this month, Birchbox subscribers were given the option to pick one of five mascara samples OR one of two featured boxes (Game Face or Power Pose). I selected the Power Pose box, which included five samples from Estée Lauder brands. October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month so Estée Lauder Companies partnered with Birchbox to donate $104,000 to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation, and this month’s box is fully Breast Cancer Awareness-themed:
1. Supernatural Convention in Secaucus, NJ: a little while after Comic-Con, my friend and I decided to buy Sunday tickets to Creation Entertainment’s #NJCON. I’d never been to a show-specific convention like this before, so I was super excited to go! As part of the con they throw a Friday night karaoke party hosted by becostumed Rob Benedict and Matt Cohen (theme: Cult Classics) and featuring the stars who appeared that day. So obviously my friend and I went to the party…and it was a blast! In the pic below you can see Erica Carroll (Hannah), Gil McKinney (Henry Winchester), Osric Chau (Kevin), Rob Benedict (Chuck), Tyler Johnston (Samandriel), and Matt Cohen (Young John Winchester). Misha Collins (Castiel) also made an appearance to talk about his charity Random Acts of Kindness’s five year anniversary, so that was amazing to see him. Also not pictured: Travis Aaron Wade (Cole), whom we ran into at Houlihan’s after the party ended. 😛 The actual convention on Sunday was fun, and we got to see panels with Erica Carroll (with a surprise appearance by Misha), Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles (always a delight to see them) and Mark Sheppard (hilariously sassy). I don’t know if I’d pay $120 to do the whole thing again, but it was a cool experience for sure.
Happy October! I love Fall, and Halloween is my favorite holiday, so the start of October is always exciting for me. I also love horror movies; even the really shitty, 2-star ones on Netflix usually have some sort of entertainment value (as in, “so bad they’re funny”). 
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1. Scream Queens: another year, another new Ryan Murphy show…not that that’s a bad thing! I love Murphy’s campy sensibility, and SQ is full of that, along with an excellent Heathers vibe, a heaping helping of extra bitchy Emma Roberts snark, and SO MUCH SCREAMING. I was amazed-slashed-amused by some of the stuff the pilot managed to get past FOX censors, including a metric shit ton of poop talk and the terms “gashes,” “blumpkins,” and “bikini burger” (I had to Google the latter two, so thanks for adding those to my vocabulary, Chanel No. 1). I’m confused by Nasim Pedrad’s character’s outfits—she’s supposedly stuck in the 90’s but her clothes look like solid 80’s to me. And what’s up with Chanel No. Whatever’s furry earmuffs? Also…candle vloggers, lol. 😛 My favorite characters so far are Jamie Lee Curtis’ Dean Munsch and Niecy Nash’s rent-a-cop Denise Hempville. It’s also fun to see Lea Michele play a super-weirdo. I can’t wait for more!
