The Weekly

The Weekly, 01.11.2021

January 11, 2021
Will 2021 be a year of getting to wear shoes? The serious questions I have for the new year…

Happy New Year! It’s my first Weekly post of 2021, and after some much needed time off for rest and relaxation to close out 2020, I am ready to jump back in to Pretty Busy!

And oh what a start to the year it has been. Watching the tragedy of what Wednesday brought in Washington, D.C., was beyond disturbing and saddening. I keep reading people saying they could never have imagined this, or that they are praying for peace and unity, and to be very honest, I cannot echo those sentiments. If you have been tuned in since 2015 when Trump first made an appearance in the political arena, this moment was obvious. I saw this in 2016, when I posted a plea to vote for decency prior to voting, and on the morning after the election when I sat in my bed crying, knowing this was what we were moving towards. This level of violence is the only obvious reality I see when we have millions of people who were either willing to excuse racism, bigotry and hatred when they voted for Trump, or truly believed in that platform when they voted for him and then flew his name on flags knowing that this is exactly what they wanted to represent. And that’s why I don’t have a prayer for unity- I don’t ever want to live hand-in-hand with people who believe in the oppression and violence towards others, and I don’t think that is what we need to be asking for in this moment. We need to hold people accountable who allowed for and incited this reality to happen, and people like myself, white people, need to reckon with the ways in which we still enable white supremacy to exist within our culture in America. In my eyes, there is not another option.

This week I also saw a lot of media surrounding influencer culture and the role that social media influencers and lifestyle bloggers have in calling out and condemning what happened last week. Stephanie McNeal, who is a must-follow if “influencer culture” is even remotely interesting to you like it is to me, wrote this article about the role that these people play in the social and political arena after the last year. And Danielle Prescod, a new follow for myself, posted this video calling out white influencers for choosing to say silent in moments where their voices have extreme influence- exactly what they claim to be.

I did quite a bit of unfollowing this week of those accounts who said nothing at all – losing a follow when you have hundreds of thousands might not seem like a huge deal, but if hundreds of us took that step, then it would help hold people accountable to their privilege. And I do think there is something to be said for the fact that not everyone is held accountable to stop and acknowledge what has happened in their workplace, but a) maybe they should be and we should be holding our companies and leaders accountable to doing so, and b) you chose to work in a world where your main purpose and role is influencing others to do something. With that in mind, I get that bloggers aren’t news sources, and that the spread of misinformation and conspiracy that caused much of last week’s violence is a dangerous consequence of people without a lot of knowledge talking about these things, but there is always the option to acknowledge and condemn heinous acts of violence like what we saw on Wednesday, as well as pointing people to credible media sources of voices talking about these issues.

Real life is not just fashion and beauty; we are whole humans and that means we are experiencing it all and have views on much of it. We can bring that balance into what we consume, too. Some people I think are great voices to follow for a balance between the worlds they chose to influence and using their voices to aid in calling out what is happening in our world? Grace Atwood, Ashley Spivey, An Indigo Day, Lemon Stripes, Nicolette Mason, Happy Go Curly, Lowes to Luxe, Hey.Candace, Carly, and The Every Girl. Evaluate your scroll, and think about the voices you’re listening to- that is one of my social media goals for 2021.

Chris and I spent much of the holidays alone, and that meant lots of sleep and television time. I jumped right on that Bridgerton bandwagon, and within 24 hours, I had finished – it’s like Pride and Prejudice meets Gossip Girl. Then I discovered that it was actually a book series, and that sucked up my life for the next few days. I’m onto book seven, and highly recommend this series if you’re looking for a decently written escape following your series binge.

I was thinking of putting together a whole post on my favorite reads of 2020, but truthfully, I just haven’t had the time or energy over the last week to put that together. But I thought I would shout out a few of my top titles from the year. Here are a few of my favorite titles from the last year if you’re looking to build your list:

Up next for me? I bought, The Daily Stoic, to do as a nightly practice for the year, calming my mind and offering perspective before bed. And I just got, The Dating Plan, as my next light reading pick.

One of Chris and I’s goals for the start of the year is to cook more and order less. I am pretty much the one that cooks for us, and so if I am not in the mood or not feeling well, I don’t cook and we end up ordering. So we have cooked almost all week, and that means I try new recipes to keep myself motivated and inspired. We loved this recipe for creamy turmeric chicken and noodles, and this recipe for a kale caesar salad with a delicious Parmesan tahini salad dressing. I’ll be sure to post any other recipes that we try and love! Stay tuned.

Another one of my goals over the last two months has been to clear out a lot of my medicine cabinet and finish products that have been half emptied. And I have made serious progress, which I am proud of. Enough progress that I allowed myself to order a few new products to try, and the one standout product that I have been so impressed with are these exfoliating pads from Elemis. I had always wanted to try these, and decided to order them when they were on sale a few weeks back, because I was not using the Pixi Glow pads that I had in my medicine cabinet (I didn’t love these- they left a sticky film on my face, and I could only use in the PM when I prefer AM to get off dead skin). These pads are incredible and made a strong first impression. I am going to be keeping these as a staple in my skincare routine- they gently work away flaking skin (I always wake up with this despite slathering my face before bed) while also waking up dull and tired skin to give it a healthy glow. Definitely recommend!

In other recent beauty buys, I was looking for a new eyebrow pencil to work on filling in the last few sparse areas in my eyebrows (so much growth from this eyebrow conditioner I wrote about here!). I am pretty new to using pencils, as I usually prefer more of a brow pen. But I decided to order the top rated one on Sephora and have been testing it to see how it works. So far, really great! The pencil goes on much easier than other waterproof formulas, but still allows for you to get thiner strokes where you want. I also splurged and grabbed this bronzer/highlighter palette that I have had my eye on for a long time. I’ll be the first to admit it is an expensive one, but I love that it’s a creamy two-in-one formula, especially as I am not a powder kind of gal and prefer something that has a consistent texture with the rest of my makeup. And lastly, I am grabbing this Nars Soft Matte Creamy Concealer today; I have seen both Katie Jane Hughes, who usually goes more glowy, and Maddy Gutierrez, who wears more matte, use this soft matte concealer pot, as their foundation and concealer. The payoff seems pretty incredible, and I don’t truthfully love a full coverage foundation with a full coverage concealer- I just feel like it gets too heavy, especially under a mask. Looking forward to trying this as soon as it gets here!

I’ve had a lot of random Amazon buys for this month, and a few worth noting here. We had two dogs for Christmas Eve, which meant a few territory-claiming-related accidents in our living room. We grabbed this cleaning/stain-removing spray I have seen lots of others talk about to tackle these stains, and wow, WOW, WOW! am I impressed. This spray completely removed two large stains on our sitting chairs with just two uses – definitely recommend keeping this on hand for stains on furniture and rugs. I also grabbed this spray bottle from Amazon to re-wet my hair when I am refreshing it (gives an extended spray that is extra jazzy), and this pill remover for sweaters (I’ve been dying to get one of these). Lastly, it’s my goal to take better care of my hairbrushes, and I ordered this cleaning brush for my Mason Pearson hairbrush (still going strong with this 2020 purchase – so glad I got the smaller size) to make sure I clean the dust trapped in the bristles out. It’s forced me to look at how ratty and gross my usual hairbrushes are, which means I am just putting grime back into my otherwise super well-treated hair…cool. Last but not least, another one of my favorite makeup brushes from Real Techniques – this brand and style is one of my tried and true makeup brushes.

I shared my top pair of jeans from 2020 in my top products post last week, but I recently decided to try the Curve Love line from Abercrombie after seeing SassyRedLipstick rock a pair as a size 14. I thought, if she can do it, I can try. So I ordered a pair of ripped jeans despite the teenage trauma caused by this brand and countless others who never made much that fit my body well when I needed it the most. And I have to say, I am extremely impressed, so much so that I ordered a second pair. I ordered my normal pant size- 31- and these really give that distressed and structured denim look with a perfect fit around my thicker thighs and butt with a high waist cut. Abercrombie, I will consider forgiveness…

Pushing myself to remove myself from social media a bit more this week to establish some healthy boundaries. To refocus my energy, this week, I am going to focus on finishing an art project that I started last weekend to hang above our bed. I’ve been getting lots of inspo from _forthehome who has tons of DIY abstract art projects saved to her highlights- definitely check it out.

That’s all she wrote! Feeling like this is all week is already all over the place, but cest la vie. I’m hopefully getting my vaccine on Thursday (!) and looking forward to a small feeling of growing hope moving forward through the month. Let’s go, 2021.

Thanks for shopping my blog post! For transparency, some of the links in this post are affiliated links, which means that I may make a very small commission off of any purchases made using them (this goes to blog upkeep!). I only share what I love on Pretty Busy Brooklyn, and appreciate your support.

alicia.ann.escobar