And I’m not sure exactly why.

You see, there’s a crazy movement going on this week started by Lands’ End and the Curvy Girl Guide – a movement about being comfortable with your body – a movement inspired by the many, many choices of swim suits for every body type that Lands’ End offers.  Swimsuit Confidence!

There’s a whole bunch of crazy ladies from the Curvy Girl Guide going to NYC to strut their fine Lands’ End Swimsuit-clad bodies on national television to show their Swimsuit Confidence.   I am not THAT crazy, but I was crazy enough to say yes when Lands’ End asked me to join the movement. They told me to pick out a swimsuit I could be confident in, then they sent it to me – but the catch – I had to post my picture in it!

Seriously, I am still not sure why I said yes.  I am still 10 pounds overweight and have ginormous nursing bewbs (which I am NOT fond of), and pretty much hate to see pictures of myself right now.

But I am what I am.  And, this swimsuit DOES really help me feel better about what I am right now.  I love it!  AND I have a daughter that needs to know that what she is on the inside is more important than how she looks on the outside.  So, I decided she and I would show our Lands’ End swimsuit confidence together. (And, as it turns out, our  broken front porch step. Oops. We’ll get right on that as soon as it stops raining constantly.)

So, here we are. Sophie and I in our swimsuit confidence.  I was so busy trying to get her to look at the camera that I forgot to suck in!  So that’s the real deal, baby!

There’s a lot going on this week to celebrate Swimsuit Confidence!  Here’s how you can get involved:

Get the Twibbon – Click here and display the “I have swimsuit confidence!” Twibbon on your Twitter profile photo. Send a tweet to @LandsEndPR proclaiming “I have swimsuit confidence!” #landsend for a chance to be entered to win a $500 Lands’ End gift card – winner announced May 27.

Participate in a Week of Tweets – Mark your calendar each day May 23 – 27, 2011 from 12:00 – 1:00 p.m. CST so you can join in the series of National Swimsuit Confidence Week events on Twitter. Follow @LandsEndPR and tweet at #landsend. We will be announcing exclusive swimwear promotions, giving away great prizes and inspiring women to embrace their swimsuit beauty.

Thanks to Lands’ End and the Curvy Girl Guide for this great idea (and for the swim suit)!  I may be crazy, but I’ve conquered a big fear today!

So it was with great glee that I said “YES!” when Mary Kay asked me to review their new limited edition Weekender Collection.

It’s a great collection of lip and eye pencils that double as liner and color!  There’s some great nail colors in there, too.

I *love* all the colors.  My eyes are poppin’ these days in the Classic Navy and Turquoise Waters colors.  But my favorite, favorite FAVORITE thing that I can no longer live without and am going to have to order in mass quantity since it’s limited edition, is the eye pencil in “Whitewash”.  It is the PERFECT sparkly white highlighter color for my browbone and the inside corner of my eyes.  Can you see it?  I just used a neutral mineral eye color, Hazelnut, with the Whitewash in this photo.

I want to marry it.  Seriously, y’all call up your Mary Kay consultant and get you some Whitewash pencil!

That’s the Weekender Collection lip pencil in Pink Sand on my lips.  Isn’t it pretty?  It’s a great daytime netural!  There are matching nail colors for it and the other lip color, Coral Stone. Love!  I have Coral Stone polish on my toes now.

Having tried them all, I can highly, highly recommend all these products in the Weekender Collection!  You can get them from your MK Consultant while supplies last, so hurry! If you don’t have a consultant, use mine, she’s wonderful and she ships for free even if you don’t live near me.

Thanks Mary Kay! I love this collection!

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Mary Kay gave me some sweet new makeup to try, and I did, and then I told you about it.  Pretty straightforward, eh?

And apparently, I have passed this tendency toward vanity down to my daughter.  Who, of course, is alarmingly adorable. But REALLY.  Emily has made fun of me for looking at myself in any available mirror before, and recently this has become a little problem for me – when Sophie does it!  Which she does at EVERY available opportunity.  Today for instance, she watched her reflection in the oven as she danced in the kitchen, in the dining room window (turning around backwards in her chair) as she ate lunch, and in the bathtub FAUCET for Pete’s sake while taking a bath!  She was really enjoying making eyes at her funny reflection in that faucet!

But all these were just minor, no big deal really.  The big narcissism problem came last Wednesday at her speech therapy appointment. Sophie l-o-v-e-s speech and her therapist, and is usually good as gold for the entire 30 minutes.  BUT.  There is a two-way mirror in the room so parents can watch the kiddos without being seen.  And this week, instead of being cooperative, Sophie made EVERY effort to STARE at herself in the mirror the whole time!  She did everything her therapist asked her to do…while watching herself do it, and making a funny face if possible. Which made her focus and accuracy come down just a few levels on the scale.  Arrgh! My blood pressure was rising on the other side of that mirror!

Sophie. This therapy costs GOOD MONEY.  Don’t make me go in there and tar paper over that mirror!

I’ll be interested to see how she does this week!  I think I am just going to go ahead and ask her therapist to turn Sophie’s chair around so her back is to the mirror.

Because after all, Sophie is the fairest.  And she just finds her reflection irresistible!

We were invited to Salon 11 in Germantown by the owner Melissa Hodson, who is, as it turns out, a loyal Mommin’ It Up reader. She’s got a new stylist, Mollie Shope, and they wanted us to come in to check out the salon and get our hair (and eyebrows) shaped up for the fall. Never ones to miss out on pampering, we happily obliged!

Here’s Jenny getting her wax job:

Just kidding! Jenny’s upper lip was carefully inspected and found to be hairless enough as not to require attention. At least she has that going for her.

Anyway.

I had not been to Salon 11 before, although everyone in my family has (more on that in a minute). It’s located in our town’s old jailhouse, and while they’ve made it beautiful, they’ve left a few relics of times past.

It is such a cute place! It’s small – one wash bowl, two styling stations – but in my opinion the size is what makes it so neat. It really encourages interaction among everyone there. We sat and talked to Mollie and Melissa and the other customers like we were all old friends… discussing everything from “Teen Mom” (my favorite subject) to bedbugs, and we had such a nice time.

It made me realize why beauty shops were once the hub of social interaction for women. I mean, they didn’t have Facebook, so I can see why they had their hair done once a week – they had to catch up on all the news! Salon 11 provides just that kind of small town, welcoming environment, while at the same time having young, hip (which even saying that word makes me decidedly NOT hip, don’t you think?) stylists who know that dark is the new light (at least according to my young, hip co-worker upon seeing my hair) and have the sense to steer old ladies like me and Jenny away from frosted hair and perms.

(No really, I have considered a perm. Like, within the last decade.)

We had a ball.

We love our new looks! And although we are geniuses and didn’t take “after” pictures of ourselves (someday we will grow up and become real bloggers, I swear), I will show you just how good Mollie is.

Yesterday afternoon (while I was at work, thank you Jesus) she took a screaming, writhing, boy who was determined NOT to get his hair cut, even though he was so shaggy he looked like he didn’t have parents, and turned him into this:

Is she good or what? As Sammy put it – “Mommy, my eyes aren’t in my hair and I can see the baseball now!”

So if you’re in the Dayton area, give Mollie at Salon 11 a call at (937) 855-1123 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              (937) 855-1123      end_of_the_skype_highlighting… you’ll love her, you’ll love the salon, and you’ll love your hair!

My vanity has done me a favor in that Mary Kay has generously give Emily and me some makeup to wear to BlissDom so that we will look as FABULOUS as we ARE. Using my mad makeup skillz and Mary Kay product, I’ve done a tutorial on how to get a neutral makeup look. This is a great look for every day and any day! Hope you all enjoy, and try to remember what I look like at the END of the video, not at the beginning!

For those of you who haven’t heard, Santa brought a Wii and a Wii Fit Plus to my house for Christmas! Actually, it was the Thrifty Mama – I won her giveaway and I was BEYOND thrilled!! Joshua was super-excited when he opened it.

The first game I was excited to play was bowling. I loooooove bowling but I am TERRIBLE at it. So I was pretty sure Wii bowling was going to be my redemption.

It is SO much fun!! I LOVED it just like I knew I would.

But perhaps I put a little too much enthusiasm into it, because, after the first two games, my left hip and my right shoulder were KILLING me. Old lady alert! Soon, we were off to my grandma’s house and we left the Wii behind. But late that night when we returned home we fired it up for some more bowling fun.

The first time I “threw” the ball, I screamed in pain. Holy Shoulder Batman! Why didn’t someone tell me I needed to STRETCH first!? Fake bowling is SERIOUS stuff!

Over the weekend I played approximately 478 games of Wii bowling. I am getting pretty good, (though not as good as my five-year-old, who bowled a TURKEY and beat me by 30 points last night!!) but last night when I went to bed both my shoulders were KILLING me. The last game Bobby and I played before bed, I played SITTING DOWN on the floor to make myself use less force when I threw. My right shoulder was BURNING! I need some Ben Gay! And some GERITOL!

Needless to say, I am hopelessly out of shape. It is time to fire up that Wii Fit Plus! I gotta get buff so my body can support my Wii bowling habit!

I got my hair cut!

Yep, that’s it. I got my hair cut. And it was waaaaaay overdue. It had been *gulp* almost four months since I’d made the time to go get it done! Crazy! Now I like my hair long, but I should still get it cut every 8-10 weeks, not every 16. It was looking pretty scraggly. And I was feeling pretty scraggly. So while I was there, I made an appointment for NEXT time – 8 weeks – and went ahead and put it on the calendar (January 7th!) so that next time I won’t look like Rapunzel tried to cut her own hair with a pair of kitchen shears when I go in. So that my hair won’t get so heavy (it’s really thick, y’all) that it hurts my scalp if I wear it down two days in a row. And so that I’ll look nice and feel good about myself. And so that I’ll make sure to at least have that 60 minutes in that chair just for me.

So, here’s my new haircut. Not that I can ever flat iron it this straight, and anyway I am much too lazy to flat iron it every day, but it’s a great cut and it’ll look great curly too! I love it!

Oh, and this haircut? Cost me $20! Go see my awesome stylist Janelle for a great cut & style at a great price!

And go read more frump-fighting posts at Fight the Frump Friday at Blissfully Domestic! And link up your own frump-fighting posts!

It’s time for me to get on my soapbox here, friends. Or my facewashbox to be more accurate. My dear readers, and lady friends, I want you to take care of your FACE! Unless you are Joan Rivers or Tori Spelling, the face God gave you is the only one you’re gonna get. So you have to take care of your skin!! Besides, even if you could, why would you want to look like this??

I mean, really? I am thinking she should’ve quite while she was ahead! Yee-ikes!

But anyhoo. No matter how fugly I get, you will never catch anyone operating on my face or injecting it with botulism (aka Botox). NOT HAPPENING. But I am doing everything I can to make sure it won’t be necessary, by taking care of my dang skin! I didn’t start until I was 30, but now I am full-on in the game. So here is my advice on how to take care of your skin so you still look like a very attractive you when you are 50!

1) CLEANSE – wash your face morning and night
2) EXFOLIATE – use a product that will slough off the dead skin a couple of times a week at least (I am addicted to Mary Kay’s microdermabrasion. It is like the BEST feeling ever! If you like liquid sandpaper to get all the dead stuff of your face, WHICH I DO!)
3) MOISTURIZE – day and night!
4) PROTECT – use a product with suncscreen to protect your skin from UV rays. Any damage you do today, you won’t see for 10 years. So in order to avoid waking up with some big-a** crows feet in 2019, start using a product with sunscreen!
5) STAY THE CRAP AWAY FROM THE TANNING BED! (this means you too, Uncle Paul!) Embrace your inner, or rather outer, whiteness, as I have, or just use a self-tanner. There are a bajillion good products out there. No need to give yourself skin cancer or wrinkles. It’s TRUE!!

Ok, so – ready, set, GO take care of your face!! And after you do that, go read how everyone else is fighting the frump at Blissfully Domestic at Fight the Frump Friday! Because, you know, I wrote that post too.

It’s Fight the Frump Friday at Blissfully Domestic! You’ll see me participating in this fun carnival fairly often because, well…I write it! You may remember FTF from it’s days hosted at Mrs. Fussypants, but now is has moved to the Style section of Blissfully Domestic. So I hope you’ll support me there and check it out each Friday and leave your own frump-fighting links in the Mr. Linky!

Today my fight the frump tip for you is: ACCESSORIZE! A necklace or a scarf can go a loooong way in making a so-so outfit very chic. Last night I got overdressed to go out for pizza, because you know, when ELSE do I get the chance to dress up, and I really loved my accessories – a long necklace and a scarf. Pardon the crappy picture but self-portraits are not my forte:

Without the scarf and necklace, this outfit would’ve been ok – but just ok. Those accessories really made it stand out and made me feel fun and fabulous.

So Fight the Frump, ladies! Getcha some great, simple, inexpensive accessories and work ‘em! And don’t forget to check out the Fight the Frump home page (my chosen topic there was eyebrows!) and leave your link in the Mr. Linky!