Over the top? Me?

Oh yeah! Check out the awesomeness! I finally got some way over the top eyelashes for performances. Aren't they just ridiculous? The spidery ones kind of scare me, but I figured I needed to get a "subtle" pair in case I wasn't feeling all green feather polka dot or barbie doll hair blue. Seriously, these things are humongous. I tried on the blue ones and with my eyes open they fill the entire space from my lashline to my eyebrows. Yet they are surprisingly easy to wear. I was afraid they'd noticeably waft with every blink, but it wasn't any problem. I think they'll need some mega heavy makeup so they don't seem so overpowering. I can't wait to try some in public :)

Hold on to your hats, here come the...

Flying Bosoms! So many bellydance troupes have traditional-style names - Zafira, Mandara, Awalim, while more irreverent ones often reference hips - Wicked Hips, Heavy Hips. There are the few outlying names - Fat Chance Bellydance and Rockabelly are two that spring to mind. I do love our troupe name, and it suits our dance style well. We're happy, funloving, highly energetic and just sexy enough it's ok to watch with your grandma.We meet at least weekly for practice, and lately have begun performing at places around town. The most recent was for a fundraising event at a local bar to raise money for biking trails and such, hence the shirts. It's been a blast, and we were all surprised how easily we can throw together a choreography or pick some random songs and do stylized improv dance for 20 min. without a hitch. We'll be performing at a downtown festival later this summer (no, not *that* one) too!
Of course more performances means excuses to get more dance clothes and makeup. Any time I see a pretty bangle for pennies at the thrift store I pick it up. If only other costume pieces were as easy. I've been having fun with more makeup styles, and have some wicked eyelashes now.Here's a bright blue with black look, with white in the inner corners, and black coming down the outer edge. Doncha love my perfectly matching bindi? This was from our first performance in town. Here's another performance look, although again the colors are more subtle in the photo than real life. The colors went from black to blue to purple then pink. And unfortunately the glitter rhinestones on my eyelashes started to flake off from overuse, so they're not as sparkly as once was. I'm thinking I need an expanded color palette, maybe red and orange, to round out the colorwheel. I also want to get some ridiculously impractical false eyelashes, like the kind that have real feathers at the edges, like these. Oh yeah, tons of fun! I wonder what it feels like to blink with that much air resistance... I'll let you know!

It's showtime Synergy!

I hope the reference wasn't too esoteric. Just rub your star sparkle earrings and get ready to kick some Misfits ass. So yet another example of the weird synergistic connection my SIL and I share. We seem to have an oddly similar approach to things, down to having matching nailpolish. Here we are at xmas (my feet, her hands): Totally convergent evolution, never have we discussed these things. All of you who know me know that I always wear blue toenail polish. I may stray a bit and wear teal, but that's as far as it goes. So one day I got a wild hair up my ass and painted my toenails ruby red. I was stunned when I next saw my SIL and her nails were the exact same color as mine. Ok, this isn't like twins separated at birth who end up living identical lives on opposite coasts. But it does feel a bit more than just coincidence. Hey, you can see my rainbow sock knitting in the corner! Sorry, got a bit of the "ooh shiny!" distraction going on.

I can give myself a black eye

I picked up a dark hot pink eyeshadow at MAC when I visited my mom last week (hey, I had a merchandise credit!). I thought with the blue, green, and purple shadows I already owned my color wheel was unbalanced. And this pink is serious enough to counterbalance all the cool shades. So I tried a couple different looks, one with pink on the lid blending to blue on the browbone. Yeah, that one didn't work so well. The blended region was purplish, and the overall effect was of a healing black eye. But flipping the colors so the blue is on the lid and undereye blending to pink then purple did work. I also went a bit further with the eyeliner than normal, thanks to my SIL's encouragement. And I really like it, I hope I can do it on command for my next dance performance (next month!).

Still not happy w/ the photography--it always looks better in person. Like you can't really tell how bright the colors truly are, or how neat it looks that the inner corner of the eye is filled in blue. And I dusted blue sparklies over my cheekbone & temple which add a lot of fun to it. Ah well, learning process all around.

A departure from the ordinary

After being turned on to Panacea81's fabulous makeup tutorials on youtube, I've had fun experimenting with different looks. She does such a great job guiding through eye makeup applications (including celebrity looks) that you quickly gain the confidence to do your own. I first got comfortable with black/brown smoky eyes - a "natural" look for parties and such. Then I went out and got a bizarre color palette for bellydance makeup, including screaming electric blue, fishscale green, purple, and white. Here's my first trial, although the colors are even more vibrant in person. I may need to try different lighting for the photos. It's also very hard to photograph your own eye, I wish I was looking the other way. Still, it gives you an idea of what I'm doing with some of my free time nowadays. Never thought I'd see the day where I not only wore a ton of blue eyeshadow, but actually posted photos of it online. But it's loads of fun, and I'm quite pleased with the eyeliner too. Now I just need some long feathery false eyelashes and I'll be good to go. Heh, this is totally ridiculous compared to my normal level of makeup. Wonder if I'll ever have reason to wear it outside of a performance?