March Favorites

Hi! I wanted to do an April Fools' related post this week, but I forgot all about my Favorites post. So I'll be pushing that one back to next Friday instead. Let's get into some of the things I enjoyed during March!

Maybelline Fit Me! Matte & Poreless Liquid Foundation, Vaseline Lip Therapy Advanced Healing Balm

I've been trying the Fit Me! foundation throughout the month, and I'm really enjoying it. I don't like heavy foundations and don't need anything full-coverage, so this one does the job for me. I'm not crazy about the fact that it breaks me out if I leave it on for too long, but I like how it wears. The shade I have looks a tad bit ashy on my skin at first, but it balances out nicely once the rest of my face is on. 

I've kept things simple as far as lips go lately, so the main thing I've wanted on them is a good balm. I lost my Carmex shortly after including it in last month's favorites, so I picked up some Vaseline. It's lighter on my lips than the Carmex, so I find myself reaching for it a bit more often. Despite that, it's improved the texture of my lips and helps a lot when I'm wearing liquid lipsticks. 

Tales of Blood & Sulphur: Apocalypse Minor by J.G. Clay, A Beautiful Mess Photo Book by Elsie Larson & Emma Chapman

When I was contacted by Dane Cobain last month to review No Rest for the Wicked, he threw in a couple of extras for me to review from a couple of the authors in his company, and this was the first of the two extras. The book is a compilation of smaller stories about a number of things--apocalyptic creatures from the sky, demonic creatures from the ground, both good and bad getting tied up in the mix--that are all tied together by one man and a lot of blood. Tales of Blood and Sulphur is, frankly, a fucked up book. It's twisted and gory beyond a comfortable level (although really, what level of gore is comfortable?). It scared the shit out of me and I loved it. A review on it should be going up within the next week or so and I'll go into more detail then, but this was quite the read for me and I enjoyed the experience. 

A Beautiful Mess Photo Book was created by the lovely ladies behind the site A Beautiful Mess, which is one of my absolute favorite sites. If you're a blogger, photographer, or would just like to learn how to take better pictures, check out this book. It's full of tips, tricks, and helpful advice on how to take better photos and allow your personality to come through in the photos you take. I've been trying to figure out what style of product photography works best for me with both the resources I have on hand as well as the products I'm trying to photograph. This book helped teach me a lot about the types of pictures I want on the site and what I can do to improve the ones I take. 

Inside the American Mob, Underworld, Inc., Netflix Presents: The Characters

The main program I was watching was Inside the American Mob, which focuses on the golden years of the mob in New York and Philly. The stories are told through firsthand accounts of former made men, associates and the authorities who worked to bring down the mafia at its prime. I enjoyed that the story was able to be told from both sides, to see how the authorities organized their operations and how the mob tried to derail their efforts. I was really intrigued by the series but I've already finished the available episodes so hopefully there'll be another season sometime soon. 

Underworld, Inc. was the show I started watching after I finished Inside the American Mob, and it was about the various illegal activities going on in the underworld. What I really liked about it was that rather than being told through re-enactments or by police accounts, the cameras were actually in the thick of things as they were occurring. From the sex industry to dog fighting rings, pharma cons to legitimate drug cartels, Underworld Inc. explores all of those things in a raw, honest manner by allowing the viewer to see it all firsthand. The people in the episodes were always concealed or given false names as to avoid identification, but they explained everything as they went along. I loved it. It's an honest look into the darker parts of human nature and what the allure of money drives people to do to one another. 

I'd been seeing The Characters pop up in my Netflix feed for a couple of weeks, sandwiched between recommendations for other crime-related shows and old school sitcoms and I kept passing it up. But eventually, I said what the hell and gave it a go. Netflix Presents The Characters is a show featuring eight up-and-coming comedians, and each one is given a half-hour episode to develop their own brand of comedy in an improv/sketch format. I enjoyed episodes 1, 4 and 5 the most. Episode 6 has a sketch about a blind detective on a Segway and a modern-day take on how the Bible was marketed, and I found both of those hilarious. So if you're in the mood for something totally new, give this a whirl. 

Virtual Town

I mentioned this in my favorites list last month so there isn't too much to add here, but I'm still enjoying it. I haven't really been gaming too much in general lately so I don't have anything new to recommend yet. I've been looking into a few new mobile games though and I'll probably be including a couple of them in next month's favorites. 

Chrome to Phone for Android

This app officially went dark yesterday, but as of now, still functions. ::knock wood:: I still think it was a mistake for Google to stop support of this app, as it certainly made things much easier when sharing pages directly from my computer. I don't care for Google's regular page sharing utility; Chrome to Phone was much easier to use. It functioned as an add-on in Chrome and all I had to do was press that button to send whatever page I was looking at directly to my phone. From what I read, Google wanted their page sharing function to be the primary one and Chrome to Phone was arguably one of the most popular 3rd party extensions, so it was discontinued. But it was great, especially since I use both my laptop and phone for blog photos and the like, and I'm gonna hang onto hope that at some point it'll be back. 

Google Plus, Bloggers Required

I created a new Google account a few months ago that was separate from my personal account so that I could run both of my blogs, but I messed up while I was creating the account and wasn't able to get it untangled until the end of February. I spent a good amount of time over there this month, learning how the business pages worked (because other than Gmail, I don't normally use G+ at all), getting everything situated and finally starting to share my posts over there. It's aight. 

I believe I've mentioned Bloggers Required in a Favorites post before, but this is one of the main sites that I use to apply for reviewing jobs. They've had a few more positions on the site as of late, but the majority of the positions available are usually for UK-based bloggers or US bloggers with high page ranks and views. But it was through that site that I got my first official job with Carapex last summer, and it's helped me find emerging companies that are relevant to RRNT. I've gotten to work on my pitching skills, it is a big part of why I finally fixed the design a few months ago, and I have to spend a lot of time on there as well so it made the list this month.

Organization tips and tricks, spring home decor, home cleaners, photography equipment

As of this posting, there are a few of the Spring Cleaning posts that have to go live, but because that was the focus of the blog for March, I had to look up the different types of organization tips and tricks that I wanted to include in my posts. That's where the home cleaners come into play as well; you should be seeing that post soon if you haven't already. 

My Spring Inspiration post went live some time ago, and I was looking for different things to fill the various sense categories. I was the most stumped on the music and decor, and since I've been looking to change something up in my room to reflect the season as well, I spent a lot of time this month checking out spring decor. 

I'm trying to start this cheap DIY series on here about how to get high-quality results from DIY equipment, which is why I spent so much time focusing on DIY photography this month. It can be crazy expensive trying to afford everything that professionals have, and I'm on a bum's budget. My pockets just aren't at that level, but the quality of the photos & content I put on here shouldn't have to reflect that. I'm sure I'm not the only blogger who struggles with finances and trying to take their blog to the next level, so that's why I'm trying to develop this series. Through trying out the various DIY suggestions for studio equipment, I'm trying to find the cheapest one that can still net me the best results. And that's where this new series comes into play. It'll hopefully be up and running sometime later this year. 

Seasonal inspiration, new beauty products, cookbooks, photography equipment and tips

As I mentioned, my Spring Inspiration post took up a lot of my time this past month, so I was trying to find different photos to give me that seasonal inspiration I was looking for. I'm also debating whether or not to do another seasonal bucket list because I enjoyed the others that I came up with, but I don't want to overwhelm myself trying to keep both blogs afloat, handle the issues in my personal life and still have to fulfill the items I've included on a list. But the seasonal inspiration, like always, is fun for me to focus on. 

I haven't been able to find a lot of new beauty products when I'm looking at local stores on my own, and that's where being a YouTube addict comes into play. The chicks on there are always finding something new and while most of the time it's a higher-end product, it does inspire me in the way of trying to find suitable dupes that are a bit more budget-friendly. I'd like to review beauty products that don't have a ton of reviews, if it helps bring new people to the site. I also just like trying new stuff that isn't quite as popular yet. How hipster of me, right?

I'm still in the middle of developing a business plan in my life outside of blogging, and I went on a cookbook binge this month trying to put together some inspiration for a menu. The thing I love about cookbooks, especially newer ones, is that there's so much to learn from them. The ability to style a cookbook to one's personal style is pretty awesome and there are so many ideas to pull inspiration or develop your own from, from the presentation and styling of the food to the fonts you use to the style of photography you use to capture the food. It's an excellent teacher for a product photographer, and the added bonus of being completely about food is what makes cookbooks some of my absolute favorite kinds of books to collect. 

To expand on the series I mentioned in the DIY series above, I had to research different equipment you may find in a studio. I'm not very knowledgeable about what goes into a photography studio or the various equipment, so I figured it was time to teach myself. By learning about the different equipment I was able to figure out what equipment I personally needed the most, and which components would be most valuable to recreate for a cheaper price. It's been pretty interesting so far. 

What documentaries did I watch this month? 

Finding Vivian Maier

This was another option that kept popping up in my Netflix feed over the past few weeks or so, and it was by far the best, most complex documentary I've watched in awhile. Finding Vivian Maier starts off as something kinda cool, but unfolds into something entirely different instead. When the creator of the documentary, John Maloof, wins a storage auction, he becomes the owner of tons of old portraits, undeveloped film, and a woman's belongings. John discovers that the woman was a very talented photographer, but nobody was ever aware of her skill. Despite her extensive collection of photos, Vivian's profession was actually nanny to a number of suburban families. His efforts to contact any relatives was futile, so he started seeking out her former clients in order to find out more about Vivian and that's where you'll find the real story. I enjoyed this documentary so much and highly recommend you watch it. 

Those were some of the things that I tried and enjoyed throughout the month of March. There's a couple of newbies on the list, but next month's should have a bunch of new stuff on it. What were some of your favorite things in March? See you soon!