Our “Valentine’s Stay-In Dinner ” turned out great! We got some steaks from Costco.  The meat at Costco never fails to be consistent in its great quality. I did a sort-of improvised “Tournados Rossini”. The steaks were bigger than the tournadoes!  I made a nice Madeira sauce with mushrooms and topped the steaks off with warmed slices Foie Gras pate.

Steak with a Madeira Sauce, mushrooms and topped with Foie Gras make a great dinner!

We enjoyed this steak with a nice Chateau Margaux…and my home made macarons for dessert!

     The only wine that doesn’t make me throw up or get a headache. Yummy macaron!

Too much wine on Saturday night   had me a bit lazy yesterday morning. It was one of those “way-to-cold-and-windy-to-go-out”. The wind chill was close to zero. It’s better to be warm and cozy.   I realized though, we had to go out to errands and possibly make a purchase of a bookshelf we had our eyes on.

At first, I wasn’t even going to be bothered to put any make up on. However we all know what that could mean. Right? I don’t want to take the chance of being called “sir” in front of my beloved Bonaparte.  Remember my “Sir” Post?

I figured a light eye would be better—you know, just a bit of mascara, liner and definitely filling in those brows.

So let’s talk about brows. Oy-when I was young I had really thick eyebrows. Back then, my brows would be called “bushy”. If I had those same brows now, they would be referred to as “on trend” (BTW, I despise the phrase “on trend” almost as I despise the word “pop”! Somewhere in the 1970’s, I plucked my brows way too thin. Over plucking was a horrible mistake because they never quite grew back the same. As more time passed, my brows really thinned out—much like the rest of the hair on my head. I was left with the disappearing brows. It’s not a good look.

Thinning brows, uneven skin. Am I the only person who isn’t perfect?

That’s when the “filling in” process began. It seems that I tried every brow product known to woman. The brow pencils never seemed to work for me. Granted, the pencils are the one brow product that actually comes in the color “black”, but for some reason, penciling made my brows look too “Mommie Dearest”. Very black and falsely thick. Very drawn on. It wasn’t a good look.

This is not the look I am striving to achieve!

Then I tried, in vain, for a decent brow powder. The cosmetic companies really pissed me off with this one. There is no “black” brow powder—or if there is, it slipped by my crossed eyes! The “brunette” powder always turned orange on my brows. YBF cosmetics touted brow pencil in “taupe”, a universal color that was claimed to work well from the lightest of brows to the darkest.

A complete fail for me

Guess what. I purchased it. It didn’t work on me. My brows turned ginger–not only that, but I broke the product in the pencil by pressing to hard!

After a long search, I found an excellent brow powder—an inexpensive one at that! NYX brow powder in Black/Gray. At $6.00 it’s a steal and it comes with a bit of wax to keep those brows in place. The little spiral brush that is included is great for taming, but the brush for applying the powder is not great.

Best $6.00 spent. This is excellent. I also use the black eye shadow. This old Vera Bradley brush is the greatest for filling in the brows!

I apply with a slanted tip Vera Bradley brush I got years ago. Due to the fact the NYX brow powder in my color of choice is always out of stock, I just use a black eye shadow. It works just as well.

After I apply my foundation and a bit of concealer, I fill the brows in. I don’t know about you, but my brows are very uneven. One is arched and one is straight. I don’t even try to change that. I just fill in with the natural shape.  Then I “brush” the brows with a brow brush. It seems to work for me.

I go with each brows natural shape–see, one is more arched!

What do you think? I like a filled-in brow. It changes the entire look of your face. Even on those days when I don’t want a complete “eye” look, the filled in brows looks 100 percent better.

A quick swipe of my NYC Color eyeliner in black made the lids look a bit more polished. I have a ton of these liners that I hoarded for less than two bucks each. The price has risen to $2.99—but it’s still the best value in liquid eyeliner. It’s just as good, if not better than the high-end luxury brands. I swear by this!

I also decided to put some lip color on. Matte color followed by lots of shiny gloss. Why is it that lip gloss never lasts too long? These days I’m digging a shiny look on the lips when I do take the time to put lip color on. The shininess is like an optical illusion for aged lips and just seems to plump ’em up a bit.

Within minutes the gloss is gone. I can’t stand that!

Within moments, though, the gloss seems to get on stray strands of hair that fall to my face, the lenses on my eyeglasses and on my clothing. I’m much better off with my old reliable Chapstick!

See what I mean? The gloss on the lips is gone.

Off in the car with our little rascal. He’s so happy to be out and about!

Who can resist that face? 

We have been on the hunt for a bookcase for the downstairs family room. Furniture shopping can be so daunting at times. There are a lot of inferior goods out there that are marked up to the most unreasonable prices! We also need strong shelving because of the heaviness of the books.  

Billy bookcase is on the far right.

We have two old “Billy” bookshelves from Ikea that Bonaparte purchased years ago. One is in the garage for storage purposes and one is in the family room. Surprisingly, they have held up well, but we both want something with more character.

We went to  “The Dump”—a furniture store that claims is discounted. We spotted a couple of bookcases that were ridiculously overpriced and the construction was extremely shoddy. Honestly, I don’t know why we bother to even browse in that store.

Next it was off to a local upscale consignment shop, The Velvet Shoestring.  The Velvet Shoestring   Here’s a couple of things we purchased in the past from that store.

Purchases from The Velvet Shoestring

Both of us are huge fans of consignment and vintage shops. Unfortunately, our visit to Velvet Shoestring  yesterday was a “miss” day.

We ended our journey at “Vintage Home”,  Vintage Home in Paoli  a unique furniture and home furnishings store in Paoli. The stuff here is a blend of old renovated furniture and new furniture made to look old. Here’s the book case.  I can’t wait to get this baby home!

We spotted it on Saturday, but just wanted do a bit of browsing (get the tie-in “Brow”sing?)  before we made a final decision! We paid $395. It was well-worth the money. I’ll post more pics when it’s delivered!

We’ve made a few purchases at “Vintage Home”. Here they are.

Our “vintage” cupboard in the kitchen, the coffee table in the sunroom, and our piece in the entry way.

I  have to say, filling in my brows and filling our empty nest are ways to make a nice appearance–don’t you think?