My mini-me! Computer Engineering Barbie!

Finally...a Barbie I can relate to. And while I probably wouldn't opt for a pink laptop or pink glasses (I'd probably pick green or blue), I love how they kept the classic Barbie look when creating this doll. I think I help prove that you can be blonde, feminine, AND a computer nerd all at the same time... I just wish I had Barbie's body to go along with all of that.. well, I did walk around on my toes a lot in my lifetime, so... :)


I will definitely be buying this Barbie! I hope that they plan to make all of the different ethnicity friends of Barbie as Computer Engineers as well, so the other four ladies who graduated with me can have a mini-me too.

Visit the official Barbie.com. I was disappointed to see that the 'girls' vote was for a news anchor. Snooze.

Read Mashable's article "Why Computer Engineer Barbie Is Good for Women in Tech."

I did it.

I posted last year about my pursuit of hair extensions...and well.. I did it. Last Friday I took the (financial and emotional) plunge into long hair. P.S. I did find a better deal than the one mentioned in the last post...but it was still very pricey.

What do I think? I really like it so far. It's so fun to have hair to curl and style, pull back in a ponytail without looking bald or like a rat tail and add a little volume to my hair. I'm getting used to it day by day.

I do have a whole new perspective for folks with long hair... my shower time has almost tripled due to the amount of time it now takes to shampoo this thing..including conditioner which is a brand new concept for me (you don't condition thin hair). And that five minute drying time I used to have? Now it's about 30 min...

But I'm having fun with it...trying new styles I never before would have done. And with a pending trip to Vegas, I'm looking forward to taking it out on the town.

What do other people think? I don't know. Most of my friends' reactions have been mixed... most are still in shock, others like it, others swear to me that it doesn't look too fake and looks great... mostly the guy friends have the highest praises (go figure).

I got a surprisingly quiet reaction on Facebook after I posted pictures...and I noted this quietness in my status today, mentioning that perhaps my FB friends weren't brave enough to deliver the bad news to me - that my extensions look bad. After posting this status I did get a couple of brave souls who spoke up and said they preferred me with shorter hair...


It sucks to hear because I care a lot about what other people think (even though I shouldn't be as concerned), so it was disappointing to see some say they preferred me with my super-thin, short and boring hair. I want EVERYONE to like it! But I guess it's very reminiscent of when I dyed my hair brown two years ago - some folks loved it, others were like "You were born a blonde, you should stay a blonde".

So people of the Internets...what do YOU think of my new look? Love it or hate it?

Before:



After:

Snow in Charleston

Christmas Sweets Buzz

I am not allowed to eat for the entire month of January to make up for all of the sweets and food I have eaten over the holidays - bleh.

Hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas and a happy New Year. Hopefully I will have a Happy New Year if our crew can ever decide upon what the heck we're going to be doing.

P.S. This is my new fave commercial... this is me this entire Christmas holiday...

I have a dream...

People always have big dreams... owning a big house, getting a great job that they love, finding the man or woman of their dreams, starting a family, traveling to foreign countries and seeing the world...

Well, I have a dream as well... a dream I've had for as long as I can remember. Something that I've worked hard my entire life to some day be able to obtain...

A dream of....
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.....getting hair extensions.

Yes folks, that's right. I have always had a dream of one day having gorgeous, thick, long flowing hair. Hair that I can curl with rollers, tease into a glorious, thick golden mane upon my head...

But to truly understand my dream, you must relive with me my hair-life. You see, I have suffered my entire life from painfully thin, baby-fine hair. Most natural blondes (yes, I'm a natural blonde..although I boost it in the colder months with highlights) have thinner hair. However, usually blondes have either thin hair with pretty good texture... or...baby fine hair, but a lot it.

Me.... I was 'blessed' with both thin and baby-fine hair. I'm not sure where I got it from.. both my parents have pretty thick hair - my dad's is a little thin, but he still has a full head of hair in his 60's! My sister has long, pretty thick blonde hair, and my brother has hair that any female would go crazy to have - he actually grows his hair out and cuts it for Locks of Love...so somewhere out there, there are females who have his hair {cool}.

Some of the pain points of such hair are as follows:

• The inability to grow ones hair past shoulders - as soon as my hair gets to below shoulder length, it's instantly stringy, and the bottom half of my hair is thin to the point of random strands and does not even match the top half of my hair - so I always end up with a short cut.
• The inability to wear high pony tails and sometimes low pony tails - if you know me, you have probably seen me joke by pulling all of my hair into said ponytail only to display what you may remember from the 80's - a rat tail. Yes... my hair all pulled together only adds up to a measly rat tail.
• I rarely, if ever, condition my hair. Conditioner and my hair are enemies and do not cohabitate - if you think my hair is thin now, you should see it conditioned.
• I dry my hair upside down... every day... for probably the last 15 years of my life - surely that can't be good for my brain.
• My hair dries on its own - in 5 to 10 minutes. This may seem like a blessing to those of you with lots of hair where it takes hours to dry - even with a dryer. I'll admit, the five minutes it takes me to dry my hair with my blow dryer is pretty nice. However, if I don't get myself under my blow dryer within a reasonable time after getting out of the shower... my hair dries on its own, flat against my head and unstylable.
• When I sweat, I look like I've been swimming. Enough said.

Look, I could probably go on and on...but I'll try to get to the point. I want hair extensions. I want Kristin Cavallari-like hair extensions. I've dealt with hair that doesn't balance out my big, round head for far too long.. I've teased, used multiple products, and dryed my hair upside down for too long... I want to feel what it's like to have a gorgeous head of hair.

Kristen Cavallari

This February I am going to Vegas with one of my best friends for her 30th birthday party. About a month ago, I was suddenly inspired... this is the perfect excuse to get hair extensions!! And I'm in a pretty good situation financially now that I could probably afford it!! Hooray! I'm going to following my dream!

So I made a consultation appointment with Salon de Capelli in Mt. Pleasant - I sat down with their extensions stylist. He walked me through everything, said it would give me the length and fullness I was looking for. It would only take 4 hours to put them on.. and the hair would match perfectly with mine. I was on cloud 9.. I could see my dream coming to life right before my eyes...

And then I asked about pricing... {insert tires screeching sound here}

$1900

I'm just going to let that resonate with you for a minute...feel what I felt when hearing that number.
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Ridiculous, right? Even though I tried to justify that price in my head (well it IS real human hair..and they do give you FREE products to use..and a FREE special brush..), I realized that I would feel incredibly stupid and guilty if I spent that much money on hair extensions. Besides I've heard and read that extensions cost between $800 and $1000...so I'm still wondering what the extra $900 is for. :-/

But I want them SO BAD. :(

I will not let my dream die. Surely there's another salon in Charleston that will do hair extensions for a much better price.. So I have a consultation tomorrow with a salon in Mt. Pleasant called Velvet, and I'm on the lookout for others. I'm even considering looking in Columbia because everything is cheaper in Columbia than Charleston...so.. wouldn't extensions be cheaper there too??

An incredibly bad Photoshopped photo of my head on a Carrie Underwood photo - what I envision I would look like with extensions...sigh.

I know it's hard for people to understand why I would spend that kind of money for more hair that will only last 4 to 6 months. I guess it's the same reasoning that women go and get a nose job, or go and get other plastic surgery done - to boost their confidence and feel good about themselves.

But in my case, I don't have to be put under to get it... and if I don't like them, they can be taken right out!