Blog has been merged!!!!

Thank you so much to all those that follow and read this blog.  I was brave enough to merge the posts from Curls and Pearls to Toronto Beauty Reviews last night.  The blog is still a little messy right now but I will be posting there from now on.  I would love, love, love if all of you will follow me there! (Pretty please!).

See you on the other side!!!

www.torontobeautyreviews.com

Elaine - Curls and Pearls.

Feeling Pretty

You know how there are just some pieces in your wardrobe that always make you feel pretty?  Well this LOFT top I bought from Extra Petite (see post here) is definitely one of them.  I think it's the pretty colours and it just makes me feel happy - and when you're happy you feel pretty, am I right?

Top:  Loft XXSP

Blazer: H&M size 2

Jeans: Gap Jean Leggings 00R

Boots: Me Too size 7

I think this top is the perfect length and I feel quite put together whether I'm wearing it with jeans or a skirt.  

I'm planning a trip to the US in June, so I hope to score some great AT and LOFT items while I'm there!

Do you have a particular article of clothing that you always feel great in?

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More LOFT...

So as an update...I have decided I will be merging my blogs!  It's just getting too much for m to upkeep both, I often get confused as to which one I'm working on so for my own sanity I will be consolidating.  Thank you to EVERYONE who has given me input and has emailed me directly about it.  I am so thankful!   I don't know how long it will take me to merge the blogs, but if you follow me on twitter I have switched over to using one twitter account as well.  I will be moving all my style posts over to Toronto Beauty Reviews and will be posting from there.  I'm hoping to get everything in place by this month!  I would really, really appreciate it if you would follow me over there! :)

Velvet in the Spring Time!

Yes it's Spring! It's starting to feel like it but with Spring comes rain unfortunately.  But it's ok, I do see it arriving very soon!

I purchased this velvet blazer from the lovely Annie of Really Petite you can actually see her wearing it in this post.  Luckily for me she picked up an extra one and I was able to buy it from her. Thanks Annie!!

I know it's Spring, but I feel a little bit of fabulous when I wear this blazer so I decided to go for it anyway.

Blazer:  Loft 00P

Dress:  Banana Republic PXXS

Jewellery:  Avon

This is definitely a piece that can make any outfit special

And I think it fits me perfectly!

Love the back too!

And here's the dress underneath.
One of my favorite purchases from Banana Republic in the US.

Of course, a close up of my Avon jewellery ;)

I love this necklace.  There are so many colours in it, it can be worn with so many things.  Strangers have actually stopped me to ask about it!

My "pretzel" earrings:

So what do you think?  Velvet in the spring, yay or nay? (if you say nay I'm still wearing it anyway ;) )

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More DSquared...

Don't forget about the Next Petite Fashion Challenge hosted by Jessy of The Little Dust Princess:

Mustard and Turquoise

So...here's a question...how do you come up with blog post titles?  This title is based on the main colours of this outfit - nothing creative here!  I was inspired by Kelly's use of colour from Petite Fashion Challenge #5 .  I just LOVED how the mustard cardigan was paired with the turquoise necklace - such a great colour combination!

Cardigan:  Gap XS (similar style in other colours)

Top:  mark by Avon

Belt:  Danier XS

Jeans:  Gap Jean Leggings size 00R

Boots:  Miz Mooz size 7

My earrings!

From Avon! (here)

And my necklace a present from my husband when we went to Jamaica :)

You may have noticed that this outfit is similar to this one - I switched up the skirt for jeans ;)

I want to send a heartfelt thank you to all of you that took the time to comment on my last post.  It really and truly means a lot to me.  I have a lot to think about.  I think for the most part I AM still scared to come out to my real life people ESPECIALLY my co-workers for some reason.  At the same time I have shared my blogs with my friends and none of them are even interested LOL.  Which makes me think that my co-workers probably wouldn't be interested either :P  I think I might move forward with a couple of steps.  First I should my own domain name for this blog.  Second, I think I might take some of your advice and post a couple of outfit posts on my other blog and just see what the reaction is.  I wonder if there is a way to combine both blogs and keep both domain names?  Hmmm...something to think about and investigate!  In the mean time, things will remain the same but I might be tweaking and playing around in the background ;)

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More Ippolita...

Weekend Wear and Need Advice

The days here are finally getting sunnier and taking pictures is starting to get a little easier again :)  I think I am still bracing for another possible snow storm since we got hit pretty badly with one last week :(  But, I'll try to think of more positive things.  For one, this outfit made me happy!  It was worn on a warmer weekend and I was thrilled to be able to leave the Winter coat at home if even just for a day:

Leather Jacket:  Danier (Canadian Store) size 2XS

Jean: Gap Jean Leggings 00R

Boots:  Me Too size 7

LOL you guys must think that I wear these jeans all.the.time.  In fact - ummm I do wear them often! But these pictures were actually taken on the same day as I took my Petite Fashion Challenge #6 pictures so please don't think I wear these jeans every chance I get (even though I do).

Scarf: dara dot designs
Top:  Mexx XS

I do however wear this scarf every chance I get because it's so soft and cozy and I love the bright colour.  I can also get away with wearing a really bright lipstick too!

So...here is where I need your advice.  I'm becoming a bit overwhelmed with maintaining both of my blogs (in case you didn't know my other blog is:  Toronto Beauty Reviews ).  The original reason why I started Curls and Pearls was to share my style/clothing journey or whatever you want to call it with other bloggers and to get feedback and advice.  I have always maintained that I am NOT a fashionista by any means.  I just know what I like and hope that it fits me properly LOL!

Anyway, my other blog is a bit more my comfort zone (even though I don't put that many posts up!).  It's also a journey for me, I absolutely love the world of makeup and cosmetics and am by no means an expert compared to so many of the ladies out there.  But, among my group of friends and family I'm the one with the answers.  And if I don't know the answers then I'll know where to find them.  Someone suggested to me that since both my blogs are still fairly new I should consolidate them. 

This is where I need YOUR advice!

I purposely left the separate to begin with since as most of you know I have a side Avon Business.  My beauty blog was meant to share my knowledge, thoughts and opinions with people in my real life many of whom are my customers and co-workers.  Of course other people whom I haven't met will be reading as well.  But I never shared my Curls and Pearls blog with anyone except a select few close friends of mine.  I felt kind of...silly...I guess is the word.  I don't mind asking my virtual friends and bloggers for advice but for some reason I didn't want my real life people to be involved.   Now I'm having second thoughts due to the time constraints and I'm getting a bit tired of trying to maintain essentially two identities ;)

Do you share your blog with people in your real life?  Is it strange?  Also, would it even make sense for me to merge the two as they are so different from each other? Also, there is the matter of all my followers on my blog and on my twitter account (I have two of those too!).  If I did merge the two, what would I call it?  I don't know that Toronto Beauty Reviews makes sense for a merged blog but I really love the name!  

I would LOVE to hear your honest thoughts and opinions.  Your advice means the WORLD to me!

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More MICHAEL Michael Kors...

Petite Fashion Challenge #6

Petite Fashion Challenge #6 is being hosted by the one and only Jess from Stylepint.

The Challenge:“Dress Up Your Basics”
Jeans and a tee is a classic outfit starter. Depending on what you layer over this basic pairing, you can change style and feel of the entire look. This is your chance to show your personality and your creativity.
For this challenge, start off with a jeans and tee basic look (it can be any style or color) and dress it up to show off your personal style with accessories, jewelry, and whatever you’d like to add.

I was actually pretty excited about this one, my basic "uniform" is jeans and some kind of top so I did have a bunch of ideas going in my head, but I wanted to kind of just keep in simple and stick with one "look".

Here is my basic white T and jeans look:

T-shirt:  H&M XS

Jeans: Gap Jean Leggings 00R - OF COURSE! ;) (here)

Boots:  Me Too size 7

(As an aside my hair isn't chopped off, it was behaving badly so it went up in a ponytail - not the best look for me unfortunately!)

There are so many ways to dress of a simple outfit like this - scarves, jewellery, sweaters, jackets etc.  It's the perfect base to start any outfit on!

I decided to go with jewellery and a blazer.  BUT I thought I would go a little "extra" and throw on some "night time" jewellery and a pretty clutch:

Jewellery:  Avon (2 necklaces layered)

Clutch:  Banana Republic gift from ML of Twenty York Street

To dress it up even further, a blazer always does the trick!

Blazer:  Mexx XS

I wish I had found a pair of earrings to go with this outfit, but I felt the ones I had were either too small or too dangly and were competing with the necklace. 

I think this outfit is good enough for a night out on the town (if I ever had a night out on the town Ha!).

What do you think?

Thank you Jess for hosting this challenge!  If you would would to sign up to host a future challenge or would just like to know more about the challenges be sure to visit the Alterations Needed Forum.

Please be sure to check out all the other ladies participating at Stylepint's site.

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More Me Too...

Toronto Petite Blogger Meetup

Ok, I totally deserve an award for doing this post in a timely manner :P  Most of my posts are of outfits taken a week, if not more before!  (Is that breaking some blogging rule?  If it is, sorry but oh well!)

I had a fantastic time last night meeting 4 AMAZING and BEAUTIFUL ladies!  We were expecting a few more but some couldn't make it out  unfortunately :(  Hopefully next time!

As Jessy mentioned in her post (she is QUICK) we met at Peridot which is a cute little restaurant / lounge on Bloor Street East in between Yonge and Church.  The food was fantastic and made for a nice girls night out treat.  Thank you to Jessy and Cynthia for organizing!

My lovely dinner dates:

Cat (Petite in the city, Jessy (The Little Dust Princess), Cynthia (Shorty Stories), Lor (Petite in the City)

And on to the food!!  LOL it was quite amusing having all of us at the table taking pictures of the food then tweeting about it - the other patrons must have seriously thought we were nuts!

Our shared appetizer

Mini Spinach&Cheese Pita Puffs 

"Phyllo Puffs Stuffed with Spinach and Cheese, Served With a Yogurt Chive Dipping Sauce"

My Entree

Atlantic Salmon

"Pan Seared On A Bed Of Spinach, Served With Steamed Vegetables And A Plum Tomato Caper Dill Relish"

One of our shared desserts

Tiramisu

"Layered Savoiardi Cookies Soaked In Espresso And Coffee Liqueur With A Mascarpone Crème Filling And Dusted With Chocolate"

Our second shared dessert (my favorite!)

Molten Lava Chocolate Cake

"Made With Lindt Chocolate, Liquid Center, With Local Vanilla Ice Cream And Garnished With Fresh Berries"

And now on to more paparazzi shots ;)

Jess trying on Cynthia's J Crew Coat

My outfit!

Blazer: H&M size 4

T-shirt:  H&M size XS

Jeans:  Gap Legging Jeans size 00R

Boots:  Miz Mooz size 7

Jewellery:  Avon

Jess taking Cynthia's Outfit picture

Cynthia and Lor in deep camera discussion

Not sure what was so interesting :P

Jess and I

It was so fun having other people take your photos for you LOL!  What a fun night just chatting and getting to know each other.  Some people are under the impression that with blogging you're putting your life out there.  Blogging is so one dimensional and only shows a small little aspects of our lives and a bit of what we're interested in.  Getting to know the ladies behind the great blogs was an honour and a pleasure.  Can't wait to do it again!

PS - I'd like to give a shout out to the front desk staff at the Marriott across the street who made sure I didn't get lost in the parking lot :P

Not So Mellow Yellow

Wow, I just realized that I have MANY outfit posts that I have not posted yet.  I guess this is a good thing since the past couple of weeks I haven't taken any pictures LOL!

It's been a busy few weeks and more busy weeks ahead.  I'm looking forward to the Toronto Petite Bloggers (Petite Toronto Bloggers?) meetup happening this weekend!!  I'm sure there will be many posts about this one ;)

The next few posts will be outfits from BEFORE I got my hair done recently.  You'd think I'd want to be showing off my new hair in all my posts right?  Well...the problem is that I've had less time to blog because I have to spend time straightening my hair!!!!  I know, priorities, right? :P

Anyway, here is an outfit that I had been meaning to share because it's probably one of the only times that I wore my bright yellow coat from this post.  I think this is another contender for the Color Brigade, no?

Coat: Old Navy XS

Skirt:  Suzy Shier size 0

I think I can still wear this coat in the spring when it's a bit cool out.  I don't wear this coat as much as I would like to as I will explain later....

Cardigan:  Gap XS (similar style but no mustard available!)

Top:  mark by Avon

Jewellery:  Avon (similar statement necklace) (earrings here)
Tights:  can't remember!

And with the jacket off:

What unfortunately didn't work for me was that this skirt kept on sticking to my tights!  I didn't have this problem when I wore this skirt in the summer with bare legs.






Close up of my earring:

The earrings match the necklace I wore in this post.

And here is a detailed shot of the necklace I wore:

I received a lot of compliments on this outfit especially the yellow coat.  But...my husband HATES it LOL!  We went to the auto show a couple weeks ago and I said I wanted to wear my yellow coat so that he could see me if I got lost (he says I always disappear in the crowd since I'm so small ;) ) but he refused to go out with me wearing it :P  I was kind of miffed, but changed anyway.  So is there an article of clothing that your significant other or your friends loathe?

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More 525 America...

Oh, and in case you didn't know, I have another blog!  Toronto Beauty Reviews - please check it out if you can, it would mean a lot to me :)

Some H&M Finds and Poll results

Despite my avoiding going into malls and stores the last couple of months I did look around an H&M while I was waiting to meet up with a friend.

I found this cute little trench coat:

H&M Trench Coat size 2

Oh and don't be confused by the hair - this was taken pre-highlights and haircut ;)

Loving the back details

It doesn't look so great unbelted but I don't know too many trenches that do.

Close up of the pretty details:

For some reason I forgot to take pictures of the sleeves!  They are slightly long for me, which is to be expected but I would probably have my hands in my pockets all the time anyway ;)

I also found this navy blazer that I tweeted about .  The red version was tweeted about by Cher @TheFuzzyMittens tweeted a pic here and Annie from Really Petite also showed it off.  Sorry, no outfit posts of the blazer yet but it fits really, really well!  I got a size 4 so smaller petites may do well with the size 2.

Shop similar items:

More Anthropologie...

And now on to the poll results from my recent Gap Purchases Part 1 and Part 2!

For the Asymmetric Ruffle Front Top 31% voted keep and 68% voted return.

For the Woven Back Cardigan 54% voted keep and 23% voted return.

For the Lace Back Cardigan 63% voted keep and 35% voted return.

For the Zip Sweater 38% voted keep and 60% voted return.

The balance of the votes was for other styling tips.  Thank you soooo much to everyone who took the time to vote and comment ;)  The ruffle front top and the zip sweater are definitely going back and I'm going to try some styling tip with the cardigans to see the versatility of them before making a final decision :)

I thought the poll thing was kind of cool and tweeted about how to do it.  A company called Zoomerang contacted me and I checked out there site to do the polls on part 2 - they were really easy and I think they look much better than the ones from part 1!

Blog purchase: Loft Habutai Flutter Sleeve top from Vicky

Once again my fellow petite bloggers have helped me out!  The lovely Vicky of Vicky's Daily Fashion Blog had the famous LOFT flutter tops in her hands and kindly offered to let me purchase them from her! I was so excited as this top is one I had been drooling over after seeing it on other petite bloggers:

Tiny in Texas
Petite XXS
Really Petite
Petite Little Girl
Fast Food and Fast Fashion

Here is a quick couple of photos of the two tops I got from Vicky.  (I apologize that the photos are so dark, I must have changed the camera settings without realizing it!)

Thank you Vicky!