hey Karen and Jen, I can feel your excitement palpitating through the monitors -- haha!
Oh I had so much fun! After 3 hours of lessons, I have homework. I was given this "skin" to go home and practice drawing in eye brows ... oh my gosh, its tough! Its one thing to draw for myself, quite another to be doing it on someone else. i could get the one on the right perfect, but the other side just would draw right and I got so frustrated and started to feel demoralized. Then I remembered a story that my hubby sent me about "The 10,000 hour rule".
One of the most talked about concepts is the "10,000 hour rule." The author explains that it takes 10,000 hours of focused study and practice to become exceptional.
But opportunity plays a big roll too. Part of success is being in the right place at the right time. "The biggest misconception about success is that we do it solely on our smarts, ambition, hustle and hard work. There's an awful lot more that goes into it than we admit."
Greatness requires enormous time, Gladwell says. This explains why The Beatles were the best rock group and Bill Gates is a billionaire. From 1960 to 1964, The Beatles played live 1,200 times and racked up more than 10,000 hours of playing time.
"Lennon and McCartney had a musical gift of the sort that comes along once in a generation," he writes. And all that playing time shaped their talent, so by the time they returned to England from Hamburg, Germany, "they sounded like no one else. It was the making of them."
In 1968, a 13-year-old Gates got access to a high school computer and logged 10,000 hours of programming. Gladwell interviewed Gates, who credits his success to his luck in having that unique access. Without it, Gladwell says, Gates still would be "a highly intelligent, driven, charming person and a successful professional" - but maybe not worth $50 billion.
So I practiced... well, I haven't clocked 10,000 hours drawing in eyebrows but at least I stopped feeling sorry for myself and instead of focusing on how I wasn't getting it right now, I focused on just drawing 50 eyebrows every night. And you know what? I did get better at it! I wish I had taken a photo of my first attempt but I'll take some shots of my progress. it'll be fun to show-n-tell later
The first lesson also included explaining the fundamentals -- tools, types of foundation, face shapes, principles of contouring. Apparently the whole point is to make the face look "oval" cuz oval is the most symmetrical of shapes. Round is symmetrical too, but I doubt anyone wants a round face... hahaha! So long, rectangular faces need to be shortened. Squares need to be softened at the corners. Round needs to look slimmer and more oval.
I also learnt a technique of applying mascara using a folded tissue paper to help you get all the small hairs (yes, lower lid too) and yet avoid smudging. I will do a video on it and post it on youtube.
She also shared a technique that she says she developed for Lancome in Singapore -- Applying loose powder with a cotton pad. It's cheaper and more hygienic than using puffs. That's another youtube video there. Applying with the cotton pad gives more coverage in faster time than using a big brush. When she showed us, I was thinking that with mineral make up, a brush is still best. This cotton pad method works best with loose powders than make up houses sell you in big pots that you need to really
poof on. But it was still a nice technique to learn.
So far, I'm having lots of fun. And today, one of my friends let me practice on her. I forgot to take a before pic. But here's the after.
Bernice, with eyebrows and acne covered up! She is amazing! She just 16, so I just wanted her to look as natural as possible. I didn't even put false eye lashes on, but one day, we will... can someone say, Prom?
i just gave her tiny cat eyes, covered the acne, made her crease more obvious (Chinese girls and our monolids, sigh) and gave her eyebrows.
What do you think? I'll keep getting better as I keep practising. I'm just really grateful she trusted me with her face. She even said she's wear the make up out to meet her friends! Woot!