Halloween

The Dark Side of Beauty

October 31, 2011 at 1:16 pm , by Nykia Spradley

In the spirit of Halloween we’ve dug up a few of our favorite boo-tiful finds.

Top Shop Smokey Eye Kit: Smoky Eyes Quad in Smouldering, $20
These four powders pretty much take the guess work out of creating a dark and mysterious eye.

Chanel Le Vernis Nail Colour in Black Satin, $25
How can a rich and shiny nail polish look anything but glam?

 

Shea Terra Organics African Black soap, $22
A spoonful of this raw soap powder added to you bath seriously does wonders for skin.

Benefit Benetint Lip & Cheek Stain, $29
Add a splash of color and tap into your vampy side with a blood red elixir that brightens cheeks and lips.

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Happy Halloween!

October 27, 2011 at 3:11 pm , by Sue Erneta

Are you ready for the biggest kids holiday of the year? I’m very proud to say that I got the costumes for the girls nice and early this year. (Yeah! Chalk one up for the working mom!)  The ladies have decided to go as their favorite mystery solving team: Scooby Doo! Lily will be the dog himself. Sophia is going as Daphne (If you haven’t read the blog about the boy who wanted to be Daphne, you must!). I’m going as Velma (I totally felt like I was taking one for the team until I saw my awesome wig and glasses!).  And my sweet husband who will do anything to make his kids laugh will be doning the blonde wig as Fred. Surely, he would have made a more natural Shaggy but there was no way I was going to let him grow a soul patch for a week! We’ve had so much fun decorating the house and preparing for the holiday. The girls have especially loved all the Halloween-centric kids shows filling up the DVR these days. Three year old Lily has even become a whiz at the computer mouse thanks to this Bubble Guppies halloween costume game.

And one last fun thing for after-dark: Check out Stella McCartney‘s Halloween-ish collection of glow-in-the-dark socks, tees, baby onesies and mittens. This is one of those things – along with light-up sneakers – that I wish they had when I was a kid. I wonder if I could fit into a large…

So, tell me? What are your kids going as? Follow me on twitter @lhjFashionLady for pics from our night of Trick or Treating!

Photo from WB TV.

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Halloween: Is It OK for a Boy to Dress Like a Girl?

November 4, 2010 at 1:06 pm , by Louise Sloan

I just read the most amazing blog post, written by a midwestern mom, a cop’s wife, whose 5-year-old-boy wanted to dress up for Halloween as Daphne, from Scooby Doo, just like his best friend, who’s a girl. That’s him in the picture. Now, if you can’t wear something silly and fun on Halloween, when you’re five, when can you? But as Cop’s Wife discovered, you can’t, not ever, no sir, not if you’re a boy. She and her son ran into schoolyard bullies, bent on enforcing sex-stereotypical costume choices. Only it wasn’t her son’s classmates who were the bullies, not yet–it was the other moms, whose faces twisted  in disgust at seeing a preschooler wear the “wrong” Halloween costume. And we wonder why we have such bad bullying problems in our middle schools and high schools, where any kid who’s different–too fat, too skinny, too smart, too slow, too effeminate, not the dominant race, too poor, not dressed in the right labels–gets harassed and pounded? Where do those mean kids get their ideas from? Hello, mirror!

My little boy, age 4, loves to dress up, too, especially in his tutu-like black tulle skirt. Like Cop’s Wife’s kid, he happens to have some close friends who are girls, and they’re into the princess thing, and really, what is not fun about a tutu? He’s also obsessed with our good friend Nelson, aka “Cherry L,” who lives in the neighborhood and happens to be an amazing reggae/dancehall/hiphop singer. My boy currently refuses to wear anything but jeans, because that’s what Nelson wears. But sometimes he likes to mix it up: Here’s my main man in dinosaur pjs and the tulle skirt, doing his rendition of one of Nelson’s rap songs, “You Check  It.” Pretty hardcore/masculine, don’t you think, swaying tulle aside?

For Halloween, though, no tutus–he wanted to be a cop. I was relieved, frankly. And I got to crossdress, as an escaped convict, complete with beard. Since I’m a girl, no one cared. But what if my son had really, really wanted to be a princess? What should I have done? Read Cop’s Wife’s blog and then post your comments/thoughts below.

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Cheat Sheet: Four Things You Maybe Missed This Week

October 29, 2010 at 3:14 pm , by Catherine LeFebvre

1. Pets in Costume!
Halloween is around the corner, which means it’s the perfect time of year to embarrass your dog or cat! Here are a few of our favorite costumes, and over on New York magazine, they’ve got some great shots of pups on parade in their finest.

2. Atomic Tom Gives a Subway Performance

New York band Atomic Tom had their instruments stolen. Fortunately, they know how to improvise.

3. Big, Fat Kisses
Marie Claire ran a controversial blog post this week called “Should ‘Fatties’ Get a Room? (Even on TV).”Writer Maura Kelly talks about how uncomfortable the sitcom Mike and Molly,  about a couple who meets at Overeaters Anonymous, makes her.   “I’d be grossed out,” she says, “if I had to watch two characters with rolls and rolls of fat kissing each other … because I’d be grossed out if I had to watch them doing anything.” Needless to say, the post stirred the pot, causing a huge backlash. Kelly wrote a response to the outcries, Jezebel pulled together some of the more poignant counterpoints to the argument, and a Facebook page was created to organize a Big Fat Kiss-In outside the offices of Hearst, Marie Claire’s publisher.

4. Puppy Dreams

Ridiculous cuteness, no matter the size. Happy Friday!

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Halloween Plans from People who Know Horror

October 28, 2010 at 3:28 pm , by Catherine LeFebvre

When your day job is mystery and horror, what do you do to celebrate the spookiest night of the year? Books Editor Lorraine Glennon asked these top-selling mystery and thriller novelists how they are spending Halloween:

“Pumpkins are the best stand-ins for heads and you can only get them this time of year. So for Halloween I gather as many pumpkins as I can…and scalp them with my sword. I set them up on posts and have at them. They cut like butter and it’s a lot of fun! –Jeri Westerson, author of The Demon’s Parchment

“My detective, Jane Wheel, finds treasure in others’ cast-offs. So my ‘research’  involves feeding my own disparate collections‹some standard, like American art pottery, and some not-so-standard, like things-innocently-purchased-at-rummage-sales-that-can-double-as-murder-weapons. On Halloween, I like to display this murderous collection around the candy bowl. Even if you have to stretch your imagination to picture how the bad guy would use a railroad spike to do someone in, everyone agrees that this pile of collectibles makes for an unsettling centerpiece.” –Sharon Fiffer, author of  Scary Stuff

“I will be playing the part of Minnie Mouse to my almost-3 year-old son’s Mickey. The only mystery is whether my husband will dress as Pluto or Goofy.–Joelle Charbonneau, author of Skating Around the Law

“My husband, crime fiction novelist Andrew Grant, and I are invited to a party, and he will be dressing up as an Chilean miner and I will go as a canary.”–Tasha Alexander, author of Dangerous to Know

“This Halloween we’ll be in Quebec City, a 400-year-old walled fortress, built on bones and faith. There are so many ghosts and mysteries in the old city that a ‘Ghost Tour’ has been created, and my husband and I will be taking it. Please light a candle for us!”–Louise Penny, author of Bury Your Dead

“Celebrating Halloween always begins with handing out candy to all the little witches, vampires, and ghosts. Then I’ll get a jump start on Día de los Muertos festivities by joining friends for a Mexican dinner at a favorite restaurant. Finally, I’ll curl up in front of the television with a glass of red wine and pop one of my favorite ‘witchy’ movies into the DVR: the 1958 classic Bell, Book, and Candle starring Jimmy Stewart, Kim Novak, and Jack Lemmon.” —Deb Harkness, author of the forthcoming A Discovery of Witches.

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Dishing It: LHJ’s Halloween Cupcakes

October 28, 2010 at 12:55 pm , by Ladies' Lounge

Halloween is this Sunday and my daughter, Lily, is having some of her 5th grade friends over. When we were deciding which recipes us amateur cooks would make from the pages LHJ, I signed up to try making these candy-corn twist cupcakes, knowing we’d have a house full of kids this weekend. Our food editor, Tara Bench, made this amazing version at left for the magazine—I doubt mine will look as good as hers but here goes. (If you want a little extra help, Tara also made a video showing her decorating technique for all the treats in our October issue. She makes it look so easy!)

The first step was to bake some cupcakes. They look a bit messy but Lily made them. They taste good anyway! Moving on to the meringue buttercream icing. Somehow this was the first time I have separated an egg. What do I do with the egg yolks? Seeing as it was 9 p.m. and the kids didn’t seem to be interested anymore, they went into garbage can. But we were doing good so far. I dissolved the sugar with the egg whites. Then I added the butter. (I microwaved for ten seconds as I forgot to take it out of the fridge.)

After adding the coloring to the white icing (a little at a time so we didn’t end up with fluorescent cupcakes) and putting the colored icing into the piping bag, it was time for my first attempt (on the left). Yikes!! That is not going to pass the 5th grade Halloween party test. My next few attempts went better. I realized you have to be bold with the piping bag. Just go for it! When I got into a roll it was easy. And finally, the finished product. Pretty good if you ask me! Not as good as the ones in the magazine, but they tasted great and they passed the Lily test! — Clare Lissaman, LHJ photo director

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Go Ask Gab: Last Minute Halloween Costumes Ideas

October 27, 2010 at 2:36 pm , by Gabrielle Porcaro

What kind of Halloween person are you?

A) The type who picks her Halloween costume in August and slowly starts to plan for it?
B) The type who decides on October 31st only to wait on an hour long line at Ricky’s?
C) The type who skips Halloween all together and stays in? (Booooo!)

Personally, I am an A person. I take Halloween very seriously and as a fashion editor, I must search for the best pieces to make my costume perfect. If you are a B, this might be useful. According to Yahoo.com these are the top-searched Halloween costumes this year. For the more “fashiony” costumes I added some insight on how to pull it off.

• The cigar guy: not being an avid golf fan (or any golf fan for that matter) I had to look this guy up… he’s actually one of the top searched costumes?  Wow! Who knew?!

• Katy Perry: obviously a wig with bangs (in any color) and any sort of romper (spend the money, they will still be around next summer) or totally retro outfit would work. You could also go the whole Elmo t-shirt route. Extra points for having a bearded British gent on your arm!

• Kenny Powers from Eastbound and Down: mullet, ‘stach, beard, baseball uniform… It’s a goodie!

• Chilean Miner: Jumpsuit, sunglasses, Chilean flag and you’re set!

• Jersey Shore: I’m an expert on this costume, as you will read below. For guys, it’s easy. This is the one AND ONLY time you should be wearing an Ed Hardy tee or go out and buy a fake one. Slick your hair back and bada bing you’re Paulie D! Gals — basically dress as inappropriate as possible, bump up your hair, big hoop earrings and lots of makeup. Extra points if you show up with a meat- or juice-head.

• Antoine Dodson: if you don’t know who he is… check the original video out and the remake!

• Lady Gaga: this is not a last minute costume, unless you are gong to go to the meat store and get 10 lbs of beef to slap on you for the night. If you were going to replicate one of her amazing outfits you should’ve hit up the craft store weeks ago!

If you want to do a DIY (not celeb-inspired) costume, get creative. My favorite was when a friend in college dressed in pink and tied a sneaker on her head… she was gum on the bottom of your sneaker. Very clever!

Of course for kids, princess costumes and are highly searched. Check out Mommy Sue’s blog on dressing your little ones up for the holiday. As for me I’m dressing up as the number one searched reality star: Snooki. Follow me on twitter: LHJFashionGirl and I’ll be tweeting pics of my costume Saturday night! In the meantime, enjoy a picture of my cutest Halloween costume. That’s me and my twin sister dressed as bees and yes, that is my older sister dressed as an Ewok!

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