Quarantine Favorites for Maintaining Sanity | September Favorites 2020

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Happy Sunday, friends! This past month has definitely been a bit of a slog for me with the fall semester up and rolling again. Although my responsibilities are not too overwhelming on the surface, I'm finding it extremely hard to get and stay motivated to do my work when even the slightest bit of news will throw my whole mental state out of wack. I'm still in the process of trying to adjust to this new normal but here are some of the things that have helped me in the process of building a more fulfilling hygge-filled at-home quarantine life ❤️

Sodastream

Whenever I'm bored during the workday, I always find myself dawdling in the kitchen looking for a snack or going to make another coffee telling myself I'm hungry or tired when in reality I'm just bored. Instead of going to grab another snack, I've replaced most of my kitchen trips with sodastream visits to keep my brain entertained but knock the unhealthy habit of constant snacking. I love adding either a bit of lemon or mango juice to my sparkling water during the day and in the evenings, it also serves as a nice mixer for cocktails! 🙂

The Soap Opera

The Soap Opera is a local business based in Madison, where I'm located - but if you're not in Madison, they also offer U.S. shipping - a feature I've definitely used during the past 6 months when I don't want to risk visiting in person. They have pretty much any bath or body product you could ever need and a whole host of essential oil products as well. During quarantine, I've gotten really into using essential oils and The Soap Opera has about every scent under the sun! They've also become my go-to for hand sanitizer because you can pick the essential oil scent you want in your sanitizer and they ship it all in reused packaging in an effort to be more sustainable - aaaaall my favorite things under one roof! 🙂

Nexcare Acne Patches

Y'all. I've been low-key obsessed with these acne patches for a couple of years now, but they've become an essential now with the rise of the dreaded mask acne. My skin is generally moderate to mild when it comes to acne but if I'm wearing a mask all day I'll usually end up developing a couple pimples here and there. These acne patches suck up all of the goop and gunk in your pores so you can just pop a patch on and wake up the next morning with a significantly smaller, if not completely flattened pimple. In my experience, they've sped up the healing process by at least a couple of days, if not weeks, and have quickly become a staple in my stash of acne products.

Howard Lite Earplugs

Being home all of the time means your neighbors are also home all of the time and as an old lady who goes to bed at 9 pm every night these earplugs have become my favorite things in the whole wide world. While I generally don't have a problem with a couple of noises here and there, when it's past like 7 pm and I start to get cranky, I become super sensitive and easily irritated by noise. I've used a lot of earplugs in the past but none have been as effective as these ones. I discovered these earplugs when we stayed in a noisy 1st floor airbnb that provided them to help guests sleep better. These earplugs have been a life saver. They block out about 95% of the noise which allows me to sleep better and sleep-in longer as well.

Zojirushi Travel Mug

Alright, this one is for those of you who share a smaller space with your sig other or roommates. My fiancee works mostly in our living/kitchen area which is great and all... until you realize he frequently has back-to-back meetings from 7:30 am until 3:00 pm and your coffee maker is "too loud" for his zoom meetings 😭Rather than get into fights about this (not that we haven't already haha - oops) the temporary solution I've come up with is to fill my Zojirushi travel mug with 3 cups worth of coffee so I can take it in to the bedroom and not get upset about the whole no-access-to-my-coffee situation. Zojirushi's are THE best travel mugs in the world by a landslide. They honestly keep hot water piping hot for 5-6 hours after the fact and actually do such a good job of keeping things hot that you have to be careful not to burn your tongue when drinking out of them.

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Hope you all are staying healthy out there during these crazy dumpster fire of a year. Don’t be too hard on yourself if you’re not being the most productive or happiest human being in the world. You’re doing the best you can. This is just a hard situation. Sending all of you lots and lots of love.

What's on my iPad: Grad Student Edition | iPad Apps for Grad Students

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Hey friends! Welcome to the second post in my back to (grad) school mini series! If you're new around here, I am currently a 3rd year PhD student and recently chatted y'all through why I use an iPad for grad school - but a question I'm often asked is what apps I use on my iPad so today I'm sharing the apps I use most often as a grad student.

My iPad Set-up

• 12.9 inch iPad Pro, 256 GB

• Apple Pencil 2

• Apple Pencil case

• Thin case from Amazon

• Matte screen protector

I use both an iPad and apple pencil and this combination has pretty much replaced any printed articles or paper notebooks I might've used in the past. My whole iPad setup is linked above but you definitely do not have to go as all out as I have - I talk about some more affordable options in my post on how I use my iPad for grad school!

Most of the apps I use for graduate school fall into three broad categories. (1) notetaking apps or apps I use for annotating books and journal articles, (2) to-do or planning apps and (3) file storage apps. Of all of these, the majority of my ipad time is spent using notetaking apps because graduate school is so much about reading and writing! In addition to the convenience of being able to keep all of my notes and plans in one convenient place, using an iPad to replace all the mountains of paper I would have used has huge environment-saving sustainability benefits as well. Alright, enough rambling, on to the apps!

Notability ($8.99)

Of all the apps on my iPad, I use notability the most by a landslide. I started using it at the beginning of my grad school career to download all of my readings so I could highlight, write, annotate etc all over the PDFs and not have to print out a mountain of paper every single week. Even though I'm no longer taking classes as a dissertator, I'm still reading tons of papers for my own research so notability is an app I use daily! Recently, I've also started using it to annotate my lecture slides during online lectures and sign documents for school or work.

Goodnotes ($7.99)

Goodnotes is the most common note-taking app pitted against Notability. It's common for students to either use Notability OR Goodnotes - but not necessarily both. I use both apps but for slightly different purposes. While they have many similar functions, Goodnotes' organization system is slightly different than Notability's in that everything is organized into notebooks. I have always been an avid notebook, planner, and journal user so I find Goodnotes is a much better replacement for that due to its notebook based organization system. I use Goodnotes primarily as a home for my digital planner where I use daily, weekly, and monthly spreads to plan out my teaching, research, and dissertation-related responsibilities. I am planning on doing a more in-depth blog post comparing the two apps so stay tuned for that!

Trello (Free)

Trello is a kanban board style productivity app that I've been using since I started college. If you've never used a kanban board style app before, it's a system that allows you to see all of your to-dos and projects on cards that are organized within lists that are organized within boards. That makes it sounds a bit complicated but it's really quite simple when you see it in use! I use Trello primarily to plan research projects and organize long-term task lists. There are so many things to keep track of in so many different areas of life that I often find it easiest to have a place where I can dump long-term to-dos into specific categories so I can organize it later. Trello serves that purpose for me.

Google Calendar (Free)

I use google calendar to track all of what I call my "butt in the chair" time. As a grad student, there are a lot of different roles and responsibilities you need to fill which means lots of places to be (during non-pandemic times of course). Rather than tracking all of my deadlines and meetings in the same place, I prefer to separate it out so that the places I need to be live in my google calendar while the things I need to do live in my digital planner. Google calendar syncs seamlessly with all of my other devices so it's an essential on my iPad

Google Drive (Free)

If you're a PhD student, some kind of automatically syncing cloud storage system is a MUST. There are literally a million files flying around at all times and you never know when you're going to need what! I use Google Drive to store all of my files and also back them up to a hard drive (when I remember to!). This means I have an extra copy of all of my files just in case anything goes wrong and I can access files from other computers if I ever need access and don't have my regular laptop with me.

SimpleMind (Free)

This app recommendation comes from one of the PhD students in my co-hort and it's honestly changed my research life! SimpleMind is an app that allows you to draw mind maps on your iPad to connect concepts, theories, research ideas - all of the above! Before using SimpleMind, I was actually drawing these kinds of mind webs by hand to figure out what my research interests really are and how they all connected with one another. With SimpleMind, I can do all of the same things I did by hand and now I can move things around and edit things, too - without having to redraw the whole dang map!

iMovie (Free)

This is a new one for me, but it's become a TOP app on my iPad this semester because of all the online teaching I'm doing! I've been recording online lectures all semester and iMovie has been a super easy way for me to edit my lecture videos.

YouTube (Free)

Admittedly, I don't always use YouTube for grad school purposes (read: lots of time spent watching YouTube for entertainment purposes!) but I often use it to learn new topics or watch videos on topics related to my research. There are lots of great statistics and teaching resources on YouTube that have saved me while trying to run a particularly nasty analysis or when I'm running into a tech snafu on my course website. It's become an invaluable resource for both entertainment and education 🙂

Hope y’all enjoyed my ramblings about iPad apps! I truly feel like having my iPad has made a world of difference in my graduate school career. It’s allowed me to be a whole lot more productivity and helps to keep all of my notes and plans all in the same place. Have you tried any of these iPad apps? Are there any other iPad apps you use for grad school that you think I should try?

My Lash Lift Experience ( +Mini Grande Lash Review!) ❤

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Hello, friends! Here is part two of my updated lash journey: my lash lift experience (and a little grande lash serum review to boot!). If you haven't checked out part one yet, take a peek at the first two posts about my lash extension journey here and here. If you're short on time → TL; DR I've had a great lash lift experience and much prefer them over lash extensions. Read on to hear why I love my lash lifts so much!

The Process:

In my experience, the lash lift process usually isn't too uncomfortable or unpleasant (especially if you have a tendency to doze off like I do... 😛) and is, by far, faster than the lash extension process. Rather than gluing on each individual lash (which can take anywhere between 1-2 hours for a full extension set) lash lifts are sort of a one and done process. Your lash technician will usually start by securing down your bottom lashes. Then, they'll begin the lift process by placing a guide (I think this is either plastic or silicon) on your eyelid and combing your eyelashes to glue them onto the guide. They'll then apply the perming solution, let it sit for 5-10 minutes, and then apply another conditioning solution which also sits for another 5-10 minutes. These time estimates are probably total crap estimates since I've never been able to actually open my eyes to check the time 😛, but usually I'm in and out the door within 30 minutes so it's definitely a quick process overall!

The only part of the process that can get a little uncomfortable is when the perming solution is on your lashes. The solution definitely smells like perming solution (aka horrid) and if the lash technician isn't careful and it gets to close to your eye - that stuff STINGS. Out of the many times I've gotten my lashes lifted this has only happened to me one time, buuuut you better believe I never went to that lash technician again! Generally, a good lash technician will be very careful, will check in with you to make sure everything feels okay, and will use a little fan to air out your lashes if there is any discomfort with the solution.

Before (w/o mascara)

After (w/mascara)

The Look:

When I first started getting lash lifts, my lashes were still pretty weak from having lash extensions. When your lashes are weak or thin, there is a greater chance that the perming solution will fry them rather than actually curl them. This is true when you perm your hair as well, but it's definitely more obvious when it's a tiny little lash! This happened to some of my lashes the first couple of times I received a lash lift, but after several months of using a lash serum, my lashes were much stronger, longer, and healthier. Now, this never happens when I get lash lifts.

Although the look of lash lifts is subtler on their own (I do not get lash tints so I cannot speak to how much of a difference a tint might make), the biggest difference between lash lifts and lash extensions is that you can use mascara on your lifted lashes. This means that you have the freedom to make your lashes as dramatic or as subtle as you want! For me, I find that a lash lift combined with mascara is just as effective in making my lashes pop but with far fewer limitations and much more comfort.

One of my biggest struggles as an asian woman with monolids is that my super straight lashes are difficult to curl. On top of that, it's difficult to get them to stay curled because my monolids will often weigh them down. This makes curling my lashes a huge ordeal with multiple lash curlers and at least 2-3 types of mascara involved. So, having a lash lift means that all I need to do is swipe on a couple of coats of mascara and my lashes are good to go! This saves me tons of time and honestly makes my eyes look just as bright as when I had lash extensions. Currently, my favorite mascaras for complementing my lash lifts are Maybelline The Falsies and Loreal's Lash Paradise. I've tried a slew of other way more expensive mascaras and the combination of these two drugstore mascaras is still the best by a long shot!

Mini Grande Lash Review: I can't talk about my lash lift experience without doing a mini-review of the grande lash serum I've been using because it has been a game changer for me. My lashes were super damaged for several months after I finally decided to ditch lash extensions so I started using the grande lash serum to try to save them! I'd tried a couple of serums beforehand but really only used them half-heartedly because I didn't think they were really going to make a difference. This serum is the first serum I actually used on a regular basis (every night) and by the first month or two of using it, I could tell that my lashes were already starting to fill in. Now, after using it for nearly a year, my lashes are in great condition, super long, and all the damage and gaps in my lashes created by lash extensions are completely gone.

I am extremely happy with the grande lash serum and will 100% continue to use it for as long as I'm putzing around and experimenting with different lash treatments. I think lash serums, in particular, pair extremely well with lash lifts because you need to have strong lashes in order to have something there to lift. I started with the lash serum but I'm now also testing out the lash conditioner as well. The only con for me has been the price point of the serum - it'll set you back $65 for a 3 month supply of the lash serum (In my experience it lasts anywhere between 4-5 months if you forget to apply it every now and then haha 😛) but given the difference it's made in my lashes, it's been worth the price.

Comfort: Alright, back to the lash lifts! The comfort of having a lash lift is where the massive difference truly is between lash extensions and the lash lift. I feel like with a lash lift, I can wear my contacts/glasses completely normally, smush my face into my pillow, and rub my eyes without having to worry that it's going to completely mess up my lashes. With lash extensions, I always had to be aware of my lashes and try to avoid touching them or else they might loosen and fall!

Durability: Unlike my experience with lash extensions, my lash lifts actually last as long as the lash technicians say they will! Usually it's recommended that you do not come back for another lash lift until after the 5-6 week mark for the health of your lashes and my lash lifts last almost exactly that long. Around the 4 week mark I'll usually start to notice that a couple of lifted lashes have fallen out and straight lashes have grown back in their place but it's a much more gradual process than when a whole extension falls out.

The Cost: My lash lifts cost me about $55 and last me anywhere between 6-8 weeks on average. This means that I really only have to go every 2 ish months - as compared to the insane 3 week time frame between lash extension fills that I used to maintain.

Final Verdict: I think I'm converted to lash lifts for life! Like I've said before, lash extensions are definitely still appropriate for special ocassions like weddings or vacations where you really don't want to be constantly touching up your mascara, but outside of that I can't imagine any situations where I would choose lash extensions over lash lifts.

Have you tried lash lifts or lash extensions? What has been your experience? I'd love to know your thoughts!