The Beauty Within

I wanted to make a post about this topic because there are a lot of girls and guys out there who think skinny is the way to go. I am here to tell you that I believe everyone is beautiful inside and out.

There are no pictures in this post due to the fact that there is no need. This is a post about self awareness and about gratitude. As you all know, if you have been following me on my social media networks, I have been unhappy with my body for a really long time. When o mention my body issues to my peers they tell me that I'm crazy and that there is nothing wrong with the way I look. I have been working on being happy with my body for a while, I may not be happy with the physical side, but it's more important to be happy with the beauty within.

What do I mean by beauty within? 

Beauty within is something every person has. Its an inner love and care; inner gratitude. If you can accept your beauty within, then it will show in your outer beauty as well. If you are taking care of your body from the inside you will feel better. I'm not talking just vitamins or excercise, even though that will make you feel a lot better phyisically, I am talking about mentally. Whenever I am unhappy with the way I look or I feel I think of something that I am thankful for. My mom always taught me to be thankful and grateful for what I have, and now every night I speak out loud what I am thankful for. 

Ill give an example, sometimes I look at my life and feel like I'm sort of wasting time and things aren't moving fast enough, I take a step back and realize my present life and see what I have and what surrounds me then I think, "well, what if I didn't have this"? Then I say my thanks. How does this have to do with the beauty within? When you show gratitude for something you will start feeling better and want to better yourself. If you arn't happy with your body, be grateful that you have a body and give thanks that you are able to change it with physical activity, whatever it may be. Some are less fortunate and are not able to do this. So always make sure to give thanks. 

I hope you all enjoyed this blog post! Leave a comment, would love to know what you thought about this post!

The Year has Come and Gone

Well the year has come and gone and oh, what a year it has been. We have all changed this past year and I would love to say thank you to all of the people that have supported me and that will support me for the years to come!

This year was so up and down, from deciding not to pursue my Paralegal life and completely changing what I want to do with my life, to finally leaving retail and getting a Salary job. I have learned so much within myself this year than any other year prior. It feels the older I get, the faster the years fly by. Man, I can't believe its 2014, and lord knows how much I thought the world was going to end in 2012, teehee.

So much has happened this year that made me a stronger person. When you look back at what you did all year, try not to think of the past year as anything negative. If you only remember negative things from the past year, try and make a list of great things that happen in 2014 so that in the following new year you won't just remember the negative and remember the positive. For example, I was laid off at my job, but that only led me to a job that I really loved and became the perfect job for when I am in school.

I want to also thank my friends and family who have supported my YouTube journey and my Blog. Without inspiration from them this year, I probably would have given up a long time ago. I am also thankful for the friends that I have made through this journey, it's so much fun meeting new people and I am excited to meet even more people for the following years!

My new years resolutions? Those are private because I don't want to jinx anything! #ripped2014

I hope everyone has an amazing New Years and I hope you will have a great 2014!

Why did I go Fire Ombre? My Hair Story ♥

Hey guys! I wanted to do a blog post about my hair today and the changes that I did and why I did it.

Okay, so...

Let's start at the beginning. This picture was taken in Florida in 2007 when I used to go visit with my grandparents, and this was the year everything started. I wanted to dye my hair so bad so I decided to get bangs and dye it dark brown. My original hair color is an ash brown. I was 15 when I took this picture, that's right, 15! I look like I'm at least my current age (22) here, and I think that was the real reason why I wanted to dye my hair, to look older.

I was pretty much a dark brown for about a year, this picture was taken in 2008, but then my hair grew a bit and I decided I wanted to get...bangs and highlights... I waited until the summer of 2008, when I went to visit with my grandmother again, to dye my hair,

So here I am, the summer of 2008, 16 and loving it! I had my hair done with fat highlights, and long thick hair!  This was probably my favorite time of my hair life. I loved having long and thick hair it was amazing!

You can see the highlights better here.

Then in the beginning of 2009, I decided it was time for the JET BLACK HAIR ERA! For some odd reason I thought I wanted black hair, so I went for it!

I only kept it for a couple months, then I thought, HEY! Let's try to go back to my old color!

DID NOT WORK!

AND I HAD TO CUT ALL MY HAIR OFF!!!! It was a really sad day for me. I hated having short hair, I was always a long hair kind of girl, but I wanted to cut it all off and start over. So I was a brunette again for a little while...

Then I met my soon to be ex, btw if you're reading, sorry!!! It's my hair story, and dying my hair red was sooooooo not my idea.

Anyways we met in 2010 when I was 18 years old, and he really liked different styles of hair on me so I said, why NOT! The day I bleached my hair was the worst day in my hair history....

The first time we dyed my hair red, I actually really liked it. Soon after, I relied that I wasn't a huge fan because my roots would always show and I had to keep bleaching and bleaching. That was destroying my hair. Yes, those are guinea pigs, we owned guinea pigs...a lot of Guinea Pigs....

Soon after, in 2011, I was tired of the maintenance and I went back to good ole jet black. I actually had that black hair for only 6 months, until I started missing my red hair again. 


So... I went and did the whole bleaching process again!

That's me and my mom, if you were wondering...

I loved my Ariel hair! It was so much fun having it! So from then on I had my red to auburn to red to auburn for the remainder of the years before now.

So, Ive been a red head for almost 3 years now, and the reason I went ombre was because my hair officially bored the hell out of me and was hard to maintain. I was tired of dying my hair every 6-8 weeks to the same color over and over again. I lost half of my hair, it's not healthy, and I know if I keep doing root touch ups, I will never get my hair back to normal again.

I decided the best way to show my creativity with my hair is to be able to have best of both worlds, I could have colored hair, but almost never have to do a root touch up due to the fact that I have dark hair on top!

So ombre is the look I have today, and I am hoping this will last me a long time so I can grow my hair thicker and stronger!

I hope you guys enjoyed my hair story! Leave a comment if you did, and if you have a hair story blog post, leave it in the comments! I'd love to read your post!

Outfit of the Night and Review: San Francisco's The Nutcracker!

Hey everyone! Today's blog post is about the San Francisco's Nutcracker. I went to go see that on the 12th of December and I have a few things I would like to speak about. First of all there will be spoiler's so if you are in the San Francisco and seeing the Nutcracker, please don't be mad if there are a few spoiler's in this blog post. Plus if you scroll down there will be a quick Outfit of the Night Pictures.

courtesy of sfgate

First, please tell me why the Nutcracker was the third "toy" that performed for the children,when Uncle Drosselmeyer brought the three toys out. I have never seen that in the performance before and i was sort of upset. I am also going to stress that I did not like that he was a red head, I am a red- head and I love red hair, but I'm going to be blunt here. The Nutcracker has always been a Brunette or had black hair, never light hair.

I LOVED THIS SCENE! It snowed on the stage during the snowflakes scene and I was in love of how magical everything was.  IF you were wondering, yes, there is a King and Queen of Winter in this rendition of The Nutcracker, which I thought was really pretty. I had no complaints about that, the dancers were amazing and it was just hands down, beautiful!

Now let's talk about the performances while Clara and the Nutcracker watch.

The performance I loved the best were of course the Russian Dancers, not only did they have the bet opening, but they were so energetic and awesome! The three male dancers jumped out of the Russian Eggs and it was so crazy and loud and amazing! I swear, they had the best applause at the end of the show.

The other dancer's were good as well except they added these three girls that were dressed with tutu's and garter belts flinging around these ribbons. Was not a fan. The dancers were great, but I just wasn't a fan of the characters.

Now I might be biased due to the fact that I am love with the Baryshnikov version of The Nutcracker and that one will always be my favorite, so when I found that Clara's younger character was different then the "Princess" Clara, I was sort of upset. I didn't like that there wasn't just one Clara, that they needed a "real" ballerina to play Princess Clara. I put parenthesis over "real" because the girl playing Clara as a child was good, but she didn't wear the pointed shoes so she could really dance, if that makes sense. In the Baryshnikov versions Clara was just Clara, no change in girls, she did everything.

By the way if you guys have not seen that version click HERE!!! it's honestly my favorite!!!

Oh but the ending, I did not like the way this Nutcracker did not end tragically. It was more like, she was happy after she woke up and that she just had the best dream ever, for which her Uncle intended. In the Baryshnikov version, she was torn away from her Nutcracker prince and was sadly looking out the window wondering if she would ever see him again. It was true love with Clara and the Nutcracker, but in the San Francisco Version it was a friendship and nothing more.

I feel like there should have been more to the ending then just waking up and happily running back to her bedroom.

Overall, great Ballet, not my favorite rendition of the story (with the extra characters and whatnot), but the dancers were amazing, the music was of course spectacular, and the effects were great. If you have never seen the Nutcracker and want to see this one, it's good, not old-school, but good. Very modernized in my opinion.

Our View, great Balcony seats!

The Chandelier was breathtaking!

Boots: My Enzo's
Dress: Go Jane (LINK)
Coat: Forever 21 last year
Purse: Gift

Close up was a bit weird looking, but you can see the true colors of the dress now!

Hope you guys enjoyed this post! More coming soon!

Charles Dicken's Christmas Faire!

Well, hello everyone! 

I am back with another blog post! This one is more lifestyle oriented! This blog post is all about the Charles Dickens Christmas Faire! This was the second year that I went and I wanted to share my experience with you.

By the way before I start I wanted to let you know that I will leave a link below this once my video is out so you can see live action shots of the faire, but for now I wanted to show you some of the shots I was able to get.                                     

Let's start with the fashion, this is not your typical street fair, dressing up is very appropriate for this type of fair and strongly advised. When you come to the Charles Dickens Faire you are submerged into another time; just imagine walking through doors and waltzing straight into The Christmas Carol. There is a smell of baking and booze and there are characters everywhere!

The dresses are gorgeous, but unless you are going to make these yourself, you are going to spend around $600 and up for a dress like this, trust me I looked. There are different fabrics, cuts, and styles of all of these dresses and you can't seem to take your eyes away from the beauty of the dresses.

This was actually something I didn't see last year, this woman (i'm sure) custom made her dress to be Dr. Who inspired. It was amazing!

So once you get into the faire, the first thing you see is the drink station, they have a few of those around the faire. They sell everything from soda and water to more "timely" drinks like mulled wine and Buttered Rum, which by the way was pretty good. Also, I would like to note that it is a timely drink for me because I live in America and we don't get Mulled wine and Buttered Rum here, so unless we make it ourselves, this is probably one of the few places we would find it.

 The one thing to know is most of the people are really nice, unless they are paid to be rude and it's part of their character, but most are really friendly. 

So now we move onto the shopping portion. Almost everything in the little shops are home made or vintage, and when I say vintage I mean they are from the 1800's or early 1900's. You could spend hours looking at everything and not buy a thing, but if you do want to purchase a trinket or two from the Dicken's Faire, be warned, for you will be spending a pretty penny.

Venders sell anything from home made fairy houses, to crystal skulls, to the gorgeous dresses and suits that you see everywhere, to even elven crowns and wands. Everything is unique and beautiful but quite expensive. So just be weary of that.

Let's talk about everyone's favorite subject, food! There are many different variates of food to try and experience. Of course you have the fish and chips, and the sweet nuts (which are almonds that, I believe, are covered with hot sugar), but there are also meat pies, geek food, just meat, and a lot more. There are also two restaurants like The Bohemian. I've always been intimidated by those because everyone in there has a costume on and play the part so well, I wouldn't know what to say back to them if they spoke to me. The food is actually not that expensive, it's about as bad as going to any fair really. I had Clam Chowder and Fries(Chips), and that cost me around $8.00. Not too bad.

These models were amazing! These women were in the windows of the main clothing shop that sold corsets and the dresses that most women wore to the fair. They would stand really still and try not to move, of course they would trade with other girls, or guys, every ten to fifteen minutes, but they did just an amazing job. I personally couldn't stand still in there let alone wear a corset while doing that.

So first of all, if you guys don't believe in Orbs...yea that's just "dust". Keep telling yourself that. 

There were little corners in random places of the faire that you would see not so aristocratic England. Of course you have to get your prostitutes and your pimps involved, how would the poor make money? So there were a couple of them roaming around as well asking for money and making eye contact with you. We even walked into a scene where the Pimp was asking his woman if she had made any money yet and she said no so he was about to beat her when another little man tried to fight him, it was a mess, but it was quite interesting. I hope I got that on video.

I don't want to speak so much about this area, it was where the belly dancer's would dance, I have  whole segment of this in my video that I mentioned previously and you will be able to see for yourself if you loved it or hated it.

Finally, I wanted to show you guys how my hair looked that day. That is all my real hair because I don't have one of those wigs that the girls wore with their dresses. If you guys want to see how I did this hair, I can show you in a tutorial. I looked more like Wendy Darling if anything, but I wanted to do something so I could somewhat fit in with the crowd.

Thanks for Reading! I hope you enjoyed this post! Video is up! Click HEREEEE

Make Up Forever: Aqua Eyes

Hey everyone! Today's post is about the Make up Forever Aqua Eyes. You know, those eye liner pencils that everyone knows about and say how amazing they are?  Well today I will be reviewing these beauties for you.

So this small palette has five travel sized liners that can be used for a lot of different looks. But how good are they? Make Up Forever is known to be pretty pricey and these full sized pencil's cost $19 USD and that's a bit more expensive than the Urban Decay 24/7 liners, but those are amazing!

 I've always been pretty skeptical with Make Up Forever but I saw this little palette for $10USD so I had to see what the hype was all about.

So when I first tried the black color (0L) it reminded me a lot of the Urban Decay Perversion liner kind of tugged on my top lid but once it heated up a bit it started to glide a bit better. It deff stayed put and it was sort of hard to take off with a make up remover wipe, but that's only the black color, what about the other colors?

17L (Lime Green)           11L(Purple)

So, as you can see these two colors above are a bit splotchy and they don't run too smoothly. I am not sure if it's the formulation of the eye liners or what but these were way different feeling then the next three I swatched.I am not a huge fan of these colors, I would be if they were more opaque, but alas they are not.

 0L(Black), 2L (Brown), 7L(Sparkle Blue)

 Alright, these three are my favorite! I am obsessed with the black and the brown color due to the fact is that they are nice colors and they are so opaque and they glide on really nice. They stay on forever and they make a nice clean line in more motion. The sparkled blue suprised me a lot. I wasn't expecting this to be as opaque as it actually was. This is a baby blue with a lot of sparkle in it. This glided on well as well and I think this would be a great liner for the lower lash line for a pop of color.

I hope you guys enjoyed this review! Will be posting more soon! Thanks so much for checking this out!

Rosa

 Hey everyone! Thanks so much for checking out my blog.

I wanted to make my first post a get to know me type of post.

My name is Rosa, I am 22 years old, and I have an obsession with what life has to offer.

I am currently in school and working so my life can get pretty hectic so I am happy to start a blog where I can write about well...whatever.

As you can see from the title of my blog, Once Upon a Dream and my Youtube channel name Briarrose91 I am kind of a Disney Nut, weird that both of these names originated from Disney's "Sleeping Beauty", but eh I go with the flow.

What this blog will be is a beauty and fashion blog, like my YouTube channel, but I will be also adding in my Life and Fitness as well. I am sort of a fitness nut and I like keeping a diary of my life as well. It's hard of course doing everything on YouTube because I don't want too much to mingle with eachother so I wanted to start a blog that would be easier to update rather than editing all day everyday, even though i pretty much do it around three times a week, but now with school starting I thought a blog might be more practical.

There are also other topics that I would like to talk about on here other than the ones mentioned above, more supernatural and spiritual. I love writing about everything and I wanted one place where I can have it all and not be classified as one particular "subject".

I will probably reveal more of myself later to all of you who care to read.

Thanks for stopping by again!

Rosa