Browsing Tag:

2016

Sleeveless sweater weather

Posted in Fashion
on 10/12/2016

This is the first post of many fall outfits that are coming soon to the blog… It dropped a few degrees down here in South Louisiana + I immediately broke out my favorite pair of jeans. This sleeveless tunic was a recent find at Forever 21 (for a whopping $15) #asteal!

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Photos by Catherine Quant.

 sleeveless sweater | distressed jeans | lace up heels | aviators | tote bag | fringe necklace | lipstick 

I am so excited about this sleeveless tunic for the fall! It is so basic which works perfect if you want to add some chunky jewelry (like I did). For a super sophisticated vibe, I layered this fringe necklace (which I love to add to any simple top for a statement) overtop the tunic. These jeans are my favorite of all time (and they’re only $32 from Old Navy) — they’re literally the most comfortable jeans I’ve yet to wear! But wait y’all… these shoes. Dolce Vita for Target stole my heart. I wanted the entire line I kid you not! But these black lace up chunky heels I absolutely had to have. They look so edgy paired with skirts, jeans, or even shorts (#gogetyouapair). One last side note: this lipstick I’m wearing is my saving grace + is the best fall color of all time.

If y’all know of any cute sleeveless tunics, send me some links! I wanna expand my collection stat.

get the look

madison-bronze-foil

Life Lately | September Edition

Posted in Uncategorized
on 10/09/2016

October here I come! September was mostly me getting back into the swing of things with school and such, so not too many exciting things happened.. (oops!) I will say that you can expect less lifestyle sort of posts from me from now on — I’m aiming to post more fashion related things on LGIP now. With that being said, let’s get on with it!

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Oh, what a night this was… Known as none other than Boys Bid Night (aka LSU Greek Life’s favorite night of the year). Our new members came to join us in getting dressed up + having the first night of fun with their new sissies!

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Gameday is back + better than ever!! I’ve struggled each weekend finding an outfit considering I own nothing purple or gold. It’s been hot as hades for each game so far, so jeans have not been an option for me. I’m awaiting the cooler weather as patiently as possible.

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If you haven’t read my most recent post, go ahead and click here! My pledge class + I got our littles this month! We had such a fantastic time crafting for them + reveal was the icing on the cake! In all honestly, I was totally suffocating being wrapped up in this get up for twenty long minutes.

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Fall Grub was a success!! The theme was ESPhiN, so pretty much anything sports-related went! My date and I went as Tom Brady + Gisele, so I donned a VS robe for the night! Creativity levels were at an all time high that night as I saw some corn dogs (LSU fans are known as corn dogs, so we love to poke fun at it), field goals, famous basketball players, football players + a few WAGS.

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We had our very first Taco night in our new house this month! All of the proceeds go to the Alpha Phi Foundation, and we opened our beautiful new home up and served some tacos. These Alpha Phi baseball tees are my favorite shirt from this year so far!! It goes great with some jean shorts, athletic shorts, or yoga pants!

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If you follow me on my personal Instagram, or just know me in real life, you would know my unfailing love for One Direction. Niall’s new song is the sweetest thing I’ve ever listened to and I swear to y’all, I actually cried while listening to it #noshame.

See, I told y’all my September was boring… I can’t wait for y’all see some new fashion posts coming to LGIP this month!!

madison-bronze-foil

How to create the perfect Big Little Week | LGIP Blabbers

Posted in Lifestyle
on 09/28/2016

IMG_8987-editedIMG_8975-editedIMG_8989-editedIMG_8978-editedIMG_8990-editedIMG_8993-editedIMG_8994-editedSo…. I’m now a big!! Last week was so stressful (leading to no blog post) but I wouldn’t change a thing. Creating a lifelong friendship with my littles is going to be the most rewarding thing! To break things down, I’ll go through a bit of what I ended up giving my little bits each day. Hopefully this can help y’all if you are going through Big Little week!

DAY ONE 

The first themed day was paintings. I had been scrolling through Pinterest since I joined last year, repining an assortment of crafts to make for my littles. Most of the paintings I saw were cheesy, and had bright colors and cheeky phrases on them. We all know that paintings of that sort aren’t going to be displayed for long, considering they don’t match much. My goal for the paintings day was essentially to create a few basic things that would go with any sort of color scheme or room.

Sticking to a warm/cool color scheme (each little liked something different), I made some watercolor prints on card stock. This was honestly one of the most simple crafts I had ever done, and super relaxing too. Water color and card stock can be purchased anywhere (for cheap), so this did not break the bank! I made two watercolor prints for each of my littles by simply free handing the background and the wording. To dress things up, I framed one print in a frame from Hobby Lobby (only my favorite store ever) that I spray painted gold and left the other one not framed.

I knew I wanted to include canvases as well in the baskets, so I made two. The first was a plain white canvas with the saying “let it be — Alpha Phi.” Again, I free-handed the “let it be” and I typed up “Alpha Phi” in one of my favorite fonts (download it here) to trace onto the canvas with a sharpie. Canvas number two was based on a pin from Pinterest of a gold ivy leaf print with our public motto “union hand in hand.” I mimicked that font onto a plain black canvas with some white acrylic paint (I totally free-handed it and just went with it).

For kicks, I made some tumblers with a gold “cheers!” sticker to add the basket as well.

Rounding out this basket was a simple hanging mini bulletin board. I painted one black with some acrylic paint and sanded it down to look distressed and the other I left its original beige-ish color. With metallic paint pens, I wrote “sweet home Alpha Phi” and added some ivy-like branches to the corners. They turned out so cute, and were easily one of my favorite pieces.

DAY TWO

The second day was hand-me-down themed. I gifted some t-shirts I gained throughout the year, an Alpha Phi hat, coozies, game day pins, and each little’s favorite candy. All around an extremely simple day.

DAY THREE

My last and final day of big little week was ivy themed (aka anything Alpha Phi). I themed my baskets black and white with some pops of red. At Hobby Lobby, I scooped up these amazing metal bins which inspired the days theme. I made a square canvas with “xoxo” on it (freehand) and that anchored the basket.

Square jewelry bowls with their initials, as well as a set of stadium cups with ‘Alpha Phi,’ ‘envy the ivy,’ and ‘a phi’ were made super simple by my Silhouette Cameo machine. I made some stickers as well with my Silhouette Cameo — one in a script font and one in a greek font.

I found some gold and white frames at Wal-Mart and put a super girly eyelash print in them. A little black and white makeup bag finished off the basket!

SHOPPING LIST

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Big little shopping

Do y’all have big little week coming up in your chapter? I want to hear what you’re making (or have made) for your littles!

madison

DIY gallery wall to jazz up any space

Posted in Lifestyle
on 09/07/2016

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Happy hump day! I’m sending well wishes to y’all, considering my week has already been long and it’s only Wednesday. Juggling school and sorority has me stressin! In an attempt to take a break from all the madness, I wanted to share a fun DIY with y’all! In my last post, y’all saw a picture of one of the DIY gallery walls in my room this year. Here’s how to create your own gallery wall on a budget!

If you have been alive for the past 5 years, you know gallery walls are all the rage. I could scroll infinitely on Pinterest through pictures of gallery walls, costing anywhere from $20-$500. As a college student, I strive to ball on a budget, hence this tutorial for those of you who want to jazz up your room without spending a lot of money!

g a l l e r y   w a l l   o n e

 First step is to start off with a statement piece. For my room, it was the golden deer head. After hanging that up first, we could get a feel for the arrangement of the two sides. Catherine and I had started off with some canvases that we knew we wanted to hang diagonally by each other (they spell out “alpha fleek”). We pretty much hung all of the big items first – the “alpha fleek” canvases, the abstract canvas, the arrowhead, the pineapple and the starbursts. Pro tip: draw out how you want to arrange the gallery wall first, lay out all of your pieces on the floor, and then you can hang.

Secondly, we hung up some square photos to add some color and fill in the gaps. The square prints are from Walgreens. They are a bit more pricey than 4×6 prints, but I love the uniformity that goes with them. Sticky tack (which will run you about $5) was a lifesaver! We stuck two pieces of tack to the back of each photo and they’re still up, two weeks later!

Lastly I would just check to make sure you’ve achieved what you wanted. We wanted something a little busy, but with lots of texture and keeping with our color scheme. I think we achieved it on our first wall, what do y’all say?

g a l l e r y  w a l l  t w o

For the wall above my bed, we wanted to display some photos. After seeing the square pictures, I quickly came up with this grid-looking idea. There really was no step by step process I took to create this wall, but I’ll give y’all somewhat of a run down of how this went!

I started on one side (at the bottom picture) and worked my way over. Varying the amount of pictures across and adding quotes we printed from Pinterest and Tumblr mixed the composition up a bit. Basically just eye ball it out. I didn’t want to make a perfect square of photos and quotes, so I made sure to scatter the mix of the two.

To top it off, I added this string of tassels, which I handmade for my dorm last year. It tied the wall together and added a pop color against the white wall and quotes on white paper.

Have y’all made gallery walls for your room? If so, how did you do it?

madison

Life lately | August edition

Posted in Uncategorized
on 09/04/2016

August was by far one of my craziest months I have experienced this year. It was a  whirlwind of things – including moving into my sorority house, 4 week long recruitment/polish week, and so so much more.

Processed with VSCO with c1 presetSeeking some off time, my family and I headed to beach the first week of August. We explored Grayton Beach, Watercolor, and Seaside. In dire need of some outfit photos, I made my sister help me shoot this OOTD. I did a post on it here.

IMG_9370My sisters and I moved into our brand new house this month! Although our move in date was pushed back a week, I can say that the wait was well worth it. Walking into our permanent home for the first time is something I will never forget.

Processed with VSCO with c1 presetIn the weeklong break between the flood and rush, we didn’t have much to do. One night we ended up going out to dinner and I shot an OOTD. These white flare jeans are my favorite for any fun dinner or night out! Here’s the post.

IMG_9339The gallery wall in my room was a labor of love. It took me about 45 minutes to get the entire wall planned out and executed. A room tour will be coming soon, but for now I’ll just leave y’all with this as a sneak peek!

Processed with VSCO with c1 presetHappy first day of 14th grade from Catherine and I! An obligatory first day of school picture was taken with coffee in hand and our favorite tees on. My school uniform consists of a big tee and athletic shorts (these forever 21 shorts are my fave).

Processed with VSCO with c1 presetMeet my roomies! Kayla is in the middle and Catherine on the right. We are having such an amazing time living in the house so far! I’m so happy they are able to put up with my excessive need to clean the room every single day.

Processed with VSCO with c1 presetRush lasted for about four weeks for us this year. Due to the flood, we ended up having to push everything back two weeks. On our first day of ice water (finally), my CHOPS gals and I had to take a picture. My dress is from American Apparel, and necklace is from stella & dot.

Processed with VSCO with c1 presetRoomies that match together, stay together. Catherine and I ended up having the same romper for sisterhood round, so a picture was in order. Sisterhood round was by far my favorite of all the rounds because I think it’s one of our chapter’s strong suits.

IMG_9483MAMA WE MADE IT! Bid day 2016 was honestly the best day we’ve had this year. Being on the other side of things is so much more enjoyable. Our theme was the Color Run, so pink, blue and yellow were our colors. We covered ourselves in glitter, jewels, and wore candy chokers — and got prepared to welcome all of our new babies (115 of them) into this amazing sisterhood!

With all that being said, September here I come!

madison

Styling white jeans at the end of the summer like a pro

Posted in Fashion
on 08/21/2016

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Y’ALLLLLLLLLLL OH MY GOODNESS. I’m so in love with this simple outfit, I HAD to share! For my big’s birthday dinner and a night out, I decided to pair my fave pair of jeans, these white flares from AOS, with this colorful printed Show me your MuMu top. White jeans have quickly become one of my favorite pieces to wear this summer. Y’all know that taboo about wearing white after labor day? I think that’s total craziness! White jeans can really go into any time of year. For the end of summer, I love pairing them with a pop of color on the top for some contrast. If y’all have been following along with me lately, you would know I also have been head over heels for chokers of any sort. This black choker is actually a thin piece of ribbon from the craft store double wrapped and tied into a bow. To avoid the dragging of these amazing jeans on the floor, I opted to wear my OTBT Bushnells (my all time fave shoe).

Here’s my foolproof formula to rock any pair of white jeans like a pro:

White jeans + a patterned top

Do y’all love the white jean trend as much as I do (cause I’m obsessed)?

white jean details

madison

On my radar

Posted in Lifestyle
on 08/17/2016

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rodan + fields unblemish line // nyx soft matte lip cream in twerp // sally hansen airbrush legs // dolce vita for target zoey chunky lace up heels // nyx hd finishing powder // ban.do large agenda

IT’S BEEN TOO LONG, MY PEOPLE. To make a long story short: I moved back to LSU (can I get a heck yeah?!), started recruitment, but a massive flood hit us hard so recruitment has gotten moved back a week… I’m off silence (technically) as of right now so here’s a lil post for y’all!

As of late, I’ve been experimenting around with acne products + Catherine (my roomie) introduced me to this line, Rodan + fields. So far, I’m enjoying the multi-step routine a lot! Topical products normally take at least 4 weeks start seeing results, so I’m planning to use this Unblemish line while I wait to start my first round of Accutane ever (eeeeek)!

NYX has been a home run for me recently with all their products, especially the HD finishing powder, which I’ve been using to bake my under eye concealer (it ROCKS), and the Soft matte lip cream (beautiful matte finish and great staying power).

Being back at school, I have to say I’ve gotten lazy with my regular self tanning routine… My bad lol. If I’m going out and want my legs to look good, I’ll use this Sally hansen leg makeup. It adds some color to my legs as well as evening them out and making them look amazing!

If y’all have been following me for the past few months, you would know I’ve been HEAD OVER HEELS for any lace up shoe by Dolce Vita. Visiting my local target a few weeks ago, I stumbled upon a Dolce Vita for target line. While hyper ventilating, I snagged a pair of these lace up chunky heeled shoes. Paired with jeans or even a simple romper/dress they add so much interest and contrast (since they’re black). I haven’t quite broken them in yet, but I’m sure once I have they will be the perfect going out shoes!

In reference to my previous agenda post, I decided to order this ban.do agenda! The size is perfect and I am so pleased with all it’s quirky + cute sayings in the inside. I would recommend!

Do y’all have anything that’s been on your radar lately you want to share? Leave me a comment below!

currently loving

madison

Happy first birthday, lgip!

Posted in Lifestyle
on 07/17/2016

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ps: this picture was taken right after my balloon escaped from my fingers + flew off into the sky... seriously a sad moment for me but what else would i expect?

ps: this picture was taken right after my balloon escaped from my fingers + flew off into the sky… seriously a sad moment for me but what else would I expect?

Well hey, it’s been one year since my very first blog post on this little site called Louisiana girl in pearls. It’s been one hell of a ride (as I always say). To be honest, I really was not sure what I was getting myself into by starting my own blog. I admired beauty vloggers + fashion bloggers from afar, but I never did dare to dip my toes into the world that was blogging until last year. Something within me was telling me “you can do this, make a blog. Go head!” So I sat at my computer in Boston, ma and started my own blog.

One year later, and to be frank I still am not a master blogger. I haven’t become blog famous or anything, but what I can say I have achieved is recognition from my family + friends – which is all I could ask for and more. I still have oodles of things to learn, and I continue to work on this little corner of the web each and every day. I have learned that with most things, there’s a learning process + I’m not always going to get things right the first try around (although my type-a personality wishes me to).

More than anything, I am proud of myself. This past year has really had it’s trials + tribulations through which I have learned heaps about myself and the kind of person I wish to be. But this little blog, + the hope that’ll grow to something I can grow my career from it has kept me going. When I am after something, I will do anything in my power to get it. Louisiana Girl in Pearls will get to the point where it want it to be someday, but until then, I’ll keep my liquid liner-lined eyes peeled to my computer screen working on content, social media, branding, + scheduling.

In celebration of this glorious day, I wanted to give y’all a little trip down memory lane of some of my favorite blog posts from this past inaugural year of Louisiana Girl in Pearls. I’ll link them below for y’all to take a peek at, but for now I want to address one last thing.

In all sincerity, i would like to thank y’all for reading – it means the world it me. If you’ve read one of my posts, or every single one of them – I appreciate you so much! The constant support from y’all is one of the best feelings in the world! To my friends + family who have given up your time to help me shoot blog pictures, or shop for clothes, or even just let me be because you knew I was writing a blog post – you’re irreplaceable and your help has helped make Louisiana Girl in Pearls what it is today!

I have had the time of my life this past year, being able to document my life on this corner of the web + have people actually read it! Here’s to many more years – cheers to LGIP!

Here are some of my favorite posts from the past year:

How to rock bold lips

The only makeup products you need during the summer

Mani Monday | Essie Bikini so teeny

An ode to freshman year

NOLA daze | feat. Maddie + Zach

Life Lately | May edition

Life Lately | January edition

Two ways to rock the romper trend this summer

Blue jeans + a baseball hat | LGIP OOTD

My stack | The best baubles for under $45

Palmin’ around 

lots + lots of love,
madison