Wrist-Wrap Santa Fe-Style

It's a wrap, Santa Fe-style, with my wrist malas and vintage horse-tack bracelets. 

If you love to pile on the bracelets like I do, you will want to stock up on wrist-wraps. I have multiple shades in almost every color of clothing that I wear.

Having so many wrist-wraps you can never go wrong and can wear a different combination every day geared to the color scheme of your outfit. You can also vary textures in addition to colors. 

Create combos that are uniquely you, expressing your mood, your love of southwestern accessories, your spiritual faith or just add that extra bit of flair to your boots and jeans.

www.etsy.com/shop/CherylBDesignsstudio

Orange Color Therapy for Santa Fe-Style

Working with color therapy is one thing I love to do and in addition to using it as a motivational tool, I like to use it as a form of expressing or increasing my mood through fashion and makeup.

Today I am working with the color orange. Orange combines the energy of red and the happiness of yellow. It is associated with joy, sunshine, and the tropics. Orange represents enthusiasm, fascination, happiness, creativity, determination, attraction, success, encouragement, and stimulation.'' 

Orange is also a perfect color for Santa Fe and southwest style, especially if bright and cultural or muted and rusty like so much in the western culture.

The shirt I chose is an orange tank with bead-work in white brown and turquoise which adds the perfect compliment to my copper and turquoise jewelry.

Experiment with how you can work the color orange into your style. Orange will brighten and fill up your day!

Another Great Match for Spring: Pink and Turquoise

Sometimes my eye just catches colors. I work a lot with color therapy but it applies to fashion as well and today my eye caught two colors I would have otherwise never thought to pair: pink and turquoise.

This is a really beautiful combination and yet another way to combine the feminine with a little rough-stock. It's dreamy yet colorful, soft with an edge.

A Return to Cover Girl Foundation

Most of the time I am on a budget when it comes to makeup products. These days there are so many products on the market that it can be hard to know what to choose; hard to know what works and what doesn’t, especially if you are shopping online and cannot try before you by. So many products, so little time and money. It can be a challenge.

There are some makeup products where skimping price-wise is ok, foundation however, is not one of them. Spend too little on foundation and you will wind up looking like Bozo the clown with orange streaks, potential breakouts and many other drawbacks that can occur if you are not using a quality foundation.

It seemed on several occasions that I would get with a product that I both liked and could afford, only to find it had later been discontinued or changed when I needed a refill. The last foundation I tried was a luxurious whipped cream but evaporated way too fast here in the high desert. It was time to shop again and I had no clue and a small budget.

During a Dollar Store shopping trip for some other items, I decided to just have a peek at the cosmetics while I was there. Of only two brands carried, one was Cover Girl and the other was L.A. Colors. I stood for a moment in front of the Cover Girl section, and practically chuckled, remembering how my first foundation forty-five years ago had been Cover Girl. I was twelve and the year was 1972. By high school I had moved on to Revlon which I thought was much more glamorous. I never looked back. Yet here I stood, staring at that bottle of Cover Girl  Clean, my mind secretly wondering yet thinking how ridiculous would that be to try Cover Girl again after all these years? It was for little girls after all, young teens covered in pimples wearing bubblegum lip glass. Before I knew it, I was scouting shades and had selected the Buff Beige.

The next morning at home I was almost scared to try it, imagining orange streaks or a visible foundation line along my chin. With one of my nicest foundation brushes, I began to apply my Cover Girl foundation. It was smooth, cool, originally scented and oh-so amazing. The feel was wonderful, soft and smooth. The coverage was excellent as is the color. The finish: satin. And oh how well it blends! I have never been more pleasantly surprised with a beauty product. 

Applying foundation used to be my least favorite part of doing my makeup and now, because of Cover Girl, it is my favorite part. I love to apply and blend this product as it softens and creates its fresh look all over my face.

I am so happy that I made the switch back to Cover Girl foundation. It cost about $6 for the bottle which left quite a bit in my budget for other fun items rather than my having to spend the whole amount on one container of foundation.

So if you are looking for a great new reliable foundation that works well and is amazingly affordable and easy to find most anywhere, you cannot go wrong with a trip back to good old Cover Girl. 

My Spring/Summer Pick for Santa Fe Style

Spring brings the desire for a fresh look and if you're going to invest, it probably needs to be something that can carry on through summer, maybe into early fall. Some years I get new pieces, other years I just re-mix and re-match what I have, perhaps with some different accessories. 

This spring though I got this red dress with native designs around the neckline.

At first I thought it too bold, bit then in the same week, I came into these adorable used and scuffed, worn but loved, black boots with red roses.

I still didn't put two and two together though until I noticed the hat that has been hanging on my wall for a few seasons now, a cute little rust-colored straw that perfectly matched the colors in the neckline of the dress and the wheels in my brain were starting to turn,

There was still something missing though and I decided it needed to be a large chunky necklace or two to compliment the red so I whipped up two that I simply adore. Finally I was ready to put it all together, and viola! My new favorite spring and summer ensemble. Ready to stroll the Plaza.

Let this be your guide in finding out how one new or simple piece can suddenly lead you on a couture-journey into sometimes seemingly mis-matched or unchartered territory. I had no idea these stray pieces would tie together for such an amazing southwest look. So keep your eye peeled and when that first piece shows up, look around, scout around and see what treaures you can add to create your own special spring and summer look.

Adding Santa Fe-Style with Scarves and Jewelry

Many days find me piddling with achieving different looks and how you can easily put them together to add a little Santa Fe-style to your outfit.

These two combos are created with the same top, a rust colored turtleneck poncho and changing out the scarves and jewelry.

Top by reathboundtrading.com, beads from Raven's Nest, Turquoise copper cross necklace by Spoiled Cowgilrz

In the first look, I added multi-layered strands of festive yet earthy-toned beads in rusts, browns and gold, then added a copper and turquoise southwestern cross and necklace. I finished the look off with a gold sparkly scarf.

Additional crystal jewelry by me, from Cheryl B. Designs Studio.

In the second look, I simply switched out the scarf for a more colorful scarf and more sparkly jewelry which could work more for an evening look.

You do not have to find exact matches but can get a general idea from which to work as you put together your own unique look working with these colors or even with other desert tones. I personally would wear this look with jeans and boots but then I wear everything with jeans and boots!

The point is to experiment and have fun!

All I Want for Christmas is Red and Turquoise

For my own Santa Fe-style this season, I will be wearing a red lace top with a red spaghetti-strap camisole and lots of turquoise. Red and green may be the traditional look but if you want Santa Fe-style go for the red and turquoise.

This is an quick and easy look to pull together if you already have the jewelry.

If not, hit your favorite retailer or re-seller for red and turquoise this season. Add jeans or slacks or a denim skirt and of course, red or tirquoise boots. I have both so my biggest problem will be which boots to wear.
Jewelry by me, Browse my line at Cheryl B. Designs Studio