Party Like It’s 2019: #NYE Affordable Fashion From H&M

H&M is a great shopping destination for chic affordable clothing.  If you need a last-minute outfit, they’re the perfect stop!  They have everything from stackable rings to nail polish.

A lot of women over the age of twenty will second-guess the store and you shouldn’t.  H&M has a range of sizes (plus size/maternity) and diverse style options.

It’s the hidden store when you want an inexpensive reversible shopper for work, or you booked a cruise but your budget calls for a thirty dollar swimsuit.

The store runs several campaigns to guide your shopping needs.

 

Last-Minute New Year’s Eve Outfit Ideas

I can’t believe the year has ended.  If you’re anything like myself, there’s always the question, “What should I wear on New Year’s Eve?”

The answer depends on your planned activities.  Some like to enjoy a private dinner while others are dancing all night!

Either way, you want to dress appropriately and have a good time.  Simple touches for a dynamic outfit include wearing a sequins jacket, statement shoes, or rhinestone earrings.  Don’t forget to add a hint of glamour with a fresh manicure or lash extensions.

Take a look at the last-minute outfit ideas that are below.  Happy New Year!

 

 

Day Party Style: Beyonce Wearing Masai Earrings

Beyoncé recently posted a selfie wearing Masai earrings and we have them available in our store. Guess who will be able to purchase them first? If you guessed yourself. You are right!

You have exclusive VIP access for being my ride or die chicks. Walk into 2019 slaying as beautiful as Beyoncé with your very own Masai earrings imported from Uganda, Kampala.

 

Tenth Street Designer Fedora Hat: On-Trend Accessories

With the new year approaching it’s time to update your wardrobe!  We love clothing pieces but often forget about the impact of great accessories.

One on-trend item for the cooler season is wearing a fedora hat.  Purchasing a variety of women’s fedora hats can actually serve two functions in terms of style and warmth!

Tenth Street clothing brand has several stylish hats for both men and women.  The company shipped Jillian which is a felt fedora hat that can be worn for brunch or a night out.

One interesting detail about this particular hat is the adjustable inner velcro.  This small feature allows the hat to fit all head sizes.

Visit Tenth Street to purchase your own on-trend accessories!

Fedora Hat:  Tenth Street | Moto (Similar) Jacket:  Express | Riding (Similiar) Boots:  JCPenney

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Blog Design Trends For 2019

Another year has almost been and gone. 2018 was a year of monumental change in website design. New trends came to the fore, whilst particular styles and tactics were cast away. 2019 is going to be no different. As long as the Internet continues to grow at the rapid pace it currently is, we can expect changes in the industry to be frequent. Keeping that in mind, read on to discover some of the best trends for your blog during the months ahead…

Security first

There is only one place to begin, and this is with website security. Internet users today are more careful than they ever have been, and rightly so. It is up to you to make them feel safe when they enter your blog. You need to look for tools like identity verification services that are dependable to make sure that this is the case. Security is only going to get more and more important as time passes.

Videos

The popularity of videos is set to soar over the coming months, let alone the coming year. Nowadays it is all about providing individuals with easy, convenient and effective ways to find out information. Many companies are in favor of videos because at the end of the day, why read something when you can watch it? This is particularly beneficial when trying to show off one of your products on your e-commerce website.

Storytelling

This is a trend that seems to be growing year on year, and in 2019 we can really expect to see it reach its peak. User interactivity and animation have allowed storytelling to be taken to an entirely new level. So, how does it work? It’s quite simple. The idea is that as a user scrolls down your blog page, the page morphs along the way to tell a story. This visual concept is being embraced by a lot of the best companies. It offers an easy, effective and enjoyable way of explaining a procedure or what your business is all about. It’s definitely a lot more exciting than reading a block of text.

Flat design

Flat design is definitely going to be embraced throughout 2019. This all began with Apple making the move away from gradients and drop shadows to provide customers with a completely flat design. More and more sites are embracing this now. It looks cleaner, neater and many will agree that it is more visually appealing. Moreover, if Apple has set a trend, you can guarantee there will be plenty of followers.

So there you have it – some of the top trends to embrace throughout the coming year. From flat design to storytelling, there are some exciting changes happening in the industry. And, as always, you have to be ready to adapt to them.  Nonetheless, remember, you should never just implement a trend for the sake of it. Think carefully about what it is going to offer your client’s website.

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Amazon Reports Record-Breaking Holiday Season

Amazon today announced a record-breaking holiday season thanks to its customers all around the world, with more items ordered worldwide than ever before. Amazon customers shopped at record levels from a wide selection of products across every department, discovering top holiday gifts and trending products offered at deep discounts and low prices. Some of the best-selling products this season included, all-new Echo Dot, L.O.L. Surprise! Glam Glitter Series Doll, fashion items from Carhartt, and Bose QuietComfort Wireless Headphones, among others.

Prime membership continued to grow this holiday season, with tens of millions of people starting Prime free trials or paid memberships, to benefit from FREE Same-Day, One-Day or Two-Day shipping, in addition to FREE two-hour delivery with Prime Now, and exclusive shopping and entertainment benefits. Prime members enjoyed shopping a wide selection of products with fast and free shipping throughout the season – in fact, this holiday millions of unique items in the U.S. shipped with Prime FREE Same-Day, Prime FREE One-Day or FREE two-hour delivery with Prime Now.

“This season was our best yet, and we look forward to continuing to bring our customers what they want, in ways most convenient for them in 2019. We are thrilled that in the U.S. alone, more than one billion items shipped for free this holiday with Prime,” said Jeff Wilke, CEO Worldwide Consumer. “Thank you to our employees all around the world who are committed to bringing our customers the widest selection of products with low prices and fast and free delivery options throughout the holidays and all year long.”

Amazon Devices & Alexa

  • Customers purchased millions more Amazon Devices this holiday season compared to last year – the best-selling Amazon Devices this holiday included all-new Echo Dot, Fire TV Stick 4K with all-new Alexa Voice Remote, and Echo.
  • It was a record holiday season for Amazon’s Kids Edition devices; customers purchased more Echo Dot Kids Edition and Fire Kids Edition tablets than ever before.
  • Customers purchased millions of Amazon Fire TV, Fire Tablet, and Kindle products this holiday season.
  • Ring and Blink sold more devices this holiday season than ever before, as more and more customers are keeping their homes safe.
  • Customers made their homes even smarter this year with a record number of smart home devices sold on Amazon.com; best-selling smart home devices included Amazon Smart Plug, Ring Video Doorbell 2, TP-Link Kasa Smart Plug Mini Outlet, and the iRobot Roomba 690.
  • Customers used Alexa to listen to hundreds of millions more hours of music this holiday season compared to last holiday season, and on even more services – including Amazon Music, Spotify, Tidal, and Apple Music, among others.
  • Customers asked Alexa to turn on their holiday lights tens of millions of times this holiday season, with the number one request being “Alexa, turn on the Christmas tree.”
  • Alexa delivered 8x as many reminders this holiday season compared to last.
  • Alexa set more than one hundred million timers this holiday season.
  • Customers requested nearly 3x as many recipes this holiday season compared to last and asked Alexa for cooking-related advice twice as much.
  • Alexa helped mix hundreds of thousands of cocktails this holiday season – with eggnog and Moscow Mule being the most requested drinks.
  • From carolers to delivery drivers and holiday guests, customers received millions of doorbell and motion announcements via Alexa this holiday season.
  • Customers were into the festive spirit with Alexa Skill Blueprints – popular Blueprints this holiday season was The Holiday Story, Santa’s Letter, and the Hallmark Holiday Greeting.
  • The number one holiday song that customers requested this holiday season was “All I Want for Christmas is You” by Mariah Carey.
  • This holiday season, customers listened to more than one million holiday stories from Amazon Storytime on Alexa – the most popular holiday story was Rapping Paper.
  • Customers around the world asked Alexa how many days or sleep until Christmas this holiday season – customers in the United Kingdom were the most excited, asking twice as much as customers in any other country.
  • Customers used Alexa nearly twice as much on Fire TV devices this holiday season compared to the same time period last year.

Amazon Best-Sellers and Seasonal Trends

Toys

  • The best-selling toys in the U.S. and worldwide included the L.O.L. Surprise! Glam Glitter Series Doll with 7 Surprises, Nerf N-Strike Elite Strongarm Blaster, Melissa & Doug Scratch Art Rainbow Mini Notes with Wooden Stylus, Crayola Inspiration Art Case, and LEGO Creator Mighty Dinosaurs Toy.

Electronics

  • The best-selling electronics this holiday season included Bose QuietComfort 35 (Series II) Wireless Headphones, the Samsung Flat 65″ 4K UHD 8 Series Smart LED TV, Apple iPad (Wi-Fi, 32GB) in Space Gray, Wemo Mini Smart Plug, Blue Yeti USB Microphone in Blackout, Wyze Cam 1080p HD Indoor Wireless Smart Home Camera, and HP Sprocket Photo Paper.

Amazon Brands

  • Some of the best-selling products from Amazon brands in the U.S. included Amazon Essentials Men’s Long-Sleeve Plaid Flannel Shirts, Goodthreads Men’s Short-Sleeve Crewneck Cotton T-Shirts, Daily Ritual Women’s Skinny Stretch Jeggings, the Stone & Beam Ceramic Geometric Table Lamp, Pinzon Faux Fur Throw Blankets, AmazonBasics Multipurpose Scissors, Amazon Elements Baby Wipes, Presto! Toilet Paper, and Solimo Dark Roast Coffee K-Cup Pods.

 Amazon Fashion

  • One of the most popular brands sold on Amazon during the holiday season was Carhartt, with over one million of its items ordered.
  • Some of the most popular brands bought with Prime Wardrobe during the holiday season were Amazon Essentials, Daily Ritual, and Goodthreads, in addition to Calvin Klein, Champion, and UGG.
  • As a top trend, athleisure was a holiday gifting favorite this season with a wide assortment available on Amazon from customer-loved brands including Champion, Alo Yoga, Nike, adidas and Monrow.
  • Amazon Essentials and Simple Joys by Carter’s, along with adidas, Columbia, and Nike were some of the most selected fashion brands added to Amazon Wish Lists this holiday season.

Fast and Free Shipping & Delivery

  • Customers continued to enjoy FREE two-hour delivery with Prime Now throughout the season, and even up until the last minute – the last Prime Now delivery on Christmas Eve was made at 11:30 pm in Berkeley, CA and included LEGO Super Heroes Captain America Building Kit, a Hallmark card, Greek yogurt, and shampoo.
  • The five cities that had the most last-minute Prime Now deliveries on Christmas Eve were San Francisco, Austin, Miami, Dallas-Fort Worth and Springfield, VA.
  • This holiday season, millions of unique items in the U.S. shipped with Prime FREE Same-Day, Prime FREE One-Day or FREE two-hour delivery with Prime Now.
  • In the U.S., more than one billion items shipped for free this holiday with Prime.

More Ways to Shop

Prime

  • Prime membership continued to grow this holiday – tens of millions of people worldwide started Prime free trials or began paid memberships, to benefit from FREE Same-Day, One-Day or Two-Day shipping, in addition to FREE two-hour delivery with Prime Now.

Alexa Shopping

  • Customers use of Alexa for shopping more than tripled this year compared to last year.

Amazon.com in Spanish 

  • Customers who made Spanish their language of choice when shopping on Amazon.com this holiday season more than doubled compared to last year, with millions of customers shopping on Amazon.com in Spanish.

Small and Medium-Sized Businesses

  • Small and medium-sized businesses had their best holiday season ever in our stores, with items sold growing at a faster rate than retail.
  • More than 50 percent of items sold in our stores this holiday season came from small and medium-sized businesses.

Amazon Physical Stores

  • Customers enjoyed shopping at our physical stores, including Amazon Books, the brand new Amazon 4-star locations, Amazon Go, and Whole Foods Market to find hot holiday products and edible favorites.
  • The best-selling items at Amazon 4-star this holiday season included Amazon Smart Plug, all-new Echo Dot, Becoming by Michelle Obama, L.O.L. Surprise! Under Wraps Doll Series toys, and the DASH Rapid Egg Cooker.
  • The best-selling items at Amazon Books this holiday season included Becoming by Michelle Obama, Diary of a Wimpy Kid #13: Meltdown by Jeff Kinney, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari, Kindle Paperwhite, all-new Echo Dot, and the L.O.L. Surprise! Bling Series toys.
  • The best-selling product at Amazon Go this holiday season was Amazon Go Theo Dark Chocolate Bar, Cacao with Sea Salt, and the best-selling freshly prepared food was the chicken bahn mi sandwich.
  • Some of the most popular holiday goodies at Whole Foods Market were California Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon wines, Parmigiano Reggiano cheese, brown butter chocolate chip cookies, and 365 Everyday Value traditional eggnog.
  • Prime members saved tens of millions of dollars this holiday season from Prime member deals at Whole Foods Market.
  • The best-selling Prime member deal at Whole Foods Market this holiday was turkeys.
  • Customers opted to eat healthy between holiday feasts – the best-selling items for Prime Now pick up at Whole Foods Market were organic honeycrisp apples, boneless/skinless chicken breasts, and Atlantic farm-raised salmon filets.
  • The fastest grocery delivery this holiday season took place in St. Paul, Minnesota and was delivered in 12 minutes and 19 seconds, and contained La Croix Sparkling Water and Zevia soda.
  • Cities that opted for convenience and had the most grocery delivery via Prime Now and Whole Foods Market were Boston, Hoboken, NJ, and San Francisco.

 Community Engagement

  • This holiday season, Amazon unveiled an easy way for customers to donate a toy to a child in need via Alexa. Since its launch, thousands of customers have donated a toy to Toys for Tots with Alexa, and Amazon has matched each donation toy for toy, delivering smiles to thousands of deserving children.
  • Amazon Future Engineer launched in November, and aims to inspire more than 10 million kids each year to explore computer science, help over 100,000 underprivileged young people in over 2,000 high schools in lower-income communities take introductory or Advanced Placement (AP) courses in computer science, and provide 100 students from underrepresented communities with four-year $10,000 scholarships as well as guaranteed internships to gain work experience.
  • Amazon enjoyed #DeliveringSmiles this holiday season making more than $1 million in donations across the country to various organizations supporting homeless children and families during the month of December.

 

Blogging Business: Rachel Parcell From Pink Peonies Featured on Forbes #Entrepreneurship

Rachel Parcell is the owner of Pink Peonies fashion blog and clothing brand designer.  Recently, she was featured on Forbes in the article:  How The 26-Year-Old Founder Of Pink Peonies Turned Her Blog Into A Million-Dollar Business.

This is a must-read article for bloggers and business women! Rachel states, “The biggest misconception about bloggers is that they’re materialistic and they have the easiest job in the world. Being a blogger is a 24/7 job that is extremely hard and takes so much more time and dedication than anyone realizes. A blogger—especially one in the early phases of starting a blog—has to wear so many hats: creative director, stylist, photographer, model, writer, editor, marketer, and the list goes on. The women who have turned a space on the Internet into a full-fledged business are brilliant, hard-working businesswomen who don’t get enough credit.”

According to Forbes, she continues to provide business advice saying, “Be creative, work hard, stay positive, never give up and be willing to take risks!”

Read more about the article here:  How The 26-Year-Old Founder Of Pink Peonies Turned Her Blog Into A Million-Dollar Business.

If you like this post, click here:  Use These Tips From 6 Successful Bloggers to Blog Your Way to Riches

Create Perfect Eyebrows with 4ever Magic Cosmetics Double Shade Eyebrow Gels

It’s no secret that I am obsessed with eyebrows.  In my opinion, they frame the face regardless of whether you have on makeup or not.

Having great brows is the one beauty treatment that can give an instant facelift without the surgery!

I had the opportunity to review 4ever Magic Cosmetics Double Shade Eyebrow Gels   Honestly, I could not wait to review the product because  I have naturally thin eyebrows.

The beauty secret to having thicker brows is using the shading technique.  I learned this tip many years ago after over-waxing the hairs.  Using a product like 4 ever Magic Cosmetics Double Shade Eyebrow Gel helped me create natural-looking bold eyebrows.

The product is also smudge-free and lasts for hours after make-up application.  To learn more about this brow gel read below:

4ever Magic’s flagship brow formula and styling tool make bad eyebrows a thing of the past! Here are some of the magical benefits:

  • Available in 4 Double Shade Products

  • Natural Brow Look

  • Smudge-free, long-lasting

  • Water Resistance

  • Enriched with Castor Oil

  • High Pigment

  • Made in the USA

  • Certified Cruelty-Free and Vegan

Click to create Sexy Brows:  3 Easy Steps

Using Technology To Promote Your Blog: 3 Easy Marketing Tips

Technology continues to creep up on us, growing faster than anyone could have predicted just a few short years ago. One of these ways is in the field of marketing. And if you’re a blogger, short of getting yourself a marketing qualification or doing online MBA programs no GMAT, it would be almost impossible to know how to do all of the things that you need to do in order to promote yourself. Well, here are some ideas on how to get your name out there using technology as your voice, in particular, social media.

There are ways of growing to a million people in a year by using Pinterest, for example, but you need to know where to start. When you say social media, you are actually talking about a big thing. There are so many different types of networks offering a variety of options. So much so that knowing where to start can be a lot harder to judge than you might first expect. Well, let’s break down the main players and what they have to offer.

  1. Facebook

Facebook is the logical place to start. It has the most users of all of the social media companies and is continuing to grow by buying other companies and integrating their service into the Facebook way of networking. As a blog, you should create your own Facebook page and use it as a platform to interact with your readers. Word of mouth has always been one of the best ways to market a brand, and Facebook is where the most amounts of mouth and eyes are online. One of the brands that Facebook bought is Instagram, a photo-sharing network, which you will want to explore as well.

  1. Twitter

Sometimes considered a rival to Facebook, but not likely to ever overtake it, is Twitter. This social media website prides itself on allowing its users to take part in a wider conversation in a concise way. It encourages people to speak to each other on a range of topics and you, as a blogger, should be getting in on that action. Keep an eye on popular hashtags and add your voice to the topic so that you are getting noticed. Your content on Twitter matters, the more interesting and engaging it is, the more retweets you will get leading to interactions and gaining followers.

  1. YouTube

Bloggers weren’t around long before the Vlogger started to take over. These days video content is considered by some to be as important as the written word. YouTube is a good place for you to get your face out there. You should create content which links viewers to your blog such as reviews of products, movies or advice. One of the keys with all of the social media is creating synergy between your accounts. Link one to the other and create a spider’s web for your brand in order to catch as many readers as possible.

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Style + Life + Fashion Men’s Gift Guide 2018: Amazon Echo Input, Beard Care Kit, Fitness Activity Tracker and More

The holiday gift guide for men is finally here!  This guide (or list) is for the woman with a special gentleman who’s either sporty or technology driven.

Shopping for men can be questionable because they’re such diverse creatures.  Some adore growing out their beard while others are inspired by rock climbing!  Either way, we want them to feel valued during the holiday season.

With that being said, take a look at the gift guide below.  Last-minute shoppers will find a variety of items from Amazon that should arrive by Christmas morning.

Men’s Gift Guide 2018