ThisNext Blog

Blame my Martha Stewart-like love for organization, but I’m still frolicking through Top 10 Sources and their lists of top ten blogs, though most of the fashion and beauty blogs they pick I’ve already noted as some of my favorites.

Via Top 10’s top ten beauty blogs list, I came across DeLush, which I already love. But Top 10 shed light on a post I’d missed, DeLush’s product review of Model in a Bottle - with a product description from the manufacturer - “Start your day with confidence with a quick spray of Model in a Bottle® to lock in that perfect makeup look without touchups” - and then their own real life review - “a beneficial product if you worry about your makeup fading or wearing off during the day.” Sounds like a godsend, even if its “mist could make your eyes a little irritated if you open them before it dissipates.”

Other Top 10 beauty blogs include Product Girl, Koneko’s Beauty Diary, Beauty Addict, Lip Gloss & Laptops, Jack & Hill, Shake Your Beauty, the Beauty Newsletter, and Real Girl Beauty, which I previously blogged about loving for the same reason I dig DeLush and the rest of these beauty blogs - they all feature real product reviews by real people.

Which, besides being much more informative and entertaining than advertorial, is a much better sales pitch. Jolie in NYC has totally got me jonesing for some Benefit “Honey Snap Out of It!” scrub after she blogged about finding it in two of her friends’ bathrooms.

Top 10 Sources blogged about their top 10 handbag blogs, and picked just about every favorite of mine. Here’s why I’m with Top 10 on their top 10.

Even though they trash talk ridiculous designer furry bags I dig, reading The Bag Lady is like a chat with a girlfriend, same as the rest of Shiny Media’s fashion blogs.

The Purse Blog, which covers mostly celebrity arm candy and designer goodies that’s worth covering, A-list names aside.

Pursed Lips sings praises of a python Fendi. That’s it. No more to say, we’re best friends for life.

Chanel Amour is all love for Chanel handbags - they’ll get you past the quilted 2.55. Dig this purse pick, makes me go ooh la love.

Pursuing doesn’t lick the toes of Louis Vuitton.

The Bag Blog finds laptop bags that look like chic totes.

Brown 712 is straight to the point: here’s a gorgeous bag. Enjoy. Not too much talk.

In My Bag has a great eye, I actually looked at this vintage purse post a couple of times.

The Bag Snob offers Michael Kors motherly advice about letting assistants run wild with design ambitions.

I’ve not really a problem with the McFashion of the world, but it’s always fresh to see truly independent designers, as much for their aesthetic as knowing their moving, growing, supporting themselves financially.

When I wrote for Trunkt, it seemed they were some of the first to realize the appeal of independent designers as an alternative to mass marketed, everyone and their mother materialism, as an “alternative” and not simply “alternative.”

Blogs are getting better acknowledged as a pop culture force -

Dig this write up on fashion blog/media network Coutorture.net in fashion bible WWD.

Congrats, Coutorture!

Like math, fashion is a universal language.

Only it’s not boring.

And it’s open to interpretation.

And tons of people blog about it.

I’ve been having fun at Portguese fashion blog mini-saia and Spanish fashion blog Sobre moda. Though I’m the only person who grew up in Los Angeles who can’t speak a smidgen of Spanish and my three years of high school French learnt me nothing, little black dresses and photos of Elizabeth Hurley in a plurple gown with a thigh high slit cross any language barriers.

Me gusta.

I got an email from Anissa at I Adore Style, who also runs IndieShopping.com and FemminaStyle.com.

I’m skimming through her sites as I blog. I Adore Style covers pretty mainstream fashion - think Chanel shows and Clinique bronzers - while IndieShopping.com and FemminaStyle.com both pimp indie and vintage clothing. Browsing these two e-boutiques, I’m thinking how I love this shift from indie as an aesthetic to truly independent design and production, from “emerging designers” meaning less DIY hipster and more handcrafted hip.

Check these My Olivette crochet flower earrings, for instance. So quirky-chic, I smell a knock-off look-a-like pair at Anthropologie in fall.

The New Hampshire (a state near and dear to my heart) Fish and Game Department issued warnings about East Coast ticks this summer and possible trail closures due to heavy rains, says Maine Outdoors Today.

But even those who aren’t lucky enough to live in the tick-ridden, washed-out Northeast can benefit from their list of 10 things to bring on every hike: map, compass, warm clothing, extra food/water, flashlight or headlamp, matches/firestarters, first aid kit/repair kit, whistle, rain/wind gear and a pocket knife.

All items could fit in a small, pack, which is a lot lighter than dragging your hiking buddy out of the backcountry after confronting dehydration, hypothermia, bonking, and the like!

Steve from Arkansas is the go-to guy on the arcane but fascinating topic of shed antler hunting: ShedAntler.net.  For the uninitiated, “shed antler hunting” is not a mission to find antlers for one’s shed, although a nice rack does look fetching above a barn door. Rather, it’s the hobby/art of finding antlers shed by elk, deer and other antlered creatures.

Found shed antlers can be used for indoor decoration (á là the chandeliers that are now ubiquitous in Rockies ski lodges) or outdoors (the best example of which is Jackson Hole’s four antler arches in its town square… each weighting four tons!

Think it’ll be easy to get your hands on a nice set of 5-pointers? Think again: Even those who live in the shed-antler Mecca that is Jackson, Wyoming, were willing to bid on elk antlers at their annual Elk Antler Auction hosted by the Boy Scouts each May. The Boy Scouts sold enough shed antlers to raise $76,000, most of which will benefit the National Elk Refuge.

Shoes. Celebrity.

Period.

I like a lady with focus, and Shoebunny’s no bunny about fashion blogging. She’s straight to the point: here’s J Simp La Lopez in expensive hooker high heels (that I’m now desperately craving). Here’s where you can buy them. Here’s Sienna Kate Moss Miller in some incredible Alexander McQueen gladiator sandals. Available here.

Sugar coated in efficiency, finding out what Chloe flats Mischa Nicole Richie Barton is rocking never tasted so good.

I love my Nike Triax. Although it is just the regular, non-heart-rate monitor version, it has been both an invaluable training aid and it is just an awesome watch. It UI is great, it is reliable, easy to use, well-designed, has a loud enough alarm (some advanced multifunction sports watches just have totally lame alarms, especially, it seems, Suunto’s).

But my Triax is going on nearly 3 years old and the band is starting to come apart after much wear and tear. So it will be time for me to get a new one soon. This time, I am thinking I would go for the Triax Elite w/the heart-rate monitor. I will probably buy one in the next month or so.

Stephen Zepeda over at IronGambit who I think is training for an IronMan just got the Nike Triax C8 HR Monitor. I hope he updates his blog to let people know how he likes it. He seems pretty hardcore since he tracks his training/performance w/bikejournal and coolruning. If you are a Mac user like me and want to get the Triax software to work w/OSX, check out Jim Charanis’ helpful tips on getting the Triax and the Mac to play nice w/each other. His tips are for Tiger but might work for later versions as well.

I am reminded how is often said that hunters are the post dedicated envrionmentalists when I read the Heartland Outdoorsman blog’s member journal: Moose Droppings.

“Thousands of snow geese take flight over the refuge in Washington County NC”

Moose Droppings says: “As one who is very pro military it is hard for me to oppose them but the plans for outlying landing field (OLF) in Washington and Beaufort Counties makes absolutely no sense to me. If you’re not familiar with the area it is vital area for migratory birds as well as other wildlife.”

Great job of informing your community about an important event. I know North Carolina wildlife advocates have won many battles in the recent past. (The loggerhead turtles come to mind.) Let’s hope this field will be another.

I know podcast killed the photo blog star, but I love all the street fashion photo blogs that spawning faster than bunnies.

Style Bubble is London girl Susy blogging about fashion and occasionally sharing an outfit.

Style Bytes is student Agathe sharing budget-conscious chic, including her own oft H&M laced outfits.

And The Sartorialist is the bible of street fashion blogs. Long on images of New Yorkers (Upper East Side yuppies to Williamsburg scenesters), limited on talk, The Sartorialist knows why street fashion matters. As he says in an interview with menswear bible DNR,

An important part is that it’s a fashion site that’s not bitchy. It’s about style, not about how expensive things are. One photo could be of someone wearing Kiton, the next photo can be of an old guy in a really old suit or a skater.

When Kurt Repanshek isn’t researching (read: hiking in national parks) or writing books like America’s National Parks for Dummies (one can only imagine the helpful advice he is able to share, like “Don’t light them on fire every August.”) he blogs about issues facing parklands and significant events therein on National Parks Traveler:

“Back in April I talked about an ambitious vision to create a green corridor from Yellowstone to the Yukon in a bid to ensure that wildlife populations along the route aren’t isolated by development. It’s a noble cause, one that some day I hope becomes reality. Well, today I’m happy to tell you that a group of Montanans has successfully banded together to, in a small way, help that cause by backing not only tough new regulations that will pertain to coalbed-methane development but also to prevent urban sprawl on the doorstep of Yellowstone National Park.”

National Parks Travler is a great resource for anyone wanting to track the goings on in the wilderness. Which is to say, if a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, it’ll probably make a sound on the National Parks Traveler blog.

Just because your backpack weighs less than a feather doesn’t mean your wallet has to be similarly stripped of all its heavy metal: Hikerdeals.com offers great deals to consumers seeking online gear bargains.

Some discounts are universal to a Web site and some are bargains on specific pieces of gear.

Stephanie over at Back in Skinny Jeans is right on about Larabars- they are the best tasting, all natural energy-bar on the market these days. 

I recently discovered them for myself and think they are awesome.  No sucrose, nothing artificial, provide lots of energy.  Excellent pre- or post-work-out.  Totally recommended.  I even let my kids eat them and I am very picky about what sorts of foods I let them nosh on (they are 4 and 2 and I want them to learn to like healthy foods which means, in my opinion, not feeding them crap that essentially overloads/desensitizes their tastebuds w/sugar and additives)

After I discovered Larabars, I poked around a bit more and found out the Health Ranger is also into them.  If the Health Ranger digs these things, you know they have to be good for you.  That guy is seriously dedicated to being super healthy and super-fit, both of which are admirable goals.

I wish more companies could figure out how to make great tasting but also super-healthy foods like Larabar.  Maybe America would be less fat and more active if we actually ate food that was good for us and made us want to go out and use our bodies instead of sitting on the couch like slugs.

If you believe that you eat first with your eyes, then you’ve got to see Jocelyn Chu’s gorgeous food and delicious photography at Kuidaore… She’s always exploring the latest greatest and the old faithful cookbooks alike (check out her review of Daniel Pignolet’s “French”) and bringing the recipes to life—each one photographed and styled beautifully. She’s no beginner, and is clearly as comfortable in the kitchen as behind the lens, but if you’re passionate about food and looking for inspiration or an addition to your kitchen library, she’s your girl!

I adore Real Girl Beauty blog. When I first clicked to it, link hopping, I thought I was checking a Real Girl Beauty site along the lines of Dove’s “Real Beauty” campaigns. And though I admire that campaign for its marketing brilliance and celebration of uniqueness, I absolutely have no problem watching Mischa Barton pimp me Neutrogena face wash, so I was pleasantly surprised to see that Real Girl Beauty isn’t so much about reconciling image issues as keeping credit card debt to a minimum.

Says Real Girl:

Who am I? I’m someone who must schedule my Sephora visits, lest I breeze inside and automatically be $100 poorer. I’m someone who uses 6 hair products from the time I step into the shower ‘til the time my hair is dry. I’m someone who will not go to sleep at night without slathering my face with antioxidants.

But more than her hyper pro-consumerism, I love Real Girl’s real recommendations: she blogs about products she uses, how she uses them, and why they work. Her blogged praises of Magiff manicure products don’t just include product images, but she shows you the before and after image of her own nails.

RealClimate is, by far, one of my most favorite blogs: they offer passionate but reasonable explanations on current developments in climate change. 



RC  focuses on educating intelligent lay-people on the subtleties/nuances of climate science.  However, like all blogs, they assume people want to join the ongoing conversation- so you just have to jump in mid-stream and figure out what’s going on. 

Although RC does a better job than most blogs of providing backgrounder info, blogs are really not well-suited to delivering primers on their subject matter.  And w/a subject as complex and politically charged as climate change, it is worth taking a step back to see the whole forest instead of just the branches of the trees that are the typical level of detail discussed in blog posts.  It helps gives needed context to what’s being discussed. 

So I was particularly pleased to see RC review 3 recent popular books on climate change.  It is super-helpful to have expert guidance in selecting what books/materials will provide a solid, scientifically valid (but not too wonkish) overview.  As a lay-person, I often find it hard  to know what is legit and what is not when reading about this important topic. 

Based on Gavin from RC’s review, I ordered Elizabeth Kolbert’s Field Notes from a Catastrophe. 

thx for the heads-up, Gavin.

Some of my favorite fashion blogs are by Shiny Media - they’re not so much about what’s in Vogue as what shoes, bags, dresses, etc. stylish Jane Does want to wear.

Every Wednesday The Bag Lady and Shoewawa, Shiny’s handbag blog and shoe dot-com, blog a product readers vote “yay” or “nay” on. Even though I’m a bit of a style nazi, I appreciate the democracy of it. But what I really dig is that they typically pick products that are “borderline” aesthetically. Reading readers’ comments, I’m reminded even the latest Jimmy Chouboutins or Marc-y Marc bags are open to interpretation.

All that said, check this Miu Miu number from today’s “Yay or Nay” at The Bag Lady - feel free to go get your vote on.

Dan’s Outside offers an intriguing collection of information interesting to though not directly related to outdoor enthusiasts, from discussions of emission standards to flood warnings in Yosemite to announcements of national parks cutbacks. Though the titular Dan Mitchell’s focus is Yosemite, anyone who is mindful of land-use and public-lands issues would enjoy what he’s covering.