The Simple Half-up Crown | with Freckled Italian

Happy weekend friends:) I'm here with a special post for you guys today-a really simple and lovely hairstyle! Today's tutorial is extra special though because I'm featuring my beautiful and incredibly sweet blogger friend Megan from Freckled Italian!

I was so excited about getting together with Megan to shoot this hairstyle for you guys. We wanted to go with something beautiful and elegant but at the same time effortless and easy, and we love how it turned out! I get requests all the time for versatile tutorials for 'shorter' or more medium length hair, and you can see how easy it'd be to keep this one sleek and tidy for an evening, or tug out some flyaway's and add texture for a day at the beach!haha Okay getting on with the tutorial:

Tools & Supplies:

 // Straight teasing comb

 // 2 mini rubber bands 

 // Hairspray

Steps 1-3: Begin by combing your hair back with your fingers, and creating an imaginary parting down the middle of your head. Take a two-inch section from the top of the left side, and smooth it out into three separate sections. Begin your left lace-braid by only adding in hair from the left side into the braid, and not adding it to both sides as you would with a french braid.

Steps 4-6: Keep braiding around to the back, making sure to keep your hair smooth as you add more hair from the left into each rotation of the braid (but not from the right! :)). Once you're past the ear, stop adding more hair in and simply complete the braid, tying off at the end. Tug the hair out gently from both sides to create a fuller look, and repeat on the other side!

Steps 7-9: Now you're going to tease your crown for a little lift and volume by taking a two-inch section of hair from the top-middle of your head and tease the base of it gently with your comb. Repeat this with another section, and another if you wish, just be gently and never use force on your poor hair.haha Smooth it over and push the middle up a bit before pinning it in place, than criss-crossing the braids over the middle and pinning those in place as well! 

Once you've sprayed it down with a bit of hairspray, you can check it in the mirror and give yourself a little fist-pump before heading out the door.haha

Well that's it for today, and I hope you love this style! I'd love to hear your thoughts on this one in particular or any other comments or requests you may have, and also before you go don't forget to click the image to go check out Megan's blog and tell her hi from me!

Megan Flynn Peterson is the blogger behind Freckled Italian, a lifestyle blog that focuses on food, friendship, love, and the ins and outs of daily life. She lives with her husband in Charlotte, North Carolina where she reads, drinks coffee, and struggles to keep the house clean.

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All photo credit for this tutorial goes to the lovely www.annadelores.com - Emily's such a sweetheart, and her photos are stunning as you can see! xoxo

I hope you have a great rest of your week, and I'll see you back here soon!

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What We Wore // black and white default

Happy new week friends! The weather has been so nuts lately. I built a fire one day with frozen toes, and the next day I turned on the air conditioning in the car for the first time this year- which felt insane! Usually when the weather gets so sporadic it means we're right on the cusp of Spring though, so bring it on! haha

Today's post comes to you from one of those faa-reezing days as you can tell. Martin and I decided to get a babysitter and bundle up for a date in the city, and we ended up matching in our black and white and so decided to document:)

Wearing:
Emily:
Hat | Forever21
Scarf: Target (sold out, but love this one)
Jacket | Forever21 (my absolute favorite!)
Shirt | Target (sold out but very similar here and here!)
Pants | Banana Republic
Boots | Forever21 (sold out, but similar here, here and here)
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Martin:
Scarf | forever21
Jacket | INC International Concepts
Shirt | trademark brooklyn
Glasses | footlocker (similar)
Jeans | Levi's
Boots | Guess (sold out, but here and here both 60%off!)

Thanks so much for visiting today and I hope to see you back here soon for a fun week of goodies coming up!
Take care today,

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Bending The Rules with the HP X360

Hey guys! I'm really loving sharing these behind-the-scenes posts lately about how I manage to mix work/blogging effectively with regular life, with so many kiddos and so much going on. It's been great to answer so many of your frequently asked questions and share some of my favorite work tools at the same time, and today I'm teaming up with HP to share the Pavilion x360, and their partnership with Meghan Trainor with you!!

Since I've had the x360 I've used little else for work(and play), since the versatility of its 4 different modes has actually eliminated my need to drag 3 or more devices around with me. I love it so much!

In these photos you can see me using it in Laptop mode (mostly for lots of emailing and creating posts), Tent mode (great for skype calls or movies), Stand mode (which I especially love when I'm using recipes in the kitchen), and last but not least as a Tablet!! When you're using it as a tablet it obviously has a pop-up keyboard, but what I was most taken by is that that goes the other way in that it remains a touch-screen even in laptop mode which cuts so many corners while I'm working and saves me so much time!

As you can see from some of the photos, the weather here has been getting warmer off and on and we've been spending a lot of afternoons out in the sunshine! I've loved spreading out a blanket while the kids play on the swings and I can get comfy with my x360 in any position. We also use it for snuggly spontanious movie nights in any room of the house, and skype calls are so much more fun on the large screen.

I gotta tell you it's so empowering to have such an amazing device also be so completely versatile. So to celebrate the 4 different modes, I thought it'd be fun to share the 4 places that I'm really  looking forward to traveling to someday!

#1: Edinburgh, Scotland | I could probably get away with leaving out which part since I think I could probably see a lot inone visit, but Martin talks so highly of Edinburge and went to school at Sterling University, and he has so many beautiful photos and stories from all over it. I'd love to visit with the family one day!

#2: Venice, Italy | I'd really love to visit Rome and Florence as well, also Milan and Verona, but I think Italy is at the very top of my list and has been for some time! It just looks so dreamy and romantic, even if it is kinda smelly in certain places as some people have said. hahaha

#3: Barcelona, Spain | I'm not sure why it came about, but Martin and I have wanted to go to Barcelona together for a long time! It just looks like such a vibrant and amazing place for adventure and fun. I think it'd be fun to go with a big group as well!

#4: The Island of Bora Bora | I mean, I really don't have to write in why we want to go there do I? haha I just think that looks like the ultimate relaxing get-away right with how fast and full life has been lately. Sigh:)

Well that might seem like an funny list, but I'd love to hear if you live any of those places? If you've ever been? If any of them are on your list too? Or even just any other particular place that you want to visit and why? :):)

Anyway's thank you so much for reading! Actually to change topics really quick, I wanted to share that HP is going 'on tour' with Megan Trainor on her #thatbasstour and is documenting it with the help of fans! I think that's such a neat idea, and I'm a huge supporter of Megan and all the success she's having with her message. You can follow along behind-the-scenes on the All About That Tour look at key elements like choreography and hair and makeup, or there's the Fan Generated Documentary that HP is putting together with collected youtubers, viners, instagrammers, etc of each tour stop, so definitely go check that out!

Thank you guys so much for reading, and if you have any questions about my work or productivity-anything along those lines, feel free to ask anything you want:)
Take care today,

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This post was sponsored by HP. All opinions are my own. Thank you for supporting the companies that support The Freckled Fox!

Baby fever favorites

1. Lion towel   |   2. Age blocks   |   3. Pink cloud mobile   |   4. Flat bunny   |   5. Fair isle onesie   |   6. Teething ring   |   7. Moose beanie   |   8. Bird art print   |   9. Super soft chevron blanket   |   10. Play gym   |   11. Blue bird rattle   |   12. Soothing baby oil   |   13. Cloud leggings   |   14. Stuffed cat toy   |   15. Batman onesie

In the last month since I've felt so much better I've been working hard to get our house and routine back on track and organized, and it's been wonderful! I always go through a big nesting phase with my pregnancies where I want to sort everything and organize everything, so it's been great to able to do that with the whole house-not just the nursery.

In all our work though I've definitely spent too much time scrolling around pinterest for inspiration and baby goodies, and I've been so caught up in baby fever with all the fun little things, I hope you don't mind my sharing this little collection with you!

I'll probably ask this on my other social media channels, but if there are any favorite shops or companies you love and think I should check out, I'd love for you to share in the comments!
Take care today,

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Recipe Inspiration for Valentine's Weekend

Oh hi there! Happy Thursday:) I hope you're having a good week so far, and as excited for the weekend as I am! We don't have any special plans for Valentine's Day or anything, but holiday weekends are always special in one way or another:) One thing we will be doing this weekend is baking some tasty and festive treats, so I've put together a fun list of things from cakes and pastries to salad dressing and a green tea smoothie! See if any of these look good to you:)

1 | No Bake Mini Raspberry Cheesecakes

2 | Raspberry Blood Orange Cake

3 | Eggless Chocolate Oat Crepes

4 | Valentine Cake

5 | Creamy Raspberry Vinaigrette

6 | Cranberry and Vanilla Yogurt Scones

7 | Shortbread Raspberry Cheesecake Bars

8 | Strawberry Cream Cheese Pastries

9 | Pomegranate Chia Seed Pudding (Vegan and GF)

10 | Raspberry Green Tea Smoothie

I can't wait for the cooking to begin! I can't have a lot of these (or any of them) right now being on whole30, but I may make some adjustments so I can indulge a bit for the holiday. And if you've noticed a bunch of these have raspberries or strawberries in them, it may be because nothing is better to me than berries or citrus in desserts, especially with Spring and Summer coming! The weather here has been awesome lately (playing outside without coats, and even turning on the AC?!) and we all couldn't be happier or more excited about the warm months ahead.

Valentine's Day is just two days away! So please share any fun plans or ideas you have for the weekend, and I'll see you back here soon I hope! Take care,

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February Favorites | My Valentine's Wish list

Happy Wednesday peeps! I haven't had a wish list on here in ages, and so I figured love-week would be the perfect time to share one!  A lot of these have long been saved in various online shopping carts, and a few I'll probably never ever see on my door-step, but a girl can dream right?! Here are my February favorites:

1 | Michael Kors Runway Watch           2 | Apricot Pocket Long Sleeve Longline Coat            3 | So Kate Patent Leather Pump           4 | Julep Courtney Says I Do Too! 5pc Collection           5 | Madewell Transport Tote           6 | J. Crew Metallic Leather Pouch           7 | TooFaced Semi-Sweet Chocolate Bar Palette           8 | Centennial Stripe Passport Cover            9 | The Courtney Bib           10 | Show Me Lace Dress           11 | Tom Ford Lip Color in Alexander           12 | Nars VelvetLip Liner in Nihwatu           13 | ByredoGypsy Water Body Wash           14 | Heart of Gold Mug           15 | Floral Patterned Smoking Flats           16 | Peach Longline Woolen Coat           17 | Swizz Style Aroma Diffuser           18 | Vernon – Black laser-cut peep-toe heel           19 | KateSomerville Goat Milk Cream

This little collage makes my eyes sparkle a bit I confess.haha As you can see I'm really looking forward to Spring and am letting pastels and nudes greatly influence my wants for this month!:) Frankly I love a big bouquet of roses just as much as the next girl, but in retrospect I'd probably rather something from this list wrapped up on my pillow for Valentines day so I could get more use out of it.haha What type of V-day gift would be your ideal?

Thanks for visiting lovely! and please share if any of these items are on your wish list as well? Or maybe you already have one or two (or more?!) and would like to share what you think about it? I'd really appreciate it! Take care:)

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Valentine's Do-It-Yourself Decor Ideas

Martin and I don't usually make a big deal of Valentines day in particular, but we do love having a solo date-night if the opportunity arrises and usually get each other something small in honor of the occasion. Since the kids are older this year though, I thought it'd be fun to add some fun little decorations around the house this week, and I thought I'd share some of my findings with you guys!

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10

Some of those look super easy and fun don't you think? Like I said, we're not into Valentines day that much-not the big bombs of cliche pink-ness that hit stores in mid-December, but we do love a good excuse to be mushy and reminisce about falling in love.

We've also had fun using it as an excuse to do little acts of 'love' and kindness for others with the kids, and it's been good for all of us:) Last night we were talking about cupid with the girls and having fun laughing over a little chubby baby who made mommy and daddy fall in love. After that we all ran around shooting pretend arrows at each other for a while before putting them in bed.haha

Anyway enough ranbling, but I hope that you've been having a good love month so far if that's your thing, and I hope that this little collage gives you a little insporation for some simple ways of celebrating the rest of the week.

Take care today, and thanks so much for visiting!

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February Mix-tape

Hey guys:) I've been doing mix-tape posts here since I started it pretty much, which has been a really fun way to nod to the past while sharing some favorite songs and singers/ bands/groups, and also hearing your recommendations as well!

I don't think any of us are surprised that the mix for February  has a love theme to it, even so I do apologize to those that are in less than a lovey mood this month:( I'll have a really great mix for you next month I promise! Anyway's here are a few favorites of mine and Martin's (lots of variety) that always seem to inspire slow-dancing in the kitchen, and I hope that you enjoy playing them around your place during love week!

Now I'd love for you to share in the comments if you like any particular song or band, if I listed any of your old favorites or if you found a new one! Don't forget also that I really love to hear any songs you'd like to recommend to me! A lot of my favorites have been shared by you rad people so I really trust your judgement.haha

Thanks so much for visiting and for any feedback that you left, and I'll see you back here soon I hope!

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Birthday Giveaway Winners!

Happy Monday you guys! It's the start of love-week over here and today's post fits that theme perfectly! As the title eludes I'm sharing my birthday giveaway winners, but it doesn't just have one of the winners, it has all the winners!

I'm so super-charged with happiness and excitement, and hugely happy to finally be getting it to you guys! Before anything else let me just go ahead and list them all here (ahhhhh!!):

Congratulations to the winners of:
#1 - the XL ad space: Regina M.
#2: the Michael Kors jet set travel tote: Kynzie P.
#3: $150 Sephora gift card: Dana F.
#4: Collection of six woman-power reads: Sylvia K.
#5: Bluedio bluetooth headphones: Heather C.
#6: Any pair of hunter boots: Paulina K.
#7: $100 Anthropologie gift card: Leslie S.
#8: 12 Kate Spade New York office favorites: Heather H.
#9: Rock-stud high-heels triple giveaway: Jordyn M, Claire M, and Kati S!
#10: $75 Modcloth gift card: Charlie S.
#11: 1 year Amazon Prime membership: Sara D.

Thank you thank you so much to each and every one of you for your patience in waiting for the results of the raffles! I know it was frustrating to have to wait so long, but every day I kept thinking the issues would get sorted out and than there were more steps to sort through:( At one point there was a risk of losing all the entries entirely to several of the giveaways and it was so scary!!
There were just so many issues in the beginning even, and as you can see we didn't even get through all 14 of them because of more issues (the last three are still on their way! haha), but after over a week of emails and messaging and paper slips and drawings and so on, it's all sorted out and I feel so much relief and excitement.

SO! If you are one of these lucky people than you've already been emailed this morning using the email listed when you signed up (some of you are already in touch- thanks!!) so please check your emails and get back to me ASAP! If you think one of these ladies is you and there's an issue, please email me at Emily.thefreckledfox@gmail.com, and we'll get it sorted out and your prizes on their way!

I can't thank you guys enough for making my whole birthday month a big amazing ride, and for always being so dang sweet and supportive of me and my blog. I hope you have a really great week ahead and a fantastic Valentines this weekend!

P.S. If you feel like sharing, I'd love to know which of the giveaway's was your favorite so I can maybe do a repeat in the near future! xoxo

Photo via: 36th avenue

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Weekend Wrap-up

This Week: Martin and I have been working hard to get ahead, and it's been so nice to feel like we're not drowning in work anymore! We started having big planning/ calendering sessions on Sunday nights after the kiddies are asleep for the week ahead, mostly so we can coordinate our weeks and set goals, and then we can check up on each other throughout the day to see how our to-do lists are going. He usually gets loads more done in a day than I do, but it's all good- I have the kids to help me with my work so there's that! haha 

Ellie has been drawing the best pictures this week, I just want to frame them all! Sophie has been managing to get so much dirt in her hair we could start a mini garden, John seems to have developed this crazy appetite for cold cereal this week and can talk about nothing else, and Lydia has successfully unrolled exactly 5 rolls of toilet paper at different times and in different locations around the house.hahaha So yeah it's been a good one!

Weekly Snapshots: 

Weekly Snapshots via @thefreckledfox on Instagram 

To-do's and Goals for the Week:

- clean out the cars
- sell the old expedition
- drink my preggo tea every day!
- finish 'it starts with food'
- film more videos!
- take the kiddies swimming
- re-pot my cacti 
- keep up with instagram updates
- try eating meat again
- teach Ellie to braid
- work on Lydi's walking
- take a lush-bomb bath :):)
- do some yoga
- read to the kiddos every night
- break out the camera more
- plan the nursery!
- sort my nightstand once and for all

A Few Facts: 

• All I want for breakfast, lunch, and dinner lately is pan-fried zuchinni with salt and pepper. the end. 
• We haven't really had the chance to go the the theater lately, and there have been lots of movies that I really don't care to see now that they're out of theaters-is that funny?
• this little miss has been keeping me awake the last few nights, but I'm still too happy about so much activity from her that I can't be irritated.haha

Something To Take Away:

"Great Things Never Come From Comfort Zones" - via Pinterest

Thanks for stopping by, and as always I hope you have a great rest of your new week ahead!

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Getting back in the game | starting #whole30

Hey guys! Today's post is gonna be a quick update on something that I started this past Monday- my very first Whole30! I've been getting a bunch of questions since sharing on my social media that I was planning on starting, and so I just thought I'd update everyone on the why's and how's and how it's been going my first week!

Firstly I wanted to share the reason for starting in my sixth month of pregnancy! I've often brought up how sick I'd been up till a couple weeks ago, and during those pathetic months of toilet bonding the only things that I could seem to keep down were pretty much bread and diluted juice.haha As I started feeling better the rule was still 'the more processed the better' so my stomach could handle it. So as you can imagine after 4+ months of eating basically carbs and sugar, I was so ready to turn things around! Thinking about different cleanses and things I could try, my focus was basically I wanted to purge my body from carbs and sugar and I had been craving fruits and vegetables like crazy, so Whole30 seemed like the perfect option!

Moving onto the how, I really started blindly! I had planned on starting the first of February, but realizing that the 2nd was the first Monday of the month (and their weren't 30 days in Feb anyways) I decided to start this past Monday. The only thing I knew was that you're basically eating purely whole foods (pretty self explanatory) and avoiding anything with multiple ingredients or aka: processed foods! In my mind I think like, anything that's gone through a machine to be prepared or has any ingredients that I can't pronounce.haha

When I say starting blindly though I mean because I hadn't read the whole30 book, I hadn't looked it up online, I hadn't gone shopping or anything to stock up on fresh goodness, and I hadn't even really ask any questions or picked anyones brains, but I think that speaks to Melissa and Dallas (the creators) that it's a simple, natural, and easy to understand concept! It's really a lot like how I prepped for my competition (only much more flexible), and it's really how we like to live every day. Except maybe with more grains and some dairy added.haha

So, fast forward to today, I still haven't read the book -though I do have it now! I've printed off their shopping list which makes it super simple to see what you can eat, I've read through the rules so I better understand the fine print and what exactly to avoid, and my meals have been going great!

I'm still having to avoid all red meat and can only have chicken and fish sparingly, but I've basically had some of my favorite simple meals cooked my favorite ways with the the simplest of components, and I love it!

That's probably all I can and should share now.haha If you want see more of my meals and keep updated than I'd love for you to follow over on instagram! Also if you have any great recommendations for people or blogs/accounts you know of or like to follow for whole30 inspiration, or any tidbits of wisdom or advice you'd like to share would be awesome.

Thanks so much for reading today and have a great rest of your week!
Now get on over to Instagram to enter, and I hope to see you back here again tomorrow!

 

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