what the F is birchbox?

anyone who has read the weekend pickthrough in the last few months knows that i have an undeniable crush on the hairpin.  what can i say, it’s a sassy online lady magazine that boasts such hardhitting articles as “how to make a doll into a wine glass in 23 quick steps“, and “9 things to name your oregon trail family“.  it’s true love.

well, a few weeks ago, i stumbled across this fine piece of journalism regarding a beauty sample subscription service called birchbox. you give them $10 a month, and they send you a very sexy (and i mean that packing is CRAZY FINE) box of hand picked samples designed to give you a big giant beauty boner.

in my package, i received the following:

juice beauty- green apple peel
archipelago- pomegranate soap
kerastase- reconstructive shampoo & a packet of something called “topseal” that i don’t entirely understand
ahava- mineral body lotion
jouer- tinted lip enhancer (i think it makes them puffy & glossy)

theoretically, you’re supposed to love the samples so much, that you go onto the birchbox website, and buy full sized versions of the products. and here is where i think we will part ways.

i’m not a fancy beauty product lady. there are 1,000,001 things that i feel like spending $50 dollars on, and fancy lip gloss and lotion are not included in that number. sure, $10 for samples of all the fancy stuff is perfect for me, so i can play without the financial impact.  but i’m never going to spend $25 on anything with the word “plumper” in the title, i’m just not.

selfishly however, i want their endeavor to succeed because i think it’s cool and i want more samples. therefore, if you are a beauty junkie, this is a really fun way to test drive all the newest smelly hair stuff technology before you buy. plus, the stunning little box you get in the mail makes it feel like motherfucking xmas.

resolved.

i was lucky enough to come into a bit of an xmas windfall this year. nothing earth shattering (most of it went to bills and to my saving’s account), BUT i decided to give myself a small allowance to spend on whatever i wanted. DANGEROUS. it could have been anything, or everything… i have a bad habit of burning through cash without really paying attention to where it goes, or really caring too much when it’s gone. i’m all like “oh, that’s was fun”, instead of feeling the intense sense of guilt and shame that keeps most people from getting in financial trouble.

the last year has overall been a good one for my financial evolution. this was the first year in over a decade that i didn’t use my credit cards even once. i also managed to have a savings account with actual money in it for more than 15 minutes. on the other hand, i didn’t pay off my credit cards as much as i would have liked, i didn’t manage to keep the majority of the money in my savings account, and i still didn’t start an HSA.

so for 2011, i have only one resolution. it isn’t to save more, or spend less, pay off the credit cards, or even open an HSA… (although all of those things are certainly worth keeping in mind). my resolution this year is just to PAY ATTENTION. wherever my money travels should take me this year, i would like to be watchful and be thoughtful about every dollar i spend. i’m thinking about leaving my debit card at home, giving myself a cash allowance, being more careful about monitoring my mint account… but it doesn’t really matter what i do, as long as i’m being vigilant.

i decided to lube up my resolution and get started a little early with the aforementioned windfalll. instead of just throwing the money into my checking account and going apeshit on whatever i happened to find first, i sat down and really thought about things that i wanted, needed, and would generally be too cheap or too broke to afford the rest of the year. here is what i came up with: