SMOONSTYLE

We are all in this pandemic together. Missing our family and friends can be a little bit heavy on the heart. Video calls, audio messages and photos were like a little bandaid, but after many weeks it doesn't have the same effect any more and sometimes it can make us feel more frustrated about the current situation, than that it would ease our minds.

Seeing your friends in real life, is still a day and night difference to the digital phone version. Even though there are no hugs, it can be incredibly uplifting to be in the same room together, all while keeping distance of course. Hence these funny photos with Jen and I being so far apart ;)

Jen came to visit me last week and brought some yummy cakes for us to enjoy. We sat on the balcony and talked how the virus has affected us as artists and how the future will look like. We all miss touring, being on stage, connecting with our fans in real life.

To blow off some steam, we had an innocent and fun nerf gun battle with Vincent. How I love collecting those arrows and finding them at the weirdest places in our house. They like to hide in our plants and hit me in the forehead! In the end I was left with a perfectly red circle on my forehead. Thank goodness that I wore those sexy blue shades that came with the Nerf gun collection kit....

Lately I have been experimenting more in my home studio with photography and music. Maybe there will be another live session with Oliver one day? I would love that!

We'll all have to be patient. We will get through this together, forever and ever!



xo
Simone



Ps. Jen has been doing these awesome one minute jam sessions with her friends on Instagram. You should definitely check it out: JEN MAJURA

Have you guys been spending more time in the kitchen lately like me?
Quarantine time has got me backing, cooking and eating more than ever before. I have enjoyed going to restaurants and bars in the past, but I have to be my own chef nowadays. Still hate to clean the kitchen, that hasn't changed ;)

A spice mix that I have been loving for so long is from the brand SPICEBAR. They are a german company that offers high quality organic spices and dried herbs. In my household we love Italian food and the 'Pizza & Pastazauberei' is a staple in my kitchen. I have posted an easy SUMMER PASTA recipe on the blog where I used these dried herbs. When I make grilled cheese sandwiches, I like to add this as well. There are so many ways how you can use this. I wholeheartedly recommend it to all food lovers out there.

There is a wide array of products that you can choose from. The 'Red Thai Curry' went into my sweet potato soup, and it was so good! The 'Rührei Deluxe' (Scrambled Eggs) always tops off my omelet and newly the 'Vanille Hafertraum' goes on top of my muesli, the Cinnamon on my waffles, I can go on for a while. If you guys want me to show you how to make your own granola, I can make a little video as well. Let me know in the comments ;)

SPICEBAR has created the discount code 'simonesimons' that will give you €5 of any order from €15.

https://www.spicebar.de

Happy cooking, baking and eating! Make sure that you don't have to do the cleaning afterwards ;)

Top to bottom: Orange, Coral, Passionate, Bright Fuchsia

The orange eye make up won the poll that I posted in my Instagram Stories. I felt like creating a fun colourful look to wear in my pyjamas. I have a lot of bright eyeshadow palettes which I have used before, so I wanted to see what other colourful treasures I have in my make up collection.

Fun fact is that I had to take my first try of this look off, because I went too far with orange glitter and didn't like the end result. You know when you are in that creative flow, but you take it too far? I did that. It happens sometimes.

This Neon Orange look features one of my oldest eyeshadow pigments in my collection. It could almost be considered vintage haha! It is a 'Bright Fuchsia' pigment from MAC Cosmetics. Back in the day the pigments came in bigger pots. I believe that this colour is discontinued. Sorry for that!

I pressed the pigment into an eyeshadow pan myself. This color is insane! I've worn it many times during the early Epica days. My future granddaughter can inherit this pigment, because it will never go empty.....









*PR sample

Concealer has to be one of my favourite beauty products. Dark circles, pigmentation marks, blemishes and any other skin discolouration can be corrected with a good concealer.

There are a myriad of concealers out there on the market and I have tried a lot of them. I am always on the hunt for a good concealer.  The Tarte 'Shape Tape Concealer' is one of my all time favourites, The only huge negative part is the horrible tube that loves to explode every once in a while. My whole everyday make up collection is stained by the Tarte Shape Tape concealer...

Estée Lauder,  Kat von D, MAC, Maybelline, Nars, L'Oréal and many more brands make great concealers. I have concealers from all these brands in my collection, but today I want to show you an awesome heavy duty concealer from CLINIQUE.

The new and super long name: 'Beyond Perfecting Super Concealer Camouflage + 24h Wear' from Clinique. I received a PR package with two shades to test and show to you. Clinique already has the 'Beyond Perfecting Foundation' which I love, and now there is a concealer/camouflage to match.

It comes in a little tube and weighs 8g. The price tag is €22,50 which is not cheap, but it is super concentrated and a little goes a long way. You can see that in my swatch photos.

Douglas.de currently sells it for €19,99

Oil free, waterproof and long-lasting but still very light weight. 

The two shades that I have are '04 Very Fair' and '18 Medium'. If I mix both shades, I get the perfect color for my skin tone. The concealer melts into the skin and is incredibly easy to apply. You can use your fingers or a brush.

My tip for you is to mix a little bit of concealer with your moisturiser and use it as a tinted moisturiser. Works really well.

What are your favourite textures for concealer? Do you like liquid concealers or creme concealers?
Do you have a holy grail concealer you keep on repurchasing?

04 Very Fair , 18 Medium

On the right I mixed both shades to match my skin tone.

I applied the concealer around my chin area. It sets to a matte finish.

While I was enjoying the sun on my balcony, accompanied by some magazines and a Radler, I came across a new perfume add that had a little sample on it. My curiosity is always very strong, even though I have found my perfect perfume long ago.

Perfume can be like a time machine. A warm blanket that takes you back and makes you relive memories or make people that you hold dear feel close.

The new perfume from Hugo Boss 'ALIVE' made me go back in time as soon as I smelled it. Even though it is a new scent, it triggered a lot of memories that I have created with the lovely people that I got to know through all the amazing events that I attended with L'Oréal.

On Perfume Master you can check out the notes that are inside 'ALIVE' . Vincent loves it too. Every time I would open the magazine, he would ask me to let him smell the perfume.

We all know that this year is looking rather gloomy when it comes to concerts and events in general.
I treasure all the incredible memories and the people that are enclosed in those memories. They will keep me going during this challenging times.

We all live in a fast-paced world and now we have all been forced to slow down. Time to reflect and be thankful for what we have and have achieved in life so far. Take pleasure in the little things. Try to take it one day at a time and most of all be thankful to be alive. Better times will come. We just need to be patient.

What are the things you value most at this moment? I am curious, let me know in the comments!

If you are a fan of pasta and garlic, you are going to love this!
This summer pasta is super easy to make. This is a fool proof recipe, I promise!
It is a mixture between a caprese salad and bruschetta, but then with pasta.

What you need is your favourite pasta. I like to take tagliatelle for this, but you can use any pasta you like. Depending on the amount of mouths you have to feed (mine are three), you can up the ingredients.






When you are ready to have dinner, cook your choice of pasta.
Once the pasta is finished, rinse well and add to the sauce. At this point I add the mini mozzarella balls. They become nice and soft. A little warning, you might smell very strongly of garlic. You have to make sure the whole family eats it haha! Vincent doesn't like uncooked tomatoes nor mozzerella balls. He just eats the pasta and then I add some tomato sauce to it.

Banana Bread for us is not a quarantine food, but something we enjoy all year around. It is the perfect way to use those over ripe bananas that are not looking to tasty anymore. You can also use them in a smoothie or chop them up and freeze them. Great to make nice cream as well. Today they are going to be used for Banana Bread. Yummy!

The first banana bread recipe that I posted on my blog is over 6 years ago. I have tried different versions of this classic and I must say that I found the perfect recipe that I altered a bit to my liking and also to what I have in my pantry. These days you have to freestyle a bit, because flour is hard to come by.
If you can't find whole wheat flour, you can also process oats in a blender. Works well and is super healthy and delicious.

The recipe that I used is from Cookie and Kate. I just love eating banana bread for breakfast. To completely honest to you, it is actually like a breakfast starter or a first breakfast. We are a family of Hobbits and love to have a second breakfast.

The only things that I changed were the amount of honey (Vincent and I don't like honey) and I added a quarter cup of yoghurt. Things that I have been enjoying lately is filming baking videos on Instagram.
I grabbed my tripod and camera and filmed this recipe for you:

Bananananana Bread


What is your favourite Banana Bread recipe?

All good things come in threes. If they are three minis it is even better and cuter! I am a sucker for miniature make up. I often end up not using them because I just want to look at them. I know, it is silly!

These cuties were my birthday present that I got for myself. Before our show in New York, I paid a quick visit to the local Sephora. I had my eyes on the Pat McGrath Matte Trance lipsticks for a while and wanted to see them in real life before purchasing them. I swatched all the lipsticks and eyeshadows that caught my eye and decided to get the mini trio, because I found it was the best bang for my buck so to speak. The chances that I empty a red lipsticks are close to zero, so I best get miniatures. One lipstick  costs around €41,00. This set was around $30 if I remember it correctly.

Three gorgeous red shades that instantly brighten my face and make Oliver run away really fast. He is not a fan of red lipstick, but I am. That is why I will continue to wear it haha.

Super comfortable on the lips, great pigmentation, long lasting and scent free. I prefer my lipsticks to be scent free, because I am very sensitive to smell.

Which color is your favourite? Do you own any Pat McGrath make up products?


Aren't these the prettiest lipsticks ever?

Always good to check the ingredients.

Obsessed!, Elson, Full Panic

From top to bottom: Obsessed!, Elson, Full Panic

The world of make up has no rules. You can create whatever look you want to wear. I love make up for many reasons. The first is to enhance your natural features and to make you feel and look like the best version of yourself.
Secondly it is a creative outlet for me. It always has been. I love to play with make up, it has been a part of my job ever since I became a singer. I enjoy the process of applying make up, to be in my own world right before a show starts. You could say it is some sort of ritual for me.

During our quarantine I decided to declutter all the things that I own. No more excuses. In between tours I just threw my make up in my drawers and things just kept piling up. There was no organisation what so ever. To start my decluttering project with my make up collection was quite the challenge, but it felt great once I was (almost) done. I still need to put the dots on the i's so to speak ;)

As I was decluttering, I found some real gems that I wanted to create looks with. I also found dried up liquid lipsticks, that went straight to the bin haha! Like a true Marie Kondo, I gathered all my empty boxes and started to use them to store my make up in a more organised way. In the past I would have just thrown those boxes away, or use them as packaging for whenever I needed to send out a package.

Have you guys started decluttering yet? Do you also find it soothing?









*Pr Sample