For three decades, I did not care about my nails. As a result, they were usually more than a little scruffy: peeling, dry, chipped, and filed (or, more accurately, broken) to different lengths.

My desire to have pretty nails coincided almost to the day with giving birth; all of a sudden, I had to let go of any reasonable certainty that I would be able to leave the house and interact with other human beings while looking anything close to presentable, and something about having polished, manicured, non-chipped nails made me feel better about that.

Like I had something, even a small thing like my fingernails, under control. "See?! I may look like I haven't slept in three weeks and I may or may not be wearing a shirt, but damn, my 'I'm Not Really A Waitress' polish looks hot."

I think we've established (via copious amounts of snow-related whining over the past two months) that I do not like the winter. But one thing that’s less-than-terrible about the season of freezing cold is the fact that my hair tends to look pretty decent. See, I have majorly humidity-reactive hair: the kind of hair that, when it encounters a single molecule of airborne moisture, twists itself into shapes so bizarre that it sometimes seems that my only recourse is to cover the whole mess up with a hat.

Humidity is not my friend.

But the fact that I’ve spent many, many a summer in humid New York City (and now humid Westchester) means that I’ve developed a few tricks to help offset all this frizz, and since some of you may be headed off to Spring Break in warm (and humid) areas in the weeks to come, I thought I’d share.

You know how when you’re a little kid and visit the dentist, they always give you the option of a few “weird” toothpaste flavors? Bubble gum, chocolate, strawberry, that kind of thing? I always chose mint. Which I guess is kind of weird for a kid, but I’ve always had a major thing about needing my toothpaste to taste fresh, as opposed to, say…fruity.

So when Crest sent over the three brand-new (and very out-of-the-box) toothpaste flavors in the Crest Be line to try, I was skeptical. Take Mint Chocolate Trek, for example: it’s vaguely evocative of a cup of hot chocolate. This does not sound like something I would like…and yet I do. It’s still minty, and still tastes like “toothpaste”…just a little bit more delicious.

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I'm very much a default-mode person when it comes to my everyday makeup: I go for the same brushes, the same shadow colors, the same liner, the same gloss. Just because...it's easy, I suppose. I love playing with makeup, but I also usually have fifteen minutes to get out the door, so I generally just stick with what I know works.

A few days ago, though, I shot an extremely cool collaboration with a beauty brand I've been a major fan of for years (I'll share as soon as I'm allowed; so excited), and the looks we put together (not pictured here) were very out-of-the-box for me. And taking a moment to play reminded me: oh. I like experimenting with makeup.

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In this video: five easy looks for chilly days (most take about thirty seconds), and pretty much every hat in my wardrobe, from the (I think) rather fabulous to the completely ridiculous.