Hello everyone and welcome to the new blog! I am Amanda, the owner and Brow Artist behind Cara Mia Brows. I started this blog as a way to connect with my current and future clients, to share information, and to hopefully build a community of brow babes!.
It’s only right that my first post is a little introduction on getting to know me and why I became a Brow Artist. I hope you enjoy these blog posts and stay tuned for many posts to come! Please feel free to share your feedback or questions anytime in the comments.
All About Amanda
I grew up in the Washington, DC area and have lived in O'ahu, Hawai’i and San Diego, California before settling in Tampa, Florida. I have a Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration & Finance and a Master of Business Administration (MBA). I worked in finance for 15 years before becoming an entrepreneur and Brow Artist. I am married to an amazing USMC veteran, and together we have 2 spoiled dogs and way too many plants.
My biggest passion in life is traveling the world. I have been to over 30 countries and I am nowhere near done. I feel the most alive when I am exploring new places and experiencing other cultures. This is probably because I come from a very mixed heritage from all over the world. Some of my favorite places I’ve been include Paris, New Orleans, Puerto Rico, Bali, Mexico, Thailand, Barcelona, and South Korea. I previously ran a travel blog documenting my adventures and encouraging others to go see our beautiful planet.
Other hobbies and interests of mine include reading, dining, concerts, theatre, museums, beaches, yoga, photography, and crafting. Music is important to me and I listen to all genres from reggae, hip hop, R&B, Latin, blues, to my favorites: rock, metal and punk. A fun fact about me is that I love all things spooky, such as Halloween and horror movies. I’m also a huge animal lover and my favorite form of self care is reading books by the pool.
A Legacy of Brows
My journey as a Brow Artist began with my grandma, a Korean immigrant who had the best style and was simply fly as hell. Like many older Asian ladies, she had her brows tattooed on the old-school way and they turned blue over time. So she covered them up with makeup and was always done up fancy like a true diva.
My family and I laugh whenever we remember how she would always critique our makeup. She would constantly tell my sister that her brows were uneven, or tell me I needed to put on lipstick even if I’m just going to the grocery store. She taught us to always look our best.
My amazing grandma lived a very hard life and had from many health problems. Despite this, she was cheerful and sassy, always brightening everyone’s day. She played a huge part in raising me and in return, I became her caregiver in her final years. It was such a joy to share that time with her and hear all her wisdom. She passed in 2013 and there is not a single day where I do not miss her deeply.
A Lifelong Obsession
From a young age, I was obsessed with my brows. I began plucking them around 12 and really jacked them up. When I was 14, I went through a serious goth phase where I actually shaved my brows off completely to draw them on. They never really recovered from this!
I never had full brows, which I was extremely self-conscious about. So I would religiously fill them in with a pencil and constantly struggled to get them even. I remember how frustrating it was to get terrible waxes where I was never happy with the shape. I took a brow pencil everywhere and I mean everywhere. I never left the house without my pencil in my bag. I would quickly touch them up if I sweated them off at the beach or would never let anyone see me browless. My struggle was real.
I also remember that I was obsessed with other people’s brows too, which is something that many barely notice but was always a main focus for me. I was always convincing my girlfriends to fill in their brows or reshape them to be more flattering. I became a self-proclaimed brow guru without even realizing it.
A Destiny Fulfilled
In 2019 while living in San Diego, I found out about Ombre Powder Brows and was thrilled to finally get my brows microshaded. I could not believe how much these two brows on my face changed my life. They made my life so much easier by allowing me to wake up with my brows already done and shaped perfectly. Best of all, they made me feel so much more beautiful and confident. No more frustration with uneven brows or sparse brow hair. I finally achieved my dream brows!
I would always rave about the Powder Brow service to my friends, which led me to realize that I should become a Brow Artist myself. After my long history with brows, it just made sense! This combined so many things I love: brows, makeup, skincare, tattoos, and most of all- helping others. I decided to learn this new craft and get certified in 2020. Since I already had a career, I just did brows on the side to gain experience for an entire year. But it became impossible to deny that it set my soul on fire to give this great gift of brows to as many as I could. Eventually in 2021, I finally decided to take the leap to entrepreneurship and open my own brow studio.
In all honesty, being an entrepreneur is the most challenging and humbling role of my entire life. But I feel so blessed to do what I love every day and build this business that was once only my wildest dream. With every client, I see how powerful brows can be and how they transform women's lives. It is the most rewarding feeling ever to be able to make them feel beautiful and confident like my brows have done for me.
This is truly my passion and my purpose, and it’s all come full circle to do what I know my grandma would love to see me doing. Sometimes I feel her watching over me and I only wish she were here today so I could do her brows too.
