In the midst of Fashion Month, a vacation, a birthday and what’s starting to feel like a blog explosion, I ran out of time to finish posting the series of Life With’s I worked on in LA this summer.

Next up is Molly Stern.

I’m tempted to call Molly “make-up artist to the stars,” but that doesn’t really cover it. Yes, she’s pretty much the only one who touches Reese Witherspoon’s face, but she’s also landed a gig for Cover Girl. She used to have her own clothing line, which sold in Barneys etc, she’s a mother of three and for lack of a less cheesy word, she’s one of the most inspirational women I’ve met - especially in this industry.

She got her start at the Shu Uemura store in her local mall, made fast friends with the girl who replaced her, Jillian Dempsey, moved to New York to find herself, moved back to LA when her mom set her up with the guy behind the counter at her favorite deli and only recently came to terms with working in beauty.

Click through for our meandering talk.

There’s been much buzz on the interwebs about Rihanna’s Italian Vogue couture shots by Steven Klein. The nudity! The bondage! The muzzle! While I generally think the pictures are all-around fabulous, I couldn’t help but focus on her practically opaque white lips in this particular shot.

I also just spotted a chalky pink version of this lip in the September issue of Russh. Instantly I had flashbacks to my middle school days of Revlon’s Silver City Pink, Zinc Pink, and Frosted Brownie. These three shades were must-wears for all of my friends, skin tone be damned.

Given that my skin is pale to the point of translucent at times, I don’t see how I could pull off either of these two examples. But what about you guys? Should we all start mixing a little white into our favorite matte shades this fall? Maybe I’ll give it a try with one of my darker hues and see how it goes.

What do you think? Can the editorial trend translate?

Steven Meisel made a puzzle.

The image, of Meghan Collison, is from his patterns shoot from Italian Vogue December 2007.

It’s limited edition - as in only 1,000 exist - and it comes in a box both signed and numbered by Meisel himself.

Considering he’s not the most willing photographer when it comes to publishing books and prints of his work, it’s a rare opportunity to own an image of his that you didn’t rip out of a magazine.

But, it’ll set you back $750.

So, unless you’re a die hard Meisel fan, or a crazy obsessed puzzle person or miraculously unaffected by the current state of the economy, we suggest making your own.

We don’t think Daisy Lowe means curvy.

We don’t think putting Jourdan Dunn on every runway means diversity.

And we don’t think Italian Vogue will save the world - but we do think it’s single-handedly given the fashion industry good face.

Just a few months post-“A Black Issue,” comes “The Africa Issue,” but this time around it’s November’s L’Uomo Vogue and the issue isn’t just dedicated to the continent. More importantly, and more timely, half of the issue’s ad revenues are promised to Africa-related charities.

Before you picture starving children sinking beneath their Burberry bibs, (which scarily, after the Indian Vogue debacle, doesn’t sound impossible), Sozzani’s quick to point out the magazine’s use of people wearing their own clothes and discussing their own style - think Michelle Obama, Forest Whittaker, Matt Damon - while outlining their relationship with Africa.

Robin Givhan points out in The Washington Post that Sozzani “runs magazines that are notable for their political incorrectness.” Basically, so few people read Italian Vogue, that Sozzani can publish pretty much whatever she wants. So no, it won’t reach the world. But the people who do read ItalianVogue - the stylists, editors, models, designers - who in turn work with the more omnipresent American fashion magazines, can hopefully translate the message to the masses.

Which will hopefully translate into more diverse ads since flipping through editorials full of black models peppered with high fashion ads full of Lilys and Natashas is like seeing a J.Mendel ad on PETA’s own website…