Eyeconic Makeup

MAC Gem of Roses Dupe

2012-01-24T22:35:00.000-06:00

Gem of Roses, from the Semi-Precious collection released by MAC this last summer, is probably my favorite lipstick of all time. It's the perfect My Lips But Better color for me. The other day at Ulta I spotted what I thought could be a possible dupe, and lucky I had Gem of Roses in my purse to compare! On the left is Gem of Roses, and on the right is Smashbox's Be Legendary lipstick in Primrose.

Houston, we have a dupe! :D I no longer have to fear the suffering I would surely endure once I ran out of Gem of Roses!

I hope this helps anyone else hunting for a Gem of Roses dupe. Smashbox Be Legendary lipsticks cost $19 at Sephora and Ulta.

Kiss My Sass Highlighter Swatches/Thoughts

2012-01-20T23:11:00.003-06:00

Some of the many products offered by Kiss My Sass Cosmetics are loose powder highlighters. I already had samples of Pink Horizons and Golden Rays from the amazing Wendi of Makeup Zombie, and I decided to go ahead and order samples of Halo and Glisten as well to have a full set.

The highlighters are $1.75 for a 5g jar with 1/4 tsp, or $7.50 for a 10g jar with 2 tsp.

Halo is described as "a very sheer white with a soft sheen (gives an extremely sheer "soft-focus" appearance on the skin)". It is extremely sheer, I think it could be mixed with a finishing powder for a really pretty effect. Click on the pictures to enlarge them, you can see the effects so much better that way!

Golden Rays is "a golden shimmer (doesn't apply as "yellow" on skin)". I really like this one, it reminds me of my favorite highlighter from e.l.f. (Gotta Glow)

Pink Horizons is my favorite! It is described as "a light pink shimmer". Simple and true.

Glisten is "peachy nude with a golden shimmer". This is one that seems like it would be good for summer.

At some point I'm going to order a full size of Pink Horizons, and probably Golden Rays as well. Have you tried any of the highlighters from Kiss My Sass?

Side note: are these some issues with the new blogger or is it just me? I'm having really weird amounts of line breaks all over the place with this post, and I had to take out some links because they would only show up at the http:// text and not change into a link.

It's been a long time since I came around

2012-01-17T21:58:00.002-06:00

...been a long time but I'm back in town!

I haven't blogged in many moons, like 6 months worth of moons. But I have a new camera and a renewed interest in blogging, so I'm excited to say that I'll be returning to the beauty blogging world :)

I'm going to be getting used to the new blogger and tinkering about with my layout, so stuff might look kind of messy for a little while. Bear with me!

I haven't really been reading anyone's blogs while I'm gone, but I want to catch up at least a little. So if you get a bunch of comments on really old posts, they're probably all from me :P Also, I would love to see any awesome blogs that have popped up while I've been away! So if you want to self-promote or promote any other beauty blogs you like to read, feel free to leave me links in the comment section. You can also always reach me via email or twitter @eyeconic_makeup (you do have to send me a follow request though).

I'm glad to be back and I look forward to chatting with everyone! Keep a well-made-up eye out for a new post soon!

The Makeup Heroes!

2011-06-26T21:20:00.005-05:00

Funny how busy my blogging break seems to be :P

I'm really excited to show you guys my first video! It's as part of The Makeup Heroes collaboration project, which quite a few beauty bloggers are a part of. If you read Wendy's blog or Wendi's blog (haha), you might have already seen their videos. I'm pretty pumped to be a part of this, so keep watching the channel and you'll see more videos and more bloggers.

Black Rose Minerals review

2011-06-25T20:47:00.001-05:00

Edit: So much for me taking a break... I wanted to finish up this review I started ages ago :)

After being mesmerized by the swatches on Sirvinya's blog, I decided to place a small order from Black Rose Minerals.

I ordered all sample baggies, which are priced at $1, the typical price for most samples from indie companies. They contain 1/8 teaspoon. You can also get 1/4 teaspoon in a mini jar for $2.50. Full sizes cost $6, and you can choose whether or not you want a sifter, which I think is great since I hate sifters.

Every color listed on the website has swatches on skin and on the eyelid, which is nice. Some pictures seem to be a lot more color accurate than others, though. Ingredients are listed for every individual color, as well as if they are lip safe, vegan, etc. With so much skepticism surrounding indie makeup companies lately, it's refreshing to see a company so open with their ingredient and safety information (as they all should be). There's currently a 10% off discount code on the front page, and I believe there was one up when I placed my order a while back.

I ordered sample sets of the Sprinkles collection, the NSFW collection, as well as various other samples. For some reason some of my sample choices didn't go through when I placed my order, and Rosa, the owner, immediately emailed me to get it worked out. My package was shipped the NEXT DAY. Everything arrived very nicely, with some cute little stickers and a discount code included for my next order. I also got 2 free samples.

Swatch time!

Top 3: Lioness, Insect, Don't Be Brassy
Middle 3: Titania, Confused, Silver & Cold
Bottom Lone Wolf: Magic Potion

Top 3: Limon, Noxious, Denver
Bottom 3: Lady, Candy Floss, Mome Rath

Sprinkles Collection
Top 3: Meringue, Sunset, Bubble-Bobble
Bottom 3: Minty, Prozzac, Ultraviolence

NSFW Collection
Top 3: Mother Sunflower, Trafficking, Doll Face
Bottom 3: Gremlin, Ocean Potion, Dionysus

Bonus cat shot!

I have nothing but good things to say about this company, the colors are absolutely beautiful and the service is amazing. I've been wearing my BRM shades more than any others ever since I got them.

Have you tried Black Rose Minerals? Lemming any shades?

break

2011-06-23T16:56:00.003-05:00

Hi everyone. If you follow me on twitter you know I'm going through a bit of a rough patch right now. I just have a lot on my plate and blogging has become a chore instead of a fun hobby. I'm going to take a break from blogging, not sure for how long. Probably a few weeks at least. I'm sure I'll be back in the future, but until then, you can always email me or find me on twitter.

Sparkly purple EOTD

2011-06-09T19:23:00.002-05:00

Last night I was bored and decided I wanted to do a really sparkly look. I could have upped the amp and used Pixie Epoxy or another sticky base to make this REALLY sparkly, but I didn't feel like doing the extra work since I wasn't going out anywhere. I used Fyrinnae's "Lemming" on my lid, Kiss My Sass' "Tattoo Shop" in the crease, and Tokidoki liner in "Donutella".

Sephora Must-Have: Smashbox "Radiance" blush

2011-05-31T18:33:00.000-05:00

Back many months ago when I visited a Cosmetics Company Outlet, there was an extremely pigmented hot fuchsia Estee Lauder blush. I passed on it, and regretted the decision for months. I decided to go to Sephora to try and find a similar product, and I ended up with a Smashbox blush in the shade "Radiance".

You can tell it's bright, but it's even brighter in real life! It has nice, simple packaging. There's a mirror in the bottom of the container that swings out, which I never even noticed until I took these pictures. Cute, but pointless.

It looks scary when you swipe it with your finger, but it actually goes on pretty sheer when used with a blush brush. It's a color that looks really natural & pretty on my skintone, and it's become on of my go-to blushes. I also like the finish- no sparkle here, which is nice for when I want to do something more subtle. I've never tried any Smashbox products before this one, and I don't think there's anything else from the brand I'm dying to try, but this blush has become Holy Grail for me. At $24 it was a splurge, but a worthy one!

Darling Girl Spring Fling collection swatches

2011-05-25T21:48:00.005-05:00

Susan from Darling Girl was kind enough to send me samples of the Spring Fling collection so I could swatch them for my readers :) Sadly, it seems I've lost the shade 'New Grass', so here is a link to one of my favorite blogs; she has some great swatches of this collection.

Top 3: Sorbet, Mango Tango, Forsythia
Middle 3: Garden of Weedin', Butterfly Flutterby, Lily of the Valley
Bottom 3: Plum Blossoms, Shower of Flowers, Lala

I wish my camera would show the complexity of Shower of Flowers, it has a great blue flash to it. Lala also has amazing pink shimmer, which is what I tried to capture with that last picture. Those two are my favorite colors from the collection. A lot of these colors are heavy are the shimmer, so I would recommend using Pixie Epoxy or a similar type product with these.

I got on the roof to take these pictures and my kitty Gloria decided to come up too!

Here's a look I did with Showers of Flowers and Lala...

and a more fun one with Forsythia, Butterfly Flutterby, and some Collection 2000 glitter liner. A customer at work told me I looked like I was going to the carnival :P

Hard Candy Glossaholic review

2011-05-17T16:35:00.003-05:00

From reviews I've read, Hard Candy seems to be pretty hit-and-miss with their product line. I can't say myself, since aside from these glosses I've only tried the primer, and I don't see much else from the line that seems too exciting. That being said, I do really like these glosses. They cost $5 and are only available at your local evil empire, Walmart.

They have a REALLY strong vanilla-frosting scent to them, which I don't like, but luckily it doesn't stay long. They also sport a giant applicator, which I didn't like at first, but now I do- it has kind of a dip in it, so it can get a lot of gloss in one go, and cover your lips in one go too. It's the same size as the gigantor MAC Wonderwoman glosses- here's a size comparison.

Hard Candy, MAC Wonderwoman, Rimmel.

I have 3 different colors- Fairy, Tipsy, and Chill Out.

Tipsy is a sheer hot pick, and Fairy and Chill Out both show up mostly clear. I love these glosses because they have FLAKIES! Much like my favorite lip gloss of all time, the MAC Superglass (of which I only own one). You can click on the pictures to see them full size so the flakies are much more visible. I just think it looks so cool, I love wearing these with a neutral eye, layered over lipstick, to give my look something more interesting.

These glosses are really sticky, which I normally don't like, but I can deal with it for these because they're so gorgeous.

Do you have any of these Hard Candy glosses, or tried any others from the line? Do you have any of the coveted MAC Superglass?

Darling Girl Cosmetics Holo-Gloss Review

2011-05-02T20:35:00.007-05:00

Right as Susan from Darling Girl Cosmetics was releasing her new collection of Holo-Glosses, she sent me samples of a few colors so I could review and swatch them :)

Basically, a Holo-Gloss is a pretty sheer lip gloss, and it has TONS of gorgeous glitter, or an amazing sheen. If you've seen the Lorac 3D glosses, than you have an idea of what I'm talking about. Since they're so sheer, I think they're best for layering over another lipstick or gloss.

What I liked about these is that even the ones that are PACKED with glitter don't feel gritty on my lips- the glitter is really fine. It does tend to stay on my lips though, even after everything else has worn off, much like MAC Superglass or the Hard Candy Glossaholics- I don't think there's really a way to avoid this. I get about the same wear time on these as I would any other gloss, which is maybe 2-3 hours. I'm a huge lip licker :P

The Holo-Glosses are $4.25 for a 3.5 ml tube, which I think is a great price. These are so amazingly gorgeous, and there's quite a few shades now. After using these, I can't see myself paying $22 for any of the Lorac glosses I was lusting after.

Now for the fun part, swatches! I left these first 2 pictures pretty big so you can really see the detail if you click to enlarge.

Top 2: Wish You Were Here, Violet Hill
Bottom 2: Blue Suede Shoes, Pennies From Heaven

Blurry so you can see all the sparkly!

Wish You Were Here

Violet Hill

Blue Suede Shoes

Pennies From Heaven

Pennies From Heaven is my favorite, and not just because the name was my idea ;) I really want to try Jar of Hearts and Queen of Hearts, I'm sure those will manage to find their way into my cart on my next DG order.

Have you tried the Holo-Glosses yet? Which shades are you after?

Purple Darling Girl FOTD

2011-04-27T21:22:00.004-05:00

I have a decent amount of Darling Girl products from my last order to swatch, but I'm having difficulties finding time for everything right now because of work and school. Luckily there's only a couple weeks of school left, so I should be able to post a lot more soon.

For this look I used a newer color, My Little Pony, on the lid with Whisper as a highlight. My Little Pony is AMAZING, it's a pinky purple with a green duochrome. It's by far one of my most unique shadows, I have nothing like it. Here's a photo that shows off the green:

I'm also wearing Little Twin Stars glitter liner over some black liquid liner.

I'm wearing Barbie Girl sweet cheeks blush, and Love Bug tinted lip balm. All from Darling Girl Cosmetics.

Pretty simple, but I didn't want to do anything too crazy since I was wearing glitter liner.

Venomous Cosmetics review pt. 2

2011-04-20T20:55:00.009-05:00

I already talked about the awesome pressed shadows Venomous Cosmetics has to offer, and now I'd like to cover their loose shadows! Samples are $1 and full sizes are $6.50, pretty standard. They adhere very well using a primer, which of course is a necessity with all loose shadows. The colors are all very pretty, some more complex than others.

Something I don't like about the full size jars is that the ingredients list is on the inside of the lid. I was sent these a few weeks ago, so that could have changed by now, I'll make an edit if I learn that's the case. Personally, since I don't have allergy concerns or anything, it doesn't matter to me, but I'm sure it could to some people.

Here's a sample baggie:

Swatch time! First up is the Well-Traveled collection.

Top row: Beaches in Maui, Secrets of Cairo, Irish Countryside
Middle row: Vegas Casino
Bottom Row: L.A. Smog, Surfing the Gold Coast, NYC Nightlife

Surfing the Gold Coast has really pretty yellow sparkle in it, and NYC Nightlife has all this amazing rainbow sparkle to it! They're both really unique colors, and my favorites of the loose shadows.

The next 3 are Monster Under Your Bed, Indian Violet, and Falling Star (from the new All-Stars collection).

The purple looks patchy, but since I started doing q-tip swatches, all purples I've done have turned out that way, so I'm blaming it on the q-tips.

Lip Poisons are the glosses offered by Venomous. They're $3.50 for a purse size (3.7 ml) and $5 for a full size (5.9 ml). The texture is difficult for me to describe... it's thicker than a regular lip gloss, and it's somewhat sticky. When I applied I felt like it kept getting a bit patchy, but after a few minutes everything seemed to kind of settle down to an even coat. I'm really not good with anything lasting a long time, since I constantly snack/apply lip balm/ lick my lips, but it stayed on pretty well through me eating ice cream (albeit carefully), and 3 hours later it was still pretty vibrant.

On the left is Genie, on the right is Trouble.

I was BLOWN AWAY by these colors! I barely looked at them when I had browsed the Venomous site, but honestly these are my favorite product of what I was sent. I love the shadows, but right now I'm really into lippies, and these colors are just stunning.

I did some awesomely awful lip swatches for you guys! Here's Genie:

And Trouble:

The flash makes Trouble look more flattering on my bare lips than it actually is, the blue in it gives me that 'Zombie Chic' look. It just doesn't work with my skintone by itself, so I've been wearing it layered over other colors.

Here's a look I did with L.A. Smog & Surfing the Gold Coast loose shadows, and I'm wearing the Trouble Lip Poison over Clinique Chubby Balm in Super Strawberry.

Honestly, my only complaint here is that some of the website photos for the shadows seem inaccurate. The Lip Poison photos seem right on, but some of the shadow photos are too overexposed or something, while some seem too washed out. I know it's difficult to get super accurate photos, but I feel like the current ones could be improved.

Overall, I enjoyed everything I tried from Venomous, and I would certainly recommend them, especially if you're going through a pressed shadow phase as a lot of people seem to be. Don't skip over the Lip Poisons as they're the company's hidden gem, IMO! And it looks like there's going to be lip and eyeliners coming soon, which is neat.

Disclaimer: I got everything mentioned in this review for free. This did not change my review, it's all my honest opinion.

Venomous Cosmetics review pt. 1

2011-04-12T22:51:00.012-05:00

Venomous Cosmetics is pretty new to the indie scene. With so many new indie companies popping up left and right, you have to have something special. Venomous offers not only loose shadow, but also pressed shadows! They also have glosses called Lip Poisons. I was interested in trying this company out, so it was really exciting for me when Tracy, the owner, asked if I was interested in trying out some products (free of charge, this is my disclaimer, blah blah). As always, my review won't be affected by this.

First up is the pressed shadows. A full size is $6.50, which I find reasonable. I think the price reflects the time it probably takes to do the pressing. They have SAMPLE pressed shadows, which is really cool! Those are $2. Here's what the sizes look like (next to a full-sized loose shadow for comparison):

The pressed samples are so tiny! I had to run my shadow brush over the sample size a few times to get the brush covered, since they're so small, but that's not really an issue. The pressed samples are too small to have the name written on the back, so here's what Tracy does:

Is it the most convenient thing in the world? No, but it works. I really can't think of a better way to do it, the text would be too small to read if you put the whole name on there. Here are my swatches of the pressed shadows:

Top 4: Yellowjacket, Amazon Rainforest Expedition, Mermaid, Gaboon Viper
Bottom 4: The Last Unicorn, Tazelwurm, Can't Give You Paris, Phoenix

You guys, these are gorgeous. I didn't take them in direct sunlight so they look a little flatter than they actually are. I could not believe how especially pigmented Gaboon Viper and Phoenix were, they apply like a dream. I love using The Last Unicorn as a highlighter. Tazelwurm is probably my favorite, it has a gorgeous blue shift to it.

Here's a quick look I did with Tazelwurm, Can't Give You Paris, and The Last Unicorn. On my lips is VC's "Genie" Lip Poison (formerly called "Cupid's Arrow").

As far as packaging, Tracy sealed everything very well, and as you can see, none of them broke. She put them in little baggies and bubble-wrapped the hell out of everything (pink bubble-wrap)! You definitely don't have to worry about any of them arriving broken or crushed.

My final verdict: I love these. There are so many absolutely gorgeous colors to choose from, and I think it's great that you can get samples. Now I need to make my own palette to keep them in...

In the next part of the review I'll talk about the loose shadows and lip poisons! I'll try to get it posted by tomorrow or the next day.

Red Lipstick & Black Liner

2011-04-05T21:20:00.005-05:00

is the name of one of my favorite blogs. It's also the look I did the other night. I NEVER wear red lips. I've literally worn red lips in public only one other time that I can recall, so this was a big deal as far as makeup goes :P

I didn't want to bombard the world with a bunch of colorful eyeshadow as well, so I just did a super neutral eye with shadows from the amazing LE Maybelline Salsa Sun palette, and for the liner I used some Physician's Formula cream liners. I winged it out a teeny bit, not much because I am TERRIBLE at winging out liner, and I didn't want to mess it up.

My lips were MAC's 'Swelter' Slimshine over 'A Classic' lipstain (which has sadly almost dried out from me not putting the cap on tight enough).

Doing really red lips with the thick liner actually made me feel confident instead of self-conscious, I felt so adult and classy!

High Voltage Collection Creation Contest

2011-04-04T19:58:00.003-05:00

One of my beloved indie companies, High Voltage, is having an amazing contest where you can come up with your own collection. If you win, Jasmine will make it for you!

I wanted to share this with everyone because I think it's such a cool idea. I'm trying to think of a cool collection so I can enter too ^_^

Since I'm posting about High Voltage I thought I'd also mention, for those of you who don't follow Jasmine on twitter (@ _High_Voltage_), there's a new membership program you can join to get discounts and such. There's also the new Norse Mythology collection. DUOCHROMES! :D

I'd love to hear your collection ideas if you feel ok commenting with them. I won't steal them but I can't promise the same of anyone else >.>

Silk Naturals swatches & review

2011-04-03T23:56:00.010-05:00

Silk Naturals (link) is a company that's been on my 'to-try' list for ages, but I've just never gotten around to ordering since they don't offer samples. Every time I've browsed the website I've found so many things I wanted, so I was really excited when Karen, the owner, contacted me about sending me some products to review. So this is my disclaimer right away, I received these products free of charge. Hopefully my other reviews have led you to trust that I'll be honest with you :) I would never give a false statement or opinion on a review. Here we go!

Karen included a 'company info' sheet with the package she sent me, which I thought was a really nice idea. On the back it had ingredient listings for all the different products they sell, which is good since it's not listed on the products themselves. Here's what an eyeshadow jar looks like (super close up):

And here's a liquid lip gloss and a Kisser Slicker next to my phone for a size comparison:

Silk Naturals seems to have a really great discount/reward system set up. They give a free Gift with Purchase (usually a shadow) with every order over $10. For every $30 you spend, you get a free shadow or lip balm of your choice. For every $100 you spend, you get a $5 discount. If you spend $125, you get free shipping (seems like a high number to me, but better than no free shipping offers I suppose).

I mentioned earlier that the reason I'd never placed an order before was because they don't have samples. I am a sample queen, and I actually only own a small number of full size shadows. However, as far as prices go, $4 for a full size shadow (3/4 tsp in a 5g jar w/sifter) is a pretty darn good price. The other products I got, the Liquid Lip Glosses and Kisser Slickers, are also very reasonably priced at $4.75. What Karen DOES do is take returns on any lip or eye products if you end up not liking it.

Normally I don't talk about website design, because I really don't care, but I wanted to mention it because I think it's really helpful. Most of the listings have swatches, and they are all very descriptive of the product- they have a 1-5 scale that rates things like opacity and shimmer, which I think is awesome.

Here are swatches of all the different shadows I received:

Top row: Sonic (MAC 'Vanilla' clone), Fire, High Beam
Bottom row: Canary, Superfly, Madison, Prowl

These shadows have amazing depth to them that I just couldn't capture. Fire has a really pretty reddish iridescence. Canary is a fabulous matte yellow. Superfly has lots of golden shimmer, and Prowl is LOADED with gorgeous shimmer- it's a very interesting purple based brown.

Here's a look I did using High Beam, Superfly, Prowl, and Sonic.

Top row: Orchid, Romp, Rollick
Bottom row: Poly (MAC 'Parrot' clone), Scandal, Vandal

The second picture is more accurate. Orchid and Romp are both beautiful, but applied a little patchy (I don't see Orchid on the website anywhere). Poly is a really pretty blue-green that makes me think of mermaids ^_^ Scandal has AWESOME red shimmer that absolutely would not show up for me, but it's there!

For my lippie swatches, I have the Kisser Slicker lip glosses on the top, and the Liquid Lip Glosses on the bottom.

Top row: Tender, Gold Blush
Bottom Row: Bubblegum, Icing

Tender is a VERY sheer brownish pink color. Gold Blush is basically just slightly golden shimmer, it looks great applied on top of other lippies. Bubblegum is a bright pink, and Icing ends up looking clear with a pink iridescence. The liquid lip gloss formula is normal, nothing especially good or bad. I really like the Kisser Slickers, they're almost like a tinted lip balm. The website has a few other lip products as well, many of them vegan.

One last thing I wanted to add was that SN makes dupes (they call them clones) of lots of eyeshadows/lippies from brands like MAC, Bobbi Brown, BE, etc.

As you might have realized by now, I really like the company! I thought the products I got were nice, COMPLEX colors, and the brand has a great product range with very reasonable prices. I will most definitely be making orders in the future. :)

Silk Naturals- With A Cherry On Top!

2011-03-28T23:29:00.008-05:00

This weird thing happens to me where I start to work on a paper but realize that it's absolutely vital I do a blog post instead. I can't control it, so I'll just have to go ahead and post some swatches! Karen from Silk Naturals generously sent me 8 of the 14 colors from her new spring collection. She also sent me some awesome stuff from the permanent line, which I'll be reviewing in the next few days.

The Collection is called 'With a Cherry On Top', here's the cute promo image:

Just an FYI, some of the colors look a little uneven or patchy, but this is NOT a reflection of their quality- it's because I used some q-tips to swatch. Everything is swatched over Concrete Minerals Electric Eye Primer.

Top 2: Juiced, Cloudberry
Bottom 2: Daiquiri, Sweet Tea

I really like Juiced, it makes a great highlight color if you apply it sheerly. I love Cloudberry as a neutral lid shade (I've been on a neutral kick lately), I think the second picture is the most color accurate version of it.

Top 2: Tingle, Neuron
Bottom 2: Pink Lemonade, Watermelon

Isn't Watermelon AWESOME? It's a very pink-based red, I can't wait to use it in a look.

This isn't my official review yet, but I do think the colors are pretty and VERY reasonably priced ($4 for 3/4 tsp in a 5g jar). I think all the rest of the colors in the spring line look absolutely gorgeous as well, Makeup Zombie and Phyrra both have swatches up with some of the other colors.

Phyrra is also having a giveaway of some of the spring colors!

You can purchase the Silk Naturals 'With a Cherry On Top' eyeshadows here.

Disclaimer: I was sent the products in this post free to review.

I'm still here!

2011-03-25T18:42:00.003-05:00

Everything is really hectic right now as I've just gotten back to Illinois and I am not happy at all with how things are going. But I'm here, so I will resume regular blogging in the next few days. I'm planning reviews of Venomous Cosmetics, Silk Naturals, the new lip glosses from Darling Girl, and hopefully some FOTD's if I stop being too lazy to put on makeup... if you want to contact me, feel free to tweet me or drop me an e-mail :)

My nail polish collection as of 03/19/11

2011-03-19T23:19:00.007-05:00

I've been packing stuff up and haven't really had time to do any looks or swatches, but I wanted to post something before I'm gone for the next few days. I decided to take a couple pictures of my nail polish collection before it got all packed up again. The sad part is I haven't used probably half of these because I bite my nails down so much it would be pointless to even try. I'm making an effort once again to stop the biting, but it's such a habit for me now I don't even notice that I do it. If anyone has any tips that have helped them stop biting, I'd love to hear them.

For comparison, here was my collection a little over a year ago.

I hope everyone continues to have a good weekend and a good week next week, I'm not sure exactly what day I'm moving back so I probably won't be able to post again until the end of next week.

Three really excellent giveaways

2011-03-17T19:39:00.004-05:00

I very rarely post about giveaways, but there are three really awesome ones going on right now that I think are worth sharing!

Reggie from Color Me Obsessed is doing an Aromaleigh giveaway, and there will be 2 winners!

Sophie from Ethereal Beauty is having a giveaway as well. Part of the prize is an Inglot pigment of your choice!

Wendi from Makeup Zombie is also having a giveaway with tons of awesome indie makeup!

Check these out, Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Another Darling Girl EOTD

2011-03-17T19:15:00.003-05:00

The other day I wanted to try out some Darling Girl samples I bought quite a while ago but I hadn't yet used (except Electric Lady). I'm really on a Darling Girl kick lately! Mojito is on the inner lid, Exhale on the outer lid, and Electric Lady in the crease. Exhale has a neat blue sheen to it that IMO perfects the look, but of course I couldn't capture it.

No full face pictures, as usual lately it seems, because I really dislike taking pictures of myself where my hair is up. Sometimes I get one that's not too bad, but not this time. :P And I have to keep doing my hair up because my blowdryer is broken and right now with everything else going on it doesn't seem worth it me to go buy a new one to have to pack it up in a few days.

EOTD with Hi-Fi Cosmetics

2011-03-14T16:39:00.003-05:00

The other day I really wanted to use Hi-Fi's "Mug Shot", but I couldn't decide what to pair it with. So I copied the style that Silhouette Screams has been doing lately, and just put it in the crease with a white shadow on the lid (Hi-Fi's "Disco"). I also used Milani's Infinite Liner in the shade "Infinite". I was just at home so I didn't put on any face makeup, so no full-face pictures.

You can see in that last picture how bad the liner looks close up. I am terrible with most liquid liners, and these Milani ones have gorgeous colors, but I find them particularly difficult for me to apply.

And here's MAC's "Athena's Kiss" lipgloss that I wore with it. I know everyone has seen it, but I wanted to show you how shiny and sparkly it is ^_^ How purple it looks really depends on the lighting, it looks very pink here.

Oops, a few little clumpies! I am moving back to IL this weekend, so from the end of this week until sometime next week I probably won't be posting at all, just a head's up.

Handwriting Tag & my pets

2011-03-12T20:07:00.006-06:00

I grabbed the handwriting tag over from Wendi at Makeup Zombie! Here's how it works:
Answer the following 8 questions in your own handwriting:
1. What is your name? And your blog?
2. What's your blog URL?
3. Write: The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.
4. Favorite quote.
5. Favorite song?
6. Favorite band/singers?
7. Say anything you want.
8. Pass this along to a few bloggers.

You can click it for full size.

I also thought I'd post pictures of all my pets, because I've been saying I've been going to do it for a long time. I think over time I've posted pictures of all of them except my chinchillas. So here everyone is :)

My dog Ginger is 8 now, I can't believe we've had her so long. She has Cushing's Disease, but she's doing fine and is the sweetest dog in the entire world. People who don't like dogs love her. She sits next to the table whenever anyone eats and begs for food :P

Ivy is 4, we got her when she was still a tiny little baby who was scared of everything. Now she's a killer :P She's sleeping on my bed in this picture.

I'm trying to think how long I've had Gravy... I think 2 1/2 years. That wall behind him is all torn up from him chewing on it T_T He's a pretty cuddly boy.

I've had Wellington for about a year and a half... he used to live with some college guys who I don't think took very good care of him, because he's extremely nervous all the time. He's still very sweet :)

Boyfriend just started showing up at our house this past summer. First he hung out outside, then he started coming in the sunroom and eating the food we left out for him, and now he's part of the family :)

And Gloria, of course, is my new baby girl! She is the cuddliest cat IN THE WORLD. Her favorite toy is the plastic seal off of the juice jug :)

I love looking at people's pet pictures so you should post them or leave a link in the comments! And I invite everyone to do the handwriting tag as well.

FOTD w/ Darling Girl & Shiro

2011-03-08T19:30:00.003-06:00

I seriously can't WAIT for Susan to re-open Darling Girl next month... maybe by then I'll have some money and be able to buy "a few" things.

A few things about this EOTD... the lid color/highlight is "Whisper", which I am OBSESSED with. It is a perfect neutral eye color, very light, but it shows up more brown in these pictures than I think it looks IRL. I use it sometimes all the way from my eyelids to my browbone. I need a full size!

The crease color is Scarecrow, but it turned out basically just black as I did the makeup, which is odd as it's actually really beautiful and complex and not black at all... It either got too muddy from being put on top of Whisper, or my brush was too dirty. Weird.

I foiled Witch's Brew and used it as a liner (the pretty sparklies only show up ok in one picture). My liner on my waterline had already worn off by the time I took the pictures ^_^;

So, the eyes didn't go quite as planned, but I still liked it. It was a different look for me. On my lips is Leeroy Jenkins from Shiro, and as you can see it's basically the best thing ever.

I've started curling my lashes with a little cheap-o curler from an eyebrow kit my mom sent me. It makes a BIG difference in how my lashes look after I apply mascara. They stay really separated and don't get clumpy.

I really liked this FOTD, I never do neutral eyes or colorful lips so it was a step outside of my comfort zone, which seems to be happening quite a bit lately. I am hoping to get caught up on blogs tomorrow!

Yellow & Teal EOTD with Fyrinnae

2011-03-07T20:52:00.004-06:00

Hey guys! Sorry it's been a week, if you follow me on Twitter you know things have just been incredibly hectic for me lately (especially midterms, boo). I really haven't had much time to catch up on blogs, hopefully I will be able to do so soon.

I wanted to use some Fyrinnae last week to do a nice and bright EOTD. I actually brought the colors below my waterline, which is something I barely ever do. It really goes out of my comfort zone for some reason, which is weird since I have no problem wearing super-bright shadows. The inner lid color is Banana Mochi, outer lid is Bali Mynah, and I think the crease is +20 Beautification. The green liner is MAC's Greenplay. I am so glad I bought this at the CCO, I use it so much more than I thought I would.

Hope you had a good weekend!

Shiro Cosmetics Intertubes review & swatches

2011-02-28T22:18:00.004-06:00

I know the reviews for these have been making the rounds lately, but I thought I'd share my opinion on the new Shiro Cosmetics Intertubes from as well. First, swatches!

I ordered Leeroy Jenkins and Yo Dawg, and got a free sample of Over 9000.

Leeroy Jenkins- swiped once, twice, three times

Yo Dawg- swiped once, twice, three times

Over 9000- swiped once, twice, three times

As you can see, these are somewhat sheer, but are definitely buildable. My favorite is Leeroy Jenkins, which I've been wearing a lot lately. Even though it's purple, it's very wearable, and this is coming from someone who rarely strays out of the rosy-mauve area.

If I had to try and compare these to a normal lip product, I'd go with 'an extremely tinted balm'. They're moisturizing the way a balm is, but have enough color to equal a lipstick. For $6.50, it's well worth the price, and I'm definitely going to be ordering more colors in the future.

I also got a full size of the shade Everything Is Bears, which is a dark brown with awesome gold sparkles. There was a similar shade from Morgana I bought a long time ago, which is now discontinued, so I decided to pick this one up.

Have you ordered anything from Shiro recently? I'm dying to try Caitlin's new pressed blushes!

The Concrete Minerals Electric Eye Primer giveaway winner is...

2011-02-20T14:24:00.004-06:00

Ki!

Thanks everyone for entering, I enjoyed reading all your suggestions for my new kitty's name. If you're wondering what I ended up choosing... I decided to keep it Gloria, the name they gave her at the shelter :P It just seems to fit her, and it kind of stuck after calling her that for a few days. Here's some pictures!

Sleeping in bed...

Sitting on the couch...

Getting ready to do her makeup...

and distracting my boyfriend from doing his homework.

For those of you interested, here's some updates on my personal life as of late. This is going to be looong.

The last week-ish has been pretty bad, and yesterday was so unbelievably bad it's almost comical. I realized, as I had suspected all along, that the itchy bumps I've been covered in for weeks were NOT from a virus, like the dermatologist said, but bites from bedbugs. Yeah, I had fucking bedbugs. So yesterday I had to take all my pets to my boyfriend's house so the exterminator could come and poison the shit out of my apartment.

While he was doing that, I went to my job interview at Macy's, the only place to show any interest in hiring me out of the 8 or so I've applied to since I moved. The interview went well, but in the end, I was told they wouldn't give me the job (which was only going to be 12 hours a week anyway, like that's enough money to live on) unless I would guarantee them that I would stay with them for a full year. As it stands right now, I am looking at moving back home after my lease is up in 8 months, so that's not a promise I'm going to make.

I left the interview, obviously pretty upset, and went to my boyfriend's house since I wasn't supposed to go back into my apartment for another 4 hours. We decided to go to the store to buy me some new bedsheets and a new comforter, because I decided I was going to throw mine away. On the way there I had a tire blow out. It didn't just get a little puncture, it got ripped to shreds. So we pulled over and called a towing service to come change the tire, since we didn't want to attempt it on an un-level, extremely busy highway.

We drove back to my apartment on the spare tire, and my mom called my boyfriend's cell phone to tell me that my new phone I ordered should be there on Tuesday. This sounds like it's a good thing, but it's not. I broke my cell phone, and ordered the new one WEEKS ago. The shitty company, US Cellular, repeatedly lied to my mom about shipping the phone out. Now that they finally actually did their fucking job, they spelled my street address wrong, and somehow managed to lose my apartment number, so UPS couldn't deliver my phone. I was expecting to get it yesterday, and now I have to wait even longer. It's already been 3 weeks.

Then we go inside my apartment and learn everything is still wet and smelly, so I had to grab some stuff to go spend the night with my pets at my boyfriend's house, where I spent the night doing laundry and homework. Now I'm finally back home, and after I finish this post, I have to go out to the store to finally buy the new sheets and comforter.

How was your weekend?

EOTD using Meow Cosmetics

2011-02-17T16:13:00.004-06:00

Overall I really like the look I did today, although it was disappointing how my outer lid color ended up looking so similar to my crease color.

What I used:
Mornings of Gold, by Hi Fi (highlight)
Kiwi, from Meow's Caribbean collection (inner lid)
Mantis, from Meow's Lost Rainforest collection (outer lid)
Ocean Spray, from Meow's Caribbean collection (crease)
MAC Liquidlast Liner in Greenplay

I also bought the new Maybelline One By One mascara yesterday, since my tube of Falsies is getting kind of gross. I accidentally grabbed the waterproof (I really don't like waterproof mascaras), so my judgment is on that, but I like it. It's not something to write home about, but it's pretty good. I like most mascaras that have the rubber bristles.

I also was lucky enough to find, amongst a big pile of makeup that had fallen off the shelves at Ulta, one of the Physician's Formula blushes with the hearts on it! I was so happy ^_^ The reason I had gone in the first place was to get some foundation for my job interview at Macy's this Saturday. I've never worn foundation, just tinted moisturizer, which lately hasn't seemed like enough. I got the new Covergirl Natureluxe foundation in the shade 310, which is a perfect match for my skintone. I've only used it today so far, but I absolutely love it. It smells really good too. Here's a review of it from one of my favorite blogs, Noveau Cheap.

And here's a picture of me and my kitty :) She's not shy anymore, she's already become the world's cuddliest cat. Sadly, she has a kitty cold, and keeps sneezing and getting snot all over me and the keyboard T_T I get to try and give her antibiotics later, can't wait...

Concrete Minerals Electric Eye Primer giveaway!

2011-02-11T20:16:00.005-06:00

Good news everyone!

After reading my last post, Emily of Concrete Minerals generously offered to give one of my readers a FREE tin of the Concrete Minerals Electric Eye Primer!

If you've been following my blog for a while, you know that this is my primer of choice, and what I use every day. I know Urban Decay Primer Potion is a holy grail item for many people, but having used that as well, I can say that for me personally the Concrete Minerals primer can totally hold it's own against UDPP. For me it works just as well, if not better, and since it's about half the price, it's what I'll continue to use! Here's my beat-up (AKA well-loved) tin.

I thought I'd show you a few swatches- a glittery loose shadow (Fyrinnae's "Lemming"), a pressed shimmery shadow (NYX's "Dune"), and a matte loose shadow (Aromaleigh's "Supermurgatroid"). On the left are the shadows without primer, and on the right they are over the Electric Eye Primer.

Now that you're properly convinced, here's how to enter: the only thing I ask is that you leave a comment with your e-mail address, and an idea (or a few) of what I should name my new kitty! Here's a picture of her:

She won't stop hiding right now, so this is the best I could do. ^_^ That's it! The giveaway will close on the 18th, and I will announce the winner on the 19th. This is open internationally! Good luck everyone, and thanks for reading!

EOTD with Aromaleigh Hi-Fi Retro Mattes

2011-02-10T23:48:00.004-06:00

Whenever I use AL samples I just get bummed out knowing that when I run out, that is IT sir!

The other day Mindy did an awesome look using her Aromaleigh matte shadows, and it inspired me to play around with some of mine today. I just got my MAC Wonder Woman stuff delivered today, and it inspired my look a little bit. The black liner against the yellow shadow reminded me a little bit of comic books, and I used a sheer red gloss to go with it, although it shows up looking pink in the pictures. I'm going to do a full list of products I used, for once!

What I used:

Eyes-
Concrete Minerals Electric Eye Primer
Aromaleigh's "Real Gone" on lid
Aromaleigh's "Smokin'" in crease
High Voltage's "Feel The Heat" to highlight
Maybelline "The Falsies" mascara
InColor (aka Jordana) FabuLiner in black
Urban Decay's 24/7 liner in "Zero"

Face-
Hard Candy's Sheer Envy Primer
Jane Be Pure Mineral Skin Perfecting Sheer Foundation
Maybelline Dream Mousse Concealer
Benefit's Erase Paste (under eyes)
Revlon PhotoReady Powder (don't really like this much)
Physician's Formula Mineral Glow Pearls (not a fan of this either)

Cheeks and Lips-
MAC blush in "Mighty Aphrodite"
elf blush in "Gotta Glow"
Urban Decay Ultraglide lipgloss in "Heat"

You can ignore the fact that I got gloss on my teeth...

It's been about 10 hours and my eyeshadow still looks awesome. I credit this partially to Concrete Mineral's awesome eye primer, and partly to the staying power of these shadows. I really love how the Mighty Aphrodite blush looks on me- I think it looks really natural, which is funny because I naturally flush a really bright pink.

To wrap it up I want to say hi to my new followers! Thanks for stopping by ^_^ I would LOVE to do a giveaway to celebrate +350, but until I find a job I really can't afford to do so. Hopefully I can get one soon so I can do a fun giveaway (and go off my own no-buy, bleh).

Gold & Green EOTD using Barry M & Hi-Fi

2011-02-09T23:17:00.003-06:00

Hi everyone! It's been a while ^_^; I've just been so busy with schoolwork, job searching, etc. Getting really settled in to a completely new place isn't as easy as I thought it would be. I'm also on a no-buy until I find a job (but I do have some packages on the way, ha). Here's a look I did the other day. I couldn't get the best pictures of it for some reason, but you get the idea.

On my lid is Barry M's "Parrot Green", with their metallic liner in "Gold". I have Hi-Fi's "California Girl"in the crease, and "Mornings of Gold" as the highlight color.

Lemming List

2011-01-30T20:34:00.014-06:00

Hello everyone. I'm trying to get back into the swing of blogging regularly, now that I've settled down a bit. You have no idea how much I appreciate all the support I've gotten from everyone, it means the world to me. I love you guys :3

I thought today I'd just show a few of the many items I'm lemming at the moment!

Morgana's Vegan Lipsticks in Goldrush and Lush. Melissa is going to be releasing a TON of new lipsticks soon, so keep an eye out for those.

The Stila Make Me Blush set, which you can only get at Sephora

Evil Shades eyeshadows in Sweater Girl and CC41 from the new Pin Up Girls collection

Physician's Formula gel liner in Glam Brown Eyes

Suds n Sass Kiss My Sass lipgloss in Domina. There's a lot of Suds N Sass products I'd like to try! I've only ever bought a few shadow samples.

Geek Chic's Geek Gloss in Happy Ending

UDPP in the shade "Greed", which is also only available at Sephora (online only I think, I never could find it in the store)

Any of these look appealing? What are you guys lemming right now?

short hiatus

2011-01-26T20:00:00.000-06:00

It may be a few weeks until I post again. I'm not adjusting well to my move and I'm really overwhelmed with everything right now. I'm trying to stay caught up on everyone's blogs.

If you want to talk to me you can e-mail or tweet me. I'll be back as soon as I can.

Brown & Red EOTD

2011-01-19T18:23:00.005-06:00

Very frustrated right now :/ As I've mentioned every two seconds for the last few months, I'm moving to Texas. We were supposed to start the drive down tomorrow, but the weather is supposed to be so terrible that driving would be really dangerous. We're going to leave on Friday instead now, and get there Saturday. It's not that big a deal, except that Friday is my 2 year anniversary with my boyfriend, and I was really excited to see him. At least we will get to have Valentine's Day together! It will be the third Valentine's Day since we started dating, but the first one we'll get to spend together. Long distance relationships are fucking difficult- we've been long distance for the last year. But if anyone ever tells you that long distance never works out, they're a big fat liar :)

Anyway, here is a look I did last week that I really loved. I used Hi-Fi's High Impact Shadow Fix over Concrete Minerals Electric Eye Primer. On my lid is Darling Girl's "Oracle", the crease is Hi-Fi's "Lords of Salem", and the highlight is Hi-Fi's "Hail Ceasar" (always showing up so dark in the pictures, gah). I also used a Collection 2000 gold glitter liner. I don't remember what lip products I used.

My eyebrows do not actually look that awkward...

And here is a picture of what my shadows looked like approximately 12 hours later, after a 4 hour shift at work where the A/C is broken and the building is always at least 80-

The High Impact Shadow Fix is so amazing. Someday I will do a comparison post with Pixie Epoxy, but for me it's like this: I use PE when I'm using more sparkly shadows with a more complex look. I find the HISF makes it harder for me to blend, but the fact that it lasts so long makes it as worthy as PE for me. I just use it for simpler looks, or when I need my shadows to last for a long time.

Before I go, I thought I'd add that I'm going to rejoin Twitter. I miss chatting with everyone, and I know it will be really nice to have your company since I will be away from my friends, family, kitties and puppy :3 So if you have a Twitter, leave your username in the comments so I can find you after I make a new ones.

Etsy makeup: Hall of Shame

2011-01-17T20:27:00.007-06:00

This is somewhat ranty, fyi.

Last night I was browsing makeup on Etsy, even though I'm pretty sure I know 99% of the non-repackaging companies who sell through Etsy. One of the first places I found was Caustic Cadet Cosmetics... womp womp.

I'm sure a lot of you have experienced that phenomenon of googling a product to find a review or swatches, seeing a picture of just an eye or a lip, and recognizing which blogger that eye or lip belongs to. So I was surprised when this listing had a picture of a beautiful eye I recognized as Chloe's from The Makeuptress. This shop seemed like your typical shitty Etsy makeup store, so I had a feeling that the owner had just stolen the picture and used it as their product photo without asking. I emailed Chloe and, surprise surprise, that was indeed the case.

As if that wasn't bad enough, I looked at some more listings, including this one for liquid liner. What an odd coincidence that all the colors in the product photo happen to look exactly like all the colors of Milani's Infinite eyeliner! Maybe it's because the picture was stolen from Karen's blog... from her post about Milani Infinite eyeliners.

At this point, repackaging fails to surprise me. Etsy makes it really easy for lazy jerks to make a quick buck. But stealing pictures, especially of another product to pretend is your own, is pretty pathetic.

Lest your face not be :/ enough already, let's look at Bad Bitch Cosmetics! First of all, and this is just me, but I hate that name. I hate the word bitch and find it extremely rude and demeaning. I cuss a fucking lot irl, but that is a word I do not say. So I would already never order from them just because of the name (which also violates Etsy's ToS by having vulgarity in a username). But even if they were called Delightfully Elegant Pony Cosmetics, I'd still have a problem with a statement they make in their profile.

"Our products - like ALL mineral makeup - is all-natural. Which also means it's vegan. There is no mineral makeup out there that isn't. Just sayin'. "

Snort. It doesn't take a vast knowledge of MMU to know that there can very easily be makeup that isn't vegan. Obviously they have never heard of carmine or beeswax, or any other animal by-products. So they're either knowingly lying to customers, or they're very ignorant about the nature of their own business.

And of course, there was the recent crash and burn of Glittersniffer. Here is a link you might be interested in.

In case you're feeling as disappointed as I am right now, I decided to link to some great Etsy makeup shops that ARE unique, original and awesome. I haven't shopped from all of these companies, so I put asterisks by the ones that I can personally vouch for.

Brazen Cosmetics
Concrete Minerals*
Hi-Fi Cosmetics*
Persephone Minerals
RockABetty Beauty
Scaredy Cat Cosmetics
Shiro Cosmetics*

ETA: Bad Bitch Cosmetics changed their profile statement a few hours after this was posted.

Tropical EOTD

2011-01-14T23:48:00.003-06:00

The other night I was bored and decided to play around with my makeup a little bit. I really like this look but feel like I have done many very similar to it. Hopefully reorganizing my stash after I move will give me new color combination ideas!

SHADOWS I USED:

LID: Aromaleigh's "Coney Island"
CREASE: Meow's "Torch"
INNER V: Fyrinnae's "Banana Mochi"
BELOW OUTSIDE OF WATERLINE: High Voltage's "Frostbite"
HIGHLIGHT: Hi-Fi's "Hail Ceasar" (this always shows up so brown in photos but it isn't!)

mumbo jumbo

2011-01-13T22:14:00.006-06:00

This post is going to be just a random mix of stuff. First off, you should go to CVS to check out their Physician's Formula! Right now if you use your CVS card, you can get $7 off any powder, blush, bronzer, or concealer. Most of those things are around $12-15, so that's basically 50% off! This is only through Saturday, so go! Now! I also got a coupon on my receipt for $10 off any PF blush, powder, or foundation. These don't expire for 2 weeks so hopefully one of the CVS stores in town will get those cute new heart blushes... I guess I'll be moving next week, so maybe I'll have luck in Texas.

Also, I got this blog award from Elyse, Cait, and Susan.

And this one from Dee.

Ok, 7 facts about me...

1. Most of my clothes are Abercrombie, Hollister, and Married to the Mob, my 3 favorite brands. All of them are overpriced but to say I am a bargain finder is an understatement. I think the most I've ever paid from any of those brands was $20 for an A&F hoodie.

2. The radio stations I listen to most are the college alternative stations, and the better of the 2 classic rock stations in town. I love a good pop song though!

3. I used to be a neat freak about my room, but it's been a DISASTER for the last few years. It is so messy I actually took a 'before' picture a few months ago, when you couldn't see any of the floor, but I haven't gotten to 'after' yet. I took out 3 full garbage bags of trash and you couldn't tell the difference. I'm moving in to my first apartment in one week and I vow to keep it clean!

4. My dream job would be to work on the X-Files, or fight demons with Sam and Dean (this season SUCKS by the way). Sometimes I get sad thinking about how these aren't real, "lol"

5. If you have read my blog long enough, you know I LOVE movies, all kinds, especially the weird ones. I'm always on the hunt to find the newest, most disturbing movie out there. Currently it seems to be "A Serbian Film"... kinda scared to watch it. The last awesome movie I saw was a doc called "Join Us", about some people escaping from a cult in California.

6. I'm a huge reader, too.

7. Feminism is a HUGE part of my self-identity. It is so important to me, and I am extremely outspoken about that, and my other beliefs.

Ok, I have to tag 15 of you guys! Sorry if you've already been tagged or don't ever do these! I tried not to tag anyone who I've seen get tagged.

Jerry
Kathy
Wendy
Robyn
Mindy
Darcey
Jill when she's back from vacation!
Elizabeth
Mai
Diana
Emily
Kira & Lydia
Carolina
Helen

Right now I am feeling very proud of myself that I think I used everyone's actual first names :D

I also thought Elvira's Thursday Poll was a really fun one today.

1. Lip Of The Day? - MAC London Life lipstick, with the Bubble Lounge lipgelee on top.

2.What is the first movie you remember seeing in a movie theater? - I don't really remember it, but I know it was Lion King. Apparently I was OBSESSED with it as a kid.

3. What makeup or beauty item will people remember you by? - I don't have a signature beauty thingy ;_; Maybe sheer lipsticks?

4. What was your first and most beloved makeup purchase you remember buying? -The first makeup I can ever remember buying was this Jane eyeshadow duo with a light and a dark brown. I still have it! I use it for brow shading sometimes.

5. What was the first beauty blog you remember reading? - Phyrra and Gothique were the first beauty blogs I ever read :)

I'll round out with saying soon I'm going to do a post of some awesome beauty blogs, I have recently found a TON of really awesome new-to-me blogs! And lastly...

Tuesday the 11th was National Human Trafficking Awareness Day. I know everyone probably has some cause or charity they're big advocates for, and this is mine. You can make donations here. Also very important is how much Australia could use help right now due to the horrible flooding. Two of the lovely ladies I tagged, Jerry and Kira, both live in areas very close to the flooding. There are so many people who have lost everything. You can donate here.

Good as gold: e.l.f.'s Gotta Glow blush

2011-01-11T20:28:00.006-06:00

As promised, today I'm doing a review of one of my absolute favorite products of all time, e.l.f.'s Studio Blush in the shade Gotta Glow. I didn't used to think there was much point to highlighters/luminizers until one day when I was reading Mindy's blog and I realized how awesome and glowy her cheeks always look in her FOTD's. So I decided to go ahead and order Gotta Glow- for only $3, it wouldn't be a big letdown if I didn't like it.

Well, not only did I like it, but I LOVE it and I use it every day. It is one of the only items I have ever hit pan on, and I will rebuy it as soon as I run out. I don't use it as on all-over face powder, because it is so golden, and because I work at Arby's (it's my last week!) my face gets gross and shiny really fast, so I don't want to make it look even shinier. I don't think I would recommend it as more than just a cheek highlighter, but if you can make it look awesome on your entire face, go for it!

Sorry about the red blotch and the cat scratch on my hand! If you click to see the picture in full size, you can see the gold shimmer. My camera wasn't picking up on it very well on my hand swatch for some reason.

On the cheek photos I applied it heavily, using three swipes. I wanted to make sure it would show up well in the pictures, but I think the flash made it show up a little TOO well, haha. It is not a huge obvious golden streak, and my blush is not that obvious! But you get a good idea.

For $3, this is a Holy Grail item for me. I really don't like most liquid luminizers because I feel like they make your pores look huge, so the fact that this is a powder is perfect for me. e.l.f. can be really hit and miss with their line, but this is a freakin' bullseye. It is also a dupe for NARS Albatross (Charlotte from Lipglossiping did a comparison post here.)

And I wanted to show you guys the amazing shirt I was wearing when I was doing swatches!

Swatches of my MAC collection

2011-01-09T18:21:00.003-06:00

Ok, I finally got around to doing swatches of my new MAC stuff! I just begrudgingly decided to let MAC into my life a few weeks ago, so it's not a lot. Since I don't have a ton of their products, it means I can do a teeny review of each item along with the swatches. :) If you want to see product photos, they are a few posts back.

First, we have a Mineralize Blush in the shade Love Rock.

This is after a few swipes with a blush brush, so as you can see it is very sheer. It has tons of really fine glitter in it, which I personally LOVE. I feel like this blush looks really natural on me, but with anyone who has skin darker than 'fair', the color payoff probably wouldn't be very good. It's been my go-to blush lately, and I love it enough that I'd buy another Mineralize Blush when I run out of this one.

Next is Liquidlast Liner in the shade Greenplay, and an Eye Kohl in the shade I Get No Kick.

I don't have UD's Acid Rain liner to compare, but I think it's probably pretty close to Greenplay. I think the product is pretty small to pay full price ($16.50), but I do like the brush, and the fact that this stuff is pretty much bulletproof. I Get No Kick has already become a Holy Grail item for me. I've been using it every day under my waterline to brighten up my eyes.

I have 4 different types of MAC glosses. From left to right is a Lipglass in shade Culture Clash, a Lustreglass in shade Wonderstruck, a Superglass in shade Cherry Electric, and a Lipgelee in shade Bubble Lounge.

Once again, I think the full price ($14.50) for the Lipglass and Lustreglass is a bit much, because they aren't very big, but they are gorgeous and I like the smell. The Lipgelee is also $14.50 but has a lot more product in it, so I think the price is fair. But the best, most amazing thing of all is the Superglass. I would gladly pay the full $18 for this any day. In fact, I wish I had bought an extra when I was at the CCO, because this is the most awesome lip gloss in the entire world, and right now it's not available. Look at the amazing flecks of gorgeous it has! I even took this huge lip picture for you so you could see the flecks in action (Cherry Electric over Slimshine Lipstick in Swelter).

The bad thing is that the flakies stay on your lips long after the gloss wears off. But I don't even care. That is how much I love this.

Last but not least, some random lip products. I swatched each twice- first layered a few times, and then just one swipe. From left to right is a Slimshine Lipstick in shade Swelter, a Pro Longwear Lipstain Marker in shade A Classic, and a lipstick with a Lustre finish in shade London Life.

The Slimshines are currently unavailable, and I haven't tried the lipstain, but I do love the lipstick! I can definitely see why MAC is known for their lip products. It's gorgeous, sheer but buildable, and very moisturizing. I can see myself with a huge stash of these in the future.

I hope that was helpful to someone! In case you're wondering why I haven't been doing much with indie makeup lately, it's because I'm not ordering anything online right now since I'm about to move. In a few weeks hopefully I'll be ordering like a fiend ;)

Neutral EOTD with bright pink cheeks &lips

2011-01-07T16:16:00.006-06:00

Hi everyone! I know I don't have the MAC swatches I promised you yet, ooops ;) But I've been super busy as I'm moving in less than 2 weeks. For the same reason, I'll probably be updating pretty sporadically for the next month or so until I'm all settled in. I will, however, be photo-documenting my moving-out experience, so you can all look at the pictures and pretend to enjoy them! Speaking of photos, check out Lady Gaga's upcoming products for Polaroid. This stuff blows my mind. It seems so advanced and futuristic to me :P

What I used:

Concrete Minerals Electric Eye Primer
Fyrinnae Pixie Epoxy

Heather, by Elohi Cosmetics (lid)
Fawn, by Elohi Cosmetics (crease)
Eat Me, Drink Me, by Hi Fi (highlight)

Maybelline Falsies Mascara

Urban Decay 24/7 pencil in Underground (waterline)
MAC eye kohl in I Get No Kick (below waterline)

mark After Glo blush
elf Gotta Glo blush

Sephora Collection Lip Attitude-Star lipstick in Delirious Rose 04
Lancome juicy tube in Paris Bubbly

My eyebrow is going rogue, to use unfortunate Palinesque phrasing.

I actually hit pan on the elf Gotta Glow blush as I did this look, so I'm going to do a review of it soon since I love it so much. I also would like to get the MAC swatches done before I leave, and a little review with swatches of the big NYX glitter cream palette I got a while ago. I hope everyone had a relaxing post-holiday week. Enjoy the weekend!

My favorite fragrances of 2010

2011-01-03T23:22:00.007-06:00

I wanted to do some sort of "end of the year favorites" post, and decided to do one about perfume instead of makeup. In 2010 I started branching out fragrance-wise, especially by trying fragrances from lots of indie companies. Until somewhat recently, I've worn Calvin Klein Eternity Summer (2007 edition) since January of '08. Now I've discovered some scents I like a lot better, and it tends to sit untouched.

Chance Eau Fraiche, by Chanel

I decided to list this one first because it's my favorite perfume, hands down. My mom gave me a little sample vial of it that she got somewhere, and I fell in love. I wish it wasn't so damn expensive though! I bought this 1.7 oz size at Sephora ($65) when I got the Beauty Insider coupon in the mail last month that gave me $15 off, and I've worn it almost every day since. I really can't describe the scent any better than to call it a fresh floral, so see if you can find it next time you go to the mall!

Celebration, by Latherati Soap Foundry

I have been meaning to review Latherati since I first ordered, which I think was this summer... I find I have a hard time reviewing body product companies though. In short, I LOVE Latherati- best lip balm formula I've ever tried, and Julie is so thoughtful and accommodating. Even though I go to indie companies to find more unusual scents, my favorite from Latherati is Celebration, which is a fragrance I can imagine being widely sold in stores. To me it smells like the description- champagne and strawberries. I just ordered the body spray and it should be getting here in the next few days :D

Dia de los Muertos, by Lethal Lathers

I loved my soap sample of this so much that I bought the solid perfume. It's a very foody type scent. To me it smells like lemon meringue pie or lemon bars, but more perfume-y and wearable. If you've smelled BABW Vanilla Lemon, this is a similar scent.

Vice, by Haus of Gloi

This is another gourmand scent. My boyfriend hates foody scents, so I have this just as a shower scrub, which I'm almost out of! :O I once saw on VH1 this restaurant which is SO exclusive that it only has 12 seats. Imagine, if you will, such a place. Or that place in 30 Rock that Jack likes with the gold covered ice cream. Imagine them serving you the most delicious chocolate coffee dessert recipe known to man. This is what Vice smells like. I also love their scent Picaroon, and their LE for summer scents in Zazz and Insalata Nocturna.

Marshmallow, by Urban Decay

The picture I put is of the old packaging that I have, but it comes in cuter packaging now. This is a body powder that is extremely sparkly. It not only smells of marshmallow, but tastes like it too ;) I think $29 is a crazy high price, but honestly I will pay that much when I run out because this is the PERFECT marshmallow scent. It is exactly what I had been looking for, and is a million times better than any other marshmallow scented products I've tried.

Lost at Sea, by One Hand Washes the Other

I really don't know how to describe this one at all. According to the description it is mainly coconut and citrus fruit, with maybe some ozone type scent mixed in. All I can say is that I love it, and I feel like regardless of what your general fragrance preferences all, you'll probably like this. OHWTO is also a big winner in my book for the many other amazing fragrances- Salty Mariner and Grass Stain are stock scents, but amazing. Barista! is a custom scent similar to Haus of Gloi's Vice. Pumpkin Bread (discontinued, boo!) was my go-to scent during fall. Vanillime and Desolation Angel are awesome lime-y scents (pretty similar imo). Becca also has a scent called Pink Lady, which is a great dupe for...

Pink Sugar, by Aquolina

I had seen this scent duped by basically every indie bath company, and knew it was one of the top selling perfumes at Sephora, so when a Sephora opened at my local mall this summer it was the first one I tested. It is REALLY sweet, like spraying yourself with cotton candy, so it's definitely not for everyone. I love how the scent changes over time- on my skin it turns from a cotton candy scent into more of a sweet vanilla.

Have you tried any of these fragrances? Which are your favorites? I'm always looking to try new ones!

Beauty Blogger Challenge

2011-01-01T21:02:00.004-06:00

If you head on over to A Girl and Her Shadows, you can see that she has set up the Beauty Blogger Challenge, a fun little weekly questionnaire thing. I promised you swatches with my next post, but I am way too hungover to put that much effort into anything. Before you start thinking I am cool or fun, it was from drinking at my cousin's wedding reception on New Years... surrounded by my whole family... with my boyfriend in Alaska... where I did not do anything but sit in a chair all night and drink fuzzy navels. On the drive back home today, my dad had to pull over so I could puke on the side of the road. Not the best way to start off 2011 :P But I am moving to Texas in less than 3 weeks, and I'm really excited about starting a new chapter in my life. It's nice to know that even when I'm moving 1000 miles away, I'll still have all of you to talk to :) That's really comforting to me, I appreciate all of you so much!

The question for this week is: Why did you start blogging about beauty? Do you think you would have blogged about other topics if you hadn’t started beauty blogging? Were you already blogging something else when you started?

I started reading beauty blogs because I was following Aromaleigh on facebook, and Miss K sometimes would link to blogs that were using AL products. The first blogs I started regularly following were Phyrra and Gothique. Through them I found other bloggers, and eventually decided I wanted to start a blog too.

I also started a movie blog at the same time, but deleted it after a few weeks because I wanted to focus solely on Eyeconic Makeup. I probably would have maintained a movie blog at some point if I never started this one, and I do a movie post over here every once in a while. Movies are my great obsession alongside makeup, so if you ever want to chat about some random film you think no one else has ever heard of, I'm your girl! Especially if it's horrifying/disturbing/disgusting :D

I really hope some more of you participate in this weekly event, I think it's really fun and I'd love to see everyone else's answers! Thanks for reading my textwall. Your reward is pictures of my dog, Ginger, who I will miss very much when I leave! She loves to sit outside in the snow :3

My trip to a CCO

2010-12-30T22:40:00.005-06:00

If you read as many beauty blogs as I do, you may have heard of the famed "CCO" shops- it stands for Cosmetics Company Outlet. CCO's are owned by Estee Lauder, and they carry discounted makeup from all the brands Estee Lauder owns. At the CCO I went to, they carried (besides Estee Lauder, obviously) Flirt! (the Kohl's makeup line), Bobbi Brown, Clinique, Prescriptives, and MAC, the reason anyone really wants to go in the first place. They also had a good amount of Clinique skincare products, and skincare products from another brand I haven't heard of, American something. I didn't look closely at the perfume brands but I do remember seeing Tommy Hilfiger. The store was at an outlet mall in Aurora, IL. I was visiting one of my grandmas who lives pretty close to that area so my mom and I decided to go to the outlet mall and check it out. :)

Sadly I forgot my camera at home that day so I didn't get any pictures of the store for you guys. If you go on Youtube though, some people have uploaded videos of what the stores look like. They had some stuff in boxes you could just grab off the shelf and buy, but things like eyeliners and lippies they only had out as testers, and you would have to bring them up to the counter to get them new in the box. Some of the gloss testers were gross, but it's nice that you know no one has touched the stuff you end up buying.

The discount prices aren't huge, I would say most things were 20%-35% off the original price. The items they carry aren't brand new things. For example, the most recent MAC items they had were from the To The Beach collection, but they also had stuff from as far back as the Heatherette, Fafi, etc. collections. They had lots of discontinued items too!

I decided to go ahead and buy my very first MAC products :)

Right now I am out of town AGAIN for another family thing, but I will do swatches when I get home. I got a mineralized blush, a Superglass, a Lipglass, a liquid liner, a Slimshine lipstick, and a lipstain. The total of these items was a little less than $70 after tax. If you have a CCO near you and you like MAC or any of the other brands they carry, it is DEFINITELY worth your time to go, even if you have to drive a while. Here is a link to which outlet malls have a CCO store.

The same outlet mall also had a Lancome Company Store. They had Juicy Tubes and this amazingly cool discontinued product I'll show you later for 55% off, so I got three items for about $20.

I also went to CVS yesterday and grabbed a couple clearance lippies from Revlon that were 75% off. They were less than $3 each. If you haven't heard by now, CVS is having their beauty clearance sale. You can find out some great information about it over at Noveau Cheap. At the one I stopped at, I don't think they had finished marking prices, but I did see a LOT of Revlon stuff on sale.

So here was my total haul for the week, and everything was purchased at a discount price!

If there is anything else I can think to add about the CCO I will, and if there is something you'd like to know that I didn't mention, please feel free to ask and I'll do my best to try and remember :P

NYX lipstick & lipgloss swatches

2010-12-26T18:20:00.005-06:00

This is the longest I have ever gone without posting in my blog! I have been so busy lately, and I have really missed blogging and reading everyone else's blogs!

I thought I'd do swatches of the NYX stuff I ordered from Cherry Culture when they were having their Black Friday sale, along with the few that I already had. It is a real PITA to try and decide what colors to order, since the Cherry Culture swatches are so incorrect and useless. While I was searching for swatches I found this blog. It's really great, and there are lots of swatches of different NYX products. Go follow!

I have 3 of the Round Lipsticks in the colors Georgia (618), Watermelon (616), and Tea Rose (628). I think I used to have a couple others that I either threw away or gave to friends because the colors didn't work for me.

Kitty likes lipstick :3

From left to right: Georgia, Watermelon, Tea Rose

Georgia and Watermelon are frosty, and I feel like they're harder for me to pull off. I fell in love with Tea Rose though, it is almost an exact match to my natural lip color.

I got one Diamond Sparkle lipgloss in Rose Sparkle (01). It is kind of metallic and I don't think I could ever wear it out without using a lip scrub first.

All of the NYX Girls Round Lip Glosses I have are very pretty, but they have this artificial lemon smell that I don't like. It reminds me of pledge. From left to right is Strawberry (11), Sparkle (05), Kiss (20), and Ballerina Pink (36).

I hope these swatches were helpful, and I'm looking forward to blogging regularly again :) How were your holidays? What did you give/get for Christmas? I got a dolphin Pillow Pet, some Bruce Willis movies (love him), 2 Wiimotes for our old broken Wii I'm taking with me to Texas (the disk reader doesn't work, but my brother just downloads games and puts them on a hard drive ;P) Hello Kitty oven mitts, and these Nikes that I asked for. I even got a cute scarf from my manager, so it was a really nice Christmas! Did anyone get any cool makeup? Are you hauling from the new MAC collections? I haven't been here in a while, I must catch up on everything!!

Some Eye(brows) of the Days

2010-12-15T21:48:00.011-06:00

You might have noticed it's been almost a month since I've posted an EOTD. Since I started blogging I got a little self conscious about my eyebrows, because I'd never waxed or plucked them or anything. So finally about a month ago, I decided to pluck them a little bit. I'm pretty sure it's impossible not to mess up your brows the first time you pluck, because you really don't know when to stop. I didn't pluck enough at first, then I way overplucked. I kind of suck at filling in my brows, when I even bother to try, so that's why they will probably look different for every EOTD I do until I figure out what works for my face. They don't look too bad anymore, and I'm sure no one is paying attention to my eyebrows IRL, so it's really not a big deal.

This EOTD is from a couple weeks ago. The lid color is Hi Fi's "Fear the Nobodies", with some gold glitter liner from Collection 2000.

A few days ago I did my most overused color combo of yellow and green. The chartreuse is Juvenile by Concrete Minerals, the green is Parrot Green by Barry M, and the purple is Nightshade by Evil Shades. These were all nearly-matte colors, so they don't look as blended in the pictures are they were IRL.

I'll end this post with a couple music videos by my favorite band, Foxy Shazam, because I'm seeing them live on Friday and I'm really excited! :D

My Stila lippie collection

2010-12-10T22:59:00.005-06:00

I took advantage of the Stila warehouse sale a couple weeks ago, and ordered myself a few new lippies. None of my Stila lippies have been bought at full price- I've gotten them from Beauty Ticket and Haute Look for discounted prices, and from the warehouse sale for really cheap too. I think I might start having heart palpitations if I ever actually went to Sephora and paid full price for something. :P

I decided to swatch my collection for you!

On the left are two swatches of the retired Lip Glaze color, Melon. On the right are swatches of the Barbie Loves Stila Lip Enamel Luxe Gloss set- Joy, Tickled Pink, and Happiness.

Here's what the Barbie set looks like.

I haven't worn any of the lip enamels yet, but when I swatched them they were almost impossible to get off my hand, so I'm going to guess the staying power is pretty damn good! The lip glaze is nice, but I can't imagine buying one at full price. There is really not a lot of product in it.

More swatches! On the left of my hand is Long Wear Lip Color in the Shade Serenade. The middle and right are High Shine Lip Color in shades Louise and Michaela.

The High Shine lip colors are apparently discontinued, but they pop up on Beauty Ticket and Haute Look from time to time. It's too bad, because I LOVE them- I love sheer lip colors (as you can see, they are both pretty sheer), and these are also really moisturizing.

Here's what the packaging looks like- if you see this, I'd snatch it up!

The Long Wear Lip Color is awesome. It is such a great shade for me, and I love the texture and feel. This is something I'd actually pay full price for! *gasp*

Right now I am really loving what I've tried of Stila's lip products. I'd like to try their Lip Rouge, Lip & Cheek Stain, and the 24K glosses.

Which Stila products are your favorites?

Latest Darling Girl order

2010-12-06T15:48:00.005-06:00

As promised, here's swatches of what I ordered recently from Darling Girl Cosmetics.

Eyeshadows: Scarecrow, Groovology, Felicity, & aqua liner in Designated Driver

Scarecrow is even prettier in person than in all the swatches I've seen! It is such a complex and unique color, this one is a MUST HAVE. I also love Groovology, it's my favorite shade of purple. Felicity was a free sample and isn't listed as far as I can tell. It's a beautiful silver, and turns a little bit pink in the right light.

Designated Driver has some holo glitter that didn't really show up in the swatches, so here's a close up where you can kiiiinda see it.

The container it comes in is teeny! It's only $3, so I think the price is fair, I just think I'll end up losing this every time I get it out. Here's a comparison picture.

I got a sample of the new cream liner in the shade El Diablo. It's a neat reddish brown. It felt kind of stiff to the touch, but when I used an angled eyeliner brush to try and swatch it, it was actually just fine.

Here is what I was most excited about, the cream blush samples! I got Barbie Girl, Mad About Mauve, and Glow Baby Glow. The top swatch is applied heavily, the bottom is sheered out a bit.

Here's a better image of Glow Baby Glow. It's applied heavily on the lift, sheered out on the right.

What an awesome highlight! I seriously love it. I love Barbie Girl too, and I'd like to try out Impetuous.

I also got a mini sized liquid kiss gloss in the shade First Kiss.

I got samples of the salmon and lemon correctors too, but I couldn't get my camera to capture them accurately, so I don't have pictures. Sadly, like every concealer I try for my dark circles, they don't work for me. I need to stop complaining about Benefit's Erase Paste so much since it is literally the only thing I've ever tried that doesn't end up making me look cakey, jaundiced, or like I didn't even use concealer at all. For normal people without horrendously bad circles and extremely weird, bumpy, and sensitive under eye skin, these might work for you, but they don't cut it for me.

See anything you like? I'm lemming all the new tinted lip balms from the Naughty and Nice collection.

Sneak Peek at the Darling Girl Naughty & Nice collection!

2010-12-04T16:51:00.003-06:00

I got my most recent order from Darling Girl Cosmetics today, and Susan kindly included some samples from her upcoming Naughty and Nice collection. The collection should be going live tomorrow or Monday, but possibly later because Susan is sick (feel better Susan!).

The top row is two colors from the Nice collection- Whisper and Exposed. Next to those is the Liquid Kiss in the shade Painted Whore. First applied heavily, then lightly. The bottom row is from the Naughty collection- Dirty Talk, Sex Kitten, and Peep Show.

Aside from Whisper, which is a gorgeous highlight/all over wash color, these are all pretty sparkly, which you couldn't tell in any of the pictures I took. Sex Kitten is especially nice with holographic glitter. I also really like Exposed, which is a brown with a green shift.

In case anyone is wondering, Sex Kitten did not stain my hand as some red shadows tend to do. I'm looking forward to the release of the rest of the collection!

Tomorrow I'll be posting reviews & swatches of the rest of my order.

Long overdue Elohi Cosmetics review

2010-11-29T23:50:00.010-06:00

I'm going to be very straightforward and honest with this review, as I try to be with every review I do. So I want to start off right away saying that the eyeshadows I'll be sharing with you were sent to me free of charge- six samples and one full size. I will also say that this is the company I was referring to in a post I made a few months back (I got the package about 5 weeks after my initial conversation with Morgan). But I am willing to cut Morgan, the owner, some slack. The company, Elohi Cosmetics, has only been opened since May, so it's relatively new.

When I opened the envelope, I thought the colors looked really nice and immediately opened up all the jars to look at them. Here I encountered problem #1.

The jars don't come with sifters, so a lot of the shadow got right up under the lid during shipping, and flew out everywhere when I opened it. There is an option on the website to have sifters put in your jar, but you'll receive a little bit less pigment to make room for the sifters. I personally don't like sifters because they're a total pain in the ass for me to get off, so it would be nice if jars without sifters were secured a bit better.

Here are swatches of the shadows I chose. They are done over Concrete Minerals eyeshadow primer.

Top 3: Heather, Fawn, Shock
Bottom 4: Gemini, Kristen, BAM, Tipsy Tiger

And here is Libra, because I forgot to swatch it with the rest T_T

I did ask Morgan when we first started corresponding if any of the colors were repackaged, and she said no. I believe her to be truthful; all the colors seem unique to me. Some of the pictures do look similar to TKB colors, but I have a feeling it's like when Shiro opened- similar colors, but not repackaged. I picked the shade Heather just because I thought having an eyeshadow with my name would be cool, but it is honestly one of the prettiest shadows I own. Depending on the lighting, it ranges from a taupe to a silver to a purple, all in one. Shock is also an insanely awesome chartreusey green, but sadly it's not on the website anymore, which brings me to my next point.

Only 4 of the 7 colors I got are still listed on the website- Heather, Fawn, Gemini, and Libra. From browsing through the company's Facebook page, it seems that there are a lot of LE collections released but only available for an extremely short time- maybe a week or two, I can't say for sure. I think it would be great if they stayed around longer, or even became part of the permanent line. Some of the colors I've seen are so pretty, and I wish I still had the opportunity to order them. The new holiday collection looks really nice.

If you go to the sales/specials section and look at the Buy More, Save More bundles, two of them state that if you order the bundles you can choose retired colors if you like. The facebook page has an album with the retired colors, but wouldn't it just be a lot easier to keep them around? I don't really understand why you can get them in a bundle order but not individually. I also don't get why the image for the 4 for $10 says it's 4 for $8, and the image for the 6 for $15 says it's 6 for $12.

I think pricing is very fair. There are no samples, but a full size is only $4, which is a great price. The bundles also make the shadows even cheaper than that, so those are a great deal. Ingredients aren't listed on the website or on the products. Morgan says to email her for ingredient information, but I think that is something that should be listed on the site. Actually, I'm not sure if it is legal not to list ingredients anywhere. Shadows that contain carmine do say so in the description. Normally I'm pretty "whatever" about ingredients, but since the shadows were damn hard to wash off after I swatched them, I am curious about what makes them stay on. The red and pink shadows stained my hand.

I THINK that's everything I wanted to say! If I forgot anything else, I'll edit the post to include it. My overall opinion on Elohi is so-so. I think the colors are really nice, and the prices are fabulous, but I feel like there is a LOT of improvement to be made before I'd place a new order.

If you want to check out more about Elohi, Dominique has also done a review.

I need help choosing my Meow foundation color!

2010-11-28T23:53:00.003-06:00

I have been sitting here trying to figure out which foundation samples to order from Meow for so long that the sale would be over in just a few minutes if they didn't just generously extend it until Tuesday. Thankfully they did, so hopefully before then you guys can help me!

For my actual skin tone, it looks like I could be a 1/Sleek, or a 2/Frisky. My real problem is figuring out my undertones. I have done all the little tests and tricks to discover what my undertone is, and I get a different result for everything I try. I am so confused. I don't want to have to order an insane number of samples, as I do NOT have the money for that right now. If someone has any idea of which foundations might work for me based on my FOTD's that I've posted in the past, please please please let me know! I know a lot of you wear Meow foundation, so any suggestions you have would be extremely helpful for me.

A product I hate so much that I'm making a whole post about it.

2010-11-23T00:00:00.006-06:00

I hope it is evident from the name of my blog that I generally write about makeup. Once in a while I'll talk about a fun indie bath & body company, cus that stuff is awesome too! I do not ever write about shaving cream, because that shit is boring, and it's not fun, pretty, or awesome. But due to the fact that my legs and wallet have been defiled by this mockery of a shaving cream, and due to the fact that I keep seeing people RECOMMENDING this crap, I decided to make a ranty post about how much it sucks. I care about you guys and don't want you to make the same mistake I did when I bought...

*DUN DUN DUN*

THE SHAVING CREAM FROM THE DEPTHS OF HELL!

I bought this Eos shaving cream from Walgreens a couple months ago, wanting to test it. I don't remember the exact price, only that it was about $1 more than my usual Skintimate shaving cream (in the scent Flirty Mango). I wouldn't even call this product a shaving cream. It is more like an extremely runny lotion, or like using a bar of soap on your legs to shave instead of actual shaving cream (which I find annoyingly ineffective). You would think, that since it's basically just a lotion, your legs would feel soft and moisturized after you use it. Wrong! My legs are really dry and sensitive, and after I shave they are usually really itchy. This product wasn't any different.

It says you can use it wet or dry- true, but it sucks either way. When I tried using it on dry legs, it left behind a really thin layer of the cream wherever I shaved that I had to wash off. The razor couldn't seem to get it all.

A lot of the product also got stuck in between the razor blades, and wouldn't rinse out. This made more hair get stuck in the blades as well, so basically the blade is ruined after one use. The sink in my bathroom got extremely clogged up last month and was practically impossible to fix, and I just now realized it was probably due to the shaving cream that was going down the drain.

You also have to use a huge amount to fully cover your legs. I have only tried using it twice, and if I ever bothered to try it again, there's only enough left for 2 or 3 more shaves.

The only redeeming quality is that it smells nice. I picked out the scent Lavender Jasmine. I don't think it smells like either, but it's nice.

Bottom line: sound the alarms and avoid at all costs!

I like to end angry posts with a nice picture ^_^ Here you go!

EOTD inspired by prettybottles

2010-11-18T18:19:00.004-06:00

I did this look a few days ago, and it was inspired by something Elizabeth from prettybottles did. It ended up looking nothing like it, as most things I imitate turn out, but I like it. It's very sunset-y.

Eye makeup:

Concrete Minerals eye primer

Pale Jewel, by Hi Fi (inner lid)
Toucan, by Meow (center lid)
BFF, by Meow (outer lid)
Mornings of Gold, by Hi Fi (highlight)
Dear Mom, by Glamour Doll (under waterline)

Maybelline Falsies mascara

some purple Jordana twist-up stick liner

Not sure why I saved my close-up pictures so small...I hope everyone is having a good week; it's almost the weekend!

Rainbow & Neutral looks

2010-11-16T22:27:00.007-06:00

I've been playing around with my makeup a lot more this week than I usually do, so I have a couple looks to show you that I personally LOVE. I washed my brushes too, yay! Quick thoughts about my brushes: with the last few washes, my Ecotools and my elf Studio eyeshadow brushes have gotten really stiff and the pigment just kind of sits on them. Any advice? The eyeshadow brushes that are actually doing the best are my Maybelline brushes that I've had for at least 3 years. I'm so impressed, I'm going to try and find some more (I THINK they were from Walmart, maybe Target). Also, I'm looking for a good and cheap kabuki brush, none of this MAC nonsense. What would you recommend?

This first look is the popular, overused rainbow look. I realized I have never actually done one, so I decided to use my Brights collection from Fusion of Color. There's no purple, but I'm not really sure where I would have put it anyway.

This next look was using my Book of Shadows III from Urban Decay. I call it "Dirty Neutral" :3 You can interpret that however you want, ya creeps.

The liner is Urban Decay as well, in the shade "Lucky".

One last thing: after reading your comments, there is no way in HELL I am getting an industrial! I'd like to get a small septum ring, but I'm going to hold off on that for a little bit since I'll have to look for a new job in a couple months when I move. You never know how places are about piercings...

IT'S ALIIIIIIIIVE!

2010-11-10T19:12:00.007-06:00

And on it's 200th post! :D

I can't believe it's been a WEEK since I last posted. I'm not caught up on anyone's blogs either, I feel so out of touch! I wish I could say I've been gone due to having a fantastically fun filled and adventurous life, but it's really because I've been sick/working/doing schoolwork/doing laundry. I've been meaning to clean my room for the past year and a half, but since I'm moving in 10 weeks, I don't see the point now, hehehe.

The looks I've been doing all week have been turning out pretty terrible, and I could not for the life of me figure out what I was doing wrong. Everything just kept looking so muddy. It seriously took me until yesterday to question when the last time I bothered to clean my brushes was. Hint: Not anytime this month. Also, not anytime last month. I'm pretty sure it was at the very end of September. So my task tonight is to CLEAN ALL THE THINGS (but really just the brushes).

Here's the only looks I've done that didn't turn into a puddle o' poop on my eyelids.

Here I used some colors from Shiro. Mew and Articuno on the lid, Mewtwo (which you can't really see due to the puddle o' poop effect) and Squirtle in the crease. SS Anne under the waterline. The highlight color is Hail Caesar by Hi Fi.

The other night before I realized the muddiness was a result of my own laziness, I got really fed up with how crappy everything kept looking, so I used some neutrals, which can never go wrong. The lid color is called Silent Night by Nars. It is really chunky and nowhere near the best gold I have, but I use it when I want to feel fancy and rich :3 The crease color is Darling Girl's Oracle, a little bit of Evil Shade's Acolyte on the lower lid, and the highlight is Hail Caesar by Hi Fi. As soon as I go off my no-buy, I'm getting a full size of this. It's my new favorite highlight color.

Before I depart again for who knows how long, does anyone have an industrial piercing? I'd like to get one but I need to know how much they hurt first, cus I'm kind of a baby. I thought the nose ring was pretty painful, for a reference.

Some Hi-Fi swatches

2010-11-03T18:16:00.002-05:00

Hi everyone! I thought I'd show my swatches from my last Hi-Fi order. I did get a sample set of the Halloween collection, but I didn't bother swatching those since so many people already have. I did order samples of all the 1st anniversary colors, and I swatched them for you since I haven't seen too many other people with these.

Top 3: Last Words, So What, Another Day Another Drama
Bottom 3: Intoxicate Me, Adrenaline, Suicide Trees

I wish I could capture the complexity of these! I'm REALLY impressed by this whole collection, especially the pinks! Last Words is a pale pink with a gold shift, a la Fyrinnae's "Rapunzel Had Extensions" (I don't have that one to compare, sorry). So What has a really gorgeous violet/blue shift to it.

Top 2: Contradiction, Like a Hurricane
Bottom 2: Verge of Obscene, Loser King

I could not for anything get Like a Hurricane and Verge of Obscene to show up as gorgeous as they are in person! Like a Hurricane is this really awesome, shimmery blue-silver color. Verge of Obscene is a super dark purple, it would be amazing for a purple smokey eye. Contradiction has some crazy pink glitter in it; here's a close up so you can see it better.

I also got 2 Spotlight Lip Glazes- Natural Assassin from the 1st anniversary collection, and Phantasm from the Nightmare 2010 collection.

Natural Assassin is a HIGHLY PIGMENTED copper! From the picture I expected it to be more pink, but the description does say it's a metallic copper. Phantasm is a sheer pearl gloss, it's going to look awesome layered over lipstick. My only complaint with these is the smell... Phantasm is ok, it has a kind of fake-vanilla plastic-y smell. Natural Assassin smells REALLY plastic-y though, and it's pretty strong.

As of yesterday my blog is a year old! :D How exciting! It would be better if this was my 200th post, but sadly it's my 199th, aww! I'm going to stay on my no-buy through the rest of November, unless it turns out that insurance will cover the new retainers I had to pay for, which it might! I really hope so, because I have some orders I'm aching to place. I hope everyone's having a great week!

My 5 Halloween movie picks

2010-10-30T14:44:00.003-05:00

Halloween is tomorrow, my favorite holiday of the year. My favorite kinds of movies are any that are scary and/or weird and/or disturbing. This is why I'm only going to choose 5 to talk about, or I'll be talking about this FOREVER. I'm also only going to talk about American movies for once, because I feel like if I delve into foreign horror too, I'll never be able to stop adding movies :P

Trick 'r Treat

This was a straight to DVD release from last October. I would call it the movie equivalent of telling ghost stories while you're sitting around a fire. It's not really scary, but it's a lot of fun.

Paranormal Activity 2

I know some people don't find these to be scary at all, but I do. I don't even believe in demons and I consider the first one to be my personal scariest movie ever. If you like the first one, you will like this too. It's just more of the same, and that's fine with me!

House of the Devil

This movie should be the "how-to" example for directors who want to make an extremely suspenseful movie. I love it for the same reason some people don't- there is SO MUCH slow buildup to the conclusion. I thought it was excellent and really scary. If you have Netflix, this is available on instant play.

Clue

I really hope everyone has seen this at least once! This has been one of my favorites since I was 11 or 12. It's spooky, funny, and obviously Tim Curry is the best :D Every time I watch it I catch something new that I've never noticed.

The Shining

For the last one I decided to pick a classic. I hope everyone has seen this one, too! There's a reason it's so famous, and that's because it's so awesome. Creeps me out every time.

Hope you guys check out some of these movies and enjoy them!

Spring Fairy LOTD

2010-10-28T20:28:00.003-05:00

Hi everyone! I've been updating only once or twice a week as compared to my normal time frame of about every other day. I don't know if I will continue posting more slowly or not. I don't ever want this blog to feel like a chore instead of something fun I love, so if that means posting just a teeny bit less, that's what I'll do. I started blogging on November 2nd of 2009, I can't believe it's been almost a year already! That seems so crazy to me. I'd love to do a giveaway, but I'm on a no buy. It would be nice if I could do a small one around Christmastime, hopefully that will work out since I have some decent paychecks coming my way.

Here's a look I did just playing around with makeup the other night. I had really been wanting to use Showy & Glowing Luna together. I like green and pink together because it makes me think of spring and fairies ^_^ The temperature has been 65-70 here for weeks, and it just dropped to 45 today so it feels so, so cold.

Shadows I used:

Concrete Minerals eye primer

Showy, by Aromaleigh (inner lid)
Glowing Luna, by Aromaleigh (outer lid)
Berry Exclusive, by Fusion of Color (crease)
Hail Caesar, by Hi Fi (highlight)
Ice Princess, by Darling Girl (lower lashline; unreleased color)

Showy and Glowing Luna are really sparkly, used over Pixie Epoxy it would have been amazing, but I wanted a soft look. Oh, I got my nose pierced too!

Closed-eye shot, first person to tell me what the poster in the picture says wins ten makeup points! Now it's time for me to catch up on your blogs :3

Aromaleigh Retro Hi-Fi Mattes swatches

2010-10-23T15:18:00.005-05:00

Since I've been wanting to experiment with mattes a bit more lately, I ordered a full sample set of the of the Retro Hi-Fi mattes from Aromaleigh. I know it's kind of late in the game to bother with AL swatches at this point, but everyone likes looking at pretty pictures, right? :)

Top 3: Train Wreck, Cranked, Heels on Fire
Bottom 4: Supermurgatroid, Flip Your Lid, Ankle Biter, Cat's Pajamas

The sparkle from Train Wreck is because I didn't start with a clean brush, but Cranked does have shimmer, but it's with a matte base. You can see how similar some of these are.

Top 4: Real Gone, Spaz, In Orbit, Radioactive
Bottom 4: Cool It, Fake Out, Big Tickle, Daddy-o

All the blues are so similar. I love the great quality of the mattes in this collection, but some of the colors are just so close. I was surprised that In Orbit was one of my favorites from the collection.

Top 3: Kookie, What's Shakin', Got Dibs
Bottom 2: In the Mix, Smokin'

I LOVE all 5 of these last colors, they are so beautiful. Sample sale sets are sold out, but there's still quite a few of these colors available for purchase in a sample 3-pack. The only full size that's sold out is Supermurgatroid, so you can still get all the rest of these!

Sorry I've been MIA all week, I've been pretty busy with school, work, and too many annoying appointments. I have lots of Meow swatches to do and tonnns of stuff I should have already reviewed months ago, and of course some EOTD's! I'm seeing Paranormal Activity 2 tonight after work; I'm pretty excited. The first one scared me so much, and I bought the DVD and watched it probably 4 times. What are your weekend plans?

I got something awesome :D

2010-10-18T11:00:00.010-05:00

Damn right that's a Hello Kitty pillowcase, made for me by everyone's favorite Kathy :D Not surprisingly, one of my kitties really likes it too and curled up on it next to me last night when I went to bed :3

I don't have any fun looks today, because I've been lazy and mostly just doing pretty neutral looks with my BoS3. I DID do my best friend's makeup for her homecoming though. She really liked it and I will try and post pictures of it if she uploads any to facebook.

I thought I'd do some blog love, since I haven't for a while and I've found some AWESOME new blogs lately! I really need to update my blogroll one of these days.

All Made Up

Beauty From Another Planet

Bonny Binnacle

Cooking Chinchillas

Cosmetics and Cats

I'll Light the Night with Sparks

Lady in a Top Hat- can I just say, this blog has the absolute BEST swatches!

prettybottles

Samelevennn

Shop My Stash- I really love this blog :)

Sorta Insane Musings of a Makeup Addict

Sparkling Luna

Tianne Marie Makeup and Retrography

I have a couple random questions that I would love for you guys to answer if you want! :D

1) What is the best concealer you know of for under-eyes? I currently use Benefit's Erase Paste, which really doesn't work for me. I might try the Kat Von D Tattoo Concealer, my dark circles are that bad.

2) I'm going to do a post of my favorite horror movies, since it's October. As you might know I'm a huge movie buff- do you know of any good Youtubers/bloggers/podcasts that talk about movies? More specifically, weird, scary, gross, indie, dark, cult, etc movies. I found one that seemed good but they didn't start talking about the movies until OVER AN HOUR INTO IT.

3) Would you be interested in a post with pictures of my adorable pets? :D I have two kitties, a dog, and two chinchillas. Would you be interested in a picture of my 2nd biggest collection (after makeup), sneakers? I have quite a lot. I'm not going to show you guys my makeup setup until I move to Texas in January, because right now it's pretty messy and awful.

4) When I am off this terrible retainer-related no-buy, I might be interested in purchasing a few MAC items. I don't have any MAC because I think it's overpriced and overhyped, but I think I should actually use some before I keep judging it. I am so overwhelmed by all their products, what are some easily available ones I should try?

Sorry for the huge text wall! Just a reminder... Kathy is awesome.

EOTD: Ethereal Blues

2010-10-16T11:57:00.003-05:00

I've been having a ton of makeup fails lately, and it's very frustrating. The last few days I've had to start over at least twice because I didn't like how the look was turning out. I think I need to stick with simpler looks or neutrals for a while. This is something that started out being a smokey dark blue look.

Kind of the opposite end of the spectrum, but I loved it. I had to pick up my sister from school and go to Walgreens before I was done with my whole face, so I had these crazy eyes but no face makeup whatsoever. I felt so awkward :P

What I used:

Concrete Minerals eye primer
Fyrinnae's Pixie Epoxy

The Overlook, by Killer Cosmetics (inner lid)
Morbid Faith, by Hi FI (outer lid/crease)
Lumi, by Sugarpill (highlight)

Stila smudge pot in Cobalt Clutch

Covergirl Liquiline Blast liners on waterline (they don't have names on them, but I think they are called Blue Blaze and Silver Spark)

L'Oreal Extra Collagen mascara

In other news, I am sadly going on a no buy until probably at least halfway through November, if not that whole month. The only exceptions are if I run out of my tinted moisturizer or mascara or something. I think I've already ordered all the Halloween stuff I want, so at least that's good. The reason is because I decided to never wear my retainer after I got my braces off, so now my teeth have shifted and my retainers don't fit. I have to get new ones and it's going to cost me $390 :( With the hours I've been working lately, that's like an entire paycheck and a half out of my savings. I'm going to rediscover great products I already have!

Killer Cosmetics Review

2010-10-13T17:51:00.005-05:00

When I posted my poll asking which company people would like to see reviewed next, I was pretty surprised to see that Killer Cosmetics was the winner. The excitement of a new company, I guess, because I didn't find anything they had all that thrilling.

The makeup is just one of the things sold on the UV Kitty website. They have a lot of synthetic dreads, and some accessories and things. They do have a blogger package available for $8.50 which includes 4 samples and 1 full size, but I just decided to order two sample sets, for $3.20 each, which include 3 samples. I'd rather have more 6 sample colors to show you instead of 5 colors, one being a full size I'd never use.

The website has 16 colors available, which isn't bad at all for a company just starting out. They are all based around some kind of killer- from Smoker's Lung, to Whitechapel (inspired by Jack the Ripper). You would think this would really interest me, since I LOVE horror movies and I think reading about serial killers is totally fascinating (don't lie, you think so too). But for some reason I just don't. I think if they were ALL serial killer based or ALL movie based it would be better, but Smoker's Lung just seems out of place. I also don't like the fact that both Whitechapel and Black the Ripper are both from the same source. I know I'm being pretty picky here. I also didn't like how some of the sentences in the product descriptions were taken word-for-word out of Wikipedia. At least say it's from Wikipedia if you're going to do that.

Ok ok, enough with the nitpicking, I know you want to see the products! But first... the packaging! It was really nice and professional looking, and I really like it. Sorry the pictures are slightly dull, I had to turn flash off because I kept just getting big shiny spots.

It came with a lot of extra stuff inside.

Before I get to the actual shadows- I promise you'll see them eventually- I want to talk about the ordering process, which I thought was weird. You don't actually pick exactly which colors you want, but instead you enter your top 5 choices. I don't even remember exactly what I did since I ordered two of the sample sets. I got my order in 2 weeks, which I think is pretty normal time, since the company is located in Canada.

I have never gotten clamshells of shadows before. I would definitely say I am not a fan. I turn into the Hulk when I open eyeshadows, so I always think I'm going to spill these when I open them, or hit the lid and knock them over. There's also nowhere to tap off excess shadow. As you can see in the picture above, the samples were very generous. They were also shrink-wrapped, which was nice.

I don't like how they are labeled... I don't remember what LK stands for. I don't see why the full name isn't put on the shadows.

Time for the swatches!

Top 3: The Overlook, Miss Argentina, LadyKiller
Bottom 3: Clockwork, Frog's Breath, Blood Bathory

Blogger flipped that last one >:[

The colors are pretty and pigmented, but none of them really stand out to me. There was nothing good enough here to make me interested in ordering again.

I'm interested to hear your thoughts, since I've seen only positive reviews so far.

Etsy window shopping

2010-10-10T22:36:00.012-05:00

Glow in the Dark soap from OHWTO

Gingerbread Men Cabochons by Delish Beads

Hippo Messenger Bag by Happy Cosmos

Rainbow Starburst Maryjanes from HelloShoes

Celebration Body Spray by Latherati

Bat Keychain from Araleling

Chinchilla Keychain by petitechinchillas

Facial Toner by Skin Journey

Matte green EOTD

2010-10-09T14:36:00.003-05:00

I'd been itching to play with mattes for a while, so yesterday I gave it a shot. I was amazed at the staying power of the colors I used, it seems like matte colors last better than their frosty/shimmery/glittery friends. By the time I had them on for about 10 hours, they still looked as bright as they did when I first applied. I had my makeup on for a total of 16 hours, and these really STAYED the whole time.

What I used:

Concrete Minerals eye primer

Slimy, by Detrivore (inner lid)
Seaweed/431 by Beauties Factory (outer lid)
Banana Taffy, by Suds N Sass (crease)
Feel the Heat, by High Voltage (highlight)

Jordana Fabuliner in black
Urban Decay 24/7 pencil in Zero
Maybelline Falsies Mascara
Covergirl Liquiline Blast pencil in Green Glow (under waterline)

I really loved how the mattes looked. I just ordered a sample set of the Aromaleigh Hi-Fi Mattes collection, so I'm excited to test out those. I'd also like to try out more of the gorgeous mattes from Beauties Factory.

I guest-posted over at Painted Moogle!

2010-10-07T21:06:00.005-05:00

How cool & exciting, you can check it out here!

The only colorful look I did on vacation

2010-10-07T20:40:00.003-05:00

Hey everyone! I'm back from visiting Texas, sadly. I've only been through one day of my typical life and I'm already bored. It's very monotonous. I really regret not moving in August when I was planning to, and I'm looking at trying to move down in January. I really hope everything works out for me.

Here is the only fun look I did while I was gone... packed all that makeup for nothing :P I used mostly one of the Beauty UK palettes. The yellow color is from the Sugarpill palette.

I think this is probably the closest thing to a rainbow look I've ever done. Sorry that's all I have for you right now, but I have 4 reviews to do, so hopefully I'll be getting off work early the next couple days so I still have daylight for swatching. I hope everyone's been having a good week.

My travel makeup

2010-10-04T12:40:00.004-05:00

I didn't want to take too much makeup to Texas with me, but I wanted to have enough to still be able to do some good EOTDs and such. Last time I went on vacation I barely brought ANYTHING, so I wasn't doing that again this time.

I decided to only bring brown & black liners, since I use those the most.

I didn't want to deal with loose pigments, so I just brought a few palettes.

Here's the face makeup I use daily.

I didn't want loose blush, so I brought a powder and a creme blush. Eye primer, a couple lippies, mascara.

I also brought some solid perfumes, no liquid in case it spilled.

In case you're wondering how my first time traveling by myself went... terrible. I do have an anxiety disorder, so as you can imagine I was freaking out enough as it was. Then my first flight got delayed by almost 5 hours. 5 HOURS. You know what we got as an apology? A granola bar and a bag of almonds. I had to switch my other flights around twice, so I was so worried and kept crying thinking I wouldn't get to Texas. It was a terrible first flying experience, and I am NOT looking forward to the flights back.

Have any travel horror stories to share? What do you pack in terms of makeup for vacation?

Halloween Collections

2010-10-01T20:45:00.002-05:00

Hey guys! I'm leaving for Texas tomorrow for a few days, but hopefully I'm still be able to post a bit while I'm there. Since it is now October, the best month of the year, I thought I'd post a big list of all the shops with Halloween collections going on right now. So far I haven't ordered from very many places, but when I get back I will spend way too much money doing so :)

One Hand Washes the Other has a great variety of Halloween products! I think I picked out a Pumpkin Bread solid perfume when I ordered the other day, and I don't know why I skipped over Choco Pumpkin!

Darling Girl Cosmetics has LE Halloween products for eyes, lips, and face. I grabbed a couple eyeshadow samples and a mini gloss.

You know Andrea of Evil Shades will go all out for Halloween! She has 6 new eyeshadows, a lip gloss, AND a glow in the dark nail polish available. You get free shipping if you order the whole collection.

A new Dia De Los Muertos collection from Fyrinnae has been released. Thanks Phyrra for this information :)

Glamour Doll Halloween sets have sold out, but there's a possibility of more- click here for more information.

Haus of Gloi has a bunch of great Halloween scents and products. I got bubbling scrub samples of Pumpkin Queen and Saft Ernte, and I love them both.

Hi-Fi Cosmetics has 10 new eyeshadows and 3 new lipglazes for the Halloween season! You can get a full set of everything, or a sample set of just the eyeshadows.

High Voltage Cosmetics has 5 new colors for Halloween. I'm really lemming Tombstone and Ghost Town.

I'm just going to link you straight to the Meow Cosmetics homepage so I don't have to link to all of their MANY amazing new colors! I am most excited about the Alien Abduction and Shattered Equinox collections. I have a huge X-Files poster over my bed so anything that reminds me of my beloved Scully and Mulder makes me happy :)

Morgana Minerals, now Morgana Cryptoria, has a whole new website! There's so much more than JUST new Halloween stuff to drool over. How cute is that orange kabuki!

Suds n Sass has some cute Halloween makeup sets, and also some amazing sounding Halloween bath products. I'm really loving the glosses, and the Boolicious scrub sounds amazing.

I hope having all this in one place is helpful!

Am I seriously the first one to post this Aromaleigh news?

2010-10-01T00:09:00.005-05:00

I feel so ahead of the game right now... ok, ok, I did see the link on a certain Aromaleigh Addict's facebook page, you didn't really think I'd be the first to post about it AND the first one to find it? Yeah right. Before you even click the link don't get your hopes up and think that AL is staying open. Not so! But, it's probably the next best thing...

Yippee!

I am SO HAPPY there will be sample sets of all these so people like me can get our glittery paws on them without emptying our bank accounts :3

EDITED TO ADD: DAMN IT MINDY YOU BEAT ME... only fair I suppose! Pretend that picture of the FFFFFFUUUUU guy is right here.

BF-Beauty.com tailor made eyeshadow compacts/cases review

2010-09-30T18:42:00.006-05:00

I have had these products sitting and waiting for me to review for so long, it's not even funny. Over a month, sitting under my bed, not even opened. When you can let new products sit for over a month before getting to them, you know you have WAY too much makeup.

What I've got for you guys today is a review of some products I bought from Beauties Factory, or BF-Beauty.com. If you go right to their website, you will see they have a TON of different products, but what I'm talking about today specifically is the tailor made eyeshadow compacts and cases (it's the second link down in the left column).

They have some new types of compact shadows since I bought mine, but I just got the plain "Eyeshadow Compacts", which are only $1.50 each. Obviously that price is irresistible, so my best friend Tiege and I decided to place an order. She got I think 9 colors, and I got 6. I also got a 6-pan palette for them, which was $6. They have lots of empty palette sizes. Our order was around $28 (I know I somehow got some sort of $2 discount or something, but I don't remember how, sorry!), and the shipping price was CRAZY. The stuff is coming from Hong Kong, so I'm expecting some sky-high prices here. I don't think it even cost us $1. It was something like 60 cents. Plus I got a free pair of the ugliest fake nails of all time, and a coupon for $5 off a $50 order. So if you're looking to really get some bang for your buck, this is the place. I think it took about 2 weeks for the order to arrive.

I tried getting some colors I have nothing similar to (and a taupe, of course), so I did pick out some mattes. They have a TON of gorgeous colors in matte and shimmer finishes. All the colors have a number and a name, but when you get them they just have the number.

Here's the packaging the individual shadows come in, and what they look like out of the packaging.

I don't have any other pan shadows to compare these to sizewise, so you can use this quarter as a visual aid. I feel like George Washington could totally be a taupe kinda guy.

SWATCH TIME!

Top 3: 431/Seaweed, 479/Prune, 480/Rich Red
Bottom 3: 518/Gaze, 579/Nuts, 565/Antique

Do you see what I'm seein'? Cus I'm seein' that I unintentionally ended up with some colors very close to some MAC and Sugarpill products. Seaweed is like MAC Sassy Grass, or Sugarpill Midori. Prune looks like Sugarpill's Dollipop. And Gaze looks like MAC's Going Bananas. These are just my opinions, and I don't have any of those colors to compare (too expensive for me!), but they're close enough to make me really happy (I love Sassy Grass and Going Bananas).

The palette I ordered was a 6 pan palette, the one without the mirror. It's made out of what feels to me like pretty cheap plastic. I personally don't care at all, but some of you might want a better quality palette.

And here is my ugly, un-color coordinated palette!

Obviously, I will have to order more shadows and palettes so I can make ones that are nice and go together instead of this monstrosity... :D I'd also like to try out some of their other products, too.

My only complaint at all is the color accuracy of some of the pictures. The bottom 3 shadows all look very close to their website picture, but the top 3 don't AT ALL. So it's kind of hit-or-miss how accurate the pictures are. But for $1.50, especially for people who love makeup like we do, I think you'll be pleased with what you get.

a post about tolerance

2010-09-29T20:32:00.002-05:00

I actually had a review done for today but I would rather post this instead. I'd really appreciate if you read the links I post so you can know what is going on in more detail. I don't know what it is about this specific tragedy that angers me so much, but I am sitting here bawling right now because stuff like this just makes me lose faith in people so much.

1

2

3

I just don't understand how people can do this to other people. I just don't. It sickens me. I hope they get charged with a lot more than invasion of privacy.

This would have made me upset no matter what, but the fact is I read the articles just after seeing this video and arguing with someone about this example of bigotry, so I was already very angry. All this homophobic, transphobic, anythingdifferentphobic bullshit has got to stop. I can't wait for the day when it is an socially unacceptable to be homophobic/transphobic as it currently is to be racist. And while I'm wishing, please end sexism also.

It's not even the fact that Tyler was possibly gay & outed by the video that makes me so sad (of course, that is awful). It's just horrifying that people can do things like this to other people at all, regardless of who they are. How can ANYONE get it into their heads that doing something like that could possibly end up without any consequences?

I will admit to the fact that there is a group I am completely intolerant of, and that group is bigots. I will NOT respect someone who doesn't believe in equality for EVERY individual.

If all this stuff has you feeling down, here is an awesome, empowering video about Don't Ask Don't Tell by the always amazing Lady Gaga.

Give your loved ones a hug.

A look using the UD BoS III

2010-09-27T15:13:00.003-05:00

This is a look I did sometime last week using my new Urban Decay Book of Shadows III. The pictures aren't the best because my camera was acting up and giving everything a sort of yellow cast, but you get the general idea!

I have placed an order with Killer Cosmetics, the winner of my upcoming review poll. Spell Cosmetics had the second most votes, but since they are closing, I'm not going to review them. The next two with the most votes were TKB and Silk Naturals, so I will be placing some orders with them shortly. I am leaving for Texas this Saturday and not coming back until next Wednesday, and I don't know how much I'll be posting while I'm gone. I have lots of things sitting around that I've had for so long but haven't reviewed, so I'll try to get those typed up before I leave.

I've only been on a plane when I was 8, so going and flying by myself, especially with my anxiety problems, is going to be extremely scary for me. Plus I have to switch flights a couple times, which will make it a million times worse. I know there are lots of rules about what you can take, so I'm worried about some of my makeup being confiscated. Does anyone have tips on what I should and shouldn't bring, cosmetics wise? Thank you!

Urban Decay Book of Shadows 3!

2010-09-23T19:47:00.007-05:00

It arrived today! I know blogs like Temptalia and Lipglossiping have already shown you everything you need to know (they were extremely thorough, I love their reviews!), but I don't think anyone ever minds seeing more pretty pictures :)

The outside of the case, I hadn't even taken it out of the clear packaging yet!

Product information

This is with the top popped open.

Sorry it's blurry- I turned the lights out and didn't use flash so you can see where it lights up.

The whole thing.

Look at the beauuuutiful colors! Here are swatches (all over the included UDPP), these are the first two rows.

I finally get to see why Midnight Cowboy Rides Again has it's infamous reputation! Honestly, I didn't think it was that bad, Uzi was much worse in terms of major glitter fallout. Here's the next 2 rows.

This is my first UD palette, and I love it. With tax it was a little over $57, and to me it is worth it because I know I will be using it very often, and I love looking at the awesome pop-up scenery. Plus, you're getting 16 shadows, the mini UDPP and 2 mini 24/7 liners (if you take the $54 and divide it by 19 products, that's less than $3 per shadow/liner/UDPP). I think it's a great deal. If you own the Alice book, I don't think you should bother with this one, they have a lot of similar colors. It's still available on the Sephora website, but NOT the UD website. Also, from what I've heard, I'm pretty sure it should be in Sephora stores October 1st, but don't quote me on that.

I'm definately going to do a look with it tomorrow, I'm so excited. :) Does anyone else have this yet, or any other palettes or shadow books? I still would like the deluxe shadow box.

Aqua & Purple EOTD

2010-09-23T00:06:00.003-05:00

Phyrra and Pixie always do such nice blue & purple looks, so I decided to do that color combo the other day. Sadly, my camera decided that I am only allowed to have one lid color at a time... the blue did not show up here at all, which I really don't get because it is a very vibrant teal and it definitely isn't close at all to the purples I used. It still looks like a nice purple look, though :)

Side-note: I checked the tracking today for my Urban Decay Book of Shadows 3! It's in Illinois now, so hopefully I'll be getting it in the mail tomorrow. When I was asking the SA at Sephora about it (the day before it went on sale on the Sephora website, coincidentally), she didn't even know what I was talking about. I think those of us who have an intense relationship with makeup & blogging probably know more about it than a lot of the Sephora SA's do!

What I used:

Between the Stars, by Hi Fi (inner v)
Karaoke, by Meow (inner lid)
Magic Spell, by Hi Fi (invisible on outer lid)
Ephemeral Violet, by Aromaleigh (crease)
Crystalline, by Detrivore (highlight)

I wanted to keep it soft, so I didn't use eyeliner. Not much else to say today, I hope you like the look!

EOTD using (mostly) Hi Fi

2010-09-20T14:25:00.004-05:00

This was a look I did before work the other night. Unfortunately, I did have a few hurdles. The two silvers and two purples didn't look as different in the pictures as they did irl. I also overblended my lid colors, which tones down some of the purple. But overall I really liked it. I did my color placement a little differently than normal; I want to break out of doing the exact same shapes and types of color placement. I really like looking at Temptalia's EOTD's for ideas, she does lots of different ways of placing her shadows.

What I used:

Concrete Minerals eyeshadow primer
Hi Fi High Impact Shadow Fix

Articuno, by Shiro (inner lid)
(all the following are Hi Fi)
Pussycat (outer lid)
Parental Advisory (outer crease)
Lyrical Master (inner crease)
Hail Caesar (highlight)

Maybelline Falsies Mascara

Jordana FabuLiner in black

Urban Decay eye pencil in Zero

My hair looks kind of 80's cus it had been in a ponytail :P

This was my first time really experimenting with the High Impact Shadow Fix. Here is my eyeshadow after an 8 hour shift at Arby's:

Conclusion: This stuff is amazing. I'd be happy to do a wear test comparing it to Pixie Epoxy if anyone is interested.

Also, a few random questions: Does anyone know of website that have designer perfume dupes? My mom gave me a sample of Chance Eau Fraiche by Chanel, and I am in love with it... not so in love with the $90 price tag. I COULD get it when the Sephora friends & family sale starts, but it would still be so expensive. I don't really know a lot about online perfume places, so if anyone knows where I might be able to find a dupe for this, please let me know!

Also, do you add your blog friend's personal facebooks? I have seen many of yours on company's pages and stuff, and I'd love to add those of you who I consider myself friends with, but I don't know how people would feel about me knowing their real names and where they live or whatever. I only have a couple of my blog friends added. If you find my Facebook, you can add me :)

Sephora Must-Have: Color To Go Red edition palette

2010-09-17T17:43:00.011-05:00

Let me tell you, I'm sick of this no buy. It was really only supposed to be until BoS3 came out, which it did, today. So I'm in the clear from now on. Yesterday at Sephora, I wanted to get something small, and they had these cute little Color To Go palettes. I got the Red edition, but I also thought the other one was cute (the purple was similar to UD's Fishnets!), and I'll probably get it next time. I am a sucker for a set. And for only $15, I'm not exactly breakin' the bank here.

I don't know why Sephora makeup gets such a bad rep- the 2 Sephora brand liners I have are great, my little face scrublet is great, and this set is great. I would say that although it's the same type of product as the Too Faced Glamour To Go set, the quality is actually better, and $5 less!

It's about the same size as my Glamour To Go palette, but the lippies and blush pull out from the side instead of the bottom.

Thanks Blogger for flipping my picture...do you see why I found this irresistible? Look at the great fall colors!

The shadows are pretty and pigmented. The dark blue matte was kind of a PITA, in typical matte fashion.

The blush is heavily swatched in those pictures, but even with just one swipe it's very pigmented (ie, easy to overdo it if you have lighter skin).

I was really surprised at the pigmentation of the lippies, since most lippies in palettes tend to suck.

Here's a smokey eye look I did today using the palette. My blush and lip color are also from the palette.

If you are addicted to sets, like me, this one's a fall necessity!

In case you like awesome stuff and saving money...

2010-09-17T10:59:00.004-05:00

I know I've been gone all week, but today's my day off so I'm going to get a lot of stuff lined up for posting :) Please excuse this boring post but I thought I'd throw out a little FYI of some stuff going on right now.

The Urban Decay Book of Shadow III is at Sephora right now. Hurry and get it before it's gone! I just ordered mine, I'm SO excited :D

Stila will be on Haute Look again this Monday.

And for those of you who love the mall as much as I do, Hollister and Abercrombie have 50% off of all redline items right now. I got a hoodie for $20, t-shirts for $7, and Hollister also had $10 sweatpants. This is the cheapest you'll probably ever be able to get this stuff. American Eagle also has most jeans on sale for $30, and they have a bunch of $15 and $20 hoodies.

I promise to have some fun stuff posted later today!

EOTD with Aromaleigh 'Hot In The City' colors

2010-09-13T14:10:00.004-05:00

I planned on doing a look like this, and somehow it ended up in another realm entirely. I was going through my yellow & orange drawer, and saw how many oranges I have that I never used. Neon Lights from the AL Hot In The City collection was exactly what I wanted, so I decided to use other colors from that collection as well: Italian Ice and Return to Tiffany's.

What I used:

Concrete Minerals eye primer
Max Factor 2000 Calorie mascara
Jordana FabuLiner in brown
UD 24/7 pencil in Crash

Italian Ice (inner lid)
Neon Lights (outer lid)
Return to Tiffany's (lower lid)
Mornings of Gold, by Hi Fi (highlight)

Me Me Me Poppy Tint as blush

Stila lip color in Louise

Nice and colorful but not TOO over the top, since I have work in half an hour. Sorry I'm behind on comments, and I have emails to answer, and blogs to catch up on, but I won't get home until probably around midnight, and then I have class tomorrow morning and work until 4. Bleh.

Don't forget to vote in the sidebar polls! I'm still on a low buy, so they won't be until the first half of October, most likely.

My Urban Decay collection, part 2

2010-09-11T02:05:00.005-05:00

I have 3 loose shadows I got for $5 each from Haute Look. They have been on the UD & Sephora websites lately for $5, although I don't think there's a lot of choices left. I have one pressed shadow, Graffiti, that I bought from Lillian's blog sale a few months ago. From left to right are Shattered, Baked, Shag, Graffiti, and Acid Rain. I think I got Acid Rain from Haute Look, but it may have been from Beauty Ticket.

Annoying packaging.

I think this primer/waterproofer duo has been d/c'd, but just the lash primer is still available on the website. It works terrifically.

I got this marshmallow flavored & scented body powder from Lillian as well. It's too bad it's $26 at full price, because it's the perfect marshmallow scent I'd been hunting down, and I still haven't found anything as good. And its yummy ;)

I know what you're thinking- where's the UDPP? Well, I used to have a tube, but I used it up. And since I found a great alternative, I thought I'd post it here.

A tin of Concrete Minerals Electric Eye Primer is $9. The color of it is the same as original UDPP, and the texture is buttery soft. I've done the whole "one eye UDPP, one eye CMEEP", and they both looked exactly the same at the end of the day (sorry no pictures, I tested it when I worked all night!). So if you don't want to shell out the cash for a new tube of UDPP, this (in my opinion, and with my experiences) is basically the same in terms of quality.

What are your favorites from Urban Decay? Also, don't forget to vote in the polls on the side of the page!

My Urban Decay collection, part 1

2010-09-10T23:01:00.013-05:00

As I mentioned yesterday, Urban Decay is my favorite high-end brand. It's probably my favorite brand overall, because to date I have absolutely loved every product I've tried. UD was the makeup I dreamed of owning when I started getting into makeup, but since I had been finding all the amazing indie companies I loved, it seemed ridiculous to pay the prices. Luckily, Haute Look has Urban Decay on sale now and again, so almost all the UD I've ever had has been from there. Since I just got my Urban Decay order from Haute Look yesterday, I thought I would go ahead and show you my whole UD collection and share my thoughts.

The pictures are all with flash in my bedroom, no natural light. It was really cloudy outside today. While the pictures may be really shadowy, they are very color accurate.

I was most excited to get a 24/7 Set, "Stereophonic", because I had never tried a 24/7 liner. It's a great little set, with four 24/7 mini liners, and one glitter liner. I got it on Haute Look for... get this... $7. The pencils from left to right are Zero, Crash, Underground, Gunmetal, and the glitter liner is Midnight Cowboy.

The 24/7 liners are as amazing as everyone says... the glitter liner is very coarse, you'd have to use it over a regular liner to make it look ok. It is nowhere near as good as my Collection 2000 Glam Crystals liners.

I also love their liquid liner I have, in the shade Lucky. I think I paid $7 for this off Haute Look. I am AWFUL at liquid liner, but it's the easiest to apply I've ever used. It's expensive at $18, but in my opinion, you're getting the quality you pay for. I want to get Ecstasy, a gorgeous purple shade.

I got the Big Buddha kabuki brush for $9. I haven't used it yet, but it is HUGE.

UD Ultraglide glosses are my favorites glosses, even though the name sounds like it should be for tampons instead of lip gloss. I got Lust and Deep from Haute Look a while ago for $5 each. I somehow broke the applicator off of Deep as soon as I opened it. This time, I got Heat, and another Deep, for around $4 each. Guess what... this Deep's applicator popped off too. Weird, but I just squeezed it all out into some empty little containers so I can still use it.

From left to right are Lust, Deep, and Heat.

So broken :(

I took more pictures than I thought I would, and there's a few things I forgot to photograph, so I decided to cut this up into 2 posts, and I'll get the second one done after I wake up. Also, if you didn't notice, there's some polls on the side- I can't decide which companies I want to try next, so you guys can decide for me :)

Stila order from Haute Look- my first experience with smudge pots!

2010-09-09T18:23:00.006-05:00

I can't believe I haven't blogged in a week! I've been reading everyone's blogs, but not commenting much. It's just laziness tbh.

Every time Stila comes to Haute Look, I always eyeball the Barbie Loves Stila smudge pots, but I never buy them. So after passing on them the last two or three times, I finally grabbed them when Stila was up on Haute Look a few weeks ago. They were $8 each. I got Cobalt Clutch and Purple Pumps.

The packaging on these is so cool, the picture on the lid is the kind that change depending on the angle, if that makes sense. I took a video so you could see the effect, but for some reason Blogger won't let me upload it. It is an AVI file, which it says is compatible, so I'm not sure what the problem is. If someone could help me out, that would be great; I really want you guys to see the neat packaging!

Here is the most color accurate picture I could get, so of course Blogger decided to flip it.

When I went to Sephora in my town for the first time with my best friend, she wanted a good cream liner and of course I told her to get a smudge pot, even though I've never tried it, since they are held in such high regard. I know she really likes it, so I was kind of disappointed with these- they turn out a lot more sheer than I was expecting, I'd have to go over the line a few times to make it nice and opaque. Are regular smudge pots better quality than these?

No flash, color accurate swatches.

If you enlarge this picture, you can see how sheer these look.

Since I haven't actually used them as liners yet, I can't say much more about these. I am glad I paid only $8 for them, because I would have felt ripped off at the full price of $20. They're both still available on the Stila website.

I also got a Stila High Shine Lip Color is shade Louise. I LOVE Stila lip products.

I got my Urban Decay order from Haute Look today, so tomorrow I'll show you that too. Urban Decay is my favorite pricey brand, and I have a variety of their products already, would you like to see those as well?

EOTD using Fyrinnae

2010-09-03T16:29:00.004-05:00

Everyone's been using their Fyrinnae colors lately, and I neglect mine a lot, so I decided to use them today. I realized that I don't actually have very many, which I guess is why I seldom use them. Looks like I need to order some more when my low buy is over :) Of course, I decided to use a hooker blue color since I have today off, so as SOON as I finish doing my eye makeup, one of my managers calls and asks if I can come in tonight :P I need the money though, only one month until UD BoS 3! Also, I want this. And when I visit my boyfriend (which means visiting Ulta), I want this and this. Oh yeah, and I'm diggin' this too.

What I used:

Concrete Minerals primer
Pixie Epoxy

Equality (inner lid)
Blue Whale (outer lid)
Kuroneko (liner, used with Beautiful Girl Minerals eyeshadow sealant)
Tell Me Lies, by Hi Fi (highlight)
Neo Universe (lower lashline)

Max Factor 2000 Calorie Mascara
Rimmel liner in black

Wet N Wild Blush in Heather Silk :)

Darling Girl tinted lip balm in Faith

Equality is such a beautiful light taupe, I rarely see bloggers using it, which is too bad because it's BEAUTIFUL.

As you can see, my skin is on the fritz. It's been really bad the last couple weeks, which is really frustrating. I used a mint masque today though, and I think that helped.

Also, you should go read my recent movie posts if you haven't, because I wanna chit chat about movies some more :3

Darling Girl Cosmetics review

2010-09-02T17:22:00.009-05:00

I actually placed two orders with Darling Girl Cosmetics before doing this review, because for some reason I ordered almost all brown shades on my first order. So having bought from this company twice, I can say the website is very nice and easy to navigate. Prices are fantastic. A sample baggie is 60 cents, a 3 gram jar is $2, and a full size in a 5 gram jar is $4- these prices are for both eyeshadows and blushes. Tinted lip balms are $4.50, and lip gloss is $5.50. Susan also has a blog where she does swatches and FOTD's.

I got my orders shipped out almost immediately after ordering, which is of course very appreciated. They also each came with a free eyeshadow sample, and a free tinted lip balm sample. Here are swatches of all the shadows I have. All shadow swatches are over Concrete Minerals Electric Eye Primer.

Top 3: Poetic Pink, Kindle, Fever
Bottom 3: Exhale, Frolic, Electric Lady

Exhale is such a unique color, it's a light purple with an intense blue shift. You can see some of it in this next picture, but for a better look, check out Wendi's blog.

Top 3: Twyla, Mojito, Mardi Gras
Bottom 3: Covet, Aerial, Dark Knight

Aerial is a hard color to photograph. It's blue, lavender, and grey all in one. I really love Dark Knight, because it's a shiny black based blue/purple that actually stays looking blue/purple when applied, and not just black.

Top 2: Chai, Cydonia
Bottom 2: Oracle, Miss Me

As someone who is avid reader of Pink Sith's "Taupes You Can't Have" series, I am always on the hunt for my perfect taupe. Many have tried, all have failed... until now. Oracle is the most beautiful, perfect taupe in the world. Here's another picture so you can bask in its glory.

I feel like it's too powerful for my eyes to comprehend, like in Supernatural how everyone has to look away from the angel's light. But I never want to look away from this bebe :D

I ordered a couple blush samples, both colors are really nice. Left is Pink Outrage, right is Impetuous. Not blended in, obviously.

So, this all seems pretty awesome right? But wait, there's more (please imagine that being said Billy Mays style)! I haven't even told you my favorite part yet. ^O^ <--- That's how excited I am.

My favorite Darling Girl product, which I may love even more than Oracle, the most perfect of all taupes...

TINTED LIP BALM IN "FAITH"! This is my new favorite lip product. I wear it almost every day. Not only is it my MLBB (my lips but better) shade, but it's super moisturizing, and when the balminess fades away, my lips are still slightly stained. It is so awesome, I ordered another one in the shade Sassy. I've swatched them for you here, along with my free sample balms.

Top 2: Faith, Sassy
Bottom 2: Brazen Berry, Athena

I. want. every. color. Here's an idea of what they look like in terms of size:

I love the packaging, it's such a nice and simple tube. Seriously, I can't rave about these enough. I have a feeling I'm going to have a stupid big collection of these by the time this year is over.

Here's a simple, work-appro EOTD I did this morning. Lid colors are Chai and Electric Lady, with Cydonia in the crease and Hi Fi's Eat Me Drink Me as the highlight.

Susan has really impressed me so far. Although not all of the colors are complex, they are all pretty, and there's certainly some stand out shades. There's a great selection of colors, and neutrals, a wide variety of blush colors, and of course the amazing lip balms! I didn't get any gloss, so I'm looking forward to trying that out on my next order.

Have you tried Darling Girl yet? Are you going to? How many balms will you buy and send me? >:D

Current Giveaways & link love

2010-09-02T16:57:00.004-05:00

Hey guys, I just wanted to make you aware of some really great giveaways going on right now!

Mindy's Giveaway

Blix's 5 Winner Giveaway

Peachy Giveaway

You've Got Nail 1 Year Anniversary Giveaway

And here are some great blogs I've been reading recently:

Principessa Grassa

Annamax

Beautys Bad Habit

Looks

Loving It

Makeup by Candie

Scrubbing Up Well

Sorta Insane Musings of a Makeup Addict

Swatch Storm

I promise, I'm going to post my Darling Girl review now! :)

ETA: I just found out MeganChair has deleted her blog :( It was my favorite polish blog, because her personality shone through her writing, and you could see what a lovely person she was. I'll miss it.

July/August movies, part 2

2010-09-01T20:17:00.007-05:00

Some more recommendations for you, my lovely readers!

Black Dynamite

This totally shocked me. One of my friends suggested it, and I thought it sounded dumb, but I said ok. This is probably the funniest movie I have ever seen in my life. It makes fun of the "blaxploitation" movies, but you can enjoy it even if you've never seen any (I haven't- yet). I'm always watching clips of it on youtube because it's just that funny. If I didn't see the release year, I would have completely thought it was an actual 70's movie- they nailed it.

The Bourne Identity

How the HELL have I managed NOT to see this until just recently? I love action movies. This is awesome and not stupid-cheesy. That is all.

Snow Angels

I can't believe this is directed by the same guy who did Pineapple Express! This movie is not a happy one, so don't go into it expecting to feel ok after watching it. I really feel for all the characters. I don't know what else to say; see it for yourself!

The Hills Have Eyes

Womp womp, another unpopular one. Just like Last House on the Left, I watched this right after the original, and liked it much better. I guess I just don't really like Wes Craven's earlier stuff. I don't see why it got so much shit, I thought it was a good, effective horror movie.

The Magdalene Sisters

I'm surprised I haven't seen this earlier, since feminism is such an important issue to me. It's basically about how "fallen women" were outcast in Ireland and more or less made slaves in laundromats. The sad part is, it's mostly true. If you get the dvd, it includes the original short documentary that the movie was based on. It's really upsetting to hear how these women were treated for being "sinners".

Saw

Say what you want about all the sequels, but I haven't seen any and I thought this was great. More of a thriller than a horror movie in my opinion. I know the others are all supposed to kind of suck, but this had a solid, intriguing storyline, and Danny Glover is always cool.

Lust, Caution

I saved the best for last! This movie is NC-17 and has some really explicit sex scenes, so don't watch it if you'll be offended. Can I go on a tangent really quick? I hate how in America, lots of people act so disgusted by sex, or even nonsexual nudity in movies, but are like WOOHOO BLOW THAT GUY'S BRAINS OUT! It's stupid to think something natural like sex is worse than murder and torture. Oh no, your kid is scarred for life because he saw a vagina on tv for two seconds. Big deal. Anyway. I have over 200 favorite movies (I know, lol), but this is probably somewhere in the top. It's over 2 hours long, and has such a complex storyline. I don't have much else to say except to gush about how great it was, so someday when you have the time to sit through this, you should.

Thanks for sticking through these posts! I'd love to hear any comments you may have.