Makeup Withdrawal

HauteLook Order- My LORAC arrived! (Pt 1 of Swatches)

Thursday, March 11, 2010

I'm so happy today, my eye is all better and it's just good to be in great health in such fabulous weather.
I've been excited all week because I've been tracking my HauteLook order- 3 weeks ago they had a really good sale on LORAC products. Since I was a little short on money at the time, I managed to convince myself to only spend about $36, including taxes and shipping/handling.
It's been so long that I had beginning to wonder if I had hallucinated the whole sale, but finally Monday night, there was an email in my inbox with the tracking code. I even had dreams last night with LORAC eyeshadows in them (I kid you not) because I was anticipating it so much.
Here they are!

That palette in the back is Snake Charmer, the eyeshadow duo is Love & Money, and the individual eyeshadows are (L- R) Suede, Innocence, Harmony and Kiwi.
I managed to get some swatches done, but as the afternoon went on, it started to get cloudy and the quality of the colors weren't done justice, here's what I did manage to get.

The Eye It Kit- in Love & Money, two really nice shades of green. I got this for $5. Yes, that's right, $5. You get a huge amount of soft, finely milled, highly pigmented shadow. The compartment it comes in is a little tricky to open, see that dent in the lower half of the cake? I did that by accident in my haste to get it open because I didn't realize that it had a flip top on one side, then a slide out black tray. Also, I really like that it doesn't come with a crappy little double headed sponge applicator. Saves space and materials, because I just toss those out anyways. Another reason to worship the almighty LORAC.

Alright, more swatches tomorrow, as soon as the weather permits!

<3,
-M

Wet'n'Wild Revamped! Single Swatches

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Another boring stay at home day. I woke up and one of my eyelash follicles was infected (yup, had to share) so I'm thoroughly sanitizing all my makeup and brushes. Let that be lesson to you! Actually, this happens a lot to my inner corner lashes, they grow at an awkward angle so they're prone to becoming ingrown.
But enough about me- here's the swatches I promised:

There's still two I haven't swatched, Nutty and Lagoon. Nutty is sold out everywhere around me so a kind MUAer is sending me one. Lagoon, I just forgot to pick up >.< I'll update this post when I get them.

(Edit: Nutty and Lagoon are now included)

Note: I used UDPP for the primer and NYX Jumbo Pencil in Milk for the base. I used Fix+ for the wet swatches, but that really doesn't effect the outcome of the color any. Also- Kitten stains slightly red when wet, as does Penny. Envy stains without anything under it. Brulee is the only matte in the line, and Sugar has the poorest pigmentation of them all (Penny has the best). Lagoon is lighter on skin than in the pan- a nice true shimmer blue, medium darkness. Nutty is my favorite, a very silvery taupe (bit on the warm side) but incredibly versatile.

Here's a few miscellaneous products:

Yes, the Craze nail polishes have been out for a while. Still the first time I've mentioned/swatched them though. All WnW's nail polishes require a base coat to really make them work, or else they streak like crazy. I didn't know how to swatch them without redoing my nails, so I looked to the great KarlaSugar for inspiration. I swatched them over shiny transparent tape.

That matte lipstick you see there, Just Peachy? I picked it up because it looked like a nice soft rose pink, but it shows up really... peachy. Too peachy. I'll post pictures when I get a chance.

Grouchy Mini Haul

Monday, March 8, 2010

I felt like crap today, I really did. I woke up terribly nauseous and with really painful hormonal acne. At least, I hope it's just hormonal. So I admit, I picked up a few things today, as a sort of retail therapy. I bought a few more Wet'n'Wild single eyeshadows (review of them soon to follow, I promise!), a new Wet'n'Wild lipstick- Just Peachy (903C), two WnW nail polishes, Essie Matte About You topcoat, a few e.l.f. tools, Studio Tools concealer brush and some aloe vera gel.

So I pretty much ruined my no-buy (again). I'm a quitter. I tried to stick to some cheap things, but the problem is when you buy LOTS of cheap things, it adds up. It probably would have been cheaper to bite the bullet and order that LORAC that I wanted. But back to the mini haul.
I started out by running to Target (3rd time this week) to see if they had an e.l.f. display yet. No luck, but I did see that they had stripped the Sonia Kashuk display, so the new stuff will be in soon! I also noticed that they took down the Boots display, I'm guessing e.l.f. will grace that spot. I bought a ST concealer brush (clearance, $1.48) which I think will be great for my delicate eye area, because it's really tiny and soft. Almost reminds me of a lip brush. Also grabbed an Essie matte top coat- I've been really wanting matte polishes lately, but figured a matte top coat would be a better investment than buying a new set of matte polishes. How thoughtful of me.

Now, disappointed by the lack of e.l.f, I ended up at Dollar General, knowing that they carried of few of their tools. Snagged 2 brushes (flat eyeliner and small eyeshadow brush) and a couple extra false lash sets (not shown). The eyeliner brush is really too wide to use with my cream and gel liners, which I like to have complete and precise control over. Also grabbed a eyelash curler, because as soon as my Shu Uemura curler gets here, I'm doing a curler review.
Moving on- I spied a W'n'w display at my grocery store, that wasn't completely molested. I'm serious here, the W'n'W displays at Walgreens look like they've been ravaged by some cosmetics hungry creature- everything good is out of stock. I managed to grab a couple nail polishes, a matte lippie and some single eyeshadows.

So what did I do right today? I used a coupon at CVS and got free aloe vera, which I had really needed. I also sent off my package to a MUAer (I hope she loves those brushes I picked out for her!).

Swatches tomorrow, scout's honor.

One last confession. I completely lied. I did order that LORAC.

My Break Up with Hard Candy Tinted Moisturizer

Friday, March 5, 2010

My whirlwind of a romance with Hard Candy's Sheer Envy Tinted Moisturizer came to an abrupt end today. We had an intense time together- it was love on first application. I really truly loved the way it felt and looked on my skin- thick and creamy out of the tube but sheered out to some nice coverage and a nice dewy finish. In fact, I had remarked to my spouse to be that tinted moisturizers had come a long way since I started using them at the tender age of 12. I remember my first one- I got an Olay sampler and I was hooked.
Anyways, back to the appalling thing I discovered when I looked at my tube today (no, the tinted moisturizer wasn't cheating on me with a prostitute, I think that might have been better than what I saw).
THIS-

Yes, that's separation. Those dark veins you see is an oily substance that has seeped out. Gross, no? And this happened overnight, not like a little bit of separation you get over a few months of the product just sitting there. Here's a close up, the pictures is a little blurry thanks to a clear lack of photographing skills, but I drew some handy arrows.

Here's the thing: I could totally understand this degree of makeup degrading, if I thought there was a good reason. But I've only had it for two weeks. And it's stayed right here, on my makeup corner. No temperature changes, nadda. I asked around, and other people have said that they had it for longer, without such sudden changes. My conclusion is that right before I bought it, it was sitting in the back of a Walmart truck in -10 degree weather or something.
I guess I'm saying that I'm disappointed that this happened to me, not "hey, don't buy this!". 'Cause it's a reasonably priced product, ($8 at Walmart) and it works extremely well for a lot of people. However, I'd stay away from this if you're not on speaking terms with silicones, and don't get along with chemical sunscreen.
So what's the final say? Will I find myself drunk dialing this tinted moisturizer for a booty call? Yes, if I'm ever stood up by another foundation, I can almost guarantee that I'll pick this up because I know it's a quick, cheap fix.
Have you tried this or any other Hard Candy product yet?

Target Clearance ♥

Thursday, March 4, 2010

I got this stuff a while ago, but I'm finally getting around to reviewing it now. I picked up all of these items at 75% off.
All this stuff is from the 'for Target' lines of makeup, basically spinoffs of high end brands. I've tried NP Set (Napoleon Perdis) and pixi by Petra (pixi) before, and wanted to dip my toes into more of the stuff.
The first thing I got was a pixi palette with a little travel case in No.3 Bronzed Bombshell for around $7.50 (orig $30).

Let me just start out by saying that you'd have to be out of your mind to think that this is worth $30. The little makeup case and brushes are incredibly cheap feeling. However, I'll still use it because... I don't have anything better! The palette itself, I'm feeling a little iffy about. I'm a bit puzzled to be honest. The title, 'Bronze Bombshell' makes me expect, well bronze and various shades of metallic colors. The blush is a sheer brownish rose, the eye shadows are orange coral and brown, and the lip colors are again, a dark shimmery rose brown and a dark strawberry.

I was highly disappointed with the shadows, the coral one has disgusting chunky gold glitter and while the texture of the brown is excellent, it's very sheer and shimmery while I had hoped for more opaqueness. The lighter lip color just shows up with a hint of shimmer on me, no pigmentation there at all. The darker color is a nice surprise, it's actually a lovely cool strawberry, something you don't see all that often that is very opaque and creamy. Now for the best part- the blush. It's soft and buttery feeling, it has such a nice consistency, I wish it was sold by itself. Actually, I ended up depotting the blush for my blush palette (it wasn't hard to do, thanks to the cheap packaging- it popped right out).I get one good blush and lip color out of it, and I think altogether it's worth $7.50 (barely) but I wouldn't pay anymore for it.

Next items!

I bought two NP Set palettes for $4.75 each, what a deal (orig $19)! One is Wanderlust Must (right) and the other is Bon Voyage Baby (right). Wanderlust Must contains all glosses, while the other contains 3 shadows and two glosses. I'll be perfectly honest the sheer glosses look really similar on my lips, with only slight variations in darkness to really tell them apart. The more opaque colors are really nice, good pigmentation and interesting colors that I probably would have never bought on my own. The three shadows in Bon Voyage Baby make me really happy, I've always wanted a light yellow like that, that wasn't too cool or too warm but just right. The brown and shimmery golden orange shade are nothing special, but nice shades none the less. Overall, Bon Voyage Baby is great for when I'm too lazy to properly coordinate shades. I'll do a look with it soon.

The lip colors are used up way too quickly though- they're so soft and seem to melt at warm temperature because it's quite gooey every time I dip a lip brush in them. So I would definitely not pay full price for them. Good steal on clearance!
Oh yeah- did you see my Studio Tools Dual Finish Brush? I've been looking for this highly elusive skunk for YEARS. No joke, capital letters worthy. I'm literally mentally shouting. And when I found out that it was being discontinued, I was really sad because I figured, "There goes my shot at finding it!" However, the makeup gods were on my side that night, because I finally saw one at Target (last one!) and picked it up on clearance for $3 and change.

How about you? Ever get anything great at Target on clearance?