What's on the Wishlist? Vol. 3

This wishlist of mine is ever expanding. This is going to be only a teeny sampling of what I've got a lemming for these days! But these are some of the things right at the top. :)

Konad Stamping Nail Art

This stuff looks like the bees knees!! I've been getting more into nail art recently, and this would certainly help facilitate that. If you aren't sure exactly what Konad is or how it works, basically the way it works is there are metal plates with designs etched into them - there are TONS of plates with all kinds of designs, from flowers to animal prints to words, and many, many more. You paint nail polish over them (you can buy the Konad kind which is formulated to work for stamping the best, it's thick and opaque enough, although there are many regular nail polishes that work too that you can look up all over the web), then scrape the excess off the plate so the nail polish is only in the design. Then you take a rubber stamper, roll it over the design to pick up the polish, roll it over your nail and voila!! There are many tutorials on YouTube to check out. There are many different kit options to start with, and then you can buy individual Konad plates as you like. There are also lots of non-Konad brand stamping plates out there (usually referred to collectively as faux-Nad) which are usually more inexpensive. Basically, mama wants some Konad!!

Urban Decay The Feminine Palette

What's not to love about this? Absolutely gorgeous packaging, which is usual for UD (I also have the Naked Palette and the Show Pony palette) with some beautiful neutrals accented by lovely soft colours. It's like they tapped into my mind when they were trying to decide what shades to put in here. It comes with a small size Eyeshadow Primer Potion - I try not to buy the full sized ones, I just get the palettes that come with a small size.... I get more for my money that way! $20 for one primer potion or around $35 for six eyeshadows and a small primer potion? What do you think!!

ghd Classic 1" Styler

This bad boy is on my wishlist for a few reasons - my hair is naturally straight for the most part (when air dried it gets a very slight wave but it doesn't take much to get it mostly straight) so it doesn't hold a curl well at all - no cheapy curling irons for me. This product is multi-purpose - although you can use it as a flat iron to get completely smooth, flat, glossy hair, because it has curved edges on the plates, you can use it to curl your hair too! It's a bit pricey at around $200 but I think it will be well worth the money!

Smith's Rosebud Salve


This is one of those cult favourite beauty products, and as someone with chronically dry, flaky lips, I'm willing to try any lip balm that is the favourite of so many people! Only $8.50CAD also makes it pretty affordable to try even if it doesn't work out... I'd be willing to pay more than that for a lip balm that keeps my lips soft and smooth!

Review: Living Proof Full Thickening Mousse

This is one product that really hits the nail on the head! You may have heard of it before. It has won awards, including Allure's Best of Beauty Breakthrough. Here's a couple descriptions from the experts.

From Sephora:
"What it is:
A weightless mousse that gives even the finest hair thickness, fullness, and touchable body.

What it does:
This mousse contains a revolutionary technology developed by Living Proof scientists-Poly Beta Amino Ester-1, a proprietary ingredient that creates a soft pattern of thickening points on hair to increase texture, body, fullness, and volume. The weightless formulation is flexible and lasts until you wash it out, so you can play with your style without it collapsing.

What it is formulated WITHOUT:
- Parabens
- Sulfates "

From Allure:
"Most body builders help hair defy gravity with a gluelike ingredient—called PVP/VA copolymer—that suspends hair off the scalp. But an encounter with a brush, wind, or your restless hands breaks down this brittle coating, and hair sinks like a fallen soufflé. Living Proof scientists ignored the traditional target (roots) and instead created a flexible polymer that adds volume through the length of the hair and stays effective—through mussing and fussing—until the next shampoo."

And from me! The thing I love about this mousse is obviously, how well it volumizes. I have fine hair, but LOTS of it. So volumizing becomes difficult because of the sheer weight of how much hair I have. This stuff plumps me up like a pro! But it's also fantastic as a styling aid. Bangs (or fringe, depending on what part of the world you call home!) are notoriously difficult to style. This stuff makes them SO easy to manage and style, it's really a lifesaver. You also need quite a small amount for it to be effective - too much actually gets a little sticky, so you get the best volumizing effects from a small amount, making it even more cost effective!

I'm currently using a mini bottle of this, but I'll be upgrading to a full size very soon!

NOTD June 24/11

Saw this today on a tumblr, and LOVED the idea!! Threw it together for myself and I'm in love... this will definitely make an appearance on my nails again!

 

I didn't take pictures of the bottles, but the shades I used were:

• Wet n' Wild Fast Dry in "Everybody Loves Redmond" (I hadn't even looked at the name until just now, *groan* that one puts OPI to shame!!)
• Sally Hansen Insta-Dry in "Whirlwind White"
• Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure in "Navy Baby" (dark enough to look like black!)
• base and topcoat were Rimmel Base Coat Top Coat Pro

NOTD June 20/11 - nail art!

Wheee nail art!!

Some cute little clouds to be exact! I don't have a lot of nail art supplies yet (ie all the colours I want, brushes, the little striper/detail nail polishes) so this is the best I can do right now with what I have to work with.

I think these turned out cute! I have a brighter blue on my wishlist (Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear in Blue Me Away) that I think would look cute for a brighter, more cartoony look, but I think with this shade of blue it's almost more realistic looking!



Here's the products I used:



Base/top coat is Rimmel's Base Coat Top Coat Pro, base is LA Girl Color Addict in Extreme, and clouds are Sally Hansen Insta-Dry in Whirlwind White!

Nail polish and MAC eyeshadow haul!

Triple threat post today!

My new job is in a large shopping mall, so my wallet better watch it! I stopped in a couple stores after work on Friday and grabbed some things I've had on my list for a while! It's always such a satisfying shop when you purchase things you've been meaning to buy, don't you think?

I'm getting more into nail art these days and want to do more with it, so I grabbed several shades of nail polish! And I had been meaning to get a Print eyeshadow at MAC, and finally got that too!



Print is a gorgeous Satin medium grey shade, so buttery soft and easy to work with. I can tell I'll be using this one a lot. I also painted my nails with one of the new polishes I bought, the second one from the right in the picture above, a Sally Hansen shade called Mellow Yellow!



So sunny and bright and gorgeous! The formula leaves a little to be desired though - although it's very opaque (this is just two coats) it's a little goopy and thick, so you have the really work with it to make it look totally smooth, and it dents very easily for a while - it's got a more demanding drying time. But I find putting top coat over it and using my favourite trick of soaking your nails in as cold a sinkful of water as you can stand helps cut down the drying time. For me it's worth it though, since the colour is just too pretty!

Here's some pictures of the Print shadow, with a swatch!



^ Had so much trouble getting this shot!! Sorry it's a little blurry but I took about a dozen other shots that were worse than this! Need a better camera!







Swatched just over bare skin, no primer or anything.

Project Make It Work: Day 2; and misadventures with hair dye!

Back with my second crack at Project Make It Work! This time I took a crack at my NYX palette!

I really liked the look of the opalescent shade called Opal (how appropriate). It's a cool shade that I think will work with a lot of different colours because it can take on aspects of the colours surrounding it, and thus be very versatile. This time I decided to pair it with purples but I think I'll try it with something completely different next time, to see if it's a versatile as I think!







Main colours used:

-inner part of the lids was NYX's Opal from the Opal/Platinum Silver/Luster trio. A PMIW Colour!

-outer lids and crease was the second shade from the right in the LA Colors Lollipop quint, a pretty medium cool purple colour

-carried both shades under the lower lashline a bit

-used 4th shade in the CoverGirl Urban Basics palette for inner corner and brow highlight - this has been a big payoff of PMIW for me, I find myself reaching for this shade more and more when I want a more subtle highlight - A PMIW Colour!

-liner and mascara!

Now! As for misadventures in hair dye! I have always dyed my hair at home, since I'm naturally a mid-toned brunette, and I only ever dye my hair other shades of brown (adventurous, I know!). So I was never too worried about messing it up since it wasn't like I was trying to go red or blonde!

But this time... I goofed! I usually buy the same dye, a Feria one, and I have tried one or two others but the Feria is what I always go back to and it always turns out great.

But this time, the siren song of the sale got to me. I didn't even really need to dye my hair... my last dye job had mostly faded rather than grown out, so I didn't have visible roots or anything. But I like to wear more self tanner in the summer, and I find that on me, having darker brown hair compliments that well. So I picked the brand of dye I'd never tried before because it was on sale so cheap - Nice n' Easy by Clairol.

I took about 10 minutes deciding which shade to pick before I had finally settled on one of their "Dark Brown" shades - I forget the exact shade name but it was definitely dark brown, and according to the little shade chart on the box (which I know aren't perfectly accurate but usually close enough!) I would have glossy, neutral brown hair (neutral is key for me! golden tones make me look yeeeuch).

So I follow all directions to a T.... climb into the shower to rinse after alotted time... get out, wrap my hair in a towel... 30 minutes later I start to blowdry.

It's black.

Not soft black, or very deep brown. Jet, blue-black. As seen in the pictures above!

*sigh* I normally wash my hair every other day, but I've been washing it every day to try and fade the colour faster. I'm making the best of it in the meantime (still playing around with getting my brows the right shade to match my hair!) and I have been getting compliments from people, but black still just doesn't feel like me!! I can't wait for this to fade down or out, but because it was a permanent shade it may take a little while. :/

Had any hair mishaps yourself?

NHL Playoffs Makeup! Go Canucks Go!

One more game in the Stanley Cup Finals! It's been a crazy up and down series but I still believe the Canucks can win it!! Bring it home baby!

This was my makeup I wore for one of the games last week, team colours whoo! I showed one style of Canucks makeup I did a while back at the beginning of the playoffs, this is another variation on the theme! Using Canuck colours of blue, green and white! :)









Main colours used:

-green under the lashline/in the waterline was shade 42 from the Sephora 5-in-1 palette (applied over NYX Jumbo Eye Pencil in Milk for staying power and vibrancy)


-blue was shade 1 from the same palette as above, with a little Ben Nye Cosmic Blue pigment blended into it to brighten the blue (applied over NYX Jumbo Eye Pencil in Electric Blue)

-white was Ben Nye Pearl Sheen eyeshadow in White

-then just basic black liner (Maybelline EyeStudio Gel Liner in Black) and mascara! (Covergirl LashBlast Waterproof Original)

GO CANUCKS GO!

Project Make It Work: Day 1

My first look to try and use up some of those shadows! Here's the post that explains the premise of the project.



*Sorry this pic is a little overly bright!! The flash really got bright but it captured the makeup so well!







Shades used:

-NYX Luster on the lid, a pretty cool shade that's almost like a toned down neutral version of chartreuse! Also used under lower lashline. A PMIW Colour!

-UD Hustle in the crease, a kind of muted plummy brown that I thought went well with the muted greeny-yellow of Luster

-used the white shade in the CoverGirl Urban Basics quad for inner corner and brow highlight. A PMIW Colour!

-NYX Super Skinny Eye Marker

-CoverGirl Lashblast Waterproof mascara

My first try at Project Make It Work was a success! I discovered a look that I REALLY like! Doing colour but in a very muted way is one of my favourite things... I usually go for more neutral looks, but I get tired of always doing browns, taupes, bronzes, silvers etc.... being able to find shades that ARE colours but just muted allows me to do colours in a more wearable way! And this Luster shade is great for that, a very unique colour! And the CG white is actually perfect for a brow highlight, I'll probably be using this a lot when I don't want to have a super shimmery highlight shade, as this one is just satin finish.

Project Make It Work!

I'm sure all beauty junkies have this same issue.... products you bought, or were given, that for whatever reason you just don't use. Maybe they're not the quality you would like, or the colours you would normally wear, the pigmentation isn't quite there or they just simply don't make it into your rotation because you favor other products first!

This project is all about making those items work - they're just sitting in your collection, taking up space - they've gotta earn their keep!

I've selected four eyeshadow palettes that I rarely use, and over the next few days I am challenging myself to use at least one of these palettes each day. I will be allowing myself to use other eyeshadows since none of these palettes have what I would consider a contour shade, and because I want to be able to figure out how to incorporate these shades into my makeup I already use and see what they work well with that I already love.

Here are the candidates!

1.

Dior 5 Couleurs Eyeshadow Palette in Incognito - this is actually a freebie size, this was given to me by someone several years ago, they had gotten it as a GWP but didn't want it. I have to say I'm a little surprised that this is constantly name dropped as a huge seller and popular item... the shadows are very smooth and buttery soft, but I find the colours veery pale and hard to see, and I'm fairly pale! But I'll figure something out!!

Swatches:

2.

CoverGirl Eye Enhancers Quad in Urban Basics - this was a silly purchase of mine, I only bought it because I loved the look of the taupe shade... and I only realized later that it appears to be the exact same as the CG single Tapestry Taupe. So although the taupe is well loved, the other three get no play at all! I'm optimistic the white can be used as a semi-matte brow highlight, but I'll need to get creative with the other two!

Swatches:

3.

Merle Norman Lasting Eyecolor Trio in Rosas - another item given to me by someone else that was a GWP. All these colours are gorgeously pigmented and smooth, and I have used the peach a few times, but the other two not so much! And to be honest, that fuchsia terrifies me! Sooo out of my comfort zone!

Swatches:

4.

NYX Triple Shadow in Opal/Platinum Silver/Luster - the pigmentation on these is fairly nice, and the colours aren't bad - but for some reason I just never use these!! That has to change! The middle colour is fairly dupeable within my collection but the outside two, I have nothing else really like them!

Swatches:

First look should be up tomorrow or the next day!! Looks might not be on consecutive days (I'm not starting my new job until next week and so this week I'm just at home, and may not want to/need to put on makeup every day!) but I'll try to have several looks up over the next week or so!! :)

HauteLook Urban Decay Sale!

I just discovered this AMAZING website and boy am I glad! But my wallet's not...

Basically, if you aren't familiar, HauteLook works like this:

"HauteLook is a premier members-only site that offers private, limited-time sale events on the world's best brands. Each day, members receive an email invitation to the newest, most exclusive sale events on the best merchandise for men, women, kids, home and beauty - at prices up to 75% off retail. HauteLook is free to join and everyone is welcome - there are no commitments or charges for membership."

These are NICE brand name items, good quality stuff... in all categories, from home items, to clothing, accessories, and even vacation packages at HUGE discounts. For example, I saw a stack of gorgeous 18k gold plated bangles accented with real turquoise, regular price $100, on sale for $29!

Back the the makeup though! According to some of the ladies on MUT, there were UD eyeshadows on last year's sale for $2!! Yes, you read that right - two dollars.

So if you haven't signed up yet, get going! By clicking on this link you can get yourself signed up, and also do me the awesome favor of giving me a $10 HauteLook credit for referring someone! ;) Then pass it along!

SIGN UP HERE!

The Urban Decay sale is this Monday, June 6 beginning at 8 a.m. Pacific time. See you there!

FOTD June 2/11

Here's my face for today! Used a few new products - most of all I'm LOVING my new foundation (see previous post for review). I think these pictures really show how nice it looks on my skin!









For the face I used:

-Rimmel's Lasting Finish 25 Hr Foundation in shade 200 Soft Beige

-Urban Decay 24/7 Concealer pencil in DEA

-Revlon PhotoReady Translucent Finishing Powder

-Revlon ColorStay Mineral Finishing Powder in Suntan Matte (as bronzer for light contouring)

-a deep pinky-red blush from my 2007 Sephora Blockbuster palette

-a reeaally old Revlon Skinlights highlighter, discontinued!

On the eyes:

-Urban Decay eyeshadow in Snatch on inner half of lids

-UD Toasted on outer half of lids, on lower lashline

-from the Sephora 5-in-1 palette, shades 14/17/18 combo blended in the crease/outer corner

-NYX Eye Pencil in Gold in the waterline with UD Half Baked eyeshadow patted on top to intensify and set

Aaand last but not least, e.l.f. Super Glossy Lip Shine in Honey Do on the lips... an almost sheer kinda glittery peachy-orange gloss!

Review: Rimmel Lasting Finish 25 Hour Foundation

Hellllooo lovelies!

Yesterday I was in a shoppy kind of mood... and I'm also getting to the bottom of my remaining foundation bottles, none of which were exactly the right shade. I was watching a few videos on YouTube about finding the right shade of drugstore foundation (the only kind my sad little budget can muster!) and some reviews... and it got me so rarin' to go that I hopped on the bus and went straight to Shopper's Drug Market on a moment's notice!

My mission was to check out Rimmel's Lasting Finish foundation (full title in the title... I'm not typing that all over again! :p). It sounded right for what I was looking for - long lasting, doesn't cause/exacerbate oiliness (my skin isn't too oily but the wrong foundation can sure make it seem like it is!) and a medium-full coverage with a semi-matte finish.

Well I got it in shade 200 Soft Beige and I can pretty much tick off all of those boxes! I'd say the coverage is medium-full with a satin-matte finish... not totally thick and matte, but thick enough that it covers most of my redness (which I get on and around my nose, and on my chin). I prefer foundations that lean more towards matte to get that flawless finish - then I can always add highlighter on the cheekbones and browbones to get a bit of "targeted" luminosity and dewiness.



The bottle!



Swatched heavy on the left, blended on the right, with flash.



Swatched heavy on the left, blended on the right, without flash.

Here's a comparison of my cheek without foundation (eek!):



And wearing the foundation:



As you can see, pores are much less visible, the redness around my nose is almost gone, overall smoother and semi-matte finish to the skin!

It's been only around 5 hours since I put it on but so far it still looks exactly the same as it did when I put it on! I think it's gonna be love with this stuff!

Has anyone else tried this foundation? What did you think of it?