This Week's Nails #6 - Mellow Yellow

Ninja post from my Mom's house in West Cork! :D

I wasn't planning on doing a post at all today since I'm not home, but before I left this afternoon I had just about enough time to photograph my nails. I painted them last night because I'm going to Galway tomorrow with some of my family since it's my sister's university graduation on Monday. I brought my camera so hopefully I'll be able to get some nice pictures! I'll be back on Tuesday so maybe then I'll be able to do the Too Faced Shadow Insurance review. That's a tough one to do when I'm not home because I'll also be talking about the eye makeup in yesterday's FOTD. I'd rather have my makeup stuff there for reference so I can do an accurate post. :)

I did my nails this colour to go with the skirt I'll wear to the graduation. I'm not getting super dressed up but I'll be fancied up a bit.

Another one from Essence, it's called 'Mellow Yellow'. I picked it up for 65 cents when the new line of polishes came out. This is unfortunately another discontinued shade, and I've learned that this is the second 'Mellow Yellow' that Essence released. The previous one was a bright, true yellow. This version is a shimmery primrose yellow. I applied three coats of this, and it's not completely opaque but I think it's meant to be like that. The colour of this polish is paler than the yellow in my skirt, but it'll go nice all the same. It's a very soft, feminine colour, I can see it being paired with a light dress in the summertime too!

I'll be offline for a few days, enjoying myself in Galway :) Can't wait to come back and blog some more! Maybe I'll even come across something nice up there to do a post on, who knows?

See you soon!

FOTD #1

Hey! It's gonna be a short one today unfortunately. It's really late and I have to go out of town tomorrow so I have to pack and stuff before I go to bed. Today I did a full face of makeup, so I photographed it and it will be my first FOTD post! :)

I even brushed my hair. I know it doesn't look it, but I totally did. Here's the deal with the eye look. I'm going to feature it it my next post because I used this look to test the Too Faced Shadow Insurance that I got in the mail today (yay!). I'll go into more detail about the application and shadows in that post while I review TFSI. I hope that's cool with you guys!

Products used:

Face:

Maybelline BB Cream - Light
Revlon Colorstay - Ivory
Maybelline Fit Me - 120 Classic Ivory
The Body Needs - Under Eye Concealer
Maybelline Cover Stick - Ivory
Essence Bronzing Compact Powder - Bronzing Queen
Catrice Defining Duo Blush - Apricot Smoothie
Inglot Loose Powder - Translucent

Eyes:

Too Faced Shadow Insurance
Urban Decay Naked 2 palette
Gosh Long Lasting Eyeliner Pen - Brown
Rimmel Scandaleyes Kohl Pencil - Bronze
Max Factor 2000 Calorie Mascara - Black Brown

Eyebrows:

Essence Eyebrow Stylist Set

Lips:

Revlon Lip Butter - Peach Parfait

Review with Look - Revlon Colorstay quad - 565 Bombshell

Hello!

I was in town recently and I walked past H&M. In the window there were a lot of pale yellow, grey and black clothes, and I admired how nicely the colours went together. I was on my way to Boots to have a browse, and ended up getting a couple of eyeshadow palettes. One was the Lid Stuff quad that I reviewed the other day. When choosing the other palette, I remembered the Revlon Custom Eyes palette I reviewed some time ago, and how I had meant to check out their Colorstay quads.

There were some lovely colour combinations, it was hard to choose! Goddess, Precocious and Enchanted were some that I remember admiring. Then I saw Bombshell, which was the same colour scheme as the clothes I saw in the window of H&M! I thought it would be nice to do a look with these colours. I don't know much about fashion and trends to be honest, but I think it's kind of cool to coordinate makeup and clothing colours together sometimes. So, maybe someone with the same ideas as me would find this look useful. These quads were priced at €11.20 at Boots.

It's new!

Look idea on the back

The Bombshell quad contains a satin white, a light shimmery silver grey, a dark matte grey, and a pale matte yellow. Like the Revlon Custom Eyes palette I have, there is a look idea on the back. I didn't follow it this time though! I felt like it didn't feature the yellow as much as I would like, and also it is too similar to the way I did the Lid Stuff look that I posted a couple of days ago. So I did it my own way instead! I'll show you that soon, but first, swatches!

These shadows don't have names either :( They're swatched over NXY Milk. I can't find my NXY White base, the cats swiped it underneath something or behind something I think. Damn them!

Sorry about my eyebrows again, lol. They look fine until I put the ring light on my camera, I'll take care of them soon. So for this look I wanted the yellow to be quite prominent, so I placed it in the center. This one's quite hard to apply. You have to really pack it on to make it show up strong. I then placed the dark grey on the inner and outer corners of the eye. I used the light grey to blend the transition between the yellow and dark grey. The shimmer in this grey adds a slight lift to the upper lid. I mirrored this colour placement on the lower lid too, and highlighted the brow bone and inner corner with the palest shadow. I finished the look by lining the upper and lower lash line with black, and applying black mascara. I applied a blue based pink lipstick too, which went really nicely. I didn't photograph it though, my lips aren't in the best condition right now since my Body Shop lip scrub suffered the same fate as my NYX base :( These shadows are meant to last on for sixteen hours. I wore mine for about ten hours, and they lasted very well. Here are a couple more pictures of the look.

Overall I like this palette. I'll certainly be using it more. I like quad palettes in general, they're so handy for popping your handbag or taking on trips with you. They're very reasonably priced too, four shadows for €11.20 is a sweet deal! Also it was technically free for me since I got it as part of a 2 for 3 offer. Hooray!

Other products used:

Essence 'I Love Stage' primer
NXY Jumbo Pencil - Milk
Maybelline Master Precise liner
Anonymous black kohl pencil
Maybelline Falsies Mascara
Essence Eyebrow Stylist Set

This Week's Nails #5 - Be Optimistic!

Nails today!
I wanted autumnal nails this week. I had a look online to see what was trendy, and I saw a lot of beautiful deep colours, but I wore Revlon 'Forbidden' (deep red) last week and I wanted something a bit brighter. I came across a small few pictures of metallic copper and orange nails, inspired by autumn leaves I would imagine. They were so pretty, and  I have a similar colour in my collection :)

This is an older Essence one, I got it before they overhauled their polish range. I believe it's discontinued now, I haven't seen it around, which is a shame because it's a lovely shade! It's like, a rusty orange colour and has a chrome finish. It's beautiful! It really suits the season too and I haven't seen many polishes like it.

Review with Look - Soap & Glory Lid Stuff - 'Off the Wallflowers'

Hello!
I'm really excited about this post, because I've wanted this eyeshadow palette for a long time! I read a glowing review on it somewhere online, but I can't remember where. It's a Lid Stuff quad palette from Soap & Glory, the one I chose is 'Off the Wallfowers'. I picked it up for €14.50 in Boots. There are two more Lid Stuff colour choices available too, 'What's Nude' and 'Smokey Dokey'. At the moment I feel like I have enough nude shades with my Naked 2 and Sleek 'Au Natural' palettes, and I love a bit of colour so I chose 'Off the Wallflowers'. Here it is in all its (Soap &) Glory!

One of the things I really love about it is that there is no sponge applicator! I hate those crappy useless things! There is a short statement about this on the back of the packaging - 'We chose not to include a cheap spongy shadow brush, because not only would it drive the price of this palette up, we thought you'd rather opt for a proper one' Good work, Soap & Glory. Can any of you remember the last time you actually used one of them? What a waste they are!
On to the swatches.

Sugar Violet, Dandy Plum, Minky, Wild Blue

'Sugar Violet' is a beautiful matte violet shade, it's actually quite bright! 'Dandy Plum' is a deep, red brown toned plum with a shimmer finish. 'Minky' is so pretty, pale gold shimmer with subtle pink undertones, while 'Wild Blue' is a bold blue shimmer.
Here's the look I created with this palette!

Ta-dah!

I used 'Minky' all over the lid, applied 'Dandy Plum' in the crease and blended 'Sugar Violet' above it. I placed Wild Blue all along the lower lash line.
The quality of these shadows is so good. They're soft, very pigmented and they're lovely to work with. I love this palette! I'm so glad I finally got it and that it didn't disappoint. I can see myself using it a lot. There's a great mix of colours to make a bunch of different looks with. I'm really looking forward to using it more and I might even pick up another one. I hope they'll come out with a wider range of eyeshadows, as far as I know the Lid Stuff palettes are the only shadows they do. I'd definitely like to see more colour combinations from them.

This is the second Soap & Glory product I've used. For my birthday my Mom got me one of their lipsticks, a Super-Colour Fabulipstick in 'The Missing Pink' which is a medium pink shade. It's a great lipstick, it's really moisturising and I use it quite often! I also have their Kick Ass Concealer but I haven't used it yet. I have a Maybelline Cover Stick on the go and I'd like to get through a bit more of that first. I have my eye on a few more of their products too, hopefully I'll get my hands on them in the future.

I'll sign off with more pictures of the look. Enjoy!

Other products used:

Urban Decay - Bootycall (highlight and inner corner)

Maybelline Master Precise eyeliner

Anonymous black kohl pencil

Essence 'Cool Breeze' Kajal Pencil

Maybelline Falsies Mascara

Essence Eyebrow Designer - 'Brown'

Review - Maybelline Fit Me

I promised something different, so here's a foundation review!

I picked this up because I've been feeling like my current foundation is a little pale for me right now. I didn't have a darker one to mix it with, so I went to look for a new foundation. I currently use Revlon Colorstay for dry skin in Ivory, which I got in early summer, but since I tanned slightly over the summer (very slightly!), this one makes my face look a touch paler than the rest of me. I actually ended up using Maybelline's BB Cream instead for most of the summer, so I didn't notice that I had tanned until I started to use foundation again recently. I have fair, yellow toned skin so I often have to choose the lightest or second lightest shade available in a range, after testing of course. I love Revlon Colorstay. It gives great coverage, doesn't emphasise dry patches and stays on all day. Not a bad word to say about it!

When I got my Revlon Colorstay, I did a fair bit of research on it first. Fit Me I just bought on a whim. I had a look around Boots, this one appealed, it instructed me on how to find my shade so I did that and picked it up. I chose the palest shade for fair, yellow toned skin which is '120 - Classic Ivory'.

Here's a picture of the products I used for this review:

Left: 17's 'Photo Flawless' primer | Right: Maybelline 'Fit Me' foundation

In order to properly show the coverage of this foundation on my skin, I took photos of different stages of application. One is of my bare, yucky, blemished, sun damaged, open pored skin.

Please mentally prepare before viewing the following pictures.

Picture 1 - The aforementioned icky bare skin. Notice all the imperfections.

THE HORROR!!!

Picture 2 - The same icky bare skin, primed with 17's 'Photo Flawless Skin Primer'. It's not the best primer I've used, but it's tiding me over while I hunt for a new one. I'll more often than not use Maybelline's BB Cream as a primer.

Pores slightly minimized

Picture 3 - Fit Me foundation '120 - Classic Ivory' applied with a stippling brush.

Much better!

It's a tad on the dark side, and it's got some sort of weird orange/tan undertone to it. I'm not fond of the colour to be honest. For the palest shade for yellow toned skin it's still quite dark. The coverage is decent. It's not as good as Revlon Colorstay, but it's sufficient. Luckily I don't have bad skin problems so I don't need heavy coverage, but if you need heavier coverage I wouldn't recommend this foundation.

It feels nice on my skin and it doesn't emphasise dry patches. Even though I didn't moisturise before I primed, it still didn't cling to any dry skin on my face. I get flaky skin most prominently between my eyebrows and on the sides of my face, but as you can see from the picture below Fit Me doesn't emphasise it.

Picture 4 - Full face picture, just foundation. No concealers or powders.

O hai! Please excuse the unkempt eyebrows.

This foundation doesn't matte your skin completely. Notice I have shine on my forehead that needs to be fixed with powder. I wore it for about 8 hours and it didn't dry up or fall off or go patchy or anything like that. I like this foundation, but I don't think I'd buy it again because they don't have the right shade for me. I will continue to use this because I hate to waste a good foundation, but I will probably try mixing it with Revlon Colorstay to lighten the colour.

Wedding Nails - Forbidden

Hellooo!
My uncle was married yesterday! The wedding ceremony was held at Fossa Church in Killarney, it's a beautiful venue. I traveled to Killarney on Thursday with my Mam and her boyfriend Paul, and we stayed in the Killarney Heights Hotel. The wedding celebrations were held there too, and it was fantastic. There were a lot of guests! About 260 people were there. Everything went so smoothly, thanks to the incredible staff, and a great time was had by all! ^_^

So, on to the nails! I thought about getting gel nails done, but I like to change my nail colour often so I didn't bother with it. I'm actually on a nail polish ban right now, I have quite a few colours I haven't worn yet. Until I've worn most of those, I won't buy any more! I've been browsing on http://www.beautybay.com/ and there are some really awesome mini collections that I would like to acquire. Also, Viola at http://rodeo.net/killercolours/ did a post on Nubar's 'Night Sparkle' recently and it's so pretty. Don't even get me started on OPI's 'The Man with the Golden Gun', a limited edition 18K gold top coat. Disgustingly beautiful. The world of nail polish is testing me! T_T

For the wedding I wore red and black. I don't have any pictures, but if I come across any I'll throw some up. I got ridiculous red heels that killed my feet (I am extremely inexperienced with any sort of heels), and my sister did my hair a bit and I had a fascinator and everything! I rocked a red lip too, but to my dismay I was the only lady there doing so..I guess nobody else was feeling brave! I did my nails with Revlon's 'Forbidden'.

It's a gorgeous, vampy, deep red. I felt really grown up and classy wearing this one. Not that I'm not a grown up, I just don't act like one ~_^ Deep red and berry nails are an Autumn trend from what I understand, so hooray for trendy me! I don't often wear dark colours, I have a lot of brights and glittery/shimmery things. I thought I'd dry something new. I got Sally Hansen's Diamond Shine base coat and top coat too, and I've been using it as both. I found it in Boots after looking in a few pharmacies first. It's worked really well for me since I got it. As a topcoat I much prefer it to the Essence ones I have. It's thinner and dries much faster. I did read some reviews of it online slating it for weakening the nails when it's used as a base coat, but I haven't experienced anything like this yet. If I do I'll be sure to report in! Luckily if I have any problems I have the Revlon base coat to fall back on, and that one's great. I'll keep you guys posted.

There have been many nail posts lately, but I promise I'll do something different soon. I've been stuck for time but nails are always a sure thing with me!