Zombie Makeup

Hey everyone! I've been busy the last few days preparing for yesterday's Zombie Walk. If you're unaware, a Zombie Walk is just what it sounds like. People dress up like zombies and walk around their city. Often they will use the event to collect for a charity. Our charity collection was for Cork Dog Action Welfare Group (DAWG). They rescue abandoned and abused dogs, and their site can be found here http://www.dogactionwelfaregroup.ie/. I wanted to share a few pics of the makeup I wore for the walk ^_^ I had such a blast with this makeup, I think I'll be doing more stuff like this in the future. It's so much fun to do and wear!

Guh?

The makeup was heavily inspired by a piece of Durga Usagi's work, here's the 'making of' youtube video for it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8KdJJs9CH5I. I highly recommend you check it out! If you like what you see on her youtube channel, certainly have a look at her website http://underbluelightsmakeup.com/. There's all sorts of amazing stuff there! :)

Braaaaaaains

I couldn't get the Wolfe FX Skinz palette Durga uses in time for the Zombie Walk, I used Snazaroo face paints instead. I'll add a product list at the end! I used Sugarpill shadows around the eyes, green and black lashes and mismatched coloured contact lenses. I was going to wear two pink lenses but I tore one of them so I mismatched instead. I think it looks even better! I really suck at applying lashes, I'm still getting the hang of them!

My look isn't perfect, but I think I did okay considering I've never really worked with face paints before this weekend! I had so much fun with this. I was expecting it to be a lot of work and not that much fun to be honest, since it takes quite a long time, but I loved every minute of doing this look. Unfortunately the day of the Zombie Walk my time management wasn't so good, so I didn't get to add pink blood like I wanted to. I was going to use a mix of face paint and lip gloss to do it! Jangsara did something cool like this using liquid latex and lip gloss on her blog recently, here's the post http://jangsara.blogspot.fi/2012/10/halloween-tutorial-pink-tears.html. I wanted to get fuzzy ear muffs too and be a super cute zombie. Everyone else on the walk was a gore zombie, I looked like a cartoon next to them! It was a lot of fun though, everyone should attend their local zombie walk!

I'll be staying in face paint mode for much of this week, since Dia de los Muertos is also this week and I want to do a sugar skull for that. I'd like to work out something really fancy for it so hopefully I'll come up with an awesome design! I've never done a sugar skull before so I'm looking forward to it. See you guys soon ~_^

Products used:

Lenses:

EOS New Adult - Pink
EOS Ice Green

I buy my lenses from http://www.honeycolor.com/

Face:

Snazaroo Classic Colours - Light Grey, Black, White

Eyes:

Sugarpill eyeshadow- Dollipop, Bulletproof
NYC Liquid Liner - Black
NYX Jumbo Pencil - White

Lashes:

Kiss Eyelusions Couture Lash Bar Collection - Mystére

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!

Galway trip! (or 'Penneys Eyre Square Essence stand')

This week I took a spontaneous trip to visit my sister Laura! She lives in Galway, which is 3 hours away from me by bus, so I don't get to see her all that often. She had a couple of days off work, so I went up there to hang out a little.
I had one shopping aim for this trip, to buy new shoes and a dress. I only managed the shoes. A cheap €5 pair of mustard yellow doll shoes from Penneys. Buying dresses involves trying them on. Trying them on becomes tedious very quickly, so that didn't last too long.
Penneys in the Eyre Square shopping center has lots of cheap makeup!
It has a Catrice stand, a Rimmel stand, and best of all a HUGE Essence stand! I love Essence products, their shadows and polishes especially are just fantastic. Their 'no animal testing' policy is also a big guilt free plus. I was in my element, I just love browsing their products and looking for polishes that I don't already own. So began the Essence nails mini-spree.


There was Disney Snow White polish collection there, that I hadn't seen in the Essence stands in Cork. It had been heavily ravaged already, but I picked up a few of the remaining colours for Laura, since she loves Disney things so much. The shades were adorably named after the dwarfs. I managed to swipe 'Grumpy' (royal blue), 'Bashful' (dark green with gold undertones) and 'Dopey' (shimmery lilac) for her. I also nabbed her an effect topcoat in 'Prince Charming' (blue and silver glitter, different sized particles), and a pack of nail stickers featuring butterflies, apples and strangely enough, grass. I took the liberty of picking her up a tube of Cuticle Remover gel,  and bottles of the 24/7 Studio Nails base coat and Quick Dry top coat. She didn't already own any of these things, and I needed to fix that if we were going to do our nails.

Image from: http://en.essence-beautyfriends.eu

The Cuticle Remover gel is great, I don't have any cuticle softening stuff myself. I've been meaning to get some for a while now, and after using this I'll have to do it before my next application. Unfortunately, the Essence counters in Cork aren't as extensive as this one in Galway, so I doubt I'll be able to find this same one. It's not as if I haven't had a really, really good look already. I'll have to scout for a worthy alternative. 
I also got an effect topcoat in 'Evil Queen' for myself, and I did attempt to use it, with lumpy results. The 'particles' are big purple discs, and they're hard to simply coat on without either getting too few or too many. I didn't have any implements with which to guide them around the nail, so I did what I could with layers of top coat. The next day I took it off because of the aforementioned lumpiness, but I will not let it defeat me.
You can read more about the Essence Snow White polish collection here:
http://www.essence.eu/index.php?id=1989&L=0

I'm currently testing the Essence 24/7 base coat for longevity vs the Revlon one. The only obvious difference between the two seems to be that the Essence base coat finished matte, and the Revlon one shiny. That of course, and the price. The Essence one was €2.29, and the Revlon one €9. I'll keep you posted.
The only other Essence polish I got was a Colour3 one in 'Walk in the park'. If you haven't heard of the Colour3 polishes, you're really missing out and I feel very bad for you. I have 4 of these now, I believe. They are double ended polishes, an opaque colour on one side and a sheer shimmery polish on the other, which is suitable for layering on the opaque colour. 'Walk in the park' is a teal/green polish, and its sheer counterpart is 'Stop for an ice cream', a blue/gold/silver shimmer. It's really pretty on, I'll do a review of the Colour3 polishes that I have soon and add some pictures.


Nail enamel excitement aside, I had a great time in Galway. I always do when I go there! We went to a nice little Italian restaurant one night for dinner. The name escapes me, but it was tasty and reasonably priced. I made Laura watch loads of Angel with me, and when she refused to watch any more we compromised on the Powerpuff Girls. We did some well earned relaxing, and visited some of Laura's favourite haunts. We saw some of her friends play music one night at the Roisín Dubh (she's a musical type herself), had coffee at Java's and breakfasted at An Tobar Nua. Fun times were had by all!

Hello World

My name is Ciara, but on the internet I'm called Chicks. This will be my first blog. I've always wanted a blog, but I didn't know what to blog about. Now I've found something!
A few months ago, I did a makeup course (ITEC qualification). The problem is, I'm not yet confident in my skills so I'm reluctant to apply for jobs. I've been practicing a lot on myself, to get different styles of makeup down, and get better at general application. I'm improving, even though I'm not working on other people much. Well, yesterday I put blue liquid eyeliner on my husband. It was very tidy, I was quite happy. I've started to build my makeup kit, so I've been buying a whole lot of makeup lately. I thought that I'd post reviews of the things that I've been buying, like many others do. I'm unemployed right now, so I'm working off a pretty tight budget too. I try to find good products and pay as little for them as possible, so if you read regularly you might be able to find some good deals! :D

Besides reviews, I'd like to post makeup looks that I've been practicing, maybe even some I come up with myself if I'm feeling creative. I'd like to get into nail art, so maybe I'll blog about that at some point. I've recently mastered painting the nails on my left hand and I'm awfully proud ^_^

So that's my plan for now. I have a some other interests too, like watching TV shows, playing/following Starcraft 2, and crochet, but I'm not sure if I'll blog much about those things..I'm not sure if I should make this a purely beauty blog or if I should make it miscellaneous. We'll see how things go.

I also have no idea about blog stuff, like format and templates, or how to make the thing on the right hand side all categorised and easy to navigate..So if it all looks like a mess for a while I'm very sorry, and I'll learn how to do it better.

Chicks