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Archives for April 2010

It Wasn’t Hard to Fall for YSL’s Crayon Yeux Haute Intense Long-Lasting Eye Pencils

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Goodness, fellow dancing queens, today turned out to be a fantastic day for pigmented makeup. First the Benefit Ultra Shines and now Yves Saint Laurent’s new Eye Pencils ($28)? Fo’ serious, all of this pigment is making me want to shake my groove thing, shake me groove thing, yeah, yeah!

The 12 new pencils are reformulated versions of YSL’s Crayon Yeux Haute Intense Long-Lasting Eye Pencils. I never tried the original ones, but these new ones overflow with color. It’s almost enough to make someone forget about the $28 price.

YSL says that a wax adhesive they use in the formula makes the pigments more intense and helps them stay put for hours on skin.

They aren’t kidding. Each of the three colors I tried — Turquoise, Leather Brown and Velvet Black — won’t let go for nothing! They grab on those lash and water lines like they’re holding on for dear life, lasting the entire day with minimal fading.

  • Turquoise: like the name implies
  • Leather Brown a cool grayish brown with a matte finish; the color reminds me of MAC Concrete shadow
  • Velvet Black: a true black without any blue or green undertones


From left: Turquoise, Leather Brown, Velvet Black
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I Could Kiss Benefit for Bringing the Ultra Shines Lip Shine Glosses into the World

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Remember when Benefit discontinued their line of OG glosses last year? Man, that made me grumpy… Creamy purple Kiss Me was a staple o’ mine for years (I always wore it on first dates, heh!). The shade, pigment and non-sticky texture made it the stuff of lipgloss legend, and I’ve been mourning the loss ever since.

But Benefit didn’t leave us hanging for long. They promptly replaced the OG line with a new collection of super sheer glosses that I thought were a’ight, but they didn’t really make my heart flutter in that “I NEEDS IT!!” kinda way.


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Makeup and Beauty Blog Monday Poll, April 19

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  1. Mood:

    2. Unusually alert (!) and chipper, considering I went to bed after midnight and got up at 6 this morning.

  2. Are you a beach lover?

    3. Totally, but I’ll only get in the water if it’s warm.

  3. Which lipglosses/lipsticks have you been using the most lately?

    4. Three: MAC Cremesheen Glass in Petite Indulgence, Estee Lauder Bronze Goddess in Wild Orchid and Too Faced Glamour Gloss in Sex Pot

  4. Mild or spicy?

    5. Extra mild, please. 🙂

  5. Eyes/lips/cheeks:

    6. Nothing yet except for lip balm and sunscreen, but I’m thinking of doing a neutral brown eye with pink cheeks and lips.

  6. ______ make me happy.

    7. Sunshine, sleep, well-behaved hair, In-n-Out vanilla shakes, upbeat music and cute accessories.

  7. ______ make me b*tchy.

    8. Getting lost, feeling bloated, rude people, entitled drivers (a sub-category of rude people), ill-fitting underwear and books with lame endings.

  8. Last thing you said out loud.

    9. “You’re so stinky!” (directed at Tabs).

  9. Outfit:

    10. I’m still in jammies and nothing matches. It’s a pair of peach, brown and turquoise boxers (with an owl print), a brown tank top and a hot pink hoodie.

  10. Weekly goals:

    11. Stick to my new daily meal plan, spend less time sitting in front of the computer every day, and remember to smile.

What up, boo? Monday snuck (sneaked?) up on me this time, but I still feel pretty good about the day…

How about you? What do you have on your plate? Do you have a minute to check in with the Monday Poll? If you’ve done it before, you know what to do. Just copy the empty list, and paste it with your answers in the comments.

Le list

1. Mood:
2. Are you a beach lover?
3. Which lipglosses/lipsticks have you been into lately?
4. Mild or spicy?
5. Eyes/lips/cheeks:
6. ______ make me happy.
7. ______ make me b*tchy.
8. Last thing you said out loud?
9. Outfit:
10. Weekly goals:

We gotta keep on truckin’, ladies. 🙂

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

Sundays with Tabs the Cat, Makeup and Beauty Blog Mascot, Vol. 83

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Is Tabs just a cat?

Well, that’s like asking, “Is the Mona Lisa just a painting?”

Like anything, it depends on who you ask. The haters would say he’s a hack — a copycat, if you will — whose best days are behind him. I, however, call him The Next Big Thing, a cross between Tyra Banks and Shere Khan from The Jungle Book.

Few among us truly have what it takes to succeed in this business (the business of being fabulous) — the discipline, the determination, the willpower and slimming stripes (not to mention the massive quantities of tuna in gravy) it takes day in and day out to be a top kitteh model.

Tabs: cat or beauty icon?

Is Tabs too sexy for this blog?

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Put Your Feet Up in the Open Thread

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Wait — the weekend’s almost over? How the heck did that happen!? After breakfast this morning (Trader Joe’s mini bagels with low-fat cream cheese), I settled down on the couch to do some reading. I wish I could say I was challenging myself with something deeply cerebral like War and Peace, but I opted for mind candy instead. 🙂 Enter Lauren Conrad’s L.A. Candy (yes, I went there!), and issues of Women’s Health, Cooking Light and Make-Up Artist magazine.

There was also supposed to be a cup of Kona coffee in this shot, but I finished it before picking up the camera up, oops!

It’s days like today that I wish we were neighbors… Then you could come over; I could make another pot (or two) of coffee, and we could read magazines, talk makeup and watch bad reality TV together — in other words, recharge!

Don’t get me wrong, Tabs and El Hub are great, but I miss my girlfriends, ya know? Seriously, when it comes to beauty and bad television, they have very little of interest to add to the conversations, LOL!

I guess that’s why I like these open threads. You might be a computer screen away, but it’s almost like we’re meeting for coffee and shooting the shizz.

If you’re new to the open thread, basically we just chat in the comments. Any topic you like, from your new favorite drugstore beauty find (Rimmel makes mine!), to the kitten you’re thinking of adopting, a problem at school/work, your new favorite TV show, or just drop in to say hola.

See you in a few! 🙂

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

This Week’s Top Posts

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[big yawn…]

Howzit, ladies? Good (belated) morning to ya. 🙂 I slept in again with a little help from Tabs. He makes it easy to lose track of time. Simply put, sleeping late with a cat beside me on the bed is one of the greatest pleasures in life.

What did you do last night? My plans changed at the last minute because El Hub ended up not going on his bromance, so we went out to dinner and a movie instead. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo? Have you seen it? Swiss or Swedish, I think… I can’t remember which, but I thought it was great.

A pair of investigators, one a girl computer hacker and the other a reporter dude for an underground newspaper, get mixed up in a wealthy family’s twisted conspiracy surrounding the disappearance of a young girl in 1966.

LOTS of awful, sadistic men in the story, but the hacker girl character flat-out rules!

Back to beauty then — what was your favorite product this past week? Was it an old standby or something new?

Physicans Formula Healthy Wear Bronzer: A Trifecta of Skin Lurving Benefits?

“Now here I go being all wrong about bronzers… I always thought they were for adding a warm, almost-tanned look to skin. Not true, says Physicians Formula, or rather, that’s not all they can do. New Healthy Wear Bronzer gives a sun-kissed glow but couples it with healthful skin benefits.”

MAC Unsung Heroes: Lychee Luxe Lipglass

“Lychee Luxe is the coral lipgloss Goldilocks would have worn because it bears (ha!) a perfect amount of golden pinkish coral… And, oooh! — the flexibility. It goes great with so many different eye makeup looks, like all of the seasonal golds, bronzes, coppers, teals and greens of summer.”

Rimmel Glam Eyes Lash Flirt Mascara, A Haiku Review

For mad length and lift, $7 Rimmel Glam Eyes Mascara delivers. It’s perfect for those midnight runs to Rite Aid or CVS, and it lasts from dusk till dawn.

MBBTV #11: Philosophy Coloring Book Gets a Bad … Rap

Have you played with any of the makeup palettes Philosophy has been coming out with these lately? This one — called The Color of Grace — gets a bad rap. Well, that’s a little misleading, 🙂 but you be the judge.

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