Makeup and Beauty Blog | Makeup Reviews, Swatches and How-To Makeup
A beauty blog blooming with fresh makeup reviews, swatches and beauty tips from your friendly neighborhood beauty addict
My nail game’s been lame all week long!
I just can’t decide on one color. Or even two or three! #thestruggleisreal
There are just so many new shades for fall, including these nine limited edition ones from NARS ($20 each).
The NARS 3.1 Phillip Lim Collection, a collaboration with designer Phillip Lim, goes on sale July 15 at NARS boutiques and narscosmetics.com (August 1 at NARS counters and Sephora stores).
Yes, I have stimulus overload.
Behold! — another batch of beauties from the new fall 2014 collection.
I’m in the midst of a may-jah Joues Contraste phase at the moment, thanks to Malice, so I’m quite stoked about that blush.
All of these are available now at Chanel counters and chanel.com.
OK, so my next door neighbor has these flowers in her front yard, and there’s this orangey red one. Every single time I walk by it I have to stop and stare for a few seconds because it’s so vibrant and eye-catching.
I was under its spell yesterday and thought, “I need to find a lipstick like that…”
Then I thought, “And I need to wear that lipstick…”
Then I pictured dream Karen throwing her arms up in the air, twirling around in circles and screaming, “It’s summer, world! HAAAAAAY!”
OK, that last part didn’t happen. 🙂 But maybe if I’d had a glass of wine first…
Anyways! The flower looked exactly like Fire, one of the reformulated Dolce & Gabbana Classic Cream Lipsticks I mentioned yesterday.
An opaque electric orangey red, Fire sometimes borders on coral, depending on what I’m wearing (it’s kind of a chameleon), like this reddish coral shift dress I’m wearing today.
Today I think Fire looks more coral, but when I wear a black or white shirt, I think it looks more red.
Now, about the formula, my lips aren’t in the best shape right now. They’ve been very dry lately (I think they got wind burned in Redding), and there’s some flaking along the edges, but not when they’re on Fire!
LOL! Sorry, bad pun. I just wanted to write “…not when they’re on Fire!”
I meant, not when I’m wearing Fire. 🙂
It applies smoothly and incredibly opaque, and here I’m only wearing one layer.
YEAH!
Lots of bad-@ssery happening around this li’l pen. 🙂
Picture Jeremy Renner doing one-armed pushups, Ryan Gosling petting kittens, and James Bond, aka Daniel Craig, in a tuxedo feeding you Oreos dipped in real milk.
BAM!
Yeah, as much as I like almond milk, it’s total bullsh*t with Oreos, but I digress…
Back to the bad-@ssery I mentioned, I guess it shouldn’t come as a big surprise considering the cost of this particular pen, the Chanel Ecriture De Chanel liquid eyeliner pen in Noir. It’s $35 (!). But in this case, I think you get what you pay for.
One of two liquid pen liners in Chanel’s new fall collection (there’s also one called Brun, a brown, and a gray called Anthracite, which is part of the permanent collection), Noir has some good things going for it.
Like midnight in the middle of the earth, Noir is dark! The color is true black, deep and intense, without any blue or green undertones, and you won’t be spending hella years waiting for it to dry. One pass leaves a full, solid line of dark color.
It’s also super shiny — almost as shiny as the MAC Superslicks — and lasts 8-12 hours, during which time it does not move, even on unprimed, naked lids.
Yeah, that’s sturdy.
Only thing, it’s not waterproof, so don’t go jumping on the treadmill when you wear it. If you perspire half as much as I do, you’ll end up with two panda eyes.
I’m just sayin’.
Also, with some liquid liners, I have to let them dry for a while with my eyes closed so they don’t transfer up into the crease, but not with Noir. It dries that fast.
OK, now, I know we’re not talking about reinventing the wheel here. It’s just a black liner — a pretty basic staple — but I sure love this one’s felt tip.
For me, felt tips usually fall into one of two categories.
Not a lot of bend…
Chanel Ecriture’s tip is a hybrid of the two. It’s a little stiff, but still has some flex.
You still get that sort of wiggly glide you get from thin, uber-flexible liners, but at the same time the tip is stiff enough to really get between the roots of your lashes, especially those teeny, tiny hairs (I usually have to switch to a pencil liner to reach, but I can reach them with this liner).
Weirdly, the first time I touched this tip, I was like, “Yeah, no dice. There’s no frickin’ way.” Because it felt a little stiff, and I usually have a hard time with that, but this one I can actually use.
Mind you, there is a learning curve (well there was for me). I like to look down into a mirror, and holding the tip parallel to my lash line (along the edge, not the tippy-tip), press once in the inner corner, then again in the center, and then again in the outer corner to complete the line across.
One, two, three — Tabs, stop meowing! Tabs is meowing in the background right now. He’s driving me a little crazy. I think it’s because I’m talking about black liner and he’s like, “Haha! I have built-in liner, and mine is always perfect!”
I’d like to say that I carry a cheat sheet with me everywhere I go with a laminated matrix of makeup cross-referenced and sorted, with ratings for finish, formula, wear time, pigment and perceived value…
Wait — no I don’t. I’m not that cray! 🙂 Most of the time I just go with my gut.
Assuming that I don’t barf a little or curse when I see the price, if I see a product and swatch it and get that fluttery feeling in my tum, nine times out of 10 I’ll make my way to the cashier (after first checking the store’s return policy).
I think I’m easy prey for savvy sales associates and makeup artists. When they see me, they’re probably thinking, “Oh, boy. Here’s another one. It’s like shooting fish in a barrel today!”
“Let me just try this on you,” they’ll say, and my gut will respond, “OK! Yeah! It looks gorgeous! Gotta have it!” 😀
So, yeah, when it comes to new makeup purchases, my gut usually drives the decision-making process.
Not exactly the scientific method, but it works for me.
How about you? How deliberate and thoughtful are you about new makeup purchases?
Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,
Karen
Upgrade! 🙂
Oh, as if anyone could actually improve upon the perfection that is the Dolce & Gabbana Classic Cream Lipsticks. They were/are some of my favorite high-end lipsticks around, in large part due to their categorically creamy and righteously rich formula (sorry, adverb overload).
They’re everything I could ever want in an expensive lipstick…except a lower price, ba-dum-tss!
But seriously, they’re packed with pigment, last a really long time, and they’re smoother than a tabby’s tum. Plus, there’s that gorgeous golden tube… I always feel fancy when I take one out of my purse.
But, apparently, Team Dolce & Gabbana did think there was room for improvement, because they recently reformulated and revamped the entire Classic Cream Lipstick line. They also added 20 brand new shades, bringing the new total to 42 (!), divided into six categories — reds, oranges, purples, corals, pinks and nudes.
The five here are just a smattering from the line, but I’m wondering — would you like to see more? I wore Petal the other day, but if you’d like to see more of the others, holla at yo’ girl.
They’re $33 each and available now at Dolce & Gabbana counters at Saks Fifth Avenue stores, Macy’s, Nordies, Sephora and online at saksfifthavenue.com and sephora.com.
* Exclusive to Saks Fifth Avenue and saksfifthavenue.com.
Ooh, gurl, have you heard the chismis?
(Chismis is Tagalog for “gossip.”)
Apparently, and you didn’t hear this from me, but Too Faced Hangover Primer is making MAC Prep + Prime Natural Radiance totally jealous with a capital J-E-L.
See, MAC Prep + Prime Natural Radiance and I — we roll deep. I’ve been using it almost daily for years.
The stuff works great, and I also love how it feels like a lotion going on. Plus, it doesn’t give me breakouts, for which it gets extra credit from me because almost everything gives my combo skin fits.
I can’t stand it when face primers feel heavy, you know, like they’re sitting in lounge chairs on my face.
Ugh! It gives me the willies just thinking about it…
Thankfully, MAC Prep + Prime doesn’t do that. It feels light and wonderful to me, and my skin looks like real skin when I wear it!
Well, like real skin…only more radiant and smoother. 🙂
Like I said, Prep + Prime and I have been buds for years, but lately I’ve been hanging out with this new Too Faced primer called Hangover, and after only two weeks, we’re already like this (you can’t see me, but I’m crossing my fingers here).
I’ve actually been reaching for Hangover’s silicone-free formula more than my bottle of Prep + Prime.
JEALOUSY!
When I walked out my front door the other day I saw these beautiful flowers in my neighbor’s yard.
I was like, “Oh, look!” I’m being greeted by flowers.
That’s the thing about other people’s flowers… We’re allowed to enjoy them too. 🙂
Do you have any neighbors who have a lot of flowers?
