Makeup Tips/How To

Easy Eye Makeup: Choose Similar Eyeshadow Colors for Easier Blending

August 5th, 2015 by Karen 12 Comments

paul joe cafe macchiato caramel drizzle k — Wearing Paul & Joe Cafe Macchiato 097 and Caramel Drizzle 099 on my lids

Like, no joke, I think I must be the slowest person on this earth when it comes to blending eyeshadow, because you know those really super blended eye makeup looks? — they take forever. Forever! — and by “forever” I mean between one and three hours from start to finish, especially if I do them intending to take pictures.

In other words, it takes freakin’ work, homegirl!

Sometimes I’m OK with that and all the blending and gradients, and I think it’s worth all the effort, but sometimes I’m not. Sometimes I just wanna throw a little makeup on my eyes and get on with my life already.

When that happens, especially when I also want to take pics and still want to look polished and not like I’m deliberately avoiding blending, I grab two or more similar eyeshadows in the same, or almost the same, color family, like two browns (one slightly darker than the other) or two close shades of almost the same intensity, like the warm brown I’m wearing in my crease in the top pic with a soft gold on my lids.

It’s kind of obvious, but sometimes I still forget that it’s just A LOT easier to seamlessly blend similar colors (like two similar browns) than it is to blend highly contrasting colors (like black and white) on completely opposite ends of the spectrum, so I can still create a buffed-out, blended eye look in a lot less time.
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5 Ways to Make Your Eyes Look Bigger

August 4th, 2015 by Karen 29 Comments

#makeupgoals — to make my eyes look SO big that even good-natured, wide-eyed anime characters start talking mad smack…with jealously, of course!

TURBO THE GLITTERY RAINBOW PEGASUS: “Did you see Karen’s eyes today? GURL, I don’t even know. I like big eyes, but hers are HUGE.”

CHICI THE COTTON CANDY KITTY: “I know, right!? I mean, where does she get off making her eyes look bigger than ours? We’re professional anime characters, for crying out loud! We’re supposed to freakin’ dominate that doe-eyed sh*t!”

Haha! Craziness…

It’s true, though.

Making my eyes look as large as possible is one of my top makeup priorities, because I feel like I look spunkier, younger (at least that’s the idea) and generally more alert and awake when my eyes appear bigger.

It’s all an illusion, of course, but illusions can be cool, and this one is easy to create. 🙂

Here are five things you can do on their own (or together) to make your eyes look bigger.

1. “Tightline” your upper water line

how to make your eyes look bigger — Chanel Stylo Yeux Waterproof Eyeliner in 88 Noir Intense

Darkening your upper water line by placing a dark eyeliner along the base of, and between, your lashes, also known as “tightlining,” makes the line look thicker, which appears to lift, brighten and enlarge your eyes.

The key is to really get down there with liner (waterproof works best for me) as close as possible to the base of your lashes. Just run it along your upper water lines, really getting in between the lashes at the roots, and repeat until you’re happy with the line.

2. Curl your lashes

If your lashes naturally stick out straight or point slightly downward, they might cast a slight shadow under your eyes, which can make them look a little smaller (my lashes do this!). If this happens to you, steal your cat’s favorite lash curler. 🙂

But seriously, curled, lifted lashes don’t cast the same annoying shadow under your eyes, and they draw attention up, up and away!

Curled lashes can also appear to sort of fold over on themselves, which can make your lash lines look thicker, which also enhances the whole “tightlining” effect.

3. Apply mascara to your top AND bottom lashes

By darkening, thickening and lengthening lashes, especially curled lashes, mascara can also make your eyes look bigger.

To really maximize the doe-eyed effect, look for a mascara that lengthens AND thickens, especially at the roots, and apply it to both your upper and lower lashes.
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Fri-Yay Makeup Fun: Strobing Made Easy

July 24th, 2015 by Karen 42 Comments

If you’ve been wondering about this whole “strobing” trend and whether it involves pulsating lights and high-octane house music, it doesn’t, so feel free to leave your glow sticks at home. 🙂

But what is does involve is highlighting, and LOTS of it. Basically, it’s good old-fashioned highlighting, only more intense and extreme, and it usually involves layering a number of products to accentuate specific areas and/or one or more of your features.

In strobing the skin looks dewy and glowing, but not in an icky or sweaty way, and the trick is to highlight specific areas while keeping the rest of your skin relatively matte or semi-matte.

Here’s how I like to do it…

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Fri-Yay Makeup Fun: Repurpose Your Daytime Makeup With a Quick, Colorful Pop

July 17th, 2015 by Karen 37 Comments

Sometimes — OK, all the time — when I’m doing my makeup and getting ready to go out, especially after a long week, I don’t like to start from scratch, so to make it a little easier on myself, I’ll repurpose whatever I’m wearing that day, and just freshen it up and add a slight twist, like this colorful green lower lash line.

It takes two things: 1) a colorful eyeliner and 2) a complementary eyeshadow. For this look here, I chose two shimmery green shades — MAC Eye Shadow in Steamy and MAC Eye Kohl in Minted.

I lined my lower lash line with the liner, then smudged out the edges with a pencil brush. Then, I patted the eyeshadow directly on top of the liner to intensify the color and shimmer.

After an additional coat of mascara and some gloss, it’s done and Fri-yay ready! 🙂

(Note: also approved for evenings at home spent chilling on the couch with Tabs.)

mac steamy minted — MAC Eye Shadow in Steamy and MAC Eye Kohl in Minted

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Intensify Your Highlights With This Super Simple Tip

July 10th, 2015 by Karen 11 Comments

Glisten up!

OK, are you glistening?

Good. Because if I could, I would open all of the highlighters in the world above my head and just pour ’em all over me, LOL! All I wanna do is glisten, and I wanna do it all day long.

To say that I’m a little highlighter cray-cray at the moment would be a bit of an understatement, and I’ve been playing with some different techniques, like this one that I recently learned from a makeup artist buddy of mine named Candace. (HI, CANDACE! If you have time, check out her YouTube channel.)

This trick is simple but totally intensifies the glistening effect in a way that doesn’t leave my skin looking frosty.
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Uneven Eyeliner? Here’s a Tip That Might Fix Your Woes

July 10th, 2015 by Karen 17 Comments

Eyeliner woes, part 3,451 — Eyeliner Woes: Vol. #3,451

If it seems like I talk about uneven eyeliner every five seconds, it’s because I do. I talk about uneven eyeliner EVERY FIVE SECONDS.

Hello. 🙂

What I wouldn’t GIVE to be one of those gals who can just paint a perfect line in a single swoosh!

Now, looking at the glass as if it’s half full, I have stumbled on a few tips and workarounds to help me deal with my chronically uneven eyeliner, and one of them is that it helps TREMENDOUSLY to start by lining my upper water lines (also known as “tightlining”), and then drawing my eyeliner on my lash lines after that.

L'Oreal Infallible Silkissime Eyeliner shades from the purple to the silver: Pure Purple, Cobalt Blue, True Teal, Gold and Silver — L’Oreal Infallible Silkissime Eyeliners from the purple to the silver: Pure Purple, Cobalt Blue, True Teal, Gold and Silver ($8.99 each)

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Try This Trick for Impeccable Eyeliner

July 8th, 2015 by Karen 30 Comments

laura mercier angeled eye liner brush — My two secret weapons!

In the alternate Marvel makeup comic book universe (because this totally exists), my superhero power is the ability to apply flawless eye liner while I’m walking backwards, hanging upside down or jumping up and down on a trampoline.

(Can you imagine?! I’d be totally doing some weird-@ss YouTube makeup videos, haha!)

But in this universe here, my superhero power is on the opposite end of the eyeliner spectrum. Here I have the ability to mess up my liner almost EVERY. SINGLE. TIME.

Seriously, why does the liner on my left eye always end up thicker than my right? And how do I manage to completely mess up perfectly decent liner at the last second? It’s an uncanny gift.

Because imperfectly executed eyeliner is something I experience often — like every day! — I’ve come to rely on a workaround when one line ends up thicker than the other. First, I dampen a thin pointed eyeliner brush with eye makeup remover. Then I run it along the edge of the liner to erase any errant bits, and if the errant liner still won’t lift off, I gently rub a cotton bud along the edge to remove whatever else needs to go.

This works for pencil, liquid and gel liner.
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Crank Up the Coverage of Your Favorite BB Cream or Tinted Moisturizer With This Time Saving Tip

July 7th, 2015 by Karen 38 Comments

BB creams.

What do you think about ’em? I’ve been on a kick lately (MAC Lightful C has been my bae for a week or so), but ya know…sometimes a girl needs/wants a little more coverage, and sometimes (well, all the time) that same girl is also in a hurry. 🙂

And that’s how I figured out this makeup tip.

Basically, instead of applying a BB cream (or tinted moisturizer) first, and then applying a concealer on top of it, you can save a little time by blending a bit of your favorite concealer into your BB cream to create a magical brew.

Mixing the two together increases the opacity of the BB cream, which gives you more coverage.

I’ve been mixing MAC Lightful C in Medium Plus with a smidgen of MAC Select Cover-Up Concealer in NC42. Then I buff MAC Mineralize Skin Finish Natural on top, and then spray a little MAC Fix+ all over my face.

The result is medium coverage with a natural-looking semi-matte finish. It’s what I’ve been wearing in my pics lately. 🙂

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