A beauty blog blooming with fresh makeup reviews, swatches and beauty tips from your friendly neighborhood beauty addict
For me, eyes that softly shimmer with an eyeshadow in a mysterious, unexpected neutral like khaki or olive, with softly smudged bronze or rose gold liner, a pair of (comfortable) false lashes, and a glossy pink lip.
Oh, yeah… That’s the ticket. 🙂
How about you? It’s spring and love is in the air… What’s your favorite flirty makeup look?
Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,
Karen
To wear whilst yacht/mansion shopping, and/or counting your gold bars, two new lipsticks from Tom Ford.
These new Lip Shimmers might be best suited for the die-hard Tom Ford Beauty fans among us, and other lovers of super sheer, glimmering $49 lipsticks.
Both sultry shades are new for summer 2014 and limited edition (including the gorgeous packaging).
Warm, glimmering Solar Gold and cool-toned frosty white Moonlight are packed with Vitamins C and E, as well as shea butter, to nourish and moisturize yo’ dry pout.
In terms of texture, fragrance and wear time, I do detect the faintest hint of vanilla when I wear these lightweight, slick, non-sticky lipsticks, but the formula only lasts about an hour on my lips.
Ooh! — sheer pink NARS Istria Lip Gloss ($26) has secret sparkle. It’s one of the seven brand new colors that were added to the recently reformulated NARS Lip Gloss line.
So soft…
So delicate…
This one’s a prime purse gloss, perfect for an easy, everyday lip look. 🙂
I like to wear it with bold eye looks because it doesn’t compete with whatever might be happening on my lids and lash lines.
Istria and her 29 glossy cohorts are available now in the new NARS Lip Gloss gang for $26 each.
The bright matte blue eyeshadow chilling in the corner of Tom Ford’s new summer eye and cheek compact is, well, unabashedly blue and comes, ironically, out of the blue, or so it seems to me.
Then again, maybe that was the point. The compact is called Unabashed, after all, and with a name like that, I guess it makes sense to have at least one outrageous color, methinks.
The bold electric blue looks like it wandered over from the Urban Decay counter and decided to kick it with TF for the summer, and it’s not one of those bait-and-switch blue eyeshadows, either — you know, the kind that scream from their pans, “Haaaay, look at me, playa!” only to apply all shy and sheer.
No way, this blue’s bright and bangin’ — perfect for bold blue eye looks, if you feel so inclined.
When I see blues like this one, my gut usually tells me to do a neutral lid and smudge the blue along my lower lash lines, or perhaps do a soft blue cat eye, but this morning my gut told me something else. It said, “Um, Karen, let the blue play with the other colors in the compact, OK?”
And I said, “Sure.” 🙂
The compact also includes a matte taupe eyeshadow, which looks a little like the taupe from She Wolf, only lighter; a glittery taupe; a shimmery golden peach blush; and a shimmery golden tan bronzer/highlighter.
I found out that if you layer the matte blue on top of the golden bronzer, it summons a dark and beautiful peacock feather teal.
COOL!
For the rest of the look, I swept the golden peach blush from the compact on my cheeks and applied the highlighter/bronzer on my upper cheekbones, down the bridge of my nose and on my Cupid’s bow.
I finished by applying a single layer of Tom Ford’s sumptuous Sable Smoke Lipstick (THE BEST high-end nude lippie, EVAH!) and topped it with a little NARS Striptease Lip Gloss.
You might be wondering, “So what the heck is this Monday Poll thing anyway?”
Well, it isn’t much of a poll. It’s more just a constantly evolving (devolving?), somewhat random list of questions I’ve been putting out to readers every Monday morning for the past seven years. I’ve always enjoyed reading your answers in the comments, and I hope you enjoy reading mine.
Just a handful of people, and I don’t have to pick up the bill.
Oh, yeah! — and I’m wearing a tiara. 🙂
I’m not 100% sure about the train. I think I hear one sometimes, but I don’t know where it is. It’s like the ghost train…
Your turn. 🙂 Just copy and paste the following questions into a comment with your answers. I look forward to reading ’em!
1. What’s your idea of a perfect birthday party for you?
2. Tell me about your first car…
3. What’s one thing you always have with you wherever you go?
4. Which of the following can you hear from your home: church bells, trains, busses, children playing, birds singing and/or wind chimes?
5. Have you ever been lost — like seriously lost — in a city, a parking lot or someplace outdoors?
I was feeling really tense this morning when I woke up. Monday mornings are usually…yeah, difficult for me, as they are for a lot of people.
I tried some of my usual Monday morning brain-focussing tricks like mind mapping and list writing, but they weren’t working. Then I went for a 15-minute walk.
Lo and behold, I felt about a million times better! It’s a cliche, but those walks really work. Sometimes the best way to get out of your head is to get out of your head.
Anywho, have a great day today. Talk to you soon. 🙂
Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,
Karen
Whenever I wear shimmery strawberry pink Ophelia Lip Gloss, I always think of Hamlet. I wonder if Francois is a Shakespeare fan…
He hath of late made many tenders of his affection for Shakespearean names.
Where is the beauteous Majesty of Ophelia!?
Ha. OK, that’s enough.
You can find Ophelia and her 29 siblings in new NARS Lip Gloss line now.
Ladies and gentle tabbies, next time your feline friend/employer goes hiking through tall grasses and ends up covered in pollen and smelly plant funk, may I suggest a waterless bath using John Paul Pet Waterless Foam Shampoo for Dogs & Cats ($12.99). It smells great and dries quicker than two swishes of a cat’s tail.
While on safari yesterday in my back yard, I wandered into uncharted territory. I cannot help it; I have an explorer’s heart, and I’m compelled to go where no other cat — as far as I know — has gone before. In this case, that included a tall patch of wildflowers and grasses.
Unfortunately, my curiosity left my normally immaculate coat in a state of disarray. I came out covered with pollen and a mysteriously stinky plant filth.
Back at the office, I charged my assistant with finding an immediate solution. I am a kitty supermodel, after all. There’s no way I’m going about my day with my fur in less than tip-top condition.
Meow! Time was of the essence because I had a nap scheduled for the early afternoon. My assistant rushed out to Petco and returned with John Paul Pet Waterless Foam Shampoo for Dogs & Cats ($12.99, part of a line that also includes a gentle puppy and kitten shampoo, paw wipes, and ear and eye wipes).
She squeezed a few pumps in her hand, and a smile spread across my feline face. Mmmm… It smelled faintly of powder and almonds.
It’s designed to penetrate, deep clean and deodorize coats for water-averse cats and dogs while gently soothing skin.
Ingredients: Water (aqua), cocamidopropyl betaine, sodium C14-16 olefin sulfonate, prunus amygdalus dulcis (sweet almond) oil, hydrolyzed whole oats (pending), chamomilla recutita (matricaria) extract, aloe barbadensis leaf juice, sodium hydroxymethlgycinate, cocamide DEA, citric acid, propylene glycol, fragrance (parfum).
She massaged the luxurious foam into my fur, avoiding my sensative ears and eyes, working all the way down to the tip of my tail.
I recorded the massage on my iPhone, and I think you can tell by my purrs that I enjoyed it.
After that, she brushed the product through my fur until it dried, which, much to my delight, only took a few minutes.
Ooh-la-la! My fur was incredibly soft. I could actually see the difference. It definitely looked smoother and smelled better. I felt like a million bucks and, because it dried so quickly, I didn’t have to reschedule my nap.
Tabby needs his beauty sleep!
According to the side of the bottle, the product was tested on humans first, and it’s cruelty-free. That gets two husky paws up from me.
Milky pale pink perfection! Turkish Delight is definitely one of my ride-or-die NARS Lip Glosses.
I think this shade looks amazeballs with a classic black smokey eye, by the way.
You can find Turkish Delight ($26) delighting NARS fans with the rest of the newly revamped NARS Lip Gloss crew right meow.
P.S. Boy, the driving here in the Bay Area has been totes cray-cray tonight! We just got back from dinner for my dad’s b-day in the East Bay, and after dinner we swung by the city to drop off my brother, who lives in an apartment downtown.
Cars were swerving, zipping and zooming all over the roads! It was total chaotic car mayhem.
There must be some astrological shenanigans going on…
Now I’m home and really looking forward to pajama time. Hope you’re having a nice night. 🙂
