Angry Kimchi: Makeup & Beauty Blog

FOTD: Under Grey

2011-08-18T16:27:00.000-07:00

I realize I've been gone for a good bit of time there...family things are sort of in order. We're dealing with it. Unfortunately for my parents, I'll be moved out by the end of this month into my brand spankin' new house, so they're going to have give it their best alone. Never thought I'd be a parent to my parents at 26..Speaking of ages. Monday was my dad's 65th birthday! He's officially on Medicare and it's downhill from here on in LOL

So to say the least it's been stressful around my parents' house. It's only going to get more so with inspections, walkthroughs and signings coming up. I thought this look was kind of appropriate because I've been a little blue and under a grey cloud it seems. So for your scrutiny I share Under Grey FOTD.

Items Used:

Eyes:

NYX Eyeshadow base in Skin Tone

NYX Jumbo Eyeshadow pencil in Milk (base)

MAC Blogger's Choice e/s Jealousy Wakes (inner 1/3 of lid)

MAC e/s in Climate Blue (Outer 2/3 of lid)

MAC Blogger's Choice e/s in Hocus Pocus (above crease & outer V)

MAC Pigment in Naked (highlight/blender)

Wet n Wild Mega Liner in 861 (Black)

Urban Decay 24/7 liner in Zero (waterline)
NYX False lashes #120

Face:

MAC Face & Body foundation in C5

MAC Studio Fix Foundation in NC43

Rock & Republic Blush in Immoral

Cargo Plant Love Bronzer

Lips:

MAC l/s in A Rose Romance

Revlon l/g in Coral Reef

Next time I'd bring the Jealousy Wakes further out on my lid, it just got lost when blended with the Climate Blue and Hocus Pocus, but I still liked the look overall.

Wish my hair would grow faster, but I like the way it looks here. I should trim more off the ends, but I want it to grow longer...decisions.

Taken with my phone, I just like the way it looked LOL Kinda like an evil villain?

Oh, Jealousy Wakes & Hocus Pocus are indeed back in stock on MAC's site so grab them if you'd like!!

A Look At: Blogger's Choice Shadows..

2011-07-14T14:30:00.000-07:00

I, like many of you, follow Temptalia to get the scoop on new collections coming out. I'm amazed at her work ethic on the site. I know I couldn't and wouldn't keep up such a blog, it's just too much...or rather I'm too lazy. I was very excited to see that she got the chance to work with MAC and create her own color along with a few other bloggers. I knew she would make something eye-catching and just had to pick it up when I saw the final product. Luckily, I'm addicted to my phone so I jumped as soon as the Twitter announcement went out that it was on the MAC site. Pays to be on your phone 24/7 LOL

I picked up Christine's (Temptalia) shadow Jealousy Wakes and Hocus Pocus by Lianne (The Makeup Girl)

Although they are different finishes they both appear similar in sparkliness LOL Sure not the professional way to describe it but we all understand, right?

Hocus Pocus is a nice smokey gray Satin finish. Doesn't it remind you of the perfect gray shirt? Maybe it's just me.

Jealousy Wakes is a jewel-tone green Veluxe Pearl Finish. It just calls to you, doesn't it.

Looks were a bit deceiving in the pan, I was scared that it was going to be too shimmery. Both, when applied are nicely pigmented and definitley not overboard on the shimmer! Hocus Pocus did apply a bit darker than I'd hoped it was going to but it's still a fine color. Jealousy Wakes reminds me of a green NARS shadow when applied. I'll have to take the time to compare them in the future.

I actually hesitated to make this post since these are both sold out on the MAC site. What fun is it to tell you about something you can't get ahold of? If you follow Temptalia's twitter she mentioned that MAC is going to try and do another production of these colors so it may be in your future yet!

On a personal note, I know I've been gone for a couple of weeks but I may be MIA again for a few more. We're dealing with some very personal family issues right now involving my mom and her well-being is more important than any amount of makeup in the world. If I feel up to it, I will definitely try to update, but between this and my potential move sometime next month (which means I'll be packing my makeup & polish here soon) I don't want you all to expect too much. Thanks for understanding and please push any good vibes our way, this is a situation I never would have imagined I'd be faced with...See you all soon..who knows, I might be able to post regularly to keep my mind off things.

NOTICE: Items featured in this post were bought by myself with my own money. In no way have the words and opinions featured been sponsored. These are my personal reactions to the products seen.

HAUL: One Trip to Ulta..

2011-06-23T07:05:00.000-07:00

I went into Ulta for one thing I walked out with 7 but not the thing I really went in for...Yep, that's me. Sometimes you go months of self control then, OOPS! It's alright, I think I have my fix now. At least I kept it to a minimum.

This was a last minute decision while I was waiting at the register. I saw this little sample set for $15 and decided to give it a try. I'm already a fan of Too Faced Shadow Insurance. But I've always wanted to try a lip primer and see if the face primer was any good. I used to use the MAC face primer when it first came out but I long since stopped using it. I'll have a little more on these later.

I normally use TFSI that I mentioned above but I really wanted to try out the NYX eyeshadow base. Why? It's a whole lot cheaper. TFSI is $18 for a 0.32 oz tube, this jar of NYX base (white or tinted) is 0.25 oz. for $6.99...So far I'm finding it's worth my 7 bucks. It's not as creamy as TFSI or UD Primer Potion. But it evens out my lid color very well. (I have pretty dark lids). My eye makeup doesn't smudge during the day and it has done all the good things that the more expensive brands have done for me. I'd definitely recommend this if you are on a budget.

I picked up this Revlon Super Lustrous Matte Lipstick in Smoked Peach for $6.99. I really like this color, it's a matte but I think it would look great with a peachy pink gloss on top as well. It applied smoothly and didn't feel drying like some mattes tend to. Not bad for a matte lipstick at all.

I, of course, had to pick up some nail lacquers...This addiction thing I have with polish is a problem xD

I finally dove in and picked up a couple of Butter London polishes. Both of these colors caught my eye immediately on the display stand.

I guess you pay $14 a piece for this packaging huh?...You have to lift the outter lid to get to the actual applicator...I thought it would have been pretty cool to have that whole top as an applicator, but whatever. Butter London polishes are 3-Free: no formaldehyde, toluene, or DBP.

Crowned crow...

The applicator was your normal round brush. It applied the polish evenly and held a good amount of lacquer.

This color is called Blagger. It's a little more teal in real life, but looks straight blue in pictures. Definitely a keeper but I find that I do have similar teals for cheaper.

This gem is called Jaffa, a nice and bright coral pink. It's much peachier in person and I think perfect summer color for that splash of color! I've been wearing it on my toes since I bought it.

I also picked up two Ulta Professional Nail Lacquers polished since it was 2 for $10 (normally $7.50/ea). Ulta has always impressed me with their in-store brand products like their eyeshadows, foundations and lipsticks (although their lipsticks used to have that old person smell...do they still have that smell? I haven't bought a lippie in a while).

The top screws off and the applicator is round, it's a bit shorter than a China Glaze or Orly brush so it feels thicker, but I don't think it is. It applied polish quite easy and controlled. The squared top didn't feel too uncomfortable in my hand but it might for some.

Cocktails Anyone? Is a nice deep plum color. To get to full opaque color I had to use three coats. This will probably get worn quite a bit this fall.

This one was my favorite, it's called Total Eclipse. It's the perfect gunmetal grey cream! Applied perfectly in two coats.

Just for fun I layered my Milani Jewel FX glitter polish on top of Total Eclipse. The gold is #531 Gold, the multi-color one is #530 Gems. I don't know if you've tried the Milani Jewel FX glitters but they are really great and the glitter actually applies to the nail. It's not like those polishes where you have to fight the clear jelly to get one piece of glitter on your nail. It's effortless with this stuff! These were two coats, so a third coat would have covered it all.

I think it was a successful trip to Ulta..even if I didn't end up with what I went for.. -___-

NOTICE: All products seen in this post were purchased by me with my own money. I have not been paid to purchase, review or display any of the products seen. All opinions are solely my own and no one else's, based on my own experiences with the products.

HAUL: A Little Here & There...

2011-06-15T06:52:00.000-07:00

This is not as much hauling as, I went to the store several times and bought random items. Saving for a house really cuts your haulage down, but one thing I'm really great at doing is being stingy when it is required! I pick up an item here and there and move out of the isle QUICKLY! So, it's been a while, let's get into it!

Liquid liner is one of those items I don't splurge on. I don't care how expensive it is, it's going to end up the same way on my lids. Wet N Wild Mega Liners are great, super cheap, and apply well. I used to use Rimmel liquid liner, but they don't seem to make it anymore...This is better just because of the cheap price alone.

A look at the brush, I get nice sharp lines with this brush, it stays together well and doesn't fray out after using several times. Holds a good amount of liquid so you're not having to redip the brush all the time.

I finally picked up one of these shadow trios. I always look at them when I go to CVS to pick up my medicine but I usually just leave them be.

I didn't know which one to get, that was probably the harder choice. The little applicator brush was actually pretty soft, but I'll stick with my regular brushes.

This one has really good pigmentation and is definitely worth the small price. These all had a slight shimmer to them, using a good base you could really make the colors pop better.

Next I picked up this Revlon Super Lustrous lipgloss in Coral Reef. I probably put about 10 things in corals in my basket: nail polish, lip gloss, lip stick or blush. I only walked out with two, I was a good girl.

It's got a nice, soft sponge tip applicator.

The picture comes off rather pink, but it was a nice shade of coral, more like the image in the bottle.

I tried to compare it to some glosses I already had.

(Click Picture to Enlarge) The Revlon Gloss is 3rd from the left and you can see that they looked somewhat similar in the bottles but different when applied.

Another coral color with Revlon Super Lustrous creme in Kiss Me Coral.

It was a little too red for me as a coral color. But it's definitely a wearable one.

Again I tried to give a quick comparison..I could have sworn I had almost an exact match to this.

Next to the pinker colors it really looks orange in the picture. It had a good, smooth texture and no unpleasant smells for either the lipstick or gloss.

And of course I see a teal, you really thought I could turn it down?! I picked up Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure in Fairy Teal. I love teal...it's really an obsession. There will be a strong teal presence in my house.

It covered great in two coats and applied smoothly. The brush is similar to the Rimmel polishes. A flat square brush compared to the normal round brushes you get. It was however better than the Rimmel brush it's not quite as wide so it made application easy. I'll be getting more of these Sally Hansen polishes.

I saw many things I need to add to my list now while I was at the store today. I'm starting to buy a few items for the house here and there though so I'll keep slapping my hand away from the pretty stuff.

NOTICE: All items seen in this post were purchased by me with my own money. I have not been paid to discuss any of the products seen. All views are expressly my own based on my experiences with the products.

EOTD: Cirque the Circus...

2011-06-08T23:39:00.000-07:00

Did I tell you guys I'm going to see Cirque du Soleil's Dralion in Atlanta in August? Yes indeed. If you've never seen a Cirque show live, you need to really put it on your bucket list. My first Cirque show was Saltimbanco a couple of years ago. It was amazing, I couldn't even imagine training every day of your life to do the things they do in those shows! Ah~mazing!

The shows are always full of color and life. I wanted to do two things with this eye, make it colorful and see how this white stripe look turned out with my eye.

EOTD: Cirque the Circus..

Products Used:
Too Faced Shadow Insurance
Princessa Jumbo Eye Pencil in Opalescent Pink (base)
Sugarpill Flamepoint e/s (inner 2/3 of lid)
Sugarpill Poison Plum e/s (Outer 1/3 of lid into crease)
MAC Carbon e/s (crease
Sugarpill Afterparty e/s (lower lash line)
Sugarpill Midori e/s (below lash line)
Sugarpill Tako e/s (to make white line, highlight & blend out harsh lines)
Urban Decay 24/7 Liner in Zero (water line)
Wet N Wild Mega Liner in black (top Lid
Pur Minerals Brow Perfection brow powder
CoverGirl LashBlast Fusion mascara

NOTICE: I have not been paid to use/promote/feature any of the products used in this post. Look was inspired by others but I did not directly copy any specific look.

Foundation Updating...

2011-06-02T14:29:00.000-07:00

I really do know those people who don't update their foundations from season to season, year to year. There's no way you're the same color in the summer as you are in the winter every single year, unless you're actually albino. I can attest to that and I don't even spend time outside. So ladies, let's all do yourselves a favor and get color matched at one point or the other with your favorite brand.

I personally had to get matched this year since I A) got tanned last year in Destin, I fade soooo slow, B) got sunburned again on my forhead this past April watching a pre-season college football game and C) because of A & B I was definitely no longer an NC35!

I was matched up to a NC42 now in MAC Studio Sculpt which I picked up. I had to go online and pick up a MAC Face & Body foundation in C5. In the picture below you can definitely see a difference just from the products in the bottle (don't worry about that weird dark spot in the F&B)

I do have yellow undertones, but it's always so hard to match yourself when products look so orange, right?

Just to start off. Here's a bare-faced picture of myself (Why does it look kinda creepy to me -__-). Stupid hormones have me breaking out at the moment, but I guess the better to show you all the coverage! All in the name of beauty LOL

All pics are taken with a flash, if you'd like to see it in the natural daylight please ask, I can do so. I applied one foundation to each side of my face so this is a direct side by side comparison, not two pictures merged together.

What do we notice first? The Studio Sculpt was definitely more orange than the F&B. The F&B is water-based so it definitely felt lighter on. The Studio Sculpt was also pretty damn orange on me. I have yellow undertones, but I'm not an Oompa Loompa! These are of course with flash which tends to make it look quite different than what you see in real life.

(Click on pictures for larger view)
Here you can see my scarred face with nothing on and with the F&B foundation. I used a stippling brush to apply this particular foundation. I'd say it covered quite well actually for just one coat (talking like it's nail polish). It didn't cover up all my scars but the lighter ones and the redness of that zit were cut quite significantly. It evened out even my sunburned forhead which is many shades darker than the rest of my face. It's water-based and supposedly water-resistant (haven't tested that aspect yet) so ideally this is great for the hot, humid, sticky Southern summers I have to put up with.

Studio Sculpt is thicker and creamier than the F&B and so therefore provided much more coverage in one coat when applied with a flat top kabuki brush. It's gel-based so it's really helps in getting a nice even coverage and is labeled as medium to high coverage. I totally agree. This one is also said to be water-resistant.

Here you can see my scars and uneven skintone has been virtually covered by the foundation. I will say in real life, it matches quite perfectly, but depending on the camera and settings I had on it could look white-cast (with my point & shoot) or too orange (with my dSLR). So in my opinion this one is great for every day covering up if you have some major scaring issue but if you're taking a lot of pictures with your average point-and-shoot for say, a night on the town with your girls. Just be mindful your face may seem a little light. Since it's thicker I'll probably use this more when the cooler/cold weather comes around. You could of course use a mixing medium like MAC Fix+ to thin the foundation out a bit. This would also help the product stretch a bit further for your wallet.

So what happens if we throw some powder over these foundations? Well let's find out. I picked up the MAC Studio Fix Powder Plus Foundation since I was running low on my current powder and needed a new one anyway.

My foundation is an NC42 but I picked up the NC43 because I have the feeling I'll be getting a tad bit darker before summer is over. I'll try to avoid that as much as possible though.

Comes with a sponge, I don't generally use sponges since I get rather oily in the T-zone during the day and who wants nasty looking powder? I use a big fluffy brush to apply and have a travel kabuki I carry.

Actually not much darker than what I currently use. I know it says it's a foundation but you don't HAVE to use it alone. But I like to lightly dust it on to set my liquid foundations.

So here we are. Same foundations covered with Studio Fix Powder. You can see that the orangeness of the Studio Sculpt still comes through. But it did help with that white-casting problem a bit with my other camera. You can tell there's less heaviness on the F&B side of my face. Definitely something to think about.

I just wanted to share. Do you all have a summer and a winter foundation that you like or do you use the same type of foundation all year. Actually, during the week any season I don't even bother with foundation. I'm at work, why should I care, I sit in a stuffy cube for 9 hours a day. I'll usually use a lighter foundation for going out at night or something like that.

MAC Face & Body Foundation is $32.50 for 4oz./20ml bottle
MAC Studio Sculpt is $29.50 for 1.3 oz/40ml tube
MAC Studio Fix Powder & Foundation is $26.50

NOTICE: I have not now or ever been paid to promote/use/give good reviews for any of the items featured. All items were purchased by me with my own money. Experiences with the above products will vary. I'm simply stating my own, personal opinions. Thanks.

No Power...

2011-05-05T12:09:00.000-07:00

I only just now realized the post I had scheduled to post a few weeks ago did not post...

That being said, I'll post that one later. I'm sitting here thinking about all that has happened in the last 7 days. As many of you should know by now, Alabama was hit by a savagely brutal line of storms that dropped tornados left and right that was part of a large system that passed through the middle of the country and the South. Tornados really let loose on the area around where I live in North Alabama. Luckily for me my area was not directly hit by any that I know of, but there's plenty of damage to prove the power of the storms. Not too surprising for me, the city where I'm building my house was actually hit pretty hard up here. I know it's a tornado prone area so I wasn't too surprised but I could see my dad's concern when I said they get tornados up there quite regularly.

Tuscaloosa, was hit really bad, Cullman (north of Birmingham) was hit bad, Harvest was hit...so many smaller towns in between were demolished, it's very sad. Wednesday was pretty crazy around here. When I went into work that morning it was actually sunny and beautiful out. At about 11:30 our alarms went off to find your tornado safe area in the building. We stayed in our area for about 20 minutes but then they gave us the all clear. My boss allowed us to work from home for the rest of the afternoon so I logged off and went home. I finished working at about 4 and decided to sleep...

I've lived in Alabama for 96% of my life, I was born here, raised. We lived through the F4 '89 Airport Road Tornado, I remember the '95 Anderson Hills tornado (an area that was damaged last week again). I've seen tornados drop out of the sky less than 3 miles from my house. Yes, I'll honestly say, I'm that person who doesn't really pay attention to warnings unless I'm looking at the radar and I'm seeing ugliness around my area. I'm not scared of storms, if the tornados coming you can't stop it, but I'll go to our safe area in the house if I feel threatened enough.

I say that to let you know, I was never in any direct threat last week. I slept for 2 hours, when I woke up at 6 it was because of the abnormally quiet room. The power had gone out apparently an hour earlier. ALL of it. We waited and waited then I got word through friends on FB (thank goodness for phone technology today) that the power could be out for 72 hours, at the minimal. At least 5 power transmission towers were demolished and had to be rebuilt almost from scratch! They were estimating 5-7 days (or more) of no power. It was nice out that first evening but the weather in the South was going to get hotter and hotter

This leads me to this afternoon. The storms finally passed late that evening, the lightning and rain was crazy. The next day my brother left a comment on my Facebook opening his home to us if we wanted to come down to Montgomery. After pursuading my parents to pack up and ship out we drove down Thursday afternoon. My parents came back Monday morning to no power, the power was finally restored to our area on Tuesday evening. I stayed until Wednesday. All the food we had to leave behind was spoiled of course but we managed to take a lot down to my brother's.. So now I'm home! I'm really wanting to go help and clean up but I don't know if I can. I don't have the best back in the world to be bending and lifting objects.

Just a few pictures of some of the damage, there's plenty out there you can look up these are not mine..I saw a video of the Tuscaloosa area you can so clearly see the path the tornado down there went, it's heartbreaking. Driving down and home you could see downed trees along the highway and a lightpole that look like it lost in a game of twister (no pun intended). I'm glad my family is safe and sound but I feel so sorry for those who lost homes and loved ones.

EOTD: Green Menace...

2011-03-25T07:12:00.000-07:00

So I missed a St. Patrick's day by a long shot, but I had this look planned about a month ago. I did it once but it didn't look so hot. So I redid it for today. I hope you like it. You could have so many variations on the color for this one, but I went with green because it's a color I rarely wear.

EOTD: Green Menace
(Excuse the one eyebrow hair that decided to march to it's own drummer..)

Eye Products Used:

TFSI

MAC Alice & Olivia Pigment - Partylicious (inner 2/3 of eye)
MAC E/S - Cool Heat (outer 1/3 of eye)
NARS E/S Duo - Pandora; the Black over Cool Heat & the white to blend out the line

NARS E/S Duo - Misfit; Nude tone used to highlight & blend out anything harsh.

Rimmel Glam Eyes Liquid Liner (top lid)

Urban Decay 24/7 liner in Zero on bottom lash/water line

NYX Fabulous Lashes - #128

Cover Girl LashBlast Fusion Mascara

Pur Minerals Brow Perfection powder

I want to take a quick moment to say that it's important you understand your own eye shape. I have a very almond shaped eye which is why I always think my eye makeup looks weird with my eyes closed. But when the eye opens it looks fine. Some people have rounder eyes, monolids, double lids, high brows, low brows. These all factor in to how you should place your eye makeup. Like for me, I have to run the shadow higher up on my lid than I think is normal because I pretty much have mono lids (one slightly double the other mono LOL) So just play with it until you figure it out like myself! It's just makeup, so have fun because it can all be wiped away when you want it to be!

I paired it with this lip. Made a nice soft petal of color, I really like it.
Lip Products used:
MAC Dazzleglass - Funtabulous
Revlon ColorBurst Lipgloss - Fire

I ran Funtabulous on the outer edge of my lips then used fire in the middle. I took a lipstick brush and blended the two colors together.

And here was the overall look...I just could not get a good full face picture, so will a 3/4 face do? :)

Face Products Used:
Blush: MAC Hello Kitty Collection -Tippy

Foundation: Revlon Photo Ready Fdtn - mixed #008 & #010

Powder: Pur Minerals 4-in-1 foundation in Medium Dark

I have got to go get color matched at MAC soon! I can't find a single foundation that matches me. I'm not NC35 anymore since the beach last year and I'm not dark enough for NC40, somewhere in between. As always you don't have to use the same products if you are going to try this look, just have fun!

NOTICE: I have not been paid to endorse any of the products seen in this post. All items were purchased by me with my money. Ideas for this look came from my own head, any similarities to other's looks are purely coincidental.

NOTD & Hair Talk...

2011-03-18T18:06:00.000-07:00

HAPPY ST. PATRICK'S DAY!

So, my guess would be that my lovely small group of readers noticed I haven't posted in a month...Sorry to just drop off the face of the blogging world but if you followed me on Twitter then you know I was still kicking. I honestly was a bit taken aback by some things that were going on in the beauty blogging world. Though none of it affected me in any particular way. As someone who follows several other types of blogs (quilting, art, photography, etc.) it disturbs me that beauty blogging can come to such cattiness to try and tear each other down but I see lots more love in other communities of bloggers (I'm sure there's an ugly side to everything but if it is, it's a hell of a lot less noticeable). In any event, I thought about things, we'll keep pushing forward with things our way. I could go on forever, but I may address that with a separate page at the top...Stay tuned...

So yesterday was St. Patrick's Day, one of those days people only celebrate to drink! LOL I'm not a big drinker at all but I do like to put on my green and avoid the pinches. I thought I'd share with you all my nails for the day!

Polishes used:
Seche Vite Base Coat
China Glaze Four-Leaf Clover
Milani Nail Art Polish in Yellow Design
Konad Special Polish in White Pearl
Konad plate #M11 (the flower...obviously LOL)
SecheVite Fast Dry Top Coat
Nail jewels from eBay

Just a little something fun, can't be boring everyday, right?!

Tsubaki is Out...for me anyway
Okay, let's all ignore the fact I need a dye job really bad in the pics...I last dyed my hair...oh several months ago. I can't even remember. I wanted to make a little comment of what's happened to my hair the last couple of weeks. I stopped using Tsubaki after two years now. I think it was one of many things that caused the horrible upper body rash I had (think chicken pox without the big scabby bumps but just as itchy). Yes, it's totally possible to suddenly become allergic to something you've eaten/used for a long time. I recently became that way with eggs. I'm a ball of allergies waiting to burst anyway, just throw me in a bubble and I may survive.

I had noticed since I stopped wearing hair grease in January that my scalp became insanely itchy between washings, I thought it was just a reaction to not putting grease in. It was sometimes unbearable and I had tiny little bumps all over my head. I stopped wearing the grease to decrease the transfer of oil from my head to my pillow then to my face at night which was causing bad break outs (has helped tremendously!) Then I had the rash, which was mild at first then I washed my hair that night with Tsubaki. The next morning I woke up to itchy tiny red bumps covering my chest, shoulders, back and stomach. It had been leading up to this for about a week. Cortisone became my best friend and I decided I was going to switch back to Organix shampoos and conditioners which were great the last time I used them.

I picked up the TeaTree Mint Shampoo (my favorite smell) and a conditioner I had never tried Moroccan Argan Oil. Smelled good so we'll give it a go. I washed my hair that night and two things happened. My scalp instantly stopped itching as much but I was worried what my hair was going to do in the morning. Tsubaki left my hair soft and smelling good instantly.With the Argan Oil it didn't have that same feeling actually felt dry. I was a bit worried..

Then I straightened my curls the next morning... Wow! My hair has not been so shiny, soft and manageable for a long time. As with the last time I used Organix, I noticed less breakage immediately when flat-ironing my hair. Below were a couple of pics I snapped with my hair laid across the back of my chair at work. No flash just under flourescent lighting and you can see how shiny it is! I wish you could feel it because it has never been so soft in my entire life. I keep touching it and almost petting it! LOL

Here you can see the texture is pretty smooth. I know, it's flat-ironed, but it never looked this smooth with Tsubaki in my hair.

Tsubaki has done me good for the last two years but I noticed way too much breakage and itching. Going back to Organix and in particular picking up the Moroccan Argan Oil conditioner was the best choice for my hair. I've been needing something that's super moisturizing since I stopped the hair grease. I recently picked up the Argan Oil Renewing Treatment (like a hair mask) as well.

So just a few words. Organix contain no sulfates or parabens which as someone who used the products before (before switching to Tsubaki) and again now I can say it does make a difference. It has always left my hair clean and scalp refreshed. The Moroccan Argan Oil is great for someone like me who requires a lot of extra moisture, very dry hair with lots of breakage and has been colored for years. I'm debating on how the Argan Oil would result on someone with oily hair to begin with. Anyone with oily hair ever tried this? I think it could work wonders since overproduction of oil is a sign you're stripping your hair of something, correct?

The conditioner is not going to feel like your normal conditioner. You may be tempted to leave some in when you rinse or condition it over and over until you feel it get slick and soft in the shower (it won't btw). I'd advise you against that. Rinse completely and let dry, you'll be pleasantly surprised when you start styling. The Argan Oil is supposed to help with UV rays and heat styling but please continue to use a flat-iron spray as I do to get that extra protection from breakage.

It smells great and has a great consistancy. I'm sorry I forgot the prices but the shampoo and conditioners will run you about 6-8 dollars a piece and the Moroccan Argan Oil Renewing Treatment was about $13 if I remember correctly (wasn't sure, there wasn't a sticker...) I can only say I'm enjoying my results with the products and hope you do too if you give this one a go. Now, let's hope they don't change the formulas or stop selling it!

NOTICE: I have not now or ever been paid to review/use the items seen in this post, all items have been purchased with my own money. All opinions expressed are solely mine and based on my experience with the products seen.

HAUL: Set for Spring! Nailed!

2011-02-16T10:08:00.000-08:00

So prepping for spring for many people invovles new wardrobes, cleaning out the house, and flinging open windows. As long as temperatures stay in the 60s I'm a happy camper, 70 and above is like death to me. I'm a hot-bodied person. I stay hot. If you asked me if I'd rather freeze to death or die smothered in unbearable heat, I'd freeze (at least you'd eventually go unconsious). The bright side to spring and warm weather...I can bust my toes out! I'm all about wearing flip flops and sandals. I hate socks and tennis shoes. So the weather around here is warming up, though I'm sure we'll get slapped in the face by at least one more winter storm, I finally started painting my toes & fingers again. I mean, you can't go out with crusty toes & fingers. And if you do, shame on you! So to welcome warm weather back to my feet, I ordered some new spring polishes.

I've not tried the Misa brand of polishes yet. They seem to have a large range of fun colors to pick from, I was on the hunt for blues and greens this go around. I have plenty of pinks & oranges in pastels, sparkles and neons but not many cream greens & blues. I found these two and threw them in my shopping cart.

Pour Me Something Tall & Strong (left), Blame It On Fat Tuesday (right).

Pour Me Something Tall & Strong (Look on the Bright Side Collection) is a nice shade of true blue creme. The problem came when applying. It's not a true cream, it's more of a pigmented jelly. The picture shows 3 coats of polish, but clearly a 4th one could have helped even more. I was dissappointed in this one and didn't really know what to expect from the other Misa color I picked up.

Blame It On Fat Tuesday (Mardi Gras Collection) however is much better. The formula was close to China Glaze in consistency and covered in 2 coats nicely. It's a nice vibrant green that does remind me of the greens used in Mardi Gras celebrations. It's a little darker in real life, but still a nice color. It also reminds me of China Glaze Four Leaf Clover polish in its vibrancy.

I'll just say...I LOVE this glitter! Not a fan of the jelly it's in though..This beauty is Color Club's Covered in Diamonds (Untamed Luxury collection)

It takes randomly cut holographic glitters and places it into a clear jelly. Which is where the problem was. Hopefully it was just my bottle in particular, but it was thick. Almost as if it sat too long and no one shook it. I'll have to add some nail polish thinner to my bottle but I love this glitter so much already. Because the pieces aren't uniform it really adds depth to the whole look of the nail.

More green! I remembered to pick up OPI's Jade is the New Black (left) and also picked up Don't Mess with OPI (right).

Jade is the New Black (Hong Kong Collection) is a green creme shade. Much less vibrant than the green Misa polish above, but an ideal color for shade for those intimidated by bright greens.

Don't Mess with OPI (Texas Collection) is like the lighter sister of Jade is the New Black. Same creamy formula with a touch less darkness. Another great green...not sure if you would need both though.

This is where other blogger's pictures get you in trouble. I had no intention of picking up the majority of the China Glaze Anchors Away collection, but then I kept looking at other blogger pictures and couldn't resist. (Plus China Glaze is so much cheaper on disount sites!). From the Sand & Sea side of the collection I picked up
(L-R) Pelican Gray, Below Deck, Sea Spray, & Sunset Sail

Pelican Gray is a nice light grey creme with silver micro glitters. I think it's most similar to Marble Tower from Nubar's Fortress Collection. The micro-glitters really help add depth to this polish though!

Below Deck, from my understanding, is one of the hottest colors to be had in the collection. I really like it. Since taupes have taken over the nail world in recent years, this is my first from China Glaze, I think. It fits in well with my other taupes.

Sea Spray is a light, misty blue shade with the same micro-glitters found in Pelican Gray. It makes me think of sea foam for some reason. Very good color for spring.

My surprise favorite was Sunset Sail.. I kept looking at pictures online and thinking it was a little too orange but I picked it up anyway. Glad I did! This light peachy creme with micro-gliters is the perfect step into spring shade if you ask me. It's warm and sweet with a hint of sparkle.

The other side of the Anchors Away collection was the Knotty Nauticals colors. I only picked up three..
(L-R) Life Preserver, First Mate, & Starboard

Life Preserver is what I will refer to as a blood-orange color. It leans just over the red line, but keeps enough orange to call it orange. It's a bit darker than any other orange I have which makes it a little more wearable on me. (I have some BRIGHT oranges in my collection).

First Mate is another color I'm in love with. Don't know if you know, but my favorite color is blue. Teals in particular but when you get a rich navy creme like this that reminds me of my favorite polo shirt in high school (by Nautica actually) I'm in love.

Dumb-dumb here forgot to take a four-finger shot of Starboard...but luckily I had a comparison picture to pull from. Here's China Glaze's green creme in the collection. It makes me think of grass though, not anything in the sea...

And finally...I wasn't going to do it, but I started thinking of all the fun combinations of things I could do with them. I just barely managed to pick up the China Glaze Crackle Glazes. I didn't bother with the OPI Katy Perry ones because I knew these were coming out and had more colors...Now for the youngin's around here, crackle polish is definitely not a new thing. I had crackle polishes years ago (emphasis: like over a decade ago!...Dear God, I'm getting old.. anyway). Back then it literally took forever for them to dry! These new ones had pretty instant results. Amazing what 10+ years can do..
(L-R) Lightening Bold, Black Mesh, Cracked Concrete, Crush Candy, Fault Line, Broken Hearted.

Instead of driving myself insane and doing each polish on my hand separately I combined them into two pictures. Lightening Bolt, Cracked Concrete, and Crushed Candy are featured below on top of Orly's Liquid Leather (black creme). Black Mesh is atop Orly's Country Club Khaki (coffee creme).

Tips for working with crackle/shatter polishes...WORK FAST! You thought matte polishes were a pain, these can cause nightmares if you've never experimented with them. Another tip, don't pile it on your nails. A thin coat is all you need, otherwise it won't crackle properly (see Crushed Candy finger). I didn't use a top coat here, but it really does finish the look!

Below I used Fault Line & Broken Hearted on top of Orly's Cotton Candy (pink creme). The pink on pink look is really cute. The first finger you can see I wanted to show you what happens if you try to make two coats. It still crackled but it's just wrong.

I'm sure you're saying..HEY! You bought a lot of green there, lady.. Yes I did. Here's some comparisons between the four I purchased.
(L-R) OPI Jade is the New Black, OPI Don't Mess with OPI, China Glaze Starboard, & Misa Blame It On Fat Tuesday

Side by side, you can see that Jade is the darkest with Don't Mess close behind and in the same color family. Starboard is much more grass green than any of the other colors. and Pour Me Something is brighter than them all and more Kelly Green.

I also compared China Glaze's First Mate and Misa's Pour Me Something Tall & Strong (why is that name so long?!) If you didn't understand what the difference between a true cream and a jelly was...I think it's clear below. First mate is completely opaque after 2 coats where Pour Me Something could use a few more if you were really trying. The shades of blue are definitely different though.

At Trans Design the prices were:
Misa $3.75 each
Color Club $3.20 each
OPI's $5.75 each
China Glaze Anchors Away $2.99 each.
China Glaze Crackle $3.20 (SOLD OUT) each.

Victoria Nail Supply is the cheapest site but they don't have 3 of the crackle polishes and do not carry OPI & Misa polishes
I ordered all of the above from Trans Design's website. The crackle China Glaze polishes are SOLD OUT now though.
Head2Toe Beauty Supply has the crackle polishes in stock for 29 cents more than Trans Design but does not carry OPI polishes.

Hope that helps!
So that's it. Next week I'll try and have a post up comparing the polishes I have in my collection now and maybe a NOTD or two.

NOTICE: All items seen in this post were purchased by me with my own money. All opinions stated above are my own and not bought in any way, shape or form. I give my honest opinions of any products shown on this blog. I am not affiliated with the sites mentioned in this post and have not been paid or given incentives to promote them.

FOTD/NOTD: Begrudge me Valentine..

2011-02-10T19:27:00.000-08:00

I debated whether to even make something up for Valentine's. You'd have to forgive my attitude about the "holiday" since I'm a single gal and a "holiday" about love sucks for single people. I wanted to throw something out there anyway that may give you an idea for your day with your special someone. It's a neutral wearable look not just for Valentine's but any night out on the town. You can do like me with lots of shimmer or tone it down for a softer look.

EOTD: Golden Valentine
Products used for Eyes:
Too Faced Shadow Insurance
24K Gel Liner from Coatal scents as color base all over lid
MAC Pigment in Golden Lemon on 2/3 of lid from inner corner out
MAC Pigment in Blue Brown on outer 1/3 of lid & crease
MAC e/s in Smutt in inner V and crease
MAC e/s in Shroom to blend out harsh line and highlight
Rimmel Glam Eyes Liner for top lid
Urban Decay 24/7 liner in Zero on bottom lash/water line
MAC e/s in Carbon to smudge out and set Zero liner on waterline
NYX Fabulous Lashes in #120
CoverGirl LashBlast Fusion mascara
Pur Minerals Brow Perfection Powder

You DO NOT have to use the exact same products I did. I totally understand everyone doesn't have these items. For the gold, there are lots of nice golds out there, Milani has one called Bronze Dolls that would work well. For the Blue Brown color you could use L'oreal's HIP Loose Pigment in Intrepid or a nice red-brown shadow. To replace Smut, any chocolate brown shadow would work.

And use your favorite highlight to blend out the harsh lines with a fluffy brush.

Make what you have work for you! I'm sure you're significant other will love the final look either way!

It should never be about the makeup when you're in front of your bf, ladies. If you can't stand in front of him without your makeup with confidence we have to look within ourselves about that.

The whole look (see below for all the products I used on my face.

Face:
Clinique Dramatically Different Moisturizer
Missha Perfect Cover BB Cream #31
Eve Pearl Salmon Concealer in Tan
Pur Minerals 4-in-1 Powder Foundation in Medium Dark

Cheeks:
NYX Rouge Cream Blush in Tea Rose (applied w/ a stippling brush)
NARS Blush in Albatross (highlight)

Lips:
MAC l/s in A Rose Romance

NOTD: Sparkles and Valentines
Polishes Used:
Seche Vite Base Coat
Orly Purple Crush
China Glaze Carnival Lights
China Glaze Bad Kitty
Seche Vite Dry Fast Top Coat

Just a simple and sparkly nail for your date. Similarly to how I did the blue & glitter NOTD post from earlier this week. I put a base of Seche Vite, then 2 thin layers of Purple Crush. On the tip I did one coat of Carnival Lights and then over it all with Bad Kitty. Make sure you let each layer dry before applying the next coat. Apply top coat and you're set!

Here's a look under a light but no flash. Sparkles like love ....yeah, that was stupid LOL..

Have fun on your dates whether you're with a lover or alone with your doggy like me -___-

NOTICE: I have not been paid to use or speak kindly about any of the products used in this post. All items were purchased by me with my own money. Looks and combinations of products were decided and thought up by me. If similar looks exist it is purely coincidence.

NOTDs: Simple yet effective...

2011-02-09T09:40:00.000-08:00

I haven't really been painting my nails lately. I'm the type of person who really likes to coordinate the toes with my fingers and in the winter, what's the point? No one is going to see your toes in tennis shoes or boots. Times I don't paint my toes, I tend to not paint my finger in the winter either. But I pulled a few bottles out and started going at it just for fun the other night.

This first one was my favorite. I used China Glaze's Frostbite, with a layer of China Glaze Nova on the tips, & China Glaze Fairy Dust all over the nail to give off a gradient-esque effect. It reminds me of a beautiful sahri I saw a girl wearing once. It was a nice satin blue with lots of sequins.

The second look was inspired by skiing, I tried to give off the idea of paths crossed like when skiiers do figure eights together (which is dangerous btw, guy broke his tooth when he ran into his buddy doing that in Gatlinburg when we were up there LOL) I used Orly's Calypso Breeze, as the base and then took a Milani Nail Art Polish in White Canvas and crossed them.

I've been in a grey mood lately. I've got grey on the brain since I've been trying to figure out color schemes for my new house. Here I used Nubar's Stronghold from the Fortress Collection, and Milani Nail Art Polish in Black Sketch.

That's all for today, have a good one guys!

NOTE: All items used were purchased by me and my own money. Product use has not been endorsed in any way and all views are expressly mine about the products.

REVIEW: Revlon ColorBurst L/G

2011-02-01T07:57:00.000-08:00

I'll admit that I own too many lipsticks and glosses. My lips are my personal favorite feature on my face. It's so easy to liven up an otherwise dull face for the day. Plus they're easy to carry in your purse. I picked up the new Revlon lipglosses from their ColorBurst line. I've really come to respect Revlon with this line. I remember what it used to be back when I was in middle school and high school. Mostly the smell..they had that awful old lady smell. You know the one I'm talking about. My mom still wears some makeup with that smell *shudders*

At my CVS they were having a sale BOGO 1/2 off. In restraint I only bought two but I had my eye on 4. The first one I picked up was Sunset Peach. A nice warm peach colored gloss with gold glitters.

The wand does take a little getting used to. Once you do though it it has a brush like quality since the applicator wand is very flexible. It's flat on the sides and it appears to try and imitate the curvature of your lips. But I wonder how someone who has thinner lips would really do with this wand. Since it is flexible it can sort of be use like a brush for a little more precision. It's also soft, not scratchy at all and doesn't pick up too much extra product when you dip it in.

Here you can see the gold glitters and the peach tone on my lips. It's a nice neutral color that can be paired with lots of looks. I didn't notice any bad smells or tastes from this gloss. The formula is smooth and not super sticky, I still think the stickiest lipgloss I've tried has been the Stila lip glazes. (Super sticky and thick formula, unless they've changed.)

I tried to compare Sunset Peach with some glosses I already have. No dead on dupes

Here you can see the size comparison (Sunset Peach is 2nd from left). Next to MAC's lipglass, and a sample size of NARS Orgasm it's taller. MAC Dazzleglass containers are almost the same size but I think the weights are different. The N.Y.C. lipgloss is almost the same size as the ColorBurst gloss.

On my hand you can clearly see how peachy Sunset Peach is in comparison. The closest color to it was MAC's Ember Glow but it doesn't have the gold glitters. Everything else I had was more pink than peach.

The next color I picked up was Fire...what an appropriate name. This bright true red creme is hot!

The color payoff was great. Again no smell or taste just a nice wash of color. Since these are glosses they don't leave your lips dry either. Because of that special wand they have I did have to make sure to clean up the lips with a Kleenex. I didn't notice any color bleeding while wearing this on myself. I don't personally use lip liner, but you may want to to make it look crisp and clean.

So how does it compare to the ColorBurst lipstick...well below you can see. I have the gloss on the top lip and Revlon's ColorBurst lipstick in True Red on the bottom lip. True red is the tiniest bit lighter and brighter in color than Fire, but if you want to layer these two, there's absolutely no problem there!

Just swatched on the back of my hand, you can barely tell the difference. The gloss obviously looks a little more wet though. I personally like the moisture of the gloss over the staying power of the lipstick. So for me, I would keep both in my stash. And seriously, for $7+ for each that's a bargain to get such a great true red color.

I hope that helps you with any decisions. I purchased mine for $7.49 ea (minus BOGO 1/2 of course) at my CVS store. Please check your stores that sell Revlon for pricing. Revlon has really stepped up their game with their recent products and for half the price or more than department store lipsticks, they are worth it. I can't wait to see more from them.

NOTICE: All products seen in this post were purchased by me with my money. I have not been asked to review or discuss any products seen, I'm just sharing my thoughts on them. All thoughts and opinions are expressly my own.

EOTD: Sliced Apples...

2011-01-19T10:20:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone! I hope you like the new layout...kinda of a pain in the ass as far as coding and getting it to look right, but it's simple and clean, no? (I especially like the slider on the homepage!) Anyway, in an effort to simulate that all my blogs are one page I've changed them all to this style. You can still go to the others by their blog names. I just don't have the money or time to buy server space somewhere and all that (As of now, I'm in the process of having a new house built. It'll be 4-6 months before it's ready so let's all hope the rates stay down and nothing happens between now & then!)

So~ Okay at first glance through the pictures everything says this is not an everyday look by any stretch of the imagination but I thought it was fun. Maybe for Halloween or some other time when crazy makeup is appropriate. (Uhm...Mardi Gras? LOL help me out on this one..). Plus it's pretty simple so you can definitely mix and match the colors and see what you come up with!

Normally, I prep and prime my lids and everything, but I was just playing around this night. So use your favorite lid primer and let dry.

Then apply a green base of some kind. I used a NYX Jumbo Eye Pencil in Horse Raddish, can be found at stores carrying NYX products, Ulta and CherryCulture.com.

All the shadows I used came from the Coastal Scents 88 Piece Makeup Palette ($18.95: not the shimmer palette). Please look at the arrows to see which colors I used in each step! Take this first color, a bright green apple green

Pat it on to the inner half of the lid.

Like so..

Next with a fluffy blending brush take this bright red pink color

Apply to the outter half of the lid. LOL excuse the half open eye~..

Use the same blending brush to blend the red into the green, pulling your brush from the red into the green.

Next with a flat brush, take some of this charcoal black color..(All the way in the bottom right corner of the palette if you can't really see)

We're going to "cut" JUST ABOVE your natural crease and down the outside of your V. (See next eye picture to see exactly what I mean).

Next we'll take this nice skin toned color

Use any large fluffy blending brush you have, I'm actually using a blush brush from the Beauty Essentials brushes they sell at CVS (great brushes and reasonably priced). It's great for blending out and highlighting a large area.

Blended out, make sure you blend out the line on the corner too, just take a Q-tip and clean the eye up a bit because it will be a bit messy looking..

Add the same green and red to the bottom lid. Also take a little more of the green and red and blend it with the black line since some might have faded when we blended it out.

Add liner to mimic the flow of the black shadow in the V. I use Rimmel Glam Eyes Liquid Liner

Add black liner to your water line, I used Urban Decay 24/7 liner in Zero. I used a pencil brush to blend it out a little.

Just to make this look a little more ridiculous looking, we're going to add some big lashes. These are some old NYXs I havem, number 111

And here's the finished eye, lashes, liner, brows and all.

Funky and bright, reminded me of apples you see in the store..

The black shadow helps to bring the look back down to earth

With my lids you don't really see much with my eyes open. Used Eve Pearl Concealer in Tan (Trust me, my skin is not looking so hot lately!!) Make Up For Ever Mat Duo foundation powder on face.

It almost looks subtle in pictures (HA!) I paired it with Rock & Republic blush in Lust for the cheeks. Any Peachy Pink blush with a little gold will work.

For the lips I patted MAC's Lip Erase Balm in Dim (from the DSquared collaboration) all over my lips. Then lightly patted MAC Petals & Peacocks lipstick (LE Liberty of London collection) to the center of my lips and blended out with my finger. Then layered MAC Perennial High lipglass (LE Liberty of London collection). Any light concealer on the lips with a pink gloss or lipstick would work. Revlon's Baby Pink would be a good one.

Thanks for reading you guys!

All products used:
EYES:
NYX Jumbo Eye Pencil in Horse Raddish
Various colors from Coastal Scents 88-Shadow Palette
Rimmel Glam Eyes Liquid liner (top lid)
Urban Decay 24/7 Liner pencil in Zero (waterline)

BROWS: Pur Minerals Brow Perfection Powder

CHEEKS: Rock & Republic Powder Blush in Lust

LIPS:
MAC Lip Erase in Dim (DSquared Collection)
MAC l/s in Petals & Peacocks (Liberty of London Collection)
MAC l/g in Perennial High (Liberty of London Collection)

FACE:
Eve Pearl Salmon Concealer
Make Up For Ever Duo Mat powder foundation.

NOTICE: I'm not affiliated in any way with the companies of the products used in this post. All items were bought with my own money. The makeup seen came from my own ideas, similiar looks are purely coincidental.

Haul: Right Before Christmas

2011-01-12T16:49:00.000-08:00

I can't believe there's still snow on the ground here, I love it! Don't love the ice so much, but when it snows in the South you have to appreciate it all since we definitely don't get 8 inches of snow that sticks around that often. Unfortunately, the snow we had moved up to the Northeast and dumped down...But hey, at least you all have the equipment to deal with it, when it snows like it did here the whole area shuts down!

So, if you follow me on Twitter (@theangrykimchi) then you probably saw a picture of a few items I picked up from Ulta right before Christmas. Wasn't much but I wanted to share, except the CoverGirl Fusion Mascara, I think I've discussed that before.

I love EcoTools brushes. I own a few of their brushes and they have been very pleased with them. This time around I picked up the bronzer brush and a angled eyeliner brush.

From the picture below you can see how dense this brush is. As a personal opinion, it's too thick for a bronzer brush. I like a looser, fluffier powder brush for bronzing. I bought this one for foundation powder blending since I needed a new one. The EcoTools brushes I have already are great because they don't shed and are super soft, something that's very important for people like me with super sensitive skin. The bronzer brush goes for $11.99

The angled eyeliner brush ($4.99) I picked up to use as a sharper brow brush. My old Sonia Kashuk angled brush is a little old (like 8 years) so it's about time for a new one, right? I'll have to break this one in a little but I think it's going to work out well.

Since I picked up a new brow brush, I figured I needed a new brow powder which has lasted forever and still going strong. The same one I used before PurMinerals Brow Perfection. Unfortunately, they only offer one shade (What's up with that PurMinerals?), but luckily for me it's a good shade to enhance my brows withouth making them sketchy looking and painted on o_O. For $17 it comes with a wax (which I don't really use) and a powder. The back side opens with a tiny mirror and a small angled brow brush for on the go touch-ups.

And finally I picked up a new color in the Revlon ColorBurst line ($8.99 each). Pink Sugar is a semi-sheer peach pink with a little shimmer and a little sparkle.

It looks shimmery on my hand here, but you can see it's quite sheer.

On my lips you can pick up the micro-glitter, it takes a good bit of the product to really get the color across, but it is quite moisturizing and smooth. It's not gritty as some lipsticks with glitters can be. You'll have to carry this around if you want to wear this all day, once you start eating and drinking it will rub off pretty easy, but for the price of the Revlon lipsticks it's not bad.

I wish I had more but being snowed in limits the visits to the store you're willing to safely make! LOL You can find EcoTools and Revlon Lipsticks at Walgreens and/or CVS and other drug stores and shopping centers, PurMinerals can be found at Ulta, ulta.com, or their site, purminerals.com. I'm really wanting to try the new ColorBurst Lip Glosses I've seen around lately! Going to search as soon as I can get on the roads (probably tomorrow). See ya next time!

NOTICE: All items seen above have been purchased by me and written about based on my personal experiences and opinions. I have not been paid to discuss or review any products seen.

Nubar Polishes (2 of 2)...

2011-01-05T19:00:00.000-08:00

To finish up the first post about my Nubar haul, I'll just get right to it! I only picked up the entirety of two collections.

First up, the Cleopatra collection. This collection was automatically attractive since there were some nice purples in there and I don't own a lot of purple polishes despite it being one of my favorite colors.

Sphinx I will tell you off the bat was my least favorite of this particular bunch. It's very pink and it's very shimmery. Two things I don't personally like together in a nail polish. If you really look through my collection you notice I have pinks and I have shimmers, usually not paired. (This was the one I didn't want, but I have a friend who would wear it so I bought the set.)

Hieroglyphs though is one of my favorite colors from this collection. The magenta purple cream is very berry in its complexion and I like that. It reminds me of an Orly polish I have had for years that has been one of my top colors.

Isis Purple is a very nice pink purple cream, almost pastel in nature, I think this is a good color for a lot of skin tones.

Pharaoh Purple is a nice lavendar color. I can see this color coming in handy for nice low-key function to add a bit of color.

Pyramid Purple is a fun bright-purple cream. I like it's brightness and shade and it's definitely one of my favorite colors. It's like a lavendar sister to China Glaze's Grape Pop.

Nile is a nice mix of purple, red and pink, with a much lighter shimmer finish than Sphinx. Which to me means it's acceptable for me to wear. I did two light coats in the picture, but I recommend 3 light coats for complete coverage.

Toga Purple is a deep plum purple with shimmer...now I don't like pink and shimmer but I do love purple with some shimmer (and/or chunky glitter LOL). It reminds me again of China Glaze's Grape Pop darker and with shimmer. If Orly's Wild Wisteria was too dark a purple for you, maybe this is what you're looking for? A great purple for my collection.

Passionate, in real life, is actually purple. Flash tends to make purples look blue in pictures, but I assure you this color is a rich blueberry purple. The purple and blue glitters in this polish give off a nice finish, that reminds me of pictures of deep space. I can imagine a mighty queen like Cleopatra rocking this polish in her time if it existed.

And lastly, I picked up the Fortress collection. I think grey nails are a great look so I was on this collection. I'd like to say though that not all greys are created equal some can look flat and dead while others have a little oomph to them. I particularly like cooler toned greys against my skin tone.

Palisade is a favorite from this collection. I like the coolness it gives off with it's touch of blue.

Barricade is a mousy grey cream polish. I was a bit let down with the lighter grey creams in this collection. I really wanted polishes that were light grey but didn't give off the "corpse hand" vibe...do you know what I mean? Something with dimension.

At first glance Palisade and Barricade seem a little similar and they are but Palisade has that touch of blue in it, giving it a nice look

Citadel is a light grey cream with a hint of yellow in it but is still a little flat for my tastes.

Marble Tower is honestly too close to Citadel in color for both to be part of the same collection.

The difference is pretty much that Citadel has more yellow and is a hair darker than Marble Tower. I mean you might have to look at that picture for a minute to catch it.. Perhaps Nubar should have tried to vary the shades further, like putting a shimmer on one or the other to vary it enough to warrant having both. I bought the set kind of knowing though that these two wouldn't be that far apart.

Stronghold is definitely worth the buy if you like grey polishes. I had two grey polishes before this set but was always looking for a good slate cream color. I think we have a winner.

Silver Sword is a charcoal black shimmer. I've said this about a lot of shimmer polishes but it looks like something my mom wore back in the day (I think I understand this polish addiction now...) But I really like this. I wore it with Nubar 2010 a while back when I got the set and it made for an interesting look.

Knight's Armour is probably my favorite from this set because it's so rock'n'roll sexy to me. But be warned like all chunky glitter polishes, you'll be wrestling with the glitters to get this off. The big chunks of square silver glitters in against the black create depth when viewed up close. Love it! Note: I used 3 coats of this one.

It is a lot messy when you remove it, look! That's a lot of glitter, it was all over my hand, but it washed off pretty easily with soap and water when I was done.

Dark Castle is a nice black shimmer polish. It reminds me of the onyx stones I used to wear when I was younger all the time. Definitely a favorite, I want to layer it with something but what...hmm...

Hope these nail swatches help you all, I know it's gets crazy with all the colors and new collections that come out all the time! The sets for each of these at bynubar.com cost $49.95. If you only want a few colors they're $7.49 a piece.

So, want to know what nails did I wear for New Years? LOL Sorry you have to look at my toes and if you're creeped out by them (I do know people who hate feet so I understand) but they're the only things still painted! I layered 1 coat of Orly's Wild Wisteria (seen here) and 2 layers of OPI's Sparkle-icious (seen here). Glittery and festive!

In other news, I just pre-approved myself for a mortgage and am going to start house hunting Friday! When I finally do get my own house I'll definitely update my OCD storage! I REALLY want to build new, but I don't know if I can deal with contractors and all that! From my friends' experiences, it gets annoying and aggrevating, but living in a house that's truly yours is worthwhile. We'll see ^__^ LOL See you all next time!

NOTICE: I have not been paid to review, endorse, or speak for the above products. I bought these items with my own money and give my honest opinions of the products from my own thoughts and experiences.

Nubar Polishes (I of 2)

2010-12-30T15:15:00.000-08:00

In order to not overwhelm you all at once I'm doing my Nubar haul from when they had their 30% off sale in two posts. I had heard from one of the ladies on Twitter that Nubar was doing a 30% off sale. I had wanted to try them out for a while. Especially since they had Nubar 2010, a Sally Hansen Hidden Treasure dupe. Now, any polish-holic knows you can't just go and buy one color.

It became clear after adding 10 million things to my cart that I needed to chill with that. I went through each collection and decided which colors I REALLY wanted. I only ordered the entire collection for two, Fortress and Cleopatra (post & swatches next week for those two).

Click on images to see larger, 2 coats of polish unless specified
First and foremost I knew I needed to get Nubar 2010 and Peacock Feathers.

As I said Nubar 2010 is a direct dupe for Sally Hansen's Hidden Treasure. I love the flakey glitter polishes for their holographic qualities. It was very hard for me to photograph at night in my room on plain nails, but it's definitely a layering polish and looks best against dark colors.

Peacock Feathers I wasn't as impressed with. It does give off different colors at certain angles but I was expecting a little more POW! in the vibrancy department. It was kind of dull. Perhaps it looks better finished off with a top coat. I was expecting something along the lines of a vibrant beetle's shell but blue...

Twilight and Midnight were released as part of the Night Sky Collection.

I'm going to admit, I already have MAC's Military from the Alice+Olivia collection they released and the Midnight is a dupe for sure. But Nubar's Midnight is a) cheaper and b) applies much easier and in thinner coats than Military does.

Twilight is the matte silver with lots of glitter in it. I preferred this one with a shiny top coat however...which defeats the purpose. But it's a little too light silver for me, adding a shiny top coat makes it a little darker.

I think I've said it before, I really like pastel colored polish. Feminine and cute, they are the perfect colors for spring or any time you're feeling girly. These polishes came from the Pastel collection.

Baby Blue was one of my favorites from this group. I have light blues, dark blues and more, but this is the type of pastel blue I've been looking for. I'm very happy I picked this one up. The pastels I have all tend to get thick and are hard to apply evenly. Nubar's formula keeps it thin and even. Yes, most of the pastels need 3 coats, but that's not unsual. The first one always looks iffy, the second looks better and by the third coat, you have a winner.

Pastel yellow is another favorite pastel color. Lemon Sorbet is nice and keeps it nice and soft. Looking through my collection China Glaze Lemon Fizz and Orly Lemonade look similar at first glance but they're darker and yellower than Lemon Sorbet

Lavendar is a great lilac purple color. It even went on well with 2 coats for me.

Baby Pink is a nice soft petal pink color. Definitely more understated than Oh Baby Pink which is has a couple of higher shades of pink on this one. I did two coats in this picture, but I recommend 3 for a solid coverage.

Oh Baby Pink is definitely not the same shade as Baby Pink. It's much brighter and darker, but still required 3 coats for me.

Finally for today, I picked up a few polishes from the Finest Silks collection

Chiffon is a nice light taupe with a touch of grey in it. I really liked this color and thought I had a dupe in my taupe OPI colors. Turns out I didn't. Any taupes I had were lighter or darker than this color and the one below..

A darker, more chocolate shade than Chiffon, Marabout is another color I thought would have a dupe or two in my collection. Nope, not one dead on, but that just proves that the polish in the bottle can look a lot different than the one applied and dried on your nails.

Moire is a really nice neutral for me, it picks up the reds in my skin tone and gives me that "mannequin hand" look (well, when I apply it right it does LOL these were in a hurry.). I love the touch of red in the brown.

Taffeta didn't remind me of fabric it reminded me candy I used to eat as a kid, it was this color. A slight hint of red/orange in this one.

And Charmeuse was one of my favorites, it's got a much more peachy undertone to it than in these pictures. I really loved it!

Overall, I found Nubar polishes to be easy to apply and very well pigmented. Most swatches took no more than two solid coats to be opaque and even. since these are formaldehyde, phthalate & tolune free I didn't know what to expect exactly. I also think that's why you'll see some streaking in the bottle of the pastels and the greys (coming nex post). But the streaking did not affect the application or color payoff. I'll definitely keep you posted if there's another sale but if you want to try a few they generally cost $7.49 a bottle.

NOTICE: I have not been paid or asked to review the above products. All words, thoughts and ideas written are expressly my own and no one else's. I purchased all items seen with my own money.

EOTDs: Flaming Eve+Cool Year 2 U...

2010-12-29T16:41:00.000-08:00

Phew~, it's been way too busy around here for the last two months! The most miraculous thing that happened so far though was the beautiful snow we got on Christmas morning!!! OMG~

Look at that! That's already 2 inches right there! It's was a miracle Christmas! Well, for us. The South never gets snow a) like this or b) actually on/around Christmas! Unfortunately for my brother 2 1/2 hours south of us, he got nothing but rain LOL The snow was great. I spent like an hour outside just taking pictures. There was still some snow hanging around when my dad and I left this morning, it'll be gone soon though, it's supposed to rain and warm up (WTF?!).

So it's been a while since I last posted. Congrats again to L for winning my first giveaway! Check out her blog to see what exactly I sent to her and her other great swatch posts @ laquerluster.blogspot.com. I'm so glad she got everything before Christmas!

Hope everyone got some goodies for Christmas, we didn't do a big one (haven't for a while). I received the best present from two of my best friends. I could have killed them when I saw it! They bought me a Kitchenaid stand mixer!!! O_O

As someone who peruses the Kitchenaid site I knew how much this baby was and I was shocked they bought me that! I never told either one what I wanted so they really went out of their way for this. Love you Mel & Somphol! This thing helped sooooo much for Christmas dinner! Now...payback is coming (in the good way of course!) My brother got me a pasta maker attachment for it so I can make all my own macaroni, spaghetti and whatnot if I choose. Should be fun!

Alright, enough chatter, I don't get enough chances to do something funky with my shadow since I work during the week and by the time it's the weekend I'm just chilling with my friends or at home so I'm not usually doing colorful anything. I'd thought I'd had some fun with my Sugarpill quads the other night though and liked the results. Possible New Years looks? (Sorry no full face)..

EOTD #1: Flaming Eve

Products Used:
Too Faced Shadow Insurance
Make Up For Ever Aqua Cream #11 Gold as base
Sugarpill Pressed Shadow in Buttercupcake (inner corner
Sugarpill Pressed Shadow in Flamepoint (middle of lid)
Sugarpill Pressed Shadow in Dollipop (outer corner)
Sugarpill Pressed Shadow in Love+ (Outer V+Crease)
MAC Shroom (crease to brow to blend out Love+ edge)

Rimmel Glam Eyes Liquid Liner in black
NYX Fabulous False Lashes in #111
UD 24/7 Glide on Liner Pencil in Zero on lower lash line

CG LashBlast Fusion Mascara

EOTD #2: Cool Year 2 U

Products Used:
Too Faced Shadow Insurance
Make Up For Ever Aqua Cream in #20 Intense Blue

Sugarpill Pressed Shadow in Afterparty (inner corner over 2/3 of lid)
Sugarpill Pressed Shadow in Poison Plum (Outer 1/3, outer V+crease
Sugarpill Pressed Shadow in Tako (crease to brow to blend out Poison Plum)

Rimmel Glam Eyes Liquid Liner in black
NYX Fabulous False Lashes in #111
UD 24/7 Glide on Liner Pencil in Zero on lower lash line
CG LashBlast Fusion Mascara

I'll post the first part of my Nubar haul I got a while back next so stay tuned if you're interested!

NOTICE: I have not been paid to endorse, use or recommend any of the products seen in this post. All items were paid for by myself with my own money.

My First Giveaway Winner Is...

2010-12-17T22:19:00.000-08:00

Alright, the giveaway entry period is over! First, I really want to thank you ladies that entered. I didn't even think I'd get 1 entry since this is a new-ish blog, so I'm very happy for 10 entries I received, thank you all for stopping by! I really wanted to give this from the bottom of my heart! I hope you enjoy it as much as I do!

Without further ado...
THE WINNER IS:

Comment #4:
L of lacquerluster.blogspot.com!!!
(Click on picture to see larger screencap)

CONGRATULATIONS!!
I've left a message on your blog & Twitter, you have until Sunday at midnight to reply back to me @ theangrykimchi@gmail.com with your full name and address! I really hope it gets there before Christmas!! *crosses fingers*

Thanks again ladies for entering. I hope you stick around and see what happens as this blog continues on. (If you don't, I completely understand!) Happy Holidays!!!

Polish Haul: Sparkles anyone?

2010-12-16T08:44:00.000-08:00

So with all the new nail polish purchases I needed a new nail polish rack...I still need a 3rd now, but we'll move on :0) Since I was ordering the rack anyway, I decided I wanted to pick up the polishes from OPI for the movie Burlesque. I didn't want the solid colors though. I wanted all the glitters. I mean, it's almost Christmas, what better time of the year to sport sparkly, blingin' nails?! I really like these, still hate OPI brushes though. I picked up some solids from previous collections...I just can't resist a good teal! I love ordering from TransDesign because for me, since I live close (they're based in Georgia), I can get my stuff the next day if I order early enough! Of course if you live further away it might take a couple of days, but they're still fast.

(As always, click the pics to see them a little bigger, all polishes are two coats unless stated otherwise)
L to R: Suzy Says Feng Shui, Ski Teal We Drop, & Cuckoo for This Color

Suzy Says Feng Shui (Hong Kong Collection) is a bright blue teal cream. I love blue, but if it's a teal blue I'm all in. This one is brighter than I thought it was going to be but it's not crazy bright. I like this shade for spring but it's bright enough for summer too.

Ski Teal We Drop (Swiss Collection) is an ideal teal for me, it's really amazing how close colors seem until you put them beside each other. I have a few other colors this one reminded me of. But the differences were great enough to make them special.

Cuckoo for This Color (Swiss Collection)...I don't think I meant to order this one. LOL I wanted Jade Is the New Black from the Hong Kong Collection but I was in a hurry to leave my desk. We'll get it, trust me on that one. Anyway Cuckoo is a shimmery dark green. Reminds me of a good silk fabric.

From the OPI Burlesque Collection
Left to Right: Simmer & Shimmer, Glow Up Already!, Bring on the Bling, Sparkle-icious, Extra-va-vaganza!, Show It & Glow It!

So sparkly! I love all these glitters, they go on so well and sparkle away. Perfect to have for the winter holiday season! Don't have to describe much, it's self-explanatory. But these are the super glittery polishes OPI released for the movie Burlesque...which I only have interest in seeing to hear Christina Aguilera...but then again I could just download the CD right? These all went on easily but I'd recommend 3 full coats if you're wearing these by themselves to get a full coverage deal. As to be expected with such a glitter, it was hell to remove, but a good soak in polish remover helps a lot.

Simmer and Shimmer is a blue jelly based glitter polish. This one probably had the most coverage issues for me. In two coats I wasn't expecting super coverage, but the other's seemed better at this. Still, blue is my favorite color so I love this. Contains pink, gold, orange and blue glitters.

Glow Up Already! has the green jelly base. It doesn't come off too green on your fingers though. There's tons of gold glitter in this one so it leans more gold in look but it also carries glitters of other colors like pink, yellow and red. It is probably the more Christmasy polish up close if you wanted to wear it during the holiday.

Bring on the Bling is in fact the gold jelly based one. When you compare the actual glitters in this polish to Glow Up Already! you realize they have the same glitter, the base is different making the output different. This one is meant to bring out the gold glitter. Where Glow Up Already! brings out the greens.

Sparkle-icious is my favorite of all six colors though. The pinkish-purple jelly based is chocked full of gold, dark pink, and blue glitter. Leaving a nice color overall. I actually think this color's quite sexy no? Something about it feels more sophisticated than the others. I'm wearing this for New Years!

Extra-Va-Vaganza! is orange jelly based with orange, blue, green, and pink glitters. You should surmise by now that pretty much the same glitters are used in each of these polishes, but the varying amount and combinations along with the jelly bases really make each different.

Show It & Glow It! is a purple based jelly....and by now you can see my fingers are COVERED in glitter after trying to remove all these swatches. This one is the grab bag mix of all the colors from the other polishes with more purple than anything else. You can see blues, greens, gold, and orange in this one.

I also bought a 2nd rack like this. This was my first one..China Glaze all around in this one..

Now I have two racks. I'm going to order a third after Christmas since I bought a bunch of Nubar during their 30% off sale! (Post coming)...Yes, I do have a ton of China Glaze polishes. I love their variety of color and finishes. Orly has only recently come back on the radar for me. While I like OPI's polish colors, finishes, and staying power, as I said earlier, I really dislike their nail brush! For my nails it's a little too wide and too short for me to hold comfortably, anyone else have this problem? I do like the OPI for Sephora brushes though, the brushes are more like Orly's and easier for me.

I have just a few more polishes that didn't fit on the racks plus the new Nubar stuff I got (not pictured). The Rimmel polishes I have suffer the same (actually worse) brush problem as the OPI, it's a very wide brush in case you wondered! Painting my little toes was a little hard with it. Color Club polish is becoming a new favorite I only have 4 right now but they seem to putting out some good colors.

I'll be sharing my Nubar sale purchase & swatches later on. I think that should be the last nail haul post, for a little while at least!

Don't forget to enter my FIRST BLOG GIVEAWAY for your chance to win the China Glaze Party Hearty set and Orly's Winter Wonderland...Details and swatches can be seen here:
http://angrykimchi.blogspot.com/2010/12/girl-her-polish-giveaway.html
Remember to leave your comments in THAT^^^^ post not here for your chance to win the prize!

Hope everyone is getting their shopping done for Christmas. I gave all my besties their gifts already, I'm being super ProcrastaSanta on my own family though...Which is bad, because my brother & sis-in-law will be here tomorrow for early Christmas! GAHHHH~

NOTICE: All items discussed in this post were purchased by me with my own personal money. I have no affiliation with any of the companies or websites listed here. I have not been paid or coerced into giving positive reviews for any products seen.

Girl & Her Polish: Giveaway!

2010-12-14T11:25:00.000-08:00

Oh Christmas-time. You really make me spend too much on myself! Anyone else have this same problem? You go online or out shopping for your friends and loved ones and end up with a shitload of stuff for yourself? The Internet is your worst enemy for a shopaholic, I swear. I don't know if I even intended on buying these. I was looking for the China Glaze Christmas polishes. Namely, the elusive elf known as Party Hearty. I guess in my brain to make up for not getting Party Hearty at the time I bought all these other polishes :D I ordered all these from Head2Toe Beauty Supply.

(All swatches are 2 coats unless otherwise stated. Click on pictures to see a little bigger)
L to R: Polo Princess, Wild Wisteria, & Pure Petunia

Polo Princess (Prepster Collection) is a creamy bright pastel pink. I love this color for spring. Hell, even if it's not spring I like this color. Pastels are very feminine and I think look good with lots of skin tones.

Wild Wisteria (Bloom Collection) is a deep purple, on first glance once you have it on it looks like it's black it's so dark. When it catches the light is when you can see the deep eggplant purple in it.

Pure Petunia (Bloom Collection) is a bright magenta colored polish. The bottle was decieving because once you put it on your fingers it's brighter than I thought

L to R: Gumdrop, Wandering Vine, Enchanted Forest

Oh Gumdrop! (Sweet Collection) I finally found you! I had been looking for this one, when this collection came out Gumdrop was sold out everywhere I looked! Somehow it was restocked and I love it! Just like Polo Princess it's a pastel, obviously. The creamy, minty green is a great color to have in your collection I think.

Wandering Vine (Bloom Collection), & Enchanted Forest (Once Upon a Time Collection) are both dark greens, and are in the same color family of forest greens, but Enchanted Forest is considerably darker. Which makes it different enough for me...I'm going through a green phase right now. I don't have many greens but I love the way they look.

L to R: La Playa, Winter Wonderland

La Playa (Viva! Collection) is a rich, deep navy blue creme. Honestly it's the blue version of Wild Wisteria. The week of my dad's surgery I wore Wild Wisteria and then La Playa on my pointer fingers, no one noticed the slight difference. Well my brother's color-blind anyway, he couldn't tell if he tried. It looks pretty bright in the picture, but IRL it's very dark.

Winter Wonderland ('Tis the Season Collection) is a sparkly jelly based polish. The glitter in it gives off a foil effect once applied. It's nice on it's own if you ask me, but can be layered as well.

L to R: Naughty and Nice, Little Drummer Boy

Naughty & Nice & Little Drummer Boy are both from China Glaze's 'Tis the Season (wonder if Orly & CG meant to have the same name on their holiday collection?). Naughty & Nice is a deep berry red, in the spirit of La Playa & Wild Wisteria, you don't really notice exactly what color it is unless you're looking at it or it catches the light.

Little Drummer Boy is a shimmery, navy blue. It's a nice color but neither of these were must haves for me. Reminded me of things I wore back in the day.

Since we're talking about the China Glaze Holiday Collection here. I did, last week, manage to get ahold of Party Hearty!! I was so excited I ordered a backup LOL I found them at Victoria's Nail Supply online. I got the Party Hearty Set which included Phat Santa and Jolly Holly polishes as well for $6. I also ended up getting Ruby Deer which I really like.

Oh they look so festive in their greens & reds, no?

Phat Santa is a nice warm red. In real life it's a little darker. I tried layering Party Hearty with each polish in the set to let you see the results. I like this combo but Party Hearty toned down since you can't really see any of the pretty red glitter against this red.

Jolly Holly is a nice shimmery green color. I'm wearing it on my toes today as a matter of fact with Party Hearty on top. Now I'll admit I spent more time making sure the glitter was prominent on my toes than in this picture but trust me, layering these two is a good idea!

Here's Party Hearty on my nails alone (my digits look rough, I know. I re-swatched over 50 polishes that night, cut me a little slack...). You could sit here and try and make this super pretty alone all night, but it's those super elusive red glitters that are hard to come by and won't attach to the brush like the other glitters. You could put endless coat after coat of this stuff and still not get a red glitter...that part's annoying, but overall, for the holiday season Party Hearty is a must!

And here's Ruby Deer with some Party Hearty as well. I like this combo better than Phat Santa. While it may seem in these pics Phat Santa and Ruby Deer are the same, they're not. Ruby Deer is a bright pure red that's very pretty alone..and I don't even like red polishes!

CONTEST OVER, THANKS FOR PARTICIPATING!
ATTENTION: MY FIRST GIVEAWAY!!!

Alright, so did you have a hard time finding Party Hearty as I did, not at full retail price? Are you still looking? Well you can head over to Victoria's Nail Supply and grab one or these sets cheap before they're gone there too. Or, if you want to press your luck or super tight on the cash, you can follow my rules below and enter to WIN the Party Hearty set and a bonus of Orly's Winter Wonderland polish (accidentally bought an extra one)!

RULES:

Open to US and Canada residents only. I'm sorry, for anyone overseas, but I'll do another giveaway next year for everyone! It would be way too expensive to send this right now.
Must be 18 or older, under 18 with parent's permission. Why? I don't want you or myself to get in trouble for you giving me your address so I can send this prize out! Got it?
You must have a valid e-mail address you check often so I can e-mail you if you win!
If you are the winner: You must e-mail me your address back within 48 hours!!! If not, I'll pick someone else. All's fair in love and giveaways!

WHAT YOU HAVE TO DO (3 chances):

Leave a comment on THIS POST telling me what your favorite holiday nail looks are. Do you go for a nice, sophisticated solid? Or do you like getting wild with glitters like me? Or maybe you're crazier and get the full blown airbrush with a winter snow scene? Let me know! Make sure you leave me a blog link or your e-mail so I can contact you (you can e-mail me if you don't want to leave your e-mail addy here w/ your name at theangrykimchi@gmail.com)
Follow this blog by hitting the FOLLOW button on the right, under my profile, and come back to this post and leave me a 2nd comment that you did so!
Follow my Twitter (@theangrykimchi) and come back and leave a 3rd comment with your Twitter name so I can check!

You don't have to do all three, but your chances are a little better if you do.

You have from now until Friday, December 17 at Midnight. I will pick the winner, email them and make a post here so you all can see! If winner emails me by Sunday night I will send package Monday morning.

I will be using Random.org's Random Number Generator to pick the winner!

Follow the rules please! GOOD LUCK EVERYONE!!

CONTEST OVER, THANKS FOR PARTICIPATING!

NOTICE: I have not been paid to advertise or promote any of these products. All opinions are solely my own and no one else's. Items seen have been purchased with my own money. I have not been sponsored to promote any site mentioned in this post either. The Giveaway Prize was bought with my own money and a gift from my heart to one lucky reader.

EOTD: Orange You Glad...

2010-12-02T14:51:00.000-08:00

I think I have a thing with orange as a shadow..It can be a really nice color, well it could be a really bad color on people too. I wore this look last week a couple of times when I had to go out. It was nice to wear SOMETHING actually since during the work week I don't do much of anything to my eyes anymore. At that time in the morning that's the last thing I'm really trying to do!

It's nice because it makes my eyes stand out and of all the features on my face My eyes only stand out really when I've done a little somethin'-somethin' to them.

It's really not hard at all and good for a nice date...I had no date, but it was still nice to wear LOL

Products Used:
Face:
MUFE Duo Mat powder in 209
Eve Pearl Salmon Concealer in Tan

Eyes:
Too Faced Shadow Insurance on lid for a base
MAC's Evening Aura from the Neo Sci-Fi collection
MAC's De-Vil from Venomous Villains collection
MAC's Embark (permanent)
MAC's Shroom (permanent)
Rimmel Glam Eyes Liquid Liner
Urban Decay 24/7 Eye Pencil in Zero
CoverGirl's Lash Blast Fushion Mascara

Cheeks:
NARS Deep Throat

Lips:
Carmex
MAC's Strange Potion from Venomous Villains collection

Let's start with the lightest color, of course. If you don't have Evening Aura, I used MAC Naked Lunch once, and one time with MAC Shroom. Any shimmery nude/orange color will work.

Get your inner corner and half your lid with the first color with any flat eyeshadow brush.

Next you want to apply De-Vil to the rest of your lid. Rock & Republic's Adrenaline eyeshadow would work here as well, you may need to apply a bit more to get the desired coloring. A nice rusty orange/red will work.

I used the other side of my flat eyeshadow brush to do this part.

I used the same brush to blend the two to gether pulling the Devil towards Evening Aura.

Next get your brown. I used MAC Embark, but a brown is a brown, any chocolate can work here.

With a fluffy blending brush, this is a synthetic one from Coastal Scents. I applied Embark to the inner-V of my lid.

Blending into De-Vil. You'll have time later to blend it more if you wish.

Now take Shroom with a different fluffy blending brush. This is an old Sonia Kashuk brush I've had for years, the new ones are probably a little different.

Blend out the harsh line from De-Vil at the top and into the corner

Apply Shroom all the way up to the brow.

...Don't know why my eye looks like that LOL. Anyway, you can see I've also applied Evening Aura to the inner lower lid and De-Vil to the outer lower lid.

I added a little more De-Vil to the crease and blended out with more Shroom.

Here you see the final look. I've added my Rimmel Liner on my top lid, on the lower I added my Urban Decay 24/7 pencil in Zero to my waterline.I lightly blended it out with a pencil brush.

Applied a little Deep Throat to my cheeks and some Carmex (winter time means dry lips!), and strange potion to the lips...We're done and ready for whatever

I look a like a Goomba from Mario here LOL

And another 1/2 fish face before we go~

NOTICE: All items used were bought by me. I have not been paid to use and/or endorse any items mentioned in this post. Use at your own caution if you have allergies to certain ingredients, please read all labels before using in that case.

Sephora VIB Sale...

2010-11-30T14:10:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone, so obviously there was no post last week. So busy with the Thanksgiving holiday like I'm sure you all were. So this week you'll get two at least! Har har har...I just wanted to share my Sephora VIB 20% off haul first. More or less this is stuff I should have bought in the first place during the F&F sale two weeks prior to this one. Don't know why I couldn't remember this stuff!

So yes, I caved, and had to try it. XPPINKXX's raved about Make Up For Ever Duo Mat Powder Foundation ($32). I'm not sure what shade I am any more, I'm thinking I'm leaning close to a MAC NC40, but just a step lighter. I should go get re-color-matched but we only have a counter in Belk here and it's a hassle at the mall!

In any event. I used Temptalia's Foundation Matrix and randomly guessed and picked a shade. I picked up the Duo Mat up in #209 based on the matrix and my guess, luckily for me, was the right one. Not too light and not too dark at all. Plus it's warmer in tone compared to my normal Pur Minerals 4-in-1 Powder Foundation. It doesn't cast a white glow on my face, it melds with my normal skin tone.

I don't really need much aside from this powder on my face. I just use my concealer under my eyes and then pat this on my face with the included puff, covers like a champ. It does indeed stay very well on the face and I find that I have less of an issue with rub off with it. Now I don't know if it's because I'm actually using the puff instead of a brush like normal, but it's nice all the same. I'd recommend this for anyone really, I'm not having any allergy or sensitive skin issues with it, but always look at the ingredients for sure if you know you're allergic to something.

I also picked up the Smashbox High Definition Healthy FX Foundation ($38). Now this time...The Foundation Matrix failed me, I got Medum M4 and it's way too dark for me. So I'll have to return it when I get a chance. I think 1-2 shades down from that will be perfect, but I'm going to the counter to make sure.

Also from Smashbox I picked up the Artificial Light Luminizing Lotion in Flash ($24). This stuff isn't subtle to say the least but I find it's nice for shining up your legs, neck and chest for those special occasions. The irridescent lotion has a slight, make-up smell but it goes away.

Like other liquid luminizer's you can do a pump of this stuff and your regular lotion for a luminous sheen all over. It dried pretty fast on it's own and it's consistancy reminds me of MAC Lustre drops, but you're getting a whole lot more for the price! I like this over my Stila Luminizer because 1) It has a pump not a brush. 2) The pink irridescent shade catches the warmer tones in light. I had tried a small sample a while back and fell in love. I'm just now getting a whole full size bottle so I imagine this will last a good while!

Blended out in this pic. See how it scatters the light over more surface area?

I have my normal dark spot treatment from Clean & Clear. It works pretty well for me actually. For someone like me who easily gets dark spots when she gets zits it's important to treat them with a spot treatment. I've wanted to try Clinique's Even Better Clinical Dark Spot Corrector ($49.50) since it came out.

Now, I can't give my opinion right now on it, I've only been using it a week. But I'm looking forward to seeing possible results...I'll get back to you all on that one.

Lastly...like I needed more..I picked up the OPI for Sephora Six Piece Full-Size nail color set ($42). The set includes 6 nice shades from the collab. I'll say this. I don't like OPI polish brushes in general. They're too thick and too wide for me personally. The OPI for Sephora polish brushes are more like China Glaze brushes which are one of my favorite. So why can't they put that brush in regular OPI? Just saying...

L-R: Opening Night, Already Famous, Access 24/7, Merry Me!, Iris I Was Thinner, & Call Your Mother
The only one that I really didn't like was Already Famous. It reminds me too much of something I saw my mom wear in the 70s in a picture. I may give that one to her she'd probably like it.

My free gift was a small sample tube of Urban Decay's De-Slick in a Tube.

I regularly use the De-Slick Powder by UD, but I've been wanting to try their gel version. I didn't like the mattifying gel from Eve Pearl too much. It really bothers me that the Eve Pearl gel is colored. The UD De-Slick is clear/white. As with anything that tries do reduce oil, you'll have to beware of using this too much. Overuse of oil-removing products are just as bad or can be worse than just leaving it alone. But it did it's job, mattified my nose when I tried it.

NOTICE: I have not been paid to review any of the above products. All items are paid for with my own money, all thoughts are my own and based on my personal experiences with them and no one else's.

I'll post an EOTD (Maybe two if you're good!) I wore/played with last week. If you follow me on Twitter (theangrykimchi), you probably have already seen one, but I'll break it down a little more! See you guys!!!

A Good Hair Day...

2010-11-17T12:51:00.000-08:00

Sometimes you just have a really good hair day...I had a really good hair week last week. My hair took the curl I put in and it stayed soft...Mind you, my hair is a hit and miss thing by a long shot! I tell people when it gets colder my hair gets better and they look at me funny. It's true. The dank, hot, humid summers of the "Dirty South" do not help my hair at all. The winter is perfect for me.

Hehe, if you look through my hair you can see two of my tattoos a little (*scandalous!*)

And old picture when I dyed my hair lighter a while back, turned orange..Probably won't go back this light. It just looked so dead...

Let's start by saying one thing. My hair is not naturally straight at all. When I wash my hair it's what we like to call "A hot mess"! Think Mariah Carey at the very beginning of her career, that's my hair...Being half Black and Korean does have some advantages in the hair department though. Even though it's naturally curly, I don't need a relaxer to loosen the curl (THANK GOD!). But brush the curls out and I have a major afro, with a soft texture. I have a bad horror story the one time I did get my hair relaxed...Let's just say it's probably the reason I have a hard time growing my hair back out on the top of my head to the length I want it now and it involved a lot of pain on my part...
I do have to wear hair grease, but not a lot (like 2 teaspoons for the whole head), otherwise I look like I stuck my head in a vat of oil! I've used Blue Magic (the actual blue one) for about 10 years now.

Someone told me my type of hair probably doesn't even need grease...you'd be wrong sir! I went without grease in my hair from 2nd grade, when I started doing my own hair, until I was about 18...it was not a good thing at all. The hair was unmanageable and broke super easy when styled. I need a little something to keep the hair in check for myself. Despite what the product smells like, it had never left bad odors in my hair.

This one my mom used to use on my hair all the time as a kid, BB Super Gro...Yes, my Korean mother was fully aware I needed grease and knew how to put it on my hair! That's why I'm not tender-headed at all now...*TUG*

Honestly, this stuff really did make my hair grow pretty fast. My mom would cut my bangs and they'd be back the next week, no joke. Don't know if it still works though. This stuff smelt awful to me!

I think I can safely say I've used every damn shampoo and conditioner on the planet since I was a kid. When I was younger of course I didn't care and just used whatever my parents bought. I wash my hair (I know this will sound gross to you but...) once or twice a week. If I've been sweaty, defintely twice. But otherwise once. It's really not good to wash your hair everyday anyway (to the ladies who can do that)...VO5 was a classic, Herbal Essences used to be a family favorite. I did the Pantene thing and my hair fell out so bad in those times...man it was horrible. I liked Dove okay, but I really enjoyed the Organix brand of sulfate free Tea Tree Mint shampoo and conditioner.

Their no sulfates shampoo's and conditioners (chemical that strips the hair). It really reduced the amount of breakage I had. Plus it left my scalp feeling fresh and cleaned with a minty after-scent.

For over a year now I've been using the Japanese Tsubaki Golden Repair Shampoo & Conditioner. I love the way it smells and it's really done a good number on my hair. Leaves it so soft and shinier than it's ever been.

Plus I really love the Japanese for being smart and not wasteful. Instead of buying a whole new thick plastic bottle and contributing to waste at the landfill. You just need to buy one refill bag. Still plastic, but better than the bottle.

I also use the hair mask every week. I order from Webichi, but you can find it a bit cheaper elsewhere. I just trust them to get me my package in a decent amount of time.

Okay, so I said I don't have naturally straight hair. Yes, that means me and my Chi Turbo are best friends. Oh yes, we've been through a lot of hell trying to straighten my hair over the years. I used to actually iron it...with a clothes iron...to get it straight, a la Mariah Carey in one of her old videos. That was soooo bad. I burned my scalp more than once, but I could get strangely close to the roots. It made my hair smell really bad though. I don't recommend ever doing that.

At some point I discovered flat irons..I had bought one as a teen from Sally's but it was crap and didn't do diddly on my hair. After the years of iron ironing my hair I bought a Bed Head, straightened great, but if it was the least bit humid *POOF* goes my hair.

I finally invested in a my Chi Turbo after seeing a friend use hers. What a fucking difference spending 100+ dollars on a quality flat iron makes! I straighten my hair in the morning if need be (really only need to after I've sweated or something) and it stays all day. Even when it's humid and rainy or I'm sweaty, it holds up well! I can get close to the root and even after a shower and letting it air dry it only takes me 20 minutes to do my whole head. 10 minutes if it's already straightened and I'm just working the kinks out. I also have the Chi Turbo Curling Iron...love that thing!

But remember to use a heat protectant! I used to used Beyond the Zone but it was really oily...why would you want oil in your heat protectant? I switched to the Chi Iron Guard spray. I like the way it smells and I can find it at my CVS.

As far as the color you see above? I used Palty Natural Brown coming from Palty's Bitter Cappacino which turned a little orange. But Natural Brown always turns a plum or pink-plum color in my hair. I really like it though. I haven't used a US hair color in years. I like the way my hair takes to the Palty dye and that my hair isn't dead dry when I'm done! Even at my shortest length it takes me two boxes to get the job done.

I want to try Natural Black next, wonder what color it will turn after a while though?...Blue?...

And that's my hair folks...It's a hot mess and when people tell me how they wish their hair was like mine I have to remind them it's not as easy as it looks. I've been trying to grow it out for the past year. I've made some good progress. Apparently I had not been paying attention to how much I had cut off last year, it was just below my shoulders and it's now down to almost mid back (not quite as long as the second picture though). Well, the parts that are growing anyway. Do you have similar hair as me, what are your favorite hair products?

NOTICE: I have not been paid to review or speak on any of these products. The opinions expressed are purely mine...<--this shit gets old to say btw...

Umm, shopping ban...NOW!

2010-11-15T11:20:00.000-08:00

Alright, don't know what got into me today, but I went a little crazy on the ordering. Probably from spending the past week back and forth to the hospital to see my dad. Starting right now we're on shopping ban...If it's not blatantly obvious I'll have some things to discuss and show later on...

Sephora VIB 20% off sale: Still some time, use VIB20 to save before the end of today! Just had to try the MUFE Matte Duo that XPINKXX has been raving about. I love my Pur Minerals 4-in-1 but sometimes you need a change, right? And isn't that what blogging is about, sharing your loves with the world for others to try?

Ordered from TransDesigns, no coupon, but I needed another polish rack after stopping by Nubar (see below)..Then I said, what the hell, get those OPI polishes I'd been staring at. Especially since I can't get ahold of the China Glaze glitter Christmas polish...

And the killer...Damn you Nubar for having a 30% off code! I've been wanting to try them for a while now, and a sale is the perfect time to do that isn't it?...Okay, maybe not this much...Use code NOV3030 to save 30% by November 30th!

Guess I'll have some new posts when these come in :) I still have to take pics of the Orly's I just bought. Going to test out the lightbox I got from eBay! Let's Go Go Go!

NOTICE: All items shown have been purchased by me with my own money. I do not get paid to review or promote any of these products.

On a side note, my dad had two surgeries last week (hence, no post). It looks like someone just stabbed my dad with a sword straight through LOL They successfully fused three vertebrae in his lower lumbar. He's sore, but his leg pain seems to be mostly gone, which is truly a blessing! And he's up and moving when he can which is a drastic change from the first back surgery!

I also had a rash on my eyes last week, apparently I'm allergic to the Almay Makeup Remover wipes I picked up at CVS. When I'd wipe my eye makeup off the skin would turn red immediately and burn! But only around the eye. Didn't have that problem with the CVS brand. What a waste, went straight to the garbage. Thank goodness for Aveeno products to help the itching and roughness go away!

Polish Addict?...Yes, I am...

2010-11-03T08:07:00.000-07:00

Anyone remember this order a long time ago?

(Sorry, prices have seriously gone up on Orly since I made this order months ago, just keep that in mind, please! Bottles are now $6.00 a piece the Cosmix collection is $10 on discount sites!)

I never did write about it, I realized...Something I love that will brighten my day is nail polish. So many shades so many brands how do you stop yourself from buying them all? I don't buy polish in-store anymore, not even if it's BOGO 1/2 or Free. Polishes are way overpriced nowadays and I like to buy A LOT (Proof? See above...) There are a few nail supply sites I really trust, not much difference in price between them all so I'm never too upset if one site is sold out of one color.

My Orly Platoon ready to go! Lots of nice fall colors in there...

I've truly been through a love...hate...love again relationship with Orly polishes. When I was 16 and started frequenting Sally's Beauty Supply this was the first brand I picked up. Not knowing what I know now about nail polishes, I didn't particularly like them. After a few uses they got much harder to apply and were gunky. Plus, I never really took care of my nails. Now, I've been through some bad nail polish in my life but I had written off Orly for a long time. But Orly stopped doing all those old-school, only my mom would wear them colors and finally got some exciting stuff.

I'm now an Orly fan again, the formulas have definitely been improved since I wrote them off years ago and the colors are starting to be more my style. So was it Orly or me that changed, really? Maybe a bit of both. These polishes were from several different collections. If you want swatches of anything you see, just let me know!

The red I think was just a random color I picked up. I have worn Calypso Breeze (the blue from Tiki Time collection) about 10 times now, I just LOOOVE this color, one of my favorite shades of blue ever! The Mauve on the left really does remind me of colors my mom wore when I was a kid. Country Club Khaki is a nice light brown, with a tiny hint of pink from the Prepster Collection.

L-R: Not Your Mama's Mauve, Calypso Breeze, Country Club Khaki

These two were from the Sugar Coated collection. They are sheer colors, I thought they'd be more opaque when I saw them, but they're not. Still very cute colors when worn...

L-R: Bon Bon, Taffy

From the Once Upon a Time collection, Mirror, Mirror (Left) is my favorite of these three. I have come to love greys. Greys are a hot color, in my humble opinion, for winter. Watch and see! Mirror Mirror is one of the best, but this is as light as I'd go, darker greys are perfect as well.

L-R: Mirror, Mirror, Pixie Dust, Prince Charming

Just to put it out there, I loved all of these from the Orly Sweets collection. I'm only mad I couldn't get my hands on the green one, Gumdrop, from this collection, but it seems I will be soon :) Pastels are just such sweet colors in general, these make your fingernails look like candy! They go on easy and are opaque after a couple of good coats.

L-R: Lollipop, Cotton Candy, Lemonade, Pixy Stix, Snowcone

These three are matte polishes and I always get complimented when I wear them. Plus it's almost like having the Calypso Breeze from above in matte too! These were from the Orly Matte Couture collection.

L-R: Blue Suede, Matte Vinyl, Purple Velvet

These are the colors from the Plastix collection. I knew instantly I couldn't just buy one color, I'd have to get all of them. For both these and the matte polishes above I was very pleasantly surprised that they lasted a good while with no top coat, since...well putting a shiny top coat on matte polish defeats the purpose! I do use a clear base when I wear them, but my record for nail polish chip-free is still only 2-3 days. I can never do 5 days like some people, blame it on technique but I'm also not gentle with my hands.

L-R: Old School Orange, Viridian Vinyl, Purple Pleather, Retro Red

Not even half the nail polish I own! I have a whole other rack like you'd see at nail salons with just China Glaze Colors. I need another one for the rest of my polishes now since throwing them in an old Sephora & shoe box isn't classy or appealing, Plus, I have no room now...I love looking at them lined up on the rack in color & brand order!...

I ordered all these Orly Polishes from Head2ToeBeauty, they're organized by collection on the site so I hope I made it a little easier for you to find them. I also frequently order from (*smacks hand*) Trans Design, Inc. Both have been super fast shipping for me. Especially Trans Design since they're based in Georgia which is right next to my state...

NOTE: All items featured in this post were bought by me, with my own money. All reviews are based soley on my actual experience with the product alone. I have not been paid to endorse anything, nor would I be bribed into doing so.

Mm, my dad is going to have another surgery on his back. Two actually. He's supposed to go in next week and do the first one on Tuesday. This one they go in through his belly and move organs around so they can go in through his back and fuse his lower lumbar together. My dad suffers from spinal bifida (stenosis, is what it's called now), narrowing of the spine. He had surgery in 2007 to remove some arthritis and open up the inside of the spinal column. There were a few minor complications the last time he went under so let's hope it's not the same this time as he has to go under twice in one week! Please just keep us in mind.

Sephora Friends & Family '10...

2010-10-27T08:06:00.000-07:00

Sephora is having their annual Friends & Family sale (it's still going on I think. Try code: FF2010 on checkout)...Even though I told myself I didn't really need anything, do I really ever listen to what my brain says?...Neh~.

I really didn't get much compared to what I know other people do when they have the F&F sale! You can see, I got 2 NARS blushes, two Sephora by OPI polishes and Make Up For Ever Aqua Creams to use as eyeshadow bases

I love NARS blushes...I love blushes period as I said in the Rock & Republic Haul post, but NARS are my favorite. (R&R is a close 2nd now). I think I'm good though, I have all the ones I wanted from them, may have to move on to their lipsticks now.

I picked up Sex Appeal and Amour ($26 each)

After looking at Sex Appeal for a while I couldn't decide how disappointed I was...or if I was even disappointed. Sephora describes it as a soft peach...That it is...

It's also a matte color, no shimmer so it's not even qualified to be an illuminizer if you tried...If it had a slight shimmer it would be a great illuminizer though (just saying NARS...). After staring at it, I would have hoped it went on pretty pigmented...it didn't really, you had to really layer it on when using a brush and even still, on my NC40-ish skin color now it was barely noticeable....perhaps on someone super pale this is a wonderful color but not for the darker ladies...

Now, on the other hand my Amour blush was the opposite. It's described as a peachy pink, and yes, I think so. Very pigmented and didn't take but a tap of it on a brush to apply on my cheeks,

Here you can see the sheerness of Sex Appeal on my dark skintone. Just a light pink flush on my hand. Whereas Amour is like *BAM* in your face! A flash will completely wash out Sex Appeal on my skin...

Finally decided to get Metro Chic polish from Sephora by OPI. I remember when it was the super hot color like two years ago (maybe longer now that I'm thinking). Now all the major companies have similar colors. The funny thing is, I really used to hate brown polish of any shade. I think I was just using the wrong ones LOL...I also picked up Ocean Love Potion, I love teal/turquoise whether it leans on the green or blue side. ($9 each)

Ocean Love Potion is definitely on the green side of the spectrum. The color reminds me of sea glass. Metro Chic is comparable to a lot of other taupe colors now on the market, but...You can never have too many taupes can you? LOL The brushes for these were similar to China Glaze ones so that was a nice change up. I'm not too fond of the original OPI brushes...

Now these I've been wanting to replace some old eyeshadow bases I have. These multi-purpose creams are supposed to be able to be used on the lips, eyes, and cheeks. I noticed the packaging directed you more or less to where they actually can be used. Colors 5-10 are specially formulated for the eyes and cheeks, whereas colors 1-4 & 11-22 are formulated for the eyes and cheeks. ($22 each)

My rainbow of colors here :) #7:Fuschia, #9:Peach, #11:Gold, #20:Intense Blue, #21:Turquoise

#7 and #9 are meant for the lips and cheeks. All of these are SUPER pigmented and spread easily. But if you plan on using this as a lippie...you better be mixing some clear gloss with it. It's drying and cakey when dried. Definitely not meant to be worn alone. If you have a mixing palette I suggest clear gloss and a bit of this mixed well & then applied with a brush...

These three are for the eyes and cheeks...Although I'm not sure how many people walk around with blue & turquoise cheeks..THAT would be interesting. These have a shimmer and shine to them and the formula is very smooth. They applied super easy to the eye and took hold of eyeshadow well. Blending over them is easy to do. (See Below)

Here's the swatches as you can see, all are super bright and pigmented. They're supposed to be waterproof and I can tell you. after letting these dry on my arm and using a makeup remover wipe, it took a good bit of rubbing for this to come off!!! But on my eyes with shadow it didn't take too much effort.

Showing a bit of a split personality here. I wanted to see how the Aqua Creams looked.
The Right half of my face I used the #11 (Gold) base, with a yellow eyeshadow on the lid, then green & black to blend out, all from my 120 Palette (from eBay). On my cheek you can see my NARS Amour. The right half of my lip is #9 Aqua Cream (Coral)

The left side on my eye I used #21 Aqua Cream (Turquoise) with Sephora Swimming Pool (see below) & MAC Carbon. On my cheek (you can't really tell) I used Sex Appeal...The right half of my lip I used #8 Aqua Cream (Fuschia).

Sephora is always giving away freebies so I used some VIB points and picked up the Sephora eyeshadow and also got my birthday extra. Which comes with another eyeshadow, a eye pencil and a lash plumping mascara.

Swimming pool is a nice, shimmery blue. It applies lighter than it appears but is super pigmented and smooth in formula.

Here you can see it by itself with no base on the right...The left I compared it to the MUFE Aqua Cream #21...Hmmm...idea?

Layering Swimming Pool with #21 produced this. A nice mix between the two colors.

Birthday set...it's free why would you say no?...

Aspen Summit is a sparkly white shade...not sure why they picked this color to put in ...but whatever, it's good and pigmented and easy to apply. Don't know if I like the packaging, twist off top...I'm liable to lose it...

Here's a nice swatch, you can see how icy it looks when applied, but still very pigmented

I don't use pencil liner mostly because, I've scratched my eyeball one too many times. Sephora included a short one in Silver Green...again..the color choice is beyond me...Black would have been fine and more usable..

Here you can see it really lives up to it's name. It's a bit silver and a bit green. It went on smoothly, but I don't think it would last long at all on your water line..just saying. Especially if your water line is like mine...

And the lash plumping mascara in black. I was never fond of these types of wands (hehe...I rhymed). I really love my CoverGirl Lash Blast mascara and it's wand. I'll probably chunk this after I try it. Even if it works, I can't stand those brushes!

NOTICE: I have not now or ever been paid to review/discuss any of the products above. I paid for them with my own money and write my thoughts base on my sole, personal opinion. Thanks...

So what did you all buy/want from the sale? After looking back, I probably could have gotten something I've been wanting to try...Oh well, always next time right?!

Rock & Republic Cosmetics..

2010-10-20T08:01:00.000-07:00

So everytime there has been a sale on Hautelook or at the Rock & Republic site two things happen. One, I keep telling myself I don't need anymore blushes or eyeshadow. You have a ton and you should totally not even keep working that thought, so I don't and don't buy anything...Second, I trick myself into thinking I really have to try them out and go and TRY to buy some...But by then I'm usually hours behind and everything is gone. *sad face* Well, thanks to my obsessive compulsive behavior of repeatedly checking my Google Reader (it's as bad as Facebook to me...) I managed to catch the sale before everything I wanted sold out! Thanks to Tao's post (and my incessant checking of Reader) I was able to get the things I wanted 1/2 off at R&R, plus $0.99 shipping! Woot Woot! The sale is still going on btw, but the blushes seem to be sold out.

Blushes originally sell for $40 a piece. Eyeshadows go for $28 a piece. O_O I know right?...The original total was $284 for 5 blushes and 3 eyeshadows..At that rate I would never have bought all these. But with the half off & 99cent shipping, it was only $142.99. Not too shabby, I think.

Seriously though, I think you're paying for the packaging and name more than anything inside these containers. The packaging is sturdy, shiny and gives you a rock and roll kind of feeling.

While they're secure and all. I think it's human to want these to snap close. There's no snap to keep the lid closed, it just lays over the blush and eyeshadow...I don't know, it seems to me if I had one in my purse, as messy as that is, it has potential to flip open on accident. That'll probably cost you $10 more if they redesigned it. The flip-side is, I don't carry blush with me so they're fine in my makeup drawer.

I picked up three eyeshadows (L-R): Electric (sold out now), Scorch, and Adrenaline.

Electric is a nice soft metallic royal blue. Blue is my favorite color so I'm always grabbing up whatever shades of it I can...

Scorch is a burnt orange color, reminds me of a good pumpkin

Adrenaline is a soft metallic burnt red-orange color...

Here are all three swatched. You can see all three have some level of metallic to their finish. Scorch being the lightest. Electric really popped in the picture. All three were easy to apply and well pigmented, but it did take a tiny bit of effort to get them on. Meaning I had to return to the pots a lot to get the pictured results.

I kept looking at Adrenaline trying to figure out what it looked like..Didn't something come out recently that was close to this?

Hmm...could it be? A MAC Venomous Villains De-Vil eyeshadow dupe? Also a good size comparison to the MAC pans if you were wondering.

Mmm...Not really when swatched next to each other the inherant differences came out. Most notably, De-Vil is more pigmented when applied and only has a light metallic sheen, where Adrenaline is focused on being a metallic orange. But close...

On first glance I realized the blushes all seem to be from similar color families. Most of my blushes are, I understand my skintone well enough now I usually buy things like blush to complement it. I can range from a NC35 to a NC45 and I think girls in this range have it pretty easy when it comes to color. Almost anything can look good on that skin...Almost, I know I don't look good in green...self-evaluation people...

Immoral reminds me...in picture...of the MAC Venomous Vixens blush Bite of an Apple but more on the orange side. It's matte and makes me thinks dirty things that would cause your face to turn this pretty orange.

Foreplay is a nice muted peach color. Also matte, it's the lightest of the colors I bought but just a beautiful flush of ...."afterglow" color LOL

Lust is a shimmery deep pink-peach color...ohhh it also reminds me of something...but we'll get to that later. Hey get your mind out of the gutter that's not what I'm talking about. I have to say the names are very fitting to each of the blushes!

Another matte peach-pink, although Lust and Bedroom seem the same in pictures the differences are evident in the swatches..

I don't know what it is, I really love orange blushes...All Nighter is a shimmery orange-pink color...*shakes head*...I had a dirty joke to put in here, but I'll save it...

Here are some swatches...

You can see, aside from the shimmer that Bedroom is lighter than Lust.

Again I kept looking at the pictures and thinking All Nighter and Immoral were awfully close in color..

When swatched side by side you can see the difference. Not only is Immoral matte but it's considerably lighter and less pigmented. I don't know if you truly need both though...

Now I read somewhere that Lust was an Orgasm dupe (boy, you can tell what was on the mind of marketing at these companies!)..Not true. They look somewhat similar but are two different colors

More evident when swatched next to each other. Lust is a richer pink-peach color. I think more appropriate for an evening look. Orgasm is my go-to everyday blush so I can vouch it's good for day wear.

Orgasm also has more evident gold tones in it which can help brighten up the face.

Overall the blushes are nice and pigmented The matte finished ones are a bit chalky when applied, but even out with blending. The shimmery ones didn't have the same issues. I didn't compare them, but size-wise they seem to be about the same size as MAC blushes.

NOTICE: All items mentioned in this post were paid for by me. I have not been payed or compensated for reviewing anything in this post. All thoughts are expressly my own and no one elses

So....looks like I'll be back in a classroom come January. Which is fine with me! If I missed anything in the past year it's been interacting with 3D-minded people..No, not as a student, I'll be teaching again. If it works out in my favor I might even do it full-time to get out of my current job. (Grr...let's not discuss that...). If I'm teaching again it looks like I'll have to delay going back to school (as a student) to get a web developer degree. I really don't want to be that stressed out. So we'll see what happens in the following months!

Circle Lens from HoneyColor....

2010-10-12T11:47:00.000-07:00

Yada yada yada, so much noise about the dangers of circle lenses a while ago, that went away quickly didn't it? You know how you get infections and all that? If you don't take care of your shit and buy fake lenses. C'mon people, common sense needs to be guiding you when you purchase things. The same infections can happen with the lenses doctors give you if you don't clean them. Research!

Here's a trusted site for you who are looking. This was an order I made to honeycolor.com a while ago. I was looking for Neo lenses and they were the cheapest, and had the ones that I wanted at the time. I had no issues ordering from them, it was pretty straight forward. The only complaint I had was they didn't update my order status so I wasn't sure when they had sent the lenses so I e-mailed them. They sent me the information very quickly though when I asked, so don't be afraid to drop an e-mail..In any event they actually came the next day after asking for information! (Patience is a virtue that I have, but when I want something...impatience wins.)

I ordered 5 pairs of lenses and they send 5 sets of lens cases (awesome, cause I needed some!)

Plus they sent the...I guess you could call it a deluxe case that comes with the small solution bottle, lens holder, lens tweezers, mirror and lens cases.

The thing I love about theses NEO's are their effect. Any lens with a limbal ring is enlarging for me since my irises are pretty small. But they look "natural" meaning they blend very well with your natural eye color and the sharp effect they give off with the starburst design is my favorite. I didn't open all of these but the ones I did were also super comfy! I thought my GEOs were goo, these feel like regular contact lenses (But remember you shouldn't wear them like regular lenses. After 6-8 hours you should take them out and let your eyes breathe.)

This blue is beautiful. Sometimes, because my eyes are sooo dark they make blues and greens pop a little too much. These looked great, vibrant but not as crazy as say, the Super Nudy Blues I have!

The Glamour Grey lens I have been eyeing for a long while. I really love grey lenses in general! If I only had two colors to pick ever again it'd be grey & brown lenses.

The browns have been a favorite too. Like I said, my eyes are dark brown, almost black so wearing even a brown lens makes my eyes pop.

And of course, I had to try a pair of pink. I wore these and a friend commented on how unusual a color it was but pretty. I told her it was pink, she was pretty shocked because she thought it would be like "OMG, WTF do you have in your eye that's pink."

Here's some pics from the lenses I opened that day (Sorry I always look so tired, work KILLS me!)

I finally opened my Honey Wings and Messish Greys, they're expiring next year so I thought it'd be a good time to open them. I really love the Wing Series

Messish Greys

NEO Glamour Grey

NEO Queen Blue - LOVE these!

MAX Pure Pink - See not crazy looking pink! They're very pretty and eye catching.

So today, I'm relaxing at home before heading back to work tomorrow. Thank goodness this is my short week at work, so I'll only work two days this week. What's so special? Today is my birthday and I'm happily spending the day being lazy..Although I'm about to make a pumpkin cheesecake for moi! HAHAHA! See ya next time!

***EDIT***
Totally forgot to put a notice on here: I was not paid to review any of these products by honeycolor.com or any other seller. I bought all items with my own money and all reviews or thoughts are 100% honest.

Quickie: Venomous Villain..

2010-10-06T16:34:00.001-07:00

Just quickly, I did get my MAC Venomous Villains Bite of an Apple.

I personally love the color. It’s a lot pink-red, reminds me of grapefruit a little, with a slight peachy undertone. Brings that Snow White quality from the pictures.

Here’s a quick shot of me wearing it. Sorry for the tired face, it’s Wednesday and it’s already been a long week. Hehe also dyed my hair the other day. It’ll change to a cherry color over the next few weeks, but I always like the darkness of it at first. I used Palty Natural Brown.

The blush is very pigmented, it didn’t take much at all to get the full color on my cheeks. It’s definitely going in my fave pile of blushes.

Caving in to the Villains…

2010-10-01T21:13:00.001-07:00

I’m not a Disney fan…I’m REALLY NOT a Disney fan. Stemming mostly from the fact that Disney’s The Little Mermaid is a pale imitation to the version…the real story…. I grew up with. Maybe you’ve seen it, but most likely you haven’t. Why? Because Disney put the distribution company of the 1975 anime Hans Christian Anderson’s The Little Mermaid out of production. I remember going to Winn-Dixie with my dad when I was about 8 and seeing the video on “final sale”. Little did I know then I should have begged my dad to buy me that video. It would take me 10 years to find the video! I only had the last 40 minutes of the movie on a tape from waaaay back when we lived in Germany!!! I finally found a copy on eBay and was lucky enough to snag it with my awesome bidding skills! This ain’t your happy little mermaid in the sea. This story is sad and it made me cry at the end even as a kid. It’s tragic and you know what…there’s boobs…mermaids don’t need no damn shells to cover themselves, they’re fucking awesome in and of themselves. Screw Ursula, the Sea Witch..she’s the shit and would eat Ursula’s fat ass…I don’t begrudge those of you who love the Disney version though, it may be all you’ve ever seen. But do yourself a favor. Go watch the real story (because Disney altered the real story to be all happy and sweet) on YouTube…after you read my post of course LOL
Han's Christian Anderson's The Little Mermaid anime from 1975

MARINA!!!! FRITZ!!! *tear* This version apparently used to come on German TV all the time while we were there (mid 80s to late 80s). Thank God my dad recorded this for me. I know the graphics aren’t all Disney quality or whatever but there is nothing comparable to this in my eyes….

Anyway…now that you all understand my disdain for Disney, I had no intention of buying anything from the Venomous Villains collection from MAC. Really and truly didn’t. But the more I looked at sample photos I decided I would buy some things.

Unfortunately I don’t think I’ve seen any of these movies the villains have come from. I mean, I know which movies they come from but I’ve never actually seen the movies all the way through. The only Disney movies I own are Bambi and Cinderella..call me deprived as a child, but I had other interests (Jem was the main one LOL). This is what I got from Cruella DeVil collection.

I like orange eyeshadows so De-Vil was a must get for me. I’ll say it like everyone else. The packaging for these are soooo tacky! C’mon MAC you know better!

I’ve been hunting down red lipsticks lately. Red lips with the right eye looks extra classy and chic. Wicked Ways lipglass has a lot of color but is still pretty sheer. It’s a little more pink on me than I expected.

Heartless is a nice red, not drying and goes on a nice crimson red. It reminded me of Revlon’s True Red..I’ll have to do a side-by-side…

Her Own Devices appealed to me because it was a nice soft pink. I’m definitely happy with this color because, although it’s a beauty powder it’s very pigmented!

The Evil Queen collection also appealed to me the most…I was hunting down that damned Bite of an Apple blush from this collection…I ordered all these from Macy’s and I don’t know why I forgot to add that blush. But HOPEFULLY Nordstrom will really have some and be able to send one out to me. But I’m not going to hold my breath until it’s in my hands.

Strange Potion lipglass, unlike Wicked Ways, is not sheer and a great color by itself. No lipstick required!

Toxic Tale…I’m not sure why I bought it. I kept taking it out of my cart and putting it back in indecision. It’s a pinky red color and pretty bright. I could see this used in a some quirky looks. Definitely don’t hate it, but it’s not a must have.

Oh So Fair is another nice pink beauty powder with lots of pigmentation. Sometimes I feel like a strong cheek, sometimes you just want something..Hime-garu style. For my skin tone it definitely gives off a cutesy vibe. I like it..

I guess I picked the two polishes up so I didn’t have to buy the whole Orly collection…because I’m a nail-a-holic and I wouldn’t be able to buy just one or two colors from the Orly Cosmic collection. Yes, there are dupes for these in the Orly collection. So if these are sold out and you want them real bad, just hit up the Orly section of your beauty store or discount online site! I picked up Mean & Green and Formidable!

I have to say the beauty powders & Strange Potion lipglass were the winners for me. I could have done without everything else. But I still haven’t tried the Bite of an Apple blush so we’ll see…

So I have in mind some looks to do…here’s a peak, something I was testing out…Yes, I realize how much lighter my face is to my body, that was on purpose. Going to try pulling some looks from some of my favorite characters…stay tuned!

Can’t believe it’s October! I’ll be 26 in 11 days from now…I’m heading into the no return land…not 30 and not 25 anymore…the in-between where stuff gets figured out about life!

E/F OTD: Purple Lift...

2010-09-21T09:21:00.000-07:00

When you think of me, the last thing you should think of is children. I have none, I don't particularly like them, nor should I generally be around them as my mouth doesn't have an off switch that turns off the sailor-talk! BUT I have two little exceptions to my general rules. My friend's, now, 3-year old daughter, and my other friends' 20-month-old daughter. They're just good little girls and cause no problems for me that other little kids normally do. Y'know, all the grabbing, asking questions incessantly, doing things that irk your nerves, etc. They don't do it, which makes me a nicer-to-children type of person. Plus they're uber-cute!

I didn't come her to talk about chillens though, I brought it up because I wore this look to the 3-year-old's birthday party weekend-before-last. Maybe psychicly I wore the purple to match the birthday girl who most of the time I only got pictures of her as a blob of purple and long blond hair! LOL (Click the pictures for bigger resolution)

Nothing dramatic for a kiddie party but I haven't done a little color in a long time. I'm usually in neutral shades for work, since I have no time to play in the morning. The shadows came from the Urban Decay Deluxe Shadow Palette ($38). I used Fishnet across the whole lid, Ransom in the crease/outer V area, and Peace in the V blended out on the crease with MAC' Naked Lunch....My picture isn't as vibrant as it really was in person. My Nikon is really better at this than my Canon, but I was heading out the door after this. No time to put the Nikon together. I used a little Fishnet & Ransom mix on my lower lash line as well.

The Rundown:
Eyes:
Too Face Shadow Insurance
Urban Decay Deluxe Shadow Palette: Fishnet, Ransom & Peace shadows
MAC Naked Lunch
Revlon Color Stay Liquid Liner
Covergirl LashBlast Fusion Mascara

Cheeks:
NARS Orgasm blush

Lips:
Carmex & Revlon Color Burst in Nude

Brows:
Pur Minerals Mineral Brow Perfection

Face:
Pur Minerals 4-in-1 Foundation Powder - Tan

And that's that...I'm working on some nail posts. I just swatched all my nail polishes on those sample nail rounds you can buy at Sally's. Between the Sharpie I was using to label the disks and all the nail polishes I think I was effectively high for about an hour after! LOL So many polishes!

This happens when..

2010-09-09T10:01:00.000-07:00

I'm a horrible blogger, I know...Grr, my LiveWriter won't post from work anymore so sorry about not updating (plus I've been busy). Anyway, this happens when you wander around CVS too long. You start buying shit you didn't need in the first place. For a girl like me it's either snacks or makeup..I’m not going to go on and on about these items (unless someone really wants my full review/opinion). I’m certain you all have seen these items but they’re worth the hype if I may say so myself.

When I went to CVS that day they had a BOGO 1/2 off on some Revlon products. So I knew I wanted these two Revlon ColorBurst Lipsticks. The Photo Ready foundation wasn’t on sale, but I’ve been wanting to try it. It also put into perspective how dark I really am now..

I picked up 008 Golden Beige…it’s too light for my skin (but slightly darker than NC35, which I’m apparently not anymore since Florida…damn it), but I wore it around the house for 5 hours, and I love it. Light, no scent, did not react to my sensitive skin, didn’t even feel it on my face after applying with a MAC 187 (stippling brush). I thought maybe I just needed to up one more shade. However Target didn't have that ONE shade (What's up with that? CVS every store I've been to is missing one color...) I picked up 010 Caramel. If it was too dark, I could always mix it with the 080, right? Turns out it was my shade, maybe a touch too dark right now since I'm SLOWLY lightening up. But for the most part Caramel was a perfect match..so that put me in the what? NC40-45 range now...Curse you, Makeup & Sun!

I got the two most popular (obviously because these were the last of each color at my store) lipsticks, Soft Nude and Baby Pink. Love both, and I was pleasantly surprised that for these at least, the tops are very accurate to the actual color.

Baby Pink is a little drying to me, something about the slightly shimmery texture of it. But a little Carmex underneath solves that problem. Soft Nude, is an awesome…nude, for the tan ladies, I’ve been wearing it nonstop since I bought it. Both of these are my purse lipsticks for on the go now. There are some other colors I'd like to get my hands on but perhaps I should tame myself..My lipstick drawer is overflowing...

Trying out Eve Pearl…

2010-08-19T09:49:00.001-07:00

So Eve Pearl, famous for her salmon concealers had a 50% off sale. 50% off everything! I ended up with almost $200 worth of products. It was definitely the right time to try some things out.

I picked up a palette and spatula, regularly $10 each. (They weren’t supposed to be 1/2 off but they totaled it $5 each LOL..Oh well…). Very helpful with Eve Pearl products. A little goes a long way and this will help you be able to maximize the foundations I have.

The Platinum Matrix Eye Cream ($50) comes in a heavy glass jar (not good for travel at all really). According to the Eve Pearl site:
”As a result, Matrix Eye Cream absorbs perfectly; humidifying, softening and calming the skin to reveal a younger, healthier complexion with no greasy shine.”

I’ve been using it since I got it, there’s no smell whatsoever from it. The formula is creamy and light. When you put it on it’s not greasy at all and absorbs well into the skin. I’ve definitely had other eye creams that felt really greasy so this is a pleasant point. After a week of use I could tell the skin was firmer under my eye, and the area was moisturized. My deep set lines did not soften any though.

So if you’re looking for a miracle wrinkle cream you’re not going to find it here. But firming up the delicate under-eye skin is a good thing to me. I probably wouldn’t buy this again though. The $50 regular price tag is a bit much to me for something that doesn’t even soften my lines even a small bit. I can get just as much moisture from my other eye products that cost $30 or less.

Unlike most anti-shine products the Eve Pearl Anti-Shine Mattifying Gel ($20)comes in the same basic color combos that all Eve Pearl products come in. But there’s only two shades. I probably should have went with the lighter Gel A (Light/Medium), but I got Gel B (Tan/Dark). Most mattifying products come in white or clear so I wasn’t sure how this would turn out.

It actually dried without altering the color of the makeup on my face from what I could tell. It did help my oily skin for a little while but after about an hour my nose was starting to shine again. I haven’t tried it under my makeup first yet, but I imagine it would only slightly prolong the inevitable shine’s return. I do wonder why they chose to tint it.

It’s been too hot to really give this a good try, but I also picked up the Eve Pearl High Definition Dual Foundation ($54).

It comes in a little velvet pouch…not sure why? But okay, I’ll take it. The packaging is very bulky. I’m not sure why they didn’t try to minimize the size of this. The dual foundation comes with two shades. I chose Tan, it seems to match okay, but I’m usually darker than I think. Being in between shadessucks…but that’s why I have the palette and the spatula so I can mix the colors to get the right shade. It has a SPF of 20, to help you out.

There’s a clear flap that lays on top of the foundation…not sure why? Guess to keep too much air getting to it and drying it out. But again…okay.

The bottom, side has your usual circular sponge. You can see how big the bottom part is alone. The top part is just as big. I’d suggest minimizing the size of the packaging for these foundations because I imagine a lot of people would just remove the foundations and put them into some other container, especially a makeup artist.

Again my falling in between colors led me to pick up the Salmon Concealer Duo in Medium/Tan ($35).

It’s very creamy and smooth. In this hot, humid Southern summer it stays put once I put it on quite well though sweat. Unfortunately I’m spending the day rubbing it off because the massive amounts of sweat pouring out of my face. (It’s just too damn hot!) I use my fingers to just pat it on under my eyes. I usually have to do a bit of both colors to get a nice even shade for my skin. It really covers the dark spots on my cheek from my pimple scars. For both the foundation and the concealer a little goes a long way. This is one product I’d consider buying again, but next time I’d get the jars of concealer ($42) instead of a compact, because you get more for just 7 bucks extra..(3.25 g for the compact vs. 6.2 g for the jar)

Overall, I wasn’t terribly impressed by anything I bought. I like the concealer’s creamy consistency and the fact that once I dab it on it doesn’t move (which was my one issue with my liquid Pur Minerals concealer), plus I like that they have 4 different shades of concealer if you need to mix. The foundation has about the same formula so I’m not really complaining there, but it’s a hassle to mix my shade if I’m in a hurry (and make sure it’s right!). The eye cream firmed but didn’t help my lines any. The mattifying gel helped for a small amount of time, but I’ll stick to oil blotters for now since I’d rather not keep adding this stuff to my already clogged pores all day. Take it or leave it. Eve Pearl products are held in high by many but for me, I’d rather keep using my cheaper alternatives that have been working just as fine.

FTC yada yada: I paid for everything seen here, my short reviews on these products were all from my personal opinion. You know the spiel…

Daring to Wear…

2010-08-17T12:30:00.001-07:00

So I have a back up of posts I have to do but I’ll skip a few and just share my eyeshadows from MAC’s Dare to Wear collection I got. Not much, just six eyeshadows. I wanted all of them really, but I stopped myself when I looked over the cart.

They’re so colorful, and exactly the types of colors I like to buy.

Louder, Please comes off much more red in real life than this picture.

Shock-A-Holic is a nice grape purple. Purple is definitely one of my favorite eyeshadow colors so you know I had to buy this one.

Atlantic Blue is true to its name. When I photographed it at first it came off purple in my camera but I guess it worked out in the end.

Zingy, immediately reminded me of Electric Eel on first glance. I didn’t really compare them yet, but I remember one or the other being darker.

Sassy Grass next to Zingy is my next favorite color from this collection. I really like true green & Kelly green colors even if I don’t think green and me are friends.

Lime is a nice …well lime green color. It’s not electric lime but it reminds me of grass more so than Sassy Grass does.

Now when I swatched these on my bare hand I was kind of expecting the opposite of what happened to happened. The three above came out kind of chalky and didn’t really take too well to my bare hand.

These three however went on smoothly and were much more pigmented than the first three. As you can see all six have a matte finish so chalk it up to formula.

Overall I wouldn’t say any of these is a must have FOR ME. Why? because I have similar colors from other brands like Sugarpill. If you really want anything from this collection it would be Zingy and Sassy Grass. This collection is definitely not for those who shy away from colors. If you feel you have a lot of similar colors though, I wouldn’t worry too much if you miss this one.

To the beach, I wish I could go back…

2010-07-30T09:37:00.001-07:00

A little while ago now, MAC released their To the Beach collection. I stayed away from most of the items but I did end up buying the Lustre Drops and a lipstick. The overall collection wasn’t for me, but I wanted to try the Lustre Drops, and I just love a coral lip.

While I was at it, I picked up the Gentle Coral Tinted Lip Conditioner as well. I’d been wanting to try it out for a while.

The Lustre Drops came in Sun Rush & Pink Rebel for this collection. I missed the Lustre Drops from a previous collection but I really wanted to get these this time around. I personally think they could be useful in your makeup kit, but I don’t think they’re a necessity.

They were very light and airy when applied though, it didn’t feel to me like I had a ton of stuff piled on. Sun Rush is a nice bronze color and definitely more for the tanner & dark-skinned ladies. Pink Rebel however I think has a broader range of users. It would look lovely on the fair skin and makes a nice highlighter on tanned girls like me…I’m running close somewhere close to an NC40 right now, I’m usually NC35…of course I was probably about an NC44 for a few weeks after my beach vacation!..or even darker-skinned ladies. Below you can see the two blended out on my hand.

The best way to apply these for me (especially the Sun Rebel), is to apply a drop or two to your moisturizer for an all-over glow. Like I said not a must have, expensive for the size of the bottle. I’d go with the Eyeko Eye Cream & Tinted Cream if you feel you missed these. They’re $10 on Cherry Culture (the Lustre Drops were $18.50 a piece, and I think you get more product with the Eyeko stuff.) Just my opinion though.

I picked up the Beachbound lipstick I’m not entirely sure why, I’m not fond of the MAC glazes, but I picked it up anyway. This is one I actually ended up liking though it wasn’t what I was entirley expecting.. I can wear this one on it’s own without gloss. It was a little drying to me though. So maybe a light layer of Carmex under it would help you out. It was peachy & more warm than my picture below lets on, I think it’s a very nice color for a summer day with light makeup.

When I got Gentle Coral Tinted Lip Conditioner ($14.50) I had to double check the packaging again to make sure it was actually Gentle Coral…I was disappointed to see how RED this TLC was! It was very red in fact! I said, maybe it’ll be a little different on my lips…Nope, still red. This is in strong contradiction to it’s picture on the MAC site, a picture I had viewed on many monitors and it always read more coral to me..(They seem to have changed the original picture I viewed all this time on MAC, but it still reads more coral than red.) I do love the TLCs from MAC so application and feel-wise, it felt as light and soft as their TLCs usually do. Very moisturizing and no smells. But I was expecting coral, see below…

I get slight hints of coral, but the red shines through A LOT more!…Oh well, maybe MAC will release a true coral TLC in the future. I’ll keep this on hand if my red TLC from the Hello Kitty collection runs out..*sigh*

NOTICE: For future reference, I have not now, in the past or ever been paid to promote, or give positive reviews on any products featured on this blog. All opinions are solely based on my experiences and honest opinions. All items are bought by me, with my money. If in the future I’m sent products to review I shall make that claim in the post for that item. Thank you..

Too much?…

2010-07-16T11:03:00.001-07:00

It’s so colorful LOL…

Um can never have too much nail polish, no matter what your parents/husband/boyfriend/friends think LOL…seriously though, it’s really hard to not keep adding polishes to the carts. Searching through Orly polishes I made a list of everything I wanted from them…this is the result. Literally, I’m only missing one single polish, but I think I can get it from another site…that sounds dangerous though…more polishes…oooh…

Gotta love discount beauty sites, feeds the addictions…I believe this will kick off my nail posts…stay tuned..

Haulage: MAC a+o & In the Groove

2010-07-12T10:02:00.001-07:00

So when I first got really into makeup, I’d have to buy EVERYTHING that came out in a collection. Luckily now, I’m “secure” enough in my makeup collection that I just let most things go and only pick up what I want and feel I need (or whatever looks cute, it’s a fine line LOL). Honestly, I don’t really haul anymore, just pick up a few things here and there. The one thing I will always jump on is a hot nail color. When I saw MAC’s alice + olivia collection’s Morning.After, I knew I would jump on it. (Nail posts are coming up soon so stay tuned to see my collection and let the true nail junkie be released!!!) Jump on it I did. The morning the alice + olivia & In the Groove collections came out, I was lucky enough to catch @temptalia’s tweet about the collection’s release first thing when I opened my TweetDeck! I headed straight over to MAC’s site and picked up a few things.

As you can see I only picked up a few things. Mostly lip related (lip junkie much?). From alice + olivia collection I picked up the Partylicious pigment, Morning.After & Military polishes & the I.Want.Candy lipglass. From In the Groove I got All Styled Up & Jazzed l/s, On the Scene & Fashion Whim Creamsheen glasses.

Partylicious pigment just looks awesome in the bottle. I don’t know if I ever told you all, but any shade of blue is my favorite color! I especially love this particular shade of teal blue (LOL in a strange coincidence I had painted my nails for the week a similar sorta blue/green. FYI: China Glaze Custom Kicks.) I refer to this color of blue as the Chloe blue, do you remember Chloe Dao from Project Runway? She always used teals of this color family and I LOVED IT!

In the bottle it looks much more on the blue side of teal…however, when you apply it, it is much more on the green (I’d like to point out tho, my skin color has A LOT of yellow undertones, which could possibly add in the changing of the color). Applying it wet and dry also leaves two different strengths in color as you can see below. Dry application looks more faded and played down, spraying a little of your favorite mixing medium, Fix+ or Pur Minerals Fulvic Mist spray makes the color pop and be more vibrant.

It reminds me of the green you’d see in a peacock’s feather, no? Loves it! Any pink undertoned ladies try this and get a different color?

Again, the Alice + Olivia collection caught me with their awesome shade of blue in the polish department.

Military is a nail color for those of you who like matte finishes.

It’s sparkly, but dries to a flat finish (I feel like I’m talking about wall paint…). Growing up as an Army brat & working for a living on military related things, it really reminds me of the flat finish you see on tanks and hummers…only with sparkles. Don’t be fooled if you’ve never tried a matte polish. Even though it looks dry, mattes are like all other polishes. They need time to dry all the way through! Plus side is, you don’t need a top coat! What you do need to do it get the polish on fast before the outer shell mattes! It makes it hard to even out your coat.

Nubar’s Midnight from their Night Sky collection is pretty much the same. I believe I read one has more sparkles…let’s face it. If you have one or the other, you don’t really need both. FYI, Nubar is cheaper ($7.49 on Nubar’s site, compared to $12 for Military at MAC, which is sold-out)

Morning.After is a sexy teal-ish leaning way more on the blue side. I love this color. I wore this color the instant I got it (after taking all these pics of course LOL) and got many compliments on it. It’s a hot color. It’s always been a hot color and will definitely be a hot color forever…but that’s just my opinion.

I started thinking I had some colors that were similar though. While similar, Morning.After still is in a shade of it’s own. Below you can see the difference between Color Club’s Gossip Column (darker than), Morning.After, & China Glaze’s Shower Together (lighter than).

Lastly from a+o I picked up the I.Want.Candy lipglass cream. My pictures do not show how truly NEON this thing is IRL. O_O Seriously, I was thinking what did I get myself into? To my surprise it wasn’t as bad layered with something. Here you can see it comes with the applicator brush not the sponge tip, which I love.

By itslef on your lips, it could make you look a little sickly if you layer it on too much, but a nice coat on one lip then pressing together wasn’t too bad looking if you wanted to wear it alone.

Okay why buy it if it’s neon yellow? Well it sounds crazy but I have the gold-yellow Liberated from the Style Warrior collection and I LOVE to layer it with coffee colored lipsticks. So why not try this one?…

Here you can see I.Want.Candy layered with Sunsation from the Style Warrior collection as well. Doesn’t it look nice? I didn’t get a chance to dip into other colors, but I.Want.Candy is a good layering gloss to me.

From In the Groove, All styled up is a nice candy pink Creamsheen lipstick. Goes on smooth and didn’t feel too drying at all (that’s what I love most about Creamsheens). At first glance I thought it looked a lot like Saint Germain…but when I swatched them I saw the difference.

Jazzed is another Creamsheen. I fell for this color because it’s coral shade of pink is one of my favorite types of coral colors. Not too orange, not too pink. Just right to me. Again, I tried to see if I had any comparisons, the closest I got in my collection of lippies was Lollipop loving and Ever Hip (Liberty of London)…but still nothing close enough.

Somewhat underwhelming were the Creamsheen glasses. They both were quite sheer, on first glance on, they look the same but you can subtly pick up on the coral in On The Scene & the light pink in Fashion Whim. They do make your lips look quite nice and supple looking though. I’ll definitely give them that. Not at a waste at all in my collection because a sheer pass of color can be sexy depending on the look.

The closest color I had was Boy Bait…it’s kind of a mix between the two, no?

So I’d say, Partylicious pigment, Morning.After polish are must haves (Hopefully some store still has them because they’re sold out on MAC). I’d recommend I.Want.Candy l/g, All Styled Up & Jazzed lipsticks, not necessarily a makeup stash requirement. Everything else, you could probably pass on if you already had similar colors. I didn’t pick up any of the Mineralized Skinfinishes because I already have a lot of them in my stash. I even have Petticoat already from a previous collection. Everyone’s making a big fuss about Stereo Rose, but I feel I have a similar color somewhere in my collection. If not, oh well, I’m not going to cry about not getting it.

Toodles everyone…

Real quick EOTD..

2010-06-17T10:06:00.001-07:00

I spent all day yesterday trying to get this blog straightened out…OMG~ no more CSS for me for a while. Anyway, I just wanted to give a quick eye I did last Saturday. I didn’t get a whole face shot though, which is sad because apparently I had a nice “glow.” But wait it wasn’t the glow I was thinking:

Friends: OMG, you look so good and happy. You’re glowing.
Me: Um (don’t take compliments gracefully LOL)…Thanks, I think it’s just my makeup.
Friends: Really? I thought you just had sex or something..
Me: o_O……..Uh…no…

Anyway…

Nothing fancy just a quick little thing.

I Used:
Too Faced Eye Shadow Insurance
MAC Da Bling [over 2/3 of lid]
MAC Nocturnelle mixed with a little MAC Shadowy Lady [over 1/3 & crease]
MAC Naked Lunch [blend edges]
Revlon ColorStay Liquid Liner
Covergirl LashBlast Mascara

I love soccer so I’ve been watching the teams I’m looking forward to making it up the ladder of the World Cup stages. Basically I root for Korea #1 (naturally), then France, Italy, Brazil, Germany, & Spain (in no particular order). Unfortunately Korea lost their match against Argentina today :( I kinda figured they would but to lose by 3 points and to have let the ball hit your own defender in a corner kick and go into your own goal…That’s tragic..Then of course to continue the bad luck, Greece won their game. I doubt they’ll beat Argentina next week in the final group games, so I’m not worried about that. Korea HAS to win against Nigeria next week though. So if Korea wins and Greece loses we’re moving on to the Round of 16. I’ll be cheering with my team Korea shirts and scarf.
대~한민국 *짝*짝*짝짝짝*!

France is going up next in about an hour so I go my headphones ready (EPSN radio online, you are my savior right now).

I feel like a neglectful parent..

2010-06-10T13:20:00.001-07:00

For my one cheeky monkey that reads this (gotta stop watching Craig Ferguson LOL), you are not forgotten, I’ve just been cooking more than I have been messing with makeup. Wanna see what I’ve been making? Go check out my other blog~ angrykimchiquilts.blogspot.com! I know you wanna. *push* Go LOL…I’ll be posting something soon. I’ve been thinking of combining blogs again, I’m so indecisive about the whole blog thing. What do you guys think?

Still Kicking..Barbie-ish FOTD?…

2010-03-22T11:41:00.001-07:00

I assure you all I’m still alive here, just busy, busy, busy! I’m soo tired from this past weekend alone. I just don’t do well when I don’t have rest.. Anyway, just so this post isn’t picture-less. I got bored one night a few weeks ago and threw some makeup on for the camera…I think it resembles a Barbie doll I used to have. (BTW: I’m really sorry if my watermarking annoys the crap out of you all, but if someone takes my pics I at least want some credit for MY pics, let people know who they really belong to. Ya feel me?..And if you were to take the time to Photoshop that out, you are seriously a loser..)
Anyway, I used Sugarpill Cosmetics on the eyes. I really do like this stuff a lot. It’s so easy to apply and work with and bright!

Here you can see what I did sorta. If anyone wants a full on tutorial, I’d be happy to do one, I just did this on a bored whim one night. I’ll list the products in a sec.

Eyes: Sugarpill Pressed e/s in Tako (all over lid, from pink to brow as well)
Sugarpill Pressed e/s in Poison plum (on V & crease)
Sugarpill Pressed e/s in Dollipop (above crease blended with purple)
Rimmel Liquid Liner in Black (top)
Urban Decay 24/7 Pencil Liner in Black (bottom & smudged)
NYX False Lashes Style No. 112
Lips:
MAC St. Germain
MAC Dazzleglass in Extra Amps
Lens:Nudy Blue Circle Lens
What did everyone do for St. Patrick’s day? I mean makeup wise? I did a green eye that day, but uh yeah, I rush in the morning so it wasn’t the greatest thing. I might redo it just for whoever wants to see it. I didn’t do anything but work that day. Sucks when all your friends are married and/or have kids, work crappy hours. *sigh* Too bad for me, I’m not looking for that right now. I can’t wait for my vacay~ hurry up! I’m tired of working. I’m standing by my claim to the master bedroom with the bathroom, woman needs her space!

Haulage: MAC & Liberty of London

2010-03-10T22:31:00.000-08:00

Before we begin, I'll be heading to the beach in Destin this year!! I've never had a family vacay, I'm going specifically with my friends, but I invited my parents & my brother to come with me. I've found a house I want to rent but I can't get everyone to agree at this moment and you all know, during the busy summer months you better jump on a nice house. Plus the house is literally right down the street from the house my bestie & her cousins are renting. But my mother is already being bitchy and saying stupid shit. See her friend went on her second cruise in 4 months (her daughter & their son-in-law are pretty damn rich too), awesome for them. But she's jealous as hell and not trying to say it straight out that she is. My dad was like yeah she said Mrs. C's living the high life and she lives the shit life............yeah, you want to talk 'bout an unappreciative person, I think you'll find my mother in the dictionary. I don't even want to invite her now. We aint rich, and I've just paid for half the shit in this house, so be fucking happy I'm even inviting you down when I want to spend most of my time with my best friends...

Alright....I have to admit...sometimes I let my little inner demon that tells me to constantly buy this and buy that win over...Apparently I do this all the time. One day I will stop listening to that dammed thing and let the little...teeny, tiny angel that tells me to save my cashola win an argument one day. But if I did, I'd have nothing to post about right? (NOTICE: I am now, nor have I ever been solicited to write reviews for any of the following companies or websites. I bought all the things mentioned in this article with my own moolah! The money my job pays me to do the shit I do everyday...)

Well let's start with a normal thing for me, I ordered some hair dye. Palty in Natural Brown, I've decided to stay dark for a while longer. My hair needs a break from the damaging bleach laced dyes that make my hair orange all summer!...Although I'm pretty damn sure it's better if I were to just let it grow out natural, but I have hereditary grey hair and they gots'ta go!!!

I love the Tsubaki Camelia Damage Hair Mask. I'm sure this has been helping my hair in the past few months I've been using. My hair has been much less damaged and it's really good for after using said dye in the hair! (Seriously, I recommend a hair mask or some other hair moisturizing treatment after a dye job, esp with Palty dyes.) I also got some more bang guards in black this time. I love these things, so great in the morn to just slide that in and do what you gotta do. It even works on my hair (which I have to add hair grease to). Then the samples...I'm guessing the red thing is a shampoo & conditioner, but the pink sample is a lotion/toner/moisturizer type thing. I don't think I've ever used the sample from Webichi. I just stick 'em in a drawer for extras when I sell stuff LOL
I picked everything up at webichi.com if you're searching!
Palty is $11.99 a box
Tsubaki hair mask is $19.99 a container (it lasts a pretty long time, little goes a long way)
Bang guards were like $2.50 or $3.00 I can't remember.

I would like to really thank Jen at frmheadtotoe.com for posting that lovely discount to wowsocool.com!! There was a special code for readers of Jen's blog to go and get a whopping 30% off of Konad plates & supplies! Awesomeness, I've been wanting these things forever, but didn't want to spend all that money (you'd think it wouldn't be an issue). I did spend way too much because, you know, once you start looking through and adding things, you just can't stop! These things make nail design super easy and fun

I think I got like 17 of them, all kinds of designs...I played with them a little, but I need to practice, it's really fun though.
Bought from wowsocool.com
Plates are $6.99 each
Two-sided stamper w/ metal scraper was $6.99
Smaller stamp w/ metal scraper was $4.99

MANIC HAULAGE~
I'm a sucker for awesome packaging...The more arty fartsy it is, the more attracted to it. MAC as you all know (I'm assuming) released their Give Me Liberty of London collection in in their annual cooperation with major fashion houses. Liberty of London coincidentally released a line for Target...just a FYI. After seeing this on Temptalia so long ago I knew I was in on this collection...damn it...I spent. Nordstrom's put the collection up on the site on Monday, a day before it officially released on the MAC website. Hoping I could get it over-nighted I paid the $25 extra to get it Tuesday...Well that was pointless b/c "due to an error" they couldn't ship it next day. But, they gave me my 25 bucks back and sent it overnight so I got it all today! LOL All good, it would have taken 'til today to get it from MAC since they only released it on the site in the afternoon (I don't even try our MAC counter here).

I love this packaging. I hate when I get something and I don't want to even throw the boxes away! That's just pitiful LOL I still have the packaging from the Hello Kitty release...Yeah anyway, it's very Victorian in feeling with a modern twist.

I think I like the inside of the packaging just as much as the outside craziness! These flowers are in every single box. IDK why I like such a simple thing so much.

So I ended up with the two beauty powder blushes Shell Pearl & Summer Rose. I don't know if you guys all remember the Hello Kitty collection that had beauty powder blushes but these are totally different from those. You can normally use beauty powders to just buff the face and set foundations and such.

These are much more like blushes & highlighters. The beauty powders from the Hello Kitty collection were very neutral and matte. If you wanted to use them as blush you'd pretty much have to really swirl your brush in there and try it. Not so true with these particular beauty powders. These have more pigments and glitter.

Summer Rose would make a nice pink highlighter color or a really shiny blush. Okay...I've used shinier....trust me...The Shell Pearl is a really nice peachy shimmery nude color. This for me would work fantastically as a highlighter. I'm very glad I bought these because now I have my NARS Albatross which is a gold base highlighter, and these two which can give off different effects. If you brush this all over your face, just make sure you get your chest & neck too ladies...it would look weird if only your face were sparklin' like that...now infamous vampire that sparkles in the sun...

I also picked up both blushes from the collection. I'm really liking this purple blush thing and think it would look fab on black women...(I can't get my friend to test it out tho LOL she doesn't trust me..). On olive women like myself, it looks pretty darn good as well...but uh you gotta make sure you don't cross that "that looks like someone punched you in the face" look...yeah..as I said before on the Color Forecast blushes...it could go there!

My camera was reading really dark tonight no matter the settings so these are a bit brighter in real life. Prim & Proper is much more peachy pink and a nice summer date night shade. Dirty Plum is beatutiful to me..but perhaps it's because I like purple so much. They both went on easily and were pretty darn pigmented.

I picked up all the Lipsticks & 3 of the lipglosses. I'm so happy I did...I've really gotta stop with the lipstick glosses.

The last one there...Petals & Peacocks...I really feel like I've seen this exact color somewhere in my collection...is it just me? I think my eyes have been staring at waaay too many colors lately..but the gnawing curiosity that I've seen that pertty fuschia pink in my collection before bugged me...I knew what it looked like, but could MAC have possibly used this color in another collection?..

Uh yeah...there was a color a couple years (?? has it been that long?). I adore this color when doing random photos....You 'memba Gladiola from the Dame Edna collection?...Yep, that's the one...Petals & Peacocks, you've been found! One difference though...Gladiola from Dame Edna was a Matte color, this Petals & Peacocks is a Amplified lipstick. So really one is shinier & more reflective than the other

Now...ask me if that really bothers me? I love this color for some reason. It's awesome & can work for many looks really...Honest, I've tried! Now I have one I don't have to add gloss to so Gladiola can stay in all it's matte glory!

Review: Need Some Suga'?!

2010-03-03T21:46:00.000-08:00

CLICK ON PICTURES TO SEE A LITTLE BIGGER VERSION

Wow, thanks Internet for sucking ass! Couldn't save before my Internet crash, luckily I had most of the words, but the pictures had to be readded all over again...Don't you love that...

Anyway~ LOL Maybe I should start off with, 1) sorry my hand is soooo friggin' dry in the pics, I had some irritation from the spray adhesive for the quilt I finished up last weekend. 2) sorry the quick eye makeup sample is not so hot, I'll have a proper look soon...

Initial Thoughts:

Mm hmm the rage across all the blogs right now is indeed the Sugarpill Cosmetics pressed eye shadows and Chroma Lust (I love that name) pigment powders. By the lovely Amy, you may know her as @shrinkle on Twitter or her blog. (Notice: I’m in no way affiliated with Sugarpill or any other company mentioned in this review or biased in my review, these are my honest opinions. I paid for this order out of my own pocket.)

I ordered the two pressed shadow pallets as that was cheaper AND had all the colors I wanted. I also ordered 7 jars of Chroma Lust pigments.

If I saw this in a store, I’d be automatically attracted to see what this was about. The packaging is bright and screams “LOOK AT ME!!” The lace detail in the drawing and gothic Lolita-esque inspired printing makes it cute and girly, but edgy all at once. Every inch of this box has been designed and detailed, you can appreciate the hard work that went into them (so much so I really hate to just toss them).

The outer packaging for the quads

These palettes are heavy out of the box! I like this because it feels super sturdy and..."bulletproof" LOL...When I compared it to my 6-pan Stila case though, Sugarpill's was only slightly heavier...if I had all six slots in the Stila case filled. I think they'd be around the same weight. I leave my makeup at home (except the tons of lipstick/glosses in my makeup bag) so it's not like I'm carrying it around. If you do carry around your makeup, you'll probably want to go the way of the individual shadows. OR maybe you can depot these? & throw them in a case...but I love the packaging too much, I don't think I could part with the case LOL
The palettes include a handy dandy mirror in the top half. Each of the palettes come with 4 colors @ $34. (Think 4 shadows x $12 = 48, it’s like buy 3 get 1 free and then some!

Palette Burning Heart comes with Flamepoint (orange), Buttercupcake (yellow), Love+ (red pink), & Poison Plum (purple).

Palette Sweetheart comes with Dollipo (hot pink), Afterparty (bright blue), Midori (in fact, Japanese for Green), & Tako (white)

Don't be shy if you plan on wearing these, subtely is not in these cards. Just check out my hand here. (Told you my hand was scary today!)

No joke, I don’t have a base or anything on my hand (my hand is extra dry as a matter of fact LOL), I just used my finger and did a few lines of each color. They went on easily and blended well (I did a sample on my arm I forgot to take a pic of). Tako, Flamepoint, and Buttercupcake are a bit on the chalky side at first glance in the sample picture. However, they picked up on a brush very easily and blended smoothly! When I applied it to my eye, they weren't nearly as chalky as they seemed on my hand. They went on easier and were brighter on the first application, than MAC's Orange or Yellow shadows to me. Tako took so little effort to pick up with the brush. So don't let a first impression fool you. What seems chalky at first in the end works very smoothly and bright!

Sugarpill also has a Cold Heart Palette (which was not there when I ordered, but except for the Bulletproof (black) I have all the colors anyway).

I hadn’t intended to, but I ended up with most of the ChromaLust pigments. Again the attention to detail on the packaging makes me not want to toss them away.

So I ended up with Junebug, Asylum, Decora, Hysteric, Magpie, Royal Sugar, and Starling.

Unlike the pressed shadows the pigments have a kick of glitter in each of them. They give off a different vibe from the pressed shadows while still being bright and colorful. I’m particularly in love with Asylum, a good red is hard to find and this is the exact shade I’ve been looking for. It’s more solid red as opposed to an orange-ish or pink-ish red.

I love dual-tones as well and Junebug and Magpie in particular are beautiful. I also love the little icons on the labels for each pigment! Hehe attention to detail and making something your own is important in packaging. Pigments and single shadows both run $12.

All the pigments went on without any effort at all. They were smooth and easily blended. I simply touched my finger into the powder and there it was. No base in any of these swatch pics by the way.

Comparison:

Let's talk about the yellow and orange first. Probably two of the hardest to find a really excellent version of. I swatched them next to my MAC Chrome Yellow and Orange.

As you can see MAC's Chrome Yellow next to Sugarpill's Buttercupcake, MAC's is actually on the chalkier side. Now I did try to rub it in and see if it got any better, but this was about as decent as I got.

There's no bases on these. Sugarpill's is smoother and not chalky at all. MAC's yellow also took about 5 circles (applying after each swirl) in the pot with my finger to get this much on my hand, the Sugarpill was 3. So it took less and came out not chalky.

With the orange I had a similar result.

I did about 3 swilrs in the MAC and 2 in the Sugarpill, you can see that the Sugarpill resulted in a nice deep orange color where the MAC would need a couple of more tries to apply. MAC also was chalkier in my sample.

With the pigments, I think Sugarpill won out as
Yes, obviously I know 5 grams will be bigger than 1 gram, I'm using it for reference so those who have one or the other can compare.

Roughly there's 1 gram of product in my Beauty from the Earth jar, I paid $6.50 for this jar. the 5 gram jar from Sugarpill is $12 dollars...mmm yeah, I think Sugarpill is worth the money, and you get more product. I like both companies so it's just a matter of taste.

FaceFront's pigment jar. They're both 5 grams. One is obviously more squat than the other, BUT most of my Sugarpill jars were filled almost to the top.

Time's like this I wish I had a little scale to weigh these. But I don't so. If I were to guess, I'd think I was getting a lot more Sugarpill than the FaceFront.

Now I said the palettes were heavy, but in comparison to this 6-pan Stila palette I got off of beautycrunch.com so long ago w/ all 6 pans in, I think they're roughly the same. Not bad considering the Stila pans are slightly smaller.

And here I've done a few comparisons to help you understand that these pans, they're pretty fucking big. Definitely bigger than MAC & this particular Urban Decay style pot. Stila is just a bit shy of being the same size. If Nars were in a round pot, I'd guess it's be somewhere around the size of the Stila pot, smaller though. I don't have the pans near me to check sizes though. Interestingly, Sugarpill and Ulta Brand single shadows are the same size.

Overview:

Packaging is fab, colors are bright and pigmented even without a base. Reds always stain the skin, no matter the company, so you’ll want to use a base to help with that. Right now there’s a limited group of colors, but I’ll be watching Sugarpill when the line expands in the future (??). Shipping was really fast...mm I ordered on a Thursday, I think and got it Saturday in the mail. Pressed shadows and Chroma Lust pigments blended well. I think it's worth the money because the color payoff is so great!

^Check out the stamp on the front of the shipping box
Probably what I loved most, even though it was such a tiny thing.

Amy actually signed the receipt! LOL It’s the little things that mean so much to people. Now, I don’t expect her to sign every single receipt in the future. It’s nice to see while she’s so busy launching her line though (I know she’s getting tons of orders right now). Thanks Amy and nothing but the best in this and future endeavors! I love your stuff!

WHERE TO BUY?!

Site: Sugarpill Shop

Pricing:
Palettes = $34; Single Shadows and Chroma Lust Pigments = $12 each

MAC'n the Seasons...

2010-02-25T19:36:00.000-08:00

I'm waiting on 2 things at this moment, a pizza to finish cookin' in the oven and 김연아 (Kim Yuna) to skate her freestyle! I was so excited for her Tuesday night. I hope things go well for all the skaters (but I'm a little biased yes). Asado had a great program as well, I was worried for a moment. Rochette..man, I feel so sorry for her, yet so happy that she was able to make the top 3. I hope she stays strong and gives a good performance tonight as well.

So I'm still waiting for a 2 lipsticks from my Nordstrom order, I hate ordering from Nordstrom, I ordered 8 things and I got a package Monday, 2 packages Tuesday, and a package yesterday. Perhaps they need a central location...I only ordered from Nordstrom's because they had most of the stuff I wanted that was sold out at MAC. Anyway, I'll show you what I've gotten so far.

MAC Color Forecast Ombre Blushes...I REALLY wanted the orange one, but my slow ass thought I'd wait to get everything (is that EVER a good idea with collections like this?)...So it seems I've missed the orange blush (better yet, did I even need it?).

Vintage Grape lives very true to it's name, it's very purple and so pretty. I'd like to see this on some fair skin ladies though (pics anyone?)...In my head I'm picturing this on someone with fair skin like they just got punched in the face...yeah, it could go there with too heavy a hand.

Azalea Blossom on the other hand I can see on many skin types.

It has some blue pink as you get down to the bottom. I tried it on when I got it and it's such a fab color!. I'd recommend this for pretty much anyone..we're however not sharing those pictures...talk about a tired ass face!

I also got 2 lipglasses in Ember Glow & Almondine.

Ember Glow is a nice coral, orange pink color. This one along with the Colour Me Coral lipstick reminded me very much of spring. This is a very nice color if you you're a seasonal makeup person for spring and summer. It just gives you a light summery feel.

Almondine is a nice transclucent pearl color gloss. This one will add a nice shine to your lipsticks. Mmm, I'm picturing this over some nice nudy pink colors, no? What do you think?

Finally, I picked up Colour Me Coral & From the All Ages/Races/Sexes collection, Myself.

Colour Me Coral much like it's lipglass mate is a nice coral, orange pink color. I really like this color, again, it gives you that springy feel and just looks fab...Did I ever mention I have a strange obsession with orange blushes and lippies? Seriously it's strange. Orange just seems to bring out certain colors in my skin to me. I don't know what, but I like it LOL

....Myself is a FANTASTIC everyday nudish color! I love this one, I've been wearing it since I got it with my NARS Striptease gloss. I may just have to pick up another one. Hmm, is this one part of the permanent line? Because if it is, I'll hold off a minute LOL (and look where it got me before.)

LOL I had a thought when I was editing this picture though. In this lighting from my camera's flash...do my lips look a little vulgar? Hahaha I don't know, something seems wrong with this one to me..

Ugh, I can't wait til Sunday, my dad will finally be home from my aunt's funeral which was today....So uh any DC-ers if you saw a group of funeral go-ers got in your way at about...12 or so that was probably my family. I love my dad so any time he's gone and I'm home with my mom alone I morbidly think about the time when he'll be gone for good. I try not to, but it slips in. I'm a daddy's girl, I don't know what the hell I would do if he died anytime soon. Sigh...

But let's not end this on that note okay?! Yuna should be skating within the hour maybe~ sooooooooo~~
YUNA FIGHTING!!!!!
AJA AJA YUNA FTW~~!!!

Bubblegum & Pot Pie...

2010-02-20T22:25:00.000-08:00

Mmm, it's Saturday night and I'm pooped! I feel like I've been housewiving it all day! My bro was supposed to come up this weekend but low-and-behold, him & his wife got sick after skiiing the weekend before. We won't be going down there anytime soon. My uncle's wife passed this morning from cancer and my dad is heading up to DC for like a week with his brothers & sisters. I know he don't want to be there that long, but they offered to rent a van and drive instead of everyone trying to drive themselves. In my family's fashion however, they are partying it up in DC right now. That's how we do. We only tend to gather at funerals and when we do, it's a huge party! I guess you could say we like to celebrate the lives of our dead, that's when the stories start going around the table and people remember the good times...I didn't know my uncle's wife very well, but they were married for 47 years and they were very close and in love. R.I.P Aunt Becca....

And to segway from that...I picked up this NYX gloss on a pure whim the other day while I was at Ulta getting my powder foundation.

From the Goddess of the Night gloss set, I picked up La~La~...about the only color they had that I wanted LOL the whole rack was GONE! other than some super duper dark colors that wouldn't work for me. Let me start by saying, not only does it look bubblegum pink in the tube, this stuff smells like bubblegum! I don't know what they put in it, but I'm probably glad they didn't make it taste like bubblegum as well. If it tasted anything like the Bath and Body Works lip gloss tubes...you'd spend more time licking & re-applying it than actual wear time.

The tube is a little deceiving it doesn't quite come off that pink IRL...I'm sure if you applied enough you could get that color. It does add a nice pink color to your lips however. I keep this one in my bag for on-the-go lip seduction LOL It's not sticky at all, feels more like...mmm...yeah, I could compare it to MAC's lip conditioners...It's lighter than NYX glosses I've tried before. As long as you don't eat or drink of course, it stays on a good while. I'm a makeup-holic in general but I particuarly like my mouth (is that weird to say) so since these were so nice. At Ulta it was $5, I didn't find it on Cherry Culture so I'm not sure where you could find it a bit cheaper. I'd say it's worth the price though, most of the NYX products I have tried have been great, so add another to the list.

I will say, I wish NYX would find a different wand for application across all their l/g! It's very rough to me, does anyone feel the same? It's a little like running the scrubber side of a sponge on my lips...Surely there's something a little better out there for them to pick..

And I leave you with my Chicken Pot Pie I made this evening, and the white chocolate, sliced almond cookies I made this afternoon. Like I said, I've been getting down with the housewiving today...Mostly because it was my day to play with the new oven that was finally installed! It really goes to show that these new appliances may be all energy star whatever the crap they want to be, but I had twice as much room in the "same size" oven from 1950 something we had in there than this one. I could barely fit my baking pan in the there! I have to get used to it though, my cookies came out harder than I like. I'm not used to an oven that actually works efficiently have to shave a few minutes off my cook times now.

Thinking about....

2010-02-14T00:02:00.000-08:00

trying to figure out what to do with my hair this year when the weather warms up. I really like the effect of having the dark hair this winter. Let's face it, we all want to lighten up a bit when it's warmer though. I have a few problems with going lighter though: It's so damaging, it's high maitainance, I have naturally curly hair so when I sweat...the hair curls up and looks nasty...I think I found an alternative if I don't want to ruin my hair again this year (I love Palty but the lighter colors damage my hair too much), plus the roots start showing and that takes me back to mainting...anyway I've had this weave piece from Sally's for like a year now. I bought clips and weave thread and made a little clip in hair piece. I think this'll be the way for me this year...

LOL I was not having a good face day, hence the color block there...but aside from that, the weave is human hair, I just have to practice hiding the tracks because my hair isn't that thick to begin with. Mmm, yes Watson, I think we have it...

It's been crazy weather here, I know it has been for most of the country. I love winter though, I need to live somewhere where it snows like crazy and then I don't have to go to work, just shovel my walk (who am I kidding, I'd have the most awesome snowblower ever!), and go back to bed because work is cancelled!!...Just need a fireplace and a Korean gas stove, I wouldn't have a worry in the world if the power blew LOL I'm sure many of you will think I'm crazy now..

Oh I have a Tumblr now folks...there's not much in it right now since I was sick last week, other bodily issues this week and just haven't done anything. I'm hoping it becomes a photo blog type thing in the end (cuz that's what tumblr's a good avenue for). I bought some new cameras I'll share, but in the mean time, if you want to follow my Tumblr then be my guest: angrykimchi.tumblr.com

On a serious note:
If you've seen the news since last night you will know a biology professor shot and killed 3 of her colleagues as the University of Alabama in Huntsville. Well I work right across the street from where the incident occured. I was home by then, but I heard a million cops & ambulances fly past my house. It was about 20 minutes later when it broke on the news here. I have many many friends who went to & are currently attending UAH, I have a friend who is also a psychology professor there (they're all okay), they've lost some good professors to them. This incident came 7 days almost to the hour after a 14 year old boy was shot and killed by another 14 year old boy at a local middle school. He was laid to rest this Friday afternoon, a mere 4 hours before this Harvard educated professor made her aweful decision over not getting her fucking tenure...A similar incident occured 2 days before in Tennessee when an elementary school teacher didn't receive his tenure either...What the fuck is wrong with people nowadays?! I have so much more I could say but in interest of not debating, I won't...Please keep the victims and their familes in your thoughts.