Saturday 29 November 2014

MY TOP MLBB'S AT THE MOMENT

This is a shorter post, since it hasn't been long since my last one. In case you didn't know, and MLBB stands for a 'my lips but better' product. I have pale, pinky-mauve-nude lips, is the best way I can describe it. These are my top MLBB's with reviews (:


First one is the Maybelline Colour Elixir in Caramel Infused. I won't go too much on about this one, since I did a review in my Priceline 40% off Cosmetics Haul and Review. I like the sweet smell, I like the precise applicator (which is super soft and lovely on the lips, may I add), I like the what I call 'perfect lip gloss' formula, I love the sleek packaging and I love the colour. 




Second one is the Bourjois Rouge Edition Velvet in 07 Nudist. It's not really a nude to me, but it's the most nude out of the range. It's quite pink, and the most different from my natural lip shade out of the four, but it's easily worn by me. These are highly pigmented, cream mousse-like liquid lipsticks. They glide on opaque and leave a nice matte finish. Only thing is that they can get sticky throughout the day, and smells like silly string (eugh!). But, I really like the colour...so it's totally worth it. 




Third one is the Revlon Lip Butter in Pink Truffle. The Revlon lip butters are fabulous. Sheer, buttery colour with a smooth moisturising formula and all the rage in the beauty community about one to two years ago. The formula is great, the colours are great and I just overall love them. 




My last one is the Ulta3 Matte Lipstick in Brown Sugar. It's a mauve-brown, more autumn-y for me as it's darker than the rest on my lips. I love the formula, especially for a matte lipstick. It's very smooth and creamy and doesn't leave my lips super dry. Their entire range is fabulous anyway, so if you see them, check 'em out!




Here are some swatches; from L-R is Maybelline Colour Elixir in Caramel Infused, Bourjois Rouge Edition Velvet in Nudist, Revlon Lip Butter in Pink Truffle an Ulta3 Matte Lipstick in Brown Sugar.




Even though they all may look starkly different, they kind of all look very similar to my lip colour, which is kind of weird. JUST LESS THAN A MONTH 'TILL CHRISTMAS *squeals excitedly* WHO'S EXCITED TOO? 

- Jess xo

Friday 21 November 2014

PRICELINE 40% OFF COSMETICS HAUL + REVIEW

As some may know, on Tuesday and Wednesday the 18th and 19th of November, Priceline had a 40% off cosmetics sale. Most people went completely gaga, stocking up on old favourites, grabbing new things, impulsively buying anything that was popular or looked good and using this chance to grab some things they've had their eye on for a while. You may know heaps of people who took this chance to spend over $200, but me being, well me, I just picked up some things that I've heard good reviews on. Even then it totalled to over $50, which is still a price I'd regretfully spend, while to others that's like cents to them. Anyway, here's the things I bought and my thoughts!

And, my exams officially finished yesterday, EEEEEE! (Reason why I've been MIA recently) I feel like I need to study, but I don't have anything to study for and that, makes me very very happy. I actually got my bottom braces today, so it's mashed potato and overcooked pasta for me for the next couple days, but I definitely don't mind (especially for heaps of potato, hehehe ^_^) 

Also, these pictures in this blog post are mine and not googles, YAY! .-.


Eyes

I picked up four things for the eyes, the Covergirl Clump Crusher Extensions in Very Black, the Maybelline Lasting Drama Waterproof Gel Eyeliner in Blackest Black, the Maybelline Full 'N Soft Mascara in Very Black and the Essence Gel Pencil Eyeliner in Cocoa Bean.












I still have yet to try the Covergirl Clump Crusher Extensions, but from reviews I've seen, it looks pretty good. I'm not sure how I feel about the brush being out of the mascara tube, but I like that you can actually get a glimpse of how the brush looks like instead of pulling it out and seeing a slightly defined wand covered in gloopy black stuff. (That doesn't sound great, since we do put that 'gloopy black stuff' on our lashes, but meh, it makes them look good ._.). I like the packaging, I like the bright green colour as it's very eye catching. 

For the Maybelline Lasting Drama Waterproof Eyeliner, it was my first gel eyeliner. I've tried many pencils and some liquid, but I've seen heaps of people rave about how gel eyeliner is their favourite form of liner, so i thought I'd give it a try. 
First of all, I love it. I think it may be my favourite form of eyeliner too now. I like how the gel is creamy, pigmented and glides on to the upper lash line. It can be easily smudged out and is quite forgiving for my not so steady hands. I find that although there are some very creamy pencil eyeliners, I find myself going over them on my upper lash line. Liquid liners are great when I want a nice precise line, but again, not very steady hands. Especially with my favourite liquid eyeliner (the Maybelline Master Precise Liquid Liner) being waterproof, it gets frustrating after a while having to remove my mistakes (along with the good part of my eyeliner) and doing it again. 
Now for the actual product, it is very black, not patchy and nice. The brush is quite nice for an included brush, being a soft but sturdy, rounded edged brush. The cover that comes with it is open, but fits snugly. I do prefer to use a small angled brush, but it's still quite nice. It's not exactly 'waterproof and smudge proof' as promised, as it did smudge under my eyes a tiny bit and when I rubbed my eyes, some black came off onto my fingers. But I still like it.

The Maybelline Full 'N Soft is one of my repurchases. It's a lovely mascara for a natural look. It gives my lashes length, a tiny bit of volume and quite a natural look which I like. It doesn't leave my lashes clumpy and gives them a nice, clean look. It smudges a tiny bit on me, but that's what the waterproof version is for right?

The Essence Gel Eyeliner in Cocoa Bean was one of those 'it looks good' impulse purchases I was talking about earlier. I thought that I really like the Essence Long Lasting Eyeliners, and since gel eyeliner in a pencil seems to be all the rage right now, it sounds promising. Plus it's a twist up and at less than $3? Why not right? It's very creamy, pigmented and smooth. It goes on smoothly and feels like well, a gel eyeliner in a pencil! It's not exactly a gel eyeliner, but what do you expect huh? It's not waterproof like it states, but it's like a normal pencil on me, which is what I prefer anyway. 






LipsFor lips, I picked up the Maybelline Colour Elixir in Caramel Infused, the Maybelline Baby Lips Electro in Pink Shock, Berry Bomb and Oh Orange and the Lanolips Limited Edition Ballerina Set.The Maybelline Colour Elixir is like a gloss, with a shiny finish. It gives quite a decent colour payoff; it's no liquid lipstick, but it's pretty good. It's not uneven in terms of coverage, and it's easier to see with the brighter colours. Caramel Infused is a very natural colour, a MLBB if you will. It's glossy, moisturising and is a good formula. It smells sweet and has that bit of stickiness where your hair will stick to your lips in the wind, but isn't too sticky to where the product transfers between lips when you press them together. The way a good gloss, in my opinion, should be. I love the packaging, it's sleek with the clear casing ad the product in a lipstick bullet shaped inside. The cap is silver and has a good twist top and a nice doe foot applicator with the point at the end for precise application around the cupids bow and the outer edges of the lips. I love how it feels, I love the colour, I love the scent and I love the packaging. When I heard the Maybelline Baby Lips Electro collection (well, part of it) were coming to Australia, I freaked. The one time I ordered two of the original ones on eBay, I loved them. I picked them all up, and I love them. Pink Shock is my favourite, since it has the most pigmentation. It makes your lips a nice hot pink colour, but with that glossy look. Like a sheer hot pink gloss, but has lovely hydration. It has a nice sweet 'watermelon' flavour as the packaging says, but it's not that artificial watermelon flavour like watermelon gum. It's quite a sweet and fruity scent, and I like it. The formula is the same for all three, and I love them. Berry Bomb is my second favourite as it gives the lips a nice purple berry wash of colour. It's sheerer than Pink Shock, and has a nice sweet fruity scent to it too, but definitely more on the berry side. Oh Orange is a nice orange which actually lightens my lips and gives them a nice coral sheen. I'm not a fan of the scent though, since it reminds me of Vitamin C tablets. But overall, I like them! The RRP isn't my favourite, but at 40% off? Why not?

The Lanolips Ballerina set contains their famous 101 Ointment with Ultra Pure Grade Lanolin and their Intense Hand Balm with Rose Oil. The tin packaging is super cute and pretty, with the feminine and graceful feeling of a ballerina. It's a very nice tin to store things in. Inside there's the two products laid on lots of tissue paper...? Or butchers paper, I'm not sure. The 101 Ointment is definitely one of my holy grails now, just like my Lucas' Papaw Ointment. It moisturises even the most chapped, cracked lips and moisturises my cuticles like no other. It has no scent, and is apparently gentle enough to use on babies. I wouldn't have paid $18 for it, definitely no, but at $11 for both of them? Why not? The Intense Hand Balm with Rose Oil I have yet to try, but from how much I love the Ointment, I'm sure I'll love it too. I love rose scented products anyway, and the packaging of the actual products is super cute too! 



Nails

I didn't buy much for nails, only one product in fact. I was in definite need of a good top coat, so after reading up many reviews to find one that is accessible in Australia, I picked this one up. It's the Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Top Coat. I haven't had time to paint my nails yet, therefore being unable to test it yet, but I have high hopes from seeing so many people rave about this top coat. It was probably mainly Cutepolish on YouTube, seeing her nail tutorials and her amazing nails, I trust her opinion. 


That's my haul and review! It's not as much as some others picked up, but that's okay with me. I think I'll be set until the next sale, hopefully! If so, I can always hit up my local Chemist Warehouse, they always have good deals anyway! 

Christmas is coming up, and eeee, I'm so excited! I started listening to Christmas music two weeks ago in the middle of my exam preparations, and it made me so happy (and maybe a tad bit distracted). Michael Buble's voice is basically Christmas, but more of that in my November Favourites. 

Ta ta for now!

- Jess xo


Saturday 1 November 2014

OCTOBER FAVOURITES


To the few people reading, these are my October favourites along with detailed reviews! Also, none of these pictures are mine. Credit to whoever's photos they are (:



Makeup

I don't have more than one 'makeup' favourite I guess, but I wouldn't want to add extra items to my favourites that I don't actually like, just for the sake of numbers. The other favourite would be my Ulta3 lipsticks, but I already featured them in a post with a review here.

Well, these are the Maybelline Electro Baby Lips. If you are a fellow Australian, you would know that our 'baby lips' are just great smelling chapsticks, with some having a slight colour variation. Finally, they decided to bring three of the six electro baby lips from America to Australian shores after a year...? I'm not exactly sure. Yeah, it's only three, but four out of the six had colour that made a difference to your lips, so I don't mind. I have the ones in Pink Shock and Berry Bomb. Below are the pictures of the American ones, but the only difference with the Australian ones is that they have the colour on the very top of the clear lid and have 'electro pop' in smaller print of the same font as the logo. Pink Shock claims to smell like Watermelon, but it's more of a sweet fruity smell, not exactly berries but close to it. It has incredible pigmentation, for a lip balm anyway. Three swipes gives the lips a nice raspberry pink colour with the shine of a lip gloss, but not sparkly. Berry Bomb has less pigmentation, but gives the lips a nice berry colour. It is NOT close to the bright purple it is perceived as in the tube, it's just gives your lips a slight purple tinge, nothing too dramatic, but I like it. It says to smell like berries as expected, and it does. It smells sweet again, but definitely berries. The formula is amazing. It's buttery smooth, moisturises the lips well and I love the gloss it gives. You don't have to think twice when applying it, and you don't really need a mirror, except I'd still use one if I have the option to, especially with pink shock. The one thing is that sometimes after it wears off, if I don't reapply it and my lips start to get those flaky patches, it'll cling to the flaky bits, but that's just me forgetting and my lips being incredibly dry naturally. That doesn't happen that often anyway though, but I really like them! 

You can get them at Priceline, Pink Shock here and Berry Bomb here. They also have another colour called Oh Orange which I haven't gotten yet, but I might try it, which you can get here.

 


Do nails come under makeup? I'm not sure, so that's why I just said one. I'm assuming it does since it's not really skincare...so idk, but pick and choose as you wish.

This is the Essie Millionails. I believe they have newer packaging now, but this is the one I have. The one day I was walking around Myer, searching the clearance bins in case of a good bargain, and I came across this. I've known Essie to be a good brand, but never wanted to spend a whole $20 on one nail polish. Seeing this marked down from $20 to $4, I thought, why not. It said nail strengthener, and apparently it could be used as a base coat. I didn't have a good base coat except for the Face Shop one, and I thought I could give it a try. It does work as a base coat, but I realised it's real purpose.

Stupid, I know, since it IS called a nail strengthener. I didn't know I had such weak nails, until I realised that my nails would always snap where it's painful, like really low so that it's unattractively showing skin. I took what I was using as a base coat instead of its real purpose and used it. Damn, my nails didn't snap painfully for a whole three weeks until I got too lazy to cut my nails...oops. But it works really well, and I'm so glad. Saves my nails from looking unattractive and uneven. It also dries super quick and lasts, which I love. 

You can get the newer version at Priceline here.
















Skincare/Haircare

I made it skincare/haircare since I have two hair favourites this month, so yeah (:

This is the amazing, life changing Liese Smooth Hair Cocktail. It is a miracle worker, and oh my goodness, your hair will thank it so much. When I was in Thailand, I was in a grocery store and had heard that Liese was a good brand. I scanned the shelf and picked this up because it was super pretty and smelt good, having no idea what it was for. I get home and google it to find it one of the most raved about hair products (along with my next favourite). It says it's a detangler to make your hair feel smooth and silky. Oh My Goodness. A couple sprays of this fabulous smelling, sweet peachy pearly looking spray, give it a couple brushes, and not only does your brush glide through your tangles, but your hair is so freaking smooth. I have these two friends, one who has naturally curly hair but straightens it so often that you'd think it would have heaps of damage. Nope, her hair is silky smooth and when you pick it up slides right out of your hands. The other has ombred her hair, rebonded her hair multiple times, dyed her hair and straightens and curls sometimes, and her hair is also silky smooth. It's just those times when you look at their 'damaged' hair and look at your damaged hair which you use virtually no heat on and envy that smoothness. This, gives you that. I totally sound sponsored, but this actually is a freaking miracle worker. Trust me, buy it if you have dry hair and envy that smoothness. I can't get over this. Also, it's much cheaper than some of those other brands like Toni and Guy. Okay, it may be more expensive here than if you buy it overseas, but it is freaking worth it, trust me. 

You can get it at Yesstyle here.

















This is the Essential Rich Premier Hair Mask. First of all, it smells abso-freaking-lutely amazing. It's sweet and has that honey, and omg I can smell it right now in my mind...anyway >.>
Not only that, but whenever my hair feels damaged or in need of some love, I scoop out a good sized amount of this and rub it into the length of my hair. I tie it up in a loose bun and let it sit for as long as I like, depending on how long I want to stay in the shower. After I brush my hair then rinse it out, and it feels softer, smoother and smells amazing. I love this stuff so much, I'm not even kidding. I use it sparingly like any other girl would if they bought their first high end lipstick, or bought a $100 eyeshadow quad or something. Again, it's much more expensive to get it here than in Asia, but meh, it's amazing.

You can get it at Yesstyle here.
















This is the Simple Kind to Skin Moisturising Facial Wash. Speaking from someone who has both dry and sensitive skin, 'kind to skin' sounds pretty convincing, especially put together with moisturising. I got it, not expecting much, but I love it. It's perfect for everyday, gentle, cleans well and I love the foaming that it does. I use it together with my St Ives Green Tea Scrub when I want a deeper clean, to clear any breakouts and if I need extra hydration. I've been using it on and off for over a year now, and every time I reuse it I forget why I stopped using it for a while in the first place. 

You can get it at Priceline here and at Chemist Warehouse here.




This is the Impulse Romantic Spark Aerosol Body Spray. I really like this. I used to use Love Story, until I realised I smelt like basically all the other girls in my grade, and I didn't like that. So I decided to buy this one, and I like it. It smells quite similar to Love Story, in that sweet, floral scent, but with different undertones. Love Story is a lot sweeter, but I'm not the best, so trust Fragrantica. The only thing I don't like is that when they changed their packaging, they cut off like a quarter of the product in order to make it more 'travel friendly,' but I guess that's the point of marketing and making business.

You can get it at Priceline here and at Chemist Warehouse here.




Other Stuff

This is my Cadence Watch in Arielle. I have pretty small wrists, and I've always had that struggle of finding a watch that fits me where I don't have to go to the very last hole, or even make my own holes because I love the design so much. This is the first watch that isn't kids where I can actually wear it on the third hole. The design is personally very beautiful, elegant, chic and can dress up a casual outfit or go with a dressier outfit. I've had this for a year now, worn this often, and it's worn pretty well. Parts of the leather are curling around the edges and rubbing off a bit, and theres one scratch on the face (probably due to me dropping it because I'm such a klutz) and I really like it, is there any more to say? I did get it for $35 including shipping, which in my opinion is an amazing price for a leather watch. Right now they're selling them for $10 with $15 shipping to Australia, but it will depend on where you live. I think that's a great bargain, and now they have a black version of this watch with a black face and I'm tempted to get it! They also have one in a coral colour with a gold face. 

You can get it at Cadence here.




As for music, I've been loving two albums this month. The first is Amy and Ellen's EP Carousel. Amy and Ellen are two teenage girls from Canberra, Australia who started off as YouTubers, singing covers. I found them through Bubz, or Bubzbeauty on YouTube, and they honestly have such amazing voices and deserve every single amount of support. They deserve to make it big with their spectacular voices and beautiful faces, and I'd love it so much if you guys would check them out, maybe give their music a listen and fall in love like I did. Water Colours is my fave, and was my alarm for half the month, and actually did wake me up. I prefer it over having loud poppy music blasting in my ears when I'm unprepared as it makes me the tad more grumpy personally. 

Anyway, check out their EP here, their YouTube channel here, their twitter here, and their individual Twitters; Amy and Ellen.

The other one would have to be Taylor Swift's new album 1989. Okay, it's been out for like five days, and yet I still love it to pieces. I loved Country Taylor Swift, but I still love Pop Taylor Swift. She's still the classy cat lady that we know and love inside though. My favourites are Style, Blank Space, Clean, I Wish You Would and Bad Blood; or just the whole album. Yes, the whole album. 

I'm sure you know where to find her, I mean Queen Swift is everywhere. 



TV shows...where do I start? Okay, so Arrow started their third season, Flash started their first season and The Walking Dead started their fifth season. I promise no spoilers, but things are stirring up in Arrow, and I'm so excited for certain character's arcs. Also, who doesn't love more Felicity? She is by far my favourite character EVER because she's nerdy, cute, awkward and I just love her and all her quirks. She's like me, plus the cute and smoaking hot...see what I did there? Heh heh.... ._.

Flash is starting, and I can tell it's going to be a great show. It has a lot of potential, and i"m loving it. Besides, Grant Gustin is freaking gorgeous, and I love how they cross over Flash and Arrow a bit here and there this season. I loved this weeks episode with Felicity in Central City, not going to say anything, but I still and will always ship Barlicity more than Olicity, I'm sorry (not sorry).

As for the Walking Dead, shits about to go down. Not saying anything, but damn it is just as intense as it always is. I freaking love it, and every time I watch it I can't help but thinking how freaking badass Daryl is, how much I love Glenn and how realistic the walkers' makeup is. Damn, hats off to the makeup artists, they look so freaking real that they scare me sometimes. Sometimes I can't help but thinking how Rick actually looks really clean for someone who hasn't had a shower for like a season and a half or something, but that's the least of their priorities anyway. And how Maggie and the other girls deal with their 'problems,' but that's just me, because they're totally irrelevant because it's fictional. Ugh, I'm weird anyway....





THERE'S MY FAVOURITES DONE AN HOUR AND A HALF LATER YAYAY! I hope the three people or less who read this enjoyed it! ^_^

- Jess xo