Eyes

A High Brow Collection: MAC Brows Are It!

March 11th, 2016 by Jessica Revitte 21 Comments

One of my favorite things about being a makeup devotee is watching trends come and go, and I’m sure that fashion lovers feel the same flash of nostalgia when they see ‘90s styles come back in vogue that those of us who love all things makeup feel when brown lips make a comeback and are bigger than ever.

But even though I love following the trends, I’m not one for hopping on bandwagons all too often. Contouring? Only if it’s subtle. Strobing? I thought I was already highlighting — what’s different? I’m confused…

I’ll be honest with you ladies (and gentlemen), that’s why I am SO excited that brows are having their moment again. As a child, my grandmother praised my thick, arched brows and told me never to pluck them. So I didn’t (I listened to her), and though brow fashions have waned and waxed from thin back to thick, my brows have remained my own.

The MAC Brows Are It! collection is the brow collection for those who are proud of their brows, whether bold and defined or soft and natural. Whatever your outlook on brows, this collection has something for everyone!

The MAC Brows Are It! collection includes a wide breadth of products to help you create just about any brow look, in almost any natural shade imaginable. MAC’s website offers product breakdowns on different looks and recommends which of the many products released with the collection would work best for your personal preference.
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Tom Ford Eye Color Quad in Honeymoon: With These Shadows, the Honeymoon Period Lasts and Lasts and Lasts…

February 16th, 2016 by Karen 34 Comments

tom ford honeymoon — Tom Ford Eye Color Quad in Honeymoon ($80)

Competely proven, statistically verifiable facts (well…) about the new spring Tom Ford Eye Color Quad in Honeymoon…

It costs $1 BILLION!
OK…it’s more like $80, but it feels like a billion dollars because we’re only talking about four eyeshadows.
Studies show that upon applying any of these four luminous shades, nine out of 10 people exhibit the following symptoms: their eyes roll back in their head, they bite down on their fist and scream, “OHHHH!” in sheer ecstasy. The tenth person just face plants directly on the ground from a standing position.
You could probably live without it (LIES!!!).

I mean, seriously, there are so many things (price notwidthstanding) about this quad that make me want to do the snake in my chair. In terms of texture, finish and wear time, it knocks it outta the park.

tom ford honeymoon swatches — Swatches of the Tom Ford Eye Quad in Honeymoon (for reference, as you may or may not already know, I’m a MAC NC42)

It’s as if Tom probed my mind like a creepy makeup alien from The X-Files (have you been watching the new ones?) and molded all of my lusty eyeshadow dreams into these pans. When I load my brush with these shadows and apply them to my lids, the pigmented powders glide, blend and buff like they were put on this planet solely to make my makeup life easier.

A few days ago, I got it into my head to use the palette, and it was a day when I didn’t have a lot of time to get ready. No joke — I had my eye makeup all blended and done in less than five minutes, and even though I blazed through everything, I didn’t have to clean up anything under my eyes.

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The $44 Make Up For Ever Artist Palette Volume 3 – Florals

February 3rd, 2016 by Karen 25 Comments

make-up-for-ever-artist-palette-vol-3-florals — The $44 Make Up For Ever Artist Palette Volume 3 – Florals

I know that April showers are supposed to bring May flowers, but what about the January showers? What do we get for all of those? LOL!

Hurry up with the flowers already please! Perhaps just an early spring bloom?

And might I suggest tulips and freesia? I think they’d go well with the new $44 Make Up For Ever Artist Palette Volume 3 – Florals.

make up for ever artist palette vol 3 florals 2 — Make Up For Ever Artist Palette Volume 3 – Florals

make up for ever artist palette vol 3 florals 3 — Make Up For Ever Artist Palette Volume 3 – Florals

How pretty is that first row? I wanna smear that blue, purple and taupe all over my… I was gonna say lids, but heck, I want it all over my body! Then I’d put it on Tabs, too, so we could be all matchy-matchy.

Yes…I’m a crazy cat lady. 🙂
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The Day in Beauty, Vol. 5: The Too Faced Peanut Butter and Jelly Eye Shadow Palette, Party Noms, and the Ultimate in Practical Baby Shower Presents

February 1st, 2016 by Karen 69 Comments

too faced peanut butter jelly palette — Wearing the new Too Faced Peanut Butter and Jelly Eye Shadow Collection palette ($36, coming soon exclusively to Ulta)

OK, it’s just not cool to mention a party unless you also talk about the food.

Because it’s the most important part! — or at least one of the most important parts, right? I mean, who wants to leave a party ravenously hungry? Shoot, not this girl. Huh uh. Not me.

Luckily, there were some pretty epic moments involving food at the baby shower on Saturday, like this lovely spread of Italian- and Filipino-inspired nommage…

Almost everything was homemade (some of my friends and their spouses are great cooks!).

I’ve been craving Italian food lately (actually, I’m always craving Italian food), and there were those cute little tea sandwiches with the crusts cut off, along with some caprese salad-style appetizers and a cheesy tortellini pasta salad dish that was DELISH.

And then my mom brought lumpia (sort of like a Filipino eggroll) and a Filipino noodle dish called palabok.

Oh, and then there was this cake…

OMG! It was a light, airy chantilly lace cake with almonds and berries (I believe it came from heaven/Whole Foods). I almost floated away right there…

CAAAAAAAAAKE!

It was one of those clutch-your-pearls, melt-in-your-mouth cakes. SO GOOD.

Yes, I did splurge a little (OK, a lot) on the sugar front, but I’ve been pretty good about watching what I eat because of the gestational diabetes. I just allowed myself a bit of a cheat day, though, because it was a special occasion.

Baby shower shenanigans! — Baby shower shenanigans

We also played a game, too. Before the party, my friends emailed El Hub a list of questions about me and the pregnancy, and then asked me the same questions at the party — things like, “How often did she [me] get morning sickness?” (Answer: I never barfed, but I was almost constantly nauseous.) and “What smells could she not stand?” (Answer: pretty much everything strong.)

Overall, El Hub did pretty well. Most of our answers lined up. One of them was about food cravings, and my answer was frozen waffles with peanut butter and raisins, and he got that one spot on, word for word, LOL!

That one was probably easy for him because he was the person who made all of the waffles, haha.

Speaking of peanut butter…

Too Faced has a new eyeshadow palette coming out called the Peanut Butter and Jelly Eye Shadow Collection ($36, coming soon exclusively to Ulta), and the name sounds quite yummy right meow.

The palette was inspired by Peanut Butter, which is also one of the shades in the Too Faced Semi-Sweet Chocolate Bar.

too faced peanut butter jelly palette 1 — Too Faced Peanut Butter and Jelly palette

too faced peanut butter jelly palette 2 — Too Faced Peanut Butter and Jelly palette

too faced peanut butter jelly palette 4 — More Too Faced Peanut Butter and Jelly…

They took that shadow, Peanut Butter, and built a mini-palette with nine powder shadows around it. The pans are arranged into three color-coordinating rows, but of course you could also mix and match them however you want. Really, all of the colors look like they go together well.

I’m wearing the palette today…

too faced peanut butter jelly palette 3 — Too Faced Peanut Butter and Jelly palette

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Hold That Curl! Start With a Layer of Waterproof Mascara to Lock In Your Lash Curl

January 27th, 2016 by Karen 19 Comments

If your unruly lashes refuse to hold a curl after you apply mascara, try coaxing them into being more cooperative by starting with a thin layer of waterproof mascara first. Then, follow it up with your regular go-to mascara.

Starting with the waterproof formula should help your lashes hold their curl longer and discourage them from quickly falling out of attention.

This was a recent discovery for me, because something strange happened to my lashes when I got pregnant…

All of a sudden (seriously, it was like it happened overnight), mascara stopped working, and by “stopped working,” I mean none of them — absolutely NONE — would hold a curl. They lost all respect for my lashes and my Shu Uemura lash curler.

I’d curl my lashes and apply a layer of mascara, but less than a minute later, every little lash would be straight as a board again.

Bluh.

So I asked on Facebook for tips, and a wonderful mascara angel suggested this one, LOL! It’s really helped with the curling situation, and it doesn’t seem to matter which waterproof mascara I use, whether high end or drugstore. It just works.

Give it a go sometime if you ever find yourself “lash curl challenged.” 🙂

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

MAC Unsung Heroes: Satin Taupe Eye Shadow

January 19th, 2016 by Karen 21 Comments

What’s an unsung makeup hero? For me, it’s an oftentimes underrated makeup morsel, a permanent collection product that scoots under the radar screen of many makeup lovers but regularly rocks my world. The long-running Unsung Heroes series features some of my favorites.

I swear, you just can’t go wrong with the classics. I wore MAC Satin Taupe Eye Shadow the other day for the first time in months. It’s a shimmery grayish purple in the MAC permanent line, and it’s been around since the days of the dinosaurs!

OK, not that long, but it has been around a while. It was one of the very first MAC shadows I ever picked up, and, and it wowed me from the start…

It’s just so dang pretty!

I didn’t do anything fancy with it this week — just the same standard-issue Satin Taupe look I’ve been doing for, oh, the past zillion years.

I needed to put on some makeup to record a video, so I lined my eyes with black liner, then took that same liner and smudged it on my lids and lower lash lines. Then I buffed out the black liner with a MAC 217 before patting Satin Taupe directly on top and blending everything together. A quick sweep of cool matte brown MAC Omega in my crease, and that was it. All done.

Easy, elegant and damned fast — which led me to think, “Dude, Karen! Why do you make things more difficult than they need to be? You should be doing this all the time!”

It was one of those “Doh!” forehead-to-palm moments when I question my life choices, LOL!

Anyway, with Satin Taupe, we’re talking must-have (yes, it’s that serious). You’ve probably seen it around in limited edition palettes here and there… Here it is in a couple of recent ones (MAC Brooke Shields Gravitas and the MAC Nordstrom Naturals palettes), but you can also find it as a single in the permanent line.

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Too Cool For School Dinoplatz Escalator Mascara Takes Your Lashes to Jurassic Levels

January 15th, 2016 by Karen 12 Comments

Because…DINOSAURS.

I have this theory that if you want something to be more awesome, stick a dinosaur on it. Or in it. Whether it’s a movie, a lunchbox or, in this case, a mascara…although the dinosaurs don’t have much to do with the lash lengthening, curling and separating properties of $25 Too Cool for School Dinoplatz Escalator Mascara.

They do, however, enhance the experience… Because they’re cute. 🙂

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Make Up For Ever Ultra HD Invisible Cover Concealer Demo and Application

January 14th, 2016 by Karen 9 Comments

There should be a video right up here in this post, but if it isn’t appearing for any reason, you can click here to watch it on YouTube.

How good is new Make Up For Ever Ultra HD Invisible Cover Concealer?

To put it in heavily hyphenated terms, it’s get-out-of-your-pajamas,-put-on-your bra-again-(right-after-you’ve-taken-it-off-for-the-evening),-and-drive-straight-to-Sephora-immediately good.

Yup, that good!

If you haven’t seen the swatches yet or read the review, here you go.

And here it is in all its magical action (in the video), along with a few more observations and a mini-review. 🙂

Make Up For Ever Ultra HD Invisible Cover Concealer: the basic scoop

Available now online and at Make Up For Ever counters, stores and Sephora in 10 shades; $27 for a 0.23-oz. tube.
The 10 shades are divided into two complementary groups — the color-correcting shades, which include R20 Porcelain, R22 Pink Beige, R30 Beige, R32 Peach Beige and R40 Apricot Beige; and the concealing shades, which include Y21 Pearl, Y23 Ivory, Y31 Sand, Y33 Vanilla and Y41 Honey.
The setting powder I mention in the video is MAC Mineralize Natural in Medium ($32)

As always, thank you for watching!

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen