Product Reviews

The Mission Is a Glow With The New Sonia Kashuk Perfecting Translucent Illuminator

August 8th, 2012 by Karen 17 Comments

Sonia Kashuk Perfecting Translucent Illuminator

You know what would be really nice? I mean, besides a shirtless Alcide Herveaux baking me semi-sweet chocolate chip cookies from scratch in my kitchen.

No shirts for Alcide I know I was going somewhere with that…

Oh, yeah! 🙂 It would be really nice to have an extra hour every morning just to put on makeup. Then I could blend, pat, and smudge till my heart’s content without having to hurry (or hear El Hub yell from downstairs, “Babe! What are you doing?! We were supposed to leave the house 15 minutes ago!”).

Dare to dream, right?

The reality is usually closer to 10 minutes than an hour, and I have to make every one of those seconds count.

Sonia Kashuk understands. Her new $14.99 Perfecting Translucent Illuminator makes the most of makeup time, so you never have to leave the house without at least a little highlighter.

sonia kashuk perfecting translucent illuminator product shot

It’s a warm, peachy golden cream/gel highlighter with a light-reflecting shimmer that creates the look of flawless, fresh skin.

sonia kashuk perfecting translucent illuminator swatch
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Dior Golden Savannah Flirts With Perfection as My Favorite Dior Palette to Date

August 8th, 2012 by Karen 27 Comments

dior golden savannah

Tabs has been a regular crankypants all afternoon. I guess he doesn’t like it when I gush about something other than him, like the new $59 5-Couleurs Designer Couture Colour Eyeshadow Palette in #774 Golden Savannah — or more succinctly, Golden Savannah, “The most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen!!”

But I do have a tendency to exaggerate when I’m smitten. 🙂

Tabs doesn’t care. All he sees is me paying attention to something else, which is a big no-no around here.

“Gah! I just want to play with Golden Savannah all day long,” and, “I’ll never let it leave my side! Golden Savannah is coming with me everywhere.”

dior golden savannah

I think he’s extra ornery because the palette’s name reminds him of a cat he used to know, a sleek Savannah named Goldie. They dated briefly one summer until she suddenly and unexpectedly left him for a blue point Siamese who lived up the street.

Then, of course, when Tabs rocketed to plus-size kitty modeling super-stardom, Goldie started calling again, but Tabs’ heart had already been broken, and he wouldn’t give her the time of day.

It’s a story as old as time itself, but I digress…

So the name! — whenever I say it out loud, I can hear Tabs cursing me under his breath.

Oh, well. I’m willing to risk the wrath of Tabs for this one, because I think it’s one of Dior’s best, most beautiful palettes in years.

Doing the makeup math

The $59 price, while annoyingly high, doesn’t seem exorbitant considering the quantity and quality of the colors this quint contains. Taking everything into account, I think the price, while typical for Dior, is actually a pretty decent deal, or so I’d like to think, and it compares well on price to less expensive department store brands like MAC.

With Golden Savannah, you get five 0.04-ounce pans of product for about $12 each — similar to the $12 MAC charges for their 0.05-ounce refill pans (five MAC refills would cost $60, or $1 more than the cost of the quint).

But there’s no two ways about it — Golden Savannah isn’t cheap. Thankfully, it also delivers a knockout on quality.

A sheen that shines

Starting with the finish, I think it’s absolutely beautiful and unlike anything else I have in my kit.

It’s as if Dior took a typical sheen and cranked it up to something between a sheen and a shimmer. Golden brown Soba Eyeshadow’s soft shine comes to mind, but even it doesn’t rise to Golden Savannah’s level.

When I’m wearing any of the shades in this palette, I feel like my lids just glow!

More than that, they glow without drawing attention to my fine lines, which is more than I can say for many products with similarly shimmery or metallic finishes.

dior golden savannah

dior golden savannah khaki design swatches
5-Couleurs Designer in Golden Savannah #774 (left) and 5-Couleurs Designer in Khaki Design #308 (right)
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Putting Jewels in Reach: The $4.79 Sonia Kashuk Fall 2012 Nail Colours Might Look Expensive, But They’re Priced Just Right

August 7th, 2012 by Karen 20 Comments

Sonia Kashuk Fall 2012 Nail Colours from the left: Hocus Pocus, Emerald City, Two Cents, Dime a Dozen and All Vamped Up

Beep-beep-beep!

Did you hear that…? That beeping sound? Is a truck backing up outside my window? Did I suddenly get a page from 1997 (007734-411-007-911)?

Oh, I see what it is. It’s just the sweet, sweet sound of my Bargain Beauty Thrill-o-Meter sounding off. 🙂

Even before I swatched ’em, I had a feeling Sonia Kahuk’s five new $4.79 fall Nail Colours would rock my budget-loving boat.

With finishes from creamy to metallic and colors perfect for fall, these highly pigmented jewel-toned polishes look like the kinds of nail accoutrements I’m more accustomed to seeing on Dior and Chanel counters, and with price tags closer to $30 than $5.

Looking at metallic copper Two Cents and creamy eggplant All Vamped Up, fall seems just days away, and I can almost hear the leaves crunching beneath my feet as I stroll around my neighborhood looking at Halloween decorations…

Creamy purple Hocus Pocus and rich green Emerald City should look right at home on my paws as I hoist a cup of hot cocoa up to my lips (can’t forget the marshmallows!), while gunmental Dime a Dozen looks like a lovely shade to bring to Thanksgiving dinner with the fam.

In the swatches below, I’m wearing two coats of Emerald City, Two Cents and Dime a Dozen. I think I also could’ve gotten away with two coats of Hocus Pocus and All Vamped Up, but I decided to apply a third because I noticed the faintest bit of streaking from those two in direct sunlight.

Sonia Kashuk Fall 2012 Nail Colours from the left: Two Cents, Dime a Dozen, Hocus Pocus, Emerald City and All Vamped Up
From the left: Two Cents, Dime a Dozen, Hocus Pocus, Emerald City and All Vamped Up

Sonia Kashuk Emerald City swatch
Emerald City

Sonia Kashuk Two Cents swatch
Two Cents
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Sonia Kashuk Serves Sheer Lips and Opaque Tips for Fall With the New Lips and Tips Mini Nail and Lip Set

August 3rd, 2012 by Karen 14 Comments

sonia kashuk lips and tips

Whoever said that celebrity pet assisting is easy was smoking some hella strong catnip.

The grueling hours and working on weekends, late-night airport trips, difficult dietary restrictions (Gravy with every meal?! Come on!) — but it can also be very rewarding, like this afternoon. Tabs didn’t give me the stink eye once today, and he even said an appreciative “Mrrow” when he climbed onto my lap for a handful of Greenies.

In fact, he was so agreeable today that he let me quit work early — right after I finished organizing his accessories closet (mostly ties, ascots, top hats and a small, but growing, collection of monocles) and buffing his claws.

First thing I did after quitting for the day was watch this old interview of Jeremy Renner…

Skip to 3:17 for a gem of J-Ren beauty wisdom!

Just when I thought my day couldn’t get any better, I opened the $12.99 limited edition Sonia Kashuk Lips and Tips Mini Nail and Lip Set.

And my Friday went from good to great. 🙂

sonia kashuk lips and tips
From the left: Nail Polish in Lacquered Lilac, Lipgloss in Shrinking Violet, Nail Polish in Undercover Lover and Lipgloss in Sealed with a Kiss

The four-piece set of color-coordinated miniature sheer glosses and opaque nail polishes comes with two pairs of matching red and purple shades for lips and nails.

The two unscented, unflavored glosses are smoooove! — and non-sticky — while the high-shine nail polishes have pigment to spare.

sonia kashuk lips and tips
Wearing Nail Polish in Undercover Lover and Lipgloss in Sealed with a Kiss

I love how Sonia chose coordinating colors with varying levels of coverage, and I think it’s cool how the products in the set work with each other when they’re worn together.
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Escape to a Land of Cute Clutches and Magic Clay With the Tarte Amazon Escape Palette

August 3rd, 2012 by Karen 18 Comments

tarte amazon escape

Time for a game of What If!

What if…you found a palette that satisfied both your appetite for stylish accessories and your appetite for makeup?

And what if said palette were available now, at this very moment (depending on your time zone), and the powder eyeshadows and blushes within it not only helped you get your pretty on, but they also improved your skin?

Blarney! you say? Nope, ’tis not science fiction. Tarte believes that such a thing exists, and it was last seen escaping from the Amazon!

Wait — that’s not right. It’s just called Amazon Escape, as in the Tarte Amazon Escape Amazonian Clay Eye & Cheek Palette, and for $44 it pledges to beautify your eyes and cheeks while improving your skin.

The secret sauce in this palette parolee? A skin-loving trifecta of Amazonian clay (to nourish skin, reduce oil and improve texture), vitamin E (which acts as an anti-inflammatory emollient and protects against damage by free radicals), and soothing mineral pigments shown to soften skin.

tarte amazon eyescape

Just as important as all that…it’s cute! 🙂

And it’s on shelves now.

I have to admit, the packaging is what first caught my attention, but the colors and claimed skin benefits also make a compelling case, not that I can detect any results after testing it for a week.

Based on the colors, at least, I think it definitely deserves more time. The six powder shadows and two blushes in the kit are downright gorgeous!

tarte amazon eyescape 2

tarte amazon eyescape swatches
Swatches from the left: Blushes in Free and Exposed; Eyeshadows in Tame, Rare, Rope, Camo, Canopy and Tribal
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My Cheeks Are Loving Tarte’s Latest Natural-Looking Cheek Stain

August 2nd, 2012 by Karen 44 Comments

tarte loving cheekstain

Things I encountered this afternoon…

1. A piece of chocolate cake.

Portion control is lame

2. A pinkish coral blush that smells like a mixed berry smoothie (more on this in a minute!).

tarte loving cheekstain

3. Jeremy Renner doing push-ups in my living room… He texted this morning to ask if he could come over on my lunch break (“Hey, girl, I’m in Novato!”).

Alright, so maybe that third thing didn’t happen. Truth is, Jeremy and I went makeup shopping at Sephora this afternoon…

Okay, okay, I’ll stop! 🙂

But seriously, I can’t wait to see Jeremy in the new Bourne movie. Maybe I’ll wear Tarte’s new Cheek Stain in Loving ($30) to the show.

If I do, one thing’s for sure — I know my cheeks will smell good, LOL!
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Kiss Frizzy Hair G’Bye With the Living Proof Restore Collection

August 1st, 2012 by Karen 21 Comments

Today turned out to be quite an innnnteresting Wednesday. Remember a few days ago when I mentioned that I had a bout of hives on my left eyelid? It was just the left eye, and it went away on its own after a couple of hours, so I chalked it up to a minor allergic reaction to something (to be safe, I still changed my laundry detergent and fabric softener and laid off the makeup for the afternoon).

Well, wouldn’t ya know it? — the hives came back! Today! Right after my workout! And this time they were on both eyes, and much worse, like horror movie scary with huge, bright red welts.

Long story short, it is some kind of allergy. I went to the doctor this afternoon, which is why I’ve been incommunicado.

The doc said I’m fine but couldn’t pinpoint the cause. I asked him if he thought it could be caused by a beauty product because, yeah, I use a few of those, but he didn’t think so. The symptoms pointed to good ol’ fashioned hay fever. I guess I just gotta wait it out.

He did suggest that I “lay off the eye makeup for the next few days…”

“What’s that now?” I asked, after I regained consciousness, LOL!

I suppose there is a bright side to all this. I figure, if I’m gonna be tooling around town without a stitch of makeup on and these two cray-cray swollen eyelids, I might as well do something sassy with my hair.

As long as I can wear it down, which I did today, to sort of hide behind, but at least my waves were bouncy and (almost) frizz-free! 🙂

I’ve been using a few products for dry and damaged hair from Living Proof’s gentle, moisturizing Restore collection, which came out last spring (available now at Sephora). The shampoos, conditioners and styling products are supposed to make hair easier to manage.

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The Dainty Dolce & Gabbana Lace Collection Delivers Nude Lips and Nails for Fall

July 31st, 2012 by Karen 23 Comments

dolce gabbana lace collection

As much as I like the idea of working beside Vampire Pam behind the bar at Fangtasia this fall, sometimes the look — the stilettos and skin-tight leather from head to toe, the super serious smokey eyes, and the jewel-toned shadow shades — is a little too, well, much for me.

So, this afternoon, I hit the pause button on the kinds of rich colors and intense shades we’ve been seeing a lot for fall, and spent a little time with the dainty, nice nudes in the new Dolce & Gabbana Lace collection.

The 10-piece release is all about bronzed skin and nude lips and nails, and the packaging? — oh, the packaging…

I just lurve lace. 🙂 I kinda wish all of Dolce & Gabbana’s makeup had this same limited-edition packaging.

Here’s a quick peek at three pieces from the collection…

dolce gabbana lace collection product shot
From the left: Intenseyes Black Intensity Mascara ($31), Ultra Shine Gloss in Perfection ($32) and Intense Nail Lacquer in Pink ($22)

Intense Nail Lacquer in Pink ($22)

If you’re getting married soon, consider classic, soft pink Intense Nail Lacquer in Pink ($22) for your tips or toes. Creamy, smooth and semi-sheer, it’s a little like Essie’s Ballet Slippers, but much, much smoother.

I’m wearing two coats here, but I’m sure I could have gotten away with one. Yes, the color isn’t altogether unique, but I think it’s perfectly executed.
MAKEUP AND BEAUTY BLOG RATING: A

dolce gabbana Intense Nail Lacquer in Pink
Two coats of Intense Nail Lacquer in Pink

Ultra-Shine Lipgloss in Perfection ($32)

On my lips, creamy beige Ultra-Shine Lipgloss in Perfection ($32) feels thick, but not sticky, and it has Dolce & Gabbana’s signature rose flavor and scent. It’s one of the smoothest beige glosses I’ve ever tried, and I can totally see it cruising down a red carpet below a shimmery gray smokey eye.
MAKEUP AND BEAUTY BLOG RATING: B

dolce gabbana perfection swatch
Ultra Shine Gloss in Perfection swatch
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