Lipstick Collection Ideals

 

                So this year I began to go through my lipstick collection. I picked out five that I would like to use up by the end of the year (read that post here: http://delightfulbalanceoflife.blogspot.com/2015/01/use-up-5-lip-products-by-end-of-2015-i.html ). The other day I was looking at my lipsticks and decided to smell them all, not in a weird way, but to see if the smell has changed for any of them. I noticed that one of them had indeed changed. It was my MAC Amorous lipstick. I was terribly sad as this is one of my favorite shades of all time. If you are familiar with MAC lipsticks, you know that they have a hint of vanilla, not a terribly strong scent, but it is there. My shade of Amorous had changed from a nice vanilla scent to a very displeasing plastic-y scent. With my goal of finishing five lipsticks for the year, and the amount of product that was left in my Amorous tube, there was no way that I was going to go through it, even if I wasn’t bothered by the fact that it had gone bad.

            As sad as this all was, and as hard as it was to throw away a tube of lipstick, it hit me, this was finally the extra motivation that I needed to make sure I go through all my lipsticks. Besides my already established goal of finishing 5 lip products, I sat down and wrote a list of what my ideal lipstick collection would be. I decided to narrow down my collection and chose colors based on seasons and every day colors. The following is what I have decided my ideal lipstick collection would contain:

è 2 “classic” reds (examples MAC Russian Red and Viva Glam 1)

è 2 Vampy Colors (examples MAC Amorous and Rebel)

è 3 Spring and Summer Colors…a purple, a coral, and a bright pink (examples MAC Up the Amp, Revlon Kiss me Coral, MAC Impassioned)

è 2 every day colors (examples MAC Myth and MAC Snob)

I am very happy with this break down; not only do I get a variety of colors, but I can shrink my lipstick collection from about 19 lipsticks to 9! The final step to achieve this is to pan these lipsticks!

Keep checking back to see my progress on my lipstick and makeup goals! Do you have a large lipstick collection? If you could only have a small amount of lipsticks, which ones would you pick? Hope to read your ideas in the comments!

Once again, thanks for reading!

~Naty

Weekly Makeup Basket

Hello everyone! I wanted to share really quickly what my makeup basket will include for this week.

For my eye shadow, I will be using my Too Faced Chocolate Bar.

 

For blush this week I will using one of the blushes from my Everything Nice palette in the shade Papa Don’t Peach.

 

 For lipstick, I am going to work on my MAC shade in Media, which is in my lip products to finish up by the end of 2015 (http://delightfulbalanceoflife.blogspot.com/2015/01/use-up-5-lip-products-by-end-of-2015-i.html).

 

Finally, for my bronzer I have been working on Milk Chocolate by Too Faced. I am enjoying this shade for the winter as my skin is extra pale at the moment.

 

 

By doing these weekly makeup baskets I hope to make a good dent in my lipsticks as well as my other makeup as well as making a commitment to use all the products in my collection. I hope you enjoyed reading! Please share if you have weekly baskets as well as I would love to see what products you are loving/using!

 

Have a great week and thanks for reading!

~Naty

Weekly Makeup Basket

The weekly makeup basket is a trend in the beauty world that allows people to choose items from their “collections” that they would like to use. Some of these products might be items that you have too many of, or items that get lost in the back of your drawers, items that are rarely used. Since I have certain makeup goals, I have decided to jump on this wagon.

My makeup basket or items that I will be using this week (January 19-25^th) include:

-> L’oreal Colour Riche lip liner in Always Red

-> MAC Matte lipstick in Russian Red

-> Sephora Enchanting Eye Palette

-> Too Faced bronzer in Milk Chocolate Soleil

-> Too Faced blush in Sweet Pink

-> Kat Von D mascara in Immortal Lash

 

Are you participating in this trend? Do you have any products that you wish you used more? Let me know in the comments below!

 

Once again, thanks for reading!

~Naty

Blue and Gray Smokey Eyes with Red Lips

Hello Everyone! I hope you are all doing well. Welcome back to my blog, and if you are new, welcome! I decided to do a look today with my Sephora palette (Enchanting). I do not believe that Sephora sells this palette anymore but I'm sure you can find similar colors in your palettes to the shades I used. So, without further ado, here we go!

 

 

 First step is to prep your eye lids. This is very important to make your eye look last longer and to prevent your eye shadow from creasing. I used Too Faced Shadow Insurance in the original (no specific color).

 Then I applied a medium gray shade in my crease, using an E.L.F. crease brush to serve as a "transition color" for this darker look. This will help the shades blend well together.

 Then I went in with a dark blue shade and a fluffier blending brush (Real Techniques) and applied this to the outer crease, making sure to blend it well into the "transition shade".

 After that, I applied a light gray shade all over the lid. I used a flat shader brush from Real Techniques.

 Using the E.L.F. crease brush, I applied a matte black shade to the outer corner of the crease to darken the look a bit more.

 I then used my Real Techniques blending brush to blend the black and the dark blue in the outer corner of the crease.

 Afterwards, I applied my foundation (Makeup Forever HD in 110). I started by applying some with my finger and then  used my Real Techniques Expert Face brush to blend it into my skin.

 I used my Benefit Speed Brow gel in Natural.

 I used a shimmery white shade as a brow bone highlight. You can also apply this to the inner corners of your eyes to brighten them up some more.

 Here I used my Neutrogena Healthy Skin brightening eye perfector. I applied it under my eyes in the shape of a triangle facing down and then used my ring finger to blend it out.

 I then used an eye liner brush (also from Real Techniques) and picked up some more of that dark blue shade to smudge under my lash line.

 Here I used the Kat Von D liquid liner (felt tip type) and lined my upper lash line, adding a wing for drama.

 I curled my lashes.

 Applied Kat Von D Immortal Lash mascara to both the top and bottom lashes.

 I then used my Too Faced Milk Chocolate Soleil to contour and bronze my face.

 Here I used my blushes (Papa Don't Peach & Sweet Pink) and applied those with a Real Techniques blush brush.

 Here I used another blush brush (no brand) and applied my highlight Inner Light on my cheekbones.

 I also applied inner light to my nose (specifically my T zone).

 I used a L'Oreal red lip liner to line and fill in my lips.

 Then I used MAC Russian Red on top of the lip liner.

 I finished off my look with the Makeup Forever Mist & Fix O2.

I hope you enjoyed this look! Thanks for reading!

~Naty

Makeup Goals 2015 Baseline

 

Hello again! So, if you have read my makeup goals, you’ll know that I would like to get through some of my makeup, or at least make a good dent in my makeup throughout this year. I wanted to post real quickly something to serve as a baseline for myself to see my actual progress throughout the year.

I already posted the baseline for my lipsticks that I would like to go through; if you haven’t read that post, you can find it here: http://delightfulbalanceoflife.blogspot.com/2015/01/use-up-5-lip-products-by-end-of-2015-i.html

This post will have pictures of what my eye palettes look like so far; I have three eye palettes, the first one is a palette that I have had for over 2 years (yikes!). It is a Sephora palette and I believe it is called the Enchanting palette. I do not believe that they sell this one anymore. I would really like to get through this palette and out of my collection pretty quickly. I have made several dents in the colors but there are some colors that I have not used or have barely touched. By the end of 2015 I would like to have made a decent dent in all the shades and to have hit pan in at least 1 of the shadows. The other two palettes are newer, I received them for my birthday/Holidays this past December. These palettes are Chocolate Bar by Too Faced and Everything Nice, also by Too Faced. I hope to have some dents in these, and if at all possible, to have hit pan in at least one shade.

As for face products, I would like to use up one bronzer and one blush. I know this is ambitious as I am using the blushes and bronzers from my Everything Nice palette, but I do believe that by giving myself a year to do this, I will be able to achieve it.

Below I am listing pictures to demonstrate what the products look like now. Also, randomly, I did discuss wanting to go through some of my perfumes, so I will post a baseline photograph of those too. I have pretty much used up one of the perfumes as I only had a smidge left, but I still have 1.5 bottles plus a miniature sample size left. I will update with new pictures as soon as there is some noticeable difference in my products. Wish me luck!

Additionally, if you have goals similar to these, or you are participating in the challenges on youtube, or you have created your own challenges, please let me know! I would love to check out your videos or blogs!!

Thank you for reading!!!

 

 Perfumes -Amber Light, Daisy sample, Pink, Wink

 Sephora - Enchanting Palette

 Too Faced Chocolate Bar

 Too Faced Everything Nice (shadows)

Too Faced Everything Nice (face products)

~Naty

Use up 5 lip products by the end of 2015

 

I posted in my makeup goals how I wanted to use up 5 lip products by the end of 2015. I also mentioned that I mainly wanted to focus on lipsticks, as they are an obsession of mine. My lipstick obsession began in 2009, when I was brave enough to order my first lipstick from MAC. This was my very first high-end lipstick, and my most daring! I picked up Russian Red, which I still have (gross, I know)! Since then, I have enough lipsticks to fit in an empty candle jar. I have made it a point to use them even more, but having so many makes it hard to go through a whole tube. This year, I am determined to finish 5 of the lipsticks I own.

The lipsticks I will be focusing on are all from MAC. I have gone through and picked out a bright red (Russian Red), a dark red for those winter days (Media), a berry every day color (Viva Glam IV), and two colors that can be used in the spring/summer (Force of Love and Up the Amp).

                                     L-R- Russian Red, Up the Amp, Force of Love, Media, & Viva Glam IV

If you take a good look at the picture, you will see that there is a white line (done with liquid paper) on the lids. This line marks the amount of product left within the tube. I will use this as a guideline to see how much I use up and to see my progress. I hope to update this progress about every other month, so that there is some noticeable progress.

 

Do you have any goals like these? If so, share in the comments section; I’d love to hear from you!

 

Thanks for reading!

 

~Naty

Confessions of a makeup addict

I feel that I have been obsessed with makeup for my entire life. My mom tells me stories of how I enjoyed to use her makeup (with or without her knowledge) and have my brother help me apply it. When I think back to my childhood, I can vividly remember being fascinated by makeup. I loved having my mom apply lipstick and mascara on me for dance recitals; I also loved any toy that resembled makeup.

At one point in my life, I remember having this little toy/machine that came with different liquid colors, bottles, glitters, etc, that allowed the child to create her own nail polishes. I loved to experiment with all the different colors, making some colors of my own as well. Additionally, I had my own little vanity where I pretended to do my makeup.

My interest in makeup continued throughout high school, but it did not peak until college. In high school, I used mostly makeup that my mom had, rarely purchasing anything for myself. The brands I was mostly exposed to or at least knew of were Lancome and Clinique. Little did I know that a whole world of makeup was out there waiting to be explored. In my college years, when I came to the United States to study, I discovered MAC. I believed MAC to be my holy grail. However, I had still a lot to learn. Most of the products that I used at the beginning were eye liner, mascara, a few eye shadows, and lipstick.

Some of the things that I learned along the way was which foundations suited me best (I still have issues with drugstore brands, as they all seem to oxidize on my face making me look like an oompa loompa, or they give me allergies), which lipsticks suit me, and even the idea of an eye primer! For years I used makeup without any knowledge of “eye shadow creasing” and what a primer did.

Sophomore year in college I discovered the beauty of youtube and “beauty gurus”. I was hooked! I learned about all different brands, brushes and how they were used for different things, as well as blushes, and even bronzers! This all led me to attempt to make my own videos, but I was still inexperienced, and my camera lacked the quality needed to make good videos. However, I continued to experiment with my makeup, and on occasion was able to do my roommate's makeup. To this day, I still love answering questions from people about makeup; my mom calls me all the time when she needs to replenish her stash, or when she needs some advice on what product to try out.

All this obsession and love for beauty has led me to acquire so many products. It reached a point where I could not fit all my items under the sink. For years, I had some of my makeup and brushes in a little makeup bag, with the overflow in a big cup. It was driving me crazy as everything was overflowing; I had no space on the sink, or in the cupboard below. Once my husband and I got our own place, I started to feel bad; I felt that my makeup and beauty products were taking control of all the space, leaving none for him. I finally decided it was time for a change, I purchased a makeup storage from amazon. Now I am able to store all my makeup in one easily accessible place. Not only is it neater and a space saver, but now I can actually see everything that I own!

However, organizing is not the only way to keep my addiction at bay. With the start of a new year, and the tags and challenges on Youtube (Project Pan, use X by y) I have decided to tackle this obsession by setting some goals for the year in the hopes of not allowing an overflow, as well as to control my expenses. I hope that creating these goals and budgets will assist me in knowing what I actually go through during the year as well as allowing me to see how much money I actually spend on a yearly basis. The following are my goals that I plan to stick to in 2015.

1.       Use up my products before purchasing others.

2.       Use up 5 lip products (lipsticks or lip liners) by the end of the year. (Lipsticks have been a real obsession of mine and I have more than I can count!)

3.       Use up or at least make a big dent in 1 blush.

4.       Use up or at least make a big dent in 1 bronzer (be it full sized or sample sized).

5.       Hit pan on at least 1 eye shadow in each palette (I have three palettes, two of which are brand new).

6.       Limit eye liners to 2.

7.       Limit mascaras to 2.

8.       Use up 2 perfumes and keep only 1-2 at hand. (As of now I have 2 full sized perfumes, a teeny tiny bit in another bottle, and a full sample sized bottle).

 If you want to see what I'm using to organize my makeup, here it is! http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00EKQLX6U/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Thank you for reading!

~Naty