Quick tip #1 : Smudgy Mascara

Today I had an idea to do several short blog posts sharing some tips that I find very helpful in my daily routine of makeup.

Does it trouble you wearing mascara on your bottom lashes because in the end of the day (or maybe even half way there) it transfers under your eyes? I know. It's nasty, annoying, you end up looking untidy, as if you were partying at a rock concert the night before. Yes, sometimes it can be a cool look too, but not everyday, for school or work. :D

Anyway, getting to the point. 

Some may tell you to use a waterproof mascara and it won't move. Of course, it depends on the product  you're using. Maybe you found one that stays perfectly all day (but then it must be pain to remove it).

In my personal experience, even mascara with waterproof formula will smudge if you tend to have oily skin or just get more oily around the eyes. Since you can remove mascara with oil-based eye makeup remover, your natural oils around the eyes works the same way - your lashes rubs against slightly oily skin and makes some product come off.

What I try to do to prevent this from happening is I powder under my eyes, or to be more precise - under the bottom lashes with my regular face powder (which is the Maybelline Dream matte powder, also good for this - a setting powder)  and a small fluffy brush which will help to absorb my natural oils during the day and this will help the lash product to stay in place.

There it is. simple, quick and hopefully - effective.

Please let me know if this works for you too! :)

Affordable Tool for Success: Eye Liner Brush!

Hello, once again!

Today I finally found the one thing I've been looking for a great deal of time. It's a brush for gel eye liner. 

You know how they say that even if you use drugstore makeup which could be less expensive but still of a good quality, but it is quite recommended to invest in good brushes/tools? 

Well, it had become quite popular buying brushes that are said to be made for painting/crafts and use it for eye liner as they are the same thing sometimes and also would cost you much much less!

I've been looking for it in various art student/painters/craft stores, but the prices are still high as the brushes sold there are for proffessional use mostly.

Today I stopped by a store called "Tiimari" which sells office supplies, decorations and items for all sorts of crafts. The shop is not targeted for proffessionals, but rather for everyone. And I found it! It is called Royal Crafter's Choice Grip 9160 in size 1/8". And it was't expensive at all. In my local currency it cost 7 Litas which equals 2 EUR. Great deal!

So now I can strat using my Maybelline Eyestudio gel eye liner with ease! 

What it also impoartant is that the eye liner comes packaged with it's own brush and I will compare it to the craft's one. Plus, a yeah or two ago I've had gel eye liner from Essence which had the exact same packaging as the Maybelline one and also came with a brush. It was much cheaper. I added it to the comparison too.

So, here are the parameters of the craft brush and three brushes compared together (the ruler shows cm/mm).

Next I am showing the line all three brushes create for comparison. See how the crafty brush is doing a fantastic job? 

I think that the difference is amazing!

And for the end I wanted to show the eye liner itself. Notice the pointy cat eye it created. 

Talking about the quality of this Maybelline  Eyestudio gel eye liner I must say that I have mixed experience: 1. It's very hard to wash it off once you swatch it on the back of your hand! After I swatched it for this blog post, I had to scrub it super hard and it still didn't come of completely! 2. When I would wehre it for the day, it would transfer to the lower part of my eye under the cat I wing. Note that my skin does get oily. So it could be that the natural oils do make it move (since it is know that oil does help remove makeup). 

SO: it is quite waterptoof, but not oil proof (which is good when you'll need to remove it).

I really hope that it will inpire some of you to go  check your craft stores and get one, because the ones ment for the use acan be quite expensive.

Thank you for reading! Hope you are having a lovely day.:)

P.S. If you are form Lithuania, you can find more information about the brushes at http://cityart.lt/lt/royal-brush-teptukai 

Updated: everyday eyes!

Good day to all!

I want to share my updated eye makeup rutine. It is based on Essence cream eyeshadow in a shade "09 For Fairies". I've seen girls wear similar shades in summer (I think Chanel's "Emerveille" looks similar). Since it has golden shimmer in it, it looks beautiful once your eyes "catch the sunlight". Although it is a cold and snowy winter out here, it is still suitable for an everyday look. It is simple and fast which makes it perfect in morning getting ready for school, university, work, etc. 

One more thing: Essence claim that these are long lasting eyeshadows and shouldn't "move" or crease during the day. I have tried a few of their shades (next post is coming up) and for me, it depends on a shade. This pink one stays pretty well on, but I feel that people with oily eyelids should use a primer or set it with eyeshadow on top. Also, the pigmentation depends on the amount of the product: the more you use, the more pigmented it will be.

More information about the product can be found at http://www.essence.eu

Review: My Holy Grail Conditioner!

In this post I would like to tell you about  my favourite hair conditioner so far.

Some background about my hair:

My hair is relatively long at this point. Six months ago I had half of my lower hair lightened to achieve ombre effect which I really grown into loving. My hair is brown with a few highlihgts here and there, and lightening the ends just brought some life to my hair.

Anyway, after that my hair became quite dry and damaged, which I was afraid the most. At the time for conditioning my hair I used Garnier Fructis nutri-repair hair mask.

Now, I know this is a hair mask but I used it as a conditioner since my hair is quite dry at the ends. And I really loved it. After washing it out, my hair would feel soft and moisterized. 

Four months or so ago, I found this store which provides a huuuge range of salon products for hairdressers. And that's where I found products from Macademia. I bought their Nourishing Leave-in Cream in a small tube and a few samples of their Deep Repair Masque.

After using the leave-in cream I realized that it doesn't help my hair much. I didn't get the results I was expecting but it would make my ends softer.

The Deep repair masque was what I really fell in love with. I would still use my garnier for conditioning my hair on the regular basis, but once a week I would use the masque on my hair. I would leave it for 10 minutes and then my hair would be softest ever after using any product. 

I remember I bought 2 samples of the masque, and they were enough for 6 uses (my hair is long but not too thick, so I don't use a lot of product). And really, this product is amazing and smells gorgeous!

After those six uses I was out of my miracle masque. And frankly, I was kind of lazy to go back to that store. And, tose products are quite expensive.;/

As I was out of my garnier hair mask as well, I went to the drug store to buy more. I didn't find the exact same one (that was odd, as it would always be in stock). I found a similar one in a diferent colour packaging, it seemed to have the same if not more fantastic claimes, so I took it. (Garnier fructis oil repair one-minute mask).

I was still sad that my miracle masque has ended, but! I noticed that using this actually leaves the same feel to my hair. This is a one-minute mask, but again, I use it as conditioner. I love it! Before washing my hair is usually tangled and hard to brush through, but already when I am washing the product out, I can freely brush my finger through it! :)

So this Garnier product is pretty cheap compared to Macademia products I tried. And will dare to say that , at least on my dry damaged hair, it achieves almost the same results! :) 

And! I use it as a conditioner on regular basis, and once in a while - as a mask, just leave it for longer in hair. 

Also, I have just checked both of the Garnie products for ingridients, and it seems that they are the same... So I kinf of failed to find the difeence between them...;/

P.s. I am not claiming that this somehow "repaired" my hair, which is damaged from dying (or more like bleaching a bit). This product makes damaged hair easier to manage and look and feel healthier.

TIPS: close set eyes!

Ciao!

As I was doing my makeup today (which I decided to do very simply) it occurred to me that this eyelook actually suits me pretty well, especially because I think my eyes are a bit too closely set, and what I did made them look more further away from eacher, hence my face looks more proportional.

SO I decided to share my tips for close set eyes!

What's to be done is to elongate the eyes, cheating, to be exact!

Tip Nr. 1 - Eyeliner :  I don't want to draw attention to the inner corners to my eyes but want to excentuate the length of the eyelid. So when lining your upper eyelid, start at least  at a third inner part away, I start at about the middle  and the further the thicker the line should be , but not too thick. Wing it out a little bit, and your eyes already should look wider set apart!

Tip Nr. 2 - Mascara :  When applying mascara to the lashes, brush them to the outer side of the eye accenting the outer part!

Tip Nr. 3 - Highlight : If you are highlighting the inner tear duct, avoid the most inner part of the eye. I like to highlight first third of the inner part of lower lashline. This will help to drag the attention away from most inner parts.

So these are my 3 tips for widening the space between eyes. They really do come handy for me, hope it will help someone too!

Cheers!

Inspired: 60s trend - Twiggy

Hey!

I have never done a celebrity inspired makeup and I have a party coming up! The theme is "60s"!
So who else could I use as a reference other than Twiggy!

This is a very simple yet graphic look. I think that false lashes aren't necessary.:) And fake freckles go very well with the look.:) 

Review: Wet n Wild liquid eyeliners

Today I want to share my thoughts on liquid eyeliners from Wet n Wild that I own. To be specific - two:
- Mega Liner liquid eyeliner

- H2O Proof liquid eyeliner

As other Wet n Wild products, these eyeliners are affordable. But what about their performance?

Firstly, I'm going to talk about the H20 Proof one. 
I bought it about half a year ago. I wanted to try a brown liquid eyeliner for a softer look and since I just wanted to try it out, decided to go with a more cheap product so that I wouldn't regret it. There was no tester in the store so I could see what was the applicator or how it would go on. I got it in Black-Brown.

When I got back home, I tried it out. And I wasn't happy with it at all >.<
The first thing to put me off was the applicator. It's a hard tip one. Don't know how you call it. (terrible if you ask me)

And then I tried it on my hand... And as I recall I was horrified! It was so liquidy, not pigmented enough, and it was hard to apply it on my eyes because of the applicator and since it's so liquidy I felt like it's going into my skin lines. In the picture you can see swatches of one coat of the liner.

So it scared me a lot, and I put it away until recently I found it in my drawer again. I thought I'd give it one more try.
I shook it well, took the applicator with not much products on it and really steadily tried to line my eyes.  I must say, when you put more effort in it, it can work. But I mean it by saying much more effort.
So yes, it can work. And you need to apply several layers of it because it's not pigmented much and because it applies better with less product on.
One positive thing about it I must say is that it is pretty water proof! After trying it on my hand and rubbing it with a wet cotton pad, it doesn't move at all! Well more like it doesn't smudge. But it loses a tiny tiny bit of pigment. So when removing this from your eyes, makesure to use a waterproof makeup remover.

And now moving to Mega Liner.
This liner is my most recent purchase but I have already wore it for a few times. I have it in Plum. Since I still have the packaging of it, let me first let you know what do they claim about the product:

"Fast drying, smudge-proof color. This long-wearing, quick drying formula applies smoothly and evenly for instantly bigger and bolder eyes. Glides on smooth"

Okay, so first things first - this eyeliner has a brush applicator which is so much better compared to the H2O Proof one. Though it's not super fine, I'd say,

But! it's not pigmented much. And because of the formula, it doesn't allow you to create a fine line easily. I'd like it a bit more liquidy because now it feels a bit thick (though not pigmented). Again, you have to work for it a bit. Yes, it does go on quite smoothly, but since it's so not pigmented, you're going to need to apply several coats of it. In the picture you can see swatches of one coat of the liner.

In addition, it's not waterproof or water resistant (not that they claim it is) because as you try rub it of with a wet cotton pad, it comes of right away. Though, as you apply more coats of it, it stays on better.  It is suppose to be long-wearing and if you're not rubbing your eyes or running in the rain, it won't be a problem.:)


SO to sum up, I'm not a fan of these two products. But if I put some effort in it and I'm not rushing trought the door, I can make them work. If you're on a budget, you'll have to practice a tiny bit, mostly witht the H2O Proof eyeliner, because it's so liquidy and can make a big mess thought it is very waterproof and this did impress me! And the Mega Liner one I like because of the colour, plus it has a bit of tiny sparkles in it.

P.S. Emily from Beauty Broadcast on Youtube has mentioned in oen of her videos that she likes Mega Liner. I think she has it in black, so maybe it has a diferent formulation and is more pigmented.

And! You can see me use both of these eyeliners in eye looks:
H20 Proof: "Private beach" eye look!
Mega Liner: Sweet candy-like eyes!

Hope this review helps any of you!

Miss K.