sakura lovely

L'Oreal Color Infallible Eyeshadows, 7 Deadly Sins Colour Tag

2011-10-31T00:18:00.000-07:00

Hi All,

New posts over at sakuralovely.wordpress.com - please come and visit! I'll continue to update this blog every couple of posts as Wordpress doesn't have a Followers option for non-self-hosted blogs!

http://sakuralovely.wordpress.com/2011/10/29/loreal-colour-infallible-eyeshadow-collection/

http://sakuralovely.wordpress.com/2011/10/31/seven-deadly-sins-envy/

Happy Halloween Everyone!

MOVING!

2011-09-19T23:16:00.000-07:00

Hi All,

Decided to harmonize all of my 'blognames' by moving to Wordpress as my 'name' on blogspot was taken! I'll cross-post links for anyone following me with Google Friend Connect, but please add http://sakuralovely.wordpress.com to your dashboards!

Latest entry: http://sakuralovely.wordpress.com/2011/09/20/delicious-calgary/

Daiso + Drugstore Makeup that Loves You Long Time

2011-08-30T11:34:00.000-07:00

Consider this my 'not-just-a-brand-snob' post ;). While I adore most high-end brands, at some point after all the fall collections come out I reach saturation and I just can't look at counters anymore. I don't want to discuss new products with SAs, and max out on even reading reviews OF new collections on blogs.

But do I stop buying makeup? Of course not :P

Lately I've really been interested by 'budget'/'drugstore'/'high street' makeup (I'll refer to it as drugstore for the rest of this entry since that's how I think of it) as it's less than half the cost of my favourite high end brands and if it doesn't work out... well it's all pocket change, really!

Thankfully this post is all about 'hits' for me. XD; The stuff I don't like just gets given away before I can post about it!

First up, what my dear Xtine and I have been referring to as the 'Love You Long Time' blush, or the 2$ Blush from DAISO that I made both of us buy so she'd stop trying to make me buy a 6.50$ BB Cream XD; (We actually bought it at Yokoyaya).

This is the BEST 2$ I have ever spent on a makeup product. The blush is gigantic, the diamond/quilting patten looks cool, and it's a lovely, fresh pink! Xtine bought the 'Beige' blush (which is actually peach) and I made her go back to get me the other colours (Orange and Beige for me, Orange and Pink for her).

The other drugstore product I'm really liking is Sleek's 'Oh So Special' palette which was previously a Euro-Sephora exclusive but is now permanent. Vicky was kind enough to pick this up for me! It's a good mix of peaches and crease colours, and like all Sleek palettes, the shadows are soft and pigmented. They dent easy though - I nicked a colour taking the plastic protector off!

FOTD Breakdown

Face: Dior Hydraction TM #3, Ettusais Pressed Mineral Powder

Cheeks: Ellefar Multi-Cheek Pink

Eyes: NARS Smudgeproof Eyeshadow Base, L'Oreal Infallible Eye Colour Forever Pink, Sleek 'Oh So Special', K-Palette, UD Zero, Benefit They're Real! Mascara

Lips: Maybelline Fiesta Flush

Any other drugstore stuff that's caught your eye? I just bought a bunch of Makeup Academy eyeshadow to try next... :)

Chanel Fall 2011 Makeover at Holt Renfrew

2011-08-17T22:29:00.000-07:00

After what felt like WEEKS of waiting Chanel Fall finally hit all the counters in Calgary (and downtown, at least, all on the same day)! Now if you follow me on twitter you've probably seen my numerous assertions that I had no 'lemmings' from Chanel fall - and I didn't - BUT I have a weakness for attending makeup events at Holt Renfrew as I always have a lovely time and I'm rarely disappointed in the results.

So of course, when Kim called me to let me know that they were having a special event for the new products with Jason, their national trainer, I signed up (knowing I'd probably end up with lemmings as a result).

This is a peek of the set-up at Holt Renfrew Calgary :) I first had a skincare consultation and application with one of the SAs before I was passed onto Jason! He was absolutely lovely and provided the right amount of conversation during the makeover - we mostly chatted about current and upcoming Chanel products. I personally find it quite awkward when they are either totally silent or ask personal questions! Jason was lovely and gave me a hand-held mirror so that I could 'follow along' and made sure to explain techniques.

He also offered to take pictures during the makeover but I stuck with this lovely one at the end, and taking pictures of the complete set :)

I am so incredibly happy with the final look! Jason asked how 'adventurous' I was feeling and I told him that I was willing to wear anything once. Somehow when I say this at makeovers this means I end up with a super smoky eye, but as it's not a look I wear on myself, I was perfectly happy with that!

Jason was also kind enough to give me a list of what he used, otherwise you would not get a product list ;)

Products Used:

- Vitalumiere Aqua B40

- 60 Noir Cendre Crayon Sourcils

- Lotus Ombre Essentielle

- Mirifique Illusion D'Ombre

- Illusoire Illusion D'Ombre

- Emmerville Illusion D'Ombre (for cheek hilight)

- Ébène Stylo Yeux Waterproof

- Khaki Platine Le Crayon Yeux

- Sublime Mascara

- Rose Ecrin Joues Contraste

- Giggle Lèvres Scintillantes

Lastly, swatches:

Emmerville, Illusoire, Epatant, Ebloui, Fantasme, Mirifique

I came home with Mirifique - it seems like the shiny metallic black I've been searching for for months!

Armani Eyes to Kill Makeover at Holt Renfrew

2011-08-03T00:06:00.000-07:00

Giorgio Armani cosmetics is one of my favourite cosmetics lines and this is largely due to the excellent service I always receive at Holt Renfrew! The girls at the counter are awesome about contacting me with info about new products and events and every time I've had my makeup done at the counter I've loved the experience! Last week I went to check out their newest products that they finally had all the testers for: the Gloss D'Armani and the Armani Eyes to Kill!

This is Rachel, she's my new Armani SA and she is fantastic. Lovely and patient, we had a great afternoon chatting about the line as she's brand new to it!

This is the first time since the Eyes to Kill were released (in March) that my counter has had all the testers! Rachel was awesome and let me pick which colours I wanted to use. I chose #3 Purpura since I'd purchased it but hadn't used it yet (and I wanted to see what it could do)!

The new glosses are gorgeous, pigmented, non-sticky, and fairly long lasting! I wanted to pick up one of the summer pink lipsticks but they were already sold out. My counter needs to order more stock in!

This was the makeover look! I actually had a full face of makeup on before I went (as I was super excited to do my Ravenclaw FOTD) but typically I go to the counters wearing nothing (it's a bit intimidating). So I got a mini-facial with their Regenessence skincare line since poor Rachel had to remove everything I was wearing!

I love this look! All Armani, here's the list of products used (but not sure on the foundation shade):

All products by Giorgio Armani Cosmetics:
- Luminous Silk Foundation
- Blush #10
- Micro-Fil Loose Powder
- High Precision Retouch Concealer
- Eyes to Kill #3 Purpura
- Eyes to Kill #6 Khaki Pulse
- Eyes to Kill Excess Mascara in Black
- Maestro Liquid Eyeliner
- Eyebrow Defining Pencil
- Smooth Silk Lip Pencil #9 Pale Raspberry
- Gloss D'Armani #500

I find it so interesting to get my makeup done at counters as I never use all one line. But I think if I had to pick ONE line to use everything from, it'd be Giorgio Armani - I've adored everything I've purchased!

Vancouver 2011 + IMATS

2011-07-31T12:53:00.001-07:00

I was in Vancouver a couple of weeks ago to visit Christine and Sheila, and it just so happened that IMATS was that weekend too! Here are a handful of my favourite pics from the 4 days I spend in Vancouver, but the link to the photoset is at the bottom!

I didn't take very many pictures since other than the ocean, Vancouver does look a lot like Calgary building-wise, haha.

We were a little later than expected, but we made it!

The NYX booth was by far the prettiest. So many eyeshadows! I've never seen so many in one place before o_O And this was just one corner of the stand!

Every time I look at this pic, I marvel at the makeup. The lines look so crisp!

Kelsie and I on the Burrard Inlet cruise :)

Sheila and I waiting in the 2.5 hr long MUFE line! We lucked out, it was even longer after we went through! I'm only wearing eye makeup here as Vancouver made all of my skin peel :(

Christine and I on the Burrard Inlet cruise. As I pointed out to her, we finally have a pic where we are both looking at the camera, AND where you can tell we are two different shades!

It was actually gorgeous and sunny our last 3 days in Vancouver. Pretty lucky :)

More pics under the cut!

We got to the show 15 minutes after it started and this was the line already! Thankfully there were 4 of us so we rotated who had to stand in the line :)

I felt seriously accomplished once we were close enough to see this sign :) 40% off was totally worth it!

I beg of you, swatch BEFORE you get to the table! Although Christine and I did stand here for a while as we waited to pay and swatched the Aqua Creams and glosses (and made my shopping list bigger).

The Ben Nye products were really nice but I was not allowed to buy eyeshadow :)

I think the other half of him is a blonde she-Viking. Haha.

IMATS had a whole lot of glitter :)

I'm always fascinated by naked sets but thankfully I hate loose eyeshadow so as pretty as these were, I wasn't tempted!

Yaby!! Right after I took this I resolved to pull out my Pearl Paints palette again :)

I have never been so tempted by something I have no idea how to use XD

The beautiful MUFE Model and her makeup! She actually helped us purchase stuff in the morning (I think she saw how sad we were about how long we'd been in line!)

Last thoughts :)

Kelsie making her way down to the ocean! Of course the day we were at the beach was the most overcast day we'd had all week :)

Vancouver 2011, a set on Flickr.

Harry Potter Colour Tag: Ravenclaw

2011-07-29T11:34:00.000-07:00

Found on Google Images

This week on Twitter my favourite girls (@Yumeko55, @CuratorofWHB, @Macnunu and @vanityfashionis) and more were discussing the end of the Harry Potter movie series. I am a HUGE fan of the Harry Potter series, both the books and the movies, and I willingly admit that I sobbed through Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2. I grew up with the books and the credits at the end felt like the end of my childhood.

*melodramatic*

To celebrate and commemorate the end of such a world-changing, fantastic series, the girls and I decided to play colour tag and pay tribute to the houses of Hogwarts and the various Wizarding schools. I was tagged with Ravenclaw :)

It's fitting since other than Harry, my favourite character is Luna Lovegood :)

I used the book Ravenclaw Colours of Bronze and Blue :)

I had a lot of fun playing with very recent and very old purchases for this look!

EOTD Breakdown
NARS Smudgeproof Eyeshadow Base
Giorgio Armani Eyes to Kill #5 Gold Blitz
Giorgio Armani Eyes to Kill #1 Blast of Blue
Hello Kitty Kimono Shadestick
Yaby Pearl Paint Palette
Make Up For Ever Aqua Eyes 03L
Make Up For Ever Aqua Liner #6
Armani Eyes to Kill Mascara

Yumeko and Vicky have already done Gryffindor and Hufflepuff! My dear Yasumi makes the quintessential Slytherin. And my Nunu took on Beauxbatons with Sirius Black's wand ;)

I am excited for the next colour tag! Pleasure to do this with some of my favourite girls!

Shu Uemura Colour Atelier Palette + Brunch

2011-07-10T23:24:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago Eva and I went to Holt Renfrew for the launch of the new custom palettes and the Colour Atelier collection. Since it was a Sunday, we made a full day of it, getting brunch at the Main Dish in Bridgeland, before heading down! This FOTD is from the products I purchased at the event (my makeup from the event wore off pretty fast as Shu doesn't offer anything like eye primers!).

Our SA at Shu Uemura is pretty amazing so we were actually able to pick out our colours in advance: this was awesome since we were going to the event on the last day. Lots of colours were sold out! Our SAs were also beyond generous and gave us a huge GWP (tote bag, full size mascara, nail polish, lipstick, and bronzer).

Here's my palette :)

It was SO tempting to get bright colours but I went with something I could travel with easily. I love the finish of the new metallic shades and it's awesome that the prices have gone down! This palette was 83$ CAD all together (if I'm remembering correctly).

And because brunch was delicious:

Bet you wish you could eat with me and Eva! :)

Products Used

Face: Armani Face Fabric #3, Armani Luminous Silk Powder #5.5

Cheeks: Shu Uemura P Vivid Pink 385

Eyes: UDPP, Armani ETK #8, Shu Uemura ME Soft Brown 856, ME Soft Copper 270, Urban Decay Virgin, K-Palette Liquid Liner, Milani Liquif'eye Black, Armani Eyes to Kill Mascara

Lips: Tom Ford Pure Pink Lipstick

I am slowly working through my backlog of pics!

Summer 2011 Looks: Dior Rosy Tan #754 & Dior Sunset Bronzer

2011-07-03T21:15:00.000-07:00

This summer my favourite 'looks' have been neutral, gold, or pink eyes with pink lips. I'm not (yet) calling it a rut as I've used several different palettes in the last few weeks, but as these looks are so low maintenance for me, I love it in the hot weather!

I had kind of written off the Dior Summer 2011 collection as boring but after swatching several times I came home with two things :)

I thought that Dior Rosy Tan (#754) would be far too similar to Earth Reflection (#609) but was pleasantly surprised that they appeared quite different! Rosy Tan is a bit warmer and less frosty. Love <3.

I seem to be on a bronzer kick this summer (I've purchased 3)! By far the most stunning in the pan were the Dior powders for summer. At my current skintone shade (I think about NC35-40) Sunset was perfect! Dior Aurora was a bit too light and peachy on me, but this bronzer managed to wake-up my face after a 12-hr shift at work - definitely a purchase.

Lastly, a better look at my FOTD featuring my current favourite shirt:

Face: Armani Face Fabric #3, Armani Luminous Silk Powder #5.5
Cheeks: Dior Sunset Bronzer
Eyes: UDPP, Armani Eyes to Kill Silk #8, Dior #754 Rosy Tan, K-Palette Eyeliner, Milani Liquif'eye Black, Armani Eyes to Kill Mascara
Lips: BITE Luminous Creme Lipstick in Bouquet

I'll be posting several variations of this as it's all I'm wearing (but I'll vary the products)! What looks are you liking for summer?

Hello Kitty Memoirs of a Kitty Palette

2011-06-09T01:30:00.000-07:00

Despite previous experiences with the Sephora house brand, I really wanted to like the Hello Kitty collaboration when it came out - I especially wanted to like their Say Hello palettes, which were sleek and cute all at the same time! Sadly the first two Say Hello palettes were underwhelming for me, and I had to accept the fact that it didn't make sense to purchase a palette 'just' for packaging - something I swore to myself I'd never do!

Luckily, with Spring came a new collection, and thankfully my swatches went much better this time - though I think I would have broken my 'packaging-only' rule, as the 'Memoirs of a Kitty' palette combines a lot of my favourite things: Hello Kitty, Sakura, and neutral eyeshadow! The picture above will rotate through what the palette 'looks' like, but basically the palette contains:

4 Eyeshadows: Satin White, Shimmery Beige, Gold, Medium Brown
2 Blushes: Peach w/ Gold Shimmer, Pink

I'm still awful at taking swatch pictures with my dSLR, but here is my attempt. :)

The swatches at the very top are the blushes (you can't really see the peach though >__<)

I found these shadows to be nice and soft, minimal fall-out, and decently pigmented. The swatches on my hand in the picture were done with my finger-tips, no base. The blushes were quite lovely - a touch powdery but they showed up well on me, and easily went with any lippie I might choose to do a look with!

Overall, a nice all-in-one palette. This would be my 'go-to' work palette if I wasn't determined to finish Dior's Iridescent Leather first. I might travel with this next as it makes a good everyday look AND includes blush, thereby cutting down on what I need to bring (in theory).

Face Armani Face Fabric #3, Armani Luminous Silk Powder 5.5
Cheeks Pink side of Memoirs of a Kitty Palette
Eyes UDPP, Armani Eyes to Kill #8, Memoirs of a Kitty Palette shadows (all 4), K-Palette 24/7 Liner, Diorshow Blackout
Lips Maybelline High Shine Lipstick in Coral Lustre

I really like how this turned out and I think this palette is 'truly' neutral. Not too cool toned, and not too warm! I wore this over a cooler base, but I think it would look good over a warm gold as well.

Have you picked this up? Let me know what you think!

Kose Addiction: Out of Africa + Giorgio Armani Eyes to Kill #8

2011-05-21T03:18:00.000-07:00

I like to think that I have generally good 'auction' skills in that I am patient and persistent enough to endlessly comb online websites to find what I want at a hopefully cheaper price - this is how I've acquired a lot of my KAT-TUN and V6 collections, Tokidoki bags, and more recently, my ADDICTION collection!

Given how exclusive ADDICTION by Ayako is, and how expensive it is on online shops, I often haunt Rakuten and Yahoo!JP to find and bid on auctions, biting my nails all the while, until I've either won or lost the auction. This post is focused on one of my biggest successes: 2 shadows from the Out of Africa collection that came out this past spring :)

As best as my dear Yasumi and I can figure (my palette came with no labels), my lucky find has the following:

- Cigarette (P) Eyeshadow

- Safari Mode (P) Eyeshadow

- Mystic Mirage (P) Eyeshadow

- Arabian Ruby (ME) Eyeshadow

- Rose Bar Blush

I'm still in the process of playing with all of my SF purchases so of course I tried these over my new favourite product, the Armani Eyes to Kill Silk Eyeshadows :)

Try #1 was pink, of course :)

Products used:

Face: Armani Face Fabric #3, Armani Luminous Silk Powder 5.5

Cheeks: ADDICTION Rose Bar Powder Blush

Eyes: UDPP, Armani Eyes to Kill #7, ADDICTION Mystic Mirage, Arabian Ruby, Cigarette, K-Palette Eyeliner, Diorshow Blackout

Lips: BITE Lipstick in Bouquet (this is obviously my lippie-of-the-week)

Next up was trying to figure out the Khaki brown of Safari Mode :)

Face: Armani Face Fabric #3, Armani Luminous Silk Powder 5.5

Cheeks: ADDICTION Rose Bar Powder Blush over Armani Blushing Fabric #1

Eyes: UDPP, Armani Eyes to Kill #8, ADDICTION Safari Mode, Arabian Beauty, Cigarette, K-Palette Eyeliner, Diorshow Blackout

Lips: BITE Lipstick in Bouquet

And still playing around with camera settings, but some swatches:

Left to Right:

Giorgio Armani Eyes to Kill Silk #8, ADDICTION Cigarette, Safari Mode, Mystic Mirage, Arabian Ruby

Do let me know what you think? I'm still in love with BOTH of these brands and cannot wait to expand my collection of them :)

ADDICTION Le Mepris Palette + Armani Eyes to Kill Silk #8

2011-05-18T21:31:00.000-07:00

Let me tell you friends, somehow when I tell myself I'm not going to buy a lot of makeup while travelling I not only end up buying MORE, but I come home to a lot of makeup. At least with this last San Francisco trip! In addition to all the stuff I'd purchased in SF/at Duty Free, I came home to two packages of amazingness (more posts to come). I finally got around to playing with all of it on my last stretch of days off!

The products I was definitely MOST excited to get were the ADDICTION lots I'd won from Yahoo!JP and my Armani Eyes to Kill Silk shadows. I managed to hold off long enough to take pictures then I dug in. But these are so gorgeous, I almost couldn't wait to play with them!

This palette actually came out for ADDICTION's Summer 2010 collection and I didn't think I'd find it again... and then I scored it from auction for 4000Y!! I kind of vocally hate the colour orange but I think it is growing on me. The top two shades have pearl finishes :)

Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous. I LOVE the way these eyeshadows look when you open the pots (although my #7 is a metallic pink on the top side now that I've used it so much). #8 is a pale champagne colour (it shows up as almost a white gold on me).

I am still learning how to take swatch pictures with my Olympus PEN, but here is the ADDICTION Le Mepris palette and a sheer swatch of Armani ETK #8

I absolutely loved this FOTD!

Products used:
Face Armani Face Fabric #3, Armani Luminous Silk Powder #5.5
Cheeks ADDICTION Orange Le Mepris Blush
Eyes UDPP, Armani ETK Silk #8, ADDICTION Le Mepris Palette, K-Palette Eyeliner, Diorshow Blackout Mascara
Lips BITE Lipstick in Bouquet

Do let me know what you think! Next up: my ADDICTION Out of Africa purchase!

L'Oreal Color Infallible Eyeshadows

2011-05-15T11:19:00.000-07:00

If you talk to me at all on twitter you've probably seen that my latest love is the Giorgio Armani Eyes to Kill Silk eyeshadows - that'll be yet another post, but basically my goal when I went to SF was to pick up three colours since they were so much cheaper there! Unfortunately one of them was sold out, so I'll wait to see if I'll pick it up here before I post about them.

In any case, after seeing reviews of them start to hit the 'net, it was pointed out to me that other brands under the L'Oreal umbrella had similar shadows - Lancome with their Ombre Magnetique and L'Oreal with the Color Infalliable eyeshadows! Both had cheaper price points than the Armani but smaller colour ranges and not available in Canada :(

Vanity-Fashionista was kind enough to surprise me with a load of chocolate (yum) AND two of the shadows to try so I thought I'd compare them to my previous experience with Armani for you!

I wore these alone over a layer of UDPP :)

First observations:
- L'Oreal Shadows are a bit smaller at 3.5 g, Armani ETK are 4 g
- L'Oreal jars feel less substantial (they are plastic) but they do include the same plastic stopper to keep the shadow compressed as the ETK
- The colours are less complex in the pot - the Armani ETK are gorgeous and flecked with multiple colours

- The shadows swatch more satin than metallic (these swatches were done with my fingers)
- The L'Oreal shadows are a bit more fragile - I'm able to tip my ETK jar upside down completely and there's no fallout, but I lost a bit of Burning Black trying the same thing
- These apply MUCH better with a patting motion, I was unable to 'sweep' the eyeshadow on the way I typically do

- These shadows did blend really well! I didn't set them with powder
- Wear time was at least 5 hours (and then I took off my makeup since I was going to bed) over UDPP
- There was a bit of fading at the 5 hour mark - they weren't as shiny/satin as when I'd put them on, but no visible creasing!

Final verdict (for me)

If you aren't sure about the loose/pressed powder texture and the L'Oreal Color Infallible eyeshadows are available to you I think they are fun to try, but for WOW factor and longevity I'm definitely sticking with the Armani ETK Silk eyeshadows - the colour range is bigger, they last FOREVER, and I don't need to put anything on top of them to make them pop! And they are available in Canada (albeit with a jacked-up price) which is always a plus. I am still intrigued by the other colours in the L'Oreal range despite this, but I chalk it up to not being able to buy them myself!

Definitely a Dior Addict

2011-04-17T18:08:00.000-07:00

You know what my marker for really liking a product is these days? Using it before taking a picture when it's brand new. XD;

I purchased Diorkiss, the colour Kate Moss wears in the Be. Iconic. promotions for Dior's new lipstick line during a gift card event at Shoppers Drug Mart. I had a promotion gift card so I got 15$ off, which made thie lipstick a pretty sweet 16$ CAD after tax :)

Diorkiss on me is a medium, moderately pigmented pink. I love this lipstick! It has almost a jelly-like finish on my lips, lasts 3-5 hours on me (without excessive eating or drinking) and is hydrating without being too slippery. I know a lot of bloggers have been comparing these to the Rouge Coco Shines but I much prefer the pigmentation and colour range of the new Dior Addicts - there are 44 to choose from!

I'm still pretty infatuated with my Armani Eyes to Kill Silk #7 but I thought I'd break out one of my favourite Dior palettes of all time to wear it with :)

Face: Armani Face Face Fabric #3, Armani Luminous Silk Powder #5.5
Cheeks: MAC Shell Pearl Beauty Powder
Eyes: UDPP, Armani Eyes to Kill Silk #7 Sweet Fire, Dior Crush Glow Eyeshadow Quint, K-Palette Eyeliner, UD 24/7 Zero, Diorshow Blackout mascara, Anastasia Espresso Brow Gel
Lips: Dior Addict Lipstick 578 Diorkiss

Have you picked any of these up? I have one other and am eyeing two more... good thing they are all permanent!

Product Infatuation: Chanel 90 Fauve & Armani Eyes to Kill #7 Sweet Fire

2011-04-08T20:47:00.000-07:00

Of course while Nunu and Sheila were here I picked up a few new things. Most of the time I buy my makeup on my own, but it's fun to have someone with you to ask opinions about (i.e. Does this colour look nice to you? on me?). I picked up two products which I absolutely adore (on their own, and together) and have spent the last 3 days playing with (and being vain, and taking pictures of the results). Plus the looks cumulatively reminded me of cherry blossoms which are one of my most favourite things in the world (obviously).

That is pretty much the only shot I remembered to take with my eyes semi-closed so you could see the makeup! My bad XD;

I'll admit that I am very gullible and easy to talk into buying at makeup counters, but after swatching this shadow 4 separate times I finally caved and purchased it on my last day with Sheila and Nunu, and with Miss Eva (who had been with me the last time I swatched it!). Fauve is a lovely purple-taupe with fine shimmer - LOVE. I couldn't think of anything in my stash that was similar (and I have a LOT of eyeshadow) and the shadow was soft, pigmented, and very easy to blend. In the following FOTDs I applied it over a base with a MAC217.

I'm still also in love with my ADDICTION eyeshadows so I used them in these looks as well!

This look:

Face: Armani Face Fabric #3, Armani Luminous Silk Powder #5.5
Cheeks: MAC Shell Pearl Beauty Powder
Eyes: UDPP, Mac Bare Study Paint Pot, Chanel Fauve, ADDICTION Keshi, K-Palette, Diorshow Blackout, UD 24/7 Zero, Anastasia Espresso Brow Gel
Lips: Dior Serum de Rouge 640

My second try involves the second item I'm totally in love with, but as we're still talking about Fauve, I'll put the product picture up after :)

Face: Armani Face Fabric #3, Armani Luminous Silk Powder #5.5

Cheeks: MAC Shell Pearl Beauty Powder

Eyes: UDPP, Armani Eyes to Kill #7, Chanel Fauve, ADDICTION Thriller, K-Palette, Diorshow Blackout, UD 24/7 Zero, Anastasia Espresso Brow Gel

Lips: Guerlain Rouge G Grace

I love that Fauve was a bit more purple (especially in real life!) over a pink base. :)

The second product I am absolutely in love with is Giorgio Armani Eyes to Kill Silk Eyeshadow in #7 Sweet Fire. This is the perfect, metallic pink! I had this look on for about 10 hours and no creasing or fading at all. I really want to try the rest of the colours. I applied this with a MAC 239 or a sponge. The texture is a bit odd in the pot - like a dried, pressed shadow so I found it hard to pick up with a fluffy brush. But easily blendable, very smooth, and super pigmented.

I have literally worn this every day for the last 3 days, and you need such a small amount! The eyeshadow is also easy to sheer out if you're not looking for the full-on metallic glow :)

Face: Armani Face Fabric #3, Armani Luminous Silk Powder #5.5

Cheeks: MAC Shell Pearl Beauty Powder

Eyes: UDPP, Armani Eyes to Kill Silk Eyeshadow #7 Sweet Fire, Cosme Decorte Magie Deco Holiday palette, K-Palette, Diorshow Blackout, UD 24/7 Zero, Anastasia Espresso Brow Gel

Lips: Dior Addict 578 Diorkiss

I have a few more purchases from the last couple of weeks which I am loving, but this is what I'm using right now!

Weekend Wrap Up [WARNING: Food Heavy]

2011-04-06T16:30:00.000-07:00

I'm beginning to think that Beauty Blogger Meet-Ups = Secret Opportunity for food blogging. I say this because despite having my camera with me for Nunu and Sheila's visit, my best photos were of the food we ate... not so much my makeup (or theirs). In fact, the only picture I have of the three of us together my eyes are closed in! (Darn it).

So with that in mind... I'm just going to show you random photos from their trip to Calgary!

(On a related note, I am super bad at keeping my eyes open with flash photography, hence all my 'makeup pictures' are taken during the day XD)

That was pretty much the only picture I got of Macnunu and I together before Sunday with BOTH of our eyes open, haha.

I've decided to order this by meal/day since most of the weekend involved where we were eating dinner haha.

Overeasy Breakfast

Soul in a Bowl

Canadian, Eh? Eggs Benedict

The Highwood: This is a restaurant run by the culinary arts students at SAIT, the menu changes weekly/seasonally

Grape juice, cranberry juice, ginger ale, if I remember right.

Nunu and I almost didn't get our mock-tails as the first server was somewhat incomprehensible and the second server forgot. D:

I took off the onions, but otherwise this was delicious! I liked my cone of fries.

Lamb was OK, ratatouille was really really good! No idea what those chips were made of though!

Red Lobster: Nunu really, really wanted to go here as there aren't any in Vancouver, apparently. XD The commercials make it look delicious!

Nunu actually did have her lobster :)

I opted for shrimp

CHAR|CUT - Completely worth going through the blizzard for it, I feel! Best food and service all weekend. Our server was fantastic and anticipated our needs, we got the last Ribeye steak that night, and they even ran back and forth outside to call us a cab at the end of the meal!

This is also the only pic I got of Sheila where my eyes aren't closed >__<;

Seriously pro at keeping her eyes open with flash!

Nice and light, the tuna was a bit citrus-y, and the bread points were super buttery!

OK, Nunu's first poutine, haha.

AMAZING. We split this between three of us.

Also really good but we couldn't finish this XD

We were determined to have dessert, this wasn't too heavy split among 3 people.

I have discovered (after this weekend) that I am craving steak lately, and even though I think I can shop with the best of them, 3 days of shopping is exhausting. I fell asleep after Nunu left, haha.

I have no idea why we look like we're the same colour, I'm actually way darker

I need to get a good pic with these girls in Vancouver!! Also, eat more. Of course :)

#HelpJapan Earthquake and Tsunami Relief Blog Sale

2011-03-14T21:29:00.000-07:00

Japan is a country near and dear to my heart, and the devastation the country is experiencing following the 9.0 Tohoku Earthquake is heartbreaking. I am hoping for the safety of the survivors and Japanese people and praying that the tremors and quakes stop and that Japan soon has time to recover.

But as important as positive thoughts, this relief effort needs FUNDS.

In Canada, the Canadian Red Cross is accepting donations for the JAPAN RELIEF EFFORT HERE:
http://www.redcross.ca/article.asp?id=38438&tid=001

Medicins San Frontieres (Doctors without Borders) has sent three teams to the Miyagi/Fukushima area and more are ready to go. You can find more information and donate here:
http://www.msf.ca/news-media/news/2011/03/significant-needs-in-remote-quake-and-tsunami-hit-areas/

Here is how this blog sale works:
- All items will be mailed via air mail by Canada Post. This does not include a tracking number
- 100% of the listed price for each item will be donated to either the Canadian Red Cross, or MSF
- Shipping starts at 5$ CAD and is 1$ for each additional item. This is the only portion of the cost I will keep to purchase packaging supplies

How the Money Will Be Donated
TWO WAYS:
- E-mail me at sakurasunshine.blog@gmail.com to reserve your item[s]

then:

1) I will invoice you for the total amount of items + shipping from my PayPal account
2) At the end of the sale (or weekly) I will donate the money to either Red Cross or MSF and post the receipt on this page with my personal information blacked out

OR

1) I will invoice you for the total shipping amount
2) You make a donation for the item amount to the Canadian Red Cross or MSF and forward me the receipt with your full name

then:

3) I will the items out within one week.

Restrictions:
1) Canada Post does NOT provide tracking numbers outside of Canada without an exorbitant cost. If you would like tracking, it will be extra, please indicate if you would like this
2) I am not responsible for the items once they leave my hands. If you do not receive your item within 6-8 weeks I will file with Canada Post, who insures each package up to 100$. All items will be carefully bubble wrapped and packaged to prevent breakage
3) Sales are first come, first served
4) All prices are in CAD, and are set (no haggling, please)
5) All items are BRAND NEW, never used

Sale Items

5) Dior Addict High Shine Lipcolor in 859 Ravishing Rose - $20

6) Rouge Dior Lip Colour in 678 Devilish Pink - $20

7) Illamasqua Intense Lip gloss in FOLLOW - $10

9) MAC x Hello Kitty Lucky Tom Eyeshadow Quad - $30

Please e-mail all sale requests or questions to sakurasunshine.blog@gmail.com

Wet n Wild ColorIcon Trios: I Dream of Greenie, I Got Good Jeans + Handwriting Tag

2011-03-01T20:36:00.000-08:00

They were a few weeks late but I finally found the new Wet n Wild ColorIcon trios at WAL-MART! Even though Mona had bought me all the pink ones, I was so excited I bought the three I didn't have. Here's hoping they'll all fit into one UNII palette when I'm ready to de-pot!

It was way too cold to leave my house today (-32C with the windchill) so I opted to play with makeup instead... same FOTD but two different EOTDs (I wanted to use them all but I didn't think my eyes would appreciate that too much) so I'll be playing with all the palettes over the next few days.

For these looks I applied the shadows as the packaging suggests (i.e. Lid colour, crease colour, browbone) rather than mixing up placement :)

I Dream of Greenie was MUCH brighter on my eyes than the swatches were (as you'll be below) on my arms. Pigmentation was good, and the browbone shade was less green than I thought it would be... I don't think it looks too awkward in the FOTD! I used a fairly dense eyeshadow brush to apply the lid colour and it kicked up a LOT of powder so... be warned when you use these!

This colour combination confused me. Individually all the colours are beautiful (the navy blue crease shade is my favourite) but as I rarely do contrasting looks I struggled with applying these... this is actually the second try! I think it looks OK now (several hours later) but I'll probably break out these eyeshadows into separate looks rather than wearing them all at once. I also found the browbone shade too dark for use there... it's a lovely silvery-blue though.

Swatches done over UDPP on my arm. See the browbone shades for I Got Good Jeans? It's so dark!

Jen and Sheila were kind enough to tag me in the handwriting meme! Here are my answers :)

Get a piece of paper and write the following things down:

What’s your name/your blogger name?
What’s your blog’s name/URL?
Write “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.”
Favorite quote?
Your Favorite song?
Your favorite band/singers?
Anything else you want to say?
Tag three to five other people.

And here is my new favourite way to apply foundation! From dry size to wet size

Blend Perfection? + Chanel Regard Perle

2011-02-22T21:16:00.000-08:00

I actually didn't have anything planned after the ADDICTION post but after getting an awesome package today I decided to do my makeup anyway... I have a lot of stuff I've only swatched but never worn (plus I *AM* trying to use up my Bourjois foundation so...)

Today was an experiment in (mostly) foundation application!

My dear, lovely Old Cow sent me a bomb of a package! I won her blog contest for a foaming milk face wash, and she tucked in WAY too many goodies (as per usual) so I'm going to write about them one at a time... since I've only used one of them!! I was super excited about everything :D But most of all, this little beauty.

This is the Cosmpolotian Blend Perfection Sponge, the latest in a line of Beauty Blender dupes... only this one is a similar shade of hot pink! I've wanted to try the BeautyBlender since I started using liquid foundation, but it's hard to find in Calgary and extremely expensive - so when I found a 'cheap' drugstore dupe I jumped on it... only it turns out it's only available in the UK at Superdrug. >__<; I'm so grateful my Old Cow managed to find this and was kind enough to send it to me.

I forgot to take a picture of it totally dry (this is still a bit damp and drying) but it just about doubled in size (I will take a comparison pic and post it to my twitter at some point). Wet the sponge, squeeze out the water, and stipple it over your face (with a boing-boing motion).

Results:

I LOVED the finish of this sponge! No streaky marks, even coverage, and it was fast! And soft :) The only downside (other than needing someone from the UK to get me one) is that it used 2 pumps of foundation instead of my normal 1... I don't think the coverage looks any heavier, but a bit does get soaked into the sponge. I didn't mind so much since I am trying to finish this foundation (and have several to go)!

I washed afterwards with the Daiso sponge cleaning soap and water :)

Version 1 of this look uses one of the new L'Oreal Infalliable Le Rouge Lipsticks in 130 Enduring Berry - this didn't quite last the 10 hrs of wear (I'd say a good 6) but the lipstick wasn't drying at all.

Version 2 uses a lipstick from the same line but this time in 138 Forever Fuschia. I need to do a close-up of this lip look at some point, but there is an almost duo-chrome sparkle to this lipstick... I love it!

Other products used:

Topic for a future post but this is the US formulation of Chanel's Espiegle :)

And the Euro/Asia/Canada version of Chanel Regard Perle - from my dear Nunu

I really love the sponge - will use it as much as possible - and I am still loving my spring Chanel stuff! Now just to finish off some of my stash... I think another month and I'll be done my Bourjois foundation!

A (Really) Dangerous ADDICTION (for my wallet)

2011-02-21T00:21:00.000-08:00

I was introduced to ADDICTION by Ayako almost a year ago by my dear Yumeko, but since the line is SO hard to get (and no one I know had tried it) I was hesitant to spend money just to try a new line out... thankfully this year several of the blogs I love reading picked up pieces to the brand and my interest was peaked... the tipping point was being able to order them from Fumi's Shop at a better price with shipping than Ichibankao and Mihokoshop. It also helped that my #1 Makeup Enabler had recently raved about the line :)

My dear Nunu and I combined orders, and when I finally got my shadows I was so excited! The packaging is gorgeous, a shiny black plastic, and the eyeshadows were pigmented, creamy, and easily blended. Keshi suffered a bit on its journey from Vancouver to Calgary but was still very usable - I used the crumbled parts to do swatches the night I got them!

Keshi (P - Pearl Finish) is the most amazing gunmetal grey I own. I blended out the eyeshadow chunks so it's more pigmented than it might normally be, but I am in LOVE with this colour. And now I want the rest of the ADDICTION crease colours. So beautiful.

Singita (P-Pearl Finish) is a lovely brown/taupe neutral to me. Not as eye-catching as Keshi but still very lovely. I also really want to try more of the neutrals from this line.

These swatches were done with finger tips, on bare skin with no base.

I did these swatches today under natural light, after I'd cleaned up any crumbling bits. These were also done with fingertips on bare skin. Keshi isn't as BAM! dark but is still my favourite gunmetal grey ever. I'd recommend this eyeshadow to ANYONE. Singita remains pretty (I really need to do a look with it).

This is the happiest I've been with a FOTD in a while - I loved everything about it! *vain*

Face Bourjois Healthy Mix Foundation #55, Armani Luminous Silk Powder 5.5
Cheeks NARS Orgasm Illuminator, Physician's Formula Happy Booster Mood Blush in Rose
Eyes UDPP, MAC Cash Flow PP, Lavender shade from Magie Deco Eye Shadow Palette R, ADDICTION Keshi, UD Virgin, K-Palette Eyeliner, Anastasia Tinted Brow Gel in Espresso, Covergirl Lashblast Fusion
Lips Dior Serum de Rouge 640, NARS Angelika Lip Gloss

And a look at the actual EOTD (so many products @_@)

LOVE this look. Have also decided to give up on MUFE HD powder - I set with just the Armani today and my makeup lasted WAY longer (also I don't turn white in photos with the flash). I've used about 50% of the MUFE, but I'm done XD; *does not feel bad about tossing*

Hope everyone had a wonderful weekend!

NARS Tainted Love + Random Depotting Project

2011-02-16T02:32:00.000-08:00

Every year I end up making un-anticipated, unplanned spring purchases, mostly because some collections seem to be ALL OVER the blogging community and others are missed entirely (so I don't put any extra effort into hunting them)! This was the case with the new NARS Tainted Love gift set (which I've seen on a few blogs since then - but only after I purchased it).

I'm happy though, because I love this set - it is SO pink!

The biggest reason I wanted this set - my first Multiple that I used! This is BEAUTIFUL, a bright pink with a bit of silver shimmer. I don't own the powder blush, but this didn't strike me as being sparkly at all.

I'm not a big lip gloss person any more, but the Angelika lipgloss (like the other products in the same shade) is a pretty pink with sparkle - decent pigmentation (I wore it alone in the FOTD) but usually I put this over a lipstick for extra shine :)

I love love love hot pink. This is a creme polish, which I haven't tried yet due to work. But it looked nice when I swatched it!

The multiple blends really, really well, and I can definitely see why they are a favourite among many bloggers! I do however, wish the packaging wasn't so prone to fingerprints and smudges - :S my multiple is already dingy looking despite my best efforts at not grabbing it with fingers covered by loose powder or eyeshadow!

---

On a random note, I depotted all of the Wet n Wild holiday palettes I had into my new UNII palette, which is LOVE. Only one shattered, which I consider a success (out of 18 different eyeshadows). I really want to order at least 2 more UNII palettes and finish depotting all my drugstore stuff - then I will have more drawer space for my high-end palettes with packaging too pretty to melt!

I forgot to take pictures, but I will try next time :)

Spring Purchases in Action: Hello Kitty & Benefit Bamba

2011-02-04T05:01:00.000-08:00

I (frequently) fall prey to purchasing a lot of things in a short amount of time and then promptly forgetting to use them. I'll usually remember them at some point but... that's not always a guarantee. After Sheila and Christine tagged me to do a blue look last week (I requested inspiration to break out of my rut) I first used tried-and-true products in my stash...

And then realised I had just BOUGHT a blue eyeshadow which I should use - Hello Kitty Charmmy Eyeshadow stick in Kimono.

So of course I went back to recreate a blue look using the eyeshadow pencil! Despite my large (large) collection of eyeshadows I don't own a lot of blue palettes (meaning I have less than 5 :P) so I decided to go with my Yaby palette (more options).

Breakdown of the FOTD
Face Bourjois Healthy Mix 55, MUFE HD Powder, Guerlain Meteorites Perles D'Or
Cheeks Benefit Bella Bamba
Eyes UDPP, MAC Bare Study, Yaby (White, Light Blue, Medium Blue), Hello Kitty Charmmy Eyeshadow Kimono, K-Palette 24 hr Liner, L'Oreal Voluminous Million Lashes, UD 24/7 Zero, Anastasia Tinted Brow Gel - Espresso
Lips Chanel Rouge Allure Laque in Ming

Bella Bamba was one of my unexpected spring purchases (largely because it came with a GWP at Holts which I thought was cute) but it's a lovely pinker-peach. I'm not sure if I see the '3D Action' the box promises me but I do like the colour! And the brush is surprisingly useful. This is my first Benefit blush.

Eye close-up and step-by-step:

1) Apply preferred eyeshadow base (I use Urban Decay Primer Potion and a neutral MAC Paint Pot - this time Bare Study)
2) Apply light blue eyeshadow over lid (Yaby Row 1, Column 4 [1-4])
3) Use Hello Kitty Charmmy eyeshadow pencil in Kimono to draw in outer corner and crease
4) Blend light blue lid colour into Kimono with fluffy brush
5) Apply medium blue mid-lid (Yaby 3-5)
6) Apply highlight and blend to soften edges of crease colour with fluffy brush
7) Apply liner, mascara, and fill in brows

I actually really like this look though I should probably find another way to wear Kimono... I don't do very contrasting looks so I have a feeling it will be more gradiation-based.

Guerlain Spring 2011 Collection: Sur Mes Levres

2011-02-02T01:31:00.000-08:00

I think this year's spring collections from the luxury Western marques were largely designed to hit my wallet - so many of them focused on pink! It's a good thing I passed on my usual Dior-addiction... made space in my stash (and heart) for other brands! As soon as I saw the promo pictures for Guerlain's Sur Mes Levres collection I pretty much wanted all of it - the hot fuschia background was a REALLY good seller.

Fortunately, while I did drop a fair chunk of change on this collection I didn't actually buy everything :P

I love everything I bought but this is my favourite. I've wanted an Écrin 6 Couleurs palette since they came out (a case in which packaging was 80% of my motivation) but hadn't loved any of the colour combinations... of course I would buy this one! Without the lovely fuschia shade it's a nice lilac tone-on-tone palette, and with the fuschia the palette makes me swoon! I adore pink (obviously). I wore this the day after I got it (as seen above) and I wish Guerlain held events like Chanel does... maybe I just need to ingratiate myself at a counter ;)

Actually I'll probably never do that as Guerlain is readily available at Shoppers Drug Mart Beauty Boutique and Murale and they have FANTASTIC points programs. I actually got bonus points + 10% off which made the 90$ CAD price tag a bit more bearable.

But barring a jewel-toned palette, this is probably my first and last Écrin palette... I'm glad I bought it!

I love the Rouge G lipsticks (which are also a rare indulgence due to price) but there hasn't been a really bright clean pink so of course I was happy to see this lipstick in the collection! The black packaging is beautiful and as weighted as the original silver metal casing... the finish on this lipstick is actually a bit more jelly-like than the normal Rouge G line (at least to me) but I still love it - a bright pink on my lips :)

I said I wasn't going to buy this blush several times, and I finally gave in after some gentle prodding from my dear Sheila (and going to re-swatch it in a better frame of mind). It's gorgeous. A peachy-pink blush with gold shimmer, I'm still playing around with how intense I want the blush to look and the best eye and lip look to wear it with... but ... it's lovely. I love the hot pink details in the included brush and in the case lining.

The above FOTD only uses the Écrin 6 Rue de Rivoli Palette, but here's a breakdown anyway:

Face Bourjois Healthy Mix Foundation 55, MUFE HD Powder, Guerlain Meteorites
Cheeks MAC Shell Pearl Beauty Powder, Rock & Republic Contrived Powder Blush in Tease
Eyes Écrin 6 Rue de Rivoli, K-Palette Liner, L'Oreal Voluminous Million Lashes, Anastasia Tinted Brow Gel, UD 24/7 Zero
Lips Chanel Rouge Allure Laque in Ming

This was the only other marque I purchased multiple things from so the rest of my spring purchases are quite random. Do let me know if you still want to see them!

Collection Les Perles de Chanel

2011-01-28T02:12:00.000-08:00

I'm sure I'm not alone in the blogging world when I say that the Chanel spring collection was the one I had been most anticipating (since December, right after the Holiday collections were 'done' for me), largely due to the Ombres de Perlées palette but also because the promo was so fresh and light and lovely.

I have spent more or less the last 2 months on-and-off phoning counters around my city trying to determine when the collection was coming in! I actually ended up purchasing several pieces from the entire collection and it was nicely capped off by a Chanel makeover today (in which I literally had Chanel on from the base up)

Sheila can attest to this (I ended up purchasing pieces from 3 counters - the Bay, Murale, and Holt Renfrew) but my SAs/MUAs in Calgary at the Chanel counters have all been fantastic! By far my favourite experience was at Holt Renfrew today - Kim was so lovely and so EXCITED about the collection that I wanted to make a purchase. Good sales tactics, haha.

Apologies if I look tired, I came off nights yesterday (and am on nights tonight in fact) so I was not very well-rested when I had the makeover done! I was also running late so I came COMPLETELY bare faced (no skin care even) which actually made Kim quite happy as it meant she could play with skincare to her heart (and my skin's) content. She applied toner, eye cream, moisturizer, and then gave me a bottle of water to sip on while she cleaned her brushes.

Look is as follows:

Face Vitalumière Aqua foundation in B40 (Beige Desert)

Cheeks Joues Contraste Powder Blush in Espiègle

Eyes Ombres Perlées de Chanel, Inmitable Intense Mascara, Le Crayon Sourcils - Cendrè Noir

Lips Le Crayon de Lèvres - Pêche, Rouge Allure - Flamboyante, Lèvres Scintillantes - Nakkar

I always find I wear more products (especially on the lips) when I get my makeup done, but I love this look! So soft and lovely. I ended up coming away with one thing from this purchase and one prior, but I think I am definitely going back for Espiègle... I love how it looks!

I actually haven't touched my own palette yet! Kim used what felt like natural hair brushes to apply, and even though I wasn't wearing my usual primer, the shadows lasted 7 hours without creasing! They might have lasted longer, but I took off my makeup to take a nap.

I know I said I wouldn't buy more foundation but I love love LOVED the finish of this - and I'll get to it! Plus the whole consultation was so lovely, that I wanted to buy something as a thank you for Kim. She was amazing! I also didn't feel pressured at all to make a purchase - she would have happily sent me on my way, I think.

All-in-all, I adore shopping at Holt Renfrew. The SAs are generally nice, and when they're available they know their lines - Kim had helpful suggestions for both skincare, fragrance, and makeup (and also gave me samples). Plus the store is always decorated so seasonally (if there's an applicable holiday).

I still have more (!) spring stuff to post, but I figure since this is a rare all-one-brand day for me it deserves its own post. :)

Photo-bomb: Cross Iron Mills, Canada Olympic Park, & A Shot of Downtown

2011-01-24T01:17:00.000-08:00

It's almost the end of January (!) so I wasn't going to post these since they're very Christmas-themed (the remainder of the shareable pics from my cousins' visit up here) but my twitter-friends seemed receptive... so you're all subject to them!

I really thought we took them to more but I skipped out on the Calgary Tower visit (too cold) and then we spent most days at either my house, my sister's, or my various aunts and uncles... so I'll have to try harder to explore my city! These are my favourite picture from where we DID visit :D

This is actually right above Murale (AKA my favourite store ever) in the 'fashion district' of Calgary - it's really the outdoor mall part of TD Square. I'm not sure if the mural is the same - it changes periodically!

Cross Iron Mills is this giant outlet mall about 10 minutes outside of Calgary in the small town of Balzac. It's about a 5km walk (I think) to go all the way around it, and it's HUGE, and they really went all out with the directions to represent Canada and Alberta. All the different quadrants are themed (this is the sports/outdoors/hunting sector) right outside of Bass Pro Shop

Those moose are real. Stuffed, but real.

I'll admit now that I am neither a hunter OR particularly outdoorsy but there isn't another place like Bass Pro Shop in Calgary, at least, and according to my cousin, not in California (I believe this is an American sports store chain). The store caters to the hunting/outdoor lifestyle and is gigantic - they sell everything from ATVs to snowmobiles and boats, to guns and regular sports-wear.

All the animals in the store are real, and in the pond there are live trout and salmon

It's a very interactive store experience! Worth visiting once even if it's REALLY not your thing just to ogle at the massive scope of it. In addition to the taxidermied animals everywhere there is a mock-fishing area (with real fish) to test out rods, a shooting range, an archery range, and a climbing wall so you can test shoes and picks and gear.

There's also random things like old bi-planes. The second floor gave me vertigo and I hate heights so we took the elevator back down. *is a wimp*

This is probably my favourite part of the mall. I think the ceiling is SO pretty.

This is the newest extension to Cross Iron Mills and was the entrance to the Entertainment district (which includes, among other things, a movie theatre and paintball range). The lights actually had a flashing show set along to Christmas carols but I missed taping it :(

The last full day we had with my cousins we went to COP so they could see the park where the 1988 Winter Olympics were held. We went on a Sunday right after New Year's so unfortunately only the hill was open, but we froze and saw that anyway. We tried to take pictures on the little replica of the podium but it was really unsteady due to all the snow piled up underneath it!

I miss my cousins already :( It was SO COLD when we took this picture - probably -20C without the windchill? I asked my cousins if they wanted to try renting skis to go on the bunnyhill but I think they were both frozen as they told me no. ;)

That's about it for my Calgary tour... it's easier to go around and visit all the outside attractions when it isn't so bitingly cold. I'm getting visitors in April, hopefully, so I'll try to take more pictures then!

Holiday Palette Round-Up

2011-01-21T23:31:00.000-08:00

Just a quick post so I can document what I purchased... and because I think all of these palettes are beautiful :)

This post is really short mostly because I didn't take good pictures of FOTDs with these palettes even though I've worn each of them 5+ times since getting them. Oops.

The Cosme Decorte Magie Deco coffret was the second most expensive thing I purchased but the prettiest, by FAR. I'd always wanted an eyeshadow palette because they look like giant pink jewels, but they are very expensive. The coffret was a good value (it also came with a loose blush, jelly eyeshadow, and lip gloss) even with Ichibankao's markup, and I love it! Still haven't figured out how to open the blush though XD;

I bought this palette largely because it was SUCH a good value (it came with a clutch, blush, and mascara) but I'm glad I did! I own a lot of neutrals but this palette is lovely and perfect for a 5 minute look, although the shade in the middle is pure glitter and kind of hard to use. I use the blush with more colourful looks - otherwise I find the whole thing is too nude-on-nude for me :)

This is the most expensive thing I purchased, but it was for a good cause (and I got a wicked deal on it!) I purchased it as part of the BeautyBloggers.org charity auction benefiting Doctors Without Borders and it was almost 100$ below retail price in the US. I'd wanted the palette since images first came out but at 300$ CAD it was way too expensive to buy without a tester (the SA helpfully informed me that they sold a lot of the palettes without people wanting to try them, so why would I?), but at such a reduced cost AND with all of the money going to charity, I jumped. I've only worn the neutrals from this palette (haha) but I love the jewel tones. Need to get myself back into wearing colours for sure :)

Hello Kitty & Sephora

2011-01-18T15:58:00.000-08:00

Look, an actual display!

I feel slightly better than dying now (though I'm still coughing) so I ventured out to the mall and to my surprise and happiness Sephora at Market already had the Hello Kitty display up! I wasn't expecting much since my near Nunu's store in Vancouver only had a stand, but look how pretty the whole display is! I was so *_* even though I'd been really cynical about the line beforehand.

I swatched all the eye products, and the cheek tints! I didn't swatch any of the lipglosses or nailpolishes as the lipglosses were all very transparent on me (NC35) and my hands, and I don't wear nail polish. Plus Nunu already swatched them.

All of these pictures were taken under a skylight (so as much natural light as possible) on an overcast day. :)

What I was MOST impressed with: the Charmmy Eyeshadow sticks and the Pen Pal eyeliners.

From left to right:

Row 1:
Kimono, Playground, Snowflake, Cotton Candy, Sweet Lavender, Cream Puff, Overalls

Row 2:
Fish Bowl, Sour Apple, Cookies, Teacup, Cupcake, Birthday Cake, Friendship

Row 3 (Liquid Liners):
Goodnight Dreams, Chocolate Milk, Purple Balloon, Picnic Basket

Charmmy Kohl Eyeliner Kit (L-R)
Goodnight Dreams: Black, Grape Juice: Purple , Chocolate Milk: Brown, Happy Cloud: White, Blueberry: Navy, Bicycle: Teal Green, Blue Sky: Bright Light Blue

Glittercute Eyeliner (L-R)
Hello Sunshine, Teapot, Sandbox, Happy Sails, Grape Soda, Coin Purse, Telephone, Night Sky

The top row is the Cottonball (hilighter) of the Hello Kitty Apple Cheeks but you can't really tell... it's basically sheer white with sparkles.

L-R
Charmmy, Blushing, Peachy, Cherry Blossom

Happy Fun is swatched in L-R, Top-Bottom, starting in the left upper corner. There is a palette of glosses underneath the eyeshadows but they are all colourless. So I didn't swatch them.

Super fun is also swatched in L-R, Top-Bottom order, starting in the upper left hand corner. The glosses in this palette were also colourless.

*** Thoughts and Purchases ***
Even though I had been PRETTY sure I was going to come home with nothing, I came home with three things from the Hello Kitty x Sephora Collection:
- Kimono Charmmy Eyeshadow Stick
- Cupcake Charmmy Eyeshadow Stick
- Chocolate Milk Pen Pal Eyeliner

By product type:
Charmmy Eyeshadow Sticks were creamy, pigmented, blended out nicely, and set SUPER fast. I had to take the swatches off with makeup remover and cotton swabs - after 2 minutes on my hands to take photos they were not moving or smudgeable

Pen Pal Eyeliners were initially quite smudgy but set nicely and were also hard to remove without makeup remover. I was told by the SA that these aren't waterproof, but I hope they'll hold up nicely. I picked up a brown one for work use, as my HG black eyeliner is still K-palette. Pigmentation was best on the black shade by far.

Charmmy Kohl Eyeliner Set had surprisingly soft pencils, but very VERY smudgy. Did I mention soft? I dented all the liner tips trying to put the cap back on.

Glittercute Eyeliners were sparkly, but in a chunky way. The only way I thought of using these were as a base since the tips are so large, and for bases from this line I prefer the Charmmy eyeshadow sticks. These were decently pigmented (all the swatches are of a swipe back and forth).

Hello Kitty Apple Cheeks are a pass for me. They are similar in texture to the NARS Multiples released last summer (more gel than cream) but for the price, the pigmentation is sub-standard. I also thought they'd have the chance of being greasy. The hilighter is mostly sparkles with a tiny bit of white background.

Say Hello Palettes are cute JUST for the Hello Kitty shaped compact but not worth purchasing. Both palettes are quite sheer and the glosses are useless (unless you really like clear gloss you need to apply with a brush). I will say that the SA was wearing Super Fun over the Charmmy Eyeshadow sticks and it looked nice, but that was after applying primer + base.

Hope this helps!

Travel Alberta: Canmore, Banff, and Lake Louise

2011-01-15T20:55:00.000-08:00

I'll be honest - I'm not a very good 'staycation' person. The only time I really travel around my own province is when we get visitors who have never been here. I'm not the kind of person who likes camping or hiking or generally outdoor activities (ha) so ... basically, my 'Travel Alberta' is a very rare occurrence.

I was lucky enough to have my cousins visit me right after Christmas this year so of course we took them around as much of Alberta as we could... roads permitting! This is really the first time I'd driven to any of these places in the winter (other than with school) so ... it was fun for me to see the place I've lived my whole life in a new light. This post is VERY picture heavy - we went to three different places in a day (and froze the entire time).

We actually decided to go to Lake Louise first, which is the furthest west from Calgary, so that we'd be travelling in one direction on the way home. I had hopes that it was going to be sunny but I really should have taken a clue from the grey skies... it was just going to snow all day (which my cousins were fairly excited about, actually).

We weren't actually planning to stop in Canmore, but we had to in order to buy my cousins long underwear as they were shivering in my sister's car during the drive even though they had their winter jackets AND the heater on :D. In contrast, I'd taken my coat off for the drive so I could take a nap. Canmore was nice (other than trying to find a public bathroom) and I bought a nice hat there on sale, so I was happy with the stop. Canmore is about a 45-60 minute drive from Calgary (it took us 60 minutes as it was snowing).

Also, all these little towns are generally 80% hotel (at least it feels like it) since they get many travellers who are just there to ski! Not much of a night-life, haha.

You pay a 9$ park preservation fee to drive through the park (it's good for 24 hours so you can drive in both directions). For the skiiers and snowboarders there are yearly and weekly pass options. We only ever buy the one day pass, as the only time we pass through are with visitors, or when driving to Vancouver, haha.

Banff National park is really beautiful to drive through (I'm not sure if you can also hike through it, but probably) but it gets closed frequently due to avalanche warnings. So my mom was on edge the whole time we drove through it even though there hadn't been a great deal of snow fall before we went.

Lake Louise (finally!) Once you park near the Fairmont hotel it's about a 5 minute walk to the actual lake. This was the VERY first time I'd seen it in winter and... it's pretty but not as WOW as in the summer when the mountains contrast with the crystal blue lake. That being said I was impressed the lake was frozen enough to play hockey on (there was even a Zamboni machine, which I forgot to take a picture of >__<). You could also rent snow-shoes to go across the lake (or around) but it was snowing REALLY hard by the time we got there and my cousins were visibly shivering. XD;

That's not cloud obscuring the mountains, that's all the snow! Lake Louise and Banff usually get 5x the amount of snow Calgary does - so if we get 5 cm they'll get more like 50. I suppose it's good for skiing, but it's awful to drive in!

And then we finally made it back to Banff! The roads from Banff to Lake Louise were super slippery due to the snow - so while normally it only takes about 45 minutes, it took us almost an hour and a half since we were driving slower. Thankfully it wasn't snowing as hard in Banff (my cousin happily took off her toque, and so did I).

I love Banff. Okay we do come here a lot in nicer weather because the shopping is nice - it's all outdoors, and the tax is the same in Calgary, but there are lots of little shops. It's very tourist-y: Banff actually had an LV store before Calgary did! Possibly because a lot of the visitors are affluent? I bought a Tokidoki hoodie in Banff that I love <3 and couldn't find in Calgary (which seems backwards, as Calgary is bigger, but oh well).

I thought these street lights were so cute! We went on the 28th, so all of the Christmas decorations were up around the town - I loved that the whole mainstreet was festive.

This was day one with the visitors - this was the busiest week off I've ever had STAYING in Calgary (more posts coming shortly, to convince those of you I've been nagging to come visit me!)

Holidays in the Sakura Household :)

2011-01-01T23:13:00.000-08:00

I hope everyone has had a wonderful holiday week! Belated Merry Christmas, and Happy New Year to everyone!! I've got lots of random things to post (including a holiday-tour of Calgary courtesy of my cousins) but I wanted to share a few snapshots from the holidays at my house this year.

I'm pretty sure that at this point my house was a fire hazard... no clear exit routes.... XD

I think the little sculpture is from last Christmas, actually, but It's still applicable now. <3

Every year we alternate between stars and snowflakes

For good fortune, there are 12 kinds of round-fruit on the table, and of course, an abundance of food for hopes of prosperity in the new year!

This is the look I have basically been wearing all week!

Eyes: Dior Eyeshadow Quint in 001 Five Golds, Diorshow ICONIC, K-palette Black eyeliner, Anastasia Espresso Brow Gel

Base: Bourjois Healthy Mix Foundation in 55, MUFE HD Powder, Guerlain Meteorites in Perles D'Or

Cheeks: MAC Cream Colour Base in Madly Magenta

Lips: MAC Something New Amplified Creme Lipstick

Best wishes for good health, safety, and happiness in 2011!

Holidays at Holt Renfrew

2010-12-10T02:10:00.000-08:00

Is it a sign that I spend too much time (and money) at Holt Renfrew if they send me Christmas cards? I mean not the store in general, but I got Christmas cards (that are designed to look like the HR boxes) from the Shu Uemura and Giorgio Armani cosmetics counters... thankfully the two counters with nice SAs that I like!

In any case the content of this post actually happened a month ago (obviously despite my best intentions I forgot to post... again) and a kind reminder from my dear Old Cow reminded me that I should update... at least so that the few readers of this blog who I don't also stalk on twitter would know I was a live!

Holt Renfrew is almost the only store in the Core (Calgary's downtown shopping district) that decorated for Christmas as a number of parts are still under construction and the Core actually donated its decorating budget to the United Way (which is nice, though I do miss the Christmas trees everywhere)! For the fellow Calgarians, the Core is MUCH MUCH MUCH nicer than it was even 6 months ago - no more exposed piping every metre! There's still a bit of construction but I think the mall looks beautiful and it's now one of my favourite places to be

The gigantic skylight doesn't hurt :)

My holiday trips to Holt Renfrew actually happened over two weeks...

I loved these trees so much <3

Holt Renfrew had their HELLO CHRISTMAS event the first weekend in November, and it's always mad busy as you get 15-25% back from your purchases on a gift card. This is probably the equivalent of a Friends and Family sale in the US, but the store was RIDICULOUSLY busy. Of course I went (I wanted my discount too) and I did the majority of my shopping at the Shu Uemura counter.

I know I always say I don't buy things for GWP but... I definitely did this time! The Aya Takano x Shu Uemura collection was so cute and lovely in person, I couldn't resist! Plus my favourite SA had told me that the GWP purchase pouch was only a 2 product purchase (instead of a $ amount) so I was quite excited.

I've tried only one other cleansing oil (Jill Stuart) in the past, but this was so cute - and for 30$ not a bad price point to try! I haven't actually USED it yet (will start in the new year I hope) but I love the pump. And the packaging! Lately I've been recycling boxes of cosmetic items right away but I kept this one :)

I am so into cream blushes lately, and while this is more of a gel formula, I love it just the same! I needed to swatch this with a brush as it melted right into my finger tips (staining them a nice cherry red colour) but I am liking how sanitary this brush is - no dipping my finger into pots! That is my chief complaint with most gel blushes - they are not kind to my germaphobic self, even if I *DO* wash my hands before I use them!

And the gift with purchase...

The pouch is my favourite part! Right now it's storing my holiday collection purchases (+ the skincare samples). When I went to pick up my purchase a different SA told me I would have to spend 165$ to get the gift, which I was not prepared to do and was pretty sad about - thankfully my favourite SA came my rescue and said she'd honour the 2-product purchase! So I got to come home with my pretty pouch :D

I used the gift-card from this event two weeks later at the Giorgio Armani event with my other favourite Holts SA. C is so wonderful I'd buy Armani makeup just so I could visit her hahaha. I didn't take pics of the purchase since it was just the Eyes to Kill Mascara but I did take a pic of my makeover:

I think MAs tend to like me because I let them do whatever they want unless I have other plans after the makeover... so my MA (not C) did a VERY smokey look which I wore out to dinner that night. I really liked it! Would not attempt on my own though.

Still need to post about the coffrets I've purchased this year... someday!

Shiny Pretty Things

2010-11-08T01:31:00.000-08:00

You know that feeling when an object sticks in your head, and you tell yourself there's no point in buying it, but it never really leaves your mind? That was the story with me and the Jill Stuart 5th Anniversary box! I've loved since I first saw it last year, but first I didn't really own any jewellery and then couldn't rationalize WHY I needed it. Plus, I had a lovely case from Yume that fit all my earrings nicely... and then I began to read more blogs and my jewellery collection suddenly outgrew my storage space!

I made do, keeping things in their original boxes, but after having an awful day at work a couple of weeks ago, AND with it being my birthday, I decided to give in and order the jewellery box I'd been thinking of on-and-off for more than a year... and I'm SO happy with it! I purchased from Gooddealer and everything was wrapped perfectly - styrofoam and bubble wrap with fragile stickers galore - and a tracking number.

As I wanted to show off my shiny new storage, I thought I should show off the shiny things that now live in it. This post for my dear Old Cow who is the reason my collection expanded so quickly AND why I started to wear necklaces :)

It's amazing who you meet through blogging! I can hardly imagine that a year ago I didn't know my dear Yasumi all that well at ALL, and it was only through the prodding of other bloggers that I finally had the courage to comment on the jewellery posts... and then I was lucky enough to finally 'win' one. Let me tell you, it was as satisfying winning an Ebay auction, finally getting my first 'Worship' necklace. I've taken pictures before, but as I received a brand new stand, I thought I'd take new pictures of my necklaces - with my camera, to practice taking super-close-up shots. :D

My first necklace, 'A Little Bit of Black' (I hope this is the right one, I am combing my e-mail for the names!) will always have a special place in my heart, and is the necklace I wear most (I personally think it matches everything). This was the beginning of my love for ribbons. On everything. Bows are love. :D

Next to my collection were the 'Beaux' necklaces. I *LOVE* these. I wear them with party dresses, over sweaters, pretty much any time I can't decide what colour would be best. I love the double strand of crystals and pearls, and the metal bows. These are just so, so classic.

I wear the Gold Beaux more with pink and green dresses since the 'coloured' earrings I do have tend to be gold with pink or green.

I was very fortunate to be able to buy both of these. I remember e-mailing frantically as I saw them and THEN commenting and being really nervous since I wasn't the first comment! This is how Ebay auctions give me anxiety. XD; I also like that I can wear them a bit more like chokers if I choose since the clasp fits around the chain links.

I wear the Silver Beaux with purple the most often, but also black (or anything else). It also goes well with all of my white gold hoops. :)

Despite my tendency to wear bright colours (in my clothing, on my eyes, and my lips) a lot of my Worship pieces are very neutral. Silver, gold, black, white. Coco Loco is no exception. This necklace reminded me of Chanel, and I love wearing it under the collar of a dress shirt over a sweater. The weight is lovely - the necklace feels so substantial, and the length of this necklace is also adjustable for me (I tend to wear it a bit longer so it can go 'over' my clothing). If I'm fidgety and playing with this necklace I tend to fiddle with the black pearls.

My last necklace - I don't know if has a name, as it was made just for me <3, but I call it Purple Velvet in my head, is my most recent Worship piece and one of the dearest to me. I had it made for a friend's wedding but I've worn it often since then, wearing the dark purple whenever I wear pink or white (or purple) and matching it to my earrings (which are a whole separate post, once I figure out how to photograph them). I love the silver rose, the silver bow, the double strands of beads... this necklace is perfect.

I am so, so fortunate to both have these pieces and to have 'met' the creator behind them. I can't wait to stalk her in person. My favourite thing is to be asked when wearing jewellery is 'where did you get that necklace?' and be able to tell the person asking that I got them from a dear friend... after beating the competition to them. :)

Warm Holiday Collections (and Wishes!)

2010-11-05T22:22:00.000-07:00

Thus far, the least wonky self-portraits tend to happen in my car :)

I actually have more than ONE post worth of content, and under the ~~threat~~ encouragement of several of my favourite girls online, I'm going to try to post more than once this month... we'll see how it goes. I tend to have grand plans about blogging and then I get distracted and end up tweeting everything and never posting. It's a vicious cycle.

In any case: I usually don't post 'haul' posts since I don't find my own purchases to be all that interesting after I gush about them (or at least they don't seem interesting enough to talk about) but after a hellish two weeks at work, not only did I end up with a LOT of new makeup - but I didn't have any chance to play with any of it! Two weeks ago was the beginning of my awful stretch of shifts (partly my own fault, partly the scheduler's) and on the minimal days (3 in 14... bearing in mind I do 12 hour day/night shifts) I wasn't at work I apparently had to maximize my time and buy as much of the collections as I wanted as possible.

Before you have a heart attack: part of this was truly spending, and the other part was all free thanks to the Shoppers Drug Mart Optimum program.

So what did I end up with?

First, the Holt Renfrew haul. I get mailers from a lot of the Holt Renfrew counters (I possibly spend too much time there) and one of them was advertising the new Armani Luminous Silk foundations... with a GWP. I whine that Canada NEVER gets good GWP, but I've come to the conclusion that I almost never use them so... I no longer purchase JUST to get the gift. That being said, this gift was pretty awesome (!) and since I'd been eyeing the Armani-skin products lately I thought I'd at least check it out...

My Armani SA is awesome and was lovely and I did end up purchasing to get the gift but I'm happy with what I got. :D

I'd actually received a really large sample of the Radiant Face Fabric at some point last summer, and while I loved both my colour match and the coverage (it was medium coverage - enough to even out my skintone but not heavy at all), the included shimmer made me look oily super fast. Plus at 46$ CAD it seemed expensive (yes you are talking to the girl with a massive Dior eyeshadow collection - somehow I can't bear to spend as much on foundation). The promotion was meant for the 65$ CAD Luminous Silk Foundation but that was MUCH heavier and the SA and I both agreed that (thankfully!) my skin was good enough that I didn't need such heavy coverage. Happily I got re-matched to the regular Face Fabric line (I think I am actually a shade lighter now though :P) and finally purchased it! If you're wondering about my change of heart: you had to buy two skin products (either skincare or base makeup) to get the free GWP, and I'd wanted this foundation for so long... besides, it is now my 'special occasion' foundation - I love the finish, but also have a cheaper HG in use right now.

Second purchase was a setting/finishing powder. Right now I am using the MUFE HD powder, which I don't love, but feel I should finish - thus it is a 'daily' item for me - but it's VERY mattifying. It's also not very portable (I hate bringing loose powder with me) and I wanted something that I could use to set my makeup and also bring on the go (I rarely do this, but you never know) if I needed to touch up my foundation. Because I don't wear a lot of foundation as it is the SA and I settled on a tinted finishing powder :) I think this was also 46$ CAD

So having met the requirements, I got my free GWP, which was a full-sized blending brush - this is the most well known Armani makeup brush (at least according to my SA) and it's SO soft - I can't wait to use it with my liquid foundations! The brush sells for 54$ CAD so I thought the GWP was a good value. I'd rather have a tool I can use regularly vs. samples. I never really use samples unless they are products I already know - I'm afraid they'll break me out! This is the best GWP I've received in a while :D

Next part of the haul was almost COMPLETELY free (I think, in the end, I paid about 6$ for my stuff) thanks to the Shoppers Drug Mart Optimum (Plus!) program. Basically, you get points for every dollar you spend at the store, and can redeem for certain cash levels. The maximum redemption is 95,000 points for 170$ of merchandise from the store (obviously no gift cards allowed). I maximize the points program by only shopping on bonus weekends (at least 10x-20x the number of points per dollar) and buying almost ALL of my really high-end makeup at SDM stores. It helps that SDM also owns Murale, which is almost a Canadian version of Sephora! Between the two stores I can purchase any of these brands: Dior, Guerlain, Stila, Smashbox, Clinique, Lancome, Chanel, Bobbi Brown, NARS, Shiseido, YSL, Bare Escentuals, and probably more that I'm forgetting. It's awesome. I've had over the max number of redemption points for a while, but since I passed on the fall collections I was determined to wait for the Christmas ones... and then they took FOREVER to be unpacked in Calgary. I was so impatient (since they had been spotted in other Canadian cities) that the day they came out I called to reserve my 'purchase'... and then found out the day AFTER I was going to pick them up was going to be a bonus Redemption weekend (so 95,000 points for 200$ - an extra 30$ of free stuff!)

Being quite a cheap person in general, despite what my makeup collection says, of course I waited to redeem. XD;

Both Dior quints this year! I was actually racking my brain a few weeks ago trying to figure out if I'd purchased anything from the fall Dior collection (answer: just lipsticks) and hadn't been too in love with Holiday 2010... until I saw it in person! I still love bright colours but I LOVED the neutral golds of both Holiday quints, and after swatching them in person, decided to get both! It helped that I knew I wasn't paying for either of them :) Felt less guilty indulging, LOL!

The FOTD at the beginning of the post actually uses my SDM haul (shocking, I know. Five Golds is GORGEOUS. Given that it's called a 'Gold Edition' I wonder if there will be more? I really hope so. Dior quints, overall, are still my favourite thing to play with and purchase. Someday I will do a collection post, and you can all gawk at the sheer number of them I have. Keep in mind that about 40% of my quints I got like I purchased these two... for free :D

Lastly I purchased my first Guerlain Meteorites! What sold me (other than that the Minaudiere wasn't available at SDM) was that the case, for the first time, was actually metal! I've always thought that the Meteorites LOOKED beautiful every holiday collection, but the cardboard cases seemed really cheap for the amount you paid for them. Packaging isn't everything to me, but it's certainly a consideration when spending 50 or 60$+ on a product! I love these - they seem to give a more 'polished' look to my FOTDs (I'm wearing them in the first pic) and help combat the mattifying nature of the MUFE HD powder.

The last thing I bought (and paid money for) was the holiday item I'd been drooling over since I saw it 3 months ago on BBB - the Dior Minaudiere. I had talked myself in and out of buying the palette several times (you can just ask Sheila) and finally gave in after seeing the swatches - I do think it's something I will use at least a few times. And it was SO gorgeous in person. The Dior SA at the Bay downtown was lovely, and let me actually handle the palette instead of a tester so I could feel the weight of it. This is probably my favourite 'star item' Dior's released since I got into makeup!

Enough babbling. Honestly I like haul posts and even makeup sales because I just like pictures of pretty things... so you can ignore all my rambling and just enjoy the pictures! Still playing with my new camera - but I think these pictures are OK!

Celebrations & Giving Thanks

2010-10-11T09:51:00.000-07:00

At O Shima Restaurant

For all the Canadians out there, today is the last of a long weekend, as it's the 'Canadian' thanksgiving - and the weekend has been beautiful! We've had a lovely amount of sunshine over the last week, so it was nice to be able to wear a dress to celebrate my birthday without shivering to death!

This weekend has been all about food, friends, family, and more food for me :) It was a lovely way to celebrate my birthday!

Except I didn't actually take a lot of food pictures AT my birthday dinner with my friends! I was too excited for a tonkatsu curry plate, I guess ;). This was the first time I'd ever had all my besties together at once (usually at least once schedule interferes) and it was a lot of fun. The restaurant was surprisingly good! I had booked it wanting to eat sushi, but they had quite an expansive menu (so in the end, only 2/9 of us got sushi, haha)

We did go for dessert afterwards though! This is my mini-trio of birthday cakes. I hate being sung to - especially in public - since I always get embarrassed, so I browbeat the besties into staying silent... no pictures at the second restaurant as the lounge was SO dark (and I haven't quite mastered the use of my camera yet).

E and I shared this :) The best part was the first cake (why can't I remember the name?) though I remember the last cake was supposed to be a sticky toffee pudding, but we both thought it tasted more like warm banana bread. Still good :D

Thanksgiving day was all about the food....

Typically I suppose you see turkey and all the trimmings (potatoes, yam, corn, etc) and while we had all that, my family is large and VERY Filipino at times, so we had a combination Western/Filipino feast! I was planning on taking pictures 'during' the prep process but we were so busy I forgot. So you'll have to make do with pictures of our finished table :D

The table before half the food arrived...

This was in the middle of getting ready... you can see the Palabok has a place front and centre, haha!

Homemade palabok - but we forgot the smoked oysters!

Palabok is my favourite type of pancit... for about a day. Then I realise how much we have left over and I wish to eat something else! My family has a tradition where you MUST eat noodles on your birthday to symbolize a long healthy life - I always want palabok, but as we were celebrating Thanksgiving the day after, I actually had ramen for birthday noodles! The palabok is still amazing though :)

The 'Filipino' side of the table: Fresh lumpia, homemade empanada, lumpia filling, pichi pichi

I love homemade lumpia but the dish is so labour intensive. Currently it's the only Filipino dish I can do by myself from start to finish, but I am working on it! We make the filling, crepes, and sauce from scratch. The empanada are chicken (a friend made these for us) and the pichi pichi are a glutinous rice cake dessert with coconut - but they aren't very sweet!

Now with cassava, a cake, lumpia sauce, and chicken adobo

The mostly complete table (after some rearranging) once the rest of my family arrived! So much of this food is still left over...

It's not quite a croque-em-bouche but it's pretty close... my aunt brought this from work - I love it!

The turkey... 20 pounds! My cousin cooked this - it's already all gone o_o

Hope you enjoyed my weekend of food! For all the Canadians out there - Happy Thanksgiving!!

24, New Camera, Mooks

2010-10-08T21:32:00.000-07:00

My new camera has a 'soft focus' feature

Yikes, only 3 hours away!! I know I tend to post sporadically, but it went to posting nil after my beloved Sony DSC-T200 camera died :( I couldn't take pictures AND I had no idea what to talk about.

My birthday is tomorrow, and I'd been contemplating a beginner's DSLR anyway, so I bought myself a new camera as an early birthday present and replacement for mine (though I will probably pick up another point-and-shoot since they are more portable, and I am lazy). I picked up an Olympus PEN E-PL1 but I am still mostly using the auto settings... definitely need to find a good beginner's guide to DSLR cameras (suggestions welcome).

In any case, to prove I am alive (and hopefully to kick my butt into posting more), my latest mook purchases (I say 'latest' but one is really old, and the other two were posted about weeks ago by other people.

Agnes B Bag + Mook

This was actually the only purchase from San Francisco that I haven't post about yet, but probably my most favourite non-makeup related thing :). Bought it at Kinokuniya after spending like 20 minutes in the store trying to figure out which one to buy... I love this bag! It is a good size for a tote, and it has a little front and inside pocket to store change. It was about 20$ USD

Mary Quant MOOK + Bag

I love love love this tote. Probably my favourite out of all three gifts in this post. I initially heard about Mary Quant from my dear Old Cow, and while I haven't been able to try any of it, I thought this mook could give an idea about the line... plus the tote is super cute! I love all the makeup products, and the colours. This is a good size also - a bit bigger than the Agnes B tote. It also came with a MQ charm, but I have already misplaced it >__<

Jill Stuart WE LOVE JILL! MOOK + Makeup Bag

Probably the mook I've heard talked most about since it came out. I found out about it on Rouge Deluxe and then from my dear Bittenbefore... luckily it was still available on YesAsia since it sold out so fast in Tokyo! I actually think I like the fabric of this bag more, and I am excited for all the pockets - I kind of want to do a test-trial of packing makeup for a trip to see how much I can fit in here. Yes, I need more hobbies in life.

These are the few snaps I've taken since I got the camera... I can already see a big difference between the quality of these pics and my point-and-shoot and I am excited to learn more about them!

Next up - my makeup 'rut' this summer (neutral eyes, liner, bright lips) and haha, a glimpse of my Dior collection ;)

San Francisco Day 3: Japantown, Union Square, Fisherman's Wharf

2010-09-02T22:18:00.000-07:00

Honestly, I am going to try to finish talking about this trip before I go to San Diego but I'm being honest with myself when I say it probably isn't going to happen. XD; I don't know why I don't have as many pictures with my mom... I think she is holding the camera a lot of the time :P

Anyway Day 3 we spent in downtown San Francisco, and we saw all the tourist-y things as neither Kuya A nor Ate M had seen them before (it's about a 3 hr drive for them, so quite a distance - and hotels are expensive!). The weather was gorgeous, and after another train ride on the BART from the airport we bought day passes to tour more of the city. It was cheaper for us to get the day pass as it is valid on the regular bus system and the cable cars :)

I suppose my new rule of thumb is that if a city has a big Asia/Chinese/Japanese shopping area I will want to go there. Hence, our first stop was Japantown (I wanted to visit the Daiso but it turned out to be really small and disappointing), which my parents were surprisingly OK with... turns out there's a big cathedral on the way there, haha. Japantown was mostly a series of shopping centres with lots of restaurants, and some random knick-knack stores (and a Sanrio, of course).

Some of it was very reminiscent of my trip to Tokyo though :) Like all the food displays! My cousins asked me several times if 'this was authentic' which made me laugh... not sure how to respond to that!

I had ramen with a sashimi side for lunch even though it was actually REALLY hot outside - this was pretty OK I think. Nothing life-changing ;)

After that my dad and I went back to Union Square while my cousins and mom went to see the giant cathedral (my dad wanted a sitting break). While we waited, I ducked into Nordstrom's hoping to try on one of the Tom Ford lippies... this is 'Pure Pink' which I LOVED and was prepared to shell out 45$ USD on... except it was sold out >___<; I resolved to try to get it in LA (but was thwarted there too :S)

This was our meeting point. I thought this side of the heart was prettier than the gold side. Lots of people just sitting outside enjoying the beautiful weather (and also a lot of street musicians - a nice soundtrack for the day!)

Honestly we only went back to Fisherman's Wharf was because my mom wanted to get 'value' from the day passes by taking the street trolleys again (as it is 5$ each way) and since my cousins hadn't seen it before - why not? Thankfully we took the streetcar that stopped on the other side haha. Finally saw Ghirardelli square (though we didn't buy any chocolate).

We also stopped by a free-admission nautical museum. I liked the old lighthouse beacon - very pretty!

That evening Kuya A took us for dinner at Patio Filipino - definitely my first 'fine dining' Filipino experience!

Pancit Bihon

Garlic Friend Chicken and Crispy Binagoongan (this was SO GOOD)

Sizzling Sisig - very sour but delicious - my first time having this!

Fresh Lumpia

The food was delicious and we were definitely WAY too full for dessert afterwards. We also got to meet one of Kuya A's uncles from his mom's side - apparently he kept telling my parents that I was very pretty (in Tagalog, which I don't understand). My parents kept referring to me as the 'pretty' one for the rest of the trip :P

San Francisco Day 2: Golden Gate Bridge, Palo Alto, & A Hotel on the Bay

2010-08-20T02:26:00.000-07:00

My second day in San Francisco started off much better, as my ears had popped while I was sleeping, and also that we were checking out of our ugh hotel to go to our actual hotel. Also because my cousin A and his wife M were coming to pick us up to spend a few days with us! I hadn't seen A since I was 3, so it was really like we were meeting for the first time :)

The weather was absolutely gorgeous, which was nice, as we spend a lot of the day outdoors and driving :)

We went for lunch, first though :)

I adore Filipino food but we don't often eat out to have it since there aren't very many restaurants that serve it in Calgary... and because I eat it at home a lot I never want to go out and pay more to eat it cooked by someone else, haha. Kuya A really likes it though, and since he's still learning how to cook, they go out often. We were at Kuya's for lunch (the name means Elder Brother) and Ate M and I shared the palabok, which is a vermicelli dish with a shrimp-based sauce, pork cracklings, eggs, chicken, and shrimp. My mom makes this for my birthday every year :) Kuya's version was tasty, but I think I am partial to my mother's (at least that is what I always say, when she asks ;) )

The Golden Gate Bridge was on my 'must-see' San Francisco destinations but as I was too chicken to bike across it (I hate heights) Kuya A surprised me by driving us across it... twice! There are little parks at either end of the bridge where you can take photos, and the weather was so nice that we took advantage of it.

Me, Kuya A, and Ate M at the Golden Gate Bridge :)

My parents had apparently both told Kuya A that I liked shopping (this is true) and I had mentioned that I wanted to go to Nordstroms, so our next stop was the Palo Alto shopping complex near Stanford - I think it was about a 30 minute drive from the bridge. The scenery was gorgeous, but I confess I kept drifting off - years of road trips have made me a pro at sleeping in a moving car, haha.

I honestly thought I took more pictures of the mall, but apparently not XD; The mall was beautiful, all standalone shops with a lot of greenery and benches in between. Of course I had to take pictures of the gorgeous flowers - they were all along the pathways, and all in bloom :)

I did make a few purchases that day, but this was probably my favourite - sitting in the sunshine, with a macaron and iced coffee, soaking up the sun underneath all my sunscreen ;)

We also went to a Target (I didn't take pictures) and bought some groceries (water, drinks, snacks) for the next few days. This is my 'actual' hotel - right on San Francisco bay! The rooms were apartment style, with full kitchens, and to encourage socializing, the hotel had free events like barbecues and shuttles to downtown San Francisco (which we took advantage of the next day).

And that was day 2 :)

San Francisco Day One: Fisherman's Wharf, a Crappy Hotel, and CRAB!!

2010-08-07T18:31:00.000-07:00

My trip to San Francisco ended a couple of weeks ago, but given my rate of posting (slower than a snail) I thought I should finally upload pictures and chat about it... especially as I am back to California in 3 weeks (this time San Diego :D). Normally I don't end up doing a lot of sight-seeing on the first day, but as we got to San Francisco quite early (around 2PM) and our temporary hotel ended up being crap, my parents and I decided to squeeze some sight-seeing in right away... and grab dinner while we were at it. First stop: Fisherman's Wharf.

Well, actually, first we dropped off all our luggage at Citigarden Hotel, in South San Francisco. We were supposed to be staying at a Marriott Residence Inn in the same area but for some reason they didn't have a room for us the first night, so they put us at a nearby hotel for free - but ugh, the hotel was awful.

Misleading lobby:

The actual hotel was more like a drive-in motel, with all the rooms opening to an outdoor courtyard. And the whole place was kind of dirty :S The stairwells were all in back corners, and not that well lit. At least it had a free shuttle to the airport and BART station? I didn't take a picture of the room because it was so ugly (and dirty, blech) - I had to move the side-table to get to the wall plug-in and there were dead bugs and used cotton pads, etc behind the table. D: D: Needless to say we spent as little time here as possible, which necessitated going sight-seeing RIGHT AWAY instead of napping first, haha.

It was a 10-minute shuttle from the hotel to the SFO airport, and then I think about a 30-40 minute BART train ride - my parents were super impressed at how 'fast' it was but I fell asleep. Haha, underground = nothing to look at. Also, the trains in Tokyo were cleaner. And brighter. Although it was hurray for air conditioning!

We took the trolley on the way down, which wasn't super interesting since I was sitting and they cram them so full all you can see is the person's legs in front of you... I learned my lesson and stood on the way back to the station from the Wharf, haha.

So... there were lots of boats. And water. And tourist shops, haha. We stopped in one to buy souvenir t-shirts for my dad's co-workers but he didn't like anything that much. We spied Alcatraz island on a return trip later in the week, but didn't end up going on a tour since neither of my parents were keen on touring an old jail, unfortunately!

My mom ate at Alioto's when she first came to North America in the 1970s... pretty amazing it is still operating! However we didn't end up eating here because I was feeling sick (my ears hadn't popped on the plane, and I couldn't hear ANYTHING) so we stopped at Joe's Crab Shack which was closer to where we got off of the trolley... so much seafood here (obviously)! There is a little boardwalk close-by where you can get crab, shrimp, or lobster sandwiches much cheaper than eating in a restaurant (but of course you don't have anywhere to sit to eat them without wandering for a bit).

Joe's Crab Shack was pretty tourist-y, but the food was good, which is really all that matters. I do feel bad that I might have unintentionally shouted at our waitress as I couldn't hear anything though :S. Oh, and this is the restaurant that reminded my mom to ask for "Sweet Tea" vs. "Iced Tea" haha.

Appetizer platter: calamari, crab+cheese+jalapeno poppers, crab and shrimp dip (the dip was my favourite part).

My dad's crab cake platter.

I got a seafood sampler platter which had a crab cake, crab-stuffed shrimp, and fried halibut... also ordered cheese potatoes which were amazing but not very attractive to look at, and were so hot we waited until we were almost done before we could eat them! My dad ate the onion strings.

My mom's snow crab steamer. This looks deceptively small, but there were 3 'sets' of legs, 2 corn-on-the-cobs, 3 large potatoes, shrimp, AND sausage. She also had to wear a paper bib to eat, much to her consternation. My mom was a little disappointed that they don't give you the crab's head to eat - we eat it over rice when we steam them at home - but she had enough crab legs that she was satisfied, I think (and kept trying to pass them on to me or my dad when she was done eating).

We did a bit more shopping and then headed back to the hotel as I was tired and cranky from my un-popped ears (thankfully they resolved after a night's sleep) and both my parents were tired. This time my dad and I stood on the street trolley and I was wishing for a seatbelt the entire time, haha! You could definitely tell when we were going up the steep inclines of San Francisco! The quick view of the streets was pretty nice though :)

Sunset from the BART train.

And that was Day 1 :)

Revlon Colourburst Lipsticks + Sunshine, FINALLY

2010-06-21T20:43:00.000-07:00

It's been raining a lot this week so I was super happy that my weekend off was filled with lots of sunshine and gorgeous weather! Spent a lot of time outside, loaded up with the sunscreen, to celebrate the official beginning of summer, and the birthdays of my oldest sister and one of the besties! I haven't posted in ages (work has been killer) so ... this is going to be a LONG post.

If you've ever 'met' me in person (or you are one of the above mentioned besties) you know that as soon as it's sunny and warm I live in skirts (no matter how windy) and dresses! I found this in my closet (I don't think I'd ever worn it) but the v-neck was a bit low-cut, hence the green tank top under the dress. Depending on my mood I'll either match my makeup to what I'm wearing, or go neutral - for the bestie's birthday party I matched, but I picked up a quint at random for today and ended up going neutral with my beloved Dior Parisian Lights palette. So of course I wanted to play with one of my many new lippies. This is actually Chanel Rouge Allure in Genial (from the Les Pop Ups summer collection) and will be the focus of a later post - it's a colour I'm currently obsessed with).

On to the actual content...

I am TOTALLY in a lipstick phase right now. All the reviews online for the Revlon Colourburst lipsticks had me intrigued (I wore one in last week's post) and with a generally positive experience, I planned on eventually getting more... this just happened to be expedited by Rexall having a 50% off all lip products sale last week! This decreased the price of the lipsticks from 10.00$ CAD (which I thought was reasonable) to 5.00$ CAD (even better!) so of course, I hauled ;) I picked up five more lipsticks, and since it was so sunny today I thought I'd finally do lip swatches... so you'll see my face 5 more times, haha.

Mauve was the last lipstick I purchased, and thankfully is not as purple on me as it looks in the tube (I may give Lilac a chance after seeing how this one turned out). Nice soft pink. Nothing ground breaking. I'm sure there are many dupes for this colour, but since I tend to wear brighter, 'cleaner' pinks I don't have anything super similar - not that that stops me from buying more makeup :P

Peach is my FAVOURITE of the lipsticks I've purchased - it is quite a bit pinker in person and goes with all of the makeup I've tried so far. I don't own anything similar to this :)

Fuschia is definitely an 'on-trend' colour this year! It's a fairly dark pink (I think the sunlight lightened it up quite a bit here), so I often sheer it out with a balm underneath.

Carnation is a pretty, soft pink. If I grab a lipstick at random I'll usually grab this one - it applies easily and isn't bright enough to overpower even my fluorescent eye looks.

Soft Nude is DEFINITELY a true nude on me. I don't think it looks TOO bad but it throw me off in this picture since the eyes are super neutral... will have to try it with a smokey/colourful eye. Good if I want a gloss colour to show up on it's own since it's so close to my skintone!

Blush is a slightly-less-frightening MLBB/nude colour on me :) Again, I'd wear this with a more dramatic eye or cheek (or both), but I do like it.

What I like about these lipsticks:

- They have a wide range of colours (20 in Canada)

- They are pigmented - all of these swatches are only 1-2 swipes

- The packaging is cute, and the colour on the cap is pretty accurate

- They are cheap! (Especially when they go on sale)

What I am 'meh' about:

- They are a bit drying - I have to apply a balm under or a gloss over to combat this

- MOST of the stores didn't have testers for all the shades - WAL-MART did, for the record, but if you like to try stuff on I'd be a bit hesitant

- They're not long lasting for me (I do lick my lips a lot, because of the dryness): I get about 2 hours of wear

I'd recommend these if they go on sale - they are pretty comparable (for me) to MAC lipsticks though I find that the very high-end lipsticks (Chanel, Dior) hold up better for me, at least in terms of moisture and pigmentation over several hours. I don't mind so much because these lipsticks are VERY inexpensive compared to the 35$+ pricetag of high end lipsticks though!

Colour Tag + Dior Tailleur Bar + Revlon Colourburst Lipsticks

2010-06-11T05:42:00.000-07:00

Working and a few days of rainy, grey weather certainly impact my desire and ability to blog! I think I am more productive when I have a few days off and it's SUNNY, so I feel like taking pictures, haha. Yesterday was grey and rainy but brighter than it had been (plus I had time to dither over a makeup look), but of course, I lacked 'inspiration'... so I turned to Yumeko who I was happy to catch online, and she suggested grey and pink :)

The above FOTD was REALLY hard to take a picture of. You know I tend to take quick webcam pics, but for whatever reason the natural lighting in my room made me look about 10 shades paler (neck AND face) than I normally am, so ... I actually dug out my camera.

Yesterday was also the first time I tried out Skinfood's Peach Sake BB Cream in #2, and the colour match looks OK... but I think I need to try it again on a sunny day (today it looks like it might be the day!). I am slowly, SLOWLY trying to find a replacement for my beloved Dior Hydraction TM #3, which has unfortunately been discontinued. For reference, I am NC35-40 :). This also smells fantastic - I am hoping it works well because I like the idea of smelling like peaches (though the smell does dissipate quite quickly).

This FOTD uses:
Skinfood Peach Sake BB Cream #2
MUFE HD Blush #6 + MAC Tippy
Dior Graphic Lights Iridescent Quint
Dior Argentic Eyeshadow Single
Dollywink Liquid Eyeliner + Korres black pencil liner (I couldn't find my UD Zero, but I don't like this unfortunately)
Fairydrops Mascara
Revlon Colorburst Lipstick in Carnation

About the lipsticks... they've been all over the blogging community so of course I was searching for them as soon as I'd read the positive reviews... sadly everything comes out a few weeks later in Canada! Finally tracked them down at Rexall and picked up a few to try out; so far I like them! They are decently pigmented (one or two swipes), don't seem too trying, and are scentless and tasteless (to me). I wouldn't call them moisturizing - after about 2 hours I applied some gloss on top as my lips felt dry. The packaging is OK... designed similarly to the Chanel Rouge Cocos but not as luxurious (of course)! Rexall is having a 50% off of lip products this weekend so I think I will pick up a few more! This is a good range if you want to try bold colours but don't want to spend $$ on a high-end brand: they had a few bright reds, and a fuschia which I purchased but have not figured out how to wear yet. I'm more a medium pink girl :)

And lastly...

!!

I know I always say that I will never buy a palette that is so pretty I'd never use it, but when I saw the special production Dior Tailleur Bar at Rouge Deluxe it was an instant 'I MUST HAVE THIS'... and it wasn't available in Canada :P

I've met some amazingly, lovely, considerate girls through makeup blogs, and one of them was kind enough to go and track this down for me! I am in LOVE. The palette is so gorgeous, and the makeup look that's included is a lovely smokey grey look... but I am afraid of ruining the picture! It will be months (perhaps years) before I work up the nerve to touch a brush - or even my fingers - to the shadows, but right now it makes me happy to open it, admire it, and grin. The set also came with a new Serum de Rouge colour (I really need to do a post on these) in a nice light pink - I believe the Serum de Rouge is actually a permanent edition being released in the fall (found on A Touch of Blusher). So I will definitely be using the lipstick... while I sigh over this palette!

Green, Purple, and Redemption?

2010-05-22T16:28:00.000-07:00

I think that pink and purple look from a few days ago catapulted me back into loving bright eye looks... too bad I'm going back to work tomorrow so I'll be back to my standard work face :P

I've been thinking about doing this look for a while, but hadn't actually picked up any of the colours until I was poked by Yumeko to try it out since she posted it first and then Haru posted a similar version using different products! I find it so interesting to see how different girls interpret looks and tutorials, so of course after her reminder I wanted to try it out
I'm not sure why this turned out more like seafoam green and purple (it's more of a kelly green in person, but I can't catch it on my camera). The green appears a bit darker on my webcam pic so I'll attach that at the end.

Keep reading for products used...

Face
Dior Hydraction TM #3, NARS Madly Blush (not pictured)

Eyes
UDPP, MAC PP Bare Study, Sugarpill Midori + Poison Plum, Yaby PP011 Emerald Dragon + -17 Lavender Snow, Sugarpill Tako to hilight
Dollywink Liquid Liner, UD 24/7 Liners Zero + Covet, Fairy Drops Mascara Anastasia Espresso Brow Powder (not pictured)

Lips
Tokidoki Fantastico Lip Ink Nana Star, Maybelline Watershiny Volumy 000, MAC Blooming Lovely

As long as I have time I don't mind using such a large amount of products to 'paint' my face, but this look could also be done with far fewer shadows - I just like using as many as possible to try to make a dent in my stash :P

I'm also SUPER happy that I found a way to make Blooming Lovely 'wearable' to me, thus semi-redeeming its purchase in my eyes. It does take there products, and I use an alternate lipstick to touch up on the go, but at least now I have a way to use it up... using up two other products at the same time!

Close-up of the eye:

As you can see, I tend to make looks a lot brighter as pastels ... do not show up on me and I use two bases to intensify the colour and make an eye look last longer. I've had this on for about 6 hours as I type this, and no fading or creasing noted!

Blogger tag is fun this way - can't wait to see what everyone posts next (so maybe I can try it!)

Edit: I forgot to add the webcam pic!! **airhead**

Rose Tinted Glasses

2010-05-20T16:34:00.000-07:00

This morning I was lacking inspiration both with what to post about, and how to do my makeup! This happens a lot when I wear a neutral colour like black or white :P. Recently I'd been wearing more neutrals like bronze/gold/brown, but I wanted to break out of my rut - so naturally I turned to twitter for suggestions. The lovely ladies on my feed suggested pink and purple, so off I went! I love this look and am happy I delved back into the bright part of my stash again, but the look also made me think of a predominant theme in my life: the colour pink.

Pink is everywhere in my life, a recurring theme I am always willing to indulge, from clothing, to electronics, to makeup (of course). So I thought I'd use this post to examine the colour's role in my life...

My two favourite dresses this summer! I adore all shades of pink, but my most favourite is bright fuschia - I love subtle, blush coloured shades almost as much :) I picked up the pink dress at Winners (which is a store similar to TJ Maxx), and the light pink dress at H&M. Hot pink makes me think of beaches, light pink makes me think of tea parties. I love both of these dresses :D

Beloved bags. I collect Tokidoki and will 95% be using a Tokidoki bag, but when I saw this Betseyville purse at Winners I couldn't resist - I loved the colour, the ribbon detailing, and the straps were a super comfy fit on my shoulder! The pink Citta Rosa Zucca was one of my first Tokidoki purchases, and probably my luckiest - I paid 60$ for it from a girl in Calgary on Kijiji... I have not got such a good deal on a Tokidoki bag since, sadly :P

My 'on-the-go' items? Pink Harajuku Lovers flats (I love these, and got these at Winners too - it's one of my favourite stores when I'm in the mood to sift through lots of items), pink sunglasses (I think I got these a couple of years ago) and my brand new Acer netbook - all the same shade :D.

I do wear other colours (I swear) but pink is the colour that makes me happiest. Doing my makeup today, I was immediately in a MUCH better mood once I finished, despite the fact that it was grey and drizzly outside.

Close-up of my eye makeup

Products Used:
Eyes:
UDPP+MAC Paint Pot Nice Vice for Base
Sugarpill Pressed Eyeshadows in Dollipop and Poison Plum
Yaby Pearl Paints in PP056 Dragon Fruit, PP047 Eggplant, PP045 Passion Fruit
Sugarpill Tako Pressed Eyeshadow + Lumi Loose Eyeshadow to hilight
Anastasia Espresso Brow Powder + Clear Brow Gel
DollyWink Liquid Liner
UD 24/7 Liner in Zero, Lust
Fairy Drops Mascara
Face
Dior Hydraction Tinted Moistuizer #3
NARS Madly Powder Blush
Lips
Chanel Rouge Coco #11 Legende

Honestly you could probably do this with fewer eyeshadows but I was playing around, and I love this look! The how-to for the eyes:
Eyes
1) Apply an eyeshadow base; I use UDPP and a MAC Paint Pot to intensify the colour
2) Apply Sugarpill's Dollipop (a matte, hot pink) all over lid, stopping just above the crease
3) Place Sugarpill's Poison Plum (a mostly-matte purple) in the outer corner and into the crease. Blend lightly into Dollipop
4) Apply Yaby PP056 Dragon Fruit (a shimmery hot pink) over Dollipop; PP045 Passion Fruit (a shimmery lilac) to the middle of your lid, and PP047 Eggplant (a shimmery dark purple) into the crease - this adds some shine and some dimension to the matte shadows. Feel free to bypass this step if you want a more matte look
5) Line top lash line with a liquid black liner - I use DollyWink, lower waterline with a black liner (UD 24/7 in Zero) and then lower lash line with a purple liner (UD 24/7 in Lust)
6) Apply mascara, fill in your brows

I may have to seek inspiration from Twitter more often :) I'll definitely be doing this look again in the future.

Lovely Regrets

2010-05-17T19:54:00.000-07:00

Every few months I clean out my stash (which you can blurrily see in the background), removing items that I don't use often (or at all) and setting them aside to give to others. Normally this encompasses eyeshadow, as I previously did not have a lot of lip products - not to mention sharing used lip products just seems a bit unsanitary to me (I don't any of the sanitizing/alcohol sprays at the moment). Even with the items I purge, there's rarely any regret in my purchases, I get rid of things to make room for new(er) purchases.

I re-swatch everything before I give it away, and on my most recent 'clean-up' I took a look at my lipsticks, and pulled out Blooming Lovely, which I couldn't remember using often... and couldn't remember why I hadn't been reaching for it. However once putting it on I suddenly remembered... my experience solidified 'Blooming Lovely' as being a major buyer's remose case :(

Blooming Lovely

Blooming Lovely just washes me out and looks SUPER lavender on my lips :( If I look at myself under fluorescent/indoor yellow-ish lighting the colour doesn't look bad at all - just a paler pink, but in natural light (this picture was taken near a window, with no flash) the colour screams LAVENDER to me. It's not really a look I like for myself. But since I don't give away lipsticks and didn't want to throw it out or return it (I love the packaging too much) I thought I would try making it work using other lip products in my stash.

Blooming Lovely + Bourjois 3D Effet Gloss in Framboise Magnific

My first experiment just made the colour shiny, but no less lavender (at least to me). I was actually surprised as the Bourjois gloss LOOKED fairly pigmented on my hand, but I don't think it mixed well with the lipstick. It's actually a dark fuschia (though it didn't impact this colour at all).

Blooming Lovely + Dior Addict Gloss 377

I picked a medium-pink Dior gloss to try next; this looks more wearable to me: almost a MLBB shade, but I can get similar colours with using one product so I am not as likely to use two... save for the sake of using up this lipstick! Probably would only use this once anyway though, since I'd have to bring two products to touch up on the go.

Blooming Lovely + Maybelline Watershiny Volumy 015

This look is a bit pinker but there are still some lavender undertones visible... and again, I hate 'needing' to layer products.

I'll probably keep this lipstick and keep experimenting until it's gone though, but I'd love any suggestions to tone down the colour - liner, gloss, other lipsticks - all suggestions welcome!

Have you ever had anything that just didn't work but you couldn't get rid of?

From A Land Far, Far, Away...

2010-04-29T21:12:00.000-07:00

I don't think the weather in Calgary is aware it's almost May as we've had three snowstorms this month - the one last night dumped about 20 cm of snow and knocked out the power in my neighbourhood for about 3 hours... we lucked out though since the areas further out of the city still don't have power right now!

The roads were gross today, so once I got home from my meeting I decided to try to re-organize my makeup (I'm in the process of it now) and after some nudging from Jen I thought I should probably do a post on my GMarket order from... 2 months ago. Haha.

This was actually just my second GMarket purchase and my first for makeup. You probably remember my search for the Maybelline Eye Studio quads a few weeks ago... well I was happy and also annoyed to learn that Maybelline released similar quads in other countries... that were completely different colour combinations from here! I still do not have all of them, mostly because I get distracted easily, but my search for them led me to discover that Maybelline changes EVERYTHING depending on the country/continent, from packaging, products, and even how the same products are numbered. This makes things really confusing (and hard to find).

However, similar to many Western marques, Maybelline's range in Asia is completely different to everywhere else on its own - different shadows, different lipsticks, and completely different focuses! This is how I discovered Maybelline's Watershiny Volumy Range... (I spelled it Watershine Volumny in all the pictures because that is what the Korean stickers say... but the JP website is different XD)

These lipsticks are meant to be medium-pigmented, moisturizing lipsticks - and they are! I saw a couple of colours on Sasa.com, but since Sasa didn't have the eyeshadow quads I wanted I searched GMarket... and hit the motherload? There are multiple sellers for the Asia Maybelline line[s] so it's basically up to you to pick who you want to purchase from based on price, shipping fees, and feedback. I no longer have the seller name, but I paid about 6.00$ USD each for these lipsticks which I think is pretty decent since Maybelline lipsticks here retail from 8-10$ CAD.

I really like these lipsticks! They go on smooth, cover the uneven colour of my natural lips, and they feel really moisturizing! I get about 4-6 hour wear on these if I'm not eating or drinking lots. I usually wipe my lipstick off before I eat so no idea how long it lasts through food, sorry!

These were all taken today - for a picture with a different lipstick but a list of what I used, keep scrolling :)

Most of the lipsticks in this range are very natural, nude-pink colours - which is what I was looking for at the time I purchased these! I wear bright colour eye looks on a regular basis so I wanted a variety of MLBB shades that I could use to 'complete' my looks that wouldn't compete with my eyes, but I think these look nice with a neutral look like this one as well. As for my actual 'day' look...

(Enlarge to see products used)

I'm wearing my parka because it snowed 20 cm this morning and the winds were gusting at 95 km/hr. Ha. This look used a sample of Chanel Rouge Coco Mademoiselle which is a bit similar to the Maybelline Watershiny Volumy 014 on me, but less shiny and more pigmented. And more luxe and expensive. The Maybelline packaging is cute but really light (I prefer a bit of weight to my lipstick packaging) and the packaging is plastic. I'll do another post on my Rouge Cocos but Chanel's packaging is pretty much the polar opposite. They both attract fingerprints like mad though.

If you're looking for a cheap, moisturizing lipstick and are willing to brave Ebay or GMarket (or live in Asia) then I can totally recommend these! Similar to previous orders GMarket shipped my tiny box of lipsticks in a box about 5x its size, but otherwise no complaints about the process. I ordered, got in-country shipping confirmation, and received the order about 2 weeks after I made it (like everything I buy online, it was stuck at customs for ages).

Warning, though: GMarket is addictive and it is SUPER easy to spend money there. They literally sell EVERYTHING, and 95% of sellers ship around the world.

sakuras & sunshine :)

2010-04-14T09:19:00.000-07:00

Last month I made a last-minute trip to Vancouver to meet up with my dear friend from Japan (and the friends he also brought with him, Kana-san and Y-san)! I rarely travel so last minute (I booked the trip about 2 weeks before I left) since usually I have to book my vacation months in advance, but luckily fate was on my side - the dates that my friend (we'll call him K-san, since Yumeko kindly thought of a name for me) was going to be in Canada I had somehow already requested vacation for!

I don't actually have a lot of photos from this trip (other than my pictures with my friends) because I go to Vancouver so often... everything looks the same. However the cool thing THIS time was that the Paralympic games were still continuing in the city so many of the outdoor Olympic events were still open. Except those pictures aren't on my camera. XD;

The first day I was on my own I browsed the 'Asian' part of Vancouver which is Richmond, where I spent most of my time at the only DAISO in Canada (and bought a lot of little tiny cosmetic jars to decant stuff into). Vancouver is normally pretty rainy but by afternoon the sky had cleared up so I decided to make my way to the bay.... I want to find the Olympic torch! This is one side of Canada place. North Vancouver is across the bay, and public transit actually includes a sea-shuttle that goes across the bay so you don't have to take the bus or train all the way around :)

Success! Luckily for me (and for K-san, Y-san, and Kana-san the next day) the torch was still lit for the Paralympic games. And I was especially patriotic since my Canada hoodie was the only one I'd brought with me! The platform designed for a better view of the torch was actually very well done - and the lines by the time I'd made it there were short and generally fast moving. I got to meet Paralympic Team Russia and Team USA while I made my trip the torch but I forgot to ask for pictures!

Day 2 with K-san and company we went to UBC which is probably the most gorgeous campus I've ever seen. This was in Nitobe Memorial Garden which is a beautiful Japanese garden... surrrounded by pine trees! If it weren't for the giant pine trees in the skyline I'd mistake it for a garden in Japan, which is probably the point. It was cherry blossom season in Vancouver while we were there, but because winter had JUST ended nothing else was green. Still pretty though :). We ran through this garden in 3 minutes as it was closing just as we walked up but the gatekeeper was kind enough to let us through. Don't let the serenity of this picture fool you ;)

This was taken on the Sea Bus which is probably the best value for 2.50$ transportation wise I have ever found in Canada. K-san and Kana-san were really excited to get to take a ferry across the bay... and pay 2.50$. The last day of my trip in Vancouver was INCREDIBLY busy as we had to cram in everything 'Canadian' we could before they left for Calgary (to visit me at home!). I don't think I have ever walked so much before - including my trip to Tokyo!

The last part of K-san's trip we actually spent in my hometown (Calgary) since apparently I talk about it so much he really wanted to see it! K-san and Kana-san asked me to take them out for 'something Canadian' and since Canada is such a jumble of different cultures this was actually quite difficult for me... until I remembered steak. Alberta is famous for its beef, after all :). This is my dish which was a flat-iron medium rare steak with bacon and mushroom gravy (yummy).

Afterwards we went for bubble tea since neither of them had had it (is it not popular in Japan? They had no idea what it was).

Love Forever, a Papaya and Mango bubble tea with jelly on the side, which is my new favourite drink. Haha.

Their last day in Calgary was a mad rush to fit in as many landmarks as we could AND find Ice Wine for them to bring home but we did make it to the Calgary Tower to look at Calgary's skyline... and to stand on the glass floor. I HATE heights. And apparently so does K-san as it took the other 3 in our group to push us onto the glass floor to take this picture. You can't tell but both of us are diaphoretic from nerves XD;

And that was my trip :) (For those who are wondering, K-san is a nurse, and he's back in Japan)

Smiles in Her Eyes

2010-03-23T16:27:00.000-07:00

Have I mentioned enough times how bad reading beauty blogs is for my wallet and stash? Lately I've become better and being able to resist the brand new 'thing' everyone seems to be blogging about, but after reading nothing BUT positive reviews, I gave in and indulged... in Sugarpill. This is the new makeup line from Shrinkle and, for me at least, I've found that it is getting raves both across Blogspot, YouTube, and LJ. After reading and seeing so many swatches I gave in and went to place my order... only to find that the palette I wanted was sold out! Thankfully the shop restocked quickly, so here is my first purchase:

Please enlarge to see product names

Did it live up to the hype?

A big huge resounding YES. This package actually arrived while I was in Vancouver and while I was/am planning on a post about the trip, I was so excited to play with these that they superseded all of the posts I had planned in my head. These colours are hugely pigmented, easy to blend, and completely eye-popping. This is not a make-up line for the faint-hearted, but if you love colour (and you know I do) than I think you will come to love this line!

Swatches were all done on the back of my hand, with clean Q-tips, no base applied. Pictures were taken in natural light with no flash. Loose pigments were swatched dry :)

The pigmentation on these is ridiculous!! In a good way. While I thought the shadows swatched nicely I was a bit skeptical at how they would perform on the eye, but for me it took a small tap with my MAC217 brush to pick up enough of Dollipop (the pink) to cover an entire eye. Though I do not work with mattes often, I find this easy to blend and true to the colour in the pan. I did use my normal base of UDPP+Paint Pot for my EOTD, but the colour didn't change at all.

First, the pressed shadows:

The only shadow I found less pigmented is Tako, which is the white shade, but as these were done with a Q-Tip, I think it would perform better when using a brush or sponge applicator - I just haven't used it yet! Dollipop and Tako are both matte shades, and Afterparty, Midori, and Poison Plum have more of a satin/pearl finish. I think Midori may be the HG green I've been looking for as I have NOTHING like this in my stash... well not until this shadow in any case. The first four shadows come in the Sweetheart Quad, and Poison Plum was purchased as a single.

And now the loose shadows:

Chromalust definitely lives up to its name! Not only did seeing swatches of these cause me lemmings but after playing with the 3 shades I ordered I now want the rest of them! I normally hate loose eyeshadows. I find them messy, annoying to work with if I have to use them wet (I do my makeup at my desk so there is no sink in easy reach) and I am generally too lazy to reach for the few I still have. These are so amazing, I think my opinion of loose shadows may be changing (slightly). For me, these are definitely the stars of the line. All of these swatches were done dry, and just from the residue left from taking the lids off of each container. Goldilux by FAR is my favourite thing in this purchase, but Lumi is so holograph and interesting, and Tiara i so shiny! I am in love :)

The above FOTD uses the following:
Eyes: Dollipop (pink) over the lid, Goldilux (gold) on outer corner and into crease used dry, Lumi on inner corner of eye, Besame Beige for hilight shade, UDPP + MAC Cash Flow PP for base, K-Palette 24hr Micro Liner, UD 24/7 Zero pencil, GOSH 24K Velvet Touch Pencil, Fairydrops Mascara, Anastasia brow powder + gel
Face: L'Egere BB Cream, MAC Prim & Proper blush
Lips: Maybelline Watershine 3D Hyper Diamond 111 Sparkling Pink

Close-Up:

I love these shadows!! This is the only look I've done so far, but I am definitely going to keep playing with these on my days off... they are a bit dramatic for work!

Got My Addictions

2010-03-14T19:47:00.000-07:00

I seem to fixate on one type of product at a time in terms of purchasing... like for a long time I purchased only/mostly eyeshadows, and then there was a very brief period were I was really into foundations (I tried a lot but didn't purchase much), most recently I was into blushes, and after a brief foray back into eyeshadow I graduated to lip products. Of course. I think I do this because I can justify purchases of products I have less of, while it's much harder for me to justify eyeshadow purchases (which I have so much of I doubt I will ever finish ALL of them). Haha, mostly I look for reasons to go shopping ;)

When I first got into makeup all I was interested in was eye-makeup as my skin was normally pretty good and I didn't yet understand why blush worked so well, and frankly I thought lipsticks were absolutely disgusting. Which is probably a holdover by being kissed by too many "aunties" with gobs of awful smelling/waxy lipstick as a child. I slowly moved on to each successive category of makeup, and while I had accepted lip gloss, I still eschewed traditional lipsticks (though I liked the liquid ones, notably Chanel's Rouge Laque Allures) for whatever reason.

I still can't pinpoint what made me talk the plunge into buying 'traditional' lipsticks but 2 months later, these are my most recent purchases (except for MAC's Viva Glam Cyndi, but I am too lazy to go back and take more pictures). I wear a lot of colour so at first I was searching for the perfect nude lippie, and then it turned into the perfect nude pink lippie, and now I am just drawn to pinks (of course). Faced with an array of shades I will 95% of the time reach for the medium pink lipsticks to swatch first. So which are the ones I've liked enough to purchase?

As anyone who knows me would tell you, I am a sucker for packaging. So while this lavender-tinted pink gave me pause, I adored the packaging MAC used for its Liberty of London collection, and this ended up in my final purchase :) It is quite lavender on me, so I've toned it own a bit with GOSH Angel, which is a lovely medium pink lip balm, but the lipstick itself is creamy enough to wear it without a gloss. I'm not quite ready to wear light purple lipstick on its own, but I am determined to make this shade work for me.

MAC's Ever Hip is from the same Liberty of London collection and is my second peach lipstick (Yumeko was kind of enough to send me a Gransenbon peach lipstick a while back). I like this as a nude lipstick when I'm not in the mood for beige or pink. This isn't incredibly pigmented compared to other brands but the colour shows up well on me, and it didn't dry my lips out, which was nice.

I really like this as a nude, My Lips But Better shade. I am finding the NARS lipsticks a bit drying, so while I'm not wearing a gloss in this picture, I'd probably put one on top... or layer a balm underneath.

I got this as part of the NARS Love Thrill set, and unfortunately they didn't have a tester for only this product when I purchased it, but I like the shade. A bit of a shinier, frostier, MLBB shade. This also needs a balm underneath to combat the drying effect.

I went to Sephora yesterday to get my free Tarina Tarantino bracelet, and out of the entire store this is the only product that really caught my eye. The lip sheens seem like more of a balm/lipstick hybrid to me for texture, but they feel nice on the lips.

I picked this up because it was 70% off and the colour looked pretty in the tube. A bit paler than I thought it would be, but a pretty milky pink. I'm not sure where else you would get these otherwise (I got this from a boutique at Cross Iron Mills near Calgary).

Forgive the swatch on my lips, they're a bit rough from me rubbing so much lipstick on and off to do this post! This was suggested as a good beige/pink nude lip, and while I find the colour a bit pale, I still wear this on its own! I've also layered it with NARS Velvet Matte Lip Pencil in Damned, and it makes a nice hot fuschia combination. The YSL Rouge Voluptes have an absolutely dreamy texture - I hardly notice I'm wearing lipstick at all!

This was my very first Rouge Volupte and the start of a dangerous relationship for my wallet. I love this shade, and wear it often. I think this is a permanent addition (hopefully) which is good because I refuse to buy backups until I'm actually done a product, but I can definitely see myself finishing this in the near future.

I went shopping with Miss_Eva a few days ago, and as we wandered between the Bay, Murale, and Holt Renfrew, I must have swatched this lipstick about 5 times... but I told her I was pretty sure I'd already bought it (and I had!). I love this medium pink, and I love that it's my favourite number. :D

I have other lipsticks, of course, but these are my most recent and in-rotation ones. I tend to use my newest products for a while, and then get distracted by newer, shiny, pretty things. This is probably a sign that I should shop my stash before buying more lipstick!

HELL. YES.

2010-02-28T15:49:00.001-08:00

GOLD AGAIN!!! GOLD IN WOMEN'S AND MEN'S ICE HOCKEY!!

What an AMAZING Olympics!! After a less-than-ideal start I think we went on to ROCK these games!! 14 golds, a new record both for Canada AND for most gold medals won by a single country in a Winter Games AND at home.

I have the stupidest grin on my face right now and I am SO PROUD of the athletes right now!!

And my Team Iginla T-shirt lasted me all the games! Every time I wore it we WON!! (I was at work, in scrubs, when we lost the USA game in preliminaries).

So sad the games are over, but WOO CANADA!! VANOC did fantastic!!

A Need for Symmetry

2010-02-19T17:46:00.000-08:00

So, confession time: when I arrange things, I really need them to be symmetrical. In nursing school I was once told that everyone has some degree of OCD-ness, and mine manifests in liking 'nice' numbers (like perfect squares) and symmetrical shapes. You're probably wondering what his has to do with this post, but basically, I was getting ready to post about the Maybelline Eye Studio quads, but when I went to go take a picture of all of them it bothered me a LOT that 11 did not make a nice shape so I went looking for the one I had missing and bought it today.

Maybelline Eye Studio quads are part of Maybelline New York's spring collection and were also released with mineral baked shadow duos (which looked nice, but didn't pique my interest). I saw them first before Christmas at London Drugs, and was struck by how 'Asian' the display looked... it reminded me a lot of the displays I saw in drugstores in Japan! Naturally I had to take a closer look, and while the display only offered a tester for the Sapphire Siren quad, I was impressed with the texture (soft) and pigmentation (decent) of the shadows swatched with my finger and was totally ready to pick up a few... until I found out that they were 12.99$! I thought this was too expensive (though this is in line with the pricing of KATE's palettes so I'm not sure why I have such a double standard) so I passed, and went on with my errands.

Eventually they popped up at WAL-MART and Superstore for a more palatable price of 10.00$ CAD so I picked up one, then two... got a couple with Christmas gifts and then when ALL the stores had them I bought them during the BOGO sales (or with gift cards - I had one for Shoppers Drug Mart for instance). Soon I had most of them (save for the elusive 12th quad) and now that I had all of them I figure it's a good time for a review and swatches :)

These aren't done in any particular order, simply just what got edited first and whatnot. These are all 12 quads currently available in Canada (I have no idea if there are other colours in other countries - well other than Japan, I know they have their own colour lineup which I am coveting).

These swatches are done on bare skin, no base, and all the photos were taken with no flash. I will use these eye shadows with my usual UDPP+Paintpot base if I'm wearing them though. They blend really easily so you need to be careful with blending, and show up much more on the lid if you use the sponge applicators... which I don't. Total brush girl. Irresistibly Ivy is probably the most reliably pigmented of all of the quad (I think) and is nice for a neutral day... if I don't feel like using the turquoise colour which I really like :)

Sapphire Siren was the quad that caught my attention but it was one of the last ones I picked up. These shadows were not as pigmented on the lid until I used a blue base (I used MAC's Otherworldly) and it's probably an eye more suited to night time... I wore it during the day anyway:

Yeah I totally match my eyeshadow to my shirts a lot of the time XD;

The light blue in Spirited Seas is a really nice silver in real life, and I love love love the highlight shade. If I was less lazy I would use it instead of my Besame shadow all the time, but as I am trying to hit pan on that (still) it will have to wait.

Pink Persuasion is the only quad I found disappointing. The pink barely shows up and the black is more matte with some sparkles versus a shimmery black (which is what I wanted). The silver shade is really nice, but I haven't found the right base to make this 'pop' yet. I hope I do, as I love wearing pinks! Mad for Mauve is nice for a neutral eye, but I am still trying to figure out HOW to wear that moss-green... so no FOTDs that I am happy with to show off yet.

I took all these pictures this afternoon but it was going between sunny/cloudy as you can tell. Sunset Seduction was the quad I picked up today (so I have no real thoughts about it yet) but Taupe Temptress was one of the first ones I picked up, and I like it for a neutral eye. I wish the burgundy was less brown though. Oh well!

These are definitely my 'Top 2' Eye Studio quads, with Give Me Gold being #1. I use it the most (the yellow is GORGEOUS and sparkly) but Copper Chic was the only one I could find for a while and it's a nice, no-thought work-appropriate eye.

Give Me Gold on the lids...

And lastly, my 2010 lucky colour...

These quads are FAIRLY similar except for the very last shades, but I'm OK with owning both since I can't return either, haha. I like Purple Icon a bit more (I love the shade on the end) but I initially couldn't find so I picked up Legendary Lilac first... I wear these over Stila's Violent smudge pot. I tried these over a pink base and they... were so not purple. Which I probably should have expected, but oh well.

Purple Icon over Stila Violet Smudge Pot

Things I love about these: Payoff is decent, quality is much better than most drug store quads (Cover Girl, L'Oreal, Older Style Maybelline), colour combinations are interesting and the eye charts on the back (oops no picture) are easy to follow for nice eyes

Things I'm Eh About: I sort of broke the Give Me Gold case trying to pry it open the second time I opened it, and there are no testers for quads other than Sapphire Siren

Things I Don't Like: These are pretty expensive for drugstore stuff, so I'd buy them on sale, but I do think the quality is comparable to KATE so I think they're worth the 10$

Must-haves: Give Me Gold

Skip: Pink Persuasion

Hope these swatches helped!

Purple for Love

2010-02-14T16:18:00.000-08:00

Maybelline Give Me Gold Eye Studio Quad, MAC Violent Grape Blush Ombre + Shell Beauty Powder on cheeks, GOSH Angel Balm on Lips

First off, Happy Valentine's Day and Happy Lunar New Year to everyone!! This year is the Year of the Tiger (which is what I am... which means I'll be 24 this year... XD) Hopefully everyone's been having a good 2010 so far. Actually made it out to celebrate CNY this year, dim sum with the besties, and otherwise I've been watching the Olympics. GO CANADA GO!!! This next picture has nothing to do with the post but I'm happy at how my avatar turned out so this is who you'll be 'seeing' on twitter until the Olympics are over... or I take another picture I like:

Maybelline Purple Icon Eye Studio Quad, Shu Uemura P Brown 76 Glow-on Blush, Dior Serum de Rouge 510

I love my Team Canada sweater, and my Olympic mittens :D

I digress. Yumeko did a magazine scan post a while ago that talked about lucky signs for each Zodiac colour. My colour was purple, and while I like the colour a lot I'm obviously more partial to pink... but then I checked my Pantone colour of the year at www.colorstrology.com and that was also purple so... maybe it's a sign.

I have been wearing a lot of purple lately, eyeshadow, clothing, etc, but the strangest/newest thing that purple has invaded is my blush collection :)

MAC Violent Grape Blush Ombre, Illamasqua Powder blush in SIN, Illamasqua Powder blush in THRUST

Do those blushes not look terrifying? ;)

Yumeko ignited my curiosity about purple blushes after her trip to the UK last year, after raving about Illamasqua's SIN blush. I was really excited as Sephora had just started to carry the line... and then found out they didn't ship the brand Canada. BIG FAIL, yes? Remembering later on during their F&F sale that Yumeko had really liked the brand's purple blush I asked a friend to CP it for me... only I asked for THRUST and not SIN as I couldn't remember the name. Oops. I quite like both THRUST and SIN, and I find that they provide natural looking flushes when applied sheerly with a fluffy brush... I used a dense brush for the swatches you'll see at the end of my babbling, and I NEVER wear the colours that way as I risk looking like a giant bruise. I picked up MAC's Violent Grape Blush Ombre just a few days ago (it's part of the Spring Forecast 3 collection) for the same reason I picked up SIN... curiosity, Yumeko, and a bit of knowledge this time. After all, if a dark, dark blush like SIN looked awesome, a slightly version would look good too, right?

Swatches L - R: THRUST, SIN, Violent Grape

As I said earlier, I swatched these with a dense brush (a kabuki) to get the colour differences to show up. On the cheeks, I apply with a MAC 187, I find a natural flush. SIN is the darkest and requires the lightest hand, and I often combine it with a shimmer powder (I use Dior's Poudre Shimmers 95% of the time). THRUST has a bit of a pinker undertone to it which I like on the mornings I need to look more alive, and Violent Grape is the inbetween shade... it's very matte (all of these blushes are) so I've been wearing it underneath MAC's Shell Beauty Powder. This is the cheek combo I'm wearing in the very first picture.

I swear I had other examples but I don't label the photos I take and I apparently tweet too much to go back and find them. But I have worn all three several times!

Do I like purple blushes? Yes, I can say that as I own three. Will I get more? I'd like to see a SLIGHTLY shimmery purple-toned blush as these are all very, very matte, but at the same time... I probably don't need another purple one. Plus these matte blushes get me to use my shimmer powders, which is good, because I find some of them not pigmented enough to be on my cheeks alone.

I tend to wear these with gold/neutral themed eyes (I tried with pink or purple or blue eye once and... too much focus on too many things) and a pink or neutral lip, but I'm sure you could rock it out with other combinations!

In which coupons are hazardous to my wallet's health...

2010-02-02T15:28:00.000-08:00

Despite my promises to shop primarily at Shoppers Drug Mart to buy most high-end makeup, I do occasionally purchase things from the Bay (I have 10$ coupons I can use once a month which is a nice incentive) and even more than occasionally, Sephora. There are still brands that only Sephora carries but mostly I still shop there because of Urban Decay and Kat Von D... and because once-in-a-blue-moon Sephora will send out discount coupons.

This is a large part in my failure to NOT SPEND there. Makeup so rarely goes on sale that when I GET Sephora coupons I 'look' for stuff to buy. So bad. So when I got my Congrats-You're-A-VIB-10% off e-mail I immediately began perusing the site, only to realise like always that [1] Canadians aren't allowed to use their coupons online and [2] By the time the stuff online I wanted came IN the coupon would probably have expired. Luckily (or unluckily?) it turned out that the e-mail had been sent out mistakenly, but I was still allowed to use the discount... and got an extra couple of days to do it.

My devotion/addiction to Dior has been well-documented, I think. Since my last post I've purchased 3 quints, and the most recent one was Extase Pinks which I found (you guessed it) at Sephora. As this quint was a new permanent addition to the line I wasn't in a huge rush to get it (in fact I was planning on waiting until SDM had it and had a bonus points event to buy it), but when I went on the last valid date of the coupon it was the only thing I wanted in the store... I caved. Saving 5.80$ is pretty decent, hey? Plus it gave me enough points to redeem a sample on the e-mail the coupon got sent to, so double bonus. :)

I normally don't post single-item-reviews but I did promise Haru so...

You can't see it in the picture, but the new quads have similar cases to the Designer quads with a silver border on the case. It's lovely :) I'm not sure what the new numbering system means but 804 Extase Pinks is SUPER similar to an iridescent quint (perhaps less shimmery, but not by much). I am a sucker for pinks and I love the dark pewter shade in the upper right; I thought it was a bit similar to Argentic (which I own) but it's a bit darker, so MUCH love for this.

Swatches in Natural Light (but no sunshine):

These were fairly light one-or-two layers of swipes; I find that for most Dior quints they appear much nicer on the eye, and I am very used to putting a good base on (you can see previous posts for this but I always use UDPP+Cream Shadow) before I even put the powders near my eye.

Test EOTD:

UDPP+Flatter Me Creaseless Cream
Purple + Grey shades from Extase Pinks
Besame Shimmer Beige to hilight
K-Palette 24hr Liner in Jet Black
UD 24/7 Liners in Zero and Ransom
Diorshow ICONIC Mascara
Anastasia Espresso Tinted Brow Gel

Full Face, two tries:

As above, with Dior Tinted Moisturizer, NARS Madly Blush, NARS Sex Machine Lip Pencil + Chanel Rouge Lacque Allure in Ming for lips.

I was actually trying out combinations to wear to a wedding this weekend, so here's my second try with the dress I'll be wearing:

Everything is the same except for the lips, which are now Dior Serum de Rouge in 840 (I think this is the Raspberry one? Could be wrong). Jewellery by the lovely Yasumi :)

I actually think I prefer the light pink lip, looking at it now. I get good wear time with the bases I use (the second pic was taken about 6 hours later, no touch-ups), and I think depending on which of the greys you use the quint is easily adaptable for daytime vs. night-time wear. So I'm happy I purchased it :)

Creature of Habit

2010-01-18T14:21:00.000-08:00

Excuse the scary picture, this is the only example of my 'work makeup' I have... this was taken at 4AM a few nights ago!

I've been back at work for 3 weeks now, and despite being off for more than a month, it was like I'd never left at all (aside from being sore after the first shift... that doesn't happen anymore). As one of my fellow nurses put it, ICU is generally 'Same stuff, different day...' or more like 'Same sicknesses, different patients'. So I'm back into the swing of things :)

Although I love to play with makeup (hence this blog's existence), the way I do my makeup for work hasn't changed very much in about a year, for several reasons, namely:
1) I wear the same thing every day for work (scrubs)
2) I work long hours and start EARLY (7AM) so my routine is fast thereby allowing me a tad bit more sleep
3) This 'face' is pretty much indestructible in terms of wearing off... I come home with the majority of it intact and that is after running around like a mad-woman at work for 12.5 hours
4) I am seriously trying to hit pan on some things, and these are the most likely to happen as I use them ALL THE time, if not every day
5) This is a pretty natural looking face I think... it doesn't look like I'm obviously wearing a tonne of make-up which is important to me at work :)
6) As long as I'm awake enough, this only takes me 10 minutes, including my hair :)

First off, the skin-care regime...

This is actually done AFTER I get home from work (I only shower 'before' work when I do nights) but... it feels like it makes more sense to start out with skincare, so I am.

Around the beginning of November, right when the H1N1 outbreak started in Canada, my skin decided to go haywire and I went from having clear skin with the rare breakout to being broken out pretty much ALL THE time, especially on my forehead. Given that I hadn't tried switching cleansers or anything in my routine for years (I used to be a fairly loyal Clinique devotee) I tried several things including replacing old products (no effect) adding in some anti-acne stuff (tried Biore and Clinique - pretty much no effect) and then even tried the 'cavewoman' routine of just using cold water and no other products (just dried my skin out). Jen over at A Beautyful Sentiment raved about the new L'Oreal cleanser, and as I was home for most of December due to my back injury I figure it wouldn't hurt to try just ONE more thing before I gave in and went to the dermatologist...

And I've cleared up almost entirely since I started using it! So #1 L'Oreal go360 Cleanser for Sensitive/Acne Pro Skin is now my first step in my skincare lineup. I get home, take off my makeup with an oil-based remover (right now I'm using a couple of different brands as I try to use all the GWP sized things in my room), and then wash my face. I love the little scrublet! I've foregone my Clarisonic + Clinique routine for now, as this is working so well (I'm now using the Clarisonic as more of a body exfoliator to get use out of it, but anyway...). I still get the odd break-out, but now it's usually only ONE pimple and it goes away really quickly. For anyone interested, I also think the breakouts were due in part to all the isolation gear we had to put on to care for the H1N1 patients... so getting a month-long break from THAT was nice as well :)

#2 Clinique Mild Clarifying Lotion + Dramatically Different Moisturizing Lotion is a bit odd in where it happens in my routine. It's my 'first' step when I work day shifts (I don't wash my face before I go to work in this case) or my second step before I work night shifts. I rarely use this step before bed-time as I generally use masks (which I'll get to), but I find that this is good for keeping my skin moisturized and it provides a nice base for my makeup. The clarifying lotion also has Salicylic Acid in it which I think is helping to keep my breakouts down now that I am no longer constantly broken out. These products are pretty much the only thing left from my Clinique loyalty, other than eye cream, haha.

#3 Clinique Solutions for Men Daily Eye Hydrator; Origins GinZing Eye Cream; Origins Spot Remover all go on after I am done with my face products (or after masks). If anyone is wondering why I use the men's eye cream, the reasons are simple: it's cheaper, has the same ingredients as the women's line, but it comes in a tube and is more sanitary. I primarily use eye cream for dryness, so I haven't been looking for one that is a line-reducer, dark circle treatment, or puffiness treatment as the only time I REALLY have those problems are at the end of my night shifts... when my sleep schedule has been messed up for days. The Origins GinZing cream is fantastic for my lower eye area, and when I *DO* notice a bit of fatigue under my eyes this seems to camoflauge it nicely :). The Spot Remover is an acne treatment and is the most effective one I've found other than the NEXCARE acne bandages. I like the Spot Remover as it works to bring pimples to a head (at which point I use one of the NEXCARE bandages). I haven't been using this as much though :D

#4 My Beauty Diary Masks
I know a lot of the Asian blogging community has been raving about these for AGES but I just recently started using them so I'm a bit late to the party. I almost entirely use ONLY the masks meant for whitening as I am trying to lighten up all the scars left from weeks of continual breakouts, but I find these really relaxing. It's also nice that I can get (most) of the flavours locally at my T&T (the ones I can't I go to Sasa or friends for) so for me, they're more accessible than the Silk Whitia or VOV masks. I'm in love with these *_*. They seem to be helping making my skin tone more even and I am thinking of adding in the DiorSnow serum to speed the process along, but this is far more relaxing than applying a serum would be... so we'll see ;)

So far I am only using my 'favourites' after getting samples and recommendations from Yumeko, Yasumi, and Mona, so the ones you see in the photo are the ones that work best for me: Premium Masks in Platinum Non-colloid, White Truffle; Regular line in Strawberry Yogurt, Provence Lavendar, Black Pearl, and Bulgarian White Rose. I also really like the Chocolate, Mixed Berries, and Japanese Cherry Blossom masks but they don't seem to carry them at T&T and alas, they are always sold out on Sasa! So is Strawberry Yogurt now :( . I definitely need to stock up the next time I see them!

And now for the makeup (this is the true 10-minutes-before-work part of my 'daily' routine)

I do my eye-makeup first :). Like with every look, I start with Urban Decay Primer Potion + MAC Paint Pot, in this cause it is always Soft Ochre or Painterly (whichever I happen to lay hands on first).

Next I do my eyes with the Dior Leather Couture Palette, which is from the Fall 2008 collection (I think?). If you are wondering why the case looks kind of beat up, it IS. When I bought it from Jamilla it came with nail polish and unfortunately the nail polish spilled all over the bottom of the palette... so I tried taking it off with acetone/nail polish remover, but this sort of also dissolved the plastic. Haha? The eyeshadow was still fine though, so I still use it. I'm trying to 'hit pan' on this first so I can recycle the compact! ^_~ I hilight with a light beige shadow, usually Besame's Shimmer Beige (I'm halfway to hitting pan on this too!). I actually use this shadow as my hilight in probably 95% of my EOTD/FOTD looks as it's so... neutral. I line my upper lid with KATE SuperSharp Liquid Liner in BR-1 which was a recommendation from the lovely Yasumi. This is the perfect dark neutral brown for work (black was a tad dramatic I found) and I can apply it without stretching my poor eyelid out, which is a plus. I line the outer 1/3 of my waterline/lower lashline with Urban Decay 24/7 Liner in Bourbon which I got from the Velvet Rope pencil set last year, and I'm about half-done this pencil (I sometimes use Stash from the same set... it's generally whatever I grab first). I finish off my eyes with Diorshow ICONIC Extreme Mascara and Anastasia Tinted Brow Gel in Espresso. I've been trying different mascaras in the last month, but the Majolica Majorca Lash Expander was too hard to remove and looked spidery; and the Korres Rice Bran mascara I tried smelled herbal-y and didn't do anything for my lashes. So back to my EXPENSIVE Diorshow I go... but I love this mascara and have already used 2 tubes, so I know I'll finish this one (yes, I only use one tube at a time... since the expiry dates are so darn fast!).

In comparison to the number of products that I use on my eyes, my face takes like 30 seconds. I don't wear foundation at all anymore, just tinted moisturizer in my HG Dior Hydraction Tinted Moisturizer with SPF 20 #3 which despite the whitening masks is still the perfect shade for me, and then I apply blush, which is mostly MAC for Hello Kitty in Tippy which is a clean, hot pink. Sometimes I am using Illamasqua SIN but I have to be careful with how much product I pick up (or it looks super purple) and I don't have that problem with Tippy.

I don't put anything on my lips other than lip balm as I have no time to reapply makeup at work, that's why there are no lip products in the picture :)

What works well for you that's become HG? Do you change your 'work' make-up around a lot?

Loves at the End of a Decade

2010-01-03T13:21:00.000-08:00

Even though I spent most of the month of December at home, I still think my 2009 ended on a high note, as I got to celebrate Christmas with my family, and more importantly, I went back to work! The first two days were harder than I thought they would be (mostly my body was not used to running around for 12 hours so my whole body - not my back - was really sore) but it was awesome to just drop back into the flow of things, even if everyone thought I'd gone on vacation (and then was SUPER nice when they found out I'd hurt my back).

This last year has overall been fantastic :) It was the first year after my dad's recovery from open-heart surgery, my first year as a practicing registered nurse, the first time I'd flown outside North America without my family, and the first year I had my car! It was also the second full year I'd been into make-up :) There are so many hilights this year, more than I can mention, but I can only thank everyone in my life and who I've met for making the year amazing <3.

I can however, give you my December hauls...

I didn't do a lot of shopping during December for myself makeup-wise as it was Christmas, plus I wasn't supposed to be doing a tonne of walking with my poor back. I did go Boxing Day shopping which is a big event in Canada to the extent of buying my iPhone (see above) and FINALLY using the iPhone case I made my sisters buy for me... before I'd even bought the phone. I also made my way to Sephora later that weekend as they had e-mailed about a 'Boxing Day' sale... and Sephora sales NEVER apply to Canada so I was pretty intrigued.

Did I haul? Yes. I had a 50$ gift card for the mall and while I intended to buy a sweater with it, the lack of sweaters in colours/sizes applicable to me resulted in my spending it on makeup. I picked up some of the clearance NARS shadow and a Benefit creaseless cream shadow (I'm not sure if the colours are actually discontinued or if it's just that Sephora is no longer carrying them, but 12$ CAD/NARS single seemed really good!)

Clockwise from top left: Night Sun, Grenadines, Silent Night, Baby Girl

Mona was actually nice enough to pick up Silent Night for me when I asked her for Illamasqua's SIN blush (I will do a post on this too, Yumeko, I promise) but the other three I got in store! The Night Sun shadow is actually cracked in half :S but it was final sale with no exchange and ... well it works the same way cracked or not. I just tapped out the excess and went on with using it. Grenadines is actually a colour that Yumeko and I talked about when she was looking for an eye colour very similar to a vampy-lip. It's more of a matte burgundy, than a true dark red you'd see on lips I think. And Baby Girl... it's pink and sparkly. I'm weak. XD;

Used these today as I was a bit dubious about how Grenadines would look on my actual eye:

I know, I know, web-cam pics. But I am super bad at taking pics of myself otherwise! Haha. I really like this, it's brighter in real life but not BRIGHT BRIGHT and I think I'd be a good pink look for work... if I wore anything other than scrubs.

Products used:

Face: Dior Hydraction Tinted Moisturizer in 3; Shu Uemura Glow-on Blush P Brown 76

Eyes: Benefit Creaseless Cream Shadow in Flatter Me + UDPP (base); NARS Baby Girl over lid, NARS Grenadines + NARS Night Sun in outer V (crease), K-Palette Jet Black liner, UD 24/7 Zero (waterline) Majo Majo Lash Frame Expander Mascara (I don't think I like this, time to switch), GOSH Velvet Touch Liner in 009 Golden Globe (lower lash line)

Lips: Sally Hansen 12-hr Diamond Lip Treatment in Baguette

Whew, you girls who do regular FOTDs, I salute you. That is far too much typing... it took me less time to put the makeup on!

Anyway, I am really happy with my Boxing Day purchases. I also picked up a bunch of MAC stuff, but I haven't started playing with it yet, so I'll do a post when I get the chance to rock a really smokey eye ;) I'm back to work on Monday so it won't be until after I'm off!

I hope everyone had a fantastic Christmas and New Years, and all my love for 2010. This is hopefully going to be an amazing year!

Just Can't Get Enough

2009-12-13T19:35:00.000-08:00

When I become interested in something, I tend to go into OCD-collector's mode and want everything associated to it that I can get my hands on. This has been a long standing personality trait: when I was in elementary school I had to have every single beanie baby EVER (I grew past that, thankfully), in high school I collected all things CLAMP (I only dabble now, not as obsessed), and in university my interests shifted towards Johnny's Entertainment (it's been like 5 years now and I am still into it... ha.)

The picture above is my Tokidoki collection about 6 months ago. I've loved Tokidoki for a long LONG time, but when the brand first came out I was still in high school and had no money. I kick myself now, as a lot of the bags I've acquired since then were much cheaper and easier to find when they were first released, of course! I find the Tokidoki community is similar to the makeup one in a lot of ways... people help each other find their dream items and it is SUPER competitive to get limited editions items... which is pretty much every single Tokidoki bag ever, since the designs and bag styles change every season!

So what does my collection look like now...?

Well it doesn't all fit on my bed, for one. Once I was back from Japan I re-started my hunting/auction-stalking skills to buy the bags I wanted as cheap as possible, and it has served me a little TOO well. Similar to my Johnny's Entertainment 'collection' my Tokidoki collection exploded, but in the case of Tokidoki, I think I am almost 'done' looking for the older-style bags.

These aren't in any particular order, just the bags as I found them and photographed them~!

Inferno: Bambinone, Stellina, Portatelefono

The Inferno stellina was my very first Tokidoki bag that I found on LJ... it was initially over 150$ USD but because it wasn't selling got marked down to 90$ USD... and I bought it! I had no idea this was the beginning of a very slippery slope :) The Portatelefono in the bottom right-hand corner is my most recent bag, and I'm using it for my DS right now, which fits perfectly! I want this bag style in other prints though, Inferno is very cute but not one of my favourites.

Foresta: Buon Viaggio, Ciao Ciao, Dolce, Bella

Foresta is my second favourite print, and from the number of pieces I have you probably wouldn't guess it is SUPER hard to find. These bags are my awesome auction-stalking skills put to work! I paid much less than market value for each of them, and I love all of them! The BV is probably my favourite, and I ended up finding 20000Y when I was cleaning it. It'll be part of my spending money when I go back to Japan :)

Original Print: Mamma Mia, Stellina OP Black: Bambinone

The Black OP bag is one of the only bags I didn't pay any shipping on, mostly because I bought it from a girl in Calgary (Kijiji is AWESOME). The Stellina was another lucky auction find, and I am SO HAPPY I got the Mamma Mia. I found it on the Hawaii Craigslist, e-mailed the seller, and then mentally freaked out when 4 other people on the Tokidoki forums reported contacting the same seller. Fortunately for me the seller was extremely fair and honoured our agreed price even though the other potential buyers had offered him more money. :)

Adios Star: Trenino, Campeggio, Buon Viaggio

Adios Star is near and dear to my heart as I took the Campeggio with me and it was pretty much the only bag I used all of my Japan trip last spring. So it is in 90% of my photos! I'm excited to have a Trenino to use as a mini-suitcase the next trip, and I have the BV because it was SUPER cheap, and my beloved little Japan-diaper-baby is on the very front.

Tan Playground: Buon Viaggio, Ciao Ciao

At first I wasn't sure if I really liked the print, but as this is one of the most rare Tokidoki prints I soon gave in, and I'm glad I did. I actually really like the 'big girls' on the prints, and I love these bags as their size does not tend to cut their heads off. The BV was part of the OP Mamma Mia ordeal and I feel very lucky to have it!

Familigia: Ciao, Ciao Ciao

I love these bags! They are a bit more subdued than most of the other prints so I can use them in more 'professional' situations. A dear friend of mine actually tracked down the Ciao Ciao for me in Ottawa when she went there on vacation!

Tutti: Campeggio, Bianco: Stellina, Transporto: Zucca, Citta: Bambinone

I confess, I mostly own these bags because at one point I wanted at least one bag in every design Tokidoki had ever released (I realised shortly after that I didn't actually LIKE every single design Tokidoki released) and because these bags were so cheap! I am afraid of using the all white bag as I am a stain magnet, but other than that I'm happy I have all of these and use them frequently :)

Citta Rosa: Buon Viaggio, Zucca

Citta Rosa is my FAVOURITE print, so you think I'd have more bags in it! But I think a lot of people really like it, because the bags are so expensive and hard to find for a good price. I got the BV in Vancouver recently and it is my favourite bag (right now). I love all the pink!

L'Amore: Gioco, Ciao Ciao

I love this print a lot, as it shows all of the characters except for the big girls! I only use it when it's nice though as the light background tends to scuff really easily.

Geometric Girl: Amica, Marina

This is one of the prints released after the Tokidoki x LeSportSac collaboration ended. I think the general consensus is that the TKDKxLSS prints are a lot nicer, but I like the purple/pink tones in this print a lot.

Portofuna: Marina, Discoteca: Sorriso, Eco Mondo: Graziosa, Celebrazione: Carezza

More post-LSS prints! With the exception of the Eco Mondo bag, I got all of these at Winners for about 50% the original retail price which is fantastic! I don't think I'd have a lot of the 'new' prints if I didn't find them at Winners for really good prices.

Mimiteca: Cosmetic bag, Paradiso: Buon Viaggio, Spiaggia: Bambinone

Miscellaneous assortment of bags, I just bought the Mimiteca bag mostly because it was only 18$ (retail 50$), I think the Paradiso print is very cute, and the Spiaggia bag took me FOREVER to find. Thankfully this blog entry forced me to reorganize my bags so now I know where they all are.

Pirata: Campeggio Vacanze: Campeggio

Finally at the end :) Campeggio is one of my favourite bag styles, as I'm sure you can see. I used the Pirata one a lot this summer, and the Vacanze bag is in heavy rotation as it's Christmas season.

On a semi-related note, I actually bought a NON-Tokidoki purse for myself the other day, and my best friend was shocked! I love all purses, just that Tokidoki owns most of my heart (and wallet) right now :)

You and Me, We're Meant to Be

2009-12-09T19:28:00.000-08:00

So I have been stuck at home because I pulled my back at work and according to my doctor and physiotherapist, the best thing to do is rest - and be patient. Which would be fine, except the last 2 weeks it has also been SNOWING like mad, so I end up stuck in my house as the roads are too bad to try driving on. I think they said on Friday that there were over 200 accidents reported :S.

In any case, in between resting and physio, I am either on my laptop (the first week laying in my bed as sitting hurt, now at my desk) or playing my DS. I am SO happy I got a DS for my birthday or I think I'd be even more stir-crazy. Anyway, with all this extra time on my hands the inevitable happened... I finally tried out G-Market.

All the blogs I read are horrible influences. XD;

I didn't even want to try going through the makeup section, so instead I thought I'd look for accessories. And after one of Yumeko's posts, I knew I wanted headbands. I placed the order a couple of weeks ago, and it finally arrived!

I ordered from this shop: Glam Girl

They were fantastic! All of the headbands were individually wrapped in plastic, then in bubble wrap, and she even included a small gift! I don't have any 'modelling' photos yet mostly because I haven't made any effort to do my hair or makeup in days, but I promise I'm going to be social this weekend so you'll definitely see a few!

Side views of the headbands:

Shipping via EMS is so fast *_* And no customs duties on this either :) Actually the weirdest part was that the headbands were in a little box, which was then in a box about 4x the size. I'm not sure why, and I should have taken the picture, but I already put the boxes in the recycling, haha.

I can't wait to wear these... and to place another order. I think the biggest problem I had was trying to match the Korean names in the picture to the names in the menu. :)