Listen, this little mini haul wasn't really supposed to happen. I blame working a minute away from Sephora. It's just not good for my bank account working on a street with literally all of my favorite stores within a block or two. Curse you, SoHo and your desired location because of it's close proximity to my favorite restaurants and places to blow all of my cash! Stopping into Sephora was inevitable, to be honest, so I should just embrace this life choice and get into this post so you can read about what you came here for! Unless you came here for rambling. If that's the case, then who needs to talk about whether or not I liked any of these products?
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My relationship with foundation is not very stable. For the most part, I tend to err towards drugstore foundations because I need to use a lot to cover my redness and acne and all of that fun stuff I'm still dealing with as a twenty-two-year-old fauxdult! However, to congratulate myself on getting a job, the only thing I could afford to get myself was a new higher end foundation. Now, not to jinx myself, but my skin has gotten markedly better and I can afford to not wear super full coverage foundations and can get away with a solid layer of a medium coverage instead. Three cheers for baby steps!
I was torn between a few foundations and honestly, I'm really sad that I like this one so much because now I'm going to have to continuously dish out $42 for the Smashbox Studio Skin Foundation. But honestly, it's worth it. I'm vain as hell so when people at work continuously compliment my skin for being fresh and glowy looking, I gotta keep up whatever it is so this never changes.
All jokes aside, this foundation is incredible. I can barely feel it on my skin, but it gives me the perfect amount of coverage for what I'm dealing with right now. It covers my occasional zits, my residual scarring, and leaves a nice even finish on my face without it looking caked on. It's not a matte finish, but it's not insanely dewy either. It falls right in between and gives my skin a healthy glow. Plus, that fifteen-hour wear is no joke. I've tested it out and with a little bit of concealer and a good powder, this foundation has gotten me through well over fifteen hours of wear. Granted, this is during the eternal winter so how this performs in the summer months is a mystery to me but I can report back on it!
Shoutout to my lovely friend Michelle for telling me to get this months ago. I didn't forget about it, girl, I promise! I just had to wait until I ran out of my beloved First Aid Beauty cleanser. She recommended this to me around the time I shared my skincare routine and told me that this is what she used to take off both her face and eye makeup. I'm very easily influenced, so I waited until I needed a new cleanser before I moved and headed over to The Body Shop at my local outlet mall to grab this cleansing balm.
This is one of those products that you get on your fingers and rub onto your face without getting it wet first. That's right, just grab a nice sized glob of that balm and spread it all over your makeup covered face until you start to see it break down. Then you just wipe it off and voila! Makeup gone. Now, I always follow up my cleansers with toners because I don't think there is a single cleanser that exists that would be able to remove the six tons of face makeup that I put on every single day and I don't expect one too. However, this one pleasantly surprised me.
I still have to use a bit of toner to remove some of the excess foundation, but honestly, this balm does the job pretty damn well. It doesn't really smell like much, which is great for any of you sensitive skin friends out there! It took some getting used to when it came down to applying this to dry skin over my makeup, but it does such a great job at breaking it all down and giving me a clean slate to do the rest of my skincare routine over. I haven't tried it on my eyes because I still use my Neutrogena Oil-Free Eye Makeup Remover religiously, but for the face, I give this two thumbs up and then some!
My eyelashes have been falling out. I don't know if it was old mascara or old contacts, but something irritated my eye to the point where every time I even get remotely close to touching my lids, lashes fall out. It's making me really bummed out because my lashes are almost as important to me as my eyebrows, but there's nothing I can really do.
I bought this mascara because I thought it was an old mascara that irritated my eyes and made my lashes fall out. I couldn't decide what I wanted so I got this one because I vaguely remember somebody on YouTube talking about it and liking it. Who that was I am not sure about but that's beside the point. I bought it, I've been using it for about two weeks, and I'm still not sure how I feel about it.
I don't think I can give it a fair judgment right now when just about half of my lashes are missing on my right eye and my left is looking like they want to join the club. I'm not sure what I was expecting from this mascara considering I did zero research on it when I bought it. The wand is kind of bendy in the middle and has a little dip in it. The formula can tend to make my left lashes super clumpy but my right kind of wispy and long. This doesn't do a damn thing for giving my lashes volume or for holding a curl though, I'm not even going to lie. I think if my lashes were fully there it would be easier to judge this mascara but so far it's just been kind of meh. I'll finish it, but I don't think I'll be purchasing after that. Sorry, Lancome! Hopefully it's just my shitty brittle and sparse lashes that are making this mascara not seem all that great. That could very easily be the case.
GASP! I'm trying and eyeliner that isn't my Kat Von D Tattoo Liner? Don't worry, I picked up another one of those as well, but I was feeling spendy and wanted to give this Stila one another try. I've tried it twice in the past and wasn't a fan of the way it winged out, but that was also at the beginning of my ~winged eyeliner journey~ and I couldn't help but wonder if that was the reason I didn't like it. Was it me and not the eyeliner?
I still don't know. The days I have tried to use it for my winged liner, it just comes out as a disaster. It's super black and long-wearing, there is no doubt about that. I just still think for the way I personally draw on my eyeliner wings, this eyeliner just doesn't give me the precision and flexibility of movement as the Kat Von D Tattoo Liner does. But what do I know? Everyone and their mothers recommend this and I do get why. Who wouldn't want their eyeliner to be waterproof and last all day? I'm not sure if this guy and I will ever get along in terms of winged eyeliner, but you can bet that this will be on my eyelid until this sucker runs out because it's super black and really easy to line my upper eyelid with ease.
Well guys, I finally did it. I caved and got Boy Brow. I wasn't really avoiding it on purpose. I just wasn't going to let myself buy a new brow gel when I had a perfectly good Anastasia one sitting in my drawers. But now that one is dried out and I've been living and eyebrow gel-less life for about three weeks now. THREE WEEKS WITH MY EYEBROWS NOT SET BY ANYTHING. Everything I even have my hands anywhere in the vicinity of my eyebrows I get worried that I'm going to smudge one of them off. Not an option!
My friend needed to get a replacement and we had to pass through Lower Manhattan again to get to the other side of Brooklyn without having to figure out the buses (that will come with time, I guess) so we stopped at the Glossier showroom. I fought my urge to spend more (the lidstars almost got me but they're too low maintenance for me) and ended up getting Boy Brow because, honestly, it just felt right. I needed a brow gel, I've been dying to try it, and really that's all that matters. I bought it, brought it home, and yes, it was an immediate love affair. I love the tiny little precise applicator and the way it locks my brows into place without making them feel heavy and chunky. There are a lot of Glossier products that I don't understand (I know, I'm a terrible blogger) but this one...this one I get.
Have you picked up any beauty bits lately? Today is the last day of the Sephora sale and I really have to resist the urge to get something...
You should def try the Monsieur Big by Lancome! This mascara has become my favorite these last few months. Extra volume and very hassle free :)
ReplyDeleteGlossier Boy Brown is my jam! I've been through several tubes of those and it's my absolute favorite!
ReplyDeletexo Deborah
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