Stila + Barbie Collection

Stila has recently come out with a set of collector cans celebrating Barbie through the decades. I decided to get the 1980 foxy can and the 2000 Jewel doll can. Each can comes with a light color eyeshadow, a darker crease eyeshadow and a cheek color in the palette. There is also a lip glaze and mascara included.

Foxy has a beige with a golden sheen, a medium brown color with a golden sheen and a matte deep peach cheek color. The lip glaze is a sheer tangerine color with a fruity scent.

Jewel has a cool pale frosty pink, a dark brown with a subtle sheen and a shimmery pale pink cheek color. The lip glaze is a deep pink color with a rosy scent.

Top: Foxy Doll; Bottom: Jewel Doll

I liked the shades in the palette. They are good neutrals with a nice shimmer. Both cheek colors are pretty nice, although the pale pink of the Jewel barely showed up on my skin tone. I was surprised by the gooey-ness of the lip glazes, both colors are nice but the texture was a bit slimy and the fragrance, especially the Jewel pink, was a bit strong.

Sephora-New items for Spring

I've been sephora.com stalking for the past few days. New items from Stila, Urban Decay, Tarte and Givenchy are available. I was lamenting the fact though that none of the store had any of the new items up so I would have to guess which color I would like best. Hardest thing to try and pick was a foundation. I gave Tarte's new anti-aging foundation a shot but I guessed wrong and got a shade waaay too dark. I ordered the 2 shades under in hopes that I would get a nice match but before my order has shipped I found them in one of the sephora stores and checked out the testers-none of the shades suited me blah. So now I will have 2 foundations to return when I do get my order.

I also found a sephora that had the new pearl shimmer lip glosses from Stila. I ordered kitten (a bronzey shade) and ocean current (a berry shade) judging from the online color swatches. When I did test out all the lip gloss shades. The kitten and south sea pearl were completely lost on me. They gave my lips some shimmer but really showed no color. The ocean current gave a nice tint of berry and the pearlescent pink gave a tint of pale pink. The glosses were very smooth and non-sticky. I like that they gave shimmer but not the glittery kind. I tried to capture a hand swatch in the store but my phone did not cooperate. I will post a pic of the 2 colors I got soon.

Urban Decay Primer Potion - Sin (First Impression)

I got my Sephora goodies today. It was one of the fastest orders I've gotten from them. I had jumped at the chance to order the new Urban Decay Primer Potion in Sin. I just recently started using the regular potion primer. I was always skeptical of primers and I figure using them would just be adding another step to my make up routine, but lo and behold I am a believer now after testing out the trial sizes provided with the lastest Urban Decay eyeshadow palettes. It helps to bring out the color in many shadows so I don't have to pile a lot on and my eyeshadow stays on much better and doesn't crease (ok, after a looong day there might be a teensy bit of creasing).

The primer in sin is a pink beige champagne color with a nice sheen to it. It would be nice by itself and as a base for other shadows. I dusted some purple shadow over my hand swatch and it became a nice metallic lilac purple color. I will definitely have to play with it a bit more but here is a preliminary pic:

The packaging is a bit different from the other UDPP. Instead of a matte/gloss box. This primer comes in a plastic clear box with a fuzzy purple tray. It's about the length of a ball point pen and I do believe it's the same as the deluxe size of the regular UDPP. I will compare when I get home.

Laura Mercier Satinee Creme Eye Color

I had seen Laura Mercier Satinee Creme Eye Color on the Nordstrom website. I had liked the Metallic Cream Eye colors that this company offers so I figure I would give this product a try.So when I was at bloomies I stopped by the Laura Mercier counter even though it seems that this bloomies never has all the new make up in stock, to my surprise they did have Satinee Cream Eye Colors.

Just like the Metallic creams, the Satinee Cremes come in a little tube-in fact I thought they didn't have the Satinee cremes because they were displayed right next to the metallic creams and blended right in with them. Although once I swatched them all on my hand, they are very different. The metallics have a nice sheen to them, while the Satinee are much more matte. They do have a very soft pearl shimmer to them. The shadow was very smooth and you didn't need very much to get a strong color. The staying power was also impressive. I had walked away from the counter with my hand full of swatches and went to the 2nd fl to take the pic before I wiped it off and It took some rubbing to get all the color off. I ended up using some lotion to help make it give a bit. I'm thinking this will be a good base color or for days when you want a simple matte color for the eyes.

Sorry, the pic is a bit blurry under strange store lighting.

Here are the colors currently available (From top left, going clockwise):
Cocoa velour was a dark brown
Pink Chiffon was a warm pink with subtle golden shimmer
Peach Organza was a bright orangey peach
Stone Suede was a smokey grey
Rum Satin was a medium brown
Ecru Silk was an off white with a subtle gold shimmer

I had thought I would like the Stone Suede but it was a bit of a boring gray to me. I ended up getting Pink Chiffon and the Ecru Silk and the SA congratulated me as being the first to purchase this product. :)

Clarins Natural Temptation Palette

I saw the Clarins Natural Temptations Palette online and I thought it looked like a great set of shadows. I've never used Clarins make -up before and I figure I would give it a try. When I took the compact out of the box, it was nice to see that it had a very nice design-shiny silver with a pink floral design. I was trying to take pics of the outside but all I would get was a reflection my camera or glare, but here's the inside of the palette.

The eye shadows were more matte than I expected and when I was trying to do the hand swatches it felt like I had to apply a lot for the colors to show up. When I tried wearing the shadow, it had pretty poor color pay off too. It was better when I used some urban decay lid primer but still kind of sheer. I might have to play around with this palette a bit more before I write it off completely but it's definitely not a stand out for me.

Mac BBR and Too Faced

I finally saw the Mac Blonde, Brunette and Redhead collection. I have to say most of the items didn't really scream "buy me." I ended up liking the Blonde colors the most. I'm in a pink lip color faze and decided to pick up the B-babe lipstick and Peroxide lip gloss.

I also got a Too Faced Girls Dig Pearls lip gloss in Tropical Pink. I was surprise that I liked it as much as I did. It's a very glittery lip color but not too over the top, although probably a bit too much for daytime. The pink glitter shows up on the lip well and it's like a toned down version of the Lancome La Laque Fever gloss in electric pink. It goes on pretty smooth, feels comfortable and not sticky.

L->R: B-babe, Peroxide, Tropical Pink

The start of the Spring haul

I made a pit stop to Bloomies and I was not disappointed. I got a chance to test out the new Dior and Lancome spring stuff. I did not cave and get the Lady Dior palette-as cute as it is, the colors were just ok for me and I could not justify $95 for a cute keychain. I did grab the eyeshadow quad in Parisian Lights and one of the new lip glosses in Rose Satin. I also wanted to get the beige nail polish but it happens to be that not all the new items were sent and they didn't have any in stock.

Top: Rose Satin gloss
Bottom: Parisian Lights palette.
1st row (L->R): Bottom left color, top left color, top right color, center color,
2nd row: bottom right color

Same story for the Lancome line, I fell in love with the new La Laque Fever glosses and new artliner colors but they didn't have all the items I wanted in stock because they were brand new-boo. I did manage to get one of the new lip laques, but I will have to return to bloomies to finishing my collecting.

Update: I changed my mind about the beige Dior polish-nice nude color but it wasn't very special when I tried it. I purchased the Porcelaine color (pink with fine silver shimmer) but I'm going to exchange it for another lip gloss since I decided that it was pretty similar to other pale pink colors that I have.

I've given up waiting on bloomies to re-stock and I placed an order from Lancome.com-I ordered the La Laque in electric pink, fever gloss in phia black, artliners in midnight glam and starshower, and the Irreverent madame eye shadow quad. I got free shipping and samples so I guess that makes up for not getting it right away, although I know the next time I go to bloomies they will have everything in stock. oh, well.

Chanel Mystic Eye Quad

I finally found a counter with the new Chanel make-up collection for Spring 2009. I thought I would be won over by the double C lip palette, but the reds didn't really excite me. I did purchase the Mystic Eye Quad since I was looking for a nice neutral palette. I loved all the shades-light pink, soft grey, dark plum and dark brown-they all have a nice shimmer to them that makes the color interesting and gives them depth. They blend together nicely in any combination and stay true all day. It's my latest go-to palette when I don't want to think.

Sorry, I didn't swatch in the order of the palette.
Top row (L ->R) has the bottom right color and the top left color.
Bottom row (L- > R) has the bottom left color and the top right color.

The Company Store

So after finally getting my learner's permit, I took a trek over to The Company Store. Luckily, my employer is one of the participating companies so I was able to purchase some discounted make-up. Whoo-hoo. I grabbed a Mac Color form 5 pcs. brush set and Mac Royal Asset Cool Eye Palette (last year's holiday collection). I've realized that when I purchase things like lip gloss at the discount stores-they tend to have that separated look that bothers me; so I've decided that eye shadows are safer bets. I also grabbed a brush set since I discovered that the Sephora brushes I got were not as soft as I thought and I have one eye shadow brush that has a sharp bristle that just pokes me all wrong.