Birthday & Christmas Beauty Haul!

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

It's been a while since I have posted.  It has been a busy couple of months!  

This post will show all of the beauty goodies I received for both my Birthday and Christmas! My birthday is very close to Christmas and so it feels like a week of gifts. I'm very blessed for that. So without further ado, let's get on with it!

First and foremost, Urban Decay's Naked 3 palette was my earliest birthday gift.  I am absolutely obsessed with this palette. I received this mid December and it's been my go-to palette ever since.  In all honesty, this palette is my favorite out of UD's Naked products.  I highly encourage anyone to purchase this palette.  It may become your favorite holy grail product too.  I have yet to find any notable cons about this palette.  It's super pigmented.  The colors are gorgeous, romantic, and sultry. The packaging is the best by far.  It's a beautiful, metal, rose gold case. My most favorite and notable shade within this palette is "Blackheart".  It is a black shade with shimmery, red glitter in it.  I do not own anything that resembles Blackheart.  Part of me really wanted this palette just because of Blackheart. It's GORGEOUS!  I have nothing but great things to say about this product.

These next products come from Sephora and MAC. 

I have tried the Too Faced Chocolate Soleil bronzer and the Better Than Sex mascara.  I have also tried my MAC plum liner.  I had to purchase the liner to put it with my Capricious lipstick since Regina wears these products in Once Upon a Time (She's my favorite!).  As for Sephora's formula X polish, I have yet to try it.  It is a gold flecks polish...it reminds me of the 14K gold polishes that I could never come across.  When I saw this polish, I knew that I needed it.  I cannot wait to put it with Essie's Ballet Slippers. The final gift is the birthday gift that Sephora gave out.  It includes the "They're Real" mascara and "Watts Up" highlighter.  I actually own a full sized Watts Up highlighter.  I really like it, so I now have a little travel size of it.  As for They're Real, I've used it a couple of times.  I had purchased a mini version of They're Real prior to this gift to see if I like it.  I do, but I have purchased some drugstore mascara that works better for me.   

Better Than Sex has been a good investment.  Would I re-purchase? I cannot give you that answer.  I'm on the fence about it.  It's a great mascara.  It makes it look like I've got a million lashes.  However, that's the only noticeable factor about it.  I really like the packaging and the bold name. But I am certain that I have mascara that does the trick at half the price of Better Than Sex.

As for Chocolate Soleil. I LOVE IT. It smells like chocolate, it blends so nicely, and I love the pigmentation.  It is perfect for my skin tone (NC30). I would highly recommend this bronzer to anyone who is looking for a more high end bronzer.  Who doesn't like the smell of chocolate? (Sorry if you don't.)

Next are my drugstore purchases as well as a gift from my best friend.  She has introduced me to the wonderful world of Forever 21 lipstick.  She bought me a rosy shade.  At first it comes onto the lips in a matte but sheer way (IDK if that even makes sense, but it does!)  It is build-able and can end up to be quite a bold and pinky shade on the lips.  I also am a sucker for the packaging.  Maybelline has also released a new line of cosmetics.  I purchased the Master Hi-Light by Face Studio as well as the Master Glaze which is a cream blush stick.  I used both and I love them!  I'm not a high fan of cream blushes, but I really love this blush stick.  I may have to purchase a new one.  As for the highlighting blush, I really love it as well.  I'm quite excited about these products! You can purchase them at CVS!  The other products I purchased were polishes.  I purchased Essie's Ballet Slippers, Maybelline's Crushed Crimson (This is LE), and Sally Hansen's Gold Roses (which I have been wanting for months, but could not find.)

The Smashbox Master Class Palette 2 is amazing. I am so in love with the shadows within this palette. I used it for my Christmas day look and I was obsessed.  This palette gives you 28 shadows, 5 blush shades, 1 bronzer shade, and 2 highlighting shades.  It also gives you 4 gel eyeliner shades.  Prior to using this palette, I heard that the pigmentation was off and that the shadows were chalky. I am going to disagree with those statements.  The shadows were not chalky to me and they did not crease all day long (I used elf primer with the NYX shadow base).  Also, the gel liners do not come off.  I swatched a shade yesterday and I had to really scrub it off of my arm.  Great staying power!  

I own the first master class palette as well and I like that palette as well.  But I absolutely love Master Class 2.  It's amazing. The only con about this is it's packaging.  It doesn't look like it fully closes and I'm trying to determine if I can depot the palette and place it into a Z palette.  For now, I'm just keeping the palette within its box.  Otherwise, I have nothing but positive words for the palette.  

The next two pictures of our my most recent purchases from my Sephora gift cards.  I am addicted to YSL lipsticks and so I purchased my third one (Fuschia in Excess).  I also purchased Philosophy's serum "when hope is not enough".  Nina Dobrev uses this product and I feel like her skin his flawless. So I had to purchase it and try it out myself.  

Finally, these are beauty products that I unwrapped within my Tinkerbell stocking. :)  I got a cute Sally Hansen nail file (neeeeded a new one), elf oil absorbing sheets, an elf shadow palette, 3 UD eyeliners, a mini UD setting spray, and Nivea cream (a great product for the handbag).  I really like UD's eyeliners aside from when they go jagged on me (the pain...).  I've used a setting spray by UD before and I believe it works (I used it for Senior Prom if that tells you anything).  I've never used the oil absorbing sheets or the Nivea cream but I'm excited for them.

There you have it.  That was my big Christmas/Birthday haul.  I'm stoked about everything as usual!

I hope you have a very HAPPY NEW YEAR!

November Drug Store Haul!

HELLO BEAUTIFUL

I went home recently and ended up taking a trip to Bed Bath & Beyond as well as Target and picked up some beauty products.  Here are my purchases!

Most of my purchases came from Bed Bath & Beyond.  I was able to pick up a Wet Brush which I had seen on MissGlamorazzi's channel on YouTube.  I have been using the Wet Brush for a couple weeks and I am so in love with it.  It detangles my hair quickly, it does not hurt, and does not pull out my hair. I also feel that I have an easier time styling my hair after brushing through it with the wet brush.

The other product that I have been trying is the L'Oreal Colour Riche Le Matte lip color in "Matte-r of Fact"  unfortunately I could not find any of the Le Laque shades and was lucky enough to come upon this color.  Lucky for me, I am absolutely in love with the product.  It has a decent lasting time span as well as a little bit of a lip stain when the product comes off.  This way, I do not have to touch it up constantly due to the fact that I still have the color on my lips.  I received many compliments at school with this shade.  I wish this product was not limited edition, I would absolutely love to wear more shades of these.

As for the rest of the products, I am slowly but surely trying them out.  I picked up another Maybelline Color Elixir Creamy Lip Lacquer, a limited edition Maybelline blush, a couple Revlon PhotoReady eyeshadow + primer + sparkle which I am absolutely in love with, another Revlon lippie, and of course, more nail polish.  I will forever hoard the lippies and polishes. Fall and Winter are my favorite nail color seasons and so I obsess over any color that I deem fit for the winter and fall.

Speaking of nail polish...I did not stop there!

I always seem to find someone wearing a very bright and fun shade on their nails and I end up complimenting them.  I have been told at least several times that their polish came from Charlotte Russe.  I ended up shopping with a friend at the mall and she wanted to check out Charlotte Russe.  I normally never shop there anymore, but I decided to go with her.  I ended up finding the nail polish section and remembered that they had a great selection of colors.  To my surprise, there was a bogo free deal and so I picked up these two shades.

I had seen these on one of my favorite blogs, Money Can Buy Lipstick, and had to go to two Targets to find them.  These polishes are the new L'Oreal magic topcoat polishes.  Three shades were available, but I just wanted these two.  I have already tried out the top coat with the gold flecks, and I love it!  I cannot wait to try out the other.

It was a successful but dangerous trip home.  I lucked out with finding some of these products.  If you've tried out any of these beauty finds, how are you liking them?

Until next time!

Bed Bath & Beyond Mini Haul!

I rarely ever shop at Bed Bath & Beyond but today I went out into the city with some friends that I live with and to my amazement, I came across their massive beauty section.  What was so wonderful about this beauty section is that it held cosmetics brands that I cannot find at my local Target, Walgreens, CVS, or Walmart.  Obviously, each of these drug stores sell select products from brands as well as select brands.  However, Bed Bath & Beyond sold brands that I never see anywhere! I have not even seen some of these brands at Ulta.

Another beautiful thing about BBB is that they sell new products.  For example, I have been searching everywhere for CoverGirl's Hunger Games collection. I even wrote a past post on the collection.  I have finally found a small collection at BBB.  

Here are the other items I purchased:

All of these products are fairly new from cosmetics lines such as Maybelline, CoverGirl, Revlon, Sally Hansen, and L'oreal.   From Maybelline, I purchased one of their new Color Elixir shades in "Caviar Couture".  From CoverGirl I purchased Hunger Games glosstini shade "Inferno".  From Revlon, I purchased one polish from the line's brand new polish collection, "Parfumerie Nail Enamels"! Here is a close up photo:

I purchased the shade "Bordeaux" because I am absolutely in love with the shade.  The product claims to have a scent when dry.  Unfortunately, I have a fresh new mani, and so I will have to test this out on my friend.

Continuing on to my purchases, from the Sally Hansen cosmetics line, I purchased two polishes from the brand new Triple Shine collection.  Also from Revlon cosmetics, I purchased one Colorburst lacquer balm and one Colorburst matte balm.  Finally, from L'oreal, I purchased the new "Voluminous Butterfly" mascara. Here is a close-up photo:

I am so thrilled about all of these new purchases and will be testing them out soon.  After I try them out, I will release a blog post on both swatches and reviews.  If you have purchased or seen any of these products, feel free to state your opinion on the products in a comment below!

Until next time!