I've been pretty busy toward the end of February and the beginning of March, hence no posts. My car, a Jetta that I loved and had heated seats and a sunroof and an aux port, broke down in numerous ways and so I have been spending most of my free time car shopping. I finally have a car now though, and I love it even more than the last one. But more on that later.
I took some pictures of the first time I wore my new makeup, and I'm pretty happy with the things I got in both of my boxes. I use the blush and the eyeshadow all the time. The eyeshadow is officially my favorite out of everything else I have. And the Fekkai shampoo and conditioner that I got samples of work so well on my hair that I'm ordering a full size thing of the conditioner. It made my hair so smooth and tangle free, so it seems worth the extra money. My friend also recommended just buying normal drugstore brands of shampoo/conditioner and alternating them with the more expensive stuff, so that it lasts longer, and it stays more effective. So, yes, would definitely recommend trying out Fekkai if you have a lil extra money to spare. Plus, on Birchbox's website you get a point for every dollar you spend, and points for every review of the box items you do, so it adds up pretty quick. When you get to 100 points, you get $10 off. So if they have items you normally would buy, it might be worth checking into to see if you can get a little something extra out of it.
Here is the Ruby Wing nail polish. I rarely wear nail polish because I suck at putting it on, and I would get in trouble at work. But this was pretty forgiving, since it was mostly clear, and I was surprised at how much I liked it. I was imagining a gaudy, solid coat of glitter, so this was a pleasant surprise. Plus, the clear undercoat turns a purplish/pink (berry is what they call it) color in the sunlight. It wasn't sunny when I wore this though, so I didn't get a picture, but it looks pretty neat.
I apologize for my face. It was difficult to get a decent picture of the makeup, and I still kinda failed. It doesn't help that most of it is purposefully subtle. Anyways, the Tini Beauty eyeshadow is amazing. It's very creamy, and blends quite well when I use my finger or an eyeshadow brush. It's pretty natural looking, so it's great for everyday wear if you want a little bit of something without looking too overboard. And if you want something more dramatic, you can layer it more and blend less so it's darker.
Like I said, the City Color blush is a little bright for me, but I've found if I put a little bit of powder foundation over it, I like how it looks. I don't think I did that here. The Pop Beauty lip gloss/plumper is also awesome. I wear it all the time now. It has a cute little container, and the color isn't super bright or overwhelming, but enough to give my lips a little bit of color, since they're usually pale and pretty dry lately with this weather. Would definitely recommend checking out the eyeshadow and lip gloss.
Again, sorry for the bad picture. It was really hard to get a decent picture of my hair from the back. I tried something new. There's a thing you can do where you make a normal ponytail, then you slide the holder/band lower on the ponytail, and make a gap in your hair in the space between the holder and your head. You then take the rest of the ponytail and pull it down through the gap. This creates a neat little twist on each side, and also kind of hides the holder. Usually, I do this at the base of my neck to give a low ponytail a bit more of an interesting look. Here, I decided to try doing it to a really high ponytail. I don't often wear my hair super high up like this because it tends to give me a headache, but when I tried this technique, it took a lot of strain off my hair and made it easier to wear my hair up so high since it was held closer to my head. Then, for the hell of it I braided it as well. My mom thought it looked fancy enough that she asked who had done it for me. So it was a nice, fairly simple thing to do to make a boring ponytail look more interesting.
I just ordered OC8 Mattifying Gel, so I am excited to see how well it works. The description says it is used on shows like American Idol and The Glee Project, and I have been in desperate need of something that keeps my face from getting shiny. I am also eagerly awaiting my next Ipsy and Birchbox boxes in the mail. I decided not to cancel Birchbox yet, just because of how much better their reward point system is compared to Ipsy. One more thing I decided to try was Influenster. My friend recommended it. I was really confused and frustrated at first, because I kept doing things like surveys and such that were supposed to make you gain points, but I never got any more points. If you get points, you're more likely to get a VoxBox, which as far as I understand it, is a few items or so that you agree to review, and they send it to you if you're 'influential'. Since I got frustrated, I forgot about it until I got two emails saying I qualified for two boxes. One has something to do with University, and I'm not sure what the other one is. I took a second survey for each of them and then it told me to expect my box at some point, so we'll see if that actually amounts to anything.
I got my new car on Monday, so I'll tell you about it in the next post :)
Have you discovered any makeup that you've fallen in love with this year?
