Technological Issues and Formal (Part One)

Oh my gosh.  Ya know, my mother always called me a tech killer, and I always kind of laughed it off, but I really do have the worst luck with technology.  My computer's ancient, and something happened a couple weeks ago that would not allow me to download images or access the internet. Once I got that fixed, my Shockwave Flash crashed. It was horrible!

But as of now, I am back in the blogging business.  So let's do this!!

At the end of every Spring semester, my sorority has a formal to wrap everything up.  We get dinner, do some silly awards, and then we have a dance at the end.  It's always super fun, and this year the theme is masquerade!  I made a mask, and I'm wearing a green dress that I bought that time Ash, Amber and I went to Springfield!  I decided that all my accessories would be black and gold, so that my dress will be the pop of color.

A while back (like a year ago), I got this four pack of mini polishes from Ulta called "Paint the Town".  There's a color in it called "Raise Your Glass" that I used for my pedicure.  It has a nice gold shimmer.

"Raise Your Glass" (don't mind my weird feet)

Then for my manicure, I used Petite's "Night" and OPI's "Goldeneye".  I used two coats of the black, with one layer of "Goldeneye".  It actually came out looking like I used a gold crackle, I think.  I love it.  I'm totally going to do this look again!

Tonight's the event, and I'll post tomorrow with the final look.  I still don't know what I'm going to do makeup-wise, but I do know that I'll be using my e.l.f. palette and I'll show you what colors I use along with hair and outfit.

-Megan

Haul damage.

Hey girl hey! Lol. So this is gonna be my "Gustavos" haul that caused a no buy of 3 months (which may possibly be broken because of a moment of weakness for the Morphe Jaclyn's Favorite Palette lol) Anyways! This is a Ulta, Sephora, and Target shopping spree. Let's kick it off with Ulta. 

Ulta 

We went to Ulta 3 times in one weekend! It's only because of the beauty steal deals going on everyday. If you didn't hear about, you missed out! Ulta had a really neat sales idea to pick 1-2 items a day. The sales could be 20-50% off on items! How can you pass that up? So of course we have to go everyday of the weekend. :) 

At Ulta I got the Best of Becca set and Lorac Champagne Dreams shadow palette. The Best of Becca wasn't on sale but it was a great deal! It was $35 for 4 items that are some of their best wanted items. I've took a pic of the back of the box to describe each item that was included in this awesome set. It was a great way to try out some of their products, considering that I've never had anything of Becca. I now understand the hype that everyone gives this brand. Their products are amazing! 

I love the shimmering skin perfector in rose gold. It's a beautiful highlight! I love the way it looks on the top of my cheek bones. So here's some background on me being so hesitant on the highlighter cheek bone deal.  I didn't like the idea of shimmer on my actual face. I have oily skin, why would I wanna add shimmer to that? Eww, well that's what I thought. I tried it out and love it! It's a great pop to your makeup. I have no idea what I was thinking, honestly. I will be using a highlighter from now on when I'm doing my makeup. I really wanna try out opal now in the pressed packaging. 

The shimmering skin perfector spotlight in opal is a great highlight color also! I have to figure out how to apply this though. It's in a tube, liquid form so it's a lil more difficult for me to figure out if I should just use my fingers to press in or what? But the color is really pretty. 

The beach tint in guava. This is a great blush for a natural look. I applied it to the back of my hand and dabbed it on my Elf stipple brush. It look very pretty. They also say you can use it as a lip tint but I'm not to sure about it for that. I like I really like it for a blush instead. 

The beach tint shimmer soufflė in watermelon/moonstone I haven't used his yet! Sorry. I'm kinda confused about how to apply it cause of the container it comes in. I'll have to figure it out too. 

Top: rose gold 

left: opal 

Middle: watermelon/moonstone

Left: guava

The next thing I got from Ulta that was one of their beauty steal deals is the Lorac eye shadow palette. Lorac is a brand that I haven't used yet and I thought this was a great chance to do it considering the palette was only $15. This comes in a great package. I think it'll be prefect for travel since it is small and sturdy feeling. It has a magnetic closure. There is also a small mirror inside. The shadows are great too. I think it's good for a everyday, easy look or even a simple look to attend a wedding, which I'm totally planning to do this summer. :) it comes with a base and highlight shade. Then it has 4 shades that shimmer and 1 matte shade. You can even do a smoke eye look with it. Lovin' it for only $15. 

I didn't get a swatch of the base or the highlighter but these are the 4 shadows. 

I love the 2nd color down. Such a pretty shimmer to it. 

Sephora 

I didn't get too much at Sephora but I did get a few deals on Soap & Glory. Apparently Sephora decided to stop saleing Soap & Glory because it wasn't an exclusive brand to them, at least that's what a sales lady told me there. Anyways I like that brand so I went a lil crazy when I saw the price mark downs. I got hand food which is just a great hand cream. Then I got the two minute t-zone detox scrub, I've only tried it once so far. I like it though. I have oily skin as I've said before, but it felt good on my skin and left it soft. And lastly, I got the lip pluming gloss in punch bowl. I love this product. It leaves this tingle and makes my lips pucker a lil. It does have a weird, hard to explain smell to it. I'm not sure what it is but I don't much care for that smell. 

The other thing I got was a Kat Von D blush in por vida. I like it. It's in a pretty color for spring time. Kind of a pink corally shade? Which is something I totally need for the spring season. 

Por vida blush 

Target 

Now target! I love getting Elf products there since there isn't any in my home town. You honestly can't go wrong trying out some Elf stuff. I'm still kicking myself from not getting the palette Megan bought. Those colors were so pretty! Maybe next time I'll grab one! Anyways I bought 2 moisturizing lipsticks. I'm so into the nude pink colors for my lips right now. It must be the spring time. These lipsticks are pretty but they aren't long lasting. I'm not complaining though, I think they're maybe $3, not a bad deal. 

Left: party in the nude

Right: pink minx

Overall, I really like everything I got from our "Guastvos" haul. We did a ton of shopping and had just as much fun. I can not wait to do it again with those girls. :) 

Now if only I can mange my no buy period until June 28. Wish me luck! Lol.   

 

Trying something new.

Hey! Okay, so random talk here but does anyone feel like they can't just paint their nails all one color anymore? There has to be some kinda design or nail art...well for those like me that are incapable of creative artsy things, it's just not gonna happen. I've done it all it seems like, the Pinterest ideas and even the nail design kits. If I'm ever gonna have pretty designed nails, it's gonna because I got them done by someone else. Lol. 

So now that's outta the way, I tried something new today! I got the Essie 'matte class' gift set pack at Ulta when I was hanging out with Amber and Megan during our Gustavos weekend. It is 3 nail polishes: matte about you (which is a clear matte),  power clutch, and master plan. I've never tried any Essie polishes before but I've seen them all over Pinterest. They always seemed to have the prettiest colors! I also never tried any matte clear polishes. There was a lot of firsts going on with this. Oh! And I didn't even tell you the best part about this set, it was totally on sale! Originally $17 and I got it for $8.50. Oh yeah! I'm pretty sure thats around the same price of one bottle. You just can't beat that. 

On the side of the box, it gives you a tip of how to use your matte color. Paint your nails one of the colors, paint on a top coat, then use the matte on the nail tip like a French tip almost. So I gave it a shot, why not right? ... Didn't really turn out for the best for me. I've now learned I totally don't have a steady hand. I think if I try this out again, I may have to see about using those hole reinforcement stickers. I probably should've tried that in the beginning but yeah, you live and learn. Haha. Anyways, I went with the color Master Plan. It's such a great color! I love it. It's a grey with a purple undertone! It'll go with everything. 

Also I'm not too sure on the whole Essie brand...it seemed like the polish was thin and it wouldn't go on very smoothly. I love the color just maybe I'm being picky? Idk, I think I may have to stay with OPI polishes. Let me know what you guys think? 

The instructions. 

Before I put on the matte tip. 

Left hand. 

Right hand. 

Feeling Lucky with Boxycharm

Hey guys! So it's a Boxycharm opening! Well, not really an opening but more like a quick review and talking about what was in it this month. :)

This month was lucky charm themed and it was great. Totally feeling lucky with all the products I got! 

Let's start out with the Oscar Blandi hair product. This was the only travel size product for the month. I ended up with hair spray. A lil disappointing since I got hair spray a couple of months ago but what girl doesn't need hair spray? It smells very good. Not much else to go on besides it costing $11 for a travel size...wow. That's a lil crazy expensive. 

OFRA eyeliner in black. I guess there was different colors you could've got in this eyeliner. I'm happy with black, you can use it with anything. I haven't used it yet but I will most definitely put it to use. I almost forgot to mention, it's water resistant! Yaaasssss! Perfect for the warm weather. I'm planning on trying this out before wearing it to any theme parks I'll be going to this spring/summer. 

LUX nail lacquer in the color mynt. Love! The color is perfect for spring. This was actually showed as a sneak peak and there were three other colors for it: coral, yellow, and mint. So I totally got the one I was hoping for. It goes on smooth and says its a gel like polish. I've never tried any gel polishes, always wanted to, so I can't talk about that but it lasted a whole two days with any chips. That's pretty good in my opinion. 

Beautiful color! It's gotta be my favorite at the moment. 

Tarte LipSurgence lip tint in charmed. This was another great product! Some people recieved theirs broken but mine came perfect. The color can be sheer or you can build it up. I'm really liking it for spring. It also has a mint smell to it. 

Top is a swatch. Bottom is my lips with the color buildt up. Very pretty. 

The last product is Previse Nutrity Skin Type 1-6 Universal Tonic. I was really on the fence on this product... I've never used, I guess you call it a tonic? I didn't know how to use it and there were other people asking about it too since it was a sneak peak. So I didn't feel too ignorant. There were instructions on the card and instructions on the bottle. The instructions on the card is only the first step of the instructions on the bottle...a lil confusing, right? Well I decided to use it like the card says. It is a very nice face product. Goes on super smooth and makes the skin feel good. I really like it. It's kinda watery? So five drops covers the whole face and you have some left over for the neck. I've used this product three times and I think I'm gonna be adding it to my skin care routine. I'm just a lil confused as to when to use it? After toner but before moisturizer, like a serum? I'm not sure! Any thoughts?

Okay so I spent some charms this month, finally. :) Boxycharm allows you to do reviews, Pinterest, and Google plus to get charms and you can spend them in a lil store. So basically you get free products. I spent, I think 2,000 charms, for Ofra long lasting liquid lipstick in Hollywood. It's a great shade of pink for the spring. I think it'll look great with the Tarte lip tint over it. 

New obsession, liquid lipstick. 

Over all the Boxycharm for March was great! The only disappointment I have was the hairspray. I just wish I got a different hair product is all but it will be put to use. 4 and half outta 5 stars. Good job Boxycharm! 

...I Spent Waaaay Too Much Money Last Weekend

Ah, Gustavos weekends... where I get my much needed girl time and my bank account gets decimated.  Worth it? Definitely.  And because of schedules, it only happens like once every six months or so, which we're working on fixing, but it was so needed and was a fitting end to my Spring Break.

So, haul time!  Beyond two new dresses (for under $20 together HECK YES) and a couple of more expensive blouses, I got a bunch of new makeup items.

At Ulta:  Ulta has had a beautiful sale going on, and on Saturday they had Bare Minerals mascara on sale for $9. Half price? I am about that life, lemme tell you.  (I used Ashley's a while back and loved it).  I also picked up NYX BB Cream and Pore filler.

At Target:  We decided to make a drug store makeup run because some of us (ahem, me) can't get over the mental hang up of spending more than $15 on a single item of makeup.  I'm cheap, I can't help it.  I got a bunch of e.l.f. items; including setting spray, brush cleaner, lip exfoliator, and a 32 eye shadow pallette. I've already used the pallette, and I love it.

At Sephora:  The last Gustavos weekend, we went to Sephora and I wanted (but couldn't justify at the time) this two ended lipstick set from Bite Beauty.  It includes the colors "Fig" and "Date".  I still wanted it just as much this time, so I treated myself.

P.S. In my haul photo, I included a buy from Old Navy, e.l.f.'s Face Primer.  I didn't get it this past weekend, but it's still less than a week old, so it deserves a place.

I am also not completely sure what the big deal is about BB Cream... I've Googled and I still don't completely understand, anyone care to explain? A more detailed review is coming soon, once I've given them a good try.

-Megan

Gustavos Weekend!!!!

Hey y'all! 

This weekend, Ash and I traveled up to visit our friend Amber. Ash nicknamed us the Gustavos back in high school, hence the title haha. And let me tell you, shopping with the three of us should be an Olympic sport. 

We had tons of fun, jokes and shenanigans were had. We ate at some of the best places: Zios, Houlihan's, Cheddars, and of course a late night Taco Bell run. We hit the mall twice, Ulta twice (I got Bare Minerals mascara for nine dollars, more on that later!), and Sephora twice. Our bank accounts were severely hit, and the both of us will be on a self-imposed spending freeze, but it was worth it.

We will each upload our hauls later this week, after we've fully tested and put our items to use. Reviews are coming, and we think you'll be pleased. 

I think my favorite part was trying out Amber's Makeup Geek eye shadows. It's pushed me over the edge and once my spending freeze is over, I'm totally buying  some! I will make it spending freeze, I will make it through the spending freeze... Hopefully. 

I think my favorite part of the weekend, beyond hanging with the girls, wasn't the makeup I bought (even though I got a BUNCH). I bought two new blouses from Forever 21 and two new dresses from JC Penny's. Hello, professional wardrobe! The dresses were a steal, together I spent less than $20 total. 

All together we've had a great girls weekend, catching up on everything that's been going on in our lives. I had a blast and can't wait to do it again...when my spending freeze is over. (I'm thinking a 3 month freeze is acceptable) lol. I'm gonna give myself a couple of weeks to try out my makeup to give my honest opinions of it so your reviews will be then. :) 

Here are some pics from the weekend. Talk to you soon!

Shopping! Megan wanted that purse so bad. It was just too cute! Also how adorable is too faced?! No teddy bears and animals were tested. Aww. Note to self: buy more too faced products. 

The top pic is of Sunday, Amber wasn't feeling too well but she put on a great smilie for us. :) 

The bottom pic was of me and Megan. We decided to get face masks at target. I think I got a clarifying peel mask and Megan did a deep cleansing mask. I really liked mine. However, I've never had a mask where you could not show emotion at all. It was like we had botox! We made fun of each other...but couldn't even laugh or smile. Of course, that made me super giggly. It was awful haha!

Watching YouTube.

Hey guys, its Ashley here! I thought I would do a different post for this week, YouTube favorites! I don’t know where I would be without YouTube in the makeup world honestly. I love watching makeup tutorials and getting tips from there. I have subscribed to some accounts that I found to be great, either the person is super good with makeup or they’re just plain fun to watch. I thought I would let you in on some of my favorites and why they make the list. Here goes nothing!

 

Jaclyn Hill - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC6jgzx2g3nlbaYkd8EMweKA

She’s my all-time favorite makeup artist on YouTube. She is amazing at what she does! I started out really interested in makeup because of her. She made me think that I could actually pull off her looks with practice and a lot of patience. I blame her for my makeup addiction now. Lol. Watch her bloopers at the end; they are probably my favorite when she includes them in her videos.

Casey Holmes - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxj0QizmFhx7kVKSArHBCTA

Casey seriously would make the best friend ever. She is super funny and down to earth. She just seems very real. Her makeup and hair are always on point too. She doesn’t just do makeup videos, she also does fashion hauls and hair tutorials. One of my favorite parts of on her monthly favorites video is she will tell what music she’s currently listening to. Music is life for me so anytime I can hear something new that may be good, I’m all up for it!

Kathleen Lights - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8v4vz_n2rys6Yxpj8LuOBA

This girl is so much fun to watch. She is real and down to earth also. I love watching her tutorials because she makes them seem so easy, and usually they aren’t very difficult. She also will try to stay away from designer makeup that is expensive or she will warn you about it if she does use it. I can’t stand when I find a look I really like and someone is using a bronzer that’s over $50…seriously? Aint nobody got the time for that.

Nicole Guerriero - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCz0Qnv6KczUe3NH1wnpmqhA

I started watching Nicole from Jaclyn Hill’s page. She’s really fun too. She does makeup and hair tutorials. Each video I watch of hers, I always learn a new tip or trick. Also, she has started a new skin care line. I would love to get the chance sometime to try it.

 

So those are just some of my favorites to watch on YouTube. Are there any that you guys watch that I should know of? Let me know, I’m always looking to find some new videos.