Tuesday, July 10, 2012

Week in photos #1

Bonjour mes amis!

I wanted to share my week in photos.


I love these style shirts and have been searching for a long time for an inexpensive one.  All of the cute ones I see are from Topshop for 60+ dollars :( but alas!  I finally found a cheap one at TJ Maxx for only 12$.


Here I'm wearing the shirt with a layered pearl/gold chain necklace from Forever 21.


I tried water marble nails for the first time!  It took way too long and didn't turn out very well so I don't think I'll be doing this again -.-

This stuff is dangerous.  It's chocolate chip cheesecake dip for graham crackers.  I dip teddy grahams in it.  Mmmm... It's like diabetes in a a bowl.


I went shopping downtown with my friends and we went to Topshop!  There's only 3 in America and it's nice to live close to one of them, even though I can't really afford anything haha.  I did wind up buying some jewelry and makeup that I will be reviewing soon.  We got a 10% off student discount which was really nice.  If you're going to the Chicago Topshop, remember your student ID!

What did you do this week?

AU REVOIR

This post was not sponsored

Tuesday, June 26, 2012

Maybelline Dream Bouncy Blush review/swatches

Bonjour mes amis!


I just picked up some of the new(ish) blushes from Maybelline and wanted to share with you.


The two shades I got are Peach Satin (left) and Orchid Hush (right).  Peach Satin is much more pigmented than Orchid Hush.  All of the reviews that I've seen say that the darker shades generally have more pigmentation than the lighter ones and that's definitely true here.


I'm wearing Peach Satin on the left and Orchid Hush on the right (for demonstration purposes of course).

Peach Satin



This is a bright peachy tomato color.  The texture is really weird.  It's soft and mushy like play dough.  The packaging is plastic and feels kind of cheap but it does the job.  It has pretty good pigmentation and a satiny dewy finish.  I rarely use cream blushes because of my oily skin but this looked very natural on me.  The staying power was pretty good.  I definitely recommend this!

.5 out of 5



Orchid Hush

This blush is a light silvery baby pink color.  I didn't like this blush as much as the first.  It's much more mushy than Peach Satin.  It also takes more product to get a good application.  The color itself is pretty but it takes a lot to build up to the color.  

.5 out of 5

You can pick these up at Target or any drugstore!

Au revoir!
This post was not sponsored

Monday, June 4, 2012

Nyx Lipstick Review and Swatches


Bonjour mes amis!

Ulta had a sale on Nyx so I picked up a few things :)
Let's get started


I got three lipsticks.  From top to bottom: Athena, Strawberry Milk, and Orange Soda




The first lipstick I got is called Orange Soda.  Orange/Corals are supposed to be really in this spring although I rarely pay much attention to trends.  I really just wanted a nude that wasn't too brown.  It feels really creamy applied and the color looks fantastic with my skintone.  This isn't a nude like I was looking for (it's more of an orangey-coral) but I actually wound up loving it!  It's a cream finish and it lasts about as long as a usual lipstick. It only lasts about an hour though without smearing/rubbing off.
.5 out of 5





This next lipstick is called Athena.  I wasn't expecting much of this lipstick due to the negative reviews it got online, but I still bought it because of the name (I'm a huge Greek mythology enthusiast).  I was hoping it would be a nice light milky pink, but instead it comes out as just a sheer silver frost.  I don't like frost finishes so this was a miss for me :(  If you like sheer frosty shades then maybe this will work for you but it didn't do anything for me.
 out of 5



This last one is called Strawberry Milk.  I couldn't quite get this to photograph correctly.  It looks a bit darker in person.  The arm swatch at the top of the page is probably the most accurate out of all of the photos.  This color is a bit too light on my skintone to the point where it looks a bit chalky.  It's not a very wearable color and it doesn't wear very long.  If you're a fan of Mac's Saint Germain you might like this color though; it just wasn't for me.

 out of 5

That's all!If you're interested in these lipsticks you can pick them up online or at ulta.

Au Revoir!

This post was not sponsored

cosmeticlove.com cheap asian makeup!

Bonjour mes amis!

This is going to be a really quick post but I really wanted to share an awesome online store that I found with you guys :)

The place is called Cosmetic Love.  It has tons of Korean brands like Skin79, Skinfood, Etude House, Missha,  and Laneige.  Now I know Asian beauty stores are relatively easy to find on the web, so hmm why am I featuring this store?
THE PRICES ARE SO FREAKING CHEAP!

I originally found this place because i was looking for the Shinee for Etude House lip balms to get for my friend, but obvs I had to check our their selection of BB creams and such, and I saw how ridiculously inexpensive everything is!  

To give you an idea, the super popular (and one of my personal favorite) BB cream, the Skin79 Hot Pink BB cream, is only 13 FREAKING DOLLARS (usd)!!!!
I bought mine for 20+ dollars and now seeing it this cheap is making me sad 

I haven't actually ordered anything from here before so I can't speak on the speed of shipping/etc but they have free worldwide shipping all the time so I'll probably order from them in the future!

Au Revoir!

This post was not sponsored 

Sunday, June 3, 2012

Mitsuwa Japanese food/skincare/haircare review


Bonjour mes amis!

I recently went to Mitsuwa and picked up a lot of goodies.
Let's get started on the post!


First I got a bunch of snacks.  
1.  Ahhhh shrimp chips!!  These things are the best for when I'm craving something salty.  When I was little, my grandma used to get them for me from a Filipino grocery store owned by a family friend.  I used to bring them to school and people would make fun of my weird Asian chips ;_;
2.  I am 100% biased when I say Filipino dried mangoes are the best dried mangoes.
3.  I freaking love these candies.  They are literally pure cane sugar haha.  I always get these instead of the candies with the adorable packaging because these just taste so good.
4.  I was pretty disappointed with these.  On every Mitsuwa haul blogpost I looked at, these seemed to find an appearance.  They were pretty bitter, like extremely dark chocolate.  It wasn't my cup of tea, but if you like dark chocolate, you'd probably like these.
5.  Mochi o^.^o mmm so good.  The green tea flavor was very strong.  The strawberry one was very good too <3
6.  I thought this was mochi when I first saw it in the store.  It's actually a frozen rice cake thingy.  It was red bean flavor with macadamia nuts.  I thought it was great.

Onward to the beauty products!


This is probably really boring, but I needed some cotton sheets for things like toner and nail polish remover, so I picked up a box.  I usually just get the Target brand cotton rounds.  I never thought it actually mattered what you use (cotton balls, squares, sheets, rounds, etc.) but wow I was wrong!  The ones I've been using are thick, which actually wastes a lot of products because you are soaking up more than you need.  These guys peel into 5 individual thinner sheets so you get 5 uses from just one, and you use less product.  It's pretty great if you ask me.



The next thing I got was this Mandom Hair Fix Water.  I don't really care for this too much.  It makes my hair smell nice but that's about it.  I wouldn't repurchase this.


This, however, is a gem.  This is the Mandom Sebum type Cleansing Express Makeup Remover.  It's the best makeup remover I've ever used.  Seriously one swipe and all of my mascara is gone.  Two swipes and gel eyeliner is gone.  I love it so much.  They have 3 other types: moist, age care, and bright up.  I got the sebum one because I have pretty oily skin.



The next thing I got is this DHC Mild Touch Cleansing Oil.  DHC is known for their Deep Cleansing oil but honestly I saw the adorable pink packaging and got this one instead :P  I really like this.  It works well to take off makeup but I usually use it to help remove clay masks once they've dried.

That's about it!

Au revoir!

prettyandcute.com review



Bonjour mes amis!

I recently ordered from a website called prettyandcute  that sells Japanese/Korean beauty products.  I was really impressed with their selection of BB creams which was what I was looking for.

The package was well packed with Styrofoam packing peanuts which kept things stable.  I received free shipping shipping for spending 50+ dollars and my package came 4 days after I ordered.  I’m hugely impressed with that because usually when I order from online stores it takes at least a week to arrive 

The first thing I ordered were two boxes of the My Beauty Diary sheet masks ($13.75 each).  I bought the aloe and pearl powder versions.  Both of the masks feel really wet and slimey when I first put them on which is a little off-putting.  After a couple minutes though, they start to feel nice and cooling.  The aloe is very soothing.  My skin feels really moisturized after using. Other than helping to moisturize, I haven't noticed any other benefits.  The pearl powder one does a lot as far as whitening.  I've used about 5 of these so far. It really helps to fade acne scars.  Also i feel like it has actually lightened my skin tone a bit because I've noticed my face is now a little whiter than my neck. 

Aloe Mask:  .5 out of 5
Pearl powder Mask:   out of 5

The next thing I got is the Skin79 Lovely Girl BB cream ($14.49).  It seems a bit greyish when swatched but it oxidizes to be quite close to my skin tone.  It provides light/medium coverage.  It tends to get kind of oily throughout the day so this isn't the best for people with oily skin.  I love the packaging though.  It's in a pink squeeze tube and it has a really cute shift to the pink.  


Overall:.5 out of 5




I also purchased the Lioele Dollish Veil Vita BB cream in the shade “Natural Green” ($22.00).  I bought this instead of the purple shade because green is supposed to cancel redness.  I use this as a primer under other bb cream or foundation in the parts of my face that get red. It does keep my face from getting red, but it doesn't control oil or have any of the other benefits most primers have.


Overall:.5 out of 5



 

Next thing I got is the famous Hot Pink Skin79 Super+ Beblesh Balm Triple Functions ($29.66).  I bought this one instead of the gold label because this is supposed to be better for people with oily skin.  I love this bb cream.  It has a very light scent that doesn't bother me.  The coverage is pretty good.  It's not greyish like most bb creams.  It also doesn't get too oily throughout the day.  This has been my everyday bb cream/foundation type thing lately.

Overall:.5 out of 5



This isn’t as interesting as the BB creams, but I got 2 velcro hair pad thingies ($3.95 for two).  They do a great job of holding your fringe out of your face when you’re doing your makeup or washing your face. 


Pretty and Cute also sent me 2 freebies!  When I checked out online, they offered you a choice of samples and I picked the Lioele Beyond the Solution BB cream.  However, the bow fringe grip (essentially the same thing as the ones mentioned above but so much cuter!!!) was a total surprise.  That’s really nice that they sent that and cute things like this are what always make me reorder from places.

Overall I’m happy with the products I received and I will absolutely be ordering from prettyandcute.com again in the future!  I was able to save on my order by using a coupon code from the lovely Jen.  You should check out her blog and youtube channel for great product reviews and tutorials.

Au revoir!

This post was not sponsored