August Favorites

These are the products I found myself reaching for constantly all month long.

The majority of these are products I'd never tried before, which is great because I love when a new product turns out to be so great that I don't stop using it after the trial period is over. 

First up is Nuance Salma Hayek Beautiful Blends Eye Quad. 

Nuance Salma Hayek Color Vibrance Lipstick in Dusty Rose. 

L'Oreal Voluminous Million Lashes Mascara [Waterproof]

 

Maybelline Expert Wear Eyeshadow Trio in Bronze Glitz

e.l.f. Studio Blush in Blushing Rose

Revisiting Maybelline SuperStay 24 hr Concealer

** read original review

I couldn't resign myself to the idea that SuperStay was just a bad concealer with limited colors and tones. So, I kept looking for reviews and comments from other bloggers, trying to see what they saw in it that I didn't. Finally, one day I had an epiphany!

SuperStay is not a good concealer for me, but it's the perfect corrector.

The difference between a concealer and a corrector is that while a concealer is there to hide your dark circles and is usually skin colored [sometimes with a bit of yellow in it,] a corrector uses colors to mask other colors in your face.
Example: My NC35 concealer makes my dark circles the same color as the rest of my face, but sometimes [most of the time,] they're too dark and the darkness shows through. Putting a pink-based corrector on my yellow toned skin cancels out my dark circles and brightens up the eye area. [I've been doing a bit of reading about all this and it seems that pink based correctors aren't necessarily just for yellow toned skin, so feel free to give it a shot.]

Although SuperStay isn't marketed as a corrector, I found that it is much too pink to work as a concealer, but as a corrector it works wonders.

I apply the too-pink SuperStay to the inner corner of my eye and first half of my under eye area where the circles are at their worst.

I blend blend blend blend until it looks passable [though always a bit powdery,] and then I put my MAC Pro Longwear concealer in NC35 over all of it. Sometimes, I skip MAC and go for the Maybelline FitMe concealer in 25 because the color looks really great.

By mixing the two colors, my circles are effectively wiped out [or at least, as much as they'll ever be.]
I'm really really happy with SuperStay now that I've figured out how to use it to my advantage. I still say that as a concealer, it's incredibly limited because of how thick it is and the very few color options, but as a corrector, it rivals Bobbi Brown's line [that's right, I said it.]

** As a way to deal with how powdery SuperStay is, I always make sure I put a little bit of extra moisturizer under my eyes and I apply the concealers right after so the area is still smooth enough to work with.

Maybelline Fit Me Concealer Review

Maybelline recently came out with a new line of face makup named Fit Me.


The purpose of Fit Me is to be more inclusive of the various skin tones people have. They have three categories [light, medium and dark] with several shades and tones in each.

Of all the drugstore brands, Maybelline has always been my favorite, but I've never had much luck with their concealers. However, I decided to try out Fit Me given the wide array of shades available.

The cool thing about Fit Me is that the shades are grouped together in such a way that you can determine what foundation, concealer and blush to buy using their number codes.

By using the tester bottles at Walgreens, I determined that my shade was 25 (Medium.)

The color is actually incredibly close to my actual skin tone. This amazed me right off the bat because I have a very hard time finding concealer that matches my skin.

What I love about this concealer is that it does what it's supposed to do. It mimics my skin tone, but brightens it at the same time, and doesn't look the least bit powdery. It's clear that my hand got lighter, but it's not obvious that it's due to makeup.

However [there is always a however with concealers,] the coverage leaves a lot to be desired.

If it seems like I'm not wearing anything on my had, it's because Fit Me is very very sheer. It's possible to build on it to make the coverage a bit better, but to be honest, it'll never be a full coverage concealer.

I think Fit Me could work for a day when I don't need as much coverage, but mostly I've been using it the same way I use e.l.f.'s Tone Correcting Concealer, on top of my MAC concealer as a way to offset its powdery quality.

I think Maybelline's idea of coordinating foundations, concealer and blushes is a good one, but I do think they should try to make the formula a bit better. I'm sure they didn't intend their products to be used in combination with better ones.

Maybelline SuperStay 24hr Concealer Review

***NOTE****
I did a follow-up review of this concealer a few months later as I just couldn't come to terms with the fact that I seemed to be the only person that hated it, make sure to read it!

I read a lot of rave reviews about SuperStay that compared it to MAC and other high end concealers, so I decided to give it a try.

To be honest, I was disappointed with the selection of colors. Like most drugstore brands, SuperStay just didn't have the variety of colors that they should. The shades are Ivory, Cream, Light, Medium Beige and Deep Beige. The closest I could find was Medium Beige, though it looked a bit light in the bottle, but Deep Beige was too dark.

Right off the bat, the color looks way too light, even though my face is lighter than my hand [as is the case with most people,] it was the wrong color.

There is no other way to describe this than to say it was a disaster. The color is too pink, especially for my skin which has yellow tones [actually "yellow tones" is an understatement, sometimes I think my actual skin color is yellow.]

This concealer is similar to MAC's Longwear in that it dries very quickly and it stays dry and powdery. It's best to apply it before your face cream dries in order to make it easier to blend.

I think SuperStay could be good for people who have more pink in their skin because with the exception of the Cream color, all the shades have pink undertones.

In its favor, I will say that SuperStay has amazing coverage. I think if it had been my right color, it could have rivaled my MAC concealer.

If you're light skinned and in need of a heavier concealer, I say give this a try.

Makeup Alley reviews

Maybelline Pulse Perfection Mascara Review

This is officially my new favorite product in the world.

I've tried a zillion mascaras and 90% of them have been a huge letdown. I put off buying Pulse Perfection because the $14 price tag was unappealing given my past experiences. However, this week CVS has them on sale for half off and I figured it was now or never.

I cannot find the words to say how much I love this. The vibrating is weird, yes but the results make up for it completely.

The good: The brush is thin, which is a nice break from those ridiculous fat brushes that have been so
popular lately.

The bad: Because the bristles are very spaced out, the brush tends to deposit a bit too much product and it's hard to apply multiple coats like I would with a regular mascara. I think anything more than three is too much.

I've read from other people that the vibrating makes their eyes water and this only happened to me for one of my eyes, but it wasn't a flood of tears and it was totally manageable.

The reason I'm willing to overlook the few bad qualities of this mascara is this:

                                                                                  
  

My natural eyelashes are not even long enough to be considered lashes. They're just tiny bits of hair that have somehow found themselves attached to my lids. Enter Pulse Perfection. They look fake, they look like spiders, I can't even wear my glasses because my lashes hit the lenses, words fail me.

I recommend this for everyone, not just tiny lashed people like me. If that's what happens when I wear it, imagine what would happen if a regular lashed person wears it.

Maybelline Full 'n Soft

I have tiny eyelashes that don't stay curled or long no matter what mascara I wear. Also, even when I find a good mascara, it only works for about a month until my lashes get used to it and build up an immunity, kind of like a virus.

Maybelline Full 'n Soft may be the answer to my problems. I've tried just about every kind of mascara Maybelline makes and even though they seemed great at first, it never lasted. Except this one.

Full 'n Soft isn't fancy, there's no commercials for it and the packaging isn't cool and colorful, but it is Amazing [capital A.] I've been using it for over 3 months and it's still working. I'm not going to say my lashes became enormous and full as I don't think that's even possible for me, but they look much better.

The mascara isn't the thick goopy kind that makes a mess, and the brush isn't one of those huge ones that put more product on your lids than your lashes like that awful Lashblast [I've never tried a CG product I liked, so I'm biased here.] My lashes stay curled and relatively long, and it's easy to remove at the end of the day.


If you have lash troubles, give this a shot, it's totally worth it.

If you don't believe me, see what the girls at Makeup Alley think.

Full 'n Soft is available anywhere you can find maybelline, it ranges from $4-6.