Sally Hansen Emerald Express - ringing in the Fall!

I went to Walgreen's the other day and saw the most beautiful nail polish I have ever set eyes on. It was a perfect time too, I was in the market for a new color and I was just musing on how awesome it is that Fall colors are finally coming in everywhere I look. I've been looking forward to wearing my mustard clothing for awhile now!


Anywho, here is the nail polish I'm rocking right now. I am a huge fan, pictures just couldn't capture how beautiful it is, but I sure tried! Sally Hansen hit this out of the park!

Can you look at this color and tell me it isn't gorgeous? I didn't think so...
















I also did some depotting this weekend. I needed to make some room around here! I feel like showing you my palettes is a bit like baring my soul, but what the hell!

Free palette from Etsy, look at the cute owl!

Gasp! Pan!

It's looking like I already made a good amount of space around here, we'll see if I can continue. I think I almost cried when I dug my paring knife into a couple of my shadows. I need to be more careful!

How to...Highlight!

So, for the longest time I had no idea how to use highlighter and was honestly resistant to the idea that it was even an important part of a make-up routine. Well, I still don't think it's important, but it sure is awesome to have.

Highlighter, luminizer, illuminator whatever you want to call it, they all serve the same purpose. It basically contains some type of light reflecting properties that give you that "glow" from within look.

Highlighters come in several shapes and forms, from liquids to powders. When picking your highlighter take into consideration what your skin type is. If you have oily skin it's to best stick to the powders. If you have dry skin you'd better use the liquid or gel. Of course, trial and error is always the best way to find what works best for you!

So, onto where to apply highlighter. Highlighter goes on the cheekbones and under the eyebrows. Be careful not to put any on the bridge of your nose, chin or temple if you get really oily it'll just enhance the look of oiliness. I do tend to get oily so I skip highlighter on the bridge of my nose, temple and chin. Some people like to do it, I don't.

Because I am oily I also like to stick to powder highlighters. Not always, sometimes I do use a gel or mix a liquid into my moisturizer but for the most part I only highlight my cheeks/brow bone with a powder. Right now my favorite is Mary Lou Manizer, my post about it here. It's a very flattering color for my NC35 skin tone and it really lasts through the day. It's very pigmented so a little goes a long way.

My routin is to do my full face of makeup, whatever I plan to wear for the day then I do my highlighter last. Over my blush or bronzer I suck in my cheeks so I can see the highest part of cheek bone and I apply highlighter there with a fan brush, again build, over doing it means having to start over. Then I grab a smaller thinner eyeshadow brush and apply highlighter under my brow bone. Ta da! Instant healthy but natural glow.

Smashbox Smokebox

Smashbox decided to release a sister for the Fall Softbox, a Smokebox for a smokey eye look. I've never owned a palette dedicated just to a smokey eye, though I probably should have a long time ago, it really takes the guesswork out.

As with the previous two palettes I reviewed by Smashbox this one is full proof and really makes it easy to get beautiful eye looks.  It also comes with two eye looks you can try out in case you're overwhelmed or uninspired.

Bliss: Looks a lot like Vanilla from the previous palettes but this one is pearlescent.
Putty: A dark brown with gold microshimmer.
Blacktop: Black with silver glitter.
Mist: A beige-taupe leaning more towards beige.
Royal: A dark purple, looks almost brown, matte.
Nocturnal: Dark navy with blue glitter.

So, there is only one matte shade in the palette, but this palette creates some really fun smokey eye looks. Definitely not boring by any means. The only down side is that Blacktop and Nocturnal have glitter in them which looks wonderful but can mean some minor fall out. With primer for me the fall out was hardly something to complain about but it is there, so I want to mention it.

Other than that I worried the colors were too dark for me to pull off comfortably or too cool for my olive skin. That was not the case the colors were wonderful and produced very beautiful looks. They are, however, very pigmented so use a light hand or you'll look like you have a shiner.

Smashbox Softbox Fall 2011

I bought Smashbox's Softbox for Summer and really loved how it was so easy to use. I feel that many shades were probably a little too soft for my NC35 skin, but I still enjoyed it, especially the liners. Summer isn't meant to be about heavy eye make up, so their Summer Softbox made a lot of sense.

When I saw that they had released a Softbox for Fall I almost passed it by chalking it up to be another palette with shades too light for me. However, when I saw it on their Smashbox site I realized this was definitely a Fall palette and that it was definitely not going to be lacking in pigment.

Fizz: A pearlescent beige, very pretty.
Pebble: A matte brown almost grey.
Minx: A pearlescent medium brown.
Vanilla: Vanilla, matte.
Ignite: A beautiful coral with a yellow pearlescence.
Sienna: A dark brown with gold pearlescence.

The palette even comes with 2 eye looks you can try if you're not sure about how to use the colors. Just like with the brown eyes palette from yesterday I have no complaints about this palette. The colors are gorgeous, truly pair very well together, are pigmented and looked beautiful on my skin. If I had to pick nits I'd say that Pebble could be a little more pigmented, but it's not something that would make me want to return the palette.

As with the brown eyes palette, these are a joy to use, are brighter with primer and last me through the work day. I very much love these colors too, usually I'm not a huge fan of colors like Pebble but it works well with these shades!

Smashbox Photo Op Eye Enhancing Palette - Brown Eyes

So I bought a new palette from Smashbox. It's part of their Girls on Film line and it's specifically tailored to brown eyes. Hey! I have brown eyes!

So, I'll start with the colors:

Marble: A very pretty taupe with a hint of pearlescence.

Wine: A reddish brown with a hint of golden sparkle.

Bark: A dark brown with a hint of golden sparkle.

Vanilla: Exactly like it sounds, looks like vanilla ice cream. Matte.

Brazilian Bronze: A bronze with a hint of sparkle.

Navy: A matte dark navy.

Direction on how to get 2 looks!

These shadows are gorgeous. They really do make brown eyes pop! The shadows themselves are a dream, they blend well, are nicely pigmented and the best is they feel like butter but the shimmery ones don't have fall out! All of my swatches above are without primer but with primer they're even better and last without creasing for my whole work day.

I own a lot of eyeshadows, but I truly love small palettes like these because they are pretty much full proof. You can create a lot of eye looks with the palette but can also just connect the dots if you're lazy or a novice. I sometimes get overwhelmed by large palettes and don't know what to pair together, with this it's like idiot proof makeup for a sleepy Liz in the morning.

This is available at Sephora.

Eye Kohl cream vs powder

This post is a long time coming. I'll be honest and say the reason it took so long to get it up was a mix of being busy/doing research, but most of all it took forever because I had to buy a L'oreal Eye Kohl from eBay since it's not available in stores anymore and the seller took their sweet time shipping.

Anyway, the good news is I have a review now and here it is!

I bought an eye kohl stick from Sephora, in black to review it against the above mentioned L'oreal Hip eye kohl.

Sephore Eye Kohl

L'oreal Hip Eye Kohl

Left: Sephora Right: L'oreal

After washing/rubbing off.  Left: Sephora Right: L'oreal

Sephora Eye Kohl

L'oreal Eye Kohl

 So, after seeing pictures here are the basics. The Sephora kohl was a stick kohl and was a very creamy formula. It applied easily but very patchy and was not as dark as the L'oreal Kohl. It didn't seem as dramatic but was very easy to build (building was definitely in order) and use, no watery eye mess. However, it wouldn't transfer from my bottom water line to the top, I had to line the top separately, that was giant pain.

The L'oreal kohl was in powder form. When I applied it I got powder in my eye, so unfortunately, I didn't really enjoy that. All kinds of not okay. It didn't get all over my face though, I think I may have just done it at the wrong angle. After that initial shock and strategic angling the powder applied darker and more evenly to my waterline than the Sephora stick. It also transfered better from my bottom to my top lash line, which meant I didn't have to line more than once. One swipe got a dramatic effect and it transfered from top to bottom easily.

One thing about kohl is that it doesn't particularly last very long, it smudges and runs throughout the day. In order to see which one would last the longest I showered with it, while they both ran and smudged horribly the Sephora ran less. However, it was gone by the end of my shower. Once I got out the L'oreal eye kohl was just as dark on my water line as before my shower, it was just a runny mess. So, food for thought!

As for other uses for eye kohl it seems like people can use it as mascara. You'd need to use powder kohl and you can dip a spoolie in water then into the powder to darken your lashes, kohl wont do much but add color. However, like I mentioned above, it's not very run-proof so you'd probably just get raccoon eyes after an hour, so I wouldn't recommend it.

In the end my recommendation would be a powder version. I know that L'oreal doesn't sell theirs anymore, but if you can find one it'd the best option in my book. Once I learned how not to get powder in my eye it turned out to be the better option!