Birthday presents - Benefit Boi-ing Concealer

Part two of the presents from my godmother is the Benefit Boi-ing Concealer! I've been needing a good concealer lately so I decided to get this as I've heard many good things about it .

I adore Benefit's packaging. It just jumps straight out at you and makes you want to buy everything they have although then you get a look at the prices and jump straight back.

I love their little blurbs!

I bought shade 2, which looked a bit too dark on my wrist, but fits my face very well, thankfully! 

It's a decently sized concealer,  I'm thinking it will last me long enough as you really don't need that much, even for dark circles! I also like the way the lid unscrews, it's not held together by some flimsy clasp so you don't need to worry about that breaking (unlike my Sephora eyeshadows).

too dark, as you can see.

before

after

So as you can see, it's a teeny bit cakey, but it doesn't settle into my fine lines (at the moment!) and it does the job. It works really well for concealing spots as well, so I'm very pleased. I'm curious as to see how it'll fare combined with my Collection 2000 concealer, hopefully very well, so I'll let you all know as soon as I've tried that!

Birthday presents - Clinique Travel Set

Today's present is from my best friend who bought this with the reasoning 'I know her mum will refuse to buy her makeup so she won't be getting that much so I'll buy her makeup'. She was right, my mum refused to get me anything *sob*.

So this is one of Clinique's many travel sets which includes:

• 1x Take The Day Off Makeup Remover 30ml/1oz
• 2x All About Eyes 7ml/0.21oz
• 1x High Impact Mascara 7ml/0.28oz ( #01 Black )
• 1x Bag ( Pink )

 So there are four products are all samples except the mascara. I actually have the mascara as a sample as well courtesy of Glamour a few months ago.

First up is the Take The Day Off makeup remover. First of all, I like the name of this, it reminds me a bit of Benefit's way of naming products. This makeup remover's quite good, it works well enough, but as there isn't an extraordinary amount of it, I'm just using it to dip a cotton bud in to remove any mistakes I may have made as I have a tendency of pouring out too much makeup remover.

Next up are the All About Eyes de-puffing eye massage serum. I've used this once but I can't really tell if it makes much of a difference as my eyes aren't really that puffy. It has a tiny bit of a sticky feel to it, which isn't really that much a big deal as it fades away after about five minutes (the feeling, that is).

Finally, we have the High Impact mascara. Although it does nothing to curl my lashes (but then again, what mascara does?), it does add volume, so I think I'll use this for night outs rather than during the day, as it can get a bit too much if I'm not careful (which I'm not during the morning before school) and I don't usually have time to start again before school.

That's it for this post, I shall be finished with my tests this week at the time that this is posted so if I don't get a lot of homework, I may have another update which isn't scheduled! (Although the next one is anyway.)

EDIT: My post scheduling thing is a little funny, it didn't post my previous post at the time I wanted to so I thought I'd just post this one today anyway.

Birthday presents - MAC Lipstick in 'Speak Louder'

[So I managed to take new pictures and that's why I am not scheduling this post for tomorrow!]

Another of my few makeup related presents on Tuesday was something that I've actually had since the beginning of June, but was forbidden to touch and wear until my birthday.

Me and Dani have now decided that we shall make it a tradition to get each other MAC products for our birthdays (I think we have?). She got Impassioned from me and I got Speak Louder.

My first MAC product. Ever! First of all, I adore the smell of these lipsticks. Second of all, I like how the packaging doesn't seem to get covered in marks whenever you touch it (talking to you, Sleek iDivine palette!) and (well duh) how professional it looks.

The lipstick itself looks really dark which for a moment made me wonder whether I'd asked for a colour that was far too similar to lipsticks that I already own, but thankfully it's a lot lighter on the skin.

 Excuse me looking a bit scruffy/tired/meh in the last foto, I'm makeupless except for the lipstick and my hair is unwashed.

So the lipstick is really nice and not too bright, which is good, because I think I have enough of those. Otherwise, it lasts a few hours, although I can't say that with absolute certainty as I wore it to the cinema and I spent those two hours munching on crisps and drinking, so it did wear off a bit.

All in all, I'm very pleased with it and shall be wearing it out ,perhaps Wednesday, it's the grand-duke's birthday (not really, it's more the national day of luxembourg) on Thursday (so it's another bank holiday!) so there'll be fireworks in town and everyone generally goes out on wednesday night and I am as well, so that's probably where I'll wear it!

Birthday presents - Benefit Cha Cha Tint

It seems I have been MIA - again. There's lots to do at school lately as our last term is so short so we have lots of tests after another, the week of the 27th is especially going to be ugly, I can already tell you guys that.

I DO have a few reviews planned as I got some makeup products for my birthday. I would start in chronological order, but I have just realised that the one camera I used for those pictures is awful and I don't like the pictures. So I'm not showing them *stubborn perfectionist*.

These ones, however aren't that bad, so that's why I'm posting them first.

So....Cha Cha Tint. I am a humongous lover of all things coral and when I first saw this in a Benefit leaflet I got on the ferry back to la France and my first thought was 'I NEED THIS IN MY LIFE.' And then I thought 'Oh wait, Benefit is extraordinarily out of your budget, girl.' So I had to settle for looking at lovely swatches on the internet.

BUT THEN I went shopping with my lovely godmother who wanted me to choose a birthday present and she generously bought me two Benefit products (the other I shall review once I have taken better pictures.).Luckily, we managed to get the last one they had so I'm very pelased about that. I'm not sure how much it costs in England, but in Europe, it costs 32€. Yes, that is quite pricey, but I've heard that the little tints you get in sets like Finding Mr Bright or with the Glamour magazine last forever so these will last longer than forever!

I love the look of these tints. The jar is nice and pretty but unlike Benetint, I believe, you can't see how much is in the jar, which is a shame, as I'd like to know when I'm close to running out. Otherwise, it's quite good. The actual packaging is a teeny bit misleading as it makes the jar look HUGE, but it's not as big as the packaging, which isn't all that bad as it's still quite an impressive size.

On to the actual product, it hasn't got the same watery consistency as Benetint, rather it's more creamy like Posietint, which is good as I always swatch Posietint instead of Benetint whenever I'm in Sephora. As per usual with tints, you need to be quick in blending them. The first time I tried this, I ended up having orange fingers, so it is quite messy. 

not a very sharp picture, but one of the best from the batch. may have to take one again

Seeing this in the bottle, one might be put off, thinking it's far too bright. As with many other blusher, it's quite sublte on application, as long as you do it lighthandedly.I think to start off, apply two dots and then blend. Benefit suggest three strokes, but I think that may be too much. Start with less and apply more if you're not satisfied, is my motto ;)

Here we have my bare lips and then my lips with Cha Cha Tint on it. You can't see the difference very well as I'm not too experienced with lips close ups -and it was rather sloppily applied- , but I plan on taking a FOTD when I wear this next (and that way, you'll see what it looks like on the cheeks as well:) )

I'm definitely going to pack this for Paris and use it a lot during the summer as coral is such a summer colour and will look great with a tan (if I ever get one!)

That's all for today, I'll see if I can update anytime soon, if not I'll try and write another post (with crappy photos) and schedule it.

Maybelline Eye Studio Lasting Drama Gel Liner

Yes..finally! A couple of weeks ago, I discovered my sleek ink pot gel liner had dried out. Then I stupidly added baby oil to it, which didn't help so I decided, as I was going to Trier anyway, I would buy a Maybelline gel liner. Why not just buy it in Luxembourg? €12.99, no way! Besides, everything is cheaper in DM in germany, so when I went there, I found it for €8.99, so I bought it there.

According to Boots website, you can get it for £7.99 or you can go to Superdrug, and get it for £5.99 as they currently have an offer to get it 2 pounds cheaper.
What I have noticed though on the UK websites is that it only exists in black...whilst in Germany, I had the choice between black, brown and navy. I chose brown as the image shows.

So an image on the side depicts what you have inside which is a brush and the liner itself.


So the eyeliner is in a sturdy pot which looks very neat and professional. It is a tiny bit misleading though as there isn't as much product in it as it would have you believe.

This picture shows what I just said, but despite this, there is still a reasonable amount in there. Also the eyeliner has these lovely little sparkles, that were a bit difficult to capture, but hopefully you can see them. They don't show as much when you have it applied on your eyes, so people who feel the sparkles would make them decide not to get it, have no fear!

It comes with a 'professional' eyeliner brush, which is actually quite decent. You could use this and get decent pay off, but of course, if you prefer a sharper line, you'd be better off using an angled liner brush.

I swatched this with the brush accompagnying it and my own angled liner brush (bottom) and whilst both give the same colour payoff, the angled brush gives a much more precise line. This stays on relatively long, although I think after about 8 hours, you might want to touch it up but still I love it.

As for the consistency, I feel it's a bit more of a cream liner than a gel liner, anyone else agree?



And here's my new practically every day EOTD look with this. One thing you do have to watch out for is that if you have oily lids, it can transfer to your crease a bit, but not as much as a pencil liner would.

So here the sparkles are a bit visible, but generally they're not. All in all this is one of my new favourite products and it's definitely one of Maybelline's better products!

beautyuk eyeshadow palette in 'soho bright'

If you are experiencing déja-vu, don't worry. I HAVE already posted about this, but then I remembered the photo I took with it and thought : this.will.not.do


You see that BLURRY MESS? I should be ashamed, being a blogger. So I decided to rectify the situation and delete the old post and publish a new one. I'm not even copy pasting the content, it was very minimalistic!

[Is that not much better?!]

So, beautyuk are a british high street brand that I think is only supplied by Superdrug. Correct me if I'm wrong on this, not having the opportunity to live in the UK, I can't always know these things!

This is one of their six eyeshadow palettes, of which I have my eye on the Earth Child (no4) and Day And Night(no6) ones. These cost 3.99 each which is a very bargainicious (I'm sure that doesn't exist, but it expresses what I'm trying to say!) price for what you're getting. This palette is the Soho Bright(no2) one and I think the name aptly describes the content.

Go and compare this picture to the first one, amazing when you think I'm using the same camera. Oh, the wonders of learning how to actually USE your camera!

As you can see, mine is a bit battered, despite the packaging being quite sturdy. I think this is due to it being a few years old and also my habit of being a clumsy oaf. That the eyeshadows have not completely broken up is amazing, the amount of falling that happens with this would be enough to make ANYTHING break.

I love how you have every colour of the rainbow in this palette and these are my favourites. This photo is actually making me want to create a look with these, it's been long enough since I've created a bright look. As for the sizes of the shadows, they're quite small, but big enough for you to get your brush into, just not one of those overly large ones, I think. Can't really say much from experience for this as I don't actually own any big ones.


As I said, practically every colour of the rainbow here. I actually used these blues for my 80s look yesterday and they blend very well and are very smooth, just a bit of fallout, comme toujours, but that's nothing serious, is it?

As for the staying power, these are quite reasonable over UDPP, I haven't tried without, but I expect they'd stay on for some time.

Here are swatches WITHOUT primer. First of all, the yellow does not look like that. That was cause I didn't clean my finger after swatching the orange and it's a similar scenario to when you're painting and you don't clean your brush before dipping into the yellow...

They are really quite pigmented on their own with a few weaker ones, such as the purples and the light green. But that kind of pigmentation alone from a high street brand is brilliant.


Now swatched over UDPP in Eden...WOWSERS! This really brings out the pigmentation of all the colours and it is amazing! They look fine without primer, but when you do use primer, it just gives it the extra something!

Anyway, I hope this review and the pictures were a lot better than the previous one and I should be posting tomorrow as I won't really be doing anything, so until then!