mini haul

Hi everyone!

Again it has been quite a while since I've blogged, but instead of a super long post, I'm using iphone pictures as I haven't used my camera very much lately.

I have a few FOTDs for you all, one using stuff that I bought when I went to Saarbrucken the other week and others just whenever I did something special with my makeup, which has become more and more rare as I've slipped into my school routine but I intend on changing that!

I still had my fringe then but by now it's grown out and I'm not sure if I should get it trimmed. It would be lovely if my nice readers could help me decide...*puppy eyes*

 

So here we have my mini haul. Well I say mini haul, actually I spent waayyy too much in Primark (I have no winter clothes) but at least I didn't spend much on makeup! Catrice is super cheap and the quality is quite good so I'm very pleased with my haul. The lip tint is very opaque, which is excellent, although it wears off after a few hours but for the price it was, I'm very content. The gel eyeliner is very nice too, I'm just concerned it'll dry out quickly (only time can tell), but application is very easy and it does last all day.

This is the "Oh My Goldness" nail polish with polka dots added on with a random unbranded nail air pen. It's quite a peculiar varnish cause at first you think the first coat isn't opaque enough so you apply a second and turns out that's too much. Well, that's probably because I'm very heavy-handed so that didn't work out very well for me. I need to acquire patience when doing my nails :P .

And this is an early morning FOTD using the above products. The lighting's not fantastic but you can see that the liner is dark (and not grey, I hate those liners that are very wishy washy), but unfortunately you can't see the lip tint very well. I would take a picture today but I'm having a bad skin day urgh...

 

And last but not least, my new jeggings and boots! I love these boots, they cost 30 euros and are from a German shop called Jumix (I think) and they were much nicer than what Primark had to offer so I'm glad I didn't just settle and buy some from Primark, because afterwards I got lucky!

I'll try and post again this week, maybe Friday or more likely Saturday, so stay tuned!

today's face

Hi everyone!

Lately, I've been experimenting more with my makeup, trying different looks every day as on Monday, I'm starting my second (and hopefully more pleasant) summer job as a cashier in the sort of local supermarket (actually there are two closer to me...) and I've always noticed how most of the ladies working at the tills put a lot of effort into their looks and experiment with their makeup. I would say they look quite put together, but unfortunately I have seen a few cases of bright blue eyeshadow, so that's not always the case. :P

So anyway, as opposed to showing up looking like the living dead  - trust me, I looked horrendous when I was emptying out bins last week... - I'd like to look nice so I've been seeing what kind of makeup I should go for, as I have been quite lazy these past few months.

The other week, I went to an outlet centre in Belgium and in the Body Shop there, everything was super cheap so I splurged a bit. Unfortunately, I just deleted the pictures as I thought I had them on my laptop, but turns out I don't so you'll have to bear with me until I post about what I bought, as I've managed to lose the cheek tint, which is really annoying me at the moment.

Back to what I was originally harping on about, today I decided to (for once) photograph my makeup step by step AND take pictures of the products I'm using, which I usually forget to do. (The above paragraph is revelant because I bought a face powder which I'm very happy with and which will feature in this post.)

First of all, it's recently been brought to my attention that you should use a powder puff to apply powder instead of a brush! Steph @ In Her Makeup Bag  posted about this after having seen a video by gossmakeupartist and after reading and watching the video, I tried it out with a powder puff (well actually I think it was a sponge, but it's the same principle, I think) and the difference really is noticeable. With a brush, the coverage was acceptable, but it's a lot better with a puff, which is great for me as I really don't like the feeling of foundation so I'm starting to rely on powder. In this picture, I've applied powder to the right side of my face and it really makes a great difference, in my opinion.

So here is my face with my base on - basically primer, concealer(s) and powder.

  

 

The products that I used were the Benefit primer that I got for free in Glamour magazine, which I'm not convinced about. It feels nice but I don't get the feeling it really helped. Otherwise I have the Boi-ing concealer, which I love but don't use often as I haven't got much of it left and that stuff is expensive! Otherwise I have the Yves Saint Laurent Touche Eclat which was a present for my birthday from my best friend. I basically use this underneath my eyes and eyebrows (for highlighting) and the Benefit one for blemishes. Finally I have the Body Shop Nature's Minerals powder, which was a bargain at 3 euros! ( I love outlet centres.)

And now for my eye makeup! I decided to repeat a look I did last December by using cream eyeshadows and a red eyeliner underneath my eyes, despite it not being very summery. Of course, I didn't want to look as if I'd been crying so I used a brown eyeliner on my waterline and was generous with the mascara on my bottom lashes, which I do anyway as my top lashes just flop down with any amount of mascara.

 

So for products, I started off with MAC's Paint Pot in Painterly which is my most used primer. It lasts really long as I've been using it regularly since last summer, so I'm quite impressed with it! Otherwise I used Fred Farrugia's mousse/cream eye shadow, which I just applied with my fingers as the end result is better than using a brush, although I still haven't found a way of applying cream eyeshadow and having it last, which is frustrating. Any tips?

Otherwise I used Sleek's Kohl pencil, which is dark red and was part of their christmas set and then an Urban Decay brown eyeliner and finally, my eyelash curlers and Benefit's Bad Gal mascara, which was also free with Glamour a few months ago.

And for the final touches, I just added a cheek tint, bronzer and a lip stain.

 I used Benefit's Hoola bronzer and Posie tint, which are part of the Cabana palette that I got for my birthday and then I used a Maybelline lip tint.

And that's it for today! Unfortunately the look didn't last very long because I sweat for some reason and even if I'm not doing anything and I've got the fan on, I still got flustered and my face gets sweaty so the makeup rubs off, which was upsetting me a bit as I'd really like to have normal skin for once. I don't have excessively oily skin, but I do sweat a lot which is unpleasant and unattractive, even if it doesn't happen all the time - only really as soon as I apply my makeup, which is frustrating.

Anyway I will try and post more regularly with my work makeup from next week onwards, stay tuned¨! 

FOTN from Berlin!

Hello everyone!

I have finally got round to posting the makeup from last Wednesday, over a week later, but nevertheless, at least I am blogging! I have just been chilling out this week as I am starting work on Monday (manual labour...yay. It pays though!).

So Wednesday night/Thursday morning was a lot of fun and I can only recommend that anyone who visits Berlin and wants to go clubbing should try Matrix on a Wednesday. It's Buy 1 Get 1 Free all night so it's not mega pricey and it also has several different rooms with different djs which helps if you get bored by the music. Apparently it's a club for tourists and not real Berliners (lol!) but oh well, I enjoyed myself and it takes a lot for me to enjoy myself going out, so I definitely recommend it. And the people I went with were lovely and awesome (my roomie and I went with a bunch of Brazilians and they were so hilarious and up for a good time).

Anyways onto the make up!

 So as for makeup, I used the Naked palette for a light smokey eyes, Benefit Hoola bronzer on my cheeks with Topshop's Neon Rose, Yves Saint Laurent Touch Eclat, which my best friend gave me for my birthday , Benefit Bad Gal mascara (the Glamour mini) and Mac Speak Louder lippie. Haha, I've got quite a few high end stuff now, haven't I?

 Anyway, I'll finish this here as it's time for me to sleep and boy, do I value my sleep! I'll try and do a few reviews in the next few days, just need to find the right background!

hair update!

Hey guys!


I'm going out tonight (hopefully it's not a repeat of the time I went out in Paris- fail!) and I decided to straighten my hair a bit, cause I'm curious to see how long it is and wow it's grown since the last time I straightened it (which was a few months ago lol). I left the top layers curly cause it gives it a bit more texture and doesn't look too artificial.

 

please ignore the awful cleavage there, slightly awkward lol...

But anyway I kind of look terrible cause I haven't applied my makeup yet but this is the best picture to show my hair :) 

I will take pictures of my makeup so I can finally post something makeup related yay!!

funny thing in berlin; "celebrity" spotting

Hey everyone!

I forgot to mention a funny thing that happened in Berlin in my first week. I was in my local supermarket an my roommate says "Hey look, it's Merkel." Now we had been joking around before so I was all "Yeah yeah, whatever you say..." but she insists on me looking and well? What do you know, it WAS Angela Merkel, chancellor of Germany (if you don't know who she is  then you need to pay attention to politics lol!)

So me being sneaky, took a picture with my iPhone (now RIP :((( ) so I figured I'll share with you all so you can chortle at the fact that even people like her go shopping ;)

 (nicely instagramed ;) ) And see the security guy behind her? There were two more in front of the shop!

 

back from the dead

Hi everyone!

 Wow neglect isn't even the right word to describe what I've done with this blog! I'm so sorry that I've been so inactive this year, but truth be told, I've never been busier. Add to that that using my computer wasn't ever really conveniant, especially as I've been the very definition of exhausted throughout the year. Well now I have a laptop so thankfully I can update more often!

I am currently in Berlin to improve my German and I love the city - I live 1 minute's walk away from the Brandenburg Gate yet I don't see a lot of tourists at all! Berlin is also such a laidback city, perfect to experiment with makeup or fashion without getting odd looks *coughluxembourgpariscough*.

I have taken a few pictures, but not really any makeup pictures as I've kept it rather simple with concealer, a bit of cream blush, sometimes mascara and usually pink lipstick. You see, it's really hot here and I'm sweating so much it's untrue so I've decided not to put a lot of effort into my makeup routine.

I just couldn't resist this photo ;) By the way, you can see that my lipstick has faded away by this point lol!
And as you can see, I got my fringe cut rather spontaneously, which in hindsight wasn't the best idea considering how hot it got afterwards.

 This is me without the fringe at the Holocaust Memorial. To be honest, I'm not entirely sold  on the memorial because it comes across as more of a playground than a memorial. But this picture is funny cause I photobombed it haha!

At the cinema in the Sony Centre at Potsdamer PLatz. Three guesses what I was going to see! ( starts with a 'the' and ends with 'dark knight rises'!!) The movie was amazing although it made me cry four times and if you haven't seen it yet, you're insane!

Here's a sort of outfit picture with me wearing my new skirt from Primark :) :) I love these kind of skirts so I was very happy to find it, especially when it was reduced from 13 to 5 euros!

And finally photobooth pictures with Sophie, who took most of these pictures here ;)

India part 2!

Here we go with our second part of my India trip! This is a rather short post as I'm feeling quite tired and am just gonna go relax after this.

 

On our way to meet the next youth group, we stopped at this place where they were making sugar from the sugar canes and the guys driving the jeeps were explaining the whole process to us, which was really interesting to hear but also shocking cause the man sitting by that (incredibly incredibly BOILING) pot could possibly lose his eyes cause the heat's so strong, but they have to have someone watching over the pot incase anything goes wrong.

This was with the next youth group which was one of my personal highlights as we played games with them and played Indian games and taught them some Luxembourgish ones and just had a lot of fun. There were some boys there absolutely fascinated with my fan and how it works which was really funny ahaha.

The next day in Solapur on our way to the station for our 5 hour journey to Raichur (dubbed hell by me cause it's so unbelievably hot there). I was fascinated by the rickshaws during my whole trip and I'm quite pleased of this photo cause it's in focus whilst everything else is slightly blurred.

On the train, on my 'bunk bed'. It was quite an interesting experience, especially as the AC made the compartment freezing and once we arrived and opened the door, it was all UNFFF with the force of the heat that was outside.

In our hotel for the night. Neela (Whose village we were staying in the next night) had come with people from her organisation to pick us up from the station and stayed with us at the hotel.

Me in the hotel, looking tired like in all my other photos. Note the classy plastic chair in the background haha!

That's all for now, hope you enjoyed!