Sweetpea and Fay Order!

So a few weeks ago I was looking for a purple blush and a friend recommended I check out Sweetpea & Fay Cosmetics. They had exactly what I wanted and I was so pleased. In addition to the lavender blush, I checked out their collection of liquid lipsticks.

So the two things I ended up getting were their mineral blush in Lady Slipper and their liquid lipstick "J'adore Les Levres" in Scuba Gear. Shipping took a bit of time, but it was well worth the wait! The first think I noticed is that packaging is pretty cute. Simple, practical, but cute.

(swatch pics taken outside because it was 7am* and not bright enough inside)

I'm super happy with the blush! It looks just as great on as I expected. The colour shows up well, and though it fades within a few hours, the colour remained noticeable right up until I took off my makeup at the end of the day.

The lipstick was surprising. I expected the consistency to be more similar to Stila or Kat Von D's liquid lipsticks, or maybe even an OCC Lip Tar. Instead it's VERY thick, and super creamy. It goes on very thick and very pigmented. And it smells like vanilla. And it even comes with a little lip brush. It stays pretty well, as long as you don't eat anything. The moment you do, it's all gone except for at the edges. But that's par for the course with most lipsticks so I'm still pretty impressed.

 However despite my bravery, the shade I got is not super wearable, and might be saved only for special occasions (at least until I get braver). I do really like it though. I might try and work out things to pair it with.

(like my no makeup no sleep look?)

Now I'm just wishing I would have ordered more! I'm especially interested in their Strangely Wearable blush collection, as it's inspired by sci fi, and that's basically my ideal situation. Next time!

So I'm going to give the blush a 9/10, and the liquid lipstick an 8/10!


*7am post all nighter, not up early 7am. I bet you can tell by the amount of exclamation points. 

Review: Miss Manga Mascara

As long as I can remember I've wanted colourful mascara. I mean, I wanted colourful hair but colourful eyelashes seemed like a more reasonable goal. So when I saw that L'Oreal Miss Manga Mascara came in three bright shades, I was excited.

I contained myself, and didn't buy it right away, but a few days ago I was in the cosmetics aisle prepping for my back to school look and I picked it up.

There was only one thing I forgot to take into account: my nearly black eyelashes. 

So I went online in search of a primer that was actually white, instead of just being a base coat. Two options came up, spending $11 on the L'Oreal Double Extend Mascara only to use one end, or spending $5 on the Hard Candy Primer that didn't have white colouration, but white fibers.

Talking about the latter led to a rather funny conversation with my roommate in which I tried to explain the concept and she ended up referring to the stuff in it as "debris" which after buying it, I'm not inclined to argue. 

Not only did I buy the Hard Candy one, I also bought the L'Oreal one... which was kind of a bad idea. The Hard Candy one was a good primer, I don't have anything bad to say about it, but it didn't suit my purpose, it didn't make the purple show. So I moved on to the L'Oreal one, which was actually was white in colour, or at least more white than the Hard Candy one.

This was not a success. The combination of the Double Extend primer and the Miss Manga mascara was not a good one. It clumped and was sticky and the colour still didn't show up.

Rather than give up entirely on all the products, I decided to give the Double Extend a try as it's supposed to be used, with it's own mascara. When you use it right, it's much less disappointing! (pictured left) It's not a contender for favourite mascara, but I regret the money I spent on it much less
than I thought I did.

At that point I'd put so much effort into trying to make this mascara work that I didn't want to give up just yet. My next idea was to try and boost the look of the colour with purple eyeliner. (pictured right) This, I found somewhat more effective, but overall, I think it would still look better with black mascara.

So, sadly, I'm going to give this mascara a 3/10. Maybe I should have tried the bright blue.

Do you have any coloured mascara recommendations?

The Autumn Tag

So one of my favourite people in the world, Lauren, of Lipsticks + Lacquer,  tagged me to do the Autumn Tag. And since I'm so fond of her, I finally got around to it! Here we go!

1.  Ok we're talking coffee's - what's your favourite seasonal drink from Starbucks/Costa/Cafe Nero etc?
I love salted caramel mochas! But I do tend to stick to my usual, vanilla lattes :) The cold weather is making me crave minty things, so I might not wait and just start ordering peppermint lattes.

2.  Accessories - what do you opt for, scarf, boots, gloves?

I gave my black boots a pop of colour with rainbow shoelaces I bought on eBay, and ever since I've been wearing them a lot. I've also been more into scarves this year, I bought a new one for my Disney trip this summer and I've been wearing it a lot since, along with a bunch from last year.

3.  Music - what's your favourite music to listen to during Autumn?
Half Moon Run is the fall-est band. Like, every song reminds me of cool weather and leaves. So yeah, them.

4.  Perfume - what's your favourite scent for this time of year? 
I don't really wear too much perfume, mostly because I prioritize my beauty money spending and perfume is rather low on that list. That being said, the one perfume I do have is Marc Jacobs Oh, Lola! and I wear that on special occasions all year round.

5.  Candles - what scents will you be burning this season?
I desperately want an apple scented candle right now. The only fall candle I have is pumpkin cupcake from bath and body works and I want to burn it but I can't find a lighter because my room is a disaster.

6.  What do you love most about Autumn?
Everything! It's my favourite time of year there's cool weather and halloween and I get to wear my leather jackets and sweaters and it's just great!!! F A L L !!!!!

7.  Favourite makeup look? 
My tendency in fall is just to go bare faced with dark lipstick, but this year I'm trying to experiment more with blush and some warm colours for eyeshadow. We'll see how it goes.

8.  What are you looking forward to most in Autumn? 
H A L L O W E E N

Me and my girlfriend are going as Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy I can't wait I'm so excited.

Thanks Lauren for tagging me! <3

Beauty and the Beast Cake

So yesterday we celebrated my roommate's birthday. Her actual birthday isn't until Wednesday but with everyone's busy school/work schedules yesterday was the best time for everyone. I was in charge of the cake, and since she loves Disney, and Beauty and the Beast is one of her favourites, I decided to use that as inspiration for the cake. It's also pumpkin flavoured, which is one of her favourite flavours and it felt very seasonally appropriate.

Overall I'm really happy with how it turned out, especially the rose! The fondant wasn't as smooth as I'd like, and there's a fair bit of icing sugar left on top, so those are just things I need to keep in mind for next time. 

Sadly I didn't take progress pictures, but I'll link the recipes for the cake here and the fondant here.

How about you guys, what's your favourite Disney movie?

Lazy Beauty Tips Lipstick Challenge Roundup #1

So about a month ago, Kennedy and Sofie from Lazy Beauty Tips issued a challenge: wear a different lipstick every day, post a picture on social media and hastag it #lbtlipstick challenge. The idea here is challenge your perceptions of what it wearable, and to understand why you're hesitant about some of the lipsticks in your collection. I've been posting pictures nearly daily on my twitter, so if you follow me there you'll probably already be familiar with this whole thing.

So since I've been doing this most days since school started this term, there are quite a few pictures. Rather than post every single one here, I'm just gonna show off some of my favourites. The plan is to, from now on, make a weekly round up post. At this point there's 19 lipsticks down, 37 more to go.  (I own too much lipstick)

top left: Urban Decay Revolution in Catfight top middle: Maybelline Super Stay 24 Color in Continuous Coral top right: Maybelline Color Elixir in Vision in Violet

bottom left: Rimmel Moisture Renew in Let's Get Naked bottom middle: NYX Soft Matte Lip Cream in Addis Ababa bottom right: Bite Beauty Luminous Creme Lipstick in Violet

What`s the makeup product you have wayyyy too much of?

Review: MAC Rocky Horror Crazed Imagination Blush

  A few weeks ago I found out a couple of things in quick succession. First was that the MAC Rocky Horror Collection that I had been counting down the days for was just in stores, not at counters. The second was that the mall across town was getting a MAC store sometime this fall. I talked to one of the girls at the MAC counter at The Bay in that same mall and she told me that they were supposed to open the same day as the collection was due out, but that they had already postponed the opening more than once.

At that point I had to weigh my options. If the store was opening that day, my best chance to get anything from the collection was to get there when it opened. The mall is a 50 minute bus ride from my house (or a 15 minute drive, god I wish I had a car on days like this). So to get there for the 9:30 mall opening, I'd have to take the 8:45 bus on my sleep in day to go to a store that may or may not be open.

I decided to go for it. I set my alarm for 8:00 and tried to get some sleep. No luck. I considered pulling an all nighter but eventually I gave in and went to sleep. In the morning I opened my eyes and checked the time only to find I'd slept through my alarm. I threw on some clothes and rushed out the door to catch my bus.

An hour later I got to the mall, and to my joy the MAC was open! And I walked through into the beautiful, brightly lit, monochromatic store... with no makeup on. That was a mistake. I asked for the blush, wanting to just grab it and go so I could take a nap before class. The store employee however, had different ideas. She sat me down and gave me a brush and left me to try it out.

Now anyone who loves makeup can tell you, some products just do not work on their own, and unless you have 100% flawless skin blush tends to be one of them. So I put it on, and it looked really bad. Sort of like a bruise. So the girl came back and looked at me, then at the blush, and went and got a bottle of their palest foundation so we could start over.

However instead of simply applying said foundation on me like is my typical experience at MAC, she gave me an interactive tutorial. Which is fair enough. And me, being me, said nothing. So rather than my planned, quick grab and go, I took an hour there. Learning how to do things I already knew how to do. But she was lovely! I'm not saying this was a bad experience at all, because she was absolutely fantastic.

So after an hour, and turning down all the other products she tried to sell me (including, sadly the Sculpt and Shape Powder, which like CURSE YOU WALLET!) I left the store looking much better than I had going in.

it doesn't show up super well on my phone camera but you get the idea

The colour is subtle and super wearable, great for fall. It's also rather long wearing. Though I love it I feel like I could have gotten a similar product for much cheaper from a drugstore brand, but I'm a sucker for theming and I love Rocky Horror so I feel like it was a good purchase.

Overall I'm gonna give this blush an 8.5/10

Okay I'm gonna acknowledge the elephant in the room here: I've been gone for a while. But I'm working on getting back into it, and I have a few posts planned as well as a couple of products coming in the mail I wanna review, so keep checking this space, there's gonna be a lot more content!