I'm back, baby!

So I'd promised this post over the weekend, and didn't get to it, but darn it, we're back, baby!

I've made no secret of the fact that I love Sinful Colors. A lot. Here are swatches of a few that just got their shot at my nails.

First up, "Burn Rubber" from the "Full Throttle" collection of textured polishes. This was my first foray in to textured polishes, and I'm honestly just not sure I'm a fan. There's something really contrary to the idea of not only allowing bubbles in your mani, but being really excited by them!

Here's a close up, for the texture:

See? Odd. Any other time, if my mani looked like that, I'd be upset!

The application, and performance of the polish were on par with what I'd expect from Sinful Colors, and I'm not at all disappointed in it, it just wasn't quite what I liked.

This color was from the "Full Throttle" collection, which as far as I can tell, was released Summer 2014. This collection is still languishing in stores though (my local Wal-Greens is not suffering for a shortage of Sinful Colors displays, that is for SURE!), so if you'd like to try it, you might still be able to find it.

And another!

This is "Beige of Honor" from the "Practice Your Accents" collection. I'm not totally sold on this one either. You know how when you try to buy a neutral lip color, and you get too close to your own skin tone, and it gets dubbed "concealer lips"? I feel like this was concealer nails for me. I'm a fan of contrast - I rocked those early 2000's Kelly Clarkson chunky highlights pretty hard - and I'm not especially won over by the neutral nails trend anyway, so...meh? I'm not in love, but I don't especially hate it either.

The "Practice Your Accents" collection was put together to be a nice collection for nail art, and I do agree that this would be a nice base for some nail art work.

This is another collection that came out in Summer 2014, but is currently languishing in stores, so if you're intrigued, you should still be able to find it!

This week, I've got so many treats, I'm undecided on what to talk about! I've got some Jamberry nails to try out, and new Sinful Colors, and Almay eyeshadow, and...and...and...ooh, all the makeups! :) See you at the makeup counter! :)

Today, We're Talkin'...HAIR!

Today, we're talking something we don't usually talk much about - HAIR! I...I'm not kind to mine. I heat style only rarely, but I do love me some hair color. And, I've been known to forget to comb it. Sometimes I genuinely remembered but just didn't, sometimes I can't find a comb, and sometimes, like in the case of this past weekend, I've been so darn sick, that pretty much as long as my hair wasn't hanging directly in my face, that was good enough for me. The elementary school plague struck my house early this year, and took me down with it, which it doesn't usually. As a result, I've been pretty well out of commission.

At any rate, today was the day I had to rejoin society, couldn't lay in my sick bed anymore, and I needed to clean up! So I raided my recent Ipsy bag, and found Briogeo's "Don't Despair - Repair!" deep conditioning mask, and hit the showers.

Of course, mine came in my Ipsy bag, but you can find this product full size for $26 a tub at Sephora, according to a quick google search. According to their website, pretty well any tasty treat for your hair is in here - "Fortified with ultra-hydrating avocado, sweet almond & argan oils, strengthening keratin protein, power-conditioning rosehip oil, soothing aloe, and super hair-essential vitamins B5, D, A, E and biotin. "

I immediatly noticed that this mask did not feel heavy in my hand - I've used some that felt like they could double as body butter in a heart beat. This didn't. It felt nice and silky in my hand. It also wasn't overly scented. I don't find scents especially problematic allergy-wise or anything, but I also don't want to be able to smell my hair either. :)

This absorbed in to my hair. Like, absorbed. I almost applied more, I was so convinced that it'd all disappeared! I decided to give it a shot though.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that even though it felt like it had disappeared, it had done a very capable job for my hair! Laid smooth, gave it a little shine, combed through easily. Super impressive. I had a sample, so I really don't get another shot at using it, but I can easily see where with regular use, your hair would get real happy, real fast!

Product shot:

Nice looking product, right? Again, this is a sample size, so it's smaller than the $26 Sephora version. Easy to read, will look nice in your shower. I'm a mope with pictures today, I guess, so I couldn't get a Before/After shot of my hair that was even a tiny bit satisfying to me, so I've got nothing for you this week that way. Trust - this is a tasty treat your hair will love! A little lightweight heavy weight that you need if you do a lot of color or heat styling!

I'll be back later in the week with some nail polish swatches for you! See you then!

Another special edition "Wet N Wild Wednesday"!

It's time for another special edition "Wet N Wild Wednesday" here at the Big Blog of Beauty, and this time, we're talkin' eyeshadow!

Our first entry is from the Summer 2013 collection, called "I'm Seeing Triples!" Despite the fact that everything I can find online attributes this collection to Summer of 2013, I'm still actively seeing it in stores, right up to today. So if you were on the ball and got one last summer, but want more, you're in luck. I've recently spotted these at Rite Aid, and bought this one personally at CVS.

At any rate - this collection is a matte lime, aqua and pink color, and I was initially attracted to them because they're so far outside of what I'd normally wear! :) I used Fergie Take On The Day primer, but came up with my own color scheme, because the labeling that Wet N Wild provides to give you a hint on how to use the colors...well that was bravery taken a little too far. Lime up to my eyebrows was more than I was ready to commit to! So I went with lime in the inner corner, the pink across the mid section of the lid, and the aqua in the outer corner, as well as in to the crease.

This shadow goes on great - I've read some reviews saying that it was better to use the sponge applicator, that you'd get more color pay off that way, but I had no problems with the payoff that I got. I did alternate a bit between sweeping the color on, and stippling the color.

I honestly don't know that I'd rock all three of these together at the same time again, but I do like all of these colors a lot. They reminded me a lot of the HIP line that L'Oreal has been selling for a while, but bonus - at a fraction of the price!

The actual palate. Wet N Wild, as you can see, provides some handy labeling, if you're not one for figuring out how to use the colors for yourself. But, like I said - matte lime up to my eyebrows was a bridge too far, so I threw their rules out the window, and wrote my own. Makeup's fun like that. :D

Wearing the shadow, eyes opened and closed. The look, in action. Nice color payoff, great durability - hung in solid for five or six hours - and a unique look. I got a lot of positive feedback on this one!

Now we move on to my Summer 2014 selection, "No Scalpers Allowed!". On its face, this one was much more wearable. A light, pinky tone, a mid-tone matte purple, and then a deeper purple with a slight iridescent quality. Everything sounds great so far, right?

Color goes on smoothly, and pretty well - I used the same brush as I'd used for "I'm Seeing Triples!", as well as a similar technique of application. Fergie Take On The Day primer, and a combination of sweeping and stippling to apply the color. Color went on smoothly. Not as much color payoff as with "I'm Seeing Triples!", but that's alright.

Looks nice, right? I used Wet N Wild purple eyeliner pencil in this one, where I'd used black eyeliner in the other, but everything else you're seeing in the pictures is the same.

So, does it sound like I'm hedging my bets a bit on exclaiming over this one? Because I kind of am. I had one giant, giant problem with this one - drifting color. The purple - and I never got a feel for which, they seemed to blend together at this point - just spread, everywhere. I had to clean up my eyes twice before I could leave for work, and twice while I was at work. Where I got 5 hours of pretty impeccable wear from "I'm Seeing Triples!", I got about 40 minutes worth of wear out of "No Scalpers Allowed!", which was a disappointment, to say the absolute least.

For the sake of equal opportunity, a picture of the palate. It all looks so promising, doesn't it?

Of these two, if I had to make a recommendation, I'd recommend "I'm Seeing Triples!" Wears well, nice color payoff, unique - it'll for sure attract attention. "No Scalpers Allowed" has only mediocre color payoff, and was suffering from constant melt down, the entire time I had it on. Pass on "No Scalpers Allowed!", unless you're just so fond of purple eyeshadow that you just can't help it. :)

Ooh! I feel so naughty!

I received a large sample of Perversion mascara from Urban Decay in my last Ipsy bag, and I've been really on the fence about it, but today tipped me over the edge.

Obligatory product beauty shot:

Isn't she lovely? Unique look. Sleek, bold, will stand out on your vanity, or in your makeup bag. Unless you've got a black one, I suppose. Or, heaven forbid, you're trying to put on your makeup in the dark. And I mean, do what you gotta do for your beauty, but I don't recommend putting on makeup in the dark. :D

From urbandecay.com;

Get bigger, blacker, badder lashes with our ultra-creamy, lengthening and volumizing mascara. Includes a deluxe sample of Subversion Lash Primer! So intense you might need a safe word, Perversion glides on and gets you sexy in one stroke. (Yet it won’t quit until you say when.) It’s insane how black it is…the purest, deepest, most intense black color imaginable. Perversion has a creamy, full-bodied texture that’s not too dry, not too wet. This allows just the right amount of “pull” so it glides through lashes. The result: incredible control for insane lashes. Go ahead and pile on coat after coat. Want to apply more before you go out at night? No problem. Even if it’s been all day since you applied, more Perversion always means more beautiful lashes. Our formula NEVER gets brittle or clumpy.

Alright, back to me...I don't know that I think this has the pigment that it says that it does. It didn't seem markedly darker than any other sort of mascara that I'd tried. So, that might be a bit much. And I don't think this is especially volumizing either.

Know where they really sold me though? The lengthening. The crazy, crazy lengthening. This formula is rich and creamy, and layers nicely, so you can build up enough coats to suit you. Although, they do also sell Subversion mascara primer, so if you're really needing some sticking power, try that one. At any rate, builds well, without getting stiff or clumpy, and lengthens, like crazy. Like, looks like false eyelashes level of lengthening. Check out my pictures!

For the sake of the comparison, check out my bare lashes here, and my lashes on Wet N Wild, here. See what I mean? This stuff lengthens, like nothing I've tried in a while! While I stand by my saying that the Wet N Wild is a steal for the price tag, I've finally come around to the...aah, 'perverse' side?

Wet N Wild Wednesday!

For todays special mid-week edition of The Big Blog of Beauty, we've got a Wet N Wild Wednesday!

I gave myself a mani, which isn't unusual obviously, but something about this one felt really familiar. I used Wet N Wild Megalast nail color, in "2% Milk", seen here in the middle:

I typically use a white polish as a base coat, but in this case, I was disappointed to find that the base coat just made the color appear streaky and yellowed. So the whole mani had to come back off, and then get repainted, sans base coat. Wet N Wild makes a mean nail polish - they promise five days of chip free color, and that's exactly what you get. If you're good, you might even eek out a sixth! Wide brush, easy to control product - it's really a heck of a steal for the price tag!

I'm admittedly not completely sold on the neutral trend (which is projected to be big for fall 2014, so stock up accordingly. Unless you're living in a part of the world where you've already done fall, in which case, you missed your shot, haha...), but I like this color pretty well. It prompts my eight year old to constantly quiz me on why I'm wearing clear nail polish, but no bother.

At any rate, this polish felt super familiar. So I decided to do a little sleuthing.

First, I went to Revlon Parfumerie nail color in Pink Pineapple, which you can see in the picture on the left. It was similar - a nice, delicate, natural looking color, but runs a bit more pink than 2% Milk, which verges more to the tan. I spoke about this polish once, here, and I was pleased to find that I was more satisfied with both the color, and the longevity this time around.

But, it didn't quite get the job done. Too pink. So I went back to the drawing board, this time going for "Bubble Bath" from OPI. Just for the note, this is also available from OPI as a gel polish, but I went with the original formula.

Bingo! Nailed it! Honestly, the only marked difference in the two is that Bubble Bath dries to a higher gloss finish - which is nothing a nice glossy top coat can't handle! Where you could maybe pass of 2% Milk and Pink Pineapple as being the same - to people that weren't that knowledgeable about either line - the only people who wouldn't know that Bubble Bath and 2% Milk were NOT the same thing is anyone looking at your check book!

Each color, with one coat. Revlon's Pink Pineapple on my pointer finger, Wet N Wild's 2% Milk on my middle finger, and OPI's Bubble Bath on my ring finger. Each one coat, no base coat. See how they're virtually identical, save for that Pink Pineapple is just a bit pinker than the other two?

Two coats! Pink Pineapple on the pointer finger, 2% Milk on the middle finger, and Bubble Bath on my ring finger. 2 coats, no base coat. As I've said, Pink Pineapple has a bit more pink to it than the other two, but 2% Milk and Bubble Bath are virtually identical in every way. And, as I explained to my eight year old - the polish on my middle finger cost $2, the polish on my ring finger cost $10. Why not save that other $8?! Heck, for the $10 it'd cost you to buy ONE OPI polish, you could have FIVE polishes from Wet N Wild! Think of the possibilities!

Later, lovelies!

Confession...

A couple of nights ago, I had one of those big, ugly cries that girls are prone to having on occasion. And as a result, I've spent the last two days, tangling with puffy eyes, that felt like they were about to overtake the rest of my face.

Which is doubly bad, because not only is that not pleasant, but the one day I did try to put makeup on over all that puff, all you could see was my eyeliner!

So I spent today combating the puff. Pinterest is curiously lacking in tips for this sort of thing - most of the recommendations involved purchasing product. So I was sort of winging it on my own.

And for the sake of things, said puffery:

Pretty bad, right? Like, if it grew just a couple millimeters more, it could take over my eyelashes, level of bad.

First, I tried an eye cream, with a roller. I'm quite fond of Olay Fresh Effects Bright on Schedule eye roller (as evidenced here), so I gave it a shot. Felt great, didn't appear to do much to help.

Next, I even gave Allegra a crack at it. Figuring maybe I was having a reaction to something (last time my eyes swelled like this, it was because of Clean & Clear face wash - years later, when a dermatologist actually recommended Clean & Clear to me, I couldn't contain my laughter!). I actually feel like this helped some. My eyes were brighter, I didn't feel as foggy. This one was a bit unconventional, but it might have been worth something.

And then we turned to the ever popular torture chamber - SPOONS. Every website you read looking for tips, everywhere you turn - spoons. Put them in the freezer until they're good and cold, put them on your eyes until they're not. Simple, fool proof, everybody's got a spoon, right? I began dancing around my kitchen! This one was pretty brutal. And I really am not sure how effective I even think it was. I even proclaimed it worse than the Ice Bucket Challenge, and my eight year old went "Oh, it's not THAT bad...", haha...

And I resorted to that good old fashioned, cure all beauty trick - water. Lots and lots and LOTS of water. It seems super counter intuitive, but they always say that if you're retaining water, drink more, because it will start to flush out the water that's in there. I even went swimming, hoping that would help! When I was pregnant with said eight year old, I discovered that apparently, when I'm pregnant, I gain the super power of being able to retain water - simply by looking at it! Don't be jelly, ladies, haha! At any rate, my OB suggested swimming. He said that the water would put solid, consistent pressure on my body from all angles, thus forcing the retained fluid out of the areas that were retaining it. And I often said I think that man was super crazy, but I know he's right on this one! So I even gave that a shot!

So here's where my day of puffery battle got me:

Not bad for a days work, right? So maybe the spoons were worth more than I thought!

But here's a few more tricks that I found, just in case the spoons don't do it for you;

They say Vaseline works for everything, right? I'm actually planning on trying this one tonight, if I can remember where my vaseline is, haha!

Curiously, this website recommends mashed banana. I didn't get a chance to get to this one, but doesn't this just sound terribly messy?

The typical recommendation of cucumber. Potatoes actually got several recommendations, and curiously, so did soy milk.

I'm depuffed, and hopefully looking terrific for dropping my third grader off for school for his first day tomorrow. I'm not typically a first day of school crier, which I'll have to remind myself of tomorrow. Because sure as the world, I've said that, and I'll cry. I can't cry, I just spent a whole day depuffing my eyes from my last cry! Although I guess if I cry, I better stop off for a potato and some soy milk on the way home, right? :)

I'm also working up a special Wednesday edition of the blog, which I'm hoping to have live this coming Wednesday. Stay tuned for that! :D

Later, lovelies!