My First Lipstick: Rimmel London's Airy Fairy.

Nothing to Disclose

Hello loves! 

Do you remember that one piece of makeup you bought and just fell in love with? For me it was Rimmel London”s Airy Fairy. I remember trying to decide which Rimmel Lipstick I wanted to have and  my mom help me decide. If my memory serves me correctly I was going out for a huge dinner with friends and wanted a nice nude lipstick and Airy Fairy was the winner. 

I still have that tube of Airy Fairy believe it or not, I probably should get rid of it seeing it is a few years old. I have bought a new tube of it, after looking high and low for it. 

Seriously its the hardest lipstick to find.Of course I could find it online, but who wants to pay for shipping for one stinkin’ lipstick?  I finally found it at Walgreens in a permanent display, where as places like Rite Aid and Walmart had gotten rid of any traces of it. 

If you are just starting out in experimenting with makeup, or trying to just find some classic lipstick shades for your kit, then Airy Fairy is one you should buy. Its affordable and beautiful. 

I would describe the color as a pinky/mauve nude with shimmer, but its definitely heavier on the pinky/mauve then nude, and the shimmer isn’t noticeable on the lips. It just helps gives it that sheen on your lips. 

The consistency is creamy and smooth, and a swipe or two across the lips gives you a nice coverage. Wear time is like all normal lipsticks, where if your eating and drinking throughout the day its more than likely you’ll need to reapply after a few hours. I have always found it comfortable on my lips and never drying. 

For a lipstick that runs anywhere from $4.97 on Walmart's website, to where I got mine at Walgreens at $5.79, its definitely one my wallet won’t cry over me buying when I need a new one! 

I hope you have a great day and I’ll talk to you all soon! 

<3 Nicole 

Covergirl and Katy Perry: Katy Kat Matte Lipstick Swatches.

Nothing to disclose, purchased by me.

Well hello there! Its been a little bit since my last post! I hope you all are well! I've just been busy working tons of hours since we are once again short staffed at work and who knows when my boss will actually decide to hire someone.

But today I am back with a look at some new lippies that have hit the drugstore. I have two of the new Covergirl and Katy Perry Matte lipsticks to show you!

I found mine at Rite aid and they were buy one get one half off! I did some research on these lipsticks and there are 11 shades total in the collection, the display at my Rite Aid was quite small, and only had about four or five shades on it. Pretty much all nudes, and berry colors. When I looked at Covergirl's website I saw that there are quite a few nude to berry tones in the collection with some bright pinks, an orange shade and even a charcoal almost black shade!

I hope that either my Rite Aid gets a more permanent display or I find the whole collection somewhere else.

So lets get into the two shade I have for you!

Reading on Covergirl's website, these are not completely matte lipsticks, Covergirl describes them as being a demi-matte lipstick, which is definitely true to one of shades I purchased.

I quite like the packaging on these and how easily identifiable these lipsticks are!. The outer tube itself feels like it has a rubberized coating on the plastic  which feels nice in the hand. The bright white color also draws the eye right in and will also make it really easy to find these in my makeup collection. 

Its great you can see a preview of what the color is on the bottom of the lipstick, even though I know Covergirl does this to all their lipsticks. Even if the packaging wasn't a bright color it would still make these easy to find.

They also put little cat ears over the names on each lipstick which is really cute and once again I will easily be able to find them and identify what collection they are from! 

Time for swatches! 

My camera did make the colors a bit darker than they are in real life so I did add some more light to the photos to get it to the right color.

Lately I've been on the hunt for that perfect matte nude color, most of my lip collection is nudes in some form or another but Sphynx is the nude lip I've been looking for, where its my lip color but better. I know i have said that about other nude lipsticks in the past but this one quickly became my top favorite as soon as I put it on. 

 Catoure is like if I bit down on my lips for hours to make them look more flushed. it is slightly darker than what the little color block on the tube shows, but I love dark lip colors anyway. Its a nice color thats not too dark to wear during the summer.  

I haven't had a chance to wear Catoure out yet, but I have worn Sphynx quite a bit. Sphynx feels nice on the lips, its smooth and creamy and in just a couple of swipes I have full coverage. Also like it says on Covergirl's Website it did not dry out my lips at all! On a day where I wear it to work I can usually get a good four to five hour wear time in between munching on snacks and drinking my water all day. When I wore it out on Saturday I got a pretty good almost all day wear on it since my mom and I were busy shopping and I wasn't really eating or drinking anything. 

Overall I really love these lipsticks, and after seeing some swatches of the other colors I most likely will invest in more next paycheck! 

I hope you guys have an awesome day! I'll talk to you soon! 

<3 Nicole 

Sally Hansen Cuticle Rehab!

Nothing to Disclose

Good morning love bugs!!!

Let me ask you a couple questions. Do you have dry cuticles? Are they hard to manage? I do! Back when all I used to post about is polish, I know for a fact swatching multiple polishes can wreak havoc on ones cuticles. Acetone is drying and not good to have on your skin or nails for long periods of time. Over the years I have tried multiple cuticle creams and oils to help keep my cuticles at bay and while some worked okay, this one is by far my favorite.


Whats even worse is when you neglect your nails and don't paint them or take care of them. Hi I'm Nicole, guilty party of one here.

I don't paint my nails much anymore, which is sad because I can remember a time I painted my nails once to even twice a day!

 I should probably stop this post right now and paint my nails...

But before I do I want to share with you guys a product I found from Sally Hansen that has helped me moisturize my dry cuticles and keep my nails, with or without polish, looking good.

Let me introduce you to Sally Hansen's Cuticle Rehab.

If my memory serves me correctly, since I've had this cuticle oil for a little while now, I got it at Walmart and its was somewhere around the $7 mark.

It says on the packaging that its a cuticle oil, but its in a gel form. I'm glad its a gel cuticle oil, so that way if I accidentally squeeze out too much it doesn't go all over the place. When you take the cap off it has a brush applicator so all you have to do is squeeze the tube and you can brush it on easily. I find that it works well so I can spread the oil all over the before I rub it in.

This stuff does have a scent to it but its not strong at all. I can't pinpoint what it smells like though, it smells to me like a standard cuticle oil, so if your not big on scents then you won't have a problem with this.

Anytime that I have applied this product, which is pretty much ever I do my nails, and once in a blue moon when I see my cuticles looking rough, I have seen an immediate result. It soaks in to both my nails and cuticles quickly and softens them so I can push back my cuticles. I have had other products in the past that did not work as quick or as well as this has.

Overall I think Sally Hansen's Cuticle Rehab is pretty awesome, my number one love about this product is how fast it works as I mentioned above. If you have hard to manage cuticles, whatever the case may be I would give this product a shot!

Have a great day and I'll talk to you next time!

Review: City Color Cosmetics: Be Matte Blush.

Nothing to Disclose

Good morning guys and gals! I'M BACK!!! How is everyone recovering from the holidays? I can absolutely say that this Christmas and New Years was the best ones yet of my adulthood. It was filled with spending so much time with family and friends, it was glorious. I even reconnected with family that I hadn't seen in over a decade.

However, rambling about my Christmas and New Years holiday is not what this post is about. I'm here to give you my review of two blushes that are amongst my favorite in my makeup collection.

I'm sure some of you have heard of City Color Cosmetics, if you haven't you should check their website, HERE !

I have found most of their products at my local Five Below, but if you visit their website you can see everything.

Today I'm going to show you two blushes I picked up from their Be Matte Blush line. I will confess that I purchased these two sometime during the fall and have been using them ever since, but on my last visit to Five Below they were still available and they also had more colors from the line.

These blushes are a nice size, they are almost the size of my palm. The two colors that I purchased were Blackberry (on the left) and Fresh Melon (on the right).

The texture on these are smooth and soft, although Blackberry was slightly more silkier feeling. One circle with your finger will give you quite the color pay off.  Lets take a look at swatches!

In both photos Fresh Melon is on top and Blackberry is on the bottom. As you can see they look different in whatever light your in. In the sun both blushes look like normal pink blushes but one is just darker than the other. In the shade however  this is where Blackberry shines, you can see the beautiful purple color that shines through making this a unique blush for my collection. Fresh Melon takes on a  more neon pink appearance.

One tip I do have is for the application of Blackberry, while both have great pigmentation, do not have a heavy hand with Blackberry, the first time I put it on I barely swirled my brush in it and I looked like a clown.

If I can recall, I paid I believe $3 for each blush. I know sometimes Five Below runs deals on the makeup they carry so look out for that. On the City Color Cosmetics Website the Be Matte Blushes are $4.99 and they always offer free shipping on orders $25 and over!

Overall for the price, size and the way these blushes perform I am over the moon for them! They currently hold a place in special drawer on my vanity where only my frequently used blushes reside!

Have you tried any products from City Color Cosmetics? If so let me know and if you have any recommendations for anything let me know in a comment below!!!

Review: Not Your Mothers Clean Freak Shampoo & Conditioner!

Purchased by me. 

Good morning my lovelies! How are you? Today I have a review for you from the brand Not Your Mothers!

A few weeks ago I published a review on their Way To Grow shampoo and conditioner, and today I wanted to bring you the second of the three shampoos and conditioners that they have!

The weather this summer has been absolutely crazy this year! Some days its hotter than anything, other days are just perfect and then there are days where it was down right cool and you actually needed a hoodie. Well... at least here in New York.



On the hot days my hair doesn't fair so well, I have normal to oily combination hair as it is and add sweat into that equation and BAM my hair just turns to yuck. I had been using Herbal Essences Cleansing Conditioner to help combat the oil every few washes but the moisturizing part was a little too heavy on my hair.

When I found out that NYM had brought out shampoos and conditioners to match some of their best hair care products I was more than happy to pick them up to give them a try, and that's how I found the Clean Freak Shampoo and Conditioner.

So far I have only seen them at Walgreen's in my area but I know they are widely available online and at other retailers. Sometimes Walgreen's has a sale and the employees who run the cosmetic counter have coupons most of the time, which is great for my wallet!

Like Way To Grow, Clean Freak is Sulfate free, and is also for all hair types, but Clean Freak also adds on no parabens or dyes! It gives you ultra clean hair while maintaining your hair's natural moisture. The conditioner is also, sulfate, paraben,and dye free. It's super moisturizing leaving your hair silky and with a luxurious shine! 

For my combo hair I found that Clean Freak left my hair feeling clean but not overly clean and with the moisturizing conditioner it didn't pack a ton of moisture back into my hair where it felt weighed down. After my hair dried it felt soft and silky, and was very manageable. 

One thing I love on this hair care set is the scent! Rosemary and mint. It's such a refreshing scent I can't stop smelling my hair for days afterward! I believe  this would also be a good shampoo and conditioner to help wake you up in the shower and get your day going. 

Overall I have loved using this set during the hot days of summer, it has really made a difference on managing my hair. I can't wait to see how it helps my hair into the upcoming fall! 

Have a great day lovelies! I'll talk to you soon! 

<3 Nicole 

Maybelline Color Blur By Lip Studio

Purchased by me.

Good morning lovelies!! How was your weekend? Mine was so-so. I was supposed to hang out with my dad but he didn't feel well so every plan we had went down the toilet. I was pretty bummed but I'll get over it as I always have.

Today I want to show you  a new product from Maybelline and has become one of my favorite lippies to wear. Maybelline has certainly become one of my favorite drugstore brands over the years and I love anything matte for the lips! I think I own more Maybelline products over any other brand.

A while back I had heard they released a matte velvet lip pencil over in the United Kingdom and after seeing some of my favorite British beauty bloggers talk about them I KNEW I would need them if they were ever to be release here. Well of course about a half a year later Maybelline released them but under a new name and different packaging. I don't have a problem with that as long as the product is good.

Review: Not Your Mothers Way To Grow Long And Strong Shampoo and Conditioner

Purchased by me.

Hi lovelies! So this post is a day late... but better late than never right?

Today I bring you the first in a series of reviews of one of, if not my favorite hair care lines!

The brand is called Not Your Mothers, cool name right? Well they have even cooler products. I discovered them last summer when I was perusing the hair care isle at Walmart. Where else would I be perusing right?  I was looking for a product that would help me maintain my hair that I was trying to grow out at the time, and Not Your Mothers caught my eye.

As I stood in the isle reading the packaging as I do with many things I was intrigued to see that the shampoo and conditioner help stimulate hair growth. However they clearly state it does not make new hair growth. So if that's what your looking for then this product is not for you.

I decided to give it a chance and at $4.74 each I couldn't say no, your talking to a girl who religiously bought Brilliant Brunette  at $8 a pop for a time, while in college.

Review: Rimmel London Show Off Lip Velvets!

Purchased by me.

Good Tuesday morning lovelies! Have you all had your coffee yet? As you read this I am currently at work, most likely dealing with people and or sitting at a computer working on some training that I am trying to complete.

Today I bring you swatches and a quick review of the Rimmel London Show Off Lip Velvets! That is a very long name for a product if I do say so myself.

These lippies came out I believe last fall, which puts me way behind on the game of reviewing them, but I just saw a Youtuber I follow recently review these and so I thought if she can do one so can I!

I am a huge fan of matte lip products. I don't do lip gloss much and sometimes a glossy lip just doesn't look good on me. A couple of years ago I fell in love with wearing a matte red lip pretty much all the time. I haven't worn one in a while, I should probably get on that! So it was no idea that I wasn't going to be picking these up when they came over from the UK.

I snagged two colors, Meteoric Matte and Burning Lava. I do want to pick up Atomic Rose, which is a lovely pink nude color.

Meteoric Matte is my favorite amongst the two I own. Dark, blue toned red/berry colors are my favorite next to a good nude color. Burning Lava, while not my favorite is a close second, it comes very close to duping my all time favorite matte red lip color; Revlon Colorburst Matte Balm in Standout. God forbid they ever get rid of that color.

The formula on these are smooth, and feel nice when applied on the lips. They are not streaky at all because obviously they're super pigmented. They look slightly glossy when first applying them but they soon dry matte.

Review: NYX Matte Finish Setting Spray.

Hi lovelies! How are you? Can you believe that we are only 15 days away from Christmas??? I haven't even started shopping yet! Hopefully I'll be able to get a few things this weekend.

Today I am going to bring you a short review on a product I bought back in September. I remember it was right after my vacation because I had picked up two NYX Butter Glosses from Target while I was away and then came home to see that my local CVS had gotten in a NYX display. I couldn't tell you how excited I was.

I picked out quite a few things from that display including the title of this blog post, the NYX Matte Finish Setting Spray.

As a makeup enthusiast I had never tried a setting spray before, I just never thought to buy one let alone use them. When I first got into makeup I had only heard of Skindanavia, if that's even how you spell it and I knew it was way too expensive for my teeny wallet.

That's why today I am glad that brands like NYX that are more affordable have these products available to the masses who can necessarily afford the high end makeup.

Above is my attempt at taking a cool photo using nature as my background. While I think its cool, I'm mad I cut off the bottom of the bottle.

To use the NYX Setting spray all you have to do is first off your makeup, then according to the bottle you hold the bottle out away from your face, close your eyes and spray a couple times letting the light mist settle on your face.

I have used this stuff a few times now, especially on occasions where I really need my makeup to last, I have found that it does help my makeup stay put. I used this most recently when my niece was baptized back in November and I had been out from about 10am until 6:30pm and when I got home I can safely say my makeup still looked like I had just applied it. I also have to say that I was wearing a  few other products to help prevent makeup breakdown but I do feel the setting spray had a hand in everything.

I think this is a good product if you need your makeup to last for a special event, as for using on a regular basis just when your putting makeup on for a work day I don't find myself reaching for it.

If you want to get your hands on the NYX Matte Finish Setting Spray you can get it at Target and CVS as long as they have displays which I'm pretty sure most Targets do, I think its select locations with CVS.  NYX is also available at Ulta and of course online as well.  The setting spray cost me about $8.49 but on the CVS website says $7.99. I have mentioned before that my CVS does mark up in price because its in a tourist location. NYX also makes a dewy setting spray as well, which I haven't bought because I have naturally oily skin and I don't like that look.

However NYX has steals and deals all the time you just have to watch out for them!

I hope you enjoyed this review and I will talk to you all in the next post!
<3 Nicole

Urban Decay Vice 3!

Hi lovelies!

How was your Thanksgiving? For those of you that celebrate it of course,  I hope you ate tons of food and slipped into food coma's, and for those of you that don't celebrate it I hope your day was wonderful and still full of good food!

My Turkey day was non-traditional this year, my mom and I made Eggplant Parm and Meatballs in marinara sauce. It was delicious!

In today's post I wanted to share with you my swatches and my thoughts on the Urban Decay Vice 3 palette! If you saw my most recent video on my YouTube Channel then you know I FINALLY got my hands on this beauty!

Ever since I opened this palette I fell in love with it. Hell I was in love with it when I saw all the amazing Beauty Youtubers talking about it, and then its all I thought about after seeing it in person in Sephora. Oh the things Sephora does to us! Am I right?

Lets take a look at the packaging.

The Vice 3 comes in this beautiful case that you can either keep your palette in or use as a makeup bag. I plan on keeping this as a carrying case for my palette, especially if I do any traveling I'll feel better about it being protected. Not that I do a whole lot of traveling anyway. The design on the case is just amazing it reminds me of a sunset or something from the 1980's but I can't put my finger on what it is.

And of course the actual palette has the same design which on the metal-ish/plastic casing looks just stunning. I could not stop staring. The Vice lettering is a lime green raised plastic, that I'm not going to lie, I ran my fingers over a few times because of the texture. Call me weird if you must.

The only downside that I found and I think a lot of other blogger did too was that the outside case is fingerprint city. I have a compulsive thing about the outside of the case looking nice and I know its a waste of time cleaning it off every time especially if I use the darn thing every day!

Look at all those gorgeous colors. Seriously you guys I didn't want to touch this palette when I first opened it, I didn't want to mess them up, but I didn't spend the $60 bucks on this just to stare at it.

So I dug in.

You get five columns of outstanding colors. Each of them in their own color family and giving you five potential looks. But I don't always go by that. I go for what I feel .

I'll get this out of the way now since I will be saying it about all the colors in this palette. The texture on these are buttery and smooth and just one circle around with your finger or a few dabs with a brush you will get lots of color. Especially with some of the darker shades like Bondage and Reign. There are a few colors that are too light or powdery, I found those to be Alien (too light), and Truth (too powdery).

Lets look at swatches.

 In the first column you have your matte/transition shades. Like I mentioned earlier Truth was the powdery shade. Obviously as a skin tone shade you don't need it to be pigmented but because its a matte shade its can be powdery so I mainly use it to blend out the edges of my eyeshadow to highlighting my brow bone.

Undone, Downfall, and DTF are great crease shades and transition shades that help when your using a ton of colors in one look.

 In the second row column you have some of the not so normal colors. I have never worn blue or green eye shadow before and yet Dragon is calling my name to be used some how very soon. I think my next afternoon off I'm going to be playing around big time.

 In the third column we have some lovely shades. I've used Vanity in my outer corner already. Its a nice change up to using a dark brown or black. In the palette it comes off pretty vibrant but on the eye its more muted.

 The fourth coloum is all the pinks and reds. Look at them, they are just so ugh unbelievable. I think part of my decision on buying this palette was based of of Sonic, and Alchemy. As you can see Alien (At the top) is that one shade I wish was just a little more pigmented. In the palette it has so much potential, it has this amazing gold shimmer to it just screams 'Oh yes come to mama!. On the eye its barely a sheer wash of color and you don't see any of the gold.  I've used Bondage quite a bit and create a lovely smokey eye with it. My co-workers enjoyed it too.

The last column we have one of my favorite shades Last Sin. Its just this amazing shimmery neutral shade that when you have a dark crease and outer corner it helps blend everything together on the lid. Even wearing this by itself is nice if your going for that, 'wearing makeup, but I don't want to look like it' look. As for the last three shades I haven't delved into them too much yet, I'll get there, I saw a really pretty smokey eye on Pixwoo's YouTube channel Revolver and Defy could be great for!

And there you have it my lovelies, my look and thoughts at the Urban Decay Vice 3 Palette. This Palette retails at Sephora, and on Urban Decay's website for $60. Amongst all the other holiday palettes out there I'm glad I got this one!

I'll talk to you all soon! <3 Nicole

Review: Hard Candy Fierce Effects Eye Shadow Duos.

Good Morning lovelies! i hope you all are well!

Today I bring you a review on a new product from the Walmart exclusive brand Hard Candy! Every time I go to Walmart I always check out the beauty section and check to see if there is anything new, so I was so glad a few weeks ago to see that some of the newest Hard Candy products had made its way to my local Walmart shelves.

The first product I picked up that caught my eye was these new eye shadow duos called Fierce Effects. From what I saw at Walmart they have four different duos to choose from. Plus they all look like each color compliments the other in the pack.

The duo I picked up is called Slow and Steady, one shadow is a shimmery champagne color and the other is a dark brown.

Here is what the packaging looks like from Hard Candy's Website. (I accidentally threw mine out before taking a photo of it.)

Credit: Hard Candy Makeup. 

"Hard Candy Fierce Effects Shadow Duo Eyeshadow features a unique hybrid texture that is not a powder or a cream and provides velvety texture with luminous color. Each shade is intensified with a second pigment for a multi-dimensional pearl finish. With intense staying power, these cushiony silky pigments offer a comfortable, long-wearing formula." --Hard Candy's Description from their website. 

I would have to agree with Hard Candy's description of the Fierce effect duos, they are very soft and velvety smooth, and are very pigmented. As for saying whether they are a cross between a powder or a cream, I would say they lean more towards a loose powder pigment. 

These eye shadows remind me greatly of the L'oreal Infallible 24 hour loose eye shadows. The packaging is very similar and after doing some research I didn't see any information that L'oreal (or their parent company) owns Hard Candy. 

Here is what the L'oreal Infallible Eye Shadow I have looks like. 

And here are the Hard Candy Fierce Effects duos.

Inside the shadows the set up is the same too where you have a little disk with a handle pressing the pigment down so it doesn't go all over the place.

If you guys follow me on here or on Instagram or Twitter, you know I love my neutral eye shadows and its my go-to look 90 percent of the time. So it was no clue that I would love these eye shadows.

These are perfect for me when I go to work early in the morning, I don't have to keep switching back between different palettes and rummaging through my stash at 5am.

Lets take a look at swatches.

The first photo is of the duo in sunlight. The champagne color is my favorite of the duo. Its not just a shadow for your lid but I love using it in other looks as an inner corner highlight. 

Here are the colors swatched in the shade. I should also say that these are swatched over no eye shadow primer! How awesome is that? 

As for staying power, without primer, I've noticed with my combination skin they last about 4-5 hours. If I use primer I get about 6-8 hours of wear, especially if I don't touch my face. I have this tendency to hold my head in my hands or if I get an itch on my eye, I forget I'm wearing makeup and tend to rub. 

I think these duo's are great. I do have one request though and that is maybe making more colors available. Out of the four duos they have Slow and Steady and one other called Lost and Found are ones I would wear. Who knows though, maybe in 2015 Hard Candy will come out with more options. 

If you want to get your hands on these Fierce Effects Duos they are available at Walmart for $5 bucks! 

See you guys in the next post, <3 Nicole. 

*All products mentioned in my post are purchased by me unless otherwise stated. I am not affiliated with any companies mentioned above and I am not being compensated.*

Review: Cetaphil Gentle Skin Cleansing Cloths.

Good morning lovelies!

I hope you all are well, and that you Halloween, if you celebrate was awesome and that you or your kids got lots of awesome candy! I got to hand out candy to trick or treaters all day and dress up with some of my co-workers!

Today I have a review for you on a product that I put off until I used the whole product up to finalize my opinion. Usually after a week or so of using a product I can tell if I like it, or if its beneficial to me. However not this one.

I'm talking about the Cetaphil Gentle Skin Cleansing Cloths, these are a new product from Cetaphil that I had never seen before. I am a huge fan of the Cetaphil Gentle Skin Cleanser. I adore it and did a fully review on it here.

When I went on vacation in September I was dead set on taking the cleanser with me, which I did by transferring some into a travel size container. I also wanted something I could take my makeup off with if I didn't feel like washing my face, and I didn't want to bring my cleanse off oil in fear it would leak all over my other toiletries. So in browsing the skin care isle at the drugstore I saw the Cetaphil Cleansing Cloths, and instantly I thought since I loved the cleanser I should try them.

I got mine at Walmart for $5.97, which is around the same price as the liquid cleanser. You get 25 pre-moistened wipes which is standard for the majority of different brands of face wipes out there.

Sadly I was very disappointed in these wipes. Upon first use of them I noticed that they are not very moist at all, they are practically dry. The wipes do come sealed up and my seal was not broken so I know I didn't buy a defective product.

When I used a wipe to clean my face it did take off my makeup but I had to go over my face quite a bit to get everything truly off. When it came to taking off my mascara and eye liner, I really had to work at it and I wasn't even wearing water proof mascara. There were a few occasions it took two wipes to completely get the makeup off.

After my vacation was over I kept using the wipes to see if maybe the wipes towards the middle or the end were more moist, but they were not.  I felt like I went through these wipes twice as fast as any other. For the six dollar price tag I don't plan on buying these again. I can get any other brand of face wipe with the same quantity for the same price and know that they will potentially work better.

I am going to stick with the cleanser because that stuff its truly a lifesaver.

Have you tried the Cetaphil Cleansing Cloths? Whats you favorite brand of Cleansing Cloths? 

Have a great day lovelies and I will talk to you on Thursday!
<3 Nicole

Maybelline Color Sensational Creamy Matte Lipsticks. My Picks For Fall!

Well hello there lovelies! I hope you all are well! I'm back with a swatch and review for you amazing readers today!

Over the last I guess you could say almost year I have fallen in love with matte lip products.

And of course this meme jumped in my head when I wrote that above sentence.  Today I am going to bringing you my views on the new Maybelline Color Sensational Creamy Matte Lipsticks. That is a mouthful.

I first heard about these through Nouveau Cheap which if you haven't heard of G. and her amazing beauty on budget blog. I seriously check her blog pretty much everyday to see whats about to hit the drugstores beauty wise.

When I read that Maybelline was going to be launching a matte lipstick line I was super excited since at the time my favorite matte lippies were made by Revlon. I am a huge fan of the Color Burst Matte Balms. Number 250 Standout is my go-to red lippie.

So I waited patiently for them to arrive at my local drugstore. The first one I wanted to pick up was Touch Of Spice, which reminds me quite a bit of the Gerard Cosmetics Lipstick 1995 which was created by Jaclyn Hill. Photos I have seen online pretty much show Touch Of Spice is an exact dupe for it.

The second one I got but didn't necessarily plan on getting, because god knows I need more lipsticks,  but I couldn't pass up Divine Wine, which is a red but its more of a vampy dark red. Its darker than Revlon's Standout. I was inspired to buy this because of the lovely YouTuber Zoella. I have always seen her rocking a dark red lip and I wanted to try too.

The texture of these lipsticks are amazing, they are super creamy and smooth. They don't dry out your lips like some mattes can do. I will say these lipsticks have a scent to them, but I don't find it unpleasant. To me it smells kind of vanilla-y. Plus I don't smell it at all after applying it. 

Lets take a look at some swatches. 

 These swatches are done with one swipe of the lipstick. In the photo you can see Touch of Spice is a brown toned nude and has that classic '90s look to it. Divine Wine is just that a nice blue toned dark red. On my lips its looks a little darker than shown here.

The staying power is not very long lasting, after eating and drinking you will have to reapply.

I paid $4.97 for these lovely lippies at Walmart which is great because other places they are about $7.99!

If you want to get your hands on these I would check out your local drugstore or Walmart now because I think everyone should have access to them!

I hope you enjoyed this post! If you love matte lippies like I do comment below and tell me whats your favorite!

I'll see you guys on Thursday with a Halloween mani!!
<3 Nicole

*All the above products mentioned by me were purchased by myself with my own money. I am not being compensated for this review.*

Urban Decay Cosmetics Naked 3 Palette!

Hi guys! Its Monday again, but that means its also new blog post day!!

I apologize for my post going up so late, but we all know real life can get in the way. I so wish that blogging was kind of my full time job.. I love it so much!

Today I bring you a post that I have been putting off because I think its my favorite one yet, and if you saw the title then you already know where this is headed.

Back in March I placed a Sephora order and bought myself the Urban Decay Naked 3 palette. I did this after much consideration of other eye shadow palette from other companies. I literally did research for months on what palette I wanted.

How important is doing research on a beauty product you want to purchase?

So in the end I'm pretty sure that I made the right decision, I have used this palette almost every day since I got it and now after a couple months of using it I want to tell you what I think.

 
First off, the packaging... I have said over and over I am a sucker for anything rose gold... and this makes no exception. I love that its a metal case that snaps shut so you don't have to worry about it opening up during travel. Its slim so it will also travel nicely as well. Its not as thin as my LORAC Pro Palette but its compact enough. I like that this palette has a texture top to it, I think it adds a little something extra that we don't always see.

All these shadows for the most part are warm rose toned shadows. I'll be the first to admit I never wore much pink eye shadow when I started playing with makeup with I was a kid. I always thought it washed me out. Turns out I was just using to pale of a pink.

Formula wise these are all soft and easily blendable. I found them all really easy to work with except Dust which is a little too sheer for me. 


Lets take a look at swatches:  All swatches are photographed in sunlight with no primer underneath.

Here we have the first three shades, Strange, Dust and Burnout. Strange is a shade I use most definitely for highlighting. Its not a complete matte, more of a satin finish. Dust is a very light shimmery pink, its a nice color but too light for me and it doesn't really show up on my eyes. Burnout is slightly darker than Dust, and I love using this as an all over lid color and blend it out with a nice light brown in the crease for a wearable look for work.

Next up we have Limit, which is one of the two only matte shades in this palette. I like using it as a transition color when I'm working with some of the darker colors. Next is Buzz again a medium pink that is kind of like Burnout but a little less pigmented, I still like it as an overall lid color. Lastly in this set is Trick. Trick is one of my favorite colors in the palette. Its a warm peach, color that is super shimmery/glittery and its just looks like foil on the lid, ( at least for me it does). I would beware the fallout with Trick, when I tap off any excess I can see the glitter go everywhere!

Now we are getting to the darker side of the Naked 3. We have Nooner, Liar, and Factory. Nooner is the only other matte shade in the palette. I like to use it as a crease shade when I don't want a smokey eye or to use a brown. Its a nice change of pace when I need a different look. Liar is a rose gold shade that I just can't believe I never used earlier.

I can successfully say I have used all the shades in this palette at the time of this post! I have aways been fearful of darker colors for fallout and the fact I suck at blending darker shadows without getting it everywhere.

Factory is a mid tone brown shade that I used on my outer corner most of the time.

Finally we have the last three shades, the ones that are the most pigmented, Mugshot, Darkside, and Blackheart. Mugshot and Darkside are darker brown shades that have a pink undertone to them, once again I use these as outer corner colors and in my lower lash line. Blackheart is a really dark brown with red shimmer running throughout. The red shimmer doesn't transfer to the eye as well though. That doesn't bother me so much but if its something you look for you can always add red glitter on top to bring it out more.

You can see even without primer these shadows can pack a punch, but sadly they don't stay long on my lid without primer. When you purchase the Naked 3 ( It retails for $52 at Sephora, and $54 on Urban Decay's website) you also get a four pack of UD Primer Potion samples. You get original, Sin, Anti-aging, and Eden which is a long wear primer. You don't necessarily need the UD primers to get the shadows to strut there stuff. The Hard Candy long wear primer does just fine.

You also get a double ended brush with your purchase. It's just as adorable as the palette. One side is a small paddle brush the other a larger fluffy blending/paddle brush. The smaller paddle brush is not my favorite, it's stuff and I have a hard time packing on color. The fluffier end however is amazing for blending out color and placing color in my outer corner! 

Overall I love this palette, I get pretty much everyday use out of it, and I never get tired of pairing it with other eye shadows I have. The price point is a little iffy for me. I never spent $52 bucks on make up before. I can see why now though, you definitely get what you pay for!

If you are looking to purchase the Naked 3 you can do so at Sephora stores or online and I'm sure they have it at Ulta, and also on UD's website! I hope maybe this review swayed you on whether or not you wanted to purchase it or not!

I'll talk to you all on Wednesday! <3 Nicole

Revlon Age Defying Firming and Lifting Foundation

Happy Friday guys!!!! How are you? Everything is semi okay on my end. Battling a lot of stress and depression right now. Just trying to make to the light at the end of the tunnel or find that silver lining.

Today I have for you another foundation review. I reviewed the Almay Smart Shade Skintone Matching Makeup a while back and raved about it. I still rave about it, heck I am wearing right now, but I have found a foundation that is rivaling it for my affections.

Revlon introduced this foundation I want to say towards the beginning of the year, but I just got my hands on it about a month ago. Living in a middle of no where place in New York we don't always get new products right away. I had seen a couple of other reviews on this foundation and people seemed to be loving it.

This foundation runs about $10-$15 depending on where you purchase it from. I got a great deal on it at Rite Aid. They were having a 40% Revlon sale, so I got this for around $8 instead! This is also a great tip for those of us who don't like shelling out a bunch of money on product that were not sure about. I recommend waiting until it goes on sale at the drugstore, they are always running 40% sales every now and then. I say buy the new product then and give it a try, at least your not paying the whole price if you wind up not liking it so much.

Here is what I love about this product. First off it has really nice coverage. Its about a medium coverage foundation that you can build on to make full coverage. I love how this evens out my skin tone and helps reduce under eye circles with just one thin layer. If I am having a bad skin day I can add a little more to the problem areas, and it doesn't look cakey.

Can you see by the photo above this has a  pump! Not all drugstore foundations have pumps, you can get optimum control with this foundation by that pump. Usually or my face I use a pump and a little more. The packaging itself is sleek and nice, it has a glass bottle so it is a little heavy but not too bad at all.

Another good thing about this foundation is it has a broad spectrum SPF of 15, which isn't too high but its nice to have some protection from the sun. The size on this is the standard 1.0 fl oz and I wear the color #30 Soft Beige.

Here is a little swatch of it against my hand. The formula is creamy and smooths on to the skin nicely. It especially looks nice when you pair it with the Maybelline Baby Skin Instant Pore Eraser which I just reviewed a few days ago. Pairing those to products together makes my foundation last all day, even when I haven't paired it with the primer it still last a decent amount of time.

As for the age defying claims of firming and lifting, I can't really tell so much because I don't have really any wrinkles or saggy skin yet. But it does make my complexion look nice and gives my face an overall flawless look.

I have always loved Revlon foundations. Revlon was the first brand I bought liquid foundation from so its no surprise I like this one.

Check out your local drugstores today if you want to try out this foundation. Remember if you don't want to shell out $15 bucks for it, wait for a sale and look out for coupons. There are coupons for everything these days!

Until next time! <3 Nicole

Bondi New York : Botanical Beauty.

*This polish was sent to me for free from Bondi NY, with a coupon code so I could try out a polish from their new polish line*

Good afternoon love bugs! Hope you all are doing well this weekend, I am spending my one day off this weekend relaxing and slowly shopping for things for Florida. I can't believe that it is less than 25 days away! I feel like I have so much to do yet!

Anyway today I bring you a polish from a company called Bondi NY. A while back I want to say maybe just before Christmas I was tweeted by them to send them my email so they could contact me about their new polish line that would be making its debut in 2013. I was super excited about this since it was the first time a company reached out to me to possibly review a nail polish!

So after a few months a waiting ( and to be honest I hadn't heard much communication so I thought maybe it was a dead end. But I was so wrong! ) I finally received an email with a coupon code so I could order one of their polishes. So when I went to their website:

http://www.bondinewyork.com/collections/types?q=Nail+Polish * Don't worry its not an affiliate link, I don't get anything if you click it to see what polishes they have to offer*

I saw they have a vast array of colors from polishes with shimmer, bright almost neon colors, and your spring time crèmes.

After looking at all the beautiful colors I chose Botanical Beauty.  Botanical Beauty is a lovely lilac color that some how combines a light purple and light pink. On the nail it leans more pink but trust me its definitely has some purple in it. Its a crème finish polish which happens to be one of my favorite finishes. It sort of reminds me of a hydrangea or a lilac bush.

I love the style of the bottle, for some reason I like the square shape, I think its because maybe its easier to store when organizing my polishes. The cap to this polish is cool, it doesn't come off revealing a smaller round cap but it does have the feel of a silky finish that's matte although the cap itself isn't slippery. The matte silky top actually helps me grip it better to open the polish, you know how sometimes we can't grip the top of polish to get it off because our fingers just slide.

The photos above were taken with two coats and a top coat in natural sunlight. The texture of the polish is amazing, if your careful it could be a ONE COATER! But I like to even out my polish with an extra coat so I did two, but the coverage for one is there. The finish without a top coat is glossy but not super glossy like when you do add the top coat.

Overall I really like this polish and think its a great pick for spring and summer, and the name couldn't fit better!

Bondi NY runs about $12.50 a bottle according to their website and right now some of the polishes I saw are marked down a couple of dollars. I suggest if your budget allows for one higher end polish you might want to give these a try.

That's all for now! Talk to you next time!
<3 Nicole

Free For All Beauty Friday! Physicians Formula Super BB Cream!

I have nothing to disclose, any and all products mentioned are purchased by me.
Happy Friday!

Congrats to all of you who have the weekend off! As you are reading this I will be at work and praying for 4 o' clock to come quickly! I have Saturday off and its my dads 60th birthday! It is a very special birthday since he is finally home from his stay in the hospital!

So HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!!!

Okay on to my very first volume of Free For All Beauty Friday! I have been putting this off since I first mentioned it because I have been so nervous to write up this post! As much as I love nail polish I love make up and beauty products equally as much although the size of either collections vary.


Today I will be giving my thoughts on the Physicians Formula Super BB Cream. I have always used liquid foundation when applying my makeup, so when I heard about BB Creams I didn't really know who or what they were. I had heard of Japanese BB Creams and how amazing they are. Sadly I know I would probably never get my hands on one so I would have to give the American counterparts a try.
After watching many reviews on YouTube, I decided to give it ago and see what I could find. I also wanted to try a BB Cream for when I go on vacation this summer so I don't have to pack a glass bottle of foundation in my suitcase.

I chose Physicians Formula because well I'll be honest, it was partially the brilliant white packaging with the holographic design on it. But I did choose it because it supposedly had 10 plus benefits, an SPF of 30 broad-spectrum and was recommended by the Skin Cancer Foundation for daily use to help protect your skin from the sun.

Here is what the packaging looks like. Plus a close up of the 10 plus benefits.

 

As you can see after you open the box you get 1.2 fluid ounces of product. Now I purchased mine back just around Valentines Day, and its now the almost of end of April and is sill have just about under a third of product left. So its lasted me about two and half months. It will most likely make it to the middle of May before I have break in to the back up that I purchased.

As for the 10 plus benefits I could go through them individually but then this post would be super long. So I'm going to break them in to sections. The first three are  smoothing, moisturizing, and protecting, I have to say these benefits prevail to be true, the BB cream goes on smooth and blends really well, I do feel like I put on moisturizer with this, my face doesn't get dry or cakey, I still put on a separate moisturizer before putting this on though, its just in my routine. As for protecting well duh it has SPF broad-spectrum 30 in it so its going to help. Obviously you wouldn't use this as regular sunscreen but for being out and about on a girls day or just sitting outside its really good for that, if your going to be in the water or on the beach in direct sun clearly you want a higher SPF sunscreen!

The next 3 Firming, Priming and Filling, and Perfecting, I would say for I don't really notice a difference, I don't like primers but this doesn't feel like one, I definitely don't get that silicone feeling when applying it. Since I'm still young I don't have to worry about firming if it does firm anything I don't see it. Perfecting, I don't think it does that, I still have to spot conceal and conceal my under eyes.

As for the last four Concealing, Brightening, Line Softening, and Long Wearing, I feel it does even out my skin tone well. The only downside is that this product only comes in two different shades. Light/Medium which is what I wear and Medium/Dark. So if you fall outside the two shades or stuck in the middle you might like this product. Some say Light/Medium is too light and Medium/Dark is too dark, and its sad there is no in-between color. For brightening I think it does lighten my face a little but that goes with evening out my skin tone. For Line-Softening and Long Wearing, once again I'm on the younger demographic for this so I can't tell if it works for that, as for long wearing I think it last well up to about the 6-7 hour mark. I have worn this to work and come home and still have a nice face but not as nice as when I first applied everything, When I wear this on a regular day and not really doing much it can last much longer as long as I'm not touching my face which is a bad habit of mine.

So here is what the product looks like.

 

 

 

I get about light to medium coverage out of this BB cream, if I don't have many blemishes (which is a rare day) it makes my skin look nice, but like I said above I do have to use separate concealers to finish the covering up when I want to wear a full face of make up. If I have a lazy day and just I am just running to the store and don't have to put a lot of make up on then this can actually work well by itself and I just set it with powder and be on my way.

 

 I do like this BB Cream, I think it will be good for Florida because it is light weight on the skin and with the humid weather down there I think it will be an excellent choice to a heavy liquid foundation.

 

For price point it is on the expensive side of the drugstore makeup lines. If you want to purchase this it will run you about $10-$13. But there is a brighter side to it. I have seen a lot of these in stores with $3.00 coupons on them and drugstores like CVS and Rite Aid are always having sales on Physicians Formula. When I bought mine I got it for 40% off which brought it down to $7-$8 and then with the $3 dollars off it was brought down to $4-$5! Not bad at all if you ask me.

 

So if you want to give it a go wait for it to be on sale and then you won't feel like you are investing large amounts of money on a drugstore product.

 

I hope you guys enjoyed this first FFABF post and I'll see you next time !

 

<3 Nicole

 

If you guys have any comments or questions or even suggestions on what you would like to see for any future Friday post please leave it in the comments below! I would LOVE to know! Thanks!