More Ben NYE

Just a quick haul and swatches of more of the Ben NYE Lumiere Grande shadows and blushes, ( my original post on those are here ) My first Ben Nye palette was purchased in October and I quickly fell in love with the high impact shades in the palette that I just had to grab some of the single shadows and a couple of blushes and pop them into a Z palette.  This time I was looking for some neutral shades, plus the blues and purples, along with a high impact pink blush and a subtle coral for day wear.

These babies retail at $7.99 USD and really are HUGE! approx the size of a rounded off Aust 50c piece, the blushes are the same huge size and I think were $6.99.

This time round the colours I picked up were
Bronze - (shimmer) LUR-5
Taupe - (matte) ER-34
Starry Night ( matte with glitter) LUR-20
Mossberry (matte) ER-62
Twilight sable (matte) this one came with no backing info so off the top of my head I dont have the colour coode for it.
Royal purple (sheen with glitter) LUR-13
Peacock (shimmer) LUR-19
Turquoise (shimmer) LUR-11
Golden apricot (shimmer) LUR-18
PLUS the blushes in peach and Fuschia

shadows

blushes, plus a small sample of body bling plantinum



sorry for the mess couldn't wait to use them :)

 swatches

left to right, Bronze( golden bronze), Taupe ( mid range grey brown), starry night( black with multi coloured glitter), mossberry (deep olive green ), twilight sable (med- dark chocolate brown )

left to right - Royal purple ( mid true purple with hints of glitter), Peacock ( bright shimmery blue verging on teal), turquoise ( bright teal blue green) and Golden apricot ( Goldy peach colour)

Blushes, peach and Fuchsia.... obviously they are applied heavily for swatching purposes and you'd never wear them like that unless you were aiming for clown, esp fuchsia!

Looking at these colours peacock and turquoise are very similar so it probably isn't necessary to own both,  and the matte neutrals are great crease style colours.  I keep loving the Ben Nye more and more with every use and I'm sure I'll find an excuse to go pick up more of these in the future, maybe from their other ranges, not just the Lumiere Grandes.

OPI Shatters haul

Hi guys, I'm still trying to play catch up on a few hauls that I haven't manged to photograph and swatch yet, so I thought I'd do a real simple and quick haul post on some OPI shatters I picked up a couple of weeks ago.  OPI is one of those deeply loved and coveted nail polish brands that are simply super exxy here in Aust, with them normally selling at department stores like Grace Bros and David Jones at ridiculous prices of $20 to $30 AUD per bottle.  Recently a friend alerted me to an OPI shatter sale on Adore beauty when they were selling the OPI shatters at $10 a bottle, shipping was around $5-6 and took approx 3-4 days (very quick!) As a result I felt the NEED to pick up every colour, with the exceptions being the black and gold shatters as they were out of stock.

The 6 shades they had in stock that I managed to get my hands on were White (NL E54), Silver (NL E62), Navy ( NL E63), red (NL E55), blue (NL E56) and turquoise (NL E64)

Navy, turquoise, blue

red,  silver and white

 Now unless you have been living under a rock, or just not interested in nails, you would know all about the shatters so just briefly the basic concept is to apply a  base coat in one colour then apply a contrasting shatter shade over the top, the shatter then crackles and what you see is a cracked finish with you base shade showing  through the gaps.  You can get some pretty funky colour combos limited only by your imagination.

For the ones on my nails this week I have used one base coat of Ulta 3's neon orange called Tahiti, then one coat of NYC nail polish in Crazy, which is a sheer shimmery citrus orange, the applied White Shatter over the top, allowed it to crack the top coated with Sally Hansen's Inst-Dry anti chip top coat.  At first I have to admit I wasn't quite sure of the white shatter, it kinda reminds me of painting my nails with white liquid paper when bored in high school, but it's grown on me :)

What do you think of the OPI shatters and do you have a favourite shade or colour combo in them that you love?

Fake Tanning adventures, ST Tropez bronzing mousse



picture taken from
www.sttropez.com.au



I was recently sent the St Tropez bronzing mousse as a Trial for the Great Tan test on beautyheaven,  this was one trial that was right up my alley as I'm constantly on the hunt for a perfect summer tan all year round.  As usual St Tropez has nailed it with their simple to use Bronzing mousse. It comes in 2 handy sizes of 120 ml for $43.95 or 240 ml for $65.95.

Getting your tan on is a breeze with this tinted bronzing mousse, it has a light airy look and feel, with no obvious fake tan smell, actually it has only the lightest almost un-noticeable smell so gone are the days of smelling like you have just topped up your tan from a bottle.

It's nice and simple to use, as with all fake tans it's best to exfoliate first and moisturize, then just work the tinted mousse into your skin area by area. The tinted nature of the product makes it a cinch to spot if you have missed out any areas and it applies really easily and covers well with no streaking.

The St Tropez mousse has to be one of the most natural bronze coloured tans I have used in a very long time, 1 application left me with a lightly bronzed glow and after I had used it 3 days in a row I found I was getting lots of compliments on my lovely Queensland tan. No fake orange tan in sight :)

I'll absolutely look into picking up another St Tropez product next time I'm buying a new bottle of fake tan, but just for the ease of application I'd probably reach for the spray on version, so I don't have to worry about trying to get the excess out of my hands afterwards.

I did end up investing in a tanning mitt as the St Tropez website suggests and that makes application so much easier and even with no messy fake tan marks on my hands afterwards.

I thought I might just pop up some before and after photos, even though I'm not sure you can see the difference, but there really was one in real life

What's you're favourite fake bake range or product?  mine is easily now ST Tropez :)

Finally, Sydney Imats Hauls - 28 Neutral palette

Hi guys, sorry for being MIA  for a while, anyone who follows my Face Book page as well will know I headed off overseas for a well deserved trip to Bali with the Hubby and no kidlets in tow.  I'm back now and starting to get back into the swing of things, I did manage to pick up a couple of items while away most importantly this seasons DIOR cannage collection and some GUESS shoes, but I'll have to work my way through the IMATS haul first and a couple of other things before I get to the DIOR.

Today I've been working on the photos from the 28 Neutral palette I got at IMAT''s, now my details are a bit sketchy seeing as I have had so much going on, but I believe I bought it at the Crown brushes stand, and I paid $35, they had a deal going of 2 palettes for $50 as well but unfortunately ( or fortunately... whatever ) I already had all the others.

The palette measures approx 22cm x 15 Cm's and is in a matte black casing with no interior mirror on the lid.  There is 28 neutral shades varying from light beige's and hi-light style colours to deep browns and some with reddish or purplish undertones, there's also a variety of finishes from mattes to shimmers.  The pans in this palette are bigger than those in the 88 palettes with each colour being approx the size of an Aussie 10c piece.  It's a very versatile and useful palette for those looking for a stack of neutrals all in one place.  The texture of the colours is soft and colour payoff for the most is pretty good, very similar to the texture of the 88 palettes.

So Onto the Pict's :)

The Palette

Row 1

 row 1 swatches

row 2

 row 2 swatches

row 3

 row 3 swatches

row 4

 row 4 swatches

row 5

row 5 swatches

row 6

row 6 swatches

row 7 ( last one )

row 7 swatches

Basically it's a nice  easy palette with a bunch of neutral all in one place, great for creating completely natural looks or for grabbing when looking for a neutral crease colour. Not really a stand out fave palette for me but very useful all the same.

What is your favourite neutral palette that you own?