Urban Decay, Deluxe shadow box

Back to the business of beauty, this time I'm taking a look at Urban Decay's Deluxe shadow box which is another one of the goodies I picked up in Kuala Lumpur.  The Urban Decay goodies I bought on my visit to Sephora in KLCC in the twin towers.

I paid $145 Malaysian ringgit for the set, which at the exchange rate I had back then roughly translates to be around $45 AUD.  Personally I don't think that's too bad considering the RRP from Urban Decay's website is $38USD, and then you have to factor in shipping costs. You can pick them up on EBay though for anything between $20 - $30 USD plus shipping.

The palette itself is similar to the 1st naked palette in that it is that hard magnetic closing cardboard covered in a velvet finish.  The deluxe shadow box is about the size of my hand and is covered on the edges in a royal purple velvet in laid with silver mesh.  On the inside you have a mirror in the lid, with 9 square colour pans, in 3 rows of 3 and 2 small sponge tipped applicators.  It also comes with a 2.66ml primer potion.

The colours contained in the palette are
fishnet - bright purple with blue undertones
honey - bright yellow gold
ransom - deep royal blue
graffiti - bright lime green
zero - shimmer black
peace - light bright blue
shag - medium coppery brown
scratch - neutral skin toned pink
underground - chocolate brown

I bought this palette simply because I was attracted to the fact that it had brights and neutrals all in one.  The shadows themselves are very similar to what is in the NAKED palette very soft and smooth and easy to use, while they are pigmented I don't feel they swatch or apply quite as bright as you initially see in the palette, but they are still quite bright.

photo time :)

The outside packaging

the inside

and the swatches
left to right - fishnet, honey, ransom, graffiti, and zero

and
peace, shag, scratch and underground

All in all, its a really cute little palette and probably a good buy for anyone wanting to add some colour and warmer naturals to their existing collection.  I don't think it's set to become a favourite of mine but is still a useful addition.

Are there any Urban Decay fans out there and what palettes of theirs do you own other than the NAKED palette?

slight deviation from beauty, The big O/S trip :) PART 1 the planning

As I mentioned in my last post I was MIA for the last few weeks while on a family trip O/S I thought I might just deviate from the makeup posts to show you where I dissapeared to.  It was a very full on 3 weeks and in order not to bore everyone with a super huge single post I'll split the trip up into smaller posts and include as much pricing and costs info as possible.

 Now that my boy is at school full time the only real quality time we get to spend together is school holidays, so with it in mind that the December/ January holidays are the longest ones we get all year, so we decided to plan a big trip overseas for this year at that time.  During the planning stage we sat the kids down and showed them some travel videos and gave them the option to choose what they would like to experience while overseas... shocking I know, allowing the kids to pick, but we figured if they got to do things they were interested in then the whole trip would be more fun.  Their choice came down to wanting to go to Disneyland and to see golden temples ( that's my girl, only 4 and already into bling!)

In order to include both of those we chose to visit Hong Kong  (Disneyland)

Kuala Lumpur... that was to satisfy my shopping addiction,

and Thailand ( Karon Beach)

 Much planning went into it and after arranging 6 flights and 3 sets of accommodation it was booked, $13 000 AUD later we were booked, planned and paid for, then the long wait and the planning of what to do in each country began.

I had lots of fun buying up big on Makeup in Kuala Lumpur that''s not readily available here in Australia, but more on that later :)

Back in action, this time with MakeUp ForEver's wild and chic aqua cream LE set

Hi Beauties, my apologies for going MIA again, this time I headed off for a 3 week holiday with the family visiting Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur and Thailand.  My plan was to hit up a couple of stores and brands such as Sephora which we don't have here in Australia. ( and spend big I did! )  I'll probably do a quickie post soon with  the full haul photos, but today I'm getting straight into it with the MakeUp Forever Wild and chic Aqua eyes limited edition set I picked up from the MakeUp forever store in KLCC.

I believe this one isn't available anymore and I may just have fluked one the last sets they had instore.  I'll still run down pricing etc just for interest/comparisons sake, so If you cant be bothered just skip right over all that to the piccys :)

Aqua creams as described on the MUFE website are a Waterproof cream colour, which are Ultra pigmented and long lasting.  They are highly concentrated in Mother of Pearl pigments, providing and immediate colour intensity with a luminous finish.  The long lasting formula will not crease or smudge even under the most extreme conditions.

They are versatile with some being able to be used on eyes, cheeks and lips, although the ones in the set are eye and cheek safe only.  The individual pots retail at $22 USD and the kit sold for approx $175 USD. Which as we all know would have been at least double that RRP on the australian market.  In the KLCC store I paid around $250 AUD for the kit, which sounds Exxy, but... well I fell in love with it!

Now I have really only just swatched and used these for the first time today, so any opinion I have on them will only be based on my initial observations of them. I used them on my eyes at around 9am this morning and they were still as good as first applied at 7pm tonight. The set has 10 colours in it, with the individual pots being clear plastic with the colour shade numbers printed on the bottom.  They are stored upside down in the case and come with the MUFE 5N brush, which is a medium to small flat tipped brush. It appears to apply the colours really well despite being on the small side.  Each colour is really smooth and creamy and sets within 30 seconds, MUFE recommends doing one eye at a time for this reason.

The set comes in a hard metal snakeskin print tin with a moulded inner for each of the pots and brush to clip straight into

Now for the individual pot pictures and swatches ( the fun bit )
02 - steel grey

 04 - snow white

 16 - Medium rosy pink

 13 - neutral pale pink

 11 - true gold

left to right - 02, 04, 16, 13 and 11

The next 5 colours - 
01 - dark graphite grey

 14 - chocolate toned

 17 - deep plum red

15 - neutral brown

 12 - bright bronze

left to right - 01,14, 17, 15 and 12

See anything you love?  Has anyone tried MUFE's aqua creams before, and what did you think of them?

DIOR 2011 cannage collection

A few weeks back I got back from Bali and did a bit of a post on some bits and pieces I picked up from IMAT's and other places and mentioned my big Bali beauty splurge was the Dior Cannage collection palette for 2011.  I'd love to Link you to the Dior site with all the info on products and pricing etc, but I still haven't had  any luck finding the cannage collections on the Dior website.

I spotted this baby at the duty free in Sydney selling for $99 AUD and had every intention of scoring it at Sydney airport on the way back in, but flight delays at Dempasar airport in Bali left me with just enough time to check out Dior duty free in Bali, which was a great idea as it was retailing at around $75 Aud when the currency conversion was done, so I was super pleased I made the effort to look for it!

I bought last years edition duty free while on a Royal Caribbean ship and the review and swatches are here. 

As with last years edition this one comes in a quilted re-useable purse for when you finish the products, unfortunately this one doesn't have the silver Dior logo on the front and it is housed in a slightly plastic shiny black quilted bag ( definitely not as pretty as last years edition )  The palette itself holds 6 shadows sorted in 2 groups of  3 colours with the colours set out so as you have a base colour, lid colour, and dark shade which is handy and really takes the guesswork out of what colour to put where.  One set is pinks and purples and the other is basic nude and smoky theme.  It also contains a small square of powder which is set out in 3 strips with the top colour designed as illuminator, then a sculpting shade plus a shade to unify the 2. In this small size those strips are pretty much useless on their own, which is how you are supposed to use the full size version, but with the small one its easiest to just swirl the colours together and use them as one.  This is followed up with 4 lipgoss shades set in 2 groups of 2 shades, the first being a balm and a sheer gloss, and the other set having a lipstick and matching gloss, again taking all guesswork out of what to use where.   It also comes with the stock standard and pretty useless applicators and a mini Diorshow Extase mascara.  This palette also comes with a nice little leaflet explain what all the colours do and where to use them, very handy if you are a little unsure.

 1st set of shadows

2nd set

3 colour sculpting and illuminating powders

lipgosses

love the cute Dior logo in the gloss :)

L-R, balm, lipgloss, lipstick and lipgloss

As expected the colours are gorgeous, and superb quality .... typically Dior!

OPI - Best of the best christmas gift pack

I've been jumping  on the OPI bandwagon a bit lately, but as much as I love their polishes I hate the high price tag that us nail addicts in Aus pay for them, so when I saw the Best of the Best gift pack advertised in the David Jones catalogue I felt I just needed to grab it.

As far as I know "the best of the best " is a DJ's exclusive gift pack, it sells in store here for $39.95 and contains 10 mini OPI polishes, each polish is 3.75ml or 1/8 F/L Oz. 

The colours included in the set are -
Alpine Snow - sheer white
Bubble bath - very natural nude sheer pink
Tickle my  France-y -  sheer pale natural taupe
Strawberry Margarita - mid toned cool pink
Cajun shrimp - hot Coral red
big apple red - true vamp red
I'm not really a waitress - deeper shimmery blood red
You don't know Jacques - mid brown taupe
Russian navy  -  deep purple blue
Lincoln park after dark - deep plum purple

Alpine snow, Bubble bath, tickle my France-y, Strawberry margarita and Cajun shrimp

Big apple red, I'm not really a waitress, you don't know Jacques!, Russian navy and Lincoln park after dark

When I hotfooted it into DJ's to pick this pack up they had none in stock and the SA took my name on a list  to give me a call when it arrived, which took approx 2 weeks, but was worth the wait after all 10 OPI's for 40  bucks :) that's a winner and seeing as I have never finished a full polish it's even better!

I'm not sure just yet what my favourite will turn out to be but Cajun shrimp caught my eye straight away  and I'm now sport ting some Bright coral red toesies :)

Does anyone have a favourite out of those 10 colours and why?