Gimmicky product review: Vaseline spray-on moisture

When these first came out, I knew that it was something that I would consider in the store dozens of times and finally buy when it was on sale. Last week these were buy one, get 20 air miles at Rexall, so I caved and bought the cocoa butter one.

The commercial makes it seem as though you just point it at yourself and spray. It's not quite that simple; maybe I just have short arms, but I can't get far enough away to get an even spray, so I end up with white blobs that have to be rubbed in (just like regular lotion...) Plus, the spray covers an area greater than the accessible part of my arm, so it goes everywhere. It also smells like chocolate pudding, which is not really my favourite thing to smell like.

In general, I'm not impressed.

My arm, covered in white gunk that has to be rubbed in.

Have you tried these? Did you like them?

theBalm Hot Ticket nail polish in Pink or Swim

theBalm was 50% off at the Rexall near where I work las week. I have heard good things about their polish, and at 50% off it was $4.50 a bottle. I bought "Pink or Swim," which is a bright coral-y pink.

The bottom photo is a little blurry but is closer to the actual colour. The formula was great: flowed smoothly and covered pretty well in two coats. I'm really happy with this purchase! Their eyeshadows are also supposed to be amazing, and I have heard that Mary Lou-Manizer is an HG highligher product. I have a lot of face and eye products, but I was looking at Meet Matt(e), too. That Stila matte palette has created a real problem!

Have you tried theBalm?

Revlon Baby Sticks. I have no self-control.

In my post about the new lip butters, I mentioned that the Baby Sticks had gotten pretty bad reviews across the board. I've walked past them so many times without really wanting them, and then I felt bad for insulting them in my previous post without having tried them (the guilt. It burns), and THEN Revlon products were on an Air Miles special at Rexall (25 bonus miles!) so I bought one. Canadian stores seem to have only gotten Tahitian and Sunset, which is disappointing because I had read that Pink Passion, the third colour, was the best performer of the bunch. I picked up Sunset because even though the tube looks very red it seemed to show up as orange in swatches.

The tube, and the product in the tube. 

The packaging is the exact same as the Joe Cheek Tints. For some reason this really tickles me. 

Like everyone and their brother has said, these are sheer. I'm very, very pale, and this is how they show up on me. This is one swipe. 

This is about 8-9 swipes. You can see that it's starting to look a little orange-y, but this is not a pigmented product by any stretch of the imagination.

Hey! It's my face! This is after putting it on in the morning (on a bare face; no BB cream) and then reapplying for photos after I got home from work. I also did not blend for the photos (that's how sheer these are). Photos are taken in sunlight (through a window). I'm also wearing the Sweet Tart lip butter and Lancome Juicy Tube in Miracle over top.

Honestly, when I first bought this and did the first few swipes on my arm, there was no pigment at all. It was just shiny, as if I'd put petroleum jelly on my arm. 

However, there was a weird waxy covering when I took off the top, and the pigmentation got better as I swatched...and swatched...and swatched. It's a sheer, jelly-ish hint of colour. It's also not shimmery but it's a cream, so it has an emollient sheen to it, which is nice for a glowy look for those who may not like outright shimmer in their blushes. 

Because it's so orange it also makes my eyes look really green, which is a bonus that I definitely appreciate. I actually kind of like this, but I understand the criticism.

Unfortunately, there are no testers in the display, so you can't try before you buy. I'm such a Revlon fangirl, and I get where they were going with this, but I was actually shocked that this made it through quality control. I'm lucky in that this works for me and for my needs, but if you are looking for pigmentation this is definitely not the way to go. It's also not cheap for how poorly it performs - these are $10.49 regular price at Rexall, and I think $10.99 at Shoppers (but don't quote me on that).

Essence Vintage District blush and eyeshadow

I'm very glad to see that Canadian stores are getting so many of the Essence LE collections. I've tried a few products from the permanent collection but nothing has ever wowed me as much as the limited edition items (and especially the LE blushes).

A few weeks ago I saw this at the Shoppers Drug Mart near where I work:

There is a tiny plastic streetlamp! That is unnecessarily adorable.

We didn't get the whole collection (we're missing at least one nail polish and lip colour) but here's what's in the display, L-R: an orange lipstick/gloss duo, nail polish (this display is missing the blue shade), a blush, two eyeshadows, a teal gel eyeliner, and nail art foily things.

I bought the two polishes, the blush (well, actually I bought two of the blushes), and the teal eyeshadow. The pink nail polish is a sort of dusky rose on me and that colour always looks disconcertingly like meat, so it's not my fave. I haven't tried the orange yet.

Blush in sunlight. See the shiny gold overspray? Ooh! Ahh!

Just the gold is on top, (mostly) just the orange is on the bottom. So, the gold overspray is very gold. The orange part is matte, and very orange on top, but as you can see from Liz's post it's really quite pink underneath.

I tried putting this on one morning and went "ACK!" when I saw how ORANGE and SPARKLY it made my face look. I'll need to apply this with a very, very light hand.

Teal eyeshadow is not normally my bag, but I figured that I would give this a go. The quality is not fantastic; I had to really pack the shadow on my finger for the swatch below, although I haven't tried it with a brush yet. It's a great colour and I think it would look really nice with a soft coral lip.

Swatchy swatchy.

Have you tried any of these products?

Stila In the Know - swatches, review, and two eye looks

This was my "big ticket" item for the Murale bonus redemption. I had been looking at a few different matte palettes, including Urban Decay's Naked Basics, but ultimately this one was what really grabbed me, thanks in no small part to Tracey's amazing swatches and the incredible eye looks she did. I'm almost embarrassed to link to her post, because that's a tough act to follow.

Here's the palette itself, along with a reflection of our weird ceiling. From left to right on the top row the shades are Air, Wind, Desert, Clay, Earth, and in the bottom row we have Driftwood, Fire, Rain, Smoke, and Ebony. The palette also comes with a smudge stick waterproof liner in Halfmoon. If I'm being honest with myself, I will probably never use the liner because I don't know how. 

Swatches in the order they appear in the palette. Just look at Fire! I also love Earth, and I am terrified of Ebony. I don't know how to use a black shadow without looking like a racoon. Who is also a heroin addict. 

The shadows are super soft and very easy to work with. They can also be used wet, but I haven't tried that yet. 

I am not so great at breaking out of the eyeshadow comfort zone, so the two looks I have below look very similar in photos. I promise that they looked fairly distinct in real life, though. There's three photos of one look and only one of the other because I got home too late to take proper photos.

This is Desert on the lid and browbone, Driftwood on the outer lid and a little bit of Fire in the crease. It looks weird with my eyes closed, but because I have so little visible lid space when my eyes are open (which is how I usually spend my days) it's not as noticeable. 

Eyes open. I'm trying to get crazy-thick Brooke Shields-esque brows, so they're a little unruly right now. 

This is pre-lip product, taken in the morning. I'm also wearing La Roche-Posay BB cream, Body Shop Tea Tree concealer and Tarte maracuja concealer, YSL Touche Eclat under my eyes, Essence Cherry Blossom blush, and Marcelle Twist Push-Up Mascara. I had Vasanti's tinted lip balm in Cancun, which is a sheer orange, on during the day. 

This look came straight from the little booklet included with the palette. Air from lash line to brow, Clay on the crease and outer corner, and Earth on the lash line. Same Marcelle mascara with uncurled lashes.

This palette was a fantastic purchase and I am so impressed with the quality. I think it's incredibly versatile, and I would quite happily now pay full price for another Stila palette if all their shadows are like this.

Another lip butter! This brings the total to 8.

I think it's probably obvious by now that I have a lot of lip products. Even if I have nothing else on my face, I wear tinted lip balm or lipstick almost every single day; I tend to look sick if I don't.
Because I have so many, I'm trying to research the ones I do buy to make sure that it's something I like, etc.

I've been stalking my local drugstores for about a month, looking for the Gucci Westman SS 13 collection for Revlon. I was really excited about the new lip butter shades. I finally found it, first in a smaller display at the little Rexall in my building, then at the larger one in the CD Howe building on Sparks/Queen:

I took this photo a few weeks ago; since then the display has appeared at the Shoppers near me. Also, most of the new lip butter colours are now gone because apparently other people were as obsessed as I was. Bad beauty blogger. Also, now may be a good time to mention my huge crush on Emma Stone. Seriously.

The collection has eyeshadow quads, the new Baby Sticks (which, by many accounts, are not so great), nail polish, and four new (not limited edition) lip butter colours: Pink Lemonade, Sorbet, Juicy Papaya, and Wild Watermelon. Out of the four of them, Wild Watermelon was the only that grabbed my eye as I already have very similar colours to the other three in my collection.

I now have 8 lip butters in my collection. I do wear every single one of them on a regular basis, but still.

Wild Watermelon is a pink-leaning red shade, much sheerer than the other red lip butters I have. It's not MLBB because I don't naturally have fairy-tale princess-esque naturally rosy lips, but it does give me that fairy-tale princess rosy-lipped glow. It sort of looks like I've been out picking strawberries and frolicking with woodland creatures.

Compared to Dior Addict Lucky. Wild Watermelon is on the left and Lucky is on the right. Lucky seems very red in the tube, and looks reddish on my lips, so this shows how WW is a pink-leaning red as opposed to a red-leaning pink.

A word of note: this lip butter is quite a bit sheerer than the regular formula, so keep that in mind. It shows up quite brightly on me but may not be visible on people with darker skin tones than mine. I do recommend swatching once it shows up in the permanent display, though, because I think it could be a great summer shade.

Do you eagerly await seasonal collections?

Maybelline: Vivids and Colour Whispers

On Friday night I went to Nature Nocturne, a monthly party held at the Canadian Museum of Nature. I applied my makeup in a bathroom at work, so it needed to be simple yet visible in the low lighting at the museum; I went with a bright pink lip and understated everything else for this reason.

Earlier this month I bought two Maybelline lip colours during the Optimum special at Shoppers Drug Mart: a Colour Whisper in Orange Attitude and a Vivids in Vivid Rose. I have swatches of both below:

Orange Attitude is on the right and Vivid Rose on the left. Orange Attitude is a sheer, slightly reddish orange and very similar to another lipcolour in my collection: Vasanti's tinted lip balm in Cancun (which smells like mango, is extremely moisturizing, and is just generally an amazing product). The Maybelline is not quite as moisturizing, which makes sense as it is a colour product rather than a lip care product. Because I'm so pale it does show up very orange on me, which I love. I'm very happy with this purchase.

Vivid Rose is a BRIGHT cool-toned (I think?), pigmented, semi-matte pink. I don't have another colour like it (although the Fuchsia shade in the same range appears to be a near-perfect dupe for Petals and Peacocks...) and it's very flattering on me. I tend to find most non-sheer lipcolours very drying, but this wasn't too bad. I did have to reapply after eating and drinking but that's normal for me. I found that applying it, blotting it, and then applying again helped prolong the wear time.

I think it may have also helped my friends find me in the dinosaur-populated gloom. Nature Nocturne was a lot of fun - very well-managed and a really neat concept. My friend and I got there right when the doors opened, so we had time to see two of the exhibits before it got really crowded. After that we just sort of wandered around with our friends and danced. The dance floor is under a model of a blue whale! Nature Nocturne is over for the summer but will start again in September, and I'm really looking forward to it!