Salon Effects Part 2: Peppermint Twist (And Other Things)

I'm doing my part 2 on the Sally Hansen Salon Effects sooner than I thought I would. I found that I really got tired of the Prep pattern quickly, not to mention I was bored with the black and silver. So I decided to go ahead and apply my Peppermint Twist pattern. I can't decide how I feel on it. I think I'm liking it. lol Tell me what you all think of it!

I had a request to talk about the difference between liquid liner and pencil (or also what I call almost a crayon liner) I used to be a die hard user of the Cover Girl Perfect Point Plus. Liquid liner completely freaked me out. I had tried it before and it just went everywhere, including in my eyes! I kept wanting to try liquid because I really feel like it looks better. I went to Sephora and asked a sales associate what they thought. I told her my issues and she directed me to Kat Von D's Tattoo Liner. It truly is the best liner I've ever used. Super easy to apply, doesn't smudge or get everywhere... I love it! After having used both kinds, I feel like the biggest difference is the effect. Pencil or crayon in my opinion just isn't as dramatic I guess as liquid. I think the liquid tends to be a truer black (or whatever shade you choose) and it's easier to make different size lines and a cat eye. That's my opinion on the two. I would recommend liquid (particularly Kat Von D), however in the end you should use what you like best! And definitely talk with sales associates about advice on products! Sephora has always been soooo great about helping me find the right product for me. 

While I was putting on my makeup yesterday I realized I have something I haven't mentioned! Anyone heard of the brand TheBalm? I only have one product from them currently, but I love it for two reasons. 1. Their packaging is SUPER CUTE! I'm a total sucker for anything vintage, so they won me over immediately just for that. 2. This particular product can be used in a couple of different ways... as eyeshadow or as a luminizer. The shade is perfect to work with just about any combination of other shadows and is also great for lightening up your face (maybe if you happen to apply too much bronzer or have spots you wants to make lighter or if you just want to look a little more 'shimmery'!) Note: the actual shade is much lighter than pictured. 

I also noticed they just started carrying nail polish! Right up my alley! So I may try out a bottle. They want the same as OPI, so I expect them to live up to the same standards that OPI meets! Their polish is called Hot Ticket and looks like it has a fairly wide variety. The question is whether I not I already have something similar! I do like that they describe the shade underneath the fun names of the polishes!

https://www.thebalm.com/makeup/nailpolish.htm

Also, many places I mentioned yesterday in my Cyber Monday post have extended their sales! 

Finally I gotta share with you all that today is Dollar Day at the Tebow Foundation! If you know me at all, you know that my most favorite guy on the face of this planet is Tim Tebow. He truly is an amazing godly man whose beliefs and values are right in line with mine. I'm also happy he's our QB and he's helping make us awesome again, but he could quit football tomorrow and he would still be my most favorite guy on this planet and I'd still want to marry him. Yep I said it. ANYWAY. lol All you have to do on Dollar Day is donate one dollar towards his Cure Hospital in the Philippines! (of course you can always donate more if you feel led to!) It's a great cause and being generous is always glamourous and in style! 

http://www.timtebowfoundation.org/

Any other requests or questions?? Send them my way! In the meantime, glam it up ladies! ;-)

Cyber Monday!

It's Cyber Monday, glamour gals! Thought I'd share with you some of the deals I've come across!

Ulta - With any $35 online purchase you can choose a cute Ulta clutch makeup bag stuffed with samples that's worth $65! And don't forget to add your free shipping code! It's found at the top of Ulta's site! (free shipping is only over $25)

Too Faced - They seem to still be having their 50% off Black Friday sale, which is really good! Looks like most of the products on sale are older, but they'd still be great! Also, you get three free gifts for Cyber Monday!

Charlotte Russe - up to 40% off site wide! And free shipping on $40 or more!

Target - looks like they're having a huge sale on pretty much everything!

Philosophy - has some great deals anyway! Doesn't look like they're part of Cyber Monday, but they're good deals! Plus be sure to play Baking Spirits Bright! You can play everyday through the 23rd! You're entered each time for the grand prize of a $500 shopping spree and their award winning skin care package! Also if you play the game you could win something instantly! I didn't win my first time... but you can play once a day!

Sally Hansen - Their Twitter said they would have Cyber Monday deals... nothing is showing up as of this post. As soon as I see something I'll let you all know! Speaking of Sally, I found TONS of new prints in the Salon Effects at Walmart! I'm so excited to try them!! A couple I'm super excited for: giraffe and pink tiger/zebra stripes!

Hope you all get some great deals!!! If you find anything I missed, share it here! Happy shopping!!!

*** Update ***
A couple more deals I've found: If you're a fan of classic movies like I am, TCM is having a sale on their movies! Also, Butter London extended their Friends and Family sale! Just put in the code CELEBRATE11 to get your 30% off!

Sally Hansen Salon Effects Winter Collection Part 1

A couple of things to share today....... first, look what I've got in my hot little hands today! 

Sooo excited!! From left to right: Peppermint Twist, Snow Bunny, Prep's Cool, and Plaid About You. I'll post a picture later in this post of my first one. I'm doing Prep's Cool first! (I'm saving the others as they're more Christmasy!) 

Secondly, I wanted to share another eye makeup look! 

This look is just like the smokey eye, except it's from Too Faced's Natural Eye palette. This is also from the 'Fashion' instruction card for that palette. I have both pictures so it shows more of the eyeliner and the mascara. I just started doing the lower lash liner over only half of my eye. This trick I got from Jessie James' makeup video. (@TheJessicaJames on twitter) Here is the link to her great makeup tutorial: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0iYs-cCXDG4&feature=player_embedded

I swear I don't walk around with my eyes like that. Only wanted to show the liner AND the shadow in that pic. lol For everything else, please refer to the My Favorite Things post! 

Ok, Prep's Cool has been applied! 

Thoughts? I like the pattern! I thought this print stuck to my fingers more than the others... but that didn't seem to cause too much trouble really. Of course I did a full mani/pedi with these! HIGHLY recommend doing this so you get your full money's worth out of it. DO NOT keep the leftover strips (I try to make it so I only have one left over from each set) because they will dry out. If you haven't tried Sally Hansen's Salon Effects... do it! So easy and they look great! I promise you'll have people asking if you did them yourself. To which I always respond yes. ;-) I can't wait to try the other winter prints! Do you plan on trying any of them? If so, which ones? Share! =) 

Finally, I must recommend that everyone go see The Muppets! I saw it tonight and LOVED IT. It had adult humor, tons of celeb cameos and of course, nostalgia. I'm pretty sure I was smiling the entire movie. Sooo great. Go see it! =) 

Hope you all have a wonderful blessed Thanksgiving! And be sure to get some great polish and/or makeup deals on Black Friday! 

My Favorite Things: Smokey Eyes and Hillary Scott

Today I thought I would share with you a few favorite things. First up, one of my eye makeup looks.

This look is actually pretty easy. Before you do anything I recommend using some kind of shadow primer. I never used this before I purchased Too Faced's Shadow Insurance. 

It's kind of pricey at $18, however it should last quite awhile as a little goes a long way. What I love about this primer is that it helps to really show the true color of shadows and it protects against creasing! Love it and will never be without it from now on! Next up, I simply use Too Faced's Smokey Eye Palette. 

I honestly was scared to try a smokey eye before this. I always thought I'd look like I had a black eye or something. Not so with this palette! You can go as smokey as you want. This look is the most I go and is directly from the 'Fashion' instruction card. The only thing I don't do is shadow on the lower lashes. I also add some of the White Lie shadow right under my brows on this look just because I don't like bare skin on my eyes when I do shadow. The great thing about these palettes is they come with the instruction cards which are so easy to follow! Once shadow is done I apply my eyeliner. The liner I use is seriously AMAZING. I use Kat Von D's Tattoo Liner in Trooper. 

It's a liquid liner but in the form of a marker or felt tip pen almost. It doesn't smear and the pen style makes it simple to apply. Also, it seems to last forever. I bought my first one months ago. Thinking I would run out at an inopportune time I bought another. That was probably two months ago. I still haven't opened the new one. I also put some Cover Girl concealer under my eyes. For my brows I use Almay's brow pencil. Finally my mascara! I am a total mascara fiend. I love anything that will make my lashes look long and full! I was using Benefit's They're Real! Mascara for a bit, but after awhile I felt like it wasn't working as well as it originally was and just wasn't worth $21. I decided to give Maybelline's Falsies mascara another shot after seeing it on the Today show. They must've changed the formula because it now is amazing! I now use The Falsies Flared mascara. LOVE IT! And that's it for my eyes! Highly recommend all of these products! Try them, I promise you'll love them! 

To finish, I want to spend a moment talking about one of my most favorite people. Hillary Scott of Lady Antebellum. 

Why is she one of my favorite people? Well besides being in my favorite band, she is also a gorgeous REAL woman who I totally could see being my BFF. I've met her twice and seriously... such a sweet kind person! Now, what I do I mean by a REAL woman you ask? She has curves. She isn't a skinny minnie. And I love that. I too have curves and am no skinny minnie. Hillary shows me that you don't have to be tiny skinny to be beautiful. So, though I'm sure she won't ever read this, Hillary, you are beautiful. Thank you for being an inspiration to me and many other women! 

So ladies, who's one of your favorite people that inspires you? 

Pretty Purple Polish

Alliteration! I suppose this is the second post for the day since I posted sooo incredibly late last night (or early this morning... ha!). However, I figured I'd post on the last layering I did that I received tons of compliments on!

Ignore the edges. Got a little sloppy. lol Ok, so this is the first layering I did after I bought my Muppets colors. Again, I started with Sephora by OPI base coat. I then applied two coats of butter London's HRH (seriously one of my most favorite shades!!). Next I applied however much I felt looked good of OPI's Divine Swine. Finished off with Sephora by OPI top coat. 

Also wanted to let you all know that if you are thinking of trying butter London, now is a good time! They are having their Friends and Family sale now through November 23! 30% off of online orders! I will say about butter London after having tried several shades... it seems to chip easily. I need to try applying the lacquers on my Sephora base coat and see if it helps. I have been applying them over BL's Nail Foundation and honestly don't think the foundation is worth it. It doesn't seem to help. But BL has done well in my layering. The thing I love about BL is they have seriously fun colors! My current favorite is Black Knight which is part of the Holiday 2011 Collection. So I would give them a try if you see a color that you really like.

www.butterlondon.com

I've had a request to try water marbling which is something I've been wanting to try for awhile. So that will be something I'll give a go here soon! Any other requests? Questions on polishes or makeup? Send them my way! I'll try to answer as best I can! 

Where To Begin....

My first blog..... where to begin? Thanks to my dear friend Denae's encouragement, I've started one. The suggestion was to write a blog about nail polishes as I've been really getting into experimenting with different polishes lately. However, I decided in the end to keep it open to not only polish, but makeup and fashion. Probably more polish and makeup than fashion. But when the mood strikes, I'll include some. So, for my first post I'll go over my most recent polish experiment. I decided to do my 'holiday' colors early as Sally Hansen has their new winter Salon Effects out and I want to get on those ASAP! (they truly are the most amazing way to liven up your nails! And so incredibly easy!) Ok, the nails.

This is so basic and easy.... all I did was layer! I started out with Sephora by OPI base coat. I then applied two coats of butter London's Knees Up. Once that was relatively dry I added however much I felt looked good of OPI's Gettin' Miss Piggy with It on top! Finished off with Sephora by OPI top coat. So far I've found that their base and top coat works really well and the mani stays chip free for at least a week if not longer. Knees Up is what I think of as almost a patent-y red if that makes sense. It's a metallic red but when I look at it I think of patent leather heels. 

 

Gettin' Miss Piggy with It looks thicker than it is in the bottle. It's in fact a sheer glitter with a clear base. So I've found that it's best used for layering. It would take more coats than I want to mess with by itself. The glitter in this polish is a ruby red with large silver hex glitters. I will say that this glitter (as with all) is difficult to remove. However in this, the silver hex is the biggest problem. You really have to let them soak up the remover a bit more than with other glitters. But the look is worth it! 

I'll have this look on for probably about a week.... I need to go buy up the Sally Hansen prints which I will post as soon as I try them. Next post will be another layering that I did before this one. I'm also thinking of doing a post on favorite makeups... thoughts?