Monday 17 June 2013

NOTD-Turquoise Sparkle

I am awful at painting nails-I previously confessed this in my "beauty things I suck at" post. But God loves a trier! Even though the weather has been decidedly unsummer-like, I've loved wearing bright colours on my nails, and when I want to do this I always reach for Barry M nail polishes-they are cheap but brilliant quality. 
For these sparkly turquoise nails, I applied the Gelly Hi-Shine Nail Paint in Guava-this is a recently released colour, it is opaque in one coat and dries super quick. On top I applied two coats of the Nail Paint in Aqua Glitter. These colours are an exact match and the result was a shimmery sparkly bright turquoise delight. It reminds me of swimming pools and blue skies on holiday. It's also foolproof-if I can do this anyone can. What colours have you been wearing on your nails for summer? Thanks for reading, Love Steph xxx



Sunday 9 June 2013

Max Factor Colour Elixir Giant Pen Stick

Nearly every makeup brand has brought out some kind of twisty uppy lip pencil product, and I myself have reviewed a couple, but I haven't read much about Max Factors offering. These are called Colour Elixir Giant Pen Sticks, they were released a good few months ago and they caught my eye on a display in Boots. 
There were a gorgeous range of shades available to choose from, including a bright pink, a red and a deeper berry colour but as I'm still holding out hope that we get some kind of summer, I opted for the shade "Subtle Coral". The reason I was drawn to these was because when I swatched them they had a beautiful hi shine finish-like a pigmented gloss in pencil form. However, the product on the lips doesn't have that sticky feeling some glosses have, and it feels quite moisturising. I love the color of this, which the shade name describes perfectly-it's a gorgeous natural coral which, in my opinion, absolutely anyone will suit. I find orange/coral a hard shade to get right on the lips-some make your teeth look yellow, and some need a tan to be worn without looking like your ill! This pencil doesn't twist up so it needs to be sharpened. The lasting power without eating or drinking anything is about 2 hours. But I wouldn't really expect anything more from a glossy moisturising finish so this doesn't bother me personally but worth keeping in mind if you're looking for something long lasting. I think this is going to be my favourite lip product this summer and I really would recommend the Max Factor Colour Elixirs-I'd definitely love to get some more colours. Have you tried these? Thanks for reading, Love Steph xxx




Saturday 8 June 2013

How I store my makeup

I decided to share how I store my makeup in a post today-it's not perfect and I have issues keeping my kids grubby little mitts off my goodies so I am intending on getting a more sturdy set of drawers in the near future from Ikea to match my malm dresser. But for now this is it.
As I mentioned, I use the malm desk from ikea as my dresser, on top of which are my brushes, stored in a couple of pen/stationery holders. These are a shiny black quilted texture and were a bargain at £2.99 each from Home Bargains. My lipsticks stay in acrylic holders which I got from eBay for £3.49 each, these are so handy as I can keep each brand stored together, or colour co-ordinate if I want, and it means with them all on display I don't forget about things I've bought.
On my windowsill beside the desk I keep my Sleek and MUA eyeshadow palettes in an old glossy box and my MAC and Stila palettes are slotted alongside.
Directly under the dresser is a small set of bathroom storage drawers which holds the bulk of my stash. I bought this a couple of years ago from Argos, and the dividers in some of the drawers I inserted myself-they're made of fabric and are wardrobe organisers from Ikea. In the top drawer I keep base products-foundation, concealer, powder, highlighters and bronzers. The separated section is all blush.
In the second drawer I keep lip pencils, with the divider holding lip glosses.
The third drawer is home to eye pencils, false lashes, liquid and gel liners and spare mascara.
The bottom drawer and my favourite one is for all my loose eyeshadows, smaller palettes, pigments and eyeshadow bases.
How do you store your makeup? Thanks for reading, Love Steph xxx