Favorite Products to Splurge On?

What's that one product that you don't care if it's expensive, you just have to have it or you have the buy the high-end version, not the drugstore version?

For me, I'd say it's foundation. I try to take very good care of my skin and some drugstore foundations just make my skin react awfully. (Some high end ones do too but anyway) I like to spend a little extra to make sure I get some good products. I like Clinique because most of their foundations are specifically for acne-prone skin or other skin issues. I've used the Even Better Foundation and I don't think that it made too much of a difference when it came to evening out the tone but heck if I can remember what my skin looked like the day before. However it felt really nice on my face and I feel more at ease knowing that it's from a skincare brand. Not just Clinique though I also don't mind spending a little extra and buying foundation from NARS or my new favorite the Kat Von D Lock-It Tattoo Foundation. I do love some drugstore foundations of course but as for splurging, I like doing it for some good quality foundations.
My favorite drugstore foundation? Neutrogena Healthy Skin Foundation. If you'd like to see a full review on that or a video featuring it in my foundation routine let me know!

So what's your splurgeworthy product?

Too Faced Love Sweet Love Set

Recently I went to Ulta and got this set from Too Faced and I've been obsessed with it. This is the description of it from Ulta's website:

 

Description

A collection that celebrates the notion that life is never sweeter than when you're in love. With that spirit, Too Faced created 2 romantic looks, complete with flirty eyes, flushing cheeks and seductively pouty lips; one look for day and another for night. Sweet Value: $130 value for only $46!

Book of Love: 6 eye shadows, 2 blushes, 2 lip glosses

Full-size Lashgasm Mascara

Deluxe Shadow Insurance

Deluxe Perfect Eyes Eye Liner in Perfect Black

Half-ounce Primed & Poreless Face Primer

Exclusive Teddy-Bear-Hair Multi-Purpose face brush

Exclusive gold embroidered velveteen make up bag

Day to Night: Two complete, romance-inspired looks for day and night

As you can tell you get so many products! I enjoy getting kits and sets before buying full sized products because as most of you know, they're insanely expensive (for those of us who aren't doctors or lawyers). You get decent sized products and if you don't like the way it performs, guess what, you have other products to try! Also, you typically get a nice clutch or bag with it! So that's my rant for kits. Onto this specific one...

First of all, I LOVE the bag it comes with. It's a blue/aquaish color and is very soft and actually a decent size! It says Too Faced on it as you can see in the picture and it's perfect for traveling when you only need to bring a few products.
The eyeshadow book comes with really nice, rich, pigmented colors. The book itself is gorgeous and fun to display on a vanity! I couldn't get a good picture of the shades but basically there's too looks they suggest you create with the 6 shadows. The first being a romantic daytime look with nice shimmery gold shades which I love using, they brighten up your eyes a lot! The nighttime look is nice too, with a dramatic black to use for defining your eyes! The blushes and lip colors are also very useful however my favorite part is the shadows.

The mascara it comes with is also very nice and the size makes it perfect to carry in your purse or... you can put it in your new Too Faced makeup bag when you travel! :D
You also get a generous sample size of shadow insurance with I thought was a very very good size, it's like the size of any other eye primer I've ever purchased! I have noticed it makes it a lot easier when applying shadows and definitely helps the shadow last.
The eyeliner I haven't really tested in regards to its lasting power or smudge-proof...-ness, but I do like it and it glides on very smoothly when applying, and I also use it on my lower lash line, and it's very hard to find a liner that is able to do that and still look nice.
The Primed and Poreless face primer feels great on your face, and when used with the right foundation I think it really does help create a flawless finish. I used it underneath Kat Von D's new Lock-It Tattoo Foundation which I might do a review on soon... and it did create a flawless face.
The face brush is nice, I use it for blush because of it's shape, I prefer to use buffing brushes for foundation and big powder brushes to apply powder (Check out ELF's Studio Brushes to find the ones I use) and typically an angled blush brush for blush and bronzer. However the brush is actually very very soft so it does work well.

Overall I think this set is a great asset to anyone's collection who enjoys makeup and trying products. It's $46, which is expensive to me but you get so much with it, it really is worth it. It's a lot less than heading to Walmart and trying to buy similar products. It would also make a great gift for any makeup lover in your life! The packaging is all done for you! The box it comes in also looks very nice as I think they're kind of meant to be given as gifts (or gifts to yourself, right?). So if you're feeling like you need some spice in your makeup collection, save some money, wait for some coupons or coupon codes and check it out!

Any thoughts of your own or questions? Leave a comment!!
 

Budget Beauty Product... ELF Makeup Mist&Set!

So I know I'm not the only one who loves a good beauty product for less than a twenty or even a ten, so I wanted to tell everyone about ELF (eyeslipsface) Makeup Mist and Set. This mist is comparable to Urban Decay's DeSlick or All Nighter sprays. You simply spray the mist onto your face before and after you apply your makeup, and it keeps your makeup looking fresh and keeps it from looking splotchy and such throughout the day. The only difference I've noticed is of course... the price. A travel size bottle (0.51 fl oz) of the Deslick or All Nighter is 12 dollars at Sephora or Ulta. A full size bottle of the ELF mist (2.02 fl oz) is 3 bucks. Yeah. I said that. 3 buckaroos. I think the full size of the Urban Decay mists are $29. You do receive a fairly large bottle, but still. They do perform similarly and that's all it comes down to really. I'm not going to go into a full on demo and review on either I just wanted to let you guys know about a good cheap dupe! Leave your thoughts in a comment! Or if you know of any other mists, please leave them here!

Influenster - new way to get involved in the beauty world!

I came across Influenster a while ago, when I was first getting into makeup and other beauty products. It's a great website if you love trying new products... and did I mention it's free? They just revamped their website also and it has become a lot of fun. It's kind of trickier than it was before, but I'm still getting used to it.
Basically with Influenster you unlock 'badges' that represent your life. For example I have a Collegiate Badge because I am in college. I also have badges for my interests in beauty, fitness, fashion, etc. There is something for everyone! Also, this site isn't just for young girls like myself, older women can also participate, and there's also a badge for mothers!
These badges qualify you for VoxBoxes, which are boxes of goodies and products that you get to review, and it's free! I've done a few boxes and I've discovered some amazing products from them. You can also look up reviews on products that others have tried to see what they think, and there's now a Q&A section where you can ask questions about products!
I know that now you have to request an invite to be accepted into the site and I don't know how long that takes or if they get "full" but I say give it a shot!
I also don't know if it is going to be harder to qualify for voxboxes now that you have to have a high "score" in your badges but I hope not. I'm fairly busy in my life and rarely have time to check the site every single day, and I hope they consider that because I love getting the boxes and trying out products I wouldn't even have known about otherwise.

If you'd like to check out Influenster or apply to be one, visit www.influenster.com and sign up. It's free and who knows, you might find your newest go-to beauty product! I know I've tried lots of products that I would not have bought if I didn't try them via Influenster first.

Newly discovered way to curl hair - No heat, and no dent in hair from clips!

So before I start this, you should know that I have awful hand-eye coordination and am extremely clumsy when it comes to using a curling iron. I'm also impatient and hate that when I try to use a curling iron it takes me an hour or so just to create the perfect look - and it never ends up perfect anyway! Sometimes I end up burning myself - and then comes the awkwardness of having to explain to people that no, it is in fact NOT a hickey, I simply can't maneauver a curling iron without harming myself. Anyway, sometimes you get that little dent at the very top and bottom of your hair when using a curling iron because of the clamp, which is annoying. Now that the curling wands without clamps have come out, it has become much easier, but I'm still clumsy, so I've still been trying to find other ways. Hot rollers still sometimes give you that dent because of the clips you put on after rolling the hair, so I had almost just decided to give up on curls forever and accept my hair to be wavy or straight forever (I can actually work a straightener - go figure) until I found these.

They're the CONAIR Pillow Soft Rollers. The packaging of mine is different because I actually bought the 24 pack and I couldn't find a picture and of course, my camera is going nuts! So this will do. So mine came with 24 and the picture of the gorgeous bouncy red hair is different but oh well! These rollers are so amazing and I don't know how long they've been out for but I just discovered them at a Rite-Aid and I wasn't even looking for rollers but I was buying a hairbrush I believe and I just noticed the huge section of rollers. I have a hot roller set and rarely get to use them because of how tricky they are - you have to pick the right size (and of course it only comes with a particular number of that size) and then worry about the clips, and wait for the set to heat up, etc. Anyway, I noticed these right away because they weren't the typical round cylinder shaped roller, so I grabbed them right away to try. Plus, it was a 24pack for 10 bucks! Pretty sure I've never gotten a nice set for that cheap. (I don't know if they're always that price or still that price but that was mine!) So I've used them many many times, and I thought maybe a Pro/Con list would be a good way to show you all what I liked/didn't like.

 

Pros



1. So incredibly easy to use. The roller's inside contains a wire, so there is no clip or clamp involved, which eliminates that dent problem. You just roll the hair around the roller and twist the wire like you would if you were tying one of those green twisties around a bag of fruit at the grocery store. (Is twistie the correct term? Oh well!) It's that easy.

2. There are no sizes. Which might matter to some, but to me that's great because I don't need to fish out a small or big roller, they're all the same! I feel like you can control the size of your curl if you really wanted to. For example if I want a tight spiral I'll just wrap the hair around the roller very tightly.

3. You can actually sleep in them. And I don't mean sleep awkwardly with a shower cap over your curlers and wake up looking like Mufasa. I mean you sleep comfortably, and the rollers stay in place for the most part. Because they're spongey and pillow soft they're very comfortable.

4. You can use these on wet or dry hair, which may not be that different from other rollers, but I don't like to put my wet hair onto a hot roller, doesn't feel right.

5. I have a lottttt of hair, and I didn't even use the whole 24 pack. I had some leftover rollers and was still fully satisfied.

6. Cheap!

 

Cons

 

1. I really don't have any cons... but the only one I can think of is that a few of my rollers have worn so that the wire kind of sticks out a little, which wasn't a big deal because I just pushed it back in. However they are very fragile I supposed when it comes to the material.

 

So there you have it, they get a total A+. I'm so amazed with how well they work. Typically I just put them in after a shower, throw on some hairspray and hit the sack. A few times I've used them in the morning and went over them with a blowdryer on the high setting and it works just as well. Dry hair is fine too, just be sure to apply some hairspray to set the curls and make sure you wait the right amount of time for the curl to set in. I think these are great for those of us who have issues with handling curling irons or would just rather let our hair curl itself while we sleep! You can just pop these in before bed and wake up with bouncy curls!

 

Thanks for reading! If you have any other curling products you recommend leave a comment! Or any products in general you'd like me to review. If you'd like to see a certain type of post let me know. I also have a youtube channel I'm trying to get out there but I'm trying to see if I can get some interest first. If you have ideas for future videos, feel free to leave a comment on that, too!

 

**I did not receive these rollers for free, I bought them with my own money and these opinions are my own. I'm not being compensated for any review and wouldn't accept it anyway.**