MAC Euristocrats II Collection: Released (USA)

Hi Beauties,

The MAC Euristocrats II Collection has been released in the USA.

Please Click Here for Product Info

XOXO,
Awilda

Jane of the Jungle

As much as I love and lust after high end brands, I often browse my local Superdrug, Boots, and even Sainsbury's (mine sells Cargo!) to find some good deals and special offers. Therefore, I was not surprised to find that the affordable company Sleek has come out with some great new products for the summer.

Recently, with this unbearable heat, I have been wearing minimal makeup and keeping everything pretty neutral with 'earthy' colours. I have therefore reached for Sleek's new Safari palette a number of times.

This palette contains 12 mineral based eyeshadows (both matte and shimmer) for just £4.88.These shadows are quite pigmented and true to colour in the pan, and I really like that they are not all shimmery (my favourite is the matte green in the bottom row). For such a low price this is definitely a great deal as the colours are pretty and very wearable.

The texture of the shadows is similar to any other pressed mineral make up and behaves in the same way as a pressed pigment so you have to be careful with fallout, or use them wet to give a more dramatic effect. I often find that mineral shadows such as these work better applied with your fingers.

Here is a simple daytime look I did using this pallette.
I used the shimmery beige all over the lid (L to R 5th on bottom row), the matte light brown in the crease (1st on the bottom row), the shimmery brown (last on bottom row and dupe for MAC twinks) on the lower lashline with a thin line of the matte black (1st on top row) as a liner along my upper lashline.
Now I am lusting after the acid palette!! I can't wait to try it, but can never seem to find it :(.
Do you guys own any Sleek palettes?

Summer Dress Inspired 3

Another video for a light summery look inspired by my dress :).
Products used:
UDPP
MAC painterly paint pot
MAC vellum, felt blue, scene, print, crystal avalanche and gesso e/s
Barry M dazzledust 20
NYX jumbo pencil
Maybelline unstoppable mascara

Maybelline blush 001

MAC saint germain and bubbles l/s

Who else revels in seeing celebs without makeup?

Whenever I see pictures of celebrities looking very plain or downright rough without makeup I have these conflicting feelings inside me, like a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other...one says "ha ha, look at them, don't they look awful, so they're not natural beauties afterall!" and then the other one says "oh god, I feel sorry for them, I would be so mortified if someone took a pic of me looking like that and I was a laughing stock with all my flaws being scrutinised".

Us girls are always trying to achieve perfection with our clothes, makeup and hair and we look to these celebs to provide us with an image to aspire to. I think we all kinda forget that they're human too. None of them are perfect and all the airbrushing that goes on in magazines and soft focus cameras being used in adverts just perpetuates the myth that they are flawless. We have to remember that they themselves admit that when they see pictures of themselves in photo shoots, they wish they looked like that in real life.

I have to hand it to them for stepping outside the front door without applying any makeup coz I personally would never ever do that, especially not if I was in the public eye. You just know that the next week your face would be splashed over magazines like Heat commenting on how crap you look.

Even though it's so easy to laugh at them and poke fun, I think we should probably give these girls a break. Maybe by going out without make up on they're trying to make girls like us feel less pressured to conform to a perfect image that the media creates. Even the most beautiful supermodels in the world don't look great without the help of a professional make up artist.

We often forget that these celebs spend more than we earn in a month just to look good for one night on the red carpet...there's hairdressers, make-up artists, stylists, manicurists etc all paid to ensure that they look perfect.

So girls, the point I'm trying to make is that we should stop beating ourselves up when we look in the mirror some days and see spots or dry skin or bad hair...no one is perfect and who would want to be? I think that would be boring and it would mean I wouldn't have to buy make up anymore...I would have to find a new hobby!I have fun just playing with make up and it makes me feel good just simply making an effort. So just remember, the celebs who are celebrated as being the most beautiful women in the world have to work hard to look that way, it's not natural perfection, it's just make up. The sooner us women accept and appreciate what god gave us, the better. He gave me a decent canvas to work with and I'm gonna use it!

Amen!

Possible freebies and shameful spending

1. The PR people at Tresemme contacted me last night via email to tell me that they still have some 24 Hour Body sets to give away to willing testers. So if, like me, you weren't blessed with a flowing mane of thick bouncy hair and you want to try the volumising products out for yourself, then click here http://bit.ly/TWemE and you can sign up and maybe get some free stuff...freebies always put a smile on my face!
2. I have been extremely bad...after my huge haul of make up and clothes the other day, I promised myself I wouldn't get anything else...but I gave in to some MAC loveliness and convinced myself that I absolutely NEEDED the following items and ordered them:

• Solar Bits in Impassioned and Scatterays
• Lustre Drops in Sun Rush
• Select Cover-Up Concealer - been searching for my HG concealer for ages and dying to try the MUFE Full Cover one but as far as I know, you can only get it in Sephora or the US and I don't have access to either :(
• Mineralize Skinfinish Natural in Medium
• Paint Pot in Rubenesque
• Lipstick in Hue
• Eye Shadow in Omega (After reading Belle Du Jour's post on this e/s and how it's the perfect neutral brown for her, given that we have similar colouring, I had to try it!)

3. On my third point, after reading a post on The Yummy Mummy's Beauty Blog, I ordered the Babylis Hot Pink Conical Wand from www.lookfantastic.co.uk in a quest to get nice loose beachy waves...a review will follow when I get it in the post!

Conclusion? Reading beauty blogs is very very bad for my finances!