BareMinerals’ More Than You Hoped For kit

Fourth and final kit in the “Perfect Gift A-D” series from QVC.

BBAC 2011: Day One

OPI’s Hong Kong collection

Originally I wasn’t interested in this collection - it looked like too many colors that were nice enough, but nothing incredibly special. Then I got one shade. Then another. And about a year later, a third. (You know how it goes.) Currently I own four colors from this collection,...

China Glaze’s Harmony

It's a lovely purple…but sadly, there's that spreadability problem that's dogged every single one of the other polishes from the Romantique collection!! (Though thankfully, China Glaze seems to have fixed that problem as later metallics have been sturdier and have applied better.) This works fine for nail art, though...

The 2011 Beauty Blog Advent Calendar

Starting tomorrow, December 1, three of us - Sirvinya, Phyrra, and myself - will each be posting a little tidbit every day. It might be a mini writeup of why we love a particular technique so much. It might be a link to another beauty blog post that we found really...

OPI’s Merryberry Mauve

There were apparently two Merryberry Mauves in the Victorian Holiday collection: this one, and a glitter. I like this one far better!! (And I haven't been able to find the glitter anywhere, so I guess it's synchronicity at work again. What everyone else snapped up I had little interest in,...

BareMinerals’ Pretty Amazing Lip Color in Savvy

Full-opacity warm rose-tan - this is not one of those new glosses, though this is one of the newer shades. I don't love nude lip colors unless there's a nice finish to them (like NYX's Earthy Black Diamond lipstick). This does make a good base for some of my darker...

NYX Cosmetics’ Volcano Black Label Lipstick (120)

The tube looks orange-red, but the shade itself applies as a semisheer pinked warm red. The color is a little hard to pin down, and it perhaps isn't as vivid a color as I would have thought for something named “Volcano”...but it's not the first NYX item name that...

Lost in Makeupland’s X-mas Special

It's not semisheer, but it does apply just a tiny bit less intense than it looks in the pot. Not that much, though - it's a really lovely “antique holiday” red that reminds me a bit of Meow Cosmetics' Future glow powder, but with the greater color payoff you'd expect...

Concrete Minerals’ Harlequin

Medium olive with a silver-purple shimmer and -=almost=- a duochrome effect. It reminds me of BE's Festive, which pleasantly surprised me with how multifaceted it was…but CM's Harlequin costs less per gram and it looks prettier than BE's Festive. So double bonus there. There's less of the...