Storing Makeup

Somewhere in between my Hello Waffle and Darling Girl Halloween shopping binge, I realized that I hadn't gone through my stash and tried to organize it in a cohesive manner in a while. As of now, a lot of my makeup is scattered between a few bags so there wasn't an easy way to assess it all quickly. Now a month ago I had assessed the way I stored my makeup and figured it would come down to two options:

1. I convert a space into a vanity of some sort and use a drawer system. The best thing I could find to emulate this would be a hardware storage for parts and then I could figure out how the other pieces (such as brushes or other tools) would fit in. 
2. Get a new train kit to store everything I had.

Both have their limitations -- the first option is limited on space and the other was out of my price range. I shelved the idea for a bit till the binge occurred because I quickly realized that if I can't access my makeup to make purchasing decisions, then there would be a problem. So the quickest solution was to look around the house and sure enough, I found a decent solution.

A while ago when my boyfriend and I visited Disney World, he purchased the Disney Wonderland Tea Boxed Assortment for me because we both love tea and the box is beautiful. The only problem was that the dividers took up a fair amount of space so if I left them in, they couldn't all fit. If I took them out, then items would slide around. The solution was adorable but not practical for storage. 

I checked around for alternative solutions that could knock around a bit were it in storage. After seeing a few pictures of storage alternatives on /r/indiemakeupandmore, I figured I could give those photograph storage bins a shot. If not, we have plenty of Legos that could be put in there instead. I decided to go with a small version to see if it would actually work so I got the IRIS Photo and Craft Keeper.

The bin comes with six 4" x 6" cases inside. Unfortunately, for a lot of the eyeshadow pots I have, I can't store them on their side so that I can see their colour so that means I needed to split up each of them by colour. I opted to put them in upside down since I'm storing the larger container on it's end (pictured below).

Above is my collection of the reds, pinks, and oranges. Of the ones that are in there, only the small Darling Girl pots and Hello Waffle eyeshadows can be stored on their side which means that there isn't too much room to spare. On the bright side, which this seems naturally limiting, there are 5 more containers to sort it all out. If you have a larger collection then going up in size may be the best option. 

I definitely did wish that I could go back to just using my tea box but for now this method would be best since it's sturdy for storage whereas the tea box would be best for display and everyday use. But hey, who knows how my collection will evolve. Especially since there's always more makeup to be had. 

Darling Girl Cosmetics, Part 1

A little over a week ago, I received my large Darling Girl Cosmetics order. Unfortunately due to a variety of things, I wasn't able to get to swatching but I started today! The last time I ordered from Darling Girl was about a year ago and I ended up giving away most of my makeup to a close friend who wanted to get into cosmetology. As a result, I ended up splurging a bit to rebuild my collection. In doing so, I had to analyze how I was going to store them all which I'll get into a bit later. I forgot to take pictures when I first unwrapped them so here's a quick look of what is in store. 

All of the white caps are from Darling Girl. Yep, a lot.

For the first set of swatches, I grabbed the reds, pinks, oranges, golds, and silvers. I guess in my frenzy I forgot to purchase anything yellow. :) As we go through all the swatches, I will be using Dreamworld Hermetica Eye of Ra Eye as the primer. Please remember that you can click to enlarge the photos. 

Outdoor Light

Indoor Light

I grabbed the eyeshadows from different collections so some of these also include The Black Collection and Who Ya Gonna Call. Also note that Hello Fall was the gift with purchase for the week that I ordered. Now while I was swatching these, the last 4 didn't look like they were very much present when I was in a dimly lit area. They really stood out once I got into natural light which you can see set them apart. As I was swatching, I really liked The Safety Dance, but looking back on the swatches, I'm pretty impressed by Obviously a Wig, Sex on Fire, and Hello Fall. 

Moving on to what I thought were the golds and silvers, I ran into issues rather quickly due to how glittery they were. In general a lot of these were pretty difficult to swatch without trying to pack as much pigment into the area as best I could. They just didn't want to stick to my skin, even with the primer. 

Outdoor Light

Indoor Light

A lot of these hail from the Who Ya Gonna Call collection and Impervious at the end was a sample that was included. I had high hopes for That's a Big Twinkie, There is No Dana, and Tragic Death of Mr. Stay Puft. Overall I like them but they were very hard to brush on so you might even be able to see each brush stroke. Again, this may be do the the glittery nature and perhaps a different type of primer would be better with this set. Nonetheless, the colours that really impressed me was The Apocalypse There is No Dana. I rather like Impervious but I will admit, I wasn't sure what colour it was supposed to be till it was on my skin because in the bag it looked like blue and brown. 

I've still got the blues, greens, and purples to finish swatching so hopefully I'll get to that soon. Darling Girl Cosmetics are available for purchase for $2.50-$5.90 depending on the size. Seeing as this is my second huge order and the first was happily donated to a budding cosmetologist, you can imagine that I really enjoy these products. I do think that if you're going to go down the rabbit hole of duochrome or glitter eyeshadows, you do need to have the right primer  though. Luckily, Darling Girl carries 3 types. :)

The Powers of a Primer

Items used were purchased or received complimentary.

Last week when I swatched a few eyeshadows, I was amazed at how far the Dreamworld Hermetica Eye of Ra Eye Dew took the eyeshadows. Now it's not that I hadn't tried eyeshadow primers in the past -- I tried the Urban Decay Primer Potion and it didn't seem to help the eyeshadows much. Actually if memory served correct, it worked similarly to a regular facial primer so for a while I was just disappointed with eyeshadows and primers altogether because I felt as though my combination of skin tone and undertones had a way of undoing the colour. Not one to give up hope entirely, I heard that Fyrinnae's Pixie Epoxy and Darling Girl's Glitter Glue were the Holy Grails of glittery eyeshadow. So I sprang for Darling Girl's Glitter Glue and while preparing for it's arrival I figured I should go through my stash to sort out all my makeup. Go figure, in my stash was another primer from Dreamworld Hermetica and so I started swatching with that.

If you're wondering why I went into this elongated explanation of my discovery of how I got around to finally realizing what everyone else realized, keep in mind that there was a part of me that resigned myself to never pulling off one of those amazing smoking eye looks. 

To test the powers of a good primer I decided to reswatch my Sugarpill eyeshadows because I use them more often. 

From left to right: Stella, Love+, Tako, and
Bulletproof with no primer.

From left to right: Stella, Love+, Tako, and
Bulletproof over a regular primer.

From left to right: Bulletproof, Love+, and Tako
over the Eye of Ra Eye Dew 

I sort of mixed up the colours when I swatched them again -- I no longer have Stella because I gave that to a friend. However you can see the difference immediately. The colours pop SO MUCH and really have better coverage overall with the help of the primer. So if you're like me and have a really hard time with getting eyeshadows to show, I'd highly recommend looking into different primers specific to eyeshadows or glittery eyeshadows in particular.

I haven't gotten around to trying out Fyrinnae's Pixie Epoxy and Darling Girl's Glitter Glue just yet but they are on my radar. You can purchase each of these through the brand's website.

• Darling Girl's Glitter Glue, $6.75
• Dreamworld Hermetica Eye of Ra Eye Dew, $5.39
• Fyrinnae's Pixie Epoxy, $7

Anastasia Beverly Hills Tamanna Palette

Items used were gifts or received complimentary.

My experience with Anastasia Beverly Hills prior to this palette had been somewhat limited. A few months ago I got myself the stencils which have been an amazing addition to my collection. I had no idea that the line included makeup so the first time I heard about the Tamanna and Maya Mia palettes piqued my attention. After much internal debate, I told myself that once my no-buy was over, I would probably treat myself to the Tamanna palette. Fast forward to a few weeks later and my friend Laura surprised me with a gift -- the Tamanna palette. She read the reviews and knew my struggles with eyeshadow and figured it would be a great fit for me. 

From the moment I received, I loved the packaging. Upon inspecting each shade of the eyeshadow, I figured that the problematic ones would most likely be Fresh, Gilded, and Custom but that was before I started swatching.

My initial swatches weren't great since I did them but you can easily draw some conclusions for yourself. Each of the colours directly align to how you see them in the palette. This first attempt to swatch was over CoverFX SPF 30 Protection Primer which is my standard primer. To confirm my suspicions, all the ones that I thought would be difficult on my skin held true (translation: I was right about Fresh, Gilded, and Custom not showing up well on my skin.

I wasn't quite content with how the images turned out and furthermore I figured that I should try to actually use an eyeshadow primer instead. So today I went back and tried each eyeshadow over Dreamworld Hermetica Eye of Ra Eye Dew.

Taking a look at the top row, which is Fresh, Blush, Venezia, Gilded, and Custom and you'll notice that now with an appropriate eyeshadow primer, those colours pop giving them a whole new dimension that a regular primer just can't do. 

In the second set we're seeing Sangria, Bengal, Chocolate, China Rose, and Noir. Again, another amazing performance for getting these colours to really stand out. What absolutely amazes me is Noir because that is the shade of black that I have long coveted. When Laura gifted this palette to me, she mentioned that Noir is perfect for using as an eyeliner and I can definitely see that.

I knew I wanted this palette but being able to swatch it made me love it even more. I will highly recommend that you have an eyeshadow primer to go along with this palette to get those colours to really shine.

The  Tamanna Palette is available for purchase from Ulta, Sephora, and Anastasia Beverly Hills for $29. 

MAC Colour 4 Eyeshadow Quad

Items used were gifts or received complimentary.

Have I mentioned how awesome my family is? Well, if not, they are. Earlier this year on a trip to Florida to visit some relatives, my cousin gifted me the MAC Colour 4 Eyeshadow Quad. Now I will admit that I'm not that familiar with MAC makeup in general since I started using indie products, but I was definitely in love with the selection in this palette. Imagine my surprise when I realized that this new and never touched before quad was circa 2010 and it seems to work well with me. 

In this quad we'll be looking at Manila Paper, Flip, Aztec Brick, and Creole Beauty. I used the Dreamworld Hermetica Eye of Ra Eye Dew which is tacky and is available for purchase for $5.39. Ellie did send me this primer a while ago but due to some issues I experienced at the time, I hadn't gotten around to really putting it to use. With that being said, this is actually my first time giving this eye primer a whirl but I am pretty impressed with it. 

About the eye shadows, I did have a hard time getting the colour to pack in and I'm not sure if that's because of the primer or the eyeshadows themselves. With that being said, the colour was magnificent as you'll see below. 

I was pretty impressed with how all the colours came out. Creole Beauty was a bit too light and hard to capture on me but overall, 3 out of 4 isn't too bad. Plus I imagine that I can find other ways of really accentuating the last colour. 

The takeaway is that this is great palette overall. The problem is that yes, it was in an older run and attempts to actually find it has been slim (which I didn't realize till after I started writing this). So thank you to Alisha for providing this very awesome quad from MAC and to Ellie of Dreamworld Hermetica for the primer.

Hello Waffle Eyeshadows

On Thursday I received my order from Hello Waffle which is an indie company that operates in Canada. For months I had gone back and forth about what exactly I wanted from the shop till finally I decided to take the plunge. I placed my order on August 23rd so in terms of shipping from Canada, the wait wasn't that bad. I wish I had taken a picture of the packaging however I was so excited that I forgot -- I will say that the shipping packaging was great for getting these eyeshadows through the mail. Each eyeshadow for the full size  cost $6.00 (US) and according to my receipt shipping to the States was $6.00. Onward!

When I first finally decided on what I was going to get, I knew that there was a risk that many of these might not show up on my skin. It happens a lot so I didn't get my hopes up. That wasn't to say that I wasn't going to be incredibly excited if they did work out. Please note that along the top of each swatch is the Smashbox primer. These eyeshadows seemed to not care about the primer at all so perhaps I'll revise the swatches when I have a primer that is appropriate for eyeshadows. Also, while I did purchase the majority of these, the owner kindly tossed in Fusion and Cat Fluff as freebies. The descriptions of each shade is directly from the Hello Waffle website. Enjoy!

Indoor Lighting

From Left to Right: Fusion, Galaxy Dust, Hobgoblin, Hot Cross Bunnies,
Thorns, Whale Hello There, Rainforest, and Cravings.

Trying to capture the shimmer outdoors.

• Fusion: Reddened purple shimmer.
• Galaxy Dust: Dark teal with subtle purple shift.
• Hobgoblin Lively olive green with silver and green sparkle.
• Hot Cross Bunnies: Light purple with golden sheen 
• Thorns:  Black with darkened gold shimmer
• Whale Hello There: Pale shimmery lilac, leans blue.
• Rainforest: Vibrant green-blue with sparkles.
• Cravings: Dark purple shimmer with gold sparkle.

Of this grouping, I knew that the darker colours would be just fine against my skin. The ones I was taking a risk with were Hot Cross Bunnies and Whale Hello There but they both took me by surprised. As you can see in the swatches above, they are quite clear and distinct. The one that I felt the most ambivalent about was Thorns however I figured that if I layered it over a black eyeshadow or even over a dark gray one, that should get it to pop a bit more.

Indoor Lighting

From Left to Right: Cat Fluff, Mendelssohn, Pachelbel, Vivaldi, Chopin,
Tchaikovsky, Lust, and Wrath.

Outdoor Lighting

• Cat Fluff: Dark grey, leans green with green and gold sparkles.
• Mendelssohn: Light pink with golden sheen.
• Pachelbel: Sparkly white-gold, wedding-like.
• Vivaldi: Copper red with silver sparkles. 
• Chopin: Romantic soft gray-purple duochrome.
• Tchaikovsky: Vibrant gold with red, silver, and blue sparks.
• Lust: Dark berry with purple and blue shifts.
• Wrath: Muted dark gray-green with silver sparks.

This group definitely had more of the eyeshadows whose pigmentation I was worried about. I've been on a bit of a rose gold quest lately so in that pursuit, I've been looking into a lot of pinks, peaches, and gold. I haven't had much luck but I keep trying anyway.

Moving along, while Mendelssohn didn't seem to show up much in the natural light photos, it did in the indoor photograph which is the first one. It is a bit demure which is fine especially if it's blended with another colour. Taking note of that, I was surprised that Pachelbel and Tchaikovsky had such great pigmentation to them. Of this group, I was pleasantly surprised by all of them and got exactly what I expected.

I am glad that I finally took the leap and ordered from Hello Waffle. All of the eyeshadows seem to be highly pigmented and have that added bonus of looking almost a bit different in outdoor and in door lighting. These are a great addition to my collection and I'll be sure to keep my eye on their collections (especially since I'm hoping that there will be a Halloween collection). 

Dreamworld Hermetica Avalon Matte Samples

Items were received by Dreamworld Hermetica complimentary.

A while ago, Dreamworld Hermetica was looking for testers for their new matte line and volunteered. Unfortunately, life caught up with me and I was unable to provide my feedback in a timely manner. While I did swatch the samples, I have had very little time to experiment much with it. Hopefully later this weekend, I'll have more to show you. For the time being though, here are the swatches!

This particular line is the Avalon Mattes and each colour is marvellously brilliant. At first I thought I'd be receiving a few samples but definitely not the whole collection which was previously unreleased. In addition to each eyeshadow, the company sent an eye primer, and a jar of both Mistletoe and Grendel's Mother (which are from the Medieval Collection). Below you'll find the entire series along with the swatches. Please remember that you can click on the pictures to enlarge them a bit. 

Apple Island, Avalon Nyght, Laird, Sayge, Small Sea, and The Grove.

Ygraine, Woad, Noble, Chalice, Blade, and Avalon Sunset.

Arthur's Shield, Druid's Earth, Into the Myst, Pagan, Round Table, Grendel's Mother, and Mistletoe.

Darling Girl Cosmetics Haul

My order arrived from Darling Girl Cosmetics on Friday and I was so excited to see it. Darling Girl currently has a high turnaround time (14-16 days) and when I checked in, the store was closed (likely to catch up on orders). I didn't fret about it, but I also didn't expect the package till next week so I was pretty content to see it waiting for me.

Now I admit, I totally forgot exactly what I ordered. I remembered the colours but I forgot that I ordered "petits" (which are in 3g jars) rather than samples (which are in zip lock bags). Part of my intent with this haul was to practice pressing eyeshadows so when it arrived and I found that they were in jars, my reaction was: "Darn it, the packaging is so cute, I don't want to press these." 

The pictures above are from the night that I first got them. I didn't really organize them properly so I had to align them again but take down their names. Off to the side on the right, you'll see two differently shaped items and that is the sample of "All of the Pumpkin" which is a gift with purchase and a sample of Burnished, one of the Wet Paint Pots (WPP). DG's WPP are of a creamy consistency that can be worn alone or layered with other eyeshadows.

Okay so, the samples are to the left now, and this time they are vaguely aligned in a way that I could remember the colours. Below you'll find the names of everything with the exception of the blush, Purple Haze, which I'll write about in another post.

My favourites from all of the swatches are: London Calling, Incognito, Attack of the 50ft Woman, Leviathan, and Monther Within. I think they all have a place in my collection, but some definitely stand out more than others. I haven't tried them out for longevitiy or tried them just yet in a look, but I have high hopes for all of them. I just need to figure out how to draw out "All of the Pumpkin" and "Burnished."

I did want to note that I did press the sample of "All of the Pumpkin" though. The sample size doesn't come with a sifter so it was a bit messy when I opened it. The shop did tape it down so it didn't make a mess anywhere else, but I realized that it would be friendly in it's loose format if I were in a rush in the morning (which I usually am) or if I were traveling. 

So after I was done swatching the first row, I ran into the "lab" and pressed it. 

---

Product: Darling Girl Cosmetics Eyeshadows

Price: Varies based on size. The petits were $2.50 and the full size (blush) was $5.90.

Stars: ★★★★★

Would Recommend? Yes! 

Takeaway: DG has a variety of beautiful colours and any of them would be a welcomed addition to a collection (seriously, I just focused on colours that I didn't have already and I'm pretty impressed).