Bang for your buck: ELF cosmetics

I decided to check out ELF's site because twitter was all abuzz with how great their sales are. And they really are great. I probably spent about $25-30 on both of these hauls, and the second one came with a free complete brush set. ELF has a lot of different palette options for eyeshadows, as well as some great beauty products.

The nail polish cube was maybe one of the best buys out of all this. It was $10, and came with 14 nail polishes. They're mini-sized but great colours and have lasted well on my nails. The one I have is the "party" set, which comes with great pinks, greys/silvers, and greens, but the other sets are really beautiful too and I have a feeling I might go back and collect them all.

My other favourite is the Studio Prisim Eyeshadow Palette, which I have in "smoke", but also  comes in a great set of pinks, and everyday neutrals. The eyeshadows are really beautiful glimmers, and blend pretty easily. They're not so highly pigmented so you'll have to build up the colour if you want it really dark, but I really love the shades and the palette is a great deal, also at $10.

I was a bit hesitant to buy concealer over the internet without trying swatches first, but I took a bit of a gamble and went with their Studio Under Eye Concealer & Highlighter. The coverage is surprisingly good, the colour worked out well, and the highlighter is great for the corners of my eyes. The 2-in-1 thing makes my morning routine so much easier.

The Studio Lip Primer & Plumper is also a great 2-in-1 deal. The plumper doesn't work as well as I'd hoped but has a nice cinnamon-y tingle, and did fill in the lines of my lips. The primer is great, and my lipstick stayed in place all day, also with the help of the Lip Lock Pencil. I really like the Lip Lock Pencil because it goes on clear, which means you don't have to worry about finding matching or coordinating lipliners.

The Eye Refresh worked just okay - I didn't see a huge difference in my dark circles but it does leave a nice refreshing cooling feeling in the morning, which helps me feel more awake. The concealer does a better job at covering up my under eye area.

Stay tuned for part 2!
-Christina

Goth birthday + pink hairspiration

It has always been my dream to have pink hair. I really do want a full head of cotton candy, but a) since my hair is so dark we'd have to bleach the crap out of it and that's expensive and b) I was always at a place of work where that wasn't allowed. So needless to say, I was really stoked to find Bumble & bumble's Spraychalk in Blush, which is the perfect light pink. It's a temporary spray-in colour that shampoos out, and after reading reviews about how good it was on dark hair, I gave it a try. Needless to say, I was stoked about the results. There isn't a ton of colour in one can but I think doing the tips looked really cool, and it was absolute perfect birthday hair. The only problem was that I was too drunk to shower after we got home so the colour got all over my boyfriend's pillows, but since it washes out, its no matter! I wore a beautiful Elizabeth & James dress, and I even matched my nails to it:

(Nails Inc in Onyx Rush, Essie in Sugar Daddy, and Julep in Chelsea. Become a Julep Maven here! I love their monthly boxes, it's so much fun to get new nail colours!)

Unfortunately it's only temporary hair colour, so I'm still dreaming of a full head of pink. One day it'll happen!  Here are my favourite pink hair looks:

Abbey Lee's dipdye

Audrey Kitching is totally to blame for my wanting pink hair

The wonderful Angelina aka ALB

Bad bitches, the lot of them.