Mail Day Haul

The packages that brightened up my day last week:

Adorned With Grace:

The items came prettily wrapped in the trademark AwG heart swirled wrapping paper.  

I got full sizes of Hope 3.8 foundation and the Supreme Smoothing Powder in Golden Tint, some blush samples and their limited edition Grab bag.  

The Grab bag contained 26 samples of blushes and eye shadows in a rainbow of colors.  

These were either discontinued or "oops" shades and are not for sale in the website.  Franchesca kindly included samples of some of the glows which were on my lemming list.

Joppa:

I took advantage of Joppa's free international shipping and got a full size refill bag of the Full Coverage foundation in Medium 2.5.  Also in my pkg were Tish's orders (no photo).

And the last package is from Frond who sent me a ton of foundation samples:  

I haven't gone through all the items yet but picked out the ones from Buff'd first because those were the ones I really wanted and needed.

Will post reviews soon for some of the other products.  Also, I've lined up in draft form lots of future entries (in photos) but haven't gotten around to writing the full articles yet since I'm still testing them or about to test them.  Stay tuned for that.

Netbook Bag

I got my HP Mini-notebook a laptop bag/sleeve yesterday.   I've had a sleeve before but it's for a normal sized laptop and I only got it because I needed one right away when my netbook was new.  

I've seen the mini laptop bags at Powerbooks in Shangrila a month ago but the design I wanted was out of stock and the remaining one was dirty.  I didn't want a dirty bag so I decided to wait for new stocks.  

While waiting for the movie (Monsters vs. Aliens) to start yesterday, we killed time at Powerbooks and I saw new stocks of the Lift bags.  Hooray!!!  The design I saw before wasn't available but I saw another one and it was the last piece.  Priced at a little more than P600 (I forgot the exact price, yeah, I'm forgetful when it comes to prices), I got it.

*Edit--I found the tag and it's priced at only Php649.

Love it!  Sorry for the crappy photo taken from my phone.  This is the Bea model of Lift bags that fits 8.9" laptops and is proudly Philippine made.  My HP Mini fits snugly in it although I can't put in anything else in its numerous inside pockets because of the snugness (uh, is this a word?).  I can still use the free pouch from my other laptop sleeve for the cables and such but I think CDs or USBs and a cellphone can fit in the outer pocket of this bag.  It has a top handle and a removable longer handle for use as a shoulder bag andthe whole thing is well-padded.  

Really cool.

Oh, and this bag can fit into my bigger tote bags LOL!

Aromaleigh Contest

One of my favorite mineral makeup companies is having a contest!  They'll be giving out 5 full sized sets of their Spring Solstice shadows to the lucky winners at the beginning of April.

The link to the LE Spring Solstice collection of shadows is here:

The link to Miss K's blog about the contest is here:

I hope I'm one of the winners.  Aromaleigh's pigments are one of the most beautiful pigments out there...even better than some high-end ones at a fraction of the cost.   Crossing my fingers (and toes)!!!

It's been a crazy week

Yes...I guess life is stressful...has it's ups and downs and so far for me, it's a roller coaster ride.

Had a good weekend.  Saturday was a trip to the dermatologist for an IPL session and dessert of frozen yogurt with mom and DD.  Sunday, we gave our hedgehog his first bath (that was a blast!)

 

and went to watch Race to Witch Mountain in the afternoon with a bit of shopping on the side.

Monday morning we went to the hospital.  My DD had recurrent cough and colds so we had a chest X-ray done for her.  It only showed pneumonitis (which is different from pneumonia) but the pedia put her on another round of antibiotics and antihistamine.  Knowing how difficult it is to make her drink those awful tasting meds we found a better tasting one and she tolerates it now (but it still takes her almost 15 mins. to finish a 5 ml. dose). 

We also had DD's ears pierced because she really wanted them ever since she saw her cousins of the same age with their ears pierced.  She also insisted that the earrings should be violet!  The first hole went well but right after she started crying.  We had to hold her down for the 2nd hole.  At least that's over and she now has lavender studs on her ears.

While we were waiting our turn for the pedia, my FIL called hubby and told him he felt dizzy since earlier in the morning.  Knowing that he NEVER calls for anything regarding his health, hubby was alarmed and told him to lie down first and that we were going straight to their house after the pedia.

We got there after about 30 mins. and when we got his blood pressure it was more than 200/110.  Hubby went out to buy emergency meds and left me with FIL for a while.  His BP was still the same and when hubby came back we gave him some medication to lower it down.  After about an hour with his blood pressure stable, we ate a late lunch at 2 pm then hubby brought him in to the ER to have an ECG just to be sure.

I won't bore you with medical jargon but they went in for a cardiology check-up because of what was seen in the ECG and then he was admitted for observation.  Initial blood results were normal though. 

All the time they were in the hospital my DD and I were left at their house where I tried to find something to do.  I watched a movie (Changeling), read the papers and tried to watch Playhouse Disney with DD.  I was so bored out of my wits that I can't imagine how a prisoner feels with nothing to do.  I tried to go to sleep and dozed for less than an hour I think.  I couldn't watch TV bec. their downstairs TV set had a problem with the cable.  My BIL arrived and I listened to his sob stories.  Early in the evening when I learned that FIL would be admitted, the telephone brigade began with SIL, 2 BIL and all of us trying to find MIL because she was still not home.  Well, eventually she came home and good thing she didn't freak out because she also has high blood pressure.

When everything had settled down and a BIL was staying in the hospital with FIL, we dropped by that night to bring his  clothes and toiletries.  Tuesday, FIL had other exams done like 2d-echo for his heart and other stuff which were all normal.  The next day, my mom went to have a check-up with a pulmonologist because of her recurring cough too.  She was put on a round of antibiotics plus other medications.  My FIL had repeat blood exams which showed that he did have a heart attack but it was a mild one (a small artery was the one affected).  The blood exams turned positive a few days after injury to the heart because it was of a smaller scale.  He was scheduled for discharge with follow-up exams on OPD basis.  

Through all this, I got sick on Monday evening with terrible colds but I'm better now.  Been drinking lots of ginger tea and lemon grass tea with calamansi (our local version of limes).  My happy moment would come later tonight when hubby comes home bearing packages from the PO.  I'm guessing those would be my Joppa and Adorned with Grace packages plus another one either from Toma (Ecotools) or from Frond's RAOK.  We'll see.

Dreamworld Creme Toppings

My HG finishing powder for more than a year now is Dreamworld Minerals' Creme Toppings.

Ingredients: 

Serecite, Kaolin Clay, Silica, Iron Oxides, May contain Silk Powder and Mica

There are 3 variants but I only get the one with Clay and Silica because of my oily skin.  These 2 ingredients soak up oil and keep my face matte for a few hours.  The silica diffuses the look of huge pores and fine lines too.  They can also be used as a powder primer prior to putting your mineral foundation.

These powders are finely milled and a little bit goes a long way.  Not to mention their yummy sounding names!  

I now have 7 shades of the Creme Toppings (I really love them, huh?).  The shades I have are Cocoa, Cafe au Lait, Banana, Butter, Butterscotch (these 5 are more of my skintone), Angel (lavender to neutralize my more yellow looking foundations and to brighten skin tone) and Peanut Butter (to darken my "a bit light" foundation shades).

Here's the latest ones I got from their last sale.  It's the Peanut Butter in To Go size and Full Size of Banana Creme Topping.

The freebie that came with my order:

Dino Rock pigment that is full to the brim!  I think this would fill a 5gr jar or more than half of a 10 gr jar.

with flash

Swatch, with flash, applied dry: 

It's a lovely brownish gold shade that is very pigmented.  (Thanks, Ellie!).

Hmm...I noticed that all the pigments I got as freebies from my recent orders were all in the brown family.  At least it would be easy to use them as I am a fan of neutrals.

  

Nail Polishes To Date

I was organizing my nail polishes a few weeks ago to create more space for them.   I gave away those I rarely used or didn't like anymore.  I found a new container for them which I got at the home department of Robinson's Galleria.  It isn't made of plastic which I prefer and has no handle on top (it was on the side) but it would do.  I bought it for another purpose but used it for the np's instead.

Good thing it can house all of them including the treatment bottles.  And it has room for so much more *evil grin*.

After editing the bottles of polish I was left with less than 30 bottles. Looks so few huh? 

Here they are:

Zoya polishes:

China Glaze polishes:

OPI polishes:

Elianto/ The Face Shop polishes:

Essie, Jessica, Skin Food, Sally Hansen, Caress polishes:

Nail treatments, base coat, top coat:

And that's all I have.

Honest Scrap Award

This was given to me by Gayle of My Wonderful World of Colors and Mhean of Moiheartsmakeup  Thanks ladies!  Met Gayle and Mhean on Girltalk talking mostly about mineral makeup.  We now have our own blogs but we still "meet" each other there and help out each other with beauty related topics (and other more serious stuff about life).

As the recipient of this Honest Scrap Award it comes with some requirements before I can pass this along to another fellow blogger.  Here are the requirements:


“When accepting this auspicious award, you must write a post bragging about it, including the name of the misguided soul who thinks you deserve such acclaim, and link back to the said person so everyone knows she/he is real. Choose a minimum of seven (7) blogs that you find brilliant in content or design. Or improvise by including bloggers who have no idea who you are because you don’t have seven friends. Show the seven random victims’ names and links and leave a harassing comment informing them that they were prized with Honest Weblog. Well, there’s no prize, but they can keep the nifty icon. List at least ten (10) honest things about yourself. Then pass it on!”



Here are the 10 honest things about me:

1. I am a shopaholic.  Be it window shopping, online shopping or actual shopping but this doesn't mean I spend money left and right.  I do my research before buying the particular product first (for skincare and cosmetics) and  I spend within my means only.  This also makes me a product junkie.  I guess that's my only vice.

2. I sleep early now that I have a family.  Before I would sleep past 12 midnight.  Now I am in bed around 10 pm or the earliest at 9 pm.  I have to bec. my DD won't sleep if we don't sleep or the lights aren't turned off.  Also, hubby wakes up very early for work so we need to turn in early.  I need my 8-9 hours of sleep nightly (or I would get sick and look and feel horrible the next few days).  Sleep makes you look younger too.

3.  I want everything to be clean and in their proper places.  I'm not OC but it just makes everything easier.  Too bad hubby is the total opposite of me!

4.  I love to read.  Loved reading since I was in grade school.  I broadend my knowledge through reading.  I can read a thick book in 1 day.  In high school, I would go around National Bookstore holding 1 Sweet Dreams book and finish reading it inside the bookstore for 1-2 hours.  Now I'm into non-fiction books.

5.  I don't like Filipino food especially those with tomato sauce.

6. I don't like kids in general except for my own.  (That's why I didn't become a pediatrician!).

7.  I'm a quiet person and I'm comfortable being alone.  I can be talkative too but I'd rather listen and observe.

8. I hate exercising and I'd rather play a sport, but then again, I hate getting all sweaty.  It's just my bad luck that I'm "pawisin".  Even standing still, I'd get sweaty because of the heat when everyone around me looks so cool and fresh.  That's why I always carry a towel with me.

9. I can't drink ice cold water.  My throat feels funny and I can't swallow it.  If it's cooler than room temp. I can drink it.  Ice cold drinks should have flavor for me to be able to drink it like iced tea or juice.

10.  I haven't drank soft drinks for more than 10 years now.  Even a sip would make my tummy ache.  

I'm passing this award to:

Aileen (Shades of U)

Soapaholic (Confessions of a Soapaholic)

Shen (Shen's Addiction)

Phoebe (Swipe Some Gloss)

Shasta (Newbie to Beauty)

Inan (Shizznizzle)

Frond (Frond's Fun With Colors)

Avon Magix (Part 2)

My first review/impressions on the Avon Magix Face Perfector can be found here.

I recently got myself a few more tubes to keep it in stock because it isn't available in our local Avon dealers.  You can get your own tubes at the Makeup Mix Shop.  They ship internationally for a very reasonable price and those who order $20 and up even get free shipping (even for international shoppers).

It still is my HG mattifier and primer.  I haven't broken out even with daily use.  Sometimes I use it alone because of the SPF 20 content.  Makeup goes on smoothly and my pores look smaller.  I've worn it for a full day and a bit of shine would still show but that would be after more than 6 hours.  It doesn't bother me though because my skin is hopelessly oily. One blotting paper is all that's needed for the day.   

Will I continue using this?  Definitely (that's why I got back-ups).  I really hope it would be available locally.

Freebie mineral pigment I got from The Makeup Mix Shop (Thanks, Toma!):

Hamesha eyeshadow - shimmering tan

Swatch (with flash): 

FOTD from last Saturday at my DD's graduation (she got First Honors!): 

*photo taken 4 hours after application 

Avon Magix as primer

EG Minerals Cover Me foundation in Helena (1st thin layer)

Lauress Minimalist foundation in Pure Yellow (2nd thin layer)

Lauress Lavender finishing powder

Aromaleigh URFP in Translucent

Blush:

Jane Be Pure blush in Rose Satin

Lumiere Silk Radiance in Winter Silk on top of blush

Eyes: 

Avon Magix as primer

Hamesha on lid

Silk Naturals Lurid on crease

Lips:

Eyeko Fat Balm in Strawberry

The Right Now Tag

*Time out muna :-)*

Tagged by Czel of Vanity's Child.

The basic premise is this – answers should all be “at the current moment.”

1. Where is your cell phone - on the bed

2. Your hair – chin-length

3. Your father – downstairs

4. Your favorite thing - shopping (actual, online and window)

5. Your dream last night – I don't remember

6. Your favorite drink – Lipton Red Tea

7. Your dream goal – our own house

8. The room you are in - bedroom

9. Your fear – sickness/death in family

10. Where do you want to be in 6 years – own home

11. Muffins – blueberry muffins are a fave

12. One of your wish list items – a big vanity table

13. Where you grew up – Quezon City

14. The last thing you did (before answering these questions) – took a bath

15. What are you wearing – old tank top and shorts

16. Your TV - 32" LCD TV

17. Your pets - more like the family's pets: 3 Labradors, 2 huge aquariums of fish

18. Your computer - desktop (I don't know brand) and an HP Mini-Note

19. Your life – stressful

20. Your mood – in pain (currently I have a bad headache)

21. Missing someone – none

22. Your car – none, but hubby has 1

23. Favorite store – online mineral makeup stores

24. Your summer – scorching!

25. Your favorite color/s - violet and blue

26. When was the last time you laughed – last night

27. When was the last time you cried – this afternoon (I was watching RENT The Movie)

28. Last person who emailed you – an online friend in the US

29. Your favorite food – pasta

30. A place you would rather be right now – mall or beach

I tag anyone who wants to be tagged.

Nail Polish Haul-edited w/ addition

My latest haul of nail poishes came the other day.  Thanks to Mhean for all the trouble of doing the spree from 8ty8beauty.  One polish is missing here and I'll edit this post with that addition once I get it.

I always have a hard time choosing shades because most of the time I end up choosing those shades that are similar to what I already have.  It takes me days to go through swatches in different blogs and researching.  

Anyway here's what I got:

OPI:

Parlez-Vous OPI (France collection) - a smokey violet, no brainer choice for me since I don't have this shade and it is unique.

with flash

no flash, artificial light

Crepes Suzi-ette (France collection)- reddish orange shade 

with flash

no flash, artificial light

China Glaze polishes:

Prize Winning Mare (Rodeo Diva collection) - golden brown shade that really isn't and changes with the light.  Very blah on the bottle but Wow on the nails.

with flash

no flash, artificial light

Wagon Trail (Rodeo Diva collection) - blackened golden green

with flash

no flash, artificial light

Emerald Sparkle (Sleigh Ride collection) - emerald green shimmer

with flash

no flash

Have you noticed how I like green polishes?

All 4 shades, with flash

I tend to avoid sheer, light shades and choose opaque, darker ones.  I use them only on my toes and never on my fingers so I like pops of color.  

Can't wait for the next spree.  

Joppa Foundation Medium 2.5

After testing the new sample I got, I decided that Medium 2.5 of Joppa's Full Coverage foundation was a better match for me.  (I ordered myself a full size refill bag right away).  Joppa's foundation has medium to heavy coverage, it doesn't break me out nor produce an oil slick on my face after a few hours.  It is on of my HG mineral foundation for more than a year now.  Their finishing powders, blushes and eye shadows are also very good.

Good thing they came up with this new shade because the Medium #3 lacked yellow but was a perfect match otherwise.  It was just a bit on the pink/beige side.

Here's an FOTD from a party I went to last weekend:

 

(no flash)

(with flash)

Face:

Avon Magix Face Perfector SPF 20

Joppa FC Medium 2.5

Dreamworld Creme Topping in Cocoa

Aromaleigh URFP in Translucent

Blush:

Adorned with Grace Shimmer blush/glow in Glamorous

Eyes:

Avon Magix as primer

Neutrogena Mineral Sheers e/s in Shell (lighter shade on lid, darker on crease)

Lips:

Silk Naturals lipgloss in Cherry Crush

 

***

Would anyone like to adopt my Joppa FC foundation in Medium #3?  I have 2 FS Refill baggies that I could give at a good, discounted price.

Eyeko Lip Gloss

New Eyeko Lip Gloss in collectible tins!  Only GBP4  per tin in 3 flavors:

Cheeky Cherry

Creamy Cupcake

Rosey Pink

Enter code "Eyeko Gloss" at check out and get a FREE gift from Eyeko.  Promo until March 8 only.

All orders ship Free anywhere in the world.

Jane Be Pure Mineral Blush

I got my Drugstore.com haul more than a week ago and included is this Jane Be Pure Mineral blush.  Been eyeing it since last year and at only $4.99 per compact, I had to have it, LOL!  

  

(with flash)

(no flash)

Ingredients are:

"Mica, Bismuth Oxychloride, Ehtylhexyl Palmitate, Zinc Stearate, Juniperus Communis Extract (Juniper), Aloe Barbadensis Extract, Urtica Dioica Extract (Nettle), Sambucus Nigra Flowers (Elder), Propylene Glycol, Tocopherol, Methylparaben, Propylparaben, Diazolidinyl Urea, Butylparaben, Ascorbyl Palmitate, Tin Oxide, May Contain: Titanium Dioxide (CI 77891), Iron Oxides (CI 77491, CI 77492, CI 77499), Red 6 Lake (CI 15850:2), Red 7 Lake (CI 15850:1), Red 27 Lake (CI 45410:2), Red 40 Lake (CI 16035), Carmine (CI 75470), Ultramarines (CI 77007), Ferric Ferrocyanide (CI 77510), Yellow 5 Lake (CI 19140), Yellow 6 Lake (CI 15985), Blue 1 Lake (CI 42090), Manganese Violet (CI 77742)"

Not so pure in my opinion but I do use traditional blushes too.  It's only the foundation and finishing powder that has to be pure minerals for me or I'd get breakouts.  Much as I'd like my mineral blushes pure, they usually come in loose powder form.  Those in compacts or in pressed powder form are easier for me to travel with. 

Anyway, I got the shade Rose Satin which looks like the darkest shade.  The powder itself applies silky on the cheeks.  It's not chalky or powdery when you swipe the brush and is fairly pigmented.  The shade looks natural on me.  It does last a long time on my oily skin which is a major plus factor!  

(no flash, natural light)

Swatch:

(no flash)

(with flash)

The compact is cute and the bottom opens up where you'll find a mirror and a brush included.   The brush, you can discard because it is so tiny and scratchy like most drugstore blush brushes. 

 

I want to try the other shades but I have a feeling they won't show up on my medium-toned skin like Rose Satin does.  Hopefully they make darker shades of this because quality is good and price is soo right!

Photo with Jane Be Pure mineral blush in Rose Satin.  

(Sorry, no other m/u on my face, just MAC Tinted lip conditioner in Petting Pink).