My Latest H2T Haul :)

Hi friends!

Hope your weekend is going well :)
I'm in a terrific mood today, since receiving my latest order from Head2Toe Beauty. The only draw back was that the package got stuck in customs, so I had to pay another $15 in order to get the goodies home with me, but hey; that's life.

This was inside the package:

ChG Watermelon Rind, Raspberry Festival (both from the Summer Days 2009 Collection) & Admire (from the Romantique Collection, spring 09) Red is a PITA to photograph accurately, what I can tell you is that RF looks waayyy more stunning IRL ;)

Color Club polishes, left to right: Recycle This!, Ride a Bike, Planet Punch, I Can't Believe It's Tofu & Babe
Those four mini polishes are 0.25 Oz (7 ml) each and are from the One & Done eco collection. Babe is from the original collection

OPI Mod-ern Girl, Poshé Fast Drying Top Coat & Seche Restore Thinner

Can't wait to swatch all of these! Also it will be interesting to compare Seche Vite to Poshé top coat. Although I'm very happy with Seche, it causes some shrinkage when used with my Zoya polishes. Perhaps the only way to deal with that is to use Zoya's own base and top coat (Anchor & Armor), I really don't know.
What are your experiences?

xoxo

It's Package Day Again, My First Essies :)

Bought these from an eBay seller recently, and today this lovely package was delivered!





I'm so exited to try these; there seems to be mixed opinions on Essie polishes, it'll be fun to finally test them out.
I'm also eager to try the Citra III, since I have problems with my nails splitting at the sides, and they are also overall very brittle, dry and fragile at the moment :(
The lovely Steph over at Nail Juice wrote a glowing review of Citra; you can read it here!
Anyway; I think a lot of those problems are due to the harsh weather/winter climate we've been experiencing those past months. Terribly cold outside, and extremely dry air inside. Both hair, skin and nails are acting up; dry, itchy skin, fly away hair and those nails cracking and splitting... I need summer ASAP! Or at least some spring :)

What's your take on Essie?

Off to feed the daughter; see you very soon :)

My Latest Polish Haul & NOTD

Hello gals! Hope you've had a great weekend :)
Let me present to you my latest polish mini haul.
These babies arrived in mail this Friday. I bought them from a seller on a Swedish auction site similar to eBay (well it's part of the eBay family to be correct).

Zoya Brooke & China Glaze Shy Blush

China Glaze "Shy Blush"
An orange-y, soft terracotta creme


Zoya "Brooke"

Zoya Brooke is also todays NOTD as you can tell.
It's a stunning crimson red with pink metallic highlights; very glossy.
Application was easy breezy; this is three coats (although one could easily get away with two).
As per usual this time of year, we didn't have any sun, so I'll have to update this post later when I've been able to shoot a few pics of this beauty in direct sunlight :)

How do you gals like this shade?

Mavala Treatment Haul

Hello lovely ladies!

Bought these a few days ago; I really needed something to soften and remove my cuticles, and they sold this in a value pack.
I've tried the cuticle remover, and it did a great job. I've never used one of those products before, so I really don't have anything to compare it to, though.
I'm gonna alter between this base coat (it's a sticky one) and my Orly Bonder. I don't want to use the Orly too often, since it causes yellow staining to my nails...
I'm afraid I can't say much about the top coat, since I accidentally dropped it on the bathroom floor before I had the chance to use it, and of course it broke. Top coat all over the floor; well, it's all been cleaned up by now :)





Have you tried any Mavala products?

Love & beauty to y'all :)

My Jenulence Haul Arrived today :)

Look what was in the mailbox today; a package from Jenulence!

I ordered mostly samples; but they had a special offer going on where I could pick a 5 gram foundation jar for free, I like those offers :)
I have ordered from Jenulence once before, and I was very impressed with their foundation and the matte eye shadows. I've never been a matte shadow fan before, but I really liked these, so I ordered a few more samples in other colors. I also ordered a few shimmer and sparkle shadows, a bronzer and of course some blushes. (I have a problem with lipsticks and blushes; I can't seem to stay away from them :>)

Here they are:

This is a little bit darker than the pic shows...

Color descriptions:

The Matte colors:

• Dawn - soft medium mauve/rosy/gray color matte eye shadow
• Purple Night - dark, rich purple/brown color matte eye shadow
• Fog - dark grayish-green color matte eye shadow

The Sparkle & Shimmer colors:

• Lavender - soft light silver lavender color sparkling eye shadow
• Pink Gold - soft warm color of pink gold
• Bisque - soft light pink-beige color sparkling eye shadow

Foundation, Blush and Bronzer colors:

• Neutral Beige Foundation (jar) - neutral beige mineral foundation/concealer formulated for heavier coverage for medium-to-light skin tone (this is the one I tried withh my first order, and it matched my skin tone very well)
  
• Beige Foundation sample - beige mineral foundation/concealer formulated for heavier coverage for medium-to-light skin tone with light pink undertones (I don't know why I ordered this, I don't have pink undertones, so I'll give it away)
• Apricot Blush - warm light apricot loose mineral blush
• Peach Blush - warm color dark pink blush
• Apricot Tan Blush - soft rusty/brown/apricot mineral blush
• Warm Medium Tan Bronzer - similar to the Warmth by Bare Escentuals. It creates a natural sun-kissed fresh look to any complexion

Have you tried Jenulence? What did you think of their products?

That's all for today, see you soon :)

ZOYA Polish Haul Has Landed!

Yesterday these beauties were in the mailbox, which was totally unexpected since they were mailed out from Hawaii last Saturday. This means 3 business days shipping time; amazing!
Out of excitement I ripped the package and immediately fell in love with all of them color wise :)
I have only had the chance to try one of them as of yet (Mikka, which I really like, and is todays NOTD), but if they're all as great as that one (application wise) I'll be in Zoya heaven!
All of them are shimmers or metallics except for "Sweet", which is the only cream in this collection.

I didn't get the chance to post about these yesterday, since it got dark before I had the chance to take pics of them, and I wanted to show you what they look like in natural daylight.

So here they are. all lined up...

L-R: Mikka, Tama, Hope, Harmony, Sweet, Hayden, Vivi, Mieko, Sylvie, Annie
Natural daylight with flash...

Without flash...

L-R: Mikka, Tama, Hope, Harmony, Sweet
No flash...

L-R: Hayden, Vivi, Mieko, Sylvie, Annie
No flash...

With flash; sorry about the blurriness...

With flash

Just from looking at the bottles I'm especially in love with..... well, all of them!! :)
Seriously, they are all gorgeous but I think I find Sweet to be the least interesting. Sylvie on the other hand is going to rock my nails this summer; it's such a stunning summer shade! Like fruit punch or something, it's a pink/coral/orange almost duo chrome shade, ahhh; summer...
Can't wait to swatch them all for you.

What do you think of this collection; any favorites?

Hope to see you back here soon; take care :)

MAC BBR & Starflash Haul Arrived!

Look what the nice mail man brought me today!
This is my latest eBay haul, consisting of a lippie named What A Do! from the MAC BBR (Blonde, Brunette, Redhead) collection, and a Starflash eye shadow called "Grand Entrance". This is a frost lippie; I really love these, they have great color payoff and the colors are so vibrant. The down side is that they are quite drying to my lips, which is why I don't use them very often these days. The MAC frost lipsticks have been replaced by NYX as my HG lippies, since they are much more moisturizing and also way cheaper :) However, I just couldn't resist this one; the color looked way to intriguing :) And I sure wasn't dissappointed when opening the package; I'm a sucker for colors like these.
I've been dying to try one of the Starflash shadows since having read many glowing reviews of it texture wise. I'll make sure to post my own review once I've tried it :)

Look at the cute little doggie :)
He/she was great do deal with, and probably run to the post office to drop off
my parcel right away since it arrived very fast!

MAC Starflash Eye Shadow in "Grand Entrance" and MAC Frost
Lipstick in "What A Do!"

Grand Entrance (left) and What A Do! (right)

"Grand Entrance"
Described by MAC as a frosty neutral peach beige
It's very shimmery; I think it's going to be a great lid and highlighter color
Limited edition - grab it while you can!

"What A Do!"
This is described by MAC as a neutral pink coral and belongs to the redhead group of the collection. I'm far from a redhead but I'll use it anyway :)
Limited edition - grab it while you can!

Have you tried any Starflash eye shadows? If so; what did you think of them?
Have you done any shopping from the BBR collection?

See you soon :)

Precision & Lumene Polish Mini Haul

Went to the mall yesterday and look what I found on sale!
Bought these Lumene nail polishes that are supposed to be formaldehyde free (Nixxy; are you there? :))
Anyway, I cannot wait to wear these; the colors are perfect for summer.
Unfortunately it was hard getting my camera to fully capture the vibrancy of these; the blue one is what I'd describe as an aqua, almost duo chrome shade.
The green is a medium lime shade with golden interference and tiny micro glitter.

No flash, daylight

Inside, with flash

Inside, with flash

As a nice addition to this mini haul; there was a parcel from the US waiting for me in the mailbox when I got home :)
I got these Precision polishes off eBay from one of my favorite sellers, Sparkling Nails, and aren't they lovely? I almost feel like eating them, but I promise I won't.
Precision polishes are supposed to be "3-Free", meaning free of toluene, formaldehyde and DPB.

No flash, daylight
L-R: Pardon My French (a frosted deep rose shade), and Swan's Song (a shimmery deep fuchsia pink shade)

Inside, with flash

No matter how I tried (I think I shot around 60 pics), I simply couldn't get the camera to display the beauty and vibrancy of these colors either, the pictures really don't do them justice. Luckily however, Siobhan over at The Nailphile has gorgeous and accurate swatches of these two on her blog; check them out.
She has amazing nails as well!

That's it for now, see you soon :)

My 24 Hour Trip to Stockholm

This post is picture heavy; Sorry, but I just couldn't help myself..:)

So, dear boyfriend and I went on a 24 hour trip to Stockholm last week to watch his brother perform in an orchestra playing in the Royal Castle. Stockholm is the capital of Sweden, for those who don't know, and is about 3 1/2 hours drive from where we live.
It felt great to get away and spend some time alone just the two of us, even if it was only for 24 hours. It's hard to leave the little one (she's 13 months), but she was very well cared for and spoiled rotten by her grandma as usual :D
The concert was amazing, and also we sat 1 meter behind Crown Princess Victoria who will become Queen of Sweden one day; it was a nice bonus.

Anyway; of course I did a little shopping as well. Although I mostly did shop for my daughter and my niece, this is what I got for myself:

L-R: Isadora blush brush, M•A•C Phloof! palette eye shadow, Make Up Store foundation brush (no 366)

Close up of the brushes

M•A•C Palette Single Eye shadow in "Phloof!"
(Shade description: Frosted off-white (Frost))
Sorry about the blurriness...

I cannot believe I haven't discovered this shadow before; although I mostly use mineral makeup these days, I really like this one. It does a great job brightening my eyes.
I'm very happy with these brushes also; the foundation brush does a great job distributing foundation evenly in a thin layer. Same goes for the blush brush. Like I said above, I mostly use MMU nowadays, but occasionally I still reach for traditional makeup, depends on my mood :D

I paid around $13 for the M•A•C shadow, $30 for the foundation brush and $12 for the blush brush.
I do think Isadora is available in other countries, but I'm not sure about Make Up Store.


Misc Stockholm pictures...

City Hall

Panoramic view

Riddarholmen

Riddarholmen; winter view

Old City (to the left) and the Royal Castle (to the right)

Crown Princess Victoria

That's it for now; see you soon :)