March Birchbox Reviews: Skin Care

Hello Again!

[hi! <--Corbin typed that!]

So far I've tried two of the products in my March Birchbox: the Vasanti BrightenUp! enzymatic face rejuvenator and the Coola tinted mineral sunscreen.

Last night I used the rejuvenator.  Basically it is papaya enzymes and microcrystals that you apply to your damp face in small circular motions.  It works as an exfoliator, and it smells pretty decent.  It did make my face feel a little tingly, but after I rinsed it away, my face felt sooo smooth and wonderful.  It says I can use it 3-5 times a week, and I might just take them up on that offer.  I'd like to try it in the mornings in lieu of my usual salicylic acid facewash just to see if it makes a difference in how dry my skin ends up.  As it is, my face gets super dried out after using my facewash and I have to drench it in moisturizer.

Speaking of moisturizer...usually I use Clinique's gel moisturizer for oily combination skin.  I love that it isn't a lotion because it soaks right into my skin and doesn't leave an oily residue.  This morning after washing my face, I used the Coola tinted moisturizer with SPF 30 sunscreen.  I LOVE the matte finish and I love that is seemed to even out my tone (I get red areas around my mouth), but I still don't know if it was ENOUGH moisture.  I want to try it again on a day that I didn't use my face wash and my face isn't already feeling super dried out.  I liked it enough that I am definitely excited about trying it again and possibly purchasing the full size.  With the way it evened out my tone, it is like a moisturizer (which I already use) and a concealer in one, and that would save me time and make my skin look nice!

My face after 9 hours at work!

Ignore the sling...I have a Grade I AC joint sprain.  Yay roller derby!

I think my skin looks fantastic here!  So I'm pretty pleased with the products.  I will definitely edit this post if I find that anything changes.  Now on to that Curl Keeper...

Ridiculous Roots

I've always been a blonde...but more of the dirty blonde variety.  I like my hair at its current shade: Wella's T28 toner, which used to be called "Princess Blonde."  Unfortunately for me, my hair grows crazy fast and my roots get to looking like this quicker than I'd like!

That means it's time to harrass my lovely sister!  Lucky for me, I have a sister that is REALLY good at doing hair, so she keeps me looking gorgeous for next to nothing!  Be expecting my call VERY soon...these roots are looking ridiculous!!

PS.  Does anyone else have the most wrinkliest of foreheads like I do?  Why is my forehead so wrinkly?  Why is this a thing?  Why does it bother me?

March Birchbox - Spring Forward

Yay, it is here!  My Birchbox for March, themed Spring Forward, arrived in the mail today!

This was a pretty good haul, although I kind of freak out at how many skin products I was sent.  There is a "rescue balm," a tinted sunscreen (interested in this product for sure, but what if the tint doesn't match m skin?!), an enzymatic face rejuvenator (sounds like it'll be good for exfoliation), a styling lotion for curly/frizzy hair, and tea and chocolates.



Here is the front and the back of the card that came in the box:

And of course a close-up of the box contents:

So I'll be trying out these products over the next few days and I'll let you know what the final verdict is.  I had an AMAZING detangling/conditioning spray in a past Birchbox called Beauty Protector that I absolutely fell in love with and bought the full-size, so I've been using that for my after-washing hair styling.  I'm interested to see how the Curl Keeper compares.  And with it getting warm and sunny outside and the beach being in my near future, I'm definitely interested in anything with SPF in it!

Alert! Serious Beauty Purchase Made!

Oooooh my goodness.  I am GIDDY WITH EXCITEMENT!  Today I purchased my first extra fancy eyeshadow palette!  Do I have any idea what I'm doing or how exactly to use it?  No!  Do I have the first idea about blending or primers? No!  Do I have a single clue when it comes to wet-dry shadows? No!  But eeeee, I'm so excited!

I was shopping at Sephora today, and my BFF has been considering the Urban Decay Naked 3 Palette for a while.  We were checking it out, and I was pretty interested in purchasing, but realized that I wasn't really into a fully-neutral palette, especially one that was so pricey.  I really like eyeshadows that are brown and purple, so I was hoping to find a palette that had both of those shades and a little bit of shimmer.

And THEN!  I stumbled upon Too Faced Return of Sexy...and oh me oh my I fell in love.  It was so pricey, but the colors were so beautiful.  I stroked the shadow with my finger tips and almost fainted with happiness at the sparkly softness, and it came with a black eyeliner and sample primer (NEVER used that before).  So I bought it.  It will definitely be a learning experience, but I'm excited!  If anyone has any tips or tricks for BEGINNERS, I welcome them!

Here is my picture of the palette; I tried to get the colors as true to life as possible.

I randomly searched instagram's #toofaced tag...and I stumbled upon this:

I cannot even count how many different steps were used to create her makeup look, and while I think it looks good, that is just WAY over the top for me.  My goal is to stay low maintenance, but feel pretty.  I feel like I can accomplish that without 700 steps and 9852 different products.  Right?!

I also got a lipstick today!  I have never been big on lip color (I have a hot Barbie pink I wear when I play roller derby...post about bout day makeup another time!), but my BFF gave me her MAC Angel today and it looks so pretty on me!  She didn't like it, so I was lucky to inherit it!  Hooray me! (WHHHHHY does MAC lipstick smell so good?!)

Look, I'm a grown up!  I left a lipstick smudge on my coffee cup. ;)

Eyeliner Part 2

I just wanted to report that today's eyeliner came out MUCH BETTER!

So happy!  This time I did it before leaving the house, but then I was almost late to work.  Sigh.  The life of a girly girl.

My Crush With Eyeliner

I've got 99 problems...and messing up my eyeliner seems to be 85% of them...

I LOVE liquid eyeliner.  I love the look of a good cat-eye.  I don't know if any makeup trend is prettier to me than a girl who wears eyeliner.  My BFF is always rocking the most gorgeous eyeliner and I have envied her.  It just seemed like a skill that was beyond me and the limits of my patience.

I realize, though, after buying some and trying it out (once), that I was kind of okay with drawing a line across the top of my lashes.  I'm decent at drawing and I've always been good at making lines, but translating that to your face can be somewhat difficult.  The first day I wore my liquid eyeliner (on a weekend while on a playdate/movie outing with a friend), I noticed that it transferred to my upper lid.  I supposed that was because I didn't let it completely dry before looking up/forward.  I also noticed that it was extremely difficult to remove (I guess it is waterproof?!), so I had to scrub it off the best I could throughout my outing before using makeup remover to take it off when I got home.

SO THIS YEAR, I made the weirdest New Year's Resolution ever. I wanted to wear MOAR EYELINER!  After the clock struck twelve, I grabbed my liquid eyeliner, and I made the most BEAUTIFUL and PERFECT application of eyeliner ever.  It was marvelous.

And then...it seems to have all gone downhill from there.  Some days, I pull it off and it looks perfect.  Other days, I mess up and end up rushing out the door sans makeup because I couldn't fix it before I had to leave for work.  Recently I realized I could draw a thin line and make it look okay and I had a series of good eyeliner days.

AND THEN....Today happened.

What HAPPENED, Today?

I mean, I know I shouldn't have done my eyeliner in the car*.
In the dark.
In the rain.
But...I thought we had figured this out. I thought we had worked past all this.  I thought we were GOOD!

...Fingers crossed things go better tomorrow.  I don't think I'm going to do my eyeliner in the car anymore.

*I was parked at work when I started doing my eye makeup.  I would NEVER try to apply makeup while driving.  Just sayin'.

Fixing My Fringe

I am obsessed with bangs. I have been wearing my hair in bangs for as long as I can remember. I have an insane love/hate relationship with this hairstyle. I tend to keep my bangs in the sideswept style, but even that presents problems for me. Sometimes it feels like most days all I do is just roll them under and pin them back, but I HATE my forehead (it is so wrinkly...like an old man).





My love affair with bangs has included many variations of lengths and even the occasional blunt fringe:

Until I watched this YouTube video, I had no idea that ALL THESE YEARS I had been doing it ALL WRONG. I turns out I had NO IDEA how to style my own sideswept bangs. This woman here changed my life:

My favorite bit of her video is at the end where she takes the hairspray on her fingertips and touches that to the edges of her bangs. I've always had problems with my bangs frizzing and this completely eliminates that! Amazing!

I also have had issues with trimming my bangs. It is really frustrating to trust my bangs to someone else - I have problems of returning home with them still too long, with them cut at odd angles that I don't usually wear them, with them being cut too short and having to be hidden away for weeks until they grow out - I just get so exasperated. I finally, with some inspiration from a handful of video tutorials, began attempting to trim them myself, using red-handled teacher school scissors (WARNING - this is highly looked down upon, but I just don't feel like buying the fancy scissors when these have actually served me pretty well!). I have been taking off a teensy bit at a time by cutting vertically upwards in tiny chunks and finally this morning I got them to exactly where I want them!

Ta da!

Styled using the tutorial from the video above, except I skip the step with the flat iron. That is a little more effort than I'm willing to put in when they look so great at this step! :)

Be sure to check me out on Instagram! #becomingthegirlygirl