Lemmings

Note: I'm having a preorder/spree for Etude house things from etudehouseusa.com, so visit my post here. 

To tell you the truth, I didn't even know that this word was used other than to describe a bird. Recently though, I've been pouring over people's blogs and other sites to try to read the reviews and see the swatches of a few items that I was thinking of buying. This word kept popping up and all I could gather is that it's used when someone really wants something.

So I looked it up, and according to urban dictionary, it's basically used when you see someone post about something on their blog, and then you get really excited and want to buy it yourself.

Well then I guess I've been lemming for a GMarket haul, haha.

When I want something I tend to do this thing where I will obsess over it and read the reviews over and over and over again until I buy it. And that's pretty much what I'm doing right now; there are a handful of items that I want, but they do cost a pretty penny, and since I already don't have much I want to make sure I'm not wasting my $$.

Quick list of products I was looking at. Since I don't have enough money (GMarket shipping is so expensive T_T) I have to hold off on buying half of them.

Tony Moly:

Strawberry & Green Apple lip tints. I was thinking about the Grape too, since I wasn't sure if the tint colors would come out different, but apparently they come out relatively the same regardless of starting color so I thought I'd skip the grape since I don't think I'd like wearing it as much.

Eyeliner: many people says that the gel liner is excellent. I do already have the Inglot eyeliner and still really like it, but I'm in an itching mood to try out different ones.

Facial Wipes: Ok, I know this is a strange thing to buy, but I need like 20,000 won worth of stuff to not get charged the extra domestic shipping so I thought I'd take that extra money and at least spend it on something lol.

Tangerine hand cream: This I thought of in place of the grape lip tint, also to fulfill money quota. Seems like there's not many English reviews of this. It's a whitening cream.

VOV:

Eyeshadows- Castledew VL331, 9157, GD9330
Castledew Lip tint balm
Showcase Lipgloss in #1
Castledew Oversetting gloss #18
And two other eyeliners (don't remember the specifics)

Banila Co:

Secret Blush in Delight and Love Letter
Red Annie Lipstick from Tokyo Scandal Line

Clio:

Blushes in #2 and #4

Etude House:

BB Magic Balm
Stamp Blushes- was thinking #4 &5?
Proof 10 eye primer: this stuff has been said to be better than UDPP
Peach Water gloss- seems like this has relatively good reviews, they only have #1/4 on gmarket though, so I'm going to get #4. #1 is the watermelon one and somehow I just don't think I will like that as much. To tell you the truth though, I really wanted #4, 5, 6 but I don't have enough money haha
Lip Fragrance in Passionfruit. Haha I know this is a funny sounding product, but I want it as more of a novelty thing

I also want popcorn pens and an assortment of earrings. I wanted to wait and put the earrings along with hair stuffs in a possible future batch, but since I don't know if I will definitely have another batch, I decided to go ahead and put them in this one

I'm also interested in other shades of some of the products but I figured I'd try out the quality first to see if I like them, lol.

If any of you have tried some of these products before then please let me know how you feel about them! This way if one of them is a doosy you can save me from wasting money, lol.

Since this is my first time ordering from GMarket, if anyone has any insight on how the US customs works/ if you've ever been tax for how much then that would be very helpful since this is looking like a relatively big haul.

Meanwhile, Gmarket is deleting the items right out of my cart -___-. I saved them into my wishlist just in case but still, tedious, aiyah.

So I will update once I order and start the review marathon lol.

Eco Tools Retractable Kabuki Brush

Soo...I went on a search for a good kabuki brush. After reading all the reviews I decided on this one, Eco Tools Retractable Kabuki. I was debating whether or not to order online, but then figured I'd see if my Rite Aid had it first, just so I could see what the brush was like. To my surprise, it was only $7.99!! The cheapest I saw online was $8.99 at Drugstore.com. So I grabbed it up since it was the last one there.

I will say now that this is one of my happiest purchases recently. NO JOKE. The synthetic fibers are soo soft, and yet it's thick enough to be stiff enough to apply stuff.

The packaging I think is strange though. They say it's environmentally friendly because it's reusable (before I figured that out I couldn't figure out how to open it since it looked like there was a ziploc type opening. Turns out you have to cut the top off) but honestly, it's made of vinyl. No matter how many plastic zippers you put on it, normal consumers me will just throw it away. It doesn't look like a nice enough pouch to keep, and besides, it's hard to get the brush out of such a small thing. And you will have made it worse for the environment than if you had just used thinner plastic.

The metal piece that covers the bristles feels kind of weak and loose, but for the price I don't care. I do keep trying to twist that piece though since it's called a "Retractable Kabuki". But this name is misleading because it's not retractable, rather it's coverable. First to put it away you have to pull up the metal piece to close the bristles, only then can you cap it.

It's about 1 and 1/8" in diameter and 3 and 3/4" long, so it's not that small of a brush. Now that I think about it, I think this may have been the brush that the girl applying makeup on the train last year was using. I remember the long tube with a brush. huh.

For those who are worried, no hairs have fallen out yet.

One thing that I thought was really funny is that if I swirl the brush around my cheeks a couple times, I can feel the static electricity between the brush and my face XD. It starts to lift my face hairs, haha. I think it may be that I have too much hair on my face or something @.@.

I know most of my posts only list bad things about products, but I can happily say, that I love this brush and I don't regret buying it at all!

My next brush that I'm looking into is Too Faced's Kabuki since it has great reviews, only thing is that it's very expensive $30, so I'm waiting until I can find it for cheaper.

Lips Lips Lips

So I decided to do a post on lips since I've gotten my hands on a decent camera finally. Lip products I'm reviewing are B&C Makemani Lip Curving Silicone, Revlon's Absolutely Fabulous Lipstick in #51 Infatuation, and Elizabeth Arden's Starlight.
So like many of you, I was lured in by this absolutely gorgeous ad featuring plump milky lips. I was even convinced enough to shell out $13. I cringe when I read this now.


Swatches of the before and after of the lip gloss. I liked the one in clear. You can see that you do sort of see the same effect after a little while. But I think the texture is what I dislike the most about this gloss. It's really sticky, when I say sticky I mean STICKY. It's also a bit sweet so I start to feel like that instead of having silicone on my lips, I have heavy syrup coating my lips.... is what I thought the first time I wrote this, but I tried it again (after not being able to find my usual of course) and there's no sweetness, so I'm not sure what I was talking about. The gloss also becomes absorbed after about 2 hrs and you get plain sticky lips. Like a child who's just finished a lollipop. I rarely use this (only when I can't find my other glosses). This is another disappointing buy. The one good thing that I will say though is that it's odorless, so that's a plus for some of you.


Elizabeth Arden's Starlight: At least I think that's what this color is. This lipstick is very creamy, it shows up darker in real life, just a little. I use this over a little gloss when I want just a little more color in my lips. I really like this color and have about 1 cm left in the tube.

Last, I've retaken pictures of Revlon's Absolutely Fabulous Lipstick in #51 Infatuation because I didn't like the pics from before. I would say the color is about 2x as intense as these pictures and the shading is more like the second picture's. Again, this isn't very drying, but because of the color I don't think I'll wear it out at all.

Nails: Orly Gorgeous and Catch the Bouquet vs Inglot

So as promised, here is my review on these Orly nail polishes. I think they costed me around $6 each at Sally Beauty.

This entire line of colors I found to be beautiful, irresistible. The left picture is 1 coat, and the right is two. Catch the Bouquet is on the left and Gorgeous on the right. The goldish color on my middle toe is Inglot's 630.

I apologize sooo much for my toes >.<. It's cold and my skin has a nasty habit of drying and peeling. My dad even bought me Lamasilk Foot Cream, but it's just like putting a bunch of Glycerin on, absolutely no help T_T.
Orly I found not to chip, it's more like it starts to fade and wear off. I'm a little disappointed because I was expecting Catch the Bouquet to be more of a baby pink. The glitters make it a sharp pink. As you can see, the colors are quite sheer, for more of a pop effect you might want to layer over black or some other darker color. Gorgeous is this magenta pink with a violet/ blue sheen.

I'm currently selling the Catch the Bouquet in my shop! (link on side) So if you think this color might be for you then hop on over.



The Inglot 630, I reviewed, before, but I thought I'd give another update review now that I've worn it a couple of days. As you can see in the left pictures, it's color in the bottle is a light pink color, I want to say a peachy pink, but when applied, the color comes out the color of the sheen, a gold color. I'm guessing this is the effect for all of the O2M line, so just be aware.

You'll also notice that I have several chip marks and scratches on my nails. I have to tell you that nail polish tends to stay very well on my nails, when I paint my toes, the polish doesn't chip or anything until I take it off with remover months later (yes, months!). So for this expensive polish to be coming off already when $1 polishes don't budge is really upsetting.

It's supposedly the same materials as what contacts are made out of and supposedly increase nail breathability. I don't know if it has more oxygen in my nails now, but I can tell you that my nails still have the same "smothered" feeling as when I use other polishes.

I also noted that this gives a streaky application. It's like there's more clear stuff than pigment so it doesn't cover the nails quite all the way. When you first put it on, for the first day to two days, it feels like the nails will scratch on anything, but by the end of 2-3 days, the polish will have become of a harder finish.

I have to say though, I am getting used to the color and quite like it now. Still wish it were a tidge more pink though, to make a dusty rose gold color. $14? =/ I'll have to think some more on whether or not I would repurchase this.

***EDIT***

Well my friend finally screamed at me "Why didn't you use a topcoat?!" So this time I did and yes, haha it does make it better. The topcoat gives the polish a harder finish and now I can go...1week without it chipping lol. I actually tried using basecoat as well, but it turns out so many layers doesn't dry well. I spent two hours trying to paint and dry them, only to mess them up in the shower again (it was late so I just went ahead and showered when I thought they were mostly dry. big mistake lol. I'm liking the color more and more, once it dulls some it doesn't look so blinding @.@. Still wish it were a tidge more pink though.

Inglot: Will Visit Again

Who knew I would spend an hour picking my things in this teeny store? I almost walked right past it. As soon as I walked in, the saleslady was bent on making sure I knew what was going on. It may just be me, but she looked a bit old to be wearing lipgloss with chunky orange glitters. She started explaining the entire history of Inglot, which I already knew, but it didn't hurt, so I just let her continue.

I glanced at the AMC pigments, and while they have beautiful colors that change, I was determined in my goal of getting two palettes, eyeliner, and a nailpolish. I spent an hour picking my things. Yes, you heard right, who knew I could take so long? Well there was another girl there that took almost just as long picking two colors.


Thought I'd first give a pic of their brushes and prices. Can't really seem to find their prices around the net.



I hadn't planned on getting lip colors, but well, that was the smallest palette that they have and I wanted a concealer. At first I thought the lipcolors were more like gloss, but as a matter of fact they really are just lipstick in a pan. The colors I picked..I thought I liked in the dark, but when I saw the colors in the light...uh oh. The left is warm, and the right is basically a berry color. Doesn't quite go very very well with my skin. So I kind of mixed the two to create a color that I liked better.

I must say, they are VERY pigmented, one swipe was enough for a day look. Less product gives a brighter, more neonish bright look, more product gives darker effect. I noticed something that may be of concern, in a room of about 75 degress, the lip colors start sweating. Yes, sweating. 75 deg isn't that warm so...$16


The concealer is cream, and I do like that it doesn't dry out the skin. Only thing is that I think that I chose the wrong shade, haha, as you can see, it's even more yellow than the sonia kashuk. Once I dug in though, I saw that it was less yellow than the surface.

You have to be careful though, because this palette collects random debris like crazy! little shirt fibers will find their way in.

The eyeshadow palette isn't quite as pigmented as i had hoped. The dark green I was wishing was a dupe of Lorac's The Green Room since I lost it. No dice. A color that I liked better for the pink turned out to be way too shiny. It became more of a sheen really. So I tested this one out which didn't look as nice in the palette to me, the glitters looked chunkier. But it turned out to be not so bad, although really shiny just the same $26

The black is a swatch of the eyeliner, color #77



The nailpolish...I'm still waiting for the effects of my $14. Color is 630. Although it looks pink in the bottle, it comes out more gold, really really shiny actually. I'm almost blinded. (Edit: I found that if you apply a coat on top with Orly's Peroxide Gel then the pink comes out more!) The polish dries fast, but it still smells like crazy. After wearing it around for a day, I can confidently say for those of you who like to keep your manicures perfect and don't have time to reapply, this is not the polish for you. The surface scratches off like crazy. Oh, and ..it has a streaky application. Edit: Read Here for an updated review.

The eyeliner, I tested and can see that it is pretty waterproof. It's not intensely black, but it'll do I suppose. Wouldn't want to end up looking crazy. $12

BCBG Paris Dragon Shoes

After oogling these shoes for the longest time online and seeing that it was way out of my price range my heart sunk and I decided to give up on them. Then, I saw them on the clearance racks at DSW, imagine my surprise!

So I tried them on in black first. I must say with these you have to go at least 1/2 a size down. Even then it was still slightly loose. I also noticed a plastic noise when I walked, not unlike child high heel shoes. I didn't like them as much and was very disappointed in how my image of these was shattered.

Then I saw the red ones, the ones I had originally and first seen. They were in my real size which means that they are loose. Still, the beautiful red lured me and I couldn't help myself so I decided to buy them anyways.

I must confess that I don't really like the ruffles, I think they're too flowery and I wanted to wear these heels anywhere and anytime i wanted to. I want them to be casual and formal shoes. So when I got home, I cut off the ruffles. I know. As soon as I did I had a panic moment and even wondered if I should replace at least one of the ruffles. The original stitching was crude anyways.

I also realized that the straps can be adjusted which helped greatly with the too big shoe issue. Only thing is that the ankle strap isn't adjustable, and as you can see, it's a bit big.

I can see why they stuck ruffles on, without them the shoes look off, and something is a little not right, but the more I look at them, the more I am convinced that had I not cut off the ruffles, these shoes would not be worn as much.

As for the plastic sound, I don't hear it as much. Maybe it's the issue of fit or something. It's still not the dull heavy thud of shoes of "better quality" I guess. =/

I definitely recommend for people to get the red ones. Honestly, the black ones don't scream of anything particularly special.

I think the cut off parts look a little like rose petals.




Excuse my toes =X

Concealers: L'oreal and Sonia Kashuk

I must admit, I'm a very brand loyal person. When I find something that works I stick with it, and I have absolutely no desire to look at other options. So you can be sure that when I decided to change from my L'oreal liquid concealer that I was unsatisfied with something.

I've been using this particular type of concealer for about 3 years. Wow, that's a long time when I think about it. I actually managed to finish one or two of them. I have two tubes of the thing now because I lost one of them for a while. Before I never really cared since I only had a spot or two to cover. Now though, I'm breaking out all over the place and require quite a bit of product to cover. That's when I noticed that the liquid tends to show up all the cracks in my often dry skin. Highly unflattering. I should mention that I never use moisturizer, which could be part of the problem, but even when I do results are about the same.

Thus I decided to change to a wax/ stick type of concealer, one that was thicker and wouldn't enter every single crack. I tried a tidge bit of my mom's Neutragena one, but I found that to be a bit to oily for my tastes, or my skin. It would probably come right off. I also want to mention that the L'oreal one tends to dry skin a bit, so it would be good for people with oily skin.

I was poking around target and decided to give Sonia Kashuk a try since my friend had said that their concealer quad was really good. I will say, I'm not blown away or anything, but I am satisfied because just as I had anticipated, it doesn't soak into every crack, and justs lays on top, so the dry flaking skin is less noticeable. Strange though, how when I went there were only 4 shades that seemed relatively close to each other. What about the people who were much lighter or darker than my skin tone? that doesn't seem right.

Anyhow, I've included pics. The darker L'oreal used to be lighter, but as you can see, it oxidizes a lot. I think it started out being an exact match to my skin upon first application. The lighter one was even lighter before, but I found it too light for my skin so I added some of the darker one to darken it a shade. The coverage looks good here, but on areas with dry skin it looks horrible.

While you may be saying to yourself, "Hey, the Sonia Kashuk one looks cakey and horrible", you should also know that I slapped a LOT of product on this time, normally i wouldn't use so much, and I would use moisturizer which DOES make a difference. It actually looks better in real life. The coverage is so much more smoother looking. Still, you can see how it's a bit too yellow for my skin. I might have done better getting #20, but at the time it was hard for me to tell because of the cap- it's burry and foggy so the colors are a bit different.

Despite this, I would say I don't regret buying the Sonia Kashuk, but I'm not entirely sure I'd buy it again. I'll still be on the lookout for a better concealer.

Oh, and the Light L'oreal isn't actually that light and different from my skin, it's the flash of the camera that makes it look that way.

Piercings are Not Meant to be Taken Out Before Their Time

Yesterday, i was so dumb! I was like "hmm..this earring looks a bit tight, maybe it got pushed in or something, I'm going to loosen it a little bit" I didn't realize that the earring back is sealed so it can't go in further. So was pulling and trying to loosen it, and then i thought I'd pull just a little harder, and I ripped the thing out! I was like O.O AHHHHH!! and then it started leaking fluid and blood. I also noticed that on the earring there was all this gross junk build up, so I cleaned it with alcohol first.

But then, when I tried to put the earring in, I couldnt get it back in! like..it really hurt to try and put it through the hole, and I couldn't find it. I was pretty sure i was just going to end up making another hole. After 30 min and my ear turning red, I managed to get it in until the little thin skin at the back, but by then, blood had already clotted and closed it up -___-. So then I had to kind of...work and clean the scab off and it finally went through.
then I struggled for another 15 min trying to get the backing on. seriously.
I'm so glad I decided to hold off on getting a second cartilage until this one's healed. Now i guess i'll have to treat it like a new piercing all over again. It's already been >8 weeks too. sigh.