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What’s In My Holiday Makeup Bag

I already delved into all the skincare goodies I’m bringing for our Christmas trip away here I thought it was only natural to show what will make it into my holiday makeup bag. I say a bag, lets be honest I’m bringing a couple of bags I’m not gonna lie 🙂

My makeup bag is definitely overflowing, but as I said in skincare post I like to be prepared!

First up is eye products.

I’m bringing 3 palettes, excessive I know, don’t judge, one of the zpalettes does contain my Inglot blushes though and a yellow under eye setting powder so it’s kind of ok, right? 🙂

I’m bringing the new Urban Decay Gwen Palette which I have swatches of here I bloomin’ love this palette and don’t want to be without. Also some Makeup Geek shadows in a zpalette and then the palette of a few Inglot shadows and some blushes.

Eye primer is essential in my world so I have a mini Urban Decay Primer Potion being added to my makeup bag. Then, in case I’m feeling posh I’m going to pack the Charlotte Tilbury cream shadow in Bette, I have a full review of this here. Rather than a black gel liner I have been loving using a dark grey one at the minute so I’m bringing my Inglot matte gel liner in 78. Then two kohl pencils. A grey L’Oreal one and a brown one from Rimmel.

The rest of my eye goodies consist of lashes, my fave individuals from Penneys, a pair of Amazing Shine lashes that I love, you can now buy these in Mr Price which is really handy. Then some Duo glue to apply them, an eyelash curler from Shu Uemura and finally some Catrice Glamour Doll Waterproof mascara, I have a full review of this here I love it 🙂

For the face, of course I am going to bring a few options because I am very fickle, and like to change my mind…alot. Also I think you need day time options and night time options too.

The Botanice Radiance Balm is coming. I have a review of this here The primer I have been using for the last while is the Wet n Wild Coverall. I really like it for my oily skin. I have the Estee Lauder Double Wear Light in a shade darker in case I get a little bit of colour, I can mix it with my tried and tested Rimmel Lasting Finish Nude foundation (review here) and a tester of the Makeup For Ever Ultra HD which I really like too. I’m also bringing the Benefit Porefessional License To Blot which is such a weird product. It’s a cream blotting stick and it bloody works!

My concealer choices for the week are my beloved Mac Full Coverage foundation. I love using this as a concealer. Then, my favourite under eye concealers of the moment (again another full review here 🙂 The Flormar Perfect Coverage and the Catrice Liquid Camouflage.

Powders consist of four faves…yep four I have problems ha! I have Nars Laguna in this really cool palette (it’s called Tahiti) and it comes with a mini Ita brush! Then the Chanel Vitalumiere Powder Foundation, sorry for dropping all of the links but I reviewed this too . the cult classic Champagne Pop from Becca is coming, I have this reviewed too here .The last one on the right then is to bring with me for touch ups, it’s the Mac Studio Fix Powder.

For contouring (and cream highlighting) I have a couple of old reliables. The Kevyn Aucoin Sculpting Powder in Medium (yep review here 🙂 and the Smashbox contour and highlight sticks (demo here 🙂

Brow products consist of the Soap & Glory Archery Pencil, then three Billion Dollar Brow products, you can buy these from Boots. I have their brow brush, brow powder and brow gel.

I have a full colour spectrum of lip choices to choose from going into my makeup bag. A red from Tom Ford called Cherry Lush, a Bourjois Rouge Edition Velvet in Ping Pong, Essence liquid lipstick in Show Off (review here) and then one of the Rimmel The Only One Lipsticks in Naughty Nude (I have a load of these swatched here) A couple of lip liners join the crew too. Rimmel Eastend Snob and Mac Whirl.

To apply all the slap some brushes are essential, right? I have the Nima Brush Girls On Tour travel set, I’m so excited to use these beauties, you can see them up closer here. I have a mini Mac 217, a random mini flat Nars brush and a big Powder n Pout P230 which I have yet to try so the hollier will be a good test. I think these will keep me going for the week, right?

That’s all the makeup that will make it into my suitcase. I’m definitely an overpacker I know, a couple of makeup bags will be needed.

If you want to have a nose at what I get up to, be sure to follow me on Snapchat. I love snapping. My username over their is ‘Beautynook’.

As always thank you so so much for reading 🙂

xxx

December 21, 2015/by Gem

Smashbox Contour Stick Trio

Guess what’s on the agenda today? How did you know 🙂 Yes I am waffling all about the Smashbox Contour Stick Trio. I decided I was going to pick these up with my Boots points, so I had been patiently saving my points and then I went online to browse the Boots website. They were on special for €38…and so… they were bought and the story begins.

So as you can see there is three pencils. A highlighter, a bronzer and then a contour.

You get a sharpener in the box too which I think is very necessary as these pencils are really creamy so use up very quickly. I think if you were using these everyday you wouldn’t get a huge amount of time out of them.

Here they are swatched on my arm. You can see how pigmented and creamy they are.

The highlighting shade is pretty light, I could probably do with a shade lighter for my pale skin, this is the story for most of these kind of things.

The contour shade (in the middle) is a grey toned brown, perfect shade for it. And then the bronze shade is a warmer toned brown for warming up your complexion, as I am sure you know 🙂

So onto using it on my mug.

First up here I am without any of the Smashbox Contour Stick Trio’s applied and some lovely bed hair too 🙂

I first apply the highlighter stick.

I applied it under my eyes, the centre of my nose and eyebrows, the tops of my brows and above my cupids bow.

Then the bronzer.

Smashbox say use the product in an x formation and I think it does work best because you tend to use less product than just drawing lines around your face. I personally use it around the periphery of my face and then blend it down. You could use the contour shade in the same way too, I just like the warmer shade around my face. I don’t contour my nose or anything like that because I feel that it is pretty small already so I don’t really find it necessary.

I use the contour shade of the Smashbox Contour Stick Trio just on my non existent cheekbones.

I am only gorgeous I know 🙂 Again using the x formation around 2/3’s of the way down my cheek. Just follow where you naturally have a hollow. If you’re chubby like me do the fishy face to find out where it is.

So then onto blending. Blending the Smashbox Contour Sticks is actually really easy, they don’t take much work at all. I just use whatever foundation brush I used. I blend the bronze shade into my skin more, whereas with the highlighter and contour shades I keep the blending more isolated to where I applied them.

You can see the bronze and the contour shades do warm up my complexion and give a slight illusion of definition on my cheeks, happy days. The highlight shade really doesn’t do a whole load for me, I’m just too pale.

Here is the whole shabang with powders and lipsticks added and the gruaig looking a bit better too.

Overall, I really like the Smashbox Contour Stick Trio. They are easy to use, easy to blend and the colours are mostly good. They are by no means a necessary step in your makeup routine. For me, I like them for when I want a more pronounced contour for going out. I will layer contour and highlight powders over top. Or for a more subtle highlight, I will just set the Smashbox Contour Sticks with face powder. Obviously there is tonnes of alternative products to get your chisel on, the sticks are just a handy one as they are small and easy to control. It’s only a matter of time before the highstreet brands are all over it and bring out their own versions. I look forward to that 🙂

What do you think? Let me know.

xxx

June 17, 2015/3 Comments/by Gem

Monthly Favourites

Gem’s November Faves

It is officially the countdown to Christmas, we can be excited and buy presents and sing Christmas songs and it is completely tolerated. Yay! Soooo… it’s the start of December, November has been and gone so quick may I add?!

This means November faves time on Chatterbox. Keep reading to see my instalment 🙂

First up I have a double lip product fave.

A lip liner and lipstick combo to be exact. Whirl lip liner by Mac made infamous by one Kylie Jenner and Nars Lipstick in Joyous Red, that is not red, it’s more of an orange brown colour. I think it looks like Autumn in a lipstick pretty much.

I have been wearing these two lovelies together a whole lot in the month of November. I love the 90’s brown lip shade revival so this is my nod to it.

I have a hat love next for this month.

This was bought for me by my kind boyfriend on a whim in River Island in the men’s section. I like to try on all of the hats in all of the shops (it can get annoying). I tried this on while we were waiting in the queue to buy himself some shoes, and it just became mine 🙂 I love all of the different colours going through it and it is lovely and soft and snuggly, perfect for this time of year. It was €17.50 not the cheapest of bobble hats I know!

The Oskia Renaissance Cleansing Gel has been my face wash obsession in November.

As beauty bloggers we are very fortunate to get alot of products for consideration. We received this product in a goody bag and had heard alot of good things about it so I literally used it the day I got it. It’s a gel wash that you apply to the face firstly on it’s own, then you add some water to make it more foamy, rub it in and then rinse it off. It gets all of your makeup off, waterproof included, without having to scrub your face and your eyes. It’s full of lovely natural ingredients including pumpkin enzyme that is meant to dissolve dead skin cells and really clean your pores. My other face cleansers have been gathering dust in the month of November, this has been all I have used.

More skincare for me this month. I got this in the October Chic Treat Club Box.

It is the Yonka Invigorating Mist, Dry Skin Toner. It is a lovely spray facial toner that smells divine, herbally and flowery all at the same time. I love using it in the evening time, it’s feels lovely on the skin, dries in really quickly and feels nice and hydrating. The smell is also really relaxing. The aerosol spray makes it so handy too, no wasting of the product.

This is a sample size, it doesn’t come this small promise 🙂

The Smashbox Photo Finish Pore Minimizing primer has definitely been my primer of the month. I’ve used nothing else, this sample has lasted me well hasn’t it? This, for me is so similar to Benefit’s Porefessional which I love. As you can see it is nearly skin coloured but blends in, so you cannot see it. It has a velvet texture, that makes your skin feel lovely and soft as well as blurring out your pores, which for me is so important in a primer. It’s not drying but it does help keep the shine at bay throughout the day. It will kill me to pay €35 for it when my mini runs out but I think I will invest as it is such a lovely product.

My last favourite is something I’ve had for ages and just stopped using.

We have here the HD Brow Kit.

I went to Preen in Dame Street in November and got my brows overhauled by the lovely Siobhan in there, she’s literally a brow wizard :). When it came to filling them in myself then I needed something to fill in the new shape of my brows where the hairs are still growing in. I have been using and loving Soap & Glory’s Brow Archery Pencil, but I needed some powder too for some extra help. So I reclaimed this palette from the back of a makeup drawer and the rest is history. I only really use the bottom two colours, “Warm Brown” to the left and “Ash Brown” to the right. I find combing them makes a good shade for me as I have red tones in my hair, but am not a fully fledged red head. However the other two shades on the top of the palette “Nude” and “Carbon” come in handy as do the other two shades I use on my brows, when you are in a pinch as they make great eye shadows. So it’s a multi functional palette. Happy days 🙂

There we have it, November faves done and dusted. I’m sure our December faves will be a flurry of new things we are dying to share with you. Have you had any stand out favourites this month? Be sure to let me know

As always, thanks for reading.

Gemma

xxx

December 2, 2014/by Gem