May Favorites, Acquisitions, and Empties (Or: Amy's Wordiness on Steroids)

Ok, guys, this post is massive. It's so far past tl;dr, it can't even see it on the horizon. Consider yourselves warned.

Favorites:
This month, I've been loving mixing Revlon Colorstay Ivory 110 with MAC Matchmaster 1. The combination is a perfect match for my skin, and it means the best of both worlds: the slip and ease of the Revlon, and the pigmentation and oil control of the MAC. Very pleased!

I've also been wearing eyeshadow 4 or 5 days a week (up from 1 or 2 in the past, ha!) because I get bored waiting for my sunscreen to absorb. My go-to look is TFSI with Too Faced Silk Teddy on my lid, LMdB Corinthian in the crease and outer V, and Too Faced Heaven above my crease to blend. Easy, elegant, and lasts all day!

I've also really been loving playing around with all my perfumes. Mitsouko is still my #1 love, but FM Carnal Flower and By Kilian Beyond Love are great for warmer weather (I love my tuberose, yum). Some of the other wins: L'Artisan Thé pour un Eté (jasmine tea!), FM En Passant (lovely lilac), Samsara (great day-to-night scent), Dior Diorella (weird, delightful chypre), and Jicky (ultimate comfort scent). I've taken to wearing one scent down my shirt (scandalous!) and a different one on my left forearm, so that I catch whiffs of them both over the course of the day. I do have to be sure to wear scents that don't clash, and sometimes I spray the same one both places, especially when I'm "testing" it (for my own edification with regards to how much I like it), but it's a system that's working well!

My Hair Routine: Suave Color Protection Shampoo and Captivating Curls Conditioner Reviews

I've been working on a big post summarizing my beauty collection (arsenal?), and while linking to the reviews I've done, I realized I've never actually written a post on my shampoo and conditioner! (The only other styling product I use is Suave Captivating Curls Mousse, which I reviewed here.)

images via Suave

Giveaway Winner!

The winner of the giveaway is Lizzy, with her suggestion that I should try Shiseido products (entry #14)! She also won one of the last giveaways I did, and has been one of the blog's longest and most ardent readers (and is one of my oldest and dearest friends IRL, aww), and if I didn't trust that Rafflecopter's selection process is completely random, I would think nepotism! So congratulations, L, and thank you to everyone who entered :-)

I'll have another post up in the next couple days with y'all's suggestions for cheap dinners. Spoiler: there's lots of legumes.

What's new with you all?

Revlon Colorburst Lip Gloss in Strawberry Review and Swatches

Hey, y'all! Today's the last day to enter the giveaway, if you haven't already! Also, you may have noticed I changed the look of the blog. It was done as a procrastinatory measure, but also because it's approaching summer now and I felt like a change (summer 'round these parts is GREEN, hence the color scheme). Let me know what you think/if there's anything you'd like to see different!

For anyone who's not read the blog before: I tend to hate lip gloss. It's sticky and messy and glops up all weirdly (though see Fraise Crème and pH Matchmaker for success stories). And yet, sometimes the hype is enough for me to be willing to try one, and when you combine that with a 40% off sale, you get the perfect gloss storm. Sometimes, though, the risk pays off, and such is the case with Revlon Colorburst Lip Gloss in Strawberry (though let me just say, no natural strawberry has ever been this color––not that it's a bad thing, just a slightly misleading name!).

Prettyyyyy

Sunday Summary

Happy Sunday, lovelies! It's been awhile since I've done one of these, but with the long weekend I feel like I have a bit more breathing room work-wise (rightly or not, ha!) so I actually feel like I have the time! I went winetasting with my mother today; it was sadly overcast, but not too cold, and it didn't rain, so all in all a weather semi-win. We went to Sarven Winery and did their flight and got cheese and bread to go with it; I neglected to take a picture until I had already decimated quite a lot of the cheese, but here it is:

Olives, apple, and manchego cheese

Still-warm baguette, yum

Fragrance Friday: Some Mini Reviews (Miniviews?)

I've been entirely too busy with life stuff lately and haven't really had the chance to write up full reviews for perfume, not to mention I am so unqualified to do so. And so, I've decided to post "miniviews" of things I've smelled, with links to more substantial reviews from other legit perfume bloggers where warranted. These are basically just the notes I took on my phone when I went perfume hunting with L at the Eugene mall (which has a truly paltry selection of perfume, so don't be expecting anything niche here), so some are very brief and uninformative, though I've added some extra comments in parentheses. Hopefully they're witty enough for you to forgive me their lack of content! (Also, if you haven't already, be sure to enter the giveaway! It closes Monday.)

Cacharel Anaïs Anaïs: Nope, smells outdated. (Classified as a floral by Fragrantica, where it received not great reviews. I think the vintage was better, but am not about to try and hunt it down.)

Chanel No. 5: Yes, aldehydes, but I like it much better in edt than edp form, because the underlying floralcy can come out. Worth smelling, should probably try on skin. (Aldehydes and I don't get along particularly well, so I don't actually plan on getting a sample of this. I know, cue perfumista horror. See Bois de Jasmin and Now Smell This's reviews.)

Clinique Aromatics Elixir: L described it as bug spray. I cannot put it better myself. Perhaps it's better when worn, but I don't really feel a burning desire to find out. (This is a classic, polarizing chypre, so I really should try it on skin sometime. Maybe I'll try the next time I'm at the mall. See Bois de Jasmin's review.)

Dior Hypnotic Poison: Okay, smells like vanilla and licorice to me. Maybe the woods come out when you wear it, but I'm not willing to find out. Too strong, too sweet. (See Now Smell This's review for a more flattering opinion.)

Dior Poison: Smelled this years ago and hated it; still holds true today. Way too big, couldn't even try and find the notes. Just no. ("Poison" is an accurate name, at least! This is arguably THE perfume of the 80s, with everything that comes with that. Should stay in the 80s, thank you very much, along with shoulder pads, big perms, and the Berlin Wall.)

Currently Coveting: Bronzers and Highlighters

Currently Coveting is an intermittent feature on products that catch my attention, whether new, cult classics, or something in between!


I'm pretty pale, much like French is pretty nasal. I've never been matched to MAC's main line of foundations, but Matchmaster 1 is just a little bit dark for me, so I'd guess I'm in the NW 5-10 range depending on season. Most of the time, I'm just fine with that; sure, I have to wear sunscreen like whoa, and gigantic sun hats are my best friend (after bunnies, I mean), but I am just way too lazy to try to fake a tan. I'm also pretty oily, much like cheese is pretty delicious. I use multiple products daily to try and keep my shine to a minimum, and still am not entirely pleased with my results.

And yet. And yet. Lately, I've been finding myself feeling like picking up a bronzer and/or highlighter. I already have a bronzer, Benefit Hoola, and almost never wear it, and a luminizer, theBalm Mary-Lou Manizer, which I can't even tell is there after application, so I justify considering buying new ones by saying I'll use it them contouring, since, while the Meow Skinny Dipper is the perfect color for contouring, I am always far too lazy (notice a trend?) to bother with loose powder in the morning, and Hoola is too dark to be a foolproof contour. Really, though, I just want them because they're pretty. Fortunately, I have more restraint than that (barely), but here are some that have particularly caught my eye:

Combos

Korres Magic Light Contouring Trio Santorini, $28 for 0.30 oz

Guerlain by Emilio Pucci Terra Azzurra Bronzing Powder & Blush, $75 for 0.56 oz

Neutral Eyes: Quick Reviews of Urban Decay Shadow Pencils in Juju and Sin and Hourglass Visionaire Eyeshadow Duo in Gypsy

I wanted to get my thoughts on Urban Decay's shadow pencils up before the end of the giveaway (extended through Memorial Day! Go enter if you haven't!), but didn't feel like doing a full review and happened to have swatches of Hourglass Gypsy that I needed to do something with, so...here's a quick combo review!

Juju (left),
Sin (right)

Urban Decay's eyeliners are cult favorites (I have Mildew and Rockstar, and love the former [the latter is a bit too glittertastic]), so everybody was pretty psyched when they came out with bigger shadow pencils. I picked up the 5 pack they'd released for the holidays when it was on super-sale and kept the two lighter neutrals for myself (the others are here), and have been using them on and off for the past couple months.

Juju (top), Sin (bottom)

Sin is a shimmery light champagne, and Juju is a shimmery taupe. They're pretty firm, so I just swipe it all over my lid and then blend to soften the edges. On their own, they crease and fade pretty badly on my oily lids, but they last ~8 hours over TFSI, and longer if I top them with powder shadow.

Sin blended all over lid, Juju blended in crease

They do need to be sharpened, but I've gotten a lot of wear out of them without needing to do so yet (the only reason I did was to test and make sure it could be sharpened before writing this review, and yes, it can––I used the larger hole in the $2 Revlon sharpener I have to no ill effects). I wouldn't pay $20 for one, but I'm very pleased to have the ones I do! Grade: B (if you get them for cheap, A-)
$20 for 0.10 oz, available from Sephora and Urban Decay

Grouchy stressed post (after 5 minutes of thinking, that's the best title I could come up with. I don't even know.)

Oh my god, you guys, I am so bleh. I've spent the last 2 weeks grading like mad, and I still feel like it's not right––with 75 students, how am I supposed to ensure consistency in my grading? Essays are the worst. I feel so ill-equipped to determine who gets a B+ and who an A-. Plus, there are some people who turned their surveys in late, but I didn't always mark them as such, so they're getting higher grades than they deserve, and that also makes me feel like a fail GTF. Blergh.

White bleeding hearts at Hendricks Park

On top of that, I've been way too social the past few days, and it is exhausting. Between that and the grading, I just feel completely drained, and all I want to do is hunker down and hide from the world and play with nail polish. Instead, I have to read some really technical articles, try and get my shit together for this experiment I'm running (which is also causing me great stress, because OMG WE HAVE 3 WEEKS LEFT AND STILL NO SUBJECTS, and hey, what about the whole term paper thing? I should probably be doing reading for that, too?) and try and catch up on syntax reading (y'all, syntax sucks) and oh right, syntax term paper, you should be written, too! What's that, you say? More reading? More confusion? MORE STRESS? Sure, why the hell not.

Pretty pale pink rhododendrons, also at Hendricks (fun fact: Steve "Pre" Prefontaine, the great track star, crashed his car on a rock and died in Hendricks Park. Olympic hopefuls leave offerings by the rock during the Olympic Track Trials [and other track and field events].)

Anyways. I have all these grand plans for the blog, reviews and comparisons and witty posts galore (you know you've spent too much time thinking about syntax when "galore" makes you think mockingly of those theoreticians who hypothesize that it is underlyingly before the noun, but undergoes movement, when it's so much simpler to realize that it's a relic of diachrony), but right now I am just wiped. So all that will have to wait.

Crepes Suzette with strawberries, from Excelsior; super nom

I'm going to go eat something unhealthy, remove my nail polish and reapply something pretty, and watch Happy Endings. I only have a couple episodes left, but I'm definitely planning on rewatching Penny's birthday episode, because I loled out of my chair. So yeah, pretending that the world and all this stressy stuff doesn't exist (denial is fun!). The readings will still be there tomorrow. I would buy myself something pretty (Armani Gloss d'Armani 511, new for the summer, and it looks like absolute perfection for me: a sheer non-sticky plum! Come to mama...), but I don't want to go over my beauty budget so I'm trying to hold off until June. Why can't I be a trust fund baby, y'all? The perfumes I could sniff, the gloss I could buy, le sigh. I'll be back in fighting style soon, I hope, but for now, go enter the giveaway if you haven't already!

How do you deal with stress?

Revlon Just Bitten Kissable Balm Stain in Crush Review and Swatches

I already have, like, way too many lip products, but when I saw a full display of the new Balm Stains from Revlon at Rite Aid during the Revlon 40% off sale, I couldn't resist picking one up.

Oh fer pretty!

I love balms, and stains, and though I already have several lippies in this style, I wanted to see how this compares.

Just Bitten Kissable Balm Stain in Crush