Sunday, December 2, 2012

Winter Nail Design

Winter Nail Design

Recently, I've been really into pretty nail designs and changing up my nails! Below is the design I'm starting out December with. I love it! I think it's elegant and very festive. I did NOT design it. I followed a tutorial on YouTube, which I'll link below. I haven't designed anything of my own yet. I plan to once I become more comfortable with it. 


This design was pretty basic and the tutorial was really easy to follow! Let me know if you have any questions or want step by step instructions of what I did to re-create this design.

Link to the tutorial I followed: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TyYmM8CwxGE&list=PL5Cq8qKc2DIWgaVdZDDYZkpfmgq2oeebM&index=15&feature=plpp_video

XO,

Casandra

First YouTube Video!

Hey Everyone!

I'm currently uploading my very first YouTube video. Eeekk! This is very exciting! I also filmed another today that I'll upload later in the week. I'm very very excited to get all of this going. 

This is the link to the video:
http://youtu.be/IXW9muDn_Pc

Please give me any feedback and advice! Everything constructive is very much appreciated! 

XO,

Casandra

Saturday, November 24, 2012

Tarte Carried Away - Swatches and Review

Tarte "Carried Away" - Swatches and Reviews

Swatches:



 The first set of swatches contain the shadows from the first row of the eye shadow palette. The colors are called snowfall in Paris, Golden Gate Bridge, volcanic ash, pyramid gold, Pebble Beach, Boston brick, Spanish sangria, Napa grapes, Iceland air, Mystic Seaport, concrete jungle, Hampton waves. Napa grapes is a near matte shade. It has chunks of silver glitter in it. The rest are a mixture of shimmers and glitters. 

The second set of swatches (from the second row in the palette) has 3 matte shades and again mixtures of shimmers and glitters. The colors are Pearl River, Seychelles sand, touchdown in London, Martha's Vineyard, Georgia peach, Tuscan sun, acai jungle, coral reef, sunshine state, Hawaiian palm, olive grove and sin city. 


Unfortunately, I only have four of the glosses with me right now. I'm traveling for the Holidays and wanted to make room in the case. I'll post swatches of all 8 when I get back home! 

Amazonian Clay 12-Hour Blush in Adventurous (shimmering rose)

Review:

Amazonian Eye Shadows - Not every shadow in the palette was a hit, but there were enough in there that I loved to make it worth the money! The shadows didn't have a lot of fall out, which I loved! Unfortunately, the shadows with thick glitter pieces (ex: volcanic ash, olive grove) didn't go on as smooth and the glitter did get all over the place. Especially with volcanic ash (the black shadow in the first set of swatches). But the other shadows blended beautifully and were incredibly smooth. Without primer, the shadows lasted about 5 hours before they started noticeably fading and with primer, their intensity stayed well over 11 hours before I had to clean then off.

Lip Glosses - I personally am not a huge lip gloss fan. I hate the stick feeling. I feel like they smear all over the place. And the color is gone in a matter of minutes. With that being said... I love these glosses! They are a little sticky, but it was bearable. No yucky strings when I pull my lips apart! But what sold me.. they last so much longer than most other glosses I've tried! I went out to get pizza with a friend. Put on the 3rd color in the swatch and when I got home 4 hours later (after eating pizza!) the color was still there! And I didn't have anything on underneath. That's pretty impressive. Definitely considering purchasing a full size version of these... if I could settle on a color. ;-)

Blush - I love the color of this blush.. it's perfect for the winter! I'd say it's more of a wine than a rose when it's on the cheek though. But still so beautiful and really does last 12 hours. The shimmer wasn't over whelming at all. It gave me a slight glow. I was pretty impressed with the blendability as well. 

Finishing powder - Goes on and feels A LOT like the MUFE HD finishing powder! I can't say for sure if it looks the same in pictures yet but the staying power seems to be about the same. I'm definitely going to finish this and let you know my final thoughts!

Mascara - I haven't tried the mascara yet since I already have about 5 opened and I really picky about only using a mascara for 3 months before tossing it. I'll post about it as soon as I try it!

Summary:

I've been playing with this kit everyday for about a week and so far, I love it! Definitely worth the $54. The lip gloss and face brush surprised me with their quality. The eye shadows (minus a few) are beautiful and wear great! I would recommend this to friends and can't wait to pick up a few more Tarte products. 

Let me know what you think!

XO,

Casandra

Up Coming:
  -Ordered the Tarte Amazonian Clay Blush Fantastic Foursome Set!
  -Working on a Top Coat Showdown! Stay tuned to see who wins 
  - TheBalm Haul from Hautelook - Super excited for it to arrive!

Tarte's Carried Away Collector's Set

Tarte "Carried Away" - Holiday Set

Why I Bought it:  

             I don't own a ton of Tarte products as the line has never really caught my attention. There have been a few products I've wanted to try, but there was always something I wanted more when I was at the store. The packaging on this set is what first caught my attention. It's really adorable!


 
         The package functions as a traveling case! The outside is a beautiful purple and gold and the inside is covered in pink lining. It feels like really good quality. Which is a plus since I hate purchasing kits that come in cheap packages. 
       The package got my attention, but once I learned about the variety of products inside, I was sold!

What it is:

Tarte's Carried Away Collector's Set
        - 8 mini Maracuja Lip Glosses
        - 1 full size blush brush
        - 1 mini Lights, Camera, Lashes! Mascara
        - 1 mini Amazonian Clay Blush in Adventurous
        - 1 deluxe sample of Amazonian clay finishing powder
        - 24 FULL size Amazonian clay eye shadows

On the left is the 8 mini maracuja lip glosses. The middle is the outside of the eye shadow palette which is BEHIND the mirror from the picture above (pretty nifty huh!). And the far right side contains the face brush, blush and finishing powder. Both the right and the light sides are zippered pockets which actually hold quite a bit of products.


My pictures don't do the eye shadows justice! The first picture is with the clear sheet that comes inside the palette and lists the color of each shadow. Fun fact: The name of each shadow is suppose to be a name of a place each person on the Tarte team has traveled. 

First Impression:

1. The Maracuja Lip Glosses
      I love the color variety of these! There is a light plum, light pink, bright pink, pale/nude pink and a bright red. The colors are great and could work for a variety of skin tones.

2. The Blush and Face Brush
     The Amazonian 12-hour clay blushes have gotten nothing but rave reviews. I personally love the look of this color and don't mind the little bit of shimmer in it. The brush is incredibly soft and feels like really good quality. I really like my current blush brush, but I'm really excited to try this one!

3. The Finishing Powder
     I didn't even know Tarte made a finishing powder! From first glance, it reminds me a lot of the MUFE HD finishing powder, which I'm a HUGE fan of. 

4. The Eye Shadows
    Wow! Really... the variety and range of these eye shadows is amazing! And even though the palette includes blues, greens and a pretty bright purple, each color/quad is VERY wearable. I really really excited to try out a bunch of different looks with this palette!

Worth the Price?:


I bought this palette for $54 at Sephora. 

Full Size Maracuja Lip Gloss is $21 for .12oz. The minis in this kit are .059 oz each. So basically 2 minis = 1 full size. 8 minis = 4 full size x $21 regular price = worth $84!!

Full size blush .2 oz = $25; Mini size in this kit is .05oz so 1/4 the product. 1/4 of $25 = $6.25

.32oz finishing powder = $28, the one in this kit is .7oz, so a little less than 1/4 of the product so about $6.50.

Lights, Camera, Lashes! .24oz = $19... The mini in this kit is .16oz so 2/3 the amount of product... and 2/3 the price is $12.73.

I couldn't find the brush on the Sephora website, but tartecosmetics.com had a foundation brush for $29 that looks EXACTLY the same. Same colors and Same Shape. And I compared prices on the Tarte website to Sephora and they matched up pretty much exactly.

And last, but not least, the full size eye shadows: The Tarte website lists quads for about $25 a piece. (Single refills are $17 each!!) So $25 x 6 = $150!!! Wow! 

So... to add it all up: $84 + $6.25 + $6.50 + $12.73 + $29 + $150= $288.48.... So price wise... DEFINITELY worth the $54 I paid for it! And this doesn't even include the cute traveling case! 

(P.S. Let me know if you liked the price break down... if not, I won't include it in future reviews!)


Summary: 

If you're looking to test out Tarte products... I would grab this up! The color selection is great and you're definitely getting a good bang for your buck!

XO,

Casandra

Coming up:
Swatches from this Kit and reviews once I've played with the products


To Do list!

To do:
     - Post Tarte "Carried Away" Review and Swatches
     - Install new Photo Editing Software (I apologize for the poor quality of the photos in my first few posts. I JUST ordered a new camera so the pictures should get better!
     - Finish Creating Banner and Customizing Blog

So much to do when starting a blog! But I'm really excited about this project and hope you are too!

XO,

Casandra

P.S. I LOVE lists! You'll probably be seeing a lot of them. :-)