skin care 101

PCOS and wacky hormones have "blessed" me with an array of skin problems. Acne, for the most part, I can deal with. Except when it's the nasty, lumpy, cystic, looks-like-I'm-growing-a-marble-under-my-skin kind. Like the one I'm nursing on the side of my poor nose. UGH. Not only ugly but painful as well. And all the salicylic acid and benzoyl peroxide topical treatments in the world don't help this type of acne. At least they don't for me. I'm currently trying a new spot treatment by Clearasil that has 8% sulfur in it. It smells a bit funky but it's tolerable. And definitely worth it if it works. I'll have to get back to you on that one.

My only other major problem is my pores. They are HUGE. Well, not all of them, but a choice few on my cheeks, chin, and nose are quite noticeable. I also have a problem with these enlarged pores becoming larger from an excess build-up of sebum. I have very oily skin so I really haven't been able to find a way around this issue. The pores look black but they're not blackheads. They're just clogged pores. I've tried everything short of a professional spa treatment. And I am diligent about my skin care. I wash my face thoroughly. I use moisturizers that are oil free and considered non-comedogenic. I use mineral makeup that does not contain bismuth oxychloride. I exfoliate a few times a week. Pretty much everything they tell you to do to minimize pores, I've done. I've even tried several different pore minimizing products (lotions, etc.) to no avail.

I was pretty much at a point where I'd resigned myself to living with skin conditions for the rest of my natural life when I came across the Clarisonic brush. I read up on it on their website and then scrutinized the 30+ pages of reviews on Makeup Alley. 350 user reviews and the product was sporting a 4.3 out of 5.0 rating. Dude. So then I went to see how much it was. A staggering $195.00. OUCH. Even still, me wanted. Me wanted BAD.

I brought the matter up to my sister and raved on and on about the good reviews and all the benefits of using this product that, for the price, should be at least gold-plated. We both agreed that we wanted to try it. Unfortunately, I am pretty much broke. And I have no room on any of my credit cards to splurge. Even still, taxes were coming so I thought I'd plant a bug in The Monkey's ear. No dice. Not even when I found it for $165-ish on eBay and elsewhere did he budge. And The Monkey never tells me no.

Bugger.

It would've been better if I'd never found the darn thing to begin with! Then I'd never have to covet what I was missing. CURRRRSES!!!

But, alas, my fate was not sealed. My sister does have money open on a credit card and she found one for $140 on eBay. And it comes with a spare brush. (Plus I ordered two of the sensitive brush heads - one for each of us.) So we're both waiting anxiously for our new skin care miracle [we hope] to arrive in the mail. We're crossing our fingers for tomorrow. If I show great improvement in my skin it'll be a shoo in to get The Monkey to allow me to purchase a brush of my own. Perhaps as an anniversary present in April? (Though, it's our fifth anniversary and jewelry would be nice....)

I guess we'll see. Here's hoping that the Clarisonic is my skin care MIRACLE! Fingers and toes crossed!

Heads Up 7 Up!

Lime green and yellow today. Reminiscent of lemon-lime soda.

Prelude to St. Patrick's Day

Hooray for St. Patrick's Day! I love to wear green and it is probably the best holiday to use an excuse to drink. :P Mostly I just like being festive and wearing green. If I wanted to, I could wear something green/St. Patrick's themed every day of the week.

So here is my first St. Patrick's Day themed look. I'm calling it Ode to St. Patty. [shrug] The next green look I do will be on the Sweet Treats list (Key Lime Pie!). Hoorah. Also on the list will be green and gold and green/black/gold. Hmm...

Colors Used:

• Urban Decay Primer Potion: All over lid and brow bone area.


• Coastal Scents 88 Palette (third column, first color): inner corner of lid.


• Coastal Scents 88 Palette (third column, fifth color): middle of lid.


• Coastal Scents 88 Palette (third column, sixth color): outer corner of lid, blended into the crease.


• Coastal Scents 88 Palette (first column, third color): used as a browbone highlight.


• Coastal Scents 88 Palette (black shadow, bottom right corner): used wet as upper liner.


• Coastal Scents 88 Palette (third column, last color): used wet as a lower liner.


• Urban Decay 24/7 Liner in Zero (black): used on waterline.


• Rimmel London Sexy Curves Mascara in Extreme Black.


• Urban Decay Brow Box in Brown Sugar.


• Everyday Minerals Blush in Corner Office.


• L'Oreal HiP Presso Lip Color in Snazzy.

The Results:

Sweet Treats Inspiration -- Oranges 'n Cream Soda

What can I say? I have a hard time wearing eyeshadow that doesn't somewhat match my outfit at the very least. Before I received my Coastal Scents palette I kept looking up at my wardrobe at an orange stripey shirt I bought at the Gap last year on clearance. It's starting to warm up and I've been wanting to wear it. But, alas, I had no orange eyeshadow to match so on the rack it stayed.

Until today! Since my Coastal Scents palette has pretty much every color of the rainbow in gradient form, I decided to try an orange look today. Then I got to thinking about my 'Sweet Treats' inspiration. For some reason, I couldn't get orange cream soda out of my head! So I Googled it and, duh, Stewart's makes an Oranges 'n Cream soda! And that, my friends, served as today's inspiration!

The Inspiration:



The Results:

Sweet Treats Inspiration -- Bananas Foster

So I've been trying to look for other things to 'inspire' my makeup looks. You know, something other than my clothing. :P So I think I'm going to do some looks based on different desserts. To start of my first set of 'themed' looks, I did a look inspired by Bananas Foster. (And, yes, I am wearing yellow today. That's besides the point!) So thinking about Bananas Foster I could see the golden yellow of the caramelized bananas. The deep brown of the caramel sauce. The reddish brown of the cinnamon. The off-white of the vanilla icecream and/or whipped cream. And maybe a cherry on top -- just for fun.

So here is my inspiration:



The Results:

Pink About It!

Today I used my Coastal Scents palette for the first time. In lieu of the upcoming pink and red holiday (read: Valentine's Day) I decided to experiment with a couple of the pinks. Can I just say: WOW. This palette was totally worth the $27.00 I paid for it (that's with priority shipping). The colors are so smooth and highly pigmented! I read the reviews and all that but it's still something else to experience it first hand. I think know I am in LOVE!

So today's look is being dubbed 'Pink About It'. Cute little play on words. Probably not that clever but whatever. Inspired by the cute little L.E.I. shirt I bought from Walmart the other day (on sale for a whopping $3.00!). It's light pink with pretty designs in gray and neon pink. I layered my neon pink v-neck tee from Pacific Sunwear underneath it. It matches perfectly. Oh oh! Plus I'm wearing my hot pink socks from Rue 21. The Monkey said "Oh my God too much piiiink!" What does he know about fashion? ;P

Colors Used:

• Urban Decay Primer Potion: All over lid and brow bone area.


• MAC Shadestick in Beige-ing: All over lid.


• Coastal Scents Palette (light pink; 7th row, 3rd down): all over lid.


• Coastal Scents Palette (dark pink; 7th row, 7th down): outer-V and blended into crease.


• Urban Decay Matte Trio in Asphalt (medium matte gray): liner for both upper and lower lashlines, outer half only.


• Coastal Scents Palette (silver; last row, first color): liner for both upper and lower lashlines, inner half only.


• Rimmel London Sexy Curves Mascara in Extreme Black.


• Urban Decay Brow Box in Brown Sugar.


• Jane Cosmetics Blushing Blush in Plum.


• L'Oreal HiP Presso Lip Color in Chic.

The Results:

Perfect Match

I bought this shirt as a Christmas gift for myself in 2007:



I haven't worn it in a while and today, since it was a pleasant 72° out, I decided to pull it off the rack and use it as inspiration for my eyeshadow. As it turns out, the colors in this shirt (save for the silver glitter) happen to match my eye color perfectly. No, really. Check it out...













Still don't believe me? How about having a look at a close-up?



See what I mean? The teal is in there, the green is in there, even the honey is in there. I'm not big on tooting my own horn but I really think my eyes are just neato. :P

Colors Used:

• Urban Decay Primer Potion: All over lid and brow bone area.


• Urban Decay Deluxe Eyeshadow in Honey (golden yellow): all over lid.


• L'Oreal HiP Eyeshadow Duo in Flashy (teal / cream combo): teal blended above crease; cream used as a brow bone highlight.


• Urban Decay Mildew (deep green): blended into crease.


• Urban Decay 24/7 Eyeliner Pencil in Electric (bright aquamarine): on the waterline.


• BeYu Eyelights in Silver**: lower liner.


• Rimmel London Sexy Curves Mascara in Extreme Black.


• Urban Decay Brow Box in Brown Sugar.


• Jane Cosmetics Blushing Blush in Earth Sheer.


• Stila Lip Glaze in Cranberry.

**I bought this in Germany years ago before I even knew how to combine colors and play with makeup. They are really neat pigment-type shadows that come in an adorable little glass bottle. However, I can't even find these online (I've checked the BeYu website, etc.) so I suspect they've been discontinued. Any silver shadow will do as a substitute!

It has arrived!!

After much contemplation, wishing, adding it to my shopping cart then deleting it; my Coastal Scents 88 Color palette has arrived!! I am so inexplicably excited I cannot even put it into words. :P I've already done about 10 teensy swatches on my hand for fun and WOW. I am looking forward to tapping into my creativity!

So here are some pictures of the palette itself. The Coastal Scents website says in the description that the pans are 'dime size' but it's nice to have a size comparison. Even though I was expecting it they still seemed so teeny! (But there is still more than enough eyeshadow for the price, don't get me wrong!)







Here are a few random swatches. I won't be swatching the entire palette because I have trouble getting good pictures of the lighter colors. Plus my camera really doesn't do swatching much justice. If you're interested in swatches of the entire palette, I recommend Brooke's post on Leesha's website.



I am quite looking forward to abusing the pinks and reds for Valentine's Day! I have a cute shirt that is light and dark pink stripey (with matching stripey SOCKS!) that I can't wait to use as inspiration. And I LOVE LOVE LOVE St. Patty's Day and will definitely be doing some green looks for March using this palette. (Especially looking forward to using that kelly green [points to swatch pic]!)

I'm NAKED! (Or am I?)

I am really saving myself for my Coastal Scents palette that will [hopefully] be here on Monday! I'm looking forward to coming up with a Valentine's Day look using deep reds and bright pinks. The possibilities with this palette (88 shades) are astronomical!

So today, I wore my 2007 Valentine's t-shirt from Old Navy. It's red with a pink-ish heart on the shoulder. I love wearing holiday/seasonal clothing. :P Red clothing goes nice with smokey grays and neutrals. I decided to go "naked" today.

Those of you that don't think you can pull off some of the looks I've done in the past should have NO problem with this look. It's so barely there that even the most conservative of folk could learn to love this look. So here goes!

Colors Used:

• Urban Decay Primer Potion: All over lid and brow bone area.


• Urban Decay Hazmat Matte Trio (pale vanilla, pale sand, medium brown): Sand color all over lid, vanilla color used as a highlight on brow bone, medium brown used in and slightly above crease to contour and add depth.


• Urban Decay 24/7 Eyeliner Pencil in Zero (blackest black): top liner, smudged with a pencil brush afterwards.


• Urban Decay 24/7 Eyeliner Pencil in Bourbon (brown with teeny gold glitter): lower liner.


• Urban Decay Twice Baked (brownie brown with subtle gold glitter): smudged over top of Bourbon eyeliner.


• Rimmel London Sexy Curves Mascara in Extreme Black.


• Urban Decay Brow Box in Brown Sugar.


• Jane Cosmetics Blushing Blush in Petal.


• L'Oreal HiP Presso Lip Color in Chic.

The Results:













Before I do this look again I need to find a good liquid liner in black. My liner on top is a little too thick, in my opinion. But that's that! SOOOOOOO looking forward to my Coastal Scents palette that I can hardly stand it!