Pret a Party

I'm at that wonderful stage of the festive season when my shopping is complete and I have the freedom to peruse the craziness of the shops without stress - and sneak an extra present or two under the tree for myself, I'm not going to lie! For those who are also being cheeky or the others who are still gathering gifts for their loved ones, I thought this was a ripper of a gift set that might lead you into Myer for a quick gift purchase. Benefit Cosmetics are known for being fun and cheeky and the holiday release of gift sets definitely embodies that - bright and interactive metal tins filled with their staple products! This Pret a Party* tin contains four little goodies that the brand are well known for which I thought was a good idea.

In theory this tin is an entire makeup look in one, albeit a very natural one (safe to say I pack more on than this each day as a blogger!) The 7.5ml POREfessional to smooth the skin and prime, Fakeup Concealer mini in Medium to cover any redness in the skin, full size They're Real Mascara and full size Benetint for your cheeks and lips! Since I've tried a few of these products and the concealer wouldn't match my pale skin tone I gave this to my best friend Candice to enjoy and trial for me, and she was impressed by the tin and said she'd be storing her makeup brushes in it as a way of recycling which I thought was a great idea. They're Real Mascara isn't one that works well with my lashes so I thought it would be interesting to see how it fared on her lovely eyes, since it seems to be a favourite of almost everyone I speak to online! So far she has used the Fakeup and it was a great match so I want to get my hands on the lighter colour for myself one day, along with Porefessional when I finish my current silicone primer.

The Pret a Party tin retails for $69 and is available from Myer. If these products don't float your boat they have a stack of other cute tins like the Party Hopping Kit with High Beam Highlighter, or the Frisky Six Starter Pack which is my personal favourite.

-Emma x

 

*Product provided for consideration. Honesty, always.

Trialling and Loving

Sometimes the stars align and thrown a whole heap of ripper beauty products into my lap for trialling! Being a beauty blogger means I am lucky enough to try out new products often, and most of the time before the general public gets a look in. I've been using all of this press-release babies for a while now and thought they deserved a wee puff up on the blog.

Napoleon Perdis - sometimes I adore the brand (they do some ripper makeovers, I went there for my 21st makeup look!) and sometimes they just miss the mark for me. I was initially really hesitant about their new Stroke of Genius Liquid Cashmere foundation*, primarily because of the inbuilt brush applicator. Upon using it however, I've fallen for the texture and the fact that the shade 'Look 1' matches is a 'hurrah' moment indeed!

Another thing I was apprehensive about trialling was the Bare Blossom Mineral Blush sample in Ember Bloom*, the idea of a loose blush powder quite frankly scares me quite a bit. The glow this gives my cheeks though - so pretty! The colour isn't very strong so I've been using this on top of my boring pink cheek powders to give it a bit of oomph, and the 'lit from within' glow everyone always raves about it finally mine!

I'd spotted these Sisley Phyto-Lip Twist lip crayons* on a few blogs and Instagram accounts before I received mine for trialling (some were also press samples, others were in hauls) and the zebra print lover in me literally squealed when I opened the parcel. I have a huge zebra print painting in my living room and it's my favourite thing in the house (bar Mister Bovary and Charlie, natch) and it seems my love for zebra was subconscious but there all along. I've been loving both shades, and the one pictured is 2 Baby which is described as a tender pink shade. These have a full post of their own coming, but suffice to say it is love. 

OPI and the Muppets have teamed up once again and I was kindly sent two nail varnishes to play around with. Looking at the shards of glitter in the awesomely-named Gaining Mole-mentum* just makes my heart happy, as petty as that sounds. I'm sifting through my nail polish stash to find the perfect base shade to wear with this to my niece's communion on the weekend - I think she will appreciate the bling!

Are you using anything that is just blowing your socks off right now?
I'd love to hear about it, new things always spark my interest!

Emma x