In My Mailbox (37 Part 2 - Makeup)

Obviously, In My Mailbox is from The Story Siren (inspired by Alea) and is usually books, but I'm going to "borrow" it to do a makeup post. Because it's my blog and I can :P

You guys all know I love elf makeup. And I got an AWESOME deal this time. See, I had to renew my anti-virus (which has its own long story I'm not going to go into), so I bought a Visa giftcard because the anti-virus company doesn't take Paypal if you live in Canada and I don't have a credit card or access to one. I always get extra on it because of taxes and stuff, and once everything was over and done with, I had about 10 dollars left on it. So I bought a 10 dollar elf giftcard with it.

Then I had a $50 Visa giftcard that I'd gotten for Christmas and been saving and I used that plus a buy one, get one 50% off coupon and all in all I only spent $10 of my own money! (Plus a little bit of the leftover giftcard that my order didn't use goes to an Amazon.ca gift certificate for myself.) And wait until you see how much STUFF I got.

(If you want to make any of the photos bigger, just click them.)

Okay, first of all, you know that ten dollar gift card I bought? They sent me this as a thank-you:

It's a Studio Lipstain. It costs $3. They sent me a $3 gift for a $10 giftcard order. How COOL is that?? This colour is called First Date. It's really hard to tell because my lighting was horrible, but it's a superbright pink that I'm not sure I'll ever wear but it's still kinda cool. I'll definitely play with it and I do really like the formula of the stain.

Now here's my actual order of stuff I picked:

LOOK AT THE BOX OF AWESOME. Apparently this is a medium box. I'm scared to know how much stuff you'd have to buy to get a large box.

This is how they pack the stuff. I actually like these bags. You sometimes get little ones, too. This is weird, but they're handy. And bubblewrap!!

This is everything I ordered. The entire order cost about 60 dollars, but I got 35 things, and the shipping itself was $15. (But with my BOGO code, I got around 15 dollars off, so, basically, free shipping. And again, I only spent 10 dollars of my own money that I had considered spent anyways. It's not as bad as it sounds, honest.)

Let's do this backwards of Eyes, Lips, Face, okay?

First, brushes:

The one on the left is Essentials Concealer Brush. I have one of these, but I wanted another because mine's getting a bit worn. (One dollar.)

The one on the left is the coolest thing ever. It's the Studio Retractable Lip Brush. You take the cap off, put it on the handle, and the brush slides out. SO COOL. (Three dollars.)

Nail polish:

Elf has apparently reformulated their nail polish, which is good because the old formula kinda sucked. I only got two because I didn't want to have a ton of nail polish I hated. Plus I have a ton of nail polish already. (2 dollars.)

Lip stuff:

Five Essential Lipticks in Voodoo, Captivating, Sociable, Posh, and Gypsy. These aren't AMAZING, but they're good, and I like that I can try different colours without wasting a lot of money if it looks horrible. I'm not a huge lip gunk person, so that's really good for me. (One dollar each.)

Studio Lip Balm spf15 in Peach. This is minty, too. I like it. It's a bit bright which would be good for summer, but I'd like to try it in Pink and Nude, too. It's not a bad colour and I can wear it, it's just a bit bright. (Three dollars.)

Studio Minty Lip Gloss in New York City. I wasn't expecting to like the whole mint thing but it turned out to be cool. Makes your lips all tingly. And I adore the names of this whole line. There's New York City, Houston, Boston, etc. New York is a bit red for me because I'm a wimp, but I want to try Boston. (Three dollars.)

Two Super Glossy Lip Shines in Pink Pop and Party Peach. I love the way these smell and they're good lip gloss. My only problem is I lose them all the time. But then again, I lost a kiddie pool once. I have all the colours except for like two. They also have spf 15 so that's neat. (One dollar each.)

Mineral Moisturizing Lip Tint spf 8 in Pink. This is a pretty nude colour. I like it, but it can be a bit pale for me. I'll probably try another colour next time I order because it's so easy and it doesn't bother me to wear like lipgloss sometimes does. (3 dollars.)

Last, I got an Essential Hypershine Lipgloss in Flirt as a free gift for referring three people to elf. I *love* this colour and the texture of the gloss is great. Plus, this one didn't break like the other twisty gloss I got from them once did. So, yay. (1 dollar, but I got it free.)

(First row of picture: All lipsticks. Second row: Studio lip balm, Studio Minty Lipgloss, Hypershine lipgloss, Super Glossy Lip Shines, Mineral Lip Tint.)

Face stuff:

Studio Blush and Bronzing Duo. I basically have this in a mini-makeup kit thingie I have, but I wanted a smaller version of it to fit better in my normal makeup bag. (Three dollars.)

Essential Shimmering Facial Whip in Spotlight. I don't know if I LOVE this, but it's okay. (One dollar.)

Studio Cream Blush in Heartbreaker. This I DO love. It's so fast for the days when I'm ridiculously pale and I don't have time to put on foundation and everything. (For some reason, powder blush doesn't show up well on my skin when I'm not wearing foundation. Doesn't matter the colour or brand. I think it's my skin.) If you're wondering, this isn't really a CREAM. It's more like a mousse. I've only played with Maybelline's Dream Mousse foundation a bit in the store, but I think it's a lot like that. It's not greasy at all and I think it's awesome. (Six dollars but it's huge and will last me forever because you hardly have to use any.)

Eyes stuff!

Obviously, eye stuff is my favourite :P

Top row:

Three waterproof eyeliner pens in Hunter Green, Purple, and Teal. I tried these before a long time ago and didn't like them, but I heard they got better. Then there were new colours and they were only a dollar... so I decided to try them. I've heard these can be a bit hit or miss, but for a buck, I didn't care.

I'm glad to say they ones I got are much improved!! The tips are thinner and the colours are way better than the other ones I tried. I have black, midnight, and plum and they all look basically the same. These actually look like COLOURS. They seem to have a bit more lasting power. I used Teal yesterday and I still have blue around my eyes from yesterday because it didn't all come off last night and I was too tired to care about it. (One dollar each.)

Three Brightening Eyeliners in Exotic Green, Teal, and Exotic Purple. This is okay liner. It smudges a lot, but I'm okay with that. (One dollar each.)

Studio Cream Eyeliner in Golden. I have this in black, midnight (dark blue that looks black) and purple from an older order. Purple is my favourite of those three, but I want to try Gunmetal, Ivory, Teal Tease and Punk Purple. I haven't played with this one much, but I think I'll like it. Gold looks good with my eye colour because they have blue mixed into whatever weird colour they are. Some browns do, too, but not all. Anyone who says all shades of brown look good on all shades of blue eyes is WRONG. Trust me. (Three dollars.)

Studio Single Shadow in Purple Passion. This is pretty sheer. I was expecting it to be brighter. It's not bad, though, just not what I was expecting. (Three dollars.)

Essential Shimmer Eyeliner in Iconic Ivory and Black Bandit. These were the only two I didn't own and I wanted them XD (One dollar each.)

Studio Kohl Eyeliner. It only comes in black and, admittedly, I'm not a huge black eyeliner wearer, but... this hasn't impressed me much. As soon as I opened it, the tip of the pencil fell off. Then when I tried it on my hand, it stained my skin really badly. (Three dollars.)

I bought three Brightening Eye Colors in Brownstone, Noveau Neutrals, and Ocean Dreams. I now own every one of these except for Butternut. (Next time.) I adore these eyeshadows. (One dollar each.)

Last of these is a Duo Eye Shadow Cream in Sugar Cookie. I use these as eyeshadow bases a lot as well as to line my eyes with a powder over top. This is the one I use the most so I figured I'd buy a backup of it. (One dollar.)

This next picture isn't makeup, exactly, but I wanted to share it:

Those cotton pads are what I take my makeup off with. You guys have no idea how glad I was to get new ones. My last batch was, like, defective and they were SUPER fluffy and I kept getting pieces of cotton in my eyes which hurts like crazy.

I found a toner for three dollars on clearance and I'm not entirely sure when you use toner or what it does, but I've heard they're good and it was three dollars, so I bought it.

Okay, now have you guys heard of these lip balms? They're called EOS. I had heard about them because I follow makeup blogs and stuff, and everyone said they were good. Then someone said that they were amazing enough that they paid like six dollars for them because apparently they're kinda hard to find in Canada. I remembered seeing them when I was looking at the makeup in this store in my town, so I went to see how much they were. Turned out, they were like three dollars. So I got two, Sweet Mint and Summer Fruit.

(Also, skincare does not count as makeup because I am not allowed to buy more makeup for myself until April. And April is only because there's a foundation I want for spring/summer and I have a coupon that expires in like June, but I'll have a bit of money in April, hopefully.)

Now, the real reason I wanted to include these is I really liked the close-up pictures I took of them. I was in the living room and the lighting was great. And I LOVE my camera. *hugs camera*

This is Sweet Mint. And it smells/tastes EXACTLY like candy canes and makes your lips tingly for a minute which is neat. The lip balm itself is a bit matte and not super glossy so that might be good for guys. Or if you just hate shiny lips. It's organic and stuff too, and three bucks isn't bad. (Chapstick is like 2.50 at my pharmacy. They overcharge like whoa.) I wouldn't say it's SUPER moisturizing, but it's still good. And to be fair, my lips are super dry.

I *cough* turned on the macro setting of my camera and kinda love this picture. I'm probably weird, but if you guys remember my old camera and pictures... this is a very good picture for me.

I can't quite place what Summer Fruit reminds me of. Maybe like melon a bit? I don't know, but I like it, too. I totally just wanted to show off this picture and that's the only reason for this part of the post.

So, did any of you stick around through this whole insanely long post?

Peace and cookies,
Laina