Saturday, April 30, 2011

Christian Siriano Kajal Eyeliner for VS

Hey all!

Today was nice out, finally, so I tried to be out of the house most of the day!  I didn't really clean up my nails from last night but I posted some new outdoor pictures of the Zoya polishes I tried in my blog post yesterday.

I decided today to try the Christian Siriano Kajal Eyeliner in Eclipse for Victoria's Secret that I got in my prize package from Tracy and Beauty Reflections!

Wonder what you do when it gets down to the bottom?  Can you sharpen this??

Sooooo like I've said before, I usually wear brown powder eyeliner, but I wanted to try out this black pencil for my something new of the day.  I wasn't planning on wearing any eyeshadow with it but when I realized how dark it was I threw on some brown shimmer on top of it, so in some of the pictures you can tell I did it this way instead of putting on the liner last.  Whoops!  That's ok, check it out:

You can see I got eye shadow on the liner, but it's all gravy
You can't tell as much with my eyes open...woo I got a crap ton of mascara on.

Up close
Closed up close

So overall I liked it.  It went on super smooth and super easy.  I usually have to press pretty hard to get a dark line with pencil eye liner but this went on super dark when I barely touched my skin!  It rubs off, but not super easily--it's stayed on with pretty much the same opacity all day!

I love the packaging, but I'm kind of confused as to what to do once you use a lot of it...I don't know if you can sharpen it back to a point or if you kind of use it so one side is pointed...like a lipstick.  Any ideas??

This runs for about $12.  I really like it and I'll definitely use it up eventually, but I probably wouldn't buy it again unless it comes in a brown.  I can't seem to figure that out with a quick google search.  I'm kind of uninformed, haha. 

Have you guys tried this?? Let me know!

<3 Whitney

PS...check out the haul I won from Stephanie over at Imperfectly Painted:


Ahh so many Sinful Colors!  I'm super excited about these, the purple is something that I was trying to buy for myself the other day but I was already beyond the three polish limit for the sale at Walgreens!  So I'm pretty happy I got it!

The keeki glow-in-the-dark (!!!) polish in the middle was a gift from my boyfriend!  It came in the mail today!  He even researched natural, organic nail polish all by himself!  So cute :)  Have you guys heard of this brand or used it??

Late Night Zoya Update!

So. I've been watching this wedding. All. Day.  I didn't think I would be this fascinated by it but seriously I've been on my couch most of the day working on my thesis with it in the background.  AND I just sat here and did my nails and it's on again.  Kate looked fabulous, she's super gorgeous.  But seriously, I'm 100% positive if you had any interest in this wedding you've already watched it or Googled it a million times today, so I'm not going to talk about it anymore :) But gosh, what a fairytale for her!  P.S. I could totally move to England and do this whole funky British hat thing...except maybe this one:

lolomgwtf!?  Seriously, what were you thinking Beatrice?  It looks like a toilet seat with a bow.

Anyway, sorry this is super late.  I had plans of finishing my thesis draft around 4 but then I decided to eff up my computer code and drew it out to about 6 pm.  Then the boyfriend won Jon Stewart tickets on the radio this morning (seriously the FOURTH (or fifth..?) thing THIS YEAR he's won from the radio, he should play the lottery), so we got to go to that show tonight.  I don't really follow politics super closely nor do I care much about either party (unless it has to do with the DOE, my potential employer), but he was a funny guy and we had a nice time!  That was my something NEW for today...we hadn't seen a show together! 

I ALSO tried two more of my Sunshine Zoyas!  Faye for my fingers and Reva for my toes!
Faye (Zoya.com)
Reva (Zoya.com)
Faye is described as "a bronzed mauve with purple and brown undertones flooded with bright gold sparkle" while Reva is a "cool toned strawberry red with glowing golden metallic sparkle."

I think Faye's description is pretty accurate.  It seems like the gold sparkles definitely dominate the color that you see.  I'd say it's a gold sparkle with a mauve underdone.  I really like this color because, like all Sunshine polishes, it changes completely depending on the lighting and angle you see it from.  Beautiful!  I used 3-4 coats, can't remember.  I think 4.

Reva and Faye

Faye

Outside! It's SUNNY!
I didn't clean up my nails much, sorry about that.
Reva, on the other hand (or foot hahaha...ha..), I can't decide if I like.  I usually have a super bright pink on my toes so this is a little blood red for my taste.  And not to mention I completely SUCK suck suck at painting my toe nails.  My utter lack of flexibility is most likely the cause (which hopefully gets better with my new yoga regime)...that and the fact that my vision is le poop so I can't see what I'm doing unless the lighting is super bright, which my living room is not.  So even though clean up on my toes took longer than painting them it still turned out looking like crap

(WARNING: toe pictures...in case you're weirded out by that sort of thing):

I photoshopped some of the FUG out, but it's still not very good.  Don't zoom in, it's a bad idea.

It's fascinating how ugly your feet can look under a 14 MP zoom.  You really see all your polish (and skin) flaws that way, haha.  I also conveniently cut out my funky deformed pinky toe.  Let's not talk about it.

The Reva looks a little darker in side  I only did two coats 'cause I slathered them on pretty thick not on purpose.  Hopefully it's dried before I go to bed. I also didn't really clean up my toes at all.  I photoshopped it a little to make it look better so you focus on the color and not how terrible I painted my toes lol.

I hope you guys had a FABULOUS Friday and enjoyed all the wedding coverage.  I know I did :)

Catch ya on the flip
<3 Whit

P.S. I added two new Giveaways to my page!

Thursday, April 28, 2011

Life Changes....and Zoya Sunshine Collection: Rica!

This is going to be a two in one entry.  I don't know if it'll always be like this, but that's okay.

I've decided to change some things in my life.  I haven't been as happy as I should lately.  I don't know if I even have legitimate reasons for being unhappy, but I don't always let things go, which is maybe why I've been a bit down.  There are also a lot of things changing soon that I don't want to throw me off.  So I made a list of things to do everyday to keep my spirits up and motivate me.

The non-personal ones include cleaning for 30 mins a day (since cleanliness makes me happy), doing yoga for 30 mins a day (since exercise makes you happy), and to try something new. There's a lot of other stuff on my list but since this is a beauty blog and not a life story blog, we're going to go along with the trying something new part on here.  I'd like to tell you what I decide to try everyday, so I think that'll be a short blurb from now on.

TODAY I went with something make-up related and decided to try the new Covergirl NatureLuxe Silk Foundation:
I tried it in...I forget, I'll have to check when I get home from school :)

I'm not used to wearing liquid foundation, but I really liked it.  It went on pretty sheer, but it seriously went on like silk.  My face was super smooth after putting it on!  It definitely doesn't cake on like some other liquid foundations, but it also didn't cover everything up.  I don't really know how you're supposed to do your whole face make up, honestly.  I don't even always wear foundation, so I don't know if you're supposed to do foundation and concealer or what...I guess its personal preference. 

But yeah, I felt like I could still see a few spots I wanted more coverage on, so I put bronzer on top of it and was pretty satisfied.  I guess I should also mention that  my mom got this for free to try from BzzAgent and she gave it to me to try, so the color I tried may not be the exact color I'd buy for myself.  Eh, it probably is...I'm pretty pasty.   It looks like on their website that they have 16 different shades. 

Overall I really like how light it goes on, how it covered up a bit of the redness I had this morning, and how smooth my face felt after.  You can also seem to put it on effectively with either your hands or a sponge/brush.  It's like $9-$12 which is cheaper than my mineral make up, but won't last as long.  I may start wearing this in the summer!


Now, what I was normally going to post about...I tried one of my new Zoya polishes last night!!  This is Rica from their Sunshine Collection.  It looked pinkish/peach in the bottle but I think I'd definitely classify this now as an orange:

Sparklesss! This is outside in overcast lighting, prob the most accurate photo color-wise

Inside, pretty good idea of the orangeyness.

This pic makes it look a little dark, the color is lighter


Even though I was initially disappointed that it wasn't more pink, I really like it.  I actually did 4 coats of this one because I lost track, but you could probably do three!  It's supposed to be sunny this weekend so hopefully I can try more of these awesome polishes and get some good pictures for you guys! 

Hopefully this wasn't too long of a post.  Let me know if you've tried the NatureLuxe foundation or this polish, I want to hear about it!!

Have a good one,
<3 Whitney

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Pink Wednesday! Funky Fingers!

Sooo for this week's Pink Wednesday I decided to try out Funky Fingers Screamin' Fuschia!

I bought this color when I stopped by Five Below for the first time a few weeks ago!  They were on sale 3 for $5, which is a great deal so I bought like 6 of their colors haha.

Screamin' Fuschia is a neon pink, but its got a slight peachy undertone.  My pictures don't do it justice...it just looks like a dark pink in these pics, so I'm also linking a few other blogs that reviewed it so maybe you guys can see some better pictures!  I don't know how I take such crap pictures with such a good camera :)

Window lighting

Window lighting...its not this dark of a pink

I tried to get super close to a lamp haha

Once again, not this dark, but I DO like how it looks in this pic

Maybe the most realistic picture of them all, still doesn't show how neon the color is on, though!

Yeah, you can't really tell how neon it is from these pictures, so maybe check out these two blogs:

The Phalanges Files and Hangi Oje Yakismaz Ki Bana (Yeah, I'm not sure what that means either, I found it via Google!)

I'm like thoroughly impressed with their photos of this color, definitely check them out!

The pics I posted are with 3 coats.  You can still see nail line but I was pretty satisfied with it for how cheap the polish was!  You can't beat 3 for $5! 

On another note, I got my Zoya Sunshine collection in the mail today! I'm super excited to try it out :)  I'll post on it when I have a chance!

Hope your Wednesday is going as well as mine!
<3 Whit

Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Giveaway Switcharoos!

Goood evening everyone!

Just wanted to point out some edits to the site.  My sidebar was getting insanely full of giveaways, so from now on I'm just going to feature the giveaways that are ending that week on the sidebar.  All of them, despite when they end, will be detailed on the page I created here (also seen on the top bar!)

I realized a bunch of links were a little overwhelming so the new page I added is in chronological order of when all the giveaways end and show a picture (and a comment or two) of the prizes!

I don't want to take down the pictured giveaways on my sidebar because I told those bloggers their pictures would be there, so after the last one ends, there won't be anymore giveaway "pics" (beyond the ones that end during that week) on the sidebar.  It makes it cluttered.  And I don't like clutter.  I like clean :)

I hope I don't disqualify myself from any of them by changing my things around...they're still on the site, just in a new place!

See you guys tomorrow,
<3 Whitney

Monday, April 25, 2011

Nail Fail: Entourage

Hey everyone.  I added a new social media bar to my sidebar on the right!  I had to geek out and pick Erlenmeyer flash icons haha.  It actually took me quite a while, too...not really sure why!

BUT if you didn't notice on that bar, I've created a Facebook page for Elemental Styles! So feel free to check it out and "like" it if you want!

Also today I thought I'd try out China Glaze Entourage.  I had, what I thought to be, a cute idea: I was going to do an Entourage base coat, throw some silver glitter on top and try a black shatter french tip...did NOT work out.  The glitter was too concentrated and I got impatient and added the shatter before it was all dried and it didn't crackle.  Whoops.

SO luckily I took a quick pic of the color before I ruined it:


I am not a fan even by itself.  The formula was okay, but this is three coats and you can still see nail line.  I also just don't think I like green nail polish.  At least not this light, bright green.  Maybe I'll save it for Xmas and St. Patty's Day...

Also, Fiona at Ha Bisky! Nails told me this color stained real bad, but I thought I'd be okay with a base coat.  Nope.  It was only on 10 or 15 minutes before I took it off and it yellowed the heck out of my nails and skin.  Boo.

I probably won't be wearing this again anytime soon unless it's to attempt nail art.  What'd you guys think?  Have you tried it?

<3 Whit

PS--may not have time for an update tomorrow, but I'll be around for Pink Wednesday!

Sunday, April 24, 2011

Easter Glitter!

Happy Easter everyone!  And also Happy Passover :)

So I've been having a pretty great weekend.  Last night the Boyfriend and I had a "date night" after we went bowling with my parents.  Super fun but I broke my thumb nail off down to the skin when I tried to use my mom's bowling ball.  Then right before bed the Boyfriend brought me out the sweetest Easter basket he made with a bunch of candy and then 4 gift cards for cute date ideas.  So sweet!

Then today we went to my parents for lunch and had a nice time!

Anyway, so the more I wear ORLY's Fantasea the more I LOVE it.  It's such a great color and I love how it changes from purple to a maroon type color depending on the angle you're looking at it and the amount of light around.  Since I broke off my thumb nail last night, I needed to repaint but I wanted to leave Fantasea on, so I added Wet 'n Wild's: Wild Shine Sparked (#435G).  It's a pinkish glitter and I think it ROCKED over Fantasea:

Window lighting, most accurate color
Ahhh I love it!  Because of the Fantasea base, it also looks drastically different depending on the lighting.  I think using that base color also makes the finished product look EXACTLY like the concentrated glitter color in the bottle:

Flash!
Window Light

Flash
Unfortunately it's been raining for more than a week here in Ohio and is supposed to continue until at least Thursday, so I don't have any sunny pictures of this!

Maybe I should start swatching my nail polishes.  I actually haven't done that yet so all of the blog posts I make are for the colors that I am actually wearing that day.  It's a big stress reliever thing for me to take an hour or so away from school stuff and do something pretty for myself so I've resisted swatching so far.  That's also why this is a beauty blog instead of a nail polish blog...I don't always have time to paint my nails everyday and sometimes doing a make up review is a lot quicker for me!

Anyyywayy hope you guys are having a great weekend too!  Let me know what you think of this combo :)

<3 Whitney

P.S.: If you follow me on twitter, you've probably already noticed, but I added a TON of new blogger giveaways today that I found on Sparkled Beauty.  A bunch of them ended this weekend, so I thought I'd find a bunch more to fill it back up!  You guys should definitely check them out on the sidebar and enter!  Also hurry up and enter GildedNails BB Couture giveaway, Painted Lady Fingers' Starry Temptress giveaway, and Never Ending Obsession's 300 follower giveaway because they end tomorrow!

Saturday, April 23, 2011

Purrrpllleee! ORLY's Fantasea

Hey everyone...hope you all had a great week!

I took off my nail polish the other day and haven't had a spare second to even throw a base coat on so I chipped two of my nails...lame sauce!

However, this morning I thought of a cute Easter idea I wanted to try with the new polish I bought last week...ORLY's Fantasea!  I was going to do some white dotting over the purple but when I started painting I didn't think it'd look as good as I'd imagined with the shimmer.  When I initially had this idea I thought the color I'd bought was more of a lighter lavender cream polish...not so much.

Fantasea is definitely a solid purple shimmer:

Window lighting

Up close and blurry...yum

This color definitely has a "reddish" undertone.  Some purples are more blue but you can see it looks a purple rust color when at an angle:

My thumb is pointed downward in this pic...it's not actually this stubby




Messed up my pinky :(

That last pic probably shows the color best. In normal lighting it's a very subdued kind of dark purple.  It's pretty sheer initially, this is with three coats.  I would've done four but I'm lazy.

If I hold my hand up to the light I can see obvious nail brush streaks, which I'm not into...but for my first obvious purple, I like it.  I was scared to wear purples with my skin tone but this one works pretty well because of its warm undertone. 

Also normally I love the ORLY formula but maybe I got a bad one with this.  The polish wasn't "thick" or anything, but I felt like there wasn't any on the brush when I first pulled it out and I had to dip my brush more than once per finger, which I haven't had to do before.  And it smells really odd...kind of like eggs.  Did anyone else have this problem with Fantasea?

Overall I'm pretty satisfied with the final product and I'm definitely glad I bought it to try!

Have a great weekend, all---I hope the Easter bunny brings you lots of candy ;)  You know--if you're into that...

<3 Whitney

P.S. If you haven't entered these giveaways yet, do so 'cause they all end today!

Varnish Vixen's Spring Giveaway--7 different prizes! Ends @ midnight EST
Sonidlo's Nail Polishes Karmin G3 Flat Iron Giveaway! Ends @ midnight GMT
Body and Soul's OPI Pirates of the Caribbean Giveaway!! Ends @ midnight EST

Thursday, April 21, 2011

Zoya Nail Polish Exchange

Hey all.  Just a quick update, I'm really busy today, but if you didn't know...Zoya is having a nail polish exchange for Earth day!

What they're doing is letting you trade in 6-24 of your old polishes (non-Zoya brand) that you would normally have thrown away for brand new Zoya polishes for only $4, which includes shipping and handling! That's a great price since you'd normally have to pay ~$8 for a Zoya polish and then more for shipping, so I'd take advantage of this deal if you guys have old polishes you don't want!  They are promising to dispose of your old polishes in an environmentally friendly way, which is also awesome!

I was hesitant at first because the minimum amount for exchange is 6 and I actually just trashed 2 old polishes (whoops), so I'll have to scour my parents house for another couple that my mom doesn't want, but I just placed my order today--I got the whole Zoya Sunshine Collection!  So go here and check it out and take advantage of it while it lasts (only til 4/27!).

ALSO can I just say how excited I am for OPI's Pirates of the Caribbean Collection?  

Ah!  Does anyone know the exact release day?  I know it's sometime in May.  I desperately want to try the whole collection.  I want silver shatter more than anything, though.  Check out Nail Polish Obsession for more details on each color if you haven't seen them yet.  Love!

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Pink Wednesday: Essie Peach Daquiri!

It's Pink Wednesday!!  Have you other bloggers joined this yet?  I think it's such a cute idea.  I didn't get to participate last week so I'm pretty excited to do my first one today!

Anyhow...I love Essie because I feel like a majority of the colors I see when I look at their display are pinks.  But it might be because I'm biased and love pink....

I bought my mom Essie's Peach Daquiri a while back and she said it was too pink for her so I stole borrowed it back.  Granted when I think of a peach daquiri I think of a wonderous orange-y alcoholic beverage, however Essie seems to think peach daquiri falls under their "corals" category...I must have some sort of "male mindset" of color separation because I think this shit is pink.

Inside with flash
Outdoors
Apologies for the kind of lax clean up on the nails.  The outdoor picture is a pretty good representation of the actual color (compared to some of the other pictures I've been taking lately!).  The formula went on well, it was a little runnier than the last China Glaze polish I used, but I didn't have any major problems.  I believe these pictures show three coats. 

Overall I think I've decided I need every pink in the Essie collection.  Once I get money I'll work on that...

Hope you all are having a good week so far!

<3 Whitney

P.S. I'm super excited because Brooke at the Blushing Noir started her 500 follower giveaway today!  She's got some great prizes you can win (including the entire CG Anchor's Away collection among a ton of other stuff) and she's planning on adding even more if she gets up to 750 followers.  You have until May 20th at noon EST to enter, and mention my name (Whitney @ Elemental Styles) if you do!  Check it out here or on my sidebar!  Good luck everyone!

Prizes from Brooke:


Tuesday, April 19, 2011

Stepping Out of my Comfort Zone for Lorac Liquid Eyeliner!

Hey all.  I told you all a while ago that I won Tracy at Beauty Reflections' giveaway!

Wellll one of the items I won was Lorac's Front of the Line Pro Liquid Eyeliner in black:
Photo from Sephora
So I haven't worn liquid eyeliner in years but it was in such a fancy shmancy container that I was super excited to try it.  Marketing works I suppose.

Wooo lookin' a little cross eyed in this picture hah
It went on very smooth but let me tell you, once it's on and dried, which it does so quickly, you can not get it off.  So you need to be super patient when putting it on and try not to get in places you don't want it.

Ignore my spidery looking eyelashes

Overall I think it changed my opinion of liquid eyeliner.  I never used it because I thought it was too much and smudgy and yuck, but I really liked this.  The formula is great and stayed on all day!  It went on so easy and in a super thin line.  I think for night time it would be perfect but for day time it was a little dark.  My hair is light brown/blonde as are my eyebrows so the black was so dark for me I actually had to darken my brows the day I tried it!  However, I would love to try the brown!

This liner runs for around $22 at Sephora and on Lorac's website.  That's a little steep for eye liner, I have a hard time paying $13 for my BE powdered liner, but then again up until a year or so ago I'm used to spending ~$5 on cheap pencil liners! 

Have you tried Lorac or are you against liquids like I was?  Let me know!

<3 Whit

PS...super excited to participate in Pink Wednesday tomorrow :)

Monday, April 18, 2011

OPI's Black Shatter!!

So I gave in and finally decided to buy the black shatter and try it.  The biggest reason was because I was so excited to get my Del Sol color changing nail polish I ordered and then I got it and it SUCKED and I wanted to cover it up:

Del Sol -- Surfer Girl
The formula is terrible and streaky!  I painted three coats and it still looked like poop.  The picture showed above is with a flash and it actually makes the streaks LESS noticeable, it was much more terrible in person haha.  I didn't even take any pictures of it changing color (to yellow/orange) because it wasn't sunny and I was still irritated about the formula.  I expected so much more from a $10 polish.  SO I decided to cover it with black shatter:


Much better
It looks silvery but I swear that's the pink under there. 

Then before I removed Happy Go Lucky I decided to test out black shatter over the yellow:



Sorry for the blur!  I love it so much more with yellow underneath.  I'm not too much of a black nail polish person but I like the black shatter anyway!  I wish they had a silver shatter, I'd rock that so hard.  Although I heard through the grape vine that they're making red, white, teal, blue, and navy shatters as a Serena Williams collection (although those still are not silver!).  I'll definitely buy the teal though and maybe the white. 

Hmmm...Maybe you can franken the white and black and add glitter to make silver?  Hmmm we'll see I suppose!

Anyway I really thought the shatter was such a cool idea.  My friend had an issue with it being thick and goopy but the one I bought was just fine.  You have to be quick about getting a thin coat on, though because it dries and cracks really fast.  Does anyone know if you can add nail polish remover to the crackle to thin it out?  I didn't know since the formula was different if you could or not--I told her just to exchange it for a new one.

Anyway, hope you guys are having a good start of the week!  Let me know how you liked the shatter if you've tried it :)

<3 Whit

Flyin' High for Autism Awareness Month!

Hello lovelies.  I'm doing two updates today because I am super upset about this color, hah. I'll explain momentarily.

Anyway, as most of you have probably heard, April is autism awareness month.  I wanted to participate because our friends' son was recently diagnosed with autism not to mention there are some others I have met and know so it's something I'm familiar with. 

I chose China Glaze's Flyin' High.  It's a lovely dark blue teal but I couldn't get the color to photograph exactly as how I see it in person!  But here are a few from different environments:

Outdoors...it looks nothing like this, but this picture is pretty haha

Bathroom lighting..probably the most accurate, actually

Up close
The actual color is probably somewhere in between the last two pictures.  The formula is great, it went on smooth and shiny and I only needed two coats but I did three ish.  I didn't let any of them dry before applying another coat because I'm lazy :)

So the reason I had a hard time with this color is because the tray table I was painting my nails on while watching TV (the history channel....) collapsed and this nail polish went flying all over my pants and the floor and then landed and leaked into a nice huge stain on my boyfriend's couch.  This resulted in me having a complete breakdown for like 30 minutes and calling my mom sobbing to come over and help me try and clean it up.  Oh, and just FYI (blue) nail polish doesn't really come out of couch cushions.  At all.  I haven't told my boyfriend yet.  But I called the company to see if they can send me out a replacement cover, so we'll see how that goes.  Ugh.  I'm still super bummed about it.  I'm so clumsy. :(

Not to mention that I had to re-do my nails again haha.

ANYWAY...that is all.  And since I had such a rough time with this, I'm going to go ahead and do my OPI black shatter review now...:)