estee lauder

MAC Prim & Proper and dupes

~ stashy ~ 29 Comments

Ahh, this blush. THIS BLUSH. I love it, and I hate it.  Well, I mainly hate the fact that I didn’t buy a back-up of it.  It’s not the blush’s fault. But the love I have for it… yes, I want to marry it.
MACPrimProper2
It was part of MAC Give Me Liberty of London collection from 2010.  MAC’s official shade description is “neutral nude” which really downplays how nuanced the colour is.
MACPrimProper3
It’s a shimmering bronze nudey shade, yet it’s got a plummy-ness to it as well.  It registers as both warm and cool tone on the skin, depending on the rest of my makeup look.

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Lip stuff stash

~ stashy ~ 64 Comments

As I’m laying out all my lip stuff in preparation for photography in today’s post, The Boy asks me, “What’s the purpose of all these pictures?”
“They’re to show my whole collection on the blog.” I reply.
“So it’s like… makeup porn?” he asks.
“YUP! You got it!” 😆

My lip stash is probably the least exciting of all of my stashes – the majority of my lip products can fit into one frame:
lipstash2
I’m just not that into lipsticks. I feel bold colours don’t suit my face. I’m also not into matte textures or shimmer, or overly glossy finishes – so it leaves me with a fairly narrow band of comfort zone, as you’ll see in my stash. And I only own 5 MAC lipsticks! (of which 3 are retired)  It’s relatively small by comparison to my eye shadow stash (600+) or nail polish stash (400+)   That said, I have amassed a lot of lip balms and butter butters.

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Blush stash

~ stashy ~ 75 Comments

Blushes make me SO happy! They’re like candy for my face! 😆

According to my inventory count, I currently have 155 blushes in my collection.  And yet I still wish I had more…! 😛  The highest brands on my wish list are Sleek and Colour Pop – I can only order them online so it’s a case of hard to get = want them even more.

I store the bulk of my blushes in the same clear drawers as my eye shadows, but in the wider format:
blushstash2

This is a picture heavy post (20+ pics)

My favourite pre-made eye shadow palettes

~ stashy ~ 33 Comments

Maybe I’m being too loose with the term “palette” since most of my favourites are just quads – but I suppose they fall under the umbrella of palettes? To me, a palette is anything more than a duo – so trios, quads, and quints all qualify.  What I’m trying to say is that I do not like large scale pre-made palettes. I know that within a palette, I will always end up with at least one dud, and the more shades within a palette, the higher the odds are that I will end up with many duds (so no, I do not own any of the Urban Decay Naked palettes!)
premadepalettes1
My criteria for a good palette is one that I like most, if not all, of the shades, and one that I can create a nearly complete eye look from. They’re great for travelling and those days when I just want a one stop shop for my eye shadow look.  Here are my favourite pre-made eye shadow palettes.

Which palettes made the cut? Keep reading

Eye shadow stash

~ stashy ~ 69 Comments

Here’s the motherlode.  I’ve mentioned many times that I have a lot of eye shadows – over 600 – it is the most abundant makeup category that I own.  I just love eye shadows and it’s the area of my face that I spend the most time applying makeup.  I’ll keep this introduction brief and just let the pictures do the talking.

It took me over 2 hours just to sort and photograph the whole eye shadow collection and probably another 4 to edit everything.  Usual disclaimer: this isn’t meant to show off.  It was actually quite a beneficial exercise for me to display all my eye shadows visually.   Warning: photo heavy post! (50 images)

Brace yourself, eye shadows galore this way