Thursday, September 12, 2013

My Dorm Room Makeup Organization

Hey everyone and happy almost Friday!! This week went so quick and I've been so busy with school. However, I managed to slip in this post before the hectic weekend.. my beauty organization in my dorm!! First off, here's a picture of my whole dorm room and then just the setup I have going on under my bed, which is lofted.
I have my eyeliners and lipliners in a simple plastic cup and I put the hairties around it to make it a little prettier.  For the brushes, I bought a plain jar for $3 from TJ Maxx and filled it with clear beads from Michael's craft store.  Above, I just have my deodorants and some nail polish (Nars, Essie, and Sephora Collection).

      

Above the three drawers I keep my makeup in, I have my lipstick holder that I got off of Amazon.com, a Caudalie beauty elixir, Origins Mega Bright Serum and Ole Henriksen Facial oil (that you can't see) and in the front I have my AM Serum, the Ole Henriksen Truth serum, and my PM serum, the Estee Lauder Advanced Night Repair (Synchronized Recovery Complex II).

Here is my lip, mascara, single shadows and gel liners drawer (I also have my MAC paint pot, Too Faced Shadow Insurance and Urban Decay Anti Aging Primer Potion in there too).  I'm really struggling as to how to organize this drawer since I am limited on space.

Below to the left is my founation/bronzer/concealer drawer, to the right is blush and highlighter.
   
 

In the desk drawers: To the left is the middle drawer that I keep my palettes in.  On the right is the top drawer, where I keep Q-Tips, Laura Mercier sponges, PTR Complexion Pads, lashes, samples, etc.

 

And lastly, in the main drawer I keep eye drops, primers, eye creams, lip scrubs, nail accessories, masks, and other things like that.


Here's the whole setup! Hope you guys enjoyed! Let me know if you have any questions! If you can link below any of your makeup setups, I'd love to see them!
xoxo
Lex

Lux Haul! Sephora, Nordstrom, Saks, & Lush

I am a college student. Granted, I'm supposed to be saving money and spending my time studying. And NOT GOING ANYWHERE NEAR A MALL. However, my classes got cancelled one day last week and I just couldn't resist.  Keep in mind, I had gift cards.. so technically, I wasn't really spending money.... right? 
I knew I needed two things: foundation and concealer. However, what I came back to the dorm with... was this.
(The boxes make it look a lot worse than it actually is).
So, first stop, I did what I went for and headed over to Nordstrom to pick up a full size of the Perfection Lumiere foundation.  I had tried a sample a few weeks ago but the Chanel salesperson at Saks was frustratingly nowhere to be found, so I chose Nordstrom this time instead.  Can I just tell you guys, this foundation is perfect.  I've been a longtime fan of the Vitalumiere Aqua, however, living in a building with no air conditioning has changed my skin from dry combination to as oily as it gets, and the Aqua just wasn't cutting it anymore, even mixed with my EL Doublewear Light. The Perfection, however, is a beautiful natural finish with slightly more coverage than the Aqua, but still the lightweight feeling you'd get from the other Chanel foundations.  I'm in love.
Next, I picked up the MAC Pro Longwear Concealer at the recommendation of a few people I follow on Instagram.  I had previously been using a combination of Amazing Cosmetics (which covers EVERYTHING but, due to the mineral oil, causes massive breakouts if I use it anywhere other than under my eyes) and the DiorSkin Nude concealer.  Both were great, the AC was a little thick and the Dior was a little sheer. So I opted for this one, and so far I'm really liking it.  I can see where people are saying it's a little drying, but if you're prepping with an eye cream (I like Smashbox's Photo Op Under Eye Primer for under concealer) its great. So far I've gotten about a 12 hour wear without a single budge or crease, not to mention the coverage is perfect for someone like me with moderate undereye circles. I also picked up the 215 brush to go with it and I'm loving using that for concealer application.

My next stop was to Sephora where I (thankfully) did not spend a cent.  Instead, I opted to use some of the points I've been hoarding forever.  I redeemed for GlamGlow (The greatest thing EVER.. review coming soon) and the Becca EverMatte primer.  Both are great and the Becca primer is helping my skin so much right now.
I also had to stop at Lush to pick up one of their sugar scrubs. Being in college, I don't really use Lush products all that much anymore (with the exception of scrubs and hair care) because there's no bath. But this scrub before shaving is amazing to use before self tanning, so I had to pick one up.  For $6.50, its supposed to be a one-time use thing, but I break it up and store the unused scrub in one of the old jars I'm saving to recycle so that I get more use out of it.
Lastly, on my way out of Saks, I stopped at Jo Malone.  When I was in Bloomingdale's in NYC this past spring, I began eyeing the Wild Bluebell Cologne.  And so, for surviving my first 3 papers of college successfully, I rewarded myself a little and took home the 1 oz bottle with me. I'm so in love, but I'm also so afraid to use it because I never want to use it up!

Have you guys picked anything great up lately in the beauty departments??
Until next time, 
xoxo
Lex



Thursday, September 5, 2013

Blue and Gold Eye Makeup Look

Hi guys!
First off, let me apologize for my SIX MONTH delay in blogging, things have been so crazy between graduating high school and starting college. However, now that things have settled down a little bit, I have a ton of new posts coming your way very, very soon. 
So basically, what I did for this look was pretty simple-- I started with a really natural golden eye look and just brightened up the whites of the eyes by lining the lower lashline with a sublte blue shadow.  I know what you're thinking-- why would blue help brighten the whites of your eyes?! Well, to be honest... it doesn't.  What we're doing here is creating the ILLUSION of it by using a contrasting color to correct the redness, in this case, blue.
To do this look, I started with the Naked 2 Palette from Urban Decay.  I used Bootycall in the inner corners of the eyes, Half Baked for the all over color, and YDK in the crease. 
 
For the bottom, I lined the lower lash line with the Chaos color from the Urban Decay Vice Palette (which will be coming up in a newer post...) and finished the look by tightlining the upper lash line with MAC Blacktrack Fluidline and YSL Shocking Mascara. L's brows are pretty full to begin with but I filled them in a little bit with a shadow from Make Up For Ever. 
This look is so easy and can be worn day or night! It's definitely one of my go-to favorites now.

Thanks for reading! Until next time,
xoxo Lex