Leighton Denny Shipwrecked and Drama on the Dancefloor

The base colour here is Leighton Denny Shipwrecked - a beautiful pistachio green creme finish from Leighton's S/S 2012 Castaway collection. It is a lovely colour with the same fantastic formula as the rest of Leighton's nail colours. Over the top I added Leighton Denny Drama on the Dancefloor (QVC exclusive) which is a chunky gold hex glitter with gold micro glitter thrown in. I used one easy coat and as you can see, it is easy to get even glitter distribution.

Please excuse the state of my nails in these photos, they were taken a few weeks ago when my nails were very dry. I also managed to knock my middle finger while the polish was drying so it has a mark near the free edge.

Jennifer xx

MAC Heavenly Creature - Mineralize Skinfinish Review

Clockwise from top left: Earthshine, Centre of the Universe, Light Year, Star Wonder

I love Mineralize Skinfinishes. Ever since I discovered them, I've been a bit of a collector so I get quite excited for new ones to come out. Heavenly Creature brought four new swirly pans of goodness and of course, I purchased them all.

They are all lovely and have very good textures. There's no chunky glitter in them like some MSFs have. They apply smoothly and look so beautiful on the skin.

Centre of the Universe

Centre of the Universe is a gorgeous golden glowy shade and works nicely as a bronzey blush. It looks really flattering, love it.

Earthshine

Earthshine is the only one that I'm just not sure on. I'm not sure how to use it really as it is quite dark and muddy on my skin tone. I might end up using it as an eyeshadow. I've tried it as a bronzer and I'm not quite convinced it works for me. I need to do more testing with it to find a way to make it work for me

L-R: Earthshine,  Earthshine blended, Centre of the Universe, Centre of the Universe blended

Star Wonder

This is a pretty pink shade which works well as a blush. It gives a soft glow and golden sheen to the skin. It would work on most skin tones.

Light Year

Light Year is a light peach shade with gold shimmer. It works more as a highlighter on me but can also be layered over blush. It is super pretty and is not a glittery highlight.

L-R: Star Wonder, Star Wonder blended, Light Year, Light Year blended

I really like these. Some people say that they find MSFs hard to wear because they can enhance pores due to the glitter in them. Try these, they might be easier to wear. I don't have noticeable pores so I can't say for myself. If I had to pick one only, I'd pick Star Wonder as the pink is very easy to wear and is the smoothest and most pigmented.

Jennifer xx

MAC Heavenly Creatures - Sky & Universal Appeal Eyeshadows

L-R: Sky, Universal Appeal

Every year MAC bring out a mineralize collection for the Summer, after their main Summer collection. They are always so beautiful with the swirls in the products and there are always lovely shades. I like mineralize products but I had to be practical with the eye shadows this year because I simply don't pull them out enough to get a bunch of them, no matter how much I like them. I chose two shades which I thought were quite unique compared to what I have already.

Sky

Universal Appeal

The things I like about the mineralize eye shadows are that you can use them wet or dry and when you apply them over different bases you get multidimensional effects which look pretty cool. I also like these swirly eye shadows because you can pick out different areas to use. Some people say you can't but I always use them like this so I know you can. You might not be able to pick out an individual colour but I do pick areas to swirl my brush in to change the shade of the shadow. Eg. In Universal Appeal, there is a dark purple, violet and gold. If I want it to be very dark purple, I choose an area which has more of the dark purple or if I want more violet, I choose those areas. 

L-RL Sky, Universal Appeal. Complete mixed colours swatched dry, no primer/base.

These two colours are quite well pigmented for mineral eye shadows when used dry, when used wet they are much better and yield plenty of pigment. Universal Appeal also appears more purple when used this way compared to the browner tone it has used wet. Sky is such a pretty shade of blue and has a teal undertone which makes it easier for me to wear, blue is not the best colour on me so I have to pair it well to work. Both colours apply smoothly and evenly and don't drop lots of fallout although all mineralize eye shadows have some fallout so care should be taken when using them. These have a much nicer texture compared to the chunky mineralize eye shadows MAC has released previously.

Jennifer xx

My current go-to neutral makeup

I am a creature of habit... and laziness. I really can't be bothered to search out different products every morning before work so I tend to use the same things for a few days and leave them in my makeup bag. Then I switch them out and try other products. This is probably because I have so much makeup and it is poorly organised to grab it as needed.

I've been wearing this makeup a lot lately and I often wear something similar to this. Gold is my favourite eyeshadow colour, I find it really flattering and brightens and opens up my eyes which is so needed when I'm tired. It also works well on most people. If you are curious, my favourite gold eyeshadow is Urban Decay Baked. It is a beautifully soft and pigmented gold which isn't too yellow or brassy, just perfect.

For this makeup, I wanted to make use of my pigments which don't often get much attention from me - they are harder to use than pressed eyeshadow and make a mess. I loved how it turned out and I need to use pigments more often.

What I used:
Urban Decay Primer Potion
MAC Water Based Mixing Medium
Illamasqua Marvel Pure Pigment
MAC Cocomotion Pigment
Shiro Cosmetics Master Sword
MAC Twilight Falls Mineralize Eyeshadow
a highlight shade (can't remember what I had in my makeup bag now)
MAC Superslick Liquid Liner in On The Hunt (black)
No7 Fanomonal Mascara
Illamasqua Thunder Brow Cake (eyebrows)

Jennifer xx

Leighton Denny - The Heiress

 This is what I have on my nails at the moment. I wanted to use creme colours as I'd worn a lot of glitter recently but still wanted it to be fun. I haven't done any stripes for a while either and last time I did them my hand wasn't as steady as it is now painting nails. I picked out one of my favourite Leighton Denny colours, The Heiress which is a beautiful purply-lilac with some dusky blue in it. On the Leighton Denny website, it is described as 'a blue-belle purple' which I think is very fitting. For the stripes, I didn't have anything in mind other than using black and white so I just made it up as I went along.

The lines aren't perfect but I am pleased how it turned out and it is probably one of the best manicures I've done for myself :)

These photos are more colour accurate with some editing (purples are so hard to get colour accurate with digital photography).

 

 

 

What I used:

Leighton Denny Under Cover Base Coat

Leighton Denny The Heiress - 2 coats

Rio Nail Pens (black and white)

Seche Vite Fast Dry Topcoat.

Jennifer xx

I'm on Twitter!

Hey everyone! I've joined Twitter today after my colleagues persuaded me to join. If any of you want to follow me, this is my account. I've not tweeted much yet but once I get into the swing of things, I'm sure more will follow!

Jennifer xx

Herbal Essences Beautiful Ends Intensive Mask

My hair is very dry. It is also quite damaged at the moment and I'm not sure why. I've not used straighteners for a good while apart from the odd occasion and I've only been rough drying my hair. I also use a Tangle Teaser which is supposed to be more gentle on hair. For some reason/s my hair has been getting very dry and turning stretchy which is so bad. My hairdresser also commented that I was loosing a lot of hair while she washed it... worrying when you're only 22! The thing with hair is that you can have stressful times and it wont show on your hair until your stress is over them BAM it cries for some care. Skin is often the same case for me.

So I went to Superdrug in search for some sort of treatment for dry, damaged hair and found this hair mask by Herbal Essences. It says that it is a split end protection intensive mask for dry/damaged hair and for £3.99 I thought I may as well give it a go. 

It is a rinse out treatment which you use in place of your normal conditioner. They recommend that you use the matching Beautiful Ends shampoo (well they would, wouldn't they!) and then slather your hair in this conditioner, concentrating at the ends then leave it on for 5 minutes. A 5 minute treatment is great for me as it means I have time to do it before work and not have to relegate it to a weekend for those 15 minute treatments. They also say to use it once a week.

I applied it to my hair as per the instuctions and washed it out and I could tell my hair felt so much better already. Now it is not a miracle product that you use once and suddenly have amazing, beautiful hair. You need to use it continually to get it to the standard you want. After the first treatment, my hair was better but nowhere near how it used to be. I used it again yesterday (twice in the same week instead of once) and my hair feels much better now and is shiny. Still not how it was before but it is getting there. 

I think it might take another pot to get it perfect but I am more than willing to stick with this treatment. For £3.99 at Superdrug and Boots (supermarkets probably sell it too), I think it is worth every penny. It also smells very nice, as with all Herbal Essences products.

Jennifer xx