(Not so) Clean Makeup Brushes

Hi everyone!

Today I have an interesting, and somewhat disappointing, post for you.

About two months ago I purchased a couple of the Sephora Pro brushes. I love the long handle, they're soft. I've had Sephora brushes before and really liked them. That was when I was in high school and who knows what happened to them. I bought the pro precision blush brush #73 and the pro contour #74. Well yesterday I went to wash them for the first time. (Gross I know. They were holding onto powders like crazy.) I decided to wash most of my brushes along with them! I did my normal washing. Warm water, baby soap, lay flat to dry. Note: this was my first time washing my Sephora pro brushes, not the other brushes I used. Imagine my horror when I saw this forming underneath only those two brushes less than an hour after washing and laying flat to dry.

Yes. It's mold. So gross. I use this on my face!

This was the first brush I picked up because it's one of my favorites. I got nervous and thought maybe it's the water in my new apartment or something like that. Then I began to move all of my other brushes, ranging from Target brushes to other Sephora brushes from a kit, Clinique to these two Pro brushes. Guess what? These were the only two brushes that had mold growing underneath them. Also, they had some funky smells. I mean, it smelled bad. None of the other brushes did.

As you can see the contour brush produced the most, the blush just a tiny amount. You can barely see it. I was very upset! I called Sephora online to see what they could do. I have to say the woman I talked to was not helpful, even a little offensive! She said there's not a lot they can do because they have been used and washed. Of course I disagreed with this. I spend a lot of money there. I pay for quality products for what? Mold to be produced after their first washing? I don't think so. So I called my Sephora store that I go to in Arizona and the manager I spoke with was very nice! He really cared and said bring them in right now I can give you a store credit. This was no problem to me. I always love buying makeup there and could use it. Also I just recently started buying Sigma brushes so it really didn't matter to me.

I immediately left to drive to the store. I wrapped up the brushes in a plastic baggie. I even wrapped up the paper towel with mold. I got to the store and had to speak to a different manager after waiting to return them. She was even nicer! I do have to say the people in the store care way more than the one online :)

She was extremely embarrassed, grossed out, understanding, and apologetic. No questions asked after showing her the paper towel. She asked for my license and gave me my store credit.

This post is not for me to complain about Sephora. I truly love the store, they were very nice about dealing with this situation (of course not as much the lady online but they made up for it in the store for sure!). I am not intending to sway your thoughts whatsoever. This is strictly an informative post. Yes, the mold is extremely sick. It scares me that I was breathing in the smell, not to mention using it on my face for weeks! AH! 

I just wanted to share this experience with others. They were very expensive brushes and I definitely did not expect this! At least the managers at my store handled it very well and made things right!

What do you think? Let me know if you agree or disagree with this! What would you have done? 

Love,

Marlee

One more thing, I did a fun haul of a bunch of different items. There is a small preview on my Instagram. Can't wait to review it all later this week :)

Have a great week everyone!

Laura Mercier Holiday 2013 Artist's Palette for Eyes review, photos, swatches

Hello all! Happy Sunday! Did you have a good week? We only had a four day week at school but it felt terribly long. Thankfully we have this next week of school and then a whole week off for Thanksgiving!

Today I bring you something I am so excited about... yes another eye palette (I think I have a problem) and yes it's a holiday one. It is the Laura Mercier Artist's Palette for Eyes!! This palette is sold out online so if you want to buy you may have to hunt one down in stores. I got mine yesterday from the Scottsdale mall. They actually happened to have quite a few. I was so excited to get my hands on one! I saw it online and I wanted it so bad but it said "Out of Stock" and in my head I was crying. When I saw it yesterday I died! The colors are so gorgeous. The textures are the softest I've ever felt. The color payoff is amazing! I just really love it, ahh!

It is a mixture of Laura Mercier's matte eye colors, luster eye colors, and sateen eye colors. There are 12 shades of neutrals, purples, and browns. The purples make it really fun and not just your average eye palette. I have to say, purple is one of my least favorite colors (I had a horrible purple -lilac/lavender- room growing up so I just got sick of it) but purple eye shadows is one of my favorite things! So weird, right??

Anyways, let's get started!

Here is the box it comes in. Nothing special here.

The texture of this palette is sooo cool. It feels kind of like a basketball and looks like it got rained on. There's nothing on the front of it but it's not like you could mistake this palette for a different one. It's a great size for travel. The length of it is from the bottom of my hand and my middle finger extends past the top just a little bit. Unlike other palette's i have that are HUGE. I love how compact this one is.

Here is the palette with flash on...

No flash... You can see the mirror on the inside takes up the whole length of the palette. I love that. It's not as wide as the palette but it's a decent sized mirror that you can actually use if you needed to.

These are the first four colors. Sparkling Dew is a sateen eye color. Guava is a sateen. Vanilla Nuts is a matte. and Primrose is also a sateen. These colors are very light. It was hard to capture them. I'm not sure I did a great job at doing so but they are lovely. They remind me of ballerinas. 

L: Sparkling Dew R: Guava

L: Vanilla Nuts R: Primrose

With no flash, L to R: Sparkling Dew, Guava, Vanilla Nuts, Primrose

Below is same colors, same order, with flash.

The ones I like best of these four are Vanilla Nuts and Primrose. Vanilla Nuts would be a good base, it's very white. I have a lot of these, though. Primrose is very girly! You can't tell but it's actually quite pink. It's frosty and it has some glitter in it.

Honestly, I got this palette for the rest of the eight colors, not necessarily these four but they would be fun to highlight brow bones, use as inner eye corner brighteners, etc.

Oh em gee, I love African Violet.

L to R no flash: African Violet (luster color), Plum Smoke (matte), Fresco (matte), Bamboo (luster color)

Now, with flash.

So like I said, I am obsessed with African Violet. I think the color is more accurate in the one with flash than without. But the other colors are more accurate in the picture without flash. 

Here is a close up of African Violet and Plum Smoke. African Violet is purple with gold shimmer. Plum Smoke is a gray/purple. It reminds me of Tease from Naked 2. I love both of these colors.

Fresco and Bamboo. I love Fresco! It reminds me of Cookie Dough from my Too Faced Joy to the Girls palette (which I use regularly). Bamboo is okay. I think it looks prettier in person than on my arm. It's bronze-y. Nothing incredible special I'm sure we all have one similar to this somewhere. 

Did I mention I love African Violet???

I love it so much I bought a single of it too. Oops!

Okay moving on...

These next four colors are FABULOUS. I mean, so pigmented, the color payoff is incredible. You'll die.

Okay, Espresso Bean looks green but it isn't. All of my pictures of this color kept coming out like this so I don't know what to say. I think the swatch is better, but it is definitely, 100% a dark brown. Not a weird brown/green color like its showing up as here.

L to R no flash: Kir Royal (sateen), Violet Ink (matte), Truffle (matte), and Espresso Bean (matte).

Here's with flash:

Check these out! Amazing right? I can honestly say I have nothing like any of these colors! I am in love with Violet Ink. (see what I mean about my weird obsession with purple shadows?)

Here is a close up of Kir Royal and Violet Ink. Kir Royal is a brown/purple color with tiny brown sparkles in it. Violet Ink looks like a really dark inked purple pen... ha. 

Violet Ink, Truffle, Espresso Bean.

The color of Espresso Bean is better shown here. But I think in real life it's even more brown. It looks like cocoa when it's on my finger.

So that's it! Great colors right? My favorites are African Violet (in case you missed that), Plum Smoke, Fresco, and Violet Ink. I love this palette and I can't wait to mix and match and play around with the endless looks it can produce. My recommendation is if you can find it buy it! It's a limited edition and has already gone so fast. I am so lucky I found one and so happy! There are singles of the colors so if you just like one or two buy those! The price is $48.00 so it's a great deal for twelve, small shadows in great casing.

I hope you enjoyed!

Happy hunting :)

-Marlee

Too Faced Joy to the Girls eyeshadow Holiday palette Review with photos and swatches

I am so excited for this post! I have been waiting a very long time for it. After some shipping troubles and THREE WEEKS of waiting I finally received my Joy to the Girls palette in the mail a couple of days ago. Needless to say I was so excited. So excited, in fact, I made my boyfriend capture the moment right after getting it from the mail box.

Here I am standing with it and the cute pink box it came in. I just love Too Faced.

So I got inside and opened it... oh wait, I did that outside. 

This was on a school night so I didn't have time to do anything with it just yet. But the next couple of mornings I used it! I  use my iPhone to take pictures. I tried to capture some images of my eyes with some of the colors on but it just wasn't working so I won't bother to upload those. 

So in this palette is 15 stunning shades all holiday related! In addition, a full sized LashGasm mascara. I will talk about that too. I swatched all of the colors and did some comparisons. Here is the inside of the palette... finally!

Sorry it looks a little used but that's because it is! I'm a teacher and school gets out pretty late where I am and when i come home from school there's not much time for new makeup. But like I said, I used it the next couple of mornings after receiving it so that's why it looks a little dusty.

Don't you just love the colors?! I sure do! There are endless possibilities with this one. If I could only use one word to describe this palette it would be "frosty" because a lot of the colors are frosty and I love that because it's a holiday palette! 

From left to right: Cookie Dough, Cheers!, Prancer, Sugar Plum, Mulberry, Snow Angel (fun names huh?)

Above is without a flash, below is with flash.

Cookie Dough is a barely there tan color. It really does remind me of cookie dough! It's good for during the day if you have something to do where you can't be super flashy and outrageous. I had a couple of meetings at school so I wore this one day. 

Cheers! is one of my faves! It's a super frosty champagne color. It goes on really well. It's super pigmented and you don't need a lot. Unless of course you want a lot! Either way this color is gorgeous. It could be worn day or night.

Prancer is a darker gold. This color was hard to pick up with my brush so I had to use a finger to pick up the color. The powder is thick. I haven't word this color but it makes me a little nervous. I feel like if I wore it one day it would be under my eyes and on my cheeks by the end of the day. Still a lovely color though.

Sugar Plum is one I like a lot too. Purple isn't one of my favorite colors but for some reason I love purple eye shadows. It's a really dark purple with sparkles in it. I used it as a liner at school one day and I loved it!

Mulberry is matte and it reminds me of Tease in the Naked 2 palette. I used it in my crease for school one day. It's a plum color.

Snow Angel is a good base. It's white and matte.

L to R: Powdered Sugar, Too-Too, Yule Log, Chestnut, Twinkle, Joy

Powdered Sugar is also a good base. It's not as pigmented as Snow Angel but that's not always a bad thing! By the way, in the pan this one really does feel like powdered sugar. It is so soft.

Too-Too is a baby pink with white/silver glitter in it. This color is not one of my favorites, I'm not sure pink eyeshadow is one of my things. Pink is one of my favorite colors but for some reason I'm not into pink makeup! (unless it's blush) It's a fun color for sure but I'm not sure I'll ever wear it.

Yule Log sure is pretty! It's a great brown with gold shimmer. I love it! It's extremely pigmented and lasts forever. I used this as a liner for school one day also. 

Chestnut is bronze-y. I've not worn this one yet but it looks pretty on my arm, haha.

Twinkle is another gold but this one is more gold than the other one and also the powder is much better. It seems like it would last all night if you wore it to an event. 

Joy is a frosty baby blue! It is quite pretty. This one is super pigmented and I can't imagine you would need a lot of this on your eyes to make a statement. Use it in your inner corner for some bright eyes!

L to R: Spike the Punch, Chimney, Coal

Spike the Punch is the other pink in this palette. In the pan it looks more coral-y than Too-Too but after you spread it out on your eyelid it doesn't really appear to be very pink. When you first put it on you can see the pink/coral color but then it goes away. This would be a fun base for using different colors on your eyes.

Chimney is a dark frosty blue. The powder if very soft and pigmented. It would be good as a liner and fun on your lids!

Coal really looks like coal! It's not black, it's a super dark gray. Definitely to be used as liner or for a smokey eye. 

I did some comparisons also...

L to R: Prancer, Twinkle, Spike the Punch, Too-Too

I like Twinkle better of the two golds and it depends on the pinks. If I wanted pink, Too-Too, something less pink but girly, Spike the Punch.

Overall this is an amazing palette and I really do love it! So girly, fun, and great for the holidays but really anytime.

One last thing, the mascara. It's okay. I like it for my bottom lashes because the want is so small but it doesn't really make my lashes super thick which is my favorite thing. I compared the wants to my favorites. (Don't mind my bf in the background, I had him hold all three so I could capture them next to each other haha)

Lashgasm, Benefit's They're Real, and Too Faced's Better Than Sex.

Well this was so much fun to do and I can't wait for all of the days and nights I can play around and experiment with all of the colors. It was worth the three week wait (unfortunately it took that long) so I suggest buying it from Sephora because it was downright painful to wait for this baby. 

In the end I got it and I am in love with it. It's things like this that make me so happy to be a girl, another perfect reason to own this palette.

Joy to the girls!

-Marlee