Monday, June 11, 2012

It's Makeup Playtime with Pure Poppet

As a kid, I loved playing with my mum’s makeup. Although she was a miminalist and didn’t have much for me to play with, I loved applying lipstick for a perfect pink pout and put on blush as part of my dress-up fun.

Kids today are no different, they love dress up and costume parties and love imitating adults around them and applying makeup as well.

And now, there is a whole product range made especially for kids to fun and safely play with colours on their  face!

Pure Poppet Play Makeup
  • Created by Georga Holdich to enrich the playtime of all kids, especially little girls, the range includes makeup crayons, lipbalms, mineral powders and makeup stencils for fun and playful designs. 
  • This is a natural way for kids to play with makeup and colours. The products are safe and gentle on delicate young skin. 
  • They are free from Ferric Ferrocyanide, artificial dyes, FD&C colours,talc, Carmine (aka Cochineal), Bismuth Oxychloride, mineral oil and paraben.
  •  My pick would be to get a play pack as a great introduction and includes a crayon to draw design straight onto skin and a mineral powder that can be applied dry onto skin or mixed with water to make face paint! The pack also comes with applicators and sponges to draw onto skin and face. 
  • Other play packs are the lip balm and powder or the mineral powder duo sets. 
  • They are safe and provide children endless hours of fun and enjoyment that is limited only by their imagination. 
  • If you want fancy designs without the fuss, then draw your pictures over stencils for pretty designs that look like a pro. 
  • These are hits as birthday gifts and treats for kids as witnessed first hand when I presented the play pack to a little 4 year old recently. It pre-occupied her for hours and she just wanted her face made all afternoon!

Little gorgeous having lots of makeup fun

Pure Poppet Mini Play Pack RRP A$9.95, Stencils (pack of 5) RRP A$4.95. Pure Poppet great for kids age 4 and up and is available online and in selected children stores
This featured product was provided for consideration.

Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Clinique Runway Coral Long Last Lipstick

It may be terrible weather with the chilly air and dreary skies in the Australian eastern coast at the moment but that doesn’t mean your wardrobe or makeup have to suffer from the same winter gloom.

Brighten up your face with a pop of colour as if it's Summer time. As they say, if you don’t have it, fake it.

Look at it this way, at least you will look good in those Instagram photos that you and your friends snap regardless of weather or season!

And nothing brings pop better than a bright lip colour, be they bright berries, sizzling reds or bold corals – they will bring some cheer to you face.

One of the latest coral is from Clinique. Good on them for releasing such a great shade that is normally reserved for the Spring season (or I should say we're lucky to live in the southern hemisphere so we get the Spring range of our northern hemisphere cousins).

Clinique Runway Coral Long Last Lipstick 
  • This is a nice and bright warm coral that universally flatter all skin tones. It is rich and creamy and goes onto lips smoothly. From a shade perspective, its a fairly good dupe for Tom Ford's True Coral, which is slightly more red whereas Runway Coral is a smidgen more pink tone(see swatch comparison below). However, Tom Ford is far more pigmented and creamier in texture when worn. 
  • Runway Coral provides medium to full coverage with a sheen finish which helps to gives a full-lip look. 
  • The other great thing is that it isn’t prone to feathering off the edge of lips when worn so there is no fear of colour bleeding onto skin and needing touch ups every 30 minutes. 
  • As for lovegivity, it does well without food and drinks (unless it’s from a straw) but the colour will fade quite a fair bit with eating and drinking. 
  • Because of the creaminess, it does show up dry lips so be sure to prep your lips with a lip scrub followed by a balm before slicking on this lippy. 
Daylight, no flash on NC30 Skin
Runway Coral is a limited edition and online exclusive that was created by Clinique Global Colour Artist, Jenna Menard and looks beautiful paired with peachy cheeks in this cold winter weather.

RRP A$36 at Clinique Online for a limited time. Get it before it runs offline.
This featured product was provided for consideration.

Monday, June 4, 2012

Monday Bites: What's in My Handbag

Monday is another start to the working week and also the worse day of the week for me. Not only does Mondayitis set in but I have 8 meetings  lined up back-to-back that eats up the whole business day so I often find myself finishing off report consolidation at home after dinner. It's definitely not the ideal start for anyone!

Given Mondays are a brain-drain day for me, I usually can't think straight to write a beauty post. Instead, I thought I’d introduce snippets of interesting things that aren't so beauty focused to just add a bit of variety to the blog (and let's face it, you're probably sick of reading the 100th beauty review on a lipstick or face cream and I'm).

I'd  like to start with a show-and-tell post and share with you what I carry with me on a daily basis. Yep, today you get to peek inside my handbag and see what I cannot leave the house with.

My bag of choice is a tote because it can open up and fit so many items when needed and still looks stylish.

For the past few weeks I’m carrying my small Longchamp Le Pilage tote in hot pink (hey I have to contrast it with all the dull black and dreary grey colour I wear for work during the winter month). This was a gift from my aunt earlier in the year.

It's lightweight, cute and easy to hold on the arms or over the shoulders. Truly, I think everyone needs a Longchamp tote in the life.

So let’s take a look inside to check its contents shall we?

I use a Purseket, the pink polka dot bag liner/organiser you see in the photo below, to add compartments to an otherwise big bag to give it structure and to organise my contents. I don’t think I can live without one of these things in my handbag anymore.

It also makes it easy to transfer contents from one bag to another if you like to change your bags frequently as you just lift the Purseket organiser and pop it into your new bag.

Now lets check what's floating within and amongst all these compartments.
  1. Oroton Umbrella – with all the rain in Melbourne lately, having this small fold up brolly is a-must if you don’t want to be caught out like a drenched cat. 
  2. Oroton Wallet – it holds my cash, cards and IDs. Say no more. 
  3. Kleenex To Go tissues* – these slim and easy to carry in bags or your back pocket comes in packets of 6 tissue in assorted pretty and funky prints that would match your bag or add style to it (this floral one matches my pink bag just fine). Tissues are always handy to have and I use it to blot my face (because I’m too lazy to carry facial blotters), clean my greasy hands after eating and help with the sniffily nose in the morning. 
  4. Dermalogica Multi-vitamin Body block SPF20*. It may be grey and raining but there is still UV rays on overcast day. I carry this SPF moisturiser all the time for when the sun peeks out and I need to protect my arms or a top up on my face and neck when I’m rushing between buildings for meetings.
  5. Keys – can’t leave the house without it or get home. It also has my work token to log into my work remotely. The key chain is from Kikki and I love the little leather bird
  6. Nail file – I have a bad habit (we’ll talk about that in another post) that always sees me breaking nails. This filer from Dr. Lewins that I got as a Priceline freebie ensures my nails are tidied up on the go to prevent further damage and leaves no mess with its own storage compartment.
  7. iPhone 4. I have nomophobia and would die without my phone. On days I do forget because I’ve left it on the charger at home, I feel like I’ve lost a part of me. Funny how 12 years ago, I lived without a mobile phone just fine (holy-molly: I just realised I been using a mobile for that long!) 
  8. A cute makeup bag (from Clinique that's under all the makeup contents). Inside the bag are:
  9. ASAP Pure lipstick in Four* – smooth creamy and luscious. Every girl needs a lipstick at her disposal at all time. This one is shade and is my daytime office shade (swatches coming up). 
  10. Face of Australia lip Shine in Morning Mist*. Pretty and pink and ultra glossy with shimmer. I love slicking this on when my lips feel abit dry. 
  11. Lancôme Rouge in Love in 159B. When I’m heading out or need a pick me up colour – this baby comes to the rescue. 
  12. Tom Ford Illuminating Powder*. My go-to press powder with its own brush for touch up during the day to keep the shine in check and give my skin a light fresh glow. I love how light and sheer it is and makes skin feel like silk.

Other items not shown in the photos are my train tickets, my work security pass, a small bottle of water and USB stick for work files.

What do you have in your handbag?
Items marked * were  provided for consideration.