A Few Recent Looks

Hi guys! How was everyone's Valentine's day? I had a nice quiet day at home with Nick and then we cooked dinner together. Nothing too exciting, but I had a great time!

Since I had a bit of a hiatus, I decided that today I would post a few pictures of some past makeup looks you may have missed. You will have to excuse the photo quality as usual. These were all quick snaps taken on my phone. I am thinking about investing in a new camera soon, but it might be a month or so before I can save up for it.

Anyways, here are the pictures!

Hope you like the looks!

Devil Makeup

Happy Valentine's Day everyone! This post isn't really V-day related, but hey, it's red!

Today's post was actually done a couple of weeks ago. It was inspired by this photo on pinterest that I found. Based on that, I created my own look, which I think looks like devil makeup!

To do this look I used Sugarpill's Love+ eyeshadow and a black eyeliner pencil from Rimmel. I also used a bit of MAC's Carbon eyeshadow and blended out the red with the two darkest red blushes in my BH Cosmetics Glamorous Blush Palette.

This was a really quick look that probably could have been blended a bit better at the edges, but I still thought I would share it with you. I hope you enjoyed it!

DIY Spa Day!

A few days ago I decided to have a fun, at home, DIY spa day! I tried out my first coconut oil hair mask as well as a sage tea face mask and wanted to share the results with you!

Let's start with the face mask recipe! I have been really into reusing my tea bags and this recipe re-uses a tea bag. Making one cup of tea with a tea bag doesn't necessarily use up all the good things in the tea. Many people make more than one cup of tea with the same tea bag, but I'm a bit picky on the taste of the second cup, so I have been trying to use my tea bags in different ways. Look forward to a post about this soon!

Here are a couple of my favourite teas to reuse on hair and skin. On the left is peppermint tea, which I often make a hair rinse out of, and on the right is the sage tea I used in my mask today.

I picked sage tea for this mask because my skin has had a few flare ups lately and sage is very soothing and calming both when ingested and for the skin. You could use any type of tea though, you just need to do a bit of research on which teas to use for different results. I added a few other ingredients that were either soothing or moisturizing as well, since it is dry here in the winter. On to the recipe!

Sage Tea Face Mask Ingredients:

- Contents of 1 sage tea bag (I re-use ones that I have already made tea with)
- 1 tbsp ground oats or oat flour
- 1/2 tsp coconut oil
- 1/2 tsp honey
- a few drops of water

Directions:

- place all ingredients but the water into a microwave safe container
- microwave for 10-15 seconds to melt the coconut oil and honey
- stir together and add water until you have a thick paste
- apply all over your face and leave on for 10-15 minutes
- wash it off and enjoy your fresh skin!

The face mask is a bit lumpy and difficult to apply to the face, but once on it really does have a calming, soothing feel to it. My skin was extremely soft after the mask and that lasted for about 2 days.

Next I did the coconut oil hair mask. I massaged about 2 tablespoons of coconut oil through my hair, from the root to the tip, and let it sit for about 20 minutes.

After the 20 minutes it was time to wash out the coconut oil, which proved to be extremely difficult for someone who has gone no poo. I have to tell you that baking soda alone does NOT remove coconut oil from hair!!! I washed my hair that way about 3 times to no avail.

Eventually I turned to the internet for help and it told me to try a raw egg in my hair. This advice actually worked! For those of you using the no 'poo method, a raw egg is a very good cleanser! You can't use egg to clean your hair too often though, only about twice a month, otherwise your hair will have too much protein in it and become brittle.

This is the coconut oil I used, and the egg that eventually saved my hair!

In the end, my hair did turn out extremely soft and shiny, but I can no longer tell if it was the coconut oil, the egg or a combination of the two.

Well, that's it for my spa day! I highly recommend you try some version of the homemade face mask I made! you definitely don't need to follow the recipe exactly and you can try this with any tea you like!

I'm Back! Jumping In With A Crazy Look!

Hi everyone! Loooong time, no see!

I'm reallly, really sorry about being gone for so long! My blogging break started off due to some personal issues that meant I had very little time or motivation to blog, but then it just became really difficult to start up again. Hopefully I'm back for good now!

I thought I would jump back in with a crazy makeup look! I wanted to do a mask type of look and this is what I came up with. It sort of reminds me of melted ice cream.

Sorry for the terrible picture quality, but I don't know where my camera is right now, so these are all cell phone pics.

to do this look I used the Urban Decay Electric Palette, the Sugarpill Cosmetics Burning Heart Palette, MAC's Carbon eyehadow and Glamour Doll Eyes' Lexington.

Well that's it for the look! Hope you liked it!

Life Update!

Hey guys!!! Very long time no see. Unfortunately a combination of broken laptops, internet issues and busy days has made it impossible for me to post here in months. I will hopefully be back to my regularly scheduled programming soon though! I have really missed blogging and can't wait to get back to it. I did want to let you all know that I am living in BC for the rest of the summer! I got a fantastic job at a B&B in the Okanagan region. Hello wine country! This was just a short little post to let you all know I'm back! The next moment I have free I will be doing a post on my summer in BC, and look forward to a new makeup look soon too!!!

Review: Zoku Slush & Shake Maker

Today I have something a little different from my usual makeup reviews. I will be reviewing a fun little kitchen gadget instead. With the summer heat just around the corner, most of us will be looking for ways to stay cool. This is where the Zoku comes in. You can make slushies or milkshakes easily, with only a few simple ingredients! I believe this is available exclusively at Williams Sonoma and costs $19.95.

This was a gift from my parents because they took a trip to the US recently and had a chance to go into a Williams Sonoma. Williams Sonoma does exist in Canada, just not in Ottawa, so going to one is always a treat. This is honestly not something I would have bought myself, since I already own an ice cream maker, but I am glad to have it now.

The Zoku comes with three parts. The inner core is the part that you freeze, the outer sleeve is like a cup that the inner core fits into and it also has a stir stick. To use the Zoku, you first must freeze the inner core for at least 8 hours. Once you have done that, put the inner core into the outer sleeve and pour whatever drink you want into it. Next, stir and scrape the sides every minute until you reach the consistency that you want.

I decided to do a full demo of the Zoku Slush & Shake maker, so you can all see how it works for yourself! I made myself a coffee concoction for the demo, in the hopes of having something like an iced capp when I was done. I started by freezing the inner core overnight, to make sure I would hit the 8 hour mark. The next day I made some strong coffee and let it cool before mixing it with some almond milk and simple syrup. I did leave that mixture in the fridge to get as cold as possible before starting.

I poured the coffee mix into the Zoku when it was good and cold. This is it at the very beginning:

As you can see, it is still completely liquid. I sat with the cup, stirring every minute or so and this is what I had at the 10 minute mark:

It looks like a slushie!!!!

This product definitely does what it says! I had an awesome frozen coffee in ten minutes! I did notice a few pros and cons while using it though, so I compiled them below.

Pros:
- It does work and can make a fun slushie or milkshake on a hot summer day.
- The design is really nice and comes in many fun colours!
- I love the stir stick/spoon design, it's fun to eat with.
- All the parts are easy to clean and wipe out.
- Overall it was a very fun experience!

Cons:
- It only makes one serving before you have to freeze it again (but if you pour your slushie into another cup immediately, rinse it in cold water, dry it really quickly and throw it back in the freezer, it only needs to freeze for about 2-4 hours)
- The Zoku is hand wash only in lukewarm water, which doesn't bother me, since I have no dishwasher anyways, but some of you might want to take that into consideration.
- It isn't as fast as making an iced coffee or smoothie would be (but it is fun to make).
- It takes up precious space in the freezer.

So overall I am very pleased with my Zoku Slush & Shake Maker! Like I said before, I probably wouldn't have paid $20 for it myself, since I already own an ice cream maker, but I still like it. I have really enjoyed the first few drinks I tried in it and can see myself getting a lot of use out of it this summer!

What do you think of the Zoku? Would you try something like this?

Happy (Late) Easter!

I hope everyone had as good a long weekend as I did! I sadly didn't see my parents this Easter, but I still had a very full and fun weekend! My family isn't very religious, so we decided to postpone our family dinner to later in the week because I had plans with other people. I unfortunately don't have many pictures to show you though, since I was busy and forgot my camera most of the time. I know this post is a bit late, but I have had a busy week!

I spent Friday grocery shopping and Saturday preparing various foods for an Easter party at my friends place that happened on Sunday. I absolutely looooove when I get an opportunity to bake food for other people so I went a little overboard and made 4 different things. I made curry stuffed buns, soft pretzels, chocolate crinkle cookies and a pan of monkey bread! I have photographs of none of it, but if anyone wants to see a post about any of those recipes, just ask in the comments!

I did manage to snap a quick photo of my friday shopping makeup and Easter Sunday makeup, so here they are!!! Light makeup for errands:

This was just foundation, a bright coral blush, mascara and a Revlon Colorburst Matte Balm in Mischievous. The next day for the Easter party I wore this:

This look was once again done using my Sigma Creme de Couture palette. It has the most perfect pastel Easter shades so I just grabbed it without even looking at anything else that day.

The easter party was so much fun! I got to see a lot of my friends and we had a great time and ate a ton of great food. One of my friends made awesome bacon wrapped chicken bites and another friend made a delicious stew. We played Cards Against Humanity (wich I won wooo!) and watched movies. It was a really special day, and hopefully the starting of a new tradition for us!

The next day my boyfriend and I went to his parents house for their egg hunt and Easter dinner. The egg hunt at Nick's parents is always tons of fun because his dad takes hiding the eggs very seriously. To him, he wins if we don't find all the eggs, which makes the game hilariously difficult. We also had a really good dinner there of ham, roast beef, asparagus, potatoes and lots of other extras! Unfortunately I got no pictures of this day either! It was a pretty camera-less weekend for me...

I finally saw my parents a few days later and had my first barbecued meal of the season, Chicken and grilled vegetables. Yummy! I have truly eaten like a king this week. The rest of my week has been spent spring cleaning. My boyfriend bought us disinfecting wipes with our usual cleaning supplies this time and I love them so much! They have made cleaning so much easier in a lot of cases!

Anyways, that's it for my little life update. What did you guys do for the Easter weekend?