Another Impulse Cosmetics Review

I did it again, broke the spending ban. Impulse Cosmetics was having a sale and all of their glitters were half off. I had been eyeing a few of their glitters for a while so I just couldn't help myself! They are normally $4 but they were only $2 so I don't feel that bad. I picked out 2 that I have wanted for a while and I just couldn't help but throwing another lipstick into my order too.

The Glitters I picked were Half-Baked, a bronzey orange holographic glitter and Raven, a black and gold glitter mix. The lipstick I got is Pandora, a dark purple. Here are a couple shots of the glitters in different lighting:

I would have done proper swatches, but I can't find my dang glitter adhesive right now! Oh well...

Half Baked is such an amazing shade. This is definitely my favourite of the two. The holographic effect is much more pronounced in person. Orange is also one of my favourite colours, so it is great. Raven is a nice dark gold with some black glitter mixed in. It is clear to me that they put a lot of effort into making some really unique glitter mixes. If you check out their Etsy store you can see that they have a lot of really interesting glitters, not just these two. I already have my eye on a few more including one called Screamsicle.

As for the lipstick, here is a swatch:

Impulse Cosmetics calls Pandora as a black cherry colour and I think that is the perfect descriptor. I love this shade soooo much! It isn't really a spring colour, but who cares? This has the same creamy matte formula as their other lipsticks and seems to last a long time before needing touch-ups. I'll have a look using this soon.

Anyways, that's it for the review and little spending ban update. What is your favourite glitter?

Review: Balea Exfoiating Face Mask

This past Christmas, my stocking was stuffed with some face masks and I am finally getting around to trying one of them out. My skin has been acting out a lot this week (I have had an acne flare up on my cheeks about once a month, sigh...) so I thought it could use a little extra pampering. The mask I picked was the Balea Exfoliating Face Mask. It has aloe and ginseng in it to help cleanse and calm the skin.

The product comes in a foil packet and looks like this:

Please excuse the grainy iPhone picture.

It is white, with a clay consistency and tiny black granules in it. It has a very light scent of aloe. I can barely notice the scent when applied to my face. I rubbed it into my skin with circular motions for 1 minute then left it on for 10 more minutes as directed by the package.

My beautiful mask coated face!

The little granules are not overly harsh on my skin, but I could still feel myself getting properly exfoliated. As I wore the mask my face got really cold for a few minutes, which I am not so sure I like. It is kind of weird.

I took a shower to wash this off because I knew I had also gotten some into my hair. I actually almost always wash these kinds of masks off in the shower, since I find them a bit annoying to remove.

Once it was all cleaned off my skin my face did feel extra soft, but that was the only thing I noticed. The soft skin effect lasted for about 2 days afterwards though!

Overall I think this is pretty run of the mill. It did what it said it would, which was soften and cleanse my skin, but it wasn't spectacular. I probably won't repurchase this one, but if I get it as a gift again I won't say no!

What is your favourite face mask?

Review: Impulse Cosmetics' Winnie And Boggart

This review has taken way too long for no good reason. Every time I have thought of taking swatch photos recently, I immediately went "blah, that's too much work," and moved on to something else. My life has been a little crazy and stressful lately, but I have no idea why I thought swiping some things on my arm and taking a photo was so much work! Don't worry though, I got over it the other day and did swatches of tons of things I need to review!

Today I will be reviewing the two things I ordered from Impulse Cosmetics over the holidays. Don't worry, I have had these for a while and did not break my spending ban to get them. I ordered one eyeshadow called Winnie and one new lipstick called Boggart. And here they are!

Winnie is a orange with a teal shift to it, and Boggart is one of their new Metalluxe lipsticks in a dark green shade.

I will start by reviewing Winnie. This eyeshadow is so unique that I just had to pick it up. It is a tan/orange shade that on it's own wouldn't be very impressive, but it is filled with these really pretty teal/aqua sparkles! The photos don't do this justice at all. Actually, the sparkles do show up, but the amazing colour of them doesn't show through at all, which is very disappointing. I am clearly going to have to work on my swatch photo skills! You will just have to trust me when I say this shade is beautiful and unique, or just go to their website and see pictures taken by someone who sucks a little less than me at it!

Now for a review of Boggart. I have extremely mixed feelings about this lipstick. I'll get the bad news out of the way first. This is not nearly as opaque as any other Impulse Cosmetics lipstick I have tried. In fact the opacity of this is pitiful compared to the rest of them. The swatch above required about 3 swipes and it takes even more when applying it to the lips. It is also really hard to get the colour even on my lips. It has a blackish base to it with the metallic green over top and if you aren't careful, you can get patches of just that blackened base. Now, for the good news. This colour is absolutely gorgeous, and once you get it on right it does stay put for a good amount of time. This colour is a pretty good dupe for Limecrime's Serpentina lipstick, although I don't have that one to make an actual comparison. I have a feeling that the Limecrime version might take a little less work to get on though, so if you are willing to pay their prices, I might recommend going with their metallic green instead of this one. I feel almost bad saying that, because I am such a devoted Impulse fan at this point, but I really think they fell short with this one. Oh well, I will continue to purchase from them, because every other lipstick I have bought from them has been amazing!

I am still pleased with my order, even though the lipstick was less than perfect. It still works eventually and I really love the colour, so I will make do. I also love the eyeshadow!

Have you ever tried anything from Impulse Cosmetics?

Review: More Notoriously Morbid Cosmetics!

If you read my spending ban update, then you know I made a little mistake a few weeks ago when Notoriously Morbid Cosmetics was having a sale. I had received a sample of Neno in my first order and just had to get a full sized jar of it. While I was at it I also got Tempest which I have had my eye on. My order also came with a few extra goodies, and here it all is:

On the top we have Neno and Tempest, and on the bottom is a Coffin Kisser in Strangely Charming cherry, a sample of Forgotten Dreams and a sample of Hearts of Black Lace.

I am so pleased with my extras, especially the Coffin Kisser! This is honestly one of the best lip balms I have ever used. It smells perfectly of maraschino cherries and is so incredibly moisturizing as well. I plan on getting more of them next time I place an order, and you should too!

Now for some swatches of the eyeshadows!

From top to bottom we have:

Neno, n insanely sparkly taupe colour. I highly recommend this one!
Tempest, a beautiful rose gold shade.
Forgotten Dreams, a very sparkly lavender colour, that didn't really show up so well on my camera. It is much more purple and less grey in person.
Hearts of Black Lace, which is a really gorgeous, dark reddish purple. This one is less shimmery and sparkly, but it has a nice almost metallic sheen to it anyways. This one also didn't want to look good on my camera. It is still really dark, but it looks more like a dark purple wine shade in person.

Well, that's it for my latest Notoriously Morbid mini haul! I will try not to break my spending ban again!

Review: Burt's Bees Radiance Day Cream and Eye Cream

The Burt's Bees Radiance collection is a skin care line that contains royal jelly. I decided to try their day cream and eye cream since I needed a new daily moisturizer and am always looking for a good eye cream. Burt's Bees claims that royal jelly will help to give you radiant younger looking skin. Now I don't know if I really need younger looking skin yet, but I wouldn't mind being a little more radiant! I have been using these for a little while now and thought it would be a good time for a review.

Day Cream:

I'll kick things off with the day cream. This sells for $24.99 on the Burt's Bees website for 55g of product, or 2 ounces. It comes in a plain glass jar with a silver lid and a small label on one side. When I first opened the lid the cardbaord lid insert (you know what im talking about I hope!) had come unglued and was stuck to the top of the jar. I managed to get it to stick back into the lid though.

I seriously need to start blogging during daylight hours so my photos don't all look like this....

This has a very faint scent of honey, which is actually not very pleasant, but you really have to stick your nose right in the jar to smell it. When I put it on my face it is pretty odorless. This cream has a kind of strange consistency when you try to rub it into your skin. It doesn't spread very far before it starts to sink in and become almost tacky feeling. I have to work small amounts in to different areas of my face, instead of putting a few globs on and rubbing them all over, like I normally do. Even though it starts to sink in so quickly, it doesn't all sink in and disappear immediately. It leaves your skin feeling almost waxy for a little while. It takes 10-15 minutes to sink in completely, which for me seems like a long time.

As for results, it does leave my skin feeling moisturized, and my skin does seem a bit more radiant and smooth to me. I'm not so sure I like the way I need to work it into my skin, but I'm a fan of the results! Would I buy this again? I'm sort of on the fence. I am not a huge fan of the texture of it, but under my makeup I don't really notice it at all. If it continues to give me great results I might buy another jar, since the price is so reasonable.

Eye Cream:

The eye cream claims to reduce fine lines and wrinkles as well as making the skin look more radiant. This also costs $24.99 on their website, but there is 14g of product in this one. This also comes in a plain glass jar, but it has a white plastic lid instead. The only label is on the bottom of the jar. This one smells a lot nicer to me, even though it is a similar honey scent.

The eye cream is a lot thicker in the jar, but it smooths out a lot more easily on the skin and then sinks in. It does leave a slight bit of that same waxy feeling for a few minutes, but it is not nearly as bad with this one. I wonder if that is what royal jelly feels like? Anyways, this one is much easier to use than the day cream.

Does the eye cream really work? Well, I don't know it this one made my skin more radiant, but I did actually notice that the skin seemed more plumped up! This made the fine lines actually less noticeable! It doesn't do anything for the dark circles that plague me, but fewer fine lines means I can cake on my usual undereye concealer much more easily. Even when I scrunch my face up, which normally makes my eyes sink into a pile of wrinkles, it isn't so bad! Would I buy this eye cream again? Absolutely! It does exactly what it says it will and I am extremely pleased with the results!

Just for fun here is my bare face after using these products for a little while.

Do I look more radiant? You know, besides those horrible dark circles... Anyone who calls those radiant is a nutter.

Anyways, that's it for the review. To recap, I love the eye cream and would definitely repurchase it and I like the results of the day cream, but am not a huge fan of the application.

Do you use any Burt's Bees skincare products? What is your favourite?

Review: Annabelle CC Cream Instant Perfecting Base

The last time I purchased my favourite Annabelle foundation it came with a mini bottle of their CC cream. I finally decided to try it out so that I could do a review!

(I got lazy and reused the photo from my haul post before.)

This CC cream is supposed to control redness, correct appearance of pores and fine lines and prime the skin. It does have a tint to it that is slightly darker than my skin, but it didn't really seem to matter once I blended it all out. According to the Annabelle website, the full size of this product is $16.95 for 1 fluid ounce. This is the natural finish, and it also comes in a luminous finish, which is a white cream.

When applying this, it really feels similar to applying foundation. It definitely doesn't have the same coverage as a foundation though.

Get ready for another horrifying photo of my bare face!

As you can see, I have some redness and some sallowness around my mouth, as well as horrible dark circles. Here is my face after application of the Annabelle CC cream:

As you can see, my face looks basically the same. There is slightly less redness and my skin looks a bit more even, but there isn't really any coverage. This does however leave my face feeling nice and smooth before I apply my foundation!

Here is my full face of foundation and powder and whatnot over the CC cream. It did make my foundation application a bit smoother and my makeup does last longer when I use this.

Overall, I think this is a fairly good face primer. I don't really notice it corrects any colour that my foundation wouldn't have already, but it does fill in pores and fine lines nicely. I think this is a good option for people who aren't a fan of silicon-y face primers.

I am currently switching between this primer and the ELF primer daily to see if I prefer a silicon formula or cream formula like this one. I am considering buying a full size of this when I run out of primer.

What is your favourite face primer?

Review: Lunatick Cosmetics Labs Palettes

I already did an unboxing about these, because I just had to show them off immediately, but now it's time for the review! These are 6 pan eyeshadow palettes from Lunatick Cosmetics Labs. This is the same company that made the AlieNEON dust stacker that I reviewed a while ago.

Each palette costs $25 and you get 6g of product. They also have an option of a stackable sifter set of loose pigments in the same colours. It costs the same amount of money but you get double the product. I opted for palettes though, because I hate dust stackers.

The packaging of these is really cute. It is a sturdy cardboard palette that has a mirror inside and magnets to keep it shut. This is what it looks like:

Each palette comes with six little acrylic rectangles that fit over each colour. This is because the eyeshadows are so soft they can easily get gouged or turn to dust, but with these you can press them back into form!

I don't think I will be leaving these in the palettes though, since they have a tendency to fall out. I will be saving them in the coffin box until I need them.

The two palettes I got were the Asylum City palette and the Jack's Nightmare palette. I'll start with Asylum City!

Sorry for the blurry picture but this one really showed the colours well. The colours from left to right are Chronically Red, Ertomania, Hydrotherapy, The Yellow Pill, Sister Mary and Confinement. All the colours in this palette are matte or semi-matte. The first thing I noticed while testing out these eyeshadows is how incredibly soft they are. I have honestly never felt a softer eyeshadow in my life before! This stuff must be so finely milled, it is almost hard to believe. Because of this they blend beautifully. Here is a swatch of them on my arm:

These swatches were done with a finger over no base. Chronically Red is a completely matte, bright yellow based red. Ertomania is a bright grass green that is semi-matte. Hydrotherapy is a semi-matte blue. The yellow pill is a matte lemony yellow. Sister Mary is a matte white and Confinement is a semi-matte black. I picked this palette because it had great primary colours and other basic shades and I am not disappointed.

The other palette I got was the Jack's Nightmare palette!

This is their Holiday palette and if you didn't guess already it is Nightmare Before Christmas themed!!! I could not pass this up, since that is one of my favourite movies ever! This palette's shades are just as soft as the first, but this is a mix of mattes and shimmers.

These are also swatched without a base. The colours in this palette are Obsession, a matte cloud grey, Mischievous, a shimmery pale blue, Doctor Finklestein, a bright matte purple, Terrorway, a rose gold, Halloween Town, a dark matte purple and Nabbed, a dark brownish purple with some red tones to it.

These are the first regular eyeshadows I have tried from Lunatick Cosmetics Labs and I am hooked! I already mentioned it before, but these eyeshadows are all so incredibly soft! They are also cruelty and talc free as well as vegan, which is a big bonus! Their makeup is also good for people with sensitive skin. I suggest you check out this company if you haven't already because these are amazing!

Have you ever tried Lunatick Cosmetics Labs products before? Let me know in the comments!

Unboxing: Madison Street Beauty

Another package came in the mail today, this time from Madison Street Beauty. They had a 60% off sale over the holidays and I decided to try them out. Unfortunately, I was far less excited when it looked like this:

Apparently, my package was damaged in the mail.

What was left of it had been put into a plastic baggie with an apology from USPS on it.
If that wasn't bad enough, when I started to inspect my eyeshadows I found they weren't even what I had asked for. I had ordered 7 shades and I only have 5 here. I can't tell if that's the post service's fault or Madison Street Beauty's. On top of that one of the shades I did receive is not what I ordered and another one of the jars is barely full. Here are a couple comparison photos so you can see a full jar and then the other jar.

I know that a lot of shadows are measured out by weight not volume, but even that doesn't account for this jar having less than half the product of the others.

Right now I am really unimpressed with either USPS or Madison Street Beauty or both. I'm not really sure. I have sent a message to the owner to let her know about my issues and am waiting for a response. I'm too upset to even swatch the things I got right now. I will do a full review of this company once this has (or hasn't) been resolved. Here is a quick picture of what I did receive anyways:

I did not order that pink shade at all.

I will update this as soon as I can! I got another holiday order in the mail today and will have an unboxing for that tomorrow, so look forward to that! That should more than make up for this debacle!

Swatches/Review: Star Crushed Minerals

If you read my mystery unboxing post yesterday, you already know that I got a little package from Star Crushed Minerals! They were having a 60% off Holiday sale and I just couldn't help myself!

I only got 3 colours since I haven't tried anything by them before. I picked Wine, Olive Pink and Electric Teal Nebula. It took a long time to get my package. I ordered this December 9th and received it January 6th. It didn't even get shipped for over a week. That is a bit long to me, but it was the holiday season so I will let it go.

The packaging of these is really plain. They also come in jars that I don't really like. The product can fall around the sides of the jar if you aren't careful. Shipping and packaging problems aside, the eyeshadows are amazing! They all have a really nice amount of sparkle in them. They also apply really well and blend easily. Here is a swatch of them on my arm with no base:

Sorry it isn't the clearest picture, but this really got the colours best.

Wine is a nice wine red shade with a bit of pink thrown in. Olive pink is a really interesting colour. It is like an olive brown tone with tons of red/pink shimmer in it. The last one, Electric Teal Nebula, is my favourite. It is an almost black base filled with tons of teal shimmer and sparkle! This is going to be my go to smokey eye shade in the future probably.

Overall I really like Star Crushed Minerals. While I'm not thrilled by the packaging or shipping, the actual product is really great quality! These all have an amazing sparkle in them that I think is very unique. The price is also quite reasonable. I ordered 2 large 2.5 gram jars and one smaller 1 gram jar. Normally the 2.5 gram jars are $10, but you do get a ton of product.

I am definitely considering getting more products from Star Crushed Minerals in the future, once my spending ban has been lifted. I think I would only get the 1 gram jars in the future though, unless I see a colour I love. I am glad I got the two large jars that I did though. Those shades are so pretty!

Have you ever tried Star Crushed Minerals? Did you like them?

Review: Sephora + Pantone Universe Emerald Capsule Collection

This year Sephora and Pantone paired up to release a collection of makeup based on the colour of the year: Emerald. I know it is the new year already, so I am a little late getting this. There is already a new colour of the year called Radiant Orchid, but here is my review anyways.

The box contains six products and originally retailed for 89.99 I believe, but by the time I was interested in it it was already on sale for 50% off. I am pretty sure that is the price my parents paid for it when they bought it for Christmas. The products inside are a cream shadow product, an eyeshadow trio, a loose pigment, a cream eyeliner, a jumbo eyeliner pencil and a mascara. I will do a quick review of each of these products.

Graphic Sculpt Jumbo Waterproof Eyeliner In Emerald: I have yet to use this product as anything other than an eye base. It is great for that. It really is waterproof and doesn't budge an inch after it dries. I find it isn't really a dark enough or pigmented enough product to use a a real eyeliner, and the end is too fat anyways. This might look really good on the waterline sometimes though. It does go one a bit sheer though, which is my main complaint and also why I think it works better as a base.

Color Watt Mascara In Emerald: This was the most disappointing thing in the box. It was completely dried out when I opened it up for the first time. Maybe this is a symptom of it being old and sitting around on a shelf all year, but this should not have been opened before it got to me ever, so that doesn't make much sense. When I opened it up the wand looked like this:

Does that look usable to you? I added a few drops of contact solution to the bottle and shook it up to see if it loosened anything up and now it is slightly better, but still not really any good. I have tried several times to get some of the product on my eyes but to no avail. Literally no colour will transfer onto my eyelashes. This is a huge disappointment, I was really looking forward to trying a coloured mascara.

Color Code Prismatic Shadow Block In Emerald: This is the only other product in the box that I don't really like yet. When I first opened this one up this is what I got:

See how greasy that is? The entire top had this disgusting oily film over the top of it. I had to wipe several layers off of the top with kleenex to get to a usable patch. Even under the filmy layer of grease though, I still find this product to be oily unless I put an extremely sheer layer on. I have tried this as a base under eyeshadows and it creased after about an hour. Here is the proof:

This was literally after about an hour! Now I might be able to use this as more of a face paint product for costumes and such. If applied to places that aren't likely to crease it does look like a really nice colour. It is more of a grass green than an emerald green though. I will keep playing with this stuff because I love the colour and had read so many great reviews. I must just be doing something wrong.

Bionic Colour Grid Shadow Block: This is an eyeshadow trio that comes in some really amazing packaging. The top is held on by 1 hinge and 3 magnets. you push it aside and the hinge moves and all the magnets let go so it can slide. The bottom also opens the same way to reveal a mirror. Inside there are three colours: Emerald, White Out and Crown Blue. The emerald shade and the blue are mattes and the other is a very frosty, shimmery white colour. I only have two complaints with this product. The first is that the Crown Blue shade is a bit chalky and less pigmented than I would have liked. The next complaint is that I wish the emerald shade was the largest block. Why would they give me the most product in the worst shade? The emerald is smooth and incredibly pigmented and also the colour they were trying to highlight. I wanted mostly that products and a bit of the accent shades, not the other way around.

Lightspeed Glitter Dust In Emerald: This is an amazing loose emerald pigment that is jam packed with emerald glitter. It works really well over a sticky base. I don't have much to say about this product because I really like it. I think the packaging is super cute too.

Color Cube Lid Liner Stain In Emerald: This is probably my favourite product of the bunch! It is a super rich, pigmented cream eyeliner product. This seems like the most intensely emerald out of everything as well. It works great as a cream base for eyeshadows, as eyeliner, on the waterline, basically as anything. Once it dries it doesn't budge until you wash it off too. My favourite combination is this on my lids as a base underneath the Glitter Dust.

Finally, here is a swatch of all of the products on my arm:

From left to right the products are the Bionic Colour Grid Shadow Block (first 3 colours), the Graphic Sculpt Jumbo Waterproof Eyeliner in Emerald, the Prismatic Shadow Block in Emerald, the Color Cube Lid Liner Stain in Emerald, the Color Watt Mascara in Emerald (took a while to get a swatch of this), and the Lightspeed Glitter Dust in Emerald.

So that's it for the review. I really liked 4 out of 6 products which is not bad, and one of the other two is probably still usable anyways. The two standout products for me were the cream eyeliner and the glitter dust. Would I buy this set again next year in Radiant Orchid? Probably not, but there is a chance I will go buy those two individual products again. I would get another eyeshadow trio as well, as long as every eyeshadow has a good formula. I am a bigger fan of emerald than radiant orchid so I'm glad I managed to get one of these boxes!

What do you think? Would you get this next year in radiant orchid?

Impulse Cosmetics Haul/Review!

My Impulse Cosmetics package finally came the other day and I am so excited to show you the new lipstick colours I got!!! It is about -20C here and when they came in the mail they were completely frozen! I should have expected that but the labels were all peeling off because the glue had even frozen! I was so anxious to swatch my frozen lipsticks that I sat on them like a bird with her eggs until I could finally twist them up.

I placed this order just a couple of days before boxing day. I was planning on waiting, but I started worrying that the shades I wanted would sell out while I was at work (I worked Black Friday). I decided to just say screw it and order them then and there, since I wanted them to arrive before Christmas. I'm really glad I did, it looks like almost everything I wanted would have been sold out when I got there. This is my third order from impulse cosmetics. To read about my first two purchases you can go here or here.

So, without further ado, here is what I got:

I didn't get any pigments this time. There were too many lipstick colours that I needed to try. Also, in case you were wondering, those are dots of lipstick on each package that I put there myself so I could tell what each one looked like without opening it up. The labels are papery so you can do that, which I actually like.

From left to right the lipsticks are Agent X, an awesome almost black teal, Lobotomy, a lighter teal, Permafrost, a bright blue and Texas tea, a metallic copper.

Now I won't have any lip swatches today, since I have a cold and my lips are drier than usual, but here is an arm swatch. I promise to have a look up using each one of these as soon as possible. The swatch is shown first with flash, then without:

The colour I was most excited for was Agent X, the blackened teal. It is like a greener version of Smoking Gun, a navy blue that has become my staple statement lipcolour. It, like Smoking Gun, is a bit drier than the rest of the lipsticks, but also seems to have a longer wear time. This works great as long as you thoroughly moisturize your lips first.

The next colour is Lobotomy, a lighter teal. Agent X is actually supposed to be a darker version of this, or so I was told by the owner. I am assuming both of them are meant to be a darker version of Circus, which is a light teal that I already own. This ended up being a little bit more blue than I expected, but it still looks great and is very creamy.

The next colour is Permafrost, a bright, mid toned blue. This seems to be their medium blue shade. They have a lighter and a darker. While the dark navy blue is still my favourite I think I like this one a lot better than the light blue, called Clinch. This one pops way more and I think looks better on my skin tone. It is also incredibly creamy, possibly most of all.

The final colour I got was Texas Tea, a metallic copper shade. This one is honestly my least favourite of the bunch, but only because I don't think it works well with my skin tone. It is still creamy and pigmented and the metallic finish in it is amazing, but I just don't like the colour on me. I might need to get used to it or something. They have a green metallic lipstick that I really want now! This one has a slightly shorter wear time than the rest of them too.

All of these colours are smooth and extremely pigmented. Most Impulse Cosmetics lipsticks go on fully opaque in just one swipe! Once again, I am very happy with my purchase from them. Processing and shipping did take a bit longer this time, but I will go ahead and blame the holidays. Nothing came when it was supposed to. If you would like to order anything from Impulse Cosmetics you can check out their Etsy store.

Which is your favourite? Which would you like to see me use in a look first?

Review: MAC Stroke of Midnight Eyes In Smoky

Quick update: I still have no idea what happened to my Clinique shadow. I even looked through other makeup bags it might have previously been in but no luck! I guess we will never know what happened. Pop Expo yesterday was amazing! I had a great time with my friends and will have a post about it up soon, but I need some time to go thorugh the pictures and photograph what I got. I got a few fun nerdy things and a cute dress though! Now on to today's post.

I recently went to a MAC event where I got a makeover and then, sadly was forced to buy a couple of products. You can read all about that debacle here. Regardless of that drama, I still like the products I got, which were the Stroke of Midnight Eyes palette in Smoky and the Mineralize Blush in Talk of The Town. I will be reviewing the eye palette today. I already did a review of the blush which you can read here.

The Stroke of Midnight Eyes palettes costs $47.50 Canadian and it come in three different options: The Warm Eyes palette, the Cool Eyes palette and the Smoky Eyes palette. Each palette contains 5 shadows and a little double ended brush, which I have actually found quite useful for on the go.

The worst part of these is that the packaging is really bulky. I love the colour scheme with the white and gold over the black, but the whole thing is enormous and plastic and somehow it feels just feels kind of cheap... I also found that opening this the first time was a bit of an ordeal. The front closure looks like it should open differently, so I found myself standing there prying at a box for minutes until it flew open by accident. I tested this out on a friend from work and my boyfriend by handing them the palette and saying "open this". My boyfriend couldn't do it at all and my friend eventually got it open but was laughing at herself by the end because of how long it took. I did notice later though that if you actually look carefully before trying to open it up, you will see where to put your fingers and pull.

The shades in the smoky eyes palette, from lightest to darkest, are Chillproof, Retrospeck, Gaelic Gold, Well Put Together and Carbon. Gaelic Gold is the reason I bought this palette. It is a gorgeous gold with a green undertone to it. I wanted this becaue I thought it would go perfectly with my MAC Humid for Holiday looks. I have already done one look using this combination that you can see here.

Since purchasing this palette, I have found that the stars in it really are Retrospeck and Chillproof. Retrospeck is a gorgeous shimmery taupe colour and Chillproof is a very frosty, pearly white. Retrospeck has quickly become my go to eyeshadow for the winter. I sweep this all over the lid, pop a bit of Chillproof in my inner corner, throw on some mascara and then a bright lip and I'm out the door. The taupe colour goes really well with almost any lipcolour I choose.

The last two colours are pretty standard for a smoky eyes palette. Well Put Together is a mostly matte dark brown with a few specks of gold glitter in it and Carbon is a matte black. The both have alright pigmentation and blendability, but carbon honestly isn't my favourite black. I think I might even prefer the matte black by NYX! These two actually looked pretty pathetic when I swatched them as you will see, but they do perform better over a base. These swatches were done without a base:

So that's it. Overall I like this palette, but I don't love it. The three shimmery shades are all really amazing, but the other two are pretty unimpressive. I am also not a huge fan of the packaging, but I do like the little brush they included. I'm not entirely sure this is worth the almost $50 price tag. If you are curious what they look like on my eyes, I have used this in many looks lately. You just have to look through some of my recent posts.

What do you think of this palette? Have you tried any products from the Stroke of Midnight collection?