Romantic Eyes

This is a romantic look using pink and purple from Lancome's Glamour on the Go travel palette.  The quality of the shadows in the palette is excellent.  The texture is silky, they go on smoothly and blend so easily.  The shadows are also superbly pigmented even without the aid of primers.

I bought this palette from China Airlines' duty free shopping magazine.  One of the main selling points was that the colors were deliberately chosen for the Asian market.  The other selling point was that except for a base face powder foundation, this palette has everything I need to get a full face.  The palette has 4 beautiful eye shadows, a blush, and 2 lipsticks all packaged in a compact palette that looks like a luggage tag. 

Anyways, this is a look that I enjoy putting together for romantic dates with Mr. P.  I hope you enjoy this video and thanks for watching and reading!  ^_^

Video editing software: Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum 11.0

Music by: Gackt "Kimi Ni Aitakute"

Seduced by the Dark Side

Haha, well maybe not the Dark Side of the Force. :)  But I'll admit I feel a little bit - only a tiny little bit - like Darth Vader when I put this on. 

A woman's got to do what she has to do to minimize dark spots.  These visors can flip down and act like sun glasses without messing up the makeup on the bridge of my nose.  It provides TOTAL face coverage from the sun, too.  I'm turning into my Mom.  ^_^

Yes, I get stared at by people who think the visor mask is unusual, but so what? In the end, I'm doing something good for my skin and eyes and that's what really matters! XD

Product Review: Olay Complete All Day UV Moisturizer (Sensitive Skin)

click on the picture to go to Olay's website

I bought Olay's Complete All Day UV Moisturizer for sensitive skin at around this time last year to deal with my bout of eczema* caused by some allergic reaction to something in a Neutrogena SPFer. 

*I'm only guessing it's eczema - never went to the dermatologist to have it confirmed.

Product information:

Complete All Day UV Moisturizer - Sensitive Skin has a light, non-greasy and gentle formula that provides moisture while helping to protect your sensitive skin from daily incidental sun exposure.

Add it to your skin care routine to:

~ Moisturizer with lasting hydration

~ Help protect skin with broad spectrum UVA/UVB SPF 15 sunscreen

~ Maintain healthy-looking skin with a gentle formula

~ Includes zinc oxide, vitamin E and aloe

100% Oil-, Fragrance- and PABA-Free. Dermatologically Tested. Non-Comedogenic (Won’t Clog Pores)

Well, now that we have the product information out of the way let's the product review underway!  ;-)

Light, non-greasy and gentle formula
This product completely absorbed into my skin a couple minutes after application.  It felt great that it was not greasy, didn't leave a residue, and didn't further irritate my skin.  The lightness of the formula was great for my oily skin (esp. in summer).  My eczema-ish thing was able to heal while I used this product.

Moisturize with lasting hydration
This moisturizer did provide light hydration for my skin, but I also felt that I could have used more around my eyes where they were really dry, rough, and patchy.  However, I didn't at the time because I didn't want to aggravate the eczema.  I think this is good for oily skinned people because it provides good hydration to the skin and accommodates the oils that kick in later.

Protect skin with broad spectrum UVA/UVB SPF 15 sunscreen
Skeptical.  It doesn't seem like SPF 15 is enough to really protect one's skin.  It may protect one's skin for a 10 minute commute to and from work, but I don't think this product provides ample protection for a 20 minute walk out in the sun.


Maintains healthy looking skin with gentle formula
Considering that my skin was dry, rough, and patchy prior to using this product and now it's normal again (yes, also oily again), I'd have to say that this product did nurse my skin back to health.

Non-comedogenic
True, that.  I never had an outbreak as a result of using this product.  The only outbreaks I had at the time of using this was during Moon Time and when I ate too much junk food.

Other thoughts and observations
All in all, this is a pretty decent moisturizer for those with sensitive skin and/or oily skin.  It doesn't claim to be an anti-aging product so don't expect it to erase your wrinkles, fine lines, or dark spots.  It's a solid and good moisturizer that does what it says it'll do.  Also, this is soooo cheap.  You get a lot of product for the tiny lil' bit of money you pay.

So, would I buy this again?
I wouldn't rule it out.  Now that my skin is normal again, I want to branch out and try other moisturizers with anti-aging or whitening properties.  HOWEVER, if I ever have any problems with my skin in the future, this is going to my go-to product to nurse my skin back to health.

Thanks for reading!

PS - Mr. P took me to go watch the very last Harry Potter at the IMAX.  It was soooo good and I loved it!  I will miss looking forward to new Harry Potter movies.

Battle Mascara: Maybelline Volum'Express One by One vs. L'Oreal Telescopic Explosion

I've been wanting to try the L'Oreal Telescopic Explosion mascara for a while because of the ball shaped wand.  I had read some unflattering reviews of this mascara but that still didn't stop me!  All in all, I'm glad I bought it and tried it out.

The battle results are in and as much as I want to love L'Oreal's mascara, my handy dandy logical decision making model is telling me that Maybelline is still the winner.

Let me just add other observations here.  The Maybelline mascara is great at holding the curl in my eye lashes all day long.  Seriously, the curl is still there when I'm ready for bed.  The L'Oreal mascara does hold the curl a long time, but when I'm ready for bed I can see that the curl has started to droop just a little.  Also, with regards to smudging, I think the Maybelline mascara starts smudging earlier than the L'Oreal.  However, L'Oreal's mascara breaks down later but much faster than Maybelline's, resulting in a darker smudge faster.

Below is a comparison picture of my curled lashes before and after mascara.  My left lashes are naturally longer than my right lashes.  I don't know how that happened or if it's permanent, but that's the fact for this set of pictures.   

The following pictures show a "time lapse" of the Maybelline and L'Oreal mascaras.

Okay, not such a great compilation of separate pictures but I haven't lost my point!  In my humble opinion, the Maybelline and L'Oreal mascara perform similarly except for curl retention.  So as far as battles go, the Maybelline Volum'Express One by One waterproof mascara is still the WINNER.

Thanks for stopping by!

A Simple Way to Enhance Monolid Eyes

Hi All!  I'm really happy today because I've uploaded my first ever live video!  It's a video on how to enhance monolid eyes using neutral makeup.  I'm a fan of Youtube gurus Iamgrape1119 and Beautybag411, and I like how they apply their eye makeup, but at the end of the day, my confidence with my eye makeup is totally subjective to my confidence with the application.  Anyways, here's my video.  Enjoy!

Honestly, I didn't have a lot of choices for the picture that would represent the video, haha!  My YouTube page: www.youtube.com/kusanagigirl1

Products used on eyes:
Too Faced Shadow Insurance primer
Tarte's Park Ave. bronzer
Tarte's Soft Pink illuminator
Tarte's matte black pencil liner
Wet'nWild charcoal gray shadow from Lust/Desir Color Icon palette
Maybelline One by One wp mascara
L'Oreal Telescopic wp mascara **

**I will post up my next Battle Mascara in a few days.

This method works for me because I don't have to be too precise with makeup application, which is a plus on busy work days when I'm always running late.  :-P  Anyways, I'm experimenting with ways to apply makeup for my eye shape, but would love to know if anyone else does it differently and how.

Video editing software: Sony's Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum 11.0

Music by Gackt, "Sakurasou" & "Love letter"