I had the biggest “oh man…” moment last night when I was loading a bunch of nail swatches from my camera on to my computer only to realise I’d mis-clicked and deleted about 80% of my swatches, these were the China Glaze Crackled collection and Zoya’s Intimate… great going Celina! These took me two evenings to create *sigh* So I guess that’s what I’ll be doing this evening, back to swatching the same polishes again

So in the mean time I bring you OPI’s Serena Glam Slam collection, which is really only 2 polishes No top coat as always, enjoy~

Simply Smash-ing!

A glittery lime / yellow green polish, required 3 coats to get this level of opacity and not sure why it reminds me of Shrek, only with bling? It’s a gorgeous polish, just not sure where I’d wear it hehe.

Black Shatter

Matte black shatter polish, apply it over a complete dry polish and literally watch it crack in under 60 seconds! I’ve done this a couple of times with the China Glaze collection and still love watching it It’s an awesome effect, just one coat needed. Be sure to apply top coat if you want to “seal” it in~

This season’s Shu Uemura‘s Spring 2011 catalogue had a highly inspiring makeup cover, it was tropical, it was fresh and best of all it was blue! So I knew I had to give this look a go~ I was initially a bit concerned because when I first swatched the colours for the first time they were not at all pigmented :/ But after I applied some primer, that all changed! Hope you enjoy the look

Face
MAC Prep + Prime – Base Visage
MAC Mineralize Satinfinish SPF 15 Foundation – NC20
MAC Mineralize Skinfinish Natural – Light Medium
Bobbi Brown Creamy Concealer – Beige
Bobbi Brown Sheer Finish Loose Powder – Pale Yellow
Canmake Highlighter – 01
Bobbi Brown Bronzing Powder – Light

Eyes
e.l.f Eyelid Primer – Sheer
Shu Uemura Morphorium Blue Palette *
Coastal Scents 78 Eye Shadow & Blush Combo Palette
MAC Fluidline Non-Conformist
Stila Kajal Eye Liner – Topaz
NYX Jumbo Eye Pencil – Pure Gold
DUO Lash Glue – Dark Tone
False Lashes
Coastal Scents – Brow Tones
Maybelline Falsies Volume Express – Very Black
Shu Uemura – Lash Curler
Maybelline Brow Styling Gel – Clear

Lips
MAC Lipstick – Angel
Christian Dior Gloss Levres – Smoothie Peche

_{Items marked * were sent to me for consideration.}

Face
Prepare face as usual, and then using a bronzing powder, start contouring your face, apply it to the sides of your forehead, under your cheek bows, sides of your nose and below the jaw line. Take a candy pink blush and apply to the apples of your cheeks. Then take a shimmery highlighter and place on your forehead, cheek bones, bridge of your nose, cupids bow and chin.

Eyes
Prime your lids with a skin tone primer, then apply a shimmery yellow powder to your brows. Take a shimmery lime green shadow and apply generously to the crease so it covers part of the lid and brow bone. Next take a rich shimmery ocean blue shadow and apply to your lids, extending to the crease. Take a dark matte purple and apply to the inner 1/3 of your eyes and outer 1/3. Make sure to blend any harsh lines between all the colours, but do not over blend. We want the colours to look like they are fading into one another, not mixing them.

Take a matte pink colour and apply to the inner corner of your eyes and 1/3 of your lash line. Take the same blue and apply to the outer 2/3 of your lower lash line, then apply a thinner line of purple over the blue.

Take a purple gel liner and line your upper lash line. Curl your lashes and apply two coats of mascara. Line your waterline with a peach coloured eyeliner pencil.

Next take a pair of false eye lashes, and cut out about 3/4 of a cm. Two for your upper lash line, and two for your lower, these should be smaller than the previous two. Coat the false lashes for your upper lash line in the purple gel liner, and then coat the lower false lashes with a gold cream eye shadow. Wait for the lashes to dry, and then apply to your lash line with eye lash glue.

Fill in your brows with a dark brown powder, and define with a clear brow gel.

Lips
Apply a candy pink lipstick, then dab a touch of gloss to the centre of your bottom lips, press your lips towards to transfer and even out the shine.

I’ve always been intrigued and curious about the shu uemura makeup line, especially their palettes. I am as you can tell by the sheer number of palettes I show on Fables, completely obsessed with palettes :9

Unlike in Australia, in Japan shu uemura is huge! The counters were constantly packed with people and it took me almost 1 hour to purchase a concealer brush from them back when I was travelling through Japan! So it’s great to see more Asian brands making their way into the Australian market

The lovely people at shu uemura were generous enough to send me the Morphorium Blue palette from their Spring 2011 collection to try out and I loved it~!

Call me superficial, but my favourite aspect of these palettes are the packaging. They are small, easy to travel with, great design and unlike many other palettes I’ve reviewed, the case is incredibly strong and sturdy. They remind me of my Unii Palettes (I’ll review these soon) in that I can throw it into my handbag and not have to worry about it. It also comes with a massive mirror and two dual ended applicators for on the go application.

The glittery butterfly design on the blush is a gorgeous touch, though not permanent and disappears after first use.

Pigmentation of the shadows varied, I’d say the yellow-highlighter proved the most difficult to work with. Very hard to get any solid colour, and most likely better used to just highlight your brow bone and inner corner of your eyes than as an actual contributing eye shadow colour.

The rest of the shadows and cream shadow apply brilliantly, very pigmented, I was surprised at how the purple shadow swatched though. Admittedly I used these shadows on my eyes before swatching and found it was extremely pigmented on the eyes! In fact I had to do a lot of blending to soften it out, yet the swatch below don’t come close to illustrating how pigmented it was on my eyes (you’ll see tomorrow!)

The pink is a sweet cotton candy pink, swatches really strong on the hand, but when applied with a brush gives a very soft pink glow.

Overall I’m really quite in love with this palette, they go for $115AU at shu uemura counters at David Jones, or you can look on their website where it goes for $69US.

If bright blues are not for you, I do believe they have issued a neutral palette which would be more every day friendly (which I’m not so secretly contemplating purchasing now)

A couple of weekends ago, Seruku, Darbara, Toby and I ventured out to check out the 2nd annual Japanese Summer Festival held at Docklands~ I was most looking forward to eating all the yummy Japanese food which I had so sorely missed since my last trip to Japan :9

Unfortunately I’m still missing it because the food here was nothing like the street food in Japan Oh well, it was still nostalgic to be able to speak some Japanese when ordering, just like we did constantly back in Japan!

Being a cosplayer I decided to make my own kimono to wear, and being a nerd meant I had to somehow make it… well nerdy! So I got the idea to draw a bunch of StarCraft 2 symbols over it, which I thought was very amusing since only SC2 gamers would know what the symbols meant. To everyone else I was just weird~

Unfortunately in true cosplay style, I started sewing on the Wednesday night before the festival and since I work during the day I only had evenings to sew it so by Saturday I didn’t manage to include the major of details and decorations I had originally planned Oh well, maybe if I find more time I might add more details and do a real shoot with it one day!

Overall the festival was insanely crowded and far too small

I did manage to run into Stacey, Annie and a bunch of other cosplayers which was fun The gang and I ended the night with dinner at Mecca Bar :9 Delicious~

Pros:

• Curves shape wave makes for easy application
• No smudging, lasts at least 15 hours
• Lengthenings and volumises lashes
• Flexible wand makes for easier use

Cons:

• Doesn’t give literally give you “falsies”

Price: $10AU

Rating:

Where: Priceline, supermarkets and chemists.

I first saw this mascara in one of the many fashion magazines I was flipping through. I’m a sucker for the next best mascara and so of course snapped it up from my local Priceline, and for $10AU that was hardly breaking the bank!

So imagine my surprise when I discovered how lovely this mascara was, it gives great volume and length, it doesn’t smudge after 15 hours of wear and the wand is both flexible and in a very easy to use shape. Thin and slightly curved for grabbing every single lash.

So why didn’t it get the 5 stars? Because it didn’t give me the best length I’ve seen, nor the best volume and it certainly doesn’t come close to false lashes. But in my experience this is probably the best $10AU mascara I have ever bought, I rank it up there with my beloved Lash Blast.

I’ll definitely be re-purchasing this mascara when I’m finished with it, it is currently my every mascara. It is just such good value for money.

Introducing China Glaze’s Anchors Away nail polish collection, the entire collection is made out of 12 polishes so I ended up picking up 6 that looked amazing in the promo photos

As usual, all swatches are 3 coats unless otherwise mentioned with no top coat.

White Cap

A white frost shimmer with gold and silver flecks. This formula really surprised me because it applied so well despite having what appears from a glance to be glitter in it. This is something I would wear to work on casual Fridays, because it is still relatively conservative with a pop of shimmer to it.

Not sure why the polish appears so golden on my nails, this is what it looks like from the bottle.

Knotty

A tanned nude with gold micro-shimmer, I absolutely love this. It’s a new twist on work friendly nail polishes. The shade is very work appropriate, but under certain angles it manages to pick up and reflect the light off it, giving a subtle sheen. I’d call this a glamorous conservative polish?

Lighthouse

A shimmery bright yellow, another lovely shade, great for summer lunches or days on the beach. Out of the family of yellows, I’d say this is probably on the more subtle side of the spectrum.

Ahoy!

Token fuchsia pink polish of the collection with gold micro shimmers, almost appears red in some angles. A great standard pink / red polish if you don’t already have one.

Sea Spray

A crème dusty blue with very fine micro-shimmer, so fine the photo didn’t manage to pick it up Despite this being the blue of the collection (and blue being my favourite colour) I wasn’t in love with this shade. I don’t know why, feel like I’ve seen it before. I only used 2 coats here.

Below Deck

A crème mauve purple shade, it reminds me of something I’d be more inclined to wear in colder weather. Almost like a fall shade. Like Sea Spray, only two coats used here~

Overall, having only seen 6 shades from this collection I was pretty happy with it. Lots of shimmer for some reason, even though the promo photos seems more crème, not that I’m complaining

I’m really getting into entering as many makeup competitions lately, not so much to win (though it would be nice) but it helps give me ideas and inspiration on what looks to do next. This is my next entry into Makeup Geek’s Valentine look~ It’s much more toned down than usual, to me it almost looks wearable, just need to lose the excess blush and hearts ;D

Face
MAC Prep + Prime – Skin Base Visage
Giorgio Armani Luminous Silk Foundation – 4
Giorgio Armani Micro-Fil Loose Powder – 1
Bobbi Brown Creamy Concealer – Beige

Cheeks
NARS Powder Blush – Orgasm
MAC Powder Blush – Azalea
NYX Mosaic Powder – Highlighter

Eyes
e.l.f Eye Primer
NP Set – New Neutrals Palette
Prestige Eyeliner – White
MAC Fluidline Blacktrack
Maybelline Falsies Mascara – Very Black
Maybelline Brow Styling Gel – Clear
Shu Uemura Eye Lash Curler
False Lashes
DUO Glue

Lips
Revlon Colorburst Lipstick – True Red
Revlon Colorburst Lipstick – Carnation
Savvy by DB Lipliner – Poppy

Face
Prime, foundation, conceal and set with powder as usual.

Cheeks
Apply a soft coral pink to the apples of your cheeks and extend all the way to your temples. Then take a more pigmented magenta pink blush and work that into your temples. Take a matte white highlighting powder and highlight all your high points.

Taking a red lipstick, draw 5 hearts along your cheek bone and place a heart shaped rhinestone at the end of one of the lines.

Eyes
Prime your lids, take a white eyeliner pencil to the inner corner of your eyes, inner lower lash line and brow bone. This is my way of “priming” for white eye shadow to make it stand out more. Then apply a white eye shadow over the white eye liner.

We’re going for a generic neutral brown eye hear, so take a medium brown to the lid and a dark brown to your crease, concentrating on the outer corner of your eye. Blend! Pat on a bit of white eye shadow to the center of your lids.

Line your upper lash line with a black gel liner, curl your lashes and apply mascara. Then apply your false eye lashes.

Define your eyebrows and extend them using a dark brown eye shadow. Then set them with a clear brow gel.

Lips
Line your lips with a red lipliner and fill in, I always fill in as this is my way of priming the lips but also ensuring the colour stays on for longer. Go over the liner with a red lipstick, then apply a pink link stick to the center of your lips for added dimension.

Too Faced palettes are some of my favourite ever! They are similar to Urban Decay (in terms of quality and packaging) palettes, but tend to have more neutral tones. I love the Natural and Naked palettes (I will post swatches one day!) and when you purchase these products overseas the price is pretty good If you are local, you can find them for $59.95AU at Kit Cosmetics or if you’re international you can try them for $35US at Too Faced.

The eye shadows are all powder, but most of them feel incredibly creamy, smooth and pigmented. I love how the palette already pairs out the looks for you ranging from Day, Classic and Fashion

The palette, like it’s Naked and Natural counter parts come with instructional cards that teach you what shadows can be used, where and how to apply.

Keep in mind that the Romantic palette is much smaller in size to the Natural and Naked, but the shadow pan sizes are still the same.

Overall, this is another great neutral palette from Too Faced and worth a look at if you love earthy tones.

2011 has been a surprisingly amazing year for me in terms of print media, and to be honest, ask me this a year ago and I would have never ever dreamed that anyone would ever want me to appear in any print media. I’m nobody! The experience has really been a dream come true, and with all the recently media publications, I couldn’t feel more blessed and honoured.

After my appearance in The Age, I was contacted by RMIT to do some promotional shots for their Japanese Exhibition to appear on their website and on Melbourne Metro’s MX newspaper (which finishes up on the 17th of March, entry is free so be sure to check it out if you have the time!!).

Check out the title placement, my friends had a good laugh over that!

They specifically requested for my Hikaru costume, and of course I couldn’t say no! It makes me insanely happy to know that the hours of intense labour and pain that went into creating my Hikaru costume is in a way really paying off! (Even though just the creation of the costume and shooting with my friends alone is payment enough and always has been~ This extra stuff is just cake.)

The MX newspaper is distributed within the Melbourne CBD only, which is where my day job (for the most part) is, and whilst I’ve never sought for approval from my co-workers, it was amazing to learn that the great majority of them are so supportive of my crazy costuming life~ (there are always bad eggs in every basket). I feel so blessed for the incredibly opportunities I’ve been given, I am truly a very lucky person <3 Thank you so much to RMIT and MX for the opportunity!

When I first received the media release for Estee Lauder‘s Create a Gift at David Jones promotion I already knew I wanted to try it out for myself. The deal is basically you buy $75AU worth of Estee Lauder products at David Jones, and you get to create your own gift set using pre-defined products. Not bad given I’ve been looking for an “entry” into the brand.

So you can imagine how excited I was when the lovely people at Estee Lauder offered to send me my own gift set

The gift set basically comes with a cosmetic bag, mini mascara, eye makeup remover, eye shadow and blush palette, lipstick, mini serum, mini moisturiser and mini eye creme. For each item except the mascara, makeup remover and cosmetic bag there are two types to choose from, I selected the warm tones for the makeup.

I actually had no intention to post this because frankly it feels like a bit of an ad, but I just realised that the promotion finishes on the 19th of February, 2011 Which doesn’t give me enough time to properly trial the products for review, and I figured had I been a reader, I’d like to know about the promotion while I still have a chance to purchase it, rather than read a review on something I can no longer buy.

I’m planning on heading down to David Jones myself before the week is out to purchase the Double Wear Foundation (something I’ve wanted to try for ages!) so I can also collect the 2nd choice for each of these items (aka the cool colours). Sue me I’m a sucker for these sorts of gift sets / freebies :3

Based on swatching alone, the eye shadows are smooth and have great pigmentation, with a mixture of matte and shimmery eye shadows, nothing overly glittery. Colours are great for the work environment, neutral and earthy tones. The blush is a dusky pink matte shade, also very smooth and the lipstick smells great (smells like guava?).

I won’t be reviewing the skin care products since I’d need at least 30+ days worth of product to see any real results. Let me know if you guys end up getting the gift set too