Your Beauty Routine Needs More Fiber!

UPDATE:  It took me like a week after this closed to get this together, sorry!  Stephtee was drawn on the RNG machine!  :D

I keep hearing about these fiber mascaras, be it from Model Co., Too Faced, or Younique.   I constantly see people ask about Younique's product in particular because of all the heavy promotion by the girls that sell it (Younique is an MLM and, like most MLM's, their sales people are consistently trying to sell and recruit in order to turn a profit).  After doing my research, I settled on Love Alpha's fibre mascara set.  The set actually looks EXTREMELY similar to Younique's, to the point where I would venture a guess that they're both the same product with differently colored packaging...only the Love Alpha costs $20+ less.  Let's take a quick glance at the products, shall we?

The mascara itself comes in what looks like an eyeglass case in leopard print.

The mascara comes with two applicators.  The largest is a "transplanting gel".  The smaller is the fibers.

On the other hand, here is the Younique mascaras.  This picture was taken directly from their site:

Same faux leather bands to hold down the tubes, same big, metal tubes, same rectangular case.  The point is that they're VERY similar, at the bare minimum.

All fibre mascaras are applied the same.  The first step is to use the transplanting gel on your natural lashes, followed by a coat of the fibres, then go in again with the transplanting gel.  Depending on how much crazy drama you want, you can go in again with the fibres and transplanting gel.  In fact, you can do this over and over, though I would caution you not to, lest you look like this person's promotional material for her Younique business:

Yes, this is a picture shared by someone who SELLS this product.  Ugh.

So, anyway, the question now becomes, "does it work?"  Yes, it does.  Does it look like you're wearing "false lashes"?  No, of course not.  It is, however, a bit more lengthening than my normal mascara routine, which I've developed after trying about a hundred mascaras.  Let's see some pictures!

Okay, this is a series of very weird looking photos, but I am wearing one coat of the fibre mascara on my right eye, which is, of course, on the left in these photos.  My normal mascara application (curling the lashes, then both steps from my Lorac Special Effects mascara) was done on my left eye.  As you can see, there is a noticeable difference between the two.  

So, what do I think?  The product has potential.  If used properly, you could likely do two or three coats of the product without looking like the warning photo above.  It's a bit more cumbersome than just a standard mascara, clearly, but I also don't consider this an everyday mascara.

For those wondering, I'm also wearing a generic pink gel liner (seriously, someone gifted this to me...I have no idea where it was purchased, but I love it), Jouer's Luminizing Tint in Pearl, Tarte's Amazonian Clay blush in Blissful, and Lipstick Queen's saint lipstick in Medieval.

Now on to the fun stuff.  I have an extra, UNOPENED, COMPLETELY AND AMAZINGLY BRAND NEW Love Alpha Fibre Mascara set to give away.  Comment below with a caption for the warning photo (just to entertain me) and a winner will be chosen at random on 2/1!

Fakes, Counterfeits, Knock-Offs, Replicas, Copies...A Rose By Any Other Name...

I had a "Lipstick Lineup" planned for today, but I've pushed that to the side because of a cosmetics related link that is spreading around Facebook like wildfire. This article on Babble.com is an on-point commentary on the problems of counterfeit cosmetic products. The article claims that, after being tested in a laboratory:

"“The results were frightening. Tests found high levels of aluminum, which has been linked to Alzheimer’s disease. Five of the counterfeit products tested positive for the metal Beryllium, a known carcinogen. What was more concerning; there were dangerously high levels of lead in seven of the counterfeit products, including two bogus M·A·C eye shadows. A counterfeit Chanel eye shadow turned out to be loaded with potentially dangerous bacteria. ‘The amount of bacteria you found in this counterfeit makeup was disgusting,’ Dr. Buka told Inside Edition."

I am not trying to dispute the above. It's clear and evident that knock-off cosmetics could be dangerous to your well-being. In fact, even if one had not read the Babble article, I think they would be able to articulate the dangers involved with the use of these counterfeit products. Indeed, the article was clear about the number of fakes that have saturated the market, tricking innocent shoppers into purchasing these dangerous products, believing them to be real.

However, what the article fails to mention is the number of people who are purposely shopping for fakes. There absolutely are people who think that $52 is an absurd amount of money to pay for a Naked palette or $20 is a crazy figure for a single shadow compact and, instead of forking over the money to Urban Decay for the product, they purchase crap like this in order to save money at the expense of their poor, poor faces. Many people think, "well, yes, it's made in and sold from China, but nearly everything I use is made in China." What I want to say is that it's just not that simple.

When I read articles about counterfeit products, they tend to, as the Babble article did, address merely the damage one can cause to their own well being as the reason not to purchase from non-authorized retailers. It makes me sad because that is truly the tip of the iceberg. Counterfeit products not only POTENTIALLY cause injury to their users, they also ABSOLUTELY cause injury to others. People on the other side of the planet are injured every day so that cheap, fake "Urban Decay" can be made available at pennies on the dollar via merchants in shady stores, from street vendors, and from overseas websites who specialize in rock bottom prices on a wide variety of items, from electronics to handbags to cosmetics. And, by "people on the other side of the planet", I mean children.

This is where I'm going to play a little "logic leap frog" that I hope everyone can follow. Counterfeit products are illegal, not only here, but also in the Asian countries in which they are produced. A company that exists solely to violate the law by producing counterfeit products will likely ignore other laws as well. One type of law that is repeatedly violated by these factories are the various child labor laws that exist in these countries. Now, when a factory is willing to employ (I use that term loosely, as children working in a factory often are required to sleep next to the machines they operate and make as little as 20 cents a day) children illegally, they probably aren't following most human rights laws. Children work in extraordinarily hot factories with inadequate ventilation around dangerous chemicals. They work 12+ hour days, seven days a week. They are physically abused by their "employers".

A decent, short read on the subject is this CNBC article, which states:

"I remember walking into an assembly plant in Thailand a couple of years ago and seeing six or seven little children, all under 10 years old, sitting on the floor assembling counterfeit leather handbags. The owners had broken the children's legs and tied the lower leg to the thigh so the bones wouldn't mend. [They] did it because the children said they wanted to go outside and play."

According to the International Trademark Association’s Alan Drewsen, this type of exploitation of minors is par for the course at counterfeit clothing factories. "There are issues of child labor in a lot of these plants around the world," he told the New York Daily News.

Absolutely. Horrifyingly. Heartbreaking. And it's getting worse.

The child labor problem in China was on the decline, until they were ranked #20 on the Child Labor Index in late 2013 (a ranking of the worst of the child labor law violators in the world), up from #53 just a year earlier. This can be at least partly attributed to the rise in demand for counterfeit goods in the developed world.

We can sugar coat it all we want, but if the only reason a person won't buy counterfeit products is because it might hurt their skin, either they aren't aware of the full truth (because of articles like Babble's, which stress the self-damage that these products can cause) or because they are so self-involved that the plight of children in developing or poorer countries is so far removed from their thought pattern.

It boils down to this: if you purchase counterfeit goods, you're contributing to the horrific systematic abuse of children in Asia. Knowing this, is there EVER a reason to throw caution to the wind and buy that Urban Decay palette from eBay, the pink M-A-C lippie you've been pining over on Amazon, or the baked shadows you spotted on Craigslist for a song? Hey, it saved you a couple of bucks and all it REALLY cost was the legs of a fourth grader who hasn't seen the sun in a month.

Jouer Luminizing Tint (my hallelujah product of the winter)

This isn't so much a review, it's a REVELATION!  I am so super excited.

As I've gotten older, my skin has gotten more and more dry during the winter.  I had been just fine using my normal foundation, Lorac's Natural Performance, all summer and fall long, but in December, things just dramatically changed.  No longer did my go-to product give me a flawless finish, smooth and matte, with just a touch of dewiness.  Now my skin looked sallow.  It was yellowing and scaling.  I had a massive problem.

I'm not normally one to complain about my skin.  I don't suffer from acne and my skin is rather smooth.  I have some fine lines (clearly more than I did when I was 25), but I'm not overwhelmingly wrinkled.  My skin, during the winter, was just too dry for a full-coverage foundation.  Honestly though, I don't NEED a full-coverage foundation either.  Besides its new found dryness, my only big skin problem that I have is freckles (not going to be able to do anything about those) and slightly uneven skin tone.

That said, I found that being extremely pale and freckled put me in a bad position.  Given that I'd likely only need a product for a few months, I decided to start off by doing something I've never done before...experiment with the drugstore and Target.  I tried a Lumene BB cream in Light (the lightest color that it comes in), but it was too dark for my skin and I had a very noticeable orange line which wasn't going to work.  Yes to Grapefruit CC cream in light was also a bust, color-wise, unfortunately.  I can't say that either of these products is "bad" since I'm clearly not going to continue to wear something that is not going to at least blend in properly.

I got off lucky, really, as I had purchased both products on sale and I didn't fork over too much cash for them.  I decided that I wasn't going to continue to toss money into the wind though and went on to the next logical step...internet research.

I spent hours (and I DO mean hours) reading reviews and searching through published lists of "best foundations for dry skin" or "the best tinted moisturizers of 2014".  I locked into one...Jouer Luminizing Tint.  Not only were the overwhelming majority of the reviews positive, but I found Youtube video reviews that made me excited about the product as well.

I did have some hesitations.  First of all, many of the videos I watched were made by people in their 20s.  Secondly, it came with a pretty hefty price tag -- $38.  This was precisely $2 more than my normal full-coverage foundation and a whopping $24 more than what my second choice (The Balm's BalmShelter) cost on Amazon.  While price is always something to be concerned with, this is also my skin and I made the decision to go ahead and invest in the Jouer product.

I received the product and decided to go head first into testing it.  Since it was a light moisturizer instead of foundation, I skipped the usual Beauty Blender routine and went straight to the old school "putting it on my face with my hands" method that served me so well in high school with my Cover Girl foundation.

Out of the tube, it did appear to be a bit more on the yellowish side of the spectrum and I worried if I had made a mistake.  It also has a shimmer to it (not overly glittery, just a pretty dewy look) that I don't normally look for in my foundation, but it really wasn't over the top.

On my face though, it did it's job.  It felt hydrating and light, but also evened out my skin tone all while letting my freckles poke through to add the illusion of youth.  It's shimmery enough to give me a healthy glow without turning me into a Twilight Vampire.

Overall, I'm in love with this product!  I'm not even sure I want to go back to foundation when the spring time/summer comes around.  I may give BalmShelter a try as well, if only for the insanely cheap price tag associated it with in a "well, why not?" manner, but I'm pretty sold on Jouer's tint.

If anyone reads this and has other suggestions, I'm always open to hearing about them!

The Balm's Nude'Tude Palette (and all the funny things it makes me feel)

Just before Christmas, I engaged in a little online cosmetic retail therapy.  As part of my treatment, my therapist ordered a Nude'Tude palette (yes, we'll blame an imagined therapist for this one, if my husband ever asks).  I had heard a bunch about it, so I had super high hopes.  Let's take a look at this one, shall we?

Top row (L to R):  Sassy; Stubborn; Selfish; Sophisticated; Sexy; and Serious
Bottom row (L to R):  Snobby; Stand-offish; Sultry; Seductive; Silly; and Sleek

This particular palette is their "nice" version, which is overlaid on artwork depicting a bedroom scene.  The "naughty" version is overlaid on artwork depicting pinups.  I didn't have much of a choice because I purchased the one on Amazon that was on sale and it didn't give you the option to specify.  I'm okay with it though since no one else will likely ever see my palette.

The palette itself comes with a VERY short two-sided shadow and liner brush that will never get used because I have my own brushes that I happen to very much like.

I swiped each shadow with my fingertips and found them buttery and velvety, without any kind of chalkiness.  They were surprisingly pleasant to touch, just super, super soft.

So...SWATCHES!!

For continuity:

Top row (L to R):  Sassy; Snobby; Stubborn; Stand-offish; Selfish; Sultry; Sophisticated; Seductive; and Sexy
Bottom row (L to R):  Silly; Serious; and Sleek

All of the shadows were swatched on top of NYX shadow base in white.  MOST of the colors are beautiful, but alas, there are a couple of shades that have fallen short of my expectations.  The Sassy, sadly, is really just a sheer shimmer, but you'd find no indication of that by looking at the palette.  The palette makes it look like a white shimmer, but what you see in this photo is actually just the shadow base.  The color payoff from Stubborn and Stand-offish were also both slightly disappointing.  Despite MANY coats of shadow, I was still able to see peeks of the shadow base.  I love the colors though, so I will still use them, regardless of the fact that I feel it's a waste of shadow to pack it on so thickly.

Overall though, for the price I've paid for the palette (about $26 on sale), I feel like I got my money's worth.  At full-price ($36), it might be a tougher sell, but I still think it's worth snatching up.  At $16-$26 cheaper than Urban Decay's Naked 3 and without all the glitter that I personally think earmarks UD's palettes as being a bit too "clubby" and, frankly, a little too juvenile for the majority of women over 28.  I'd be amiss if I didn't state that a little glitter, or shimmer, is lovely (and The Balm's palette certainly has lots of it), but I have long been weary of the UD glitter fallout, given my experiences with two different books of shadows.

And the best part?  The above photo was taken at 11 AM.  In order to test not only their pigmentation, but also their longevity, I left them on all day.  I washed some dishes (admittedly with gloves on), cooked and served up dinner, and played with my dogs.  Here's what the same arm looked like at 8 PM:

Yeah, some of the darker shades (the bottom row) had some serious fade, but I am pretty sure I use my arm a whole lot more than my eyelids on a day-to-day basis.  For a nine-hour wear, it held up really well.  Like exceptionally well.  Can I state this enough?  Nope.  It held up amazingly.

I keep seeing people asking questions about what to buy as a Naked dupe and, while this may not be a "dupe" in the traditional sense (the colors are, by no means, the same), but this IS a gorgeous neutral palette for everyday wear.  I, of course, love the bold colors on my eyes, but for a daily look, there's nothing better than a classy neutral...and the Nude'Tude palette has them in spades.