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Depotting: Urban Decay Heavy Metals, BH Cosmetics Zodiac, Besame Snow White, Urban Decay Electric

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**Disclaimer: I'm just sharing my experiences here.  If it helps you, awesome.  If you end up jacking up your expensive makeup, don't come for me.  This is just what worked for me!  It began with the Snow White palette.  Besame's Snow White palette is freaking beautiful but the packaging, while gorgeous, is irritating as heck to use.  You have to hold pages out of the way every time you want to use an eye shadow.  You can use hands or figure out something with a headband or clip but one way or another, you have to hold pages out of your way.  So I wasn't using the palette.  I paid too much money to not use it!  Time to depot, by which I mean remove each individual pan from the original palette and place it in alternative packaging.  This is not about train depots.  Two different words.  Just saying. The Snow White palette was cake to depot.  The glue isn't too sticky and there are gaps between the pans and the cardboard packaging.  I simply slid one side of a d
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December 2017 Hits, Misses, & Pans

I told myself I'd update more while on break from school but the holidays happened, and everything was chaos.  So here I am with a monthly update, once again.  Just stuff I've been using. Hits: Real Techniques Instapop face brush .  This brush claims to be great for loose powders and I was struggling a little bit with my loose powders.  My brushes kicked up powder for me to inhale, but I kept applying too much when I used a sponge.  I thought I'd try this guy, and I'm glad I did!  I'm not sure what wizardry is at work but you tap it into a loose powder and the powder actually sticks in the bristles.  It doesn't get kicked up in your face when you apply.  It's similar in shape to my Hakuho-do Wedge Sloping Powder Brush , but I think softer, and it works much better with loose powder!  If you like to use loose powder, save your money and go with the Instapop. Urban Decay Troublemaker palette .  Bought this in the Sephora VIB Rouge sale.  I almost didn'
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November 2017 Hits, Misses, and Pans

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This month has been low on posts.  I haven't been doing anything new or different with my makeup and there's not much point in posting the same look day after day.  I'm also in a bit of seasonal depression, which makes motivation go straight down the tubes.  This has more to do with a sad event than the sunlight disappearing.  Do I look like a sun worshipper to you?  LOL.  Enough about that though.  I do have my monthly list of current loves and hates, and things I've either finished off or hit pan on.  I haven't been buying lots of new makeup to review, but it is so satisfying to actual use up the crap I buy. Hits: Neutrogena Hydro Boost Gel-Cream.   This stuff is golden.  I bought my first jar in October, because Ulta had a sale on it and I had a $10 birthday bonus.  I was looking for a nighttime moisturizer that was free of irritating plant extracts and fragrance.  What I found was a sensitive skin-friendly replacement for Belif The True Cream Moisture Bomb. 
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October 2017 Hits, Misses, and Pans

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Late with this, but what the heck?  May as well?  It's kind of long and probably no one will read it but for my own reference at least, here's what was working and not working for me this month.  Also, a lot of trash.  I prefer reviews of items that have actually been finished off because you know the person has really had time to use it.  A first impression doesn't mean much.  So here we go. October Hits: Going to be extremely boring and predictable and say Ofra liquid lipstick in Napa Valley .   I've been in a purple lipstick phase this year, and this is my favorite shade and formula.  It wears well, it lasts through my long days of work followed with school, and it wears comfortably.  This particular shade goes with most of my-version-of-neutral eye looks. Panned/Finished Off: Too Faced Shadow Insurance Anti-Crease Eye Shadow Primer :   Can't remember when I bought this.  Probably over a year ago.  It works.  I would probably repurchase if it goes on sale a
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Urban Decay Heavy Metals Palette

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The palette: Urban Decay Heavy Metals . Purchased with points at Ulta.  I probably would not have paid cash money for this palette because it looked beautiful but also annoying.  I am tired of depotting awkward palettes.  For free, what the heck?  Note that I'm probably judging a free palette less harshly than I'd just a palette I paid cash for. I'm not going to post swatches.  I think there are plenty of swatches already out there if you just want to see the shades outside the palette.  I'm going to post some of the first looks I got from playing around.  General thoughts on the palette will be at the end.  We begin with a full work week of looks, dumb expressions and all.  I'm not a model.  I mean, obviously.  Just playing around with makeup here. Look 1: Transition/crease shades are Buon Fresco and Venetian Red from ABH Modern Renaissance.  From Heavy Metals, I used Punk Rock all over the lids, Glamrock on the inner corners, and Afterparty on the lower lash
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Modern Renaissance, Tenant, & Moondust

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I have been feeling unmotivated to branch out from a default daily red look lately, but I branched out slightly this morning.  It began with the usual primer, then Buon Fresco from Modern Renaissance in what I'm calling my crease.  I put down a base of Nyx Jumbo Pencil in Rust on my lids.  Went over Rust with Venetian Red from Modern Renaissance.  These are all common components of my default look but here is where it started deviating from my norm.  I just started looking around at my stash and seeing things I love but don't use.  And then I used them. Blended out Venetian Red into Buon Fresco with the dark purple from Urban Decay's Tenant palette .  I didn't commit the shade names to memory and I can't get the damn picture to enlarge so it's purple, okay?  I used the palest pink from Tenant on the browbones, and the darker pink in the crease area, just adding depth by using some different shades and blending them together.  I used a slightly bigger brush f
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September 2017 Hits, Misses, and Pans

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Stuff I've been loving, hating, and finishing off.  Ingredients at the end, because there are so many times I realize I'm reacting to something and then I try to think back to what products I've used that had that thing in it.  But I can't turn the information up because the ingredients aren't online, or they've changed, or whatever.  Hits: Cotz Face Non-Tinted SPF 40.  My heritage is Scottish, Irish, English, and Danish.  I'm paler than any human should be in this life.  I fry in the sun and never turn any shade of brown.  I do go yellow on occasion, like an old book.  That's the effect the sun has on me.  I fry, and I turn yellow, and look older.  I reject this.  Chemical sunscreens bother my eyes.   I'd been using La Roche-Posay mineral sunscreen but it was making me a little itchy.  That's when I discovered the cassia alata in it.  I Googled and found out this plant is supposed to cure all kinds of things including genital herpes.  Cal
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