Brazen's Lots O' Luck Giveaway

Grey of legothique is currently hosting a giveaway for Brazen Cosmetics! You could win Brazen's three LE shadows for St Patty's day and their new gloss (with green sparkles!) I'm sure we can expect even more LE's from Brazen very soon.

Beau: Grey cornflower with blue sheen

Shenanigans: Smokey true green with sparkle

Gimme: Blue-based violet with multiple color shifts

FOTD: Honey kissed

My FOTD! This has to be one of my most favorite color combos yet. I also found my lip tints from BLSoaps which I ordered during a sale in the summer time, and played around with one of those. I will be doing a full review & swatches of all the shades I have very soon.

Chicken & Broccoli Alfredo

My boyfriend wanted to make chicken in a mushroom sauce for dinner tonight, and I came across this recipe.

The recipe is pretty simple; I picked up some boneless chicken breasts and panfried them in butter. I fried up some mushrooms in butter in another pan, and once the chicken was browned I added a can of Campbell's creamy mushroom soup, a can full of skim milk (instead of the 1 can water recommended), some more butter, 1/2 cup parmesean cheese, and mozza cheese. I boiled the linguine and during the last few mins tossed in the cut broccoli.

Although I love mushrooms, I have to say I was never a fan of mushroom soup growing up, so I was a little hesitant in trying this recipe. Honestly, it was a great meal! It would have been even better with a glass of white wine. ;)

Coral & Turquoise

Today's FOTD. I've been having an obsession with turquoise lately, and I'm really loving Evil Shade's lipgloss in Push.

Here's a better view of Sobe's blush, Icing on the Cake. It's a really pretty neutral, and super sparkly! They have an entire line of Duochrome blushes. I'm going to try to do a look for each of the blush samples I purchased.

Eyes: Brazen Coy, Paradox, Incognito, Headstrong
Face: Brazen Hi-Def powder, Sobe Botanicals Icing on the Cake blush
Lips: Evil Shade Push lipgloss

Quintescentials on Etsy

I went to class today only to find out it was cancelled - my instructor lives outside the city and we had a crazy snow storm last night, all highways were closed this morning. I should have known better to check the annoucements online...Gah! Luckily, I came home to a package from Quintescentials! I had added their Chocolate Fudge scrub hearts to my favorites and was dreamily eyeing the listing for days... before finally giving in and placing an order. I contacted the owner, Samantha, and she put up a custom listing for me of 10z of Chocolate Fudge scrubs. For $5.00 you recieve 6oz of scrubs, and $8.00 gives you 10oz. Shipping was very reasonable to Canada.

My order arrived in a small box, wrapped in pink tissue paper. The invoice was also included with a thank you note!

My scrub hearts were beautifully packaged, so cute! I was also sent a bar of Pink Vanilla Sugar as a gift, thanks Samantha!! :) This reminds me of Lush's rockstar, but more cotton candy & vanilla scented.
The scrubs?? They ARE as delicious smelling as they look! Oh goodness... I really do love chocolate, and I love these. I wish I could eat them; they smell like brownies! I used half of a heart on my hands, and they felt really nice. They're exfoliating, but not rough. If you run your hands under some warm water, you can mold the scrub a bit so it becomes more softer. I do like that they come in convienant, one time use sizes! I hate bringing my huge sugar scrubs into the shower, and worry about getting water inside of them. For 10z, I received 15 heart scrubs.

Yum! Don't they look good enough to eat?!?

You can also check out Quintescentials's blog for updates and more! A giveaway just ended today, and i'm sure there will be more in the future.

Evil Shades: Pin Up Girls Swatches

I received my order from Evil Shades today! It was placed on the 21st of Jan and shipped on the 3rd of Feb. Which is weird, because i'm still waiting on two orders which were shipped Jan 10th. Customs must be swatching my order...
I ordered the Pin Up Girls collection in sample sizes, Push lipgloss, and a few other eyeshadow samples.

Limited edition Push lipgloss! The color is quite nice, a coral which is perfect for spring.Yum! The gloss itself is very moisturizing and non-sticky.

Most of my samples were filled to the top, but they were quite varied. Y'know how some companies make eyeshadows with glitter that is hardly visible? The red glitter in this is ACTUALLY present, and visibly shows up when swatched!

Shadows all swatched over primer & Pixie Epoxy.

CC41, sweater girl, pencil skirt, vavavoom, whisper, wink, wiggledress, bombshell, wyvern, glooming, sinister, nightshade, backtalk blush, silk stockings lipstick, push lipgloss

CC41 - matte neon orange

sweater girl - matte neon yellow

pencil skirt - matte blue, I didn't see a shift in this one.

vavavoom - pine green with golden highlights! Would look awesome with brown eyes.

whisper - lavender with silver sparkle

wink - pink with silver sparkle

wiggledress - matte black with visible red sparkles

bombshell - beige with blue shift

wyvern - light green with sparkle

glooming - black with large visible aqua sparkles

sinister - vivid green

nightshade - bright purple.... Yes, let me tell you, this color is bright. The clamshell was packed almost full, and silly me, I sat swatching these in my living room. I spilled my sample ALL over my living room floor.. Thank goodness I managed to get it out. I scrubbed with a kitchen cleansing spray for quite some time. Probably going to get another sample of this with my next order, it is a pretty shade.

backtalk blush - bright pink with golden shimmer; less hot pink than I was expecting, this is totally wearable!

silk stockings lipstick - lighter than it appears here. It's a little darker than the Bombshell eyeshadow.

push lipgloss - coral gloss

My favorites are Whsiper, Wink, Bombshell, and Wyvern! I'm really excited to try the lighter shades out as lipcolors or as a blush. Bombshell is a really pretty neutral, and I plan on wearing Silk Stockings tomorrow. I'm not a fan of matte shades, but i'm thinking of trying the neons over some other shadows, to make them appear brighter!
Did you order anything from the Pin Up Girls collection?

Hi-Fi Zodiac Collection Swatches

I received my sample order from Hi-Fi Cosmetics that I placed on Jan.07/11 today. The TAT was insane before Veronica closed up shop for her move, but the wait was worth it. The set of 12 sample eyeshadows was 8.99, and Veronica had a 10% off coupon when I ordered. She included two free eyeshadow samples, eye glitz in new age sample, and the high impact shadow fix sample! Overall I really like this collection of shadows, all the colors seem to compliment eachother and there's quite a few combos i've been considering, based on these photos alone.

goodbye, pisces - vivid blue with an aqua sheen in the light

dark star capricorn - purple-grey with pale pink highlights

sunrise in aries - peachy orange with yellow sparkle

chinashop taurus - gold with yellow sparkle

scorpio rising - purple with pink and blue sparkle

in love with a sagittarius - baby pink with tiny blue sparkle

age of aquarius - light baby blue with silver sparkle

journey of a gemini - more purple than saggittarius, with a blue/silver duochrome

leo, lord of lights - liquid bronze! the bronzer version of On Tour

gift from virgo - looks white in the bag, but applies to a shimmery pale pink, would make a nice highlight/accent on tearduct

three libras - pale taupe with silver sparkles

tropic of cancer - pink-purple with purple and silver sparkle

queen of disaster - medium bright blue with silver sparkle

wanted - darker, more warm version of leo

new age eye glitz - green, lime green and blue sparkle

My favorites of the bunch are dark star capricorn, journey of a gemini, leo lord of lights, gift from virgo, three libras. I think i'm going to need a full size of Three Libras, it looks like the perfect everyday/neutral shade. I also really want to try sunrise in aries mixed with a peach lipgloss, It's a lot more of a coral color than it appears in some of the photos.

Here's a photo of one of the sample baggies; as always, you get a ton of product with Hi-Fi!

Now for the eye primer, quite a few people compare it to Fyrinnae's pixie epoxy. I applied a pea sized amount, & I found that the shadows applied easier (will have to see how it works for blending shadows later) but it defintely stained as others have mentioned! It is very thick, and when I went to wash it off, the shadows smeard in the direcion I washed, hardly moving at all. I had to scrub my hand for a good couple of minutes to get the shadow all off and my hand still felt sticky afterwards. My hand is now red and a little sore, so i'm a little hesitant to try this on my eyes. Have you tried the High Impact shadow fix?

Happy Valentines!

Happy Valentines Day everyone!
Valentines has never been one of my favorite holidays, as we all know, it's very commercialized. Being in school 5 days a week and my boyfriend working evenings (till midnight), the weekends are the only days we really get to spend more than an hour together lately. Valentines was an excuse for us to take time for ourselves and enjoy a nice dinner by ourselves.
Originally I had assumed we would be going out for valentines, but Matt made me a homecooked meal...Aww! He had been preparing all day Saturday while I was at home & reviewing class notes and made the chicken teriyaki sushi. To be honest, i'm not a fan of fish and Chicken Teriyaki is our favorite sushi, one of the few I'll actually eat when we go out for sushi.

The set up.

He hand-rolled the sushi which included sushi rice, cucumber, and pan-fried teriyaki chicken. He made and fried the chicken dumpling in a deep fryer. I was honestly very impressed, as I do all of the cooking around our house (he loves to cook breakfast though!) It was completely unexpected and I was extremely happy he took the time to do this all for me.

Closeup of the orchid he gave me.

What are your plans for Valentines Day? I have class until 5PM tomorrow, and then am off to the hospital until 8PM or so to research my patients, and he won't be home until late, which is why we celebrated today. Please tell me your V-Day stories tomorrow! :D

Dinner with family FOTD

We went out for dinner tonight with relatives we haven't seen in many, many years. We went out for delicious greek food, one of our new favorite places called Park Towers.

Eyes: Brazen Ice queen, Fyrinnae Damn Paladins, Brazen Cold Shoulder

Face: Brazen Bronzer, Brazen Perfect 10, Brazen Hi-Def Powder

Lips: Brazen Shimmy (smells just like chocolate, yum!)

Recent Swap: Sudsy Soaps & Scents and Mad City Sue

I recently did a swap with a wonderful gal over on the Swappers forum and received my end the other day! I received a bunch of products from various etailers including Isle of Eden, Mad City Sue, Doctor Sweet Tooth, Sudsy Soaps & Scents and more. I will be reviewing the remainder of them another day, as i've ordered other products to try out, but there's two I wanted to do now.

This is my 10 oz scrub from Sudsy Soaps & Scents. It goes for $9.00 for 10oz, which I think is more than generous. For example, Haus of Gloi's sugar scrubs are $10.00 for 7.5 oz.

Scent description: White Chocolate - The aroma of creamy cocoa butter, marshmallow, meringue, white chocolate, and vanilla beans.

It smells delicious, like moist chocolate cake. I can definitely smell some of the marshmellow and vanilla notes. I used this on my hands earlier, and it left them feeling very soft and moisturized! The formula of this scrub isn't one i'm used to, the exfoliating power from the sugar is there, but it's VERY thick and creamy; the texture is more like a thick exfoliating lotion than that of a pure sugar scrub i'm normally used to. I used it in the shower last night, and a little really goes a long way. A Haus scrub takes me MONTHS to use, i'm sure this will take even longer! It left me feeling moisturizing after the rinse off, and the scent did linger which I liked. This is perfect for dry winter skin (like mine!) I'm excited to try more from this company, they're products look mouthwatering and products are reasonably priced.

I've ordered from Mad City Sue multiple times before, and am always impressed with her products. I received a roll on perfume and body spritzer in Blue Raspberry Icce. I couldn't find a scent description for this scent in her etsy shop, so it may have been discontinued. It's a very sweet scent, and to me smells identical to the Blue Raspberry Fanta slurpee! (A favorite among Canadians, even in winter.) It has a bit of a sour note, but yum, smells delicious.

Have you ordered from either MCS or SSS? What scents have you tried?

David's Tea, my guilty pleasure.

I've been purchasing from David's Teas for the last 6 months or so, every since they opened a store in a local mall. They've only been open since 2008, so they're still a relatively new company. I figured it was about time I did a post on them, and reviewed some of their products. They sell loose teas, so you will need a tea ball infuser or loose tea brewer. The site is easy to navigate & gives you ingredients for each tea, time to steep, how much to use, and related products. They recently offered shipping outside of Canada, and shipping is free after you spend $75 (otherwise shipping fees are $25, yikes!) I've only purchased online once, but I purchased during the holiday season and it was shipped within two days, and arrived in three.

First off, since a lot of you don't know me in real life, let me start off by saying I hoard teas. I love tea! On an average day I drink about1-2 cups of caffienated tea, and 4-5 decaf teas a day (on top of many glasses of good ole' water.) I have to stop drinking caffiene around 3pm otherwise I'll be up all night. I'll drink the occasional black tea, but since I found David's Teas i've been drinking their matte (an alternative to caffiene.)

Most of their teas are 6.50CAD for a 50g bag. They used to offer free tins with the purchase of 100g, but that offer is available in store only now. With every online purchase, you instead receive three free samples in containers, good enough for 3-5 uses. Since Valentines day is coming up, the company is currently offering V-day gift sets which include chocolate infused with some of their teas.

Love Tea #7

Description: One sip of #7 and you’ll find yourself head over heels. Mysteriously changed. Magically happy. Walking on air. How does it work? Frankly, we don’t know. Our blender came up with it and then just ran off with the girl of his dreams. Maybe it’s the chocolate bits that lower your inhibitions. Or the seductive strawberries. Or the romantic rose petals. Either way, this black tea is seriously lucky.

A 50g bag of tea is 6.50, which gives you many, many uses since the black tea leaves are so small. I've been drinking this the past few days, and it's quickly become a new favorite! I've tried lots of black teas which claim to have such-and-such added flavors, but you mostly get strong black tea. With this, I can taste the strawberries, chocolates and a hint of floral. If you're a chocolate/sweets fan, I would highly recommend trying this tea!

Forever Nuts

Description:  It looks all normal when it’s loose. But steep it and you’ll see that it’s nuts. Within seconds, this tempting jumble of almond slices and chunks, apple bits and cinnamon bark starts turning a crazy shade of pink. Why? Because it contains a hint of beetroot. That’s what gives this rich almond tea its earthy depth and its all-natural signature colour. Deliciously nutty, decidedly addictive.

 

Ahh..... The smell of this alone is delicious. Every now and then when I'm picking a tea to drink, I admit, I will open it just to get a quick whiff. it smells THAT good. But I also like almonds. This tea is 6.50, but since the nuts weigh a lot more, you get fewer uses out of this tea. I think i've gone through three bags since September, using 1 tsp per use and almost daily (or every other day.) It takes a little longer to brew, to get the true taste to come out, and it turns a shade of hot pink. Yumm.

 

Read my Lips

Description: Okay, this is probably the world’s best chocolate tea. Honestly. Better than dessert. More reliable than sex. It’s a totally decadent combination of China black tea, vanilla, peppermint, chocolate bits and spicy red peppercorns. Plus it contains little red candy lips for a kiss of sweetness. In other words, it’s a completely satisfying spring experience with no guilt or strings attached.

Before I picked up Love Tea #7, this was my daily caffienated tea for the last month. It's mostly chocolate mixed with black tea, and the red peppercorns are a nice touch. I don't find them particularly spicy, more sweet. And the little red hearts are adorable!

Glitter and Gold

Description: This deep dark Chinese tea is like a gorgeous starry night, glimmering with gold and silver sugar crystals that shimmer as they steep. Take a sip and the slow suggestion of cinnamon will warm your body. Your toes will tingle and your mind will turn to fireworks, falling stars, late-night seduction. It’s basically magic. (Is it getting hot in here, or is it just the tea?)

This tea goes for 7.50, and it was discontinued earlier this year and brought back again after many requests. I was very excited to try this tea out after hearing all the raves. This is VERY strong black tea, although it tastes delicious. You don't really get "glitter" in your cup, more like a slight shimmer from the gold sugar balls. The cinnamon is a prominent note, and just tastes devine. The black tea is so strong in this, it gives me major GI upset within 20 mins of drinking it. I asked the Facebook group, and no one else has experienced this problem so it could just be me, but I find this tea extremely strong (and I use less than the recommended amt)

Jumpy Monkey

Description:  This brew uses ingredients from the Rain Forest Alliance to give you a tasty boost. It combines freshly roasted peaberry coffee beans with Argentine maté, and laces them with almonds, white chocolate and other roasted barks and roots. The result is deliciously satisfying. And by buying this rainforest product, you’ll be fighting global warming and helping the monkeys. No wonder they say maté makes you efficient.

This is my daily morning tea. I don't particulary like the taste of coffee, but the coffee beans compliment this tea rather nicely. It's not your traditional mate, it smells mostly of chocolate. It is delicious! Mate leaves supposedly contain antioxidants, boost the immune system and metabolism, and give you a boost of energy. I've heard it keeps you going longer than caffiene, and you don't get the crash associated with caffiene/energy drinks. Caffiene in general makes my heart race mad, to the point where I can't control it, and i've never had a problem with mate teas. My mom has various heart complications, and she's been drinking yerba mate for daily energy for a good 5 or so years now.

Mother's Little Helper
Description: Need a little relaxation? Try running for the shelter of this mother’s little helper. It’s got organic valerian (aka “nature’s Valium”) to take the edge off your 24/7 reality. Plus there’s chamomile, peppermint and lemongrass for an added dose of tranquility. And pretty blue cornflowers just to make you happy. One sip and you’ll feel like you’ve spent the day at a spa.

I will tell you, I hate the taste/smell of chamomile and avoid most sleepy-time teas for that reason. It's really not the dominant note in this blend, I get more of the peppermint thank goodness! I drink this on a nightly basis, and 50g gives you a bag filled to the top of the bag so it lasts quite a while. It takes about 20 mins to kick in, but I can honestly say I fall asleep within minutes when I go to bed. It really is my nighttime helper.

What do you think of David's Teas? Did any of the teas peak your interest? If you've taken a peek at the site, are there any others you're interested in that you'd like me to review?

Summer look with Brazen Cosmetics & Evil Shades

A Beachy/Summer type of look for today. I've had enough of snow! I wanted to do something fun as well since I passed my skills checkoff on catheterization. :D

 I also wanted to play around with my bronzer from Brazen Cosmetics and try out my Evil Shades shadows.

A Noble Cowl

I received some gorgeous yellow merino wool (super soft and squishy!) from a friend who lives in Australia during a swap I did in the summer time. I loved the wool but wasn't sure what to do with it.

I started this cowl Friday eve and finished later that night! It was a quick knit. It's quite large, but I like my scarfs that way. I'm working on making some cute pins so I can wear it similiar to this.

Everyday FOTD

Today's FOTD! We went out for breakfast this morning with an old friend of mine. This FOTD is actually my new "everyday" sort of look. I really love Fyrinnae's Damn Paladins eyeshadow; the soft blue hue is really gorgeous, and it's light enough for me to wear to the hospital.

Blue Raspberry FOTD

A quick FOTD I did today before going out to run some errands... The battery to my camera died so I borrowed my mom's and couldn't really get a good pic. The shadow is so much more sparkly in real life!
I am eating a blue raspberry slurpee right now (hence the FOTD name!) It was so nice outside today, -5!

Morgana Plumeria

 I wanted to experiment with Morgana's Plumeria lipgloss so I did a quick look to go with it.

This gloss is extremely pigmented, you need to give it a few shakes before use or it settles to the bottom. Once applied, it does last a fairly long time (100% through eating a sandwich at lunch!) and has mild staining on removal.