Today's Olivine Adventure

I love olivine in it's rough mineral form... shown to the left. Gemstone quality olivine is polished into peridot... and this may sound crazy but when it's all polished up and presented as peridot, it kinda loses something to me. So. I saw this pick and recreated it to the look that I'm wearing now (and I do have to go to the airport tonight, so lets just say that I didn't put on makeup for nothing...





Ignore the wet hair... I put on my makeup after I took a shower. I normally shower at night so that I don't have wet hair in the morning, however it IS a day off for me, so I decided to shower early since I do have to go to the airport. Ugh. I hate the airport. Anyway.

I used medium mineral foundation applied wet, then used the white eyeshadow cream liner all over the lid. I put the black cream liner in the outside triangle and smudged it with my finger (yes, I am a bad girl, I don't really care). I then applied Jordan mineral eyeshadow, which is a dark pigmented olive green, over the inner two thirds of the lid. I then blended that with the black cream liner. I brushed some of the black liner into the crease and blended that up almost to the brow bone. The highlight is Pure Gold mineral shadow applied sparingly. I lined both upper and lower with black liner, then brushed Jordan over the lower black line.

I used a very light ruby mineral blush and covered that with Pixie Dust from Moi Minerals, I don't have any very neutral blushes yet and didn't want to call attention to my already jutting cheekbones. I also just used a generic slightly wine colored lipstick, which underlines the two weaknesses in my collection of makeup that I am going to be fixing in the future as I can afford it.

I don't think I did too bad a job matching the picture of olivine that I found... of course, that IS my opinion. :-D

Just a couple of my looks that I play with.

This is how I went out of the house today. I always get compliments on this look. No, my lips aren't crooked... J doesn't take very good pictures and I had curled my lip at him right before he got this shot. I love that man, but some days...

This is my version of a rainbow eye. It's not a true rainbow because there's no yellow or orange. It starts with chrome blue, then goes grape, ruby, and wild emerald. The colors are lined up in the same order on the lower lid, with dark blue liquid eyeliner on the top lid, highlight white under the eye (and under the eyeshadow), and green on the waterline.


This was just a little green/gold look that I slapped on before going in for my 4 hours on the 24th. I wasn't really concerned with how it looked and was around half asleep while applying it. I don't know if I would repeat this look.

There's a base of highlight white, with wild emerald on the inner half of the lid and tinsel on the outer half. Lined in the black cream eyeliner applied with an eyeliner brush, with a under brow highlighter of crystal white.





This is an icy eye look, which I thought fitting considering the nasty cold that we've had recently. The highs may be in the 20s, but with a wind at 20-30 mph with gusts to 50 and a windchill in the single digits, it's been a real bitch!

On this look I used the white cream shadow/liner as the base, cut half and half chrome blue with highlight white and applied to the whole lid, then used chrome blue uncut to the outer lid and crease. I lined it with a blue liquid eyeliner on the upper and lower lid, and a blue kohl-type eyeliner to the waterline.

There... now y'all can see a very very small sampling of the very odd looks that I do every morning. I have no fear of my makeup application and I feel no need to think that I need to look more/less conservative in my job (legal dept of a large insurance company). I'm of the opinion that I only get to live *this* life once so I might as well enjoy myself!

Mineral Shadows Pt. 1... Where I am not so pleased with my purchase.

Ok, here's part 1 of the mineral shadows post.


I would link this, however the shop that I bought it from on Etsy says that the seller is no longer registered with Etsy. This is the "Sterling Collection" from MineralMagic.

I bought this set because I loved the colors in the photograph that you can see here. This shows two golds (one lighter than the other), a brighter and darker green, a wine and a silver. Now... what I got, well... not so much. The darker green is actually a greenish brown. The lighter green is very very pale, much paler than you would think from this picture. The lighter gold is actually gold, which is goood... the darker gold is a kinda augusty-pumpkinish-brownish gold. It's really hard to describe. It is pretty, don't get me wrong... but it's not gold. Or brown. Hell, it hasn't yet made up it's mind! The silver is actually more gray than silver. In fact, it's so gray that I haven't yet used it.

My impression of this seller is that the images are less than true to color. Mind you, I viewed this on not one but 4 different monitors... and none of them came close to the actual colors sent. I didn't get a chance to mention that to the seller... the store was already closed by the time I got what I ordered. However, I do like the colors enough to use them in combination with other colors I already owned. I've already talked to a friend of mine who orders bulk containers to ask her to purchase a bag of jars with sifters so I can blend these colors in with colors that I'm already blending them with in order to have ease of usage.

This product was packed in medium sized 5 gram jars. The amount of product I would say is around maybe 2 grams in said 5 gram jar. The lids are opaque white... and I HATE that. I always end up having to either open the jar or flip it over unopened to figure out what color it is. It gets really annoying to flip over 4 jars before you find that the one you want is the 5th jar. Please. I could have ruled out the others without fucking around if the lids were clear. Not only that, but the amount of product per jar wasn't up to what I think it was worth. I've purchased from other sellers with the same size jar and gotten more product in that jar. I call it "bang for the buck", slang that I've heard since I was a small child.

Now on the quality of the shadows... they are highly pigmented, yes. However, they seem to be too much of a mix and not enough stand alone color. What I mean by that is there appears to be a LOT of aurora borealis type shimmer to these shadows. While I love a good shimmery shadow, that kind of shimmer appears to be all colors in one instead of a purple shimmer in a purple shadow. When there is too much of it, well... everything kinda begins to look rather brown. That's what you get when you mix all kinds of colors together willy nilly. Brown shadow. If I wanted something that appeared brown when applied, the logical choice would be to buy a brown shadow.

Basically what I ended up doing is taking purer colors from another seller and using them to blend with these colors. Blending a true green with the darker green made it appear green with brown shimmer instead of straight brown shimmer.

All in all... I won't purchase from the seller again, at least not eyeshadows. Before the shop closed I did find a mineral lipstick there that I really enjoyed.

Chubby Cream Eyeshadow/Liner by Heavenly Naturals.

I bought the white eyeliner pencil shown at the 7 o'clock position. I love this pencil!

The concept of white eyeliner is the liven or brighten up the eye by application to the lower lid/waterline and around the tear ducts. This product has a wonderfully smooth application, which is perfect for application in that oh-so-tender area of my face! Also, I've successfully used this as a eyeshadow base underneath eyeshadows. The cream consistency provides enough "grab" for the shadows to "stick" without causing creasing. 2 thumbs up!


Next we have Mineral Makeup Chubby Liner in black or brown by Erzulie Cosmetics:

I bought this black pencil the same day as I bought the above white pencil and I have to say that I love this one just as much! Since I use a lot of black eyeliner (well, not a lot at once, but some almost every day) I was looking for a easy to apply, creamy solid black eyeliner with staying power... and this one has it ALL.

Adding in the super fast shipping and great communication with the seller and this is an A+++ buy!



Another great buy... Flawless Foundation in Medium from Erzulie Cosmetics
I admit, when I received this in the mail (3 days after I ordered it, rock on with that super fast shipping!), I was doubtful. I mean seriously, it looked so dark in the container! Even looked dark on my finger! But when I put this on and it melted into my skin so smoothly and required so little in the way of buffing to smooth the finish, I was hooked!

Now, I did end up requesting a scent free version of this foundation. The original foundation formula contains EOs, one of which I have an allergy to (and I'm one of those allergy people who have to carry around and Epi-Pen). If you need a scent free version I urge you to contact the seller... she's awesome!

I'll have more to review in a later post... I wanted to knock these out first considering that the next review will cover several eyeshadows, sellers that I've bought from on Etsy for mineral eyeshadows, and my craptastic luck on eBay with a supposedly "good" seller who totally flaked on her end of the bargain.

Have a great evening!

All Mineral Makeup, All the Time

Why mineral makeup for the Faerie? The answer is simple m'friends...

Allergies.

Apparently I am allergic to some common makeup preservatives and I get a rash from applying more that a few well-known makeup brands. These brands include but are not limited to: MAC, Rimmel, Neutrogena, L'Oreal, Avon, and Mary Kay (which I used to sell and love), just to name a few. So I had no problem throwing them out even though I hadn't used them in a long time when I found out that many makeup products are contaminated with heavy metals (including mercury and lead) and they can be sold without disclaimers to women (and men) stating that they may contain "trace amounts". See the problem with trace amounts of a heavy metal is that they can and will build up over time. They don't flush themselves out of the body without assistance. So, I just tossed them out and resigned myself to a "makeup free existence".

But the problem with this is simple... I love makeup. I really do! There is something about a well made up face that just appeals to my inner sense of ascetics. Maybe it's my own personal vanity, but cosmetic free skin isn't for me. Then again, that may have something to do with my own ethnic mix, which causes me to have two different shades of skin on my face, making it rather depressing for me to see when I look in the mirror. While my skin isn't horrible because I do take care of it, I do prefer to have it all the same basic color.

Don't get me wrong, a LOT of women have a natural beauty that cosmetics only hide... those women deserve to show it off. However that's not me and I'm not afraid to admit that.

About six months ago I started surfing Etsy seriously looking for good mineral makeup sellers. These people are devoted to providing small batch minerals to the public, most of them at decent prices. I mean seriously... MAC wants $18 (or thereabouts) for a single eyeshadow! That's not "doable" to those of us who pinch pennies unless we want to charge our beauty items to credit cards, causing debt that we really can't afford.

This blog is meant to simply chronicle my experiences with sellers and their products, both good and bad. Nothing here is meant to slam ANY seller. What works for me (and what doesn't) doesn't guarantee that it will work for you. If you think that I'm wrong, or if a review that I give doesn't suit you or your skin type, please feel free to try them for yourself (or don't, that's totally up to you).