A look in Rememberance

So, in my last post I explained that I have been under the weather. I have actually been in and out of the hospital, and seen a few doctors now because of some medical issues. These issues are pushing the doctors to believe that I have Crohn's Disease. It is not confirmed yet but it scares me to death.

My Grandmother had Crohn's and died from complication with it almost 4 years ago now. I miss her terribly and she means the world to me.

I decided to do my makeup on a whim tonight, and took the colors for Crohn's and Colitis awareness (which is purple) and use them.

 

Makeup for a Cause: Team Pink Eye

Today post is brought to you by Team Pink Eye who is trying to raise money to donate to Susan G Komen for the cure.

Review: Tick:Tock Cosmetics "Infinity Eyeshadow Base"

NOTE TO READERS: I was in no way compensated for this review by means of free product, money, or any other type of reimbursement . I purchased the products review here on my own, without letting the seller know that I was also going to do a review on the products recieved. All of the following opinions in this post are my own and do not come from anyone else unless otherwise stated or quoted. Thank you!

So today I have a new product to introduce to you all. This was just released recently by Tick:Tock Cosmetics and advertised as a dupe of the NYX eyeshadow pencils that a lot of makeup users know and love. This dupe is what some people have been begging for since the NYX disaster a while back involving a sale gone wrong.

Say hello to the Infinity Eyeshadow base. From their Website:

Some Recent EOTD

Soooo, It's been awhile. Here are some eye of the Days I have done recently and I wanted to share with you <3

Using Rockeresque Beauty Company:

Hollywood, and Gingerbread Cookie

Review: Altered Ego Cosmetics

Tessa Brock recently started up an Etsy Shop a little over a year ago to feature her homemade jewelry. Since then, she has gotten 94 pieces of feedback there, all of which left her with a 100% feedback rating. She was a stellar seller on Etsy, and still is. Now, she has started up her own makeup line: Altered Ego Cosmetics. I had the honor of getting samples of her "Futurama Collection" to try out and review. So here is my 2 cents on Altered Ego!

These are the 7 colors that I received. The colors represent the main characters in the series: The Professor, Bender, Hermes, Zoidberg, Amy, Leela, and Fry. Each Mega Clamshell came with a very good sized sample, which was delivered to my mailbox, neatly packaged and with no spillage! I was excited to see that since clamshells have a habit of not wanting to stay closed, which is at no fault to the business, it's just the packaging that doesn't want to cooperate.

Since they were samples, I did not expect to see a neatly printed ingredient list on a good sized card included. The ingredients are as follows:

Professor: Titanium Dioxide, Magnesium Stearate, Calcium Aluminum Borosilicate, Silica, Tin Oxide
Bender: Titanium Dioxide, Magnesium Stearate, Calcium Aluminum Borosilicate, Silica, Tin Oxide, Mica, Iron Oxide
Hermes: Titanium Dioxide, Magnesium Stearate, Calcium Aluminum Borosilicate, Silica, Tin Oxide, Mica, Iron Oxide, Carmine
Leela: Titanium Dioxide, Magnesium Stearate, Calcium Aluminum Borosilicate, Silica, Tin Oxide, Polyethylene Terephthalate
Fry: Titanium Dioxide, Magnesium Stearate, Calcium Aluminum Borosilicate, Silica, Tin Oxide
Amy: Titanium Dioxide, Magnesium Stearate, Calcium Aluminum Borosilicate, Silica, Tin Oxide
Zoidberg: Titanium Dioxide, Magnesium Stearate, Calcium Aluminum Borosilicate, Silica, Tin Oxide

The only Non-Vegan one is Hermes, and it is labeled as such on the ingredients list. The fact that she went the extra step to throw in a print out, and mark on said list what was non-vegan made me very happy. It is hard to find service like that.

 Without further ado.... SWATCHES!

The Full set

Close up 1

Close up 2

I use q-tips to apply the colors over a small circle of NYX Jumbo Eye Pencil in Milk. It did not take much  to get this color, and they glitter is subtle to intense. Depending on how much you apply, the more vibrant and the more sparkle you get. I love that with these colors. I can do a soft, gentle look, or an intense, glittery, and eye popping look. Below is a softer look that I did with Fry and Amy.

I kept this on all day, and it didn't wear out, or crease. My eyes looked amazing all day, and lasted until I attacked my face with a makeup remover. Also, I think I am in love with Fry. It's a great peachy-orange, and as you pack on more, the more vibrant it becomes. Love it so much.

So the final verdict: I will buy from Altered Ego in the future, and will add them to my recommendations  list for all my readers as well as my friends. To conclude this, listed to what Tessa herself has to say, and below are the links to all shops and pages for her company!

Q: What made you decide to make your own makeup?
A: I have always been fascinated with the idea of making things for myself so when I discovered that I could get my hands on materials to make my own makeup, I knew it was the beginning of something awesome! Also, being a person with a very modest income, if I can find a way to do something myself then I will.

Q: As a company, do you have a specific mission or service standard that you expect to reach or provide?
A: Sometimes it is hard for me to refer to or label what I'm doing as a business or company, so I really don't have a specific mission. It's more like this: I make things for myself and if I decide that I want to offer the item that I made to other people then I have to make that item as awesome as possible. The reasoning behind that is because that item is a representation of me. When someone receives something that I have personally made then they can be assured that I have put my best effort into it and that I will continue to strive to do that something even better.

Q: What are your future plans for your company?
A: I would love to combine my jewelry shop and makeup in one. More pointedly, I plan on weeding out most of my colors that contain ingredients like Ferric Ferrocyanide, Chromium and Aluminum. I plan on expanding from just shadows and offering more products, like lipbalms. It is hard for me to want to make things that I'm not really interested in so I haven't really planned out much more than that.

Q: Is there anything that you would like potential or existing customers to know about you or your company?
A: I would love for everyone to know that I don't think of them as dollar signs. Each and every person that has ever or will ever purchase from Altered Ego will always be appreciated and treated the way that everyone deserves to be treated. When someone decides to try my products they are choosing to support a human being not a conglomeration and I will always make it a point to show that appreciation.

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Altered-Ego-Cosmetics/125421667532428

Artfire: http://www.artfire.com/users/AlteredEgoCosmetics

Etsy: http://www.etsy.com/shop/AlteredEgoCosmetics

Review: Virus Insanity Eyeshadow

I have wanted to do a review of Virus Insanity for awhile, but wanted to have time to play with everything for awhile before giving y'all a final verdict. They offer Super bright to super dark colors, mattes, shimmers, and glitter. They've got unique names, funny names, to down right dirty names... in the good kind of dirty I promise! What more could a girl ask for! So here's my 2.5 cents!

Packaging

Everything that I have purchased from VIE has always been packaged very nicely. my last order was a larger one, which is usually where companies have had issues with packaging, in my opinion. So here's what I recieved yesterday:

 This was the box, fresh off the mail truck. It was sealed up tight, and there was no damage to the box at all. I could shake it and there was little to no movement of the items inside.

 The top of the box upon opening it was packed with tissue paper to pad the top which was very nice. It helped protect things from shifting in shipment to me. I love this because that leaves less chance for things to break or open!

And finally, my order there are 55 shadows, 6 samples, and 6 of the shadows were one of a kind "experiments". I know how some of you feel about receiving experiemnts but let me tell you something that sets this company apart from the rest of those that I have used...

Every single one of the experiments has an ingredients list on the back. Even though they were experimental, VIE made sure you still knew what was going on your face. Not a "May Contain" list that most experiments have, an ACTUAL list. Did VIE earn brownie points for this in my mind? Heck yes! I have NEVER seen a company do this far with experiments if they weren't to become real colors.

VIE Packaging grade: A+


The Products 

So, we all differ in opinion of color choices and such. So the first ones I am showing you are the above experimental ones as swatches. Other companies I had gotten "experiments" from were not anywhere as good as their usual products. I was a little worried when I saw experiments written on the bag, but hey, everything deserves a chance.

They do not have names, and I haven't had the creativity in the past 24 hours to name them yet. These colors are all beautiful, and I love them. This picture doesn't do some of them justice, trust me. They were just as good as all of VIE's other products. They went on smoothly, they were easy to apply, and took little to actually get this type of pigmentation. These were done over just a NYX eyeshadow pencil in milk, and applied with a clean q-tip, so I was impressed that they came out this bright without use of primer and such.

This is the best thing ever. Sifted Stickers. Prevents spillage in shipment, which makes me happy because that means I get more product to play with. These are the experiments, so they do not have colors names on them but behold:

All of VIE's None experimental colors have these little top stickers on them. These 3 colors are from the Goddesses Collection in case anyone falls in love at first sight with them. <3

When I applied the product to my face, there was little to no fallout on my cheeks. Loved that. Less clean up makes me happy. The colors themselves, even from different color groups blend together nicely. For example, this is my EOTD today:

These two colors are on my list of faves right now. The green is "Blow Me" and the purple is from my custom collection and is called "Heavens Mirror". They went on nicely and have lasted all day so far. I only used an NYX pencil to put them to the test so this is, again, without primer. I am again Impressed.

VIE's Product Rating: A


Customer Service

Here's the biggy. We all want to see stellar customer service out of Indie companies. I will be honest, my order was incorrect when I got it yesterday. I had ordered a custom collection with 6 colors: Noble Team, L'cie, Albion, Heavens Mirror, Assassin, and Subject Delta. Noble team was missing, but I had 2 jars of Subject Delta. I contact Jennifer Sherrodd right away about the mix up. She apologized right away and asked that I please check the rest of my order to make sure it was correct. I did, and told her this was the only error. She assured me that she would send out a replacement tomorrow, which would be today. I found this on my facebook moments ago:

So not only did she keep her promise of sending it today, she sent me a confirmation number to track it and informed me that she sent it priority. She went the extra mile to make sure I was happy. This speaks volumes to me about how dedicated she is as a business owner. Other companies where I received incorrect products I got the runaround, then was sent something I didn't want, was never sent anything, or was sent something sub-par.


VIE's Customer service grade: A

Overall: A- for AMAZINGLY AWESOME! <3 I will order again, and I will recommend VIE to anyone and everyone. Link to their FB fan page/shop is in the sidebar!


To finish this off, I sent Jennifer and asked her a few questions about her company, so here's what she said:

Q: What made you decide to make MMU?
A: This is a pretty generic answer, but honestly I was sick of spending so much money on eyeshadows so I decided to start making my own. I did a lot of research first and ended up buying the TKB Pop Color's kit to start making myself eyeshadows because I tend to go for really bright colors. I slowly started buying more ingredients and my friends caught onto what I was doing and wanted to try them too! So eventually I made a Facebook fan page and figured out how to go about selling my eyeshadows.

Q: Is there any meaning behind your company name?
A: Virus Insanity is a name I thought of when I was a teenager. I was full of angst and thought it sounded cool ;) It kind of stuck with me for a long time, and I wanted something kind of edgy for my eyeshadow line so I decided to use it.

Q: What is your goal as a company?
A: When I first started out, my goals were to make incredible colors that no one had ever seen before. Much more recently I've been concentrating on making sure I have great customer service because I honestly consider my customers to be friends. Eventually I would love for this to get big, I want VIE to be successful.

Q: To you, what is amazing customer service?
A: I would consider amazing customer service to be admitting your mistakes and making it right. Everyone messes up once in awhile. Occasionally I will forget a color or send the wrong color, I'm only human. Once I marked an international package as goods instead of a gift and the girl ended up having to spend nearly $23 to get her package. I immediately sent her the money through Paypal, no questions asked. If I forget a color or send the wrong color, I send out a package the next day (or as soon as possible) and include extras. I think that as a seller you have to live up to your mistakes, admit that you messed up, and fix it. The customer is always right, because as a small business owner my customers are EVERYTHING.

Q: Out of your product line, what are your favorite colors?
A: My all time favorite color is Becca-ecca! It's named after my best friend so it definitely has a soft spot in my heart! Becca's favorite color is suuuper bright green so I had to make a crazy lime color for her. Some other favorites of mine are Smoked Lilac, Mohawk, and Ocean Mystery. And another color I really love is Ferris Wheel, it's a hot pink with green iridescence and lime green glitter. For some reason it reminds me of pink puke, but in a really GOOD way!

______________________

Love ya!

EDIT: A little disclaimer. I have become an Admin on the VIE page. Jennifer did not pay me for this interview, she didn't give me free product or any compensation at all besides a thank you after reading it. I bought from her before becoming admin in order to do a review, not imagining that she would ask me to be an admin on her fan page to help her out. I spent roughly $130 on all that you saw in the photos, and that was all I got. Jennifer also did not ask me to write this review, and did not know about it until I asked her to answer the above questions for my blog.

Primer, Primer.. Who's got the Primer!?

Why use eye primer? What's the point of adding another step to (for the most part) our already long makeup application project? Lets take a look at 2 options for eye primer!

First off, what is eye primer used for? Well it helps with making your eye shadows/pigments stay on all day, helps prevent creasing, and because more color will adhere to it, helps make a brighter look. There are people that swear by primer, and there are those that don't. The following is all in my own opinion, and this is my first time EVER using primers. Enjoy my fail y'all.

The Contenders:

Sephoras Basic Eye Primer

Urban Decay Primer Potion
(In the original sheer)

The question is, which one works  better? Which one holds up to show the true colors of eyeshadows/pigments? That's what I have set out to find out for you guys! 

Observation #1: Application

The above picture is my eyes with both primers applied.  SEP is on my Left eye, UDPP on the right (Hey look! I figured out how to label my photos without them looking like crap! <3) Both applied well. SEP has a built in brush, and UDPP has a wand. I do have to say I much prefer the wand to the brush because it doesn't clog up like the brush does. SEP dispenses by a twist bottom that pushes product up into the brush, which means that you can have to much, or the brush will cause clogs later on if not sealed properly. They both set themselves and were ready for base in about 1-2 minutes.

Observation #2: Adding a Base

 So, a side by side comparison. the SEP just kinda absorbed the NYX pencil into it. The UDPP held only the NYX Pencil like it was glue!

 Close up for the SEP eye. You can see where the primer changed colors where the NYX was applied originally.

Close up of the UDPP eye. The UDPP held onto the pencil, and allowed me to spread it fairly easily across my eye.

I really did not like the appearance of the SEP. It looked kinda gray-orange on my skin after the base was applied, and it felt strange. It really felt like I had poured straight foundation on my eye lids and just left it there. Not a great feelings. UDPP is nearly invisible, which means that if you don't take your makeup to the base of your brow, it won't show as much as the SEP would. It's also easier to apply a base onto, and it still maintains the bases color. I would be afraid to use colored bases with SEP since it would discolor them.

Observation #3: With Eyeshadow/pigment added on

SEP with Irish springs and Supernova: Irish springs took an orange undertone thanks to the coloration of the SEP primer. Not happy.When you apply a color, you want that specific color, not a variation of it. So, I'd say that SEP would be a better primer for looks with all oranges, or browns. That way, the colors are less affected by the coloration of the primer itself.

UDPP with Irish Springs and Supernova: Very true to color. The green popped and remained that way until I took off my makeup this evening. The Orange looked amazing as well, and wasn't made too bright or darkened by the primer. UDPP seems to be the better choice so far because it doesn't add more color to your eye shadow, it just helps it remain in one piece

Also, a short side note: Facebomb Cosmetics is a brand new indie company run by my friend Shayna Toole. Just got my first order from her today, and I love these two colors. Check out her facebook page to see all currently available colors!

The Verdict:

After trying both, and wearing both for a few hours, I have to say that Urban Decay Primer Potion is the clear winner this round! It does it's job, doesn't color the pigments because of the shade of it, and dries slightly faster than Sephoras Eye Primer. I really suggest it, and have to say it is well worth the money you have to pay for it. Wanna try it out? Sephora has their sample size bottle for $9 and they go a LONG way! I highly suggest giving them a try at least once. Urban Decay is my official eye primer of choice for now. Do you ladies have another suggestion?  Let me know in the comments below!!